BOOKS BY ANANTA Welcome to Satsang with Ananta

Now, the thing is that the made-up individual identity does not give up on false knowledge. If you are new to Satsang and if I were to tell you that ‘Everything you think you know is garbage’ you might feel like ‘Oh, he is very aggressive.’ [Chuckles] What do I really mean?

I really mean that the Truth cannot be known in this way; in a mental way, in a conceptual way, in a pictorial way, in a phenomenal way. But also, empty of concepts, the Truth cannot be missed.

The Truth can never be known in a conceptual way.

And empty of concepts you cannot miss the Truth.

Now, everything that you think you know about yourself is false because it represents somebody who isn’t here.

Tell me something you really know about your Self.

What do you really know about your Self?

And if you know nothing about your Self, then what can you know about the world? So, stop trying to fathom Reality in this way. Nobody has been able to do it.

Then, what is this ‘Know Thy Self’? [Speaking as someone in sangha]: ‘All the Sages have said ‘Know thy Self’. Yet, you [Ananta] are saying that you cannot know it.’ This is the other part of what I am saying, that when you’re empty of notions, empty of concepts, you can’t miss it.

Now, this is a restaurant which has no take away. You can’t put it in a bag and take it home (if you know what I mean). If you try to box this experience, if you try to make a concept like ‘I found the Self. It was like this, it was like this’ then it seems like it is lost.’ If you try to make a painting of it, it seems like it is lost. So, in your imagination you cannot hold it, in your concept you cannot hold it; you have no apparatus. Your memory cannot hold this. You have no device, no apparatus, no safe that can hold this.

But you are never lost because you don’t have to hold it. You see? When you are empty of this concept of grabbing, of getting, of clinging, of understanding, of knowing …, Here You Are!

And the good thing about discovering this ‘Here I Am’ is that you See that ‘Even when I am grabbing, grasping, clasping, wanting, holding …, I am not lost, (in Reality). The recognition of this is useful in that way.

When we claim to know mentally then it seems like the Real Truth seems to get obscured or masked, in a way. And when we are empty of all of this ‘knowing’ (which is Right Now) it is apparent to you.

Now, for a long time, the mind might fight you and say ‘What apparent? What is apparent? Nothing is apparent. Why does he keep saying apparent?’ [Chuckling] But it is. You will see this. In fact, in this moment, before you buy into that idea, it is apparent that it is apparent. There is no struggle, Right Now. There is no end or start or struggle.

Q: When you say ‘apparent to you’ …, apparent to who?

A: Apparent to You, the Self, the Consciousness Itself which is playing this game of the seeming-individuality and the getting rid of it.

Q: For that, it is always apparent

A: For that, it is always apparent but in the ‘Big Seeming’ (as we call it; the Leela, the Maya) It has given Itself the power to play ‘as if’.

Q: Is there something else which indulges in all this?

A: No. It Itself indulges in all this. It is all there is. There is nothing else to even indulge in anything else. Just like if I say to you ‘Imagine that you’re in Kashmir’ (or something like that) you can build this. If I say ‘Believe a hundred thoughts about that one’ you can start to build a story around this one and then somebody comes and says ‘Oh, that one …, his head got chopped off!’ [Pretends to be shocked] It’s just an imaginary character that you just believed a hundred thoughts about. You see? You read a story book. A narrative is collection of ideas that we have about something. And then if it ends abruptly, like somebody came and chopped his head off; end of story. ‘Ouch! What was that?’ [Making a shocked expression]. It’s like that. So, there was never anybody else; it was just Consciousness Itself given the power to believe these narratives and to believe that there must be an existent entity behind this narrative.

So basically, this ‘person’ is nothing but a narrative, a set of ideas you have about YourSelf. There is no existent entity beyond Consciousness. Because otherwise then there would be ‘God and me’ …, there would be two. It is God Itself which is playing.

Q: That is why it is apparent to Itself?

