Here’s an Aussie with a little different approach. Went to India but didn’t find a teacher. No tradition and doesn’t pull any punches.
“I suffer because I think and because I am true to my feelings. I do not suffer because of events.”
“Check this with your own experience.”
“…you do want to suffer because you haven’t learned from your life experience what causes suffering.”
“The only self-knowledge I get is when I run into a brick wall.”
“…I only suffer because I think. And I only think because I give in to my feelings. Have you learnt that yet?”
“Once I know ‘why do I suffer?’, its obvious. I don’t have to suffer any more.”
“But I don’t have to suffer because I lose my house. Indeed, I have to then take action. A lot of action… But it’s only action that I have to take to address the situation. And action does not require thinking. Action requires looking… If I look at the situation without thinking, I will see the next probable move.”
“Be with the shock. And know that it’s natural to be shocked.” “The animals do not think about it. They just get the shock, then they take the necessary actions…to rejuvenate themselves.” “We think about what we’ve lost. And that’s when you suffer.” “What is suffering?… It’s all feeling.”
“Decisions are made by feelings.” “You can be controlled by your feelings.” “You can stop acknowledging your feelings.” “You need no feelings. You need no thoughts about some spiritual path. Rubbish… You practice now. It’s absolutely impossible to think about now.”
He’s a little grumpy about the western emotional enamor of eastern teachings and religious traditions. (laughs)
“What can I do? What do I feel I should do – Rubbish. [just] What can I do?” “You always get through. So stop wasting your energy in thinking about what you’re going to do in the future and do…what is right to do now. And if you don’t know what to do, then don’t do anything. Go and sit on the grass and feel your guts going… your feeling trying to say feel me, feel me.” “If I think about you, I’ll become you. And if I become you, I’ll be a mess.”
“Give up your feelings. That’s what stops the mind.” [emotions are the energy drivers of the ego]
“Liberation? Liberation from what? … from my feelings. Which are weighing me down.”
Teachings “…all promising something in the future. But how about now?” “The only thing that keeps me from now are my thoughts and my feelings.” “This is the truth I’m going to tell you but you have to discover it for yourself.” “I don’t need to know anything more, for instance.”
“In the absence of yourself is the fullness of life, now.”
“Do I want to suffer or not suffer, now? Immediately, if you can hold that, as soon as you go to suffer, go to think,… just say no. Because that’s the cause of suffering.”
He then goes on to talk about what Me is, what he calls the void within. I would not say I agree entirely with him, but he makes a very important point here and really goes to the heart of it. From my perspective, feelings have value – it is being trapped or attached to them that is the issue.
Barry Long, first ‘Course in Being’ meeting, 1995.
The clip is called “Me – The Void of Absence”, free on the Audio Downloads page. This is just from the first 30 minutes of a much longer talk. His journey.
Barry died in 2003. He talked about dying in the last part of his life.
Barrylong.org
Last Updated on November 11, 2017 by Davidya
This guy’s pretty cool.
Thank you for your insight into his writing, there was a man once who said it is acceptable to feel, not to wallow. Too bad he did not learn to live by that piece of wisdom; however, I use a 5 minute rule. Feel it, walk into the fire and know what it is, the fire will go out when we let go.
Catch me up.
Hi Ariel
Barry is a great example of how one’s experience defines what they teach. He started with a spiritual crisis in his early 30’s, left his family to find a teacher in India, and failed to find one.
What he suggests is a great tool for moving past the drama that plagues even some people who have woken. But its a bit of throw the baby out with the bathwater. Feelings do indeed fuel suffering. But just as events don’t cause suffering, neither do feelings. It’s our attachment to and absorption with that do.
Putting feelings aside can be a useful exercise but rejecting them outright can be a barrier long term. Some of the richest aspects of awakening are through the heart. It is not just about freedom and peace, but bliss and love. As I have mentioned elsewhere, just as there is self and Self, so too is there love and Love.
Some even make the journey itself through the feelings, so they can be both hindrance and technique.
In some ways, he is the stereotypical man, rejecting feelings and promoting sex without them. But he did learn a few gems 😉
Hi Connie
Yes, exactly – wallow or become absorbed in. Being able to take a step back and see your drama at play is key to seeing through it. To being able to choose not to engage it.
Yes, allow all things. When you allow it, it is released. When you resist it, it persists.
Hi David, Barry Long did meet a teacher in India, but only briefly. He spent a silent 1/2 an hour with J Krishnamurti and that precipitated his 1st stage enlightenment. He went on to live and teach in London for a few years, where one of his students, who was a schizophrene, went past him and became Barry’s teacher for 6 weeks, which led to Barry’s own God realisation.
He published a book called “The Origins of Man and the Universe’, which is rather reminiscent of some of the insights you’ve published, though he uses non-Indian terminology. The first edition had a spiral diagram on the front cover, which I never really understood, but from your description of consciousness curving in on itself, now makes a lot of sense.
Thanks for the background, Philip. Interesting trajectory.
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Yes, the way consciousness becomes form is in a spiral. When we picture vibration, we see a wave. But this is a 2D representation. Waves actually move in spirals. Similarly, the earth orbits the sun but the sun is moving through space at a high speed so we’re really spiraling through space. Another form this takes is in vortexes. Water spirals down a drain…
And thank you for mentioning lucialorne in one of your online dialogues. I thought if you’re doing a retreat, it’s gonna be good. I did the research and I wasn’t disappointed. Listening to Lorne is now my daily meditation.
You’re welcome, Philip. A large part of my experience with the variations in awakening and later shifts has come from those retreats. I’ve seen a lot of people wake up with them and have further shifts. They have retreats just for people clearly awake as what they need is a bit different.
.
Awakening usually needs silence, as Yoga describes:
“Yoga is the complete settling of the activity of the mind
Then the observer is established in the Self”
But once the silence is established, then its about waking to the flow in the silence. That’s what leads to Unity and refinement.