Welcome to the Art of Conscious Living. Today I have back as my guest Tobin Giblin. I’m so very pleased to have him to talk about what he’s been doing since I last seen him and what he’s about to be doing in the near future here. Tobin, how are you today? Doing really, really well, Victoria.

It’s great to see you again. Thank you for coming here today on such short notice. . So what have you been doing and how has your work been progressing? And Well, it’s been an incredibly, incredibly rich time lately.

I have just closed up shop here in San Rafael and I’m sort of launching out into a new chapter of my journey. And so had probably the most special gathering of my life. It was, 20 or 30 of my closest friends and we all kind of did like a wake, although I was, it was like, as if I had died. So the, the love and the inspiration in that group of people just has been wind under my wings and I’m just sort of setting off on a new, new, part of my journey. So when you say awake, it was a celebration of It was a celebration of, one life within my lifetime.

It was kind of like, as if I had died, what everybody would bring and say in the spirit that they would kinda come with and it was like a full hearted, amazing celebration of the life I’ve lived and, and just to kind of inspire me forward to really go with, the, the spirit that I’m kind of saying yes to at this point in my life is to really just let spirit take me where it wants, to kinda like lean back into the currents of life and see where I’m most meant to be and most meant to serve and most meant to express this that we’re that we’re sharing here today and talking about when we do. And that makes me think about what we were talking about last time, that it’s not really a planning thing that you do, that you live in the presence and you live in the awareness of what is happening in the now, That’s right. And that now leads into the future. So there’s no actually analytical great moments of thinking about it or stressing about it or worrying about it or having to do. It’s basically just letting go and allowing it to talk to you.

That’s exactly right. How you’re gonna be proceeding forward. That’s exactly it. And, to listen right now, the refinement of my process is more about listening to that guidance and being able to follow it. And it just, it starts to become a very fluid, river like existence.

Everything just, you know, inner, outer, it all becomes one, almost liquid, I call it the lubricious magic of life. It’s just, it’s always flowing, it’s always appearing and disappearing, and, and it just seems to have a more and more beautiful and magical quality the more you do release or let go in the way you were describing. I call it letting be. It’s just, it’s just letting be. And as you, as you be this space of letting be, the, the magic just rolls on and unfolds and reveals itself and seems to have an intelligence that’s way beyond at least my little planning, figuring out mind.

So there’s a, there’s a, there’s a divine magic and beauty to the unfoldment, and, so I’ve just been saying yes to this in deeper and deeper ways, And then, it all just, just like this moment, it becomes just filled with that bright, beautiful spark of possibility of possibility of divinity, of life, and then you just watch. And it always does something new, you know. It always takes you to exactly where you’re meant to be. I know you have a lot of gathering, different groups of people, but have you worked with the workforce of corporations and businesses? No.

I haven’t entered into that yet. I am I’m open to it if that’s what comes my way. I have a few friends who are kind of venturing out in that realm and they seem to enjoy it and be able to, do good work there. And I haven’t I just haven’t entered that realm yet. But your thinking and your way would be so different and opposed to the way that it’s structured right now.

Yeah. So how do you think that It would be pretty radical. It would be radical. Yes. To say the least.

But do you think it would be more productive, as productive, or what would you feel It depends on how you define the word productive. Yes. Let’s define this word then. It would be much more productive if we define productive as bringing about, the qualities of goodness of your true nature. If you, if you really value joy, if you value, a kind of, inner harmony, a kind of, flow, a kind of goodness that just in just saturates every cell and makes you feel like, wow, I’m so glad I’m on planet Earth, then yes, it would increase productivity thousand fold.

But in terms of, you know, profits, I’m not sure. That would be that would remain to be seen. We’d need to do some experiments. Most likely, it would it would bring the right amount of money for that company where it would be sustainable for the long run. .

That’s what tends to happen when you release into this way of being is that things become much more harmonious and stable for the long run. So you might not get it’s kind of like if you’re pumping hormones into a plant. It might look good for the first year or two, you know, if you had rose bushes and you were pumping it full of like really intense stuff. It might look great for a little while. It might look better than the plant that you’re just using organic soil with, But in ten years, twenty years, thirty years, fifty years, a hundred years, this plant is gonna look much, much more robust and have, you know, produce much more for the world around it in the long run.

So it’s kind of like that that would probably be maximized. I’ve heard a saying, you’re calling it sacred comrades. Yes. And in sacred comrades, it’s about bringing spirit there and productivity and profit, of course. Right.

