Essay Edition
Foundations of Spiritual Community
Sangha, or satsanga, means association with truth. Association with truth, in this context, is translated as spiritual community.
We live in a world that is not so interested in enlightenment, not so interested in humility and silence and spirituality, in all those ways that are very counterflow to much of society's interests. But we come together and say, we are interested in enlightenment, which means a variety of things. Even in a way, we are trying to discover what it means to be interested in enlightenment.
What makes a sangha? Just imagine the ideal for a moment: a group of people who are individually engaged in practice. While those practices are their own, and it is not about conformity, there are certain elements that are shared in terms of value. If we value light and love and intelligence and heart, these shared values are not a matter of conformity, but rather a matter of finding people who appreciate what you appreciate in life.
We each have our individual practices, but they center on these values as a means of cultivating more of those values. Say light is something you love, or heart is something you love, and your practice every day brings more light and more heart. Then, as sangha, together we have that collective power. We say, this matters to us.
You may be in a world of people who do not care about mathematics. Imagine the Pythagorean Mystery School, Pythagoras and his sangha of mystic mathematicians 2,600 years ago. They did mathematics together. It did not matter if the world did not know math at the time. They did.
Our individual practices strengthen the substance of the sangha. Think of it as one big bank account, but we do not put money into it. We put our attention into it. We put our practice into it. Imagine if we were all at the highest level of this practice. There would be gravity. There would be power between us.
To create a community, to have a community, to be part of a community, and in doing so create that community, because each one of us is creating it by being here, we are establishing a lifestyle opportunity, something that may not exist. I have a longing for a world that experiences light, that experiences deep, unconditional love, freedom, peace, and humility. It is a wonderful experience that I have experienced myself with a very small group of people that I have known over the years. But I want it bigger. I want to invite people into creating that world. That is the creation of the sangha.
Community Practices and the Fabric of Sangha
The mathematical side in me wanted to decompose sangha into its constituent frequencies, its basis, if we use another mathematical term. What is the basis for the space that we call sangha? A basis is essentially the fundamental building blocks of something. It has this individual part, it has the collective part, and it has the interconnected part.
Sangha has the individual part. It also has the group meeting. We come together and meet consistently. That is essential, the consistency, the rhythm of meeting. It is important that it is reliable to our subconscious. There is a reliable factor that is very important. We can rely on the consistency.
Then there is the interpersonal. What strengthens the fabric of sangha is the interconnected, woven threads. The whole idea is that we go through the obstacles of practice together. Maybe this week you did your meditation, but this happened or that happened. Or maybe this new thing happened that was really awesome. It brings some collective momentum.
One of the things about sangha is shared values. Any strong community has shared values, meaning they find something valuable that they agree is valuable. Most of all, with this, it is silence, meditation, light, heart, and also a refinement of the mind, which I would maybe call intelligence.
I am on this journey too, and I am trying to figure out how to engineer this to be better. What I would love is a rich, full sangha of people who love light, intelligence, and heart.
Spiritual Lineage and Collective Purpose
When I think about sangha, I think about somebody like Ramana Maharshi. He was a really lovely enlightened being in the twentieth century. There was this wonderful community meditating with him and with each other, centered on the teachings of enlightenment.
Sangha is necessary. Otherwise, we get pulled into the currents of other interests. You have to cherish the desire for enlightenment. It is hard to develop it and find it. This desire is a feeling, an inspired feeling. When you find it, sangha helps perpetuate it.
It is the feeling that something is greater, something is beautiful, something inside of us, something that is always there. It is sacred, the feeling of sacredness, the longing for sacredness, and then the way to it. A way to actually experience that, cultivate that, build that collectively, and then share in it.
Imagine if there were one physicist in the whole world. He would not be able to share it with anybody. You could not have talks about physics. It is a cultivation. Sangha is a spiritual fellowship. It is very important. I think it provides a particular kind of support.
There is a Buddhist sangha. It has its little parts all over the world, lots of Buddhism going on. That is an ancient sangha. It goes back many, many centuries. But there is something a little bit more unique that we are doing as a sangha because it is the intersection of the mind and the heart. That is a little bit newer.
Even in Buddhism, there are mental practices, but using mathematics, computer programming, and modern disciplines as part of the practice is a rare synthesis. Although it is a very natural synthesis, because mathematics is pure mind. Meditation is pure mind. Heart and mind are one. It is this mind space of all of that, so there is a lot of overlap there.
There are sanghas with slightly more specificity. My paramguru, my guru's guru, my teacher's teacher, had a sangha that was centered primarily on light. They stabilized their lifestyle through computer programming, believe it or not. I actually come from a computer programming lineage.
