Transcription
Rob: Yeah, Boaz?
Q1: allowing sexual images or images with aggression to become more imaginal, learning to trust them
Yogi: I have a question about aggression. [inaudible]
Rob: Okay. So if I try and summarize, and see if I've got the gist: [you're] asking about this notion of aggression, and perhaps related to what we did with the movement, and some things I said this morning, perhaps. There's some concern and fear there, because there's recognizing a lot of sometimes what feels like the energy of aggression inside, and unsure whether it's controllable or not, and so there's a kind of wanting to inhibit it at times, and wanting to just practise mettā as an alternative, to divert that. And then, if I understand the last part of the question, sometimes unsure if your state of your consciousness and energy is affecting other people in a real way. Is that ...?
Yogi: Yeah. In particular in respect to the aggression, because I wouldn't want that to have a negative impact.
Rob: Yeah. Thank you. These are really important questions. The first thing to say is just the fact of you asking and having this concern is a really good sign. It's a sign of health. Doubt, a kind of intelligent doubt, is a sign that these are things you care about, you know, and you want to do what's best, and do what's healthy, and do what's right. That in itself I read as a very good sign. It's a good way to go into any of this stuff, with a dose of kind of healthy, intelligent doubt and discrimination. So that's one thing. If that wasn't there, and you were reporting all kinds of, you know, uncontrollable aggression, then, okay, something else needs to come in here. But just the fact of doubt and concern there, to me, is a really good sign.
This, and probably also sexual eros, are two of the areas where, understandably, we have a lot of concern. There are lots of answers or responses or avenues we could open up or point you to outside of the kinds of soulmaking paradigm that we're doing: just practise mettā, or all kinds of things. I think this is hard within the soulmaking paradigm. For instance, with the sexual eros, when I have attraction to someone, and it becomes very real, and it's, let's say, possible, definitely possible within this paradigm, but not necessarily that easy, especially at first when you haven't fully got a sense of what it means for something to be imaginal -- I know what 'imagination' means. I can feel energy in my body and all that. But like I said this morning, this word imaginal, there's quite a richness and dimensionality to it. When that starts to open out, that dimensionality, that fullness of what it means to be imaginal, it's almost like it opens up more space for something -- for instance, aggression -- to become imaginal and holy, and the more imaginal and holy it becomes. Or sexual eros and attraction to someone who's just unavailable; it's just the wrong person to be attracted to; it's not the right situation. The normal impulse that we have as careful, sensitive human beings is to try and rein all that in. That's a really valuable kind of avenue. We need to be able to do that.
In time with these practices, there's the possibility of letting the thing become more imaginal. So in the case of aggression, oftentimes it's 'I' as subject, the person with physical power, and with the intent to destroy something, in some sense. With the eros, or the sexual eros, it's let the object, let that person become more imaginal. What does that mean? They become more than flatly human. They become full of dimensions, full of complexities, full of mystery, full of an unfathomable beyond, and all that begins to fill out. That creates more folds and more spaces in which the eros can be contained. If the eros is not contained, it has to spill out into action: "I have to have that person. We have to concretize some kind of relationship or some kind of sexual action." It's not to say that's not the right thing, or the right thing, or whatever. But when there's not the amplitude, the dimensionality of the imaginal, then the eros or aggression or energy has to act out on a flat, material level.
This is not a basic teaching at all. I have to say: I think it's really possible, and it's not necessarily easy. But the more we get a sense of what does it mean for something to be imaginal, what is that kind of constellation of, let's say, qualities and aspects and relationship, then the more we kind of trust that wherever there's dukkha, it can be made holy by becoming imaginal, by being sensed with soul. Wherever there's eros and attraction -- "I want that person. I need to have sex with them," or whatever it is -- it doesn't have to be acted out. Similarly with aggression, it has, if you like, a holy dimension. We're not really taught about that in this culture, either with aggression or with sexuality. But it becomes accessible more and more, and when that space opens up, it's like, more space, less pressure. You understand? Like a gas. As there's more space, there's less pushing that it has to do something concrete.
