Beyond the Mind | Expanding into Inner Peace and Self-Realization

In this episode of the Deepening the Stillness podcast titled “Beyond the Mind: Expanding into Inner Peace and Self-Realization,” host Anandi Sano explores the profound journey of spiritual growth. This episode invites listeners to delve into the space beyond the mind, emphasizing the importance of remembering intrinsic knowledge rather than acquiring new information. Anandi discusses the transformative experience of observing oneself from a detached yet deeply connected state, and the importance of relinquishing the mind’s need for control to facilitate spiritual growth. Listeners are guided through the complexities of surrendering control to access a deeper state of stillness and understanding, highlighting the ongoing nature of spiritual journeys. The episode concludes with an encouragement to integrate stillness into everyday life, fostering harmonious existence and enhancing relationships. 

Timestamps

00:00 Journey within to remember your spiritual truth.

03:57 Observer merges with the observed, experiencing expansiveness.

07:38 Self-realization: surrendering the mind’s need to understand.

14:55 Surrendering deeply, not control, enables expansion.

18:30 Infinite journey into deeper peace and expansiveness.

20:53 Feeling distant brings closeness to true essence.

24:12 Guide students to realize inner peace, expansiveness.

29:34 Peace enables deeper spiritual growth and creativity.

31:58 Surrender brings profound and lasting inner peace.

34:40 Alignment brings clarity, balance, freedom, and flow.

39:59 Mind becomes supportive, aligning with self.

42:09 Presence transforms experiences and relationships positively.

44:28 Trust journey, explore stillness, deepen through Sano

Summary or Key Takeaways:

Intrinsic Knowledge: Focus on remembering and reconnecting with inherent wisdom rather than learning new concepts.

Self-Observation: Embrace the experience of observing oneself from a detached but deeply connected perspective to facilitate spiritual growth.

Releasing Control: Understand and practice letting go of the mind’s need to control in order to access deeper consciousness.

Surrender: Embrace the beauty and challenges of surrendering control as a key aspect of spiritual evolution.

Ongoing Journey: Recognize that spiritual growth is an ongoing process requiring continual surrender and openness.

Supportive Mind: Aim to shift the mind’s role from a controlling force to a supportive partner in the spiritual journey. 

Integration of Stillness: Incorporate moments of stillness into everyday life to create a harmonious existence and improve relationships and interactions. 

Sano Method and Academy: Explore methods and educational programs like those offered by Sano to deepen spiritual practice and self-realization. 

Transcript

Welcome to the podcast, and welcome to this episode. Let’s just settle into a moment of stillness, a space where we step beyond the mind, our reality, beyond what we think we know, and enter the profound depth of what truly is. Today, I want to invite you to walk with me. Not to learn something new, but to remember what you already know deep within yourself. I know that so many of you have walked a spiritual path for years. Some of you, decades, some of you, like me, have had the yearning since we were a child. And so many of you have explored teachings and books and practices and different traditions. And yet, for many of you, and for many of my students, there’s a sense of reaching a plateau.

There’s that longing to go beyond what you can describe and to move deeper into the silence and stillness where your mind cannot follow you. And it’s silent, and your reality changes. And so in this episode, I want to explore the space beyond the mind’s grasp, the expansiveness that opens up when we step back from the body, the reality, and we watch ourselves. We witness ourselves from that still, quiet place within. And it’s a sensation many of you, I’m sure, have experienced. You know, that feeling of being further back and detached, in a sense, from the body. But it’s not being disconnected. It’s as though you observe life from a distance, and yet you’re more present than you’ve ever been before. This is an experience of depth, one that many can feel, but few can fully comprehend.

But it does come, and today we’ll go beyond the initial taste and understanding of this expansiveness. And I want to talk about the uncharted depth that await you, beyond the limitations of what you know and what you understand. And many of you have, have felt it, you know, the sensation of stepping back, in a sense, from your own body, and of watching yourself from what feels like a distance. Or you are just at your back, or just behind your back. You’re there, and yet you’re not. You might feel like an observer, you know, watching the breath come and go. You’re watching the thoughts rise and fall. You’re looking at your hands, and you’re marveling at the sheer brilliance of, you know, the design of the human vessel.

