Awareness and Consciousness

*note* nice explaining from Subramuniyaswami about awareness and consciousness,and the difference between them.
-added by danny-
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Coursing the shakti kundalini, transcend the successive gates of awareness. Reduce the perishable body to its elemental constituents and then discard them. Then do you enter the grace of the Holy One, and there you abide and adore. That, indeed, is the fitting worship of Sadasiva.

Tirumantiram 1854

Awareness, a Ball of Light

The average person who is not a mystic lives two-thirds in the external area of the mind and one-third within himself. The within of himself can be, and sometimes is, very foreboding. He doesn't understand it. He is a little afraid of it and prefers to involve himself with external things. Possibly he's had some inner experiences, some emotional unhappinesses, and he shuns anything that is inner. The mystic lives, and is taught to live, two-thirds within himself and only one-third in the external. In learning how to do this, the mystic is taught to become consciously conscious, or aware that he is aware. He learns to separate awareness from that which he is aware of. The person who is not a mystic, living two-thirds in the external mind, says, "I am happy," meaning, "I am aware of a state of mind called happiness, and I am in that state, so that is me." Or, "I am unhappy. Unhappiness is me." The mystic living two-thirds within says to himself, "I am flowing through the area of the mind that's always unhappy." He doesn't change; he is a pure state of awareness.

Visualize a little ball of light. We'll call that man's individual awareness, and that light is shining right out from his eyes, and this little ball of light is going through the mind. It's going through the area of the mind that's always unhappy. It's going through the area of the mind that's always dreaming, the area of the mind that's delightfully happy, the area of the mind that's in absolute bliss, the area of the mind that's absolutely in jealousy all the time, the area that's in fear all the time -- many people live in this area of the mind; it's quite crowded with lots of balls of light there. This ball of light flows through the area of the mind that's in resentment. It's like a churning ocean. It's a delightful place to be in, especially if you're a little ball. You get bounced all around. Then there's the area of the mind that is completely peaceful and has always been peaceful. No mood or emotion has ever been in it to ruffle it, because that's the peaceful area of the mind. The one who meditates seeks out this area to become aware in. Man's individual awareness is just like this little ball of light, and it's like a camera. It photographs. It registers. It understands. It is pure intelligence. Man knows where he is in the mind, but the first step in awakening on the path of enlightenment is to separate awareness from that which it is aware of.

Tuesday
LESSON 30
Claim the Being Of Yourself

We say, "I am sick," and in the English language that means my body is sick, or I am aware of this body not being in a perfect state of health. The mystic knows he is not this body. He can even remember dropping off the body many, many different times, getting new bodies through the process of reincarnation. We are not what we are aware of. We are separate from that which we are aware of. We are only flowing through these areas of the mind. If we live in San Francisco, we are not San Francisco. If we live in unhappiness, we are not unhappiness. That's only one of the cities of the mind. This is a great meditation. You can grasp this awakening in thirty seconds. You can grasp this awakening in thirty hours, or thirty minutes. You can grasp this awakening and have it come to you vibrantly in thirty weeks, thirty months, or thirty years or thirty lifetimes. It just depends upon your willpower.

As soon as we can understand awareness detached from that which it is aware of, we have a vibrant energy, a tremendous drive. A tremendous willpower is released from within us, and we live with the feeling that we can do anything that we want to do, almost as quickly as we want to do it. We want things to happen now, for we vividly see the area where they already exist within the force fields of the mind itself.

How do we live our life from this point? We begin to apply this philosophy in every department of our life. There are some habit patterns in our subconscious mind that have not caught up with this new perspective as yet, and you'll be running up against them. As soon as you find awareness totally identified with a subconscious area that has become conscious, immediately turn inward, detach awareness from that which it is aware of and just be pure energy.

