But in this field of pure awareness, being aware of awareness itself, it's an unbounded experience. There's such freedom in that experience. So, it's glorious because it is a freedom that's remarkable. Extraordinary, I think is a better word. And there is something so fulfilling in it because the mind's come back home. The mind is at home, and that generates this extraordinary relaxation, this extraordinary contentment. And that is that feeling of a kind of bliss.
The simplest state of human awareness is a self-referral field of pure consciousness, a field of all possibilities. Knowledge is structured in consciousness, and we are not in the world, the world is within us. Welcome to Simplest State, where together, we explore the nature of consciousness and self-realization.
What if ancient Vedic science isn't just a philosophy, but is a precise technology for accessing the very structure of consciousness itself? Imagine that silence is not empty, but is the very source of all creation, and the infinite field of consciousness holds the magic to experience itself and give rise to the entire universe.
Today, we're speaking with someone who's spent over 30 years bridging the gap between ancient wisdom and modern experience. Candace Badgett is an international director of the Global Mother Divine Organization, a board member of the World Association for Vedic Science, and co-founder of The Raj, one of the largest Ayurvedic health centers in North America.
She has published academic papers on Ayurveda and women's health, and has written some of the most groundbreaking academic work on Purusha, Parashakti, and the self-interacting dynamics of consciousness.
Candace doesn't just study these ancient truths, she lives them. If you've ever wondered how infinite silence gives rise to everything we experience, I think you'll enjoy this conversation.
Candace Badgett, welcome to the program. Thank you very, very much for being here.
Thank you, Ron, for that very full and generous introduction, and thank you for inviting me to enjoy this conversation with you today. I'm really looking forward to it.
As am I. I'm just delighted that you're here. The work you've done is absolutely fascinating and compelling, and I can't wait to get into it. So, let's start right in, uh, because in your work, you've described Purusha as a field of pure intelligence that possesses a kind of inherent magic, the ability to experience itself.
I want to start by asking, why is this capacity for self-experience considered the essential trigger for creation?
Well, that is a topic that could launch a PhD, for sure, a thesis. Absolutely. It's so fascinating, and I want to step back just a little bit before I completely dive in with you on this because this is everything. We're just about to talk about really the story of everything. Maharishi Mahesh Yogi... who my husband and I had the great good fortune to work for, for 20 years directly, and to participate in some of his beautiful long courses,
and Maharishi just asked us to create the women's wing of the TM organization. In order to inspire this kind of new structure and the participation in this new structure, I really had to deeply understand the nature of these two elements, you could say, or principles, that literally are the constituent parts of our own consciousness because they are these values of Purusha and Parashakti, or the male and feminine principle is another way we can define them.
I had never put my attention extensively on Parashakti, the feminine principle, which I felt had to be the foundation of this organization, an understanding of this principle had to be the foundation. And once I began to really put my attention on this area of Parashakti, I realized you can't know Parashakti without knowing Purusha. And you can't understand, fully, either one of them or both of them without understanding their relationship.
I started going into all of this, and then I realized, once you understand the reality of Parashakti and the reality of Purusha and their relationship, you understand everything, everything. Where you just think, how am I ever going to get my mind around this?
But the thing is you go back into this literature, back into these texts again and again, these, these books and lectures, it all begins to sort itself out. And also, it's based on our own experience. So, we begin to have that experience in our own awareness, how consciousness functions, how it flows.
First, we have to know that field of pure, pure consciousness, pure awareness. We have to know that experience of being aware of awareness itself and nothing else. Aware of awareness itself and nothing else. Now you're dealing with the ground state of the mind, the ground state of everything. And as you begin to understand how that moves and how that expresses, because you could say it's a field of nothingness. So there it is. There's that field, silent and nothing.
So how does everything spring? First and foremost, subjectively for us, our own thoughts, our own feelings, our own experiences in life. How does all that spring from this field of pure wakefulness, awake to itself alone? And then you begin to realize it's not only silent; there's a dynamic value there. Now, where is that dynamic value? So we're just going to the very basics. We just get to our own experience and it's okay, we transcend the thinking process.
As everything is unfolding, you kind of understand how consciousness is shifting and expanding and what is this? What is this new kind of way of experiencing? And then where does that fit in the whole journey to actually owning, and living, and experiencing, and being ultimate reality?
So you just want to come back right to home base, basically. You want to come back to: what is this experience when I first simply transcend the thinking process and experience that transcendental reality of being aware of awareness itself?
When we talk about transcending, and awareness experiencing awareness itself, is that individual awareness experiencing pure awareness, or is that the same thing as pure awareness experiencing itself?
Exactly.
Yes. And yes, but we're used to knowing something by observing something. So ultimately, we're going to know something by being it. In other words, we can only know pure consciousness by being pure consciousness.
Right, right.
And then there it is, it's just pure consciousness knowing itself. So we're just shifting in the way we know, we experience, reality.
It's a new way because always it's me, is perceiving something through a process of observation. So, always we have those three values involved, I could say, the observer, the process of observing and the object that's being observed.
Whether that object is just a dream, we're observing a dream, or we're observing an object or we're observing a thought or whatever. Those three values of the knower, the process of knowing, and that which is known. That's our reality of experiencing.
So now we're stepping into a new dimension, in a sense of experiencing, because this is our, our base camp. This is our source of our whole experiencing, thinking process. And that base, that foundation is pure consciousness. Just wakefulness is another way to say it. But pure wakefulness. Wakefulness awake to itself and nothing else.
In that case, the observer and observed that you spoke about, in a sense, merge.
They merge.
They become one and the same.
They're one and the same thing.
Right.
Exactly.
Subject and object are unified.
Subject and object are unified.
So, in a sense, you could say there's no duality. It's one unified experience.
Right.
and that's exactly why we see various teachers talking about non-dualism, which is very big these days. It's non-dualistic because there's no more subject and object. There is just that oneness.
This is where, okay, you've got silence, in a sense, because the mind isn't moving. Usually the mind is either projecting into the future, or it's reflecting back on past experience. So the mind is moving. In this case, the mind is not moving, and yet it's not inert, it's not asleep, it's not unconscious, it's wide awake. So, suddenly you have a very interesting experience that is two opposite things at the exact same time. And that is: there's nothing, the mind is not moving, and yet the mind is maximally awake. It's like it's just radiating in wakefulness. So it's not an inert quality at all. There's something actually extraordinarily dynamic simply in that value of maximum wakefulness.
Fantastic. I'm so glad you said that because I think many people have the misconception that the experience of pure consciousness, or transcendence, is a flat, uninteresting...
A void.
Yes, a void. And they think, "Well, why? I don't want to lose my individuality into that." But they don't recognize that that experience is rich beyond what they can even imagine.
It's fullness and the bliss that one generates within that field of pure consciousness is all-encompassing.
All encompassing. And then what's even more amazing is, as we become more and more familiar with this field, we find everything. We find all the mechanics of creation. We find the whole universe emerging. We find a real, a world that is more real than the outside world that we're used to.
So, it's an exciting journey and it's one that is forever unfolding itself and unfolding itself. It's beautiful. But even this simple experience is so liberating because the fact that the mind isn't moving in the grooves of a thought.
In other words, when we have a thought, it confines the mind. It creates a boundary for the mind to move through. Now that, that thought can be about what groceries we need to get at the grocery store, or it can be about the nature of God, or the size of the universe. But it doesn't matter if it's a mundane little thought or it's a great big, huge thought, it's still a specific channel through which the mind is moving.
But in this field of pure awareness, being aware of awareness itself, it's an unbounded experience. There's such freedom in that experience. So it's glorious because it is a freedom that's remarkable. Extraordinary, I think is a better word. And there is something so fulfilling in it because the mind's come back home. This is like, this is base camp here, you know? The mind is at home, and that generates this extraordinary relaxation, this extraordinary contentment. And that is that feeling of a kind of bliss. And then I, I've gone off. You see, the thing is we start one place, and we end up in a million places here.
All roads lead to Rome. It's all wonderful and compelling discussion.
Well, what's so incredible... we'll get back to your question, I promise. But what's so amazing is that when we have this experience, the thing that's so fulfilling is — and it's not even a conscious realization because you're not really engaged in analyzing it in that moment that you are it — it's that you have finally attained what every single desire you have ever had was aiming for, because every single desire we have is for more happiness. We just want that abiding happiness.
And so, we... what do we imagine? As soon as I get my new house, I will have my abiding happiness. The only problem is we get our new house and our dog runs away, and now the house is not providing that abiding happiness. So this is the ever-changing world that is never going to provide what we, in the depth of our soul, are looking for. So the minute we become the reality of who we are, through the process of transcending, and allowing our awareness to experience itself in its pure unboundedness.
and having that experience, one of the primary recognitions at that time is: I was always this. How did I miss it? How did I not see this before? It's so simple. There it is. I was so caught up, imprisoned in my mind and in my thoughts that I missed it. I overlooked it in a sense, even though you can't overlook it because it's the basis of consciousness itself.
But that, in a sense, is what happens. And then coming back to it, there's that recognition, and also that tremendous relief, to be free, out of the prison, released from the boundaries.
That's it. so beautiful. So I wanted to talk about it all in the, in these terms of our own identity and our own experience and coming home to who we are, and knowing that reality by being that reality.
And now I'm going to talk about it a little differently, kind of objectively. Like it's this thing out there, and this thing does certain things. But I had to first and foremost make sure that all our listeners are appreciating that while we talk about it as if it's something out there, in reality, we're just talking about our own self. We're just talking about the way our own consciousness functions and flows, you could say, even flows. So, you were saying, this field of silence, and this is referred to as purusha, that field of the absolute—a field of... a field that is infinite and eternal and omnipresent.