But here’s the subtle beauty of it all. The more that you dwell in the space, the more you begin to realize that the one who’s observing or watching is not separate from what is observed. And I’ll talk about that in another episode where it all melds and you don’t become the observer anymore. And you don’t become the awareness anymore. And so when you start to experience that subtle beauty, there’s an expansiveness that opens up a quiet sense that you’re far beyond the body, the mind, and what you know and what you understand. And this feeling of expansiveness is the beginning of something deeper. And I think that’s really important for people to understand. And it’s not just the mind pulling away.

It’s a shift in consciousness. You’re not just watching the body. You’re watching from a space that has no limits, no boundaries. And the more you rest there, the more you start to understand that what you’re feeling is the edge of something far greater. It’s the edge of something far greater. It is not it. It is the edge. It’s the next step. And this is where the mind tries to understand, to grasp, and that’s where we find resistance. And I think all of you will probably understand when I say the word resistance. The mind has always been our tool for navigating this world. But when you step into the vastness of who you are, the mind reaches a point where it simply cannot follow. And that takes a while.

And for many of you, this is where frustration arises. You know, you’ve read the books and you’ve practiced techniques, and you’ve meditated for hours, and you’ve done so many different things. But the mind keeps trying to grab hold of what you’re experiencing, trying to make sense of something it just cannot understand. And that’s the key. The mind’s limitation is the gateway to something far more profound. It is at this very point, this threshold, where the deep work begins. And it’s here in that space that you can be guided. You can be guided into the silence beyond thought, into the stillness that moves you beyond the mind. And it allows the releasing of the control of the mind.

Now let’s talk about the space where the mind struggles. For so many of you, the experience of touching that stillness is both exhilarating, and it’s also really bewildering. You’re stepping into something vast, yet there’s a part of you that remains bound, tethered, trying to make sense of it. And that’s actually the beauty of this stage in your journey, the realization that you cannot understand this depth with the same mind that has always sought to control, to categorize, and to name everything. And in this space where you feel that like a gentle tug, that attempt to intellectualize what you’re experiencing is where the shift begins.

And many think that self realization is about a great understanding about having an epiphany, but it’s not. It’s about knowing that the mind can’t understand and letting go of that need. When you feel yourself stepping back, in a sense, from the body, that’s the beginning of surrender and acceptance. And it’s a release from identification with your perceived reality, with the physical form, with the thoughts that continuously arise and then pass through. But it’s not detachment in the sense of pushing things away. We’re not pushing anything’s away. It’s more like a merging with something so much greater, so much larger. You may have noticed that as you go deeper, the body starts to feel light and in a sense, almost irrelevant, as it’s no longer the center of your awareness.

And this isn’t dissociation. This is expansion. You’re touching the edge of something boundless. And the boundaries of your physical vessel, your physical form, are starting to dissolve into it. And this experience, when you allow it to unfold without the mind’s need to control or interference, it would lead to the realization that you’ve always been more than this body and more than your mind. And yet here is where I see so many get stuck. And the mind battles to pull you back, to tell you it’s impossible or that it’s only a temporary state. And then the mind will create stories. You’ll have thoughts, you’ll have ideas, even doubts. And it will do that to try and pull you into its grasp again.

And this is where the real journey begins, allowing yourself to move past the mind’s attempts to reclaim control and resting in the stillness beyond it. And that’s what I do with my work, which is not about meditation or breath work or all the other practices that are out there is we work on a different level, energetically, to move beyond that, to start shifting the mind out of its state through an energetic process. And when we do that, it’s here that the depth of stillness becomes your anchor. Not your thoughts, not your breath, but the stillness itself. And so when the layers of self, the energetic layers of self, become empty, they have no energetic components in it. It allows for space.

