If “I” exist then the primary imprint, the primary awareness is the sensation to exist paired with the sense to have not existed prior. And it’s an internal sense.

Vedanta:  Who knows awareness? If there is only awareness, which is the meaning of “non-dual,’ who but awareness “knows” awareness? But to say awareness knows awareness is meaningless. Awareness just is. It is yourself. I think you should know that the “I” is awareness, which means that nothing can leave an imprint on it. If something other than awareness could leave an imprint awareness would not be free. But we know that awareness is the only free thing…which is not a “thing”… there is.

The awareness that you know is a “secondary” awareness, the reflection of awareness in the human mind. It is affected…imprinted to use your term…by sense perceptions. Sense perceptions become thoughts in the mind. It is affected by emotions, memories, desires, fears, etc.

You are right, there is a primary awareness, but it is pure original unborn existence shining as whole and complete awareness. You are close when you say it is the “sensation to exist,” but it is more than a sensation, which Ramana called the “I sense.” It is the universal “I”, existence shining as awareness. You, awareness, are not a sensation, you experience sensations. So, you cannot be a sensation.

Nothing precedes you, awareness, the universal I. You are aware of what happened to your “I sense,” you are aware while things happen, and you are a aware when something stops happening and something else starts happening. I think your phrase “not existed prior” actually means that nothing existed prior to you, awareness, which is true.

To say nothing precedes you means that you were never born. If you were never born you never die. You…awareness… are free of birth and death.

I think we are saying the same thing, but the way you express it is confusing.  The words above are not my words, although they reflect my knowledge of myself as awareness.  Talking about awareness is very difficult because it is not like anything we know with the senses.  Over the centuries the knowledge of existence shining as awareness accumulated and was refined by great sages who knew awareness as their own innermost self.  So we have today a very precise language…Vedanta…to express our knowledge of both What we are…ever-free awareness…and who we are…affected reflected awareness.  The fact that I use a time-tested language accounts for the fact that thousands of people read my posts, visit my website, study my books and watch my videos and attend my talks world wide.  If I just used my own words probably nobody would listen.

James: The word “samadhi” refers to both a state of mind and to the unborn you, existence shining as whole and complete ordinary ever-present consciousness…yourself in short. You can’t meditate on yourself because you are yourself. But you, ordinary awareness can meditate on your mind and its states.

Samadhi is a compound word, sama and dhi, a contracted form of buddhi, the intellect, the part of your mind that thinks. Sama means equal. So samahdi is an intellect that sees no difference between one thing and another. “A yogi in samadhi sees no difference between crow shit and a gold nugget.” It means that the essence of unwanted shit and wanted non-shit is the same. It is just your own consciousness/awareness appearing as what is valuable and what is detrimental.

For a spiritual person it means your likes and dislikes. If you don’t know who you are, you will pander to your likes and avoid your dislikes. It is a terrible job. It is called “samsara,” going around and around as if caught in a whirlpool and never getting free. This is how our likes and dislikes frustrate us. If you realize you are the real or true self, you discover that you are free of the samsara problem, although likes and dislikes may continue for a while, they gradually dissolve, become preferences, and eventually dissolve for good because you are happy with yourself as you are and don’t need things to make you happy.

So, when your mind is in a non-dual state you can pay attention to what it feels like to be non-dual.  It always feels good because that state is just the experience of the bliss of non-dual awareness reflected in the mind.  In this way you get a value for non-duality.  Once you have a value for non-duality you will develop a dislike of duality and you will enthusiastically try to stay in that state.  Of course it won’t work because that state is you, but that’s OK because at some point you will re-discover that you are samadhi, meaning you have non-dual vision.   You are a cyclops.  🙂

MT: As an aside, FWIW Self Inquiry (at least as far as I have understood and practised it) hasn’t (so far?) persuaded me of a grand ontological truth about my self (or Self).

It (alongside reflection, meditation etc) has put a gap between me and things that had been so close to me I would once have described them as ‘mine’ (passing thoughts, self-perceptions, judgments, feelings etc). So much of the messy bundle that constituted that psychological ‘me’ entity now seems to be flotsam flowing past (along with the world at large). I still get tugged along with it at times, but seem to more readily emerge.

James: A gap is good, like an early warning system that gives you time to shoot down enemy missiles before they land.  Or time to think about the fears and desires that are pressuring you to do something to complete yourself before you go off half-cocked.

