Dr. Neil's Spiritual Awakening to Non-Duality
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You may have heard about spiritual awakening. Do you know someone who is living it? Join us as Dr. Neil Schuitevoerder describes the lived experience of an advanced stage of human consciousness and shares insight for seekers of all traditions. Dr. Neil will speak from the direct experience of Being, Brahman, Sunyata, or Pure Consciousness as he transmits Non-dual Reality to you -- non-dual space/time, non-dual thinking, non-dual love, the non-dual body, and his yogic abilities to travel the cosmos, move through the bardos and, at the same time, live as a psychologist, husband, father, and grandfather. His experience dispels many myths about awakening. He will be interviewed by his partner, Dr. Connie Zweig, author of Meeting the Shadow, Romancing the Shadow, Meeting the Shadow on the Spiritual Path, and the award-winning book The Inner Work of Age: Shifting from Role to Soul.
Dr. Neil's Spiritual Awakening to Non-Duality
Meeting the Shadow on the Spiritual Path
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Dr. Neil explores key questions: How can someone be awake in a high stage and still act out his or her personal shadow? Why is there an epidemic of gurus and priests acting out their shadows today? Why do we need to cultivate shadow awareness in the context of our spiritual lives? Because there is shadow material stored in the subtle body at each chakra, he goes through each one and describes the risk of eruption of shadow material at that stage.
Greetings. Thanks for joining us today. We've had 500 downloads to the podcast, so we're very excited. And we have a hot topic today to discuss. My favorite topic. Some of you may know me as the shadow expert because of all of my books on the topic of the shadow or the personal unconscious. And today we're going to talk about meeting the shadow on the spiritual path. Some of you may know this book on the topic. And if this is a passionate, curious subject for you, you can find a deep exploration of the encounter with the shadow, the dark night of the soul in our spiritual worlds with my book. Today I'm going to talk to Dr. Neil about extending the psychological understanding of that into the spiritual world, into the subtler levels, and expand our spectrum of understanding to include non-duality around the shadow. So let's start out with some questions. I'm going to pose some basic questions, which I believe some of you have. A lot of my clients have these questions.
SPEAKER_00Okay.
SPEAKER_01So when we're awake, do we still have a shadow? Or when our teachers claim to be enlightened, what happens when they act out their shadows in destructive ways? They act out the abuse of power or sex or money. Are they really enlightened or not? And what is the experience of awakening as a state and not establishing it as a stage or level of consciousness? Is that about the shadow? And how do we know how do how can we learn how to cultivate shadow awareness in a spiritual context so that we can avoid religious trauma and spiritual abuse? So that's kind of setting the framework for what we're going to talk about today. When I do that, it sounds like we need more than one podcast. So, Dr. Neil, what is the relationship between spiritual awakening and the shadow or the personal blind spot that we all have around our unconscious issues?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, this is a deep question for spiritual devotees, because they nearly always meet the shadow on the path. Um, either in their teachers, gurus, priests, uh, rabbis. Uh they find that there are aspects that are abusive, financially abusive, emotionally abusive, sexually abusive, uh, power abusive, or sometimes pathological? Uh, they could be uh sociopaths or um so this is a serious question for spiritual uh devotees, and it's kind of rare to find someone who doesn't, a teacher who doesn't actually cross the boundaries.
SPEAKER_01So, how can we understand that if we have this sort of um myth that awakening means we become perfect and we don't have a shadow anymore, whether us or our teachers?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's a myth. Truth about it is one never gets rid of the shadow, there's always more, and there's always uh shadow material which needs to be dealt with. Um there are levels of consciousness where shadow is present, and levels of consciousness where shadow is not present. Um, so the the uh ego stages of spiritual development, uh there's shadow present, and the non-dual stages, there's no shadow present. So everyone lives in both because we're human, and so nobody escapes the work that needs to be done on the shadow, or you will be facing the consequences this lifetime.
SPEAKER_01So when you say the ego stages, um why don't we use the model of the chakras? Because I've really explored this in psychological language, but we want to move now to the subtle bodies and the subtle realms to explore shadow.
