Intimacy: A Phenomenological Ontological Study Rudolph Bauer, Ph. D Diplomate in Clinical Psychology, A. B. P. P. Washington Center for Consciousness Studies and The Center for Phenomenological and Existential Consultation
Intimacy And Self-Liberation Intimacy is a profoundly Being-full Human experience. Many desire intimacy, but many can never find this luminous experience within themselves or within their lives. There are different forms of Intimacy just as there are different ways of knowing and different ways of experiencing. In Phenomenology and in Dzogchen and in Kashmir Shavism there are two foundational ways of knowing. There is our knowing of our mind which knows phenomena. The knowing of our mind knows phenomena through thinking, feeling, sensations, memory, reasoning, imagination and perception of reality. And there is our Direct Non- Conceptual Knowing of our Primordial Awareness which knows Being and Being-fullness. This Direct Knowing is our direct non conceptual pre-reflective experiencing of Being and Being-fullness. This Direct Knowing of our primordial innate awareness, this Direct Experiencing of Being and Being-fullness is often called Gnosis or Jnana or even Yeshe. Yeshe means Wisdom. To experience Being and to know Being and to live within Being is Wisdom. Wisdom is not the delusion of omniscience and the illusion of omnipotence. The spiritual aspiration of Omniscience and omnipotence is simply our endless human aspiration of Grandiosity. Many spiritual and religious traditions wishfully conceive of spiritual realization as the accomplishment of omniscience and omnipotence. Many Spiritual traditions of both the east and the west consider their Leader or Leaders as Omniscient and Omnipotent. As Hegel describes in his wonderful text The Phenomenology of Spirit, we often desire someone who has Absolute Knowledge and then in finding them or in creating them we fall into the Master Slave relationship. Mind As Knower of Form, Awareness as Knower of Being Another way of saying this is that our mind is our knower of form, and our awareness is our knower of Being. This distinction is of essence in Dzogchen, Kashmir Shavism and in Contemporary Existential Phenomenology, and in Contemporary Existential Experiential Psychotherapy and in Existential Phenomenological Consultation. This distinction of our knowing of mind and our knowing of awareness is profoundly useful in knowing Phenomena and in experiencing the Being-fullness of Phenomena. We want to have the felt sense of the difference between being in mind alone, and being in awareness alone. And so, our integrating of our mind within our Being-full Awareness helps us to experience our phenomenological world and the Being of our phenomenological world simultaneously. The Integration of Mind Within Awareness Wonderfully, we can integrate the knowing of our mind within the knowing and experience of our field of intrinsic primordial awareness. With this integration of our mind within our field of innate primordial awareness, we can know Phenomena and the Being of Phenomena simultaneously. We can know Being, and we can directly know Being within Phenomena. In knowing the Being of Phenomena, we can also know Being as Phenomena. This integration of our mind within our awareness field allows us to experience the Essential nature of phenomena and the radiant Being-fullness of phenomena simultaneously. This experience is described as Yeshe and this is Wisdom. Thus, we can live within Being and live within our Phenomenological Translucent Sea of Being, the Luminous Sea of Being of and as our Existential Phenomenological World. This living within Being and the Being of Phenomena is the essence of natural self -liberation. This is Yeshe! This is Wisdom! This is also the doorway into our lived experience of the Intimacy of Pure Being-fullness. Ontological Intimacy and Psychological Intimacy There is Ontological Intimacy and there is Psychological Intimacy. Ontological Intimacy reflects the manifestation of our Being-full awareness within the Being-full awareness of another person. And Psychological Intimacy reflects our mind knowing and entering the knowing mind of another person. Our mind may enter into psychological union with another person’s mind. Ontological Intimacy is the profound Being-full intimacy of our Formless Field of Being-full Awareness entering into the Formless Being-full Awareness of another person. Our Luminous Formless Being-full awareness enters into Ontological union or Being-full union within the Being-full Formless Awareness of another person. This union of Beingfullness is Beatifically Bliss-full. This Being-full Formless Union is Yeshe or Wisdom. The Mingling of Minds This Ontological or Being-full Intimacy of our Primordial Formless Beingfull awareness entering into and within the Being-full Primordial Formless awareness of another person is not simply a form of psychological intimacy. Psychological Intimacy is our phenomenological psychological form of mind being close, or near or entering within and into the phenomenological experience of another person’s psychological mind. In a way, in psychological Intimacy we are Mingling Our Mind within another Person’s Mind. We can also Mingle our mind with and within a collective group of minds. Psychological Union and Ontological Union Our Ontological Intimacy of Being-full Intimate Union is not our interpersonal relational psychological Intimacy of mind contacting mind but rather our experience of Ontological Intimacy is the profound experience of our Non- Dual Awareness as Formlessness Being-fullness being in union within the Formless Being-full non dual awareness of another Human being. This is the mysterious union of luminous formless Being-full awareness within another person’s inner most luminous formless Being-full awareness. Our psychological Intimacy is the intimacy of our psychological personal mind being within intimate contact with another person’s psychological personal mind. Our mind has many functions. There is thinking function, feeling function, sensation function, memory function, reasoning function, and imagination function to name a few. Our personal mind functions can be in contact with the personal mind functions of another person. Our thought can resonant to the thoughts of the other; our sensations can be in union with the sensations of the other; our feelings can feel the feelings of the other; our imagination can be within our imaginal experience of the other; memory can remember the other; and our reason can reason with the other. Our mind can enter into a phenomenological personal union