And so what this means is that it's almost like a frozen field because it's everywhere at the same time. In other words, movement implies going from where you are to where you are not. But since it is everywhere at the same time, it is infinite and eternal. There's sort of a sense that it's like this frozen absolute silence.
But, as you made reference to the word, this field has some magic in it, and that the magic is that it can experience itself. It can be awake to its own existence. Okay, so we have a big dilemma here, because how is this frozen field that is everywhere at the same time, how can it observe itself? How can it know itself? How can we even know what it is? Because, you say, "Well, what's above it?" It's already above and below, and how do you even know what's above and what's below if it's already above and below at the same time?
So in order to know itself, this infinity has to collapse to a point. So this collapse of infinity to a point is the magic, is the mechanism, by which this field can know itself, by collapsing to a point. And I always use that example of when you go to, like, the biggest mall in the universe and, and, you walk, you walk into the mall, and you're looking around and suddenly you have no idea where you are. You go over to the big thing, you know, this big white map, and then there's a little red dot on that map, and it says, "You are here." And the minute... Now you, now you look up, okay, Neiman Marcus is straight ahead and Sears is behind. Okay, okay, I know exactly where I am.
So this is like the same thing, infinity collapses to a point of infinity where now it has a localized reality. This is a non localized field, completely non localized, but it col- it collapses to a point, a localized point, where now it takes its stand and observes. And what does it say? It says, "I'm nothing. I'm nothing. I am eternally nothing in front of me, infinitely nothing behind me, infinitely nothing to the left, to the right, and up and down," and there it is. "I'm nothing."
And then suddenly it recognizes, "I'm silent." That's what... "I'm silent." But then it "Wait a minute, I'm having a very dynamic conversation with myself. I am observing myself. This is a dynamic process. So I'm silent, but I'm dynamic." And then the realization comes, " My experience was completely silence, nothing, when I looked around. But then something hid that perspective, and I was able to recognize, wait a minute, I am very dynamic here. I am talking to myself. I am observing. I see what's going on here, and I can project myself forward infinitely, project myself backwards infinitely. I can check out infinity till the ends of infinity, which never end.
I could be extraordinarily dynamic here." So then the third realization is, "Okay, so I'm silent and I'm dynamic, but I'm also... I also have a filtering process, which even though I'm two opposite values at the same time, I can filter them out. There's something that hides the silent value so I can see the dynamic value, and hides the dynamic value so I can see the silent value."
So now it's an amazing process of self-discovery. I'm going to discover everything about myself. And it's with the help of this filter that hides the homogenous, unified wholeness and allows these specific values to be appreciated within a unified wholeness. And it's as the attention... Because of course, now we've also created the three-in-one structure that we all know, of the knower, the process of knowing, and that which is being observed. And it's all one thing. It's just silence as the knower. It's silence curving back on itself as the process of knowing. And silence is the object that silence is observing. So it's one unified field, but now divided into three values. Three aspects this unified field that now begin to interact with each other.
So we had this vast field of singularity that now has within it the concept of relationships. So one value looks to another. Now we begin generating frequencies within a silent field. And we all know that the physical world is not made up of particles, it's actually been found to be made up of frequencies. It's made up of these frequencies—the self interacting dynamics of consciousness itself produces the frequencies that ultimately give rise to all of creation.
That's a beautiful description. I sometimes think of it as kind of a hall of mirrors effect, where you hold two mirrors to each other and suddenly you have infinite reflections. So you have observer and observed and process of observing. And in doing that, you create a new object of observation, a new observer, a new process of observing. And it, in that way, it multiplies infinitely.
And that's what, what Dr. John Hagelin and other quantum physicists would say are those vibrating elastics of string theory that then percolate, and in replicating themselves infinite number of times, give that appearance of a manifest creation.
And it's just our own self interacting dynamics of consciousness.
When the observer observes the process of knowing, there's that principle of what you see, you become. So the knower becomes that value of process of knowing, but it becomes a knower-qualified process of knowing. So now you have a new entity, you've created a new value.
Now then, that object — the silence is an object — it observes this new entity, which is a knower-qualified process of knowing, and it becomes the the known-qualified, knower-qualified, object of process of knowing and this is how all these qualifications or impurities, in a sense, build up until you have Upaveda, and Upaveda is Ayurveda so you have the human physiology.
And another really fascinating way to look at point and infinity is that the human physiology is the point of infinity. And now it's looking to find its way back to being infinity, not just a point, a localized point of infinity. And that's the whole process of gaining higher states of consciousness. It's the point looking back to infinity to become infinity once again. But in that process, infinity itself can know itself in its totality.
So the human nervous system is required in this process. What's the difference between Brahman, which is ultimate reality, and the Absolute, which is that eternal, never-ending, infinite field of silence? The Absolute exists whether anyone knows it or not. But Brahman, where the Absolute becomes a living reality, requires a human being. So there we are. We're on a beautiful journey, very purposeful, and very glorious
So in, in other words, pure consciousness is pure consciousness. Absolute is absolute, whether we're aware of it or not.
But to go through that process and to become aware of it through the vehicle of a human nervous system, we then have that precious opportunity to experience that totality, and live that totality of life, and that is what we refer to as Brahman.
Brahman, ultimate reality.
Ultimate reality.
What's so beautiful is once we step into that ultimate reality, we were never anything but.
Right.
I was never a limited human nervous system. I was never a monkey. I was never anything. I have eternally been this. The hallmark of Brahman is that the opposite is also true. Yes, but the opposite is also true. It's a reality that embraces pairs of opposites without canceling, have them cancel each other out. So it's very hard to speak about Brahman. You cannot penetrate it because speech is a relative vehicle. We know something by virtue of not only what it is, but by virtue of what it's not. And so our whole field of knowing and knowledge and everything is based on pairs of opposites that cannot exist at the exact same time without canceling each other out. Brahman is the embracing of the to- the totality.
That knowledge is indescribable because consciousness alone can know itself.
Right.
And that means that the individualized consciousness, and the discrete words and descriptions will never be able to imbibe those qualities.
That full enlightenment, Brahman, is obscured until the moment you step into it. Now, this is a fascinating thing to think about. Are we, are we going off on too many tangents?
Oh, not at all.
it's all the same field of total knowledge. We cannot go astray even if we try.
It encompasses all opposite values.
So this, this thought that it cannot be... It's obscured, that was the word. Obscured until the moment you step into it. And when you think about higher states of consciousness and how they unfold, and it's a very kind of logical process. You know, first you have to appreciate that you are that field of transcendental consciousness. You, you have to have that experience of pure consciousness.
And then when you have it often enough, frequently enough, and because the mind and body is so intimately connected, every time you transcend, enormous purification and restructuring is going on in the physiology to be able to maintain that style of brain functioning, which is silent and wide-awake dynamic, only in that wakefulness value, at the same time.
To be able to maintain that brainwave functioning, physiology has to be, really, transformed for that process to be upheld. And that is through the process of transcending regularly. It, there comes a time where your whole sense of identity is really more established in that unbounded value than in this kind of dynamically interactive state of consciousness where you're kind of identifying with the activity around you and the different circumstances that are happening. You're still participating, you're still living a full and dynamic life, but you are not identified with any of it.
And that experience is a particular state of consciousness, where you are that unbounded eternal self, and everything else is the non-self.
So this is a major duality that gets created. Before, we were so identified with the ever-changing world, there was no duality. We were just identified with that alone. Then we go through this process of opening up this inner field and stabilizing it. And so this field where I am this unbounded, eternal reality, silent reality, wakeful silent reality, and everything else is not me, that includes my own ever-changing thinking process, and moods and feelings. It's not just activities outside. You know, this feelings and moods and fluctuations or whatever, we just don't identify with them.
So there you go. You've got this duality. And, the ultimate reality of life is absolute unity. So something has to happen here because this Grand Canyon of a gap, of a divide, between the self and the non-self, that has to be addressed. A further development is going to take place, and that's when the value of the heart really steps in, because we just begin to appreciate the beauty and the perfection. Everything is right. Everything is in its place. I'm just moving with that evolutionary force of nature, and therefore everything I do is in line with that, and everything is right.
And as appreciation grows, we begin to perceive those really fine celestial values of the relative on the surface. That brings that value of the ever-changing world closer to my own expanded unified value. Ultimately, we see those expressions of life reflecting who I am, and that is unbounded and eternal. So now it's unboundedness that we see on the surface of every relative boundary. And this is where the Mahavakyas are so important.
This is where the teacher reassures the aspirant, because as this value of nothingness is making itself predominant on the surface of everything we're appreciating, there's this sense of we're starting to kind of drown in nothingness, and that's when the Mahavakyas, Aham Brahmasmi, I am the totality.
The teacher says, "It's all right. Everything's good. Don't worry about it." Everything is within the transcendent.
Sorry, let’s just clarify for our viewers what a Mahavakya is.
Now, Mahavakya, a Sanskrit term, of course, the great statement, the great truth that affirms the experience of the seeker, of the aspirant, upon achieving that, that exalted state of consciousness: "I am That, thou art That, all this is That."
So, oh, yes, because otherwise, as you said, you're drowning in that wholeness of unity. One feels as if lost, or disoriented, perhaps. Perhaps.
Yeah.
And that's why it's so important to have the roadmap. So you have the technologies to develop this, to refine the physiology, expand consciousness, and then you need that roadmap because you are shifting into different states of consciousness. This is a new way of perceiving the world around you, and, and your relationship to that world around you. And so really, it's such a blessing to have the insights into the Vedic texts that explain all of this process. But to have them laid out so clearly is a huge gift.
