Awareness Is Key

[Raptorsin7]

I wanted to share a quote I came across from user @pluto a while back. I don't think this person is active anymore but this pointer is quite profound.

"Awareness is key... and surrender is the key to awareness" 

The simplicity of awareness is the goal of many spiritual practice imo. You can essentially rest your mind in the simplicity of awareness. When you surrender the ego's activity awareness becomes primary. Awareness takes no effort, so when you surrender effort all you are left with is awareness.

Let me know your thoughts

[Phoenix11]

From what I have seen too, it appears that awareness is the goal of many spiritual practices.

I feel there are various degrees to surrendering to circumstances. After all, our life is the sum of all circumstances we have been put to. Surrendering to awareness on a Sunday morning when I have nothing to worry about can be quite easy, but surrendering to awareness and being present when going through things which can be very taxing on life's energy can be a challenge. 

[Raptorsin7]

@Phoenix11 Yeah I find sometimes surrender comes easy and I can really notice the energetic shifts, and other times I really struggle and it seems like I can't surrender even though I think I'm doing the same thing as when the surrender comes easy

[SOUL]

@Raptorsin7  I noticed something in the initial post of the thread then it was revisited in your response to a reply so I would ask you to read the thread again since it's only a few posts deep and tell me if you notice it as well.

Did you notice it? The quote you posted wasn't all that explicit about it but it surely revealed the challenging nature of your point of the thread. How difficult it is to not do.....not doing.... anything. We actually screw up not doing anything.... by doing it... and doing... something.

The quote mentions spiritual practice with a goal, the doing of something to attain something. That goal? Simplicity of awareness... and the recommended? To surrender...the letting go of the activity of the mind is a credible recommendation that many espouse.

Except that the ego will use this as another thing to do to get something. Surrendering, the letting go of the activity is another activity with a goal that is desired because it is an unmet condition for what is being sought. You see how sneaky the mind can be?

You even say it yourself in your response to the other reply, "it seems like I can't surrender even though I think I'm doing the same thing as when the surrender comes easy". See? You say 'doing the same thing', an activity to create desired conditions to attain something you perceive you don't have.

We don't have to do any activity of 'surrender' to attain awareness because awareness is as you suggest, effortless, it just is. Even if there is activity of the mind that may serve as a distraction from the simplicity of awareness doesn't require us to do an activity of surrender to be present in awareness.

We just can BE present in awareness, it's always being presence and there is no activity that allows for it to be there, it always is. So don't let the ego use the activity of surrender to attain some condition that it acts like you don't have to distract from being present in awareness.

[Nahm]

On 1/27/2022 at 7:40 AM, Raptorsin7 said:

@Phoenix11 Yeah I find sometimes surrender comes easy and I can really notice the energetic shifts, and other times I really struggle and it seems like I can't surrender even though I think I'm doing the same thing as when the surrender comes easy

Just a suggestion. Replace “surrender” with bringing attention to feeling of breathing from the stomach, aka meditation of course. 

[The0Self]

Surrender is being blown about like a feather, without action or inaction, but it isn't something new. It is a technique in which one relaxes all voluntary effort (action and inaction) -- i.e. if effort is already happening, then (counterintuitively) non-surrender would be voluntarily relaxing that effort. But the "practice" of surrender is not actually a technique, nor is it even a practice -- it's a pointer... This is because you are already 100% surrendered, so to speak. There is no one separate from the infinite who could be un-surrendered, that is.

Edited January 28, 2022 by The0Self

[Raptorsin7]

@SOUL Hey I get what you're saying I think.

It's like when I surrender there may be some genuine surrender of the mind, but then the mind/ego comes in and attempts to try to surrender. Is that accurate?

Is this what's preventing true surrender? Because sometimes I feel like I'm genuinely letting go, but others time its really a struggle and I'm not sure how to account for that difference 

 

[Nahm]

The mind, ego, ego activity, and surrender… are thoughts. That there is someone surrendering, is also thoughts. Awareness is definitely the key, and awareness is aware of these thoughts, and is aware that these are thoughts. Careful though. It’s all fun & games till no one loses an I. 

