Dave: There is no next step with regard to self knowledge. Knowing you are not the Jiva, which is knowing you are awareness, is the knowledge. 

Awareness = Existence = You, and as there is nothing other than that, so you shine as everything. Everything “else” depends on you for its existence.

Bill: Ok, I understand the logic behind that, but I will need to contemplate it more because attachment to the Jiva is still there. I will keep doing the “work” until that attachment is gone!

Dave: The thing is, there is no work to do, there is only something to know. You are awareness right now, whole and complete, and you always have been. There is absolutely nothing you can do to become what you are. There is only knowing it, which means recognizing it, as it is.

You do understand the logic clearly. It is important not to doubt that. The contemplation needed is not so much on the logic itself, but on how the logic does its work. How does the logic apply to me, right now? That is the question. The logic is flawless because it is simply expressing the fact of what I am, so the “problem” I believe still exists must lie elsewhere. 

Think of a person who wants to learn how to play the guitar. He needs to get a guitar, take lessons, implement many techniques, and gradually he will learn the guitar. He has a lot he can and must do, since he is not yet a guitar player and wants to become one. Knowledge alone is insufficient to achieve his goal. Doing is required. 

Now, think of a person who is searching for his glasses, and his friend points out “hey, they are right there in your hand.” What does that person need to do to know where his glasses are? Nothing, the glasses are already in his hand! The ignorance about the location of his glasses vanishes when knowledge of the location appears.

The moment he understands it, a thought is generated that says “lift your hand up and observe that the glasses are in your hand.” This happens automatically. Once he does that, another thought will be generated that says “put the glasses on.” This also happens automatically.

Therefore, nothing more than understanding that “the glasses are in my hand” is actually required of him, because once he understands (which is not an action), no more effort is even possible for him to find his glasses. They are no longer lost. Any “doing” after that takes place automatically, as dictated by the situation.

Bill: I notice that the Jiva is trying to pull me back into ignorance and forget who I am. Yet, I know that is not accurate because the Jiva is inert and has no power of its own. It is quite the enemy!

Dave: The Jiva is not “trying to pull you back into ignorance,” the Jiva is ignorance! It is inert yes, but you make it not inert (not really but as if) when you give it your power. 

Your enemy is yourself, the one that thinks it wants to be free but actually is perfectly content with this story of “not getting there yet.” I am not saying YOU don’t want to be free, I am saying that there is a part of you that thinks it wants to be free – a part which you feel good about – but it is the enemy in disguise because it is the very same part that tells you you are not free. 

This part is the doer of action, and it is very, very sneaky! It is also extremely proficient at its job, which is its own survival. It does not have the capacity to actually desire freedom, since it is inert, but it is a shapeshifter that just as happily assumes the role of “dedicated inquirer” as it does “stuck person who does not get it yet.” Both are perfectly fine with it, as they each fulfill the purpose of its survival. 

You (awareness) do not and cannot “want” to be free, because you just are (free). You love the idea of freedom and you crave freedom because you love yourself as you already are. Freedom and wholeness feel familiar and natural because that is you. That’s why you never want to get away from those feelings. Jiva is fine as it is too. It is only a problem when you take it – and its requisite problems – to be what you are. 

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. 

Greetings with love and respect. Update. As I continue to contemplate the teaching and practice actualizing it, a very subtle point has come into focus. As a result of a recent fast without food and water alone in nature—one of the more helpful indigenous practices, which I undertook for the purposes of soaking the mind in sattva and burning out remaining vasanas—I am finding a new outlook on equanimity.

As you know I have suffered from a steady conflict with my Jiva program’s   judgments, expectations, fears, and resentments with regards to its relationship to the larger community.  It occurred to me in the wake of my fast that it is not up to me as an individual to resist or chase anything. This perspective totally solves the “what should I do” dilemma.

If I am planning, due to a desire, then I am subject to the pain of worry due to the lack of my desired object. If I am absorbed in resentful resistance to the experience Isvara has placed in front of me, then I have lost discrimination. The old saying “let God handle it” does not work because Jiva is not “letting” God do anything. God IS handling it and always has been.   So what use is the  surrender?  It just keeps the jiva locked in a story, a mental concept.

This may sound dangerous to the uninitiated, but true surrender is the acknowledgment of Jiva’s true place in the Universe, its short and beautiful existence, and the fact that striving for or against anything is pointless. The only thing left is how well one responds in the present moment.

