This is a reply to an inquirer, who is responding to my previous satsang with him.
Sundari: I am going to answer all the points, including those referring to my last email that you added in italics. And, I will give an overall assessment of the continuing ‘holding’ issue to which everything boils down.
Quote Sundari (previous): As I read your email for the second time (even though there is clearly a big breakthrough) I once again got the distinct feeling of regression.
Frank: Yes, this happened – the (apparently) different fears rooted down into one vortex of “I as Jiva am no good,” with grief. The more it gets exposed, the worse it seems (I don’t think it can go any lower or deeper). To still be standing, not running away is good but that’s all.
Sundari: If you keep digging in the darkness of the Causal body as it plays out for Frank, you will never find the bottom; there will always be more muck. It is endless because it’s beginningless ignorance, and it’s not even ‘yours’. Vomit is just vomit, beyond seeing what’s requires seeing in light of Self-knowledge, what’s the point of repeatedly going there? You are aware of how your Frank program runs, you know it all. You have the tools to objectify everything that happened to Frank and why his adaptive child core holds together with such low self-esteem coupled with shame. Very few humans walking this earth are without these samskaras, they go with the territory of being human. It’s masochistic to keep at it, and maybe it’s time to let it all go?
Sundari Quote (previous): The difference this time is that it also seems clear that ‘you’ were wide awake during the process.
Frank: Exactly so – it’s like being confident enough while having teeth pulled; to just let the ego’s thrashing wash over the Self. Learning it does not “hurt me” brings confidence. The opposite of “ego busting” in some cult (carried around for a few days until it wears off)—there is no one busting anything. It’s Isvara with a mirror, reflecting the deepest areas I kept secret even from myself. All I can say is it’s reaching a bedrock now; nothing there, nothing left.
Sundari: Bedrock is good, confidence is good coming with the recognition that nothing hurts you as the Self. There is always more ignorance and more pain when the ego is in charge; one can get quite attached to the identity that pain affords. And who is keeping secrets from whom? Certainly not the Self. So it’s just the ego hanging in there, thrashing about, doing what egos do. Hide, project, deny, pretend they know what’s going on while suffering like mad chasing objects and causing havoc.
Sundari Quote: (previous): Isvara must use a jackhammer to break up the hard core of the “Duryodhana Factor”.
Frank: Yes please! Does Isvara provide the jackhammer? I thought it does not “want” (as non-dual) anything – but this is maybe in the context of answering the prayer of an inquirer, as the Self, which knows it is deluded by Maya? As James says – the squeaky wheel gets the grease?
Sundari: Don’t be too eager to get Isvara’s sledgehammer! Isvara does not want anything as it is not a person, but as its function is karma phala datta, Isvara will unerringly deliver the karma that is in your account to work out. There is no escape from the arrow of karma if you think you are a person. The point here is, as a Self-realized person, who gets the karma? There is no karma for the Self.
However, when you have the karma of an inquirer, as you do, and you have the good grace of one who has realized the Self, which you also have, then you are on a particular trajectory—one of freedom—from AND for the jiva. That means Isvara will deliver the karma appropriate to free the mind from identification with the jiva. Moksa is only for the jiva, remember, so this part is not much fun. And of course the ego does not like it and digs in. If there is still a stubborn clinging to some aspects of that damaged persona, the sledgehammer may well be necessary for little ego-ji. And don’t worry, you do not need to look for it! Isvara will find ways both big and small to send it to you.
Frank: I feel more and more invisible as a Jiva to the world. At work I can say something and it’s not that people just ignore it; they seem to not even hear it. If I walk in a room it’s like they look through me. My ego falls off a cliff but it does not hurt; just kind of smile to myself, it’s Isvara and it’s all good.
Sundari: It is only the unfulfilled, unloved ego that needs recognition from the world, and needs to be visible to it. If it is becoming invisible to the world, rejoice. Ironically, what follows – IF – Self-knowledge obtains, is a confidence so vast and subtly powerful that you cannot NOT be noticed. And the best part is ‘you’ do not care or notice one way or the other. The ego is then no longer in charge and in the service of Self-love and no longer needs to be loved or noticed. Pray for that day.
Sundari Quote(previous): This is almost without fail the adaptive child program we all must neutralize. As an inquirer it can feel like nothing has assimilated and you are back to square one.
Frank: Yes, this happened / is happening and I got hit by a massive flu, bound to the sofa unable to “do” anything in the last three weeks, hence my delay in writing, also taking time to really assimilate. I had a vivid dream of meeting Trump and my mind said in the dream “this is crazy – this is the embodiment of everything just wrong” yet still trying to get him to “see me”, recognise me while grovelling, knowing this is absurd in the dream. Then a few days later, a similar dream of a partner from decades ago, now meeting again in the dream, I’m saying “we really have to be together!” – yet knowing as I am saying it that it all went south already and makes no sense!
Then another dream again – at a job decades ago, forcing myself to do the stupidest task in a job I hated yet still being told I won’t make the grade (of something I hate anyhow and feeling guilty I can’t cut it). All absurd – but honestly – not at the time! Isvara is shaking me by the shoulders “don’t you see the absurdity of all this!?
Sundari: The fundamental problem – the ego’s need for love and recognition from others. It is absurd that we find it so hard to love ourselves, and even harder to believe that we do not need love because we are the source of it!
Frank: I can admit that previously also in our communications I was secretly hoping for your confirmations (and felt a little crestfallen if not). Now it’s different. True reflection is what I pray for now. I know you have always given this, it was jivas filters not letting it in.
Sundari: What confirmation were you hoping for, other than that we keep pointing you towards your true Self and away from the false self? I am glad you see that.
Sundari Quote (previous): Hopefully, the revelation of who you really are is more powerful than ever.
