Realise that the conceptual thinker and conceptual thoughts seemingly obscure the non-conceptual natural state. Pause a thought even for an instant and the natural state is fully evident. STOP and SEE. In the seeing, pure awareness gets used to itself".
- "Sailor" Bob Adamson
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Q: I recently discovered your site (www.theeternalstate.org) and renewed my hope of understanding this. I have been listening to the audios and videos on your site and have questions, if you don’t mind. I guess that I expected this to clear up without my participation but ….
That’s common, it’s a misunderstanding of the way some point to what is and say things like “there is no one so there is nothing that 'you' ('I') can do."
As a pointer to the actual Real essence of what you are, there is perhaps value in the pointer that “there is no one.” But when taken on as a belief by the “person” who still is convinced that he or she "IS" a real separate controlling entity, all that belief usually results in is resignation, ennui, despair. Saying or believing “I am no one so obviously there’s nothing I can do” is a false belief held by a “person” egoically claiming to be no one. And since "I believe" “I am no one” and therefore “I am powerless” to rediscover what is true, as a consequence of believing this lie I must be doomed to a hopeless state of despair at worst or “quiet desperation” at best. Then that hopelessness is covered over by what a “me” calls “hope.” It says, "Maybe 'I' CAN find this peace I seek!" You will NOT.
This True Perfect Peace is the absence of "you." So that hope is like icing on a turd! It’s a product of the false beliefs in a “me” and “other than me”, of a personal attainment for “me,” and a false belief in "time," and a "someday" when “I will get there.” But you cannot get TO the HERE and NOW. You already ARE HERE NOW!
So, these beliefs, when unexamined, operate at a deep level, and result in a certain yet totally false conviction ... the conviction that there IS a separate "me" that must somehow get control if "its time and its life." This conviction is like being sentenced to life by a conceptual judge, to a conceptual prison of endless suffering as a seeking and never finding what is sought. Whether through money, sex, drugs or accomplishment, or religion or spirituality, and finally "nonduality," there is this endless seeking for ... and never finding ... true satisfaction! It's horrible.
Something you said (in the audios and videos on your site ) about understanding who and what you are really hit home. I have read that before but I don’t think paid close enough attention to what was really meant by it. I must know who I am first? I must ask myself this?
Let’s go over the “basics:” The good news (very good news indeed!) is that the suffering has a cause and when the cause is looked into and rooted out at the core, suffering ends and then there is simply what is, unmodified, uncorrected and unaltered, and life in true freedom happens … for no one (paradoxically!). Elimnate the cause and its effects cannot remain. Here's how:
First off: Again, asking yourself right now, “Do I exist?”, it is absolutely certain that you are. This is absolutely known … I AM. No one can say “I am not.” So Being, your Awareness of Being here now every moment, is primary and inescapable. THAT is what you are. I AM. Nothing added, nothing but this NON-conceptual I AM. You as This are already awake, already home.
Secondly: What IS the cause of suffering? An uninvestigated claim that there is such a “thing” as a separate solid “me” that must manage and control its life (“my life.”) What is the nature of this claiming mechanism? It is “naught but a thought!” The I AM of your undeniable Awareness of Being IS and That exists before the thought “I.” Then the thought “I” comes before all else. As in "I ... am ... this body." And the thought I is NOT the true “I-Consciousness that you actually are. The I thought points to what is … points only! Looking right NOW: Is the thought of a thing ever what is pointed to or represented by the thought? Can you burn a log in the fireplace by shouting “fire” at the wood? Can you put a fire out with the word “water?” NO! (And without a thought added to the I thought, where is this "body?" That "body" you are probably still convinced that you are is also "naught but a thought!")
So the word “I” is NOT the true I of Presence-Awareness. You are and you know that you are. That I AM that you are is the one same I AM that everyone is. Again, asking yourself right now, “Do I exist?”, it is absolutely certain that you ARE. That’s “step one of two” in this final seeing of the real … and step two is a matter of seeing what is false and discarding that. That knowing awareness arises as the thought I am. That I AM is certain and Real. The thought "I" that appears to divide what is into concepts of I and other is false.
Another thing that I was hanging onto is what the state of enlightenment would mean. I had ideas of a totally secure feeling of joy and well-being that would allow me to go through life untouched by negative thoughts, feelings or events. I don’t really believe that now but still find myself hoping there is something (soothing, comforting, etc.) here somewhere.....
You will never get “there!” There is no attainment. No such thing as peace of mind. No such thing as “my” well-being. It ain’t personal at all. And there IS NO teacher, no student, all this is unborn and the ONLY reality is I AM. Your TRUE SELF, the Being-Awareness that you inescapably know and are, JUST IS, beyond ideas of a me who is either “secure” or “insecure.” You see, so long as the false belief in a separate I entity is still at play there is often a feeling of insecurity and vulnerability. This was my experience until it was seen clearly that there simply is no such thing as a “me” that can be vulnerable and insecure.
What you are describing is a STATE. A state that will "allow me to go through life untouched" ... that's one of what Stephen Wingate calls The Outrageous Myths of Enlightenment!" You get free of a myth by seeing that it IS a myth! "The earth is flat!" That was a myth. Now no one believes that one. Just seeing the false AS false is an aspect of this clear knowing of what is real and what is not real.
All "states of 'me' being this or that" come and go. What never changes? Only THAT is real. And nothing real can be threatened and ”feel insecure.” And nothing unreal actually exists.
There is joy and well-being. But not for “you!” That joy and well-being is your Natural, Eternal state. But THAT is NOT “personal!" THAT is, in a way of speaking, the ABSENCE of “the person.”
So besides acknowledging (I Am) how do I proceed?
Asking who am I comes after the knowing I AM. There is NO “acknowledging” needed. It is simply the direct nonconceptual knowing of your own presence of being. Here and now you ARE. Full stop!
So that is known. Period. Now, what is “next” (actually it is simultaneous but appears as a “process in time”) is that you set into investigating WHAT IS this “identified pseudo-subject” that calls itself “I” in thought and considers itself separate from “other than I” also in thought … this is in “part two” of this seeing, discovering once and for all what you are NOT. "I am a person:" Is that TRUE? Is the thought the thing? What AM I? I AM. What am I NOT? Any thing at all. I AM No Thing. Yet, I AM. Don’t try to get that with the mind! It can’t be known that way. THIS is in a way, NOT-KNOWING.
I AM THAT. What? NOT KNOWING. Yet I AM. Got it? Drop it!
From experience I can confirm that you must know beyond doubt BOTH what you ARE (Presence-Awareness, Being-Consciousness) and what you are NOT (a thing apart from all that is.) Then the suffering ends right here right now. Then (now) there is Absolute Freedom, the Home you never actually left. But this is not freedom for “you.” It is Freedom FROM the false belief in the idea of a separate “you.”
I AM. That is certain, inescapable; you know that Your True Nature, your own Being, simply, IS. Then looking at WHO or WHAT I AM is the investigation into all false beliefs, beginning with the belief that the thought I is what I am. You are not a thought! You were never a concept and never could be. It was a mistake made in ignorance that the thought I was believed to be what you are. Asking “Who am I?” and (importantly!) rejecting all answers as “me” is part two of this nondual seeing.
So that’s the “drill:”
1: I AM. That is certain.
2. I am NOT a thing apart from That I AM. That is proved to yourself on investigation.
Stay in touch. Call if you like! Let’s get this completely nailed down for you straight away. Life in True Freedom from all psychological suffering is your birthright and your true nature so if there are any remaining doubts, questions or ‘yes-buts’ lets get ‘em resolved.
Re-read this a few times and allow the pointers to "sink in."
That’s common, it’s a misunderstanding of the way some point to what is and say things like “there is no one so there is nothing that 'you' ('I') can do."
As a pointer to the actual Real essence of what you are, there is perhaps value in the pointer that “there is no one.” But when taken on as a belief by the “person” who still is convinced that he or she "IS" a real separate controlling entity, all that belief usually results in is resignation, ennui, despair. Saying or believing “I am no one so obviously there’s nothing I can do” is a false belief held by a “person” egoically claiming to be no one. And since "I believe" “I am no one” and therefore “I am powerless” to rediscover what is true, as a consequence of believing this lie I must be doomed to a hopeless state of despair at worst or “quiet desperation” at best. Then that hopelessness is covered over by what a “me” calls “hope.” It says, "Maybe 'I' CAN find this peace I seek!" You will NOT.
This True Perfect Peace is the absence of "you." So that hope is like icing on a turd! It’s a product of the false beliefs in a “me” and “other than me”, of a personal attainment for “me,” and a false belief in "time," and a "someday" when “I will get there.” But you cannot get TO the HERE and NOW. You already ARE HERE NOW!
So, these beliefs, when unexamined, operate at a deep level, and result in a certain yet totally false conviction ... the conviction that there IS a separate "me" that must somehow get control if "its time and its life." This conviction is like being sentenced to life by a conceptual judge, to a conceptual prison of endless suffering as a seeking and never finding what is sought. Whether through money, sex, drugs or accomplishment, or religion or spirituality, and finally "nonduality," there is this endless seeking for ... and never finding ... true satisfaction! It's horrible.
Something you said (in the audios and videos on your site ) about understanding who and what you are really hit home. I have read that before but I don’t think paid close enough attention to what was really meant by it. I must know who I am first? I must ask myself this?
Let’s go over the “basics:” The good news (very good news indeed!) is that the suffering has a cause and when the cause is looked into and rooted out at the core, suffering ends and then there is simply what is, unmodified, uncorrected and unaltered, and life in true freedom happens … for no one (paradoxically!). Elimnate the cause and its effects cannot remain. Here's how:
First off: Again, asking yourself right now, “Do I exist?”, it is absolutely certain that you are. This is absolutely known … I AM. No one can say “I am not.” So Being, your Awareness of Being here now every moment, is primary and inescapable. THAT is what you are. I AM. Nothing added, nothing but this NON-conceptual I AM. You as This are already awake, already home.
Secondly: What IS the cause of suffering? An uninvestigated claim that there is such a “thing” as a separate solid “me” that must manage and control its life (“my life.”) What is the nature of this claiming mechanism? It is “naught but a thought!” The I AM of your undeniable Awareness of Being IS and That exists before the thought “I.” Then the thought “I” comes before all else. As in "I ... am ... this body." And the thought I is NOT the true “I-Consciousness that you actually are. The I thought points to what is … points only! Looking right NOW: Is the thought of a thing ever what is pointed to or represented by the thought? Can you burn a log in the fireplace by shouting “fire” at the wood? Can you put a fire out with the word “water?” NO! (And without a thought added to the I thought, where is this "body?" That "body" you are probably still convinced that you are is also "naught but a thought!")
So the word “I” is NOT the true I of Presence-Awareness. You are and you know that you are. That I AM that you are is the one same I AM that everyone is. Again, asking yourself right now, “Do I exist?”, it is absolutely certain that you ARE. That’s “step one of two” in this final seeing of the real … and step two is a matter of seeing what is false and discarding that. That knowing awareness arises as the thought I am. That I AM is certain and Real. The thought "I" that appears to divide what is into concepts of I and other is false.
Another thing that I was hanging onto is what the state of enlightenment would mean. I had ideas of a totally secure feeling of joy and well-being that would allow me to go through life untouched by negative thoughts, feelings or events. I don’t really believe that now but still find myself hoping there is something (soothing, comforting, etc.) here somewhere.....
You will never get “there!” There is no attainment. No such thing as peace of mind. No such thing as “my” well-being. It ain’t personal at all. And there IS NO teacher, no student, all this is unborn and the ONLY reality is I AM. Your TRUE SELF, the Being-Awareness that you inescapably know and are, JUST IS, beyond ideas of a me who is either “secure” or “insecure.” You see, so long as the false belief in a separate I entity is still at play there is often a feeling of insecurity and vulnerability. This was my experience until it was seen clearly that there simply is no such thing as a “me” that can be vulnerable and insecure.
What you are describing is a STATE. A state that will "allow me to go through life untouched" ... that's one of what Stephen Wingate calls The Outrageous Myths of Enlightenment!" You get free of a myth by seeing that it IS a myth! "The earth is flat!" That was a myth. Now no one believes that one. Just seeing the false AS false is an aspect of this clear knowing of what is real and what is not real.
All "states of 'me' being this or that" come and go. What never changes? Only THAT is real. And nothing real can be threatened and ”feel insecure.” And nothing unreal actually exists.
There is joy and well-being. But not for “you!” That joy and well-being is your Natural, Eternal state. But THAT is NOT “personal!" THAT is, in a way of speaking, the ABSENCE of “the person.”
So besides acknowledging (I Am) how do I proceed?
Asking who am I comes after the knowing I AM. There is NO “acknowledging” needed. It is simply the direct nonconceptual knowing of your own presence of being. Here and now you ARE. Full stop!
So that is known. Period. Now, what is “next” (actually it is simultaneous but appears as a “process in time”) is that you set into investigating WHAT IS this “identified pseudo-subject” that calls itself “I” in thought and considers itself separate from “other than I” also in thought … this is in “part two” of this seeing, discovering once and for all what you are NOT. "I am a person:" Is that TRUE? Is the thought the thing? What AM I? I AM. What am I NOT? Any thing at all. I AM No Thing. Yet, I AM. Don’t try to get that with the mind! It can’t be known that way. THIS is in a way, NOT-KNOWING.
I AM THAT. What? NOT KNOWING. Yet I AM. Got it? Drop it!
From experience I can confirm that you must know beyond doubt BOTH what you ARE (Presence-Awareness, Being-Consciousness) and what you are NOT (a thing apart from all that is.) Then the suffering ends right here right now. Then (now) there is Absolute Freedom, the Home you never actually left. But this is not freedom for “you.” It is Freedom FROM the false belief in the idea of a separate “you.”
I AM. That is certain, inescapable; you know that Your True Nature, your own Being, simply, IS. Then looking at WHO or WHAT I AM is the investigation into all false beliefs, beginning with the belief that the thought I is what I am. You are not a thought! You were never a concept and never could be. It was a mistake made in ignorance that the thought I was believed to be what you are. Asking “Who am I?” and (importantly!) rejecting all answers as “me” is part two of this nondual seeing.
So that’s the “drill:”
1: I AM. That is certain.
2. I am NOT a thing apart from That I AM. That is proved to yourself on investigation.
Stay in touch. Call if you like! Let’s get this completely nailed down for you straight away. Life in True Freedom from all psychological suffering is your birthright and your true nature so if there are any remaining doubts, questions or ‘yes-buts’ lets get ‘em resolved.
Re-read this a few times and allow the pointers to "sink in."
Friday, September 28, 2007
Q: If I am not controlling anything, then how does anything happen?
That is a good question. The answer, however, will not satisfy the questioner, which is merely a thought-form arising in Presence here and now. This Presence is what is real, never changing. So all that “is happening” is not actually “happening” at all. Nothing is happening. You are dreaming of happenings and dreaming a question and dreaming a questioner. If there is a sleep dream at night, when waking happens the dream is seen as a dream and no longer troubles you. You don’t ask “ If I (the dream I) am not controlling anything how does anything happen?” regarding that sleep dream because you know beyond doubt that nothing ever happened in the dream. It was never real, only imagination and in a way ONLY a movie arising that was watched. By what? Who or what watches even now as these questions and answers arise? In this “waking dream?”
Right here right now golf is being watched on TV, then typing is being watched, reading is being watched, watching as hearing sounds of a TV announcer is happening, seeing the fingers dart around hitting little black squares with white squiggles is happening, black markings appearing on white space is being watched. What is watching all this?
This is Not-Knowing, the Unknowing witnessing Awareness, Being-Consciousness, Aware and Awake as the silent Witness of the dream. Looking for, and failing to find, a separate entity doing or controlling ANYTHING is what Leo Hartong elegantly calls "awakening TO the dream." (NOT waking up from it. Awakening to the seeing that this so-called "waking state" of consciousness is a dream we ... as out True Self ... are simply watching.)
Is there any way to influence what manifests?
Asked and answered. What would control or influence in the dream? Watching the dream (drama) is what is real. All notions of influence or control are stories of a dream character. Thoughts of an “I” that can “influence” or an “I” that wants to know if it can control what happens in a dream … do you get the irony?
