“AWAKENING” - What is it?
I’ve met a lot of spiritual types - gurus, psychics, healers - when I was interviewing on Wisdom Television. They write books. And that was the subject of my show.
They were all sincere people but sometimes I felt like I had to pull them out of the stratosphere with a rope so “ordinary” people could understand what they were saying.
My standard pep talk was -
“We are not preaching to the choir here. Picture a guy sitting on his couch in his underwear drinking a can of Bud. He’s our audience. If we don’t reach him, we have failed.”
I accidently met that guy. He was leaning against a building next to the post office drinking a can of Bud at 11 AM. Working on a construction project.
He called out to me as I was leaving my car. “Hey, television lady!”
Surprised. “Do you watch my show?”
“Never miss it.” My God, my story was real.
Tom Stine, one of my favorite bloggers, had a real spiritual teacher on a podcast this week. His name is Larry Melton.
His subject is “Awakening.”
He had never joined an ashram in Tibet or lived in a cave or wore saffron robes. He was as authentic as the construction worker. He worked every day, had a wife and children and he spoke truth in a way anyone could understand.
It was a long interview but I could not tear myself away from it because this teacher spoke from his heart to my heart.
Just to give you an idea, I wrote down some of his phrases I wanted to remember.
Speaking of meditation. “Life is a meditation.”
The questions we should ask ourselves. “Who am I?” and “What is really true?”
“The only thing you know is that you don’t know.”
“Awakening is just relaxing. Falling back to your true nature.”
“Awakening is not dependent on mystical experiences.”
“Being in love with what is.”
“The human mind wants to find something wrong and fix it.”
I’d tell you more but I don’t want to spoil your experience with an extraordinary teacher.
We don’t need a rope to bring this gentle, loving soul back down to earth. He is grounded in reality while living a spiritual life.
Go over when you have time to Tom’s site and listen for yourself or if you rather, he will send you a transcript so you can study it little by little.
“Awakening” does not sound so complicated now. Maybe you and I can do it.
Even the guy with the can of Budweiser would get it right away.
To hear for yourself, just click.
Hi Corinne, I’m really glad to see this post about my interview with Larry Melton. You heard in our conversation what I have had the joy of experiencing when I’ve talked with Larry and spent a bit of time with him.
Both his goal and mine are to make spirituality as accessible as possible. I’m glad to hear that we might have succeeded.
Tom Stine | Spiritual Life Coachs last blog post..Interview with Larry Melton, Spiritual Teacher
Oh, and by the way, Tom - you are an excellent interviewer. You let your guest talk and do not interrupt and your follow up questions are on target.
Will look forward to more of the same. Although I don’t know how you can top Larry!
Please thank him for the wonderful interview. Lots of people will benefit from it.
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Hi Corinne,
Tom passed your comments on to me about the interview. We had a great time with it and I appreciate hearing from you about it. It is nice to know that it spoke someone other than just Tom and I.
Life moves us in amazing ways, eh?
Fond Regards, Larry Melton
Wow, Larry -
That was nice of you to drop by here!
Glad you liked my article about your interview.
Yes, life does move in amazing ways. Lazy Sunday and I was about to go watch Mad Men on reruns when I started to listen to your interview!
Got hooked on it! Thanks! Much better time spent!
Hey,
Thanks folks for sharing the podcast. I’m loading it now.
I must be great!
Raymond Chuas last blog post..You Are The Director Of Your Life
I just listened to the podcast and it just sounds like a load of mumbo jumbo. The fact that these two men are even discussing this probably means they haven’t ‘got it’ yet.
Too many people trot out trite phrases like ‘Total awakening’ or ‘Seeing through the me’, ‘Living in the unknowable’.
As far as your excellent advice of broadcasting to the ‘man with the can of Bud’ these guys on the podcast just don’t qualify.
No wonder all this inner searching has reached such a multi- million-dollar industry. For all seekers who read this I’m sorry if this sounds negative.
Just give yourself a day off - there is nothing to know - get on with life and your experience. Take responsibility for your own life. Put the mumbo jumbo aside.
Hi Raymond -
See from Tom’s site that you loved his interview and are downloading it to you Ipod.
Glad you shared my enthusiasm for it!
Dear Chris -
I am trying to figure out whether you have gone the route of the woo woo consciousness movement and got burned out -
Or - you never got sucked into it in the first place.
I would be in the first category. Been in it for years, both in my work and interest. Some of it is good. But I finally became a cherry picker.
One of the things I enjoyed about this kindly teacher, Larry, is that he never even suggests, as so many others do, “Follow me - I have the way.”
He is firm about we are our own teachers.
Sorry I’m not really familiar with ‘woo woo’. You might think I’m having a go but I don’t feel I can stand by and let this load of tosh go by.
While you say Larry isn’t asking people to follow him, the sub-text of everything he says and does is exactly that, otherwise like the rest of mankind he would just get on with his life, like Siddhartha to offer a literary example.
The interview was so full of pretentious nonsense it made me want to have others question it too.
There was a report in New Scientist: 11:56 27 May 2008
by Ewen Callaway
“God may work in mysterious ways, but a simple computer program may explain how religion evolved
By distilling religious belief into a genetic predisposition to pass along unverifiable information, the program predicts that religion will flourish. However, religion only takes hold if non-believers help believers out – perhaps because they are impressed by their devotion.”
Like the great poet/philosopher Donovan once said or sang: First there is a mountain, then there is no mountain, then there is.
Oh Juanita, I call your name.:-)
Thanks for sharing Tom’s interview of
Larry with us.
When people speak their personal story of
awakening it’s not always going to resonate
with everyone.
But just imagine the one who was totally
asleep and has now been nudged by Larry’s words.
Keep up the good work Corinne. !!!
Thanks, Deb -
Very sage comment.
“When people speak their personal story of
awakening it’s not always going to resonate
with everyone.”
I will second that!
And I feel it reaches the right ears every time!
Dear Chris -
See above.
Guess it does not resonate with you!
OK with me.
Hi Corrine,
It is a great interview and I just love it!
Thank you for sharing it with us, Corrine.
Raymond Chuas last blog post..Strength Is Useless Without Brain
I’ve been catching up on my favorite blogs via RSS feed and email feeds. Tom is one of my favorite bloggers. His RSS feed has survived countless “spring cleanings” when I was paring down the number of feeds I read every week.