They would make a lot of money computer programming, and they had this whole way that he taught them how to do it. Even if people had no computer programming skills whatsoever, he would teach them. Then they could build their lives in such a way that they had ample time for meditation, ample space for quiet, and opulent living that was conducive to spiritual growth, instead of being distracted by things.
The focus on love and light and intelligence is kind of unique to what we are doing. I would like to strengthen that gravity, those as the values. If you were in a Taoist sangha, it would be more focused on nature. It is a little bit of a different path. The mechanism of awakening is different.
Within love, light, and intelligence, there is a particular mechanism of awakening. How do we shift our mind field, the topology of our mind, the shape of it, so that we can touch the divine? I am trying to share that. In a very direct way, I would love to help anybody who is really wanting to experience that. I want to help, and then we can build sangha. It is part of why we are here.
We are the seed. Once we reach a sort of critical mass, it should grow automatically. That tends to happen. By deepening our practice, we are actually working toward that. In a way, we are founding a sangha together.
When I met my teacher, I was like, “Oh my God, that is it. I have been looking for that my whole life.” I recognized it almost instantly. I had never met anybody who was teaching with the values that he was using. It was very, very close to exactly me. Then, after ten years, I thought, okay, Noel, now I am going to do it in more of a way that is exactly me. But my teacher's focus is light and mindfulness and heart. I guess it is actually quite similar.
Nonduality and the Unity of Mind and Heart
Jnana yoga, the path of discrimination, is very much about understanding. Krishnamurti did this. He says, “If you get it, if you understand the truth, you are not going to do these things. You are not going to think that way.” If you understand the truth, you will be kind to your neighbor because you will not just understand it, but know it, deeply know it in a holistic way.
The mind and the heart are one. It is interesting to divide them. They are usually thought of as two. I think it is hard for me to think of them as two, actually, because what is mind?
We want to say, here is my mind, and here is my heart, but really, everything is in mind. The word mind is a little bit funny to use because it seems like it is more directed toward the head. But really, the heart and the mind are the field in which all experience occurs. It is the knower.
There are different dimensions of it. The mind tends to be more abstract. The heart tends to be more intuitive. But they are both within the field of knowing, the field of cognition, the field of consciousness, the field of experience, or going beyond experience.
In yoga, sometimes they say you have to destroy the mind. In fact, Ramana Maharshi says this. He says, “Destroy the mind.” It is interesting because the mind goes even further out to be a mind that is no mind. There is no experience in it.
Or it can be a mind that is all, which is kind of like unity. It is a waking nirvana state, in a way, where the nirvana comes into the world and the cosmic body becomes your body. The cosmic mind becomes your mind. There is Adam, and then there is the whole thing. But really, I am the whole thing, and Adam is part of it.
It is a different shift that can happen when you are in a kind of nirvana state, where the illusions of separativity dissolve.
Ultimate truth, or satsanga. Sat means truth, and it is really talking about the ultimate truth, which is to understand the fundamental nature of existence, the essence of existence. But it is more than understanding. It is an ecstatic being of it, an embodiment of it.
That is what these enlightened beings achieved. They know the ultimate truth, and they say strange things like, “You were never born.” If you inquire, you will discover the truth that you were never born, and you can see it in the moment.
You may think, but I was born on this date at this time. No, that was not you being born. That was just something that happened inside of you, a part of your experience.
These are nondenominational truths that exist. I am not even sure they are particularly human. In fact, I am more than not sure. They are not even particularly human. This is the truth of existence.
Enlightenment does that. You can experience it through love, and the knowing of it is ecstasy itself. To know this, you have to dissolve. You have to be nothing. Or you have to be everything, perhaps a more bhakti approach: I am everything.
Then you start sounding like Jesus and saying, “I am the one Son of God,” and people misunderstand you. But that is what he was saying. He was seeing that he is everything.
There are a few teachers I read who say things like, “I am the supreme reality.” It sounds like their egos are out of control. But really, if you ask them further, they will say, “You are also the supreme reality, and so is everybody.” So their egos are definitely not out of control.
Meditation and Self-Transcendence
Erasing the self. Cessation of the self.
In meditation, we become nothing, and in doing so, we become what we unacceptably are, always, forever.
Bring attention to the heart center. Wake up the faculties of the heart. A lot of times, our assemblage point, that center from which we feel our being, is in the head. Move it to the heart. Look out from the heart. Place the assemblage point right in the center of the chest.
Reach out with your heart. This is the metaphysical reality of a large heart, an expansive heart. Centered in that assemblage point, allow it to go out in front of you.