This is the dream character that wants to exert control to make things go its way. But where IS this entity, this character? You are dreaming. Can a dream-entity do anything? The dream is being watched by what you are … being, aware of all that is arising in this waking dream. Just watch. And see if you can locate the “one” who asks the question and see if that is a real thing or merely a wisp of thought!
I know it probably comes from some separate sense trying to control everything, but it keeps arising.
If it keeps arising, so what? It’s a thought-movement, just energy arising as movements of sound and silence, feeling-thinking… the only thing problematic is when this movement of energy is fixated on, taken to be “about me, “ and then resisted in some attempt to modify, correct, alter or fix it. There seems to be a notion that this is somehow indicating “something wrong.” But to whom does this energy arise? Is there a controller or is this also appearing as a “happening” … as part of the waking dream of isness?
There are kind of two parts of me I guess. One of them wants to control what is going on, and the other part is glad that it never has to be worried about controlling anything ever again.
Now THIS is TOTALLY FALSE! There is no “me” … and no “parts" of that nonexistent “me.” That is the still-extant belief in a separate controlling entity! Root that out through investigation! Where is this “me” that has “parts?” Where? Where is a me that either “wants to control” or wants to be unworried about being responsible for what it does and has and is in “its” life!? WHERE IS IT!?
You are and you know that you are. That I AM is known and totally certain. All else is false. Who or what believes any thought to be real and be pointing to any real object apart from the pure Subject-Awareness, that I AM which is your True Nature?? Hunt for that separate one and you’ll never find it.
If you are not the doer, then who is responsible for anything?
You answered the question that you asked! There IS No one. There IS no doer in the machinery! But do not take this as a new belief! Find out by LOOKING for that "doer" yourself, to see if you can locate such a thing!
What asks this? What wants to know? Stop look listen and BE.
Full stop!
-------------------------------------------------
Follow-up:
"So I just keep saying "so what, this is it" to everything until I get back to presence."
NO! You cannot get OUT of Presence!
What is this I that "keeps saying"? It's absolute bullshit!
There is no going away or getting back! All arises IN Presence.
That IS the I Am. Inescapable and undeniable.
You cannot NOT be!
That is a good question. The answer, however, will not satisfy the questioner, which is merely a thought-form arising in Presence here and now. This Presence is what is real, never changing. So all that “is happening” is not actually “happening” at all. Nothing is happening. You are dreaming of happenings and dreaming a question and dreaming a questioner. If there is a sleep dream at night, when waking happens the dream is seen as a dream and no longer troubles you. You don’t ask “ If I (the dream I) am not controlling anything how does anything happen?” regarding that sleep dream because you know beyond doubt that nothing ever happened in the dream. It was never real, only imagination and in a way ONLY a movie arising that was watched. By what? Who or what watches even now as these questions and answers arise? In this “waking dream?”
Right here right now golf is being watched on TV, then typing is being watched, reading is being watched, watching as hearing sounds of a TV announcer is happening, seeing the fingers dart around hitting little black squares with white squiggles is happening, black markings appearing on white space is being watched. What is watching all this?
This is Not-Knowing, the Unknowing witnessing Awareness, Being-Consciousness, Aware and Awake as the silent Witness of the dream. Looking for, and failing to find, a separate entity doing or controlling ANYTHING is what Leo Hartong elegantly calls "awakening TO the dream." (NOT waking up from it. Awakening to the seeing that this so-called "waking state" of consciousness is a dream we ... as out True Self ... are simply watching.)
Is there any way to influence what manifests?
Asked and answered. What would control or influence in the dream? Watching the dream (drama) is what is real. All notions of influence or control are stories of a dream character. Thoughts of an “I” that can “influence” or an “I” that wants to know if it can control what happens in a dream … do you get the irony?
This is the dream character that wants to exert control to make things go its way. But where IS this entity, this character? You are dreaming. Can a dream-entity do anything? The dream is being watched by what you are … being, aware of all that is arising in this waking dream. Just watch. And see if you can locate the “one” who asks the question and see if that is a real thing or merely a wisp of thought!
I know it probably comes from some separate sense trying to control everything, but it keeps arising.
If it keeps arising, so what? It’s a thought-movement, just energy arising as movements of sound and silence, feeling-thinking… the only thing problematic is when this movement of energy is fixated on, taken to be “about me, “ and then resisted in some attempt to modify, correct, alter or fix it. There seems to be a notion that this is somehow indicating “something wrong.” But to whom does this energy arise? Is there a controller or is this also appearing as a “happening” … as part of the waking dream of isness?
There are kind of two parts of me I guess. One of them wants to control what is going on, and the other part is glad that it never has to be worried about controlling anything ever again.
Now THIS is TOTALLY FALSE! There is no “me” … and no “parts" of that nonexistent “me.” That is the still-extant belief in a separate controlling entity! Root that out through investigation! Where is this “me” that has “parts?” Where? Where is a me that either “wants to control” or wants to be unworried about being responsible for what it does and has and is in “its” life!? WHERE IS IT!?
You are and you know that you are. That I AM is known and totally certain. All else is false. Who or what believes any thought to be real and be pointing to any real object apart from the pure Subject-Awareness, that I AM which is your True Nature?? Hunt for that separate one and you’ll never find it.
If you are not the doer, then who is responsible for anything?
You answered the question that you asked! There IS No one. There IS no doer in the machinery! But do not take this as a new belief! Find out by LOOKING for that "doer" yourself, to see if you can locate such a thing!
What asks this? What wants to know? Stop look listen and BE.
Full stop!
-------------------------------------------------
Follow-up:
"So I just keep saying "so what, this is it" to everything until I get back to presence."
NO! You cannot get OUT of Presence!
What is this I that "keeps saying"? It's absolute bullshit!
There is no going away or getting back! All arises IN Presence.
That IS the I Am. Inescapable and undeniable.
You cannot NOT be!
False "Teachings"
Just a niggling but crucial bit of misunderstanding that can be heard erupting from the mouths of some organisms that appear to be false "teachers of oneness" ...
"Consciousness is time bound." Consciousness - Being-Awareness, One-Without-A-Second ... can THAT ever actually be "time bound?" Impossible. There is an APPEARANCE of "time." There is no time, no separateness, no bondage, no liberation. This story of consciousness is false. What is REAL? Being, I AM prior to any thing, and the essence of all apparent things. THAT is No Thing. Can any thing come from no thing and be "bound?"
Q: Ha ha. Better email him and meet at sundown ...
LOL! Nothing serious, just loving poking a bit at false concepts in case there is still someone who cares!
I love the guy. It ain't "personal!" Ha!!
Who would care either way? Only a fasle entity that still believes in its own separate existence!
Yeah that is my modus operendum ! i think i wanted that to come out as latin for thats how i operate. if there was an i ... thank god there aint.!
And the non-existent flock said, amen!
Another reader comments on this: This teaching of "awareness prior to consciousness" is very misleading...I was in a state of confusion with (yet another teacher) a few weeks ago ,because he was saying that awareness is still a shadow,that there is something beyond that!...but that's just a nice story!...because all that can be known is I AM...the rest is fiction...
Exactly that! Confusion reigns in a mind that makes fictional distinctions and separates this from that ... existence is and that is known, full stop! LOL. No teacher no student. No path no goal. No "Consciousness" no "Prior to Consciousness." I AM. Just That.
Just a niggling but crucial bit of misunderstanding that can be heard erupting from the mouths of some organisms that appear to be false "teachers of oneness" ...
"Consciousness is time bound." Consciousness - Being-Awareness, One-Without-A-Second ... can THAT ever actually be "time bound?" Impossible. There is an APPEARANCE of "time." There is no time, no separateness, no bondage, no liberation. This story of consciousness is false. What is REAL? Being, I AM prior to any thing, and the essence of all apparent things. THAT is No Thing. Can any thing come from no thing and be "bound?"
Q: Ha ha. Better email him and meet at sundown ...
LOL! Nothing serious, just loving poking a bit at false concepts in case there is still someone who cares!
I love the guy. It ain't "personal!" Ha!!
Who would care either way? Only a fasle entity that still believes in its own separate existence!
Yeah that is my modus operendum ! i think i wanted that to come out as latin for thats how i operate. if there was an i ... thank god there aint.!
And the non-existent flock said, amen!
Another reader comments on this: This teaching of "awareness prior to consciousness" is very misleading...I was in a state of confusion with (yet another teacher) a few weeks ago ,because he was saying that awareness is still a shadow,that there is something beyond that!...but that's just a nice story!...because all that can be known is I AM...the rest is fiction...
Exactly that! Confusion reigns in a mind that makes fictional distinctions and separates this from that ... existence is and that is known, full stop! LOL. No teacher no student. No path no goal. No "Consciousness" no "Prior to Consciousness." I AM. Just That.
Q: I have read where you answered awful obliquely to the straight question "when did Realization happen for you?" I want an honest, straight answer, dammit!
I can only answer a question that is based on a false premise with a false answer! This is the mind that believes there was a separate person and now wants to know when that person "became whole." That whole premise is bullshit. It's like believing in a flat earth.
So: The question assumes several assumptions of fact, but these alleged facts are devoid of proof, there is NO evidence, so the assertion of fact is discovered to be completely false in Truth: Assumption #1) There is an entity that was not realized and now is, and assumption #2) There is such a "thing" as "time." This is to mistake an appearance in a mirror for the real.
Relatively speaking, in the way Sri Nisargadatta answered this same question from a seeker, "I met my final teacher John Wheeler in 2004. In 2007 I realized my true nature as Presence-Awareness. But this is a RELATIVE understanding ONLY and has NO basis in FACT. I say that because on examination I find NO separate personal entity that could attain or not attain "realization."
The Absolute Truth is, there is no teacher, no student, no path, no attainment, no time, no separateness, all is One Essence, One-Without-A-Second.
So who gets enlightened or realized? And when? The question is unanswerable in Truth because the premise is false. The mind wants to know these things, but do these answers end the suffering? Not possible. All answers like this lead to more ignorance in a mind that now believes there is such a "thing" as "realization!"
Consider this from The Hsin Hsin Ming:
"All is empty, clear, self-illuminating, with no exertion of the mind's power. Here thought, feeling, knowledge and imagination are of no value."
Full Stop.
Your answer sounds like a bunch of nondual bullshit. Why not just be straight and say, "2007?"
Who cares?
Have a beer. Get laid. Drop the search for answers and just BE as you are. You are. Ask yourself, “Do I exist?” You are and that is known. That is all there is to this.
I can only answer a question that is based on a false premise with a false answer! This is the mind that believes there was a separate person and now wants to know when that person "became whole." That whole premise is bullshit. It's like believing in a flat earth.
So: The question assumes several assumptions of fact, but these alleged facts are devoid of proof, there is NO evidence, so the assertion of fact is discovered to be completely false in Truth: Assumption #1) There is an entity that was not realized and now is, and assumption #2) There is such a "thing" as "time." This is to mistake an appearance in a mirror for the real.
Relatively speaking, in the way Sri Nisargadatta answered this same question from a seeker, "I met my final teacher John Wheeler in 2004. In 2007 I realized my true nature as Presence-Awareness. But this is a RELATIVE understanding ONLY and has NO basis in FACT. I say that because on examination I find NO separate personal entity that could attain or not attain "realization."
The Absolute Truth is, there is no teacher, no student, no path, no attainment, no time, no separateness, all is One Essence, One-Without-A-Second.
So who gets enlightened or realized? And when? The question is unanswerable in Truth because the premise is false. The mind wants to know these things, but do these answers end the suffering? Not possible. All answers like this lead to more ignorance in a mind that now believes there is such a "thing" as "realization!"
Consider this from The Hsin Hsin Ming:
"All is empty, clear, self-illuminating, with no exertion of the mind's power. Here thought, feeling, knowledge and imagination are of no value."
Full Stop.
Your answer sounds like a bunch of nondual bullshit. Why not just be straight and say, "2007?"
Who cares?
Have a beer. Get laid. Drop the search for answers and just BE as you are. You are. Ask yourself, “Do I exist?” You are and that is known. That is all there is to this.
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Q: It seems to be that there is free will because if it weren't then the future would already be set. I don't know…. sure a lot of things happen on their own without ourselves having any say about it but people still make decisions every day...
Ignorance says "people make decisions." But on looking it's seen that "decisions" are simply thoughts happening in Awareness. Where is the "thinker? Where is the "decider,” the “chooser?" Rather than argue for a false position look for yourself and see if you actually find a controlling entity. Freedom from suffering consists in knowing what you are (Awareness, just That) and knowing what you are not -- this is seen on direct investigation.) There IS Absolute Freedom. But not for you.
LOOK instead of trying to make your position on choosing and free will RIGHT and the Absolute Freedom that You already ARE will be known, by no one.
I have chocolate and vanilla. I can choose chocolate.
Cut through this dream story! Seeing is happening, seeing is what You are. What “chooses” chocolate? You say "I choose chocolate." Are you now believing in some conceptual chooser with volition that you learned in a seminar like est or Landmark!? If so then do this: "There is NO chooser, NO choice." Choose THAT. LOL ... LOOK! Who's that believer? The truth is there is NO you and no chooser. You are No Thing. You DO No Thing. You HAVE No Thing! Find this out: Where IS this "I" that believes it chooses? What controls the choosing or the chooser?
Where is your control? Where is any chooser apart from a series of thoughts arising in Awareness? Did you control that commenting? Where is the entity that is seeming (only seeming!) to exercise choices? The end of suffering consist in finding out that there has never been a chooser apart from Being Itself. You ARE. Stop wasting time and energy trying to be right about an "enlightened concept!" Do you want to be right or be free? Is that choice yours? Then exercise that choice and choose for the next two weeks to NEVER have a feeling or thought that makes suffering appear. Lots of luck on that one.
Obviously the entity making the decision makes the decision. it may be an unconscious decision though but hey...
What entity? Where IS any such actual separate entity!? You are and you know that you are. All else is a story that keeps you in imagination and there is suffering but only for an imaginary entity. Cut the nonsense and LOOK instead of trying to make your position on choosing and free will RIGHT and the Absolute Freedom that You already ARE will be seen, by no one. That is the Home you yearn for.
Freedom is another word for no one left to choose.
Actually I’m not really ok with my life, I just don't really get this non-duality stuff. It’s one thing to know about something it's totally another to really know it. Amen.
Now we are getting to the heart of the matter! And this is the point: Find out the source of your being "not okay." That "not okay-ness" IS suffering. Suffering ends when you try and fail to find a controlling entity called "me," and at the same (no) time see that you ARE, Being IS, and that is known. You are. Awareness, that is simple and real. All else is imagination ... the entity trying to control its life, and therefore suffering in effort and struggle, IS only imagination.
Where IS this "I" that believes it chooses? What controls the choosing or the chooser? Where is your control? Where is any chooser apart from a series of thoughts arising in Awareness? Did you control that commenting? Everything is happening -- to no one! Where is the entity that is seeming (only seeming!) to exercise choices? The end of suffering consist in finding out that there has never been a controlling entity, a.k.a. the "choice-making chooser."
Ultimately, of course, even the appearance of a "suffering entity" is Oneness, "Oneness-ing" that way! However let's not simply believe that! Looking in these ways to find that the "entity" is actually non-existent CAN happen ... as part of Oneness, Onenessng, too! Nothing can be separated from Oneness. Nothing!
Ignorance says "people make decisions." But on looking it's seen that "decisions" are simply thoughts happening in Awareness. Where is the "thinker? Where is the "decider,” the “chooser?" Rather than argue for a false position look for yourself and see if you actually find a controlling entity. Freedom from suffering consists in knowing what you are (Awareness, just That) and knowing what you are not -- this is seen on direct investigation.) There IS Absolute Freedom. But not for you.
LOOK instead of trying to make your position on choosing and free will RIGHT and the Absolute Freedom that You already ARE will be known, by no one.
I have chocolate and vanilla. I can choose chocolate.
Cut through this dream story! Seeing is happening, seeing is what You are. What “chooses” chocolate? You say "I choose chocolate." Are you now believing in some conceptual chooser with volition that you learned in a seminar like est or Landmark!? If so then do this: "There is NO chooser, NO choice." Choose THAT. LOL ... LOOK! Who's that believer? The truth is there is NO you and no chooser. You are No Thing. You DO No Thing. You HAVE No Thing! Find this out: Where IS this "I" that believes it chooses? What controls the choosing or the chooser?
