Part IV: CHAPTER 31 The Cosmic Mandala a talk by Da Free John July 11, 1982
Part I MASTER DA FREE JOHN: There has been a great deal
of discussion in recent years about near-death phenomena.
Certain doctors and psychiatrists have been writing about
phenomena reported by people in hospitals who go through a
process in which they seem at one point to die and then are
eventually resuscitated. After they are resuscitated, they
report all kinds of “uncommon” experiences. People have been having these kinds of experiences for
thousands of years. As long as there have been human beings,
people have been having these experiences, and not only when
near death, but under many conditions. In fact, people
commonly have these experiences, but there are so many
taboos against communicating or even having them that people
are being denied access to Ultimate Wisdom. They are being
denied access to learning that which would enable them to
understand and transcend the condition of embodiment. There is presently in the world today very little
awareness or understanding of the brain and what is beyond
the brain. The world is being run on the basis of the most
conventional presumptions of what a human being is. It is
presumed that we are necessarily elemental, fleshy
creatures, and that we should be socializing our
consciousness and simply adapting to the elemental level of
human existence. That and nothing else is supposed to be the
purpose of a human life. There is a mass of very weighty
taboos in the world against doing anything with our
consciousness except socializing it in the context of gross
physical embodiment. If we are doing anything else, we are
suspected of being sick, crazy, aberrated, involved with
unreality. The most creative and wise activities that have ever
involved human beings, however, are precisely those devoted
to the transcendence of gross embodiment and the mere
socialization of consciousness. Only when we transcend our
gross embodiment and our superficial social mind and can
enter the roots of our condition are we engaged in a process
that is creative and ultimately liberating. But the dogmas of this world are based on naive
identification with gross embodiment, and people are
expected by the machine of the State to socialize themselves
and to be very happily serious about fulfilling themselves
and other people in the plane of gross embodiment. The
dogmas of this world demand the socialization of the being
as an absolute commitment. The State and other social
structures enforce that demand for socialization and put so
many heavy taboos and negative consequences in the way of
any other endeavor that other orientations of attention are
not pursued. There is nothing inherently negative about
loving and serving people and achieving a benign presence
among others, but we are binding ourselves by not realizing
and being committed to a process that is beyond mere
socialization. Popular knowledge, furthermore, is always
opposed to doing anything beyond socialization of
consciousness and learning, experiencing, and fulfilling
ones existence in any other context than that of a grossly
manifested human individual. There are times when religious institutions are dominant,
and there are times when secular institutions are dominant.
In our time, secular institutions are largely dominant, and
the form of popular knowledge that is now the norm should
generally be placed under the heading of what we call
science. Scientists in general are materialists, ordinary people
who are fundamentally devoted to gross socialized existence.
They are confronted by unusual phenomena all the time. They
read the same reports that everybody else is reading about
near-death phenomena and mystical and psychic phenomena. And
in general, they are automatically disposed to criticize
these phenomena from a materialistic point of view. They are
like Pharisees. They cannot enter into the domain of such
phenomena themselves, they will not permit anyone else to do
so, and they are busy creating taboos against such phenomena
altogether. The reason near-death phenomena are of interest at the
present time is that they have a certain air of legitimacy.
These phenomena are being reported by scientists, generally
by medical professionals who report the phenomena on the
basis of interviews with their patients. Thus, these
experiences are being observed by scientists secondhand, and
they take place in a condition that is not “artificially”
induced, as in the case of mystical meditation or taking a
drug. Thus, since everybody is going to come near to death
and die, there is an air of legitimacy about these
particular kinds of reports. But the reports also remain
controversial, as if there is some reason why we should not
presume something authentic about them. Not only is there something authentic about them, but the
structure in which those phenomena are arising must be
clearly understood. There is currently no model of existence
in the hands of science, however, whereby these phenomena
can be understood in ultimate terms. As yet, science has not
communicated a world-view that acknowledges all existence,
all of manifestation, to be arising in Consciousness.
Science is still devoted to the ancient view of materialism,
which conceives of consciousness as a secondary development
of material existence. It does not see material existence as
nothing but an electronic modification of Ultimate Being or
Transcendental Consciousness. Yet it is only in that
framework of Realization that phenomena of any kind can be
truly recognized. People who enter into near-death states have experiences
very similar to the experiences of mystics, yogis, psychics,
and people in general who are dissociated from their
physical existence for any number of reasons and not merely
because they have come near to death through an accident or
on an operating table. People thrown into dissociation from
the physical for one reason or another, as in a faint or
swoon, have experiences that actually result from tuning in
to the subtler origins of appearance. People having
experiences of this kind report many things in common. The
differences in their reports arise from the differences in
their states of attention, mind, or consciousness. People who have near-death experiences frequently talk
about a particular class of phenomena, which is the feeling
of separating from the body, floating upward in the room,
looking downward, and seeing, hearing, and observing
altogether the gross material events that are taking place
in the room. This is a phenomenon called out-of-body
experience, or exteriorization. It is a sign that
consciousness can dissociate from physical embodiment while
alive, at least temporarily. Such out-of-body experiences are common. Millions of
people have had them, and not just people on operating
tables. They experience this state with varying degrees of
lucidity, under different conditions, each in a different
frame of mind, and with different degrees of preparation.
