THE VEDANTIC WAY
by Lex Hixon

LEX HIXON
1942-1995

Lex sent Mighty Companions this beautiful credo, which was drawn for a Vedanta group in Woodstock, New York, as a model for a group in Los Angeles. We gathered for an evening facilitated by Lex. The transcript of that evening was something Lex edited and hoped to get published, before his illness precluded the effort.

This is a free association of persons sensing, exploring, and realizing non-duality: indivisible consciousness, timeless awareness. We are non-commercial and non-formulatable.

Our base is in the revelatory teaching of the ancient Upanishads of India, the Vedanta, the final goal of the Veda, or cosmic science. Vedanta is the final goal of all knowledge, be it sacred or secular. Vedanta is the cessation of the appearance of separation between knower and known, between subject and object. Vedanta is the teaching of non-duality: indivisible consciousness, timeless awareness.

Our motto at Vedantic Light is the ancient Sanskrit phrase om tas sat: Pure Being is the only Reality. This truth can be experienced as the timeless syllable, om, which appears in Sanskrit letters as the logo of Vedantic Light.

All religions and cultures contain subtle reference to non-duality, which is always the core nature of Reality, but Hindu Vedanta and Buddhist Mahayana present detailed teachings on non-duality and powerful methods to awaken to it. We therefore informally accept these two noble traditions from ancient India as our basic guidance. The teaching of non-duality, radical as it may seem ev3en to the modern mind, is not new but perennial.

We at Vedantic Light respect all persons and their unique religious and philosophical approaches, but we are committed to the non-duality which we call the open space beyond religion, beyond philosophy, beyond personality, beyond consensus thinking. This open space is indivisible and non-perspectival. Mahayanists call it shunya, empty; Vedantists call it purna, complete.

Various musicians, artists, dancers, and poets perform their work at Vedantic Light, but the core of our presentation is offered by the non-dualistic philosophers and practitioners of Vedanta and Mahayana, predominantly Americans who have received authentic spiritual transmissions from the ancient East. Of course, we do not accept any basic distinction of East and West, ancient and modern. Non-duality is a timeless teaching that fits all cultures, all historical periods, all persons, all spheres of Being. We do not distinguish between beginners and advanced practitioners.

Occasionally, we present sacred ceremonies from various traditions, but these and all other events at Vedantic Light are presented to be understood in the light of non-duality -- pure consciousness appreciating pure consciousness, non-dual awareness pouring into non-dual awareness.

We accept all metaphors only to eventually annul all metaphors, rescinding all pictures, maps, esoteric teachings. This is not an intellectual exercise but a direct experience, ending in complete satisfaction, not in nihilism or annihilation. We view this traditional process of removing metaphors, including the metaphor of a limited individual observer, as gentle and compassionate. It is free from the arrogance of iconoclasm. It is healing as well as illuminating. It does not involve itself in claims and counterclaims.

We think that non-duality will be the leading principle of the emerging global civilization. We experience non-duality as a practical and loving way of life, open to everyone without restriction, regardless of astrological configuration of temperament.

Although Vedantic Light is not an organization, tax-exempt or otherwise, we applaud all organizations, sacred or secular, which are attempting to help, educate and inspire. We raise no money for Vedantic Light. We have no projects. We aspire to experience the completeness at the core of consciousness and to think and act only out of that completeness, that non-duality. This is our concrete contribution to the human and animal community.

We at Vedantic Light are not waiting, with hope or with fear, for some future evolution of humanity or progress of history, for we know without doubt that the essential completeness, or freedom, longed for by all conscious beings, always exists here and now. Regardless of perceived suffering, there is spiritual plentitude right before our eyes, not only for some elite but for the people as a whole, for conscious life as a whole. We consider this to be an egalitarian and ecological attitude.

May circles of persons from all walks of life who are committed to the realization of non-duality spring up everywhere in the modern world. May non-dual celebration prevail!