Where is your control? Where is any chooser apart from a series of thoughts arising in Awareness? Did you control that commenting? Where is the entity that is seeming (only seeming!) to exercise choices? The end of suffering consist in finding out that there has never been a chooser apart from Being Itself. You ARE. Stop wasting time and energy trying to be right about an "enlightened concept!" Do you want to be right or be free? Is that choice yours? Then exercise that choice and choose for the next two weeks to NEVER have a feeling or thought that makes suffering appear. Lots of luck on that one.
Obviously the entity making the decision makes the decision. it may be an unconscious decision though but hey...
What entity? Where IS any such actual separate entity!? You are and you know that you are. All else is a story that keeps you in imagination and there is suffering but only for an imaginary entity. Cut the nonsense and LOOK instead of trying to make your position on choosing and free will RIGHT and the Absolute Freedom that You already ARE will be seen, by no one. That is the Home you yearn for.
Freedom is another word for no one left to choose.
Actually I’m not really ok with my life, I just don't really get this non-duality stuff. It’s one thing to know about something it's totally another to really know it. Amen.
Now we are getting to the heart of the matter! And this is the point: Find out the source of your being "not okay." That "not okay-ness" IS suffering. Suffering ends when you try and fail to find a controlling entity called "me," and at the same (no) time see that you ARE, Being IS, and that is known. You are. Awareness, that is simple and real. All else is imagination ... the entity trying to control its life, and therefore suffering in effort and struggle, IS only imagination.
Where IS this "I" that believes it chooses? What controls the choosing or the chooser? Where is your control? Where is any chooser apart from a series of thoughts arising in Awareness? Did you control that commenting? Everything is happening -- to no one! Where is the entity that is seeming (only seeming!) to exercise choices? The end of suffering consist in finding out that there has never been a controlling entity, a.k.a. the "choice-making chooser."
Ultimately, of course, even the appearance of a "suffering entity" is Oneness, "Oneness-ing" that way! However let's not simply believe that! Looking in these ways to find that the "entity" is actually non-existent CAN happen ... as part of Oneness, Onenessng, too! Nothing can be separated from Oneness. Nothing!
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Before any thing, thought or feeling is, You ARE. Being.
A Key to The Kingdom?
Are you suffering? Is there a tension, a resistance, to what simply IS? Have a look: Maybe the source of suffering is a belief in an "I" sense that is "in control." But does this "I" or sense of "me" that has innocently been accepted as what "you" are actually have 100% control over what thoughts arise, what feelings or emotional experiences come up, what happens in "its world?"
Perhaps the key to seeing that this "I" is a powerless concept is, try to control your thoughts and never have an unhappy thought or emotion for, say, two weeks. Then let us know how it went, and if you still believe that "you" are the "managing director of your life." For me, my gut-sense of "who I am" was "charles in charge!" Yet there was so much that didn't go my way that I finally had to look at that belief: "I'm in charge:" Is that TRUE? So see what you consider to be your gut-sense identity and challange that belief by giving it a 110% effort to "be in charge" in your life . . . at all times! Either you are 100% in charge or 0% in charge. It's not a "partial" thing. So get busy! Take 100% control for two weeks.
Try this right now for, say, two minutes: Are you doing it? How's it going? Anything coming up that you didn't cause!? Well, then, where IS this controller we call "me?"
And while all that is going on, just notice that the awareness of your being, present as the ever-knowing consciousness of "I am," has never gone away.
I Am. That is the home you never left ... and all that is, arises in that, and is not apart from That.
The real key to the Kingdom of Heaven? It ain't locked. This is it.
A Key to The Kingdom?
Are you suffering? Is there a tension, a resistance, to what simply IS? Have a look: Maybe the source of suffering is a belief in an "I" sense that is "in control." But does this "I" or sense of "me" that has innocently been accepted as what "you" are actually have 100% control over what thoughts arise, what feelings or emotional experiences come up, what happens in "its world?"
Perhaps the key to seeing that this "I" is a powerless concept is, try to control your thoughts and never have an unhappy thought or emotion for, say, two weeks. Then let us know how it went, and if you still believe that "you" are the "managing director of your life." For me, my gut-sense of "who I am" was "charles in charge!" Yet there was so much that didn't go my way that I finally had to look at that belief: "I'm in charge:" Is that TRUE? So see what you consider to be your gut-sense identity and challange that belief by giving it a 110% effort to "be in charge" in your life . . . at all times! Either you are 100% in charge or 0% in charge. It's not a "partial" thing. So get busy! Take 100% control for two weeks.
Try this right now for, say, two minutes: Are you doing it? How's it going? Anything coming up that you didn't cause!? Well, then, where IS this controller we call "me?"
And while all that is going on, just notice that the awareness of your being, present as the ever-knowing consciousness of "I am," has never gone away.
I Am. That is the home you never left ... and all that is, arises in that, and is not apart from That.
The real key to the Kingdom of Heaven? It ain't locked. This is it.
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Hi Charlie, it seems now that the sense of an individual is less and less and what happens, simply happens. Things seem new and fresh and the sense of wanting to control or alter what is in anyway seems to be fading.
That is the natural eternal state being unconcealed, in a manner of speaking …now, just notice that this appearance of a seeming individual is also simply happening, and that too is not two! That too is happening. Where is any doer of that happening of an appearing belief in an individual controlling entity? Where is the doer of all the happenings? Can you find such?
In a way there is almost a resignation that this entity has no control anyway so why bother trying to control the uncontrollable. The looking for the person who was in control and the inability to find him was and is very helpful.
That resignation is a signal that there is still the subtle belief that there is a doer that can control even the not controlling (!) … The bothering or not bothering … and thereby do something as a doer to end the search. It’s very subtle.Interestingly enough a seeing of what I am not (i.e. a controlling entity) appears to be more effective here than a seeing of what I am.
That was also the case here. Ultimately, in my view there must be both sides of the non-dual coin to bring the search to an end: 1: Seeing that what you are Awareness, just That, the nonconceptual I AM, Being and only That. And, 2: If there is still any vestige of a subtle belief in a separate controller, a doer of all the doing, a director of the happening of livingness, then that needs to be got down to and seen to be absolutely and doubtlessly false. When the false is no longer believed only the True remains. The truth is in Being NOT Knowing. Only the non-conceptual imperceptible unseable unknowable, arising as the pointer to that in words, I KNOW THAT I AM. THAT I AM, alone (all one) is true. All else is imagination. And that imagination, the false entity-appearance taken to be real, survives as a seemingly separate thing apart from the whole only through beliefs that are not actually real!
The seeing of "what I am not" appears to allow the emergence of a subtle awareness that is in the background. The seeing of "what I am", still seems to generate a somebody looking for or trying to notice the spacelike awareness which feels a little contrived and effortful.
It appears that this pointer has done what it could to show the natural state. Now drop it! It might well seem contrived and ineffective once it’s done the work. Remember Ramana Maharshi’s pointer that these conceptual tools are like a thorn you use to remove another thorn imbedded in your foot. Once the thorn has done its job and the imbedded thorn has been dug out you discard both thorns. Like that throw away all the pointers and BE what You ARE … Awareness-Consciousness-Loving to BE ... just That! Nothing else!What also appears to be happening here is that the body is feeling a huge amount of unrest and tension. There is an understanding that there is no"I" that created this in the first place and no "I” that can do anything about it.
Full stop!
Now that this Understanding is clear, let’s move on to experiencing the Teachings rather than merely comprehending them.
However the body feels like a highly-strung coil that is about to snap. There is an urgency and unrest here that shows no sign of subsiding, If you had a comment on this I would be very interested in getting your thoughts on it?
Been there! Know the feeling! But what is there in you that wants that to be different and resists the appearance of that tension, urgency, unrest? That false doer, the apparent “entity” that wants to fix that or change that, is what is under investigation. Simply LOOK. Where is the one that wants to take control of the body? This energy is happening and that energy is appearing presently as a bundle of conceptual sense-feelings and then what arises is a wanting to control or fix that tension, that discomfort. But what is the experiencer of the discomfort? Where is that experiencer!? Is there any such? Or is what is happening simply this experiencing!?? Where is that “experiencer” in deep sleep? Yet the body lives on just fine without any doer, in deep sleep.
Where is the doer of the experiencing? Where is any doer? Can this doer actually be found? If it cannot be found can it actually be real? Or is this energy moving and the subtle identification as the doer OF that energetic happening still at play and not yet seen to be a chimera, a phantom, NOT solid and NOT in control of anything whatsoever?
Have a good look into that and let’s talk soon.
That is the natural eternal state being unconcealed, in a manner of speaking …now, just notice that this appearance of a seeming individual is also simply happening, and that too is not two! That too is happening. Where is any doer of that happening of an appearing belief in an individual controlling entity? Where is the doer of all the happenings? Can you find such?
In a way there is almost a resignation that this entity has no control anyway so why bother trying to control the uncontrollable. The looking for the person who was in control and the inability to find him was and is very helpful.
That resignation is a signal that there is still the subtle belief that there is a doer that can control even the not controlling (!) … The bothering or not bothering … and thereby do something as a doer to end the search. It’s very subtle.Interestingly enough a seeing of what I am not (i.e. a controlling entity) appears to be more effective here than a seeing of what I am.
That was also the case here. Ultimately, in my view there must be both sides of the non-dual coin to bring the search to an end: 1: Seeing that what you are Awareness, just That, the nonconceptual I AM, Being and only That. And, 2: If there is still any vestige of a subtle belief in a separate controller, a doer of all the doing, a director of the happening of livingness, then that needs to be got down to and seen to be absolutely and doubtlessly false. When the false is no longer believed only the True remains. The truth is in Being NOT Knowing. Only the non-conceptual imperceptible unseable unknowable, arising as the pointer to that in words, I KNOW THAT I AM. THAT I AM, alone (all one) is true. All else is imagination. And that imagination, the false entity-appearance taken to be real, survives as a seemingly separate thing apart from the whole only through beliefs that are not actually real!
The seeing of "what I am not" appears to allow the emergence of a subtle awareness that is in the background. The seeing of "what I am", still seems to generate a somebody looking for or trying to notice the spacelike awareness which feels a little contrived and effortful.
It appears that this pointer has done what it could to show the natural state. Now drop it! It might well seem contrived and ineffective once it’s done the work. Remember Ramana Maharshi’s pointer that these conceptual tools are like a thorn you use to remove another thorn imbedded in your foot. Once the thorn has done its job and the imbedded thorn has been dug out you discard both thorns. Like that throw away all the pointers and BE what You ARE … Awareness-Consciousness-Loving to BE ... just That! Nothing else!What also appears to be happening here is that the body is feeling a huge amount of unrest and tension. There is an understanding that there is no"I" that created this in the first place and no "I” that can do anything about it.
Full stop!
Now that this Understanding is clear, let’s move on to experiencing the Teachings rather than merely comprehending them.
However the body feels like a highly-strung coil that is about to snap. There is an urgency and unrest here that shows no sign of subsiding, If you had a comment on this I would be very interested in getting your thoughts on it?
Been there! Know the feeling! But what is there in you that wants that to be different and resists the appearance of that tension, urgency, unrest? That false doer, the apparent “entity” that wants to fix that or change that, is what is under investigation. Simply LOOK. Where is the one that wants to take control of the body? This energy is happening and that energy is appearing presently as a bundle of conceptual sense-feelings and then what arises is a wanting to control or fix that tension, that discomfort. But what is the experiencer of the discomfort? Where is that experiencer!? Is there any such? Or is what is happening simply this experiencing!?? Where is that “experiencer” in deep sleep? Yet the body lives on just fine without any doer, in deep sleep.
Where is the doer of the experiencing? Where is any doer? Can this doer actually be found? If it cannot be found can it actually be real? Or is this energy moving and the subtle identification as the doer OF that energetic happening still at play and not yet seen to be a chimera, a phantom, NOT solid and NOT in control of anything whatsoever?
Have a good look into that and let’s talk soon.
Monday, September 24, 2007
Q: I was wondering if you could help me with some thinking that has been happening. If the mind cannot know the nondual Source, what can know?
An answer did bubble up in some detail, as you will read below. But I came back to the beginning because what occurred in the space here is to ask you first, why do you want to know these things? Let’s get down to it: Are you suffering? Will the answers to arcane abstract questions like this end your seeking and suffering? Who cares about this?
I enjoy these kinds of discussions but my main thrust here on my site and with my talks and videos is to point out directly what is causing suffering so you can root that sucker out and enjoy the rest of your life without suffering, living in the freedom of perfect peace and effortless ease.
So: ARE you suffering? Let’s get into that. Write back and tell me what the suffering is like for you. And we’ll delve into that. Meanwhile when you finish reading this e-mail, read (or re-read) the essay on the front page of the website, “The BASICS.” Read a few times. Read each time as though you never read it before. (You haven’t ever read it “before.” Each moment is new!)
Meanwhile here is what came up in response to your questions:
If the mind cannot know the nondual Source, what can know ?
Nothing can “know” the nondual Source, as there is nothing OUTSIDE That to “know” That. It IS “NONDUAL!” The idea that Source can be “known” is the mind’s attempt to turn Source into a thing, an object that is known. Source is neither subject nor object. To the mind it is No Thing. Source is space-like Awareness, empty, meaningless, unbounded, infinite … but all these words are absolutely insufficient to describe Source which is patently indescribable.
What the mind will try (and always fail) to do is to grasp the ungraspable. This goes on until it dawns on the seeker that the mind is, quite simply, the wrong tool for the job. The mind is a thing. Can a thing ever grasp NO thing? It’s akin to the eye trying to see itself. It’s hopeless!
Is this just another thing that is kind of self-evident always, or is knowing that you cannot know as far as that goes?
Yes, the Truth of your Being, that I AM that I am and that I AM that YOU are, is Self-Knowing Awareness. But this truth is NOT the words, concepts, thoughts. As Lao Tzu put it, “The Tao (Source) that can be named is NOT the Eternal Tao (Source.)
The I AM you know beyond doubt. And, anything else must end up in the beauty and silence of what I call “the gift of unknowing!” So it’s getting to the heart of this when it is seen by no one, seeing with N aked Awareness Itself, that all the mind can EVER say in Truth is, I don’t know.”
I guess what I am really trying to figure out is: what is realized when you realize the Self?
In a word? NOTHING.
What is “realized?” That there is nothing to realize. Nothing. This is seeing by no one that there never was a division in Source. You ARE what you seek. Already always awake here and now. The seeking seems to divide Source into a subject seeker and an object called self for it to realize. Enlightenment can be said to be the simple knowing that there is nothing to get and no one to get it.
But to the Ultimate Unknowable Source, these are all dead words that are empty and meaningless, and the word enlightenment or the words self-realization are pointing to MYTHS!
If you are interested in ending suffering and living in natural freedom, ponder this: What or who is this “I” that says “I am trying to figure this (un-figure-outable nondual Being) out?" The mind is machinery. You, when identified falsely as the mind-thinking-machinery, will endlessly ask questions like these and try to grab and own That, Source, which is OUTSIDE the mind! Seeing is happening. Seeing thoughts is happening. That is Consciousness, your knowing directly I AM before the thought arises that I am 'me,' is Presence, Awareness, arising as seeing without a seer, knowing without a knower, clarity without a subject or object.
The mind is a thought, “I” that as taken to be a solid separate thinking feeling controlling entity, “I apart from “Other,” then that thought-structure SEEMS to divide up totality. But can a thought do anything? Can a feeling/thought actually divide the Whole?
Do you actually come to know the Source of this I AM or is it just realized that you can never know, so the search gets called off and you get back to being?
What search? What Source? What being? Who would get back to that which has never been left? Being IS. Unknowable, That is the silence of deep sleep, pure Awareness before Consciousness arises as the knowing “I AM” and then is translated by Infinite Energy into the thought-form I AM “me.”
These are very good questions, it seems that you are on the precipice of this and I’d say, as John Wheeler once said to me, “get ready for a life free of suffering!”
For now, I’d say, write back and tell me the nature of the suffering for you, and also I’d suggest you watch the video series “This Is It” on YouTube… HERE. There is also a link on the site to a dialogue wherein the seeking and suffering ended for a guy named Paul. That one’s on the audio/video page. The download is free.
