Meeting Peace with PB

Paul Cash has played a major role in the Foundation’s efforts to bring forth and share with many people the spiritual writings that PB left to us. Paul served PB during PB’s final months on Earth and was blessed in many ways including being one of three people tasked and trained by PB to edit into publishable form what became the sixteen volumes of The Notebooks of Paul Brunton. In the following essay, Paul shares intimate details of one effect that PB’s rare presence had on him.

P aul Brunton wasn’t just especially good at some things that other people are also really good at. Or merely extraordinary at a mix of things that other people also do very well, on an everyday basis. It wouldn’t be appropriate to think of him as a record-holder or record-setter among similarly skilled high achievers in a field we honor with awards or medals or trophies.

He was a catalyst for becoming aware of things that many of us have no awareness of whatsoever. He could open a passageway to connect/contrast this realm we live as real and stable with what actually gives it the reality it seems to have, while it makes sense. And when the sense of everyday life’s reality was disturbed or suspended by something unimaginably disruptive, he could help you find your way into the deep purpose of the intrusion, if you were so inclined.

I’ve told entertaining, even some charming, anecdotes about Paul Brunton through the years. Some have helped people see how human and warm and funny and “normal” he could be when he wanted to be. But I’ve come to wonder if such little vignettes actually diminish him in some minds, and to suspect they probably do when not given in proper context.

What makes Paul Brunton most worth remembering for me isn’t how much he could be like us at our individual smartest or most amusing or most charming, but how different we could be when we saw ourselves as he could. It wasn’t about how to get a bigger and/or better ego-self or a specific skill set or romantic partner or position or prestige in the world. It was about connecting and staying connected with something infinitely reliable of a totally different order of being.

This capacity is what I want to try to write about. It’s not to look back to a glorious once-upon-a-time now passed—not about eulogy or sentimental/exaggerated tribute. It’s more about connecting with what makes reading Paul Brunton’s writings most worthwhile today. Even every day if possible. It’s also about tending to the development of seeds he roused to life, and moving forward with patient confidence to their maturing. It’s about establishing the whole conversation about Paul Brunton at an appropriate level, and setting a proper context for some of the more amusing sometimes quirky details that are part of the fun of the story.

Actually, Paul Brunton is more than “just” a catalyst. Without trying to, he could stir things to motion in a person that were not conceivable for them before. We would at times see by means of him things we couldn’t explain with our selves as we knew them. We would have to let those familiar selves be temporarily displaced by deeper layers of self that would seep in, and deepen us. These deeper selves would suspend the quick-to-judge tendencies of our habitual minds long enough for something entirely novel to arise. Remarkably, this still seems to happen for some people through reading his writings.

It was not like being taken over or possessed by something or someone other. It was more like being invited to take possession of deeper dimensions of who we could be—and at some mysterious level know we actually already are. This deeper something feels invariably more real than what we had settled for as bottom-line real before. Becoming even once aware of it undermines the spiritual lethargy that might settle again for so little. There really was no going back, and that could be terrifying. Blissfully, thrillingly terrifying. Radically honest. Truly unsettling, in the many nuances of the word.
Connecting with Paul Brunton in the way I want to speak of wasn’t like spending better quality time in the world I already knew. It was more like finding myself inexplicably somewhere entirely different, as if on another planet or something like that. I often didn’t know its name. Or if it was even part of our solar system. And sometimes it wasn’t.

One of the first things I noticed on entering PB’s apartment for the first time was how noisy I was. Not in the sense of talking loud or stomping or scuttling awkwardly about. Just as a way of being. The noise of my own thoughts in his apartment was a ruckus not to be unnoted. He and the whole space he lived in were by comparison so astonishingly quiet. Even while there was talking going on.

PB’s apartment where I knew him in Switzerland was in a condo building, so it wasn’t really quiet—not an idyllic peaceful or soundproofed setting by any means. But the whole space of it seemed to be pervaded throughout with some sort of an invisible inner lining, a silence that insulated it in some essential way from the ambient building- and people-noise on the outside. There’s an expression that x or y or z has a silver lining. This lining felt to me more of a translucent gold or yellow, not visible but feelable, kind of like sunlight in alert deep peace. Untapped solar energy at rest maybe.

Something made me aware (as if pointing it out) that there was an option: I could keep noticing my noisy thoughts and be out of harmony with PB and that space, or I could tune to that seeming inner lining. When I did tune to that almost tangible something-not-a-thing, my thoughts lapsed at the door on entering the apartment. An exquisite sense of intimacy would draw me graciously into the space, and into more direct relation with the remarkable presence that was PB. To be honest, it wasn’t so much that I tuned to it as that I learned to move slowly and let it tune me. And as it tuned me, I never felt more welcome anywhere than I felt when I was there.