But the experience of exteriorization is not a high
experience in the scale of possible experiences. It is just
an immediate dissociation from bodily consciousness, with
attention still fixed in the gross plane of the body. More elaborate reports of near-death phenomena go beyond
this simple experience of exteriorization. In these more
elaborate experiences, people typically report first of all
feeling themselves losing all bodily consciousness and then
beginning to have visual perceptions, perhaps seeing
different kinds of lights. Then they will typically see a
tunnel. In the tunnel, or in the approach to it, they may
have experiences of meetings with people who are no longer
physically embodied. At the end of the tunnel they often
report seeing a white figure, and, depending on their
religious background, they will say that it was Jesus, or
the Virgin Mary, or any one of a number of archetypal
religious figures. They will also see other worlds and
places and have conversations. Eventually, they return to a
sense of association with the body and are again animated
through it. Individuals who have these experiences describe
differently the experiences they had on the way. What is
common among all of these experiences are the basic
structures that are there to be perceived, once one
dissociates from perception in the physical dimension or the
gross environment. Those basic patterns or structures
transcend all the interpretations of mind and all the kinds
of experiences to which attention may lead us in those
structures, and they are basically the same structures that
are otherwise reported by mystics or yogis, who, in the
midst of a controlled life, are able to intentionally
dissociate attention from the gross dimension in times of
meditation, and who have the same kinds of experiences,
including visions of lights, places, persons, archetypal
figures, and deities. Part II MASTER DA FREE JOHN: Truly, out-of-body
experiences and visions are mental phenomena. But mind is
greater than we conceive mind to be from the purely physical
point of view. What you are seeing at the present moment is
actually a vision. You are having a vision at this moment.
You know that you are seeing, but you do not generally
acknowledge or presume that you are having a vision. Rather,
you are identified with a physically embodied state in this
gross environment, and you see and hear on that basis. Thus,
you are not generally in a position to understand the nature
of your own experiencing. You are subject to the dogmas of
the conventional world-view, the common vision of Reality.
Therefore, you tend to deny any ultimacy to your ordinary
experiences, and to your extraordinary experiences as well.
You tend not to become very psychic, because to be psychic
is taboo. You tend not to be mystical, because to drift out
of socialized, body-based attention is taboo. Likewise, you do not even consider the psychic aspect of
your gross perceptions. You tend to be bound to the usual
belief that consciousness is somehow personal, independent,
and reducible to matter, or merely an effect of a material
condition. You grant a great deal of significance and
superior force to what is external to you bodily. You grant
reality to what you are seeing, and you do not significantly
enter into the consideration of the process of seeing
itself. It is more or less common knowledge, at the present time,
that you are not merely seeing what is external in this
room. Your seeing is, in fact, an electronic apparition,
developed in the nervous system of the brain. You have no
direct connection to the gross object, or objects, that you
are seeming to view at the present time. In other words, you
are having a vision. You are not merely seeing a gross
environment, but you are having a vision of a gross
environment. Likewise, your sense of being physically embodied is
communicated to you as consciousness through the electronics
of the nervous system. You are experiencing an apparition,
an electronic sense of being identified with a gross
physical body. The position in which you are experiencing
perceptions is an extremely subtle position. You seem to be
possessed of very gross, tangible objects of attention, but
none of the objects with which you are associated are
actually gross and tangible to you. They are all electronic
apparitions. Because of the tendency to be identified with the body,
and also because of all the taboos associated with
conventional consciousness in this world, people do not
investigate, or thoroughly explore and consider, the status
of their own experience in any moment. Therefore, when they
have uncommon experiences, such as near-death or even
mystical experiences, they interpret and modify those
experiences, or only move into certain kinds of experiences,
because of limiting tendencies or presumptions of mind. Mind is not merely in the brain and less than the brain.
Mind is the circumstance of consciousness in its association
with objects of all kinds. Mind is universal, infinite in
extent. And if we put ourselves into a position to explore
the roots of experiencing, we are going to enter into a
realm of mind in which we realize mind to be greater than
mere daily thinking and social consciousness. Those who take up the discipline of yogic mysticism learn
in the process to become responsible for the tendencies of
mind and attention that cause certain experiences to arise,
or cause attention to gravitate toward one or another kind
of phenomenon, or cause limiting interpretations to be
superimposed on experience. Through the science of yogic
mysticism, living beings can enter into a pure perception of
the mechanism of our existence. The spontaneous experiences of people in the near-death
condition are really impure perceptions of the mechanism
wherein experience is arising, because people are not
completely responsible for attention, and therefore for
mind. Likewise, in the ordinary waking state, because of the
conditional limits of attention, people are engaged in an
impure perception of the present phenomena of ordinary
waking consciousness. They do not directly enter into an
awareness of things. They are living out a conventional
destiny based on un-Enlightened presumptions of born
existence in this world. People do not typically enter into
higher phenomena, or source mechanisms, and even if they do,
whether intentionally or unintentionally, they tend to enter
into them through the mechanism of irresponsible
attention-attention that is habituated to a limited state of
self-identification, limited associations, and mind forms
that are developed in the un-Enlightened drive of the
individual for consolation and survival. But in the near-death experience, and in the death
experience, which will come to everyone, attention moves
directly into, through, and beyond the subtler mechanism of
the brain and nervous system, and then into the Source of
phenomena, of mind, and of the mechanics of attention. That
Source of phenomenal appearances is a great Power. It is
Energy. It is called Shakti in the Hindu tradition. It is
Maya, or the binding power of creation. It is a dimension of
the Ultimate Transcendental or Divine Being, in Which we
inhere, and with Which we are ultimately and perfectly
Identical. But because we are related to That with Which we
are ultimately identified, and in Which we inhere, on the
basis of an already presumed limitation of being, we do not
