The Lotus Mind Workshop – June 2007

Kris – The Lotus Mind Workshop – June 8-10, 2007

Friday June 8 – ‘Meet and Greet’ at The Churchmouse and Firken

On Friday night Serge and Mark hosted a ‘meet and greet’ at a neighborhood pub. As far as I could tell almost everybody who attended the workshop showed up for the fun. It was wonderful to meet so many people I had been exchanging ideas with on New World View. As I enjoyed a gin and tonic, several people introduced themselves, having recognized me from my avatar. Others recognized my voice from the Kris Radio show. It was fun for your faithful reporter to be a minor Kris Chronicles celebrity for an evening.

After about an hour I went home to collect my resources and get a good night’s sleep. As I left I remarked to Serge that getting together socially before the workshop was a great idea because the ice was broken and tomorrow morning we could get right down to business.

Saturday June 9 – Day One: Second Mind Articulation

On Saturday morning, after a brief welcome and introduction by Serge and Mark, Kris came through and thanked us all for our part in manifesting the gathering.

Next Kris gave us a technique to quiet the ‘mind monkeys’ that gives new meaning to holding your tongue. He suggested that we stick out our tongue and take hold of it with our thumb and forefinger. Startlingly, this immediately quieted the mind. He said that pressing our tongue against our teeth or touching it to the roof of our mouth did the same thing.

The reason is that our inner self-talk automatically engages the muscles in the tongue in tiny movements as though we were speaking out loud. Holding our tongue or immobilizing it by pressing it against our teeth had the effect of suppressing this internal chatter, our mind monkeys.

We were to use this technique during the weekend when we wanted to quiet our minds. It could also be used when we were meditating or asking ourselves important questions and wanted to quiet our minds to receive the answers. Kris suggested we might also find it helpful just before sleep.

Next Kris led the group in a most evocative ceremony. He held a branch of a tree with many leaves on it and each person came up in turn and took one leaf to symbolize their engagement and participation with Kris and Brahm, with the rest of the group, and with themselves.

At this point Kris explained the symbology of the lotus. The beautiful lotus flower floats on top of the pond even as its roots are embedded in the muddy bottom. Many teachings have used this analogy to show that even though human beings are innately flawed, we can rise above our lowly origins, transcend the physical and attain enlightenment.

In contrast, Kris stated emphatically that without acknowledging and embracing our physical selves we cannot be truly spiritual. Our bodies are not an impediment to our spiritual journey, our bodies are our spiritual journey! [The lotus flower is nothing without the root and only arbitrary divisions separate the flower from the stem and root in the first place.]

Next Kris introduced the idea of the ‘higher intellect’ as Seth described it, or ‘second mind’ as Kris more often labeled it during this weekend. Our first mind is our normal waking state based primarily in our physical brain, dependant on our outer senses and mostly taken up with the official line of consciousness.

The second mind is not based in our physical brain as much as it encompasses our whole physical body and much, much more. Our second mind gives us access to all knowledge and wisdom. Every cell in our bodies is a living holographic microcosm of All That Is and through our bodies we have access to this infinite treasure trove of awareness and understanding.

We often think that our subconscious is holding us back from realizing our dreams. This is only half right. Certainly there may be old programming that limits our awareness of choices, but at deeper layers our subconscious also contains an intuitive understanding of our potential and a yearning to discover and fulfill ourselves.

Now Kris took us on one of his patented Adventures in Practice. [There are several powerful AiPs in this workshop and reading the transcript or hearing the audio is highly recommended to get the most out of these practices.] After the usual relaxation process, we discovered a temple of light in our inner awareness. Within this temple we discovered a pyramid of light that we entered and traveled through, emerging from the top into a vast inner space populated with countless stars and galaxies.

We drew lines connecting all these points of light to each other and then superimposed this imagery onto our physical bodies, realizing that each ‘star’ was a cell or neuron and we were creating countless new pathways within our brains and throughout our entire bodies. We saw this pattern of energy accelerate faster and faster, illuminating first our spine, then the nerves reaching out to every part of our bodies and then every cell tingling and thrilling with this newly articulated energy and awareness.

Needless to say, this was very powerful and affecting, and this was just the first practice on the first morning! [I am reminded of the movie Cocoon where a young man who wants to have sex with a beautiful alien is treated by her to a spectacular energy mergence. Reeling from this experience, he gasps, ‘If that was foreplay, I’m a dead man!’]

When we returned to the seminar room after this practice, Kris did something quite unusual and dramatic. He asked us to close our eyes and return to the space and feeling tone we had just experienced. Then he went around the room and touched each of us in turn in a precise pattern involving our temples, the backs of our heads, our foreheads and finishing with a stroke down each shoulder.