But as I said, I don't think this is a sort of beginning practice at all. It takes quite a lot to do that. There are plenty of people in this room who have a lot of energy and have a lot of eros. You could say, from a certain psychological perspective, which is not the normal [psychological perspective], the gods are knocking loudly, asking for something from them, and there's no conceptual framework to hold or to even regard that energy that moves in any kind of way that gives it any more sanctity or depth. A lot of people in this room right now who have that kind of psyche. And it's difficult. It's an art, really, to learn to open that up to different possibilities. So I definitely don't think it's the easiest thing, but I do think it's possible, and probably the way it comes is really, as I said, just getting more and more of a sense, gradually, of what it means for something to be imaginal -- what's that experience? What's that relationship? And slowly we begin to trust that more and more. In loads of interviews, someone presents something, and it's like, "Whoa," there's just so much difficulty there. It's not that I would always use the imaginal as how I relate to looking at something, but I have, by this point, a trust in me that whatever it is, there's a way it can open up imaginally that will redeem it, that will give it these holy roots, that will create less difficulty with it.
What to do right now? I don't know. We haven't so much spoken about practice, so I don't know quite where you're at. But it might be more leaving that aggressive thing aside a little bit, and concentrating more on just what ways the imaginal does come, and what ways you can get a sense of it. Probably if you have a lot of aggression, for instance, or people with a lot of sexual eros or whatever, it might be that you see, "Well, that's characteristic of images that arise for me." I've shared in talks I used to get a warrior image, different kinds of soldier images. I can really see I have that in me, you know? I'm a warrior, but not on a physical level at all. So once that becomes an image, and I kind of sense the holiness in it, and the sense of what my duty is to that, and the sense of it being neither real nor not real, that's really key. It's the reification piece. This is neither real nor not real, and it gets refracted into my life not in an obvious way. So the warrior for me manifests in all kinds ways. It has manifested in all kinds of ways. I've never hit anyone. I'm not interested in physical violence, etc. But it manifests. It refracts in a not-obvious way. And part of allowing it to do that is getting the whole sense of what it means for something to be imaginal, which also includes this 'neither real nor not real' thing.
So it might be just growing more in the sense, getting more accustomed to the sense of what it feels like, and what the experience is of something being imaginal, and you begin to trust it more. But I would probably guess that in the process of that happening, some of the images that come will involve power or aggression or that kind of thing. And you will see in meditation, the mind goes, "Ah, I don't know. This can't be right. I don't trust this." Very normal. And again, a good response, a healthy response. This is where I go back to things like trusting more the energy body sense. So let's say I have an image of some stomping warrior-like guy or something. He seems full of power and energy, and he could destroy anything, it seems. "I don't trust this. It doesn't feel very peaceful," etc., is what my mind says. But I check my body, and lo and behold, there's this kind of alignment. It doesn't feel agitated in any way. It feels open and harmonized. I trust that more than my initial mental response. And then I pay more attention with openness. I was saying to someone earlier, you can put a ring fence around it: "I'm just going to give this five minutes of trust, and after that I'm going to go back to being suspicious of it." Okay? [laughter] Just playing, because (we'll talk about this) trust is one of the key ingredients in the relationship with the imaginal. So I can just put a ring fence around it, trust it a little bit. And in that five minutes, ten minutes, slowly you'll start to pick up on the sense of soulmaking: "There's something mysterious about this." Yes, there's clearly power, and physical power, and a capacity to destroy. Plenty of people have realized you can't create without destroying. Destruction is not as simple as it seems.
But I start to get a sense that there's more to this than what my little mind thinks it is. It's got, as I said, an inexhaustibility of meaning, an unfathomability, a mystery. There's a curious beauty to it. These qualities are there. They're part of what it means for something to be soulmaking and imaginal. Slowly, slowly, I learn that I can trust these. I don't know if I shared this on a talk. When I was first trying to explore and develop all this stuff, I used to have images that were sexual, or at least offering the possibility of sexuality. I don't remember if I've ever said this. One of them, I had a dream, and it was a woman sort of trying to seduce me. This was some years ago, and I was just beginning to explore the imaginal and find out what it might mean. My tendency, with all my practice and history, was "that can't be spiritual, so we won't do that." [laughter] And it took me probably a few years to trust that. This dream, I can't remember what stage it was. This woman, I was being my monkish sort of self [laughter], and she looks at me with a lot of love. This is now in the morning, working in meditation. She says, "You're kind of stupid, aren't you?" [laughter] She said it with a lot of love. It was like, "You don't really get it, do you?" It was something about the way she said it, like she was teaching me something.
