The Tenth Insight - a brief commentary - part one

Because of a comics script that I'm currently working on and that takes place in Shambhala (well, part of it does), I've decided to continue reading James Redfield's books, namely The Tenth Insight: Holding The Vision and it's follow-up The Secret of Shambhala.

As you probably know, James Redfield is widely known for his book The Celestine Prophecy. A book that tries to expound on how the individual might secure a greater sense of spirituality within himself, whilst providing tools for him/her to achieve this over an action-adventure setting.

I really enjoyed that first book when I read it probably some ten years ago.

But, since then, a lot of things have happened.

I saw also the film about The Celestine Prophecy a couple of years ago. Enjoyed it for the low budget that it was and the difficulties of making it work on the screen but felt that the message hadn't actually been communicated through it. A good attempt but a failed one nonetheless.

Anyway, I got to The Tenth Insight some ten days ago.

Surprisingly I felt the writing didn't really engage me, that I could see through it the objectives of the writer, everything feeling a tad too artificial for me.
Still, and fortunately so, some parts abounded with information that, even though didn't shake me to my very foundations, were still good to revisit and imbued with a good sense of heartfelt truth.

But on this book, much more than the previous, what I've been feeling the most are the author's beliefs and objectives, however positive they may be. It's not the truth but his truth. And the only problem I have with this is that this is not fully acknowledged.

He is trying to give us a world vision after all. An all encompassing sense of things. Which is great but, to me, also flawed. And profoundly so. And, when we get to these things, I feel that we should be extremely careful with what we say otherwise we might be closing doors instead of opening them, as it is our intention.

my first sense of inadequacy came when I kind of projected the journey I'd travelled so far with the Tenth Insight over The Celestine Prophecy. And, beyond that feel that the main character had somehow been partially reset in order for this new spiritual progression take place, I felt that both books shared this idea that spiritual clarity is easy and quick for those deeply involved in it.

Now I'm not saying that this is untrue - because it isn't - what I'm saying is that it doesn't apply to everybody. Well, at least, that's what my experience shows.

Spirituality means different things to different people. And what I have observed that happens with most people is that, as soon as they realise some of their inner truths with some degree of profoundity, these truths (be it fears, aspirations, dreams, ideas, feelings, sensations) become more insubstantial. And this creates a sense of well being, since the old pressure has subsided, often believing that it has disappeared. Yet, to me, what I see is that these things have only become more ethereal, more vague, more diluted and difficult to track and observe. And so people acquire this tendency to forget about them and believe some processes have been completed or are very close to completion.

Some times people have deep revelatory experiences. Visions. Dreams. A sense of clarity and purpose that seems to transcend and take them with them. and because the sense of true imbued in these things is so powerful they tend to take these things literally.

And I'm not saying that they shouldn't. I'm saying that they should pay attention to their attachment to these experiences and to the truth they seem to contain.

When people tell me these experiences what I usually tend to see is how capable their psychology and knowledge obtained throughout this latest incarnation of theirs is able to create such a scenario.

And I think this is the most important thing to recognise. It keeps us humble and it keeps us both inside our experiences and yet somewhat detached from them. It makes these experiences flexible to time.

I'm saying all these things because I've been through processes like these or similar to these many times, always during meditation retreats, in such a way that these days I am able to acknowledge phases of deepening awareness where these experiences are likely to take place.

They're always powerful and life-changing. but the change that occurs is that you're no longer so surprised by them, because they become (at least during a retreat) more of a routine than a rare occurrence.

And I think that's what makes a huge difference. When you go to the encounter of these experiences with both a method and inner determination, with conditions being met both inside and outside of you.

I am saying these things because I recognise that it is easy to be somewhat misguided by oneself. The ego can be rough and tough but it is also subtle and alluring. and it is at these levels that these characteristics become more apparent - and it is oh so tempting to fall prey to them. Because they feel so good and so nice and warm and comforting. we are excited and yet we are at peace. And the world seems to open before us and, lo and behold, it reveals the very secrets we longed for so long. And we take them and now we have a mission and we KNOW.

And we miss the ego behind these things. We miss the subtle constructs of our psyche that have simply produced a wonderfully beautiful dream. A dream better than anything we could've come up by ourselves but that, simultaneously, encompasses so many of our half spoken, half thought aspirations and hopes.

I have felt this very clearly with The Tenth Insight. James has probably had many profound experiences and his desire to help his fellow human being is quite genuine. But it's this very need and thirst that both mask and reveal his own being behind it: even if he does try to remove himself from the picture and achieve a position of greater neutrality.

that this happens is only natural. And it is because it is so that I am writing this. It is clear that many of James's experiences where somewhat spontaneous, that his karma has brought them easily into his life. He partially sought them, of course, but life was also always there for him, guiding him towards these achievements. So, it is natural that his whole approach to spirituality is that of a free floating method. A method that really has little of methodical about it. based more on principles than techniques.

And that is fine, of course.

But, my hang-up with that is that I believe that this is not so for most humans living today.
The potential for them to reach such a state is there in all of us of course. But, in the physical, practical sense, it is not with so many of us.

Because if it was, there were many more James Redfield's around. The Celestine Prophecy would be lost in a sea of similar texts and probably even be considered mediocre. It is not. It is considered a shiny beacon: and it is!

