No matter how we well we believe we know ourselves, so much of what we share comes directly from cultural programs that fill our clever minds. Family religious traditions, disciplines we have studied, dogmas that we take as fact and systems, techniques, methods, favorite books, enlightened teachers, etc. All planted in us as beliefs. Beliefs are programs. Their intended function is to provide a framework for your experience. Their unintended effect is to limit your experience. Take a moment to think this through: any system of fixed belief only 'sees' what can be understand and included in the specific system - and the dogma that are its 'laws.' Whatever lies beyond the system's reach of inclusion... simply is not recognized as possible. The implications of this are profound and the ways in which we all suffer from limitations to our experience enforced by programmed 'beliefs' is quite amazing!
The New Circle is an invitation to explore experience and consciousness beyond all dogma, discipline, cultural program – and so, beyond belief. In initiating this New Circle space, I have been carefully shown how to respond to our programmed impulses that would fill in sacred space with pre-packaged systems and beliefs. And, like anything that is brought up when a moment ’feels just right,’ these pre-established dogmas tend to hide us from ourselves right when we most need to let go and surrender into self-revelation.
As always, The Circle is the perfect format for helping each other to let go of all that we are holding away from our own realization. For several decades (of the Human Potentials Movement) our Circles dealt with whatever feelings we were suppressing. Now it is time to deal with the careful deconstruction of all the walls and edifices of all the cultural ‘castles’ we have been building for many millennia. As beautiful as they are, in their defensively hierarchical (patriarchal) forms, they still represent mass cultural beliefs that were created and dogmatized specifically to perpetuate illusions of superior understanding. Regrettably – for my personal commitment it would be much easier were this not true – this must include not only the ‘mainstream’ religious streams, but also many of the more esoteric traditions of yoga, meditation and ethnic tribal wisdom.
Today we can begin to let go of these ancient forms – and the assumed perfections of their supposed masters. And as we are able to release these sacred cows, special texts and hierarchical systems of belief, we can meet anew in the simple openness that is the invitation of every next breath. And this is no small promise: our response-ability in this new direction is enormous. We can experience this when we are alone. But when we open our eyes and accept the New Vision that comes to us, we will look around and find others looking knowingly into our eyes. Sharing. A Circle.
Even harder than letting go of the ancient packages of beliefs that we carry is moving beyond our current sets of pre-programmed illusions: New Age teachings, well-marketed certification programs, assigned masteries, genderist certainties, cherished symbologies, esoteric teachings, favorite books and blindly accepted practices. Given a chance, we can re-form all of these things in an Open Circle. We need not ‘throw them all away,’ when we can change our learning from outside in to learning inside out. And whatever remains of all that we have learned in the past, will be the truth of your own experience – and no longer 'someone else’s words,' and no longer your culture’s pre-packaged program. For... “We are all virgins to our every next experience.”
Experience is infinite, and we only allow a very small amount of our infinite experience in to our awareness. Beyond any individual’s experience, consciousness is omnipresent throughout all universes as a Living Force. What we know as ‘higher consciousness’ is not hierarchical at all: it is simply the opening of self which allows consciousness to flow through experience. And as we dare, we begin to be aware.
As we breathe in awareness with new openness, then we understand through real-time experience that ‘we are all virgins to our every next experience’ – if we let it be so. And the only thing that is stopping us is Fear. It is Fear alone that has built every wall of every defense and every psychological weapon that we unconsciously use to hold openness and surrender away – every presumed superiority, every submissive self-denial, every pretended non-involvement (and so many more)!
No one can see her/his own defenses. If we could they would at once fall away. Psychology knows this, but refuses to look at the implications of the fact that: all defenses happen beyond our personal awareness. In the New Circle these things are more easily seen and in compassionate invitation, can be released. Transmuted. As they fall away, all of the energy that has gone to maintaining them is liberated and opens us to experiencing something new and different.
As we stand up when the Circle feels complete we are often reborn in to a new way of experiencing awareness - and self, and others, Earth and Spirit - something new that we could not have imagined before. The transformation is not – cannot be – total and instantaneous, but where the (meta-process) seeds have been planted and the tools to tend the garden are in hand, change is inevitable – and we can hold this potential in our hands and in our hearts.
If you know a few others, after even a single Circle shared, who also know these simple secrets (that ought never have been hidden in the first place), then you will discover that you have allies, friends, a support network, co-reflectors, lovers who can walk with you from here to there, hand in hand. And as you experience this you will realize that the ‘New Circle’ you attended (with whatever inevitable pre-beliefs in mind) will simply never end.
Despite all that has been written here, and all that has been written before, people are still going to contact our Circle organizers and want to know, "What’s going to happen in Jai’s Circle?" How do I know this, because the organizers are asking me right now!
There is only one answer: "No one knows." This will be unlike any other Circle you have attended. You will understand ‘why’ after it has occurred. Nothing can be understood until it is experienced. This is not a ‘failing,’ it simply is.
Next, people will want to know, "But what are we going to do in this Circle?"
I really wish I could respond to your need to know... but all I can say is this:
"We are going to remove our layers of belief and conditioning – just as much as we easily let go of. Then we are going to enter The Circle as open as we can be (no more is ever needed). We will Surrender together and from this will grow a Meta-Process that will be self-revealing as it unfolds. It is not a secret: it is truly self-revealing. Grown fresh for all of us in our Living Circle. As we Let Go, something will happen that you have never experienced before. Change will come from this. A new relationship with your self, with the others who have come to be there with you. We will all experience initiation, if we can but let it in."
What you see in this Circle you will never see again. The 'how to do it’ learning is communicated through your/our experience. There is no need to 'take notes' - the learning is always new. No one will be asked to do anything that they do not wish to do. There will be no certificates or certification issued. There will be no belts or levels or titles awarded. And no prizes or expensive courses to win – or to buy. There is nothing you need do to prepare yourself, nothing to read (except, please, the above) and nothing you need to bring – except food to share for our dinner together. And a pillow, a blanket and a torch.
Somewhere in the corner of the room we will meet in, will be a small box. It has a sign that says: "Please leave all your dogmas, disciplines, theories, favorite books, healing systems and beliefs here."It is a very small box, but it is more than big enough to hold all that we do not need to directly experience breathing - feeling - touching - sharing - letting go - opening to love - opening to share love - touching infinity and bringing it Home.
