>I think the thing I must face most regularly is the reaction to the outside world on this shift. For so long, I was leading the pack in so many areas of my life that society puts on a pedestal. And now, my innate desires have taken me somewhere else. When most people around you are trying to become a somebody, and you’re trying to become an embodiment of love, the mirror to your patterns is strong if you stay planted in this space. I guess that’s the point.
I feel the judgment even if it's passive amongst people around me. It’s as if I was in a race and they feel like the horse just lost its wind and all the other horses have pulled ahead.
such a hard thing and resonate so much - key is to find the other nobodys!
Amen brother! I am glad that in our case we were able to connect and have the kinship of being on a similar path...one might even say, the pathless path ; )
Scott, one of my aya friends shared this piece with me. I could have written much of it myself, right down to the testing at NYU. 3.5 years as well, this all started in October, 2018. Thanks for sharing, it’s been an isolating and (at times) terrifying experience but I’m likewise emerging into a pretty incredible place on the other side.
Scott - Your vulnerability and insight is much appreciated. I think you would find some common ground with Loic Le Muer, who founded the 'Le Web' conference some years ago and has recently spent a lot of time in the Amazon and as coming at these topics in a similar light (Although Loic certainly stepped RIGHT out of the noise to pursue his awakening) : https://loiclemeur.substack.com/
Animals shaking off stress - something us anxious humans need to learn in today's age of electrosmog with bathes our physical nerves, yet we've been taught anxiety is a mental illness of "bad thoughts" as Freud invented the term at the onset of the telegraph, Earth's first use of wireless radiation tech:
Did you know that animals would often go to healing areas of water, often by regenerative direct current (DC) magnetic field lines, and this is how the ancients knew where to build their temples?
Thanks Scott, glad I could shed some light here! Love the concept of your stack. On a different note, I laid out on the rocks and did the Wim Hof method and felt that kundalini rise up my spine as in your video. Have you done Wim Hof before?
Hey Scott - I just finished listening to the audio version of "In Love With the World" by Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, - https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/41429805 - an esteemed Buddhist lineage holder who actually walked away from his monastic kingdom to live on the streets of India, confront attachment to his identity as a revered teacher, and directly work with his own inner impediments to full surrender to Reality. It's really helpful because in general the Buddhists have a long history of mapping, describing and making distinctions about these various altered states and conditions, which we have very little education about in the west. But clearly you have a teacher, so that's most important, and the groundedness and maturity you communicate in relationship to this experience is a service. Thanks for sharing about it and perhaps check out the book.
Thanks so much Rick. I appreciate you sharing this with me and for you engaging with my work. I haven't read it, but it's certainly refreshing and commendable to see a spiritual teacher acknowledging the presence of positionality in his own awareness then doing something about it! I will def check out : )
Thanks for sharing Scott. Particularly love the bit on not running away from your life. I've observed many who have had a transformative experience begin to think there's an "out there" somewhere. And so they keep chasing and seeking - myself very much included at times. What I continue to learn is that life's full experience, including the emotions our stories might want us to suppress or resist, happen right here on good ol' earth. Even the medicine is right here on earth! We get a chance everyday, in our daily lives, to have and complete full experiences and feel all of it. And the less I suppress, the more space I create to experience all of it. I assert that what I'm meant to learn is right here in my everyday life. It IS life. Why I'm here, so to speak.
Well said Mike! It's why I love the spirit of Karma Yoga that espouses life is your teacher. When you start to contextualize everything you see in that way, life definitely takes on a deeper, more special meaning : )
Thank you for sharing this, it deeply resonates. I am currently grateful for the spiritual awakenings I have experienced,
but now I am finding it hard to find the balance of consciousness expansion while
maintaining performance for “societal success” and to be honest vice versa as well. I truly appreciate this reminder of surrendering the control, and love the simple practice you’ve shared of letting go. This message was right on time, so glad I decide to click.
That's awesome RyAnn! Agreed that maintaining your inward orientation amidst the pressures of modern cultures is the biggest challenge...but also the biggest opportunity IMO! Cool that you're on this path!