If we are honest, and if we leave our comfortable nest of family, friends and companions on the spiritual path we will see that the spiritual level of most people is embrionary. The seed is there in all of us but it is next to dormant in most of us.

If this weren't so, it wouldn't take catastrophic events affecting our lives to shake us out of this slumber and awaken the desire to reach higher and deeper into ourselves.

some of us don't need this drama or trauma to do this of course.

In these people the seed is moving.

But how far do we go into turning the seed into a full blown being? Perhaps we stop with the first root or sprout coming out of the seed, believing this is it.

And it is. But it really is just a beginning.

Anyway, I feel that James wants to inspire us into a sense of ease and possibility within our lives. And that is so good. But it can also be unrealistic. And if that's the case, then the shock of realising this can throw us too far back for us to realise it is just a necessary part of our process of growth and acceptance.

another problem that I see with this text is that James creates names to label some type of experiences. and, by doing this, not only he's kind of implying that they will happen to all of us (or that they are there for us to access them) but also that they are real, that they are what he's implying that they are.

I think this is also natural to happen. After all he wants to give us clarity about things as much as possible, he wants to materialise these things in our minds eye. but, then again, there are issues with these things.

I suppose I felt like most people did when reading about one's Birth Vision, World Vision and, particularly, the chapter A History Of Awakening.

I felt I would like to be able to experience these things also.

That, here they were, so clear, so easily accessible and yet my brain, my mind, my spirit, unable to communicate and reach them and make them readily available to my experiencing.

But then I remembered some of the stuff that happened to me whilst on a few retreats. And I could easily fit it into either of these categories.

The difference? The difference was that I never bothered to label these things apart from describing the meaning that these had imprinted on me.

You see when you label something, when you give an experience a name, you limit it, because when you remember it you remember it through that name and through the condensation of meaning, of content that was distilled from the original experience. this is the problem with words. They appear to reveal but in fact they limit immensely. This is why I more and more feel that words can only serve as guideposts, as signs along a road. Rather than ever showing the path they can only point the way. And I feel it's very important to keep this in mind at all times - simply because minds have a tendency to do the exact opposite which, of course, simply reveals their own present and more superficial nature.

Before I wrap this text I'd like to say a few things more about the Birth Vision, World Vision and a History Of Awakening.

As it seems to me the Birth Vision of an individual has mostly to do with the awakening of part of our core self. Kind of like a stepping stone onto the ultimate experience of enlightenment. Because we are approaching a kind of core level of being our ego, our own personal history become somewhat detached from the moment to moment experience. in other words, we are fully aware of what's happening, only the fact that this is about us, and that it is us that are experiencing it doesn't seem so important anymore. From this looser, free floating mindful landscape and vantage point, we observe our history in a new light, from a new perspective. It is easy to see personal traits and the way our life, those around us and the world combined apparently seamlessly to create, reinforce or model them. we watch the film of our becoming, not just watching us but watching all of the participants contributing to it. it is a life transforming experience and it may occur several times, at each time, new aspects of this coming into light. Sometimes some being further developed, clarified or transmuted into a deeper sense of truth.

The World Vision is the next logical step from the Birth Vision. we have gained a deeper knowledge of who we are and what made us but we still have this need of knowing how we fit in with the rest of the world. this is a kind of proto-history of awakening. we suddenly realise that the process of others must be somewhat similar to ours, that some of these people might have realised it whilst others haven't yet and we play multiple scenarios that would contribute to either outcomes. as these mount there comes a sense of direction, after all if we evolved and changed and found a deeper, inner core, so will others. Therefore, if this happening to more people, and it seems to be a kind of a goal in each of us then certainly the world too must be imbued with this sense of direction. Then our personal sets of beliefs feed into this sense of direction and an image, a configuration of a world behaving in this way comes clearer into view. Perhaps then we involuntarily work backwards somewhat, seeing the near past and the present, seeing the conditions we lived through or know sufficiently about that support this, that create a causal relationship that enhances that sense of direction. we can see our direction in tune with the world, and we can sense the direction of the world, affecting all beings, moving us too, towards an outcome that is far greater than what we already sense for all of us. It could only be so, in any case.

But then, if we (voluntarily or not) cast our mind back and start to fathom how the past has given rise to the present we are living through, to this future that can be somewhat vague but yet utterly precise in the reality of our experience, we are then able to see the whole of life's evolution on Earth as an aspect that gave rise to our present condition, that will give rise to what will undoubtedly one day come.

What is necessary to remember here is that these experiences will mostly feed on things we already know. That either we have acquired deliberately or not - with a good degree of freedom and creativity by the creation of some connections and establishment of relationships between things that we might not be fully aware before.

in short all of these experiences correspond simply to the increasing distance our momentary experience of our inner nature retains in regards to our ego. Ie, they correspond to the egoic detachment that is simultaneous with and an expression of, our true nature of being. This feeling of expansion culminates in a sense of infinity accompanied with a loss of form, context and content, until we finally become one with ourselves, stop to know, transcending that feeling of infinity altogether and enter what lies beyond it.

Enlightenment.

(or, quite possibly, simply a glimpse of that experience, too powerful for our not yet quite ready minds to hold on to...)

Peace.