The Impact of Awakening, Part II: Clarity & Bliss

[00:00:01]So, now when I use the term clarity, and in Vajrayana, the Tibetan term for it is ösel, clarity.

[00:00:13]So, I'm not speaking about it in the way that it's usually discussed in non-duality, which is often referred to a kind of cognitive clarity, right? A kind of clarity at the level of consciousness in regards to the nature of thoughts and the capacity to look directly into the experience. So, often that is uh called clarity.

[00:00:44]But, uh in this context, clarity means this uh sudden, unexpected, spontaneous uh appearance of the sense perception completely peeled out of uh conceptualization, like peeled from conceptualization, uh which is the constant categorizing and labeling and uh like seeing things uh through thinking mind, through the ordinary mind.

[00:01:24]So, how it appears is that the phenomena arises from this uh non-conceptual immediacy as nothing other. So, thoughts and sensations, emotions, they arise as already liberated. They arise as liberation because uh it's so clear, this untainted, unblemished nature of the mind itself, and that the phenomena is nothing other.

[00:01:59]So, everything appears kind of hyper vivid and uh fluid, very ephemeral, like in constant flux, but uh very timeless at the same time. So, this experience of sense perception doesn't happen in time because time or causality is one of those conceptual filters that is uh demolished in in the awakening process. So, when this specific effect of awakening kicks in, reality appears uh in its original state, we could say.

[00:02:45]And and it's always here, right? It's always here. So, it's it's not about the you know, progressing on the path to some special realization.

[00:02:58]Uh it it's it's actually about a complete opposite. It's about regressing in the um perceptual flow so thoroughly to the root of that spontaneous emergence that we're able to see that if we are not experiencing reality through this fundamental distinction of a subject and objects, this like really subtle but uh profound dualistic split, then phenomena arises uh as natural perfection, you know, or spontaneous presence.

[00:03:43]That's that's just another word for this uh expressive uh potentiality, this creative power of the ground that appears now dynamically as uh clarity.

[00:04:03]Right? So, all the colors are very effulgent, but they don't belong anymore to objects.

[00:04:11]They don't anymore belong to some objective world that is perceived.

[00:04:18]They are not perceived from distance.

[00:04:21]So, the visual field collapses into a a kind of flat, but at the same time uh completely multi-dimensional, kaleidoscopic kind of spontaneous emergence of uh light. So, there is no seer.

[00:04:44]There is only this spontaneous manifestation of the visual field as an undivided.

[00:04:52]And it's incomprehensible for the mind.

[00:04:54]So, the mind cannot understand this way of perceiving because mind, like the ordinary mind, always perceives in terms of duality. You know, that there is a seer and seeing and seen.

[00:05:06]But this is a fundamental collapse of that deeply rooted perceptual filter.

[00:05:14]And that applies to all the sense fields.

[00:05:17]So, the sound is just this pure radiant vibration.

[00:05:25]You know, not here, not there.

[00:05:28]There's no hearer, no heard, no hearing.

[00:05:31]It's just this uh appearance, this lucid, self-illuminating uh appearance that is completely timeless and seamless.

[00:05:44]And at the same time, utterly ungraspable.

[00:05:53]And the inner sense of the body, so the kinesthetic field, is equally completely insubstantial, but intensely present and sensitive.

[00:06:05]So, there's no separation whatsoever.

[00:06:08]So, when this energetic contraction called the self or self-grasping, that is is very physical condition, when that releases, the whole of the body appears as this uh kind of field, this uh interpenetrative and inter- connective uh fluid processing, basically, without any inherent existence or substance.

[00:06:37]So, there's no distinction whatsoever here between the world and our most uh intimate sensation of our physicality, because it's just one spherical experiencing, which is in its essence experience-less.

[00:07:04]Right? So, so this uh pure non-conceptuality is uh it's very much what makes this uh realization of the clarity uh possible.

[00:07:22]I mean, we can have certain glimpses into this way of perceiving.

[00:07:26]Uh I mean, people can have certain glimpses through psychedelics, for example. So, like LSD is famous for collapsing the kind of superficial layer of the ordinary mind and the narrative self, so the sense perception is suddenly like very vivid.