So I gradually let myself trust that, and realized that what looks like hindrance, defilement, etc., actually, when it opens up to what we mean, 'erotic-imaginal,' it opens up way more than that. And yes, it's sexual, and yes, all that stuff, but so much more than we think. I would say the same is potentially true of what you're calling aggression or power. But it's in the relationship, and we have to find that. That takes time. All this takes time, all of it. Yeah? So with all this, you have to see, "What am I ready for? What's my edge? What feels okay? What do I need to have in place?" All that. Some people sort of jump in at the deep end, and just start swimming, and that's fine. But I have to be responsible to this one, and care for this one, and my pacing with this.
There was a reason, beautiful reasons why I was so cautious. I mean, partly it was indoctrination from spiritual traditions and stuff. But there was a lot of, just as in your question with the concern, it reflects a love. It reflects my love, my willingness to just not, "Well, it feels good. I might as well." There's much more care. Do you understand what I'm saying? So it's like, "I'm not sure ..." Why? Because I'm devoted to something. I'm devoted to whatever the best thing is, and whatever the fullest spiritual learning is. If that means not just indulging in something that might just feel good, then okay, that's what I do. So my concern and my hesitation and my slowness was a beautiful thing. And I learnt something. And she had to teach me in this way. Do you understand?
So I don't know what the exact journey will be, but there's something in there. And yeah, also to say: I would never say "Everyone needs to do this, and that's the only way you can kind of address aggression or sexuality." It's just one possibility. But some of you -- and maybe you already, Boaz -- will feel, "I am suspicious. I don't quite understand everything that's being said here or taught. But I just have this attraction to it, and I have a sense somehow, and I don't quite understand how it's going to work." It might be that that's your thread, and you follow that, and it does start to unfold, and you do start to really trust, and the fullness and the richness begins to blossom there. Okay? Good? Yeah.
Andrea, yeah?
Q2: navigating images, letting the image work on you vs you working on the image
Yogi: I have a question about navigation with images. And first I just wanted to say thank you for sharing your images today, because that was a really helpful jumping off point, particularly the king. So after that session, I went outside, and I was just doing standing meditation, and at one point had hands on the belly, and the image that came was of a complicated pregnancy. What I wanted to say was the image was immediately beautiful as a concept. As a poet and a writer, it touched me. But it wasn't fully imaginal. I just liked it. So then there was a sort of trying to resonate with it, but feeling that the liquidity wasn't there; there wasn't a softness. There was something in the relating to it that still felt like relating to a concept of something that was a bit dry. So I stopped ... Maybe this is a writer thing, of not wanting to tinker with something, not wanting to kill something that has beauty, if it's not ready to be written, not ready to be explored.
So then I was taking a walk later, and thinking I'll ask you this question in this session, and I felt very soft and open because I was out walking in the fields. Then there was a slight resonating with how a complicated pregnancy, something of looking at the loss of a possible, unfathomable beauty that you don't yet know. And then immediate tears, and immediate soulfulness, meaningfulness in that moment. There was a knowing that something had aligned. Then I continued walking, and trying to almost resonate more or pull out more dimensionality, and then wondering, "Oh, should I just have left it alone, and stayed with that sense of just that beauty?" So I guess this is just to express that the navigation of these things is -- I seem to have a sense when it charges or when I can feel the soulfulness, but then it feels very clumsy, the trying to draw out more dimensions.
Rob: Yeah. Okay. Can I briefly sum it up for the recording?
Yogi: Yeah.
Rob: Andrea's asking -- in this case what happened was a concept arose, or just words in the mind, and they seemed like they were full of imaginal potential, or even creative potential as a writer, but it wasn't really going to that kind of juicy, full, resonant sense. But later, the added sort of idea or sense of not just a complicated pregnancy, but of a mystery that could have been born, but was missed, and not accessed, not opened to. That idea touched a lot and felt full of soul. But then wondering if you then tried a little too hard to kind of put the foot on the accelerator and sort of extract more juice, etc. Yeah?
