It is for you to see what the truth is. Only your experience, your own openness, your own investigation, and your own freedom with respect to everything that anyone has told you in the past, will let you know. Only you can know who you are, nobody else, not your parents, educators, scientific community, doctors, only you. It is your job.
***
When you say that your thoughts are coming from this ocean, it seems so impersonal. Are you like that all the time?
The ocean in its depth doesn’t care about the storm. Everything is possible in this ocean. This ocean is not personal. When you said, “You,” you personalized this ocean. You were speaking to a bodymind. A body-mind is just an appearance in this ocean. It has no reality in itself. The ocean is peace itself. You are it. I am it. We all are it.
It is how I would like to live, but it seems impossible.
From the vantage point of a personal entity there is no peace, so from that point of view it is impossible. The only way is to understand that you are already this eternal peace. That is the true you. Then these questions won’t arise. When this is understood, the chances are that the body-mind will be at peace, but it doesn’t matter. You are at peace. You are peace.
The whole world is seeking fulfillment.
That which is fulfilled is fulfillment itself. You are that. Find this fulfillment in yourself, as you are. Remain still and then this fulfillment will find you.
If I just notice that the fulfillment is already there, there is nothing to do.
Yes, the doing, the activity, and the misery, veil the happiness that is inherent in our true nature, just as the waves on the ocean seem to eliminate the transparency and the peace of the ocean. When the mind goes quiet, this peace reveals itself. It is causeless. It is not produced.
Do spiritual practices, meditation, self-inquiry, and chanting cause the waves or still them?
They are all part of the doing. However, it depends also on what the ultimate goal is. If the ultimate goal is personal, then it is not true spiritual practice. The best result of such a practice is to bring you to that understanding. However, if the ultimate goal is to find God, to find happiness, which is neither personal nor achieved by the person, then it is sacred practice. In fact, in this case, it already comes from the divine. There are many paths that lead to the same center. At some point, all paths become one, in silence.
Is not life also a teaching process in which we have to choose? Is Hitler an act of God? Is nobody responsible?
Nobody, nobody, nobody! You do not choose your thoughts or your actions as a person and neither does anybody else, because there are no personal entities endowed with free will. The person is chosen; it does not choose. Why not see Hitler as cancer? Cancer has killed many more people than Hitler. We feel that cancer is natural and that Hitler is not. Everything is natural. Everything appears in nature. Hitlers are natural. Although we have these feelings about Hitler, we also know deep inside that the reason that Hitler was the way he was, is because he judged people. From the vantage point of Hitler, there were good people, the Aryans, and bad people, the Jews, the gypsies. Hitler was the way he was because he judged good and bad. The last thing we want to do is become a Hitler ourselves, so don’t judge anyone, Hitler included.
So should the likes of Hitler just be left alone to do their thing?
Certainly not. In every situation, we welcome the totality of that situation, including our own responses and reactions. Having looked at the situation with this impartial attitude, we act accordingly, taking everything into consideration. It is the lack of judgment in such a case that enables us to act in the best possible way for all concerned. Judgment comes from an apparent separate entity and is directed towards a similar separate entity. However, discrimination is impersonal and impartial. It comes directly from higher reasoning, from consciousness. It is not mediated through the thought or the feeling “I” as a separate entity. It sees the situation clearly and acts appropriately with efficiency, confidence, and courage. Peaceful means are employed whenever possible, but varying degrees of force are occasionally necessary. Even apparently violent action may, on very rare occasions, be necessary. However, in this situation, the action taken will come from love of the truth and not from hatred of an individual. Consciousness is spontaneous. It doesn’t rely on ready-made solutions. It does whatever is necessary to restore the truth in the situation and is then open for the next moment, without any residue from the past. It is fearless.
I think I recognize the impersonal consciousness, and it feels very limited.
When we have the experience of universal consciousness, no fear remains. It is immediately removed by this insight. It is very easy to find for oneself the answer to the question, “Have I had the experience of impersonal consciousness?” It is the same as the question, “Do I still feel the fear of disappearing?”
Krishnamurti talks of a special insight when listening to an enlightened person. Does this transformation only happen in the mind or is it related to the body as well?
It could go through the mind, through feeling, or through the body. Ultimately, it comes from nowhere. It comes from silence, which is beyond the mind and the body. We could ask a question and the answer, which comes from truth, can reach its destination on the spot, and we say, “Ah, yes,” and there is an impersonal glimpse of truth. Or the answer can be received and the understanding dawns later. Or it can happen without even using the intellect. Someone can come and sit here, and realize later that something has changed without their noticing it. They notice that there is more peace, more freedom and, at some point, there is joy, peace, or freedom that knows itself. Causeless means that you cannot pinpoint any object that could be its origin.