live on the basis of Identification with the Divine or
Transcendental Condition. The situation of beings in this world is typical of
beings in all worlds. We are presuming a limited condition
of being, based on identification with attention in our
current state of embodiment. The embodied attention is
surrounded by a massive psychic form or individuated state
of energy. And each of us is living out that condition in
the gross plane of embodiment. We have the opportunity in
the subtler range of our existence to explore higher
conditions of existence and the Transcendental or Ultimate
Condition of all existence. That opportunity is directly
available to our consciousness in the present moment, but we
are dissociated from it through the habit mechanism of
attention. Likewise, in sleep, in dreams, in reveries, in
near death, in death, in our life of aspiration and
creativity, in all kinds of moments, we are thrown out of
the circumstance to which we are tending to bind ourselves
habitually, and we have the opportunity to perceive or
intuit That which is Ultimate, Divine, Transcendental. But the state of our attention, which is a mechanical
gesture of consciousness within the frame of manifest
possibilities, determines our experience. If an individual
enters into the near-death or actual death state in a moment
of spiritual maturity, having (through real
self-transcending practice) become responsible for the
mechanism of attention so that the body-mind is in a state
of equanimity and attention is inherently free, then
whatever secondary phenomena may occur, the primary
phenomenon will be directly obvious. What people are seeing in the near-death state are mind
forms or tendencies of mind. The tendencies of their
attention are causing them to gravitate toward apparitions
in the universal realm of appearances. Thus, people do not
generally report a direct awareness of the mechanism on the
basis of which phenomena are arising. Rather, they describe
secondary visions. Part III MASTER DA FREE JOHN: If attention were free to
simply see the universal mechanism in which the phenomena of
near-death experiences are arising, however, what would be
seen is a Mandala of light, or light-energy, made of
concentric circles. When we view this Mandala of light-energy, at first a
dark field appears. That dark field may show signs of
patterning-golden-yellow lightning flashes, or a geometric
composition of lines made of bluish yellow or silvery-gold
light. Then, toward the center of this dark field, a
golden-yellow field will appear. Further toward the middle
of that golden-yellow circle or field is a brilliant blue
field, and between the golden-yellow field and the brilliant
blue field, surrounding the central blue field, is an aura
of dark indigo light. If the vision continues even further,
at the very center of this blue field is a white brightness.
It may be visualized as a very clearly defined star with
five points, or it may be just a brilliant whiteness,
flashing out of the center of the blue. If people talk about seeing down a tunnel when they are
entering into the near-death state or the after-death state,
generally the tunnel is the indigo field that surrounds the
blue. As they enter into the blue, they seem to pass down a
long tunnel made of the indigo field. Then they see into the
blue field itself, and if they do not become involved in the
blue field, they will see beyond its possible visionary
phenomena or apparitions. The blue field itself will seem
like a tunnel that moves into the distance and may even
curve slightly to the right, so that the white brightness
seems to be directly ahead of them, but just slightly around
a curve. The light even looks as if it is shining against
the left wall. In the Tibetan Book of the Dead , it is said that after
death a person will immediately enter into the clear white
light. This is the white brilliance, the primary light from
which all colored light comes prismatically. The curve is
the sign of the crystalline prism that is manifest
existence, which breaks up the whiteness into colors. Just
as a rainbow is red and yellowish at its outer edge, then
blue toward the center, the outer field of the Mandala is
golden-yellow with reddish or pinkish colors at its
periphery and blue toward the center. But at the most
distant central point is the white brightness. In death, attention moves directly into the white
brightness. That white brightness is not merely objective to
attention. If its State is truly Realized, it is Realized to
be the Native Radiance of Transcendental Being, or the
Transcendental Divine Self. Only if it is Realized as such
will attention enter into the Domain of Whiteness and stay
there. That is the state of Liberation or entrance into the
Transcendental or Divine Domain. But we are controlled by the mechanics of attention. We
are already identified with lesser states by virtue of the
habit of attention. Thus, as it is said in the Tibetan Book
of the Dead , if there is no ability to remain in the white
brightness or the clear white light, other apparitions will
immediately appear. The Tibetan Book of the Dead describes a
developing sequence of apparitions, at the end of which
occurs re-embodiment in the gross plane. This text is in
fact a record of the real investigations and real
experiences of highly spiritualized individuals who had the
capacity to enter into all of this freely. What they
describe as the return from the white brightness or the
clear white light to embodiment is in fact a process that is
inevitable in nearly all cases. Each of the levels of this Great Mandala represents a
quality of energy or light. In each of the rings or portions
of this Mandala that move out from the central whiteness are
infinite numbers of possible worlds and kinds of embodiment.
In this world, this gross plane in which we now exist, we
are manifesting, in visionary form, a portion of the
golden-yellow field of the Mandala. We are at the outskirts
of the Great Mandala of the Cosmos at this present moment.
There are grosser conditions of awareness, grosser
possibilities, than the present one, which may be called
hells, or degraded states, or states of embodiment less than
human. They may be represented as forms of worlds other than
the present one, as well as states in the plane of this
gross world that are not necessarily apparent to vision. We are presently existing in the outer frame of the Great
Field of the Cosmic Mandala. Unless there is responsibility
for attention, there will be no movement closer to the
center. Unless there is Enlightenment, there will be no
permanent residence in the Center, or the Source, and there
is no permanence anywhere but in the Source. All
possibilities, all forms of embodiment and experience in the
planes of manifest light, the rainbow of blue and yellow
fields of the Mandala, are temporary. It is possible to live a long time in any plane. It is
even possible to live a long time in this gross world under
certain conditions of yogic transformation. It is possible
to appear as an ordinary human being in this world for
hundreds or thousands of years. Typically, people live just
for a few years, but they could live longer. To live longer
is not to Realize Enlightenment-it is simply to live longer.
It is possible to realize a state of relative equanimity in
this world or any other world and to live more peacefully,
more happily, more pleasurably, more sensibly, more sanely.
