The Three Threads

By George A. Boyd ©2021

Q: What is the difference between faith, philosophy, and meditation? Do they arrive at the same point ultimately?

A: To understand the difference between these transcendental functions of the mind, you need to become clear about the three threads.

The thread of faith and remembrance – This thread connects with the ego and tracks into the presence of the form of God in the First Mesoteric Initiation—this is the faith aspect of this thread. Then, it connects with each form of the Divine above the First Mesoteric Initiation from the Second Planetary Initiation to the Infinite Stage on the Seventh Transcendental Path—this is the remembrance aspect of this thread. So we believe in God up to the First Initiation; beyond that, we remember God. This is the conduit through which we pray to God.

The intuitive thread (Antakarana) – This is the thread that runs from your brain, through your conscience, your intellect, and the Superconscious mind to the Soul’s consciousness, what we call the Illumined mind. This is the thread that allows you to ask a question and receive an answer. Philosophers, theologians, psychics, and psychologists tap this thread to receive understanding and guidance—this allows you to dialog with your Soul. We teach you to tap into this thread in our training in Jnana Yoga, which we present in our intermediate classes, the in-person Mudrashram® Master Course in Meditation and the by-mail and the online Accelerated Meditation Program.

The thread of consciousness – This thread connects the attention in its ground state through each focal point in every level of the mind—Conscious, Subconscious, Metaconscious, and Superconscious. You access this thread through isolating the attention (mindfulness) and guiding it to travel along this thread to specific locations along this thread. We teach how to accomplish this in the Raja Yoga portion of our intermediate classes.

The cord of faith is primarily emotional; the intuitive thread, mental; and the thread of consciousness, noetic. You use the thread of faith and remembrance when you want God to help you and guide you. You tap the intuitive thread when you want to gain insight and understanding. You travel on the thread of consciousness when you want to have direct experience of the object of your meditation.

We suggest that you need to be able to utilize all three threads effectively, when it is appropriate to use them. You are taught about how to have faith in God or to remember the Divine in your religious training, and how to pray to this Being. We point out that it is also important for you to be able to activate and utilize the other two threads.

Study and explore these three threads. Learn to apply them.

Ways to Interiorize Attention Revisited

By George A. Boyd ©2021

Q: I have gone to Vipassana retreats and experienced deepening insight into my mind, but when I came back from the retreat, I have found it difficult to meditate. Is there some way to go within without the need to completely withdraw from daily life?

A: Absolutely. Your challenge is to find a method that enables you to collect your attention and move it inward along the thread of consciousness. However, what might work for one person to achieve this might not work for you. For this reason, we recommend that you learn a variety of ways to interiorize your attention, and utilize the ones that allow you go within.

Some of the methods that allow you to move your attention within include:

  1. Tratakam, using your intention to move your attention to discrete focal points along the thread of consciousness
  2. Absorption of your attention into inner pranic (life force) or sensory currents—breath, inner sight, and inner sound
  3. Using visual metaphors for deeper levels of your mind, focusing your attention, for example, on steps of a ladder, floors of an elevator, chakras in an inner body of light, centers in an array—like the Sephiroth of the Kabala—or layers of a mandala
  4. Paying attention to your experience in the present time at some level of the mind until you break through into a higher state of consciousness
  5. Use of the Han Sa mantra to collect attention and absorb your attention into the focal points along the thread of consciousness
  6. Praying to God, asking the Divine to guide your attention into higher states of consciousness; this may also take the form of repeating the name(s) of God as a mantra or chanting
  7. Guided meditations, following the suggestion of your meditation teacher to travel within; becoming absorbed in the beam of attunement from a disciple or Initiate and traveling on that current of attunement to the inner worlds of Light

We teach types (4) and (5) in our beginning meditation course, the Introduction to Meditation program. We teach types (2), (3), (4), (5), and (6)—and you do have the initial experience of doing guided meditations (7)—in our intermediate meditation classes, the in-person Mudrashram® Master Course in Meditation and the by-mail and online Accelerated Meditation Program. We train you in type (1) and you have multiple experiences of ever-deepening guided meditations (7) in our advanced class, the Mudrashram® Advanced Course in Meditation.

