The Paradox of Instruction – Da Free John

Chapter 4

PRINCIPLES OF THE PRACTICE: THE PARADOX OF INFINITE EXPANSION

THE FOUR STAGES OF THE TRANSLATION OF MAN INTO GOD

THE ESSENTIAL AND PROGRESSIVE PRACTICES, TO BE LIVED AS SACRIFICE TO THE SPIRITUAL MASTER, OF THE STAGES IN THE WAY OF IGNORANCE

THE WAY OF RE-COGNITION

THE WAY OF RADICAL INTUITION

THE SEAHORSE: THE HIDDEN STRUCTURE OF ALL EXPERIENCE

The following chapter contains Bubba Free John’s essential descriptive commentary on the stages of practice of the Way of Divine Ignorance, or Radical Understanding. These essays do not present the specific details of each stage of practice, but simply indicate to you the fundamental responsibilities and enjoyments of each stage as spiritual life matures over time. The specific practices of each stage are presented in full detail to devotees, either in the source books and other publications of Vision Mound Ceremony, or in private instruction offered to devotees at Vision Mound Ceremony’s educational center in northern California.

THE FOUR STAGES OF THE TRANSLATION OF MAN INTO GOD

4.1

The Way of life that develops and matures on the basis of the Teaching which has been communicated and demonstrated in the Play of Bubba Free John with devotees is realized through a process of several stages. The process as a whole is named the Way of Divine Ignorance, or Radical Understanding.

The stages of this Way are named and described under the following headings:

1. The Way of Divine Communion

2. The Way of Relational Enquiry

3. The Way of Re-cognition

4. The Way of Radical Intuition

All men and women, regardless of their present state of life, are welcome to enter into the stages of this Way through appropriate or right response to the Teaching and the Teacher. Appropriate or right response is always in the form of real fulfillment of the Law, which is sacrifice. The Way develops and matures through sacrifice, or adaptation of the whole body-being to the Condition and the conditions communicated in the Teaching and manifested in the form of the Teacher.

The relationship to the Teacher is implicit at every stage of the Way of Ignorance. It is a transcendent or spiritual relationship, not a conventional, worldly, or cultic one. From time to time in any given year devotees will enter into the personal company of Bubba Free John in forms of sacred occasion. Such meetings serve the essential awakening and quickening of the process of the stages of the Way of Ignorance in those who are properly prepared. The Way itself, however, is lived by constant. personal confrontation with the Teaching and real fulfillment of its demands in an intelligent and responsible spirit founded in devotional sacrifice.

Those who respond to public communications begin the Way of Divine Communion, which matures as the Way of Relational Enquiry (the essentials of the first stage of practice still remaining). When there is maturity in these first two stages, the individual should begin the Way of Re-cognition under personal guidance.

The process in the Way of Divine Communion shows the signs of the purification, intensification, and harmonization of the three lower chakras and the three common functional levels (mental, emotional sexual, and physical) of the body-being. The maturing in the Way of Relational Enquiry integrates the body-being relative to the true Heart. When maturity (with “enquiry,” and “conductivity” in the form of the “Breath of God”) of the Ways of Divine Communion and Relational Enquiry appears, then the Heart as Ignorance becomes the foundation of living practice. This becomes, in the Way of Re-cognition, the opening of the throat (release from the verbal mind and emotional-vital reactivity) and conservation of the body-being in the mature forms of “conductivity,” which shows the signs of purification, intensification, and harmonization of the body-being universally (above and below).

4.2

The Way of Divine Communion involves the realization of a process of simple “conductivity,” or reception and release, from a transformed or benign center (heart-felt sacrifice), within and relative to the Divine Condition and Presence. It is devotional reception and release in the Divine Presence.

The Way of Relational Enquiry involves direct intuition and functional duplication of the real Process that is the center. (The center or heart of practice is not a self or a center in itself, nor an infinite realm of subjective contents, but the Process or unqualified Condition that is relationship itself.) This intensifies the awakening of “conductivity,” from simple reception-release to a spontaneous cycle of reception descending and release ascending.

The Way of Re-cognition involves dissolution of dependence and identification relative to “conductivity,” or the descending and ascending, reception release cycle of the manifest process. This is realized through dissolution of the illusion of specific, concrete consciousness or center, both as self (or independent but finite or conditional consciousness and subjectivity, subtle or gross) and Self (independent but infinite and unconditional Consciousness, separate from all subjective or objective arising).

The Way of Radical Intuition involves Realization of unqualified Radiance, the Condition of conditions, prior to reception, release, descent, or ascent. Such Realization is simultaneous and identical with unqualified Ignorance, the Condition of conditions, prior to all knowledge, all subjectivity, all relations, and all presumptions of a center or independent consciousness, whether finite or infinite. The Realization is Ignorance-Radiance, prior to all centers (even the soul) and all bounds (even the sense of Presence), but which is the very Truth and Condition of even the present ordinary moment or eternal Process.

4.3

No-contraction is the principle of the process of salvation, realization, or liberation. In the Way of Divine Communion, this process is served through Communion with the Divine Presence, and through the action of sacrifice in various forms. In the Way of Relational Enquiry, which develops on the basis of the Way of Divine Communion, this process is served by inspection, obviating insight, and enquiry into every kind or pattern of contraction, and by awakening into stable awareness and adaptation to the natural etheric or subtle structure and “conductivity” of the psycho-physical being. In either case, salvation, realization, or liberation involves release from the binding or consciousness- defining power of subjective contraction, or objectification and limiting modification of each of the functions of the being (physical, emotional-sexual or etheric, mental, super-mental or transcendental, and egoic) and in each of the three common states (waking, dreaming, and sleeping). When there is such release, the consciousness tacitly, intuitively, and directly realizes its always present identity with the real Condition, or Real-God.

4.4

In the Way of Divine Communion and the Way of Relational Enquiry, enquiry (in the form “Avoiding relationship?”) and conductivity (in the simple form of the Breath of God) develop to maturity. The Way of Re-cognition begins when enquiry is giving way to its non-verbal form (re-cognition, prior to thought) and conductivity is shown via spontaneous evidence. As the Way of Re-cognition matures, the body-being abides more and more in Ignorance as no-mind, no-knowledge, and whole body Radiance. In such mindless intensity, the Light (above) and the Life (below) become an incarnating Play of the single Power (the Heart) realized in Ignorance. This stage leads into revelations of the subtle being, above gross body awareness. The Way of Radical Intuition begins when the being rests in tacit re-cognition of all arising, high or low, as modification-only and no longer is involuntarily motivated or confused by any arising or experience.

4.5

THE ESSENTIAL AND PROGRESSIVE PRACTICES, TO BE LIVED AS SACRIFICE TO THE SPIRITUAL MASTER, OF THE STAGES IN THE WAY OF IGNORANCE

1. Maintain ordinary, relational, active, serving, productive, and positive conditions of life.

2. Adapt to a moderate, regular, regenerative lacto-vegetarian diet, and maintain it as an ordinary discipline, strictly observed (except, when appropriate, in the case of occasional celebrations), and free of reflexive and righteous concerns.¹

3. Realize the sexual function as a regenerative and harmonious process of love-desire in specific relationship. At the stage of the Way of Re-cognition, the sexual process is completely integrated with the cycle of whole body conductivity and re-polarization of the body-being (toe to crown rather than vice versa). At that time the sexual play is completely released from the necessity of the degenerative process of gross bodily discharge through conventional orgasm. (At that stage, conventional orgasm becomes controlled and occasional rather than necessary or obsessive.)