Even so, so to live itself is not to be Enlightened, nor is
it a permanent condition. Sooner or later life comes to an
end. Subtler worlds exist closer to the center of the Mandala.
Even in the golden-yellow ring there are subtler worlds
closer to the center. In the blue field, there are all kinds
of worlds. In general, to live in any of the worlds closer
to the center is to live in a condition that is more benign,
with greater powers and with a greater range of phenomenal
possibilities than the usual life. But to live in these
worlds is not to be inherently Enlightened, free, or
immortal. Nor would immortality be desirable in those
planes, because there is no ultimate Happiness even in the
state of equanimity. Equanimity is simply the “sattvic” or balanced condition
in any realm of possibility. Equanimity is not an end in
itself but simply a ground on the basis of which attention
is relatively free. What you do with attention on the basis
of equanimity is the means for the transcendence and
transformation of destiny. DEVOTEE: Master, you have mentioned that there
were worlds for each color in the rainbow. People have said,
for instance, that they have gone to green worlds. MASTER DA FREE JOHN: Yes, every kind of
possibility exists. Everything that mind can be can also be
objectified as a world. You could say that this is a yellow
world. But all the colors appear in it as well. It is yellow
or golden-yellow by virtue of the portion of the cosmic
structure out of which its particular vision is made. But in
each realm, each stage in the Mandala-in the blue realm, or
the yellow realm-all the colors are potential. I mentioned to you that when the Cosmic Mandala is
visualized as light, it may be seen as a dark field, and
then a golden-yellow circle, and then a sort of indigo field
leading to the blue center, and then at the center of the
brilliant blue a white star or a white flash. This vision is
evident even in our own brain mechanism. When we enter into
the subtler energies or mechanics of the visual system of
the brain, we may visualize this Mandala. That visualization
is not the same as the viewing of the Cosmic Mandala itself.
Under certain conditions of relaxation and dissociation of
attention from the body, it is possible to see this Mandala
by pressing the eyeballs and concentrating toward the center
of the brain. What you see then is the Mandala, but it is
the Mandala represented at the level of the structure of
light associated with the brain and nervous system. It is a
kind of personal version of it, therefore. Because the
Mandala is duplicated in every fraction of all appearances,
it can be visualized in the structures of our own brain. But
after we pass through that limiting structure, we see the
same representation of light beyond the brain, through other
media of phenomenal appearance. In vision we pass into the larger cosmic domain of this
Mandala by concentrating on and passing through the Mandala
represented in our own brain. People near death, or having a
low-grade mystical experience, will see the Cosmic Mandala
in, and limited by, the plane of the brain. It would not
appear if the brain were not still active, or if we were not
still bodily attached. But if we see that representation (as
we do in certain mystical states and in the transition to
death), if we Concentrate upon it and hold to the center,
then we will also pass beyond the brain into the cosmic
dimension of light outside the brain. By concentrating on
this representation of the Mandala in the brain, we can move
beyond the brain, even while alive, to see structures beyond
the brain, in the realm of mind or psyche that is cosmic in
scope. As you concentrate on this Mandala, if you do not hold to
the center, you will not see the complete Mandala. At first
you may not see it at all. You may just see a dark field, or
you may see in it the flashes, or lightning, or geometries.
Then you begin to see the Mandala appear by degrees. You may
at first see a golden, sunlike light, or you may see a
silvery-bluish, moonlike light. Or you may see a reddish
light, or lights of any color. They may appear as a
relatively diffuse or generalized field, rather than a spot
at the center. The degree of concentration and freedom of
attention from the body and the diffusing mechanisms of the
brain determines the degree to which you will clearly see
the Mandala in total. Whether the entire Mandala or only a
portion or a representation of it appears, if you do not
continue to hold to the center, you will not see the rest of
it, or you will not see it clearly, or you will not go to
the center, but will stay in the periphery. To the degree
you do not hold to the center, and to the degree you do not
visualize the Mandala completely, you will tend to gravitate
as attention, or as mind, into representations that develop
in the different fields of the Mandala. Thus, if attention is held in the golden-yellow field,
visions will begin to appear in a golden-yellow field. Or
you may pass through the tunnel of the indigo into the blue
field. But then the blue field itself, instead of appearing
with the white light at the center, will appear to be a room
or a place at the end of the tunnel. Originally what is seen
in the blue field, apart from the white light that appears
in the midst of it, is a place of churning forms, a kind of
bluish plastic. But other very strong, clearly defined,
primary colors and shapes also appear in it. It almost seems
like a clearly defined room when you first see it, but then
when you clearly visualize it, you will see that this blue
field contains something like distinct forms, but that they
are not really separate from one another, and they are
moving around. As soon as you dwell upon the blue field, the
mind will cause it to turn into particularized forms.
Attention will move via mind, in that particular plane of
the Mandala, into places, visions, and environments.
