From Morocco To Stanford To Infinite Consciousness

Dear Friend,

This is a free-flowing post on my personal story of coming across SPIRIT or TRUE NATURE and how it continues to transform my life.

My intention is to get across my vibe and build a long-term relationship with you as Friends Of The Way. Pouring myself ablaze, sharing what resonates in my heart, musings so refreshingly real it burns like ice :D!

May this be helpful (and fun to read...) from my heart to yours!

Morocco To Stanford

Born in Virginia but grew up in Morocco since I was 1.

Spent part of my childhood in Senegal (Lebanese family) and France in a tiny village in the Pyrenees (French family)

Eldest of two younger brothers

Went to a French public school in Casablanca

Fairly military-style childhood but also major freedom if I had my shit together

Grew up very independent as a result. Parents never checked my homework, no curfews, etc.

Bought my first phone and computer with money made from doing lots of ads for Moroccan National TV haha

One ad for a vegetable oil company! I know... shame - never use that fucking poison! Highly ranked seed oil disrespecter here.

Friends with everyone in high school. Vibed with all people.

Never got bullied.

Apart from getting street mugged several times lol (ran for my life!)

Once where I fought (success!) ...so they threatened to beat me up with machetes next time (no joke haha)

Alert af walking to school but all fine in the end

Played rugby, surfed every week, and did martial arts (Judo/Aikido and some Muay Thai) all childhood

Surfing here with my brother in Taghazout, Morocco :D

Sensitive kid who wrote poems and shit and couldn't stop pondering Existence.

Nobody really cared or could seriously discuss this with me so kept it to myself.

Adults around felt like they only "believed" things about God or Life. Was lost.

Stopped believing in God around 12 (family both Christian and Muslim)

I thought "God must be a cope because people are afraid of death and the unknown and need meaning. If there's nothing after death then so be it. I just want the raw truth. No sugar-coating thx"

Materialist worldview indoctrination begins

Fortunate to have been majorly red-pilled by a wonderful music teacher who seems to never age (looks 40 but is at least 80+).

Would talk for hours about quantum physics, the nature of reality, conspiracy theories, Peruvian Shamanism instead of respecting the one-hour "music session" hahaha, we spent 2-5 hours every week passionately talking about everything.

I fucking love this man. He had so much to share. I had so much to learn.

Wanted to become a surgeon so spent a summer in an operating room (perks of Morocco haha).

Saw 15+ phat babies born and 60+ insane orthopedic operations.

Adjusted the operating light like a King (my only job).

Surgeon would give me bones from patients haha. Fasted all day matching his schedule.

Did Ayahuasca and also had a near-death experience at 16 almost drowning for an hour surfing that opened me up to deeper states of consciousness.

Made me realize that there is far far more to how I can experience and know myself.

Despite an unstoppable living desire to figure out what the hell is going on. Who am I? What am I? What is my purpose? What is the nature of reality?

I was still 'skeptical' of 'spirituality', allergic to woo-woo bullshit as I called it.

Still read everything I could get my hands on.. neuroscience, psychotherapy, spirituality, philosophy, etc.

Hated the rigid french system and how much our school belittled us.

Was a good student (also not from a wealthy family) - decided to go all-in, excel in my work and go to the US.

Broke with gf and had that extra dark energy for two gruesome years.

Started learning English at 16 and preparing applications for US. Nobody knew wtf I was doing including my lovely parents.
‍
Got into Stanford. Unbelievable to me. Left with zero nostalgia.

I punched and broke my window twice. Even though very chill in general, still exploded from self-imposed pressure.

Studied electrical engineering. Then focused early on AI research stuff.

Figured I'd be an "entreprenOr" for life so went bananas and almost finished my degree within 2 years taking grad classes I wasn't ready for. Worth it.

Spent remaining two years launching "startup" projects and attending pretty much zero lectures (so freaking inefficient!!!). Not even buying the textbooks.

Paid my way through school via internships, recording classes (camera guy lol) sometimes getting paid to record my own class and still not paying attention! and grading homework (gave so many As hahaha)

Tried to create "Jarvis" from Iron Man w/ a friend - worked 9 to 5 every day on top of uni work, partying, and a part-time job for several months.

Laughably naive in hindsight. Great learning experience about AGI, limits, and wtf is intelligence again?!

Moved on to a software healthcare project for almost two years.

Many insights on building software at scale and how absolute garbage most research is (statistical illiteracy is a disease and society is truly multi-layered BS).

