AUM. You’ve heard it, chanted it or meditated to it. Yet, do you know what the sound really means?

The oldest known spiritual text, the Upanishads from ancient India, says that AUM is the sound of God. That’s a pretty bold statement, isn’t it? The ancient text goes on to explain that it also represents the three types of consciousness that we experience each day: waking, dreaming and dreamless sleep. These states correlate with the birth, life and death cycle as well as our body, emotions  and soul. In Christianity, this corresponds with the Trinity.

To make this sound properly, start with the “A” in the back of the throat. If done properly, you will notice the vibration is strongest in the soler plexus, representing the strength of the physical body.  The “U” is made in the front of the throat. You might notice that the vibration of this sound is strongest in the chest or heart region, representing love, passion and energetic aliveness. With a long, slow, exhaling breath, bring the two vowel sounds together and end with the hum of the “M”. You may notice the energy shifting to the forehead or third eye region. This represents presence, mind, essence or soul. That’s how you voice it. Now let’s talk about the symbolism.

AUM is said to have four parts:

“A” is  the realm of awake consciousness and things, including the physical body.

“U”  is the realm of dream consciousness and symbols, including emotions and the energy body.

“M” is the realm of dreamless sleep and  unmanifest consciousness, including the mind and soul.

The silence surrounding and including the sound of AUM is Spirit itself, the non-dual source and container of the miracle and mystery of all creation.

The “A” represents waking consciousness and physical matter. This realm makes up our perceived reality of physical objects governed by the laws of cause and effect. Something happens and there is a result.

The sound “U” represents a dream state. This realm is the birthplace of myth, archetypes, religious and spiritual symbolism and non-ordinary states of consciousness. The non-ordinary states are realized through deep spiritual practices or drug-induced spiritual experiences. In the dream state, things appear to be separate from us, but we know that isn’t real. In our dreams, the things we see are all being created by our sub-conscious mind. The most common way to interpret dreams is that everything in the dream represents an aspect of you. In the dream state, there are no rational laws of cause and effect. Everything is a symbol of something in your mind.

“M” is dreamless sleep. Consciousness is present but with no awareness of any separateness. The experience of this state is called unmanifest consciousness. It is the goal of true spiritual yoga to achieve this completely stilled mind with no thoughts while being awake. This experience of a completely quiet mind is merged with Source and is the closest we can come to being with God.

The fourth and most important part of the AUM recognizes the silence that transcends and includes all of the former states. Pure consciousness is the ground of all being from which everything arises and into which everything falls back. With the recognition of the silence that surrounds and includes the sound of AUM, we move beyond the three realms and realize all is one and all is God.

To sum up:

“A” starts in in the back of the throat to the count of four and vibrates near the soler plexus stimulating the third chakra and stomach, liver and spleen.

represents:

• The physical body
• Birth
• Waking consciousness and present moment awareness
• The beta brainwave frequencies (12hz-38hz)
• Within the Christian trinity, Jesus living as a man on earth as the Son of God

“U” is made in the front of the throat to the count of eight and vibrates near the chest stimulating the fourth chakra and heart.

Represents:

The emotional, energetic, subtle body

• Dreaming, intuitive and symbolic consciousness
• life
• Alpha-theta brainwave frequencies (3hz-12hz)
• The Holly Spirit within the Christian trinity

“M” is made with the mouth and lips to the count of twelve and vibrates near the forehead stimulating the Sixth chakra and pineal gland.

Represents:

• The  mental realm, soul and causal body
• Deep dreamless sleep, psychic phenomenon and intuition
• Physical death
• Delta brainwave frequencies (0.2hz-3hz)
• The Father within the Christian trinity

“The sound of silence” to the count of 16 with a subtle awareness on the seventh chakra.

Represents

• The non-physical
• Non-dual and ever present awareness
• Eternity
• The element of Spirit
• The mystery  and intigration of the Trinity itself

With this new awareness, I invite you start your day with three AUM’s in the morning upon awakening, during your morning shower, or during your meditations. Then take three before going to bed. You can do them silently or say them out loud. Be aware of the realms or states of consciousness as you voice the sounds and let your mind flow from one state to another until you meet the perfect silence that surrounds the AUM. That’s where you will find the experience of God.