Environments may thus be entered into in the blue, or the
gold, or any range or representation of this Mandala. This is why I have recommended to people that the best
discipline at the point of death, or in the midst of the
death process, no matter what they have done all their
lives, is to relax and to release all hold on the body and
the mind and states of attention. Transcend fear through
surrender, and ultimately a visual representation of the
Mandala will appear. When it does, keep your attention to
the center of it. Do not be satisfied with lesser
representations of the Mandala such as a golden light, or a
bluish light, or any other light. Keep holding to the center
until the entire Mandala appears, and keep holding to the
center until you move into the white field. Even though this
exercise will not be sufficient for movement into the white
field permanently, it will be a purifying gesture that
generally will serve your transition and that is therefore
positive. In any case, attention will tend to gravitate from the
white field back into lesser planes and visions. Other
individuals will be seen. Helpful people will appear, and
you will move into another condition quite naturally and
easily. It happens in every case. These transitions after death are not all pleasurable,
however. All kinds of uncomfortable apparitions and
apparently hellish circumstances may appear. Circumstances
may arise that will justify fear and sorrow and anger and
desires of all kinds, and you will tend to locate there for
a time. The secret is to keep surrendering and holding to
the center, not fixing on these visions, but recognizing
them as mind, as possibilities determined by your own habit
of attention. Relax that habit of attention. The more you do
this, the more you will release the quality that is tending
to arise, and you will minimize the stresses that may be
associated with the transition. In any case, sooner or later a relatively fixed condition
will arise based on the limits of your ability to release
and transcend the mechanism of attention. In that condition,
whatever you may or may not remember about the Way of
surrendering or transcendence, you will be embodied, fixed,
related. That is precisely what has happened to you
here. If you can achieve a state of spiritual maturity and
responsibility in life, then you will not experience the
utter lapse from responsibility and general intuition of the
Awakened Condition at death and after death. You will
possess the arms in whatever condition arises after death.
Likewise, you will have those arms during this lifetime if
you will consider the Way and take up its practice. Your
experience will more and more authenticate, verify, and
justify the Way. However, the experiences associated with spiritual
practice are not significant in and of themselves. They are,
in general, just objectified states of attention, or
mind-forms, states of energy. We must recognize them,
release them, and move beyond them. Until attention is Free in its Source, it cannot remain
in the Transcendental Condition. We are brought into that
Condition at death, but we do not and cannot remain There,
in spite of our belief in It and our desire to stay There,
unless we have done the sadhana, or real spiritual practice,
whereby we become responsible for the very habit energy of
attention and Realize its Source-Condition. That Realization
requires profound clarity, devotion, commitment, and
practice. Thus, it is very unusual for any living being to pass
from this world, or any other world, into the Divine Domain
and to remain in that Condition. People can have temporary
experiences of It, however. For example, in near death and
death, experiences of this Mandala of Origination can be
generated or a temporary perception of this Origin may be
experienced. It is always there to be glimpsed. Part IV MASTER DA FREE JOHN: It would be useful for any human
individual and all of humanity as a cultural order to enter
into the investigation of the source of patterning or
experience and learn about its mechanism. Even so, this
investigation is not sufficient. Through one kind of science
or another, investigations into these mechanisms will be
made in the future, just as such investigations have already
been made, most typically on the basis of the ancient
sciences of yoga and mysticism. But such science, such
investigation, such learning, is not sufficient. Wisdom must
be added to it-a spiritual Way of life must be added to this
acquired knowledge. The mechanism of attention is a mechanical structure,
binding on consciousness, and what you know in the plane of
the mind is not sufficient to enable you to transcend the
mechanisms of attention. Many people, on the basis of a
religious or spiritual point of view, entertain some level
of presumption about such mechanisms and the after-death
process, but they have not the ability to enter into a
higher destiny or the Transcendental Condition of Perfect
Freedom, Liberation, and Eternal Existence in the Divine
Domain. Thus, humanity needs more than science. In addition
to some higher or esoteric knowledge about the circumstance
of our existence, humanity needs the Wisdom of
Transcendental Teaching and the Wisdom of practice. Attention is a mechanical process or superimposition on
consciousness itself. It determines a disposition toward a
certain kind of experience, and once you start having that
experience, you begin to superimpose even on that a sense of
identification with your present state. Clinging to your
present condition, you begin to develop fruitless desires
for fulfillment, even desires for release. There is useful knowledge in your individual experience
of uncommon states, reached via one or another kind of
circumstance, and in the reports by others of such uncommon
states. But in addition to useful knowledge, you must
understand your condition of existence and the mechanics of
your own attention. You must become devoted to a practice of
life that will enable you to become responsible for
attention, so that while alive, and in the midst of uncommon
states, and after death, you will have the ability to locate
attention in its Source and to locate your existence in the
Transcendental or Divine Domain, which is the True Heaven of
Existence, the very Divine State. If you do not practice in
a manner that enables you to be responsible for the
relocation of attention beyond its present tendencies or
circumstances, then you will always tend to return to the
states that are determined by the mechanical tendencies of
your attention. At death there is a movement into the clear light, and
there may be temporary experiences of the clear light while
you are alive as well. But you will not have the ability to