There is freedom in equanimity.   It is the freedom to not give a damn about shit that truly does not matter. Meditation is a joy when there is less crap rolling around in your head. And things seem to happen more spontaneously when Jiva is open to all the ways in Isvara lets it act in the world. What a beautiful thing! How subtle and hard to explain. Anyway, that’s the update.

Love

James:  Beginning karma yogis can’t blow off their desire to change unwanted experiences into desirable experiences.  No blame.  But at some point, they realize that desire is not a command, only a suggestion from ignorance that seems like a command.  But as one pays attention to one’s thoughts in light of the teachings, it becomes more and more clear that every experience is equal to every other experience, what I call a zero-sum fact and you call equanimity.  It realizes that in so far as Jiva exists, it is here to learn and that avoiding learning from unwanted experiences is counterproductive.  So, it takes everything as a gift, which isn’t the same as “leaving everything up to Isvara.”  You’re right about the danger of the “letting go and let God” teaching, which definitely has its place in so far as it neutralizes one’s resistance.   You can’t move forward if you are resisting something in the present. 

While the power of now teaching needs to be eventually discarded, it is useful to focus the mind on dealing skillfully with what is happening in the present.  You seem to have moved to the second stage of karma yoga where you just give all the usual desires a pass.  Ho-hum. Nothing new here.  Nothing to gain or lose.  This too will pass. Let’s go fishing with a barbless hook. Etc.  Discrimination is knowing that what Jiva wants and doesn’t want is unreal.

Very nice update.  You’re a beautiful flower growing like a weed.   Love you.

Ramji

Franco: What’s the difference between jiva and the doer/ego?   I’m having a hard time differentiating the two

Sundari: As always with non dual thinking, it is a matter of perspective. Who is having a hard time differentiating? From the Self’s point of view, the conceptual jiva/ego (individual) is just a thought identified as the doer – the one with the body/mind and a story, who does things to get what it wants and to avoid what it doesn’t want. There is no difference between the doer and the ego – neither are real – meaning, not always present and always changing, ‘manufactured’ by Isvara, the Causal body, or Maya, beginningless ignorance.

From the perspective of the individual, the ego trying to differentiate itself from the Self is a pointless exercise, it cannot be done without Self-knowledge because the Self is not an object of perception. It is what makes the perceiver and perception possible. The ego trying to define the Self sees it as an object to obtain, something other than it because duality is involved. This is why there is such confusion in the spiritual world regarding what nonduality is.

Most of the supposedly nondual teachings out there (other than Vedanta), confuse satya (nonduality) with mithya (duality), or impose satya onto mithya, because they do not have a teaching on how to differentiate the two, which Vedanta does have.  In fact, this is where all the teaching of Vedanta takes place – understanding who and what the jiva (personal) / Jiva (impersonal) is, who and what Isvara 1 (Pure Consciousness) & Isvara 2  (creator wielding Maya) is, what is different and what is the same about both. Without this teaching, freedom from and for the jiva is not possible.

This topic is covered extensively in Inquiry into Existence, in the Mandukya Upanishad, as well as Essence of Enlightenment, Bhagavad Gita and other texts. Though the explanation below is condensed, it is still a bit long, so persevere as it is the most important teaching for moksa.

How Isvara and Jiva are the Same

Isvara and the Universal Jiva are eternal impersonal principles in Awareness which manifest whenever Maya manifests, which is also an eternal principle or power in Awareness. Though there is a difference between the impersonal and personal jiva explained below, there is essentially no difference between Jiva and Isvara except in their capacity to create. Isvara creates the objective world and Jiva creates its subjective world, its world of thoughts and feelings—which also come from Isvara, the gunas.  Isvara creates all objects, subtle and gross and the jiva only knows the objects it has contact with.  It cannot create a flower, the sun, the moon, and the stars. Isvara is conscious because it is the self plus Maya, the creator of jiva. The jiva appears to be conscious (but is not) because Consciousness shines on the Subtle body, which is why Vedanta says Isvara and Jiva are ‘essentially’ the same. 

