It took me years to remember to trust intuition.
My training and practice as an engineer made me susceptible to the pull of the world to observe and analyze it.
The development of the N.O.W. Tone Therapy finally brought about a balanced integration of objective observation and intuition in my life. I found I could trust inner knowing –– intuition, and not just rely on supposedly objective observations of the world which are fraught with perceptual distortions (more on this another time).
Speaking from personal experience, engineers and musicians are susceptible to the pulls of the world of form. We love to observe, measure, test, quantify, compare –– and judge. The engineer / musician who is too firmly rooted in the world of form, one whose self identity is experienced through form-attachment, is at risk of missing the truth of inner knowing.
A concrete example –– the subtle background hiss produced by N.O.W.’s speakers.
Because N.O.W. is an electronic audio system it is subject to the form-limitations encountered in all audio systems. In particular, there is an inherent “noise floor” of all audio systems that can be observed upon close aural inspection.
A music system, whether an mp3 app on your phone or a vinyl disc on a record player, always has a noise floor. But the noise floor is usually not noticed because the music is of sufficient volume to “mask” the lower level noise floor.
N.O.W. is a bit different. The New Origin Waveform tones in N.O.W. have great dynamic range from loud to soft tones –– with many soft tones extending for a long period of time. As a result, N.O.W. does not have as much “masking energy” as music that has more sustained, higher volume content. The noise floor of the N.O.W. system can be heard if one brings one’s attention to this aspect of N.O.W.
When I was inventing N.O.W. (doing the “reduction to engineering practice” it’s called) I was cognizant of the noise floor of the system, and worked hard to make the noise floor as low as possible But I did not let my observation of the inherent noise floor of the system prevent me from being able to use N.O.W. in a way that moves beyond objective observation to pure Knowing –– to allow N.O.W. to reach me and activate my intuitive Knowing.
In other words, I observed the limitations of the N.O.W. form-objects (the speakers) but did not get hung up (as engineers and musicians are wont to do) with this limitation. The limitation of self noise was noted, and moved beyond, to Trust that N.O.W. was coming into the world as perfect as form-limitations would allow, and to Trust that N.O.W. had plenty to teach –– if I would become still enough to hear this wordless teacher of peace and allow intuitive knowing to arise.
We could say that N.O.W. suggests we should be as interested in our reactions to the world of form (people, place, things and thoughts) as those forms that cause us to react. In the N.O.W. noise floor example above … my reaction to the “imperfection” of N.O.W.’s noise, was as interesting to me (eventually more so) as the noise itself. This shift of awareness, from object awareness, to “awareness of awareness”, is the awakening of consciousness from the slumber of form identification, to pure “I AM” consciousness.
This is a rather significant development in an individual’s life, and by extension, the life of the plant. This is the development of an awareness that consciousness just IS. That we need not experience the world only through problematic thought constructs and the suffering that arises from them –– “This N.O.W. system has a hiss, this hiss annoys me, it is not perfect, this makes me suffer because, as an engineer, I cannot tolerate imperfection”.
You don’t have to be an engineer or musician to experience the transcendence of “imperfection” with N.O.W.
We here at solu have noticed that some first-time listeners to N.O.W., (particularly at somewhat noisy public events) have commented that they wished the background noise was lower so they could hear the N.O.W. tones better. What they will soon come to realize though is that N.O.W. can simply be accepted as it is, in each moment it is heard. One can be the observing consciousness that is thinking the thought “I wish the background noise was lower so I could hear these nice tones better”).
With repeated use of N.O.W., self-observation of the mind’s activity becomes the default mode. As this consciousness becomes awakened, with it, comes greater insight –– and awareness of intuitive Knowing beyond the word-forms that arise from analysis and judgment.
We could say that this is type of healing of separation that proceeds without the help of words or talk therapy. I feel this as a type of wordless prayer, experienced in the heart, but extending outward as radiant love.
Why not be intuitive if it feels like love? N.O.W. frees one from the shackles of words –– words that are twice removed from truth –– because they are but symbols describing other symbols.