remain in that Condition, or even to realize what that
Condition is, except to perceive a clear brilliance and feel
a sense of temporary freedom, unless you are responsible for
the movement of attention. In spite of any secondary desires
to remain there, you will automatically drop back from the
position of the clear white light into the planes of
existence, through the blue and the yellow into the gross
condition again. This is absolutely inevitable. There are no
two ways about it. No vicarious means exists for escaping that
inevitability. There is no mere belief in Jesus, or God, or
any superior power that is sufficient to move you into the
Transcendental Condition. No amount of knowing about the
mechanisms of that transition, no amount of knowing about
the mechanisms of the arising of experience, is sufficient
to enable you to move beyond these limitations into the
Transcendental Condition. Only the actual practice of the
transcendence of attention, wherein its limiting tendencies
are overcome and it achieves the freedom to locate itself in
the Transcendental Domain, is sufficient. There is
absolutely no other way to be Liberated from the binding
conditions of the cosmos. People can learn and perhaps move gradually through the
stages of life that I have described, and eventually enter
into the disposition of the seventh stage of life and then
into the Transcendental Condition. But to presume that you
will move by such a route is to place a huge obstacle before
you. Moving through that process is not something you can do
in a short period of time. Many lifetimes and powerful
experiences intervene in the meantime to prevent you from
fulfilling that aspiration. The power of the phenomena
experienced outside this gross embodiment is immense. Maya, or the binding power of the manifesting Force, is
so profound that it will distract you. Your attention is
already bound to an egoic or self-centered condition of
existence, and you are ready to be the pawn of that Maya. It
is inevitable. You will not possess the ability to cut
through it. You will be immediately distracted by secondary
apparitions in the plane of the Universal Mandala. They will
seem to you so wonderful, or so awesome, or so terrifying,
that you will become subject to your own egoic emotional
turns-fear, sorrow, anger, attachment, lust, and so
forth. To casually presume you will begin with a little
improvement of life and a positive aspiration and belief and
hopefully awaken to the capacity for Liberation into the
Transcendental Domain is simply a weak proposition. It is an
excuse not to practice. If you truly understand the process,
you will realize that you have no option but to deal
directly with the mechanism of attention. The Way is not the
piecemeal path of the progressive stages of life. It is not
the path of the devotion of attention to phenomena, high or
low in the scale of Nature. As soon as attention is devoted
to objective manifestation, either in the form of this
apparent gross realm or in the form of any subtle
apparition, it is subject to the binding power of the
objectified force. The objectified force of Nature, even the
objective white light, has the effect of binding you until
you are free of the egoic significance of attention. Therefore, the Way itself is most direct. It is not the
way of the stages, fulfilled by moving attention into
subtler and subtler dimensions of objective existence. It is
the direct Way of returning attention to its Source. If this
Way is taken up, then the way of the stages is bypassed. In
order to take it up, however, it is necessary to be prepared
for this direct practice. You do not become prepared for it
by taking up the practice of the stages of life. You prepare
yourself by restoring equanimity to the body-mind and
freeing attention from the binding concerns of the
body-mind. This is a much simpler proposition, and it forms the
basis of the culture of practice in the Way that I Teach.
This culture of practice is a culture of preparation
relative to the first five stages of life, wherein the
body-mind is restored to equanimity, and attention is freed
of its binding association with the body-mind. Then, when
the body-mind is thus balanced and attention freed, you can
actually take up the practice of the direct submission of
attention to its Source. This practice is given in its
essential outline in the description of the Perfect Practice
in The Liberator (Eleutherios) . The preliminary practices
and preparatory disciplines of the Way, including those
relative to diet, sexuality, conscious exercise, service,
and meditation, are described in the general literature of
my Teaching. But you must remember that the culture of preparation is
just that-a culture of preparation, in which the body-mind
is restored to equanimity and attention is set free. That
culture of preparation is not an end in itself. You are not
supposed to be struggling with it and spending the rest of
your life engaged in it. It should be entered into based on
clear understanding, real “hearing” of the Teaching
Argument, real self-knowledge in the midst of that
consideration, and “seeing,” or conversion to the
Spirit-Presence and reception of Spirit Blessing. In the
midst of such real commitment, you can, in a finite period
of time, enter into the practice of the submission of
attention to its Source. The total culture of preparatory discipline and the
direct practice of the transcendence of attention engaged in
the second stage of the Perfect Practice are a Way that
bypasses the limiting concerns and orientations of the first
five stages of life. The second stage of the Perfect
Practice bypasses the limited aspect of the orientation of
the traditional sixth stage of life. It is not merely a
practice of meditation on the atman or ones self as
consciousness separate from phenomena. It is a matter of
devoting attention directly to its Source, not merely
collapsing attention on itself, but turning attention to its
Source, to the Consciousness, the Being, the Living Force in
which the presumption of egoity, or self as limited
attention, is transcended. The seventh stage of life is a
unique culture for which you must be prepared by fulfilling
the second stage of the Perfect Practice. The Way in the
seventh stage of life is practiced on the basis of the
Siddhi of recognition, the Power or Capacity that is
inherent in the Awakened Condition. The first stage of the Perfect Practice, which
encompasses the Way of Faith and the Way of Insight as well,
is a culture in which equanimity is restored to the
body-mind, and attention is released from bondage to the
concerns of the body-mind. It is a culture of discipline
based on “hearing” or understanding as its pre-condition.