Frank: It is – by subtraction of what I am not; stubborn as heck.
Sundari: I am glad to hear it, and hope that it is firm.
Sundari Quote (previous): Nididhysana is, after all, a requalifying, which means revisiting and neutralizing remaining stubborn binding emotional/mental programs and tendencies.
Frank: Like standing on a Medieval battlefield, taking off the breastplate and waiting for the next arrows with no way of leaving the battlefield. It’s ok – it’s not a spiritual experience either; more like knowing I am going to throw up after food poisoning and welcoming the dawn when it’s all out.
Sundari: Well, the analogy is not really correct. Self-knowledge removes the protective façade that ignorance appears to give you, which makes the ego feel very vulnerable and afraid. Even though the ego goes kicking and screaming, Self-knowledge takes you off the battlefield of Maya where you are beset by the arrows of ignorance from every side. Safety from ignorance definitely doesn’t come through experience, but through the once and for all firm recognition that none of that is you, none of that is real. The vomit and the poisoning of Maya is then over for you, once Self-knowledge is firm. And ego that believes itself to be in charge finally returns (and remains) demoted to the office filing clerk, where it belongs.
Sundari Quote (previous): The second is having the confidence to silence the infernal and relentless voices of diminishment by reclaiming your true status as Awareness. The jiva’s past is just an idea in you, no more real than the clouds passing the sun, and just as changeable. Let it be.
Frank: It does not feel insurmountable anymore – I am not negotiating, not putting up shields and now it’s just dredging up stuff. There was grief about this a few weeks ago, now happiness is growing but not about anything particular.
Sundari: My advice: Stop dredging. See whatever comes up out of the Causal body as a curious observer. It will cease to have any power over you, or cause any trouble for you, when completely objectified. It is a time to rejoice, not grieve, that the jiva persona is fading and becoming insignificant. See that as huge progress.
Sundari Quote (previous): One of the most difficult things for most people to overcome is that there really is only one jiva program. All vasanas are universal and not personal, and uniqueness is really an ego fantasy. Yet what all jivas crave is to matter.
Frank: “To matter” – an odd expression – as if the effort for the ego is to become solid, permanent matter – but I do not need to “matter” – I exist already! To see Isvara differently as non-dual rather than dual God: there is now an intuition that trying to matter to Isvara is as ridiculous as trying to matter to people, companies or relationships.
Sundari: You got that one! I have attached a wonderful satsang that German had with an inquirer summing up this issue. There is no progress to be made without understanding God and what true devotion means. Make sure to read it.
Sundari Quote (previous): The big hurdle for all jivas to get their heads around is that life in mithya truly is zero sum. So Isvara will use whatever is required to shake up the ego and free you from that clinging, suffocating, limited thought.
Frank: After the flu I went too early (bad idea) to an old public sauna to sweat it out. I was looking at a lamp in the ceiling, Jiva and body exhausted – seeing through the Jiva to a dim steamy lamp: This “person” is not “me”; but I have really thought so, most of my life. Letting go of even the impulse to investigate the ego, the person, to “fix it” keeps the merry-go-round going – it’s like giving up an addiction like smoking.
Sundari: Yes, you are right. In the absence of unconditional love for your(not)self, there will often be an addiction to digging into the ego. It’s painful but it feels ‘good’, and as I said, the pain becomes a known entity, even ‘safe’. Again, this pertains to the holding issue – the relentless need for love.
Sundari Quote (previous): As I said to you: the only really important fact, apart from the fact that you cannot perfect the jiva:
Frank: Yes. Every time I earnestly tried, in any part of the field, to perfect the jiva, or even just fit enough, Isvara taught me so often it is pointless. A mistaken “jiva ticket of admission” which Isvara refused (a delayed blessing I see now). The ego says I have failed on call counts in all things – erroneously “true” or “not true” – neither means anything anymore.
Sundari: The only failure is the failure to love yourself. If this drive to perfect the jiva does not drop away entirely, there is no way you will truly stand in Awareness as Awareness. You still have one foot in the ego identity because perfecting the jiva will simply never happen. You may give lip service to standing as the Self but that is all it will amount to. Many advanced inquirers get stuck here and just cannot take the next step to stand in their true glory as Awareness. They are in love with their doubts as a way to avoid totally negating the ego identity. It’s actually a bypass.
Sundari Quote (previous):You are the revelation. You are the only ‘thing’ that is relevant or lends relevance to anything. You cannot be augmented or diminished, ever. Not possible. You are just fine as Frank.
Frank: Yes.
Sundari: I know you know that you are fine, and you know at least intellectually, that you are the Self. Self-knowledge is working in your life, you are putting it into practice, and it has already made a huge difference in your lived experience. But it seems that the unloved part of the ego identity is clinging and won’t let go. It plays out in the unresolved love issues of your life, the unfulfillment of the deep desire to be truly known, loved, seen and accepted.
As stated, this is a deep, common and universal samskara. There is no way to fix it or your past other than to see it for what it is: ignorance. As you said previously, even if you were given everything you could have wished for as a jiva, from infancy to now, you would still be longing for the true union, which only happens when ignorance is removed by Self-knowledge and you claim and permanently stand in your true identity as the Self.
Your holding problem—the inability to love yourself unconditionally—stems from this unresolved longing for love outside yourself. Most of the time you are aware that it cannot be given to you. But it is still there. Don’t feel bad about that, it is not anyone’s fault or doing. But it is time to ‘man up’ as Ramji would say, and give this up. You do not need to be loved. You can never fix the past or what was or was not given to you, and you do not need to. You are love. You are the sought, you are whole and complete, unchanging, ever-present Awareness. Your true nature is love, the love that makes love loving. Take a stand in it and practice the opposite thought if anything still contradicts that.
Much love to you too
Sundari