But doing it with awareness, doing it with that there is consciousness to it and there’s accountability to it Yes. Opposed to basically going in and raping the land and deforesting the land and don’t care. Yeah. It’s about a level of consciousness. Yeah.

It’s about a level of connection and intimacy with, first of all, yourself. But as soon as you become intimate with your own being, with your own self, you can’t help. That’s the doorway to intimacy with everything and everybody, including, but not limited to, our planet and nature. So you can’t help but feel completely connected, as if that were your arm. You know, you wouldn’t go around chopping off your arm to make money.

You’d, you would never do that. You know, so, or it was your family. Your closest family. You wouldn’t hurt them to make a profit. So that intimacy, the intimacy of the individual immersion in one’s own truth.

And that’s what I’m most interested in, and I think that’s why I haven’t kinda branched out to corporations and companies yet. I can see it happening. Anything’s possible. But my the main thrust of my existence and where I show up is with individuals. And that can happen in groups, but it’s really like, how do you like if I was with you, how do you, Victoria?

How do you know and fall into the recognition in a real way, in an authentic way? How do you fall into the recognition of who you really are, of what you really are, of what this life really is in its most minuscule and beautiful magic that is so possible and yet so obscured in our day to day kind of the, the veils that our conditioning puts on us. So my work has really focused on giving each person I touch that real invitation and doorway to a completely liberated way of being that, you know, you usually hear about or read about, you know, these poems by Rumi. People are inspired by them, but not many people can actually taste in a sustained way live and embody and walk around as an expression of that brightness, of that lightness and freedom. That we actually are beyond some of this momentum of our mind.

So if I, you know, I feel like even if I did walk into a company, it would be like, okay, how where does this catalyst? This is what seems to happen. This isn’t something I necessarily do, but it seems to be what happens when I walk into a room. It’s like there’s a catalytic quality of like a fire touching other people and letting them wake up to their own true nature. It sounds what you’re saying to me is that there’s a aliveness that you’re connecting with inside of yourself first, that spark of genuine goodness, a quality, that one gets in touch with inside themselves and then unites that in others and shares that with others.

Yes. It becomes almost like a, it’s like a catalytic little awakener. It just people can, oh, that’s, that’s available here too. And it is, it is all those things you said. It’s a goodness.

It’s a, it’s a light. It’s a preciousness. And in its, in its simplest expression, you know, in Buddhism they talk about emptiness. It’s the emptiness or the awakeness that we are. And so we all have the possibility.

It’s a very realistic possibility. That’s the wonderful news. That even as we walk around in, you know, this little town, San Rafael, or wherever we’re living, that you can actually know and experience and live what the Buddha talked about And in my journey, I was exposed to many teachers And many teachings And such a so. Teachers. Lots and lots of Zen teachers.

That was my first . Foray. So all the big names and the not so big names in Zen was what I first exposed myself to Then there was the spirit rock and the opening up Then there was all the gurus who kinda come in from India And who were touched by, Punjaji And, you know, all the teachers who were kind of catalyzed by him And his predecessors. Just, and then not to mention all the, you know, just the different books that are here available. And just reading all of that.

Just exposing myself. And for so many years, I had inspiration. I had so much inspiration, so much, passion for this journey, but not a lot of exposure or taste of the reality of what these teachings had to offer. And I was blessed enough to be kind of almost like taken by the hand across the bridge into this other way of being. And that was my teacher, Adyashanti.

He was the first one who really said, hey, Tobin. Enough with the theory. Enough with the practices. Enough with all That’s all great. You’re helping yourself become a better human being.

That’s all good. But here’s this other possibility here. Almost like, as if he’s sitting behind this curtain and his hand comes out and takes me behind the curtain. Wow. Oh.

Here it is. What did you see there? What did you experience? And what do you know from that point of view? That’s the million dollar question That’s a great question And that’s kinda what I’ve been trying to point to in everything I say I point to that To that mysterious, divine, almost nothing something It’s an empty something That you can’t, the mind can’t concretize You can’t put your finger on it That’s why it’s so tricky to talk about because it’s in fact, it’s impossible to put into words.

We can only kinda point to it or inspire with the words to transmit the state, the actual experience. Well, is that energy is that within us or is that out of us? That we’re trying to get to it or obtain it, or we already have it? So Very good question. Ultimately, it’s both.

Ultimately, it’s everywhere and all things at all times. But for us as human beings, on this journey to knowing this, to embodying this, to living this, to expressing it in the most authentic and pure and real way possible, this is the way, inward. We have to go in. We have to go in to find it. We have to find out who I mean, in a nutshell, it’s who am I?