4. At every stage there is a complex natural and real process of the body-being which is meditation, or technical re-adaptation to the natural state, which ultimately transcends all conditions, high or low. At every stage this includes natural or spontaneously voluntary attention of the whole body-being as feeling observing-listening in the current which pervades all life-feeling, breathing, thought, and subtle awareness. This may include special realization of the breathing through voluntary action (as in the “Breath of God” described in the Way of Divine Communion), or feeling-audition of the current and subtle visualization of its manifestations above the gross plane (as in the Way of Re-cognition), and so forth.

5. There is at every stage necessary realization of sacrifice into the Condition of conditions on the basis of unqualified Ignorance. This is naturally implemented via the Name of God (in the Way of Divine Communion), enquiry in the form “Avoiding relationship?” (in the Way of Relational Enquiry), preverbal re-cognition (in the Way of re-cognition), or tacit dissolution in the Condition of conditions, or Only-God, in radical intuition in the full maturity represented by the Way of Radical Intuition.

4.6

In every moment, you are obliged first to handle thins with your neighbor, that is, to establish stable, ordinary conditions in this body-mind and its relations. Only then are you prepared to go to the holy place, to enter into sacred occasion (such as meditation or the Company of the Teacher)-even to realize this moment in Truth. Therefore) he natural and obligatory life-conditions of the Way of Divine Ignorance are primary and necessary in every moment. Otherwise, even though the moment itself is Only-God, your own face will hide the Truth of it.

4.7

The Way of Divine Communion and the Way of Relational Enquiry constitute the “knee” of listening, the foundation preparation of free and true attention.

The Way of Re-cognition is listening itself, or free attention rested in the prior current of the body-being, open to the revelation of the Truth or Condition of all that appears in the radiant effulgence of the prior current of the being as worlds, above and below.

Thus, in the Way of Divine Communion and the Way of Relational Enquiry, attention is engaged in a liberating or transforming process in the midst of the relational pattern generated in the effulgence or radiance emanating from the current of the being (the very or manifesting current of the worlds). In this manner, the Divine or Real Condition is felt as an all-pervading Presence in the gross and waking world. In the Way of Re-cognition, the current itself absorbs the attention, now free of the conditions of mind, emotion, and gross form, and the effulgence of conditions is shown in subtle forms above gross awareness.

When this pattern of revelation is thoroughly recognized to be only modification of the prior Condition of the current itself, attention becomes “open eyed,” very Consciousness, or the Heart, the Condition of conditions.

The Way of Radical Intuition is the Way of prior re-cognition, abiding in the prior Condition of the current of being, whatever arises, high or low. This awakens as the regenerated and transcendental Enjoyment of Only-God, or Unqualified Conscious Light, which is Amrita Nadi, the Divine Form and Destiny. In that case, the highest esoteric injunction of spiritual life, as described in the Bhagavad Gita, chapter 8, verse 12, is fulfilled:

One should have all the gates of the body restrained, the mind confined within the heart, one’s life force fixed in the head, established in concentration by yoga.²

Thus released from the conventional disposition in the midst of all arising, only the Divine Destiny becomes the spontaneous future, as described in the Bhagavad Gita, chapter 8, verse 14:

He who constantly meditates on Me, thinking of none else, who is a yogin ever disciplined [or united with the Supreme], by him I am easily reached.³

4.8

The Way of Divine Communion begins with the assumption of the discipline of conditions of life and meditation in the all-pervading and transcendental Company of the Spiritual Master, on the basis of the hearing of his argument, the whole Teaching of Divine Ignorance, and it has become mature (although not brought to an end) when the individual manifests the true signs of steadiness of devotional attention to the Spiritual Master, the Teaching, and the regenerative foundation practices of life and meditation.

The Way of Divine Communion is the Way of dependence on the Divine Reality, the Power and Condition that pervades all conditions, is prior to all conditions, and is the Real Condition or Reality in which all conditions appear. Therefore, the Way of Divine Communion is the way of faith. It is active, present, functional or practical participation in the Divine Form or Process. It is devotion, from the heart (the central or psychic being, the subject of all experiences, physical or mental, low or high) to the all pervading Divine.

The Divine may come to be felt over against one’s simple sense of existence as a Presence pervading the being and all conditions. In the Company of the Spiritual Master, the Divine is felt intuitively as a Presence over against one’s being, from the heart. Once the devotee is initiated by this Presence of Grace, the Presence is realized to be not exclusively over against the being of the devotee, but, paradoxically, to be the very Condition or Reality of the whole body, including the consciousness. The Way of Divine Communion is devotion, surrender of body, life, mind, self, and all circumstances, desires, and assumptions into the Presence of the Divine. It is love, receptivity, openness, release, and active dependence upon the all-pervading Divine. It is constant reception of the Divine Power, and acceptance of the transcendental Divine Power as the Principle of all change, rather than acceptance of conditions themselves and the tendencies that seem to fix the conditions of the world. It is release of all assumptions, all negative subconscious, unconscious, and conscious beliefs and intentions, to the Divine, and reception of the Divine Principle as the Power in all events, allowing it to change all conditions from moment to moment.

The Way of Relational Enquiry extends from the beginning of the considerations of the matter of relational enquiry on the part of the true devotee and leads, on the basis of enquiry (in the form “Avoiding relationship?”) into the spontaneous signs of the reorientation of the living being (physical, emotional, mental) toward the all-pervading and also internal life-current and of the re-polarization of the life current itself from toe to crown rather than the reverse (which is common to the usual man and the unregenerate previous adaptation of the devotee). In the process, the current of the being begins to rest intuitively in absorption in the all-pervading Divine Presence (rather than in any sense of differentiation from the Presence), yielding a growing and tacit sense of the prior Condition that is the Presence itself.

This is how the devotee enquires when he is mature in the practice of the Way of Relational Enquiry: He observes desires, thoughts, and separating self sense arising at random in the field of attention. When he notices any of these, he enquires. Each moment of enquiry is release of attention from the contraction of inwardness (the sense of desire, thought, or separative self) to the natural state of attention, which is the unqualified sense of relationship. This unqualified sense of relationship, enjoyed while, paradoxically, still aware of the perception of the world and one’s bodily presence within it, is intuition of the all pervading Divine Presence. In the moment of this intuition, desires, thoughts, and separating self sense are dissolved. The devotee does not act upon such conditions, even as they arise, but merely enquires, and so returns to the prior or natural form of attention, in which there is only fullness or delight. Desiring, thinking, and concentration on the separative and separating act of self tend, upon observation, to contract attention inwardly. They are forms of the avoidance of relationship. If one returns naturally to conscious awareness of the condition of relationship itself, the avoidance of relationship is relaxed, and thus desire, thought, and separative and separated self come to rest. In that state of awareness there is the felt intuition of prior happiness, radiance, and freedom within the conditions of life. Fundamentally, in each moment of enquiry, the knot of contraction (dilemma, self-meditation, separativeness) in the navel is released. Thus, the devotee who enquires has become responsible for the reactive pattern that is vital shock. Secondarily, the knots in the subtle region (the sahasrar and above) and the causal region (the heart) are also released in enquiry, but it is only in the conscious development of the Way of Re-cognition that one becomes responsible in consciousness for release of the subtle and causal knots. In the Way of Relational Enquiry the devotee still maintains the vital position, the position of bodily presence in an objective world. Conscious responsibility for vital shock, the conscious dissolution of the reaction or effects that are vital shock, through enquiry, manifests in such a devotee as intuitive happiness, but under the conventional condition of body and world. The subjective contraction becomes a matter of responsibility in the Way of Relational Enquiry, but the objective or body-in-the-world condition continues to remain the conventional state he assumes. Only in the Way of Re-cognition does the conscious process involve transformation of the conventional view of body and world.