Whether you learn these methods from us or learn them elsewhere, we encourage you to acquire proficiency in a variety of meditation methods to enable you to rapidly interiorize your attention and advance to the level where you can begin to perform inner work—to resolve your life issues; to tap into your Soul’s intuition, abilities, and unconditional love and compassion; and to transform your spiritual evolutionary potentials.

Progressive Benchmarks of Meditation Mastery

By George A. Boyd © 2021

Q: Are there any guidelines for what we should be able to achieve in meditation?

A: What you achieve in meditation is based on (a) your aspiration, what you desire to achieve, and (b) your proficiency with the practice of meditation. We can identify markers of relative proficiency with meditation, starting with the ground state of a non-meditator or a person who has never been able to successfully meditate, and progressive benchmarks of mastery of the ability to focus attention. These are listed below.

  1. Can’t get out of waking state of consciousness
  2. Can do basic mindfulness, monitor centers in the Conscious mind
  3. Can travel in the Temporal Mnemonic zone and participate in depth psychology
  4. Can meditate on the chakras of the Subconscious mind
  5. Can consciously enter the astral body and participate in hypnosis, remote viewing, or astral projection
  6. Can unite attention with the Self and contemplate the centers of the Metaconscious mind
  7. Can contemplate the archetypes of the Subtle Realm
  8. Can raise awareness into the wave of the present time and tune into the Soul’s thought and intention
  9. Can lift awareness into the Star Seed and the nuclei of identity of the Planetary Realm
  10. Can unite attention with the Soul
  11. Can unite attention with the spirit
  12. Can unite attention with the attentional principle
  13. Can unite attention with higher octave nuclei of identity
  14. Can unite attention with spirits in higher octaves
  15. Can unite attention with ensouling entities in higher octaves
  16. Can unite attention with Satchitananda

In our intermediate meditation classes, the in-person Mudrashram® Master Course in Meditation and the by-mail and online Accelerated Meditation Program, we train our students to access benchmarks 2, 3, 4, 6, 10, 11, and 12. Those who complete one of these courses, and opt to go on for our advanced meditation training, the Mudrashram® Advanced Course in Meditation additionally learn to access benchmarks 9, 13, 14, 15, and 16.

When spiritual transformation is done at the cutting edge of spirituality, you maintain full contact with your waking state of consciousness, your life, and your personality and can return from these altered states of consciousness at will.

In many spiritual traditions, they teach you to identify with an essence outside of the cutting edge of spirituality, and unfold it along its track. This leads to imbalanced states where your attention may be fixed in a nucleus of identity or spiritual essence, and progressively dissociate from personality functioning.

These imbalanced states appear to progress through the following steps [Note: you may not necessarily experience all of these steps, or all of these steps in order]:

  1. Union with a higher octave nucleus of identity through meditation
  2. Movement of that higher octave nucleus of identity along its track
  3. Sense that the world is unreal (derealization)
  4. Sense that your life and motivations are unreal and worthless (demotivation)
  5. Sense that your personality is unreal (depersonalization)
  6. Communion with archetypes, gods and goddesses
  7. Communion with the guide form of the Supervising Initiate of this Path
  8. Fixation in the nucleus of identity without the ability to return to the waking state of awareness
  9. Formation of a pseudo-personality and dissociation from human life and feelings
  10. Kundalini syndromes, if they have not appeared earlier, may arise at this stage
  11. Inability to function any longer in normal adult roles
  12. Complete absorption in inner spiritual experience

If you are doing meditation and you are having experiences like this, you may be following a track of spiritual imbalance. The appearance of steps 8, 9, and 10 are especially problematical, and typically precede the loss of any ability to function in your personality in normal adult roles.