There is a shift in the structure of your energy when you do this. If you are experiencing the light, you can use the light by bringing your heart into the light, merging with the light, emanating light.
Light is very high frequency. Heart is big and bright, brilliant.
It is important in this meditation to feel your qi activated, your kundalini. It subdues the mind. We are not simply sitting here. We are basking, steeped in the energy.
You can feel it in your heart, perhaps all around if you are activated enough. It appears as a luminosity within the mind. Allow that luminosity, brilliant, to wash you away.
Peace is freedom from the personality, the self-reflection. Let go of individuality. Become anonymous to yourself, absorbed in the unknown and the unknowable.
Find our way into that space through the gentleness of letting go. Release the burden of thought, story. Just simply be what we are, an innocent child of the universe, letting love carry us away.
Being. Thus.
Let silence erase us.
Experience a sense that you are submerged in heart, its warmth and love, your own nature all around, within, perched on the edge of eternity.
When we generate all this love, we have the capacity to have abundant goodwill for the world because we are so complete. We have none of what Krishnamurti calls inward poverty. We have inner wealth instead, richness.
I think all people really look for that.
Reflections on Meditative Experience
Light is the substance of mind. It is made of light. You can see it. It is a visual phenomenon, and yet it is not based on photons. It is not based on the mundane light that comes from a light bulb. It is recognizable as the essential substance of mind.
When everything stops being so solid and physical, you can see this. You can see the light by eye-gazing with each other. That is how my teacher taught me, gazing at each other.
Sometimes the energy feels like a giant room, like a stadium, one room. It is like a black room. Inside, it is all black, but you know it is a room, and there is space between us because the energy opens. The dimensions open up.
If you go into a deep state and my words stop making sense, then they did their job. You do not have to keep listening to me. In fact, that is why I talk, to help guide that state where the mind turns off. Once you are there, just do your own thing. You are there. Just be what you are.
Full Transcript
Foundations of Spiritual Community
Adam Wes Namaste, everybody. Let's just get settled in and maybe wait for one or two more people to join us.
I'm actually not feeling so well today. I'm surprisingly sensitive to eating salty food. It completely knocks me off. Yesterday, I accidentally put too much salt in my food, and I've been out of it for the whole day. But I didn't want to cancel because I can still be here.
How are your practices going?
What makes a sangha? Just imagine the ideal for a moment: a group of people who are individually engaged in practice. While those practices are their own, right, it's not about conformity, there are certain elements that are shared in terms of value.
If we value light and love and intelligence and heart, these shared values aren't a matter of conformity, but rather a matter of finding people who appreciate what you appreciate in life.
Imagine the ideal. We each have our individual practices, but they center on these values as a means of cultivating more of those values. Say light is something you love, or heart is something you love, and your practice every day brings more light and more heart. Then, as sangha, together we have that collective power. We say, "Hey, this matters to us."
It keeps that strong. You may be in a world of people who don't care about mathematics. Imagine the Pythagorean Mystery School, Pythagoras and his sangha of mystic mathematicians 2,600 years ago. They did mathematics together. It didn't matter if the world didn't know math at the time. They did.
Our individual practices strengthen the substance of the sangha. Think of it as one big bank account, but we don't put money into it. We put our attention into it. We put our practice into it. Imagine if we were all at the highest level of this practice. There'd be gravity. There'd be power between us.
Sangha has the individual part. It also has the group meeting, so we're good about this. We come together and meet consistently. Thank you, everybody who comes here consistently. That is essential, the consistency, the rhythm of meeting. That's why I'm here today, I think. One of the main reasons is because you guys have been consistent, and I said, "Okay, I'm going to be here."
It's important that it's reliable to our subconscious. There's a sort of reliable factor that is very important. We can rely on the consistency, and as long as I'm feeling decently well, I'll still show up.
There's the individual, and then there's the collective. Now, there's one more element of sangha that's super important, which is the interpersonal.
It would be good if, you know, Andrea and Sam, you guys became friends and texted each other and said, "Hey, there's my practice. How's your practice? Did you do that thing that we talked about in class this week?" That would be great. You guys should be friends with each other.
I don't know how to do that online. Usually, if we were meeting at some temple space, everybody would mingle afterward and you'd make friends, right? But I'm not sure how to reproduce that. Actually, I would be very grateful if anybody had a suggestion.
How many of you have Ariella's phone number? Actually, a few of you have, but not for sangha reasons, because Ariella's family.
Oh, here comes David! Sam, did you tell David to be on time? Do you have his number?
You see what I mean? What strengthens the fabric of sangha is the interconnected, woven threads.
Hi, David. You have to watch the recording and get the first five minutes. I'm glad you made it.
