About
'Spiritual seeking' began for me in my early 20s and, looking back, it is easy to see the synchronistic events that led into what I now call the 'Inner Journey'.
Having first begun to tiptoe into exploring my own inner experience and the 'psychological mind' through some of the writings of Jung, I then became interested in philosophical thought and ancient eastern wisdom teachings such as those of Lao Tzu and the Buddha.
Later I became involved in practicing meditation, studying karmic astrology and tantra, and this led into a lifelong immersion into the words of most revered, respected and highly regarded of the great spiritual mystics in history.
In the midst of this, in my middle years, during a traumatic period in my outer life, what is commonly called 'spiritual awakening' occurred.
It was a shift in my consciousness - as if I had been woken from a trance - and the person I had believed myself to be - my egoic self - lost solidity. I became aware of an 'awareness' in the 'background' - an unmoving stillness behind all thinking, feeling and perception.
From this 'place' I became a 'witness' to what was arising in my conscious awareness, and could now see how my ego had previously been in the driving seat - even when I was trying to be a 'good' person, or believing I was a 'spiritual' person.
From this moment forward all my thinking, feeling and behaviour began to change because I was no longer under the unconscious influence and control of my ego – no longer was I my ego - but the observer of it.
With this new 'perspective' and the new ability to 'sense' the selfishness of ego - and then be able to do something about it - its ‘wrongness’ - my life quickly went from conflict, stress, discontent, and unhappiness, to inner peace and a joyous sense of being connected with the flow of life.
Since that time, countless further 'realisations' and inner experiences of a mystical nature, have deepened my understanding of what 'spiritual awakening' really is.
It is so very clear now that all those years ago, what I first experienced - the discovery of 'awareness' - was just the very beginning, and only when the ‘turning point’ on the journey is reached - the coming to see the 'wrongness' inherent in the egoic self - does one grasp the true purpose of this life, and come to know the only path that must be travelled if we are ever to reach the destination of the journey.
John Foster
Having first begun to tiptoe into exploring my own inner experience and the 'psychological mind' through some of the writings of Jung, I then became interested in philosophical thought and ancient eastern wisdom teachings such as those of Lao Tzu and the Buddha.
Later I became involved in practicing meditation, studying karmic astrology and tantra, and this led into a lifelong immersion into the words of most revered, respected and highly regarded of the great spiritual mystics in history.
In the midst of this, in my middle years, during a traumatic period in my outer life, what is commonly called 'spiritual awakening' occurred.
It was a shift in my consciousness - as if I had been woken from a trance - and the person I had believed myself to be - my egoic self - lost solidity. I became aware of an 'awareness' in the 'background' - an unmoving stillness behind all thinking, feeling and perception.
From this 'place' I became a 'witness' to what was arising in my conscious awareness, and could now see how my ego had previously been in the driving seat - even when I was trying to be a 'good' person, or believing I was a 'spiritual' person.
From this moment forward all my thinking, feeling and behaviour began to change because I was no longer under the unconscious influence and control of my ego – no longer was I my ego - but the observer of it.
With this new 'perspective' and the new ability to 'sense' the selfishness of ego - and then be able to do something about it - its ‘wrongness’ - my life quickly went from conflict, stress, discontent, and unhappiness, to inner peace and a joyous sense of being connected with the flow of life.
Since that time, countless further 'realisations' and inner experiences of a mystical nature, have deepened my understanding of what 'spiritual awakening' really is.
It is so very clear now that all those years ago, what I first experienced - the discovery of 'awareness' - was just the very beginning, and only when the ‘turning point’ on the journey is reached - the coming to see the 'wrongness' inherent in the egoic self - does one grasp the true purpose of this life, and come to know the only path that must be travelled if we are ever to reach the destination of the journey.
John Foster