The Direct Path: A Conversation with Sam Harris

In this conversation, Sam and Stephan discuss the direct approach to self-realization, a path of awakening that draws from nondual wisdom traditions of Zen, Dzogchen-Mahamudra, and Advaita Vedanta, and bypasses elaborate belief systems or self-improvement techniques. 

They also discuss Stephan’s experience learning and teaching Zen meditation, becoming a monk, Stephan’s experience of awakening and integration thereafter, sudden vs. gradual awakening, common misunderstandings about the direct path, and the connection between meditation and ethics as it relates to student-teacher relationships.

Wake Up to Your Nondual Spiritual Nature

A Weekend Journey of Self-Realization

Originally offered through the Open Circle Center, this eight-hour "deep dive" into the nondual nature of reality guides you step by step in questioning your accustomed identities and assumptions and waking up to your true self, beyond the mind. Perfect both for the new seeker who wants a concise introduction to spiritual awakening and for the seasoned seeker (or finder) who wants to clarify and deepen their understanding, this video course can be watched over several weeks or used as the focus of a solo weekend retreat.

Each of the five classes features teachings, pointing-out instructions, guided meditations and inquiry, and dialogue with participants. For those who might be considering joining the School for Awakening or working with me as a spiritual teacher and mentor, this is is an excellent introduction to my teaching orientation and approach.

Excerpt from Course Introduction

Meditation Without a Meditator

Many seekers who shift from progressive approaches like deliberate mindfulness to a more direct approach continue to search for the right meditative strategy, the sweet spot that allows them to let go of their efforting and drop into their natural state of nondual presence. But paradoxically it’s this very strategizing that needs to drop away as presence reveals itself to be the nature of reality, the deeper ground beyond a separate self, not something that you can strategize into being. You can’t do it—you can only join the nondual presence that’s always already taking place.

So how exactly can you position your awareness to fall into nondual presence? In this two-day mini-retreat you’ll learn how to take the backward step to illuminate the deeper ground of Being as your true nature or true Self beyond all division. Once that deeper identity has been revealed, you no longer have to search for what is already so blatantly obvious. You merely need to be it.

The retreat features self-inquiry, direct pointers to the nature of reality, and a series of guided meditations that lead you through the stages of awakening to nondual presence. In nondual presence life unfolds effortlessly, without an illusory someone in charge of the unfolding, as an expression of the exquisite intelligence at the heart of the Mystery. Absolute and relative dimensions of Being—universal and individual, trans/impersonal and personal, one and many—dissolve into a single, vibrant, multidimensional, perfectly imperfect current of love and manifestation. Just This!

Spiritual Integrity and the Teacher-Student Relationship

A Six-Hour Video Course

Those who assume the role of spiritual teacher represent a whole world of meaning to their students. When they fail to embody the truths they teach and act in unconscious, manipulative, or abusive ways, they betray their students’ trust and shake their confidence in the value and validity of spiritual awakening. Over the years I’ve worked with many people who have reported being exploited or betrayed by their teacher, and I’ve written extensively about the issue, including a recent article outlining what I consider the basic principles of teacher integrity (see my blog on this website). 

The issue of teachers going astray raises the deeper issue of what constitutes spiritual integrity in general. In this class we explore:

• the importance of ethical precepts in all the world’s spiritual tradition

• the role they play in preparing us for awakening and guiding our behavior after awakening

• the deeper heart wisdom from which they naturally arise

• guidelines for choosing a teacher who acts with integrity and walks their talk

• the complex psychological issues involved in the teacher-student relationship

• the problem of narcissism

• the ways a teacher’s failure to live up to these guidelines can cause lasting pain and trauma for students

As always, the class includes guided meditation that grounds the exploration in an awakened perspective, teachings and pointers, and Q&A and discussion.

Interview with Rick Archer of Buddha at the Gas Pump
on Spiritual Integrity

In this interview, Stephan and Rick explore some of the following topics:

• What does spiritual integrity really mean?

• The role and deeper meaning of ethical precepts

• Understanding the power dynamics of the teacher-student relationship

• How teachers abuse their sacred responsibility and act out of integrity

• Why narcissists are drawn to becoming spiritual teachers

• How students are taken in by misguided teachers

• The crucial role of discernment on the path: “The true guru is inside you”

• Sex in the forbidden zone: Wanderers, predators, and boundary confusion

• Acknowledging and integrating the shadow

• How to know when it’s time to leave a teacher

• The future of the spiritual teacher-student relationship in the We

Original Interview with Rick Archer
of Buddha at the Gas Pump

The Deepest Question Is: Who Are You Really?

Excerpt from a talk at the 2019 Science and Nonduality conference in Italy that covers the basic trajectory of inquiring and awakening to the truth of our nondual spiritual nature.

The Seeker Is the Sought
Interview by Renate McNay of Conscious TV

Stephan talks about his early Zen training, his study with Advaita master Jean Klein, his spiritual awakening, and the ongoing journey of embodiment that follows awakening. He also reflects on the abuse shown by some spiritual teachers.

Living from Truth in Challenging Times

Whether through chronic or life-threatening illness, personal loss, or global or political uncertainty, life has a way of challenging our connection with truth and inviting us to find an ever-deeper, more unshakable ground of happiness and peace. How do we remember and embody who we really are even when the going gets rough? This video webinar with Stephan explores this core issue through teachings, guided meditation, and dialogue in the direct approach to spiritual realization.

Falling in Love with Your Divine Imperfection

“In the world to come, God will not ask me, why were you not Moses? He’ll ask me, why were you not Zusya?”  —Hasidic master Reb Zusya of Hanipol

Not surprisingly in our goal-oriented, self-improvement culture, many seekers turn the journey of awakening into the pursuit of spiritual perfection. When I’m really awake, they believe, I’ll be just like Ramana, Nisargadatta, or some other saint or sage, free from human foibles. But spiritual awakening actually has quite the opposite effect: after years of struggling to be perfect, our hearts break open to the beauty and inherent perfection of our precious, messy humanness. In this satsang, we explore the divine invitation to love ourselves just as we are.