with the personal mind of the other. This is our personal psychological Intimacy. Many people can experience this form of psychological intimacy. Many people may spend their entire lives within this form of psychological intimacy. This is good fortune. Ontological Intimacy is our formlessness Being-fullness awareness entering into, and within the formlessness Being-full awareness of another person. The Intimacy of Formless Being-full Awareness within the Formless Being-fullness Awareness of another person is our direct non conceptual experience of luminous formless Being-full awareness entering into and through another person into this innermost union of luminous formless luminous Being-full awareness. This can be a Luminous Beatific experience. Esoteric Union There is the resultant esoteric union of our formless luminous Being-full awareness entering within formless luminous Being-full awareness of another person. This esoteric union of our formless awareness within the formless awareness of the other is the luminous union of our personal Being-fullness within the Personal Being-fullness of another Human Being. This union of Being-fullness within Being-fullness can be a Beatific Visionary event. The Felt Sense of Luminous Beatific Union Ontological Intimacy reflects the experiential felt sense of our direct formless Being-full awareness as our direct non conceptual knowingness entering within the direct felt sense of formless Beingfull awareness as non- conceptual experiential knowingness of another person. Within this direct formless union of the human experience of formless awareness within the union of luminous formless awareness, a third human manifestation of our mutual formless awareness is brought forth. The Mysterious Conjunctio This third manifestation is a Being-full manifestation of the Mysterious Conjunctio. This Mysterious Conjunctio is the Sphere of Union that Jung so often attempted to elaborate and describe never to his satisfaction. This Mysterious Conjunctio is our human experience of Beatific Union. This experience of Beatific Union brings forth a Sphere or Sphera that contains and surround us and embodies both persons or even a group of persons, a collective. Timeless Awareness Within Timeless Awareness This union can be within Timeless Awareness. Within Timeless Awareness this union can be forever and ever. And this Timeless union can be life after life and death after death. The union is within formlessness and this union is indestructible. This is Vajra Kumara. Vajra Kumara is the experience of our innermost Being-full indestructibleness. This is the creative ontological luminous experience of Being unborn and undying. This is the creative ontological luminous experience of our ongoing continuity of Being and Beingfullness life after life and death after death. This innermost union can be a continuous intimate resonance, a Timeless Resonance. This is the experience of Being-full Primordial Reality reflected and experience by our own innermost intimate ontological Who-ness. This is our luminous experience of our Being in Timeless Awareness as Timeless Awareness in Time. Our innermost intimate Being-fullness is our experience of our Profound Being and our Being-fullness as Who-ness. Our innermost Who-ness is our Ground of Being and Being-fullness. Our Who-ness is both Source and the manifestation as and of Source. Beatific Intimacy This Beatific Intimacy is the experiential visionary experience of NonDualistic Being-fullness within our Non- Dualistic Being-full dimension of Primordial Awareness as human beings. This Creative Intimacy of Formless Awareness being within formless Awareness is the creative experience of self -liberation. Self- liberation is our experience of our Luminous Being-fullness embodying Luminous Being-fullness. This union can be infinite in its horizons, vast and multidimensional. This union can be both Timeless and in time simultaneously. This liberating Intimate union of Being-full awareness reflects our experience of Being-full Timeless Awareness in time. Being-full awareness has the profound luminous quality of Being-full presenceing. We are established as Being within Timeless Awareness within Time. Sometimes this profound non conceptual experience of Timelessness Awareness is called Sangwa Yeshe. This profound ontological union is the union of our Being in Timeless Awareness in union within a person or persons who are simultaneously experiencing Timeless Awareness within Time. This is both Beatific Vision and Beatific Experience and Beatific self- liberation. To experience Being and Beingfullness is to experience Bliss. Bliss is an ontological experience. This is self-liberation through the Being-fullness of our Timeless Union within the Timeless Being-fullness of Being. This Beatific experience is truly potentially possible for everyone. This ontological Being-full capacity is within everyone. This natural Beatific Experience is not some grandiose omnipotent and omnipotent aspiration as articulated by so many omnipotent eastern and omnipotent western religious traditions. Personal Psychological Intimacy There are two dimensions of intimacy just as there are two dimensions of Our way of knowing. There is our personal psychological intimacy of the knowing of our mind knowing the phenomena of another person as well as their mind phenomena. By mind phenomena, I mean our thinking function, feeling function, sensation function, imagination function, reason function and memory function. These functions are what some call ego functions or personal psychological functions. Our mind phenomena often reflect the sense of “I” ness. This sense of “I” ness is not our pre-reflective personal Being-full dimension of Whoness. This psychological intimacy is the intimacy of our person as phenomenological mind knowing and entering into the phenomenological mind of another person. This is our union of interpersonal intimacy. This is our intimacy of psychological union. This is an exoteric union. Formless Awareness as Entering Formless Awareness Ontological intimacy reflects our direct knowing as formless awareness, and our formless awareness is our Being-fullness knowing Being both within our self and our knowing Being within another person’s Being and our Direct Knowing the Being of the world and Being within the World. The luminous knowingness of our Being knowing Being, is our nonconceptual direct intimate Being-full experience that is the nature of our direct knowing as primordial awareness, or as Jnana or as Gnosis or as Yeshe. Our Field of Formless Awareness is this vast creative range of experience