This essay from Girard Haven on that which is beyond time, is from his book, “Notes from a Conscious Teaching.”

At first, we are identified with the machine, and on that level, changing the machine’s behavior seems like work. But from one angle, all this does is make the prison more pleasant. This, if anything, only increases the denying force to escaping. If we work on ourselves, we can create something higher. At first it is something higher within the machine. But eventually we transcend the machine and reach something that is beyond time. 

The machine wants to know what unity is and how it can become more unified. The Teacher says that we cannot be unified on the level of the machine, and so to be present instead. Then, by being present, it turns out that we create an “observer” that is at least more consistent.

With difficulty, we come to understand there is a way to be more unified. It is simply to be present and observe ourselves in the moment. It does not in involve “doing” on the level of the machine at all. Of course, if we can really observe in the moment, then consciousness becomes a major stimulus for the machine. Since it is a stimulus-response machine, it does begin to act differently. But that only comes later. In trying to divide attention, one can train the machine to be aware of much more than one normally experiences. As a consequence, one has a machine that works better. 

But when we understand that through this process we are becoming aware of ourselves, we create something separate from the machine. The triad is different when we are aware of ourselves. That is what allows us to wake up rather than simply let moments of presence slip by and not accumulate into anything more permanent in ourselves. It is a tricky place in the work. It is not the changes we experience that matter, it’s the observation that matters. …

First, one learns to separate from the machine and observe the machine. Later, one learns to separate from that and observe the extent to which one is able to be separate. At that point, one is remembering something that is no longer connected with the machine. One is simply aware of being aware, aware of one’s own consciousness.

Most of our lives are not shocking. They consist of ordinary experiences with nothing particularly unusual happening. So we have to learn more and more to remember ourselves in ordinary moments. And then we make one of those amazing and miraculous discoveries in the work. Because when we learn to remember ourselves in ‘ordinary’ moments, we discover that there is no such thing. How can a moment be ordinary when you are with students? How can it be ordinary if you are aware of yourself? If you can see yourself as part of the universe, on both larger and smaller scales?

Girard Haven has been a Fourth Way author and teacher since 1974. His books are available on http://robertearlburton.org/bibliography and Amazon.com.

Other articles by Girard include Working Beyond the Machine and Awakening as the Third State of Consciousness. For more of Girard’s essays published in this magazine, see https://fourthwaytoday.org/author/girard-haven/.