"Earlier I was sure of so many things, now I am sure of nothing. But I feel that I have lost nothing by not knowing, because all my knowledge was false. My not knowing was in itself knowledge of the fact that all knowledge is ignorance, that `I do not know' is the only true statement the mind can make."
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
________________________________________________
An answer did bubble up in some detail, as you will read below. But I came back to the beginning because what occurred in the space here is to ask you first, why do you want to know these things? Let’s get down to it: Are you suffering? Will the answers to arcane abstract questions like this end your seeking and suffering? Who cares about this?
I enjoy these kinds of discussions but my main thrust here on my site and with my talks and videos is to point out directly what is causing suffering so you can root that sucker out and enjoy the rest of your life without suffering, living in the freedom of perfect peace and effortless ease.
So: ARE you suffering? Let’s get into that. Write back and tell me what the suffering is like for you. And we’ll delve into that. Meanwhile when you finish reading this e-mail, read (or re-read) the essay on the front page of the website, “The BASICS.” Read a few times. Read each time as though you never read it before. (You haven’t ever read it “before.” Each moment is new!)
Meanwhile here is what came up in response to your questions:
If the mind cannot know the nondual Source, what can know ?
Nothing can “know” the nondual Source, as there is nothing OUTSIDE That to “know” That. It IS “NONDUAL!” The idea that Source can be “known” is the mind’s attempt to turn Source into a thing, an object that is known. Source is neither subject nor object. To the mind it is No Thing. Source is space-like Awareness, empty, meaningless, unbounded, infinite … but all these words are absolutely insufficient to describe Source which is patently indescribable.
What the mind will try (and always fail) to do is to grasp the ungraspable. This goes on until it dawns on the seeker that the mind is, quite simply, the wrong tool for the job. The mind is a thing. Can a thing ever grasp NO thing? It’s akin to the eye trying to see itself. It’s hopeless!
Is this just another thing that is kind of self-evident always, or is knowing that you cannot know as far as that goes?
Yes, the Truth of your Being, that I AM that I am and that I AM that YOU are, is Self-Knowing Awareness. But this truth is NOT the words, concepts, thoughts. As Lao Tzu put it, “The Tao (Source) that can be named is NOT the Eternal Tao (Source.)
The I AM you know beyond doubt. And, anything else must end up in the beauty and silence of what I call “the gift of unknowing!” So it’s getting to the heart of this when it is seen by no one, seeing with N aked Awareness Itself, that all the mind can EVER say in Truth is, I don’t know.”
I guess what I am really trying to figure out is: what is realized when you realize the Self?
In a word? NOTHING.
What is “realized?” That there is nothing to realize. Nothing. This is seeing by no one that there never was a division in Source. You ARE what you seek. Already always awake here and now. The seeking seems to divide Source into a subject seeker and an object called self for it to realize. Enlightenment can be said to be the simple knowing that there is nothing to get and no one to get it.
But to the Ultimate Unknowable Source, these are all dead words that are empty and meaningless, and the word enlightenment or the words self-realization are pointing to MYTHS!
If you are interested in ending suffering and living in natural freedom, ponder this: What or who is this “I” that says “I am trying to figure this (un-figure-outable nondual Being) out?" The mind is machinery. You, when identified falsely as the mind-thinking-machinery, will endlessly ask questions like these and try to grab and own That, Source, which is OUTSIDE the mind! Seeing is happening. Seeing thoughts is happening. That is Consciousness, your knowing directly I AM before the thought arises that I am 'me,' is Presence, Awareness, arising as seeing without a seer, knowing without a knower, clarity without a subject or object.
The mind is a thought, “I” that as taken to be a solid separate thinking feeling controlling entity, “I apart from “Other,” then that thought-structure SEEMS to divide up totality. But can a thought do anything? Can a feeling/thought actually divide the Whole?
Do you actually come to know the Source of this I AM or is it just realized that you can never know, so the search gets called off and you get back to being?
What search? What Source? What being? Who would get back to that which has never been left? Being IS. Unknowable, That is the silence of deep sleep, pure Awareness before Consciousness arises as the knowing “I AM” and then is translated by Infinite Energy into the thought-form I AM “me.”
These are very good questions, it seems that you are on the precipice of this and I’d say, as John Wheeler once said to me, “get ready for a life free of suffering!”
For now, I’d say, write back and tell me the nature of the suffering for you, and also I’d suggest you watch the video series “This Is It” on YouTube… HERE. There is also a link on the site to a dialogue wherein the seeking and suffering ended for a guy named Paul. That one’s on the audio/video page. The download is free.
"Earlier I was sure of so many things, now I am sure of nothing. But I feel that I have lost nothing by not knowing, because all my knowledge was false. My not knowing was in itself knowledge of the fact that all knowledge is ignorance, that `I do not know' is the only true statement the mind can make."
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
________________________________________________
Saturday, September 22, 2007
"You need not bring your dream [that this is 'my life'] to a
definite conclusion. or make it noble, or happy, or beautiful; all you
need is to realize you are dreaming. On waking up you find that you
are Love Itself, embracing all. - Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
_________________________________________
A book author whose book I reviewed, I’ll call " a person called x" (name withheld to protect the innocent!) writes,
"Amazon haven’t posted your review yet……by the way, how do you find all this?"
I have been asking some interesting questions ... and inviting others to do the same:
What wants ... anything?
What is in charge of “charles?” Or “person x?”
Can I find a controller in here or there or anywhere, anywhere?
No.
Who cares to be known on Amazon? A “Person called x” or a "charlie?" what are those?
What am I? I don't know.
Yet I absolutely know that I AM, there is Existence and I Am That.
Who cares whether a review appears or not?
What is "controlling" all these impulses of energy that arise as thoughts about "me" and "my" books " my website” etc etc
I do not know.
All I can ever know is, I AM. All else is the Mystery of the vast Unknowing Unimaginable Nothing
Yet there is … Always Only Love.
definite conclusion. or make it noble, or happy, or beautiful; all you
need is to realize you are dreaming. On waking up you find that you
are Love Itself, embracing all. - Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
_________________________________________
A book author whose book I reviewed, I’ll call " a person called x" (name withheld to protect the innocent!) writes,
"Amazon haven’t posted your review yet……by the way, how do you find all this?"
I have been asking some interesting questions ... and inviting others to do the same:
What wants ... anything?
What is in charge of “charles?” Or “person x?”
Can I find a controller in here or there or anywhere, anywhere?
No.
Who cares to be known on Amazon? A “Person called x” or a "charlie?" what are those?
What am I? I don't know.
Yet I absolutely know that I AM, there is Existence and I Am That.
Who cares whether a review appears or not?
What is "controlling" all these impulses of energy that arise as thoughts about "me" and "my" books " my website” etc etc
I do not know.
All I can ever know is, I AM. All else is the Mystery of the vast Unknowing Unimaginable Nothing
Yet there is … Always Only Love.
Friday, September 21, 2007
The Key to The Kingdom
Investigate. Does this "I" or sense of "me" that has been accepted as what you are actually have ANY control over what thoughts arise, what feelings or emotional experiences come up, what happens in its world?
The key to seeing that this "I" is a powerless concept is, try to control your thoughts and never have an unhappy thought or emotion for, say, two weeks. Then let us know how it went, and if you still believe that "you" are the "managing director of your life." For me, my gut-sense of "who I am" was "charles in charge!" Yet there was so much that didn't go my way that I finally had to look at that belief: "I'm in charge:" Is that TRUE? So see what you consider to be your gut-sense identity and challange that belief by giving it a 110% effort to "be in charge" in your life . . .
And while all that is going on, just notice that the awareness of your being, present as the ever-knowing consciousness of "I am," has never gone away.
Awareness is never lost nor found. IT IS. That is what you are ... the aware presence that sees thoughts, feelings, changes, happenings, effort and struggle, trying to control, trying to not control ... all is witnessed by that Awareness that you are.
So you are what you have been seeking.
Investigate. Does this "I" or sense of "me" that has been accepted as what you are actually have ANY control over what thoughts arise, what feelings or emotional experiences come up, what happens in its world?
The key to seeing that this "I" is a powerless concept is, try to control your thoughts and never have an unhappy thought or emotion for, say, two weeks. Then let us know how it went, and if you still believe that "you" are the "managing director of your life." For me, my gut-sense of "who I am" was "charles in charge!" Yet there was so much that didn't go my way that I finally had to look at that belief: "I'm in charge:" Is that TRUE? So see what you consider to be your gut-sense identity and challange that belief by giving it a 110% effort to "be in charge" in your life . . .
And while all that is going on, just notice that the awareness of your being, present as the ever-knowing consciousness of "I am," has never gone away.
Awareness is never lost nor found. IT IS. That is what you are ... the aware presence that sees thoughts, feelings, changes, happenings, effort and struggle, trying to control, trying to not control ... all is witnessed by that Awareness that you are.
So you are what you have been seeking.
Consciousness is all there is, and you are That.Full
Stop.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
end game
It is enough if you do not imagine yourself to be the body. It is the "I am the body" idea that is so calamitous. It blinds you completely to your real nature. Even for a moment do not think that you are the body. Give yourself no name, no shape. In the darkness and the silence reality is found.
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj -
End Game
The false belief, "I am this body," not seen as a belief but as something that is real, is a major source of suffering. This talk points to what is Real, beyond the belief or conviction that what you are is a limited body that will one day disentegrate and die.
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
when? only NOW
Q: When did you realize? A specific date please!
Again: Well: As a story (only) I met John Wheeler in late 2004 and “Sailor” Bob Adamson in 2005. It … the search … was essentially “done” by mid-2006. But that story ... and the storyteller ... are both false! This Natural State is NOT an attainment by or for a person... it is the absence of a person who needs to attain! Words fail, always.
Oh well... never mind. No matter.
Q: What is realization?
Realization is the disappearance of a seeker, which is the eternal natural state of absence of anyone to get realized.
As “Sailor” Bob Adamson puts it,
"Because awareness is self existing there is no effort needed or anyone who can make an effort to get it or lose it.’
As Tony Parsons puts this, "What disappears is the one who feels separate and needs not to. There’s only being. It can’t be conceived of. It can’t be described. It cannot even be known." Full Stop.
More from Tony ....
"There is no one that can do anything and there is nothing that needs to be done or known! There never has been anyone to do anything. The whole misconception that keeps us firmly in the sense of being separate is the idea that we can do anything or the idea that we need to do anything. Why do we need to do anything? There is just what’s happening. It is all immaculately complete and without need."
More from Bob:
"The natural state is never lost. It is not an appearance, and therefore it can never disappear. It is always the same. It is not an entity. Realize that the conceptual thinker and conceptual thoughts seemingly obscure the non-conceptual natural state. Pause a thought even for an instant and the natural state is fully evident. STOP and SEE. In the seeing, pure awareness gets used to itself."
Had Enough of seeking?! "Me" too :-)
Q: When did you realize?
Just NOW.
Q: (Angrily) Nisargadatta gave a date. He said I met my Guru at 34, and at 37 I realized.
Okay, that's what Nisargadatta said. And I said what I said.
The question I have for you, sir, is this:
Who cares?
____________________________________________
Again: Well: As a story (only) I met John Wheeler in late 2004 and “Sailor” Bob Adamson in 2005. It … the search … was essentially “done” by mid-2006. But that story ... and the storyteller ... are both false! This Natural State is NOT an attainment by or for a person... it is the absence of a person who needs to attain! Words fail, always.
Oh well... never mind. No matter.
Q: What is realization?
Realization is the disappearance of a seeker, which is the eternal natural state of absence of anyone to get realized.
As “Sailor” Bob Adamson puts it,
"Because awareness is self existing there is no effort needed or anyone who can make an effort to get it or lose it.’
As Tony Parsons puts this, "What disappears is the one who feels separate and needs not to. There’s only being. It can’t be conceived of. It can’t be described. It cannot even be known." Full Stop.
More from Tony ....
"There is no one that can do anything and there is nothing that needs to be done or known! There never has been anyone to do anything. The whole misconception that keeps us firmly in the sense of being separate is the idea that we can do anything or the idea that we need to do anything. Why do we need to do anything? There is just what’s happening. It is all immaculately complete and without need."
More from Bob:
"The natural state is never lost. It is not an appearance, and therefore it can never disappear. It is always the same. It is not an entity. Realize that the conceptual thinker and conceptual thoughts seemingly obscure the non-conceptual natural state. Pause a thought even for an instant and the natural state is fully evident. STOP and SEE. In the seeing, pure awareness gets used to itself."
Had Enough of seeking?! "Me" too :-)
Q: When did you realize?
Just NOW.
Q: (Angrily) Nisargadatta gave a date. He said I met my Guru at 34, and at 37 I realized.
Okay, that's what Nisargadatta said. And I said what I said.
The question I have for you, sir, is this:
Who cares?
____________________________________________
nisargadatta right now
The state of identity is inherent in reality and never fades. But identity is neither the transient personality (vyakti), nor the karma-bound individuality (vyakta). It is what remains when all self-identification is given up as false - pure consciousness, the sense of being all there is, or could be. Consciousness is pure in the beginning and pure in the end; in between it gets contaminated by imagination which is at the root of creation. At all times consciousness remains the same. To know it as it is, is realization and timeless peace.
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
"Seeker of Truth, Follow NO Path. All Paths lead 'Where.' The Truth is HERE.- ee cummings
A Potent Pointer:
In deep sleep you are not a self-conscious person, yet you are alive. When you are alive and conscious, but no longer self-conscious, you are not a person any more. During the waking hours you are, as if on the stage, playing a role, but what are you when the play is over? You are what you are; what you were before the play began you remain when it is over. Look at yourself as performing on the stage of life. The performance may be splendid or clumsy, but you are not in it, you merely watch it; with interest and sympathy, of course, but keeping in mind all the time that you are only watching while the play -life- is going on.
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
just now
Silence, Seeing and Time: "When did the seeking stop?" It's a common question: "When did the suffering end? When did the penny drop? "When did 'you' see that there is no you?"
Have a good laugh!
Have a good laugh!
effort will take you nowhere
Unless you make tremendous efforts, you will not be convinced that effort will take you nowhere. The self is so self-confident that unless it is totally discouraged it will not give up. Mere verbal conviction is not enough. Hard facts alone can show the absolute nothingness of the self-image.
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
Monday, September 17, 2007
subtle confusion
Thanks to John Wheeler and 'Sailor' Bob Adamson!Ending the Subtle Confusion . . . . .
through Seeing the unreal "I" with Naked Awareness:
Two In One
'"Sailor" Bob Adamson and John Wheeler, Together in Melbourne, Australia - September 2007
Click HERE for an Enhanced mp3 Audio of this Talk
Many Thanks and Much Love to Mandy Willison for this!
Saturday, September 15, 2007
The Trap of Being an "Enlightened Person"
There are some "seasoned seekers" who attend endless satsangs and talks and spiritual gatherings and at every single one "prove beyond doubt" that they know "I am That" and "I am All That Is." They are easily recognized: The say things like, "I know that I don't know" and "You must ask who you are" and they pose as serene, calm, quiet "visiting teachers in drag" who don't drink or smoke and only listen to holy music. They tend to "take over" in satsangs. When the host pauses or there is simply a loving silence happening, their mouths open as they deign to “descend from on high" to the depths of a satsang to help poor ignorant you who don't see clearly as they do. Unless the host wisely chucks their holy ass out the door, they sagely offer their self righteous pity and intone spiritual "truths" from their lofty perch as they look down on you for still being a "miserable seeker."
These are the worst kinds of fakes. Why? They usually don't even know they are faking. This is the "sacred trap" of being a "self realized person." They honestly believe they have "made it" and they are now "enlightened."
They cannot hear that "enlightenment" is not a "personal attainment." What is called enlightenment is only so called by an observer who senses that there is an ABSENCE of a person to claim enlightenment; that can be said to be enlightenment. One who CLAIMS enlightenment is the ego-bound seeker who wants to prove they've "got it."
What is enlightenment? The absolute absence of any idea of being separated --being a "me," an entity -- apart from the whole. It's an ABSENCE, not the "presence of an owner of the absence of the person!" Impossible to grasp with the thinking mechanism we call "mind."