Lifted every day to cure myself :D

Ended up also traveling to 20+ countries alone (best!), a fair amount of partying, and sublime to hellish experiences haha. Went crazy bananas a lil bit.

20 years old Chris in Indonesia :D‍

Stopped the healthcare project (ouch!) and $0 in my bank account at that point.

Figured I needed to refine my marketing and strategy skills anyways so went straight into launching a marketing agency.

Had no idea what I was doing. Closed a client on a performance basis "don't pay me if I don't deliver' :D and after a few months of lackluster results, the project boomed and was set on track to rinse and repeat and expand from there.

A relatively demanding work life, countless failures and turns, and much ebb and flow from great intensity of awareness to glorified automaton haha.

The main thread running through my life was How can I be a Real Living Presence and less of a Certified Mechanical Robot as I move through to the TOTALITY of my life.‍

Explosive Experience In NY: First Encounter Of The Third Kind

Rewinding to being 19.. one day chilling in a NY park (sober!!) and yet again pondering Reality, "I" disappeared and "went" beyond time, space, no location; eternally everywhere and nowhere. No more "Chrisness".

This was 10000x more profound than all experiences I've had including drugs including DMT (but that would be comparing apples to a forest... no "experience" touches this). 1000x is no dramatical exaggeration.

Felt like being drowned in ineffable black peace, totally saturated with pristine luminous transparent radiant clarity… indescribable freedom beyond bounds.

Kids were running around in the park and I felt I was them running around. I was EVERYTHING.

It did feel like a third encounter of the third kind in its impact, immensity, and otherworldliness.

‍"There's so much to this world HOLY JESUS MOTHER FLYING FUCK" or "I becAMe EVERYTHING" was the accurate technical analysis or so my mind said as I *reflected* on this a few hours later...

Very interesting in hindsight how the conditioned mind inserts itself in what it can't touch and packages it in some conceptual wrapper… the non-conceptual mind cannot be made an object of the conceptual mind.

Regardless, I was touched deeply, indelibly. Impossible to forget. Impossible to argue against it. Impossible to philosophize away the depth, fulfillment, and preciousness that suddenly opened up void of whatever my mind says or does, transcendental of all things perceived.

This lasted for two hours or so before a friend joined me and it readily faded in "potency" as I tried to describe it haha. Did not really know how to make sense of this whatsoever.

This 'experience' amplified a great fire within to dive deeper and led me a few months later to an invitation to my first meditation retreat in the Tibetan Mahamudra Tradition by Dustin Di Perna (thank you Dustin!)

First Meditation Retreat: Lightning Strike

Got invited to a 10-day retreat in the Mahamudra Tradition, 20 years old by then.

I had a computer systems architecture exam to prepare for but decided to say "fuck it" and leave for the retreat. Worth it? HOLY SHIT YES.

One of the teachers drove me there (LUCKY ME!). Bombarded him with so many questions. I was incredibly excited and overzealous. I shared with him all my "naive" beliefs and looking back, he was so kind and empowering. So grateful.

Lived in a cold tent by myself and forgot to bring warm clothes so I was effectively freezing my ass off every night haha in the woods "mOrEE TiMe TO MeDitAte Must Be Free Now! FreEzing IS A LIE" lol

Remember seeing most people at the retreat above 50+ but I truly felt "Holy shit these are my fucking people" so happy to be here. Something felt so palpably "real" in the atmosphere.

Growing up felt quite belittled and undermined in my exploration of depth/truth since I am young and going HARD growing up in this zombified world disconnected from any depth but people there supported and empowered me to GO DEEPER.

A music producer from London, next to me: "Hey Chris. Don't stop going deeper into this. This is it. This is the most precious thing. You better be levitating at 40" Me: "Yes sir. Reporting for duty". (So Much Love)

Despite all the enthusiasm, I was greatly resisting and "efforting" trying to do this or that to my experience, translating what I heard to what I already believed I understood instead of actually listening with fresh eyes.

Then after 3-4 days, I "gave up", surrendered and decided to simply listen with fresh eyes "You know what? Only the false can die. I will always remain. Just die fucker. All-Is-Well. Nothing to fear. Trust the teachers. You know nothing. Drop everything you've ever known and carefully listen like the teacher is pouring gold, like a child seeing everything for the first time"

This is just the self-talk going on in my consciousness. There's no person that dies, only the familiar sense of self like a familiar blanket that a kid may carry around, only ideas and concepts die. Nothing real can be lost.

