Path of Logic

Path of Logic

After running Pyramid Publishing on La Brea for a year or so, Larry Spiegelglass called my office to have me talk to him about writing his book. He had developed a philosophy that he claimed could cause proponents to find inner peace of some kind. He really didn’t define the result, except to say that it was supposed to be pretty wonderful.

I drove over to his rental house that evening, where he hosted a discussion group several nights a week for his six or seven students.

Larry didn’t seem to believe in any sort of religion or spirituality…but what he seemed to be describing was actually enlightenment. But he’d never call it that. I would be surprised that he even was familiar with the concept of awakening. If he had ever heard he word enlightenment, he would have disregarded it.

Larry’s concept needed a lot of work…but he was a brilliant, mesmerizing and highly charismatic speaker. He also came off as something of used car salesman but his philosophy was compelling and very intriguing from the first moment he started talking. And if you followed this philosophy, you would experience a sort of inner freedom that is beyond anything in your imagination.

He would sit back and wax philosophic for his students…his attractive wife, Teri, and 2 ½ year old daughter, Chime…and two vicious guard dogs that carefully watched for any sudden movement. (Larry had a bit of paranoia. The dogs were clearly protection.)

So we’d sit around and chat and smoke some weed and talk about the philosophy for several hours. Larry and I carried 90% of the conversation…I was clearly his star student. Of course, I knew a lot about the concepts that he was reaching obliquely. His logic was new and exciting approach for me…and at the same time, I was coming from a whole tradition of spiritual concepts laid down over thousands of years.

Larry and I both loved to talk. (Words are the alcohol of the Irish…and so is alcohol. Yes, Costello is a very large Italian family, but it’s also a small Irish family from just north of Galway.)

The point is that Larry and I were both deeply in love with good talk, good smoke, logic, philosophy…and the magic power of words. We got along famously. On the other hand, I was a fairly good sized guy and my very size intimidated Larry. He never really got over that aspect of our relationship.

Larry and I got together two or three times a week…often more…for three, sometimes four hours a night. It took that long for Larry to pass on his philosophy to me…and we started collaborating…building on each other’s ideas. It took about six or seven months for him to impart the whole of his philosophy.

I am going to include Larry’s philosophy…or the result of our collaboration…

At least, this is sort of a summary of the essence of Larry’s philosophy followed by a few brochures we wrote on Larry’s “process”.

The Logic of Awakening

We ALL start by feeling that it is impossible...that we will never awaken. Relax. Be at Peace. Start by knowing (not by believing, but knowing) that you really are already here.

(How can you not be here? You ARE here, right?)

It is so simple that the mind gets confused over how easy and simple it is. But the one thing you need to realize is that the journey is well worth the effort. Paradise awaits. Here. Now. And all that's required is your "Being".

Not thinking about being.

Just be.

Being "in heaven" inside the Present Moment...is the secret behind all the religions of the world.

So we will try and do something easy...like... Awakening For Complete Dummies....(where I'm the Dummy) and I will do my very best to keep everything as simple and easy as possible.

Let's start from the easiest place I know.

Actually I need to start even one step farther back. We need to start at Basic Rule #1...which says that I will never just tell you what I believe. This rule is very important and not too easy to really understand. But, you see, anybody could just tell you anything at all. So what if they believe this or that. That idea is just what someone told them. What does it matter what anyone believes? It's just an idea.

I could believe that the cows on the moon are all blue. But my belief does not make anything true. Not my belief. Not anyone’s' belief. Not even yours. Or anyone’s'.

Belief is nothing more than an idea that somebody held onto. An idea they made important. Or an idea they think sounds really nice. Most times, it's just an idea that they really WANT to be true. And they think that maybe if they believe it hard enough....maybe it will be true.

Actually, I have a bunch of beliefs. But since I became awakened, my beliefs have lost their importance.

This was taught to me by a very crazy old man....crazy like me I suppose. His first lesson (not a belief)...was about reality. At the end of it all? Awakening is all about reality. What is real and what is not-real. In the whole "awakening" thing? We call the not-real "The Illusion". It is sort of a game. A game based in pure thought. To win this game, you need to awaken from the Illusion.

How simple. The Illusion is the not-real world. All that is required is to awaken from the not-real Illusion...and awaken to the real world...which is enlightenment....to awaken from the dream.

See? This whole Enlightenment game is really incredibly simple. Your job is to keep the mind from making it more complicated than it really is.

There are two different worlds. These two worlds are over-layered by one another. They exist simultaneously. A real world (which we will talk more about)...and a not-real world called "The Illusion". To awaken from the dream is the break the "spell" of the Illusion and awaken to realize the REAL world.

Let's stop and allow you time to think about what I've said so far...and maybe give you time to consider whatever questions you might have.

Let's see. We need to go to the next simplest level of awakening. The next concept is called a "hypothesis". A hypothesis is really just "an idea worth considering". So let's spend some time considering this idea: Reality can only exist in the present moment. This idea is either true or false.

So let's see how this might work. Basically, only three possibilities of time exist. There is the past, the present and the future. We need to examine how any or all of these three time divisions hold any real things. Does the past, present or future hold any reality?

I suppose that I would point out that reality consists of things that you can touch, feel, smell, see. That is, reality is very physical...sort of by definition: reality consists of real things.

The past? The past is a collection of memories of real things. The past is a series of thoughts, ideas, impressions, feelings...about some moment in time that once used to be real.