Anyway, I have been there, done that, got the t-shirt. I am here now to tell you, there ain't NO joy in that pretense. That emperor's got no clothes. But don't tell the emperor she has no clothes, or he'll have your head! Don't tell the fake you see through her or him; they'll either scream at you or slink away. On second thought maybe it IS a good idea to tell them you see their phony act. Then they might leave you and your pals in peace!
Hey, if the shoe fits wear it. Maybe wearing it will let it be seen to be a crappy outfit and getting down to the real might arise. Who knows? Anything is possible.
Meanwhile I have a question for those guys and dolls who posture at meetings and satsangs this way: What makes you think you have something others don't? What makes you talk like Ramana or Jesus? What makes you go from place to place to spout your wisdom?
Find out.
Then I will have just one more question for you.
There are some "seasoned seekers" who attend endless satsangs and talks and spiritual gatherings and at every single one "prove beyond doubt" that they know "I am That" and "I am All That Is." They are easily recognized: The say things like, "I know that I don't know" and "You must ask who you are" and they pose as serene, calm, quiet "visiting teachers in drag" who don't drink or smoke and only listen to holy music. They tend to "take over" in satsangs. When the host pauses or there is simply a loving silence happening, their mouths open as they deign to “descend from on high" to the depths of a satsang to help poor ignorant you who don't see clearly as they do. Unless the host wisely chucks their holy ass out the door, they sagely offer their self righteous pity and intone spiritual "truths" from their lofty perch as they look down on you for still being a "miserable seeker."
These are the worst kinds of fakes. Why? They usually don't even know they are faking. This is the "sacred trap" of being a "self realized person." They honestly believe they have "made it" and they are now "enlightened."
They cannot hear that "enlightenment" is not a "personal attainment." What is called enlightenment is only so called by an observer who senses that there is an ABSENCE of a person to claim enlightenment; that can be said to be enlightenment. One who CLAIMS enlightenment is the ego-bound seeker who wants to prove they've "got it."
What is enlightenment? The absolute absence of any idea of being separated --being a "me," an entity -- apart from the whole. It's an ABSENCE, not the "presence of an owner of the absence of the person!" Impossible to grasp with the thinking mechanism we call "mind."
Anyway, I have been there, done that, got the t-shirt. I am here now to tell you, there ain't NO joy in that pretense. That emperor's got no clothes. But don't tell the emperor she has no clothes, or he'll have your head! Don't tell the fake you see through her or him; they'll either scream at you or slink away. On second thought maybe it IS a good idea to tell them you see their phony act. Then they might leave you and your pals in peace!
Hey, if the shoe fits wear it. Maybe wearing it will let it be seen to be a crappy outfit and getting down to the real might arise. Who knows? Anything is possible.
Meanwhile I have a question for those guys and dolls who posture at meetings and satsangs this way: What makes you think you have something others don't? What makes you talk like Ramana or Jesus? What makes you go from place to place to spout your wisdom?
Find out.
Then I will have just one more question for you.
Where's The Bliss?
Who's waiting for
Suffering to end
NowsLetter #5 Sept. 2007
From theeternalstate.org
How do I END this Endless
Seeking and Suffering?
A seeker writes, "I very much appreciate what you are sharing online, as I can really relate to what you've said about going through deep suffering as a seeker. I would really like to get to the point where the suffering drops away."
The only issue here is that there seems to be a "me" (over there) that really would like to "get to a point" where the suffering drops away.
There are two false beliefs operating in this litany of the mind:
a: I am a person, a "real me." There is NOT.
b: There IS some point in "time" other than now. There is ONLY NOW.
Three questions to keep up on the screen of Pure Naked Awareness:
1. Do I Exist? Before the mind says 'yes' ... Existence just IS. Undeniable and Inescapable. THAT, is what You actually are. Then as the mind thinks, yes, I am, I do exist, I am here etc... go to question #2:
2. Who Am I? Or What Am I? The mind will answer all sorts of stuff. Discard ALL answers - you are NOT a concept or feeling or a body or mind. You exist. Not as a thing, as No Thing. Simply come back to "Who Am I? Then it may be seen that what you thought was a separate you has disappeared and all is Empty and Meaningless, and a beautiful knowing I call "I Don't Know," the GIFT of Unknowing, is revealed and recognized. A silent Being-Knowing is now arising as YOU, AS Not Knowing. Absolute Freedom, Absolute Peace.
3. Who Cares? Having a good laugh as it is seen that there is no one to care or not care! And never was. It's empty and meaningless and that TOO is empty and meaningless. LOL! Now: If this is not your actual experience, go back to question # 1.
This non-practice of non-duality seeing dismantles the false leaving only what is Real and Never Changing ... Awareness, just That.
Here and now you are already That. Dismantle the false and only the Real remains.
Do I Exist? YES
Who Am I? I DON'T KNOW
Who Cares? HAHAHAHA!
Only Freedom Is. I am Not.
So long as there is a belief in a "thing" called "me," keep at it until the minds gives up as it finally recognizes that the answer is NOT in the mind.
Beyond Freedom, There it Is ...
Only Love.
___________________________________________
This Week's Pointer:
"I feel that I have lost nothing by not knowing, because all my knowledge was false. My not knowing was in itself knowledge of the fact that all knowledge is ignorance, that 'I do not know' is the only true statement the mind can make."
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
What is it in you that never changes?
For now, can you accept that only That which
never changes can be Ultimately Real . . .
________________________________________________
This Week's Ponderation:
There seem to two kinds of searchers: those who seek to make their ego something other than it is, i.e. holy, happy, unselfish (as though you could make a fish unfish), and those who understand that all such attempts are just gesticulation and play-acting, that there is only one thing that can be done, which is to disidentify themselves with the ego, by realising its unreality, and by becoming aware of their eternal identity with pure being.
Wei Wu Wei
NEW Dialogues
How to point to Ananda? I see these pointers clearly:
Sat =Being, pointer, Do you exist?
Chit =Knowingness; pointer, How do you know that you exist?Ananda =Bliss; pointer ??????????????????????
ASK YOU:
Do I exist?
What Exists?
Who cares?
Not-Knowing, There IS Bliss!
LOL!
Thanks, but I'm looking for a pointer to Ananda. My point is that bliss is not so obvious like Sat= being and Chit= Knowingness. In all of ' Sailor' Bob and his disciple's books they included a lot of pointers to Sat and Chit but like, someone asked Nisargadatta "That I am existence is obvious that I known is obvious but where is Ananda? I like to have a good pointer question to point to Ananda like the questions that you and your friends use to point SAT and Chit. Thanks
Okay, Ananda = Bliss? NO. Ananda = Peace. Pointer: Not-Knowing.
NOW: Do some looking, Who is asking? Who wants some "Ananda" that is not present where that one who asks resides right now?
Ananda is another word for Timeless Peace. Where does That Awareness begin? Or end? This Endless Beginningless Awareness IS that Peace, or Ananda, that you seek.
If you're looking for an EXPERIENCE of some orgasm-like ecstasy that "you" can OWN and hang onto, you will never know the True Peace of "Ananda."
Freedom in Not Knowing is what the word "Ananda" is pointing to. Give up all expectations of orgasmic highs. They will NOT be fulfilled.
This is IT. Right here right now you ARE.
Be what you are. The more you seek outside of THAT -- Naked Being, Presence-Awareness, the direct unavoidable Beingness, the more you will be simply circling the conceptual wagons to avoid the arrows being fired at your false beliefs.
Stop seeking and LOOK -- do you know that you exist? What exists? Is there a person who will attain in a thing called time? NO.
Full Stop.
PS: Nisargadatta Maharaj said in His book, "Self-Knowledge and Self Realization, the following.
"What do the syllables of this immovable one signify? Absolute bliss of the Self, it is Sat (being), Chit (consciousness), and Ananda (beatitude)."
That's it from "the horse's mouth:" Beatitude, or what I call Peace. That is your being, naked awareness. Nothing special!
_____________________________________
Q: I Have been with "who am I" since we spoke, as much as possible. "What am I " also keeps popping up in between. It is seen that whenever the question is asked, attention seems to point back within, and it's seen that there is only silence (briefly).
Yes, that's right ON. "Who" or "what", either is fine -- this is the classic time-tested investigation that finally removes the seeming obstacles to knowing the Actuality of your Being.
Now just see that The Silence IS what You are. That Awareness is inescapable. Even when "then there is silence "briefly" and when there is activity "mostly", all of that happens, all is happen-ING, IN YOU -- That Ever-present Silence-Awareness. All the questioning is doing is erasing traces of the false and only the Eternal remains -- The Home you never left.
This is perfect, right on the mark. Nice work; just keep going.
-------------------------------------------------------------
Our last gathering was a rollicking good time! Seeking and suffering disappeared for many in gales of unbridled laughter and joy, as the basic pointers to out True Being of Unbounded Freedom sank in and did their work with out effort or struggle.
There is an audio CD set of that meeting available on the website, and a few sample tracks are on the free downloads page, with more to come so check back often.
The next regular Sunday group meeting is on October 7th, 2007
from 1:30 to 3:30 PM with an optional pot luck early supper at Applebees afterwards
There also meetings every Wednesday from 7: 30 till 9 PM.
Location:
"Indian Oaks," 1111 S. Oakwood Road,
Apartment 1308, Enid, OK 73703
(#1308 is in the rear left corner building of the complex.)
Consultations One on One are also available by telephone or in person. Meetings with your group in YOUR location can also be arranged. Charlie is retired from day to day work and so is available to travel most anywhere to meet with those with an interest in Self-Liberation. There is no charge but donations are always welcome.
Got questions? Write to: non.duality@yahoo.com.
_____________________________________________
Enjoy The Now, that's all there really is!
From I Am to I Am, With Love
Who's waiting for
Suffering to end
NowsLetter #5 Sept. 2007
From theeternalstate.org
How do I END this Endless
Seeking and Suffering?
A seeker writes, "I very much appreciate what you are sharing online, as I can really relate to what you've said about going through deep suffering as a seeker. I would really like to get to the point where the suffering drops away."
The only issue here is that there seems to be a "me" (over there) that really would like to "get to a point" where the suffering drops away.
There are two false beliefs operating in this litany of the mind:
a: I am a person, a "real me." There is NOT.
b: There IS some point in "time" other than now. There is ONLY NOW.
Three questions to keep up on the screen of Pure Naked Awareness:
1. Do I Exist? Before the mind says 'yes' ... Existence just IS. Undeniable and Inescapable. THAT, is what You actually are. Then as the mind thinks, yes, I am, I do exist, I am here etc... go to question #2:
2. Who Am I? Or What Am I? The mind will answer all sorts of stuff. Discard ALL answers - you are NOT a concept or feeling or a body or mind. You exist. Not as a thing, as No Thing. Simply come back to "Who Am I? Then it may be seen that what you thought was a separate you has disappeared and all is Empty and Meaningless, and a beautiful knowing I call "I Don't Know," the GIFT of Unknowing, is revealed and recognized. A silent Being-Knowing is now arising as YOU, AS Not Knowing. Absolute Freedom, Absolute Peace.
3. Who Cares? Having a good laugh as it is seen that there is no one to care or not care! And never was. It's empty and meaningless and that TOO is empty and meaningless. LOL! Now: If this is not your actual experience, go back to question # 1.
This non-practice of non-duality seeing dismantles the false leaving only what is Real and Never Changing ... Awareness, just That.
Here and now you are already That. Dismantle the false and only the Real remains.
Do I Exist? YES
Who Am I? I DON'T KNOW
Who Cares? HAHAHAHA!
Only Freedom Is. I am Not.
So long as there is a belief in a "thing" called "me," keep at it until the minds gives up as it finally recognizes that the answer is NOT in the mind.
Beyond Freedom, There it Is ...
Only Love.
___________________________________________
This Week's Pointer:
"I feel that I have lost nothing by not knowing, because all my knowledge was false. My not knowing was in itself knowledge of the fact that all knowledge is ignorance, that 'I do not know' is the only true statement the mind can make."
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
What is it in you that never changes?
For now, can you accept that only That which
never changes can be Ultimately Real . . .
________________________________________________
This Week's Ponderation:
There seem to two kinds of searchers: those who seek to make their ego something other than it is, i.e. holy, happy, unselfish (as though you could make a fish unfish), and those who understand that all such attempts are just gesticulation and play-acting, that there is only one thing that can be done, which is to disidentify themselves with the ego, by realising its unreality, and by becoming aware of their eternal identity with pure being.
Wei Wu Wei
NEW Dialogues
How to point to Ananda? I see these pointers clearly:
Sat =Being, pointer, Do you exist?
Chit =Knowingness; pointer, How do you know that you exist?Ananda =Bliss; pointer ??????????????????????
ASK YOU:
Do I exist?
What Exists?
Who cares?
Not-Knowing, There IS Bliss!
LOL!
Thanks, but I'm looking for a pointer to Ananda. My point is that bliss is not so obvious like Sat= being and Chit= Knowingness. In all of ' Sailor' Bob and his disciple's books they included a lot of pointers to Sat and Chit but like, someone asked Nisargadatta "That I am existence is obvious that I known is obvious but where is Ananda? I like to have a good pointer question to point to Ananda like the questions that you and your friends use to point SAT and Chit. Thanks
Okay, Ananda = Bliss? NO. Ananda = Peace. Pointer: Not-Knowing.
NOW: Do some looking, Who is asking? Who wants some "Ananda" that is not present where that one who asks resides right now?
Ananda is another word for Timeless Peace. Where does That Awareness begin? Or end? This Endless Beginningless Awareness IS that Peace, or Ananda, that you seek.
If you're looking for an EXPERIENCE of some orgasm-like ecstasy that "you" can OWN and hang onto, you will never know the True Peace of "Ananda."
Freedom in Not Knowing is what the word "Ananda" is pointing to. Give up all expectations of orgasmic highs. They will NOT be fulfilled.
This is IT. Right here right now you ARE.
Be what you are. The more you seek outside of THAT -- Naked Being, Presence-Awareness, the direct unavoidable Beingness, the more you will be simply circling the conceptual wagons to avoid the arrows being fired at your false beliefs.
Stop seeking and LOOK -- do you know that you exist? What exists? Is there a person who will attain in a thing called time? NO.
Full Stop.
PS: Nisargadatta Maharaj said in His book, "Self-Knowledge and Self Realization, the following.
"What do the syllables of this immovable one signify? Absolute bliss of the Self, it is Sat (being), Chit (consciousness), and Ananda (beatitude)."
That's it from "the horse's mouth:" Beatitude, or what I call Peace. That is your being, naked awareness. Nothing special!
_____________________________________
Q: I Have been with "who am I" since we spoke, as much as possible. "What am I " also keeps popping up in between. It is seen that whenever the question is asked, attention seems to point back within, and it's seen that there is only silence (briefly).
Yes, that's right ON. "Who" or "what", either is fine -- this is the classic time-tested investigation that finally removes the seeming obstacles to knowing the Actuality of your Being.
Now just see that The Silence IS what You are. That Awareness is inescapable. Even when "then there is silence "briefly" and when there is activity "mostly", all of that happens, all is happen-ING, IN YOU -- That Ever-present Silence-Awareness. All the questioning is doing is erasing traces of the false and only the Eternal remains -- The Home you never left.
This is perfect, right on the mark. Nice work; just keep going.
-------------------------------------------------------------
Our last gathering was a rollicking good time! Seeking and suffering disappeared for many in gales of unbridled laughter and joy, as the basic pointers to out True Being of Unbounded Freedom sank in and did their work with out effort or struggle.
There is an audio CD set of that meeting available on the website, and a few sample tracks are on the free downloads page, with more to come so check back often.
The next regular Sunday group meeting is on October 7th, 2007
from 1:30 to 3:30 PM with an optional pot luck early supper at Applebees afterwards
There also meetings every Wednesday from 7: 30 till 9 PM.
Location:
"Indian Oaks," 1111 S. Oakwood Road,
Apartment 1308, Enid, OK 73703
(#1308 is in the rear left corner building of the complex.)
Consultations One on One are also available by telephone or in person. Meetings with your group in YOUR location can also be arranged. Charlie is retired from day to day work and so is available to travel most anywhere to meet with those with an interest in Self-Liberation. There is no charge but donations are always welcome.
Got questions? Write to: non.duality@yahoo.com.
_____________________________________________
Enjoy The Now, that's all there really is!