Isvara is not a person with likes and dislikes like the Jiva, or Subtle body. And neither Isvara’s creation nor jiva’s creation hides Consciousness.  It is always present prior to the creation and prior to the birth of individuals.  You can’t have a macrocosmic creation without Consciousness.  Something had to exist before Isvara could ‘bang’ the creation into existence.  That something we call Paramatma, pure Consciousness, free of both Isvara and Jiva.  If this is true, which we know it is, then we can eliminate both Jiva and Isvara as real and take ourselves to be Consciousness—the Self.

Consciousness (me) is never affected by Isvara’s creation or by jiva’s creation.  I am the knower of both. 

Or you can look at it this way:  It is clear that jiva is conscious.  It is also clear that Isvara is conscious because the creation is consciously designed.  Inference tells us that, and inference is a valid means of knowledge.  We do not have to meet Isvara in person (not that Isvara is a person) to know that it is conscious. So, if the jiva’s consciousness depends on Isvara’s consciousness and Isvara’s consciousness depends on Paramatma, Pure Consciousness, then both jiva and Isvara are Pure Consciousness.  If you don’t depend on the world or on the person, you certainly can’t be either one of them.  An effect (Jiva) is just the cause (Isvara) appearing in a form. 

We can’t apply the same logic to Isvara except loosely because Consciousness does not ‘cause’ Isvara.  Isvara in association with Maya, Beautiful Intelligent Ignorance (creative principle), is something altogether different.  Isvara is not an effect but it is a cause with reference to the creation.   There is only one Awareness/Consciousness out of which everything arises and depends upon, but Awareness is always free of the objects. Awareness is adjata, unborn. 

Vedanta is the path of the unborn, because it reveals that although there appears to be a creation, nothing ever really happened, from Awareness’ point of view. All objects are made up of Awareness and dissolve into Awareness in that they appear in the mind and the mind appears in Awareness. It is tough and counter-intuitive to assimilate this because the mind is conditioned by the hypnosis of duality – Maya.  The ego has a hard time accepting that it, the mind or individual jiva (Subtle Body) like all objects, is an object known to you, Awareness. Taking a stand in Awareness as Awareness requires negating the personal jiva identity. Not denying its existence, simply understanding that it is not real. When that takes place, you know that the Jiva is Jivatman – the nondual impersonal Self.

The jiva and its subjective world are called “apparently real” because neither is always present and is always changing.  As long as the apparent entity or the jiva is still embodied in the apparent reality, enlightened or not, it is subject to Isvara, the Creator.  We know the world is not real because when you analyze it, it resolves into empty space and space resolves into Consciousness as far as you cannot know space without Consciousness.  It is an object known to you.  There is just you, Consciousness, in which the jiva or person appears in a particular a priori environment i.e. Isvara. 

Isvara creates, sustains, and destroys the whole universe.  Within Isvara’s creation are innumerable jivas, individuals: plants, animals, humans, insects, etc.  Jivas are living beings with gross, Subtle, and causal bodies.  Human jivas have intellect which makes them self-aware, self-reflective.  This means that they can interpret their experiences. The way that a jiva’s Subtle Body interprets its experience is its ‘world.’  Its interpretation is its ‘creation.’  When we say the world would not be there without the mind (Subtle Body) we mean jiva’s interpretation, its projection, would not be there, not that the material world, the senses, the five sheaths or Subtle Body and the vasanas would not be here. We call the jiva’s creation “pratibhasika satyam” or “jiva srsti”, the subjective reality, and it forms the basis of our ‘individuality’.  Even though in truth there is only one jiva, our personal likes and dislikes shape how we see and experience everything, creating the illusion of individuality.  Isvara’s creation is called ‘vyavaharika satyam,’ the objective world.  This is the world of science, the objects and the laws of physics which are not under the control of any jiva.

This teaching is vital so the jiva does not confuse its creation with Isvara’s.  The jiva is in Isvara’s creation and is required to respond to it.  This is called dharma, or appropriate response.  If it responds appropriately to what Isvara wants, the jiva will be in harmony with Isvara, the creation, meaning its environment.  But if it is living in its own world and gets a request from Isvara and responds according to its fears and desires, likes and dislikes, it is quite possible that the jiva will run afoul of Isvara (its circumstances) and suffer.  Thus, this teaching makes us aware of the difference between the subjective and the objective realities.  If it is clear which is which, you can choose to follow dharma, not the minds programmed likes and dislikes, in case they are different.  There is no problem with jivas’ desires as long as they conform to dharma. 