This is really, I think, key: not to put pressure on the psyche, really, and not to put pressure on images. One of the characteristics of the imaginal -- we may mention it again -- is a sense of grace. 'Grace' means receiving for some unknown reason. Not deserving, nothing; it just comes. It's given. So it's not the whole truth of what it means to be imaginal, but it's one aspect. So sometimes with that, there's the attitude that fits a recognition of grace, which is a kind of, like, it comes and it goes, and it blows, and it blows in and out, and we're given a whole thing, a half a thing, or a glimpse of a thing. So I think sometimes that attitude is really important. That relationship with a sense of grace, recognition of grace and relationship with it, is already something soulmaking, potentially, and already an ingredient that if something is ready to come, it might help.
So there's that on one side, and on the other side, again, it's one of these things -- we wish we could download everything instantaneously. So some of the things in the instantaneous download, you already know, but ... [laughter] There are different aspects of the imaginal. Sometimes, slowly, slowly, you can kind of get a sense of it's a matter of noticing something, and that noticing of a kind of characteristic there. Let's see ... in your example, it may be the love, you know: love for this unborn or this loss. And maybe some mysterious love of this that was unborn for you. Love is an aspect, both ways, of the imaginal. Or the sense of grace. You begin to slowly get a sense of "What are the things I can notice here? They're already there; they're just not obvious to me yet." And that noticing draws them out, and that allows the whole thing to come alive.
In terms of pacing, yeah, I think sometimes it's hard to tell, you know. Certainly what happened was there was this initial thing that didn't seem to go. Then there was this kind of middle stage, and there was some juice. It's a bit like what I said this morning: there's some soulmaking right there in the richness, in the juice of that, and maybe to linger there, and let that do its work on the heart. Heartfulness is part of soulfulness, definitely. So let that do its work on the heart and the energy body without rushing and saying, "Okay, what's next?" So there was already plenty of juice there. It's a matter of resonating with it. That's a big part of this, what I said this morning about tuning and resonating and letting something work on you, as opposed to you work on it. None of this is fixed, but sometimes it's "let me work on it." It's more active. And sometimes the poise has to be, or the tendency has to be kind of corrected a little bit in someone to be more receptive. You understand? It could be that in that middle stage that you're describing, yeah, there could have been more, "Let's just hang out with this, and let it reverberate and ricochet in the being, and feel it, and recognize the beauty in that, being touched in that." And if it wants to go to another level, it will. I don't know; does that ...? Yeah? Okay. Good.
Lauren, yeah?
Q3: concerns about qualities/energies having unwanted effects outside of practice, the imaginal Middle Way
Yogi: Mine builds on the first question around ... yeah, as I work more with images that don't share the ethics of my own life, that act in ways that I wouldn't act ... this builds on something, that kind of thing. There are certain energies that I feel strongly pulled to work with, and come up for me a lot imaginally, but I have a fear that as I work more with those, that when there isn't the strength of the imaginal container, that that energy is strengthening in my life outside of it in ways that are totally not what I'm trying to do with my life! [laughs] I feel in the midst of that and curious about it.
Rob: So energies, or images?
Yogi: Well, like ... sorry, I'm deciding if I want to be more specific. There are often images that are like images where the imaginal self is wanting worship or wanting ...
Rob: To be worshipped?
Yogi: To be worshipped. That's one of them.
Rob: Yeah, thank you. That's beautiful. I'm really glad you said that. You know, there's a tension between our usual, culturally dominant ego psychology, regard for what is a healthy ego and what's too much ego -- there's a tension between that whole conceptual framework, which we all have inherited, and some of the things that soulmaking opens up, some of the things that images open up.
There are many possibilities here. One thing that occurs to me right now is: when an image arises, even if I feel like I'm inside that image, or I am that image, I'm identified with the image (as opposed to the image is an object other than me, it feels more that way), there's still a sense of it's me and it's not me. Yeah? This is really, really important. It's part of what I'll talk about with -- I meant to say it this morning and didn't have time -- what I call the Middle Way of the imaginal. It's real and it's not real. It's me and it's not me. That sense is really important, okay? Even when the image is other, it's not me, and it's me somehow. So tuning into that sense amplifies it. This is like what we were talking about with Andrea, one of the aspects of the imaginal -- the more I notice that, "Oh, yeah, it's me, and it's not me," that's part of what I would call the Middle Way of the imaginal. It takes its place between real and not real, between me and not me.