MT: But what is it that the mental and emotional flotsam passes? If someone asked me “what precisely do you think you are?”, my answer would still be “I don’t know”. I don’t know whether such knowledge is possible for humans, whether by mere introspection or that plus reasoning and/or empirical investigation. Many claims are made, of course. As they conflict, most must be false.

James:  The flotsam flows by you, existence shining as unborn awareness/consciousness.  There is no other option.  The “What” that is the subject of the sentence is the correct word.  Normally people say “who.”  Who always refers to a person, whereas what is impersonal so it applies to the impersonal you.  The flowing thoughts are also impersonal, although if you think you are a who you will tend to identify with them.  You will think they are “my” thoughts.

So the next issue is why you aren’t certain that you are the What.  If you think about it, nobody ever informed you that you exist or that you are conscious because it is obvious.  And nobody has two selves.  If they did, they wouldn’t know which one was real.

So you know there is only one of you, you know you exist and you know you are conscious, which means that you “borrowed” your awareness from impersonal awareness/consciousness, the real you.  But there is one thing about yourself that you probably don’t know, that accounts for the doubt about your identity. 

You don’t know that the real you is unaffected by the passing flotsam, which means you are free.  If you know that, you will become very interested in claiming your ever-free identity.  So Vedanta points out this fact. 

Tonight’s’ talk is on a satsang I recently posted which briefly unfolds the difference between the Cause and Effect and the Non-origination teaching. It is titled not the same but not different, which is typically ambiguous Vedanta terminology! In essence, this is the same as the reflection teaching we have been touting for a while now, which is understanding the difference between personal conscious awareness that humans are endowed with, and impersonal universal nondual Awareness as our primary identity, and that of everyone else.

I recently had several satsangs on this topic with Shay, both on Zoom and posted on the website.  I must just say here, Shay, that I commend you for being willing to do so without requiring anonymity. That shows dispassion on your part, and understanding that ignorance is not personal. Everyone struggles with the same issues. There is nothing unique in anyone’s ignorance. Duality works the same way for everyone, more or less.

The main issue Shay had, one that is common with inquirers, is the belief that once you have understood the foundational teachings of Vedanta, you have gained knowledge, and moksa follows as a matter of course. Sadly, this is not the case, ignorance being as subtle and tenacious as it is.  Shay was hugely disappointed and dismayed to hear that he was wrong. He really thought he had done everything he needed to do, and felt cheated because he had been such a dedicated inquirer for 25 years. What he had not yet seen was that the dedicated inquirer had expectations and was in the way of moksa.

It’s fairly easy to say I am the Self because that is logical if you think about it, and it’s incontestable. The Self/Consciousness is the only thing that cannot be negated. But to truly understand what that means so that Self-knowledge transforms the life of the jiva is another matter. This transformation is simply one of knowledge, though it can and usually does manifest in a great improvement in quality of life for you as a jiva.  In fact, even though moksa is not about improving the jiva, if this transformation does not take place, it is likely that there is still work to do on remaining ignorance.

Once the mind no longer needs to affirm its identity, and ceases doing so as both verbalized and cognitive knowledge has served its purpose,  Self-knowledge has assimilated. Not as an object gained, but as in ignorance removed. Then we are established firmly, directly and ineffably in the Self as the Self.  There is no need or desire to go around spouting Vedanta. If the knowledge is needed at any time, it is directly available to the intellect.

Then the practice of discrimination between satya and mithya has  become automatic, since it is now just knowledge. You no longer need the principles of Vedanta, they are a means to an end –  freedom from and for the jiva. They can be discarded. What few people register and Vedanta tells you upfront, is that the teachings of Vedanta are a set-up. Ramji makes a point of this in most of his teachings and seminars, yet it does not land for most people.

The tricky part of inquiry is that for Self-knowledge to assimilate so that it translates to direct, automatic and permanent discrimination between satya and mithya, we must start with the Cause and Effect teaching, which explains the nature and identity of the creator, Isvara, the created, jiva and the creation, the field of Existence. I.e., it explains duality, with reference to nonduality. To negate duality you first have to know what it is. These are the foundational teachings of Vedanta, and  with it come the practices to apply, such as karma yoga, devotional yoga, and guna yoga.