The jiva looks out through the body, identifies with the senses, perceives a world, and thinks that it is seeing what is actually there.  It knows it didn’t create it, but it sees itself as separate, incomplete, so chases objects to complete itself. The saying ‘the world is there because I see it” is true from the point of view of Awareness, not the jiva.  The jiva, which is actually Awareness, can’t perceive a world unless Isvara has already done its job as a creator.  The jiva is seemingly responsible for its external creation as far as it doesn’t exist (for it) unless it perceives it.  However, it should be clear from the example of deep sleep that the jiva doesn’t create the world because there is no world for it when it is asleep.  Yet the world is there for other waking jivas. That shows that some other factor, and we call it Isvara, is the creator.   

Franco: Is the doer a jiva and Jiva with capital J the eternal principle? Is “Franco” the doer and the apparent fact of my individuality Jiva?  As always, thank you very much in advance. 

Sundari: See above. The definition of Jiva is Awareness with a Subtle Body. The Eternal of Universal Jiva is a principle, a tattva, not a specific person.  It is actually Pure Awareness, Paramatma. There is really only one person or Subtle Body, appearing as many; it appears as if there are individuals who are all different because of their particular uphadi – their ‘individuality’. or personal conditioning. When the jiva (ego) is identified with its uphadi it is called a ‘samsari’ – a mind under the spell of Maya, duality.

This is a nondual reality, not a duality, all appearances to the contrary notwithstanding.  Therefore, there is only one principle operating, not two – the nondual Self, Awareness, the witness to the apparent show ‘we’ call ‘reality’. It is witnessing ‘Franco’, the personal jiva, having a hard time discriminating between itself as the Self/Jivatman and the objects appearing in it, a.k.a., Franco the conceptual entity/ego/doer, under the spell of Maya. 

The one Jiva appears as three ‘types’ of ‘jiva’:

 1). The  ‘small’ jiva/doer/ego, a conceptual or individual entity –  a superimposition onto the Self, like a mirage.  It has a name, a body/mind and a story it identifies with, calling it ‘me and mine’. It is nothing more than a thought you keep alive. As stated above, this jiva is called the doer/ego or the human being, the one who is totally identified with the body/mind (including all experience) = samsari.

2)  There is the jiva who knows aboutAwareness, but it does not know what it means to be Awareness.  This jiva has indirect knowledge and is often called a Self-realized jiva.  This jiva has had an experience of being Awareness but has not actualized Self-knowledge, so the knowledge is not firm, ignorance is still present. This is the one who re-identifies with objects or still seeks experience because the vasanas are still binding and doership has not been fully dissolved. The jiva program or conceptual entity (ignorance) is still operative, blocking access to Self-knowledge.

3).  Finally, the Jiva with a capital ‘J” is impersonal, and has permanent direct Self-knowledge because he/she knows that their true identity IS Awareness, and they know what it means to be Awareness, while still apparently manifesting as a jiva or individual. This means that the jiva identity is known to be merely conceptual, Self-knowledge translates fully into ALL aspects of the person’s life. This is the jivanmukta, the Self no longer under the spell of ignorance or the Self-actualised jiva. Together, Jiva and Isvara weave the dream and are the dream of Maya, giving rise to Franco’s apparent individuality, but the jivanmukta, though free to live and act according to its svadharma, never confuses the two again.

The Three Jiva States:

Jiva, enlightened or not, also manifests as three ‘little’ jivas according to the state that it experiences:

1) As viswa, the waking state entity.  In this state its mind is totally extroverted.  It is hypnotized by duality.  It chases and consumes experiences.  Viswa appears in two forms: (a) free of identification with objects (a jivanmukta) or (b) as a doer (karta) or “person” identified with objects (a samsari)).  Both a jivanmukta, a liberated person, and a samsari, a bound person, have a common identity as nondual Awareness.