ultimately reflecting Timeless Awareness in Time. The Experiential Knowing of Being and Being-fullness This experiential knowing of Being is direct and non-conceptual and pre-reflective. This knowing of Being is profoundly experiential and profoundly intimate. This direct non conceptual experiential knowing of Being allows us to know both Being in and of itself and allows us simultaneously to knowing the Being of phenomena. This direct knowing of Being and Being-fullness is Non-dualistic Knowing. We can know the Being of person, the Being of animals, the Being of trees, the Being of buildings, the Being of meaningful words, we can know the Being of the many infinite forms of Being and Being-fullness. We can also know the Being of ideation and the Being of Actuality and the Being-fullness of Reality. We, as our own Pure Awareness can know Pure Being and the Being-fullness of Pure Being. The knowing of Pure awareness is the knowing of Pure Being and Pure Being-fullness. The Multidimensionality of Being and Being-fullness We can directly know and experience the multidimensionality of Being and Being-fullness. We can know and experience the Being-full dimension of the actuality of our Ordinary Life World. We can know and experience the actuality of the Being-full Luminous Archetypal dimension. This archetypal dimension of luminous Creative Energies and Creative Elements manifesting within us, and within our life world; creating and manifesting the ordinary actuality of our life world. We can directly know and directly experience the ontological dimensions of Source and Phenomena being the same, exactly the same in oneness. We can directly experience Being as source, and the Being-fullness manifestations of Source. The Ground of Being and Being-fullness is Source. Being as Source and Being as Phenomena are in oneness and sameness. To experience this sameness is selfliberation. To experience this sameness of Being-full source and of Being-full phenomena is naturalistic self-liberation. We can experience our source and our own Being-full awareness being in the Union of actuality and sameness. We can actually experience our own awareness as source. Longchenpa describes this experience of primordial reality as Source being our own Being and Being-fullness as profound self-liberation. There is the luminous Dzogchen prayer “May I experience all Phenomena as Source. May I experience all phenomena as the Dharmakaya.” “May I experience all Phenomena as The Ground of Being”. Intimacy of Mind and Intimacy of Awareness There is the psychological intimacy of our mind knowing phenomena and there is the psychological intimacy of our mind knowing the phenomenological mind of the other person. We can experience and perceive and have a felt sense of the mind of the other and as well as the collective mind of others. This is the psychological meaning of “Intersubjective”. There is our ontological intimacy of our Formless Awareness Beingfullness entering into, and experientially knowing the formless Being- fullness (awareness) of another person or persons. There is the intimacy of formless awareness knowing and entering deeply into the Being-fullness of Phenomena. Our mind knows phenomena and our awareness knows the Being and Being-fullness of phenomena. The experience of our formless experiential awareness knowing the Beingfullness of phenomena is a source of ontological self-Liberation. As the Shavites say “The Bliss of Samadhi is the The Bliss of the World”. The Drama of Psychological Intimacy and The Drama of Ontological Intimacy in Beatific Union There is the Psychological intimacy of our psychological mind knowing within the psychological mind of another and there is the ontological intimacy of formlessness awareness of person entering within the Being-full formless awareness of another person. The intimacy of form knowing form is the intimacy of our phenomenological personal mind knowing the phenomenological mind of another personal mind. Our luminous Formless Awareness is our experiential knowingness of Being and Being-fullness. Formless awareness is our Being experientially knowing Being. Our own formless awareness immediately and directly knowing Being within our own Being-fullness; and our own awareness simultaneously knowing the Being-fullness of phenomena. Our own awareness as Being knows Being in and of itself. Awareness knows the Being and Being-fullness of phenomena and awareness knows Being in and of itself. This is our open experience of the luminous spaciousness of self-liberation. This is our natural non dualistic knowing of Pure Being and our natural non dualistic knowing of the Being of phenomena. Our Being’s Knowingness of Being is called Primordial Awareness. Beings knowing Being is called Primordial Awareness. Being’s knowingness of Being is our own innate awareness, or more explicitly our intrinsic innate primordial ontological awareness. Heidegger describes the Knowing of Being as Dasein. Mind knows phenomena and our Being Knowing of Being is Being-full Awareness. To know our own Pure Awareness is to know Pure Being and Pure Being-fullness. This is Rigpa. This is Gnosis. This is Jnana. This is Yeshe. Knowing Our Own Being as Pure Being Many do not know that their own Being knows itself, as Pure Being. And this pure knowing of Being is pure knowing of ontological primordial awareness or simply awareness. This distinction between mind and awareness is often lost in contemporary culture and is not understood or appreciated or valued. In Tibetan culture our mind is ‘sems’ and our ontological awareness is ‘semde’. This same foundational distinction is experienced in Contemporary Existential Phenomenology, and in Ancient Phenomenological Dzogchen and in Ancient Phenomenological Kashmir Shavism. The Intimacy of Form within Form There is the Intimacy of form within form, and this is the intimacy of my mind entering and experientially knowing within another’s person’s mind. This is the intimacy of the felt sense of interpersonal contactfullness. This is the intimacy of our mind knowing mind and our body knowing body. This is the intimacy of experiential contact-fullness. Our intimacy of mind is the intimacy of shared thinking, shared affective experience, shared sensation, shared memory, shared fantasy. This intimacy is interpersonal and this intimacy is psychological. This Intimacy reflects our relation of our mind to another mind within context of the intimate contact between and within minds. Our minds enter into each other and within each other. This intimacy is a psychological intimacy and can be deeply personal and deeply loving and