Just discovered your writing Scott - really enjoyed reading this post. Have you come across the work of Dr. David Berceli? I was introduced to TRE (Tension & Trauma Releasing Exercises) by my osteopath. The background to these is also rooted in studying the way animals shake off experiences virtually in the moment whereas we humans lay them down. https://traumaprevention.com/what-is-tre/
Thanks Brad. I remember reading about TRE about 5 years ago when I read the body keeps the score. I never really went deep on it, but seems like a useful practice for sure
If I recall correctly, she investigates with Western medicine. She connects it to the death of her father (I think, it's been a long time since I read it) and ultimately doesn't come to a conclusion about why it's happening. I think maybe I should read it again, as the details appear to be lost to me! It's a beautifully written book, but she definitely explores the issue very, very differently from how you have.
It sure is. I was meditating on how it can be like going through what I imagine is the journey of souls. A dark place, where there is nothing to hold
On or hang on to but oneself and the trust one has.
I’m amazed that we as humans are managing to traverse this path - in large part alone nowadays being so disconnected and seperate. I can imagine that doing this with fellow brother through a process of initiation and ongoing connecting is a whole different story.
Then again, it seems like someone created Substack to replace that for us
What I've found is once you start looking, we seem to be everywhere. 😂 Just reading through some of the comments here, I think there is a lot of people out there going through it (seemingly on their own).
But I agree, the more people talk about it and share like you have the better.
Thanks for sharing all your sharings about your personal transformation. Just discovered your blog quite by synchronicity.
As you are now in the process of becoming a Nobody, I think I know Who that is – as I am becoming Nobody as well. (And, we should remind ourselves, Odysseus long preceded us in this Hero’s Journey, in his encounter with the cyclopes… And, by the way, may they have been symbolic for awakened giants with their third [or first] eye activated?).
Great piece. I can totally relate. I started experiencing the same thing a few years ago. In my case, I knew what it was as I am an energy practitioner. There is great power in dropping into innocence and becoming nothing. Definitely a journey.
Scott -- I appreciate your lucid writing on the subject of your own awakening. I've definitely gone through a transformation these past several years -- realizing that I was unhappy, selling my business, realizing that I was disconnected & unhealthy, a major—and intertwined—awakening of my intuition and athleticism, radically changing my relationship with alcohol, creativity re-awakening, 'remembering' that I am here to write, and now doing that... and still, I know & can tell there remains a surface to be pierced. I've given it a shot a couple of times, but I haven't yet dedicated myself to a meditation practice, and I would like to. I've learned Vedic meditation, seems simple, just gotta stick to it... that said, what is the method that you practice? Insight meditation? and can you recommend a good starting point to learn the method? I've tried Sam Harris' app, and, I love what he's doing but I don't really feel that guided meditation is that effective for me...
Bowen - thanks for reading bud and as an ex athlete, who liked his belgian ales, I relate to everything you're talking about.
One thing that might be helpful is reframing meditation to finding a practice that allows you to experience stillness of the mind everyday. This could be induced by sound with an app like nucalm https://nucalm.com/, breathwork with https://www.othership.us/app, Qigong or TaiChai which I like https://renxueamericas.org/, or of course, traditional meditation.
I also think a big reason people struggle is the perceived payoff. They sit down and the entire time they are evaluating time tradeoffs of doing vs. being in the practice. If you believed that mediation held the keys to the most important purpose of your life (greater levels of evolution/realization/awakening), would the practice be different? Only you can answer that.
totally agree with your reframe about stillness as opposed to "meditation" necessarily per se... Thanks for the pointers, I will check those resources out. I did read your meditation journey - great piece, and the "trajectory" helps. I appreciate your work here Scott.
Hi Bowen, I've been through the same process and helped others through it. I think Scott is right - it's not about the method but the goal. You can get there in a lot of different ways.
If you do feel like meditation is something you want to get into, I would recommend sitting a retreat. many people think those are only for advanced practitioners, but that's just not true. By committing to something all day for multiple days you get up that learning curve, and are then able to do it on your own with better results.