It was kind of like if you have a dial in your heart, like a radio dial, and it turns to just the right frequency to displace raucous static with a clear signal of the desired wavelength. Or imagine deep in your heart space a dial on the door of a safe you didn’t know was in there, and the dial turns to just the right place, and a door you didn’t know was closed opens to something of awe-inspiring inner value, sometimes even heart-stopping.

This “tuning” didn’t happen all at once on entering PB’s apartment the first day, or even of a sudden over the first weeks of being there for several hours every day. Instead for days the din of my noisy thoughts seemed often louder and more raucous, despite occasional moments of dwelling quietly with the deep alternative. My mind came up with many reasons for how I wasn’t a good person for what PB needed and deserved in a personal secretary/assistant and all-around man Friday for the next six months.

I spoke with Anthony Damiani on the phone about this, as he was the person who had arranged for me to be there with PB. Part of me felt that he should find someone more suitable and replace me asap for PB’s sake. He said to not give up, to keep trying to do what PB said or asked for, as well as I could. Eventually there was a meltdown. Some kind of walls or shell I had brought with me collapsed. And the din collapsed with them.

I began hearing PB often as if he were speaking from deep inside that inner safe in my heart, more than from across the table or room. Something in his tone of voice and unusual phrasing had me listening inwardly there for his meaning at least as much as outwardly for his words. And the degree to which I was quiet inside determined how well I understood what he was saying. I was surprised even more by how my own thoughts and feelings and speech began to come from that deep inner place rather than from my head or from wherever my memory or self-image might be operating on a given day. It was deeper. It knew more. It knew better. It deserved to be trusted. And PB’s presence actively encouraged me to trust it and speak its knowing.

This process is difficult to describe. It’s radically different than acquiring information, or developing a utilitarian or marketable or socially advantageous skill (mental, aesthetic, cultural development). Others helped me cultivate that sort of thing before PB, and more have done so since that time. What PB, simply by his presence, prompted me to cultivate was a deeper immersion into my being. As interiority. Expansive interiority, if you can imagine such. Increasingly inclusive interiority. Eventually, less and less seemed “out there.” More and more seemed to be part of an intimate, immediate, inner reality more real than the outer one.

One passage that helps me speak of this altered perspective comes from T.S. Eliot. Something profoundly self-aware in you recognizes that as he says: “You are not here to verify,/ Instruct yourself, or inform curiosity/ Or carry report. You are here to kneel/ Where prayer has been valid.” (“Little Gidding”) But you actually aren’t even here to pray this time, you’re here to give/surrender full attention to a presence you feel but can’t possibly see . . . and let its simply being present change you. You are here to be utterly quiet. You are not to emulate or imitate or credit yourself for being here. You are here to listen. To be receptive. To observe without comment. And let the stillness in you respond in its own mysterious ways.
It was quite some time before I realized that this is where PB most often wrote from. In the beginning it was more a matter of simply learning to be aware there.

What happened to the walls or shell I brought with me as I accepted that degree of inner quiet also happened to many of the words I brought with me. They melted down, got free from imprints the culture I grew up in had stamped them with—conventional associations used as coin of the realm where each thing is separated from all other things and unquestioned materialism reigns supreme.

“Peace” was the first word to change radically. As I had brought it with me, the word meant an absence of open conflict, usually temporary or at least tentative, often “enforced” by vigilant willingness to employ intimidating weapons kept on high alert. It stood for something relative to conditions more complaint-worthy that existed before or may come to exist again. It had no positive inner aliveness or wealth as a quality of its own, except maybe now and then during a happy moment of some release from problems and refreshing communion with nature. Then one day, from deep within the inner safe, a saturating feeling emerged, infinitely rich and infinitely desirable, magnificent and deeply satisfying in its own right. It pervaded all I felt to be me and all I felt to be around me, and resonated with the inner lining of PB’s space. At first it was almost blinding; but soon a great clarity prevailed: everything, including me, became clear and vivid and more present, more immediate, than I had seen or heard through the screen/veil/barrier of my thoughts.

Eventually I understood that this is what Peace actually is. It’s what PB means when he says May the Peace of the Infinite Mind reveal itself to you. It’s a sacred quality, or quality of the Sacred, a sacramental vessel that PB could be a proximate focus for that Infinite Mind to reveal its qualities through. It could operate in and through him. It was a constitutional element of what at times sacramentally presenced him. And so utterly refreshingly, he took no credit for it whatsoever.

The kind of sage he had become by the time I knew him could function at times as a locus for the infinite mind’s activity in a person. In this way this kind of sage can help some people at some times see what they need to see next as a focus for their development, and even stimulate their aspiration toward it. (But not at all times or for all persons.) In my case this Peace came first, and it changed everything. Reverence soon became an inescapable disposition in myself rather than just something wondrous and inexplicable to observe in a few others and not pretend to be able to imitate. It was nothing like admiration or even like being enamoured with something or someone. Those feelings were somehow outer-oriented. This is deeper deeper more interior and seems to be bottomless. Words bow and implore its permission, its blessing, before venturing to be spoken.

