Fourth Way Journey

“OH MY GOD (saying with utter bliss)…the person I knew as myself, who was called “[your name]” just simply disappeared! Something new came into me and took over my body! I am new! I am awake!, filled with positive energy and pure love. The weaknesses that person had before simply vanished under the strong light…the positiveness…and I am the light itself….and in fact we all are light in essence! There is no such a thing as darkness!”

And you will SEE the real world truly for the first time with your own new eyes.
Literally your sensory perceptions are now doubled…

“Colors are amazing!…Everything looks double-vividness and double-contrast. It is as if everything was enhanced by Photoshop! The colors are so rich and evoke ecstatic emotions. Leaves on trees and grasses swinging with a wind under a sun light look like as if you are looking at a motion picture shot by a high-speed camera…so ecstatic just looking at them. Oh my god…rich colors of flowers and textures….

All of these are always there but I did not know that the world was so beautiful…filled with ecstasy. The world is no longer dull and flat…In fact I cannot even remember how it looked before…”

During the time of my depression, I came to see that I will not awaken whatever I do, because what is making effort is still a part of the machine, and the machine will not awaken. An realization that the Master needs to come from outside of the machine.

This was not an easy ‘fact’ to accept – the fact that I am in a true sense a machine and therefore there is no way I can ‘achieve’ enlightenment. The enlightenment was up to the hands of god.

It took time but eventually I gave up. I gave up and accepted the fact that I will not awaken. It was a logical conclusion.

This giving up on my enlightenment, the acceptance, gave me a tremendous relief – or release, in fact, – from the greatest identification of my life – a pursuit of enlightenment.

An enlightenment is a gift. It might happen to you, or might not. And it is not something you can achieve.

I clearly understood that the enlightenment, the master, have to come from outside of myself, and all I can do is, to do my best to remember myself, day by day, applying what I have learned, do my work, and help others. And the enlightenment… is up to god.

If it is meant to happen to you, it will happen, and there is no other way.

This was a tremendous let go, giving up totally of “my” enlightenment, a deep acceptance that after all decades of pursuit, the fact that I will not and cannot awake.

The awakening happens not as a result of ‘teachings’, but it is indeed a gift, which needs to be given.

In prior to my experience on September 11, 2002, I had been in a deep depression. After devoting my entire life to Fourth Way work and making sincere effort on myself, still the enlightenment was not happening. I have done everything I could (at my best) – effort to remember myself, non-expression of negative emotions, and choosing work over anything else, etc. I became perhaps a ‘better’, ‘nicer’, and more balanced person compared to a decade ago, but the enlightenment was still not happening. I started to see the probability that I might not awaken in this life time…and this was not acceptable.

I went into a deep, deep depression. I did not commit suicide but suicidal thoughts were always there.

The only thing mattered in my life – the awakening – was unlikely to happen to me. What’s the reason to live then? Am I just going to live rest of my life, making effort, but in sleep? Is this my fate for this life time? THIS WAS NOT AT ALL ACCEPTABLE. I acted superficially fine externally but I was in a deep depression, all the way to the bottom, feeling that the enlightenment was not going to happen.

I struggled in this state for several years.

During the month preceding September 11, 2002 was indeed a miraculous period of my life.

After gave up on ‘my’ enlightenment, I lived a day at a time, simply continue doing my work, humbly. My emotion was quieter and lighter, and more in a prayer-like state.

And one day, I started to experience – a miracle.

I realized, when I am in a state of prayer, in a state of grace, when I am feeling beauty, compassion, and love, I CAN PROLONG moments of ‘being present’ – for a quite long time, compared to a standard what I could experience before. Perhaps a few minutes at a time at first.

I noticed I was able to sustain the ‘presence’ as long as I could sustain these emotional state I was in. I was definitely able to acknowledge that “I exist in the present” and able to act while staying in the present.

I experienced a warm sensation in my upper chest in these moments…emotion from higher emotional centers…

It was exciting and miraculous. I did whatever I could to evoke these emotional state – listening to fine classical music, reading poetry, looking at beautiful artwork, and prayers, and I experienced a prolonged presence.

I was able to say “I can be present and I can stay in the present!”.

And on the night of September 11, I went to bed with this prayer-like emotion, relaxed, laying down, and some minutes later I was unexpectedly filled with a whole body orgasm. I was transmuted, and a new inextinguishable awareness was born.

It was indeed a miraculous period of my life.

You might think my September 11 experience marked the happy ending of my journey….

NO, not at all!

It was literally a life-or-death survival following the September 11 experience, for many years to come. Here are some of the challenges I experienced:

• My essence was completely open and exposed to the external world without any protection by personality. I was my essence itself, like a new born baby. Any tiny negative impressions or stimuli that cause negative associations, such as other people’s negativity, negative visual images, harsh sounds, and even a slightest of my fearful thought hit my essence very hard, and caused a terrible instability emotionally and mentally, and quickly drained my energy. I was literally lucky to be alive at the end of the day… I needed to re-learn how to protect my essence.
• The wrong work of centers drained my energy very quickly, such as an unstoppable strong momentum in the moving center. Because I was filled with a large amount of energy, it was easy to fuel the wrong work of centers even more. Everyday I needed to watch myself very carefully and stop the wrong works of centers immediately when I observed.
• When my energy was drained, I felt as if my consciousness was waning, losing grasp of this physical world. It took 2-3 days for me to regain the strength, physically and mentally.
• Needless to say, if I expressed negative emotions, it drained my energy immediately, and consequence was not pretty…
• I needed to cope with my new awareness born in myself. It was very disorienting and weird state until I got used to it.

….It was a celebration when I literally managed to survive 1 year….

Thing is that there was no ‘post-awakening survival guide’ existed, so I needed to survive by trial and error.

Over the course of several years, the excessive energy in my body gradually subsided and balanced, and I became more proficient in not letting myself drained.

But there was still a problem…. Even though this new awareness – a master – was always there and I could be present and stay in present, I was often in a ‘quasi’ state in which I was not able to ‘definitely’ be present. A master was in the household, but only passively observing the situations (servants) from behind, so to speak. A master was not ‘in charge’ of the household yet.

It took another 14 years(!) before a master found its right position….

This indefinite ‘quasi’ state lasted 14 years, up until September 2016….

I can see now that during this period, the steward was in charge of the household, not the master. There always was a presence of the master, but he was not actively stepping forward to take control of the household, perhaps because he was not yet strong enough.

The steward was dealing with all household issues – servants’ identifications, many I’s, negative emotions, etc. And often it went out of control.

So, after 14 years, the steward cried out…

“Help! How can I manage all of this? So many strong I’s are occupying the household and I do not know what to do. Show me how to get out of this situation! I cannot keeping going like this! Help!”…..

Some weeks after the steward’s cry, I was in a state of definite self-remembering, deeply being in the present…contemplating…

Suddenly I REALIZED…

OH!!

….I AM THE MASTER…..

I AM THE MASTER HIMSELF!
I AM THE MASTER OF THIS HOUSEHOLD!
I AM THE ONE TO COMMAND!
I AM!

I AM the one to command servants in my house…

“SHUT UP! AND BE QUIET! OR GET OUT OF MY HOUSE! I AM THE MASTER!”.

And it worked!

Something has shifted in myself.
A birth of I AM Presence.

How strange that I did not realize this simple fact until now. I AM the master. The master was always in the household, but he was not aware that he is the master himself and that he has the right to command.

Finally the correct order between the master, steward, and servants was established in the household…

What a relief it was…. finally the master realized that he himself is the master.

A new beginning of my Fourth Way journey.

I AM the master, embodied. And I AM here.