SPEAKER_00All right. So the the um understanding of the chakras are that we have seven major chakras. This is the Hindu model and 49 minor chakras. The major ones are the important ones because these chakras are symbolic energy centers that reflect different levels of consciousness. Um, they're reflected in the sense that uh the chakras are the connection between the physical body, the etheric body, and all the other bodies. So, for example, the physical body has seven major chakras that connect to the etheric body, and the etheric body has seven major chakras that connect with the with the astral body and and mental body, and so on. So there are all these layers and levels of energetic connection between different bodies that we have. So let's begin by working with seven chakras.
SPEAKER_01And so let's start with the first.
SPEAKER_00First chakra is at the base of the spine, has uh it's called the Muladhara chakra in the Hindu tradition, and has to do with survival, has to do with pure physicality, has to be do with the caveman, cave person aspect of ourselves, which is eat or be eaten, instinctual, instinctual alligator mentality, I call it so you know.
SPEAKER_01So, how does that connect with shadow? Is there shadow material stored in the subtle body and in particular in the chakras?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, you could have shadow material from a previous lifetime, you can have shadow material because you're part of humanity, and humanity has huge amounts of shadow material. That is the work of opening up the spiritual path on each level. So, on the physical, on the first chakra level, uh, one could be financially greedy and manipulative, and this is irrelevant in terms of what your spiritual stage of development is. One could be highly evolved and be a sociopath.
SPEAKER_01Uh how is that possible? Uh well, I mean, Ken Wilbur tells us that you can experience any state in any stage, right? So you could experience, like you said, greediness for your own survival and still have some higher chakras open that allow you to experience a higher state.
SPEAKER_00Yes, well, um, that's very true. And how would I explain this? Um, when one reaches the non-dual states uh of consciousness in terms of evolution, one has a tendency to forget the human side of oneself. So gurus, teachers, spiritual devotees um who reach this level, priests and so on, uh often see themselves as beyond doing something wrong. They are naturally involved in always right action without attempt to change it, but it's an illusion. An illusion of the spiritual uh stages of non-duality, because while one may be in a non-dual state of consciousness, one is also in a body, and the body has its own evolution. The first chakra is a representation of the development of the of the uh instinctual self.
SPEAKER_01So, what might be an example of somebody acting out the first chakra, like you said, financial greed.
SPEAKER_00Um, yeah, so I had an experience, I won't mention names, but I had an experience of uh loaning money to what I considered an enlightened being, and I wasn't the only one who considered this person enlightened, and ended up that he stole the money, and uh and confrontation did not change anything uh in terms of the dynamics or the admission. There was a total unconsciousness about the process of ethics and morality with regards to money and power.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so his ethical moral development was really a missing piece, even though we knew him extremely intimately and we knew how highly evolved and advanced he was.
SPEAKER_00Correct. Okay, and uh so you know that was painful because we projected the ideal onto him, as many devotees do, uh, and of course he he failed to meet that. So um it was really traumatic for us, yes, and the the meaning of it for a uh spiritual person is or for uh for us, or for me, actually, let me cannot speak for you, is that kindness and compassion and morality are essential. One needs to be constantly working on that.
SPEAKER_01And it's interesting that the most of the religious and spiritual traditions teach morality through scriptures and laws, it's behavioral rather than actually rooted in consciousness.
SPEAKER_00Correct, and one often sees paradoxical frameworks in spiritual teachings. Um, for example, we are in a political area now where uh lying, cheating, moral degradation, sexual abuse can be very common and can be supported by many people who are uh politically conservative.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's shocking.
SPEAKER_00And uh and how could that be?
SPEAKER_01And religious.
SPEAKER_00And religious. How could that be supporting someone who's a liar, cheater, manipulator? Yeah, and so we know that that can exist because people tend to repress their own shadow material, and the shadow material are those that are idealized. Right. And eventually one has to meet the shadow, as famous all of it wants to see this.
