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I’ve written before about the fact that the Lefkoe Belief Process (one of the many processes that comprise The Lefkoe Method) has both a very practical element and a profound spiritual element. Getting rid of beliefs and conditionings changes your “creation,” in other words, it results in major changes in our daily behavior and emotions. The Who Am I Really? Process, which is an element of the Lefkoe Belief Process (LBP), enables you to enter an altered state of consciousness where you deeply experience anything is possible, there is nothing missing, and you have no limitations.
I am now discovering that another one of TLM processes is more spiritual than I had realized.
The practical side of the LOP
The Lefkoe Occurring Process (LOP) enables you to recognize that you automatically and unconsciously give meaning to events, perhaps 20-50 times a day, and usually do not distinguish between reality and that meaning, in other words, how reality occurs to you. Therefore, your “occurring”—the meaning you give reality—is experienced as reality.
And because events have no inherent meaning, all of our feelings—positive and negative—are the result of our occurrings.
The LOP then enables you to make a clear distinction between reality/events and meaning/occurring, and finally to dissolve your occurring. As a result you are able to deal more effectively with reality, easily get rid of negative feelings, and create your experience of life moment by moment. Obviously the LOP produces very practical results.
The spiritual side of the LOP
Although I have had some sense that there are spiritual elements to the LOP, I have started to realize that it is almost like a spiritual practice.
A friend of mine who lived at an ashram when he was younger and who has studied many of the Eastern religions said that there are several things in common with the Eastern traditions: You learn to hold all concepts lightly. You learn to drop evaluations. You learn to drop the tendency to stick new ideas into an old slot, in other words, say that the new thing is “like that,” which keeps you from fully experiencing the new thing. You learn to climb outside of your customary way of interpreting. And you learn to jettison old identifies and ways of thinking.
I’ve never described the LOP quite like that before, but I could accurately use it as a description of my process.
Another person I talked recently who has being studying Taoism said that his guru taught him by using events in reality. By that he meant, he learned to stop giving meaning to things either his guru told him to do or that the guru suggested he notice. Eventually that practice enabled him to stop living in the past and future and live totally in the present.
That also is one way of describing the purpose of using the LOP on a regular basis.
A description of Taoism
Read the following partial description of Taoism from Wikipedia:
“Pu … is a metaphor for the state of wu wei … It represents a passive state of receptiveness. Pu is a symbol for a state of pure potential and perception without prejudice. In this state, Taoists believe everything is seen as it is, without preconceptions or illusion.
“Pu is usually seen as keeping oneself in the primordial state of tao. It is believed to be the true nature of the mind, unburdened by knowledge or experiences. In the state of pu, there is no right or wrong, beautiful or ugly. There is only pure experience, or awareness, free from learned labels and definitions.”
Interestingly, that also is one of the results of using the LOP on a regular basis: you stop judging and evaluating events; you focus on and deal with just the event itself, without any meaning.
Although I designed the LOP to produce a practical result, now that I and others have been using it consistently for the past couple of years, I am seeing that it also serves as a spiritual practice. Consistent use of the LOP produces many of the same results that years of meditation and various types of spiritual practice produce, namely, a major reduction in stress, a significant lessening of suffering, and the ability to “passively” observe your thoughts without giving them meaning or being attached to them.
To get a sense of how the LOP works please watch a short video I’ve prepared, http://occurringcourse.com.
I would love to hear from those of you who have practiced Toaism, Buddhism, or any other Eastern discipline, and who are familiar with the LOP. Please let me know your take on the relationship between the two. How are they similar and how are they different? I especially would love to hear from people who also have taken the Lefkoe Occurring Course and can describe the similarities and differences they notice from their personal experience.
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I can’t watch or observe my Thoughts and I can’t watch or observe my spoken words or my friends words only I can hear them – the same apply’s to Thoughts.
I can hear my Thoughts. A Thought or a spoken Word or any kind of Voice has no shape so how can you see invisible?
After 7 years of being a stupid beliver to this lie I lost almost everything I so hard worked on. I let myself to brainwash me and have a sick hope of happiness. I believed a lie. I was easly fooled. You can’t see invisible but you can hear it.