Coming back to this fact that this ultimate reality is obscured, this is because we have only, and always, known ourselves to have a defining edge. So, in ignorance, before we know anything about consciousness, or that it's our own reality, and fathoming consciousness; I am, I'm me because I'm in this body and I have this personality, and I'm not you.
You have a different personality, and you have a different... you look different than I look. And so it's very, it's very clear. I have a defining edge.
Okay, but what about when now we've been transcending and transcending, and we're really identified with this unboundedness, but it's our unboundedness. It's this individual, in this body, with this individual personality. It's my unboundedness, and that unboundedness is defined by the non-self, by that which I'm not. So I'm not all my thoughts and I'm not feelings. I'm not really this personality. I'm not really even this body. But but these things give a definition to who I am.
So what I'm not, helps to define what I am. It gives a defining edge to my reality.
So then what starts to happen, of course, the relative becomes far more beautiful, divine; that's where divinity shows up in life. And the love of God's creation, because it's so glorious, is so important in expanding the heart. And that's why, you know, all these paths, bhakti path, intellectual path, karma yoga, all these, they're all contributing, they're all part of the process. They're not separate.
They're not really separate paths because each value is developing something so important. Because as the heart expands in the glory of God's creation, the glory of that appreciation, then we contribute to that process of refining the relative through, you could say pipelining, consciousness, or the self, through our sensory perception.
So it's not that the relative itself magically transforms. It's our perception, and that field of pure consciousness extending itself to the environment through our own perception, that's transforming our perception of creation.
Then suddenly, that which I am, unbounded eternal silence, begins to reveal itself everywhere I look. It's the essence of every object in relative creation. It's the essence of... because everything did emerge from that, and suddenly this becomes a sensory perception. But it grows in pieces.
So first it starts out by the pen on the table. Suddenly we're perceiving something very different other than this beautiful celestial divine value that was colored our perception before then. So this is expanding little by little, the whole desktop, the whole room, out the window to the horizon. But in our mind, because at that point, in God consciousness, when the celestial is dominant everywhere, where the divine is seen and experienced everywhere, the duality that now exists is simply my unbounded self, and God. Relative is the expression of God. That's it, there is only my unbounded self and God.
So then we're holding on, even though this value of the self is showing up everywhere, expanding my sense of self as if I'm taking each object into that value of myself, and that makes myself expand. I'm getting bigger and bigger. Everything is coming into my value. And yet we're holding on to something like, somewhere at the outer edge of the universe, I must stop and maybe God and God must start.
Somewhere out there, I have an edge. I've got a defining edge. I can't see it. It's like a great big, huge balloon, and you're in the middle of it, and it just keeps expanding and expanding, a helium balloon. And until at some point, you can't even see the edges of that balloon. It's just gone out so far. And then one day you hear a pop. And there is no... you realize... that's the ultimate realization: there is no defining edge. There's nowhere where I stop. God and I are one in the same value, and yet we're different. And that's another issue we can take on, how we can be God and not be God.
Union with God has now become identity with that ultimate reality. You can't go beyond God. God is not a concept to be overcome. And yet we say, Aham Brahmasmi, I am the totality. How do we resolve those two beautiful things?
But anyway, that's why we can't know that reality. And therefore, the self, the unbounded self that we've known ever since cosmic consciousness, all the way through unity, the expanding unity and expanding unity, and then Brahman. That big self has no semblance whatsoever to the big self that we lived before that value. And that's why that reality of Brahman is obscured until the moment we step into it. And it is an intellectual revelation by virtue of the Mahavakyas; the confirmation. Yes, Aham Brahmasmi, you are the totality.
The infinite diversity of the universe exists with the unbounded silence of your own self. Amazing. Thrilling.
And just to reemphasize that point, it's not in itself an intellectual concept or a philosophy. It's, I don't even like to use the word realization. It...
A recognition.
We don't wake up in the morning and say, "Oh, I realize I'm awake." No, you just are awake. You just are that. And that totality of awareness, the same thing; that is the reality. It always was the reality.
Always was. There was never a sequential unfolding. Even though...
Right, right.
...we could say we had to go through this sequential unfolding, you get there, you step into the reality, it's like there was never a sequential unfolding.
And I think people tend to worry. They think, "Oh, I'm losing myself. You're saying I have to not be me, that that's not me, and I am this." But again, we have to come back to the point that you're, you're giving up something this big for unboundedness. It's not a trade-off. One steps into that unboundedness as a field of infinite bliss.
You've spoken of Brahman, the totality, and the absolute, and pure consciousness. And there's another expression in Sanskrit to describe that field, which is Sat Chit Ananda.
Right.
It's unbounded bliss consciousness. Bliss is its essential nature. Bliss is integral to what pure consciousness is.
To experience that, one experiences bliss. There's no loss of individual happiness. One is immersed in the totality of bliss consciousness.
This is such an important point, Ron. Thank you so much because, I remember one talk that was given on, on Sat Chit Ananda, where Maharishi was talking about sat, that, you could say frozen, eternal, never changing, never moving, reality of truth that has some magic in it. And the magic is chit — consciousness.
It can experience itself. And then the point was, if it can experience itself, what is the experience? Bliss.
Individuality is not lost, because again, there's Brahman. Your individual, and your universal, at the exact same time. Nothing is given up.
Gaudapadacharya says in his commentary, " Pracharah sa tu vigyeyah," the mind in samadhi expands.
Samadhi being transcendental consciousness, transcendent.
The mind in samadhi expands.
The mind in samadhi expands. And thereby he, Gaudapadacharya, establishes Brahman consciousness, Brahmi Chetena, as not a state of transcendence, but a state of expanded awareness, thereby implying the practicality of action and behavior and experience very thorough and most profound in that state of Brahman consciousness, where the mind is expanded. It doesn't get extinct. It gets expanded. The jiva, the individuality, becomes Brahm. It doesn't mean the jiva gets lost and extinct, but it only expands. It is the expansion of individuality which is desired of the state of Vedant.
What a wonderful clarification. That is brilliant. Thank you for that one. In fact, you enjoy the individuality for the first time. You're really free now to enjoy the individual life because you're no longer... It's no longer an existential situation where everything hinges on your mood and what happened today, and what didn't happen today, and what you received, and what you gave, and what you didn't receive, and was it a good day, was it a bad day.
You're no longer dependent on those things because you're grounded in that totality of awareness. So now the individuality becomes a beautiful, enjoyable play of life.
Beautiful. And also another point on that, is that there's no conflict. Life has no value of conflict because everyone and everything is perceived as an extension of myself, and what can be more dear to me than myself? And so everything has that intimate, dear, reality to it, which makes very relaxed.
You're way ahead of me because I wanted to ask you about that because you wrote a paper called "Conflict Resolution Within the Structure of Consciousness," and you highlight the mind's tendency to identify with the unified field. And I want to ask you to please explain how does this understanding, between the relationship between Purusha and Parashakti, specifically, result in the resolution to conflicts?
Well, yes. The relationship creates the conflict in a sense that we could really say Parashakti, the feminine principle, both creates the conflict and resolves it. But the way it gets resolved is in such a glorified manner, that's... Well, the other thing is it's an inevitable process. So we'll go back. And again, it's the action principle. Mother Divine, Parashakti, the feminine principle, is the action principle. It's the dynamic organizing power of the universe. And Purusha is that silent foundation. So it's eternal, it's unbounded, it's never changing. It's that stability. It's that reality that life is. But there's a process. We'll say atma is the absolute. But atma has to wake up to its own dynamism in order to become Brahman, in order to become a living reality, which the absolute, as a living reality, we could say is the definition of Brahman, ultimate reality.
So, atman is the absolute, but relative to individuality until it's awakened to its full value.
Relative to individuality. That's great. That's a perfect way to say it. And this is from, the Srimad Devi Bhagavatam, and it says, " Thou art eternal, ancient Paraprakriti, and Mother of this universe; Thou dost impart, out of mercy, the Brahmavidya, the knowledge of Brahman, to the ancient Purusha. Thus he, Purusha, can realize his eternal nature."
So, she is the instigator of a self unfolding process within the field of Purusha that transforms that field into a living reality.
And, sometimes you have to ask the question, why would this perfect state of equilibrium disrupt itself and produce the universe? And again, we come back to that point that in this silent absolute reality exists the magic that it can experience itself. And that consciousness, being conscious of itself, that is the essence of Parashakti, Mother Divine. She is the waking up process. She is the lively wakefulness in that field that allows that field to experience itself in all its infinite dimensions.
So there is conflict because the minute, the minute that field, which is nothing, becomes awake to itself and says, oh, I'm nothing, it's created something. Now that something happens to be nothing. But the minute that the nothing is realized and identified as something, it is something. It's just a something that happens to be nothing.
The recognition is in the awareness of the nothingness, which is now something different than nothingness.
Exactly, it's nothingness, observed.
Exactly. Exactly.
It's something. So, now you have nothing and something. It's both nothing and it's something. And therefore, there's the sprout of duality. And as soon as you have duality, it's am I this, am I that? All the confusion begins.
But it was inevitable, it's the very nature of this field itself. It has to be chopped up into infinite pieces and then all put back together again. And when you take all the pieces of the specific values of the diverse universe that emerge out of a field of sameness, wholeness, when you put it all together, the sum of the parts is more.
The wholeness is more than the sum of all those parts. And so you've created something so much more than just that flat field. Now you've come out with a more evolved state.
So Maharishi one time said, as he was describing that process of how the knower looks to the known, and it becomes the known, but qualified, knower qualified, and all these qualifications, and frequencies and fluctuations build up to the human physiology, and then the human physiology then embarks on its, try to find its way back home in wholeness and infinity, Maharishi said, "So you see, it's nobody's fault. Ignorance is just the inevitable step to Brahman."