affectionate. This intimacy can also reflect our own mind body relational intimacy within our own self. Our Mind Body Union Entering Mind Body Union within Another Not only can our minds enter each other’s mind but our body can enter another’s body in psychosomatic union within each other. Touch enters touch. Our own mind body personal union can enter into a mind body union with another mind body person. Our mind body union can resonate and enter into and within the mind body union of another person. This mind body union within the mind body union of another can be direct, immediate and bliss-full intimacy. The Bliss of Being-full Intimacy To experience Being is to experience Bliss. Our own mind body in union can enter into intimacy within the intimacy of another mind body in union. The Chakrasamvara Tantra elaborates the experience of Being and Being-fullness as the experience of Bliss and the experience of Beatific Union and Beatific Vision. Within our own mind body intimacy we can enter into intimacy within another person’s mind body in intimate somatic union. This intimacy is the intimacy of touch and the intimacy of Being touched somatically and psychologically and energetically. This somatic intimacy may naturally unfold into the ongoing embodiment of bonding and attachment with and within each other. True bonding and true attachment are the ongoing continuity of the experience of continuous inner intimacy of shared Being-fullness. This bonding creates the Shared Sphere of Being-fullness. This intimacy can also be the intimacy of Duality of beings within the Non- Duality of Being and Non- Duality of Being within dualistic beings. This Being-full Intimacy brings forth the Sphere or Sphera of Being that surrounds us and embodies us collectively at times. This Sphera or Sphere can be infinite in its horizons and vast and even multidimensional. The Field or Sphera of Esoteric Subtle Experience There is a oneness of sensation, there is a oneness of the field of Beingfull sensation that takes us beyond external touch and external stimulation. This oneness of Being-full sensation opens us into the oneness of our erotic esoteric field of Being-full embodiment. There is an embodiment that arises within us, and between us that encompasses us. This embodiment is the embodiment of the Being-full luminous esoteric life force itself. This embodiment brings forth Beingfull Ecstasy in light of and in spite of life circumstances. This Being-full intimacy is a luminous Beatific state of human experience. The Simultaneous Experience of Psychological Intimacy and Ontological Being-full Intimacy There is the Intimacy of our mind body somatic union within the mind body somatic union of another and then there is the intimacy of our Being-full formless awareness in union with the Being-full formless awareness of another. We can experience these two different forms of Intimacy simultaneously. This is a Beatific Being-full Experience of luminous Being-full Bliss-fullness. This Bliss-fullness can reflect the ongoing continuity of luminous Being-fullness. This experience of Luminous Being-fullness can deeply reflect our union of Timeless Awareness within Time. The Being-fullness of Form as Form There is the intimacy of our awareness which is our primordial awareness knowing Being and the Being-fullness of Being. This is the intimacy of formlessness Being-fullness entering formlessness Beingfullness. Our inner most formless awareness is entering into the innermost formless awareness of another Being. This is profound ontological intimacy of Being-full formlessness entering Being-full formless-ness within the Non Dualistic Being-full union of Being-full awareness within Being-full awareness. This form of Being-full Intimacy is ontological intimacy and is ontological Non-Duality of Being-fullness within the duality of forms. Forms embody Being-fullness. Being-fullness radiance manifest through both form and formlessness. Through the form we can experience the Being-fullness of the form. To touch the form is to touch the Beingfullness of the form. To see a form is to see the formlessness of the form. To kiss a form is to kiss the Being-fullness of the form. To feel the form is to feel the Being-fullness of the form. To gaze into a form is to gaze into the Being-fullness of the form. To love a form is to love the Being-fullness of the form. Forms are the embodiment of Beingfullness. Forms are Being-fullness embodied. Being-fullness informed. To experience the felt sense of a form is to experience the felt sense of the Being-fullness of the form. To hear a form is to ear the Vibrational Being-fullness of the form, the energetic Being-full dimension within the form as the form. We can directly experience the formlessness Being-fullness of a form as the form and we can directly experience the forms of Being-fullness. All forms are forms of Being-fullness. This is the liberating experience of Non- Duality within Duality and Duality within Non-Duality. This is also the unfolding experience of mutual Beatific Self- Liberation. This is also the luminous experience of Beatific Vision of luminous Being-fullness as Form. Being-full Who-ness Within Being-full Who-ness Is Being-full Self Liberation There is the luminous formless union of our Being-full formless Whoness within the Being-full formless Who-ness of another person. This is the actually of the profound union of ontological Who-ness within ontological Who-ness. This is Wisdom Gnosis, this is Jnana, and this is Yeshe. Our formless awareness is our ontological Who-ness. And Our Whoness is our Formless Awareness. Formless awareness is not simply emptiness or nothingness. Formless awareness is our luminous Beingfull Who-ness. Formless awareness is luminous Being-full Presence as Being-full Who-ness. Who-ness is ontological and not simply a Personal Psychological Event. Gnosis Within Gnosis, Jnana Within Jnana, Yeshe Within Yeshe This is the union of Gnosis within Gnosis; and this is the union of Jnana within Jnana; this is the union of Rigpa within Ripga. Jnana means direct knowing-ness, Gnosis means direct knowing experience of Beingfullness. Rigpa means our ontological open knowingness of Luminous Being-fullness. This is our experience of luminous Presence in union within Luminous Presence. This is our luminous Being-fullness entering within luminous Being-fullness of the form and Formlessness of another person or persons. The Mysterious Conjunctio This Union, this Mysterious Conjunctio is always our awakening of our unfolding luminous experience of self-liberation. Ontological Intimacy is a direct experiential transmission