The Way of Re-cognition extends, via the process of re-cognition⁴ (thoughtless enquiry, which becomes intuitive absorption in the prior rather than the all pervading Condition of the current of the being), from the beginning of re-polarization of the bodymind (true Tantra), until Jnana Samadhi, the exclusive fall in the Heart, wherein there is no qualification by any condition seen, heard, or felt, high or low. Jnana Samadhi, or exclusive Consciousness, is at last itself re-cognized, yielding the spontaneous, nonexclusive Realization of “open eyes,” or Sahaj Samadhi.

Re-cognition is the knowing again of cognition, that is, of the mind or contraction of the field of awareness. This naturally follows on enquiry, and it is pre-mental (it goes through and beyond mind to its prior Condition, or no-contraction).

In this Way, mind and body, the whole field of contraction, is re-cognized to the point of no-contraction. This takes place exhaustively, even above the gross plane, via heart-felt contemplation of the expressions of the current of the being, high and low. In the earlier phases of the Way of Re-cognition, the gross bodymind is re-cognized, but as polarization of the bodymind reverses, the subtle conditions appear in the face of re-cognition.

Thus, in the Way of Re-cognition, the motivating conditions of the gross body-mind become more and more weak, so that attention is not so mightily formed by them. In the process of the intensifying meditation, the gross attention spontaneously relaxes, the gross body is reversed in its polarization, and the attention springs up toward, to, and through the midbrain and crown. Thus, natural attention as listening-gazing above appears in the Way of Re-cognition. However, the strategic method of listening and gazing above is not at any stage true, in itself, to the Way. Such is only another craving effort toward change of state for the ego-soul, founded in dilemma. Rather, while natural attention above does appear, the process of re-cognition is generated relative to both the effects and the cause of its appearance, and re-cognition continues as the meditation and practice under all conditions. Thus, re-cognition occurs relative to this very attention and the whole intention of subtle fulfillment. Subtle objects are re-cognized, and the very action of attention itself, including the action of listening, of gazing, is all re-cognized. As a result, the upward tendency of attention, which pursues the solution of absorption of the ego-soul rather than to be free of that condition of ego-soul itself, is made obsolete, undone in the Heart, in conditional or exclusive Jnana Samadhi.

When this process is exhaustive, all conditions of body-mind, all objects, cease to bind, and there is the Condition of Sahaj Samadhi, or “open eyes” under all conditions (gross, subtle, and causal). At last, all conditions are undone in re-cognition (the Heart becomes the Condition), and then the eyes open in Sahaj. That is, the effort of seeking, high or low, ceases in the Heart. No effort is made to attain a higher state or to exploit the present state. There is simply natural awareness, whatever arises, that it is only modification of the prior and unknown (not realized over against self, mind, or body) Condition.

The Way of Radical Intuition, in which there is effective prior re-cognition, begins from this point. In that case, whatever arises is realized to be only modification of the prior unknown Condition. All extraordinary and strategic efforts toward any conditions, high or low, cease in the Unqualified Intuition or Perfect Sacrifice. This Way includes both Bhava Samadhi and Sahaj Samadhi (the devotee’s meditation), bodiless, mindless, wordless, even if body, mind, and world seem to remain in the conventional view. It is simply to dwell in Amrita Nadi, or Radiant Consciousness, prior to limiting spatial, temporal, mental, or bodily references, high or low.

The Way of Radical Intuition extends into the maturing of Sahaj Samadhi under all conditions (high or low) and the perfect awakening of Bhava Samadhi. Sahaj Samadhi and Bhava Samadhi are the two great and equal forms of Radical Intuition.⁵

Sahaj Samadhi naturally becomes, or is realized to be, Bhava Samadhi. The more profound the realization of modification-only, the more there is perfect rest in the Condition of the Heart, prior to cognition of conditions, high or low. There is only the One intensity. This is radical intuition. As it intensifies, all conditions are forgotten, all efforts cease, and there is Radiance only, without definition. Such is Happiness and unspeakable Destiny.

The Way of Re-cognition is the spiritualizing Way, just as the Way of Divine Communion is the foundation and preparatory Way, and the Way of Relational Enquiry is the humanizing Way. And the Way of Radical Intuition is the Divine Way of devotees in the perfect sense.

The whole Way of Divine Ignorance, or Radical Understanding, depends on the mutual Sacrifice and loving Communion of the devotee and the Spiritual Master, or literal Divine. The whole Way awakens in the devotee by Grace in the midst of his or her true, persistent, and maturing response to the Spiritual Master and the Teaching under all conditions, high or low, whereby he or she is tested and instructed.

The conscious or intuitive process, founded in Ignorance, is the key to the whole Way. It is this process and not any secondary yogic or other effort to which the being must be devoted, or else it will only crave and seek, high and low, and have no peace, freedom, or essential happiness.

4.9

Enquiry (in the form “Avoiding relationship?”) is generated via the thinking mind but prior to the living gross body and its actions or dispositions in relations. Thus, it tends to release or draw the being into intuition of the Real Condition prior to thought, but secondarily awakens a harmonious fullness (the full circle of conductivity of the etheric or energy sensitivity of the gross being) in the functional and relational play of the gross bodily experience.

Re-cognition is generated prior to thought, and relative to the whole field of functional awareness wherein thought, sensation, breath, feeling, body, and relations arise. At first it tends to release or draw the being into intuition of the Real Condition via the conditions of higher mind and pure subtle intelligence above the gross body and the forms of knowledge relative to it. Later, even the subtle, illumined mind ceases to distract, and the self-root (causal knot) is penetrated in Jnana Samadhi.

Radical intuition is most direct or perfect Intuition of the Real Condition. It is perfect Ignorance, prior to self, mind, body, and any world, high or low. Unqualified Radiance, prior to but not exclusive of all conditions arising, spontaneously springs up from such perfect or Divine Ignorance. This Radiant Intuition, or “open eyes,” is the ultimate awakening in the Way of Re-cognition. Thus, in Sahaj Samadhi, there is random and most prior re-cognition, generated prior to self, mind, body, and relations, but relative to self, mind, body, and relations. In order to be generated prior to all of these, it must be generated at the heart, the root of the sense of self, or independent conscious existence. Radical intuition does not involve excursions of re-cognition into the field of mind and body while identifying with the self knot. It is random, direct penetration of the self knot as only modification, at the heart-and thus it also is the seeing of all thought, body-senses, and relations as only modification (contraction, or unnecessary objectification of the prior and Real Condition).