Not only is the past filled with nothing more than memories and thoughts...but each of those remembered moments was once (briefly) the reality of the present. In that past "present moment of reality", there were billions and billions of bits of information. But at the time, we could only grab a very small packet of data. That is, we really couldn't expect to remember everything from each moment. There's just too much information to remember everything, so what we do is remember just those bits of data or information that we consider "important". And we make these decisions based on how we think about things. If we think one way, we might grab this packet of data from that past moment...or if we think other things are more important we might remember a different series of things about that past moment.

There is an old saying..."When a pick-pocket meets a saint, he only sees the pockets."

Added to the fact that there is far too much information in a single “present moment”, that moment simply goes by incredibly quickly. The present moment is smaller (faster?) than a picosecond. A picosecond is a unit of time used in computers. A picosecond has exactly the same relationship to a second…as a second has to 10,000 years. Yes…a very small unit of time.

And yet the present moment is even smaller…faster. The present moment has no duration. It is a single moment in time. One “point” in time…of no duration. Now if there are billions of bits of data available in each of those moments…the exact color of the sky at each gradient of light…the exact hue of each tilt of water in a shifting sea. How much accurate data is it possible for the mind to “save” during a time unit of zero duration? Okay…let’s grab up a bit of this blue over here. Oops..too late…moving on. And that present moment is over already.

What the mind does…to try to make sense of all this information…is that the mind tries to focus on the “important things”…on the fly…and to “string together” a series of moments to try to make sense of too much information. How accurate can a memory be under these circumstances?

We each remember each past moment slightly differently. No two people could remember the same past moment in exactly the same way. It's even less possible that two people could remember a whole afternoon...or a whole weekend...much less a whole summer...in exactly the same way. One of them (or probably both) has to be wrong.

So the past is really a great jumble of memories and thoughts...a great many of which may be accurate...or maybe not. But still, even if a person could remember every single moment exactly as if it were real....every single detail of every moment. Still what we'd have is thoughts and memories. The past doesn't have anything that we can touch or feel or see or smell. The past is a giant folder kept in your brain, filled with ideas about what once happened. We just can't say that the past holds anything real.

Let me know if you have some thoughts about how the past could hold any real things. We can always go deeper into any of these concepts. I'm trying to keep it as clean and as pure as possible. And keep it as simple as possible at the same time.

(Just for the record, most of what I am passing on here was a philosophy created by a brilliant man named Larry Spiegelglass. He was my fourth teacher.)

Let’s see where we are. As I remember, we’re considering the idea that: Reality can only exist in the Present Moment.

In order to understand the nature of that reality, we had to consider the three elements of time: past, present and future. Unless there are compelling arguments to the contrary, we have to conclude…at least for now…that the past is made up of memories of real things, but the past does not contain any real things that can be touched or felt or smelled or seen or even heard.

If the past does not contain any real things, how about the future?

Can we see things in the future? Touch them? Smell them?

Exactly what future are we talking about? Will a future exist? How do we know that time doesn’t stop? What does the future hold?

Why do we assume that we are a species of fortune tellers? That we know what happens in the future? We assume that the sun will come up tomorrow. It always has.

Perhaps tomorrow, three blue moons will rise to illuminate the planet. How do you know? How can we know a future that does not yet exist? We assume.

Where do our assumptions come from? All of those assumptions? About our jobs, assumptions about our relationships, about our finances, about our health. Dozens and dozens of assumptions hopes and fears about a future we know nothing about. We simply make up our assumptions. Just plain…make ‘em up. Hopes and fears. Again from our minds. And if we have habits of thinking in this one way, then so will we shape our assumptions about the future in that same way.

Where is it that we can find real things in a future that we merely assume to exist?

We cannot.

Since the future has yet to happen, there is nothing to touch, nothing to feel, nothing to see, or smell. No real things.

And we have already determined that…by definition…reality consists of real things: pillows and sand and flowers and the glint of sunlight on the waves.

Real things.

Not memories.

Not mental assumptions of a future that has not yet happened.

It comes down to this. Real things are things that exist. The future contains only those things that do not exist yet. If it does not exist yet, then it cannot be real yet. Reality consists only of real things.

Reality can only exist in the Present Moment. That is the idea we are considering.

The nature of reality.

The past has no reality for it is simply filled with memories, stories, recollections, The past holds no real things that can be touched, seen, held, smelled, or seen. The past is created entirely in the mind…by what we have chosen…and how we have chosen…to remember that fleeting “past moment”.

The future is created entirely in the mind…by what we have chosen to assume will perhaps happen. And these assumptions of the future are entirely based on what our mind has chosen to hope for or to worry about.

The past and future are both created in the mind…based on how your mind has been trained to work for you.

Generally speaking, it would be logical to say that those things created in the mind are not “real things”. Mental projections, perhaps…thoughts, ideas…but where is the reality?

In the past, present or future, where can you reach out and touch something, see something?

Back to where we started: Reality can only exist in the Present Moment.

We have determined that there is no reality in the past for the past is merely filled with thoughts and memories. And we cannot reach out and touch reality in the past.

We have determined that there is no reality in the future because the future has not yet happened. And we cannot reach out and touch reality in the future.

Reality can only exist in the Present Moment.

Only real things can exist in that Present Moment.

Entering the Present Moment requires a break in the cognitive stream of consciousness.

Entering the Present Moment requires a break in the cognitive stream that makes up the soap opera that is your life.

Entering the Present Moment requires a break in the cognitive stream that consists of words and makes those words the bedrock of your existence.

Entering the Present Moment requires a break in the cognitive stream that makes up the Illusion.

Entering the Present Moment requires a break in the cognitive stream that has created the Unreal World.

Let the thoughts go, like the cars passing in the street.

Let the thoughts go, like the cars passing in the street.

Step through the mirror into the awakening of your true self.