Once this knowledge is understood, and these practices are part of our life, it gets us to the door of nididhysana. Here  we get to the next and final stage of inquiry: to negate duality involves negating cause and effect as mithya, also called the non-origination teaching. This requires fully dissolving the subject/object split, which also involves dealing with the jiva’s remaining  mental and emotional issues. Many inquirers get stuck here, which is why we say that the ego survives moksa.  At this stage, while the inquirer still needs some guidance from the teacher to stay on track, nididhysana is something the inquirer must do alone, with reference to Self-knowledge.

The inquirer already has the teachings, and the teacher cannot help them in applying them. That is up to each on of us. The teacher can spoon feed the inquirer but it will not help them. Its our coming of age as inquirers; we are no longer children seeking guidance. We are mature finders, and we have found the answers to all of life’s problems.  We just need to apply them.

All Vedanta teachings are based on words which are based on Self-knowledge. But all words are mithya, they are the finger pointing at the moon.  They are not the moon.  So while it is very important to study Vedanta and to memorize the foundational teachings, and certainly you will not progress without this, that is not what will set you free of limitation. Moksa is up to the grace of Isvara.

This is not a cause for concern because if you understand the value of the teachings and the importance of faith and surrender to them, you know that they will ‘do the work’ of removing the remaining ignorance. The teacher cannot do that for you, nobody can. Certainly, your ego will not. A helpful reminder at this stage, especially for inquirers who still have expectations as to how the teachings ‘should’ work for them, and who get frustrated, is one simple mantra:

I am never not the Self.

Not the Same and Not Different

Sam: It’s funny, I feel like I understand what you or Ramji say when you say you are speaking about the cause and effect teaching, but my mind feels like a sieve when I ask myself the question “what is the cause-and-effect teaching?” I’m not certain what the block is or whether there is one, but I am most certainly going to keep my attention on it until I feel comfortable that I can answer that important question.

Sundari: The cause and effect teaching in Vedanta is an entry-level teaching and not that complicated, but it is subtle. In some ways it fits the religious narrative: there is a creator and a creation subject to it, and the creation is intelligently run by natural laws which cannot be transgressed without consequence, i.e., cause and effect. However, the Vedanta perspective on cause and effect, of course, differs in important ways.

Isvara, the impersonal creator, is Consciousness wielding Maya, not a personified deity. Unlike the religious creator, Isvara does not punish or reward but is simply the facilitator of karma. So, in truth, as Maya is the three gunas, it is these three forces that bring everything into manifestation, including the jiva construct or Subtle Body—i.e., the individual and its field of experience. There is no actual creator except beautiful intelligent ignorance. The creation seems conscious, intelligently designed, and run because the light of Consciousness shines on it, but it has no light or intelligence of its own. 

As stated, the first stages of self-inquiry require investigating and understanding the creation, meaning the creator (Isvara), the person (jiva or Subtle body), and its field of experience (the world- jagat). Not to perfect the person in order to attain salvation for it in some hereto perfect heavenly world beyond the imperfect material world, but to negate both the person and the world in light of jnana yoga (Self-knowledge). To take a stand in Awareness as your identity and develop devotion of Isvara (as the Self, not a deity), to whom the jiva entity (person) owes everything.

But that is not the whole story because if this is a nondual universe, which we know it is, the cause and effect teaching is duality and Vedanta is about nonduality. The two never meet. Vedanta provisionally accepts duality because it meets the beginner inquirer where they are coming from – duality. It is a radical paradigm shift from duality to nonduality, so the teaching slowly builds the foundations for that essential liberating leap that the inquirer must make to progress to the next stage of self-inquiry, understanding the Isvara – jiva identity.

Unlike religion which places an all-powerful deity infinitely above and beyond the mere mortal, Vedanta reveals that as this is a nondual universe, there is essentially no difference between Jiva and Isvara except in two ways: Isvara as creator is omniscient and the jiva only knows the objects it has contact with. Secondly, in their capacity to create. Isvara creates all objects, subtle and gross, the objective world, and Jiva creates its subjective world, its world of thoughts and feelings—which also come from Isvara, the gunas.

The next all-important question to be answered arises here, which is: if Isvara and Jiva are both Consciousness, what is real, and what is not real? Vedanta defines real as that which is always present and never changes, which cannot be used to describe the creation because we can negate it with Self-knowledge (jnana yoga). The definition only applies to Consciousness, the one, and only non-negatable, invariable, ever-present, unchanging witnessing factor. Vedanta calls the creation apparently real, which means, it owes its existence to Consciousness, it does not have a reality of its own. It does not stand alone because it is always changing and not always present. 