A: To Itself, to Itself. [Nodding yes] That’s why I say Satsang is a crazy game where That which can never be lost comes to find Itself. Like Guruji [Sri Mooji] has a better way of putting it: ‘Satsang is a rehab for God by God.’ [Chuckles]

Whatever we say; whether it’s an alarm clock that you YourSelf set, whether it’s breadcrumbs you left along the way when you were going into the forest (and breadcrumbs are not the best idea which is something we know from the story).

As we’re starting to examine really what we know, were realizing it’s all nonsense. Everything that we know, it’s all nonsense. And the thing is, even this we cannot know fully (that it’s all nonsense). If we were able to say ‘It’s all nonsense’ that would be fine then. But we don’t even know whether it’s all nonsense. [Chuckling]

In fact, we’ve gone beyond the duality of sense and nonsense. Beyond the duality of right and wrong, beyond yes and no. Like we were asking the other day: What’s the difference between yes and no? Like: What’s the difference between before and after? And you’ll see at the root of it ‘Okay, this comes from memory, this comes from projection…’ Ultimately, you come to see that for all of these, at the bottom, you just have concepts of them. Like what is memory? What is projection? Whose light is this? Who is the light in which all of this is projected? You See? Then you come to the unity in a way, which is beyond explanation.

So, fundamentally what I’m saying today is that: You cannot capture It as a visual, as a perception, and you cannot come to an ultimate concept of It because It is beyond both these things.

Now struggle. Now try to struggle. Because struggle is only about these things; in your trying to know it mentally or trying to capture it perceptually in some way. You can’t see it and you can’t think it. Let’s put it simply. You can’t see it and you can’t think it: Now, how will you struggle? Because your struggle is about these things. Like he was saying, his struggle is about having an experience of It. And I’ve said: You can’t have a concept of It or a perceptual experience of It. Now what is left?

Like all of You said ‘But, I Am It.’

Are there two of You then?

If You are It, then is there another one?

Then it would not be ‘A-dvaita’ (not two).

Actually, all of us See intuitively that there is just one of Me; there is just One ‘I’. It’s not like ‘There’s one me, there’s another me…’ These are just ideas we can have about ourself, that ‘I’m this way, I am that way.’ But when we really look, it becomes very straightforward. We See ‘Okay, that dancing is me, and this dancing is me; and what witnesses both of these? Is that not primary?’

Now, you’ll See that all your judgments, all your grievances, all your struggles come from this sort of self-definition. Self-definition means ego-definition; when you define yourself as something, as a limited entity.

[Silence]

[Looks at sangha]: But?

The ‘but’ comes from this impulse to define. ‘But how is it? But when will I…?’ You know,  something.

Now, can you leave yourself undefined?

[Silence]

Even beyond the definition of ‘All there Is’ …, beyond ‘All’ and ‘there’ … is IS.

The thing is that we take these things very much for granted and move onto the next sort of idea. Like we take this Existence for granted. If we didn’t take it for granted we’d just be in wonder of it. Like ‘I exist …’ [Looks around with awe] You don’t have to say these things but I feel like ‘What a wonder, what a miracle. [Saying in awe] I exist! What is this Existence? What IS this existence?’

Now the thing that’s happened is that this is taken for granted. The most wonderful, joyful part of it is taken for granted. It’s like ‘Yeah, yeah, I exist as somebody. Now, tell me about that somebody and what I can do to help that one.’ We quickly put that ‘somebody’ into the picture. It’s never there, actually. It is just pure Existence.

This is the innocence of a child. They are not so quick to presume the existence of a ‘somebody’.

That why I say about all these ‘why’ questions, first can anyone say why I exist? [Looking around the room] Why I exist? Before you can say anything about anything else (‘Why does this happen in existence? Why do bad things happen to good people? Why is my life like this? Why do I behave like this?) first, fundamentally, You have to exist for any of that to happen. So, why do you exist? Or who is it that exists?

So, don’t be so quick to put on the mask of somebody-ness. ‘I exist as somebody; now tell me about that somebody.’ You see, like that. Take off the mask.

You Exist. You Are.

What is That?

And if you say ‘But I have moments where I see that I don’t exist’ then That which notices your non-existence: what is the Existence of That? That which notices your non-existence, your non-being: what is That?

