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    Heightened Awareness: Toward a Higher Consciousness
    Heightened Awareness: Toward a Higher Consciousness
    Heightened Awareness: Toward a Higher Consciousness
    Ebook99 pages1 hour

    Heightened Awareness: Toward a Higher Consciousness

    By Justin F. Stone

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    About this ebook

    This how-to manual includes simple instruction in assorted disciplines that lead to heightened consciousness. Frequent use of these practices can lead to greater awareness of one's sensory surroundings -- and one's more important inner landscape. Readers can come to know the majestic Satipatthana (Way of Mindfulness), Chi Kuan, Great Circle Meditations, and more.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBookBaby
    Release dateSep 6, 2013
    ISBN9781483507712
    Heightened Awareness: Toward a Higher Consciousness

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      Book preview

      Heightened Awareness - Justin F. Stone

      www.gkpub.com

      No Matter How Small The Drop of Water

      It Reflects The Entire Moon

      HEIGHTENED AWARENESS

      By Justin F. Stone

      Good Karma Publishing, Inc.

      Copyright © 1988

      Copyright © 2013 Second Edition

      All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without prior written permission of the publisher.

      GOOD KARMA PUBLISHING, Inc.

      Albuquerque, New Mexico

      www.gkpub.com

      Printed in the United States of America

      Artwork by Justin F. Stone

      ISBN 1-882290-17-8

      ISBN: 9781483507712

      10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

      TABLE OF CONTENTS

      Why the Need for Heightened Awareness

      Foreword

      Introduction

      Chapter 1     Posture & State of Mind

      Chapter 2     Breath

      Chapter 3     Evolution & Awareness

      Chapter 4     Sound

      Chapter 5     Chi & Prana

      Chapter 6     Mindfulness

      Chapter 7     Satipatthana

      Chapter 8     Visualization, Chih K’uan & Great Circle

      Epilogue

      Final Word

      Glossary

      Summary of Practices

      WHY THE NEED FOR HEIGHTENED AWARENESS

      Bare attention, or Mindfulness, is the first step in gaining a heightened awareness. But by itself, it is not enough. This bare attention to progress leads to a deeper awareness. Bare attention, by itself, means that every action is performed mindfully, in full conscious awareness, and that trends of thought are discerned and noted instead of becoming unconscious fantasies and stream of consciousness trends. Since we perform so many acts from habit, without even realizing we are doing them (shaving, combing the hair, washing the teeth, heating the water for tea), we become automatons in many areas, and this is the very opposite of heightened awareness."

      To know that we have placed our shoes under the bed – to know it and not assume it – is a great step forward in achieving bare attention and the beginning of the way to a heightened awareness. To realize that our posture is a slumping one – without feeling the need to immediately correct it – is to observe the posture in complete attention. To be aware of the gradual aging of the lines in one’s face when looking in the mirror, and not to pretend the lines aren’t there, is true attention, and it can lead to understanding, the knowledge that nothing is permanent and that change is inevitable. This is not easy in the beginning and requires real effort.

      It is said that habit is the enemy of old age, and this is true at several levels. First, we perform the same actions at the same time in the same way and are not fully alive in doing so. We run on automatic pilot. Second, these habits become deeply ingrained habit energies (vashanas in Sanskrit), and they shape our lives. When they develop into tendencies (samskaras), they may shape lives to come, and the person of that time may not know why he or she does certain things or feels certain urges. This is a form of slavery we have imposed upon ourselves. One may drink heavily without knowing why, or without even liking the taste of alcohol; this uncontrollable tendency is a samskara carried over from the habit energies we built in another lifetime. This is our Karma, and it shapes us and makes us what we are.

      So, in going from bare attention to heightened awareness, we are countering these destructive trends. At one level we become more alive, more capable of real joy in everyday life; we become masters of ourselves. At the deeper level we begin to undo the strands of Karma we have woven for ourselves. To achieve heightened awareness would seem to be very desirable.

      FOREWORD

      In truth there is no such thing as higher consciousness. There is only consciousness. But in individuals, the pure consciousness is usually blocked in varying degrees, so we speak of higher or lower states of consciousness. The sun is always the same, but when we see it through heavy clouds, we speak of weak sunshine. In the same way, pure consciousness – which is everywhere, in every sentient and insentient thing and in every inch of the sky and empty space we see – is more latent than actual in most beings. It’s obscured by what the Indian people call tamas (lethargy, ignorance in the larger sense) and by the vashanas and samskaras (habit energies and tendencies) that make us what we are and make up our Karma.

      When consciousness is dull and obscured, our awareness is extremely limited. As the clouds are brushed away (that is, the habit energies and other obscuring factors are weakened), awareness grows from the inside, and it always goes from the limited individual outlook to the far-reaching universal. The choiceless awareness that Krishnamurti speaks of is a good example of consciousness shining without obscuration, choiceless meaning the obscuring energies are not operating. Normally we operate in a pleasure-pain continuum, seeking those things that are pleasant to us and avoiding what is painful. This is the opposite of choiceless awareness and is the result of self-clinging. If we are aware only of what seems pleasant and unpleasant, this can hardly be called expanded awareness – rather, it is self-centered activity.

      In India the people speak of four states of consciousness – waking, sleeping, dreaming, and the fourth, unchanging state that underlies the other three, the Turiya state. Just as the movie screen remains unchanged while we watch the rapidly moving figures that flash upon it, so the Turiya state (the Reality) is there underlying whatever condition we are in. Our limited awareness seldom makes it apparent to us, and for this reason, we perform certain disciplines so that we can become aware of it, sometimes for very short periods.

      All of us have brief glimpses of the Turiya state, the Reality – perhaps just before falling asleep or when coming out of anesthesia. Sometimes, after intense periods of concentration or prayer, the mind becomes one-pointed, and we have an intuition of Reality. Those who practice* deep meditation of various kinds certainly have frequent short periods in the Turiya state, and these brief touches of Reality can be shattering. There are no words to describe them, as they are not truly experiences in the dualistic subject-object relationship. Something has happened, although nothing that can be remembered. When such experiences are strong or prolonged, these flashes can change our lives.

      Heightened awareness always begins on the inside, not being merely a matter of tactile or sensory occurrence. We begin to be aware of the vast ocean of consciousness in which we swim (live and breathe and have our being). We note our breathing, the ringing in the right ear or vibration from ear to ear, even the coursing of blood through the arteries and veins. With the heightened circulation of the Chi (Vital Force or Intrinsic Energy), we begin to have disturbing physical manifestations; it seems that someone is pulling our hair or insects are crawling on the face. These are

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