2) As taijasa, the ‘shining one,’ Awareness with a Subtle Body, illuminating the dream state.  The Subtle Body is turned inward facing the Causal Body, the vasanas.  The experiences it has are just experiences of the vasanas.  Jiva (ego) is not present in the dream state in the same way that it is present in the waking state.  In the waking state Jiva identifies with the doer/ego so the doer is not seen as an object.  It is thought to be the subject.  In the dream state there is also identification but the doer/ego can also appear as an object illumined by taijasa, Awareness reflected on the Subtle Body; in the dream you can see the waker going about its business, walking, talking, eating, etc.  The doer/ego is a dream doer/ego similar in some respects to viswa but with unique powers.  These powers are inherent in the dream state and do not belong to taijasa although in normal dreams it identifies with them.   The doer-ego and the events appearing in the dream are just waking state events that have become vasanas that are out-picturing as dream events. 

3)  As the sleeper, prajna, in the deep sleep state.  Prajna means ‘almost enlightened’.  It is almost enlightened because it experiences the limitlessness and bliss of Awareness but lacks knowledge of what it is experiencing because the intellect is not present in deep sleep.

The Subtle Body disappears in the deep sleep state as does the Microcosmic Causal Body (personal subconscious).  The personal subconscious belongs to the conceptual jiva/ego and produces the jiva’s karma.  The deep sleep state is defined as a state with no mental activity.  It is the same for everyone because the personal subconscious is subsumed into Isvara, the Macrocosmic Causal Body.  Deep sleep is the presence tamoguna, alone.  Rajas and sattva are dormant.  There is no sense of individuality (ahamkara) in this state because the Subtle Body of the individual is not there to be conditioned; the ahamkara belongs to the Subtle Body. 
The Macrocosmic Causal Body, another name for Isvara, is the deep sleep state.  

Although the nature of both the Jiva and Isvara is Awareness, both the Jiva and Isvara are inconstant factors with reference to Awareness.  Jiva is inconstant because it changes from state to state and because Self-knowledge removes the notion that it is a limited entity, revealing its nature to be pure Awareness.  Isvara in the role of creator is inconstant because logic and scripture, which is just science, informs us that it disappears at the end of the creation cycle; whatever is created will be destroyed.  Isvara in the role of creator is eternal with reference to the jiva but not with reference to pure awareness, Paramatman, the constant factor.


The dream state has two aspects: waking dream and sleep dream.   It is called the pratibasika state, the subjective state of reality.  It is jiva’s creation (sristi).  It is not created directly by Isvara but is responsible for an individual jiva’s interpretation of reality.  In the dream state (whether the jiva is awake or asleep) vasanas influence how reality is interpreted by the jiva.  Isvara provides the raw material for the interpretation, but not the interpretation itself.  Ultimately it is all Isvara, but to get to that understanding…which is tantamount to moksha…the jiva has to understand what it is responsible for and Isvara’s role in jiva’s creations i.e. projections so that it can be free of both itself and Isvara. 

No Perfecting the Jiva

A big problem in the spiritual world is that seekers believe that Self -realization or enlightenment will perfect or make the person limitless.  It will not.  As Awareness you are and always have been limitless.  As the person you are and always will be imperfect and limited.  Though life for the jiva will improve immeasurable, removing ignorance of your true nature does not necessarily mean that you change as a person, or that you have to become perfect or “holy”.  The person never leaves the apparent reality and the apparent reality is limited.  The person is fine the way they are; they do not need to be perfected, only understood. When you know your true identity as the Self you will not cause injury or break dharma in any way as a jiva.  You know that Isvara’s world is perfect the way it is, all appearances to the contrary notwithstanding. The person no longer has an ignorance problem, so therefore, discrimination between satya and mithya is no problem.

There is much more to this teaching, and it is very subtle and difficult to assimilate. but central to moksa.  I hope this helps

Much love, 

Sundari

Dear X….,

If you are going to stand up to your fear of criticism you need to understand a few facts Simply taking a stand in your true nature doesn’t work unless these facts are fully appreciated. Please contemplate on them deeply.

The Fact about Facts

Don’t waste your time asking why facts are facts. Nobody knows. They exist and they rule life. Also, don’t expect your facts to trump the facts of the group.

The Facts about Individuals and Groups

(1) You were born into a social situation.
(2). You were born with a particular disposition (svadharma)
(3) Your disposition is basically different from the nature of your family and clan into which you were born.

The Needs of the Total (the group, society) Come First

(4) Groups are entities in themselves made up of individuals that appreciate protection and support. There is nothing wrong with it, in fact is very useful to be a contributing member in some ways, not so much in others, but owing to the zero-sum nature of life it comes with a cost. Groups need the individuals in them to conform to the desires of the group. Smaller groups, family clans, also need to conform to the values of the society at large or they risk destruction. The needs of the total come first.

