The Seven Qualities of Awakened Awareness, Part 2

Passionate Presence
by Catherine Ingram

(Page 2 of 2)

Usually people associate a sense of unbounded presence with epiphanies in life-being present at a birth, or a death. People lose themselves in sexual union, in nature, or in the presence of heart-wrenching beauty. In those moments they forget to keep up the story about the one having an experience, and all that is left is the actual experience of presence. Yet peak experiences are only portals to our true nature, which is already occurring completely on its own.

What is known as realization is merely feeling this immaculate presence here and now, realizing or being fully cognizant of the ordinary miracle of just being. This needs no attainment since it is already occurring. It requires no special circumstances, no life epiphanies, no meritorious preparations. It is fully present each moment of our lives. It stays fresh and innocent despite our sorrows, regrets, and whatever damage or failures we feel we have sustained. No suffering or transgressions have marred it, just as no exalted deeds have enhanced it. Countless thoughts and experiences have come and gone, and none of them have adhered.

Though meeting a teacher facilitated this awakening for me, it is not always necessary. In fact, awakened awareness is not dependent on any particular circumstance. We are each endowed with clear perception that becomes dormant or obscured through the conditioning of fear, loss, and belief. When we deeply relax in silence, our awareness effortlessly shines with a transforming brilliance. We live as sensible and practical people, but with a twinkle in our eyes. We go about our business as usual-answering phones, taking care of children, riding the subway-and we enjoy a quiet sense of presence through it all. Aware that we are living in a grand mystery, feeling the radiance of its presence everywhere, we also take care of the tasks at hand.

I began sharing these understandings in 1992, initially at the invitation of Ram Dass, spiritual teacher and author of the classic Be Here Now. Since that time I have traveled extensively, conducting public evening events in the U.S. and Europe. These gatherings, called Dharma Dialogues, are interactive discussions alternating with periods of quiet. The dialogue's purpose is to bring one's attention to present awareness and see through the mind's habitual ways of trying to squirm out of it. Each night is different, a kind of improvisational Socratic conversation that eventually leads, in almost each case, to silence.

In addition to Dharma Dialogues, I have also led many silent residential retreats. It is in the retreats, when people are simply quiet and free to float in the deep waters of their being, that I have noticed the emergence of a surprisingly consistent intelligence. This intelligence is cross-cultural and transcends biological abilities and educational backgrounds. People who may not have been considered intellectually gifted experience this intelligence as do people who have had little education. It could be thought of as an intelligence of the heart because it seeks harmony and the equilibrium of goodness. I call it awakened awareness because it is innate and suddenly just wakes up. It is this awareness or intelligence we refer to when we say we are in our "right minds." We might add that awakened awareness is when we are in our right hearts as well. When we are in our right minds and hearts, we are instinctively loving, generous, and clear.

For years I had been reflecting on the universal nature of this awareness. I had noticed, especially in retreats, that people in the daily group sessions would speak in almost mystical poetry to describe the ordinary events of their days. I realized that what we now call mystical works of poetry from former eras were simply descriptions of reality by people of those times, such as Rumi or Hafiz of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. They weren't trying to be poetic. They were describing feelings and life as they literally experienced them. They were reporting from the field of awakened awareness.

In retreat, I began to notice similar descriptions spoken by people who had never been exposed to these ideas. I have often been startled to hear perceptions and feelings described in nearly exact language by, for example, a person who lives in rural Scotland and one who lives in Hawaii. I realized that this intelligence crosses time as well, that the awakened awareness of the Buddha, Christ, or Rumi is not distinctly different from that of our own. People over the centuries have stumbled upon this inherent intelligence in countless ways and expressed it in art, poetry, music, science, and even religion.

My attention began to reflect on and marvel at the similar expressions I observed in people who exhibited awakened awareness. It became a secret hobby of mine to notice these similarities wherever I traveled in the world. One night I awoke from a dream in which I had identified seven primary qualities that naturally and consistently emerge in awakened awareness. I got out of bed, wrote them down, and went back to sleep. The next morning I looked at what I had written and saw the basis for this book.

The seven qualities-Silence, Tenderness, Embodiment, Genuineness, Discernment, Delight, and Wonder-are familiar to everyone. Yet we often overlook them in our pursuit of worldly things or spiritual advancement. In awakened awareness, however, these qualities are our daily company, our best friends. They come from our own innate wisdom and guide us better than any philosophy ever has.

This book is therefore simply a reminder of what you already know in your heart of hearts, in your own awakened awareness. Someone who recently read the manuscript said that during the reading she often found herself thinking, "Yes, absolutely right, but how do we get there?" The irony is that in the moment of saying, "Yes, absolutely right . . ." she was in awakened awareness itself. It is your own awakened awareness that recognizes truth. You don't have to strain to find it or strive to intellectually hold onto it. Insight is best metabolized fresh. There is no need to remember anything for later. If you try to grasp it, you end up with dogma. If you relax into the quiet center of your being, your own awareness will notice every wink of the mystery that comes your way. silence

She had been on the quest for so long that the reasons for it were no longer clear to her. She was just moving, step after step, too tired to think. Having recently fallen down a slippery bank into a thicket, she was bruised and scratched, her daring leaps of former times now too difficult to execute.

Seeing a river in the distance, she made her way there to get a drink and wash her wounds. Afterward she lay under a nearby tree thinking that if she could just get some rest, she would be able to renew her journey with invigorated determination. After all, the quest was important. The quest was all there was.

She was about to drift off to sleep when she noticed an old woman sitting on the riverbank nearby. The woman, who had been gazing at the water, turned and silently gestured to her, opening her arms with palms outward as if to say, "Just this."

Yes, just this, the woman thought as she fell into a deep sleep. When she awoke several hours later, evening had fallen and the old woman was gone. Getting up, she realized that something was very different. The stars were now shining pinpoints within her being, their light no longer traveling from a distance but encompassed by her awareness as glowing prisms within the vast regions of herself. The river and its sound, the trees and their smell-all now existed in a sweeping whole, a multidimensional canvas of color, forms, and sensations. She realized in a flash that it had always been so.

Her restless thoughts, so long her only companions, disappeared into a void as soon as they arose, as though pulled into space. They were whispers in a cathedral. They were ghosts, without relevance. She remembered that she had been on a quest, but now the idea of it seemed strange, and she could no longer hold the thought of its importance.

The silence, on the other hand, seemed almost loud in contrast. She spent the rest of the night feeling like a bird that had been freed from a cage into a palace of starlight, the silence now and again punctuated by the words "just this," though even these words were claimed by it.

Copyright © March 2003, Gotham Books, a member of Penguin Putnam, Inc., used by permission.

About the Author

Catherine Ingram is a renowned dharma teacher who has been leading Dharma Dialogues and retreats since 1992. She is a cofounder of Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, considered the most prestigious Buddhist center in the West. She is the author of In the Footsteps of Gandhi: Conversations with Spiritual/Social Activists and has contributed articles to O magazine, New Age Journal, East West Journal, and Yoga Journal, among other publications.