What am I, really? That question taken seriously enough and deep enough, will help you help the awakening of that which you really are to occur. What am I? What really am I? So that inward, ultimately, or let’s say initially, we have to go inward to discover who we are, what we are, in essence.

Are we all different, or are we all one of the same? That we’re all sharing a common union together? Well, again, this is where we get into the mystery of things, the paradoxical nature of reality. Primarily, we’re all the same. We’re all this oneness.

We all, everyone who touches into this, this oneness will know it singularly. It’s like a singularity. It expresses itself in millions of, qualities. So you might have a different experiential overtone to that to that divinity, to that majesty, to that mysterious magic oneness. It might have a different, qualitative overtone.

That’s why you get so many teachers and so many teachings all having different emphasis. You know, one’s talking more about love. One’s talking more about, like a will, a strong perseverance quality. One’s talking about emptiness. One’s talking about, the brilliancy of things, or the Jesus Christ.

In the Yeah, the Christ love. Christ love, which was the unconditional love. In love. He was lost in love, pure love, in the bliss of unconditional love. So that expression comes out of this mystery, and it’s one of the most beautiful forms available.

So in at the essence of the essence is one mysterious singularity. I like that word. It’s a singularity. There’s no there’s not two. And yet, as one drops and becomes this, almost instantaneously, the millions of expressions, the millions of forms, of which Christ’s love is one of, and one of the most beautiful, you know?

Of which, compassion, bodhisattva like compassion is another. The pure awakeness of somebody like Ramana Maharshi just. So that’s another expression. And each soul, each individual will be expressing that, dancing with that, interacting as that in totally unique and in different ways. So it’ll be totally different as it’s coming from this one undescribable singularity.

Each time we drop down into meditation, or allow the energy of meditation to take forth, it’s filling yourself up with the divinity of the vastness of consciousness, of source energy. We it’s not only our mind trying We’re actually regenerating ourselves, rejuvenating ourselves at that moment. Ultimately, in its best form. I mean, meditation is a million things.

Everybody who’s doing meditation might be doing a slightly different thing. There’s so many forms of it. But the But essentially, they have one thing in common is there it’s the letting go of the mind Yes. The mind that thinks it’s running the show, knows all. Exactly.

It’s completely relinquishing that That’s right. And filling up with this what you’re the undescribable, which is the sense of the What you are. Quietness inside Yes. The the authenticness, The being ness of who we are. That’s it.

That’s it. Which is not coming from the concept of who we think we are. That’s exactly right. It’s coming from another place of just being. Being.

Yes. Of the being ness. And that’s what we actually are. Yeah. So the way you’re pointing it out, that’s perfect.

Because this, in all of our spirituality, in all of our endeavor as spiritual beings, to wake up, to transform, to be liberated, to, put, you know, whatever the words are. Everybody’s aspiring and working for some kind of shift. But ultimately, it boils down to these two levels. One, the mind level. The separate sense of self.

The false me. The conditioning. The mind that just thinks and, you know, plans and frets and worries and wonders and selves. It’s the self. It’s me.

And it’s so, so powerful, and it creates like a fog, basically. So, yes, meditation in its essence is dropping below that, seeing beyond that, relaxing out of that, and to and just, you don’t even you’re not doing it, but you’re just stopping what you have been doing. And what is naturally available is what you actually are, which is all these things. You just said them so perfectly. Silence, quiet, brightness, beauty, compassion.

I mean, just alive, just that purest aliveness is what we are as our beauty ness. It’s quite beautiful, but it expresses itself in many different ways, many different flavors. So one of the things in this in this path is to get very clear, a very clear distinction on the difference between this sense of self and its kind of familiar expression, its familiar sense of, a kind of agitation usually, kind of kind of nause. Even in its best moments, it has a, its vibration is one of, agitation. And so you start to realize, oh, that’s what I think I am.

It’s what I believed I am from very early on. You start to realize, wow, maybe that’s not the whole picture. And maybe that’s actually masquerading for something that more, much more authentic, much more mysterious and real. And that becomes the journey. Sorry.

Go ahead. So we are not our thoughts only, we are not only of our nervous system, we are not only of our sum total of all of the different parts of our body that may be working properly or not working properly. That’s exactly right. We are something that is un describable, but yet very profound. That’s right.

That’s for sure. And when we push away all of the obvious, and acknowledge that and drop down into the quietness of that, we start to get a taste of that. Yes. Yes. And that’s the doorway.