This is fundamental …, but it’s not mental!

[Laughs. Looks a laughing sangha member and says ‘She has a good sense of humor.’]

Can you leave yourself un-molested, un-defined? When you define yourself in a certain way, it is like you are molesting your Being, in a way. [Smiles] Not in reality. You see, you are troubling yourself in way. Let us put it simply. Or do you have to think about it? ‘Can I leave myself un-defined?’ [Smiles]

Remember that you have to know something to struggle. If you don’t know anything at all, there is no struggle. But even greater is what I’ve told you today is that: When you don’t know, then your true Knowingness is apparent.

I said it is like a reverse classroom. I have seen a quote yesterday (was it Saint Francis of Assisi?) where he said ‘Self-forgetting the Truth’ …, something like that. So, coming to Satsang is like a big forgetting. If you come here with a bag of collectables and you want further collectables to be put in the bag, that is not Truth. Come and leave your bag. [Smiles] Everything that you have collected, it is gone actually. You had left it, now you want to go out with it. [Smiles] Will you pick it up again and go back with it? [Smiles] That is the game.

Q: “For it is by self-forgetting that one finds.” [St. Francis quote]

Q: “It is by self-forgetting that one finds.” Beautiful. Most unique. “It is by self-forgetting that one finds.” What were we taught? That the more you know, the more you will find. If you do not define yourself, it is completely apparent.

What is Here Now, without definition? Even when the question comes, don’t jump to a conceptual answer. What is Here Now? I know that our habit is to go to the mind and say ‘Okay, what is here? Something.’ So, don’t rush to pick up what the mind is offering as the answer. You just have to check; to have you own insight about it.

Like, to put it simply, if I tell you the subtitles in this movie are all wrong. [Sangha chuckles] It happens sometimes, you know? You download an international movie and you get the wrong subtitles. And you are watching it for sometime, and you feel like ‘But this is not matching.’ [Chuckles] This has happened. A French movie or an Iranian, Persian movie I was just watching it and you have to watch these with subtitles, and after five minutes, you discover ‘No, these guys are talking about some lunch and these guys are at war. What is happening?’ [Smiles] It is not matching. So, if I tell you that sub-tilter in this movie is all wrong …, but you can see for yourself What Is, then at least we go beyond this narrative. And the thing is that you will not just see the objects; you will also naturally be aware of that which perceives objects. This is my promise to you, that as you leave yourself empty of this sub-titler, empty of these subtitles, you are not just aware of objects that are perceived but you are completely aware of That which perceives them.

[Reading from the chat]: “Father, there is some expectation that I would know un-doubt-ably somehow or have some sort of certainty but not sure how; if it would be a thing seen or what?”

Now, this is good because we can really inquire in to this. Is there anything that we know that we know undoubtedly?

See, this can be a feeling that ‘If I know this Self, then I will know this with full certainty.’ But what is that we know with full certainty?

[Someone from Sanga says]: Things always pass. This too shall pass.

‘This too shall pass.’ But it is a nice, very helpful, sort of reassuring thing. Do we know with certainty, certainty? [Chuckles] It is a belief. Belief itself implies that ‘I believe it.’ So, maybe it is the end of the phenomenal world. [Chuckles] This will not pass.

There is noting that we really know undoubtedly. Everything fundamentally can be doubted (as we know here). So, as we let go of this ‘sort of’ knowing, then we come to a Knowing which is undoubtable. Undoubtable and yet inexpressible. The Knowing with a capital ‘K.’

[Someone from Sanga says]: Without words.

‘Without words.’ Yeah. So, what you have to do, in a sense, is define your search. What is it that the end of the search should mean? And see whether it is still talking about some phenomenal movement or some conceptual understanding. I invite you to look into a deeper, into a truer Knowing, which is not waiting for anything to happen.

Or is freedom still going to be an idea of how the body should be? Like if I start asking you ‘What is your definition of your freedom?’ are you still going to say ‘Ah, I should just be able to dance!’ [Smiles] Is it still about the coconut? Or is it about a deeper insight you have about yourself?