of cosmological energy, of cosmological light, of cosmological Being-fullness, and of cosmological luminous presence. Ontological Intimacy is a Cosmological Being-full experience. Ontological Intimacy is a Cosmological Being-full event. Ontological Intimacy is ongoing Cosmological Being-full experience of Self Liberation. Beatific Experience and Beatific Vision as Beatific Self Liberation This ontological union of Luminous Being full presence within Luminous Being-full presence is Beatific Experience. This Beatific union reflects the great Beatific Affection of our Who-ness, our Who-ness as Ground of Being, and our Who-ness as Source. This experience of our own Who-ness as Source was Longchenpa’s ultimate description of foundational Self Liberation within Dzogchen. Longchenpa was and is the sublime Master of Dzogchen. He lived in the 14th Century. Not all Dzogchen traditions hold Longchenpa’s vision and his profound ontological Being-full understanding. As Namkai Norbu, the great, great contemporary Dzogchen master would so so often say Dzogchen does not belong to any religion. Dzogchen does not belong to any culture. This is a most serious and wonderful statement about the universal nature of Dzogchen. A Dzogchen Prayer of the ONENESS of Source and Phenomena Many Buddhists are aghast at this profound experiential understanding. There is the ancient Dzogchen prayer “May I experience all phenomena as Source.” This dramatic prayer reflects the essence of our natural Self- Liberation. This prayer is so simple and so direct and so complete. This prayer is a prayer of the actuality of Being and Being-fullness. This is a prayer of the actuality of our Being-full world and Being-full Universe. This prayer illuminates the experiential understanding that the Bliss of The World is the Bliss of Samadhi. This prayer illuminates that the Bliss of Samadhi is the Bliss of the World. This is a prayer of the actuality of Being-full Existence. This prayer illuminates the actuality of Being-full Who-ness as the Being-full Source of Self Manifestation. Many Buddhists are aghast with this luminous understanding. Perhaps You are also. This of course is not a function of belief, but rather “lived experience.” Brentano and Phenomenological Actuality Brentano (Born 1838-Died 1917) was an early phenomenologist who taught both Freud and Husserl at the University of Vienna . He taught phenomenologically that awareness was formless, formless presence and awareness was not emptiness or nothingness nor the absence of Being or the absence of Being-fullness. Formlessness of awareness is vivid luminous Being-full presence. Formlessness is Being and Beingfullness. Formlessness is Being-full knowingness, non- conceptual prereflective Being-full knowingness. Formlessness is Being, Pure Being and Pure Being-fullness. Consciousness is Pure Being-full Awareness. Consciousness is formless, luminous formlessness as direct non conceptual knowingness. So, if you gaze inside, you will experience this formless awareness knowingness. You will see no-thing or nothingness. This no-thingness of formlessness does not mean formless awareness does not exist. It does not mean that Psyche does not exist. For Brentano this means formlessness is psyche without form. To think that formless awareness does not exist is Ma-Rigpa. Ma-Rigpa means the profound ignorance of what is! When someone ask you to gaze inside and you experience luminous openness and you experience pure formless luminous awareness. And then that person implies to you that there is no ontological Being fullness, no ontological Being-full existence of self, that you are simply voidness and emptiness and you are non- Existing because your awareness is not a form. They are teaching MA RIGPA! You are being taught the Ignorance of what IS. They think that only form truly exist. This is ontological ignorance of formless awareness within form. The Delusion of the Illusion of Phenomena When you experience yourself and your Being and your world and everyone you love as an illusion, and everyone you love as lacking actuality because their awareness is not a thing or a form, then you are living within a nihilistic delusion. Your sense of the actuality of forms and the reality of forms is profoundly distorted and negates the Beingfullness of Consciousness and the formlessness of Consciousness. In this unhappy and in this limited and limiting way of experiencing formless awareness as Being and Being-fullness, your very lived experience becomes negated and you are experienced as existentially absent of the living Being-fullness of self. Thus, like Gautama you will also think and will also experience that ‘All life is Suffering.’ Of course, without Being-fullness, all life is suffering. Without Being-fullness of beings, all life is without meaning. This is Ma Rigpa. This is ontological ignorance and the suffering of Being-lessness. So, formlessness is thus confused as Emptiness or Being-lessness or as nothingness or as absence of Being-fullness. Some think formless Being-fullness is nothingness or emptiness or non – existence. They Equate Being as only a thing, or only as a form. This way of concrete operational thinking and this concrete exoteric way of understanding is reified thinking and reified conceptualization of concretized mind alone. This is a radical ontological philosophical distortion and a profound philosophical ontological distortion which sustains unbearable ontological suffering in this world. This is a concretized exoteric experience of consciousness. This narrow vision reflects a dense concrete operational thinking style. This thinking style can dominate latency age children as Piaget describes. This thinking style is of latency age fixation. This concrete operational style is the thinking style of exoteric thought. Exoteric thought is “thing” and Cause Effect dominated thought. Exoteric thought reifies lived experience. Exoteric thinking reifies awareness and reifies Beingfullness and reifies consciousness. In exoteric thought there is no experience of self- liberation. The Foundational Distortion of Being and Phenomena This was Gautama’s mistaken perceptual experience confusing the formlessness of consciousness with the emptiness of Being-lessness and confusing the openness of consciousness with absolute nothingness and the spacious luminous openness of formlessness with Emptiness and Nothingness and Non Existing-ness. This mistaken experience is psychologically distorting and epistemologically absent of Wisdom. This view is actually (Ma Rigpa) ignorance and this nihilistic view invalidates human experience and human