The mathematical side in me wanted to decompose sangha into its constituent frequencies, its basis, if we use another mathematical term. What's the basis for the space that we call sangha? A basis is essentially the fundamental building blocks of something. It's got this individual part, it's got the collective part, and it's got the interconnected part.
Then I think one requires the inspiration. Mom, for example, if you were to practice some of these things, there would be something you could bring. Now, I'm so grateful that you're here at all, and you bring so much, but I'm pointing you out because you're like, "Nothing. You didn't do anything," right? That's the only reason I'm pointing you out, because you're so honest like that. I'm sure a bunch of people didn't.
But the whole idea is that we go through the obstacles of practice together. Andrea, maybe this week you're like, "Oh, I did my meditation, but this happened, or that happened." Or maybe this new thing happened that was really awesome. It brings some collective momentum.
Colleen The funny thing about me is I've really struggled to do things by myself. I really love being in groups. Even my dreams are only about groups. I'm always in a group. I'm not making excuses, but that's a good one for today.
Adam Wes No, that's not an excuse. That's actually good feedback.
I'm on this journey with all of you guys too, and I'm trying to figure out how to engineer this to be better. What I would love is if we had a rich, full sangha of people who love light, intelligence, and heart.
Colleen So what's the definition of sangha?
Adam Wes Sangha, or satsanga, means association with truth.
Colleen Okay.
Adam Wes Association with truth, essentially, in this context, is translated as spiritual community.
Colleen Okay.
Adam Wes We live in a world that is not so interested in enlightenment, not so interested in humility and silence and spirituality, in all those ways that are very counterflow to much of society's interests. Most of society is, especially in America. I don't know, is it worse in America? I don't know. We've got our mixed parts, some parts more, some parts less.
But we come together and say, "Hey, we're interested in enlightenment," which means a variety of things. Even in a way, we're trying to discover what it means to be interested in enlightenment.
To create a community, to have a community, to be part of a community, and in doing so create that community, because each one of us is creating it by being here, we are establishing a lifestyle opportunity, something that may not exist.
Think about Silicon Valley. They've got their lifestyle there. They're all startup people, they're techy people, and they live a certain way.
I have a longing for a world that experiences light, that experiences deep, unconditional love, freedom, peace, and humility. It's a wonderful experience that I've experienced myself with a very small group of people that I have known over the years. But I want it bigger. I want to invite people into creating that world. That's the creation of the sangha.
The feedback, Colleen, Mom, that you gave is actually good feedback, because there are people who just don't want to do it by themselves. So you're making me think, "Okay, what's the solution for that?"
Community Practices and Digital Spaces
A solution might be that maybe David could host a Friday morning meditation, where everybody shows up and maybe I'm not there. That would be an interesting experience. You guys get a day where you actually do some more meditation, so it's not just once a week.
Or maybe anybody who wants to volunteer. Andrea is like, "I'll do Sundays," and Sam's like, "I'll do Thursdays." Then they've got something every day, and you guys can just show up here together. That could be fun.
Another one is maybe a larger catalog of recorded meditations. You could do recorded meditations, so it feels like you're doing it with me, and I record the meditation. I already have a bunch of those in Circle.
But I'm really open to suggestions. I wasn't sure what we were going to talk about today, but I guess it's sangha, and I've been wanting to talk about that.
Colleen Sorry to interrupt. If you want us to get to know each other faster, maybe you can put us into those rooms, and we can just chat to each other.
Adam Wes Got it. I'm actually looking now, which is silly, because I can't look now. I've never done Zoom rooms before, the breakout rooms. That's a nice idea. Yes. Okay, thank you.
Also, a WhatsApp group, I think, is really good. Would you guys like a WhatsApp group? I think that would be cool, because that's a good group chat environment. In Circle, you have to go and seek it out, but I think everybody here has WhatsApp, right?
What do you think, David? David's been quite involved since the beginning of summer, so I'm asking.
David P Yeah. I like your idea of having additional meditations during the week and some of us hosting them. I like that initiative. It would serve my purpose of having a bit more of this routine that I am building.
Adam Wes Yeah.
David P Definitely. I do find a lot of value in the guided meditations that you recorded.
Adam Wes Nice. Do you have any requests for different versions of those?
David P I was going to say that I build my weekly routine around those meditations somehow. Perhaps you could see that part from a higher perspective, from 3,000 feet high. At the end of the day, you could have this meditation. For instance, you were talking about externalities, the moon and planets. Having a guided meditation for those specific moments is something that could help.
Adam Wes Oh, you mean like a full moon meditation?
David P A full moon meditation.