You can expect a beautiful life, a beautiful relationship with the being of yourself. Claim the being of yourself as you. You have enough knowledge now. You don't have to discover the being of yourself and keep looking for it. Just be the being of yourself and travel through the mind as the traveler travels around the globe. The wonderful story of awareness, I could go on and on talking about it, because it is so very basic and so very, very important. This then makes an infinite intelligence and everyone the same. Only, they are living in different areas of the mind, or different houses.

Wednesday
LESSON 31
The Mechanics Of Attachment

Have you ever had people come to you and tell you all of their problems? What did they do? As a pure state of awareness, they came to you as a pure state of awareness. You were not identified in the area of the mind that they are living in. So, they came to you, because they want to get out of the area of the mind that they're living in. They've been living in it so long, they think they are that area of the mind, like somebody that has lived in a house so long and is so attached to it that they would rather die than move from the house. So then, they come to you and start telling all the problems. First they start with the little ones, and then they start with the big ones, and all their complaints, heartaches and everything that that area of the mind involves. Now, you can do one of two things. You can gently talk with them and bring them out of that area of the mind into your area of the mind, or they can move your awareness right into that area of the mind, too. And when they go away, you are feeling terrible. You're feeling just awful.

You've gone to a movie. The movie screen is just a screen. The film is just film. And the light is just light. And yet the combination of the three can move your awareness into areas of the mind that can upset your nerve system, make you cry, make you laugh, make you have bad dreams for a week, change your whole, entire perspective of life -- the combination of these three physical elements can do this, if it can attract your attention.

Now, if we are sitting in a movie, and we are realizing that we are going through moods and emotions but we are not the moods and emotions that we are going through -- all we are doing is being entertained by our senses -- then that's the mystic. He is enjoying life and what life has to offer. He is even remembering in past lives when he had similar experiences that the players are portraying on the screen, and he has empathy with them. He is living a full and a vibrant life, and yet when he walks out of the movie house, or walks away from the TV, he has forgotten the whole thing. He doesn't carry it with him. His awareness is immediately right where he is currently. That's the power of the great eternity of the moment.

Thursday
LESSON 32
Living Two-Thirds Within

Living two-thirds within oneself and one-third in the external world -- how do we do it? As soon as we live within ourselves, we become conscious of all of our various secret thoughts, all of our various emotions, that we would just as soon be without. Therefore, we distract ourselves and endeavor to live two-thirds in the external world and only one-third within ourselves. As aspirants on the path, you have to live your life two-thirds within yourself. When you are conscious of the thoughts that you don't want to think, the emotions that you don't want to feel, go deep within where they don't exist. Take awareness to the central source of energy, right within the spine itself. Feel that energy flowing through the body, moving the muscles, enlivening the cells. Then you are two-thirds within yourself, and the world looks bright and cheery all the time; the sun is always shining. Immediately, when we begin to identify totally with our thoughts as being reality, then we begin to make mistakes. We are living two-thirds in the external world.

How to strike the balance? Regulate the breath throughout the day. Keep the spine always straight. Always sit up straight. As soon as the spine is bent, awareness is externalized. We are living two-thirds in the external area of the mind and only one-third within. As soon as the spine is straight, our awareness is internalized. We are living two-thirds within and only one-third out.

What's the biggest barrier? Fear. Afraid of our secret thoughts, afraid of our secret feelings. What's the biggest escape from fear? Go to the center, where energy exists, the energy that moves the life through the body. The simplest way is move your spine back and forth. Feel the power that moves that spine. Feel the power that moves that spine back and forth. Feel that energy going out through the physical body. Open your eyes and look at the world again, and you will see it bright and shiny. You're two-thirds in and one-third out in awareness. You're balanced. "Be renewed by a change of your mind." Be renewed by releasing awareness from one area of the vast universe of the mind, drawing it back into its source and releasing it again, sending it to another of the vast areas of the mind.

Friday
LESSON 33
The Great Study Of Awareness

The study of awareness is a great study. "I am aware." The key to this entire study is the discovery of who or what is the "I am." It is the key to the totality of your progress on the path of enlightenment. What is awareness? As you open your physical eyes, what is it that is aware of what you see? When you look within, deep within, and feel energy, you almost begin to see energy. A little more perception comes, and you do actually see energy, as clearly as you see chairs and tables with your physical eyes open.