[Salvijus]

On 2022-01-27 at 2:23 PM, Raptorsin7 said:

When you surrender the ego's activity awareness becomes primary

This.

On 2022-01-27 at 2:23 PM, Raptorsin7 said:

when you surrender effort all you are left with is awareness.

And this.

I've been telling you this for a long time already. The problem is, intention to surrender is itself an effort. Your effort starts way beyond your current reach of awareness. That's why you can't stay in permenant presence because you're not even fully aware of how much unconscious ego struggling there is.

If you want to be in permenant effortless presence, you must learn to observe effort as if it was an object in your mind. Then effort or no effort makes no difference anymore. Even if you're full of effort you won't lose presence.

Edited February 1, 2022 by Salvijus

[Zeroguy]

On 1/31/2022 at 4:29 PM, Nahm said:

The mind, ego, ego activity, and surrender… are thoughts. That there is someone surrendering, is also thoughts. Awareness is definitely the key, and awareness is aware of these thoughts, and is aware that these are thoughts. Careful though. It’s all fun & games till no one loses an I. 

All minds appear in the very same Being?

[The0Self]

43 minutes ago, Zeroguy said:

All minds appear in the very same Being?

The very same Being appears as all minds, but there actually aren't any minds.

[Nahm]

47 minutes ago, Zeroguy said:

All minds appear in the very same Being?

Do all magnifications appear in a magnifying lens?  Experientially yes, actually no.

Just gonna put this here…

 

[SOUL]

@Raptorsin7  It's just simply the mind/ego is using the activity of surrender/letting go as an obstacle to being present even to the extent of doing an activity of not doing to distract from being.

[Raptorsin7]

@SOUL Ahh. Idk what to do, my instinct is to ask what do I do. But i guess thats the exact trap I'm in 

Edited February 3, 2022 by Raptorsin7

[WelcometoReality]

On 2022-01-27 at 1:23 PM, Raptorsin7 said:

I wanted to share a quote I came across from user @pluto a while back. I don't think this person is active anymore but this pointer is quite profound.

"Awareness is key... and surrender is the key to awareness" 

The simplicity of awareness is the goal of many spiritual practice imo. You can essentially rest your mind in the simplicity of awareness. When you surrender the ego's activity awareness becomes primary. Awareness takes no effort, so when you surrender effort all you are left with is awareness.

Let me know your thoughts

Yes, one becomes aware of the struggle/intention that arises so surrender just happens without an intention to make it happen. 

It's felt like a giving up. The futility of struggle becomes apparent.

[Raptorsin7]

2 minutes ago, WelcometoReality said:

Yes, one becomes aware of the struggle/intention that arises so surrender just happens without an intention to make it happen. 

It's felt like a giving up. The futility of struggle becomes apparent.

When/How did it happen for you?

[WelcometoReality]

41 minutes ago, Raptorsin7 said:

When/How did it happen for you?

It happened 6 years ago while writing on this forum. The day after a SDS.

[Salvijus]

@WelcometoReality so now what? You stopped trying and what happened? Did you get enlightened?

Any shift in conciousness?

Any shift in energy?

Did the suffering of desire came to an end?

Did all internal conflict caused by desire gone away? 

Did your personal sense of self died?

Did you expand into nondual state of presence?

Edited February 3, 2022 by Salvijus

[WelcometoReality]

1 minute ago, Salvijus said:

@WelcometoReality so now what? You stopped trying and what happened? Did you get enlightened? Any shift in conciousness? Any shift in energy? 

An awakening happened. A shift that continued back and fourth between separation and non-separation for a while until it was abiding non-separation.

 

[Raptorsin7]

32 minutes ago, WelcometoReality said:

It happened 6 years ago while writing on this forum. The day after a SDS.

Wow cool. So you just realized you could surrender effort?

How long were you seeking before that? And was that your last big realization or have you had others