Adam Wes Oh, I love it. That's a great idea.
David P It's something that, for me, makes me closer to what you said during that sermon. Now I have something solid to use. I can say, "Hey, okay, it's a full moon. I have my meditation." It's easier for me to implement something. For me, guided meditations could be more powerful.
Adam Wes Okay. But what about the interconnected aspect? I want you guys to know each other.
Maybe that's awkward, but how would it be? Afterward, people mingle, but we can't mingle because we just get off the computer. It's one of the digital problems in society. There's no mingle time.
I used to go to these meditations, and the mingle time was one of the most fun parts. We'd meditate for an hour, and then they'd have to kick us out 45 minutes later because everybody would stay and talk and get to know each other.
It's nice because one of the things about sangha is shared values. Any strong community has shared values, meaning they find something valuable that they agree is valuable. David, I remember the sheet I made of our values, right? I made those very clear.
But most of all, with this, it's silence, meditation, light, heart, and also a refinement of the mind, which I would maybe call intelligence.
What about a WhatsApp group, David? Do you like that?
David P I'm not sure, because it will be another WhatsApp group. I like Colleen's idea, which is super simple, of having these small groups. I'm not saying today, but perhaps next session, where we just have these ten minutes or so.
Adam Wes Oh, I like that. Maybe that can be the mingle.
David P Yeah.
Adam Wes I can create breakout groups for after class if anybody wants to hang around and mingle. But some of you do like WhatsApp, right? Andrea, do you like WhatsApp? No?
Andrea P I have an idea. I like this community thing. I'm good at it.
Adam Wes I'm serious.
Andrea P What we can do is a mix of what you're saying. I have been doing this with my friends because everyone has a path. They're learning different stuff. Like I told you, I'm doing some Buddhist meditations.
I have very intense friends, so they have been through a lot of courses and kinds of meditations. What we did is set a date and an hour, like every day at 8:00 p.m. We do it on Mondays and Wednesdays, and on a different day we do something different. But the idea is that one person leads the meditation or proposes something, so that person will be the host.
Adam Wes You do that?
Andrea P It wouldn't be the same as what you do because you are an expert, but if it's my turn, I will say, "We are going to try a Buddhist meditation because I have been doing blah, blah, blah." Then you will get to know something about me. If someone else says, "Okay, I have done that also," or it interests them, it will connect.
We can do that. It can be, like Colleen said, every day for just 20 minutes, just to remind yourself that you have to do a meditation. Maybe every day at 7:00 a.m. or every day at 9:00 p.m.
Adam Wes Something short, like 20 minutes, would be perfect.
Andrea P The idea is to create the habit and just to show up.
Adam Wes Exactly.
Andrea P You will be in charge of opening the Zoom and putting on the music, and maybe proposing something, but you don't have to. Something simple.
Adam Wes Okay, thank you. I love that. I'm going to think about this, but I still like the WhatsApp idea, even though you guys both have said no. Does anybody like the WhatsApp idea?
Andrea P The thing with WhatsApp is that you have to curate it. You have to make sure you share some kind of information. Otherwise, we will just be talking with you, but not with each other, and that is the purpose. I don't know. I will send you something.
Adam Wes Okay.
David P Check the messages that Sam is writing. Discord.
Adam Wes Isn't that just like Circle? I chose Circle over Discord, thinking it was just higher quality.
Eslam O It's like Circle, but it has chats and everything.
Adam Wes What did you say?
Eslam O It has voice chats, video chats, and you can stream your screen.
Andrea P You can have events, and you can host them just like Zoom. It's like Circle plus Zoom plus a calendar.
Eslam O It has everything, even group chats and voice chats. There's no feature on Earth that is not in Discord.
Adam Wes Okay. On Circle, people haven't been using the chat. That's why I'm trying to think of something else, that maybe WhatsApp would be better. I feel like they haven't used it on Circle, so why would they do it on Discord?
Eslam O But Circle doesn't have voice, right? On Discord, you can have a bunch of sections and a bunch of rooms. Anybody can come in and leave. You can have five people in there, and you can just go in, say hello, sit in silence, and then leave. It's like a living room.
Adam Wes Nice. Okay, so it's very much what I was envisioning.
Eslam O Yeah.
Adam Wes Okay, maybe we'll do that then.
Spiritual Lineage and Collective Purpose
All right, let's get back to sangha.
When I think about sangha, I think about somebody like Ramana Maharshi. Where's my Ramana Maharshi book? His name is Ramana Maharshi, and he was a really lovely enlightened being in the 20th century. There was this wonderful community meditating with him and with each other, centered on the teachings of enlightenment.