The loss is real… felt but ultimately more like losing the blanket and this is so supremely deeply layered.. it goes on and on deeper and deeper as true nature displaces what’s more conditioned "dead”.

After different practices on opening up to greater compassion and cultivating the intention for the "libeRatIOn of all SeNTiEnt BeINgS". Felt so inundated in kindness/tenderness thought my consciousness was completely electrified, frying in love. Unstoppably cried for more than 30 min. Felt myself to be like "Mother of all beings" - not at all but that was the vibe felt whatever hahahaha.

Through different pointers on the nature of reality something exploded like a lightning strike... Suddenly I am "above clouds" reminiscent although different in flavor from the experience in NY.

Everything fresh, icy, searing, unobstructed lightness, reality popping in HD, freedom beyond bounds, interconnectedness with everything, deep rejuvenating dynamic restfulness, more depth, more dimensionality...

I felt like I had suddenly woken up from dreams, from the smallness of my little world, and suddenly feeling myself to be shining radiance. In complete awe and intimacy with everything around me.

like a ‘THUNDERBOLT FALLING FROM THE SKY WITHOUT RESISTANCE’

I am flowing, radiating, shining. Everything is supremely poignant, pregnant of itself, oozing its Signature Vibe.

The personality/ego didn't decide to let go of itself, the trying of letting it go is personality itself. Disidentification happened. More like seeing through it as a mental construct and therefore instantly seeing/being the deeper ground.

Despite no longer feeling "here" as my usual familiar sense of self everything rolled perfectly, so simply. I remember making so many jokes with NEW FRIENDS haha and we were all laughing so hard. I can speak and interact fine wow haha even as "Chrisness" was no longer the contracted center of my reality.

This quote I had read before the retreat "Light of awareness shines through personality like "light shining through a stained glass window" now hit me differently.

This entire time I am looking only at the "objects" of the dream of life as if solidly separate and naturally awareness is tremendously dimmed but when turned onto itself suddenly it lights up because it is light and everything is light, like a sun forever shining.

Few days later. Me stops dead in my tracks... "Where the fuck is Father Earth haha?"

So was I eternally free beyond bounds after that? Not really. Resumed straight into a hectic and demanding life and had one day to prepare for that computer architecture exam...which I tanked!!

I didn't meditate nor ground what I had experienced "what's meditation now? everything is light haha" and slowly but surely my ordinary consciousness resumed, the expansion contracted back into the familiar waters of personality. I didn't understand!!

This is partly why chasing after anything including spiritual experiences is like grasping for 'mist' whereas realization or real understanding is like an indestructible mountain to whatever degree it is established or "realized". Every experience like a non-binding permutation of THAT [co-dependent arising]

Mind blown on so many levels and incredibly grateful to have had access to this. These teachings are incredibly precious and always undervalued as we can't grasp the preciousness, depth, and subtlety they point to until we TASTE it for ourselves and it is INFINITE.

Everything we think we are gonna lose is only ideas, concepts and what we truly are is That Which Always Remains. So ultimately there's really nothing to fear as much as personality throws tantrums [expected]

Utmost Preciousness Of Teachings And Entering The Endless Work

What happened after the first retreat? Would say I entered the "The Pathless Path" or "The Work" which is always already the case in a way but consciously recognizing it.

Went to more retreats primarily in the tradition of Tibetan Mahamudra and right after joined The Diamond Approach; following up w/ teachers and mentors to keep deepening on the path (until I physically die haha)

Briefly about the Diamond Approach "The Diamond Approach is a spiritual teaching that utilizes a distinctive form of inquiry into realization, where the practice is the expression of realization. Its aim is absolute freedom that can be described as living realization, a dynamic enlightenment where transcendent truth lives personally in the world. [] inquires into the structure of reality as a whole, ego structures, essential structures, and the structures of the universe"

‍Amazed and profoundly grateful at the utter preciousness of the era we live in. All esoteric teachings accessible? People moved hell and earth to get access to these in the past and we can just "GoOGLE" ...unreal.

One thing that transpired as I engaged the path deeper is the infinite depth and inexhaustible richness of simply Being and the endlessness of the journey of conscious evolution.

‍Why "The Work"? Why bother taking the trouble and expense to practice? Why even understand myself? Why engage inner work? Why make it the overarching priority?