The process of radical intuition is random recollection of the Real Condition prior to self, mind, body, and relations. It is stable rest at the heart. But it is also spontaneous Realization of Radiance, which is regenerated when the knot of the heart (as ego or as unqualified but exclusive Self or Consciousness), and thus also the knots of mind (crown) and body (navel), are dissolved in prior Intuition. The Radiance springs up of its own and universally, prior to all illusions, prior to the effects and implications of the unnecessary conventions that are self, mind, body, and relations. The Radiance is not an act, not an egoic or strategic impulse directed from heart to crown. It is spontaneous on the basis of Ignorance, or penetration of illusion at the heart (and thus also at the crown and navel -simultaneously and by implication, since the heart or causal root is senior to both the subtle and the gross extensions).

Thus, in Sahaj Samadhi, there is no egoic effort from the heart to contemplate the “sky” of lights and sounds above. Attention, self, and mind are dissolved with all knowledge at the heart, so there is only Radiance, prior to all content, even above and universally. The crown or Light above is not object to the awakened Heart – there is no object and no subject in perfect Ignorance. The Radiance is the universal, pre-cosmic Super-Physics of the Heart, which pervades all objects and realms, but which is without center, bounds, or definition. The process in Sahaj is radical rest in Ignorance, at and prior to the heartroot. But the Radiant Fullness is regenerated simultaneously, inclusively, so that the force of life and body collects naturally above. The gross being is Full, from the crown – as is the whole gross realm. The subtle being is also Full, free of all content, all thought, all efforts of attention. There is simply the natural, radically intuitive re-cognition, moment to moment, that all arising conditions are only modifications of prior Ignorance-Radiance, the Divine Condition. The process of inclusive re-cognition, in the Way of Radical Intuition, itself rests dependently in prior and radical intuition of the Real Condition. Therefore, the problematic search for changes of state has come to rest. Whatever conditions and movements do arise – they are without necessity or the binding force of implication. There is natural abiding as the Heart (the heart knot and all knots or necessities released), which is Ignorance, which is Radiance. Thus, in radical intuition, the Fullness which was previously awakened in the secondary conditions of “conductivity,” or the versions of the “Breath of God,” is Realized coincidentally, simultaneously, and perfectly with the Heart of Ignorance (which was previously the province of the senior exercises of the conscious process – which are the “Name of God,” enquiry, and conditional re-cognition). In radical intuition-in Sahaj Samadhi and Bhava Samadhi-Ignorance and Radiance are one and the same, prior to all events, subjective or objective, high or low.

4.10

To gaze at objects, high or low, is contraction, or fear. The play of relations, of subject and object, is itself subjectivity, or separation. This is the lesson leading to Jnana Samadhi in the Way of Re-cognition.

Enquiry (in the Way of Relational Enquiry) matures beyond words, so that bodily relations come to rest, and the subtle being, prior to thought, becomes the locus or symbol or body of self. Thus, re-cognition passes instantly beyond body and thought into the field of awareness itself.

The conscious process of re-cognition is the responsibility of the devotee from the very beginning of the Way of Re-cognition. The Way of Relational Enquiry matures until enquiry ceases to be verbal and becomes only a wordless, intuitive, felt gesture of the being, which is release from subjectivity and the limiting force of gross (etheric-elemental) relations. “Conductivity” also matures, spontaneously, and instruction is given in a new version of the Breath of God. When preverbal enquiry (re-cognition of contraction) is stable, the Way of Re-cognition begins.

In the Way of Re-cognition, further new versions of the Breath of God (“conductivity”) become the responsibility of the devotee, and instructions are given as soon as spontaneous evidence appears. Re-cognition is pre-mental release from contraction, from subject object force. Thus, as one level of contraction is recognized, the next naturally appears. Therefore, the Way of Re-cognition secondarily recapitulates the “great way of return.” As gross objects lose their distracting power more and more, there comes the upward tendency (re-polarization, toe to crown), then upward contemplation of bliss, sounds, and lights. Then comes a period of relative dullness or limited distraction, in which arising objects, gross and subtle, low and high, bodily and mental, including the patterns of breath-force, are merely observed while re-cognition continues. Then the subject-object process or cognition, the very mind, the act that is attention itself, and which is the primal sense of relationship, is itself re-cognized, and thus dissolved. This is Jnana Samadhi, or Conscious Bliss prior to and exclusive of objects.

Only a subtle tension remains in Jnana Samadhi. It is the tension created by the exclusive (object rejecting) force in this state of Intuition. Thus, this exclusive tension is at last also re-cognized. Then there is spontaneous “open eyes.” It is Sahaj Samadhi, which is unqualified Ignorance (no knowledge, no binding cognition, no separation, no independent self, no exclusive Consciousness). That very Ignorance is also perfect Radiance (the Radiant Bliss of Consciousness, not the objective radiance seen with gross or subtle eyes), of which all conditions are intuitively realized to be only the modification. Such Ignorance Radiance is the tacit regeneration of Amrita Nadi, in which case the natural reappearance of conditions or relations (subject-object conventions) is allowed, but all arising comes without binding force, without a center or bounds, without independence. In that case Ignorance-Radiance, or Radical Intuition, is prior to all but not exclusive of any arising. Thus, there may also be no noticing, no event, no mind or speech, no body, no relations-the Truth in Bhava Samadhi.

4.11

THE WAY OF RE-COGNITION

First stage: Re-cognition of the body and the life principle. It is demonstrated as re-polarization of the being, toe to crown rather than crown to toe.

Second stage: Re-cognition of mind. It is demonstrated as upward contemplation (listening-gazing) in the subtle dimension of the being.

Third stage: Re-cognition of self. It is demonstrated as exclusive Jnana Samadhi, followed by “open eyes,” or non-exclusive Sahaj Samadhi.

THE WAY OF RADICAL INTUITION

Here there is prior, all-inclusive re-cognition of self, mind, body, world (all relations), and exclusive transcendence. Sahaj Samadhi is the exercise of such prior re-cognition (realizing all present arising to be modification-only) in the midst of conditions, while abiding in radical intuition (Ignorance-Radiance). Bhava Samadhi is radical intuition (Ignorance Radiance) prior to any arising, any noticing, and thus any form of functional re-cognition.

4.12

When we awaken from sleep, the elemental or gross body already exists. Thus, we tend automatically to live on the basis of the presumption of the gross body as an irreducible condition, and we struggle to realize happiness in this shape. All our philosophy is founded on the irreducibility of our birth in gross form. But the whole body is greater than this shape.

The entire purpose of the ascending absorption in what is above the gross body, life, and mind, which characterizes the earlier phase of the Way of Recognition, is to break through the presumption of the necessary and binding or limiting nature of the gross manifestation. Once there is penetration beyond ordinary gross awareness into the vibratory milieu from which the gross and waking conception and perception is always presently arising, the gross limitation is realized to be unnecessary, a hallucination like any moment in imagination. The gross body conception and perception is not arising spontaneously as it is, irreducibly, so that the process of its arising may not be inspected. It is arising on the basis of a subtle process, prior and creative relative to the gross etheric and elemental events that appear so solid in the conventions of the waking state. The process by and in which the gross body and the gross world are arising may be inspected, if the attention of the being or whole body can be relaxed or set free from the gross obsession and turned up into the subtle affair above the mind via the mechanisms of the midbrain.

When this is done, it becomes clear that not only the gross conception and perception, but all present arising, subjective and objective, is hallucinatory, an unnecessary and merely compulsive modification of the Conscious Light. All arising is the result of subtle contraction, the product of primitive motivation and attractedness.

