The Foundational Spiritual Exercise

Consider with me the difficulty of pursuing spiritual goals with our selfish egos, always chanting ‘me-me-me.’  We want God’s embrace while holding on to the very thing that precludes that embrace – our tiny egos.  There is such a clear irony here.  Jesus says, in multiple places, that he is already here, with us.  He has always been, and will always be here.  

Let me give you some examples.  In John’s gospel, Jesus says, “I am in my Father, just as you are in me and I am in you” (John 14.20).  A chapter later, he says, “Abide in me as I abide in you” (John 15:4).  How about in Matthew, when he says, just before ascending into heaven, “Know that I will be with you always, even to the end of time” (Matt 28.20).  One of his names, Emanuel, actually means “God with us.” We just don’t notice.  Worse, we don’t know how to notice.

So how do we open ourselves to that holy Presence?  We conceptualize the issue as needing to do something different.  That’s our ego talking.  Often, our religious institutions echo our ego and exhort us to do all kinds of things:  we need to behave better, to do this and not that, we need-need-need.  Starts to sound like the ego talking, doesn’t it?  Me-me-me all over again.

But let’s face it.  We have followed the dictates of our ego in our pursuit of the Divine, and we have come up mostly empty.  The ego gets us started, but it can’t take us very far down the path.  Following the wonderful work of David Hawkins, it is not our doing that will bring us into God’s embrace; it is our letting go that is the ticket.

What!?!  The ego starts screaming right about now.  “Letting go diminishes us.  Letting go makes us less.  Letting go is scary!”  

I am reminded of an old cartoon, in which a man falls off a cliff during the night but manages to grab hold of a bush growing out of the hillside on his way down.  He calls out, ‘God, help me!’  A Voice answers, ‘Let go.’  ‘I can’t let go, I’ll fall to my death.’  ‘Let go,’ comes the reply.  Finally, in desperate agony, because he can’t hold on anymore, the man lets go.  And drops six inches to the ground.  Pretty scary fall, isn’t it?

We are afraid to trust, because we have lived in a world with so much untruth.  We have learned from repeated experiences not to trust.  So, we hold on to what we think we know.  Sadly, our holding on keeps us from opening to God’s embrace.

To find the Divine, we need to shift from relying on ourselves and our egos.  The central core of spiritual work “is aligned with undoing and the unloading of the mind rather than its enrichment.”  We need to change our programming from ‘getting’ to ‘allowing.’  In a word, we need to let go.

And this brings us to our first spiritual exercise.  You can practice this anywhere, at any time, and it is always beneficial.  You don’t need to adopt a particular posture, although I have found it helpful at the start to close your eyes and sit quietly in a quiet place.  Then, simply open your awareness.  This is not so much an action of getting as it is a letting go. It involves going inside of yourself:  letting go so that you can move into your deepest being.  There, Jesus promises us, we will find that we are already in union with Him.

This spiritual practice can be found under various names in all of the major religions.  In Zen Buddhism, it is known as “just sitting.”  In Daoism, it is known as “sitting in oblivion.”  In Hinduism, it is embodied in the phrase, ‘Thou art That,’ meaning that you are that for which you seek.  In Christianity, it is known as the Practice of the Presence of God, and Brother Lawrence, a 17th-century monk of the Carmelite order, is one of its foremost exponents.  Regardless of the name, the practice involves abandoning the getting activity of the ego so that you can see what is actually there, inside of you, at your deepest levels.

Like all forms of meditation, you will probably find this practice a bit difficult.  It is extremely simple – there is literally nothing to do.   But your ego is not likely to enjoy the experience, so it will throw up all kinds of barriers.  These will likely take the form of distractions and ‘forgetting’ to do the practice.  It helps, therefore, to give yourself a minimum time for practice and specific times to engage in it.

I would suggest practicing this several times during your day.  I like to open myself this way after my morning coffee.  I often practice for thirty minutes or more, but in the beginning, I had a hard time even stretching it to five minutes.  So, I would suggest you start with five-minute practices.  In addition to morning practice, I typically take short breaks with this throughout my day, and then again as I lay in bed before sleep comes.  

Because it is difficult to read this material and do what it suggests, I have included an audio clip of this exercise.  Use it a time or two, if you find it helpful, to facilitate your initial practice.  After a while, you will probably find it more of a hinderance, so then just discard it.

Opening to the Divine:  The Foundational Spiritual Practice

• Find a quiet place where you won’t be disturbed.  Turn off your cell phone and deal with other potential distractions that might interrupt your spiritual practice.

• Be seated in a chair, with your spine upright and your feet flat on the floor, cradling your right hand in your left.  Don’t cross your legs or ankles, and don’t interlace your fingers because they are likely to fall asleep, which will distract you from your practice.  

• We entertain ourselves with cascades of thoughts, one after another.  For the time of your practice, let go of chasing after them.  Just sit, let go, and be open to that Presence which the scriptures of all faiths say is always with us at all times.

• Sit without moving, so that the distraction of movement doesn’t take you away from your intention, which is to sit in the Presence and experience what is Real and True.

• Close your eyes and turn your attention inward.  

• Open yourself to the presence of God right here with you, around you, and within you.  Don’t push yourself to imagine something – that is just more doing and your ego-driven thinking.

• Simply let go of everything.  Let go of your thoughts, and observe your interior world.  

• Rest here for a time.  

• When you are distracted, bring your attention back and observe the play of your thoughts and emotions without chasing after them.

• When you are ready, let the feeling come back into your feet, your hands, and your face.  Take a deep breath and open your eyes.

With practice, you come to know your inner world.  You will get more and more comfortable there, and the distractions will gradually cease.  You will find yourself letting go more freely, thinking less, and going deeper and deeper.  You will actually be able to feel the changes in yourself as you get more experienced here.  

As you practice, you will find a deepening of peacefulness within yourself.  This peacefulness arises because you are feeling more and more secure.  Remember that security is the ego’s primary job, so as you relax into this practice, the ego has less and less to do.  Your constant thinking will diminish, and your peace and joy will increase.  What a bargain!  LOL

If you have questions about your practice, please email them to me ([email protected]) so that we can start a Q & A column.  

Next week we will focus on the importance of intention to your spiritual practice.  At first glance, your intention may not seem terribly important, but you will find that it is a crucial element in achieving the success you are looking for.  Until then…

With deep affection,

P.S.  Several of you have expressed the desire for an online meditation class.  If there is enough interest, I will try to figure out how to hold a group class on the web.  If you have an interest, please write me at [email protected]. 

Humility as a Tool  → Letting go → Fear → Openness →  Acceptance & Growth

If you are finding this newsletter course helpful, you may want to consider Dr. Kaisch's latest book, Inside the Invisible:  The Universal Path to Spiritual Transcendence.👇

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