[Kris has never done this kind of ‘laying on of hands’ before to my knowledge. In fact, I am not aware of any of the ‘ghosts’ doing this. {Apparently Kris did something similar last year at the Castaic workshop.}]

Without much further explanation we broke for lunch. Many of us enjoyed a busy, noisy lunch at Sushi Sky, a nearby Japanese restaurant.

After lunch we reassembled and Kris described his intention to help us develop our second mind. Our second mind was that vast interconnectedness based in the cells and neurons of our physical bodies that we had experienced in the first practice. Consciously choosing to engage our second mind was very helpful in allowing us to move away from our shadow issues.

Kris took this opportunity to point something out about our shadow issues – the pain, fear and confusion we challenged ourselves with daily. He asked us to consider the motivation behind these issues in our lives. With the right perspective we could see the greatest possible sense of compassion and love as our motivation for creating these limitations and challenges.

The rest of the afternoon was taken up with two more Adventures in Practice. The first one involved sitting on the floor in groups of three. Each group sat facing outward with their backs touching. We were supported by the backs of the two other people in our group while Kris took us on a journey that further explored the qualities of our second mind. We entered our DNA and watched as it pulsed with knowledge and insight beyond our understanding. Then we followed these pulsations as they connected and resonated with the DNA of the two people in our group, all the people in the workshop, and eventually all life on Earth.

Many people including your faithful reporter found sitting in this way was very uncomfortable even though the overall practice was very affecting. Several times during the process I consciously and deliberately set aside some pretty intense physical discomfort in my back and legs to follow Kris’ voice and focus on the potentials of my second mind.

It turned out this was a cunning little trick that Kris actually confessed to afterwards. He said that he was aware that many of us were very uncomfortable and smilingly gave himself a little whack on the hand and said, ‘Our bad!’

In retrospect of course, we see that this was good training for those everyday moments when our first minds are distracted by some pain or discomfort and we choose to engage our second mind.

He made up for our discomfort in the next practice which involved lying on our backs on the floor with a pillow under our heads – heavenly after the sitting position – and we explored even greater expanses within our second minds. Frankly I was so distracted by the glorious feeling of lying flat on my back that I didn’t pay much attention to the details of this practice. [Please refer to the transcript for details.]

I do recall that at one point he asked us to summon our experience and feeling tone of the second mind and gently focus on someone we felt might need an energy boost, whether a friend or family member, a stranger, or simply anyone in need of a more nurturing perspective on themselves.

This ended the session at around 4 o’clock. Everybody hung around and chatted for a while before breaking for dinner. It had been announced that there was an evening gathering between 8 and 10 and it felt good to know we were coming back for more fun.

Saturday PM – Fun with Kris, Defrene and Two Songs

At 8 o’clock it was still light outside but the room felt very different. More intimate and cozier somehow. Kris came through and made a few important points. He reminded us of the central value of choice in our lives. Our ability to choose in every moment was a precious, essential quality of our being.

He then told us that the evening was a free-for-all and not part of the Lotus Mind program. He warned us that he was letting his hair down and showing us that he was ‘foxy, fun and full of the juices of existence’. This was an opportunity that many could not resist, to ask personal questions. I will only touch on the highlights.

One attendee said she felt that she was amongst family and Kris said this was likely a common thread through most of us.

Someone asked about parenting and Kris mentioned that raising children was about sharing, exchange and growth as well as being a wonderful opportunity to nurture our own inner child.

Grinning, he said that he hoped his answers were, as always, ‘clearly ambiguous’.

Asked about ‘abnormal growths’ in the body, he said that these were usually the result of anger and frustration. The key here was forgiveness of self – especially for being angry and frustrated with ourselves. Kris very gently reminded us all of ‘our ability to choose, to express, and to transform energy because it is our pleasure to do so’.

After a brief break, Serge introduced Emmy who sat in the big wingback chair that Serge and Kris had been using. To our delight, Emmy said that she was going to let Defrene through. This was Emmy’s first public channeling and it was wonderful to be present for her début.

After some comments on Kris’ presentation and on her own use of sign language, Defrene returned Emmy to us so that Emmy could sing a song. The delightful and evocative song that Emmy sang for us was directly in the lineage of Jane Robert’s Sumari singing.

Next Ella came forward and sang a song of her own for Kris and Serge. The song was entitled ‘Eagle Chant’ and Ella sang it beautifully and soulfully. [In retrospect, I feel the lyrics of this song should be part of the record but I neglected to get them from Ella.]