SPEAKER_01Well, every tradition says this. Every tradition teaches the dark night of the soul, every mystical path has or hero's journey, or religious teaching has the stage. You know, I call it meeting the shadow, and there are many, many names for it. The Via Negativa, right? The stage of facing the enemy, whether it's out of us or inside of us. So let's go to the second chakra.
SPEAKER_00Second chakra.
SPEAKER_01What does that look like acted out?
SPEAKER_00Well, it's the chakra of the tribal beings. Tribal beings uh function on a group level. The survival of the group is imperative, and everything is done for the survival of the group. These could be small groups like a family, or this could be a large group like a political party, or a church community, or church community where you know, where somebody is always considered correct and never does anything wrong because they're the head of the these communities, because they're carrying that idealization, correct.
SPEAKER_01And this can be a sangha or a um shamanic group. This is cross-denominations. We're trying to describe the dynamic, not the content.
SPEAKER_00Right. One can often see this in spiritual teachers who who uh tell their devotees uh that sexual intercourse is open, and yet they engage in it themselves. Um I'm not saying that we shouldn't have spiritual leaders or uh who are sexual, but there's a contradiction what they say they are and what they are.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's claiming celibacy, yes. So they're hypo hypocritical, right? So um, so how does the sexuality relate to the tribalism in the second chakra? How are those connected?
SPEAKER_00Well, each chakra um is a transmitter of information from a body in through the energy centers into the ultimately the physical body or the body. Um, so each uh chakra has many qualities to it, it's not just one quality. I mean it's it's complex, it's not a simple, one-dimensional.
SPEAKER_01So, could we say that group think uh the refusal to doubt or question authority is part of the shadow issue at this stage, at this level, second chakra?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, second and partially the third as well. Okay, and when we say chakra, of course, remember we're we're talking symbolically because it's really the body, the spiritual body that is the astral body uh that is expressing itself energetically in this world.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so um, you know, when I was researching my book on this, I found that many there are cultural issues in this that have to do with monastic cultures in the East, um, people who are trained in celibacy and spirituality coming to the West and encountering, you know, the sexual license and the openness and the self-expression of people in the West. And and therefore, so both things would happen. One, they demanded obedience, like you're describing, and not being questioned. In fact, some of that is written into uh certain paths, and then the other thing was around sexuality, and I encountered a young man who was who is supposedly the reincarnation of Kalu Rinpoche, a Tibetan Buddhist teacher who was renowned. Um, and this young man said that there was a lot of sexual abuse in the monasteries in Tibet and Nepal. So he wasn't that surprised when he came here and he saw that going on in the West. So this is a consequence of the sexuality remaining in the shadow in the second chakra, being locked into that zone of the subtle body, and then being released in a way that's harmful to self and harmful to other. Okay, let's move to the third chakra.
SPEAKER_00Third chakra has to do with the rational mind, uh, with uh individuality. So one leaves the tribe and becomes an individual. One thinks for oneself. Uh politically, one might uh not belong to one party, one might be an independent, or might um be able to see the good and the bad in a political party uh or in a community. Uh, one might be able to participate in the community yet, on the other hand, see some problems and difficulties in it.
SPEAKER_01So there isn't an us and them, a right and wrong projection once you get to the third chakra. Is that right?
SPEAKER_00No, there is. Uh, there's just more individuality.
SPEAKER_01Um okay, but that that projection might continue.
SPEAKER_00Yes, projection continues all the way up to the sixth chakra.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00So there's always an as and a them until one reaches the seventh chakra, where one is um in a non-dual state. In other words, there are no opposites.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so in the third chakra, how does the shadow show up?
SPEAKER_00Usually power, uh, narcissism, blaming others, uh, abusing others, superiority. Um, our path is the only path. We know, others don't know. We are saved, others aren't saved. So there's a great deal of uh.
SPEAKER_01So there's still a we.