So we don't have to feel badly. Yes, we are where we are, working through all our issues, but you know, we're working our way back.
Beautiful. That's some kind reassurance, I think, for all of us.
It's very kind reassurance.
And then what sorts out all this chaos, is that intelligence itself. So, whatever muddles itself is also capable of un-muddling itself. The complexities are found in the different expressions of intelligence, and the clearing up of all the complexities also belongs to this intelligence, which results in the completely fulfilled state, without doubt. One huge, enormous reality, that is also the expression of this intelligence.
All the possible values of intelligence become true only when one has seen that all this chaos is myself, and all this silence is myself. Unity is myself. Diversity is myself. And I am all that there is to it. And in this state, there is no query. There is no doubt. There is no conflict. It is a pure, simple, state of awareness.
So I, I declare Divine is the source of conflict, but Mother Divine is the source of ultimate reality in Brahman.
Fantastic.
The true organizing power.
It all resolves itself.
It resolves itself. And what's so beautiful is what you see in this whole process of moving through higher states of consciousness, when you look to the relationship between Purusha and Parashakti, you see that one will take the lead in one state of consciousness, the other kind of is the predominant in another state. The other takes the lead again to move it on to the next. The two natures of Brahman, who hold onto their own nature while partaking in the nature of the other. So that these are two eternal, infinite values that cannot be together and cannot be apart.
That is fantastic. I think it's so commendable, Candace, the way you prepared yourself for leadership of the women's organization by diving to the most fundamental values of consciousness. And this male-female, this Purusha-Parashakti, this Shiva-Parvati, this sort of seeming duality, actually we see it in many religions and spiritual teachings around the world.
Now, we think of pure consciousness as pure consciousness. There's a question that only you could answer, I think. Why, within the field of consciousness, do we talk of Shiva-Parvati, Purusha-Parashakti?
Why does that connotation exist in an unbounded field of pure awareness?
Look at the relative as an expression of a unified field, and you look at the importance of the human physiology. It is the reflector to reflect back to that field what it is.
Now, what's so interesting is that we all have both values within ourselves. We are both purusha and parashakti; our consciousness is that.
We're just moving through the process of becoming familiar of a whole range of pure consciousness's expression in relative pairs of opposites.
Mother Divine is the mother to this universe, and the most essential quality of every woman is her capability to be mother, whether she has children or not.
When God appears to anyone, it takes form. It takes form. There's name and form. From a personal perspective, what is the most supreme being in the universe? It's God, and we give it a form, and it's worshiped in cultures in many different ways. And, in the Vedic tradition, Krishna is the embodiment of that duality, and he always has with him his consort, Radha.
Something that has human brain capacity, which is a point that can grab infinity. So we must give that ultimate status if we're going to give it form, if it's going to be in a personal realm.
And if it's going to be that mother value predominant, it's going to be Devi.
The male is singularity. I always laugh because, you know, I think men like to hold onto their singularity. And women are always looking for relationship. You know, that, that's that mother... that is the principle, when you go to the impersonal reality, and you're looking at Parashakti and Purusha; Purusha is singularity, and Mother Divine is the principle of relationship. That's a dynamic principle. So it really, it fits together so perfectly. There's no imposition. It's just what emerges naturally in the unfolding process from point to end up as infinity.
It's interesting to note that you bring out all this knowledge of these fundamental values of life at the level of Purusha and Parashakti, the male and female principle. And you are, I have to tell you, the first female guest on this program, Simplest State. My apologies to our female viewers. It is not by design. It just worked out that way that, uh, until now, there had not been a female guest. How fitting and how appropriate. I'm so delighted that you're the first, and that's exactly what you're talking about.
I mean, you've been a, an international director of the Global Mother Divine organization for many years. Keeping in mind that not everyone practices Transcendental Meditation, people have different techniques, different practices.
I would like to ask, having been in that position for so many years, what insights have you gained that you could share about a woman's, specifically, spiritual journey?
I would say that the greatest gift that we can give ourselves is finding this inner self-sufficiency. It's so precious because that principle of relationship is so strong in us, because that is when we go to that impersonal level of the absolute, there's the principle of singularity, and that implies a kind of self-sufficiency. And there's the principle of relationship, which implies relationships.
But we become so successful in that nourishing role that we are hardwired to provide, because we give the first experience of love to humanity when that mother holds that baby in her arms. This is just this incredible gift. We're hardwired for that.
And then we continue to express it throughout our lives. And the less stress we have, or the less hurt we've experienced in our lives, well, then we have to protect ourselves. We feel to kind of shut our hearts down a little bit, and that obstructs our ability to fully express that nourishing power. Whatever we can do to bring that back, to take those boundaries away, because that's where our fulfillment is.
It's just extending love and appreciation in a natural, unobstructed flow. That is what brings us fulfillment more than anything else. And so, whatever we can do on our spiritual journey that's allowing that process to take place. And the best thing is, it's by going within and finding that transcendental reality of pure consciousness where we are supremely self-sufficient. We've come back home.
So now we're not so worried about what we can get out of the relative world, we're in a position to just give; just give. And not only does that nourish our environment, but it brings so much fulfillment to us. So we just want to find our way back to that beautiful field of supreme self-sufficiency in fullness and bliss, and be able to extend that out to the world. So, I would say for a woman, that is a key component of a spiritual journey.
That is loving and nurturing advice, I think, for women everywhere. Thank you for that, Candace. I guess we're coming to the end of our time, unfortunately. But I do want to ask, just briefly... we don't have time to go deeply into Ayurveda—that's a whole other episode, but a beautiful subject. Butas one of the co-founders of The Raj, the beautiful Ayurvedic wellness center, I want to ask, uh, just very briefly, if you could tell us what you see as the relationship between physical wellness and Ayurveda.
Because wellness is central to everyone and everything. Health is wealth.
Absolutely right. And I just want to say I'm co-founder, along with my husband, Rogers Badgett. Together, we built The Raj 35 years ago, pioneered, pretty much, the use of Ayurveda in North America, and continuing today. Very encouraging that it's something that is becoming quite well recognized.
Ayurveda is brilliant, and really and truly, in a way, we could see Ayurveda almost as the umbrella under which all Vedic knowledge is contained. And that's because, in Charaka Samhita, the main text, 6,000-year-old text of Ayurveda, the definition of health is established in the self, established in pure consciousness, where now we've experienced it enough, this is our identity. Consciousness and physiology are so intimately connected. Physiology is an expression of consciousness; consciousness is what gives rise to the structure and function of the physiology.
But then everything in life is a precipitation of these values of the self-interacting dynamics of consciousness. So then, everything we can do can be aligned with those laws of nature that emerge from that field, and structure the entire universe.
So that involves what we eat, and our daily routine, and how everything, all the choices we make, are to support the growth to higher states of consciousness. And Ayurveda is the roadmap for every one of those choices. It is the most remarkable system of healthcare. It's the oldest continuously practiced system of healthcare in the world, acknowledged by the World Health Organization. And, it, it's phenomenal, and it's going to make its inroads now. Doors are opening, and it is going to inform modern biomedicine so that it doesn't go right off the cliff, because it's kind of headed in that direction.
So Ayurveda will restore the integrity of all medical systems. I have no doubt about it. So that's what we do at The Raj. We have these purification therapies, Pancha Karma, that are not only purification processes, but they rebalance and they rejuvenate, and they strengthen the entire physiology. And today, with all the environmental toxins that you just hear about, every time you open your computer there's another article that comes up about fat soluble toxins, pesticides, herbicides, the forever chemicals, how they're now, finally, being linked to the steady decline of health in the United States and Canada, I'm sure.
And we did a study, 20 years ago, that was published and peer-reviewed, that showed that five days of pancha karma removed the most dangerous fat-soluble toxins by 50% in five days.
So, we're back involved with Mayo Clinic, about to do another study. I've been to Washington, to some of the MAHA institutes and NIH, and Health and Human Services events to keep informing the public about the miracles of Ayurveda, the contemporary relevance of Ayurveda.
I completely agree. Ayurveda is truly a profound science of health and wellness, and I certainly hope it increases in popularity more and more because it's phenomenally beneficial.
This has been wonderful. In speaking with you, just to regress for a minute, I was reminded of...
There's this old story from the Vedic literature, of the little boy asks his father from where the creation comes, and the father tells him to go and get that fruit from the banyan tree. And he gets the fruit, and he tells him to open it, and he opens it, and he says, "What do you see?" "I see the seeds." He says, "Take one of the seeds. Open it. What do you see?" " I see emptiness, nothingness." And he says, "Yes, from that emptiness that huge, enormous, colossal banyan tree emerges."
And I think you've explained that so beautifully, that within that emptiness, there is this inherent dynamism of awareness being aware of itself, and from there creating frequencies and a vibratory quality that emerges as creation.
Before we leave, Candace, it's been such a pleasure, I hate to end this conversation. We could go on. We could do a whole other two hours on Ayurveda. But I do want to give you a chance, in case there's anything I've missed, in asking you questions, if there's anything else you want to add, or anything you feel that our listeners and viewers should know before we go.
Well, I'll make one comment on the seed analogy that you just made because it is so beautiful. So, we open up that seed and there's nothing there, nothing concrete. But what is there, in that hollowness, is the memory of the entire tree. These two values of nothingness and memory; these are two eternal, unmanifest, values that make up our own consciousness, our own journey to find and remember who we actually are, and to live the reality of the whole banyan tree.
Very well said. Very well said. Memory perpetuates the journey, and the inner grace brings us back home.
Beautiful.
Thank you so much, Candace Badgett. It has been a tremendous joy having you. Thank you. I'm looking forward to some point in the future, we'll talk all about Ayurveda, and The Raj, and the brilliant contribution you and your husband Rogers have made in operating and creating The Raj.