[00:07:47]And everything appears uh um in a way that kind of imitates this natural condition, you know, this clarity uh and transparency, you know, of the phenomenal appearance.

[00:08:03]But uh because the psychedelic is an artificial chemical that kind of uh temporarily forces our system into this way of perceiving, uh it's it's not the same. It It cannot induce the fundamental insight.

[00:08:24]The fundamental insight of emptiness, no mind, like recognition of the non-conceptuality, which is uh um the recognition of the nature of the mind. So, even if we have flashes into this way of perceiving, I would say that there is still a subtle filter there um that is not perceived, you know, but uh that is like one of the essential difference between when this is realized through genuine awakening process than as a temporary glimpse induced by the chemical substance in our brain.

[00:09:12]Uh so, so yeah, when it arises together with the non-conceptuality, this uh impact of clarity, you know, luminosity, radiance, there is no reification.

[00:09:33]Right? So, without um this tendency of the mind to constantly reify reality or reify identity into something this luminosity is allowed to express itself like without any attempt to make something out of it like to call it the ultimate reality or call it God or call it our true essence nature or call call it what whatever people want to call it because this is like the trap of the inherent existence when we are tapping into this fluid and spontaneous natural expression of reality that there is then the tendency to reify it into something right and and then it instantly loses that otherworldly like unblemished spontaneous uh kind of uninhibited like wild felt sense of it like we never really say what it is but the only way to remain in this freshness is to like fully release like this tendency to grasp it or try to possess it or own it or understand it you know through through reification or through applying these kind of substantialistic views upon this reality so that's another way to kind of make this into something actually existing that we start to imagine that this is consciousness or or this is a some sort of a oneness reality, you know, that is experiencing itself. And it it just the habit of the mind, you know, to kind of use these views of inherent existence to interpret something which is utterly beyond views.

[00:11:51]So, so this this uh This is not a view. This is not a perspective on reality. This is not any kind of uh new paradigm of experiencing.

[00:12:02]That's why it's beyond the conditioned mind to comprehend what it is, but it will attempt, of course, if it has glimpses or openings.

[00:12:13]So, I'm just pointing out here some of the ways uh the ordinary mind or the conditioned mind can kind of uh hijack this type of uh uh cracks like in reality.

[00:12:34]So, I like to use the word clarity in the way they describe it in Vajrayana, so they use the term ersel to refer to this particular experience aspect of reality.

[00:12:51]And um that's just my preference because I resonate deeply with that language, and sometimes just hearing a word like that is uh much more clarifying for me than any kind of complex intellectual or poetic or kind of cryptical sutras that aim to point out exactly the same.

[00:13:14]So, just this simple word ersel, for me it it resonates deeply. Like I think I heard it for the first time in uh Awakening to Reality blog. Someone was using that word and and it was that's a profound like remembrance.

[00:13:33]So, in Vajrayana, it is said that this experiential impact meaning clarity that is the true entrance into Vajrayana.

[00:13:46]You know, when when our system um reaches this point where you know, this illusory container um of the dualistic mind, it it just spontaneously kind of collapses into this acausal uh causeless uh ground, right? Something like that.

[00:14:26]And often times the clarity comes together with bliss. So, bliss is another um impact that the awakening process has in in our body mind experience. So, it it's a kind of a sign that this unbinding process it's it's working because when these deeply rooted mental constructs and beliefs and habits you know, they start to dissolve when the sense of separation, which is kind of like an energetic core at the you know, at the center uh of the bundle of of the narratives, right? And of the um cognitive loops and behavioral loops.

[00:15:14]So, when when that starts to spontaneously self-liberate and self-release, which is the awakening process, like that manifests as bliss.

[00:15:26]So, it's um it's fundamentally nothing that different, you know, than what we are used to called bliss in the conventional human sense, but at the same time it's it is very different in its essence because um like the conventional human um world or paradigm, like bliss is always something that is experienced uh temporarily. It's it's always uh based on conditions, and that's what people are pursuing it, right? Because it's uh our in in the dualistic way of perceiving reality, it's something limited, right?

[00:16:21]It's something that we need to cling to when it appears because we instinctively know that it's not going to last.

[00:16:29]Um so, this type of bliss often manifests like uh just very intense aliveness or sensorial uh feel of um kind of like radical pleasure or ecstasy.