SPEAKER_00There's still a we, but there's much more an I uh than a than a we.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so in in psychology, we might call this separation and individuation, where we begin to move out of the group, whether it's the family or the religious community or the political community, and we begin to cultivate more independence, more autonomy, more thinking for ourselves, and so on. Yes. So the drive to belong, which is so crucial, motivation in the second chakra, and leads to, you know, if that's unconscious, it can lead to shadow acting out.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_01So then as we move up, as the kundalini rises into the third chakra, there's more um independent thinking. And you said it was rational, so there's more independent thinking, um, questioning authority, um, and separation from the group, even though you may still belong.
SPEAKER_00Correct, you can belong to a group and yet be somewhat an independent thinker, an independent uh have an independent structure of thinking or functions I am, and because I think, therefore I am.
SPEAKER_01And the abuse of power that might erupt, what could that look like?
SPEAKER_00Usually it's uh bullying, uh, manipulation, uh, superiority, and we're talking particularly a lot of spiritual past, but uh yeah.
SPEAKER_01So I've seen, you know, I wrote about the full range of the abuse of power. It can be very covert, hardly noticeable, but people are subtly coerced to look a certain way, to talk a certain way, to believe certain things, right? And then it can be very overt, you know, where people are punished and shamed for separating from the group, for disobeying, or rejected because one is not doing what the group thinks is about.
SPEAKER_00Uh, and we see this very often there with people who leave the tribe, uh, Mormons who lead the tribe, Hindus who lead the tribe, uh, Christians, Orthodox Jews, Orthodox Jews, and there's there's a lot of literature on this. Um that they're rejected and shamed and bullied, shunned, shunned, and there's huge attempts to bring them back into the fold, right? Uh yeah, and back back into the group, I think.
SPEAKER_01And so we could look at all these behaviors in the context of shadow. Right?
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_01So the leader, the clergy person, or the teacher is abusing power in the sense of controlling threat of punishment, threat of going to hell, your family will go to hell. We've seen this with Scientology. We've seen this with cult-like groups that are very um that abuse power in order to control people in all kinds of ways. You can't eat that or you'll die. You can't think that or you'll go to hell. You can't feel that or you'll never be enlightened, right? So abuse of power. Okay, let's go to the fourth chakra.
SPEAKER_00Fourth chakra is the heart chakra, um, which has to do with compassion, empathy, relatedness, uh, humanity, and the opposite, the material that I hit that's hidden in there, the shadow material, jealousy, in inside and outside.
SPEAKER_01Maybe anger, yeah. I was thinking that maybe envy, competition. Also, I would say some subtler feelings, like if you if the hard chak is about connecting to humanity, you might feel left out, right? You might feel that you don't belong.
SPEAKER_00One is yeah, one is rejected as being a human being. One does not belong to the human tribe.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Also, I would say people in high stages could act out the shadow material in the heart chakra that was passed down to them from their families and other and further generations back. So, like for example, um, I love you, but if you don't do it my way, I'll withdraw my love. Right? So there's a threat of um disconnection, threat uh using the love abusively. Now that's more individual. So maybe that's not the heart chakra. Is that the heart chakra?
SPEAKER_00Well, um, in some ways it's it is part of the heart chakra. It's uh it's using the heart chakra in a negative way. But as one goes and develops, and we're talking about developmental models uh through the chakras, in other words, one begins to grow. Right now, there are there are about 10% of people who have reached the heart chakra, so it's kind of rare. Uh, most people are in the second chakra. It means that they're tribal and they believe that their political party and their social connections uh or and their family religion, religion. Uh that's the only way. Um, and the third chakra is much more diverse, diverse. People see others as individuals who have their own path, and one can actually uh grow in that way. And the fourth chakra is a jump because it has more to do with humanity than a small group.
SPEAKER_01Uh, and um I remember having an experience of my heart chakra opening on a long meditation retreat, and everyone I looked at was divine, everyone I looked at um looked like God to me, looked like divinity.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, you loved everybody.