In my experience with Zen meditation, we practiced sitting and focusing on the breath, and watching the mind do it’s stuff. Noticing thoughts, noticing I’m having thoughts, noticing I’m getting lost in my thoughts, and then releasing the thoughts and coming back to the breath. And of course if you’re noticing your thoughts, then eventually you can see that you are not your thoughts, but the conciousness behind the thoughts – just as you say in the Who Am I Really? process. But it seems to me that the occurring process really accelerates my ability to specifically see that my thoughts, or meaning, are not real. Example: A driver pulls into the crosswalk and stops. I give it the meaning that he’s a jerk, doesn’t care about anyone, he’s selfish. I used to try and not hold onto those thoughts, try to let them go, come back to my breath, etc., BUT – I was still convinced that my assesment was THE TRUTH, and my negative feelings were just an undesireable result of the event. I think where the occurring course is taking me(I’m in it now), is seeing that my thoughts DO NOT reflect the TRUTH, and in fact have nothing to do with it. My mind is just generating meaning as it always does. It’s very freeing, and anything that results in a freer, less stuck mind, is definitely spiritual. Spiritual nature must express through the mind for humans.
I am not an experienced meditator. I want to draw your (and my) attention to this as my personal reply to your question:
The quality of surrendered awareness/non-expectation/ the creation of all aspects of silence (pyhsical/emotional/mental) / embracing all experience (including pain) that happens as a result as long as needed.
Hi Morty,
Some of the videos are laying the context, some are explaining what needs to be done. The last 10 minutes might be helpful. I am not sending any ideas to you of myself, you know your experience and can compare with the info that is being given.
I think only a genuine spiritually enlightened teacher can truly answer your question. Maybe you can ask one.
Love,
Erdal
I think the essence of the message given is, by creating silence within our physical body, emotions and thoughts, through sitting and allowing this to happen by doing nothing and staying in awareness, or in staying focused on the spiritual heart, we will be gradually introduced in all aspects of ourselves.
The essential thing is one should be willing to do this even though pain can arise from time to time, without expectations, as long as it is needed to and it might become difficult at times and take a long time.
I think the relationship with LOP is in LOP we may use our way of creating stillness of mind through awareness/distinguishing occurring from reality.
The missing thing in LOP is, probably, sitting deliberately to allow all aspects of this silence to happen (pysical, emotional, mental) with complete focus on it and be willing to experience all of the pain that arises without the slightest manipulation to control it/dissolve it. Total lack of activity/lack of surrender is probably the difference. When this aspect of surrender is missing, I think the ego of the practicioner of LOP still subtly has the reins, allowing what experence/emotions it wants to allow and manipulating/suppressing the rest towards its own ends.
Love,
Erdal
Hello Morty,
The following video series explains what true spirituality is: (about 40 mins)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRHRzMuftik&feature=plcp
I think this video can be used to understand the relationship of LOP with true spirituality.
Love,
Erdal
Hi Erdal,
Thanks for the link. I listened for 10 minutes and didn’t see the connection you refer to.
Love, Morty
I find lots of similarities between The Lefkoe Method, Occuring, and the practice of meditation and spirituality.
The work of Harvard’s Susanne Cook – Greuter is an exhaustive study of the various levels of consciousness that are available for people to work through. Those who have practiced a great deal, or otherwise have had a sudden rare and lasting epiphany, will literally perceive the world and reality in a way that is quite different from the majority.
I have studied and practiced these ideas for many decades, have spoken with Cook Greuter and other experts and find that your work , Morty, is right there, and as you mentioned – in a practical way.
There are also brain entrainment programs using audio that can induce a state similar to the more balanced ‘brain’ that plays host to an observant and impartial viewpoint. These programs can speed up the meditation process which , alone, can take many years.
My study of all the known methods of this process includes the work of Cook Greuter, Barrett C Brown, Robert Kegan ( Harvard) , The Dalai Lama, Byron Katie, Ken Wilber, Adi Da, and from a practical business standpoint, Bill Torbert, and Dave Logan at Culturesync.
It mostly comes down to this- Turn the subjective into objective. Witness your own mind as it witnesses what you consider to be reality.
I like how you, Morty, use all these concepts in a practical, daily life way that is easily applicable to modern living.
chrisitianity has same understanding of living in the present by forgiving, to love one another and to have faith that every good things you sow will reap better in the future.
My spiritual belief confer with your method and clear my mind everyday by giving no meaning to my occurings that results to sound decision making and happy life.
This method changes me positively.. more power.
ferdinand
I remember reading this story a long time ago. It has some conceptual over-lap with the LOP.