Because this you cannot predict; how the coconut will dance on the surface, we cannot predict because every expression of every Sage is different. Ashtavakra went as far as to say that ‘Every Sage is constantly in contradiction with one another.’ [Chuckles] So, you cannot choose. There is one very angry Sage, there is one very happy Sage, there is a silent Sage, a Sage who talks, talks and talks. So, there is no such definition. It is still going to be about the coconut.

Are you still defining your idea of freedom in coconut terms? Or have you become more spacious? You allow this coconut to move as it wants but You See that within You all these movements can happen and it does not affect You. You do not have a certain outcome. You are not defining. That is freedom; which allows all things to come.

What makes you confirm Awareness?

What is the basis of your confirmation?

You are not just lying. You are not just saying ‘Okay, we know it’s the right answer. Let us say yes, I am aware.’ You are aware. Like you were saying: It is most obvious. How is it so obvious? What makes it so obvious?

Q: Only because that I am aware that I am aware.

A: It is only that ‘I am aware that I am aware.’ [Smiles] Yes. What does it mean to be aware that you are aware? How can you paint this Awareness for me? What color will you use?

Q: No, color.

A: How big will that painting be?

Q: No size.

A: He is saying something very beautiful. ‘I am aware that I am aware.’ I’m asking him to define this ‘Awareness.’ He says ‘No color, no size.’ At least tell me how many dimensions it has.

Q: No dimensions.

A: [Smiles] What is That without dimensions? And he is not just making it up. It’s not a concept of ‘no dimensions.’ So, this is the reason why your mind will struggle with this completely. Because the mind only means dimensions. ‘Maya’ itself means that which can be measured.

Now, the thing is that this means nothing for you, or what you think you are. [Smiles] The recognition of the Self means nothing for the person that you think you are. It can have a lot of by-products. Bliss, in fact, is promised. [Smiles] Sat-chit-ananda is promised; Ananda. But I am provoking you towards the Truth, irrespective of what benefits (or not) there might be.

This is why the whole example of the ‘The ocean and the coconut’ comes. You found that you are the ocean. You used to think that you are the coconut on the surface of the ocean. Now, you found that you are the ocean. Did something special happen to that coconut? Did the coconut get a halo? I know it sounds like a very strange example but this is exactly what most of us do. ‘I am discovering this about myself; now what does that mean for me?’ So, our coconut-ness, our selfishness, is so much part of our conditioning that it can translate in this way also, that ‘I discovered that I am the boundless ocean but please tell me, how does that help this coconut?’

A: ‘Not knowing’ can seem a bit shaky. Not knowing can seem shaky for it a bit. Allow it to shake.

What I’m really saying is that because no concept can translate your true insight, no concept can match what your true insight is showing you, therefore this ‘not knowing’ (this inability to conceptualize the Truth) can seem like it is a bit empty. It can seem like ‘Do you really know the answer?’ It can feel a bit too open to ‘not know.’ And that is fine.

Once you start to taste this emptiness then you’ll never want to fill this up conceptually. (You can never say ‘never’ …, but mostly.)

Q: So, you’re pointing to us is: Don’t try to know the Truth, in that sense; like knowing it in a conceptual way.

A: Or perceptual way. Most importantly, in a conceptual way.

Q: Like we know in the phenomenal world…

A: What do we know in the phenomenal world?

Q: Well, within the play, I mean to say, just some things. I need to know this is a shirt, and I need to wear it this way.

A: Do you need to know that it’s a shirt to wear it?

Q: No.

A: This is like my example I take often, like I say ‘Do I need to know it’s a glass to drink from it?’

Q: If a thirst arises…

A: Do I need to know that it is thirst?

Q: No, I don’t need to know. I’m experiencing something.

A: Exactly. That’s why I’m saying your naked perception of it, empty of your concept of it. You see? So, all of this is a play of naked perceptions until we involve our conceptual mind in it and say ‘We know what this is. This is thirst, this is grief, this is joy, this is water, this is a glass’ (all of this). But just like babies; it’s a beautiful example how babies can suck milk from the breast. They don’t know any of it. They don’t know what milk is, how to drink it, none of this; and yet that movement happens naturally.

