To Breathe God

"Gateh, Gateh, Para Gateh, Parasam Gateh, Bodhi Svaha!
Gone, Gone, Gone Beyond, Gone Beyond the Beyond:
Hail the Go-er!" ~Tibetan prayer

At some point, images get in the way, even our favorite image of God: so we pass beyond it. At some point, words get in the way, even the divine name: so we pass beyond it. At some point, we even stop clinging to the dearest feeling: we pass beyond it. And at some point, the soul itself gets in the way: so we pass beyond it. This is the meaning of Gateh in the great meditation mantra of Tibet.

But breath never gets in the way. Breath remains, even when there is no mind. Thinking dissolves into pure Presence, then there is only this breath: not the previous breath or the next one. And this breath is never my breath.

Where does this breath come from? Where does it go? Follow it and see. Breathing is constant rehearsal for the moment of liberation.

This breath expires into silence. But this silence is no mere absence of sound. It is the heart's silence, rich with creative energy, luminous with love, yet free from any image or thought. Amma Karunamayi tells us simply, "In meditation, silence is the Mother."

Do not assume that this is simply an Eastern teaching. It is also the age-old practice of Christian mystics. In the early Church, these mystics were called hesychasts, which means practitioners of silence. In the 7th Century, St. Hesychius of Jerusalem wrote that the core of Christian mysticism is, "The heart's silence, undisturbed by any thought." The light of Christ can only be born in the womb of the silent heart.

The heart's silence at first may seem like a negation, yet it is the most positive experience possible. For this silence is the soul and source of creation, the silence that was here before God said, "Let there be light."

Womb-silence generates the world, yet ever transcends what it gives birth to. This immanent transcendence - ever witnessing creation, ever pervading the creatures it witnesses - is also the meaning of Gateh, beyond, the causeless in whom all chains of causation are rooted.

The silence of the heart breathes forth all creatures yet abides un-created. Because this silence has no boundaries, it is ever-expanding. Because it is ever-expanding, it is dynamic. The dynamism of silence is bliss.

If only for an instant, between out-breath and in-breath, when I surrender and die in this eternal silence, I truly Am.

What remains after surrender cannot be spoken. To describe it would be another image, another word, another thought. One might say, "Surrender and all that is left is Buddha-mind. " One might say, "Be crucified with Jesus in the stillpoint at the center on the cross of opposites." One might say, "Taste your true nature - sat-chit-ananda - Being, Consciousness, Bliss." Yet each of these affirmations only creates another I, another thinker to affirm it. One calls himself a Buddhist, one calls herself a Christian, one calls himself a Hindu. Better just surrender and drop thinking.

"Be still and know that I Am God," advises Psalm 46. This beautiful verse shows us that devotion and non-dualism, Biblical religion and Indian philosophy, the teachings of the East and the doctrines of the West, are just concepts, road-signs on the map, all pointing to the same experience.

Be still... Let mind-waves settle down into the ocean of silence. Let conceptual thinking subside.

Be still and know... Only when thinking becomes silent is there true knowledge. Gnosis is knowledge without thought.

Be still and know that I am... Gnosis is deeper inside us than any act of memory, reason, or belief. It is the innocent Self-revelation of I Am, without any other referencing image or name. Which is exactly what the Lord tells Moses in Exodus 3: I Am is the divine name.

Be still and know that I am God. This one verse unites theism and non-duality, ending religious dispute. Now we can get on with the real business of spiritual living: to breathe God.

Who is God? The answer comes not as a thought but as a breath; or rather, as the energy of Grace in this inhalation. This energy is Shakti. Breathing Shakti is the answer to the question, who is God? Shakti is the Holy Spirit, the divine breath, the supreme Mother of creation. In ancient scriptures, whether in Chinese, Arabic, Hebrew or Greek, the same word is used for both breath and spirit. And the Spirit of God is portrayed as feminine. Her all-mothering power of creation is God's active energy, while God himself is the witnessing silence, the un-created source.

Thus Goddess Shakti enters our bodies as awakened breath, filling us with divine energy, divine silence, divine bliss. This transformation happens when the mind is free from thought, free from belief, free from "religious" dispute.

What is the experience of God? Not a belief, nor a remembered image, nor an esoteric vision - for mystic visions are also thoughts and activities in the mind. But the experience of God is simpler than any vision or arousal of imagination. It is the pure energy of silence, Shakti herself, the scintillating star-stuff that gushes from the center of the heart. Therefore the classic Yogic scripture Vijnana Bhairava declares:

Exhalation goes out, inhalation comes in. At the stillpoint where they merge, one experiences the state from which Creation comes forth and into which it is absorbed....

The supreme Goddess, whose nature is to create, constantly expresses herself as exhalation and inhalation. By resting awareness in the space of the heart, between the descending and ascending breaths, one experiences Bhairava, the source of creation.

We breathe the Goddess every moment of the day. But it is as if we are asleep when She comes into our chamber. She is our most honored guest, yet we ignore Her. By the scattering of our thoughts, by the dispersal of our attention in the anxieties of the world, we are just too busy to notice the one power that can heal us, and heal the earth. We are too busy to notice the gift of this breath.

Now is the time to return. To return to the Giver. Let her lead you. Let her lead you home. Home to the stillness where the gift arises. Let the Goddess lead you home.