During a recent Breema workshop, one of the students asked about the hara (belly). What is it? What happens with the hara during a session? Is it connected to the chakras? The meridians?

For me, it was one of those moments that shows very clearly that no matter how many models and theories we are familiar with, and no matter how well these seem to explain what is going on, we are no closer to really understanding it.

Of course, these theories and models and maps can be very useful. They have a practical value, and we can certainly understand something more or less well in this conventional and practical sense. In a conventional sense, a map is “true” or “valid” if it works well enough, and false if not.

But even if they work, we are no closer to really understanding.

In a conventional way, we know that a map is different from the terrain. Any map highlights some features, ignore other, and may be inaccurate in what it highlights and leave out something important. Chances are, it does leave something important out, we just don’t know it yet.

Also, a map is made of thought, while the terrain is something else. They are different in kind, often dramatically different.

Thoughts are always about the past. Even if they are about the present, they lag behind. And if they do say something about the future or present, it is always drawn from memories of the past.

Models always have a shadow, a reversal that is not included. They are inevitably partial. They leave out views and perspectives that also have validity. And life, as it goes about its business, has a tendency to bring up just those things that can only be understood through those reversals views.

So in all of these ways, we see that a map is not the terrain. It can be quite useful - and “true” - in a practical way. But that is how far they go in terms of their relationship to what they supposedly are about. They work (or not) in a practical sense, and that’s it.

There is also a more immediate way to see that the map and terrain are quite different, not only in degree but in kind. Where we see that the terrain is awareness itself, taking different appearances, and the map is just an overlay.

If we explore it through the sense fields, we see that thought is an overlay on each of the sense fields. It is an interpretation, a question, about what happens in the sense fields. It has immense practical value for our human self in the world, and no value - or truth - beyond that. It is just a thought. An activity of the mental field.

Any statement, theory, model, map, is a question only. Sometimes it helps our human self to function in the world. Sometimes it is less helpful. Sometimes it can even be a pointer for us to explore what we really are, and also here be more or less effective in a practical sense.

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Another look at karma, and how it is and isn’t, and is personal and universal, belonging to the part and the whole.

As with any maps, models and stories, the story of karma is a practical tool only, a tool that helps our human self to orient and navigate in the world. A tool that can be more or less useful depending on what we want to use it for. There is no value or truth in it beyond that.

And we can say that karma is and isn’t.

It is, because there is, obviously, cause and effect in the conventional sense.

It isn’t, because there is only what is here now, the five sense fields and what appears in each one. Anything else comes from the inside of a story. Past, future, time, continuity, space, extent, causality, all that is only found on the inside of a story.

It is individual, because we can find, in a conventional sense, causality within the boundaries of this human self. We see how thoughts and decisions are followed by actions in the world, and so on. It is also individual as a practical ethical tool, inviting and helping the human self to live in a more ethical way and follow the golden rule more easily.

It is universal and of the whole, because everything has infinite causes and effects, reaching back to the beginning of the universe and out to its furthest reaches. What we see locally, including what appears as local causes and effects, are just the local effects of movements within the whole.

So karma, cause and effect, exists in a conventional and practical sense. If we look a little closer, we cannot find it in our immediate experience. It can only be found on the inside of a story.

It is individual, again in a practical and conventional sense. And it belongs to the whole of the world of form, in that everything happening locally has infinite causes and effects, and is a manifestation of the movements of the whole.

And we can find all of this here and now, in our own immediate experience. How is it true for me, here and now? What do I find when I look for myself?

Michael Dowd’s new book, Thank God for Evolution, is available for pre-order. Also check out the book’s website which has articles as well as audio and video samples.

He does a great job of providing bridges from the traditionalist/fundamentalist to the rational/scientific perspectives, and between science and spirituality, all within an integrally informed framework.

(Not sure how much the book goes into the integral maps, but his talks often do.)

Any story has only a relative truth. It has limited and temporary validity only, and there is also a grain of truth in each of its reversals.

And it is relative for several different reasons.

First, stories differentiate within the seamless whole of the world, which means that any segment only exists relative to something else. Here is relative to there. False relative to true. Life to death.

The appearance of anything distinct is dependent on, in contrast to, and relative to a boundary and something on the other side of the boundary.

Then, there is a grain of truth in each of the reversals of any story. The appearance of limited truth of any story happens when we recognize the grain of truth in its reversals as well. We recognize the relative relationship between the initial story and its reversals, and the grain of truth in each of them.

And if we ignore this, trying to put all truth into one story and remove truth from its reversals, then that appearance too is dependent on the relative relationship between the initial story and its reversals.

When I see the grain of truth in each of the reversals, I may find that I appear as a separate self, but when I look, I also find that this sense of separate self only comes from an image, a thought, and is not inherent in what arises. There is a grain of truth in both. Or, I lie, and I can find that in my life. Sometimes I lie blatantly, and even if I try to be honest, what comes out of my mouth is a lie because it is a limited truth.

Or, if I take I am honest as an absolute truth, then that truth can only appear because there is no truth in its reversal, I lie.

The appearance of a limited or absolute truth in any story is dependent on, in contrast to, and relative to, its reversals.

Also, any story has a grain of truth only as related to a set of other stories. It is dependent on a particular context of other stories to have even this grain of truth. And it is when we switch this context of other stories that we can see the grain of truth in its reversals.

I lie. Yes, I can find a set of stories that says that - in memories of times when I did, and even here now because any storytelling, any use of words, is really a lie. It leaves out a great deal, simplifies horribly independent of how complex it is, and splits the world when the world itself is not split.

I am honest. Yes, I can find that too, in another set of stories. Even if I blatantly lie in some situations, there are many other situations where I am quite honest. And here now, I try to use stories that honestly reflect my experiences, as much as possible. I try to be true to what appears as true to me here and now.

The appearance of truth in any story is dependent on, in contrast to, and relative to, a set of supporting stories.

And finally, a relative truth only exists because there is an absolute truth. It is dependent on, in contrast to, and relative to an absolute truth.

Relative truth is what arises filtered through stories, whether these are recognized as only stories or not. And the absolute is this field of awake void and form, recognized as awakeness itself. And in real life, both go together very well.

Awake void and form is inherently absent of and untouched by any stories, including the one of I and Other, whether it recognizes itself as awakeness or not. And the overlay of stories, whether taken as just stories or not, is essential for this human self to function in the world.

The appearance of a relative truth is dependent on, in contrast to, and relative to an absolute truth. And the relative truth arises due to, from and within the absolute, so is dependent on it that way too.
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There is another irony here:

Conventionally, we tend to think that the Truth with capital T is a mystery, and always will be. Possibly, at best, something revealed after death, if we are lucky and the universe is set up that way. We can always know quite a bit about this physical world, the world of form, so that is not really a mystery, but the Ultimate Truth will quite probably always remain a mystery.

But when Ground awakens to itself, this too, as so much else, is reversed.

Now, we see that the Ultimate Truth is revealed to itself, so simply and plainly that it is difficult to express in words. All is God, awake void and form. There is no separate self anywhere, no I with an Other. The nature of all is God, is awake void and form. The ultimate truth is no longer a mystery.

And we also see, equally plainly, that the content of world of form is always a mystery. Whatever maps we put on top of the world of form is always only a map. There is an infinite number of ways to filter the world of form, and even if it was filtered only one way, there is an infinite number of maps possible to account for the world of form as it appears.

The nature of everything is clearly revealed, but the content of everything ultimately remains a mystery, independent of how refined and sophisticated our maps are.

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