This special spiritual teaching was given by Bartholomew on "Awakening to the Deathless," i.e. focusing on how to live fully before concerning ourselves with death. Bartholomew began by establishing that if we learn to live with "quality and depth and focus and magnificent joy," then death becomes a natural, exciting transition - like arriving in a new city - rather than something terrifying. The fundamental issue is understanding who is actually living this life.

Bartholomew explained that what we call "ego" or "me" is actually just a temporary constellation of thoughts, bodily responses, emotions, and actions - a mercurial, ever-changing structure that's far more insubstantial than physical objects. This ego-self is "full of holes" and gaps, most obviously seen in the natural pauses between breaths. These gaps reveal that we're constantly "dying" in small ways - thoughts arise and fall back into emptiness, breath comes and goes, and each night in deep sleep we experience a state of "non-being" that we actually find restful and seek out repeatedly.

The key insight is that we're already experiencing something very similar to death every night in deep sleep - a state where the ego-mind dissolves completely, yet we consider this blissful and restorative. Even our physical bodies are constantly dying and reconstituting at the subatomic level. We're not the continuous, solid entities we imagine ourselves to be, but rather waves arising from and falling back into a vast lake of consciousness. Death is simply a more obvious version of what's already happening constantly.

To live dynamically is to become aware of this "deathless state" that's always present beneath the changing surface phenomena. This involves repeatedly "turning toward" the deep self or God-nature by silencing the thinking mind and dropping into the spacious awareness between thoughts and breaths. Initially this might feel empty rather than blissful, but like learning to swim, one must move beyond ankle-deep experience to discover the full depths. The practice is simple: moment by moment, be willing to stop thinking and relax into just being present.

Bartholomew addressed practical concerns about functioning in the world, explaining that as one turns inward, external activities continue but are guided by a deeper intelligence rather than ego-will. The apparent problem is our false belief that we've been "doing" our lives through personal will, when actually a mysterious creative principle has been orchestrating everything all along. As this recognition deepens, one realizes there's only one will operating, not two separate wills in conflict.

The teaching concluded with guidance on using difficulties - including serious illness - as doorways to awakening. Rather than projecting problems onto external circumstances, we're encouraged to look within and ask what each challenge is here to teach us. By being willing to examine our fears, loneliness, and other discomforts closely rather than pushing them away, they naturally dissolve, revealing the deathless awareness that was always present. The ultimate invitation is to be willing to let die everything that can die - fears, identities, possessions, even our spiritual concepts - so that what remains is the eternal, unchanging essence of what we truly are.