The Mystery

Ask yourself the question: when does my experience take place? The answer is always: now. When we woke up this morning it was now. When we had breakfast it was now. When we went back to our rooms it was now. When we walked into this room it was now. What is the difference between all these nows? How many nows have you experienced this morning? Have there been lots of nows? And if so, how long, exactly, does each now last? Don’t think about this. Your experience is taking place now, so the now is available for direct investigation. How long does now last? Is the now that was present while we were having breakfast a different now than the now that is present now? And if so, what is the difference between them? When did the breakfast-now stop and this now start? And if there is no difference between them, then it means that the now that was present at breakfast at eight o’clock, and the now that was present at nine o’clock, and the now that was present at ten o’clock, and the now that is

How to truly uncover lasting happiness can seem like a lofty or impossible goal. But somehow, Rupert Spira makes it seem not just possible, but as clear as glacier water. This talk digs into non-duality, the nature of time, the beauty of simple awareness, and what all the great spiritual traditions of the world were pointing to. Rupert Spira is an English teacher of the 'direct path', a method of spiritual self-inquiry through talks and writing, and a notable English studio potter with work in public and private collections. Spira was deeply interested in the nature of reality from an early age. By age 17 he was studying meditation and practicing a classic Indian method of spiritual inquiry called Advaita Vedanta. He has studied with Dr. Francis Roles, Shantananda Saraswati, the Shankaracharya in, and is steeped in the wisdom of thinkers and mystics such as P. D. Ouspensky, Jiddu Krishnamurti, Rumi, Sri Ramana Maharshi, Nisargadatta, and Robert Adams. An exploration of the natu

Consciousness is what we can know best and explain least. It is the inner subjective experience of what it feels like to see red or smell garlic or hear Beethoven. Consciousness has intrigued and baffled philosophers. To begin, we must define and describe consciousness. What to include in a complete definition and description of consciousness. The hard problem of consciousness is the problem of explaining why any physical state is conscious rather than nonconscious. It is the problem of explaining why there is 'something it is like' for a subject in conscious experience, why conscious mental states 'light up' and directly appear to the subject.  The usual methods of science involve explanation of functional, dynamical, and structural properties—explanation of what a thing does, how it changes over time, and how it is put together. But even after we have explained the functional, dynamical, and structural properties of the conscious mind, we can still meaningfully ask th

Consciousness isn't something scientists like to talk about much. You can't see it, you can't touch it, and despite the best efforts of certain researchers, you can't quantify it. And in science, if you can't measure something, you're going to have a tough time explaining it. But consciousness exists, and it's one of the most fundamental aspects of what makes us human. And just like dark matter and dark energy have been used to fill some otherwise gaping holes in the standard model of physics, researchers have also proposed that it's possible to consider consciousness as a new state of matter. To be clear, this is just a hypothesis, and one to be taken with a huge grain of salt, because we're squarely in the realm of the hypothetical here, and there's plenty of room for holes to be poked. But it's part of a quietly bubbling movement within theoretical physics and neuroscience to try and attach certain basic principles to consciousness in orde