The Needs of Spiritual Types

(5) The desire for freedom, which is your basic impulse puts you in conflict with your clan, which expects obedience. Nobody likes suffering. Suffering is unnecessary but it comes with a cost. See the zero-sum rule in operation once more.
(6) The cost is sacrificing the protection and support of the group for the sake of independence and positive self-esteem.
(7) People whose predominant desire over time is freedom and self-love are always attracted to groups and individuals with the same desire. So all spiritual people have a stronger desire to non-conform than secular people who strongest impulse is security.
(8) Because a spiritual person exists in a society that values security more than freedom, the spiritually inclined individual needs to gradually sacrifice the security of the group for the security of Self knowledge, since the self, existence shining as unborn ever complete consciousness is the only free thing.
(9). The pursuit of freedom depends on trust in the teaching and the teacher. An impersonal teaching and a teacher trained in the methodology is required if you want to avoid the pitfalls of seeking on your own.
(10). So faith in the teaching is absolutely necessary. Blind faith doesn’t work, which is why I asked you above to understand these facts before you accept them. If you accept the idea that you are free without accepting these facts low self esteem will continue.
(11) There is no need to change your circumstances to achieve this unless you trust Isvara to look after you, although if you can find some way to explain the facts in this satsang to the leader of your clan, he or she may be inclined to support you.

What is Knowledge Yoga?

Knowledge yoga is accepting facts at the expense of beliefs and opinions. Your statement that you have low self-esteem and that you don’t like criticsm is a belief, although it seems true. It seems true because you believe these words. You believe these words because you don’t know you are the Self. If you take a stand as the Self it is impossible to believe these words because the Self is no fearful and critical. To convert belief to knowledge you need to know the facts of life.

Love,James

James:  Yes. This is very beautiful writing.  It is very moving, your bhakti. 

This search touches me, moves me. I am not afraid to see. I am not afraid of the attachment to individuality fading away. 

Since our last conversations about my doubts regarding my marriage, I went through a deep process of self-observation. Despite the agitation of the mind, the internal conflict, the urge to act on impulse, I have tried to observe all this and investigate what was behind the crisis. I tried to practice Karma Yoga, hung my qualifications on the bathroom mirror to look at them daily, etc.

My Jiva went through many changes. I can stay home alone for many days and don’t feel the need to have friends around to keep me company… Being in contact with other people is no longer important to me. 

When I am with people around, I don’t feel bad, but depending on the degree of superficiality that can happen in encounters, people can bore me… I can’t feel connected to many people. My biggest enjoyment is reflecting on Yoga and Vedanta, and I don’t have many people around me with that interest. I try to accommodate… Do you see this as something negative?

James:  Absolutely not.  That is exactly the way things are with me.  You are on the best path that isn’t a path.

I have also lost the sex drive or it has become very weak. I feel more open, more attentive, more available for my husband, but sexually it feels like something has worn off. I don’t see sexual intercourse as important anymore. Sometimes I have the feeling, if I separate tomorrow, that I don’t need to look for another partner. When we talked in the past about my crisis in marriage, it seemed unthinkable to me to live without a partner, without sex. Today this prospect doesn’t scare me. Anyway, I am married and my partner has sexual desire. Perhaps what is happening to me could represent a problem in my marriage. But I would like to ask you if I should see what is happening to me as something negative. 

James:  It is a completely positive way to be.  You don’t need someone to lean on even when you think you do.  The spiritual path is a path to independence.  Sex is fine when you don’t need it.  But it is quite natural to loose interest.  It is a typical samsaric habit, limited in every way. 

In my personal life, I remain productive, I work, pay my bills, organize my house… In my relationships with people I try to be helpful and kind. My level of transparency has increased. When I don’t like something, I look for a way to show it to the other person with care and love.

James:  Learning how to assert yourself in such a way that others get the message but don’t feel rejected or hurt is wonderful.  I love this letter, the kindness, the transparency.  You are a pure soul. 

I say all this because when we start on the spiritual path, there is a risk that we will want to drop everything and go to a cave in the Himalayas, to an ashram… Sometimes I wonder whether or not this desire to be alone, the decrease in sexual desire that I am experiencing, contributes to the duties that I have to fulfill in order to burn my vasanas, my karma, etc. 