From I Am to I Am, With Love
Friday, September 14, 2007
In Not-Knowing it is possible to recognise the nature of what you are, and to no longer doubt or deny this. Seeking is believing in doubt. Recognise what you are and all doubt is irrelevant. -
-Unmani (Liza) Hyde
-Unmani (Liza) Hyde
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
"Absolute Freedom - The Home You Never Left"
New Book, "Absolute Freedom"
Coming in October 2007
Preview it at
Monday, September 10, 2007
Bad News, Good news
Here is a question for YOU: If you are seeking …. What are you seeking for? What is it that you don’t have right now that you want to attain? Awakening? Enlightenment? Self-Realization? Liberation? What ARE these things? Are they “things” at all?
Here’s another, harder question for you: What IS enlightenment? What IS awakening? Liberation? Realization? Do you know what these words mean? What the concepts, these words-sounds, are pointing to? Are the concepts describing some actual attainable object? Some “thing” that “you” can “attain?”
Honestly now? Do you REALLY know? Or do you only think you know? Is it really clear or are you only believing a story told by some so-called “awakened, enlightened, liberated or self-realized ‘person’!?” Or is it some hearsay, something you read in some “spiritual book” by some “sage”, or some “holy scripture” (which are just records of dead words from dead people recorded as the interpretation of OTHER dead people?)
How foolish is THAT!?
Look: I am not attacking YOU. These words are to poke with a sharp pointer at the balloon of concepts (filled often with hot air!) … let’s poke a bit at the “culture” of “spirituality” … because that set of cultural beliefs (cultural = cult) can keep the sincere seeker on the hamster wheel of endless suffering and offers no authentic, lasting peace.
There simply is NO such “thing” (key word, thing) as awakening, enlightenment, liberation, or self-realization. These are concepts, ideas, stories; that is all. And a concept will never satisfy your longing for your true nature. The menu ain't the meal!
That’s bad news if you’re a seeker.
“What!!??” I hear you blurt out. “I am suffering here. Are you telling me that my suffering must be endured because there is no enlightenment and liberation from this endless seeking and suffering?
No. The notion that suffering must be endured is truly crap.
Now for the good news. The really cool good news is that what you actually ARE is are already awake, already liberated, already self-realized, already enlightenment itself.
There is peace, joy, freedom, wholeness. But that is not a personal state of affairs. What we call "the person" is just a false belief in a separate individual called “myself”, or “I”, or “me.”
Let’s have a look beyond words: Are you aware that you are present and seeing these words? And the spaces between the words? Aren’t you clearly presently aware that you exist? You are? That awareness is itself endless, Beginningless, peaceful, silent and open, like the sky. That Awareness Itself is the natural, eternal state of total freedom … simply, naked being-awareness.
Notice that. That is what is being pointed to with all the fancy words. Drop the words and see that YOU - this naked awareness – IS. THIS is the Beginningless and endless True Peace that the seeker yearns for, shining before the mind’s stories of “me” and “liberation” and “someday.”
This Awareness is always here right now wherever you go. It may have been overlooked as the mind focused on attaining something that was missing, something to solve a problem for a person. But the actual fact is, YOU are Awareness ... and That is never missing. That is a space-like knowing that the mind translates into the words “I AM.”
This Awareness is the peace that surpasses understanding; the natural state of serene open seeingness itself, devoid of
Identification as this or that thing. This Awareness IS Awake, liberated, realized. This Awakeness IS enlightenment itself. It ain't personal. It just IS. It is NOT an attainment. It very simply already always IS. Full Stop. You are this. There is nothing more to seek. In fact any seeking can only seemingly obscure that, yet ultimately it is impossible to hide from what you are, since you ARE the awareness that sees these words appearing before the eyes.
Awareness IS. Prior to, during, and after everything appearing, all stories, experiences, knowing, not knowing, etc … that Awareness sees all that is happening.
Everything happens in awareness and You Are That. Search Over.
You are always aware, always aware of something, whatever is appearing before your eyes and ears; whether that appearance is painful or pleasurable, happy or sad. Hearing, seeing, knowing … all these arise in awareness. Awareness sees, hears. It’s the essence of everything and never missing ever. That is what you are.
So you ARE the liberation, realization, awakeness; you ARE freedom itself. Just see right now that the label, the word, is not the actuality. Freedom is NOT a word. NOT a concept. NOT an experience. Freedom IS and you are that.
You are Awareness Itself. Already free and peaceful. So if that is what you were seeking you can stop now, because you already have it. See this right now for yourself. If you believe that you are anything other than awareness itself, who believes that? Challenge the assumption that you are a thing apart from that ever-present naked awareness.
You are NOT a concept, NOT a belief or a believer, NOT a thing apart from Awareness. You are what you seek. Se it now. You are already the enlightenment, the peace, that you have been looking for. That is all there is to “awakening” or “liberation” Seeing that what you are is naked awareness and what you are not is a thing apart from That.
Awareness is always present. It's not present yesterday or tomorrow, or even today. It's always only here now. YOU, as timeless, spaceless awareness that's always seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, smelling, is what YOU are.
All concepts and experiences that come and go in Awareness are totally irrelevant. Nothing that comes and goes can ever touch the Perfect Peace that YOU are
Just notice, "I am present and aware, right here right now." That's all there is to it. Game Over: Allee Allee In Free.
So: Welcome back to the Home you never left.
Here is a question for YOU: If you are seeking …. What are you seeking for? What is it that you don’t have right now that you want to attain? Awakening? Enlightenment? Self-Realization? Liberation? What ARE these things? Are they “things” at all?
Here’s another, harder question for you: What IS enlightenment? What IS awakening? Liberation? Realization? Do you know what these words mean? What the concepts, these words-sounds, are pointing to? Are the concepts describing some actual attainable object? Some “thing” that “you” can “attain?”
Honestly now? Do you REALLY know? Or do you only think you know? Is it really clear or are you only believing a story told by some so-called “awakened, enlightened, liberated or self-realized ‘person’!?” Or is it some hearsay, something you read in some “spiritual book” by some “sage”, or some “holy scripture” (which are just records of dead words from dead people recorded as the interpretation of OTHER dead people?)
How foolish is THAT!?
Look: I am not attacking YOU. These words are to poke with a sharp pointer at the balloon of concepts (filled often with hot air!) … let’s poke a bit at the “culture” of “spirituality” … because that set of cultural beliefs (cultural = cult) can keep the sincere seeker on the hamster wheel of endless suffering and offers no authentic, lasting peace.
There simply is NO such “thing” (key word, thing) as awakening, enlightenment, liberation, or self-realization. These are concepts, ideas, stories; that is all. And a concept will never satisfy your longing for your true nature. The menu ain't the meal!
That’s bad news if you’re a seeker.
“What!!??” I hear you blurt out. “I am suffering here. Are you telling me that my suffering must be endured because there is no enlightenment and liberation from this endless seeking and suffering?
No. The notion that suffering must be endured is truly crap.
Now for the good news. The really cool good news is that what you actually ARE is are already awake, already liberated, already self-realized, already enlightenment itself.
There is peace, joy, freedom, wholeness. But that is not a personal state of affairs. What we call "the person" is just a false belief in a separate individual called “myself”, or “I”, or “me.”
Let’s have a look beyond words: Are you aware that you are present and seeing these words? And the spaces between the words? Aren’t you clearly presently aware that you exist? You are? That awareness is itself endless, Beginningless, peaceful, silent and open, like the sky. That Awareness Itself is the natural, eternal state of total freedom … simply, naked being-awareness.
Notice that. That is what is being pointed to with all the fancy words. Drop the words and see that YOU - this naked awareness – IS. THIS is the Beginningless and endless True Peace that the seeker yearns for, shining before the mind’s stories of “me” and “liberation” and “someday.”
This Awareness is always here right now wherever you go. It may have been overlooked as the mind focused on attaining something that was missing, something to solve a problem for a person. But the actual fact is, YOU are Awareness ... and That is never missing. That is a space-like knowing that the mind translates into the words “I AM.”
This Awareness is the peace that surpasses understanding; the natural state of serene open seeingness itself, devoid of
Identification as this or that thing. This Awareness IS Awake, liberated, realized. This Awakeness IS enlightenment itself. It ain't personal. It just IS. It is NOT an attainment. It very simply already always IS. Full Stop. You are this. There is nothing more to seek. In fact any seeking can only seemingly obscure that, yet ultimately it is impossible to hide from what you are, since you ARE the awareness that sees these words appearing before the eyes.
Awareness IS. Prior to, during, and after everything appearing, all stories, experiences, knowing, not knowing, etc … that Awareness sees all that is happening.
Everything happens in awareness and You Are That. Search Over.
You are always aware, always aware of something, whatever is appearing before your eyes and ears; whether that appearance is painful or pleasurable, happy or sad. Hearing, seeing, knowing … all these arise in awareness. Awareness sees, hears. It’s the essence of everything and never missing ever. That is what you are.
So you ARE the liberation, realization, awakeness; you ARE freedom itself. Just see right now that the label, the word, is not the actuality. Freedom is NOT a word. NOT a concept. NOT an experience. Freedom IS and you are that.
You are Awareness Itself. Already free and peaceful. So if that is what you were seeking you can stop now, because you already have it. See this right now for yourself. If you believe that you are anything other than awareness itself, who believes that? Challenge the assumption that you are a thing apart from that ever-present naked awareness.
You are NOT a concept, NOT a belief or a believer, NOT a thing apart from Awareness. You are what you seek. Se it now. You are already the enlightenment, the peace, that you have been looking for. That is all there is to “awakening” or “liberation” Seeing that what you are is naked awareness and what you are not is a thing apart from That.
Awareness is always present. It's not present yesterday or tomorrow, or even today. It's always only here now. YOU, as timeless, spaceless awareness that's always seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, smelling, is what YOU are.
All concepts and experiences that come and go in Awareness are totally irrelevant. Nothing that comes and goes can ever touch the Perfect Peace that YOU are
Just notice, "I am present and aware, right here right now." That's all there is to it. Game Over: Allee Allee In Free.
So: Welcome back to the Home you never left.
Saturday, September 8, 2007
the delusion of the "oneness experience"
Q: I had a Oneness experience many years ago in Vietnam, (during probably my most boring period over there). Had never heard of such a thing and just a couple weeks later I was sent to an LZ where I came across Alan Watts' "The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are.” Well this triggered another such experience except this time I tried to possess it, to keep it for myself. And, like quicksilver through my fingers, it was gone.
This is a very familiar story. Many seekers have had such misleading occurrences happen and they are then really fooled into believing there are such “things” as “enlightenment” and “Liberation.”
When awareness of the nature of reality dawns in the mind of the seeker, that there is no such thing as permanent “enlightenment” and that any experience, of oneness or any other “state,” must necessarily pass away, the seeking begins to fade away. The realization begins to dawn that ONLY what NEVER CHANGES, never comes and goes, could be the Eternal State, the natural freedom of Being itself. The "experience of oneness" is ACTUALLY, TWO-NESS: There’s the experience and the one experiencing! So in actual fact it is a fake, a delusion of mind masking as “oneness.”
In Oneness there is NO experiencer and NOTHING experienced. There is only the experience-ING. Then when it is pointed out that any experience comes and goes in awareness and awareness itself is never changing, always clear, present and open, allowing whatever appears to come and go, then it’s coming up to “game over,” and being completely free of suffering.
Then the clarity of the simple seeing that what we are is Presence-Awareness and that the personal entity is actually nonexistent becomes the living experience-ING. This is an impersonal occurring and not anything attainable or hold-onto-able, of course: There are NO enlightened “people.” A “me” being “enlightened” is the ultimate oxymoron, because the “one who seeks enlightenment” is nothing more substantial than an idea of an "I" who can “get” something he or she is not. You already always were, will be, and are Awareness. Just that and nothing else.
At any rate my life since has in a particular sense. One of "suffering", looking for the door to that experience again (while I raised a family). Along the way, I tried to vanquish my ego, which I perceived to be the primary obstacle to my quest, doubted my goodness (purity of heart), my discipline. Meditation seemed like taking a very roundabout road to get to where I already was.
All suffering is for a personal “entity,” and there quite simply is NO such thing anywhere. Look for the separate person, do the investigation in the way the sages have always pointed out, and you find that the “me” is conspicuously ABSENT! This is very good news, because it ends the suffering once and for good. When the false is seen AS false, there is no longer any urge or motivation to “dissolve or destroy” it. How can you kill a ghost? Try to capture a phantom. It’s like trying to grasp a cloud. Impossible. But each must find this out for himself or herself.
The investigation is key… looking for mister or miz me and finding that there ain’t no such actual separate entity, not in you, nor in anyone else, puts paid to the seeking and the concomitant suffering. You simply wake up to the dream, and the realization arises that there never was a problem for the Real You, the Unborn Naked Awareness, and that all suffering was imagined owing to a mistake in identification … the idea that “I am a body, I am a mind, I am a person, a me. All that happened was an innocent error usually around the age of two, wherein a thought that bubbled into awareness from nowhere was believed to be a real thing that described an individual separated from the “world out there.” Clear up the mistake, root out the false cause, and the whole house of cards collapses, leaving what is always present, never changing, your True Natural State of Being-Awareness … just That and nothing else.
Correcting the error is simple; a little investigation is all it takes. Don’t let anyone tell you that suffering is “just part of what is.” That is a useless piece of nondual crap. Suffering can end, and has ended for countess seekers who take up this commitment to completion in earnest. “Sailor” Bob Adamson’s search ended in the presence of Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj 30 years ago, and he has since pointed out what is real and shown the way to see the false and discard it for many, many fortunate “former seekers.” Now with the advent of the Internet the good news is spreading all over the world. And you are the beneficiary. Look: It's even happening in rural Oklahoma!
So please just take up these simple pointers: You know that you are aware, you are being. That being is inescapable. Then challenge the lies the mind tells you … don’t keep accepting the false assumption that you are a separate entity. Freedom is what you are and you can taste it. Make that your living reality. You have friends who have done the investigation and can help to shed light on the pathless path and that is most fortunate indeed. Use them!
Perhaps you can help me understand my enigma and help me take the next step toward "dis-llusion-ment"!
These pointers can take the seeker beyond the need for "help." See how these work as you get into them with some earnestness. Do keep in touch; feel free write or call with any questions or doubts or “yeah-buts.” Let’s get this done once and for good. Thanks for writing, see you soon.
This is a very familiar story. Many seekers have had such misleading occurrences happen and they are then really fooled into believing there are such “things” as “enlightenment” and “Liberation.”
When awareness of the nature of reality dawns in the mind of the seeker, that there is no such thing as permanent “enlightenment” and that any experience, of oneness or any other “state,” must necessarily pass away, the seeking begins to fade away. The realization begins to dawn that ONLY what NEVER CHANGES, never comes and goes, could be the Eternal State, the natural freedom of Being itself. The "experience of oneness" is ACTUALLY, TWO-NESS: There’s the experience and the one experiencing! So in actual fact it is a fake, a delusion of mind masking as “oneness.”
In Oneness there is NO experiencer and NOTHING experienced. There is only the experience-ING. Then when it is pointed out that any experience comes and goes in awareness and awareness itself is never changing, always clear, present and open, allowing whatever appears to come and go, then it’s coming up to “game over,” and being completely free of suffering.
Then the clarity of the simple seeing that what we are is Presence-Awareness and that the personal entity is actually nonexistent becomes the living experience-ING. This is an impersonal occurring and not anything attainable or hold-onto-able, of course: There are NO enlightened “people.” A “me” being “enlightened” is the ultimate oxymoron, because the “one who seeks enlightenment” is nothing more substantial than an idea of an "I" who can “get” something he or she is not. You already always were, will be, and are Awareness. Just that and nothing else.
At any rate my life since has in a particular sense. One of "suffering", looking for the door to that experience again (while I raised a family). Along the way, I tried to vanquish my ego, which I perceived to be the primary obstacle to my quest, doubted my goodness (purity of heart), my discipline. Meditation seemed like taking a very roundabout road to get to where I already was.