Thank you so very much.
Thank you, Ron. It's been delightful.
The simplest state of human awareness is a self-referral field of pure consciousness, a field of all possibilities. Knowledge is structured in consciousness, and we are not in the world, the world is within us. Welcome to Simplest State, where together, we explore the nature of consciousness and self-realization.
What if ancient Vedic science isn't just a philosophy, but is a precise technology for accessing the very structure of consciousness itself? Imagine that silence is not empty, but is the very source of all creation, and the infinite field of consciousness holds the magic to experience itself and give rise to the entire universe.
Today, we're speaking with someone who's spent over 30 years bridging the gap between ancient wisdom and modern experience. Candace Badgett is an international director of the Global Mother Divine Organization, a board member of the World Association for Vedic Science, and co-founder of The Raj, one of the largest Ayurvedic health centers in North America.
She has published academic papers on Ayurveda and women's health, and has written some of the most groundbreaking academic work on Purusha, Parashakti, and the self-interacting dynamics of consciousness.
Candace doesn't just study these ancient truths, she lives them. If you've ever wondered how infinite silence gives rise to everything we experience, I think you'll enjoy this conversation.
Candace Badgett, welcome to the program. Thank you very, very much for being here.
Thank you, Ron, for that very full and generous introduction, and thank you for inviting me to enjoy this conversation with you today. I'm really looking forward to it.
As am I. I'm just delighted that you're here. The work you've done is absolutely fascinating and compelling, and I can't wait to get into it. So, let's start right in, uh, because in your work, you've described Purusha as a field of pure intelligence that possesses a kind of inherent magic, the ability to experience itself.
I want to start by asking, why is this capacity for self-experience considered the essential trigger for creation?
Well, that is a topic that could launch a PhD, for sure, a thesis. Absolutely. It's so fascinating, and I want to step back just a little bit before I completely dive in with you on this because this is everything. We're just about to talk about really the story of everything. Maharishi Mahesh Yogi... who my husband and I had the great good fortune to work for, for 20 years directly, and to participate in some of his beautiful long courses,
and Maharishi just asked us to create the women's wing of the TM organization. In order to inspire this kind of new structure and the participation in this new structure, I really had to deeply understand the nature of these two elements, you could say, or principles, that literally are the constituent parts of our own consciousness because they are these values of Purusha and Parashakti, or the male and feminine principle is another way we can define them.
I had never put my attention extensively on Parashakti, the feminine principle, which I felt had to be the foundation of this organization, an understanding of this principle had to be the foundation. And once I began to really put my attention on this area of Parashakti, I realized you can't know Parashakti without knowing Purusha. And you can't understand, fully, either one of them or both of them without understanding their relationship.
I started going into all of this, and then I realized, once you understand the reality of Parashakti and the reality of Purusha and their relationship, you understand everything, everything. Where you just think, how am I ever going to get my mind around this?
But the thing is you go back into this literature, back into these texts again and again, these, these books and lectures, it all begins to sort itself out. And also, it's based on our own experience. So, we begin to have that experience in our own awareness, how consciousness functions, how it flows.
First, we have to know that field of pure, pure consciousness, pure awareness. We have to know that experience of being aware of awareness itself and nothing else. Aware of awareness itself and nothing else. Now you're dealing with the ground state of the mind, the ground state of everything. And as you begin to understand how that moves and how that expresses, because you could say it's a field of nothingness. So there it is. There's that field, silent and nothing.
So how does everything spring? First and foremost, subjectively for us, our own thoughts, our own feelings, our own experiences in life. How does all that spring from this field of pure wakefulness, awake to itself alone? And then you begin to realize it's not only silent; there's a dynamic value there. Now, where is that dynamic value? So we're just going to the very basics. We just get to our own experience and it's okay, we transcend the thinking process.
As everything is unfolding, you kind of understand how consciousness is shifting and expanding and what is this? What is this new kind of way of experiencing? And then where does that fit in the whole journey to actually owning, and living, and experiencing, and being ultimate reality?
So you just want to come back right to home base, basically. You want to come back to: what is this experience when I first simply transcend the thinking process and experience that transcendental reality of being aware of awareness itself?
When we talk about transcending, and awareness experiencing awareness itself, is that individual awareness experiencing pure awareness, or is that the same thing as pure awareness experiencing itself?
Exactly.
Yes. And yes, but we're used to knowing something by observing something. So ultimately, we're going to know something by being it. In other words, we can only know pure consciousness by being pure consciousness.
Right, right.
And then there it is, it's just pure consciousness knowing itself. So we're just shifting in the way we know, we experience, reality.
It's a new way because always it's me, is perceiving something through a process of observation. So, always we have those three values involved, I could say, the observer, the process of observing and the object that's being observed.
Whether that object is just a dream, we're observing a dream, or we're observing an object or we're observing a thought or whatever. Those three values of the knower, the process of knowing, and that which is known. That's our reality of experiencing.
So now we're stepping into a new dimension, in a sense of experiencing, because this is our, our base camp. This is our source of our whole experiencing, thinking process. And that base, that foundation is pure consciousness. Just wakefulness is another way to say it. But pure wakefulness. Wakefulness awake to itself and nothing else.
In that case, the observer and observed that you spoke about, in a sense, merge.
They merge.
They become one and the same.
They're one and the same thing.
Right.
Exactly.
Subject and object are unified.
Subject and object are unified.
So, in a sense, you could say there's no duality. It's one unified experience.
Right.
and that's exactly why we see various teachers talking about non-dualism, which is very big these days. It's non-dualistic because there's no more subject and object. There is just that oneness.
This is where, okay, you've got silence, in a sense, because the mind isn't moving. Usually the mind is either projecting into the future, or it's reflecting back on past experience. So the mind is moving. In this case, the mind is not moving, and yet it's not inert, it's not asleep, it's not unconscious, it's wide awake. So, suddenly you have a very interesting experience that is two opposite things at the exact same time. And that is: there's nothing, the mind is not moving, and yet the mind is maximally awake. It's like it's just radiating in wakefulness. So it's not an inert quality at all. There's something actually extraordinarily dynamic simply in that value of maximum wakefulness.
Fantastic. I'm so glad you said that because I think many people have the misconception that the experience of pure consciousness, or transcendence, is a flat, uninteresting...
A void.
Yes, a void. And they think, "Well, why? I don't want to lose my individuality into that." But they don't recognize that that experience is rich beyond what they can even imagine.
It's fullness and the bliss that one generates within that field of pure consciousness is all-encompassing.
All encompassing. And then what's even more amazing is, as we become more and more familiar with this field, we find everything. We find all the mechanics of creation. We find the whole universe emerging. We find a real, a world that is more real than the outside world that we're used to.
So, it's an exciting journey and it's one that is forever unfolding itself and unfolding itself. It's beautiful. But even this simple experience is so liberating because the fact that the mind isn't moving in the grooves of a thought.
In other words, when we have a thought, it confines the mind. It creates a boundary for the mind to move through. Now that, that thought can be about what groceries we need to get at the grocery store, or it can be about the nature of God, or the size of the universe. But it doesn't matter if it's a mundane little thought or it's a great big, huge thought, it's still a specific channel through which the mind is moving.
But in this field of pure awareness, being aware of awareness itself, it's an unbounded experience. There's such freedom in that experience. So it's glorious because it is a freedom that's remarkable. Extraordinary, I think is a better word. And there is something so fulfilling in it because the mind's come back home. This is like, this is base camp here, you know? The mind is at home, and that generates this extraordinary relaxation, this extraordinary contentment. And that is that feeling of a kind of bliss. And then I, I've gone off. You see, the thing is we start one place, and we end up in a million places here.
All roads lead to Rome. It's all wonderful and compelling discussion.
Well, what's so incredible... we'll get back to your question, I promise. But what's so amazing is that when we have this experience, the thing that's so fulfilling is — and it's not even a conscious realization because you're not really engaged in analyzing it in that moment that you are it — it's that you have finally attained what every single desire you have ever had was aiming for, because every single desire we have is for more happiness. We just want that abiding happiness.
And so, we... what do we imagine? As soon as I get my new house, I will have my abiding happiness. The only problem is we get our new house and our dog runs away, and now the house is not providing that abiding happiness. So this is the ever-changing world that is never going to provide what we, in the depth of our soul, are looking for. So the minute we become the reality of who we are, through the process of transcending, and allowing our awareness to experience itself in its pure unboundedness.
and having that experience, one of the primary recognitions at that time is: I was always this. How did I miss it? How did I not see this before? It's so simple. There it is. I was so caught up, imprisoned in my mind and in my thoughts that I missed it. I overlooked it in a sense, even though you can't overlook it because it's the basis of consciousness itself.
But that, in a sense, is what happens. And then coming back to it, there's that recognition, and also that tremendous relief, to be free, out of the prison, released from the boundaries.
That's it. so beautiful. So I wanted to talk about it all in the, in these terms of our own identity and our own experience and coming home to who we are, and knowing that reality by being that reality.
And now I'm going to talk about it a little differently, kind of objectively. Like it's this thing out there, and this thing does certain things. But I had to first and foremost make sure that all our listeners are appreciating that while we talk about it as if it's something out there, in reality, we're just talking about our own self. We're just talking about the way our own consciousness functions and flows, you could say, even flows. So, you were saying, this field of silence, and this is referred to as purusha, that field of the absolute—a field of... a field that is infinite and eternal and omnipresent.
And so what this means is that it's almost like a frozen field because it's everywhere at the same time. In other words, movement implies going from where you are to where you are not. But since it is everywhere at the same time, it is infinite and eternal. There's sort of a sense that it's like this frozen absolute silence.