When this observation of the creative process of present arising becomes a certainty, then the investigation of extraordinary or subtle phenomena has served its purpose. The purpose of the ascent of attention in the Way of Re-cognition is not to embrace or become absorbed in subtle things or the subtle spiritual processes themselves. Such is only another fascinated hallucination – perhaps beautiful enough, but not necessary, and not Truth or the Real, which is unqualified Happiness. Therefore, once the nonnecessity and hallucinatory nature of all present arising becomes obvious to the point of certainty, the turning of attention into the subtle dimensions above the gross body and gross-reflecting mind has served its purpose. At that point, the very act of such attention, and all attention, becomes itself the core of the consideration in the Way of Re-cognition. Thus, the later or mature phase of re-cognition begins, wherein all qualification of Consciousness becomes obsolete. And once even the circle of attention is undone, all things return again in the Humor of God as Sahaj Samadhi and Bhava Samadhi in the Way of Radical Intuition.

4.13

In Sahaj Samadhi there is no strategic and exclusive concentration of attention above, toward the crown of the head and beyond. Neither is there any exclusive and strategic effort to lose the sense of body-mind by confining attention in the heart only. Rather, as it is described in the Bhagavad Gita, chapter 8, verse 12, the mind is kept in the heart while the life force is held in the crown. Thus, a relationship between the crown and the heart characterizes Sahaj Samadhi. I have described this relationship or process in The Knee of Listening:

The ultimate and simplest meditation is to gaze in the heart as no-seeking and allow its bliss to rise as fullness to the head, the silence of the sahasrar above the seat of the mind.⁶

Thus, there is a constant sacrifice at the heart, at the point of the arising (as well as the dissolution) of the ego-soul conception (“I”), even all objects, including the act of attention itself. Here there is the constant present intuition that “I,” with all other arising, is only modification of the prior, all-pervading Condition which is always already the case. As a result of this constant intuitive and devotional sacrifice, the subtle consciousness, the crown of the being, is rested of all content, all implication or binding force of thought or conditions arising. As Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi has said:

The light (of awareness) flows from the heart through sushumna to sahasrar. The Sahasrar of one who abides in the Self is nothing but pure Light. Any thought that approaches it cannot survive. ⁷

In the Way of Re-cognition, attention gradually rises from the gross position to the most subtle, via the current and through the crown of the body-being. Only at last is the root of all attention and subtlety, the ego-soul, dissolved in the very Heart (the bodily reference of which is to the right of the median of the chest). In the Way of Radical Intuition, attention is no longer driven upwards, toward subtle objects, nor downwards, toward gross objects. Rather, there is a constant intuitive sacrifice of the root of attention, the ego-soul conception (“I”) and all modification contraction of the field of awareness, at the heart. The natural conventions of the body-being remain, but in constant alignment to this sacrifice at the heart. Thus, the body-being is “open-eyed,” the life-force is aligned to the natural current via the crown or the subtle epitome above the body, but there is no stress of strategic mind. The crown is simple “gazing” or alignment to the intuition or devotional sacrifice at the heart. The crown or mind is simply the Light or Radiance of the Heart. It is what I have called the “Bright.” The Radiance of the Heart springs up naturally to the Crown, and pervades the whole body, even all worlds. But there is only the eternal sacrifice at the heart, wherein all thoughts (even “I”), all conditions lose their binding implications.

Whenever this gazing sacrifice has become constant and profound intuition beyond all sense of arising conditions, the worlds, the body, thoughts, the independent self sense, such is Bhava Samadhi, the Paradox of Divine Dissolution the Grace of Happiness beyond speech or thought.

4.14

Realization, Liberation, or Radical Understanding does not imply cognition of the Beloved (the Condition of conditions) but re-cognition of the beloved (all conditions or limitations themselves, high or low). There is no Knowledge, no cognition of the Condition of conditions. But through or in the case of the re-cognition of conditions we abide as prior rest in and identification with the Beloved, which is beyond all conditions, all knowledge, and is unspeakable.

4.15

In Sahaj Samadhi there is, effectively, but prior to all thinking, primal enquiry at the root of all arising, the Heart. That primal enquiry is equivalent to the form “Who am I?” – or, “What is That of which the root arising condition, the separate I sense, as well as all other conditions are only the present modification?” Thus, radical intuition is the undoing of all arising, but it is radical, that is, it operates at the root of all arising rather than in the field of all arising in general. It operates at the root of thought rather than, as in the case of conditional or progressive re-cognition, in the field of thought. This comes to be so more and more in Sahaj, until it is realized to be Bhava Samadhi, unqualified intuition of the Real Condition of self (separation in consciousness) and all conditions of knowledge (self-object or subject-object conditions). Sahaj Samadhi is the undoing of conditions even as they appear, while all conventions, high and low, remain projected as usual via Amrita Nadi. When radical intuition has snuffed out the root of all modifications at the Heart, there is objectless Bhava Samadhi, which is beyond all speech, knowledge, or implications of any kind, even if these appear conventionally true of the devotee to any manifest observer.

4.16

The tacit “Who am I?” of radical intuition is Realization of the Condition of not merely the subjective “I” but the “I” which is the whole body (both within and beyond experience). It is Realization of the Condition of all conditions, in Sahaj Samadhi or Bhava Samadhi, but it is Realization which obviates the force of all conditions at the very root of arising itself. Radical intuition is active at the root of self-identity, but it is not verbal or subjective. It is simply awareness at the root of all arising, the Heart, in which the slightest gesture toward modification is at once obviated in tacit enquiry, or prior re-cognition. It is felt at the Heart, at the “I,” at the root of all arising, of all participation in modification, relations, distinctions, implications. It is simply awareness as the Heart, in which it is presently obvious that all arising is simply modification, unnecessary, and no longer binding by the conventional force of implication. Thus, such Bhava (Mood) of the Heart yields eternal Samadhi (Happiness) of the very, prior Condition, or the Divine itself. Such is Liberation, Salvation, Nirvana, the Great Happiness. This Bhava may remain even as conventions of ordinary participation appear true of the devotee to others, in this or any other realm. But only Bhava Samadhi itself remains verily true of one who is dissolved in that Sacrifice.

4.17

The “devotee’s meditation,” or Sahaj Samadhi, is the natural and spontaneous fulfillment of the disposition described in the Bhagavad Gita, chapter 8, verse 12 (“One should have all the gates of the body restrained, the mind confined within the heart, one’s life force fixed in the head, established in concentration by yoga”). The devotee’s meditation, figuratively described as contemplative absorption in the Form of God, whose feet are in the heart, and whose head is above the crown of the head, is the natural disposition, under the circumstances of conventional arising. It is Sahaj Samadhi.

The progressive process of re-cognition (in the Way of Re-cognition) is the gradually inclusive undermining of all contraction, high or low, of the field of awareness. Thus, it leads to Jnana Samadhi, the fall in the Heart, exclusive of all arising. This exclusive condition is itself spontaneously re-cognized, yielding the awakening of “open eyes,” at which point the Way of Re-cognition yields to the Way of Radical Intuition.