All suffering is for a personal “entity,” and there quite simply is NO such thing anywhere. Look for the separate person, do the investigation in the way the sages have always pointed out, and you find that the “me” is conspicuously ABSENT! This is very good news, because it ends the suffering once and for good. When the false is seen AS false, there is no longer any urge or motivation to “dissolve or destroy” it. How can you kill a ghost? Try to capture a phantom. It’s like trying to grasp a cloud. Impossible. But each must find this out for himself or herself.
The investigation is key… looking for mister or miz me and finding that there ain’t no such actual separate entity, not in you, nor in anyone else, puts paid to the seeking and the concomitant suffering. You simply wake up to the dream, and the realization arises that there never was a problem for the Real You, the Unborn Naked Awareness, and that all suffering was imagined owing to a mistake in identification … the idea that “I am a body, I am a mind, I am a person, a me. All that happened was an innocent error usually around the age of two, wherein a thought that bubbled into awareness from nowhere was believed to be a real thing that described an individual separated from the “world out there.” Clear up the mistake, root out the false cause, and the whole house of cards collapses, leaving what is always present, never changing, your True Natural State of Being-Awareness … just That and nothing else.
Correcting the error is simple; a little investigation is all it takes. Don’t let anyone tell you that suffering is “just part of what is.” That is a useless piece of nondual crap. Suffering can end, and has ended for countess seekers who take up this commitment to completion in earnest. “Sailor” Bob Adamson’s search ended in the presence of Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj 30 years ago, and he has since pointed out what is real and shown the way to see the false and discard it for many, many fortunate “former seekers.” Now with the advent of the Internet the good news is spreading all over the world. And you are the beneficiary. Look: It's even happening in rural Oklahoma!
So please just take up these simple pointers: You know that you are aware, you are being. That being is inescapable. Then challenge the lies the mind tells you … don’t keep accepting the false assumption that you are a separate entity. Freedom is what you are and you can taste it. Make that your living reality. You have friends who have done the investigation and can help to shed light on the pathless path and that is most fortunate indeed. Use them!
Perhaps you can help me understand my enigma and help me take the next step toward "dis-llusion-ment"!
These pointers can take the seeker beyond the need for "help." See how these work as you get into them with some earnestness. Do keep in touch; feel free write or call with any questions or doubts or “yeah-buts.” Let’s get this done once and for good. Thanks for writing, see you soon.
I Am
Establish yourself firmly in the awareness of 'I am'. This is the beginning and also the end of all endeavour.
Hold onto the sense of 'I am' to the exclusion of everything else. When thus the mind becomes completely silent, it shines with a new light and vibrates with new knowledge. It all comes spontaneously, you need only hold on to the 'I am'.
Refuse all thoughts except one: the thought 'I am'. The mind will rebel in the beginning, but with patience and perseverance it will yield and keep quiet. Once you are quiet, things will begin to happen spontaneously and quite naturally, without any interference on your part.
Just keep in mind the feeling 'I am', merge in it, till your mind and feeling become one. By repeated attempts you will stumble on the right balance of attention and affection and your mind will be firmly established in the thought-feeling 'I am'. Whatever you think, say, or do, this sense of immutable and affectionate being remains as the ever-present background of the mind.
To know what you are you must first investigate and know what you are not. And to know what you are not you must watch yourself carefully, rejecting all that does not necessarily go with the basic fact: 'I am'. ... Separate consistently and perseveringly the 'I am' from 'this' or 'that', and try to feel what it means to be, just to be, without being 'this' or 'that'.
Give up all questions except one: 'Who am I'? After all, the only fact you are sure of is that you are. The 'I am' is certain. The 'I am this' is not. Struggle to find out what you are in reality.
Cling to one thing, that matters, hold on to 'I am' and let go all else. This is sadhana. In realization there is nothing to hold on to and nothing to forget. Everything is known, nothing is remembered.
...just remember yourself. 'I am', is enough to heal your mind and take you beyond. Just have some trust.
Stop searching, and see -- it is here and now -- it is that 'I am' you know so well.
You cannot meaningfully say 'this is what I am'. It just makes no sense.
'I am' is first-hand and needs no proofs. Stay with it.
Be content with what you are sure of. And the only thing you can be sure of is 'I am'. Stay with it, and reject everything else. This is Yoga.
Go back to that state of pure being, where the 'I am' is still in its purity before it got contaminated with 'this I am' or 'that I am'. Your burden is of false self-identifications -- abandon them all.
Don't you see that it is your very search for happiness that makes you miserable? Try the other way: indifferent to pain and pleasure, neither asking nor refusing, give all your attention to the level on which 'I am' is timelessly present. Soon you will realize that peace and happiness are in your very nature and it is only seeking them through some particular channels, that disturbs.
Give your heart and mind to brooding over the 'I am', what is it, how is it, what is its source, its life, its meaning. It is very much like digging a well. You reject all that is not water, till you reach the life-giving spring.
The 'I am' that pursues the pleasant and shuns the unpleasant is false; the 'I am' that sees pleasure and pain as inseparable sees rightly.
Those who practise the sadhana of focussing their minds on 'I am' may feel related to others who have followed the same sadhana and succeeded.
You need not worry about your worries. Just be. Do not try to be quiet; do not make 'being quiet' into a task to be performed. Don't be restless about 'being quiet', miserable about 'being happy'. Just be aware that you are and remain aware -- don't say: 'yes, I am; what next?' There is not 'next' in 'I am'. It is a timeless state.
http://www.nonduality.com/iam.htm
Hold onto the sense of 'I am' to the exclusion of everything else. When thus the mind becomes completely silent, it shines with a new light and vibrates with new knowledge. It all comes spontaneously, you need only hold on to the 'I am'.
Refuse all thoughts except one: the thought 'I am'. The mind will rebel in the beginning, but with patience and perseverance it will yield and keep quiet. Once you are quiet, things will begin to happen spontaneously and quite naturally, without any interference on your part.
Just keep in mind the feeling 'I am', merge in it, till your mind and feeling become one. By repeated attempts you will stumble on the right balance of attention and affection and your mind will be firmly established in the thought-feeling 'I am'. Whatever you think, say, or do, this sense of immutable and affectionate being remains as the ever-present background of the mind.
To know what you are you must first investigate and know what you are not. And to know what you are not you must watch yourself carefully, rejecting all that does not necessarily go with the basic fact: 'I am'. ... Separate consistently and perseveringly the 'I am' from 'this' or 'that', and try to feel what it means to be, just to be, without being 'this' or 'that'.
Give up all questions except one: 'Who am I'? After all, the only fact you are sure of is that you are. The 'I am' is certain. The 'I am this' is not. Struggle to find out what you are in reality.
Cling to one thing, that matters, hold on to 'I am' and let go all else. This is sadhana. In realization there is nothing to hold on to and nothing to forget. Everything is known, nothing is remembered.
...just remember yourself. 'I am', is enough to heal your mind and take you beyond. Just have some trust.
Stop searching, and see -- it is here and now -- it is that 'I am' you know so well.
You cannot meaningfully say 'this is what I am'. It just makes no sense.
'I am' is first-hand and needs no proofs. Stay with it.
Be content with what you are sure of. And the only thing you can be sure of is 'I am'. Stay with it, and reject everything else. This is Yoga.
Go back to that state of pure being, where the 'I am' is still in its purity before it got contaminated with 'this I am' or 'that I am'. Your burden is of false self-identifications -- abandon them all.
Don't you see that it is your very search for happiness that makes you miserable? Try the other way: indifferent to pain and pleasure, neither asking nor refusing, give all your attention to the level on which 'I am' is timelessly present. Soon you will realize that peace and happiness are in your very nature and it is only seeking them through some particular channels, that disturbs.
Give your heart and mind to brooding over the 'I am', what is it, how is it, what is its source, its life, its meaning. It is very much like digging a well. You reject all that is not water, till you reach the life-giving spring.
The 'I am' that pursues the pleasant and shuns the unpleasant is false; the 'I am' that sees pleasure and pain as inseparable sees rightly.
Those who practise the sadhana of focussing their minds on 'I am' may feel related to others who have followed the same sadhana and succeeded.
You need not worry about your worries. Just be. Do not try to be quiet; do not make 'being quiet' into a task to be performed. Don't be restless about 'being quiet', miserable about 'being happy'. Just be aware that you are and remain aware -- don't say: 'yes, I am; what next?' There is not 'next' in 'I am'. It is a timeless state.
http://www.nonduality.com/iam.htm
Friday, September 7, 2007
"... in the state of witnessing you ask yourself 'Who am I?', the answer comes at once, though it is wordless and silent. Cease to be the object and become the subject of all that happens; once having turned within, you will find yourself beyond the subject. When you have found yourself, you will find that you are also beyond the object, that both the subject and the object exist in you, but you are neither."
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
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Sri Nisargadatta Quotes for Today
There is only imagination. It has absorbed you so completely that you just cannot grasp how far from reality you have wandered. No doubt imagination is richly creative. Universe upon universe are built on it. Yet they are all in space and time, past and future, which just don't exist.
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The variety of personal worlds is not so great. All the dreams are superimposed over a common world. To some extent, they shape and influence each other. The basic unity operates in spite of all. At the root of it all lies self- forgetfulness; not knowing who I am. In a hospital there may be many patients, all sleeping, all dreaming, each dreaming his own private, personal dream, unrelated, unaffected, having one single factor in common - illness. Similarly, we have divorced ourselves in our imagination from the real world of common experience, and enclosed ourselves in a cloud of personal desires and fears, images and thoughts, ideas and concepts.
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
---------------------------------------------
The variety of personal worlds is not so great. All the dreams are superimposed over a common world. To some extent, they shape and influence each other. The basic unity operates in spite of all. At the root of it all lies self- forgetfulness; not knowing who I am. In a hospital there may be many patients, all sleeping, all dreaming, each dreaming his own private, personal dream, unrelated, unaffected, having one single factor in common - illness. Similarly, we have divorced ourselves in our imagination from the real world of common experience, and enclosed ourselves in a cloud of personal desires and fears, images and thoughts, ideas and concepts.
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
Thursday, September 6, 2007
the gift of unknowing
End the search now .... come Home to Being...
It's all about Being, Living As Freedom .....
THIS Is The Eternal, Natural State.
This is about ending the search for "wholeness", "completion," "enlightenment", "self realization", etc etc ... there is no such! There IS NO awakening, NO liberation ... this is the end of that story! To come back to the endless peace of unbounded freedom and indestructible joy is what this one is for. Come on home right now. Welcome!
It's all about Being, Living As Freedom .....
THIS Is The Eternal, Natural State.
This is about ending the search for "wholeness", "completion," "enlightenment", "self realization", etc etc ... there is no such! There IS NO awakening, NO liberation ... this is the end of that story! To come back to the endless peace of unbounded freedom and indestructible joy is what this one is for. Come on home right now. Welcome!
just this as it is
Ask yourself: Do I Exist? Am I Aware that I am? Obvious, isn't it? YOU ARE. That Existence that YOU are is the same Existence that Nisargadatta, Ramana, Christ, Buddha, and Krishna et al ARE. It is not that "they" "were" That; they, and YOU, ARE That. Timeless Endless Beginningless BEING.
The I AM that I am is one and the same as the I AM that you are. Existence cannot get more existent. Awareness cannot become more aware. You are That, here and now, fully Being and Aware.
So call off the search! And if you think you cannot, ask yourself, WHO said so? Question the assumption that what you are is limited or lacking in any way. Asking yourself, Who am I? What am I? Where is the me I believe I am? This investigation reveals the false AS FALSE, leaving ONLY the Real. Just ASK, with no expectation of any answer or any outcome: Simply ask and see that what you truly are is no thing.
Can something come from no thing?
The I AM that I am is one and the same as the I AM that you are. Existence cannot get more existent. Awareness cannot become more aware. You are That, here and now, fully Being and Aware.
So call off the search! And if you think you cannot, ask yourself, WHO said so? Question the assumption that what you are is limited or lacking in any way. Asking yourself, Who am I? What am I? Where is the me I believe I am? This investigation reveals the false AS FALSE, leaving ONLY the Real. Just ASK, with no expectation of any answer or any outcome: Simply ask and see that what you truly are is no thing.
Can something come from no thing?
Wednesday, September 5, 2007
this is freedom
Who cares about philosophy? Your life is the concern. If you are suffering get at the source of it and root it out at the taproot. Is there free will or is everything determined?
Who cares!!??
THIS Is Impersonal Freedom from all suffering.
THIS is here now.
THIS is what You are.
Full Stop.
Who cares!!??
THIS Is Impersonal Freedom from all suffering.
THIS is here now.
THIS is what You are.
Full Stop.
no mind
There is no such thing as mind. There are ideas and some of them are wrong. Abandon the wrong ideas, for they are wrong and obstruct your vision of yourself. Assertions are usually wrong, and denials right. Only by denying can one live. Assertion is bondage. To question and deny is necessary. It is the essence of revolt and without revolt there can be no freedom.Sri
-Nisargadatta Maharaj
-Nisargadatta Maharaj
Tuesday, September 4, 2007
Can something come from no thing?
Ask yourself: Do I Exist? Am I Aware that I am?
Obvious, isn't it? YOU ARE. That Existence that YOU are is the same Existence that Nisargadatta, Ramana, Christ, Buddha, and Krishna et al ARE. It is not that "they" "were" That; they, and YOU, ARE That. Timeless Endless Beginningless BEING. The I AM that I am is one and the same as the I AM that you are.
Existence cannot get more existent. Awareness cannot become more aware. You are That, here and now, fully Being and Aware. So call off the search! And if you think you cannot, ask yourself, WHO said so?
Question the assumption that what you are is limited or lacking in any way. Asking yourself, Who am I? What am I? Where is the me I believe I am? This investigation reveals the false AS FALSE, leaving ONLY the Real. Just ASK, with no expectation of any answer or any outcome: Simply ask and see that what you truly are is no thing.
Can something come from no thing?
Welcome to Being ... The Eternal State.
Obvious, isn't it? YOU ARE. That Existence that YOU are is the same Existence that Nisargadatta, Ramana, Christ, Buddha, and Krishna et al ARE. It is not that "they" "were" That; they, and YOU, ARE That. Timeless Endless Beginningless BEING. The I AM that I am is one and the same as the I AM that you are.
Existence cannot get more existent. Awareness cannot become more aware. You are That, here and now, fully Being and Aware. So call off the search! And if you think you cannot, ask yourself, WHO said so?
Question the assumption that what you are is limited or lacking in any way. Asking yourself, Who am I? What am I? Where is the me I believe I am? This investigation reveals the false AS FALSE, leaving ONLY the Real. Just ASK, with no expectation of any answer or any outcome: Simply ask and see that what you truly are is no thing.
Can something come from no thing?
Welcome to Being ... The Eternal State.
stay out of the 'dream'
Both sleep and waking are misnomers. We are only dreaming. True waking and true sleeping only the gnani knows. We dream that we are awake, we dream that we are asleep. The three states are only varieties of the dream state. Treating everything as a dream liberates. As long as you give reality to dreams, you are their slave. By imagining that you are born as so-and-so, you become a slave of the so-and-so. The essence of slavery is to imagine yourself to be a process, to have past and future, to have history. In fact, we have no history, we are not a process, we do not develop, nor decay; so see all as a dream and stay out of it.
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
Monday, September 3, 2007
Do you know the cause of suffering? END it!
The end of suffering is a matter of simply seeing what is always Real and what never changes, and what is false, which is nothing more than a false belief in an individual person called "me." That false belief is the core cause of suffering.
Cut through the root cause and the effects cannot remain. Being ... Naked Awareness ... is inescapable and ever-present. Nothing that comes and goes in Awareness can be what you truly are. Seeing this, the search ... and any suffering ... ends right now.
_____________________________________
Cut through the root cause and the effects cannot remain. Being ... Naked Awareness ... is inescapable and ever-present. Nothing that comes and goes in Awareness can be what you truly are. Seeing this, the search ... and any suffering ... ends right now.
_____________________________________
End Suffering Here and Now!
This followup to the previous video was prompted by an e-mail from a seeker who has "see" his true nature, yet is still suffering, and tries to justify suffering as "just an appearance." Been there done that no joy in mudville. See right now that suffering can END, once and for good. When the false is seen to be false, only
the True remains.
This followup to the previous video was prompted by an e-mail from a seeker who has "see" his true nature, yet is still suffering, and tries to justify suffering as "just an appearance." Been there done that no joy in mudville. See right now that suffering can END, once and for good. When the false is seen to be false, only
the True remains.