As always, your comments are welcome and you are welcome to pass it along to anyone

The Why and the How of Making the Shift from Ego to Essence
“It is the best of times and the worst of times.” These are the familiar words of Charles Dickens from the novel A Tale Of Two Cities. Seems fitting in today’s times. With the financial melt down, high rate of unemployment, threats of terrorism and all of the devastation taking place around the planet, it certainly seems like we are in the worst of times.

Yet, it is the best of times. Why? More people on the planet are waking up than at any other time. The evidence is in the popularity of Eckhart Tolle’s New Earth and the research done by Arjuna Ardagh and reported in his book The Translucent Revolution. People seem to be genuinely interested in making the shift from a fear based ego driven life to one more grounded in spiritual essence. It’s the necessary shift that the world must make in order to change our direction from the destructive path that we are headed down to a path that honors the evolutionary impulse of life to grow towards greater consciousness and wholeness.

This article is intended to:
Provide you with my understanding of the benefits to making this shift and give you the practical and doable steps to do so.

let’s begin by defining ego and essence and making some important distinctions between them. I love to go right to the dictionary to see how close or far away my own, sometimes abstract, understanding of a word matches the one in the dictionary. Merriam-Webster offers the following definitions:
Ego: The self especially as contrasted with another self or the world.
Essence: The individual, real, or ultimate nature of a thing especially as opposed to its existence.

Simply put, our ego is the part of us that recognizes our separate, finite and temporary bodies. Because of this identification with the limited self, the experience is one of fear with the focus of attention is on protecting this self and getting ahead. This leads to all of the ego’s protecting and proving strategies. And, if taken to far, prevent us from the experience of intimacy and wholeness that we seek and is the source of all the violence, wars and destruction of our beautiful planet.

Why make the shift? Short answer is more Peace, Power, Purpose, authentic Power and Presence in your life, the 5P”s of Radical Wholeness. When we are connected with our essence, the experience is one of being in touch with Spirit. When the core of our identity is more aligned with the whole of life than our finite ego self, we relax and become more interested in expressing our authentic uniqueness for a purpose that in some large or small way serves life. This identification with Essence leads to the expressing and connecting behaviors that provide us with the deep intimacy and the experience of wholeness that we’ve been seeking all along.

Every one of us has two core drives: One is for our individual separate self to survive and thrive in a world. This is the proper and necessary function of a healthy ego. Dr. Richard Moss calls this the first miracle. Think about what an absolute miracle the ego is. For the first time God, Spirit, The Universe, Life can be aware of Itself!

Along with the birth of the ego comes more suffering and more love and possibility than the Universe has ever known. I’m not a parent, but for those of you who are, is the birth of and raising of your own child a fitting parallel? Dr. Richard Moss has written about this in his book “The Second Miracle.” While the ego and it’s birth of self consciousness may be the first miracle, we can make now create the second miracle. How? With our own personal commitment to consciousness, together we can realize our deepest collective purpose, creating haven on earth.

The second and deeper drive within each of us is for wholeness. It’s the universal desire within the individual soul to merge with the whole. I’m referring to the experience of unity, love, connection with spirit, oneness, peace beyond all understanding…by whatever name, it’s the experience of being finally and deeply at home. The Sufi poet, mystic and spiritual philosopher Rumi would likely call this the insatiable longing to reunite with our beloved.

So, what does it mean to make the shift from ego to essence to living a life of Radical Wholeness? Simply put, it’s appreciating the value of the ego while recognizing its limitations. It’s allowing your ego to be a vehicle to help you get to where you are going on time and knowing all the while that you, in your essence are in the drivers seat. This is in contrast to a life dominated by the ego with it being in the drivers seat with little or no awareness of his essential nature. He is the one blowing the horn for you to get out of the way so he can get where he is going because he is more important than you.

How do We Make the shift?
It’s important for me to emphasis here that there is no simple formula that is true for everyone and it’s seldom a linear journey. In my own experience it’s actually more of a spiral of transformation that grows from rigid ego dominated thinking spiraling upward towards wholeness with greater degrees of flexibility, consciousness and present moment awareness.

Here are the steps that I have experienced both on my own life and with numerous clients.