In a way it’s just like hearing or digestion or the heart beating. But in our process of the play of individualization we’ve given ourselves attributes; like we’ve given ourselves boundaries (enclosing his hands around his body) and constrictions. And then we’ve attached other attributes to ourselves saying ‘I’m doing this. The heart, I’m not beating; that is nature’ (as if there is an entity called ‘nature’). ‘Nature is doing that.’ You see? ‘Digestion, that’s nature. This I’m not doing. But the movement of my hand, I am doing.’ Then if you are not doing your digestion then that same One cannot move the hand? So, we’ve given ourselves certain attributes and said ‘Yeah, this part I’m doing, the speaking I’m doing.’ Actually, every time you speak it’s apparent to you that you are not speaking. There is nobody sitting there. The speaking is just happening in the same way hearing is just happening.

So, this process of sensational movement, perceptional movement, is all just happening. You see? We have taken some of this and taken individual ownership of it and said ‘This I am doing.’ So, you don’t need to know ‘shirt, wearing’ (none of that) to wear it. It’s all part of the same movement of Consciousness. The waves are moving. You’re saying ‘In this wave, this part I am moving. But from here to here, [Moving his hand to a certain height] Consciousness takes me. But from here to here, [Moving his hand higher] I have to do. And therefore, to do that I need to know this.’

This is very, very fundamental because if Satsang leaves you with even this simple concept that ‘I am wearing my shirt because I know it is a shirt’ then I cannot leave you with that. [Chuckles] In fact, (this is one of the examples I share sometimes) I was getting ready for Satsang one day. All of the process of picking out the clothes; all of it is happening. And I could see the mind is trying to keep up with that process, saying ‘Yeah, yeah, wear this.’ It had already been decided, in a way; Consciousness has already picked out how it’s going to play. But the mind was coming in and saying ‘Yeah, wear this, it will be fine.’ So, it’s just trying fast to keep up. And that’s when you start to notice your Being is always one step ahead of your mind. It is your mind which is struggling to catch up with This; with ‘What Is’ in its manifest aspect.

Q: I have a question about ‘perceiving and conceiving.’ Guruji [Sri Mooji] said (I was just listening to Satsang yesterday or day before yesterday) where he was saying ‘You are perceiving what you are conceiving.’ So, the doubt was…, (one is): in the phenomenal aspect, you see something and you can either perceive it as good or bad. And that’s the phenomenal part of it.

A: Okay, slowly, slowly. Even at this point (a favorite example these days) [Picks up a glass of water]: are you perceiving it as good or bad?

Q: I assume it is the object but it is the interpretation which arises…

A: So, then we can use another term (before we demolish all the terms) [Chuckles] which is just to conceptualize it as if It Is. One is to perceive it. So, you say phenomenally there is a perceiving of it and then there is a concept which seems to get bundled with it. The judgment only comes form the concept, not the thing in itself …, (if there is such a thing as ‘a thing in itself’). So, even this we took the example of the other day, that based on our concepts of it, then we can say ‘good’ or ‘bad’. But the judgment can never come in the pure perception itself.

In fact, it is very beautiful. I was just reading it the other day and I saw that it was said that ‘The perception actually becomes blurry, it is not fully perceived, when we start to conceptualize.’ And why it happens is because we have a limited quantity of attention, so once we move away from just even phenomenal perception to conceptualization, then the perception actually is lost. And we think that we are working then from the conceptual version of what we think it is, rather than what It Is, even phenomenally.

Q: Sort of looking with colored glasses.

A: Exactly.

Q: So, the question was (that’s at the phenomenal level but) when you are at the space of just the Awareness, does this thing of ‘You are perceiving what you are conceiving’ happen at a subconscious level? I am conceiving happiness so happiness starts developing around me. It’s sort of like success begets success; if you feel successful, you get more success. If you feel failure, you will get more failure. Which is sort of what Management Gurus use.

A: ‘The Secret.’

Q: Yeah.