Love in Search of Itself
What are the ways of resting in awareness?
To be knowingly invited by silence. To think about silence, which means to be invited by the thought or question about silence, awareness, or God. To see everything as God. To feel God’s presence inside, to think of God, or to perceive everything outside as being God. These are the ways of resting in awareness.
By God, do you mean awareness, consciousness?
Yes. Everything you feel is God. Everything you think is God. Everything you perceive is God.
Do you mean just being aware of what is?
It depends what you mean by being aware. We are aware of objects, that is, thoughts, feelings, and perceptions, but not all of us are aware of being aware. We have to be aware of being aware, of being awareness. Normally, when we are aware of objects, we are completely identified with the object. In India, they call this Savikalpa samadhi, absorption in the object. In such a moment, it seems that our entire experience comprises whatever object is present, be it a thought, feeling, or perception. At some point, we understand that in order to have this experience, something must be present to experience it, to register it, something that is conscious, aware, knowing. We formulate this by saying that our experience comprises that which is conscious and an object. Initially, the object part of the experience seems to be by far the largest part of this experience, and that which is conscious or aware of it, whatever that is, seems small, almost insignificant, but nevertheless we know that it is there. However, as we become more interested in what this conscious presence is, the more significant and tangible it becomes and, by comparison, the more the object diminishes in importance and solidity.
At some point, we realize that it is in fact this conscious presence that is the most stable and lasting element of our experience and that the object itself is, by comparison, fleeting and insubstantial. This process culminates temporarily when we become completely absorbed in this presence. Awareness is aware of itself without an object. This is called Nirvikalpa samadhi, samadhi without objects, absorption in the Self without objects.
When objects reappear, we have the choice of identifying with them again or of remaining aware of awareness in the presence of objects. In this case, the objects themselves are
experienced as none other than awareness or God itself, and this is called Sahaja samadhi, the natural state.
These are the three modalities of being aware. The first is ignorance, the second is knowledge of Self in the absence of objects, and the third is knowledge of Self in the presence or absence of objects. The second stage is already a stage of Self-realization, but it doesn’t bring about complete happiness because in the presence of objects there might still be some nostalgia for the objectless state. There might still be a desire to go back to pure awareness without an object. At this stage, there can still be a hidden refusal of the present moment, the current situation, so happiness is not established. It is only when we see everything as God that there is stability.
So I have to allow that to happen, be aware of that happening and do nothing else?
We cannot make awareness happen. We have to understand first that we are awareness and not the body-mind, that we are this limitless, infinite, timeless presence. We take our stand in the reality of awareness, not in the illusion of a body-mind organism. Then when objects, appearances, phenomena, reappear, we realize that they arise out of our presence, abide in our presence during their existence, and then vanish back into our presence when they disappear. Their true substance is therefore our very presence. Once that is understood, at first intellectually, we can welcome every object, every appearance, as being consciousness itself, at least potentially. Then all we have to do is to let it unfold freely until it reveals itself as such. It is a game of hide-and-seek. It requires patience. It requires the knowledge that it is a game and this requires giving objects the room to unfold freely, not manipulating the situation or the objects. Then each situation is like a piece of music and we have to wait for the keynote at the end for the resolution. That is when we receive the beauty of the piece. Before that, there can be dissonance, ugliness, but this ugliness makes us long for the final resolution and then it is beautiful. If it is always harmonious, it is boring! The divine harmony encompasses the totality. You cannot take a piece of Bach and say, “I only like the consonance and not the dissonance.” We have to embrace it all. The beauty involves the inclusion of everything.
I am so distracted by objects in meditation.
As a result of the purity of our intention, we are not really interested in the objects that arise during meditation, but rather in the unknown presence in which they arise. We have an inkling of the presence at the precise moment that an object arises and again when an object vanishes, if the intention is directed towards the presence, not towards the object. The difficulty is that we may try to create an absence in the mind, a blank space, which would impersonate the presence. However, all that needs to be done is to make sure that the intention, the sacred intention, is there in the background and to trust it.
The mind will no longer feel it has to create the pseudo presence. As a result, the real presence takes over because it has always been there effortlessly. The fact that the mind does not see the presence, does not mean that it is not there. The mind cannot see the consciousness that is understanding these words in this very moment. This consciousness is not a thought or a feeling. We are it, without making an effort to be it. We have always been this consciousness, this presence. What we are not, appears in it and disappears in it. Because everything appears in it and disappears in it, this consciousness itself has no boundaries. Boundaries appear and disappear like everything else. Consciousness shines between the appearances of the objects and during the presence of the objects. In fact it shines as these objects.