And remember that the mind is the representation of what’s going on within the layers of self, the energetic components. If that is all unanchored and creating lower vibration and frequency, the mind expresses that, right? So it then tries to control. Whereas as we release that, the mind quietens. And so we’re teaching our whole mind and body a new reality. I know many of you have touched this place and then felt it slip away. You come out of meditation, or you finish a deep session, and immediately or a little while later, the world pulls you back.

The noise of life, the distractions, the demands. They call you back into the mind’s chatter. But the real practice is carrying that stillness with you, learning to live from that space, to let it color every aspect of your being. And that’s what I focus on when I work with my students within the work that I do. We cultivate this stillness through energetic practices, to expand it and to live in it. And this is how we go deeper. And then each moment in stillness builds upon the last. And it allows you to move through different layers of consciousness, through the ego’s need to understand and into the space of direct experience. It’s not something that can be explained. It has to be felt.

And each time you step into this, the state becomes more natural, more permanent, and more part of who you are. So I want to take you even further in this exploration because I know this is where some of you already stand. And you’re at the edge of something so profound. And you’ve had glimpses of stillness, of expansiveness. Perhaps you’ve even experienced moments where the body feels distant and the mind can’t quite grasp what’s unfolding. But the truth is, these moments are only the beginning. And it’s important to understand that it’s not about adding more techniques or forcing anything to happen.

Yes, we need practices and techniques to allow ourselves to go deeper, to allow ourselves to expand more, to allow ourselves to become more empty. But at some point, we need to understand that. It’s about surrendering more fully. And this is where I find many people hesitate because surrender feels like losing control. But the control we think we have is just the mind’s illusion, real surrender, which brings about deep states of gentleness as well. The kind that takes you into the deepest states of stillness isn’t about giving up, it’s about opening up. And it’s here in this openness where you truly begin to experience life from a different place.

It’s no longer about trying to understand the experience, but about being in it fully. You’ll notice that as you move deeper, the boundaries between yourself and the world around you start to blur. The sense of I me, who I am begins to fade. And instead there’s a feeling of unity, a oneness with everything that exists. And this isn’t just a concept. It’s a lived reality. And it’s something that can only be felt when the body and mind quiets and stops trying to grasp. Now, for many of you, you’ve read about these experiences in books or heard them described and possibly even had experiences yourself. But there’s a difference between knowing about something intellectually and experiencing it for yourself.

And this is why we practice. This is why we have techniques and a community and teachings, why people come together to cultivate that stillness, to create the space for these deeper experiences to emerge. And it’s about moving beyond the surface and stepping into a profound depth that’s always been there, and it’s always been waiting for you. And the beautiful part is this depth is limitless. There’s always more to discover. Every time you touch it, you open yourself to more stillness, more peace, more expansiveness. It’s a journey that never ends, because the deeper you go, the more you realize that there is no end to it. It’s infinite. And that’s what makes this path so extraordinary. You know?

And I hear so many people talk about, I am there. And I think it’s really important for students who are looking for a practice to realize that it never stops, it never ends. And to just be wary when you hear those words, when someone has said to you that they have arrived, because it’s not arriving anywhere, you then go deeper, and it goes deeper and deeper, deeper. And what I also need you to understand is that what you’re experiencing as you start moving into these states is not just a detachment from the body or the mind. It’s not an escape from life or reality. In fact, it’s the opposite.

It’s stepping into the truest, most real version of yourself. And remember, you’re not losing anything. You’re gaining everything. And there’s this misconception in, I think, a lot of spiritual practice that these deep states of stillness and expansiveness are about leaving the world behind. But I’m here to tell you that the more you surrender into stillness, the more connected you actually become, not just to yourself, but to the people around you, to life itself. And this is the the paradox of the spiritual journey. In a sense, in the moments when you feel furthest from the ordinary, you are, in fact, closer to the essence of everything. And you may have noticed that as you deepen your practice, the stillness becomes more familiar.