But, as you made reference to the word, this field has some magic in it, and that the magic is that it can experience itself. It can be awake to its own existence. Okay, so we have a big dilemma here, because how is this frozen field that is everywhere at the same time, how can it observe itself? How can it know itself? How can we even know what it is? Because, you say, "Well, what's above it?" It's already above and below, and how do you even know what's above and what's below if it's already above and below at the same time?
So in order to know itself, this infinity has to collapse to a point. So this collapse of infinity to a point is the magic, is the mechanism, by which this field can know itself, by collapsing to a point. And I always use that example of when you go to, like, the biggest mall in the universe and, and, you walk, you walk into the mall, and you're looking around and suddenly you have no idea where you are. You go over to the big thing, you know, this big white map, and then there's a little red dot on that map, and it says, "You are here." And the minute... Now you, now you look up, okay, Neiman Marcus is straight ahead and Sears is behind. Okay, okay, I know exactly where I am.
So this is like the same thing, infinity collapses to a point of infinity where now it has a localized reality. This is a non localized field, completely non localized, but it col- it collapses to a point, a localized point, where now it takes its stand and observes. And what does it say? It says, "I'm nothing. I'm nothing. I am eternally nothing in front of me, infinitely nothing behind me, infinitely nothing to the left, to the right, and up and down," and there it is. "I'm nothing."
And then suddenly it recognizes, "I'm silent." That's what... "I'm silent." But then it "Wait a minute, I'm having a very dynamic conversation with myself. I am observing myself. This is a dynamic process. So I'm silent, but I'm dynamic." And then the realization comes, " My experience was completely silence, nothing, when I looked around. But then something hid that perspective, and I was able to recognize, wait a minute, I am very dynamic here. I am talking to myself. I am observing. I see what's going on here, and I can project myself forward infinitely, project myself backwards infinitely. I can check out infinity till the ends of infinity, which never end.
I could be extraordinarily dynamic here." So then the third realization is, "Okay, so I'm silent and I'm dynamic, but I'm also... I also have a filtering process, which even though I'm two opposite values at the same time, I can filter them out. There's something that hides the silent value so I can see the dynamic value, and hides the dynamic value so I can see the silent value."
So now it's an amazing process of self-discovery. I'm going to discover everything about myself. And it's with the help of this filter that hides the homogenous, unified wholeness and allows these specific values to be appreciated within a unified wholeness. And it's as the attention... Because of course, now we've also created the three-in-one structure that we all know, of the knower, the process of knowing, and that which is being observed. And it's all one thing. It's just silence as the knower. It's silence curving back on itself as the process of knowing. And silence is the object that silence is observing. So it's one unified field, but now divided into three values. Three aspects this unified field that now begin to interact with each other.
So we had this vast field of singularity that now has within it the concept of relationships. So one value looks to another. Now we begin generating frequencies within a silent field. And we all know that the physical world is not made up of particles, it's actually been found to be made up of frequencies. It's made up of these frequencies—the self interacting dynamics of consciousness itself produces the frequencies that ultimately give rise to all of creation.
That's a beautiful description. I sometimes think of it as kind of a hall of mirrors effect, where you hold two mirrors to each other and suddenly you have infinite reflections. So you have observer and observed and process of observing. And in doing that, you create a new object of observation, a new observer, a new process of observing. And it, in that way, it multiplies infinitely.
And that's what, what Dr. John Hagelin and other quantum physicists would say are those vibrating elastics of string theory that then percolate, and in replicating themselves infinite number of times, give that appearance of a manifest creation.
And it's just our own self interacting dynamics of consciousness.
When the observer observes the process of knowing, there's that principle of what you see, you become. So the knower becomes that value of process of knowing, but it becomes a knower-qualified process of knowing. So now you have a new entity, you've created a new value.
Now then, that object — the silence is an object — it observes this new entity, which is a knower-qualified process of knowing, and it becomes the the known-qualified, knower-qualified, object of process of knowing and this is how all these qualifications or impurities, in a sense, build up until you have Upaveda, and Upaveda is Ayurveda so you have the human physiology.
And another really fascinating way to look at point and infinity is that the human physiology is the point of infinity. And now it's looking to find its way back to being infinity, not just a point, a localized point of infinity. And that's the whole process of gaining higher states of consciousness. It's the point looking back to infinity to become infinity once again. But in that process, infinity itself can know itself in its totality.
So the human nervous system is required in this process. What's the difference between Brahman, which is ultimate reality, and the Absolute, which is that eternal, never-ending, infinite field of silence? The Absolute exists whether anyone knows it or not. But Brahman, where the Absolute becomes a living reality, requires a human being. So there we are. We're on a beautiful journey, very purposeful, and very glorious
So in, in other words, pure consciousness is pure consciousness. Absolute is absolute, whether we're aware of it or not.
But to go through that process and to become aware of it through the vehicle of a human nervous system, we then have that precious opportunity to experience that totality, and live that totality of life, and that is what we refer to as Brahman.
Brahman, ultimate reality.
Ultimate reality.
What's so beautiful is once we step into that ultimate reality, we were never anything but.
Right.
I was never a limited human nervous system. I was never a monkey. I was never anything. I have eternally been this. The hallmark of Brahman is that the opposite is also true. Yes, but the opposite is also true. It's a reality that embraces pairs of opposites without canceling, have them cancel each other out. So it's very hard to speak about Brahman. You cannot penetrate it because speech is a relative vehicle. We know something by virtue of not only what it is, but by virtue of what it's not. And so our whole field of knowing and knowledge and everything is based on pairs of opposites that cannot exist at the exact same time without canceling each other out. Brahman is the embracing of the to- the totality.
That knowledge is indescribable because consciousness alone can know itself.
Right.
And that means that the individualized consciousness, and the discrete words and descriptions will never be able to imbibe those qualities.
That full enlightenment, Brahman, is obscured until the moment you step into it. Now, this is a fascinating thing to think about. Are we, are we going off on too many tangents?
Oh, not at all.
it's all the same field of total knowledge. We cannot go astray even if we try.
It encompasses all opposite values.
So this, this thought that it cannot be... It's obscured, that was the word. Obscured until the moment you step into it. And when you think about higher states of consciousness and how they unfold, and it's a very kind of logical process. You know, first you have to appreciate that you are that field of transcendental consciousness. You, you have to have that experience of pure consciousness.
And then when you have it often enough, frequently enough, and because the mind and body is so intimately connected, every time you transcend, enormous purification and restructuring is going on in the physiology to be able to maintain that style of brain functioning, which is silent and wide-awake dynamic, only in that wakefulness value, at the same time.
To be able to maintain that brainwave functioning, physiology has to be, really, transformed for that process to be upheld. And that is through the process of transcending regularly. It, there comes a time where your whole sense of identity is really more established in that unbounded value than in this kind of dynamically interactive state of consciousness where you're kind of identifying with the activity around you and the different circumstances that are happening. You're still participating, you're still living a full and dynamic life, but you are not identified with any of it.
And that experience is a particular state of consciousness, where you are that unbounded eternal self, and everything else is the non-self.
So this is a major duality that gets created. Before, we were so identified with the ever-changing world, there was no duality. We were just identified with that alone. Then we go through this process of opening up this inner field and stabilizing it. And so this field where I am this unbounded, eternal reality, silent reality, wakeful silent reality, and everything else is not me, that includes my own ever-changing thinking process, and moods and feelings. It's not just activities outside. You know, this feelings and moods and fluctuations or whatever, we just don't identify with them.
So there you go. You've got this duality. And, the ultimate reality of life is absolute unity. So something has to happen here because this Grand Canyon of a gap, of a divide, between the self and the non-self, that has to be addressed. A further development is going to take place, and that's when the value of the heart really steps in, because we just begin to appreciate the beauty and the perfection. Everything is right. Everything is in its place. I'm just moving with that evolutionary force of nature, and therefore everything I do is in line with that, and everything is right.
And as appreciation grows, we begin to perceive those really fine celestial values of the relative on the surface. That brings that value of the ever-changing world closer to my own expanded unified value. Ultimately, we see those expressions of life reflecting who I am, and that is unbounded and eternal. So now it's unboundedness that we see on the surface of every relative boundary. And this is where the Mahavakyas are so important.
This is where the teacher reassures the aspirant, because as this value of nothingness is making itself predominant on the surface of everything we're appreciating, there's this sense of we're starting to kind of drown in nothingness, and that's when the Mahavakyas, Aham Brahmasmi, I am the totality.
The teacher says, "It's all right. Everything's good. Don't worry about it." Everything is within the transcendent.
Sorry, let’s just clarify for our viewers what a Mahavakya is.
Now, Mahavakya, a Sanskrit term, of course, the great statement, the great truth that affirms the experience of the seeker, of the aspirant, upon achieving that, that exalted state of consciousness: "I am That, thou art That, all this is That."
So, oh, yes, because otherwise, as you said, you're drowning in that wholeness of unity. One feels as if lost, or disoriented, perhaps. Perhaps.
Yeah.
And that's why it's so important to have the roadmap. So you have the technologies to develop this, to refine the physiology, expand consciousness, and then you need that roadmap because you are shifting into different states of consciousness. This is a new way of perceiving the world around you, and, and your relationship to that world around you. And so really, it's such a blessing to have the insights into the Vedic texts that explain all of this process. But to have them laid out so clearly is a huge gift.
Coming back to this fact that this ultimate reality is obscured, this is because we have only, and always, known ourselves to have a defining edge. So, in ignorance, before we know anything about consciousness, or that it's our own reality, and fathoming consciousness; I am, I'm me because I'm in this body and I have this personality, and I'm not you.