Sunday June 10 – Day Two: Brahm, The Orodin, and Senders and Receivers

On Sunday morning Kris came through and after we entered a relaxed state, told us the story of the Orodin. Our true identity as a species is an ancient and spectacular race of beings Kris calls the Orodin. [Please refer to my summary of the session when he introduced the Orodin.]

Suffice it to say that our true identity is that of a particular clan of essence who are exuberant in their skill and enjoyment of creating civilizations within this particular dimension for the sheer pleasure of the experience.

After this story about our origins, Kris answered some questions and got back to the topic of the hidden treasures in what we fear and oppose. He said that our greatest fear was of our own unlimited qualities – love and power – and that we tended to stop ourselves when our fear and opposition brought up the possibility of recognizing these qualities.

His advise was that even though we might feel overwhelmed at times, not to stop the process but to allow whatever we oppose to be accepted and embraced.

He repeated that behind our fear and opposition was our own loving intent and that we need not fight or oppose this loving intent. It is only because of a belief in our own inequity or flawed nature that we doubt the motivation behind our challenges.

When we try forgiving ourselves a few times, we discover that it is a sweet and delicious feeling that we could get addicted to. As we reclaim these orphaned parts of ourselves that we have been opposing or denying for so long – fears, pains and unsolvable problems – we discover that they are masks hiding treasures beyond worth.

‘All points of time and space intersect now in your physical bodies.’

After the break Brahm came through with a very different energy than Kris. He commented that Kris might have his own interpretation of some of the things he was going to say. [It is always fun to hear these guys talking about each other.]

Because he is much more soft spoken than Kris, Brahm made use of a microphone and amplifier. He started out by suggesting that along with our first and second minds, we had a third that was beyond duality and non-duality. This formless third mind supports the existence of the first two in the same way that the second supports the first.

Brahm told us that our greatest opposition in physical life was to instances of ‘infinite presence’ – to our own experience of being ourselves. [This reminded me of a speech attributed to Nelson Mandela where he says that our greatest fear is of our own power.]

Brahm likened our dilemma to the way we use words to express ourselves. For every word we choose to speak we omit many other possible words. We omit these words because of the practical needs of speaking and because we judge that the other words do not fit into our intended expression. Likewise we omit many potential expressions of ourselves because we do not think they fit into the mainstream of who we think we are.

These omitted words, and omitted aspects of ourselves, contain as much or more, meaning and information as the chosen ones. ‘It is not only what we choose that expresses who we are, but also what we omit.’

‘When we explore what we have chosen to omit we widen our self knowledge and this leads to the experiences we seek.’

Someone asked a question about allowing our contrary, contradictory impulses exemplified in the phrase, ‘Fuck the Dalai Lama!’. Brahm suggested we might be opposing our inner Dalai Lama and that we should ‘get in the middle’ between opposing and allowing.

‘All of you are the saints you revere and the sinners you spit on.’ We are also not these things at the same time. And we are also more than all of this and at the same time we are none of these things. [Our true source and self must ultimately be indefinable from the perspective of any expressed point of view because any such point of view is entirely encompassed and created by the source.]

Being aware of these multiple, mutually contradictory contexts regarding a particular experience neutralizes our duplicity and places us in our power to choose what we want.

Brahm went on to describe our position in the ‘eye of the storm’. All around us is the ‘storm’ of the realities we are creating through allowance and opposition. Our origin is in the calm middle and we are buffeted and discomforted by the storms of our creations only when we stray from this centre.

Brahm pointed out that our third mind was aware of both the first two and asked us why we should settle for being a divine being when it was we ourselves who had created all divine beings.

‘Your life and your world do not define you. But instead, you define them!’

Brahm withdrew and we broke for lunch.

After the lunch break, Kris led us on a final practice. Everyone was to pair up with somebody they didn’t know very well. We were to be senders and receivers and send and receive what we had learned about being in the second mind to each other. Each person took turns being the sender and the receiver. As the sender we summoned the essence of the workshop and our experiences of the weekend and transmitted it to our partner by placing our hands on their chest and back. Then our partner did the same to us and we received their experience of the weekend.

Kris told us that we could repeat this process when we were alone by assuming the receiving role. We can tap into this energy whenever we need to and apply it to any issue in our lives.

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As I look back on the weekend two somewhat contradictory impressions remain. One is that it was an extraordinary event of planetary importance – being recorded for posterity in many different formats – with representatives of at least three quadrants explicitly present… [!]

And from another viewpoint it was like an intimate get-together with friends and family. The most relaxed and casual kind of affair with everybody just being themselves and having fun.

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