SPEAKER_01I loved everybody, yes, so that was a state in which my heart chakra opened. Right. Um and I remember the intensity of that state. So is there anyone who turns that then into a stage and lives in that reality?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, this is a big illusion. Illusion is that one reaches a stage and is permanently in that stage rather than one experiences a stage uh and state experiences a state. Yeah, I guess it's a better way of saying it. One experiences a state and can actually return to that state at any time. For example, I can live in the first chakra, second chakra, third chakra, fourth, fifth, sixth, all the way through into the non-dual states, and none of them are permanent. So um, while I might be looking at the galaxy right now, I'm sitting in this room at the same time. Uh, while I might be um uh considering a moral issue, uh third chakra, second or second chakra issue, I might also, I am also um looking at humanity's failure in this regard. So one does not live on one level, um that's an illusion, and I think um it's it's certain paths tend to foster that illusion that one can escape birth and death by reaching a certain level, that one can be in a stage where one has no more karma left, no more uh no more problems left. One is always available for right action and never does anything wrong. But these are illusions. One one never escapes being a human being.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so let's go to the fifth chakra. What is that about?
SPEAKER_00That's probably the most difficult to describe because it's sort of the beginning of spiritual chakras. Um has to do with the planetary awareness. So the consciousness of being a human being, an animal, a life on this planet, and it's the planetary consciousness, in other words, the earth has its own consciousness and its own direction, it's evolving itself and us in its process.
SPEAKER_01So we move from our connection to humanity to our connection to Gaia, and how does that affect daily life?
SPEAKER_00Eating correctly, relating to uh animal life compassionately, taking care of the physical body. This is another level of physical body, because the physical body is part of the earth's body, uh, relating to mountains and rivers as alive entities. So this is um talking to the trees and listening to the trees talking back to you.
SPEAKER_01So this is not about voice. We I think of the fifth chakra as about voice. Yes, is it about them?
SPEAKER_00Yes, that is one of the aspects of it.
SPEAKER_01Can you talk about that?
SPEAKER_00Well, um, can you express your feelings, your thoughts, your emotions, your your desires verbally? Um having a voice in the world, uh listening to the voice of the world, of the earth, the planet, and all all planets actually have their own voice.
SPEAKER_01Planets have a vibration and a um so are you saying that my connecting to my voice and connecting to the voice of Gaia, that there's a connection there?
SPEAKER_00I speak, I speak in alignment with the planet, yes, as all beings that are human, let's call them human because they're not in cot out form on other planets, connect to the planet. So, in fact, just about all planets have are alive and have beings on them on subtle levels that are not necessarily physical or conscious for us.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, but let's stay on earth. So, this individual voice, which is so important to so many people, whether it's in your family, in your marriage, or in your legacy, having a larger voice, is in some way connected to how is that connected to the planet?
SPEAKER_00Well, it's the planet's voice, you know, rather than the ego's voice. Ah, the ego's voice means that I, as an individual, have a voice and should be heard. The this is not an individual's voice, this is the planet's voice.
SPEAKER_01Okay. And the sixth chakra.
SPEAKER_00Sixth chakra is the soul chakra. That's the one that has been through many lifetimes, usually a number of them. There are old souls who have numerous lifetimes, and young souls who are just beginning and have a few. It's uh a body that is infinite.
SPEAKER_01What do you mean it's a body?
SPEAKER_00Well, the soul is a body, it's just like the physical body has a body, is a body, the soul has a body too, and it expresses itself through the sixth chakra in this world.
SPEAKER_01So there's a lot of popular lore that the sixth chakra is about clairvoyance, clear audience, yogic powers.
SPEAKER_00Sure, that's all different aspects of the soul.
SPEAKER_01Okay, can you talk about that?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, the soul uh is always evolving. Soul uh has no real beginning or end because it's it's uh it's growing, it uh it sees one who's opened up the sixth chakra and opened up the soul connection with it, is psychically aware, can hear things that are on subtle levels, and yet can uh can communicate with other beings on subtle levels, and you know, and um there are dark souls.
SPEAKER_01So, what was it like for you when your sixth chakra opened, and what's the shadow material there?