And I get that at first that feels like that's a really tight rope to walk between those. As I get more of a sense of this neither real nor not real, me and not me, this tightrope becomes actually a wide open boulevard. It feels like actually that's the most spacious place to be, in that neither real nor not real. It opens up doors. What was a narrow entranceway or pathway actually becomes huge. Again, like we said with Boaz, it's a matter of getting a taste for this and beginning to trust it more. So it's me, and it's not me. Who is the 'not me' part? Part of the 'not me' part of it is -- you pick your language -- the divine, the Buddha-nature, the angels, yeah? Or it's soul. You understand? So it's me and it's not me, and part of the 'not me' is -- it's divinity, it is soul. Yeah? And I would say soul wants to be seen, and soul wants to be seen as sacred, and soul wants to see as sacred.
So the wishing to be worshipped, or recognizing that worship is appropriate, or devotion, or that sense, it belongs to the nature of soul-sensing. Does that make sense?
Yogi: Yes.
Rob: So again, it's like, "Oh, a very heady idea," but the more I sense this, the more comfortable I become in this 'me and not me,' and 'it's the divine.' What soul yearns for mostly is to sense with soul. Soul yearns to see and be seen, and show itself and reveal itself in images, and have the soulful response to images. That's what soul wants. You, unfortunately, as we all are, are just instruments of soul, from a certain perspective. We're vehicles for this process, amazingly delicate and very unique instruments for this process to play out.
Again, we're back to conceptual frameworks. It's a very different way of, idea of understanding what's going on. If it remains abstract, it just doesn't make any difference. But there's a way in the practice, in the thick of the practice with this, you can get the senses of these things. A little bit related to Boaz's question, the more I sense this, the more I sense that I can trust this. It looks like something we would be suspicious of in our usual psychology, whether it's aggression, or a kind of sexuality, or what looks like some kind of ego amplification, and stuff like that. But something potentially much deeper is being played out there in the theatre. And as you get a sense of that, the ego doesn't tend to identify with it so much.
Yogi: It doesn't need as much to have the thoughts of whatever, superiority or ...
Rob: It won't, no, because we're tasting that, if you like, what is superior -- we're tasting it, and we're getting the blessing of it, but not as 'me' in the usual ego sense. So again, it's like, this might all sound very far-fetched, but at this point I just absolutely trust that this is what will happen if one goes into it with all the sensitivity and care. This is what will open, as opposed to I'm going to get more egotistical, etc.; I'm going to be demanding everyone bows at my feet. [laughter]
Yogi: That's why I chose this seat. [laughter]
Rob: So it's hard. This business of trust is hard. But I think it's probably the case that most of you, like I said, have this glimmer of trust in something. We tend to think from -- I don't know how to say this -- from one level out. So it's like, "These images are mine. They reflect me, and they're expressions of me," as opposed to you are an expression of an image, or actually, you are an expression of many images, some not yet born, and your life is that. Turn everything upside down. I'm not saying this is the truth. It's a concept. Yeah? And that concept itself is a potentially soulmaking concept. It's rich, it's beautiful, and it does something to the ego needs. It just does something.
Now, certainly there are other ways of combating ego, and Buddhadharma's full of them, and it's great. But there's also this soulmaking way, which looks like, "Hold on, that looks like it's going in the wrong direction," but it's not, because things get filled out, and amplified, and given their archetypal roots, given their dimensional scope and their sacredness, and that changes everything. It becomes about divinity, if we use that word, and not about me -- or only about me inasmuch as I wish to somehow live and express and sense divinity. I said -- I can't remember when I said it -- this business about fullness of intention, like why am I practising? Why am I doing this? And eventually it just becomes more about that level. It's what soul wants, or it's what the divine wants, and that becomes the primary reason, as opposed to me and my personal development, or anything even more sort of grubby than that. Does that ...?
Yogi: Yes, thanks.
Rob: So these things take time. It might help, me saying this, and there might still be some [inaudible]. But it's really in the sense. We're talking about ideas now, but you can sense these things in practice, and slowly, slowly, it's like, "Ah, there's a freedom here, whole other dimensions of freedom and possibility," but you have to taste it for yourself. It usually happens gradually. Yeah? Okay.
Let's have a bit of quiet together.
