Step Nine

Step 9. In Stillness All Things Can Be Known.

Stillness of mind allows a greater mind to emerge and to reveal its wisdom. Those who cultivate stillness with a desire for Knowledge will be preparing themselves for greater revelation and true insight to emerge. The insight may emerge during practice or during any normal activity. The important aspect here is that the preparation has been made.

Twice today practice yesterday’s practice of stillness, but practice without the expectation of a result. Do not use this practice to ask any form of question because you are practicing stillness, in which all speculation, all questions and all searching end. For 15 minutes, twice today, practice stillness once again.

Practice 9: Two 15-minute practice periods.

Here you will find the entire book free for download http://stepstoknowledge.com/

Here you will find pointers for getting started if this is your first encounter with this practice: Taking the Steps to Knowledge.

November 13, 2012 Round One: “The insight may emerge during practice or during any normal activity.” 

This is very pertinent for me and what speaks to me most directly in this Step.

I have just been reading the section on the forum about Stillness Practice and what other people share about how they practice stillness, all very interesting. But what I realized is important for me is being able to practice stillness wherever I am and whatever I am doing, without making special preparations and being in what I consider the "right" place. In other words, I strive for stillness being my normal operative mode. Perhaps this is a tall order, but I am aware that insights do indeed emerge as I go about my normal activity.

July 3, 2014 Round Two: I am feeling the importance of preparation here. It is very encouraging to know that I do not need to expect any results at this point. I practice and I prepare myself for greater revelation and true insight to emerge. I am feeling the value of this calm and steady approach. There is no rush, no striving to find answers, no pushing for results. Stillness has an indescribable all-pervading quality. It is where the truth resides.

First practice – no speculation, no questions, no searching, just being still, opening my mind to the vastness, floating away.

Second practice – there is more to life than meets the eye. There is something vast and boundless beyond the physical plane where the truth can be known. I just have to content myself with knowing that while I am in body I will not have the capacity to understand. Practicing stillness helps to bridge the gap between the physical and the spiritual. That is all I know right now.

June 25, 2016 Round Three: Key words: stillness is used 6 times, Greater Mind, greater revelation, true insight. 

I am to still my mind so that the Greater Mind can manifest and greater revelation and true insight appear.

First Stillness practice - 4.15 - 4.30, sitting up in bed. Masha was purring on my lap, but that did not distract me. I entered Stillness with no expectation of result. Expansion of mind, bright lucid place, some unsummoned visions appeared, no meaning, no insights. The fifteen minutes went by too quickly.

I am moving on this time to cultivate the ability to enter Stillness at any given moment during my daily activities. This manifests as a continuous calm, peaceful feeling throughout the day, a feeling of being grounded within myself, of not being buffeted about or overwhelmed by my emotions and thoughts. It manifests as remaining neutral in situations that arouse negativity in particular. I am seeking clarity in how to react to certain situations in a way that expresses what I genuinely feel, but at the same time in an appropriate manner.

All things can indeed be known in Stillness, but it still takes practice to attain this level of inner awareness.

Second Stillness practice - 21.06-21.21. Right before turning in to sleep. It was way past my bedtime, but I was not sleepy. I was chatting with Hilary. We have a practice now of sending each other audio recordings. It is a new way of expression for me. I am learning how to express my thoughts coherently when speaking, rather than writing. It is a challenge. I concentrated on a bright orb, an aperture leading out from a dark cave. I often have to go through a dark, cloying, unpleasant place to reach a luminous place of peace and love. I am always able to stride boldly through this dark place without being distracted or waylaid. And I am rewarded with the benevolence I feel in the golden, lucid realm of the Divine.