In meditation, we take our attention away from all objects, from all appearances. Don’t try to transform whatever appears. It is our very intention to change things that perpetuate them. Let everything blossom in presence. Surrender all appearances to this presence. Let this presence create them, maintain them, and allow them to disappear.
At every moment, everything is suspended in God’s invisible arms. Everything is free-floating in presence. This presence is everywhere and therefore we are not excluded. It is this very presence that permeates the mind, the body, and the world, as consciousness.
Surrender your mind, everything you think you know, everything you want, everything you have, to this presence. Be in innocence and in not knowing, in “childlikeness.” Don’t be afraid of letting go of your concepts. They are not your life. There is a life beyond concepts. There is eternal life beyond the me-concept.
In meditation, our intention is with the consciousness that lies behind, beyond, and between the objects, whatever objects are being perceived at any moment. That gives total freedom for the objects to evolve, to tell their story, to do their performance, and then salute and leave.
***
I enjoyed sitting in the park today until some youths came along swearing and totally disrupted the peace. I hated them and in the end I moved. What would have been the enlightened approach?
To move sooner!
There are sometimes more unpleasant situations than pleasant ones, so there has to be some acceptance.
These situations are your yoga exercises. It is very interesting to observe your reactions. The chances are that if you observe and welcome these reactions in yourself, you may still have to move, but these situations will not surface too often. These types of situations arise in order to teach us to be welcoming at all times. There are levels in welcoming and we progress from one level to another. As long as we have not mastered a certain level, the same type of situation will keep on repeating itself until we are able to gracefully accept the situation, knowing that it is God. I am not suggesting you subject yourself to mistreatment or abuse. There are intelligent ways to welcome the totality of the situation and then move on quietly, without any anger, resentment, or division. There can even be the understanding that it is these people’s freedom to behave the way they do and that it is fine if they are having a good time or at least think they are. If we make our happiness dependent upon the way other people behave towards us, we are in trouble.
The same principle applies to accepting and allowing war as well, but it still brings sadness. All the human despair, indignity, ignorance, and lack of compassion. Do you not feel it?
People are tortured by cancer and die in millions. Do you feel it? Suffering touches me but not the lack of compassion. Who am I to judge? The problem is that people kill each other because they judge each other. If I start judging them, I become like them. Why would I do that? I don’t see the situation as something that happens to individuals. I see it as a situation that arises in consciousness, like cancer, death, or any other situation. I care about the now, about my neighbor. You think things should be different in order to be happy.
Cancer can be accepted as a natural part of life. Are you saying that the conflict and violence that mankind perpetrates is natural as well?
Yes. It is also a natural disaster that human beings lack compassion. We have to go to the root of this specific natural disaster and ask, “Why?” It is because most people feel that they are separate entities. At the root of war, at the root of lack of compassion, there is the ego, the notion that I am a separate, personal entity. How am I going to liberate everybody from their ego? Maybe that is not my mission. It is ambitious and pretentious.
All we can do is work on ourselves. We can start with our own sense of being separate, with our own judgment, with our own feeling that things should be different, with our own refusal of the present situation, with our own refusal of others. As a person, we are not going to save the world and perhaps the world doesn’t need to be saved. All we can do as a person is to do our best. To do our best, we start by liberating ourselves from our own ignorance. We stop stirring up more disharmony and conflict in the world by freeing ourselves from inner conflict, which comes from fragmentation. In this process we discover our eternity, our immortality. That will fill us up to the brim with happiness, and this will overflow and start resonating in others around us, without our doing anything to cause it. That is the only
way to be happy and to do our best in the world as we know it. I am not suggesting that if we have a job in the world that involved helping others, we shouldn’t do it. Of course we should. However, it is the understanding that is important, because it is the understanding that is truly implemented in any activity.
It seems that you are speaking of yourself as an individual. If we are consciousness, how do I understand that I am infinite consciousness and also an individual?
You are not an individual at all. That which is overflowing with happiness is happiness itself. It is not the individual that is overflowing with happiness. Light, consciousness, is aware of every individual in the world. It is the same light that is you and I. There are not two lights. The notion of an enlightened person is absurd. The right reason for attending these meetings or reading spiritual books is to resonate with what is said, not to create theories about enlightened body-minds.
The Perfume of Silence Page 18