[00:16:46]Um or kind of sudden surge of uh type of nectarian type of like fluidity that pervades our entire sense experience and our sense of self dissolves into it.

[00:17:01]Or just very um kind of uh high spiritual um let's say inspiration.

[00:17:20]>> So, all of these appears in the process of awakening, but at the same time there's something fundamentally different about the kind of joy of reality waking up to itself and spontaneously unbinding these deeply rooted that dualistic knots. So, so that kind of bliss is almost like threatening actually for the sense of identity. So, the identity likes to have bliss as long as it's you know, it still doesn't threaten its fundamental reality that it's the experience of a pleasurable experience.

[00:18:03]It's in charge, it's in control. Um it doesn't really kind of question anything fundamental about its own sense of reality.

[00:18:17]But this kind of uh well, the bliss is not even a correct word for it. Energy would be better. Like this spontaneous um responsiveness of the kind of joy of reality that is not an emotion. It's It's really this very uninhibited and um innocent like primordial innocent pure delight that is released when this uh concealment of being a person, you know, is is being dropped.

[00:19:01]So, bliss is here revealed to be the fundamental fabric of reality itself, but now it's so like free and so all consuming.

[00:19:13]Like fears and wrathful and like radically autonomous. Kind of like dancing, emptiness dancing.

[00:19:25]That this level of bliss is often extremely uh scary for for people to encounter if there is attachment to a sense of being a separate self.

[00:19:39]So, in that sense, it's not at all bliss in a human sense.

[00:19:54]So, these two experiential impacts of awakening, like bliss and clarity, they obviously like interweave.

[00:20:03]And and they are also one of the main pitfalls often times like in these phases of awakening where sudden dissolution happens, when deconstruction or dereification takes place, and this uh self-liberating nature expresses itself, you know, as intense, hyper vivid uh highly ecstatic uh luminous field of uh uh total freedom.

[00:20:39]So, it's just the habit of the mind to cling, to grasp around pleasurable experiences. So, that's the habit of the dualistic mind that can still and often times uh can even intensify like in the awakening process as long as there is any sense of the identity left, because it will still perceive according to that fundamental paradigm of scarcity that you know, happiness or choice something we need to hold on to.

[00:21:21]So, it's just a habit, but it can cause like surprisingly uncomfortable state of stuckness during during this process when these spontaneous openings appear and sometimes they're called awakening honeymoons and then when they apparently start to disappear then there is often the tendency to try to hold on to the clarity and bliss.

[00:21:44]There's a sense that the awakening has been lost when those experiential aspects kind of dissolve in this fundamental just empty nature which in itself is uh without any characteristics. So, this is kind of the creative expressive aspect of the ground. So, when it uh kind of dissolves into the pure spontaneous and we are not anymore experiencing experiencing that then then there's a tendency of the mind to interpret that awakening is that.

[00:22:27]And and that's just the experiential expression of it, of course. And even though we see clearly with the insight that awakening is not that, it's nothing that uh mind can ever grasp or comprehend.

[00:22:46]It's not an experience.

[00:22:48]And we see this with the genuine insight, we see this and yet this tendency to to grasp can still appear.

[00:23:04]>> So, it's just um something that many people go through and there's really um nothing about this experience.

[00:23:20]It's actually like a teaching in itself.

[00:23:23]um When whenever we encounter just this direct sense of self-grasping that when we are able to look into it directly with naked awareness, with the fundamental clarity of the insight um it's uh it actually deepens further that initial awakening. So, so it's never about getting rid of the grasping. It's is always about seeing that actually this uh habit of the dualistic mind it's just the unconditioned mind in disguise. So, when you look into it directly, it evaporates into this uh pure spontaneity.

[00:24:09]And in Dzogchen, they use this uh metaphor like like a snake uncoiling its own knots. So, that's how the grasping appears. It appears like an object when the dualistic mind functions.

[00:24:24]You know, and then we attempt to fix it, we attempt to manipulate it, we attempt to you know, work with it, but the most direct way to work with this tendency of grasping or fixating is not to interfere with it and just look directly into it from this place of unconditioned mind, and then you see that it's actually nothing other, and it spontaneously liberates.

[00:24:50]So, that's that's the path.

