Dear Sundari
I have been meaning to write for ages since I saw the article you wrote in August. I have no idea what was triggered, but it has touched me for weeks and I keep thinking about it.
Sundari: how lovely to hear from you again, it feels like ages since we last had the pleasure of your company. I am so glad to hear that my satsang on the emergence of a deep samskara (whose time was ripe to be finally busted!) has helped you. I have had several people write in saying the same thing. It was important to share the experience because negating the residual jiva ignorance is a tough one for most inquirers; it happens in stages, never all at once. There is no way around it though if moksa is the aim.
While it can be said that there is no need to bother with the jiva because it is not you, the Self, yet freedom is not that free if there is still a conceptual jiva causing resistance. Keep in mind though that no matter at what stage of jiva negation you are at you are no less the Self. How can you be, as this is a nondual reality? ‘The steps to get ‘there’ are the qualities of being ‘there’. Hold fast to that thought at all times.
Lisa: I have been dreaming about teachings and spiritual teachers and I am aware that my nights are filled with tendencies from my personal history interspersed with these dreams on the nature of consciousness
Sundari: Dreams are how most people work out unconscious content, though a lot of dreams are just universal vasanas out-picturing and have no bearing on our personal narrative. All vasanas and samskaras come from the same big pot, the Causal body. It just feels like ours are personal because we have a story attached to them, but they are not. In dreams, we mine the Causal body for wisdom that we can’t access with our conscious mind and there is some benefit to that, depending on what one considers ‘wisdom’. Though research on the dream state is proving more and more how important it is to dream, especially when it comes to processing memories, which is just the recording of our waking state experiences. We all dream in a language peculiar to our own lives, though if we compare our dreams with others, we find that all dreams are as governed by the gunas as our waking state dream world is.
Dream interpretation can be helpful for understanding what lies in the unconscious, as long as one remembers it’s all mithya. James did a lot of it in the very early days. What’s interesting is that studies on dream content indicate that most people’s dreams are based on fear or contain elements of anxiety or pain. That’s because most people’s unconscious is run by fear, rajas, and tamas. The fear/pain plays out in many different scenarios in the dream state because it is an extension of the waking state, which is why the emotional pain or joy stays with you when you wake up.
The only real difference between the waking and dream state is that when you wake up, you know it was a dream and the fear/pain state in the dream was ‘not real’. It could be the remaining emotional content from your life buried in the unconscious coming up to be seen and processed, or it could just be just the eternal impersonal play of the gunas. Either way, it has nothing to do with you as the Self, and as the jiva, you are not your past or what happened to you. You don’t seem too fazed by the dreams, which is good.
Lisa: From the point of view of mithya there is so much to say from the point of view of myself there is nothing to say.
Sundari: Amen!
Lisa: But I am still from time to time confused, not by my identity but that I am not feeling much. I find it so different, so odd. Basically, I notice that my emotions are thin or flat as if they are observed in a far-away place. However, I do feel fear, both Tom and I have had health issues to do with aging. He doesn’t seem to feel fear, but these aging issues bring up fear for me which I know are unreal. This is still rather thin but it is there. The Jivas vulnerability is hard to separate from. Anyway, I wanted to write to you and I know Ramji is ruthless on fear, it is my hook. Your article has made me come right up close to inspect this deep-seated pattern.
Sundari: I like the way you describe the way you process your emotions, as ‘thin, flat and far away’, but who does the ‘I” in your statement refer to? Who is confused? Clearly, the Self cannot be confused if you are firm in your identity as nondual Consciousness. But nonetheless, you are objectifying the emotions, which is odd for the ego because it is usually so invested in feelings, especially fear. It shows that despite the confusion dispassion and discrimination are at work. There is nothing wrong with feelings, positive or negative. The problem comes when we are invested in and identified with our emotions, and they hijack the mind causing suffering. Feelings are not suddenly going to stop because you know you are the Self, though, in time, as Self-knowledge firms up, feelings fade away very quickly as nothing sticks to you as the Self. They are just ripples in the Maya fabric. At that stage, you find that you hardly ever remember any dreams, good or bad.
Even with Self-knowledge, the jiva remains vulnerable in that it is a changing entity in a changing field, and the impermanence of everything (especially the body) is the only certainty. But when Self-knowledge is firm, the jiva is as good as non-existent, feelings are objects known to you and not real, which allows the deep confidence of the Self to shine. The confidence takes a while to manifest though, as Self-knowledge assimilates and scours out all the ignorance. Just keep up your inquiry, keep taking a stand in Awareness as Awareness and practice karma yoga religiously, thought by thought.
Lisa: When I am wise it is known as experience rising and falling but I am not always wise it would not be true to say that is always so.
Sundari: By saying ‘when I am wise or when I am not wise’ I presume you mean when Self-knowledge is operating, or not? It cannot refer to the Self because that does not rise or fall, being the only non-negatable constant and witness of the experiencing entity apparently rising and falling. If there is still a transactional jiva program operating hidden samskaras will rise and seemingly obscure access to Self-knowledge because ignorance is still there.
As I said in my satsang that you mention above, this was my experience, and it took ‘me’ so by surprise because I was so convinced that I had negated the samskara. But there was still a residual layer to it lurking, a thief in the house, stealing the bliss of the Self! And Isvara pushed it out of the Causal body when it was time for it to go. Be patient with the process, you are doing so well. Just think how far you have come, where you were when we first met you. You really have put the knowledge into practice in so many important ways.
Ramji does not tolerate fear, that is true, another reason this samskara of mine had to go. It is such awful energy, rajas, as you know. Like all vasanas it is universal, but it is the King of all vasanas, also called free-floating anxiety (dread), what the Christians call ‘Original Sin.’ It is always present, yet hidden in the Causal Body, and it is looking for objects to attach to. It is related to ‘others’; it is the ultimate experience of duality or ‘otherness’. In most samsari’s it works out in petty mundane and indirect ways all day long, year after year. Death by a thousand cuts. You can see the accretions in the faces of samsari’s as they age—the exhaustion of existential suffering, the weight of the vasanas etched in faces inured to delusion.
I know you know that there is no death for you as the Self. So, offer the residual fear of the aging and death of the body to Isvara on the altar of karma yoga every time it arises. Find or make an object that symbolizes this fear for you (it can be anything) and put it on your altar as a way of symbolically giving it away to Isvara. When the fear thought comes back talk out loud about it to Isvara, flesh it out, go for a long walk on your own and have a good yell, tell Isvara you don’t want it. Do this often! Talking out loud and telling Isvara what to do (as the Self, of course, not the ego) feels really good! We cannot make ourselves not feel fear; only Self-knowledge can remove it, but we do not have to carry the burden or burden ourselves further because the fear thought is still there. It is just a thought, and it will go when it goes. Trust Isvara and trust karma yoga, it is perfectly designed to bust samskaras.
Lisa: Thank you for stirring my pot by writing about your life It is most helpful. I would love to see you both. I don’t know when we will travel again but good to see Ramji in satsangs.
Sundari: You are so welcome Lisa, thank you too for sharing your story. Perhaps we may see you next year at some point.
Sending you both much love and big hugs
Sundari