‍"The journey commences for some sooner than for others, and for some more intensely than for others. We are fortunate if it has commenced at all. We are lucky that we are willing to dedicate so much energy and effort to it." - A H Almaas

Well, for me it feels like the best moments of my life were like tiny glimpses of the Truth shining forth and "The Work" is being more intensely who and what I truly am which is every moment not when I "meditate", uncovering the depth of what I truly am, the real substance, beyond the confines of the familiar personality-word and learning to live/embody that truth in its full-blown glory in the midst of ‘wordly’ life.

An invitation for a much much more intensely alive existence.

‍First, I Feel A Call From The "Outside", I read spiritual books or hear people talk about freedom. I am inspired by something pulling me, something more. I follow, I practice to fix myself, to change myself, to get something: I want to be free, feel bliss, discover the mysteries of existence, shatter my limiting world. Did I get it yet? Did I get it yet? Maybe I will get to ultimate something then I can sit my ass and be intensely free forever? :D

"That doesn’t mean there aren’t different phases of awakening, different depths of awakening, because there are. The idea that all awakening is the same is ridiculous. Not all awakening is of the same depth. That can vary tremendously. But to touch a little reality is still to touch reality. We don’t want to underestimate the value of any degree of awakening. Any degree of awakening is actually extraordinary. It has an incredible value to it." - Adyashanti

‍Second, The Path Is My Heart. I Am The Path. Not because teachers or anything tell me this or that but because it is utterly innate, self-obvious. Everything is THAT unfolding and I am THAT. It is not to improve, change, or get something for "myself". It is as if an indestructible mysterious eternal flame is burning brighter coming from my depths. It is obvious that "I" cannot get anything for I am THAT already, instead of a life of frenetic seeking for this or that, I searchlessly behold now the magic of a life of ceaseless creative discovery, endless adventure.

If All-That-Is is One Indivisible Reality, then it makes sense that "Realization is Practice, Practice is Realization" - Dogen Zenji.

‍Third, There's No Arriving, Transcendence & Transformation Are Utterly Intertwined.

‍"Many people believe that realization signals the end of practice, the end of doing the work. We might think, When I am realized, I won't need to practice any longer; I can simply be.” When we are not realized, the situation appears that way. But from the perspective of realization, living is a matter of continual practice and continual engagement. [] The dynamism of reality reveals further realizations by revealing ever-subtler delusions. Runaway realization is the magic of reality beholding its own mysteries as possibilities of further realization" - A. H. Almaas

‍Transcendence which has many levels means we are beyond all particulars, the "universal transcendent side".

Clarifying/purifying consciousness does "lead" to Transcendence, cleaning/digesting/metabolizing the veils of the past filtering/distorting/dimming the always already immaculate light of true nature.

‍Transformation takes Work. It is not only the clarification but also the maturation of consciousness, the development and expansion of capacities and qualities, the living dynamic integration of the fullness of Reality into one unified impersonal personal being-ness that is not a mental construct defined by past or memory but the individuation and personalization of consciousness, the transformation of Personality Into The True Ego, The Polishing Of The Grain of Sand Into The Pearl Beyond Price.

From Loss To Deeper Ground

Making almost two million dollars and losing it all at 25 while deep in practice revealed something crucial: the work wasn't choosing between consciousness and creation - it was discovering they were never separate.

I spent years dealing with a car accident where a truck hit me straight in the head, spine issues, businesses dissolving, and the pressure of so-called deeper realization.

What remained was more real than anything I'd built.

This period of dissolution became the qualification for what I do now.

Not because I "figured it out," but because I learned to see there was no gap. Liberation and transformation, consciousness and form, depth and works in the world - they move together or not at all.

House Infinite emerged from this recognition. Not as a brand strategy, but as a principle: the empty vessel that births infinite worlds. A venture studio for building brands and partnerships that serve from depth, working with founders who refuse to split themselves, who live in relationship with Truth.

I've guided 100+ people through containers integrating their work in the world with living Truth where the latter is priority. Not using depth as a tool for outcomes, but discovering how living from Truth naturally transforms everything - including how you work, create, and serve.

This isn't a method but a deepening relationship. It's what occurs when Love of Truth is actually primary.

Now based in Bali.

Working with those committed to living Truth - through extended transformation containers (Deeper Work) and strategic partnerships building brands that bridge consciousness and form (House Infinite).

Needless to say, I keep learning and I am fired up to keep evolving, keep embodying the Real while simultaneously resting ever deeper in That Which Always Remains.

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That Which Always Remains is That Which Always Changes
"We" Are The Living Mystery

Your Friend,
Chris

Thank You For Reading!