That ‘something else’ is at the heart of inquiry, not as a subjective notion but as an identity issue. What, not who, I AM. The whole point of self-inquiry is to discriminate satya, nonduality/Consciousness, from mithya, the effects of Maya, duality. Vedanta is a progressive methodology so by eliminating all the inconstant variables, the common identity between Isvara and Jiva can only be Consciousness, so the person is an object known to Consciousness, and you cannot be what you know. Thus, the cause and effect teaching forms the bridge for the next step: The much more difficult non-origination teaching, which is about as subtle as any teaching can be. 

Assimilation depends on whether the inquirer has the requisite qualifications, is properly taught and has a thorough foundation in the first stages of inquiry. Though the inquirer may well have understood that they are the Self at this stage, as we often say, Self-realization is where the ‘work’ of self-inquiry begins. A common occurrence among inquirers is that they jump ahead before completing some of the important foundations for self-inquiry. This always catches up with them and holds them up in their quest for freedom from limitation and dependence on objects for happiness.

The completion of the steps of self-inquiry means assimilation, not being able to parrot the teachings. Some inquirers who think they must ‘learn’ Vedanta, miss the point that Vedanta is purely a means to an end: moksa. Once you know you are the Knowledge you no longer need the means. Others, like the Neo-Advaitins, deem the first stages irrelevant and just skip mithya entirely, heading straight to satya.  Sadly, it does not work to impose satya onto mithya. To kill the beast of duality one cannot pretend that it does not exist. It does exist because you experience it; the question is, what is it? If there are still the remnants of a doer lurking it will stand in the way of an independent mind free of the suffering caused by duality.

For moksa to attain, duality must be negated entirely, and to do so we must understand what it is, there is no other way to establish your identity as Existence (capital E).  Only then can assimilation of the non-origination teaching take place, without which Self-realization remains an intellectual understanding, it is not actualized. Moksa does not obtain. Many inquirers understand both the cause and effect and non-origination teachings quite well. But there is somehow a disconnect in their discrimination of the difference between them, usually because something has not been assimilated, or there is still some jiva purification in the way.

It helps to think of the cause and effect teaching not as a means to explain the cause or the creation (though it does do both) but as a mechanism to negate duality (the doer) by removing the non-essential variables. These are anything other than you, the Self. Here is a recap.

As I am the Self, I am non-dual, limitless. whole and complete, without parts, without beginning or end. Anything other than me is impossible because non-dual means just that: nothing other than, no divisions, no parts. But as I am limitless, I contain all powers, even the power to apparently limit myself: Maya – beginningless ignorance—the cause, which makes me, the causeless changeless ever-present non-dual Self, appear to cause, to change, and to be many. I.e., it makes the impossible possible and seems to make me ‘become’ the effects of ignorance, Maya.

This is not an actual change like milk becoming cheese, which is irreversible.  It is an apparent change because I, the Self, cannot cause or become anything being a partless, changeless whole. To do so would mean I have to become something other than me, which is impossible. There is only me. So, I never enter into the apparent creation, the effects, even though the apparent creation only exists because of me.

Think of it like this: Just like a movie director/producer and cast do not enter into a movie onscreen, even though the movie exists because it was produced/directed and acted by them: they ‘caused’ the movie, the ‘effect’. But the movie is not real; it is just a projection, a trick of light on a screen. It cannot affect (modify) anyone other than psychologically. It’s all in the mind, as the saying and the teaching goes, which of course, is where everything ‘happens’! 

I, the Self, am not your mind or in it, which, like all effects, is an object known to me. Nothing affects or modifies me. So, though the Maya movie is me, I am the producer/director/actor, the apparent indirect ‘cause’ of it, but I am not it. Confusingly, unlike the producer/cast of the movie, I am not the actual cause of it. There is no cause in me because there is nothing other than me.

You can’t get something out of something that is incapable of modification–this is how the logic of the non-origination teaching destroys duality (assuming qualifications and assimilation). It answers the logical question: 

How can Sat, Consciousness, be the basis of the material creation if it is non-dual Consciousness? The material creation is not material. It has no actual substance; it is a mirage. The deeper you delve into it, the further it recedes.  Just like a movie, the creation is a projection caused by Maya, which is not the same OR not different from Sat, Existence/Awareness. Very important distinction, not the same and not different, essential to nondual vision, i.e., discriminating Satya from mithya.

