What can you tell us about intelligence?
Ordinary intelligence is a cerebral function. It appears as the faculty of adaptation and organization. It allows complex problems to be handled by bringing into play a large quantity of givens. Linked to heredity and to acquired conditioning of the brain, it operates sequentially, in time. This kind of intelligence is responsible for performing math calculations, formulating logical arguments, or playing tennis. Operating like a super-computer, it excels in accomplishing repetitive tasks and may one day be surpassed by machines. Its source is memory, the known.
Intuitive intelligence appears as understanding and clarity. It is responsible for seeing simplicity in apparent complexity. It strikes directly, in the moment. Always creative, free of the known, it is at the heart of all scientific discoveries and great works of art. Its source is the supreme intelligence of timeless awareness.
When intuitive intelligence turns upon itself, trying to grasp its source, it loses itself in the instantaneous apperception of supreme intelligence. The recognition of that higher intelligence is an implosion that destroys the illusion that we are a personal entity.
Does this recognition occur independently of someone’s level of general intelligence?
Yes. The presence of an intense desire for awakening is a sure sign that this recognition has taken place.
Is the destruction of the ego induced by a gradual or a sudden awakening?
The first moment of recognition already contains in it the germ of its fulfillment, in the same way that the seed already contains the flower, the tree, and the fruit. For a little while, the ego, stricken by the still partial vision of this intelligence, retains a semblance of life. At this stage, habit still maintains its old identifications, but an irreparable breach has slipped into the belief in our separate existence. One’s heart is no longer in it, one could say, in all senses of the word.
Intermittent recurrences of this recognition widen this gap even further until the moment when the ego, which is a perceived object, becomes completely objective, prior to dissolving before our very eyes, making way for the invasion of the ineffable.
Following this awakening, we find ourselves free of fear and desire. Free of fear because, having reintegrated our immortal self, the specter of death leaves us forever. Free of desire because, knowing the absolute fullness of being, the old attraction objects held for us ceases spontaneously. Old physical and mental habits that derived from the former belief in a personal existence can manifest for yet a while, but all identification with objects perceived or thought is impossible henceforth.
When contemplated in the amazing neutrality of awareness, these habits die, one by one, without their occasional recurrence triggering a return of the illusion of the ego.
What are the signs by which we can recognize higher intelligence?
Thoughts, feelings, and actions that flow from higher intelligence refer to their source, the self. As they fade out back into their source, they leave us on the shore of the absolute, like the foam that a wave deposits on the sand. The thought that thinks truth proceeds from truth, and brings us back to truth. This thought has many different facets. It poses apparently diverse questions like: What is happiness? What is God? Who am I? All these questions originate from a common source: from eternal joy, from the divine, from our self.
When these questions, permeated by the fragrance of truth, invite you, make room for them, make time for them, surrender to them, let yourself be carried by them. These thoughts are like the footprint of God in your soul. Let it proceed where it will. The one in whom these thoughts have awakened is very fortunate. No obstacle can prevent him access to the truth. Once the desire for the ultimate has grasped you, the entire universe cooperates in the fulfillment of this desire.
Are you in this state of fulfillment at this moment?
There is no one in that state. This non-state is the absence of the person.
Do you go in and out?
It isn’t a state.
Are you awake in that state?
This non-state is awake to itself. It is awareness. I am awareness, you are awareness.
In that case, you are aware that everything is in its place?
From the point of view of awareness, everything is awareness, thus everything is in its place. Nothing is tragic. All is light, all is presence.
Given that we are light and that the things around us are also that light, do you see things differently from us?
No. I see everything exactly the way you do, but there are things you believe you see that I don’t see. I don’t see a personal entity in the picture. Even if an old habit arising from memory comes up, it is totally objectivized. It is simply part of the picture. It is not what I am. I don’t take myself as something thought of or perceived. That is all. You can do the same thing. You are free. It is enough to just try. Do it! Right now!
How do I go about it?
Each time you take yourself to be an object, for example, a body or a man with a certain profession, be aware of it.
So there is a self at a higher level that observes the situation. Is that the perspective?
That is the intellectual understanding of the perspective, not its reality. The reality is your welcoming attention, not the concept of your welcoming attention, or the concept of yourself as welcoming attention. It is simply your luminous presence, without tension or resistance, welcoming moment by moment the thought or sensation that is coming into being, letting it unfold freely, and letting it reabsorb into itself without leaving any traces. This original light is not an absence but a fullness. Surrender yourself to it. Let yourself be overcome by it.
-Francis Lucille
Taken from Eternity Now
A sample of the book can be downloaded from: http://www.non-dualitypress.com/sample/Eternity%20Now_sample%20chapter.pdf
His website: http://www.francislucille.com/
this topic of spiritual awakening is so very complex for newcomers, as even people with years of studying the subject are sometimes even more confused and do not see reality as it is, sometimes they can go for magic, for wishful thinking, sometimes confusion is still with them, as it is allright, if the teacher is really not too clear, it is not your fault to not grasp the message, few teachers are really clear and lucid and they can be understood by more people, this understanding is the ultimate one can ever hope for, even though some people go overboard with fantastic beliefs that what ever they believe, they have a right, I do not involve myself with extremes, I still get confused in the complex business of living fully, but thanks to reading eckhart tolle, and francis lucille lately with more interest, I could say that still it is not easy, of course not, but slowly when truth is truly truth, your heart understands, and it starts to make sense, specially when it is explained in really deep wisdom, as the cause of addictions, the mind, the concience, many factors we did not even knew that existed, I never said it was impossible, just that it is not easy to come to a clear understanding, because very few people have that wisdom to explain it, thank you.