Note: One of life’s most difficult conflicts is sacrificing one’s personal
values when they conflict with universal values.
Dear Ramji,
So happy to hear from you! Thanks for your response and for sending the treatise on so many topics. I read the whole thing, although I do better with shorter,” less is more” pieces. I will respond to the things that spoke to me most.
First, I will respond to your personal note to me. Let me be clear, I need to clarify my position. Yes, I have one but do I have to be attached to it? NO.
Ramji: Usually people are attached to their opinions but, you are right, attachment to them is optional.
Therein lies the issue. If people want the shot, get it. That is not my concern, although I do have concern for my loved ones who get it because of my safety concerns about it.
Ramji: Well, people view threats and the solution to threats differently according to their conditioning, what Vedanta calls svadharma, personal values.
I am against censorship and forced vaccination to keep one’s job.
Ramji: It is indeed unfortunate that sometimes people have to choose between one alternative and another but such is the zero sum nature of duality. But an employer has a different dharma from an employee, meaning different priorities and values. Since the employee depends on the employer for his or her job, he or she doesn’t have the option to override the employer’s duty to his or herself and his or her relationship to the business. There is always a power imbalance in social institutions, business and financial entities, even families. So, you can’t actually condemn the employer if he or she sees the collective as more important than the individuals in it. It is his or her duty to enforce the will of the group. The needs of the total come first…think the law of eminent domain. Think majority rule, which is the basis of democracy. If children’s desires trumped their parent’s desires you have no family.
That in my opinion is concern for justice, which also matters to me. Yes, justice is a position and I do have a bias against Bill and Tony, and Big Pharma, who have censored lifesaving info. Is it not okay to have an opinion as long as one is not attached to it? You had an opinion about the shot. You said you got it for the greater good. What if I think the shot is unsafe and is poison and not for anyone’s good? Am I supposed to adopt a position for myself and others that I don’t believe in? Am I a lemming who follows obediently or do I question authority and think for myself? I choose the latter.
Ramji: Sure. But that choice has consequences over which you have no control. The spiritual issue is this: should you allow your mind to be disturbed about things over which you have no control?
I don’t know what you shared on You Tube, but if they challenged your opinion, then it must have been questioning the efficacy or safety of the shot as “misinformation.” Just out of curiosity, what did you write?
Ramji: I pointed out that the virus and the vaccine are “not-real” from the point of view of the Self, existence shining as consciousness, and acknowledged that from the point of view of the world they are real. However, sadly their algorithm wasn’t programmed to recognize the distinction between the bliss of existence and the miseries of daily life, so they gave me a warning and the option to contest the warning. But I was happy to be censored because from the worldly point of view the virus is a treat, as is the vaccine, at least according to some. Was it just that they censor me? Yes, from their point of view, no from mine. But was I attached to my point of view? No. It doesn’t matter to me what groups or individual’s think. They are free to think what they want. And I’m not a rebel. I respect things that have power over my body and mind.
Things that I have shared with people are ways of possibly protecting oneself and building up the immune system by having a high vitamin D level and taking helpful supplements rather than thinking the shot is the only way to prevent COVID.
RamjI: Sure, but many people, myself included, do both; get the vaccine and the booster and take care of the immune system by living a very conscious healthy lifestyle. About 80% of the people I know took the vaccine. Nobody reported unwanted side effecs. In fact, tens of billions of doses have been administered and the population of the world keeps increasing.
I know you will say that the “lamestream” media censors the “the truth” but actually there is only one media. The views of anti-vaxxers are available for anyone who wants to google them and their “evidence,” which doesn’t meet the definition of evidence, is also available. A belief or an opinion is only evidence of itself. But anti-vaxxers tend to think the majority should share the anti-vax view. If anti-vaxers were a majority there would be no vaccine and that would be “fair,” since in a democracy the majority rules, at least theoretically. If anti-vaxxers ruled would the people who wanted vaccines legitimately feel a sense of injustice?
I have tried to help them to see what is happening with censorship and free speech. Both of these topics fall on deaf ears. My ego likes to think that my research is valuable to others. Not getting the response I hoped for only brought me pain as I said before and did not bring peace to them as I can be too forceful sometimes in relating info. So I stopped educating. I will admit, I have been judgmental of people who don’t question or think in this regard, but I own that it is my issue, not theirs and gives me a chance to work on myself.
Ramji: I wait until I am asked for my opinion generally or I set up the big picture context before I offer it so that people aren’t expected to conform to my views. I nearly left Sundari two years ago because of her Duryodhana factor, offering unsolicited unwanted advice to one of my friends. It was a very painful time for her but a very positive experience because it forced her to choose between her relationship with me and her tendency to tell people, including me, “the truth according to Sundari.” She quickly apologized and my friend has no hard feelings. In the two years since, I noticed that the tendency to “share” her opinions has gradually disappeared. And she told me recently that she was happy and grateful for what happened and that she had finally mastered that judgmental interfering part of her mind.
Does Vedanta not allow one to take a stand on something? Or does Vedanta allow that as long as one can stay unattached and unjudgmental it is OK to have an opinion that is perhaps kept more to oneself. Yes, I know how challenging that is , but aren’t we here to work on that anyway?
Ramji: Of course you can have whatever opinion you want, but dharma trumps “honesty” every time. Every human being has a hard and fast expectation of non-injury because reality is a benign non-duality. So one should always consider one’s actions, speech and thoughts in terms of the principle of non-injury. No, your thoughts don’t injure others, except when they become words. But they injure your mind. An aggressively opinionated person is not comfortable because he or she is injuring his or her self not because others don’t accept their views.