The Pathless Path to Genuine Awakening

In the Tibetan tradition, the process of spiritual transformation is divided into three parts: ground, path, and fruition. The ground is the nature of reality, as it is, consciousness, the absolute—abiding, unchanging, and undisturbed by whether we realize it or not. The path is the process through which we realize the ground experientially, in our own heart and bones, and make it our lived reality. In other words, it’s the way the ground comes to fruition in this very human life.

In the nondual world these days, there seems to be a tendency to collapse the path as if it didn’t exist. Consciousness has always been your very essence, your very own true nature, so why do anything to realize it? After all, you already are it, and any seeking just reinforces the illusion of a separate doer. Yet as long as you haven’t directly experienced the nondual nature of reality for yourself, you won’t be able to free yourself from suffering and confusion.

In this satsang, we talk about the importance of genuine awakening, the stages in which awakening tends to unfold, and what you can do to help make yourself more “awakening prone.”

Finding the Dark Inside the Light

At the darkest time of year, we’re invited to rediscover the eternal light that abides in the midst of the dark. Christians celebrate the luminous appearance of the Christ child, the son of God and the embodiment of love and redemption. Jews celebrate the holy miracle of the oil lamp that illuminates the Temple far longer than expected and offers inspiration in dangerous circumstances. Japanese Buddhists commemorate Buddha’s enlightenment at dawn on December 8. In a darkening world, we have the opportunity to revel in a radiant truth that cannot be dimmed or extinguished. 

The Liberating Power of Presence

When we first embark on the spiritual journey, awareness may be a quality we cultivate through the practice of meditation. But as our understanding matures, we realize that awareness is always already present as the background of all experience. As a result, our practice shifts from meditation to what in Dzogchen is called non-meditation—letting go of all effort to meditate and allowing our natural state of awake awareness, or unconditional presence, to shine forth. In the light of this nondual presence, limiting beliefs, patterns, and emotions self-liberate, and freedom dawns.

The Dance of Relationship

Intimate relationships are a paradoxical challenge. At the deepest level they nourish and inspire us and invite us to realize our oneness with all of life. But at the everyday level they often stir up core reactive patterns and stuck places that obscure our deeper spiritual knowing. In this way, relationship offers an unparalleled opportunity to see through our conditioning, release our reactivity, and free ourselves to be who we really are.

Just Be Who You Are

This simple injunction from Ramana Maharshi has the potential to cut through all our conditioning and invite us to return directly to our very own true self. The first step involves penetrating through to our deepest, groundless ground and abiding in unconditional, nondual presence. No self, no other, just This, the one without a second! This is what I AM.

But the next step is often the more challenging: Clearly expressing the light and the love that we’ve realized ourselves to be through this tender, imperfect human form. Remembering and abiding as who we are amid the many challenges of intimate relationships and work in the world. Knowing who we are, how do we keep getting hooked in and forgetting—and how can we snap out of the trance of separation and return home?

Working with Trauma on the Path of Awakening

When I asked my first Zen teacher about becoming a monk, he said, “Monasteries are places for desperate people.” Many of us are drawn to the spiritual path because of the suffering we experience as the result of early-life trauma, be it childhood abuse or neglect, life-threatening experiences, or repeated situations where our physical or emotional survival or integrity seem to be at stake.

Compared with the ordinary range of painful life experiences, trauma has a unique impact on the psyche and the nervous system that can complicate the awakening process and leave us feeling especially frightened, isolated, or unintegrated. In this satsang, we’ll explore how to relate to the effect our trauma continues to have on our lives, in the context of awakening.

Not Knowing Is the Most Intimate

The current pandemic has essentially dismantled and upended the world we thought we knew. Now how do we respond to the groundlessness and uncertainty the virus has visited upon us? Do we flow with the situation as it unfolds while taking refuge in a deeper peace that can’t be disturbed by the constant change and dissolution? Or do we latch on to the latest conspiracy theories so we can regain the false security of presuming to know what’s going on, rather than letting ourselves be humbled in the face of the mystery?

In this satsang, we explore the Zen teaching “not knowing is the most intimate” in light of our current situation. As always, the meeting features guided meditation, talk, and dialogue.

Death Is a Favor to Us

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What Does Nondual Really Mean?

Everyone seems to be using this spiritual buzzword these days, but misunderstandings and misconceptions abound. In fact, there sometimes appear to be as many versions of nondual as there are teachers espousing it. Does it mean reality is just a single undifferentiated whole, and being awake means experiencing oneness with everything all the time? What about our differences? Does the nondual view invalidate science, which is based on studying and measuring discrete phenomenon in a seemingly objective world? Is this world merely an illusion, or is it an expression of a deeper whole? And how do the major traditions of Buddhism, Advaita Vedanta, and Taoism differ in their understanding of nonduality?

In this satsang, we’ll explore the concept of nonduality in the spiritual traditions of the East and ground it in direct experience of nonduality through guided meditations and contemplation.

Interview with Phil Goldberg and Dennis Raimundi for their Spirit Matters podcast.

Interview with Michael Taft for the Deconstructing Yourself podcast in which we explore the fascinating connection between the qualities that characterize narcissism—exaggerated sense of self-importance, lack of empathy, entitlement, and exploitation—and the role of the spiritual teacher. Many of the teachers who have abused their power have been identifiably narcissistic, and narcissists seem to be drawn to the position just as they’re drawn to be politicians, entrepreneurs, and CEOs.