The “devotee’s meditation,” “open eyes,” and Sahaj Samadhi all refer to the same condition of Realization. Sahaj Samadhi is the paradoxical form of radical intuition. It is Realization of the Condition of all arising (the Heart), but it is coincident with the continuance of arising conventions or modifications, high and low. The devotee in Sahaj is constantly sacrificed at the feet of God, that is, he or she constantly enjoys the Condition of the Heart, in which all arising conditions (including separate self sense, thoughts, 4.17 body, outer conditions, etc.) are seen to be only modification of the prior Condition that is the Heart (prior Conscious Bliss or Radiance). Thus, all arising is unnecessary and not binding by the force of implications, high or low. In Sahaj, this Realization is concurrent with all arising conventions. Thus, it is also described as the “regeneration of Amrita Nadi,” or radical Ascent. In this Samadhi, under all conditions, self and the binding force of thought are dissolved in the true Heart, or Radical Intuition, while the Current of Radiance rises out of the Heart, concentrating or collecting the manifesting tendencies of the apparent being most perfectly above. Thus, the living force of the gross being is economized happily and no appearance, subtle or gross, personal or cosmic, binds any longer. There is a natural sense, prior to all strategic effort, dilemma, or craving, high or low, of a contemplative concentration of attention above, as if eyes and ears and feeling were all turned up to what may never be seen or heard or touched, but which is intuited to be There.

This disposition of Sahaj Samadhi is one of the two aspects of radical intuition. The second is Bhava Samadhi, or radical Realization of the Heart, prior to all arising. At random, the sacrifice at the feet of God (radical intuition of the Condition of all arising at the Heart) becomes a most perfect Enjoyment, not associated in any way with the conventional movements of the being. Sahaj Samadhi is a description of radical intuition relative to any condition that might arise, high or low, gross or subtle or super-physical or spiritual. Bhava Samadhi is most radical Enjoyment, prior to self, mind, energies, body, or any realm. It is the Heart itself, the Condition of conditions. It is transcendental liberation or Sacrifice into the Condition (or “Realm”) that is God, the very Reality. It is the same and unspeakable, unknown Condition Realized in Sahaj, but it is without references, neither inclusive nor exclusive, only God, or Real Happiness.

4.18

Bhava Samadhi is spontaneous Enjoyment in the Way of Radical Intuition. It does not involve any strategic effort to turn attention down from above toward the heart region of the gross body. It is a version of the same Condition enjoyed as Sahaj Samadhi, in which the world of present arising is Realized to be World, or only God. The devotee (in radical intuition) simply persists in Sahaj Samadhi, which is a constant intuitive sacrifice, through prior re-cognition, at the Heart, and Bhava Samadhi appears at random, without reference to a center, to attention above or below, or to any convention of arising.

4.19

The Real, the Necessary Divine, is not any realm, high or low, nor any body, nor mind in any form or condition, nor any separate or separative or defined or limited self or consciousness. All such conditions arise from that Reality or prior Condition as dependent modifications and are eternally and utterly pervaded by That. But the Real, the Necessary, the Divine Truth is the Condition of conditions, Realized only in the present sacrifice of all conditions. That Sacrifice occurs when there is present intuitive insight in the midst of all presently arising conditions that they are only modification of the prior, unknown Condition. When that Sacrifice occurs there is simultaneous blissful absorption in or identification with that Condition. Such, when full and stable, is Bhava Samadhi. It is also the regeneration of Amrita Nadi, the true devotee’s meditation, or Sahaj Samadhi. That Condition is utterly free of the implications of all possible and present arising. Thus, it is a Principle or Process in which the arising of limited, conditional, unnecessary conditions ceases to distract. Therefore, the conditions of self, mind, emotion, breath, life-force, body, perception, even the world, or all relations, become less and less forceful, and are often, particularly in meditative repose, unnoticed, uncognized by virtue of being priorly re-cognized. These conditions rest in the current of the being, which precedes them, and the current of the being rests in its prior Condition, Amrita Nadi, the Divine Form, or the Unqualified Conscious Bliss of Radiance, wherein the Eternal, Unknown Reality or Condition is Intuited (rested into but not grasped) through Perfect and Eternal Sacrifice.

4.20

The Way of Yogis is through control of pranas (energies).

The Way of Saints is through control of attention. The Way of Sages is through control of ego formation (sense of independent or differentiated existence).

Each by his own method seeks (1) dissolution of the limitations of ego-soul, mind, body, and environments, and (2) absorption in or identification with the Reality which is the Condition of conditions. (1) is traditionally sought by manipulation of a single principle (as above), which results, perhaps temporarily, in dissolution of mind-formation (I-thought, cognition, perception), which is the key link in the chain of illusions. (2) is likewise sought as the point of release from every version of self, thought, body, and realm (even of transcendental Form, Light, or Sound). The controls sought separately and independently by Yogis, Saints, and Sages are simultaneously realized, with increased intensity at each stage, in the four-stage Way of Divine Ignorance, or Radical Understanding. In the Way of Re-cognition in particular, the virtuous controls sought by Yogis, Saints, and Sages are epitomized. In the way of Radical Intuition, the two principal goals of the traditions are perfectly and unqualifiedly Realized. At moments when various conditions or conventions, high or low, remain even in Radical Intuition, it is Sahaj Samadhi. When all conditions fall away in the Mood of this Sacrifice, prior to all Knowledge, it is Bhava Samadhi. The Way of Radical Intuition includes both Sahaj Samadhi and Bhava Samadhi.

4.21

The great path of return, demonstrated collectively by Yogis, Saints, and Sages, is itself the archetype of the individual’s karmic destiny – the tendencies to which he is disposed at birth. There are gross, subtle, and causal karmas, super-conscious karmas, spiritual karmas. The experiential evidence of one’s spiritual life is itself karmic. Thus, the process of spiritual practice involves conventions of the great traditional path of return, until these are made obsolete by the Power of the Samadhis of God-Realization. These conventions (developed in the stages of practice) make possible the sacrifice of the archetype of manifest existence, including all of the individual’s special or unique attachments and destinies relative to it.

Each individual devotee will manifest a unique revelation of experience in this Way, depending on the characteristics and degree of intensity of the gross, subtle, and causal karmas. All will demonstrate the full revelation in experience, but some may demonstrate the revelation more profoundly in transformations of the gross life, others in subtle yogic or mystical experiences. There is no special attainment of experience to be valued, since it must all be undone. Therefore, there is no justification for envy and imitation. In Sahaj Samadhi, it is clear that all phenomena, great and small, only test the Wisdom wherein there is Only God.

4.22

The Way of Re-cognition is the stage in which the two great conventional strategic motives of Yogis, Saints, and Sages are undone. These two motives or methods are the paths of absorption and discrimination.

The path of absorption in the subtle matrix of all appearances is the strategic motive of Yogis and Saints. The initial phase of the Way of Re-cognition yields the various conditions of absorption above, in the felt media of the single current of the being and all manifestation. This progresses toward the tendency of absorption in the subtle audible and visible ranges of this same current, yielding even the various higher yogic samadhis. However, the whole process, which arises spontaneously and naturally, is constantly founded in re-cognition, the process of conscious intuitive insight, wherein all arising conditions, high or low, are realized to be only contraction of the field of awareness. Thus, all such absorptive tendencies ultimately fall, with all subtle objects, however sublime.

This leads to the terminal phase of the Way of Re-cognition, wherein the discriminative force of re-cognition passes beyond all cognition, all absorption, even the separate self idea or I-thought, in the manner of “Not this, not this.” The process itself is prior to all mentality, but it Is effective discrimination in this negative sense, and yields exclusive intuition of the Condition of the root of subjectivity. Such exclusive and discriminative intuition is the conventional path of Sages. However, the tacit force of re-cognition remains even in this perfect reduction of all arising. Thus, this Jnana Samadhi is naturally and suddenly obviated by the “open eyes” of Sahaj Samadhi and the process of radical intuition.