love and human actuality and human nature. Many philosophical and religious systems suffer this narrow view of human life and human experience. As Bodhidharma said in the 6th century, “Beyond words and letters there is a transmission, that does not belong to any tradition, it is the nature of human awareness.” This ontological distortion of formlessness with emptiness did not take place in Greek Philosophy nor did this confusion take place in western medieval philosophy nor in the realistic ontological philosophical tradition of Thomist Aquinas and most medieval scholastic theologians and philosophers. Brentano was philosophically realistic and Brentano’s phenomenological understanding greatly influenced both Freud’s and Husserl’s understanding about our lived experience of Psyche. Psyche is not a thing, a reified thing. Psyche is the lived experience of Being-full Consciousness. Psychological and Ontological Intimacy Now it is true these two forms of Intimacy, the psychological intimacy of mind and the ontological intimacy of our awareness can be joined together within the Fullness of Mysterious Being-full Intimacy. This mysterious union is foundational for our embodied lived experience of Mystic Relational life. Our embodied form-full lived experience of our Beatific Vision of Pure Being-fullness, and as our embodied luminous formless awareness within form experience continuously opens Beatific Natural Self-liberation. Beatific Vision and Beatific Experience The Beatific Vision is the vision of our embodied Being-fullness as luminous formless awareness as Source, and our formless awareness as our Ground of Being. We do not have formless awareness we are formless Being-full awareness. Our Who-ness is Our Formless awareness. Our own Who-ness is Timeless Awareness within time. Our own Who-ness is Being-full source and the Being-full Phenomena of Source. Remembering Phenomena and Source are Being-fully the Same. Many forms of eastern philosophy cannot understand nor experience this profound liberating experience of the Actuality of Reality. Our formless intimacy is the lived experience of the infinite immanence of formless Being-fullness as primordial formless awareness that manifest everything and everything. This experience of our formless Being-fullness of Being is Pure Awareness, and is our Pure Creative Consciousness and our Pure Self Manifestation of Pure Being-fullness. Language as House of Being: The Being-full Articulation of Being-full Experience Eugene Gendlin’s wonderful phenomenological work is focused on the articulation of our lived experience of Being-full Meaning-fullness elaborated from within our lived experience of phenomenological Being within our field of experiential awareness. Our art-full articulation of the felt sense of our lived experience of Being and Beingfullness of phenomena is itself a phenomenological Being-full experience. Our experiential articulation of our Lived experience is a Being-full metaphor of the drama of our articulated language-ing of our lived experience of Being and our Being-full experience of phenomena within our field of awareness, rather than our being limited only by being within our experience of mind alone. Within existential phenomenological psychology, the articulation from our Being in mind alone is considered to be a dissociative experience. Our opinions of our mind alone, and our articulation of our lived Beingfull experience are different dimensions of our personal experience. Transmission of mind and transmission of awareness reflect the different dimensions of transmissional experience. Transmission of mind is psychological and transmission of awareness is ontological. These dimension of ideation of mind and the dimension of lived experience of Being-fullness are often profoundly confusing psychologically and philosophically. Most often people located in mind alone only are able to articulate their experience of mind alone as Opinion. They are unable to articulate their lived experience of the Being-fullness of phenomena and the phenomena of Being-fullness. Opinion As Mind The articulation from mind alone is an opinion. And it is great to have opinions about everything and anything. But it is most useful to know that the articulation of our lived experience from the place within our lived experience will have a lived authenticity, and have the power of experiential transmission which is our direct transmission of Being-full meaning. The felt meaning of Being and Being-fullness is directly transmitted from one person to another. This transmission is both non conceptual and conceptual. This transmission is direct and experiential. As Heidegger so often said “Poetically does man dwell.” Dwelling is a metaphor for Being in awareness and for Being in Being-fullness or formlessness, and not in form alone. Meaning arises out of nonconceptual experience, meaning arises out of the felt sense of Beingfull phenomena. Meaning arises out of union of awareness infusing our mind and our mind remaining within our Being-full awareness Field. (presence) Form and Formlessness We can have a felt sense of form and a felt sense of formless awareness. Our felt sense of form will reflect our mind and our body, and our felt sense of formlessness, will reflect our primordial awareness or psyche or spirit or gnosis or jnana, or our Who-ness as Being-full Knowingness. When our mind and our awareness are integrated, we are able to experience and articulate the experience of phenomena and the Being-fullness of phenomena simultaneously. We can also articulate our most wonderful subtle experience of Formless awareness. We can articulate our wonderful experience of our Beingfull experience. Formless awareness is ultimately boundless and uncontained. Formless awareness permeates mind and body. Formless awareness is the place of foundational elemental experience. Within formless awareness is the power of transformation and the power of the liquidity of change. Formless awareness is potential space embodied. Within formless awareness is our doorway into esoteric experience and esoteric understanding. Formless awareness liberates us from exoteric concrete operational experience of our world and our reified concrete sense of our embodiment of luminous Being-fullness. Our Luminous Energetic Power of Our Being-full Formless Awareness Our Being-fullness awareness is not only Formless awareness, our Being-fullness is not only Spaciousness awareness. Being-fullness is not only luminous awareness. Being-fullness awareness is compassionate awareness in manifestation. Our Being-fullness Awareness is also the Profound