James:  The desire to be alone is the aloneness vasana eating up the worldly vasanas.  When you think about it, we are always alone even when we are surrounded by people.  Nobody can get into the Self.  Swamiji used to say, “The spiritual path is walking all alone to the alone (the all one).”

Everything just happens… It is not the fruit of my Jivas decision… And I do not see it as positive or negative…   I think, I just observe it… I used to write fiction in the past… But I did not write the texts at all… The texts wrote themselves… The act of writing used to show me what would happen with the characters. It was not my decision at all…  I think life is like that… We observe and it shows us what is the next task. The Jivas life writes itself. 

A big hug. Love, Francine

Om and Prem,

James

Well summer is in full swing. I moved from bait fishing to fly fishing.  Being a knowledge-minded person, the endless amount of information and applied skill needed to fly fish is a great chew toy for the mind and being on the water, especially moving water is a moving meditation.  My life has been sufficiently simplified that I can go any time I want.  Wyoming is loaded with plenty of amazing fishing within a 45 min drive in any direction so I am having a great time. The phrase epistemological humility comes to mind as I laugh at myself getting flys caught in the bushes. My seemingly never ending string of sloppy casts are free of the jiva’s need to look good or smart or capable and instead accepting right where “I” am, at the beginning.

I had a wonderful thought about the river as a metaphor to the mind.  The water is always flowing just as experience is always happening.  If there are no obstructions the water flows smooth and effortlessly.  But life has its twists and turns, the mind eddies and laments as if resisting its new course. Vasanas are like rocks in the water. The stronger the and bigger the vasana the more disturbance in the flow. But always the sun is just shining witnessing the flow of experience. The happiness I feel is not dependent on the river of mind being straight and free of obstruction.  The jiva is in the flow trying to accomplish the tasks of life. Once in a while his efforts bear fruit or they don’t.  His offering is the humility to not care if anyone thinks he is a good fisherman.

Thank God there is no more need to throw boulders in the river to create more and better opportunities to get something.  I am free and it is wonderful. The world and people are driving by the river trying to get where they are going so they can accomplish their dreams.  My desires continue to wither on the vine. The ideals, the collective ego identities, companionship, reputation, pleasure, all pale in comparison to nondual peace of mind. 

As always forever grateful….. 

The more I reflect on the camera and the picture metaphor, I realize, I am both! There is no other way.  Moonlight is there because of sunlight and the reflective material.  No moon, no moonlight.  It makes no difference to sunlight which is still present.

Mind with its “moods” (gunas) are reflectors of the light of knowing.  I, the supreme principle, can’t even claim to be a knowing principle as that implies the presence something other than me to be known. That is why I asked you last week whether the presence or absence of mind (sattvic or not, contemplating or not) had any bearing on me, existence/awareness. 

This brings up the fact that there is no point of view in awareness/existence, but all apparent points of views are mine.  I don’t need to claim anything.Can you reflect on this please, perhaps in the satsang today or later via email?

Ram: Yes, it is a good topic for the Sunday night satsang.  The answer is an emphatic YES!  Now you’re talking.  No claiming is necessary.  Only knowledge is required.  So, if you were inclined to speak about yourself you would say, “I am” backed by the following knowledge.

”There is no sun and no moon, no Self and no Not-Self.  These ideas are teaching tools.  There is just me, the silent knower of both.  Yes, I am both in so far as they exist, but I am not them.  If “I am not them,” is not included, it may mean that you think there is an actual connection between the sun and the moon, the Self and the subtle body, the non-eternal jiva.  The unborn sun was there before the moon and it will keep shining when the moon is gone.  It is eternal and independent.  Even to say it is independent implies dependency.  All you can say is “I am (existence shining as whole and complete unborn consciousness).  “There is nothing else.”

Good for you, Peter.  Perseverance furthers.

Love,

Ram

I want to get your input on my understanding of vasanas/karma.  The gunas (Iswara) are not a person, but impersonal FORCES which are the blueprint and perception of every experience (the thought portion of experience) and karma/change. 