Sunday, September 2, 2007
You are NOT this Body, or mind, or ANY 'thing'
You are That No-concept No-Thing - Naked Presence, that Awareness which the mind translates into the "knowing" that "I am" ... and you are NOT this person, this body-mind, or any 'thing.'
Nisargadatta Maharaj:
I am not this person, this body-mind or any thing.
As I can't be what I perceive, I am not this body-mind or any thing that I am conscious of.
As body, you are in space. As mind, you are in time. But are you a mere body with a mind in it? Have you ever investigated? (252)
Why not investigate the very idea of body? Does the mind appear in the body or the body in the mind? Surely there must be a mind to conceive the "I-am-the-body" idea. A body without a mind cannot be 'my body'. 'My body' is invariably absent when the mind is in abeyance. It is also absent when the mind is deeply engaged in thoughts and feelings. (434)
You observe the heart feeling, the mind thinking, the body acting; the very act of perceiving shows that you are not what you perceive. (2)
The perceived cannot be the perceiver. Whatever you see, hear or think of, remember - you are not what happens, you are he to whom it happens. (519)
Desire, fear, trouble, joy, they cannot appear unless you are there to appear to. Yet, whatever happens points to your existence as a perceiving centre. Disregard the pointers and be aware of what they are pointing to. (220)
Realize that every mode of perception is subjective, that what is seen or heard, touched or smelt, felt or thought, expected or imagined, is in the mind and not in reality, and you will experience peace and freedom from fear. (201)
When you realize that the distinction between inner and outer is in the mind only, you are no longer afraid. (464)
You are neither the body nor in the body. There is no such thing as body. You have grievously misunderstood yourself. To understand rightly, investigate. (253)
You are not in the body, the body is in you! The mind is in you. They happen to you. They are there because you find them interesting. (212)
You only know that you react. Who reacts and to what, you do not know. You know on contact that you exist: "I am". The "I am this", "I am that" are imaginary. (337)
To myself, I am neither perceivable nor conceivable; there is nothing I can point out to and say: "this I am". You identify yourself with everything so easily; I find it impossible. The feeling "I am not this or that, nor is anything mine" is so strong in me that as soon as a thing or a thought appears, there comes at once the sense "this I am not". (268)
Whatever you may hear, see or think of, I am not that. I am free from being a percept or a concept. (152) A
s you cannot see your face, but only its reflection in the mirror, so you can know only your image reflected in the stainless mirror of pure awareness. See the stains and remove them. The nature of the perfect mirror is such that you cannot see it. Whatever you can see is bound to be a stain. Turn away from it, give it up, know it as unwanted. All perceivables are stains. (126)
Having perfected the mirror so that it reflects correctly, truly, you can turn the mirror round and see in it a reflection of yourself -true as far as the mirror can reflect. But the reflection is not yourself - you are the seer of the reflection. Do understand it clearly - whatever you may perceive, you are not what you perceive. You can see both the image and the mirror. You are neither. (330) Remember, nothing you perceive is your own. (510)
What is really your own, you are not conscious of. (445)
You are nothing that you are conscious of. (458)
As there must be something unchanging to register discontinuity, I am not this body-mind, which is neither continuous nor permanent. The mind is discontinuous. Again and again it blanks out, like in sleep or swoon or distraction. There must be something continuous to register discontinuity. Memory is always partial, unreliable and evanescent. It does not explain the strong sense of identity pervading consciousness, the sense "I am". Find out what is at the root of it. (307)
You cannot be conscious of what does not change. All consciousness is consciousness of change. But the very perception of change - does it not necessitate a changeless background? (516)
Changes are inevitable in the changeful, but you are not subject to them. You are the changeless background, against which changes are perceived. (333)
The self based on memory is momentary. But such self demands unbroken continuity behind it. You know from experience that there are gaps when your self is forgotten. What brings it back to life? What wakes you up in the morning? There must be some constant factor bridging the gaps in consciousness. If you watch carefully, you will find that even your daily consciousness is in flashes, with gaps intervening all the time. What is in the gaps? What can there be but your real being, that is timeless? Mind and mindlessness are one to it. (333)
Realize that whatever you think yourself to be is just a stream of events; that while all happens, comes and goes, you alone are, the changeless among the changeful, the self-evident among the inferred. Separate the observed from the observer and abandon false identifications. (215)
The succession of transient moments creates the illusion of time, but the timeless reality of pure being is not in movement, for all movement requires a motionless background. It is itself the background. Once you have found it in yourself, you know that you had never lost that independent being. (409)
What changes is not real, what is real does not change. Now, what is it in you that does not change? As long as there is food, there is body and mind. When the food is stopped, the body dies and the mind dissolves. But does the observer perish? It is a matter of actual experience that the self has being independent of mind and body. It is being-awareness-bliss. Awareness of being is bliss. (210) You must realize yourself as the immovable behind and beyond the movable, the silent witness of all that happens. (319)
As the person is a changing stream of mental objects that I as the subject take to be my body-mind, I cannot be a person. I am, but I can't be this or that.
Nothing is wrong with you, but the ideas you have of yourself are altogether wrong. It is not you who desires, fears and suffers, it is the person built on the foundation of your body by circumstances and influences. You are not that person. (424)
The person is never the subject. You can see a person, but you are not the person. (64)
Your being a person is due to the illusion of space and time; you imagine yourself to be at a certain point occupying a certain volume; your personality is due to your self-identification with the body. (205)
How does personality come into being? By identifying the present with the past and projecting it into the future. (206)
The body-mind is like a room. It is there, but I need not live in it all the time. (153)
The person is merely the result of a misunderstanding. In reality, there is no such thing. Feelings, thoughts and actions race before the watcher in endless succession, leaving traces in the brain and creating an illusion of continuity. A reflection of the watcher in the mind creates the sense of "I" and the person acquires an apparently independent existence. In reality there is no person, only the watcher identifying himself with the "I" and the "mine". (343)
It is because the "I am" is false that it wants to continue. Reality need not continue - knowing itself indestructible, it is indifferent of forms and expressions. To strengthen and stabilize the "I am", we do all sorts of things - all in vain, for the "I am" is being rebuilt from moment to moment. It is unceasing work, and the only radical solution is to dissolve the separative sense of "I am such and such PERSON" It is not the "I am" that is false, but what you take yourself to be. I can see, beyond the least shadow of doubt, that you are not what you believe yourself to be. (458)
What is really your own, you are not conscious of. What you are conscious of is neither you nor yours. Yours is the power of perception, not what you perceive. It is a mistake to take the conscious to be the whole of man. Man is the unconscious, the conscious and the superconscious, but you are not the man. Yours is the cinema screen, the light as well as the seeing power, but the picture is not you. (445)
As it is my presence, which is always here and now, that gives the quality of actual to any event, I must be beyond time and space. I was never born, nor will ever die. Take the idea "I was born". You may take it to be true. It is not. You were not born, nor will you ever die. It is the idea that was born and shall die, not you. By identifying yourself with it you became mortal. (392)
Your mistake lies in your belief that you were born. You were never born nor will you ever die. (83)
Between the remembered and the actual there is a basic difference which can be observed from moment to moment. At no point of time is the actual the remembered. Between the two there is a difference in kind, not merely in intensity. The actual is unmistakably so. By no effort of will or imagination can you interchange the two. Now, what is it that gives this unique quality to the actual? A moment back, the remembered was actual, in a moment the actual will be the remembered. What makes the actual unique? Obviously, it is the sense of being present. In memory and anticipation, there is a clear feeling that it is a mental state under observation, while in the actual the feeling is primarily of being present and aware. Wherever you go, the sense of here and now you carry with you all the time. It means that you are independent of space and time, that space and time are in you, not you in them. It is your self-identification with the body, which, of course, is limited in space and time, that gives you the feeling of finiteness. In reality you are infinite and eternal. (516)
Found at:
http://www.nonduality.com/asmi1.htm
Nonduality Presents: ASMI
Excerpts from Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj's I AM THAT
compiled and edited by Miguel-Angel Carrasco
Numbers after quotations refer to pages of the edition by Chetana (P) Ltd, Bombay, 1992.
ASMI home
Nisargadatta Maharaj:
I am not this person, this body-mind or any thing.
As I can't be what I perceive, I am not this body-mind or any thing that I am conscious of.
As body, you are in space. As mind, you are in time. But are you a mere body with a mind in it? Have you ever investigated? (252)
Why not investigate the very idea of body? Does the mind appear in the body or the body in the mind? Surely there must be a mind to conceive the "I-am-the-body" idea. A body without a mind cannot be 'my body'. 'My body' is invariably absent when the mind is in abeyance. It is also absent when the mind is deeply engaged in thoughts and feelings. (434)
You observe the heart feeling, the mind thinking, the body acting; the very act of perceiving shows that you are not what you perceive. (2)
The perceived cannot be the perceiver. Whatever you see, hear or think of, remember - you are not what happens, you are he to whom it happens. (519)
Desire, fear, trouble, joy, they cannot appear unless you are there to appear to. Yet, whatever happens points to your existence as a perceiving centre. Disregard the pointers and be aware of what they are pointing to. (220)
Realize that every mode of perception is subjective, that what is seen or heard, touched or smelt, felt or thought, expected or imagined, is in the mind and not in reality, and you will experience peace and freedom from fear. (201)
When you realize that the distinction between inner and outer is in the mind only, you are no longer afraid. (464)
You are neither the body nor in the body. There is no such thing as body. You have grievously misunderstood yourself. To understand rightly, investigate. (253)
You are not in the body, the body is in you! The mind is in you. They happen to you. They are there because you find them interesting. (212)
You only know that you react. Who reacts and to what, you do not know. You know on contact that you exist: "I am". The "I am this", "I am that" are imaginary. (337)
To myself, I am neither perceivable nor conceivable; there is nothing I can point out to and say: "this I am". You identify yourself with everything so easily; I find it impossible. The feeling "I am not this or that, nor is anything mine" is so strong in me that as soon as a thing or a thought appears, there comes at once the sense "this I am not". (268)
Whatever you may hear, see or think of, I am not that. I am free from being a percept or a concept. (152) A
s you cannot see your face, but only its reflection in the mirror, so you can know only your image reflected in the stainless mirror of pure awareness. See the stains and remove them. The nature of the perfect mirror is such that you cannot see it. Whatever you can see is bound to be a stain. Turn away from it, give it up, know it as unwanted. All perceivables are stains. (126)
Having perfected the mirror so that it reflects correctly, truly, you can turn the mirror round and see in it a reflection of yourself -true as far as the mirror can reflect. But the reflection is not yourself - you are the seer of the reflection. Do understand it clearly - whatever you may perceive, you are not what you perceive. You can see both the image and the mirror. You are neither. (330) Remember, nothing you perceive is your own. (510)
What is really your own, you are not conscious of. (445)
You are nothing that you are conscious of. (458)
As there must be something unchanging to register discontinuity, I am not this body-mind, which is neither continuous nor permanent. The mind is discontinuous. Again and again it blanks out, like in sleep or swoon or distraction. There must be something continuous to register discontinuity. Memory is always partial, unreliable and evanescent. It does not explain the strong sense of identity pervading consciousness, the sense "I am". Find out what is at the root of it. (307)
You cannot be conscious of what does not change. All consciousness is consciousness of change. But the very perception of change - does it not necessitate a changeless background? (516)
Changes are inevitable in the changeful, but you are not subject to them. You are the changeless background, against which changes are perceived. (333)
The self based on memory is momentary. But such self demands unbroken continuity behind it. You know from experience that there are gaps when your self is forgotten. What brings it back to life? What wakes you up in the morning? There must be some constant factor bridging the gaps in consciousness. If you watch carefully, you will find that even your daily consciousness is in flashes, with gaps intervening all the time. What is in the gaps? What can there be but your real being, that is timeless? Mind and mindlessness are one to it. (333)
Realize that whatever you think yourself to be is just a stream of events; that while all happens, comes and goes, you alone are, the changeless among the changeful, the self-evident among the inferred. Separate the observed from the observer and abandon false identifications. (215)
The succession of transient moments creates the illusion of time, but the timeless reality of pure being is not in movement, for all movement requires a motionless background. It is itself the background. Once you have found it in yourself, you know that you had never lost that independent being. (409)
What changes is not real, what is real does not change. Now, what is it in you that does not change? As long as there is food, there is body and mind. When the food is stopped, the body dies and the mind dissolves. But does the observer perish? It is a matter of actual experience that the self has being independent of mind and body. It is being-awareness-bliss. Awareness of being is bliss. (210) You must realize yourself as the immovable behind and beyond the movable, the silent witness of all that happens. (319)
As the person is a changing stream of mental objects that I as the subject take to be my body-mind, I cannot be a person. I am, but I can't be this or that.
Nothing is wrong with you, but the ideas you have of yourself are altogether wrong. It is not you who desires, fears and suffers, it is the person built on the foundation of your body by circumstances and influences. You are not that person. (424)
The person is never the subject. You can see a person, but you are not the person. (64)
Your being a person is due to the illusion of space and time; you imagine yourself to be at a certain point occupying a certain volume; your personality is due to your self-identification with the body. (205)
How does personality come into being? By identifying the present with the past and projecting it into the future. (206)
The body-mind is like a room. It is there, but I need not live in it all the time. (153)
The person is merely the result of a misunderstanding. In reality, there is no such thing. Feelings, thoughts and actions race before the watcher in endless succession, leaving traces in the brain and creating an illusion of continuity. A reflection of the watcher in the mind creates the sense of "I" and the person acquires an apparently independent existence. In reality there is no person, only the watcher identifying himself with the "I" and the "mine". (343)
It is because the "I am" is false that it wants to continue. Reality need not continue - knowing itself indestructible, it is indifferent of forms and expressions. To strengthen and stabilize the "I am", we do all sorts of things - all in vain, for the "I am" is being rebuilt from moment to moment. It is unceasing work, and the only radical solution is to dissolve the separative sense of "I am such and such PERSON" It is not the "I am" that is false, but what you take yourself to be. I can see, beyond the least shadow of doubt, that you are not what you believe yourself to be. (458)
What is really your own, you are not conscious of. What you are conscious of is neither you nor yours. Yours is the power of perception, not what you perceive. It is a mistake to take the conscious to be the whole of man. Man is the unconscious, the conscious and the superconscious, but you are not the man. Yours is the cinema screen, the light as well as the seeing power, but the picture is not you. (445)
As it is my presence, which is always here and now, that gives the quality of actual to any event, I must be beyond time and space. I was never born, nor will ever die. Take the idea "I was born". You may take it to be true. It is not. You were not born, nor will you ever die. It is the idea that was born and shall die, not you. By identifying yourself with it you became mortal. (392)
Your mistake lies in your belief that you were born. You were never born nor will you ever die. (83)
Between the remembered and the actual there is a basic difference which can be observed from moment to moment. At no point of time is the actual the remembered. Between the two there is a difference in kind, not merely in intensity. The actual is unmistakably so. By no effort of will or imagination can you interchange the two. Now, what is it that gives this unique quality to the actual? A moment back, the remembered was actual, in a moment the actual will be the remembered. What makes the actual unique? Obviously, it is the sense of being present. In memory and anticipation, there is a clear feeling that it is a mental state under observation, while in the actual the feeling is primarily of being present and aware. Wherever you go, the sense of here and now you carry with you all the time. It means that you are independent of space and time, that space and time are in you, not you in them. It is your self-identification with the body, which, of course, is limited in space and time, that gives you the feeling of finiteness. In reality you are infinite and eternal. (516)
Found at:
http://www.nonduality.com/asmi1.htm
Nonduality Presents: ASMI
Excerpts from Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj's I AM THAT
compiled and edited by Miguel-Angel Carrasco
Numbers after quotations refer to pages of the edition by Chetana (P) Ltd, Bombay, 1992.
ASMI home
Saturday, September 1, 2007
a fine distinction
Consciousness comes and goes, awareness shines immutably. When there is a person, there is also consciousness. "I am", mind, consciousness denote the same state. If you say "I am aware", it only means "I am conscious of thinking about being aware". There is no "I am" in awareness. Witnessing is of the mind. The witness goes with the witnessed. In the state of non-duality, all separation ceases.
-Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
-Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
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