Energetic Power of the self- manifestation of our ontological Primordial Creative Awareness. This Energetic aspect is an intimate aspect of the spectrum of awareness. This energetic dimension metabolizes the density of mind into the light of awareness. This luminous energetic dimension of our primordial awareness manifests within our lived experience of Being and Being-fullness. This energetic dimension metabolizes the density of our instinctive drives and drivenness. Self-Liberation in essence allows us to live within our ongoing continuity of Being within and as our experiential field of embodied Pure Being-full awareness in self- manifestation. To live within this sense of Luminous, Energetic Being-fullness, is to live within this non conceptual pre- reflective embodied pervasive Energetic field of Pure Awareness. This Pure Luminous Awareness furthers our capacity of deepening and sustaining and continuing living within Timeless Formless Awareness in Time. Formless Awareness is embodied Being-fullness. Formless awareness is embodied spaciousness. Formless awareness is embodied Luminosity. Formless awareness is the embodied luminous Energy of our Cosmological Life Force. Formless Awareness Within Form Formless awareness is deeply related to form and inhabits form and infuses form. Formlessness is not a transcendental experience as some would like you to think. Formlessness is not emptiness. Formlessness is not nothingness. Formlessness is not the absence of Being-fullness. Formlessness is not an absence of Who-ness. Formlessness is not a dissociative detached moment. Formlessness is not the Transcendental dimension Beyond the Beyond-ness. Formless awareness is Energic Embodied Awareness. Formless awareness is vital Energetic Field Phenomena. Formless awareness is an Ontological Field Phenomena. Formless Awareness is the field of Being manifesting within ‘You as You.’ Formless Awareness is our Pure Ontological living presence of Luminous Energetic Being-fullness. Formless awareness is the Immanent realm of Being-full lived experience. Formless awareness is the doorway of our ontological openness into Esoteric luminous Energetic Existence Formless Awareness is our Esoteric Luminous Being-fullness of Being and is our own unending luminously Energetic Being. Formless awareness is infused with the luminous energy of the metabolization of experience and the metabolization of instinctive drivenness. Formless awareness is further more our profound experience of the subtle archetypal elements of spaciousness, of energy , of earth, of fire, of luminous liquidity, and of air. Formless awareness is an energetic elemental state that permeates our embodiment and permeates the embodiment of others. Formless awareness permeates and is permeated by our creative energetic embodiment in our world. Our world is a Luminous Energetic manifestation of Being-fullness. Formlessness awareness is the intermediate area of Potential Spacious Experience. Formlessness awareness is the creative source of change and transformation. Formlessness awareness allows us to energetically move into the liquidity of Being-fullness. We are able to energetically move within phenomena and move through phenomena. Formlessness awareness is our luminous source of creative energetic transformation. Formlessness awareness is our source of our energetic selfmanifestation of the world and within the world. Primordial Awareness as Life Force of Luminous Energetic Manifestation Our Luminous Life Force is the luminous energetic manifestation of Being and Being-fullness. Our Luminous Life Force is luminous Eros; and our luminous life Force is luminous Consciousness. Our luminous life force is the manifestation of our luminous Primordial Awareness. Our Creative Luminous Life Force is an energetic manifestation of Creative Luminous Consciousness infinite in its horizons vast and multidimensional. Entering Into and Within Each Other Two people can enter into formlessness awareness within each other. This is Ontological Being-full union. This is a Being-full naturally healing state of Presence. This is also true Tantra that is our ongoing Continuity of Luminous Being-fullness life after life and death after death. This ontological energetic capacity is our natural manifestation of luminous Eros in our Intimate Participation within the Creative Universal life force of Being-fullness. Universal Primordial Ground Awareness manifests this luminous diaphanous power (Shakti) of pervasive relational energy as our life Force and as The Universal Life Force infinite in its horizons, vast and multidimensional. The unfolding and embodied manifestation of Luminous Primordial Energy is the Self-manifestation of Primordial Ground Awareness. There is an endless unfolding of the manifestation of luminous Elemental Energy within our person as our person. We are both activating and being activated by the Sublime Energy of Creative Ontological Self-Manifestation. In Kashmir Shavism this luminous universal ontological creative energy is called the Shakti. This Shakti is intrinsic and pervasive luminous Being-full energy manifested within our Creative Cosmological Universal Life field. This luminous energetic field is Infinite in its horizons, vast and multidimensional. This Life Force arises out of Primordial Timelessness Awareness manifesting energetically within Time as Time. This Life Force is an Event of Being and a Being-full Event. This luminous Translucent Being-full Eros is not a concretized physical drivenness in and within Formless Luminous Awareness. This esoteric Shakti or Esoteric Diaphanous Eros unfolds within us and around us as Cosmological Luminous Pervasive Energetic Existence. This Universal Life Force is Timeless Awareness manifesting Being-fullness within Time. This Being-full Universal Life Force is manifesting within Timelessness as as Time. This Creative Life Force is the mysterious pervasive unfolding of Self- Liberation and Self-manifestation within, and through the unfolding events of Being and Being-fullness. SelfLiberation is a Being-full Event. Self- Liberation is not as some think a Beingless Event, an Eventless Event. Esoteric Understanding Goes Beyond Exoteric Understanding This Creative Ontological Eros, this Creative Shakti, this Creative Pervasive unfolding of luminous diaphanous Being-full Energy is not our exoteric mechanistic concrete operational Instinctive Drivenness. This Being-full Eros is not the reified concretized driven-ness that Freud so eloquently elaborates. The Freudian exoteric elaboration of instinctive driven-ness is an exoteric erotic experience highly