About this episode
Eli Jaxon-Bear was born Elliot J. Zeldow in Brooklyn, New York, in 1947. His eighteen-year spiritual path started in 1971, when he was a federal fugitive during the Vietnam war. In 1978, Kalu Rinpoche appointed him the president of the first Kagyu dharma center in Marin County. In 1982, he was presented with a Zen Teaching Fan at ChoShoJi Zen Temple in Japan. After a search took him around the world and into many traditions and practices, his path and his search ended when he was pulled to India in 1990, where he met his final teacher, Sri H.W.L. Poonja. Confirming Eli's realization, his teacher sent him back into the world to share his unique psychological insights into the nature of egoic suffering in support of self-realization. Eli infuses the teaching with his teacher’s living transmission of silence. He presents a unique map of egoic identification as a vehicle for ruthless self-inquiry and final realization of true freedom. He dedicates his life to passing on the transmission of his teacher. Eli currently meets people and teaches through the Leela Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to world peace and freedom through universal self-realization. He is the author of Sudden Awakening into Direct Realization, (New World Library), The Enneagram of Liberation: From Fixation to Freedom, (Gangaji Foundation Press), and he is the editor of Wake Up and Roar: Satsang with H.W.L. Poonja, (Sounds True). Transcript of this interview Interview recorded 4/14/2013 First BatGap interview with Eli. YouTube Video Chapters: 00:00:00 - Introduction to the Interview with Eli Jaxon-Bear 00:04:20 - The One Cosmic Being 00:06:49 - Lovemaking and the Mystery of Consciousness 00:09:21 - The Truth of Self-Identification 00:11:21 - The All-Pervading Intelligence 00:13:34 - The Consciousness Before the Big Bang 00:16:15 - Being Present Before Perception 00:18:39 - The Permanent Realization 00:20:58 - Using Crisis to See Deeper 00:23:14 - The Capacity of Emotions 00:25:33 - The Fall of the Roshi 00:27:40 - Spiritual Names and Practices 00:29:49 - The Usefulness of Spiritual Practices 00:32:02 - Dissolving the Ego and Individuality through Meditation 00:34:22 - Finding the Balance Between Enlightenment and Normal Life 00:36:53 - The Middle Way and the Eightfold Path 00:39:03 - Trusting the Universe's Support for Awakening 00:41:11 - Letting Go and Letting God 00:44:04 - The Wounding of the Egoic Shell 00:47:06 - The Insanity of the Ego 00:49:48 - The Search for Truth 00:51:37 - The Mystery of Traveling 00:53:46 - The Significance of Devotion and Higher Beings 00:56:24 - Meeting Siva at the Banks of the Ganga 00:59:00 - The Importance of a Final Teacher 01:00:59 - The Psychedelic Experience and Ayahuasca 01:02:41 - LSD and Awakening 01:04:47 - The Mystery of Freedom and Love 01:06:45 - People Waking Up 01:08:22 - A Global Awakening 01:10:13 - Introduction to batgap.com