And you might find it easy to touch that space where everything becomes silent, the mind quiets, where the body feels light, where you feel as though you’re observing everything from a distance, yet in the same moment, feeling more present than ever. It’s in these moments that you’re starting to see beyond the illusion of everything of separation. And this is where the mind often struggles. You know, it’s so accustomed to defining everything, categorizing every experience, trying to make sense of what’s happening, trying to measure its milestones. Are we good enough? Are we there yet?

Oh, I’ve reached that milestone. But the depth we’re talking about, these profound states of stillness, they don’t fit neatly into any category. They’re totally beyond thought, beyond words, beyond explanation. And that’s why the mind finds it so difficult to grasp. But that’s okay. You don’t need to understand any of this intellectually. You just need to experience it. In these moments of stillness, you’re not thinking about being still. You’re not thinking about the body or the breath or anything at all. Everything simply is. The mind. Your reality, in its confusion, may try to label it as detachment or disconnection, but it’s actually a form of deep integration. You’re integrating the truth of who you are at the deepest level.

And then this is where the shift begins. It’s not just about experiencing stillness for a few moments during practice. That’s not what we want to do. It’s about allowing that stillness to flow into every part of your life. And then how do you bring this peace into your relationships, into your work, into your everyday moments? This is where the real transformation happens, when the boundaries between practice and life dissolves and you realize that they’re actually one and the same. Again, this is what I guide my students towards. Not just a moment of stillness, but a life that is infused with this depth, with this peace, the stillness, with this expansiveness. It’s not something you have to work for. Yes, we have to allow the expansion to occur, but you need to realize that it’s already there. It’s waiting for you to notice it.

We just have to remove the rubble, in a sense, so that we can access it. Now let’s move a little bit deeper into what happens when the mind finally stops fighting. And I know for many of you, there’s a sense of relief when this happens, almost as if you’ve been holding your breath. And now, finally, you can exhale. In the early stages of your spiritual journey, the mind is usually the loudest part of your experience. It wants to label, to define, to understand. But as you move further, as you sit in the stillness longer, something shifts. The mind begins to realize that there’s nothing to fight. It starts to settle. And this is one of the most beautiful moments. It’s as though the mind, once a constant companion of chatter, begins to soften, to quieten, to accept that it doesn’t need to grasp at everything anymore. And the big thing,

I think, is that it learns that it can rest. And in that resting, it becomes a partner, not a combatant. It becomes an ally in your spiritual growth. And that’s what I found so utterly fascinating on my journey. As that started to change and the mind softened and walked with, in a sense. And so what does this look like? And imagine the mind as a wave. In the beginning, it’s crashing against the shore. It’s fighting to control, to make sense of the ocean. But as you go deeper, as your layers become more empty and your body becomes more empty, and the energy starts flowing in a different way throughout you, the wave begins to merge with the sea. It’s no longer separate.

The mind and the body wants restless and contracted, becomes fluid, part of the greater whole, and it flows with a deeper awareness instead of fighting against everything. And when this happens, your experience of yourself and reality and stillness changes profoundly. And no longer are you in constant battle with your thoughts or even in battle with your body, your nervous system. Instead, the mind becomes a companion that supports your journey. It’s then like walking beside a friend. There’s no longer a need to lead or pull or fight against you, just walk together. And then in this state, the mind can observe without judging. It can allow experiences to pass without needing to analyze them. And as the layers become more and more empty, there’s nothing in the layers that are triggered anymore.

So the mind can observe without judging, without responding, without needing to create a story because of past events, it can allow experiences to pass without needing to analyse them. And then this is where the partnership begins. And it is a partnership. The mind becomes a tool, but it’s no longer the master. It follows the direction of your deeper awareness, the oneness, the divine within you, rather than trying to control it. And this is why when we talk about self realization or deeper spiritual growth, we often mention peace. Not just peace of mind, but peace with the mind, stillness of the mind, stillness of the physical vessel, it all becomes one.

