Conversations with Avant-garde Sages - The Wizard LLC

Conversations with Avant-garde Sages
probably what happens with people who experience that kind of
bliss with the use of psychedelic drugs, etc., is that they're thrown
into a real experience but there's no rudder. And so in my case the
stopping the thinking was a culmination of inquiry. Actually it is
what I had been doing for two years as to what's it all about, what
does it mean to be human? And culminating in the stopping of the
chatter.
So both side of the brain were always active, both sides of the
brain were fully active during the whole process including
discovering the silence, allowing the silence to show up.
WIZARD: So there was a paradox shift in the primacy of being?
NORIO KUSHI: Yes.
WIZARD: Of what you are and what you're saying is the silence
moved to the forefront.
NORIO KUSHI: Yes, absolutely. It is an incredible experience,
yes. I don't mean to make it sound trivial because it's not. As the
same time really the big deal is recognizing that everything I
thought I was, this name, which was a basket which contained all
my experiences from when I began speaking, and all my history,
all the problems, the things that I dealt with, etc., the
relationships, the three marriages, the three divorces, etc. I
thought that was all me, I came to realize that that's not me.
[Laughs] It's incredibly liberating.
TRIP: Although your ex won't agree with that, right [Laughs].
NORIO KUSHI: Well when I saw Joanne, my wife number three,
and the first thing… we talked for a moment, and she noticed there
was a shift, there was a change. First thing she said was, "Boy, I
can finally talk with you". [Laughs] And I just cracked up
laughing, because I knew exactly what she was talking about.
Before I thought I knew how to listen and everything, and I didn't
even know how to listen.
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