1. Recognize and release your Core Wound. At the root of every ego is the fear bast thought: “I’m not enough and wont have enough.” Each of us has our own different version this one limiting belief. Common examples are: “I’m bad”, “I’m unworthy” “I’m unlovable”, “I’m flawed”, I’m weak.” Somewhere during our early conditioning we made this limiting conclusion about us by comparing ourselves with others. This created what I call a core wound. Many of us have spent a large portion of our lives attempting to hide from, cover up or overcompensate for this one wound, at the root of our ego. This takes a lot of energy and moves us away from our Essence. When you stop running from and are willing to fully face, feel and embrace this core wound on a mental, emotional, physical(somatic) and energetic level, it is finally released.

2. Recognize and let go your ego’s proven strategy designed to compensate for this core fear. At opposite of the ego’s fear based thought of not being enough is the compensatory desire to be more than or better than others in some way that makes us extra special. For example, if some has the core wound of feeling unlovable, they may have an inflating ego strategy of going out of their way to be loving, helpful and pleasing while pretending to have no needs of their own. Someone with the core fear of not measuring up may have a proving strategy of always needing to be seen as superior. They are driven more by looking successful and gaining acquisitions than truly connecting with others and being of authentic value. Once the core wound has been released, the ego’s proving strategy has to go as well, if this liberated state is to remain.

3. Discover and contribute the authentic talents, skills, strengths and passions that naturally emerge from your Essence. Now that your focus of attention is on expressing your gifts for a purpose that serves Life rather than your ego trying to prove that you are somehow a little extra special, you experience your essential specialness. This is a real, yet humble kind of specialness. It comes with the realization that you are being a good steward of the gifts that Life has entrusted in you with a kind of surrendered purpose. This may feel like a merging of your individual uniqueness with the universal whole.

So, the formula is….
- Ego’s core fear and inflating opposite
+ Contributing gifts from Essence
= RADICAL WHOLENESS

Last Friday evening I attended a unique spiritual process called Sozo. Sozo is Greek word meaning “to make whole.” Being the wholeness nerd that I am, I had to check it out. The two hour process was a powerful experience for me and ended with a deep SOZO meditation/prayer. My heart just broke open and what came through so load and clear was this:

“Give away the one thing that could provide others with the most value. Give away the ego to Essence Core Wound Release”

So in order to be a good steward of the insight that came through, during the month of May I’m giving away 20 one hour and fifty minute sessions to anyone who has not experienced this powerfully liberating process. No stings attached.

Each session will follow this format:

1. Discovering the Core wound process. This is the root thought of your ego and the source of all of your protecting and proving strategies that get in the way of your wholeness.

2. A complete explanation of the release process. Then, we will determine together whether or not to do the energetic release work at this time. If we can fully face, feel and embrace even our most negative emotions and limiting beliefs on a mental, emotional, physical (somatic) and energetic level, we are released from them. It’s quiet amazing, actually. I feel in awe each time I have the privilege of guiding someone through the process.

3. Conscious Integrative Breathwork to integrate what has been discovered and released.

4. Optional follow up email support process including daily reminders to do the Practice along with deepening questions (like earliest recollections of having this core fear, mask behaviors…) for three weeks.

Of course, some may want to do more individual work or attend a workshop at some point. Yet, be assured that there will be zero pressure to do so. This is me being a good steward of the insight that came on that Friday evening.

So, call or email to schedule your session. I will limit this to the first 20 people who schedule.

Please feel free to email or call me with any questions that you may have about this or the Sozo experience.

In Wholeness,
Michael
404 246 1036
michael@radicalwholeness.com

Dedicated to Helping Individuals and Couples Find and Live their Most Authentically Unique Expression of Wholeness

Here’s are two audio clips  inspired by my interview with Mary Simpson, founder of Docho

International, about the ego to essence to Radical Wholeness work that I

feel so passionate about.

First clip is a somewhat choppy six minute clip and provides a brief explanation of what I call Radical Wholeness.

Second clip is about nine minutes and offers an explanation of the SOULutions Radical Wholeness process itself and the different ways people can take advantage of this powerful work.

Enjoy and pass it along if you are inspired.

In Wholeness,

Michael