David Bruneau's blog

 An interesting contemplation happened the other day.  I had been exchanging emails with a friend and the conversation had become such that I was emotionally triggered by some of the things the friend had said.   I went to a dyad meeting in the evening feeling stirred up from our email interactions and in the first dyad quickly felt the most authentic place to be contemplating from (so to speak) was this state of reactivity.  That's where the juice was,  so why pretend something "spiritual" is of interest when th Read more »

J. Krishnamurti often spoke about the importance of moving beyond the known. The extremely practical nature of exploring this idea was revealed to me recently in terms of relationship. It seems that feelings of anxiety and uncertainty can easily arise in the context of relationship, especially a "romantic" one. What another is thinking, feeling, and doing is so often unknown and this can give rise to a strong sense of insecurity, vulnerability, and helplessness. Read more »

While inquiring into the question "What am I?" the other night in a dyad format, I noticed that a very strong sense of beingness was present. And as the dyad progressed there was an experience of expansive love and a fresh realization that love is what I am (or at least that is one way of describing an essential quality of what is ultimately indescribable). A strong awareness was suddenly present that as this love is an essential aspect of what I truly am I can never be fully satisfied by anything less. Read more »

The other evening while doing an inquiry suddenly a perceiving was present wherein it was extremely clear that I was making up reality moment by moment. Everything is my creation, and each moment is a fresh creation which arises out of "nothing" or "emptiness". The "I" that is creating this appearance of whatever arises in the moment is not the conceptual "I" or "me". That conceptual I is one of the creations arising out of the invisible mysterious source and it has no ultimate existence or permanence in itself. Read more »

 Most of our conditioning seems to support the outward flow of attention. Fulfillment is sought in externals - in objects, other people, career, and so on. And there is also the movement towards and attachment to ideas, knowledge, and intellectual understanding as ways of creating and sustaining some sense of identity or selfhood, some sense of security in an ever changing world. The mind (or thought) is always engaging with forms of various kinds, which keeps it alive, props itself up with a sense of being continuous and substantial. Read more »

It seems more and more clear or more deeply seen that the natural state of being, what I really am, cannot be defined at all. Nothing can be accurately reported or said about it because it is a non-dual, non-mental, non-conceptual something or nothing which escapes all labelling or conceptualizing. Even to say that I am (or that what is here is) Awareness or Presence requires an objectification of what is, a projection of something called awareness, presence, being, and so on, so that it is at a distance and can be perceived and conceived. Read more »

  J. Krishnamurti often spoke of the way in which we are perceiving ourselves and the world.  He pointed out that when we look at another - or a tree or flower - through an image then there is no real relationship, no real contact with the reality of the perceived object.  He invited us to see without the image and find out what happens. Read more »

Recently my daughter and I were talking about our current -or close to current - experiences and, as often happens with our conversations, we sank into a profound inquiry into the deeper truths of our experience, the underlying mechanisms of thought, consciousness, and motivation that were shaping it. This type of inquiry is so powerful and helpful in clarifying experience, bringing insight into the workings of the mind, and opening up the awareness of our true nature. It cuts through any confusion or lack of clarity around the experience being examined. Read more »

In another dyad recently I entered a contemplation on emptiness and formlessness. An image arose which seemed to describe my situation in life these days. I am sitting on the edge of a cliff looking out at a vast emptiness, nothingness, or void. Everything that used to give meaning to my life has been falling away and this nothingness is what remains. There is a sense that I am still here in some way, separate from this void. Sometimes there is more openness to the emptiness, sometimes less. Read more »

 The other night in a dyad process there was spontaneously a clear sense of not believing what thoughts were saying, a shift "backwards" into the Awareness within which the thoughts were arising. What I am was very obviously not what thought was creating but much more the Awareness and Presence, the undefinable Mystery. As I contemplated this Awareness it became clear that it could only be "known" by objectifying it and creating a subject - object duality, which is not true knowing. Read more »