Who then, is the witness, the knower of the creation, you may ask? I, the Self, am also called the non-experiencing witness or knower of the effects of Maya (ignorance): the Subtle body, or jiva/experiencing entity and all objects. But in truth, I am not a witness to anything as there is only me to ‘witness’ me. I am only a witness with reference to the witnessed when Maya is operating. When Self-knowledge removes ignorance of me from the Subtle Body (mind), there is no Maya in the mind anymore.  Non-dual vision is permanent. Self-knowledge is not an object to obtain, it is who I am, so once moksa obtains, both ignorance and knowledge are then just objects known to me.

Cause and effect are, therefore, words to describe Isvara (me plus Maya), and the doer, the effect (me apparently under the spell of ignorance…note apparently). Both Isvara and Jiva share their identity with me, which is real, but neither the Isvara nor Jiva construct is real, though as stated the cause/creation appears to exist just like the movie onscreen.

When Self-Realization is not indirect intellectual knowledge but a direct experience of Existence As Your Identity, Self-actualization obtains and you see everything as just ISNESS, the Self.  You. There is no longer the need to take a stand in Awareness because you are Awareness, there is no ‘stander’ left. The reality of Maya, ignorance/duality, is no more, though duality still apparently exists, and you can enjoy it for what it is, it is as good as non-existent. As Maya no longer deludes, you never confuse ignorance with knowledge again, confusion and suffering for you are over. Mithya ‘becomes’ satya because there is no other option.

Much love

Sundari

Question:  Can you enlighten me? In one of your seminar series you say that ‘matter’ is inert. Then in another series you say ‘matter’ is eternal. I might be confused for the wrong reason. Is this reflection or possibly non origination?

James: I hope I can enlighten you. The problem is caused by comparing to ideas that are in different categories.  Eternal belongs in the TIME category.  The reflection teaching belongs in the Matter category and the Non-origination teaching doesn’t belong in a category because there are only categories if there is a creation.  Let’s start over.  

Consciousness/Awareness is eternal and matter is eternal. Consciousness is not conscious, and matter is not conscious. But when Maya (Macrocosmic Ignorance) is opperating Consciousness and matter together become a conscious, mixture, which is to say that they appear as a single unicellular organism, which complexifies by dividing. This process goes on for approximately 14.67 billion years on the cosmic clock.  It is called reflected awareness. Prior to creation of the material world, which provides a reflection for awareness in the form of macrocosmic sattva, the eternal inert material “portion” of Awareness is potential. It exists, but it is unmanifest.

Now we are 14.67 billion years into the creation.   You will probably be surprised to know that the reflection is still expanding and will probably expand for many more billions of years.

Anyway, sometime during the last 5-10,000 years, the reflection in jivas becomes more subtle and at this point we can say that a very tiny minority of human beings) become aware that they are aware. Most humans are not aware that they are not human.

An equally tiny cohort of this tiny cohort somehow hears about Vedanta, of which an equally tiny cohort understands the value of Vedanta (freedom from dependence on objects, not freedom from objects) and commits to actualizing said freedom, of which an equally tiny cohort with the help of scripture and a guru is set free of the notion that it is a created (born) entity. In short, a very rare few. One of my friends once said that there probably aren’t twenty-five people in the world who understand what I’m talking about, which is fine with me in so far as most human beings don’t understand their non-difference from other human beings.  Think how nice it would bn if you could claim that 25 people understand you.

Anyway, from this point on Awareness enjoys the option of granting freedom to the created entity. Keep in mind that the created entity is not non-existent. It is a living functioning conceptual entity with karma that eventually dies.  It cares a lot about karma because karma creates its future, which can always stand improvement.

So the question becomes, “If I am unborn Awareness and know there is no death for me, why would I bother blessing a finite entity with a happy life?”

Vedanta’s answer is “Why not?” It gives three reasons: (1) for the sake of the jiva itself, which suffers various unwanted limitations (2) for the sake of the teaching tradition which it owes a debt of gratitude for setting it free of the notion it is only a jiva and, (3) for the sake of the world.  Everyone Is more or less concerned about the state of play in the world today so Vedanta informs us how to improve it.  Think long and hard on this statement,

“One Less Ignorant Person is a Net Gain for the World”

and discard as much ignorance as you possibly can before you shuffle off the mortal coil. 