But what is it that is aware? When awareness moves through superconsciousness, it seems to expand, for it looks out into the vastness of superconsciousness from within and identifies with that vastness. This is what is meant by an expanded state of awareness. What is awareness? Discover that. Go deep within it. Make it a great study. You have to discover what awareness is before you can realize the Self God. Otherwise, realization of the Self God is only a philosophy to you. It is a good philosophy, however, a satisfying and stable philosophy. But philosophies of life are not to be intellectually learned, memorized and repeated and nothing more. They are to be experienced, step by step by step. Get acquainted with yourself as being awareness. Say to yourself, "I am awareness. I am aware. I am not the body. I am not the emotions. I am not the thinking mind. I am pure awareness."

It will help for us to make a mental picture. Let us now try to visualize awareness as a round, white ball of light, like one single eye. This ball is being propelled through many areas of the mind, inner and outer, and it is registering all the various pictures. It has, in fact, four eyes, one on each side of it. It is not reacting. The reaction comes when awareness is aware of the astral body and the physical body. It is in those bodies that reaction occurs. We are aware of the reactions in these bodies, for the physical body and the astral body are also part of the vast, vast universe of the mind.

Each individual awareness, ball of light, is encased in many bodies. The first and nearest encasement is the body of the soul. The second encasement is the astral, or intellectual-emotional, body. The third encasement is the physical body. The radiation from awareness, this ball of light, is the aura. Awareness is an extension of prana from the central source, issuing energy.

Energy goes where awareness flows. When awareness focuses on relationships, relationships flow. When awareness focuses on philosophy, that unfolds itself. Ultimately, when awareness focuses on itself, it dissolves into its own essence. Energy flows where awareness goes. I was always taught that if one foot was injured, for example, to focus on the other foot and transfer the healthy prana from that foot to the ailing foot.

Saturday
LESSON 34
Awareness and Consciousness

Consciousness and awareness are the same when awareness is totally identified with and attached to that which it is aware of. To separate the two is the artful practice of yoga. Naturally, the Shum-Tyeif language is needed to accomplish this. When awareness is detached from that which it is aware of, it flows freely in consciousness. A tree has consciousness. Awareness can flow into the tree and become aware of the consciousness of the tree. Consciousness and mind are totally equated as a one thing when awareness and consciousness are a one thing to the individual. But when awareness is detached from that which it is aware of, it can flow freely through all five states of mind and all areas of consciousness, such as plants and the Earth itself, elements and various other aspects of matter. Here we find awareness separate from consciousness and consciousness separate from the five states of mind attributed to the human being. In Sanskrit we have the word chaitanya for consciousness, and for awareness it is sakshin, meaning witness, and for mind the word is chitta. Consciousness, mind, matter and awareness experience a oneness in being for those who think that they are their physical body, who are convinced that when the body ends, they end and are no more.

We have three eyes. We see with our physical eyes and then we think about what we have seen. Going into meditation, we see with our third eye our thoughts. Then we choose one or two of them and think about them and lose the value of the meditation. It is the control of the breath that controls the thoughts that emerge from the subconscious memory patterns. Once this is accomplished, and the ida, pingala and sushumna merge, we are seeing with the third eye, which is the eye of awareness, wherever we travel through the mind, inside or outside of our own self.

The minute awareness is attached to that which it is aware of, we begin thinking about what we were aware of. Controlling the breath again detaches awareness, and it flows to another area of the mind, as directed by our innate intelligence, this intangible superconscious, intelligent being of ourselves that looks out through the eye of awareness in a similar way as do the two eyes of the physical body. This then divides what we are aware of and thinking of what we were aware of, or distinguishes the process of thinking from that of seeing during meditation.