Yeah. That’s the doorway. That’s what I was talking about when metaphorically Adia’s hand came out of that black mystery and that’s the doorway, then that can actually deepen and further and take over in a way that it’s not just an experience, but it’s a lived, for lack of a better word, it’s a lived knowing. It’s a lived way of and it’s not a knowing in the mind, but it’s just a it’s kind of like the sun emanates rays. It can’t help but do that.

So once we’ve had a direct experience and know ourselves for what we really are, once we can actually inhabit that more and more, it just shows as a radiance. It just becomes a radiance that we walk around as in our life. And that’s quite a process to embody that deeper and deeper, more and more. So that’s kind of where you’re residing and living and walking and talking from. But that’s the possibility and that’s kind of what my work with people and groups is about.

Kinda what my existence seems to be more and more about, just living that. And again, not with a plan or an agenda or a doing or an idea that this is what I’m supposed to do and let’s go fix everybody. There’s none of that runs anymore. It’s just kind of like I walk around, and that’s what makes sense. Kinda like, oh, I’m go get a meal three times a day.

It’s just obvious to do so. That’s kind of how it is with this, with this other movement. It just happens more and more. So there’s a quietness with it, with great awareness always. Oh, I love I love your words. Yes. You’re walking with great awareness and a lot of attention to the process. Yeah. It’s it may be And it’s a word would be witnessing. The witnessing.

Yes. That’s good. Because it’s intention is a tricky word because it can so easily slip into that agenda of intention. I have an intention, but it slid into now there’s an agenda. There’s a right way versus a wrong way, and I’m gonna go do it.

You know? But this is this is completely absent of that, as if something washed through, like a like a cleansing ocean wave just washes through, and it and it just dissolves the very fabric of your the part of your body that would that would even do those agendas just gets somehow just cleansed out of the system. And then you’re like, oh, here I am. And yet, then, just like you take a breath, it’s just obvious to do that. Oh, now I’m hungry.

It’s obvious to do that. It’s not because I should, and it’s right, and I wanna impose that on the world. It just makes the most sense. And so then, movement occurs along those lines, and it’s quite beautiful. It just and it becomes a dance. And the weird thing is, as much as there’s this human man body guy doing these things with others, At the same time, the most prevalent experience is that there’s not two things. There’s not two people. And that’s that becomes the prevalent experience, and you’re just kind of left in a kind of awe and wonder, and it just kind of makes you smile with glee at the weirdness and magic of it all. Like, and that’s how that just starts to just be kind of this mysterious flow. Very beautiful.

Yeah. So lot of chaos and a lot of stress. Yes. Yes. That’s a good way of saying it, the antidote.

It’s the opposite of what I mean, if you look at it closely, our culture and all the people in it are just expressions of this separate sense of self, kind of going at its extreme, pace. It’s like machinery that’s just kind of working. That’s what causes that. If you could just boil it down to one thing that causes all the suffering, all the pain. Not just physical pain, because that’s a different thing, but the kind of emotional pain, the strife, the struggle, the sense of, gosh, life just doesn’t feel right.

It hurts. It sucks. It’s not good. Relationship dramas, you know, work, all that. It all boils down to that little momentum usually resides right around here in our brain called the me.

Well, Tobin, it’s been an absolute pleasure speaking with you. Do you have any final thoughts that you’d like to share that really comes up from your heart that Thank you. You would like to share with others. Let’s see. Well, I’m remembering our last conversation, and to put it connect it with this one, there’s really a desire to express to each individual, the, the beautiful opportunity, and the realistic opportunity that’s available to each and every person who really wants to know something other than that.

That cycle of me, of separation, of suffering, of whatever you wanna call it. That there is a even people who’ve done so many years of spirituality, that with an authentic aspiration, there’s a there’s a there’s a little hidden doorway. There’s a trap door in it all that we can find our way into and through, and that we can live in a completely different existence. So, I just wanna kind of put out the possibility and the inspiration from that deeper, more authentic place. Because for me, in my journey, it was usually one or the other.

It was so authentic and true that it was out of reach. Or it was so inspiring and wonderful that it didn’t actually have the transformative power that created a sustained shift in my existence. And what I’m here, I think, embodying this feels like as I recollect over our two conversations, it feels like what I’m kind of most expressing is that those two can go together. That deep, authentic, deepest, deepest spiritual truth, and that inspired aspiration and sense of possibility of the heart can come together for any person who really wants it to bring about a completely transformed life, one that’s very, very worth it. Thank you.