James:  I hope so.  Consciousness/Awareness is eternal and matter is eternal.  Consciousness is not conscious and matter is not conscious.  But when Maya (Macrocosmic Ignorance) is operating Consciousness and matter together become conscious, which is to say that they appear as conscious beings, first as a unicellular organism, which complexifies by dividing.  This process goes on for approximately 14.67 billion years on the cosmic clock.  This process is called reflected awareness.   Prior to creation of the material world, which provides a reflection for awareness in the form of sattva, the eternal inert material “portion” of Awareness is potential.  It exists, but it is unmanifest. 

At the very end of this process (from our point of view, although the reflection is still expanding and will probably expand for many more billions of years), sometime in the last 5-10,000 years the reflection becomes more subtle and we can say that a very tiny minority of human beings) become aware that they are aware.  Most humans are not aware
that
they are
not
humans.

An equally tiny cohort of this tiny cohort somehow hears about Vedanta, of which an equally tiny cohort understands the value of Vedanta (freedom from dependence) and commits to actualizing said freedom, of which an equally tiny cohort is set free of the notion that it is a created (born) entity.  In short, a very rare few.  One of my friends once said that there probably aren’t twenty five people in the world who understand what I’m talking about, which is is fine with me in so far as I like to make myself useful.    

From this point on Awareness enjoys the option of granting freedom to the created entity.  Keep in mind that the created entity is not non-existent.  It is a living functioning conceptual entity that eventually dies.  So the question becomes, “If I am unborn Awareness and know it, there is no death for me.  So why would I bother blessing a finite entity with a happy life?”  Vedanta’s answer is “Why not?”  It gives three reasons: (1) for the sake of the jiva itself, which suffers various limitations (2) for the sake of the teaching tradition, which taught it that it is free and, (3) for the sake of the world.  One less person with an active Duryodhana factor is a net gain for the world. 

The Self is always good because it is the subject, the consciousness or awareness. There is no need to do anything or to change it.

I always say “the Self is “nothing”, not something or no thing”. Because it is not an object of observation but the observer or awareness.

I formulated this correctly, didn’t I?

James:  Yes, but “nothing is not a good word, although I know what you mean.  There is no such thing as nothing because there is only consciousness.  The self is definitely something because we love it more an anything.  To say the self is “not a thing” or the self “cannot be objectified,” is as good as words can do.   

Now I finally understand that if you do anything in this world, dedicate it to God or Ishvara.  Because as a human being, I always want something and do everything to become happier. Doing this is unnecessary because what I said above about who I am is correct.

James:  Yes, the Self can’t be improved.  It is always fine as it is.  However, it improves without effort if you stand as awareness/consciousness; the knowledge does the work.  One additional point, however:  Amma is a who.  You, the self, are a what. 

It is the best attitude for my body/mind to act like this in this world, this dedication to God. Not for the sake of the Self because that is okay.

It couldn’t make me (the Self) happier, because every action I takes causes another one. Because the pattern is, it wants the result of the action to be repeated in this way.  Is this conclusion also correct?

James:  Yes, indeed! 

Thank you very much for all the energy you put into teaching.

Lots of love

It’s my pleasure.

Amma: Thank you for your answer. I wrote you this email because I was happy that I had come to an insight again. Some aspects of the teaching are so difficult to understand that it can take a long time before they are truly understood. Like “dedicate your worldly actions to god.” For a long time I couldn’t understand why I should do this. Or “the right perspective of object and subject”. This last topic makes everything very simple and clear. And is a beacon in a troubled world.

It’s good to see oneself as a robot because we are all just dancing to Ishwara’s tune.  It’s important to know what you are, but that’s just the beginning of one’s true life.  The best is yet to come.  People say they know and leave it at that, but claiming self- knowledge is basically conceit.  If you actually experience yourself as you are, there is nothing to know and therefore nothing to claim.  

So, where does the rubber meet the road? 

Answer:  When you are perfectly satisfied with yourself as you are warts and all and when you are completely satisfied with your circumstances, no matter how pleasant, tedious or tortuous.  Most spiritual people are stuck in convenience. They have comfortable lives, superior to the lives of average robots, but they are robots themselves, flogging the dead horse of success.  

Vedanta says, “Quit when you are ahead” and move on to simplicity and divine inspiration.  One should look in the mirror and see a new person every day.  And smile.  And then forget today’s person as you live it out in anticipation of enjoying and forgetting tomorrow’s person.  Nobody who thinks they are human is fully satisfied because humans are not real.  “I shine and the world and its humans shine after me.” 

If you hear yourself saying this with easy confidence, you are not a robot.  You are existence itself shining as whole and complete unborn awareness. 