 Ramji:  Yes, but to say they are the perception of every experience is not correct because there is only one perceiver, the Self, and it is guna free.  The gunas can’t perceive because they are material forces.  Knowledge doesn’t perceive, action doesn’t perceive and matter doesn’t perceive.  So, aided by Maya, the Self perceives.  I understand that this is not the import of your question.  I’m just being picky about the language. 

This includes the experience of the limited I, calling itself I, a person, a conscious being.  This is a vasana driven identity passed along from eons ago, is it not?

Ramji:  Yes.  It is a conceptual entity that arose after billions of years of cosmic time.  It began when Consciousness (assuming the presence of Maya) became self-aware. 

Because at 2 weeks of age there is no limited I, it is a learned concept of separation or difference from objects, a perception of separation from the field that is dictated by the already existing  vasanas.

Ramji: Yes.  The sense of separation is unconscious from the individual’s point of view but becomes conscious when the gunas have established the physical body securely in the material world.  The sense of separation or incompleteness builds up over time, as you say in the next sentence. 

Vasanas build up over time,  So I  have “lived” here for thousands of years and the tendencies of every living being (jiva) has accumulated in form of the unconscious that drives /motivates desire, action or karma for each jiva.

Ramji:  Yes.

Human Jiva learns of this process when he examines his personality/psyche (but has no direct access to the bank of all the vasanas, which is Isvara).

Ramji:  Correct.

Can I extend this to matter, electrons are also driven by “tendency” to go to their lower energy state no matter how much you try to keep them up in the excited states.

Ramji:  Yes.  It is an inexorable force.  Excitement (rajas) morphs into its opposite, entropy and disappears only to reappear later in an endless circle. 

SO, when you tell us experience is the result of past actions, it is actions of the entire field built up over millions of years in a bank of vasanas (Iswara), who is an I that has lived over millions of years?

Ramji:  Yes.  It is an “eternal person.”  It is a conscious entity that is aware of everything that happens and keeps a record.  In Vedic science it is called chitra gupta, which means a scribe.  It “writes” everything that happens down.  Its vasanas are “words.”  Recall the first mantra of the Mandukya Upanishad, “OM, the word, is all this.”  All this refers to all knowledge, action and material matter.  The “words” it “writes” are sounds, vibrations with an inexorable absolute creative power, that keep the cosmic “wheel” spinning.   

….not sure if I can say it is the eternal Jiva which in a human mind can claim I, act based on the forces of subconscious and collect karma, etc.

Ramji:  Yes, you can.  Isvara and Jiva are both you, existence shining as unborn ever-full awareness.  It is all that Me.  Conceptual, non-eternal jiva can’t claim it because it isn’t conscious and it is just one of countless objects that momentarily flash into being and then disappear.   

At some point in “time” jiva realizes that awareness/being is its very essence because of which he thinks, perceives/feels, emotes based on what vasana is influencing.

Ramji:  Yes, indeed.  It can “realize,” which is a conscious event, because it is non-different from Consciousness.

Then, existent/awareness (I) is out of time so I have nothing to do with the sequential  transformation of vasanas into desires and desires into actions and actions into vasanas. 

Ramji:  Yes.  The “then” is incorrect because cause and effect language doesn’t really apply but I think you know that.    

There is no discrete being, just I, the “ground of being.  The word “I” is really a pointer to that which is silent/presence and has no discrete form shape, subtle or gross but somehow IS the form and shape of everything that exists.

Ramji:  Yes!

A bit of intellectual questioning.  I know this supposes cause and effect and/or projection of all of this including the time period for all of this to evolve.  If you think you need me to hear your words/answer we can do a zoom, or better yet wait till I see you in Trout lake. Otherwise , email will do.

Ramji:  Why wait?  I had my red pencil out but couldn’t use it.  You have it all right.  I tidied up your words a bit so as not to confuse others.  The basic idea…that you can claim Isvara status…is very radical so you need to be mindful of the context in which you claim it.  It is entirely appropriate to discuss it with me, however.  Knowing your non-separation from jiva and Isvara destroys jiva’s sense of limitation, separation and inadequacy.  Krishna, speaking as the Self, says that a person who understands non-duality “is dear to me,” which means “is me.”  When he addresses Arjuna as a friend he is saying that there is no difference, in so far as friendship the perfect mirror of the truth. 

Thanks Bossman!  So glad you decided to keep the satang this Sunday. Easter is for the BIRDS. 🙂

You are most welcome.

Much love,

Bossman