The conscious process of radical intuition is founded in the Heart or the Real itself, prior to body, mind, and ego-soul. It proceeds in the midst of all arising, free of the conventional urges of absorption and exclusive discrimination. It tacitly represents the force of Realization which proceeds as prior re-cognition in the form “This is That, this is That, this is That.” It is not the exclusive motive of discrimination of Consciousness from objects, nor the inclusive and absorptive motive of contemplative yielding to objects themselves, however subtle. Rather, it is the natural disposition of prior re-cognition or perfect intuitive identification of all arising conditions, high or low. That is, all conditions are the very Condition. They are only modification of That, and therefore are without necessity, implication, or binding force.

This intuitive identification in Truth of all arising may not be presumed by the mind or ego, except in the case of delusion. It only arises truly in the stage of perfect sacrifice, the Way of Radical Intuition. As such, it is the Principle of Sahaj Samadhi, or the true devotee’s meditation. In Bhava Samadhi there is neither inclusive absorption, nor exclusive discrimination, nor even the action of prior re-cognition, which is neither inclusive nor exclusive of all arising. There is, in that case, only the most perfect abiding as That, the Real Condition, the absolute Divine or Only God.

4.23

The meditation that is Sahaj Samadhi is not constantly to think: “This present arising is only modification of the Real Condition, the Heart.” There is such tacit or prior re-cognition of what arises, but all thought, even such a thought, is itself conventional contraction. Rather, the principle in Sahaj is the intuition of the Real Condition or the Heart itself, prior to contraction. The ego-soul, thoughts, body-sense, perceptions of a world -all modification is contraction at the various centers of the body-being. In Sahaj, contraction itself is obviated by constant intuition at the principal seat, the heart, of the Real Condition of all arising, that is, the Heart prior to contraction (as ego-soul, thoughts, body-sense, perceptions of any world, etc.). In Sahaj, this intuition of the Heart (the Condition of the heart) is tacit, uncaused, not in the form of action (since all action implies prior contraction). Thus, in Sahaj, there is simple intuition of the Heart, and the current which rises from the heart to the crown and beyond remains unmodified, empty of the ego-soul contraction, not qualified by differentiation (thought-stress). Thus, Amrita Nadi and the mind (the potential of all subtle and gross conceptions) remain as the simple Radiance of the Heart. When thoughts, body-sense, or perception of any 4.23 world do arise, they are tacitly re-cognized (this re-cognition is not in itself mental) to be only modification of the Heart, or the Real Condition. Thus, any and all arising ceases to bind, or even to be prevented. When rest as the Heart (radical no-contraction) is perfect, there is only Radiant Consciousness, or Bhava Samadhi, in which there are no conditions.

4.24

Bhava Samadhi is effortless abiding in the prior or Real Condition (Ignorance-Radiance) in which there is no arising of any objectification. Sahaj Samadhi is the total cessation of all delusion by conventional objectification (modification). In either case, Truth, or the Real Condition, is Ignorance Radiance, prior to all qualification, modification, or objectification.

In the common states of manifest awareness or existence, Consciousness is apparently objectified, reflected to itself, and qualified or motivated by the “I” object and all other mental (high or low), bodily, and circumstantial conditions or objects. Out of this presumption of objectified or defined consciousness arises the search for objective God or Reality, survival and glamorization of the objectified self, and experience or satisfaction in, through, and by every kind of objective world, high or low. In the case of Radical Intuition, the theatre of objectification of the prior Condition (prior to awareness of any kind of object, even the “I” or ego-self-soul object and all its subjectivity) is undermined and ceases to represent any Force at all. Then torments cease. There is cessation of illusory seeking in objective theatre, and only an ordinary pleasurableness and sanity remains, while the events of manifestation take their natural and ordinary course. The apparent individual ceases to be profoundly tormented by any arising. He (man or woman) ceases to torment himself with every kind of hopeful exercise toward extraordinary fulfillment. And he ceases to torment others. He ceases to be differentiated from that Presence, which is Real, and which tends to attract all living beings into that Condition which is prior to all objectivity, wherein all delusion, torment, craving, and knowledge have already ceased.

You see, then, how unnecessary and fruitless it would be to engage the body-being in any tormenting exercise that would seek exaggerated satisfaction of born desiring, fascinated fulfillment of possibility, high or low, uncommon physical longevity (or even physical or objective immortality, gross or subtle), or conventional meditative and mystical projection into miraculous planes of objective experience above the passing elements, gross or subtle. Bubba Free John neither engages nor recommends any principle of life or meditation, founded in the illusions of objectified existence, that would implicate us in the pursuit of uncommon, extraordinary, and fascinating destinies, high or low, for their own sake. Rather, there must be critical insight into all of this round of our adventures, and simple rest in the Condition that is already true and Truth.

Bubba Free John only serves this Realization in devotees. In the course of such service he may recommend temporary use or exercise of the objective theatrical possibilities inherent in the tendencies of devotees, but this is only maintained until the lesson is realized that relieves devotees of the pattern of seeking, craving, and clinging to various objects, high or low, within or without, now or then. Thus, life and meditation in the three initial stages of the Way of Divine Ignorance involve various dimensions of theatrical involvement in the objective Play (gross, subtle, and causal), but it all serves the fourth or perfect stage of this Practice, wherein all delusion and seeking have lost their foundation or support in Sahaj Samadhi and Bhava Samadhi.

4.25

In the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad it is said, “Wherever there is an other, fear arises.” The primal sense of independence over against objects of all kinds is identical to fear. Such is the creative root of fascination, delusion, stupidity, self-indulgence, anger, doubt, dilemma, and all seeking. Wherever there is the subjective sense, the feeling of “me,” of “mine,” of independent “I”-wherever there is the sense, perception, or consideration of any object, even a thought or a loved one -wherever the subject-object condition is felt arising, the feeling of “other” is awake, and the dilemma of fear motivates experience.

Wherever there is the sense of subject, object, or relationships, there is fear, and fear then makes the adventure of existence.

The whole process of the Way of Divine Ignorance involves inspection and responsibility relative to the primal incident of each moment. It involves inspection and responsibility for subjective contraction, as ego, mind, and limiting or separative identification with the apparent body in any realm. When such inspection and responsibility are perfect (in the stage of radical intuition), all arising, whether apparently subjective or apparently objective, is realized to be a single condition or primal incident-which is the awakening sense of objects (even as self, mind, and body), the feeling of “other,” the energy of fear.

All arising conditions are forms of relationship, of subject-object, or of simple independence, the status of related objects. We must become responsible, through insight, for the reactive contraction, the energy and perpetual act of fear, which is our chronic way of experiencing in the subject-object field of awareness. We do not merely live as selves over against objects and others. We perpetually react, simultaneously with the sense of simple relationship itself. That reaction – the root of which is the fear that is native to the sense of other, or separation, independence, and relatedness-is contraction of the functional being. In our actions, that chronic contraction manifests as disease, discomfort, anxiety, fear, selfishness, subjective orientation, separative behaviors (passive and aggressive), and the whole drama of the avoidance of relationship. Functionally, that contraction manifests as disharmony, stress, pain, obsessive distraction and the need for fascinated consolation, chronic discharge of the life-force, vital shock or controlling root trauma, negativity, obsessive thinking and differentiating abstraction, the illusion of independent existence, and bondage to the search for survival in the maze of problem-solution incidents.