Lastly - I use Waking up as well, and have found the series by Jitindriya on Compassionate Awareness, and the one by Henry Shuckman to be much better for people who are just starting. Hope that helps.
Great newsletter and an incredible journey! I can relate to the startup journey and the overachieving type-A tendency to turn everything from exercise and meditation into a tool for further productivity. My eye-opening moment came later after I'd burnt myself so hard and spent 25 days in silence.
In the Buddhist idea of Dependent Origination, before one can start on the path, one needs to have a certain amount of faith that it will lead to awakening and "there is more to this than chasing the same old money and fame." But in order to have the faith, you need to have a certain amount of suffering. This is sort of a prerequisite. When you've suffered enough, you've then reached a point where you look for alternatives.
Maybe that's something that people who are so focused on achievement/goals have in common (or, anyone really!); when those goals aren't bringing the satisfaction anymore, our mind/body/soul says I've had enough.
25 days in silence. wow! I was talking to a friend about this the other day. Sometimes those that sprint up the mountain fastest, find that it isn't for them sooner. It is a more rapid, exhausting path then one that is more gradual. So it'd make sense that a lot of type A people come to know these things sooner then later. Though, there are obviously countless examples of people who dont. All part of the mystery!
>I think the thing I must face most regularly is the reaction to the outside world on this shift. For so long, I was leading the pack in so many areas of my life that society puts on a pedestal. And now, my innate desires have taken me somewhere else. When most people around you are trying to become a somebody, and you’re trying to become an embodiment of love, the mirror to your patterns is strong if you stay planted in this space. I guess that’s the point.
I feel the judgment even if it's passive amongst people around me. It’s as if I was in a race and they feel like the horse just lost its wind and all the other horses have pulled ahead.
such a hard thing and resonate so much - key is to find the other nobodys!
Amen brother! I am glad that in our case we were able to connect and have the kinship of being on a similar path...one might even say, the pathless path ; )
Scott, one of my aya friends shared this piece with me. I could have written much of it myself, right down to the testing at NYU. 3.5 years as well, this all started in October, 2018. Thanks for sharing, it’s been an isolating and (at times) terrifying experience but I’m likewise emerging into a pretty incredible place on the other side.
Scott - Your vulnerability and insight is much appreciated. I think you would find some common ground with Loic Le Muer, who founded the 'Le Web' conference some years ago and has recently spent a lot of time in the Amazon and as coming at these topics in a similar light (Although Loic certainly stepped RIGHT out of the noise to pursue his awakening) : https://loiclemeur.substack.com/
Loic is the man!
Animals shaking off stress - something us anxious humans need to learn in today's age of electrosmog with bathes our physical nerves, yet we've been taught anxiety is a mental illness of "bad thoughts" as Freud invented the term at the onset of the telegraph, Earth's first use of wireless radiation tech:
https://romanshapoval.substack.com/p/hysteria
Did you know that animals would often go to healing areas of water, often by regenerative direct current (DC) magnetic field lines, and this is how the ancients knew where to build their temples?
Wow, that's fascinating. I did not know that, but it makes sense to me
Thanks Scott, glad I could shed some light here! Love the concept of your stack. On a different note, I laid out on the rocks and did the Wim Hof method and felt that kundalini rise up my spine as in your video. Have you done Wim Hof before?
Hey Scott - I just finished listening to the audio version of "In Love With the World" by Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, - https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/41429805 - an esteemed Buddhist lineage holder who actually walked away from his monastic kingdom to live on the streets of India, confront attachment to his identity as a revered teacher, and directly work with his own inner impediments to full surrender to Reality. It's really helpful because in general the Buddhists have a long history of mapping, describing and making distinctions about these various altered states and conditions, which we have very little education about in the west. But clearly you have a teacher, so that's most important, and the groundedness and maturity you communicate in relationship to this experience is a service. Thanks for sharing about it and perhaps check out the book.