selfcontained and concretized and psychologically dense. This experience of endless instinctive drivenness unfolds and transforms within our esoteric context and our esoteric experience of luminous pervasive Luminous Energy. The Freudian understanding is a brilliant densely reified exoteric understanding. Our ontological understanding of the Energetic Luminous Being-full Existential Dimension is a Luminous Esoteric understanding. Energetic Transformation Our mind knows the exoteric experiential dimension of existing-ness. Our primordial awareness directly knows the esoteric dimension of Being and Being-fullness. To enter Being-full awareness and to live within Being-full awareness is to live within the esoteric experience of Being-full life. Instinctive energies of Drivenness are energetically transformed into luminous states of Creative Being-fullness infused with Being-full states or fields of pervasive Bliss and Ecstasy. Liquid like Ecstasy. Liquid like Bliss. The unfolding luminous realm of field like energy becomes pervasive. An ordinary person can live within the luminous continuous experience of radiant Energetic Being-fullness infinite in its horizons and vast and multidimensional no matter the circumstances and in spite of the situational context. Instinctual drives are no longer distinctive physical states of specific drivenness but pervasive embodied fields of Being-full Luminous diaphanous subtle energy. This is the essence of Ontological Tantra. True Tantra is Ontological and not simply a psychological event. Mysterious Sphera Our unfolding Tantric understanding and Tantric experience is our unfolding experience of Luminous Being-full Eros unfolding and self - manifesting as Cosmological Luminous Universal Life Force as an Events of Being and Being-fullness. The Esoteric life force manifests as a mysterious Sphera vast and is multidimensional infinite in its horizons. This Sphera embodies us and contains us and protects us through the events of Time including Death itself. We live and die within Timeless Deathless Awareness, life after life and death after death. Being-full Timeless awareness is indestructible and is unborn and undying. Being-full Timeless awareness is language-ed in Dzogchen as Vajra Wisdom. The Chakrasamvara Tantra elaborates this archetypal pervasive energetic experience and this Bliss-full ontological understanding of Being-full Universal Energic Shakti that is continuous life after life and death after death. Shakti is a word language-ing this unfolding of Beingfull self-manifestation of this luminous diaphanous Being-full Energy that is the intrinsic energetic dimension of Primordial Consciousness as our personal intrinsic energetic field of primordial luminous awareness. Our life as” lived experience “ is the unfolding existential dimension of the Shakti or Luminous Energy of luminous Being-fullness manifesting us and manifesting within us and manifesting around us as the lived experience of ontological Luminous Being-full life and Being-full events of Timeless Awareness within Time. Our Ongoing continuity of our lived experience of Cosmological Luminous Being-fullness Energetic Life Force is Ontological Tantra. Our Ongoing continuity of Cosmological Being-full awareness life after life and death after death is Ontological Tantra. Being-full Eros as Life Force unfolds as the Luminous Cosmological Shakti to use the language of Kashmir Shavism. As this Cosmological transformation takes place within our human experience and unfolds within our lived experience as this Being-full Erotic Realm of Pure Life Force within our lived embodied Being-full experience. This experience goes beyond the domination of the concrete operational exoteric realm. The concrete operational realm unfolds within us and transforms into the Esoteric Realm of Luminous Energetic Being-fullness. Esoteric Timeless Eros transforms and unfolds and opens our transition from the concrete operational containment of exoteric operational physical concrete drivenness into luminous forms of Esoteric cosmological diaphanous fluid luminous forms of energetic experience and luminous fluid forms of esoteric luminous Living Being full Dynamic Presence-ing Cosmological Luminous Creative Being-fullness is a manifestation of luminous Being-full Creative Shakti. Creative Being-fullness manifests and becomes the Luminous Life force of Shakti. This Shakti illuminates and permeates everything. This Cosmological Shakti illuminates and infuses the vast range of our human lived experience becoming experientially infused within Luminous Fluid Energetic states of living continuous Presence just as we are. Tantra is the energetic dimension of Creative luminous Being-fullness and Tantra is exquisitely Pure and Self- liberating energy within our lived experience within every and all human context and all human events. Shakti luminously and fluidly pervades every human experience and every human context. Cosmological Shakti infuses, and saturates and liquifies concretized human exoteric experience. This is the magnificent unfolding personification process of luminous radiance presence of self-luminous esoteric self- liberation. Intimacy As Ontological Self Liberation There is this deepening of this endless intimate esoteric drama of selfliberation through the luminous intensity of our universal life force manifesting the endless transition of deathless awareness within which we leave one dimension of Being-full existence into other dimensions of Being-full existence life after life and death after death. Thus, we esoterically transform Being-full life after Being-full life and Being-full death after Being-full death. Our personal historical existence is a Cosmological Event life after life and death after death. The Sphera is our ongoing continuity of Being-fullness life and Being full Union life after life and death after death. This Intimate Sphera or Sphere embodies us and we embody the Sphera .All those we live within Being-full Intimacy and within Being-full Union are within this Sphera life after life and death after death. This is wonder of Deathless Awareness as described in Dzogchen and Kashmir Shavism Tantras. This is the vast wonder of Ontological Intimacy as Being-full Self- Liberation. Self - Liberation is the experience of Phenomenological Ontological Intimacy. Self-Liberation is the luminous experience of the oneness and the sameness of Phenomena and Source. Our own Who-ness is the Ground of Being as Pure Being-fullness. Believing is not Experiencing and in Experiencing there is no need for Believing.
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