I usually don’t write about these things, because they are secondary effects and also content of awareness. But it can still be helpful to mention and clarify.

Below the dust kicked up by our wrestling with life and stories, there is a stream of quiet bliss and joy. It is the bliss of just being, of experiencing independent of the content of experience.

It is a current of quite bliss and joy, and also of an alive presence… of love… intelligence… guidance… being itself…

When we first discover this, there are times when we stay with this quiet current of bliss, even if the personality is doing something completely different… the personality may be in despair, caught up in anger, frustration, irritations, longings, grief and so on… and yet, the quiet current of bliss is still there. It is there, independent of what the personality is doing.

I have found two ways to notice this current that seem especially effective.

One is to simple be with our experiences, as they are. The book Unconditional Bliss by Raphael Cushnir is one of my favorites on that topic… very practical and simple.

The other is to examine beliefs themselves, seeing that any story is only a relative truth, which in turn allows beliefs to fall away. The Work is the simplest and most effective approach I have found for this.

Of course, as with anything else, we arrive at the gold only by doing the work. We can read about it as much as we want, even believe everything Raphael Cushnir and Byron Katie says, but that in itself won’t help us much (it could even trigger more discomfort…!)

The gold is only revealed by digging… by being with our experiences, especially those we would rather not be with… and by sincerely examining our most cherished beliefs, especially those we would rather not let go of.