[00:25:01]>> But yeah, there's a lot that could be said, you know, about this subject, and this is just what comes up to me spontaneously in this moment when I'm speaking about it.

[00:25:23]But yeah, Adyashanti said uh very well uh you know, that uh fascination with states of consciousness or experiential aspects of awakening, I think we could call them states of consciousness. So, so fascination with states of consciousness leads to dependency and bondage.

[00:25:46]And I read that uh statement a long time ago, and I still think it's one of the most uh kind of precise and crystal clear um pointers towards the pitfall of this uh expressive aspect of awakening. So, um fascination with bliss, fascination with clarity, like this hyper vivid uh sensorial spontaneously manifesting, kind of like very otherworldly way of perceiving.

[00:26:23]Um yeah, that's um that's a pitfall. Like if uh if there's any attachment or clinging that associates to it.

[00:26:39]And in my view, there can only be this type of attachment or clinging if we still haven't seen through the inherent existence. So, the experience of the clarity and police it appears like something actually existing.

[00:26:57]And and then we start to cling to it.

[00:26:59]So, when this uh absence of inherent existence, which which is all about the pure non-conceptuality, right the inside of emptiness.

[00:27:12]So, so when that is applied like spontaneously and automatically almost like repeatedly alongside this awakening process uh then this tendency to grasp will naturally kind of unwind at its root because uh in this reality where there is no separation grasping makes no sense when when there is um Yeah, when when there when that's fundamental kind of split between uh experiencer and something that is experienced.

[00:28:01]When that is unseen and then the clarity of that structural shift is uh being totally integrated like in a in a very like somatic and physical and visceral manner. So, it's not just uh cognitive clear seeing. It's not just uh insight at the level of the mind. It's it's an all-encompassing and all-consuming uh clarity in that sense.

[00:28:29]Now I'm using the clarity in in this sense, right? In in the sense of the fundamental Yeah.

[00:28:42]insight.

[00:28:51]>> Yeah, in this pure non-duality this experience last bits of awakening like clarity and bliss and no mind, no conceptuality, they are just the kind of fabric of perception itself.

[00:29:17]And when that becomes increasingly clear whenever the remnants of the karmic mind or the residues of the sense of separation appear and apparently kind of color the field of perception it doesn't appear like a problem anymore. It doesn't appear like something has been lost and now the experience needs to be fixed or clarified or transformed or purified or corrected.

[00:29:50]So at this stage and now I'm really speaking about this subtle aspects of deep realization. So in this stage that is exactly the key that you see directly that samsara and nirvana arise from the same source which is this uh empty clarity.

[00:30:19]So you cease interfering with the samsaric appearance when it arises and you see that it's fundamentally nothing other than this nirvanic display of the enlightened wisdom mind.

[00:30:33]So you don't need to do anything about it.

[00:30:39]It actually becomes almost impossible anymore to separate them.

[00:30:45]Because when we cease seeing anything as a problem, like an appearance of a contraction appears, if there is nothing in the experience that registers it as a problem or something that we need to do about it, it doesn't appear as anything, right? It doesn't Even calling it contraction would require a certain type of interpretation. If that's not occurring, just just that experience of uh the energy appearing, it just liberates into the space by doing nothing when this is very clear, when when we are stabilized in the unconditioned mind.

[00:31:34]So, yeah, so so that's just one of the specifics of of of this path, like Dzogchen, because um earlier on the path is actually crucial to be able to discern between like a habitual mindstream and the unconditioned reality. So, it kind of separates samsara and nirvana very forcefully.

[00:32:04]So so that's crucial when we are in this phase of a disentanglement from thoughts and clarifying like the nature of perception.

[00:32:20]That's crucial in familiarization, familiarizing with nature of the mind, with the recognition, with the fundamental insight.

[00:32:35]But when that becomes kind of like a just a natural effortless spontaneous way of being you know, there there comes this point where all techniques so to speak like any remedy that we would apply to our experience is going to be an obstruction. That's so that's when all of that is is dropped and it it's so beautiful how how this uh that kind of appears and the path is really nothing but a yeah, like this natural intelligence, this natural open intelligence of the ground appearing as the path, right? So it it it's uh I do feel like reverence now when speaking about it because uh it's so beyond uh like the understanding what it is.