You have a different personality, and you have a different... you look different than I look. And so it's very, it's very clear. I have a defining edge.
Okay, but what about when now we've been transcending and transcending, and we're really identified with this unboundedness, but it's our unboundedness. It's this individual, in this body, with this individual personality. It's my unboundedness, and that unboundedness is defined by the non-self, by that which I'm not. So I'm not all my thoughts and I'm not feelings. I'm not really this personality. I'm not really even this body. But but these things give a definition to who I am.
So what I'm not, helps to define what I am. It gives a defining edge to my reality.
So then what starts to happen, of course, the relative becomes far more beautiful, divine; that's where divinity shows up in life. And the love of God's creation, because it's so glorious, is so important in expanding the heart. And that's why, you know, all these paths, bhakti path, intellectual path, karma yoga, all these, they're all contributing, they're all part of the process. They're not separate.
They're not really separate paths because each value is developing something so important. Because as the heart expands in the glory of God's creation, the glory of that appreciation, then we contribute to that process of refining the relative through, you could say pipelining, consciousness, or the self, through our sensory perception.
So it's not that the relative itself magically transforms. It's our perception, and that field of pure consciousness extending itself to the environment through our own perception, that's transforming our perception of creation.
Then suddenly, that which I am, unbounded eternal silence, begins to reveal itself everywhere I look. It's the essence of every object in relative creation. It's the essence of... because everything did emerge from that, and suddenly this becomes a sensory perception. But it grows in pieces.
So first it starts out by the pen on the table. Suddenly we're perceiving something very different other than this beautiful celestial divine value that was colored our perception before then. So this is expanding little by little, the whole desktop, the whole room, out the window to the horizon. But in our mind, because at that point, in God consciousness, when the celestial is dominant everywhere, where the divine is seen and experienced everywhere, the duality that now exists is simply my unbounded self, and God. Relative is the expression of God. That's it, there is only my unbounded self and God.
So then we're holding on, even though this value of the self is showing up everywhere, expanding my sense of self as if I'm taking each object into that value of myself, and that makes myself expand. I'm getting bigger and bigger. Everything is coming into my value. And yet we're holding on to something like, somewhere at the outer edge of the universe, I must stop and maybe God and God must start.
Somewhere out there, I have an edge. I've got a defining edge. I can't see it. It's like a great big, huge balloon, and you're in the middle of it, and it just keeps expanding and expanding, a helium balloon. And until at some point, you can't even see the edges of that balloon. It's just gone out so far. And then one day you hear a pop. And there is no... you realize... that's the ultimate realization: there is no defining edge. There's nowhere where I stop. God and I are one in the same value, and yet we're different. And that's another issue we can take on, how we can be God and not be God.
Union with God has now become identity with that ultimate reality. You can't go beyond God. God is not a concept to be overcome. And yet we say, Aham Brahmasmi, I am the totality. How do we resolve those two beautiful things?
But anyway, that's why we can't know that reality. And therefore, the self, the unbounded self that we've known ever since cosmic consciousness, all the way through unity, the expanding unity and expanding unity, and then Brahman. That big self has no semblance whatsoever to the big self that we lived before that value. And that's why that reality of Brahman is obscured until the moment we step into it. And it is an intellectual revelation by virtue of the Mahavakyas; the confirmation. Yes, Aham Brahmasmi, you are the totality.
The infinite diversity of the universe exists with the unbounded silence of your own self. Amazing. Thrilling.
And just to reemphasize that point, it's not in itself an intellectual concept or a philosophy. It's, I don't even like to use the word realization. It...
A recognition.
We don't wake up in the morning and say, "Oh, I realize I'm awake." No, you just are awake. You just are that. And that totality of awareness, the same thing; that is the reality. It always was the reality.
Always was. There was never a sequential unfolding. Even though...
Right, right.
...we could say we had to go through this sequential unfolding, you get there, you step into the reality, it's like there was never a sequential unfolding.
And I think people tend to worry. They think, "Oh, I'm losing myself. You're saying I have to not be me, that that's not me, and I am this." But again, we have to come back to the point that you're, you're giving up something this big for unboundedness. It's not a trade-off. One steps into that unboundedness as a field of infinite bliss.
You've spoken of Brahman, the totality, and the absolute, and pure consciousness. And there's another expression in Sanskrit to describe that field, which is Sat Chit Ananda.
Right.
It's unbounded bliss consciousness. Bliss is its essential nature. Bliss is integral to what pure consciousness is.
To experience that, one experiences bliss. There's no loss of individual happiness. One is immersed in the totality of bliss consciousness.
This is such an important point, Ron. Thank you so much because, I remember one talk that was given on, on Sat Chit Ananda, where Maharishi was talking about sat, that, you could say frozen, eternal, never changing, never moving, reality of truth that has some magic in it. And the magic is chit — consciousness.
It can experience itself. And then the point was, if it can experience itself, what is the experience? Bliss.
Individuality is not lost, because again, there's Brahman. Your individual, and your universal, at the exact same time. Nothing is given up.
Gaudapadacharya says in his commentary, " Pracharah sa tu vigyeyah," the mind in samadhi expands.
Samadhi being transcendental consciousness, transcendent.
The mind in samadhi expands.
The mind in samadhi expands. And thereby he, Gaudapadacharya, establishes Brahman consciousness, Brahmi Chetena, as not a state of transcendence, but a state of expanded awareness, thereby implying the practicality of action and behavior and experience very thorough and most profound in that state of Brahman consciousness, where the mind is expanded. It doesn't get extinct. It gets expanded. The jiva, the individuality, becomes Brahm. It doesn't mean the jiva gets lost and extinct, but it only expands. It is the expansion of individuality which is desired of the state of Vedant.
What a wonderful clarification. That is brilliant. Thank you for that one. In fact, you enjoy the individuality for the first time. You're really free now to enjoy the individual life because you're no longer... It's no longer an existential situation where everything hinges on your mood and what happened today, and what didn't happen today, and what you received, and what you gave, and what you didn't receive, and was it a good day, was it a bad day.
You're no longer dependent on those things because you're grounded in that totality of awareness. So now the individuality becomes a beautiful, enjoyable play of life.
Beautiful. And also another point on that, is that there's no conflict. Life has no value of conflict because everyone and everything is perceived as an extension of myself, and what can be more dear to me than myself? And so everything has that intimate, dear, reality to it, which makes very relaxed.
You're way ahead of me because I wanted to ask you about that because you wrote a paper called "Conflict Resolution Within the Structure of Consciousness," and you highlight the mind's tendency to identify with the unified field. And I want to ask you to please explain how does this understanding, between the relationship between Purusha and Parashakti, specifically, result in the resolution to conflicts?
Well, yes. The relationship creates the conflict in a sense that we could really say Parashakti, the feminine principle, both creates the conflict and resolves it. But the way it gets resolved is in such a glorified manner, that's... Well, the other thing is it's an inevitable process. So we'll go back. And again, it's the action principle. Mother Divine, Parashakti, the feminine principle, is the action principle. It's the dynamic organizing power of the universe. And Purusha is that silent foundation. So it's eternal, it's unbounded, it's never changing. It's that stability. It's that reality that life is. But there's a process. We'll say atma is the absolute. But atma has to wake up to its own dynamism in order to become Brahman, in order to become a living reality, which the absolute, as a living reality, we could say is the definition of Brahman, ultimate reality.
So, atman is the absolute, but relative to individuality until it's awakened to its full value.
Relative to individuality. That's great. That's a perfect way to say it. And this is from, the Srimad Devi Bhagavatam, and it says, " Thou art eternal, ancient Paraprakriti, and Mother of this universe; Thou dost impart, out of mercy, the Brahmavidya, the knowledge of Brahman, to the ancient Purusha. Thus he, Purusha, can realize his eternal nature."
So, she is the instigator of a self unfolding process within the field of Purusha that transforms that field into a living reality.
And, sometimes you have to ask the question, why would this perfect state of equilibrium disrupt itself and produce the universe? And again, we come back to that point that in this silent absolute reality exists the magic that it can experience itself. And that consciousness, being conscious of itself, that is the essence of Parashakti, Mother Divine. She is the waking up process. She is the lively wakefulness in that field that allows that field to experience itself in all its infinite dimensions.
So there is conflict because the minute, the minute that field, which is nothing, becomes awake to itself and says, oh, I'm nothing, it's created something. Now that something happens to be nothing. But the minute that the nothing is realized and identified as something, it is something. It's just a something that happens to be nothing.
The recognition is in the awareness of the nothingness, which is now something different than nothingness.
Exactly, it's nothingness, observed.
Exactly. Exactly.
It's something. So, now you have nothing and something. It's both nothing and it's something. And therefore, there's the sprout of duality. And as soon as you have duality, it's am I this, am I that? All the confusion begins.
But it was inevitable, it's the very nature of this field itself. It has to be chopped up into infinite pieces and then all put back together again. And when you take all the pieces of the specific values of the diverse universe that emerge out of a field of sameness, wholeness, when you put it all together, the sum of the parts is more.
The wholeness is more than the sum of all those parts. And so you've created something so much more than just that flat field. Now you've come out with a more evolved state.
So Maharishi one time said, as he was describing that process of how the knower looks to the known, and it becomes the known, but qualified, knower qualified, and all these qualifications, and frequencies and fluctuations build up to the human physiology, and then the human physiology then embarks on its, try to find its way back home in wholeness and infinity, Maharishi said, "So you see, it's nobody's fault. Ignorance is just the inevitable step to Brahman."
So we don't have to feel badly. Yes, we are where we are, working through all our issues, but you know, we're working our way back.
Beautiful. That's some kind reassurance, I think, for all of us.