One might think that only nothing at all (only inexpressible unconditioned being / is or is-not-ness . . .) could transpire in such a sacred place. That stillness must reign inviolate. I could imagine no more for quite some time than slowly learning to breathe this very different atmosphere, to breathe it in and be nourished in an entirely new way, at an entirely new level, to breathe it out and mysteriously bless. Mysteriously bless nothing or no one in particular but simply to be and to be Blessing. Tears of a melting heart flowed as pure gratitude.

So it was even more of a surprise to me to discover next that this Peace is dynamic. It’s not only a state of immobile rest that fills a person with unconditional joy and contentment and release from any need to stir or be stirred. It‘s somehow still and also makes certain activity more efficient, more productive and of better quality in much less time. There’s no bodily tension—no tension in the neck or shoulders or jaw, no scrunched toes, no stomach or gut tightness. Yet it’s fully alert. Doesn’t miss a thing.

There’s no indecision or wavering in it, no should I do or not do this or that first or now or later or never, no anticipation or regret. It gathers what needs doing into a neatly ordered pile and attends fully to each task, one by one, without disrupting itself by what it’s doing or being distracted by or anxious about what it hasn’t yet got to. There’s no energy wasted on dread or reluctance or haste or need to finish before some desirable or undesirable something happens or doesn’t happen. Each task gets exactly what it needs, no more, no less. And when the tasks are finished, it’s content to be still and do nothing. It doesn’t need to entertain itself or be entertained. But it can.

Doing this with PB, the blessing of his simply being was a constant when I could hold attention to it. And it could also be directed if called for.

It soon seemed to me that this Peace is exactly what people need most, if there is to be a better world to live in. But how few know it even exists, let alone really desire it? So much of world as we live it is about power, the struggle for or against power. Does such relentless struggle lend itself to even aspiring for real peace?

Years before this happened with PB, Anthony had asked me, when I first met him, what I wanted. I hadn’t really thought about it then but now recall myself saying something like, “A little peace now and then would be nice.” I had no idea back then that Peace could be so wonderful. But I do remember Anthony saying, “What good is peace if you’re still stupid?” I could tell him now, “It’s pretty good. More than pretty good, it’s infinitely better than wanting anything else.” I easily could settle for it.

But around PB there was no staying stupid. His deep atmosphere and unique personal manner impacted in several other ways simultaneously at a variety of levels. One effect was to awaken a boundless curiosity and patient application to learning. Ignorance was no longer any kind of bliss. Laziness was disrespect for the opportunity of being alive. I wanted to know everything and had the energy to pursue the full range of my interests, and surprise surprise, discover new interests that emerged on their own. And I wanted to know it all at once. There was so much energy, abundant spiritual vitality, to expand my world view, to appreciate details of motive and intention and purpose of the leaders and momentums in culture and the ideas putting them forward.

PB stimulated, somehow by simply being what he was required, me to work on many things at once, in what he called “a complete course.” I had arrived as something of a mystic/poet. He initiated me to a new and immensely more vast and nuanced level of development, something I had no real awareness of as a possibility before.

It might be lovely if I could say that this joy-filled nurturing continued without interruption for the rest of my months working with PB through that spring and summer, and that it has grown steadily since. I don’t really know if it would be lovely to be able to say that or not. I do know it’s not what happened.

The Peace that revealed itself so gloriously that first time didn’t stay long. After a few days I couldn’t find my way back to it or find a way for it to come back to me. I couldn’t reconnect at will through meditation or by means of any creative mind games I tried. I didn’t often or for long actually feel its presence in simply being alive or in doing my various tasks with all the care and attention I could muster. I somehow knew it was still very nearby, but rarely felt it as before, as the real living Presence and not just as a memory state. This seemed so no matter how I longed for it, how much I tried to be quiet and attentive and receptive.

I would feel it sometimes for a little while and then not feel it for a longer while. But knowing for sure that it did and does exist and is real, and not settling for a self-flattering memory state of it, did continue. That made then and continues to make now a difference that there has been no undoing, no cure for.

One day at lunch after this initial “experience,” PB asked me why was I so depressed. I had been trying not to show it, but there was no concealing it from him. Of course it was from having lost feeling of the Peace and feeling miserable about that. He said that having that Peace is very rare, and that a lot of people who have worked much harder for it than I had didn’t have it . . . and what was so special about me that I should have it when they don’t. He mentioned one very high-level spiritual teacher that I looked up to and said “He wants it and doesn’t have it. He may get it. But in the meantime, he doesn’t sit around moaning and groaning about not having his precious Peace. He spends his time being cheerful and helping others. You should take him as an example.”