Thanks so much Rick. I appreciate you sharing this with me and for you engaging with my work. I haven't read it, but it's certainly refreshing and commendable to see a spiritual teacher acknowledging the presence of positionality in his own awareness then doing something about it! I will def check out : )
Thanks for sharing Scott. Particularly love the bit on not running away from your life. I've observed many who have had a transformative experience begin to think there's an "out there" somewhere. And so they keep chasing and seeking - myself very much included at times. What I continue to learn is that life's full experience, including the emotions our stories might want us to suppress or resist, happen right here on good ol' earth. Even the medicine is right here on earth! We get a chance everyday, in our daily lives, to have and complete full experiences and feel all of it. And the less I suppress, the more space I create to experience all of it. I assert that what I'm meant to learn is right here in my everyday life. It IS life. Why I'm here, so to speak.
Well said Mike! It's why I love the spirit of Karma Yoga that espouses life is your teacher. When you start to contextualize everything you see in that way, life definitely takes on a deeper, more special meaning : )
Thank you for sharing this, it deeply resonates. I am currently grateful for the spiritual awakenings I have experienced,
but now I am finding it hard to find the balance of consciousness expansion while
maintaining performance for “societal success” and to be honest vice versa as well. I truly appreciate this reminder of surrendering the control, and love the simple practice you’ve shared of letting go. This message was right on time, so glad I decide to click.
That's awesome RyAnn! Agreed that maintaining your inward orientation amidst the pressures of modern cultures is the biggest challenge...but also the biggest opportunity IMO! Cool that you're on this path!
> Under the veil of this race, the horse has decided to play a different game.
Truly, a meaningful update— well told!
Your lifelong learner updates have been missed. Now, very glad to know why.
Appreciate you! 👊😎
Thank you JW!
Just discovered your writing Scott - really enjoyed reading this post. Have you come across the work of Dr. David Berceli? I was introduced to TRE (Tension & Trauma Releasing Exercises) by my osteopath. The background to these is also rooted in studying the way animals shake off experiences virtually in the moment whereas we humans lay them down. https://traumaprevention.com/what-is-tre/
Thanks Brad. I remember reading about TRE about 5 years ago when I read the body keeps the score. I never really went deep on it, but seems like a useful practice for sure
Fascinating and reminds me of Siri Hustvedt's memoir, The Shaking Woman. Wtf is that all about then?!
I wonder if she is familiar with eastern traditions. The book seems description seems very western oriented vs. metaphysical
If I recall correctly, she investigates with Western medicine. She connects it to the death of her father (I think, it's been a long time since I read it) and ultimately doesn't come to a conclusion about why it's happening. I think maybe I should read it again, as the details appear to be lost to me! It's a beautifully written book, but she definitely explores the issue very, very differently from how you have.
Thanks for sharing. I can see a lot of parallels, and it's reassuring to know others are going to this process.
I look forward to hearing more about what you discover about yourself in coming posts.
Knowing we are not along amongst big transitions is so helpful! Appreciate your support man!
It sure is. I was meditating on how it can be like going through what I imagine is the journey of souls. A dark place, where there is nothing to hold
On or hang on to but oneself and the trust one has.
I’m amazed that we as humans are managing to traverse this path - in large part alone nowadays being so disconnected and seperate. I can imagine that doing this with fellow brother through a process of initiation and ongoing connecting is a whole different story.
Then again, it seems like someone created Substack to replace that for us
Hopefully the alone part changes in the near term as more people go through this!
What I've found is once you start looking, we seem to be everywhere. 😂 Just reading through some of the comments here, I think there is a lot of people out there going through it (seemingly on their own).
But I agree, the more people talk about it and share like you have the better.
You beamed me up, Scotty! :)
Thanks for sharing all your sharings about your personal transformation. Just discovered your blog quite by synchronicity.
As you are now in the process of becoming a Nobody, I think I know Who that is – as I am becoming Nobody as well. (And, we should remind ourselves, Odysseus long preceded us in this Hero’s Journey, in his encounter with the cyclopes… And, by the way, may they have been symbolic for awakened giants with their third [or first] eye activated?).