SPEAKER_00Well, the sixth chakra was kind of one of the last to open. I actually opened up higher chakras than the six. There are more than seven, uh, although we don't necessarily refer to them. But for me, uh it was about discovering that I was there at my own birth as a physical child, the infant, and that that was my soul that was there, and that it has always been, it has always been part of the development of the human being, it has guided and directed my life uh from the beginning, and will be there through my death and after my death, and so that awareness came with the opening of that chakra, yes, and so I realize we skipped the shadow in the fifth chakra, but let's stay with the sixth for a minute.
SPEAKER_01So, what's the shadow material that might develop? I mean, what comes to my mind is black magic. What's the shadow material that might develop there and be acted out?
SPEAKER_00That's the dark soul, that's the uh the soul that I guess uh there was a word which I used earlier on called a Rakshasa, which is uh a demon, the demons have souls too, and uh demons can cause immense damage in our culture, and people can be possessed by a dark energy or demon, and this often happens at the soul level.
SPEAKER_01So when the sixth chakra opens, there's a risk of that.
SPEAKER_00There's a risk of being possessed, um, and one there's a risk at every chakra of being possessed, but particularly this one, because uh this is the the home of psychopaths, sociopaths, cruel beasts.
SPEAKER_01Uh so a psychopath has an open sixth chakra while the heart chakra is closed.
SPEAKER_00That's correct. And so And it's a very dangerous aspect on the spiritual path. There are many who have got lost at this level.
SPEAKER_01You know, the phrase from Star Wars, he went to the dark side, kind of echoes for me.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So the splitting of the dark and light here in the sixth chakra.
SPEAKER_00It's clearer as daylight. In other words, the capacity to split the light and dark side is really expressed through the sixth chakra. And the shik chakra has different levels, it's not just one level.
SPEAKER_01Do you want to talk about those?
SPEAKER_00Um well, there are five of them, and they're just an evolution through different subtle structures, not worth talking about at this point.
SPEAKER_01I mean, there's a popular conception that witnessing or self-observation happens at this chakra, but I think that it maybe it's only at one level that that happens. That level of makara that's in the sixth chakra. That's the high level where we begin to witness.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, where's the first level of the sixth chakra is about light and dark, right and wrong? It's where things are unclear because they're the opposites of theirs at the same time.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so let's pause for a moment and come back to the fifth chakra and look at the shadow material there. So, how might the shadow be acted out by somebody who's rooted here?
SPEAKER_00I think you expressed it as a voice that is stuck, that the uh earth's voice is not expressed. People are denying that we have global warming. They are playing with the dark side of the pollution and the aggressive misuse of the earth. And this is done with the consciousness of the earth as well.
SPEAKER_01You know, it occurs to me that denial is probably a shadow at every level. You know, denial of survival needs, denial of power needs, community needs, denial of love and compassion, right? So here we're talking about denial of the planetary needs, requirements, consciousness, even for survival. It's being um, and I don't think that there's a lot of denial of the climate crisis anymore, but there is certainly personal and corporate greed that behaves as if they're in denial, putting money and personal um advancement over the planet.
SPEAKER_00Okay, yeah, and if you think about it, it's it's it's against the survival of human beings, it's against our own survival, it's a dark destructive force.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so let's go to the seventh.
SPEAKER_00Right. Well, the seventh is the first non-dual state. It's a state of um for me, it was awareness that I am everywhere, that there's no place that I don't exist in the physical or emotional in all the different universes. On in the different chakras, there's no place that I am not present. Although some places I'm more aware than others, but the seventh chakra is uh the beginning of a place where there is no observer and observed. One is everywhere, and one knows things, one is part of knowing uh one is uh the beginning of um loving everything, being a source of love and uh an expression of love and a perceiver of love. So it's this sort of seven chakra is the beginning of the divine aspect of journey. The first seven chakras that we've spoken about, the first up to the sixth chakra is human development. Below the first chakra is mineral, plant, animal development, and that expresses itself through chakras on those levels. Above the seventh chakra, there are a number of different levels of the but one can be on a seventh or eighth or ninth chakra level and still be abusive on the lower level because one has not spent time developing it.
