Andrew Cohen
Celebrating Life with Unfulfilled Desires
Aug 25th
After arriving in Boulder we found a good hostel very close to the venue where Andrew Cohen’s band Unfulfilled Desires was going to play. The gig they gave at the Shambhala Mountain Center had been great; the band playing in a large tent and a crowd dancing in the sun, celebrating life after the retreat that left a deep imprint in our souls. So we were very much looking forward to this concert in the Rock n Soul Cafe to groove on the flexible jazz. The place was filled with fans, happy to meet up with each other, and the band kicked off right away. Playing straight from the soul in perfect unity, transmitting a profound joy to the public. It didn’t take long before people start clearing the floor, moving tables and chairs in the coffee-place to create room to dance. It was a joy and an inspiration to see how each band member pushed their own edge and supported each other improvising, obviously having a blast while playing. It was thrilling to notice how every time the band plays, they have evolved. The cafe exploded with good vibrations, leaving everyone in rapture. It was hard to leave the place, as it almost turned into a sacred space to celebrate life and being together.
Watch the video.
UD at Rock n Soul
Creating Heaven on Earth
Aug 25th
Gen Ys road tripping the Being & Becoming Retreat
On Monday, we finished the second annual Being & Becoming Retreat with spiritual teacher Andrew Cohen. On the first day of this retreat, Andrew told all 300 people there was an audacious goal for the ten days that we would spend together—to create heaven on earth. Andrew described this 21st century heaven as a place where everyone is sane, happy, rational, very, very inspired and where everyone surprises each other with the leaps forward they take every day.
In those ten days, that miraculous vision became a reality. Everyone on the retreat was transformed, and in my own experience the amount of joy, clarity and the sense that anything is possible was profound.
After the retreat, 7 of us younger Gen Ys decided to take a road trip together. We rented a gigantic Chevy Yukon and we’ll be driving and blogging around Colorado for the next week to continue creating heaven on earth and see what it takes for people are age to be generators of this kind of possibility.
We’ll be posting multiple updates throughout the day, so keep reading and let us know what you think!
Love — Eric, Reid, Emily, Bergen, Tineke, Spencer & Jeremy
Fate, Synchronicities and Volitionality
Jun 11th
For some strange reason, perhaps because I’ve always lived very close to my dreams and authentic creative impulses, I’m someone who’s become accustomed over time to experiencing synchronicities on a regular and ongoing basis. It’s baffled me at times, thinking that there might be something out there talking to me and telling me what to do, yet over and over again, when I try to follow whatever these messages seem to be telling me, I’m usually left even more confused than when I started when I’m left empty handed in the end. Luckily I’ve developed the maturity and come to a place now where I generally just leave these events alone and let them pass, which is the same position that I cultivate in relationship to my thoughts while meditating (a practice I’ve developed through Andrew Cohen’s teaching of Evolutionary Enlightenment).
You can see the postmodern (individualistic ‘everything is about me’ way of being) conditioning I carry in those earlier responses, when I’ve thought synchronicities seem to be telling me something about myself. Within those interpretations, there’s also a sense that I am the star of a surreal mystery movie and everything that is happening is just part of a film I’m starring in. When I’m constantly faced with the fact that my imagination in relationship to these events simply ran wild into no man’s land, I’m confronted with the fact that everything actually isn’t about me at all, not even these synchronicities.
Read the rest of this entry »
There’s Nothing Virtual About It!
Jan 31st
For those of us whose lives have been touched by Evolutionary Enlightenment and have been inspired by the spiritual impulse to change the world, we often feel the desire to share what’s had such a big impact on us with others. So let’s use this blog post to brainstorm ideas of how get people excited about Andrew Cohen’s Virtual Being and Becoming Retreat on February 13th & 14th. Use the comments below to post ideas, ask questions and build off each other so we can help reach our goal of sharing an evolutionary perspective with 50 new people.
Meditation as a means to Consciously Evolve!
Dec 16th
In an evolutionary context, meditation is seen as a means to a higher end. At the same time, paradoxically, we meditate for its own sake with no expectation to gain anything from our efforts. It becomes more and more apparent that over time, through our determined and dedicated practice, a greater purpose for meditating is awakened within us that absolutely transcends the personal. We start to see that as we go beyond our separate sense of self, or ego, it enables us to more fully align with and take responsibility for the part of us that is none other than the driving force of the Universe.
By transcending the limiting parts of ourselves in meditation that come in the form of thoughts, feelings, memories, and time, we awaken to a deeper dimension of the Self that is limitless. As we give more weight and attention to the Self Absolute, or the ever-present Ground of Being, it becomes our fundamental reference point for acting in the world. When we are no longer acting on behalf of the limited ego, we become vehicles through which the creative passion of the evolutionary impulse, or Authentic Self, that emerged from that empty Ground fourteen billion years ago, is free to express itself in this world. Read the rest of this entry »
Spiritual Transformation Is Not a Psychological Process
Oct 28th
Here’s a recent quote from spiritual teacher Andrew Cohen that we thought was powerful, thought provoking, and worthy of some serious discussion:
Spiritual Transformation Is Not a Psychological Process
Authentic spiritual or mystical transformation is not a psychological process. Mystical teachings go deeper than that—they refer to the nature of consciousness and the structure of our deepest interiors. They are not just helpful psychological principles and practices invented by the human mind—they point us to the discovery of natural or inherent laws that become apparent to anyone who awakens to the deeper and more subtle dimensions of the interior of the cosmos. All authentic teachings that come from mystical insight are really describing subtle principles, structures, and laws that already exist in your own deepest interior, which is the interior of the evolving cosmos we are living in. Most people don’t awaken in such a way that they are able to perceive these subtle laws or structures, so when they hear mystical teachings they interpret them as injunctions or instructions. And they can be used in that way. But they really represent a deeper and more subtle dimension of reality itself. And when you begin to look at mystical or enlightenment teachings as laws and subtle structures that actually exist, your relationship to them changes significantly. You realize that if these are actual laws or structures, rather than ideas that someone came up with, then they represent an absolute truth, and if there is any integrity in your self and soul, you have to deal with them. So then these principles become the path, and you walk in a straight line. And you will see development occur. If you adhere to them, you can’t go wrong.
Andrew Cohen
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