Throw Away The Map

Only our experience and knowingness are uniquely ours...

by Layton Payne

Supposing you successfully answer the eternal question, "Who am I?" What then? Would there be further questions to answer, conflicts to solve, problems to address? WHAT knows the answer? Per haps instead of seeking and forever embracing conflict as a righteous necessity in life, why not explore, play, and create-as you choose--at any level of consciousness? Throughout the ages this has been referred to by many names: The Dance of Shiva, The Homecoming, and more recently quantum physics, The Collapse of the Wave Function.

If you back yourself out of all your creations, i.e., emotional baggage, mental "facts," self-concept, physical body, physical universe, you would discover the unbounded, limitless and inexpressible-SOURCE. As Swami Muktananda observed:

"So many thoughts arise and subside, arise and subside. Try to perceive the Source of the arising and subsiding thoughts. When the waves of thoughts stop arising, this is the space of God. God lies at the Source of thought."

Those who have reached enlightenment can only leave maps for us to follow. Unfortunately, the map is NOT the territory. When we follow a path, sadhana (belief system), it is common to ride the rising wave of initial excitement followed by the trough of disappointment, bewilderment, and even giving up. The Source seems out of reach. We may become mesmerized-and rightfully so-by the utter beauty and timelessness of the Masters' words, and yet they are only words.

Only our experience and knowingness are uniquely ours. Everything else is merely a map. Convincing ourselves, usually unconsciously, that the map IS the territory is the folly of irresponsibility, a self-imposed trap.

For instance, when we be come trapped within a belief, we may search high and low for the "answer" to our problems. We usually never consider that the belief, "I have a problem," generates experiences (fatigue, fear, disease-"The Problem!"). The gilded labyrinth of the mind continuously seeks for answers to "the problem."

A COURSE IN MIRACLES elegantly addresses this perpetual conflict: "'Seek and do NOT find.' This is the one promise the ego (mind) holds out to you, and the one promise it will keep. For the ego pursues its goal with fanatic insistence, and its judgment, though severely impaired, is COMPLETELY CONSISTANT."

Muktananda asked, "Do you want to know God as he is? Or, do you want to know God as your mind tells you he is?"

Avatar effortlessly returns you to the Source of life, the Source that CHOOSES to create beliefs and therefore have experiences. To be the silent witness outside your creations is to be at Source--the freest you can ever be.

So, if beliefs indeed create experiences, wouldn't it make better sense to play with beliefs rather than to make beliefs an end in themselves?

Avatar is a self-directed investigation of the core of your life- consciousness itself. Upon gently returning to the Source you can easily fashion your life as YOU want it. Life becomes a work of art, and you are its respectful, unlimited creator, rather than a shackled creature.

Remember: you are broader, deeper and greater than you can ever imagine.

What is so unique about Avatar? Most trainings and courses offer a new set of beliefs that are perhaps a step beyond the ones you currently operate with. If you can accept and integrate these new beliefs, you may take a step toward improving your life. Avatar does not give you a "new and improved" set of beliefs to adopt. It is not about improving your life. Avatar enables you, as Source, to easily recognize the beliefs you are currently operating with (and thus experiencing). Avatar gives you the tools to effortlessly and permanently cease creating beliefs you no longer choose to experience. Thus, you choose the beliefs and create the reality you prefer.

 

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