Awareness travels into the wonderful strata of thought, where thought actually exists in all of its refined states. First in these strata of thought is an area where ideas are only in a partial, overall, conceptual stage. Deeper into this stratum, they, as concepts, become stronger and stronger until finally they almost take physical form. Finally, they do take physical form. But you are the pure, individual awareness, the ball of seeing light that is seeing all of this occur within these strata of mind and not identifying too closely with them. The quest is to keep traveling through the mind to the ultimate goal, merging with Siva. When you are conscious that you are awareness, you are a free awareness, a liberated soul. You can go anyplace in the mind that you wish.

The mission is: don't go anyplace. Turn awareness back in on itself and simply be aware that you are aware. Try to penetrate the core of existence. Become conscious of energy within the physical body and the inner bodies, flowing out through the nerve system and drawing forth energy from the central source of the universe itself. Now try to throw awareness into this central source of energy and dive deeper and deeper in. Each time you become aware of something in the energy realm, be aware of being aware. Finally, you go beyond light. Finally, you go into the core of existence itself, the Self God, beyond the stillness of the inner areas of mind. That is the mission and that is what humanity is seeking -- total Self-God Realization.

Sunday
LESSON 35
Awareness Finds A New Home

Needless to say, the Self does not mean the realization of your personality. Some people think that this is what Self Realization means. "I want Self Realization," they say, thinking all the time it means, "I want to realize that I am an individual and not dependent upon my parents. I want Self Realization." Other people feel it means, "I want to realize my artistic abilities and be able to create." It does not mean that at all. All this is of external consciousness, the intellectual area of the mind. It is a lesser form of self realization. Self Realization is finding That which is beyond even superconsciousness itself, beyond the mind -- timeless, causeless, spaceless.

After Self Realization, awareness has a new home. It does not relate to the external mind anymore in the same way. It relates to the Self God, Parasiva, as home base and flows out into the various layers of the mind, and in again. Before Self Realization, awareness was in the external mind trying to penetrate the inner depths. Then it would return to the external mind and again try to penetrate the within through the processes of meditation. After Self Realization, the whole process of the flow of awareness is reversed.

Mind and consciousness are synonymous. Awareness is man's individual spiritual being, the pure intelligence of his spiritual body, flowing through this vast universe of the mind. We want to be able to flow awareness through any area of the mind consciously, at will, as we go in and in and in toward our great realization of the Self God, which is beyond mind, beyond time, beyond consciousness, beyond all form. Yet, it is not an unconscious state. It is the essence of all being, the power which makes the electricity that flows through the wire that lights the light that illumines the room. When we sit, simply being aware of being aware, the currents of the body harmonized, the aura turns to streaks of light dashing out into the room, and we are sitting in our own perfect bliss, simply aware, intensely aware, of being aware. Awareness itself then turns in on itself enough to experience, to become, the Self God -- That which everyone is seeking.

That is the sum total of the path. That is the path that you are on. That is the experience that if you keep striving you will have in this life, even if it is at the point of death. It is then you will reincarnate as a great teacher on the planet and help many others through to the same goal. For there is no death and there is no birth for the immortal body of the soul that you are, that pure intelligence that goes on and on and on and on and on and on. So go in and in and in and in and in and in. Arrive at the ultimate goal. Make it your journey, your quest. Want it more than life itself.

Generally our greatest fear is death. Why? Because it is the most dramatic experience we have ever had in any one lifetime. Therefore we fear it. We are in awe of death. It is so dramatic that we do not remember, really, what happened during part of the experience, though occasionally some people do. However, the body of the soul knows no birth, knows no death. It goes on and on and on, and its awareness goes in and in and in to its ultimate goal -- awareness of itself turned so much in on itself that it dissolves in the very essence of Being, as it merges in Siva. You cannot say anything more about the Self, because to describe the Self adequately there are no words. It is beyond time, form, cause, mind. And words only describe time, cause and mind consciousness, which is form. You have to experience It to know It. And by experiencing It, you do know It.