Category Archives: Presence

Practising Presence

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Although I have written about this topic before, I believe that my message is not redundant. My goal is not to entertain or provide food for thought through essays, but rather to create bridges between the impermanent and the permanent.

Words are my chosen medium, as I have no other choice. However, the essence of my message is beyond the words themselves, beyond the thoughts they provoke. My message about Presence – what remains after the sound has faded and the thoughts have vanished. When the mind becomes still, what is left is you – Presence itself.

While the mind can conceptualize Presence, it can never truly experience it. Presence can only be felt by Presence. For those of you who have some understanding of programming concepts, we could use the analogy of a recursive function calling itself from itself.

To delve further into the workings of consciousness, how does it shift from “Me, John Doe, I think of Presence” to “I am Presence”? The answer is simple: when the mind stops its activity, and when one relinquishes their identification with labels and forms, all that remains is Presence. The challenge lies in becoming aware of the dictates of the mind, of its grip on what it decides to show you and slowly regaining control of the content of your conscious space.

Presence is also known as Awareness or Consciousness, it is pure Awareness or Consciousness in its unadulterated state – before it has been shaped by mind activity and the labeling process.

This pure, transparent Presence is what some refer to as “God”, although the term has been so overused and misused throughout history that it is not always a useful term. However, it is important to mention it here to connect certain dots.

Presence is the clear conscious space in which objects, sensations, thoughts, and emotions arise. Like a dream that exists in and is made of the consciousness of the dreamer, the world exists in Presence and is made of Presence.

If there is one dreamer and the world is the dream, then one has the power to awaken within the dream. Awakening within the dream is called lucid dreaming, while in waking life, it is called spiritual awakening.

However, it is important to note that the awakening of Presence is only half of the story. This realization is just the beginning. Once one is clearly established in their permanent self, their impermanent identity and personality will slowly start to align with that newfound clarity. Every personality has its unique characteristics and flaws, and spiritual awakening does not brutally alter any of that. Rather, it provides a new perspective that can over time manifest through the personality as correct vision, and compassion, resulting in the correct action.

Finally, it is important to remember that Presence, pure consciousness, does not exclude anything – it embraces all, as it is the source of all. In some spiritual circles, the ego is seen as the enemy, or there is a belief that there is “nothing to do” because there is “no person”. However, such claims are made by spiritualized egos. In Presence, the permanent and impermanent are essentially one, united in Love.

From someone to no one, from no one to someone – I am complete.

Calwen

Presence is the True Self

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PresencePresence can be seen as the boundless and permanent container of impermanence. Objects fall and rise in Presence which has no beginning nor an end, it is eternal and infinite.

Presence is not an object but it is the source of all objects, the essential nature of objects, and the essential true self.

It is easy to fall into the trap of thinking that you have a self but it is really the wrong way around, the self, Presence, has you.

Presence is the essential nature of all objects, of all forms, it has no boundaries or limits, it permeates everything, from the atom to the galaxies, it is immanent and transcendent at the same time. “Having impregnated the universe from a portion of myself, yet I remain” says an old Hindu scripture.

Presence is sometimes referred to as “nothing”, being the source of “everything” this can be a source of confusion. Presence appears as nothing if we try to define it from an object-oriented point of view because it has no identifiable attributes or limits like objects have. Nevertheless, Presence is made of Presence so in that sense, it is not nothing. Also, the nothing/everything approach is dualistic in essence and doesn’t convey properly the essential unity of all that IS.

Presence is the reality behind the “I am”, Presence is the true self.

Calwen

What is Presence?

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Presence is what remains when thoughts are absent, when emotions are like a peaceful lake under a blue sky, and when you are aware of being aware, it is the light of pure consciousness.

Presence is just a word, a reference for the mind, it was my choice to call it that way, but you must feel totally free to call it as you want, you don’t even need to name it at all, it is up to you.

Words are just shells, pointers, they evoke a reality but are not the reality, they are just a convenient way to create a ladder in the mind. That ladder will eventually collapse, and the essence of what the words evoke will appear to the silent presence of WHAT IS when all mental constructs have collapsed.

Spiritual teachers insist that Presence cannot be understood with the mind, this can initially be very frustrating for the seeker who might conceive Presence as an unreachable and overly complex abstraction that can only be perceived by the selected few, nothing can be further from the truth.

The first thing I would like to tell you is that the reality behind Presence is simple. When you will be in Presence you will laugh and say to yourself, “I can’t believe it was so simple, it was always there, I just did not notice it.”

So why can’t Presence be understood by the mind ? simply because mind and thoughts are objects contained in Presence. Presence is that to which the mind appears, and not just the mind as we will see later on.

The witnessed cannot put the witness in a box, because the witness, Presence, does not have identifiable limits or attributes like objects have, as soon as it is framed it is lost. Only Presence can know Presence.

In programming language, we could, by analogy, say that Presence perceives itself very much like a recursive function works, it calls itself from inside itself and never leave its own scope. If you are a programmer, you could rightfully ask me “Where is the initial function call coming from?”, this event is triggered by the cessation of identification to forms, body, mind and emotions.

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Can you see the sharks ?

You have probably heard of  “The Magic eye” phenomenon in the 90s. Some people can see the 3D effect very quickly, and it can take a lot longer for others. It is just an analogy, but what is happening to consciousness when it “perceives” Presence, is very similar to what happens to someone who sees “The magic eye” effect.  It is obvious for those who can see it, but it is very hard to explain with words to someone who is still struggling to see it.

Presence is simple once you approach it through beingness not thinking. I will develop that point in more details later.

For now, just remember that it is simple to stand in Presence because it is essentially what you are, it is your natural state of being.

Calwen