Journey Into Awakening

Thank you. Wonderful. Welcome. My first time here up north. And it is perhaps not mere coincidence, but synchronistic that we are coming together here at a time of crisis politically. And it is significant that a group of people are gathering here who are focused on spiritual awakening. And of course, the inevitable thing that comes with spiritual awakening, that's inner peace. And that's what needed not only here, but in the rest of the world too. Most of you are here because you are already undergoing what I call the awakening process. And I'm sure some of you are here who are already awake and just enjoy listening to me don't need to be here anymore, but that's fine. And one or two maybe here against their free will because your partner or a relative or good friend told you that you really need to come here. And it is a sad fact that the people who really need to be here are not going to be here mostly, but that's fine. Awakening eventually will come to the whole of humanity. But right now at this time, a certain segment of humanity is beginning to go through this evolutionary shift, which I sometimes call the awakening of consciousness. And I guess, although I have no plans, particular plans for this evening, but my feeling is that it's going to be about awakening, the awakening of human consciousness, and not only about the awakening of human consciousness. I have a feeling that this evening is going to be an essential part of the awakening that's happening on the planet here and there. So I'd like this evening to be not only interesting for you on a conceptual level or entertaining, because that wouldn't be quite enough. And you might get bored after half an hour or so. But more importantly, I'd like this evening to be experiential for you. Something that goes beyond conceptual understanding or taking in new ideas, interesting ideas. And then you can go home afterwards and say, oh, that was interesting, or to be talked about. I don't remember everything, but that was an interesting idea. Maybe there may be one or two interesting ideas, but this is not what this evening is about. It's something deeper, a shift in consciousness. So I'd like you to experience as we spend this evening together, to experience or to deepen, because many of you have already are already going through this shift. Then this evening is a deepening for you of this shift in consciousness. And for one or two of you, it may be the first time. And that may be one or two of those of you who didn't really want to come here, but were dragged here by someone else. And you may get suddenly have Your first glimpse of what is meant by awakening and what in Zen they called satori. And you suddenly go, oh, now I know what he's talking about. That's what it is. And then you talk to a friend about it tomorrow and say, well, what is it? And you say, well, I can't explain it, but I realized something. Humanity is going through what has been until now, a very slow evolutionary progression. Human consciousness, so slow that you would hardly notice it. Humans are slow learners. They repeat the same mistake again and again. The same thing that causes them suffering. They do it again and again and again, both personal, on a personal level and on a collective level. The same mistakes politicians make and so on, until a point comes when they can't stand the suffering anymore. And that's always a good point to reach. And then suddenly an inner opening happens. Suffering has its purpose. And many of you would not be here, I would even say most, or perhaps even all of you would not be here if you had not had your share of human suffering. So retrospectively, we can be grateful for the suffering that we as individuals have gone through because it has taken us to this point of the awakening of consciousness. This also applies to the whole of humanity. Humanity is, you can consider it as an organism that is gradually evolving. The collective consciousness of humanity. Each individual is an expression of the collective consciousness of humanity. And the collective consciousness of humanity is an expression of the one universal consciousness. The greatest mystery of the universe. And perhaps this is a good starting point for our evening. The greatest mystery of the universe is not out in outer space. The mysteries of the galaxies, the mysteries of the black holes, the billions of galaxies that exist. That it is phenomenal. It's unbelievable. And the greatest mystery is not on the atomic level, which is also unbelievable. The world that is there, the atomic and subatomic level scientists explore, which we only understand a tiny fragment of, just as we only understand the tiniest of fragments of what is out there. So you have the two realms, the two mysteries, the outer space and then the macrocosm. And you have the microcosm. And people write books, great scientists write books about the mysteries of the universe. And the amazing thing is, many of these books, very good books, fail to mention one word. They explore them as mysteries of the universe. But there's one word you can have a whole book on the mysteries of the universe. Either the macrocosm or the microcosm, or the two together. The one word that's not mentioned is consciousness, which is the most fundamental mystery. The fact that. That the universe is conscious that is the most amazing miracle. How do I know that the universe is conscious? Well I am conscious. You are conscious. The universe is conscious in us the the universe is experiencing itself for a brief moment as a human being it's also experiencing itself for brief moments as a plant or an animal and that's an amazing thing. Now scientists are probably never going to figure out what consciousness is if it's even possible to figure out what consciousness is because scientist is concerned with looking out there. You can either look out into outer space or you look into the most the innermost of matter but what scientists don't look at is their own consciousness which is the universe looking at itself. So the awakening of human consciousness is and I'll give you now the answer in case you have better things to do so I'll tell you the secret of the universe now and so if you want to have a pint after this it's okay at least you know the secret of the universe us.