Vedanta insists that once you mature and understand that taking a stand as a flawed mortal entity is a bad life choice, you must take a stand in your true nature, which is unconditional love. To become an unconditionally loving person is to actualize one’s full potential.
You said “justice isn’t real because it depends on injustice and doesn’t take into account the mortal law of karma.”
Ramji: The moral law of karma, not the mortal law, Kathy. I explained the moral law of karma in the paragraph on non-injury above.
I don’t really get how this applies to withholding info that could be helpful to a wide number of people or forcing people to get a shot they don’t want because the government or some group of people who profit by it think they should. How does one make decisions about life or one’s health if you don’t believe that something is good or bad. You obviously think the shot is good for you unless you have acquired info and a viewpoint that is different.
Ramji: Who appoints who to keep God’s laws? In fact the law of karma/dharma “blesses” people who conform to it and “punishes” those who don’t. It’s an impersonal, self-equilibrating mechanism. Nobody needs to take the moral high ground, although it is one of human’s most unattractive tendencies. All you need to do is to be sensitive to the needs of others. However, if someone requests your views, get it in writing in triplicate, have it notarized and then let them hear your wisdom.
I think the main reason people so willingly got the shot is fear. Some may say that it is for the greater good, but on some level they believe the shot will save them from getting COVID. (Even thought Dr. Deborah Birx who was on the news every night with Fauci now says that she knew it would not prevent infection and might only lesson severity.) The reason I think this is because even after people got the shot, they were still afraid to be around unvaccinated people. So much fear these people have! And so much blame towards unvaccinated people who dare to think and question what they put in their bodies with such an untested product!
Ramji: Pleasure and pain are built into life’s setup. And fear of injury or loss is the most powerful motivator. Keeping that in mind, precaution is an intelligent spiritual value. It is not fear, however. It is having a plan for dealing with unfortunate eventualities.
One of the main things you said that really spoke to me is this—“My reality is seemingly useful to me and is subject to cancellation by your reality.” So true! Everyone has a different reality and mine should not be better than yours. You are entitled to yours and I am to mine. Because I like bottom lines for the sake of simplicity, this is what I think and this is slowly becoming my understanding, but you know I have a very opinionated mind with passionate feelings to work through so it will take a while! ACCEPTANCE! Non-attachment to my expectations and better to have none at all. Buddhism 101. Let people be who they are and accept them as part of the ONE. No need to fix anyone. Love yourself with your foibles and let others have theirs. I agree with you that “whatever a person believes should not matter to them if it keeps them from experiencing the ever-full and complete love that they are.” I really need to remember that. Thanks!
Ramji: You’re welcome, Kathy. There is actually only one self although when you take the bodies into account it seems as if there are many different self’s. If you say the word “I” and don’t say one more thing everyone will understand because we are all the same self. We exist and we are consciousness. Nobody needs to tell us that because it is self-evident. But when you add a whole lot of modifiers, qualifiers and qualities to that “I” you get differences. This is what Ramana says in Sat Darshanam, a classic Vedanta text. So the best way to relate to people is to relate to them as non-different from you. You wouldn’t consciously injure yourself so if there are only apparent, not real, differences, then all your relationships will be positive. People will see themselves in you. This is why I am successful.
Does sharing information about something indicate a “disturbed mind” or is it about how it’s delivered? Do you really not have an opinion about anything anymore? Or are you just not attached to it? You share it and let it go?Why does a contrary view have to be a disturbance? Are we supposed to just agree with everything someone says and never express another view?
Ramji: It’s how it’s delivered and the big-picture context. It seems as if I have opinions, but I don’t. In fact I present them as “mine” so I can satirize them. I only traffic in what I know. People have beliefs and opinions because they have doubts. So it is best to use Self inquiry to convert beliefs and opinions into knowledge or discard them, because for every belief and opinion there is someone who has come to the opposite belief or opinion honestly.
Beliefs and opinions are handed down from generation to generation and picked up unwittingly from others according to the natural proclivities that come with birth…first the family, then the culture, politics, etc. It’s osmotic, unconscious. One should question them in light of one’s highest value…freedom and non-dual love…and discard those that don’t serve it.
Is this a belief or an opinion? It seems so, but not really. It is common sense wisdom. If people chose to identify with self-insulting, self-limiting beliefs and opinions knowing full well nothing we think or feel is etched in granite, they deserve to suffer, like alcoholics and smokers who know better but choose to continue indulging their samskaras.
Is it an opinion to say they deserve to suffer? It is a statement of fact because they are suffering. Life is very just. You can’t escape your karma unless you choose to escape and take the requisite steps, which always involves a certain amount of discipline. Of course nowadays people are so lazy and entitled owing to affluenza that they don’t tend to avail themselves of the escape hatch. Vedanta is the escape hatch.
I like what you say how “life, like a loving mother looks after us in every way. It lovingly gives us measured does of joy and sorrow to purify our hearts , etc.” I am glad that your life is so successful, you have a huge following to your teachings, and love in your life. You probably never think about how the shot could be harmful and trust that whatever is meant to happen will happen no matter what. Isn’t that the Vedanta teaching?
Ramji: Yes. Everyone likes to hear that they are beautiful, free and adequate…because they are. Nobody likes to hear voices of diminishment.
How long will you be in Trout Lake and the States? It would be lovely to see you again. I might be driving west in September, but driving there in time for the retreat would be challenging, plus I have 2 commitments on Aug. 22. Still wondering how long you will be there. I trust all will go well!
Ramji: I will be there till August 31, then back to Spain, Lord willing and the creek don’t rise. I love you, Kathy.