The second stage of the Perfect Practice is the practice,
meditation, or samadhi of immersion in the Transcendental
Being, for which we have the capacity when attention is set
free, on the basis of equanimity of the body-mind. Thus,
free attention is the pre-condition of the second stage of
the Perfect Practice. The third stage of the Perfect
Practice, or the seventh stage of life, is a culture of
practice based on prior Awakening or Enlightenment, which is
its pre-Condition. Thus, each of the three levels of the Perfect Practice
has its unique pre-condition. It is not merely a matter of
thinking about these ideas, or believing in them. You must
do the practice of each of the stages. You cannot merely
read my Teaching in The Liberator (Eleutherios) and presume
that you are in the seventh stage of life or that you are
immediately ready to do the practice of the submission of
attention to its Source. You do not have the ability to do
those practices until the pre-conditions are met. What you
might be able to do, if you could hear the Argument,
understand yourself rightly, and be committed to the Way, is
to begin the practice wherein you restore equanimity to the
body-mind and free attention for the second stage of the
Perfect Practice. A rare few might be able to take up the Perfect Practice
in its first stage, as I have described it in The Liberator
(Eleutherios) . They may actually have the unique capacity
to practice in that fashion. Others will have to devote
themselves to the Way of Faith or the Way of Insight until
they awaken to the capacity for the second stage of the
Perfect Practice. The third stage of the Perfect Practice is based on
Enlightenment. It is no longer a matter of seeking
Enlightenment. Enlightenment is already the case. The Source
Condition of consciousness, the Nature of Nature, the
Subjective Matrix of the Objective Matrix of Nature has been
Realized. The self is Realized to be Transcendental Being,
Self-Radiant. That Self-Radiant Being is objectively viewed
as the clear white light in the center of the Mandala. When
you are already in the position of the clear white light by
virtue of Realization, then you have the capacity to move
attention into that Condition, transcending all the limiting
conditions that are potential in this Cosmic Mandala. Unless there is such prior Realization of the
Source-Condition of attention, the mere movement of
attention into phenomenal states in the Cosmic Mandala will
not be sufficient for Enlightenment. Attention that has not
Realized its Source-Condition is not free. It is bound to
certain tendencies and habits of association. Those limiting
tendencies will be reflected in superimposed limits on
experience in the form of mind, and they will cause
experiences to appear in one or another fashion in the Great
Mandala. We are in that Great Mandala of Infinite Energy at this
very moment. But you are, by virtue of the mechanism of
attention, seeing that Mandala in the form of this room, as
a solid, gross, objective condition. And you are bewildered,
wondering what this is all about, trying to survive, and
trying to feel happy. Deep beneath all of that, you want to
be released, you want to be free, you want simply to be
Happy. You do not quite know how to achieve that Happiness,
so you are seeking fulfillment in the plane that is
conventionally available to your attention. The Way of actual release or Liberation is the Way that I
Teach. It is the Way of observing the mechanism of attention
and becoming completely responsible for it. It is the Way of
freeing attention from binding association with present
conditions, so that it can enter into its true Condition,
and not merely enter into subtler states of objective
Nature. Part V MASTER DA FREE JOHN: The views communicated in the
lesser stages of life are about the uses of attention, based
on un-Enlightenment. In the mystical yogas of the fifth
stage of life, Enlightenment is the goal, and the method is
to devote attention to subtle objects in Nature or in the
subtle lights of the Cosmic Mandala. But it is not possible
to enter by those means into the white field at the root of
this Mandala, because attention is already identified with a
position that is less than that great white field. Attention
is already habituated to a position in the periphery of the
white source of lights. It is not possible, even by purifying the associations of
attention, to move into and remain in the Origin. Through
means of self-denial and meditative dissociation of
attention from gross perception, you can at most move
attention into a subtler plane of existence. But you will
not be able to move attention into its Ultimate
Source-Condition by moving in the objective realm of the
cosmos. It is not sufficient, therefore, to rise by mystical
means into subtler perception. You must first of all Realize
the Source-Condition of attention itself. Having Realized
That, then you will be able to recognize phenomenal
existence from the position of the Self-Radiant Being.
Whatever arises will be recognizable. This is the sadhana or practice that continues naturally
in the seventh stage of life. It is not an effort of the ego
but the natural process that develops as the spontaneous
capacity of Enlightenment. In the seventh stage of life,
therefore, the being is Awakened from its egoic position,
its limited state of confinement to a certain objectified
existence as a self, or a limited being. Consciousness is
inherently Radiant as the Transcendental Self-Radiance of
Divine Being in the seventh stage of life. The apparent
individual in the seventh stage of life is Transfigured by
his or her own Radiance, the Radiance of the Self, which is
neither male nor female nor an egoic identity of any
kind. Therefore, in the first phase of the seventh stage of
life, there is recognition of the grosser context of
embodied being. In that phase of life the embodied being is
Transfigured, spontaneously Free, Radiant, Blissful, Loving,
and Helpful. But the seventh stage of life is not about
phenomenal changes themselves. It is about existing in the
Enlightened or Transcendental Condition, the Self-Radiant
Condition. The fundamental or natural, spontaneous process
in the seventh stage of life is to recognize whatever arises
in the Transcendental Being. In the first phase of the seventh stage of life, the
grosser context of apparently embodied attention is
recognized directly in every moment. It is more and more
Transfigured. The activities of attention are generated
spontaneously. There may even be lifetimes that would pass
in this first phase of the seventh stage but, after a period
of time, the seeds of even the Enlightened movement of
attention into the gross plane will be released. They will
have been used up. Until then, a person having become active
in the first phase of the seventh stage of life might
function as a Teacher in the gross plane-in this world, for
instance. But, having done service in that form, the seed of
even that motivation of attention is recognized and
undone. Inevitably, therefore, at some point the second phase of
the seventh stage of life begins, which is the phase of
Transformation. Among its signs are the development of what
are called “siddhis,” or powers, such as unusual psychic and
spiritual healing abilities. These siddhis might even be
associated with the Work of an individual as a Teacher. But
eventually the second phase, or the phase of Transformation,
enters its fullest form, without significant association
with activity or attention in the gross plane. This phase
may also be lived out in this world, or it may be lived out
in subtler worlds after death as well. It is also a stage of
recognition of whatever is arising as nothing but a
non-binding modification of Transcendental Being. Eventually the seeds of the movement of attention in
those subtler, transformed conditions of attention will be
dissolved, and the third or ultimate phase of the seventh
stage of life appears, the stage of Translation into the
Radiant Domain of the Self, or That which is objectively
observed as the clear white light in the center of the
Mandala of the Cosmos. Thus, in the third phase of the
seventh stage of life, the already Enlightened Condition, in
which all conditions of attention are recognizable, movement
into the Divine Domain or the clear white light is Realized
as a permanent Condition. There is no possibility of moving
permanently into that Radiant Domain, free of all
limitations, until there is just such Enlightenment, and
such perfect recognition of all phenomena. The third stage of the Perfect Practice is the Great Way.
It is the Way that I Teach. It is the Great Condition of
existence. It is the spontaneous Way of Life that is lived
by beings who have Awakened to the Transcendental Condition.