If you have become involved with a spiritual practice, which is generating these symptoms of spiritual imbalance, there is yet hope for you. Through the strategies of dynamic rebalancing or progressive spiritual recapture, you can rectify any imbalances you have created. Those of you who have generated Kundalini syndromes through your well-intentioned meditation practices can take advantage of our Kundalini Recovery Services—a service we have provided to the meditation community since 2006.

We encourage you to learn to master the practice of meditation so you can go to any state of consciousness at will and return to the waking state of consciousness upon completion of your session. If you are having difficulties returning, we may be able to assist you.

What is Progressive Spiritual Recapture?

By George A. Boyd © 2021

Q: What is progressive spiritual recapture?

A: Progressive spiritual recapture means that you unfold at your cutting edge of spirituality to the point where your ensouling entity and vehicles of consciousness aligned with the axis of being re-align with any nuclei of identity or ensouling entity that have been moved off of this axis through Light Immersion or transformational techniques.

In many spiritual traditions anchored in the Cosmic, Supracosmic, and Transcendental Spheres, the spiritual teachers of these Paths have their disciples identify with a nucleus of identity, spirit, or ensouling entity that is outside your cutting edge of spirituality. When these Paths initiate their students into a transformational method or move their spiritual essence along through directed attunements, it begins to move this spiritual essence out of alignment with the axis of being.

At a certain point of imbalance:

  • Some individuals can experience energetic imbalances or Kundalini syndromes.
  • Others separate from identification with their life and their personality, and experience depersonalization, dissociation, and demotivation.
  • Others may adopt beliefs and lifestyles that hinder them from making personal growth and achieving their dreams, as their spiritual teachers can program almost every aspect of their life.
  • Others learn that the personality or personal mind is evil, so they completely abandon the personality and keep their attention perpetually in union with the spiritual essence cultivated in this Path.
  • Others begin becoming messengers of the teaching and seek to convert others to join the group; they rarely communicate from the personal level, and become a mouthpiece of their teacher’s message. As a result, they may no longer communicate their personal feelings or desires, but are continually “preaching,” doing “shakubuku,” “teaching the dharma,” or “giving satsang.”
  • Others create a split inside themselves, so they have a pole of bliss and peace, and an ego that feels terrified, anxious, overwhelmed, and paranoid. They oscillate between their spiritual essence and this inner nucleus of pain and terror, and may continually struggle to suppress this aspect of their nature.
  • Others develop intense devotion bordering on obsession, and continually want to be drawing closer to the apparent spiritual source on this Path. As a result, they neglect their health and personal development; they abandon their duties to their families; they can no longer focus on education or employment; and they do not plan for the future, but live in a timeless now.
  • Others create a philosophical synthesis that justifies remaining in an altered state of consciousness and unfolding their spiritual essence along their delineated Path. This view narrows their perspectives to that one Path; aspects of the Continuum of Consciousness outside of this lightened corridor opened through the inner Planes appear as dark, deluded, or evil.

Through unfolding at the cutting edge of spirituality, gradually these aberrations affecting energy, emotions, belief, motivation, perspective, and identity begin to ameliorate. At a certain point, they may completely abate as they are reintegrated into the evolving cutting edge.

Progressive spiritual recapture is one of the options available to those who are struggling with Kundalini syndromes—and the other consequences of imbalanced spiritual development we have listed above. When imbalanced spiritual practice has eclipsed your ability to function at the level of your personality, and has warped your emotions and cognition, it will take time to reintegrate these split-off aspects of consciousness, but with practice of methods that unfold you at the cutting edge of spirituality, wholeness can be restored.

Some of those who have done Kundalini Recovery sessions with us have opted to learn to work at the cutting edge of spirituality. After two to three years of practice, they have reported their Kundalini syndromes have completely subsided.

While progressive spiritual recapture is not an instant fix, there are those who have found that it has allowed them to heal the split within them and become reunified with their innate spiritual core. This is an option you may also consider, if your current spiritual practices are wreaking havoc on your ability to function and your sanity.