Sangha is necessary. Otherwise, we get pulled into the currents of other interests. You have to cherish the desire for enlightenment. It's hard to develop it and find it. This desire is a feeling, an inspired feeling, actually. When you find it, sangha helps perpetuate it.
I don't know if I've helped you guys feel that feeling when you practice. It's the feeling that something's greater, something's beautiful, something inside of us, something that's always there. It's sacred, the feeling of sacredness, the longing for sacredness, and then the way to it. A way to actually experience that, cultivate that, build that collectively, and then share in it.
Imagine if there were one physicist in the whole world. He wouldn't be able to share it with anybody. You couldn't have talks about physics. It's a cultivation.
Sangha is a spiritual fellowship. It's very important. I think it provides a particular kind of support.
Andrea, you're into Buddhism, and there's a sort of Buddhist sangha. It's got its little parts all over the world, lots of Buddhism going on. That's an ancient sangha. It goes back many, many centuries.
But there's something a little bit more unique that we're doing as a sangha because it's the intersection of the mind and the heart. That's a little bit newer. Even in Buddhism, there are mental practices, but using mathematics, computer programming, and modern disciplines as part of the practice is a rare synthesis. Although it's a very natural synthesis, because mathematics is pure mind. Meditation is pure mind. Heart and mind are one. It's this mind space of all of that, so there's a lot of overlap there.
What I'm sharing is that there are sanghas with slightly more specificity. My paramguru, my guru's guru, my teacher's teacher, had a sangha that was centered primarily on light. They stabilized their lifestyle through computer programming, believe it or not. I actually come from a computer programming lineage.
They would make a lot of money computer programming, and they had this whole way that he taught them how to do it. Even if people had no computer programming skills whatsoever, he would teach them. Then they could build their lives in such a way that they had ample time for meditation, ample space for quiet, and opulent living that was conducive to spiritual growth, instead of being distracted by things.
The focus on love and light and intelligence is kind of unique to what we're doing. I'd like to strengthen that gravity, those as the values. If you were in a Taoist sangha, it would be more focused on nature. It's a little bit of a different path. The mechanism of awakening is different.
Within love, light, and intelligence, there's a particular mechanism of awakening. Without trying to describe it now, because it's hard to describe, and I've already spent all these sessions with you sharing it anyway, there's a mechanism of awakening. How do we shift our mind field, the topology of our mind, the shape of it, so that we can touch the divine?
I'm trying to share that. In a very direct way, I'd love to help anybody who's really wanting to experience that. I want to help, and then we can build sangha. It's part of why we're here.
Obviously, there are only nine of us here today. I didn't promote it or anything, so that's part of the reason. But this is the seed. We are the seed. Once we reach a sort of critical mass, it should grow automatically. That tends to happen. If there were 50 of us, then it would just start growing on its own, and it would grow more and more.
By deepening our practice, we're actually working toward that. Imagine there are 50 or more people showing up, and each of you could hold our 20-minute daily meditations. It would be really special. Jenna, you could hold it if you wanted to. Ariella, Mom, Jacob, Colleen, if you guys wanted to, it would be great.
In a way, we're founding a sangha together, especially those of you who keep coming consistently and are all about what we're doing here. The people who come and leave and don't come back just weren't as aligned in their values. People's values are very deep.
When I met my teacher, I was like, "Oh my God, that's it. I've been looking for that my whole life." I recognized it almost instantly. I'd never met anybody who was teaching with the values that he was using. It was very, very close to exactly me. Then, after ten years, I'm like, "Okay, Noel, now I'm going to do it in more of a way that's exactly me."
But my teacher's focus is light and mindfulness and heart. I guess it's actually quite similar.
Any questions about sangha? The sermon is sangha today.
Nonduality and the Unity of Mind and Heart
Eslam O What I think about satsanga is, like you said, association with the truth. I believe that the truth is the one dreamer dreaming all dreams, and it's nondual in nature, which means we are all one and interconnected.
I've been intellectualizing this in service of the One, not just for intellectualization's sake. I love something that you said: the mind and heart are one.
Would you please elaborate on that? I remember having an awakening, and you told me, "Your semantics are in the right place," or they seem to be in order. I was thinking geometrically that things are resonant, coherent, and aligned. What I'm trying to do with intellectualization is bring coherence to the mind and the heart together.
Adam Wes Yeah. Jnana yoga, the path of discrimination, is very much about understanding. Krishnamurti did this. He says, "If you get it, if you understand the truth, you're not going to do these things. You're not going to think that way."
If you understand the truth, you will be kind to your neighbor because you will not just understand it, but know it, deeply know it in a holistic way.