It’s a space where you and the mind are no longer at odds, where the mind and the body surrenders into the vastness of who you truly are. And when everything settles, the mind settles, it becomes empty, becomes still. Something magical happens. It allows the deeper parts of your being to come forward. Creativity, the deeper intuition that is there, the inner knowing that has always been there, just beneath the surface. And it now has that space to breathe and to rise up and you’re no longer blocking these with thoughts or mental chatter or the energy, the low, vibrating energy that has been like a wall to constrict. Instead, there’s a beautiful harmony between your mind, your body, your reality, and your deeper self. And I know this is the turning point for many of my students.

It’s when the battle they fought for years, often unknowingly, finally ends. It’s when they realize that their mind, their energy, their body isn’t the enemy. It’s just being conditioned to try to protect them. And once it sees there’s no need for defense, it surrenders. It softens. It sighs with relief, in a sense. And in that surrender, it finds peace. As the mind settles into this new role, no longer the force that drives everything, but it becomes a quiet, supportive presence, a profound shift begins to take root, to take hold. And this isn’t just a momentary change. It’s not something that just is there for a fleeting moment or maybe for a few days. It ripples through every part of your being and into every, every corner of your life.

And when the mind stops its constant chatter, when your layers are empty, there’s space, space for deeper parts of you to emerge. And I describe this to my students as a feeling of expansion, where what was once tight, contained, and defined now becomes open, fluid, and boundless. And many people will say, yes, I felt that, but don’t trap yourself in that, because there is so much more. There’s such an expansiveness to be found and explored. And as we start to move into it, this is when your spiritual journey starts to move beyond understanding, an intellectual understanding, and into true knowing, beyond knowing. When the mind is no longer resisting the layers of stillness you touch, even within, you know, the Sano method or in meditation or other practices or in moments of presence, deepen I significantly.

It’s not just about experiencing stillness. It’s about living from that place and carrying it with you throughout the day. You begin to act and speak and move from this deeper state of being. Every action, even the smallest, becomes infused with this stillness. And this is what I mean when I say that your life begins to shift profoundly. When everything settles and aligns with the depth of who you are, something so utterly beautiful happens, and you’re no longer just trying to manage life, to navigate it or make sense of it. Instead, you’re moving through life with a sense of flow, with the mind supporting rather than leading. And decisions become clearer, emotions are balanced, and the need for external validation begins to dissolve. Many of my students describe this as a profound freedom, a sense that they’re no longer being pushed and pulled by the demands of their world, their external world.

And instead, they’re finding themselves rooted in a deep inner stillness. And from that place, everything else begins to align. Of course, that doesn’t mean challenges don’t arise. But the way you respond to them changes. And your mind no longer reacts from fear or conditioning. Instead, it observes. And from that observation, a calm and clear response emerges. This is where the true power of growth lies, not in trying to control or force the mind, but in allowing it to naturally align with the deeper parts of yourself. When this happens, you stop feeling divided between the spiritual and the practical.

And then you no longer, in a sense, compartmentalizing your spiritual practice as something you do in meditation or yoga or other practices or the sinew method of peak or in moments on a retreat. Instead, your entire life becomes your practice. Everything becomes part of your journey, every conversation, every task, every thought. The mind becomes an instrument of this deeper awareness of who you are in the depth of stillness. And you start to realize that that true stillness is not just something you experience in moments of silence, but something that infuses everything you do.

nd this is key. It’s not about trying to reach a state of stillness or forcing the mind to be quiet. It’s about allowing yourself to go deeper into the layers your being. And in doing so, the mind naturally quiets. The peace you seek is already within you. It’s just a matter of allowing the space to happen for it to surface. And the deeper you go, the more profound the stillness becomes. And that’s why I talk about with my students. As the layers become more empty, there’s always more. We can always go deeper within the layers to create more space, to create more expansion and stillness. And from this stillness, you’ll begin to notice something utterly incredible. Life starts to flow in such an easy way, and there’s no more striving or pushing. You’re simply present and deeply connected to yourself and to the world around you.