SPEAKER_01Well, can you describe that? What are the shadows in those higher stages?
SPEAKER_00There's no shadow in seventh and higher stages because they're non-dual. Non-dual meaning not to, so there's no opposite, it's just one energetic force.
SPEAKER_01Well, then how can they still be abusive?
SPEAKER_00One can still be abusive because one exists in a physical body, and that physical body has seven major chakras, and one cannot be developed in one of those seven chakras or all other seven chakras. Uh, so um spiritual development needs to include development of all chakras, all of those bodies, and a failure to do that is what we're seeing, which is an epidemic abusiveness of priests and gurus and spiritual teachers.
SPEAKER_01So this kind of reminds me of the podcast we did about living in non-dual and dual states at the same time. Yes, so someone can be can have a seventh, eighth, ninth chakras open and experience those states, but they can still have shadow material in the first three or four five chakras. Yeah, and so they and so they can get caught, they can get triggered and act out, even though simultaneously they have a non-dual awareness.
SPEAKER_00Correct. In other words, the dual awareness that begins in the first chakra and continues all the way to the sixth chakra is a source of darkness and can be acted out above the seventh chakra, or the seventh chakra and above, uh, there's non-duality in awareness, and there's no splitting, but often uh people who have reached the uh non-dual awareness believe that they are immune from poor or bad action, bad behavior, and that immunity and that lack of awareness that uh that is a serious problem in the spiritual development.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so we had another teacher who lived his life in India as a sannyasi, didn't have, and we knew he was very advanced, he was definitely in non-dual states, and at the same time he hadn't developed relational skills. He was sexist, he was contemptuous um toward me, and so it seemed to me, it was very confusing to me because I knew from his descriptions and from his main student that he was very evolved, and I noticed more and more that he was treating you differently than he was treating me, and so in our framework today, what we're saying is that um he had missed some steps in his own relational development, emotional development, maybe ethical development, heart chakra. And that was appalling to me. But now, in retrospect, I feel compassion because I mean it wasn't that traumatic. Me. So I can get there. I can get to okay, he missed these steps. The framework for a monk in India doesn't include learning how to relate to women as equals. And so this feels important for people who have teachers who come from monastic traditions, East or West, and to recognize that there's certain training that's missing, certain education, certain um kundalini openings that are that may be missing. And then what happens is we start to doubt that they're really awake. Well, if he does this, then how could he really be awake? If she does that, then how could she really be right? And so we're trying to help you, our listeners, hold the complexity of this topic in a sophisticated way that includes psychology and the unconscious, as well as spiritual development.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, the unconscious is very important. Um I'm aware of somebody who claimed to be in a spiritual state, non-dual state on a permanent basis, uh, and yet was in denial about his own darkness. Uh, and this person actually is in seven years of psychotherapy. So one can be in psychotherapy and not develop the uh first, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth chakras. Um, but the unconscious material needs to be worked through, not just the conscious material.
SPEAKER_01So let's let's return now, Neil, to the present moment. So as we close. Yes. And you know, we've gotten feedback from listeners that they enjoy coming back to the present moment at the end of our conversation. So let's check in with you.
SPEAKER_00So there is a deep sweetness in the mouth, in the heart, in pure love for all beings, and it's the nature of divinity, the nature of this cosmos to actually be sweet, blissful, loving. And that's the gift uh one can tune into and express.
SPEAKER_01Can you give us anything more specific?
SPEAKER_00Well, one cannot do that unless one actually develops the consciousness of the shadow material that can be stored. Otherwise, it'll be very temporary and will disappear quite quickly. Ah, so working on shadow material is the doorway into love, it's the doorway into non-dual love, meaning love without opposite, uh, and um spiritual paths that focus on this uh process really open up deeper levels on every chakra, on everybody.
SPEAKER_01Great, thank you. The journey continues, continues the journey of light and darkness and our path to awakening.
SPEAKER_00There is no end.
SPEAKER_01Thank you, see you next time.