The reason I said the mind and the heart are one is that it's interesting to divide them. They're usually thought of as two. I think it's hard for me to think of them as two, actually, because what is mind?
We want to say, "Well, here's my mind, and here's my heart," but really, everything is in mind. The word "mind" is a little bit funny to use because it seems like it's more directed toward the head. But really, the heart and the mind are the field in which all experience occurs. It's the knower.
There are different dimensions of it. The mind tends to be more abstract. The heart tends to be more intuitive. But they're both within the field of knowing, the field of cognition, the field of consciousness, the field of experience, or going beyond experience.
In yoga, sometimes they say you have to destroy the mind. In fact, Ramana Maharshi says this. He says, "Destroy the mind." It's interesting because the mind goes even further out to be a mind that is no mind. There's no experience in it.
Or it can be a mind that is all, which is kind of like the unity that you're talking about. It's a waking nirvana state, in a way, where the nirvana comes into the world and the cosmic body becomes your body. The cosmic mind becomes your mind. You're like, "Okay, there's Adam, and then there's the whole thing. But really, I'm the whole thing, and Adam's part of it."
It's a different shift that can happen when you're in a kind of nirvana state, where the illusions of separativity dissolve.
Ultimate truth, or satsanga. Sat means truth, and it's really talking about the ultimate truth, which is to understand the fundamental nature of existence, the essence of existence. But it's more than understanding. It's an ecstatic being of it, an embodiment of it.
That's what these enlightened beings achieved. They know the ultimate truth, and they say strange things like, "You were never born." You're like, "What?" It's like, "Yeah, you actually were never born." If you inquire, you will discover the truth that you were never born, and you can see it in the moment.
It's like, "Wait, but I was born on this date at this time." No, that wasn't you being born. That was just something that happened inside of you, a part of your experience.
These are nondenominational truths that exist. I'm not even sure they're particularly human. In fact, I'm more than not sure. They're not even particularly human. This is the truth of existence.
Enlightenment does that. It's great. You can experience it through love, and the knowing of it is ecstasy itself. To know this, you have to dissolve. You have to be nothing. Or you have to be everything, perhaps a more bhakti approach: "I am everything."
Then you start sounding like Jesus and saying, "I'm the one Son of God," and people misunderstand you. But that's what he was saying. He was seeing that he's everything.
There are a few teachers I read who say things like, "I am the supreme reality." It sounds like their egos are out of control, right? But really, if you ask them further, they'll say, "Oh, you're also the supreme reality, and so is everybody." So their egos are definitely not out of control.
What do you think, Mom? I feel like that piqued your interest somehow. No? Okay.
All right, let's do some meditation. Oh my gosh, we went over! We talked so long. I'm sorry. I initially thought that we were not going to talk at all today because I wasn't up for it, but here we talked for 40 minutes.
Shall we meditate? Okay.
My goal is to keep it to 30 minutes. Maybe we should start setting a timer so that we do the part that matters the most, which is meditation.
Andrea, that's beautiful. Aw, see, that's sangha. You see how she's feeling gratitude? When you're around that, it feels nice because it holds the wavelength, and you can live in that. You're not the one guy who stands outside of the store and bows, and everybody's like, "Oh." They respect it, but they're like, "That's unusual."
That'd be me, by the way. I'm talking about myself. That was beautiful, Andrea. Thank you.
Meditation and Self-Transcendence
All right, let's play some of our music, which maybe will change in 2026. You guys are great. Thank you. Is it audible, David?
Erasing the self. Cessation of the self.
In meditation, we become nothing, and in doing so, we become what we unacceptably are, always, forever.
Bring attention to the heart center. Wake up the faculties of the heart.
A lot of times, our assemblage point, that center from which we feel our being, is in the head. Move it to the heart. Look out from the heart. Place the assemblage point right in the center of the chest.
Reach out with your heart. This is the metaphysical reality of a large heart, an expansive heart. Centered in that assemblage point, allow it to go out in front of you.
There is a shift in the structure of your energy when you do this. If you're experiencing the light, you can use the light by bringing your heart into the light, merging with the light, emanating light.
Light is very high frequency. Heart is big and bright, brilliant.
It's important in this meditation to feel your qi activated, your kundalini. It subdues the mind. We're not simply sitting here. We're basking, steeped in the energy.
You can just feel it in your heart, perhaps all around if you're activated enough. It appears as a luminosity within the mind. Allow that luminosity, brilliant, to wash you away.
Dear true self.
Peace is freedom from the personality, the self-reflection. Let go of individuality. Become anonymous to yourself, absorbed in the unknown and the unknowable.