As this shift in the mind deepens, so too does the way you experience life over time. The struggle, the internal conflict between the mind and your true self, it gradually fades. What takes its place is a harmony, a flow that integrates your mind, body, and self into a seamless, unified experience of living. And it’s the most incredible, incredible feeling. And I have to say, this is not something that happens overnight, and nor is it a one time event. It will unfold gradually as you continue to immerse yourself in this process. Every time you touch deeper stillness. Every time you allow the mind to become empty, your layers to become empty, something profound shifts within you, and you begin to trust this process more and more.

And the need to constantly control or manage life starts to dissolve. And one of the most beautiful aspects of this journey is that as the mind aligns with yourself, it no longer fights to understand or grasp what’s happening. And this was huge for me. Instead, it becomes a gentle companion, a supportive presence that allows you to navigate life with greater ease and clarity. And this is where the mind truly becomes the perfect partner rather than an obstacle. You start to notice that your reactions to external events change. Things that used to trigger anxiety, stress, or fear no longer hold the same power anymore, and you respond with a calmness that arises from this deep place of being.

Your mind obviously still functions. It helps you think, plan, and navigate daily life, but it no longer drives you in the way it used to. It becomes more like a tool, something you can use when needed, but not something you’re constantly at the mercy of. And this creates such a profound sense of freedom. You’re no longer bound by the mind’s limitations, its constant need for validation, or its attachment to outcomes. Instead, what you’re doing is you’re living from a place of deep inner peace and presence, where life unfolds in a very different way, without the need for force or control.

And here’s the thing. This doesn’t mean you withdraw from life or stop engaging with the world around you. Quite the opposite. Yes, there will be times when you need to, or you feel like you need to remove yourself for a while. But what happens then as you move through that? It then means you engage more fully, but from a place of peace rather than reactivity. And your relationships, your work, your interactions with others, they all start to shift. You bring this stillness, this presence into everything you do, and it transforms not only your experience, but the experience of those around you.

Many of my students report that as they continue to immerse themselves in this practice of the sunnu method of peak, they notice changes not just within themselves, but in their environment. Their energy starts to shift, and it influences those they interact with. This is the power of deepen, authentic spiritual work. It radiates outward, touching everything in your life without effort or force. So as we wrap up today’s conversation, I want to remind you of something important. This process, this journey, your path of deepening stillness and moving towards self realization and beyond. It’s not about perfection or reaching some final destination. Get that out of your mind. It’s about continual growth, continual unfolding.

Every moment you spend in stillness, every time you allow the mind to settle, you’re taking another step on this path. If you find yourself in those moments where the mind resists or struggles to understand, remember, this is part of the process. It’s totally, utterly natural. And with each step, you’re moving deeper into alignment with who you are, with the vast, with the infinite consciousness that lies beneath the surface of the mind. Allow yourself to trust this journey, to trust the wisdom that is emerging within you and know that you’re exactly where you need to be.

And I also want to gently invite you to continue this journey in a way that feels aligned. If you felt the stillness that we’ve explored today, if something has shifted within you and you’d like to continue deepening into that experience, I encourage you to explore the Sano academy. It’s not about learning more for the sake of it. It’s about living from the space of stillness, embodying it every part of your life. And the teachings that have been given by source for these times, they’re here to support you.

And whether you’re just beginning or you’ve walked this path for years, the academy and this work that I do is designed to take you further at your own pace, into that deep peace that we’ve talked about today. And if this resonates, if you feel called to explore this more, you can find all the details about the academy and other programs on my website, and I’ll be here continuing to guide you in whatever way feels right for you. Thank you for being with me today, and may the stillness carry you forward. Until next time. Many blessings.

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Learn more about the Sano Method and Anandi’s teachings  and how it can help you connect with your inner stillness and transform your life.