The Farmers Luck.
Long ago, there lived a farmer at the edge of a small village. One day, his best horse broke through the fence and ran away. The farmer’s neighbors came to visit and give him their condolences for his loss.
“Such bad luck!” they said sympathetically.
“Maybe.” replied the farmer. His neighbors were puzzled by his response.
The next day, the horse came back, and with it, followed two new wild horses.
The neighbors, hearing the news, visited the farmer again.
“Wow, such good luck you have!”
“Maybe” said the farmer.
That day, the farmer’s son, while attempting to ride one of the wild horses, fell and broke his leg.
“Oh, how unfortunate!” the neighbors said.
“Maybe” the farmer replied.
The following day, a military brigade marched through the village on the way to war, drafting all the young men in the village for their army. They noticed the farmer’s son’s broken leg, and did not draft the wounded young man.
“Such good luck!” said the neighbors.
“Maybe” said the farmer.
here the link to it :
http://obaitori.typepad.com/obaitori/2010/03/the-farmers-luck.html
Hi Jessy,
Yes, this story does demonstrate one aspect of what the Occurring Course teaches: events have no inherent meaning.
Love,Morty
I am currently doing the occurring course, have done first level teacher training and belief elimination course.
My spiritual life started in 1976 with a totally uncontrolled spiritual awakening and I struggled for 20 years to come to terms with what had happened to me. So I have tried almost every type of spiritual and therapeutic practice, the main one being non-duality teachings.
In 1996 I had two awakening experiences. In first I was taken out of my body while walking in a wood, and in the second I realised I could never experience myself because I am myself, in other words the self is intrinsically unknowable.
Since that time I have been refining anything that gets in the way of being that non-beingness, mostly through the sedona method. My perception of self had become finer and finer almost to the point of disappearing at times, but had been feeling a little stuck of late.
The lefko belief process has really reignited that process.
Just before starting the Occurring course I had a dream in which I saw my reflection in a mirror. The reflection was paper thin, and the image of myself began to wobble like the image on an old tv screen. Behind the image was the invisible dark presence of the Self, and then I could feel that in me with a jolt of recognition, like a luminous dark invisibility.
So something is definitely working. The other thing I am noticing from time to time are feelings of bliss almost coming out of my joints or bones. This can go on for a week or so.
Anyway thanks for the courses so far, I’ll let you know how it goes.
A bit awkward to comment on, what sort of ‘spiritualism’ is Alex talking about.
He does not intend to be tautologous, but we have the church of spiritualism, this I do not accept. It may or may not exist, but to pander to it is not of much value.
The other Spirit I do understand to some degree. It comes upon who it may as it so wishes……..e.g. Saul breathing fire and brimstone on the way to Damascus. Here he just witnessed the first Christian murder, that of Stephen.
So this Spirit does not take any notice of how good or bad a person is. The individual is overcome by something much stronger than themselves, as say…….are the steps of the retreat of Francis of Loyola?
Transcendental meditation can be self induced. But that must require some practise.
Perhaps Alex would expand? What was this spiritual feeling exactly, did he experience other feelings, did he like it, did he feel good, was any other agent involved in his mind.
Correction and apology, I meant Ingnatius of Loyola. Not Francis.
This sounds interesting, and I understand the concept of detaching meaning from experience to help free oneself from negative or self-defeating thinking. But, don’t we want to give meaning and context to events on our lives? By using your method, how do we incorporate our experiences into the Whole of our existence?
The first time I heard about the concept that the way we experience events is not equal to the way events are, and that the mind distorts reality and makes us suffer and attach to imaginary meaning, was with Eckhart Tolle’s book, The Power of Now. It’s a spiritual book.
I found it to be amazing, and using that information, I had 4 or 5 episodes where I had these lapses of time where I got into a deep, altered state in which I felt I was pure awareness, and I transcended meaning. These episodes lasted from 15 to 45 minutes. I’m not sure exactly what I did to get in that state, but it was similar to the LOP, which is basically recognizing that the mind tends to project an artificial reality on top of physical reality.
Looking back on what I’ve read about spiritualism, it seems to me that the concept of occurring is a much clearer understanding of this topic than many gurus have or are able to convey.
I’m very glad I had the opportunity to take the Occurring Course, because now I know exactly what to do to deliberately dissolve meaning, and be peaceful and whole as a result.