Find our way into that space through the gentleness of letting go. Release the burden of thought, story. Just simply be what we are, an innocent child of the universe, letting love carry us away.
Being. Thus.
Let silence erase us.
Experience a sense that you are submerged in heart, its warmth and love, your own nature all around, within, perched on the edge of eternity.
When you're ready, we can come out of the meditation.
When we generate all this love, we have the capacity to have abundant goodwill for the world because we're so complete. We have none of what Krishnamurti calls inward poverty. We have inner wealth instead, richness.
Come up.
I think all people really look for that.
Reflections on Meditative Experience
Hi, Mom. Can you share?
Colleen Yeah, I'm okay. Do you want me to talk about something?
Adam Wes Share your experience, like usual. What do you mean?
Colleen I don't know if it's just me, but I love the music. When the music goes on, I can't hear your voice. Is this just me?
Adam Wes No, that's if it's too loud. It does that.
Colleen The music isn't too loud, but I just don't hear you. It must be my aging hearing. Anyway, it was very nice, and I think I dozed off and went into a dream or two.
Adam Wes Describe your experience, your mystical, metaphysical experiences.
Colleen It's very hard for me to be still in life, as you know, and this is a good opportunity. Once a week, at least, I completely go still and go into a different place. It's very interesting that I can do that. Whatever happens, it just makes me relax completely.
Adam Wes Oh, it's working. Good. Beautiful. You got super still. Did you see any light?
Colleen Interestingly, today there was orange and yellow. There was purple.
Adam Wes Wow. Okay. And no pink?
Colleen No, there was pink. Yeah, there was pink.
Adam Wes Thank you for your approval. Well, thank you. Good job.
Just so everybody knows, she's not imagining light. She's actually perceiving the light, usually in waves of light. You can see it. Light is the substance of mind. It's made of light.
That's one of the goals. I'd love to help all of you experience this. It's a visual phenomenon, and yet it's not based on photons. It's not based on the mundane light that comes from a light bulb. It is recognizable as the essential substance of mind.
When everything stops being so solid and physical, you can see this. That's very, very beautiful that she's able to experience that.
We've been doing it for about three years, or four years almost now. I showed you the light before that too. It's really fun to get together in person and gaze with each other. You can see the light by eye-gazing with each other. That's how my teacher taught me, gazing at each other.
Namaste, Mom.
All right, we're going to wrap up in three minutes. Ariella? You're muted.
Ariella Okay, I'm also very relaxed, and I also dozed off. Amazing. Thank you, Adam.
Adam Wes Namaste.
Ariella Your shirt. My name, Ariella, "ari" means lion.
Adam Wes A lion sweater, like me.
Ariella That really connects with me. Thank you.
Adam Wes Namaste. And for the two of you, try to stay alert. No dozing. Dozing is not ideal.
It's good that you got relaxed and saw the light, but dozing is not ideal. It should feel like absolute alertness at the same time. Well, I don't know. It depends. I'm a little light in my presence myself, so I could maybe get it.
Andrea, how about you?
Andrea P Something happened to me similar to Colleen, but I don't think it was my hearing. I heard you, Adam, very far away. I heard the music. It's not that your voice wasn't clear, but I just felt far. I don't know.
Adam Wes Energetically?
Andrea P Yeah.
Adam Wes Wow. You knew I was talking?
Andrea P I heard it farther away.
Adam Wes That could have been an energy you were picking up on. Sometimes the energy feels like a giant room, like a stadium, one room.
As you speak right now, I'm having this image of an energy that I've experienced. It's like a black room. Inside, it's all black, but you know it's a room, and there's space between us because the energy opens. The dimensions open up.
Andrea P Yeah, I felt something like that because I have been working on dissolving and being part of the universe. Everything blacks out. I feel the universe. I felt that, but you were really, really far away. I could hear you, but I had to pay more attention, like, "Oh, he's talking. Pay attention."
Adam Wes Nice. That's good. If you go into a deep state and my words stop making sense, then they did their job.
You don't have to keep listening to me. In fact, that's why I talk, to help guide that state where the mind turns off. Once you're there, just do your own thing. You're there. Just be what you are.
Okay, it's 7:15. I think we should stop to be on time, unless there are any burning sharing comments that people want to share, because we never want to miss those.
Okay. All right, guys. Thank you. Nice to see you.
Another thing is maybe invite any of your aligned friends who might want to be part of this. Word of mouth is a better way because if you guys resonate, then it's likely you have a close friend or two who resonates in the same way.
Namaste, David. Namaste, Sam. Namaste, Dad. Namaste, everybody.
All right, Andrea, Mom, Carl, Ariella. Bye, everybody.
Ariella Bye.