I was the circumstances of your birth, your life now, and your coming death.

I was the smile of your first love, the cruelty in your childhood bully,
the excitement in your ambitions and the pain of your failures.

I was the whisper in your heart that first awakened your desire for freedom.

I have been every teacher and each distraction from the teaching.

I yawned at your humiliations and rejoiced when you were humbled.

I slept, disinterested in your exaltations and defeats.

Every minute of every day, from every direction, I have loved you as myself, but you do not see me.

I am salt and sweet, the tongue and the knower of taste.

I am heat and cold, pleasure and pain, the desire for health
and the wisdom of sickness.

I am rush hour’s hectic mess of honking horns and the terrifying silent emptiness of deep space.

I am the infinite potential of knowledge and ignorance, benevolence and evil.

I am everything you have ever known, experienced, or hoped to experience.

When the results of your actions come to fruition that too is me.

Creation’s infinite lifeforms and experiences are merely
a speck of dirt under the nail of my pinky toe.

I am the true love behind your most intimate griefs.

Even the one reading these words and knows the dawning realization of truth?

You guessed it.

Me again.

You thought you were you, but it was always me. 

Jeremy Goodfeather

A Salmon Swimming Upstream

James: Today let’s talk about the three simple steps to freedom, the  application of knowledge. Shankara calls it jnana abhyasa, practising knowledge.  If you say I’m sad, I’m depressed, I’m angry, I’m happy, I’m guilty, I’m satisfied, etc., etc., these are stories that have nothing to do with yourself. 

Yeah, I understand that.

James:  You are not producing the story.  The gunas are.  If you say I’m happy, virtuous and satisfied, sattva is producing that story. If you say I’m agitated, angry, and competitive rajas is generating it.  When you say I’m depressed, listless, and dull, tamas is at work. 

We are not concerned with (1) the story or (2) the guna that causes it.  We are only interested in (3) the storyteller.  What is #3?  It is awareness, the knower of the first two.  If you objectify and drop the first two, you immediately go Awareness.  You have identified yourself. 

I understand that.  In the voicemail, I wasn’t claiming a story.

James:  I agree. You weren’t, but your voice was.  Right?

That’s where it’s unconscious?

James:  Yes.  You were your voice because if you were awareness, you would not speak in a depressing tone of voice.  There would be bliss in it because awareness is bliss.  The knowledge was right, but the voice was wrong.  When you signed on a minute ago your voice was cheerful and happy because the self answered the call. 

Umm…

James:  So, to get to bliss all you have to do is monitor the gunas, move your attention to awareness and know that awareness is bliss.  It’s totally simple.

I understand that.  These are subtle thoughts

James:  Which are also a story.

Yes.

James:  What guna are they?

Well, they are knowledge, which is sattva.

James:  Yes.  Now, what you didn’t say is very interesting.  Where are you speaking from now?

From the I, from the observer, in this moment.  There is only this moment.

James:  There you go, there is only this moment.  Now keep thinking.  Therefore, what?  Therefore, who gives a damn about subtle thoughts?  If I ask if you want to be rid of subtle thoughts, you will probably say yes because you want to be awareness, right?

Umm…maybe.

James:  The “maybe” means you are thinking now.  The answer is you don’t need to get rid of the subtle thoughts or any non-subtle thoughts.  Why?

Because you are awareness before you can think a thought.  So, the thoughts only mean something if you think you aren’t awareness. 

I will come back to this and own it but please give me the liberty to ask a question. 

James.  OK.  I’m going to indulge you and pretend that you’re not awareness.    

What I noticed is that I have a bad attitude.  Swami TV says that sadhana should be joyful, but for me it’s always been about problem solving.  No wonder that’s depressing.  Right?

James: Right.  I’m happy that you didn’t conflate depression with the I. 

Because it’s endless, you know, you never get to the end of a life full of problems.  I notice that it is the mind’s habit to automatically flip into problem mode.  And as you say, the voice reveals it.  It’s the gunas at work.  I get it. 

James:  Good.  So there’s no problem.

Okay, it feels like effort.

James:  “It feels like effort” is another series of words that refer to action and seems to imply that action is a problem.  But action and doership are not a problem for me, awareness.  I don’t have instruments of action. 

So if you can learn to think this way, you’re good to go always in every minute. This way of thinking is non-dual knowledge.  It destroys the idea that life is just a bunch of problems and immediately replaces it with the direct experience of being, which is anandam, joy. 