If interested, you (or I) can read about it in my (our) new blog here: https://thedolphinwhisperer.substack.com/p/hey-you
Great piece. I can totally relate. I started experiencing the same thing a few years ago. In my case, I knew what it was as I am an energy practitioner. There is great power in dropping into innocence and becoming nothing. Definitely a journey.
It is the ultimate journey! Thanks for reading Guerda and hoping you are having a smooth process
Scott -- I appreciate your lucid writing on the subject of your own awakening. I've definitely gone through a transformation these past several years -- realizing that I was unhappy, selling my business, realizing that I was disconnected & unhealthy, a major—and intertwined—awakening of my intuition and athleticism, radically changing my relationship with alcohol, creativity re-awakening, 'remembering' that I am here to write, and now doing that... and still, I know & can tell there remains a surface to be pierced. I've given it a shot a couple of times, but I haven't yet dedicated myself to a meditation practice, and I would like to. I've learned Vedic meditation, seems simple, just gotta stick to it... that said, what is the method that you practice? Insight meditation? and can you recommend a good starting point to learn the method? I've tried Sam Harris' app, and, I love what he's doing but I don't really feel that guided meditation is that effective for me...
Bowen - thanks for reading bud and as an ex athlete, who liked his belgian ales, I relate to everything you're talking about.
One thing that might be helpful is reframing meditation to finding a practice that allows you to experience stillness of the mind everyday. This could be induced by sound with an app like nucalm https://nucalm.com/, breathwork with https://www.othership.us/app, Qigong or TaiChai which I like https://renxueamericas.org/, or of course, traditional meditation.
I also think a big reason people struggle is the perceived payoff. They sit down and the entire time they are evaluating time tradeoffs of doing vs. being in the practice. If you believed that mediation held the keys to the most important purpose of your life (greater levels of evolution/realization/awakening), would the practice be different? Only you can answer that.
You might also consider working with a coach. I'm sure there are plenty online, but a coach/teacher is always a great way to get leverage. Here's my own journey if you haven't read it https://scottbritton.substack.com/p/reflecting-on-10-years-of-meditating
Life kind of forced me to be a meditator more then me choosing it.
totally agree with your reframe about stillness as opposed to "meditation" necessarily per se... Thanks for the pointers, I will check those resources out. I did read your meditation journey - great piece, and the "trajectory" helps. I appreciate your work here Scott.
Hi Bowen, I've been through the same process and helped others through it. I think Scott is right - it's not about the method but the goal. You can get there in a lot of different ways.
If you do feel like meditation is something you want to get into, I would recommend sitting a retreat. many people think those are only for advanced practitioners, but that's just not true. By committing to something all day for multiple days you get up that learning curve, and are then able to do it on your own with better results.
Lastly - I use Waking up as well, and have found the series by Jitindriya on Compassionate Awareness, and the one by Henry Shuckman to be much better for people who are just starting. Hope that helps.
Great newsletter and an incredible journey! I can relate to the startup journey and the overachieving type-A tendency to turn everything from exercise and meditation into a tool for further productivity. My eye-opening moment came later after I'd burnt myself so hard and spent 25 days in silence.
In the Buddhist idea of Dependent Origination, before one can start on the path, one needs to have a certain amount of faith that it will lead to awakening and "there is more to this than chasing the same old money and fame." But in order to have the faith, you need to have a certain amount of suffering. This is sort of a prerequisite. When you've suffered enough, you've then reached a point where you look for alternatives.
Maybe that's something that people who are so focused on achievement/goals have in common (or, anyone really!); when those goals aren't bringing the satisfaction anymore, our mind/body/soul says I've had enough.
25 days in silence. wow! I was talking to a friend about this the other day. Sometimes those that sprint up the mountain fastest, find that it isn't for them sooner. It is a more rapid, exhausting path then one that is more gradual. So it'd make sense that a lot of type A people come to know these things sooner then later. Though, there are obviously countless examples of people who dont. All part of the mystery!