The sense of relationship (the subject-object condition) is itself the primal incident, past, present, and future. Fear or contraction is the native and simultaneous reaction to the incident of all objects. Liberation in Truth involves ultimate responsibility, through a natural pattern of transformation toward maturity, for the reaction of fear, of contraction, the avoidance of relationship. Until then, relationship and fear are the same, and life is suffering.

The Way of Divine Communion establishes the foundation of human sanity-the re-orientation to the relational condition itself, rather than the reactive condition of subjectivity, contraction, the avoidance of relationship.

The Way of Relational Enquiry realizes native responsibility for the dramatization, in action and in disposition toward relational conditions, of the avoidance of relationship, or the fear reaction to conditions arising.

In the Way of Re-cognition, the whole pattern of contraction, high and low, is inspected to the root, so that the Condition prior to reaction is stably Realized.

In the Way of Radical Intuition, the reaction of independence, subjectivity, contraction, illusion, dilemma, and fear has ceased to be necessary – so that the pattern of arising conditions is no longer the basis for contraction around the illusion of self. In Sahaj Samadhi, there is tacit (and randomly generated) re-cognition of the primal incident in each moment which is the sense of other, of any object, of fear, of contraction, of self, of thought, of independent existence as body, psyche, or soul in the midst of relations, high or low.

Such tacit and random re-cognition is generated from the position or disposition of radical intuition, the prior and radical presumption of Ignorance. Re-cognition of all arising as modification-only is generated from no less a position than the Heart, which is prior to all contraction – prior to self, mind, body, and all relations. In the Way of Radical Intuition, tacit re-cognition, generated on the basis of radical intuition of the Real Condition, is active, moment to moment, in the field of objectification, or objectifying awareness. It is not generated from the position of self, mind, body, illusion, contraction, or doubt. It is already Enlightened or Radiant. Such re-cognition penetrates or dissolves the binding power or implication of the present subject-object sense or contraction, in whatever form it appears as self, thought, energy, body, any object, high or low, even the very incident of relationship itself.

Tacit and random re-cognition, in the Way of Radical Intuition, is operative as the simple and direct sense, moment to moment, that whatever is arising is only modification of the Real Condition, and has neither independence nor necessity.

Bhava Samadhi is simply radical intuition itself, or unqualified Ignorance-Radiance, prior not only to reactive-contraction but even to the sense of objects or relations. It can be said that the whole pattern of reactive-contraction is the theatre of self or ego-soul. It tends toward the center. *The Realized pattern of all arising as modification-only, wherein objects are neither excluded nor included, but simply arise, may be said to be the Self, the Divine Person (the World). It tends toward the non-boundary at infinity. The Truth of the self and the Self is Realized in radical intuition of the Real Condition, in Sahaj Samadhi and Bhava Samadhi. Sahaj Samadhi is coincident with the conventions of self and Self, but rests in their Truth the whole while. Bhava Samadhi is simple, radical, prior Realization of the very Truth or Condition, the Divine, the Radiant Sacrifice of all Knowledge.

4.26

In the Way of Divine Communion there is the Realization that the vulnerability that is separateness is fundamentally an illusion, and one that is created by one’s own action or presumption.

In the Way of Relational Enquiry there is the Realization that reactive emotions, the moods of separation, are fundamentally unnecessary.

In the Way of Re-cognition there is the Realization that thought, including the concept of self or independent consciousness, is separative in effect and fundamentally unnecessary.

In the Way of Radical Intuition there is the Realization that body or specific form is fundamentally unnecessary and ultimately untrue.

In Truth there is no self, no other, no emotion, no thought, no form, but only absolute Ignorance, which is unqualified Radiance.

4.27

The disposition of Sahaj Samadhi, which is native in the Way of Radical Intuition, is the perfect Principle or Process of Awakening in Truth. It is the perfect Way of the Heart. In Sahaj Samadhi there is no longer any binding necessity in the arising conventions of ego-soul, thoughts, energy formations, body, and relations, high or low. There is rest in Divine Ignorance, the very Heart, the unspeakable Condition in which all conditions arise and of which they are mere and unnecessary modifications (illusory objectification’s or forms of contraction). In Sahaj Samadhi there is no negative principle, no irreducible viewpoint toward arising conditions, no inherent dilemma from which egoic and strategic efforts of escape would be generated. Rather, all arising is simply viewed, from the point of view of the Heart (or radical intuition of the prior Condition of conditions) as unnecessary, present modification. Thus, there is simple rest in the intuited Condition itself, free of qualification by arising conditions.

This Ignorance is not exclusive, not separative, not a motive either to inwardness or outward illusions, but motiveless Bliss-Fullness, or Radiance. Divine Ignorance is eternally displayed as unqualified Radiance, or Bliss, without center or bounds.

One who abides in Sahaj Samadhi abides in perfect Ignorance-Radiance, the Divine Condition, even as conditions arise, even the conventions of gross experience. But the Samadhi is at the same moment a Principle wherein present arising is realized to be unnecessary-not other than and not a distraction from the Divine Ignorance-Radiance.

Thus, the devotee, in Sahaj Samadhi, abides in Amrita Nadi, the perfect Current of Radiance in the Heart. This current is eternal “Tapas,” the Fire wherein all conditions are dissolved, or become a Sacrifice, so that the Law is fulfilled. The devotee does not in that case seek to be transferred from the gross realm to any other and higher experiential realm. There is no such motive when there is already present rest in the Divine Condition, whatever arises. But that very rest is a Principle or Fire wherein conditions are dissolved. Thus, in the Way of Radical Intuition, there is apparent, spontaneous Awakening (or “Ascension”) from the theatre of the gross world, and direct Translation into the Perfect Domain. The Way of Radical Intuition is the Way of radical or Divine Transformation in Truth.

In the grosser apparent states, the devotee in Sahaj Samadhi is sacrificed, dissolved, or at rest in Amrita Nadi, the Current from heart to crown (Heart as no-center, which is Radiance to Infinity). There is no effort to ascend by manipulation of attention. There is simply Sacrifice, through radical intuition, in the Heart or Real Condition of all present arising. There is rest in Ignorance-Radiance. But the Process is so profound it is a Fire of Light in which there is always present dissolution of limitations. Thus, the conditions arising are burned up in such Samadhi. There is Awakened Absorption in the Current of Radiance, the Bright or Unbounded Vibratory Swell of Bliss. That Absorption may be accompanied by all kinds of experiential appearances, high and low, of sound and light, of realms and bodies. But no qualification survives the Fire. No strategy is required, no method arises as binding motivation. There is simply the Process of Radical Intuition itself, relative to all conditions, high and low. Thus, Sahaj Samadhi is the perfect and Awakened Principle or Process of Translation into the Condition that is Truth or the Divine. In that case, and only in that case, there is release from manifest conditions, the necessity for repetition of the present or gross dream as well as all hierarchical dreams in subtle conditional realms. Devotees who truly become a Sacrifice in Sahaj Samadhi Awaken in the Perfect Domain by Grace. Such Awakening is Bhava Samadhi, or Translation into the Divine without qualification.