The Online Gatherings has been considering what we’ve described as ‘complementary understandings’ of what practice instructions offer us. On the one hand, there’s an understanding characterized by stepping stones. The instructions are stepping stones, one to the next, leading, if you will, to a final destination or a ‘full practice.’

The second understanding is a more portal-oriented approach. In this view, each instruction is a portal into a world unto itself, into the experience that lies within, beneath, and behind the words that form the particular instruction. So “slow down” becomes not just a stepping stone to “surrender,” but also a gateway into a world of experience, exploration, and curiosity.

One question raised by this portal approach is how we discern movement from one instruction to the next. How do we know when it is appropriate to move on? How do we recognize when our experience has shifted and a different aspect of experience has come to the fore?

There are three ways this can happen. First, we can simply follow the instructions. Someone – a recording or a guide – may say, “Slow down. Surrender. Settle,” and we move along with those instructions.

Second, we can shift when it feels right to us. We sense it is appropriate to move from “slow down” to “surrender” and simply do so.

Third, we can trust and respect moments of insight, moments of transpersonal knowing. We can trust those moments when a sense of knowing arises from beyond ourselves, suggesting “slow down” has become “surrender,” and “surrender” has become “settle.” In more traditional terminology, we can trust the arising of the prajnaparamita in our practice. This then becomes a launch pad for beginning to trust transpersonal knowing, the prajnaparamita in our lives.

Each of these three approaches has its place. They are complementary in the same way the two understandings of practice instructions are complementary. No one approach takes precedence over the others. They all have value in different circumstances.

These, then, are three ways we can discern movement from one instruction to the next, from one aspect of our human experience to another, when we are exploring in a portal-oriented way: follow the instructions, shift when it feels right, and trust and respect the arising of transpersonal knowing – the prajnaparamita – in our practice, and perhaps, occasionally, in our lives.