Yes.  Maybe the idea that problems are the problem isn’t accurate.  When I was reading one of Sundari’s satsangs I realized that there is an abiding sense of disappointment, the feeling that I’ve missed something.  Owning the problem of missing out is ignorance. 

James:  Cool. Now you’re thinking.  You’ve been victimized by FOMO, fear of missing out.  You need to cultivate JOMO, the joy of missing out. 

Yes. Yes. That’s good. You’re right. Yeah, absolutely. Yes.

James:  Self inquiry is tracing back to the source, cause and effect.  If you do, you always come to a place where there’s no problem.  You can’t keep pretending that you are a feeling-thinking entity.  You are purely a knowing entity that’s unaffected by what it knows.  There is torture in Ukraine but you don’t feel it.  You know it.  It may produce an emotion but you don’t feel the emotion, which is just a sentient entity making a story about it. 

Yeah, yeah, it doesn’t affect this particular person.

James:  We understand how unjust, violent, ugly and evil it is and we observe our equipment feeling compassion and a sense of injustice and sadness but I am still me.  I am still aware.  That situation and the feelings it causes are away from me.  I never cease to be me and become them.

I know I’m going back into the story, but it for me, it’s helpful.  It gets rid of quite a lot.  There is FOMO around spirituality and being spiritual, which is crazy because my nature is awareness and awareness is bliss.

James:  Yes, even people in great pain want to live another day because life itself is bliss.  Some Vedanta people are bedeviled by the fear of claiming I am bliss even though it is true.  They say, “I can’t say I’m a happy person, because my feelings are telling me that I’m not a happy person.”  They are afraid they will become enlightenment sick because they are samsara sick.  See how they have to lie to themselves to avoid dealing with the truth.  So called normal life is not healthy.  To hell with feelings.  They are just an opportunity to small-self obsess.

Exactly. Exactly.

James:  We are swimming against the stream.  We have to hide behind rocks and collect our energy before we dart out into the current and swim like hell to make a little progress.    

And…?

James:  It is easier to surrender to stories, which is like circling in placid eddies.

Every moment is a challenge, just staying with knowing and staying away from identifying with feelings.

James : Standing as awareness.

You see, already when I think about it, I’ve gone serious.

James: Yes.  Standing as awareness is hard work and, come to think about it, sounds very vague.  It’s a little too abstract for me.  I don’t think I’ll stand as awareness today.   And simple knowing?  I’m suspicious of things that sound to easy.  I think I’ll go shopping. 

Yeah. Yeah. And you know what?  If the Jiva shows up as serious, that’s not my problem. It’s, its problem.  I’m aware of her depressions. 

James;  I make fun my seriousness and my dumb jokes to demonstrate the attitude of a person who knows that they’re free.  Swamiji used to act like a total fool in certain situations when he felt that he would not be misunderstood.  If there was somebody who had a particular idea of what swamis were supposed to act like, they would hate the swami.  But all the ego’s posturing and pretending, spiritual and worldly, is funny.  I get the same problem sometimes in my seminars.  Serious people can be very irritating. 

Every bit of Vedanta is right from the very beginning.  When Sanjaya is remotely telling Dhritarashtra, the blind king, meaning an ignorant person, what’s happening on the battlefield he says. “ Krishna said to Arjuna, I have taught you the wisdom of Vedanta.  Now I will teach you the wisdom of yoga, a little bit of which removes great fear.”  Arjuna is all ears because he’s afraid of killing the good guys.  Notice, he’s not afraid of killing the bad guys.  In fact, he’s full of revenge.  That’s serious for you.   But Krishna positioned his chariot in front of two men he respected and who he would have to kill to win the war, instead of in front of Durydhodana, whom he hated.  When Krishna pivots from Vedanta to yoga, Sanjaya says, “Krishna, as if smiling…”. Krishna didn’t smile outwardly because he didn’t want to insult Arjuna, but he was inwardly laughing.  Awareness, observing the world, is always laughing.  I know a comedian who is serious about comedy.  If that isn’t funny, I don’t know what is.

One beautiful day a long time ago I was on the street in India in a big crowd near a temple with a gay friend who wasn’t sure if he was gay or straight, much less if he was awareness, when a woman walked up to him and said, “Why are you crying when the Lord is laughing in your heart?”  As mysteriously as she appeared she blended back into the crowd and disappeared.  So, you just need to know the difference between what you’re experiencing, serious or not, and who you are.