Prior to such Awakening, we have the capacity to move as
attention into the Mandala of the Cosmos, and into subtler
states, but we do not have the capacity to enter permanently
into the White Domain, the Transcendental Domain, that is
the Subjective Source of all conditions. The lesser stages
of life are not the ground of Enlightenment. But once
Enlightenment is the case, then there is the capacity to
move into the Transcendental Domain. It is possible to be
Enlightened in any domain. In the seventh stage of life a
being can appear in any domain whatsoever, in any one of the
levels of this Great Mandala. But until there is
Enlightenment, it is not possible to transcend all
domains. The Great Siddhi of Enlightenment is the capacity for
free attention. It is the most useful ability, and it is
what we develop on the basis of our primal motive toward
release. That unpleasant mood which is unhappy, fearful,
wanting to be released is our best advantage in the embodied
condition. That desire to be released becomes the capacity
of free attention when we really exploit it and devote
ourselves to that motive. In that case it ceases to be
merely an unpleasant disease. When we acknowledge the motive
toward release and make it the mover of our lives, we
transcend our seeking and our bewilderment. We become
associated with real practice, real responsibility Then that
motive toward release becomes the simple movement or
capacity of free attention. That is why the unpleasant mood or primal motive toward
release in its neurotic form is so valuable to us-not for
its own sake as a mood, which is relatively unpleasant, but
because, once we really use it and reclaim it from its
diseased and neurotic condition, it simply becomes free
attention, or that which is inherently free, inherently
released, and therefore that which inherently satisfies the
motive toward release. Part VI MASTER DA FREE JOHN: Attention moves in a great
electronic field, a three-dimensional realm of little
electronic dots. Attention in itself is one dot, in one
position in this moment and in the next moment in another
position, not just in a two-dimensional screen, like a TV,
but in a three-dimensional realm of an infinite number of
electronic dots. Attention can move to any one of those
spaces instantly, without moving through everything in
between. Attention is just the point of awareness, keyed
into a great electronic medium that has the capacity to
represent itself as solid appearances, or just light, or
energy appearances, or darkness, or nothingness. Truly, the entire affair is terrible, absolutely
terrible. It is a horror to contemplate. The only thing that
makes it not seem horrible to us is our capacity to achieve
a state of relative equanimity in our present condition. We
can balance ourselves, feel relatively relaxed and enjoying
something like pleasurable feeling, but we are still not
immortal, Enlightened, Free, Happy. We are just intoxicated
with equanimity. That is why equanimity is not an end in
itself in this Way. It is simply the base for free
attention. We must do something with our
attention, having realized equanimity. We must not
just hang around in a sattvic state, righteously enjoying
our balanced condition. That condition will last only as
long as conditions permit it to last in this world, and it
will cease at death. All kinds of influences can interfere
with our equanimity. Thus, it is not an end in itself. It is useful to bring the body-mind into a state of
equanimity. It has secondary associations that are
pleasurable, but basically it is only useful. It is a
condition in which our attention is free from bondage to
those conditions that, in equanimity, are now in a state of
balance. Thus, we must use equanimity as a base, an asana on
the base of which we can enter into the contemplation and
samadhi of the Condition or Source of attention. Consciousness is just like a point, moving in this
infinite, three dimensional crystal, or plane,or sphere of
dots. It feels individuated, separate, and trapped. Wherever
it is, it sees everything around it. Wherever you look,
everything surrounds that center of looking. In the next
moment, you are in this spot, or that spot. There are always
the surrounding forms, motions, and energies. You are
trapped as this little point in the midst of it. We must take attention away from its preoccupation with,
or bondage to, this infinite medium of dots and let it fall
back into the contemplation of its own Source. When that is
done most profoundly, then there is the inherent or tacit,
spontaneous recognition of the Infinite Field in which this
mechanical act of attention is being moved. Then whenever
attention does move, wherever it moves, its condition and
its objects are inherently, instantly recognizable. They are
still what they are as an appearance, but they are
recognizable in their Source Condition.They do not have the
capacity to destroy Enlightenment, or the Realization of the
Truth. But we must persist in this power of recognition. It
is a kind of Yoga of Enlightenment. Unless we persist in it,
attention will simply continue to arise mechanically in this
great crystal or Mandala. And, Enlightened or not, there is
still the environment of limitation. Thus, in the Enlightened condition or disposition, we
must exist moment to moment as this Siddhi, or Power, or
Disposition, of recognition. It is this Power that will
Transfigure, Transform, and Translate attention and its
field into the Ultimate Domain. Therefore ultimately all of
that will be replaced or Outshined by the Divine Radiance,
the White Force in which it is appearing. The environment of
appearances is only an apparition based on this mechanism of
attention. If attention is transcended in its Source, the
environment ofappearances is recognizable. If the Power of
recognition is magnified, then all of these conditions will
be Outshined by the Radiance that is the Source of
Nature. That is Liberation. That is Enlightenment in its ultimate
sense. The Siddhi of Enlightenment guarantees that
Liberation. Enlightenment itself is certainly Liberation,
but it is not an end phenomenon. It is the native Condition.
That native Condition is a Siddhi, a Great power, which
permits us to transcend the limiting force of the Cosmic
Mandala That is the esotericism of the seventh stage of
life. That is the Process to which all those who respond to
me are being drawn. It is That to which you are invited. But
you can only participate in That if you actually live the
Way, achieve equanimity and free attention, resolve
attention in its Source, and then persist in the spontaneous
Siddhi or Process of recognition, until there is the
Outshining of conditional existence. More: Attention,
Death and Realization Transcending
the Cosmic Mandala
Transcending the Cosmic
Mandala