It's very kind reassurance.
And then what sorts out all this chaos, is that intelligence itself. So, whatever muddles itself is also capable of un-muddling itself. The complexities are found in the different expressions of intelligence, and the clearing up of all the complexities also belongs to this intelligence, which results in the completely fulfilled state, without doubt. One huge, enormous reality, that is also the expression of this intelligence.
All the possible values of intelligence become true only when one has seen that all this chaos is myself, and all this silence is myself. Unity is myself. Diversity is myself. And I am all that there is to it. And in this state, there is no query. There is no doubt. There is no conflict. It is a pure, simple, state of awareness.
So I, I declare Divine is the source of conflict, but Mother Divine is the source of ultimate reality in Brahman.
Fantastic.
The true organizing power.
It all resolves itself.
It resolves itself. And what's so beautiful is what you see in this whole process of moving through higher states of consciousness, when you look to the relationship between Purusha and Parashakti, you see that one will take the lead in one state of consciousness, the other kind of is the predominant in another state. The other takes the lead again to move it on to the next. The two natures of Brahman, who hold onto their own nature while partaking in the nature of the other. So that these are two eternal, infinite values that cannot be together and cannot be apart.
That is fantastic. I think it's so commendable, Candace, the way you prepared yourself for leadership of the women's organization by diving to the most fundamental values of consciousness. And this male-female, this Purusha-Parashakti, this Shiva-Parvati, this sort of seeming duality, actually we see it in many religions and spiritual teachings around the world.
Now, we think of pure consciousness as pure consciousness. There's a question that only you could answer, I think. Why, within the field of consciousness, do we talk of Shiva-Parvati, Purusha-Parashakti?
Why does that connotation exist in an unbounded field of pure awareness?
Look at the relative as an expression of a unified field, and you look at the importance of the human physiology. It is the reflector to reflect back to that field what it is.
Now, what's so interesting is that we all have both values within ourselves. We are both purusha and parashakti; our consciousness is that.
We're just moving through the process of becoming familiar of a whole range of pure consciousness's expression in relative pairs of opposites.
Mother Divine is the mother to this universe, and the most essential quality of every woman is her capability to be mother, whether she has children or not.
When God appears to anyone, it takes form. It takes form. There's name and form. From a personal perspective, what is the most supreme being in the universe? It's God, and we give it a form, and it's worshiped in cultures in many different ways. And, in the Vedic tradition, Krishna is the embodiment of that duality, and he always has with him his consort, Radha.
Something that has human brain capacity, which is a point that can grab infinity. So we must give that ultimate status if we're going to give it form, if it's going to be in a personal realm.
And if it's going to be that mother value predominant, it's going to be Devi.
The male is singularity. I always laugh because, you know, I think men like to hold onto their singularity. And women are always looking for relationship. You know, that, that's that mother... that is the principle, when you go to the impersonal reality, and you're looking at Parashakti and Purusha; Purusha is singularity, and Mother Divine is the principle of relationship. That's a dynamic principle. So it really, it fits together so perfectly. There's no imposition. It's just what emerges naturally in the unfolding process from point to end up as infinity.
It's interesting to note that you bring out all this knowledge of these fundamental values of life at the level of Purusha and Parashakti, the male and female principle. And you are, I have to tell you, the first female guest on this program, Simplest State. My apologies to our female viewers. It is not by design. It just worked out that way that, uh, until now, there had not been a female guest. How fitting and how appropriate. I'm so delighted that you're the first, and that's exactly what you're talking about.
I mean, you've been a, an international director of the Global Mother Divine organization for many years. Keeping in mind that not everyone practices Transcendental Meditation, people have different techniques, different practices.
I would like to ask, having been in that position for so many years, what insights have you gained that you could share about a woman's, specifically, spiritual journey?
I would say that the greatest gift that we can give ourselves is finding this inner self-sufficiency. It's so precious because that principle of relationship is so strong in us, because that is when we go to that impersonal level of the absolute, there's the principle of singularity, and that implies a kind of self-sufficiency. And there's the principle of relationship, which implies relationships.
But we become so successful in that nourishing role that we are hardwired to provide, because we give the first experience of love to humanity when that mother holds that baby in her arms. This is just this incredible gift. We're hardwired for that.
And then we continue to express it throughout our lives. And the less stress we have, or the less hurt we've experienced in our lives, well, then we have to protect ourselves. We feel to kind of shut our hearts down a little bit, and that obstructs our ability to fully express that nourishing power. Whatever we can do to bring that back, to take those boundaries away, because that's where our fulfillment is.
It's just extending love and appreciation in a natural, unobstructed flow. That is what brings us fulfillment more than anything else. And so, whatever we can do on our spiritual journey that's allowing that process to take place. And the best thing is, it's by going within and finding that transcendental reality of pure consciousness where we are supremely self-sufficient. We've come back home.
So now we're not so worried about what we can get out of the relative world, we're in a position to just give; just give. And not only does that nourish our environment, but it brings so much fulfillment to us. So we just want to find our way back to that beautiful field of supreme self-sufficiency in fullness and bliss, and be able to extend that out to the world. So, I would say for a woman, that is a key component of a spiritual journey.
That is loving and nurturing advice, I think, for women everywhere. Thank you for that, Candace. I guess we're coming to the end of our time, unfortunately. But I do want to ask, just briefly... we don't have time to go deeply into Ayurveda—that's a whole other episode, but a beautiful subject. Butas one of the co-founders of The Raj, the beautiful Ayurvedic wellness center, I want to ask, uh, just very briefly, if you could tell us what you see as the relationship between physical wellness and Ayurveda.
Because wellness is central to everyone and everything. Health is wealth.
Absolutely right. And I just want to say I'm co-founder, along with my husband, Rogers Badgett. Together, we built The Raj 35 years ago, pioneered, pretty much, the use of Ayurveda in North America, and continuing today. Very encouraging that it's something that is becoming quite well recognized.
Ayurveda is brilliant, and really and truly, in a way, we could see Ayurveda almost as the umbrella under which all Vedic knowledge is contained. And that's because, in Charaka Samhita, the main text, 6,000-year-old text of Ayurveda, the definition of health is established in the self, established in pure consciousness, where now we've experienced it enough, this is our identity. Consciousness and physiology are so intimately connected. Physiology is an expression of consciousness; consciousness is what gives rise to the structure and function of the physiology.
But then everything in life is a precipitation of these values of the self-interacting dynamics of consciousness. So then, everything we can do can be aligned with those laws of nature that emerge from that field, and structure the entire universe.
So that involves what we eat, and our daily routine, and how everything, all the choices we make, are to support the growth to higher states of consciousness. And Ayurveda is the roadmap for every one of those choices. It is the most remarkable system of healthcare. It's the oldest continuously practiced system of healthcare in the world, acknowledged by the World Health Organization. And, it, it's phenomenal, and it's going to make its inroads now. Doors are opening, and it is going to inform modern biomedicine so that it doesn't go right off the cliff, because it's kind of headed in that direction.
So Ayurveda will restore the integrity of all medical systems. I have no doubt about it. So that's what we do at The Raj. We have these purification therapies, Pancha Karma, that are not only purification processes, but they rebalance and they rejuvenate, and they strengthen the entire physiology. And today, with all the environmental toxins that you just hear about, every time you open your computer there's another article that comes up about fat soluble toxins, pesticides, herbicides, the forever chemicals, how they're now, finally, being linked to the steady decline of health in the United States and Canada, I'm sure.
And we did a study, 20 years ago, that was published and peer-reviewed, that showed that five days of pancha karma removed the most dangerous fat-soluble toxins by 50% in five days.
So, we're back involved with Mayo Clinic, about to do another study. I've been to Washington, to some of the MAHA institutes and NIH, and Health and Human Services events to keep informing the public about the miracles of Ayurveda, the contemporary relevance of Ayurveda.
I completely agree. Ayurveda is truly a profound science of health and wellness, and I certainly hope it increases in popularity more and more because it's phenomenally beneficial.
This has been wonderful. In speaking with you, just to regress for a minute, I was reminded of...
There's this old story from the Vedic literature, of the little boy asks his father from where the creation comes, and the father tells him to go and get that fruit from the banyan tree. And he gets the fruit, and he tells him to open it, and he opens it, and he says, "What do you see?" "I see the seeds." He says, "Take one of the seeds. Open it. What do you see?" " I see emptiness, nothingness." And he says, "Yes, from that emptiness that huge, enormous, colossal banyan tree emerges."
And I think you've explained that so beautifully, that within that emptiness, there is this inherent dynamism of awareness being aware of itself, and from there creating frequencies and a vibratory quality that emerges as creation.
Before we leave, Candace, it's been such a pleasure, I hate to end this conversation. We could go on. We could do a whole other two hours on Ayurveda. But I do want to give you a chance, in case there's anything I've missed, in asking you questions, if there's anything else you want to add, or anything you feel that our listeners and viewers should know before we go.
Well, I'll make one comment on the seed analogy that you just made because it is so beautiful. So, we open up that seed and there's nothing there, nothing concrete. But what is there, in that hollowness, is the memory of the entire tree. These two values of nothingness and memory; these are two eternal, unmanifest, values that make up our own consciousness, our own journey to find and remember who we actually are, and to live the reality of the whole banyan tree.
Very well said. Very well said. Memory perpetuates the journey, and the inner grace brings us back home.
Beautiful.
Thank you so much, Candace Badgett. It has been a tremendous joy having you. Thank you. I'm looking forward to some point in the future, we'll talk all about Ayurveda, and The Raj, and the brilliant contribution you and your husband Rogers have made in operating and creating The Raj.
Thank you so very much.
Thank you, Ron. It's been delightful.
