Knowing at The Almaasary • A Glossary of Key Passages from the Work of A.H. Almaas

Experience of Knowing and Being as a Single Phenomenon

In self-realization we experience ourselves as Presence where Presence is both Being and knowingness. Here, the cognitive act and being are the same experience... The reason we experience knowing and being as a single phenomenon is that Presence is the Presence of consciousness, pure consciousness more fundamental than the content of mind... experiencing the direct truth and reality of our consciousness requires no object.
The Point of Existence, p. 22 • discuss »

Not Knowing Underlies All Knowing

One corollary of the fact that not-knowing underlies all knowing is the recognition that knowing is not something we must have. Knowing is a transitory phenomenon. Something arises and you know it; the experience of knowing it at that moment is what matters. what is important for your liberation is not that you’ve just gotten a piece of knowledge, which you can store in your brain in order to increase the amount of knowledge you have. What matters is the direct experience of the luminosity. And this direct experience of the luminosity needs and requires the ground of not-knowing.
Spacecruiser Inquiry, p. 101 • discuss »

Knowing is a Fundamental Characteristic of Every Moment

Knowing is a fundamental characteristic of every moment of our experience. Our sensation is knowledge of sensation; our emotion is knowledge of emotion. Our seeing is knowledge, our hearing is knowledge, our thinking about past, present and future is knowledge. Questioning is knowledge. Our sense that we don’t know something is knowledge; we know that we sense that we don’t know.
Inner Journey Home, p. 46 • discuss »

Learned Ignorance

The first kind is called learned ignorance. It can also be referred to as developed ignorance or accumulated ignorance. Sometimes the term conceptual ignorance is used, which means that as our mind develops and we acquire the capacity to conceptualize, we develop a certain kind of ignorance that is specifically human. Generally speaking, animals and other beings don’t have that type of ignorance, because it is something that you have to learn in order for it to develop. Usually this ignorance develops as knowledge. That is to say, much of our knowledge about ourselves and about the world is actually learned ignorance. It is ignorant because it is simply wrong; it does not reflect how reality is. We have all kinds of beliefs and ideas about reality that are not true. We have positions and philosophies and ideologies about ourselves, about how things work, and about what makes things happen, and many of these are inaccurate. Of course, it is difficult to see this as ignorance, because it is what we know, it is what we take to be our knowledge.
The Unfolding Now, p. 114 • discuss »

Innate Ignorance

The other level of ignorance is more fundamental, more subtle, and more difficult to deal with. It is called innate ignorance. But we cannot even recognize it as ignorance until we work through much of our learned ignorance. Unless we become much more illuminated about our beliefs, ideas, positions, and patterns, our innate ignorance will be hard to identify. But at some point, it becomes clear that no matter how much of our learned ignorance we work through, the realization arising from that process does not bring us to the clarity, openness, and immediacy that we have experienced when we are more directly in touch with reality. This is when we begin to recognize what is called innate ignorance, which is also referred to as primordial ignorance. This is the ignorance that we share with all animals. It is not learned; we come into the world with it.... We come into the world not knowing our True Nature. We don’t know who we are. That doesn’t mean that we don’t experience True Nature. It doesn’t mean we don’t feel it. It doesn’t mean that we don’t perceive it. It means we don’t understand it. We don’t know what it is. We don’t know its meaning, its significance. We don’t know that it is what we are.
The Unfolding Now, p. 116 • discuss »

Being Ruthlessly Honest

To know the truth you have to be both a scientist and an artist. To really go about doing the work from the perspective of truth you have to unify the two sides of the brain. You have to be rational and intuitive at the same time. Loving truth for its own sake creates some kind of sincerity, some kind of humility and honesty about who and what we are. Am I angry but pretending to love? Do I want something from you but am pretending to give you something? You have to be ruthlessly honest here, out of loving the truth and loving who you are and who the other is. Your will engages with exact and utmost precision. You want to see exactly why you are doing this and what it’s about. So as you see, knowing the truth is a precise, scientific way of looking at what’s here now.
Diamond Heart Book V, p. 207 • discuss »

Knowing the Capacities and Functions of the Soul

The knowledge of the soul does not mean only experience of the various states and conditions and transformations of the soul, which is the personal consciousness. It also includes the various capacities and functions. To know the capacities and functions of the soul means to know how to operate as human beings should or can operate. The knowledge of the soul includes knowing how to live correctly. The soul evolves through some kind of education. Frequently, while some parts of the soul develop, others remain untouched. Often the development of the soul is not balanced, is askew in various ways. So we tend to go around in circles instead of going straight because of this imbalance in development. But with the development of balance, we learn to move forward, toward greater evolution and expansion.
Diamond Heart Book V, p. 333 • discuss »

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