A: Not even to say ‘Management Guru.’ [Laughter] This whole manifestation business. [Smiles]

Q: So, I’m wondering if that is what Guruji meant…, where you are literally what you perceive around you …, since that is what is being conceived at a subconscious level.

A: See, I like to say that for Consciousness, there is no such thing as a subconscious. [Chuckles] That’s a different realm of study. I have nothing against that. ‘What is there in your subconscious?’ then we start looking at all of that. So, let’s maybe keep it a little simpler than that. Like yesterday we were saying: there is no actual perceivable difference in this waking state and a dream state.

So, when you are perceiving the dream, who is conceiving it?

Q: That’s where the question is. [Laughs]

A: The same Consciousness.

Q: Yeah, yeah.

A: The same Consciousness in Its very Existence. In fact, ultimately we can come to a point where we can say ‘There is no difference between perceiving and conceiving. Your perceiving of it is the conceiving of it and your conceiving of it is the perceiving of it.’ So, then attention goes from a tool which is just gathering data or gathering sensations to becoming that which provides the light to phenomenal existence. [Chuckles] It’s like a lens through which the light of Your Being is then conceiving/perceiving (if we can use the same term for both).

So, it is not something which is in the time gap. Like yesterday we were joking ‘a million dollars, a million dollars’ and then (because of the manifest power that You are endowed with) over a period of time, a million dollars will manifest. It’s not like that. It’s the same thing: Your perceiving of it IS the conceiving of it. I know that for the mind it is a bit … [Makes a gesture of difficult] [Chuckles]

Q2: You only said it’s different, no? You said it’s different also before?

A: No, no. Okay, say again what I said? [Chuckles]

Q2:  You said it’s some arrogance; you said about how we give it our interpretations.

A: Yes, but I used another term for that which is to conceptualize it; not to conceive.

Q2: Okay.

A: So, we are talking about three terms: to perceive, to conceive and to conceptualize. [Chuckles] Now the ‘conceptualize’ we kept aside, because that is all judgment, interpretations inference, all of that, which has no claim over Truth anyway.

Then we are now talking about now two terms, which is ‘perceiving’ and ‘conceiving’ (not to conceptualize.

Q2: So, when conceptualization happens of something, then we don’t conceive it or perceive it?

A: You still perceive it. But you seem to perceive it with the add-on of the judgment.

Q2: But that’s not conceiving?

A: [Chuckles] Even that we conceive, actually. Even our concept is only what we conceive. You see? But I am saying that if we keep the conceptualization part of it aside for a moment, and just dig into…

Okay, let’s step back. So, he said that ‘In the phenomenal realm, you can then perceive something as good or bad.’ And I was questioning that. ‘Do you really perceive something as good or bad? Or actually, there are two perceptions at play: one is your sensory perceptions and the second is the perception of your concepts? and both mixed up [together]?’ Then the judgment can be believed in, which is that it is good or bad in itself. But the thing in itself (and I always say ‘If there is such a thing’) the thing in itself is not conveying either good or bad; it is just ‘What Is’ (or at least in this case, it is what is appearing). So, it’s latent in the appearance of a phenomenal object. The judgment is not there. The judgment is always an add-on from this narrative mind; from this interpretive mind.

So, first we looked at that and said ‘Okay, let’s take the judgment itself out.’ Then we looked at ‘What does Guruji mean when he says that ‘Your perceiving of it is the conceiving of it’ or ‘Your conceiving of it is the perceiving of it.’? So, I am proposing to you …

Q2: We are conceiving an idea?

A: No, that would be the concept part. We have kept it aside then.

Q2: The conceiving would be what?

A: [Chuckles] Yeah, this is what we are saying. So, I am proposing to you that there is actually no difference between your perceiving of it and your conceiving of it. And ultimately, you can use these two terms in the same way. Just like in a dream: you are only perceiving what you are conceiving and you are only conceiving what you are perceiving.

It is not like ‘The Secret’ manifesting kind of way where you say ‘I conceive of the thought of a Ferrari’ [Laughter] and then maybe in the phenomenal experience, it will come. That’s a different process which we are not getting into.

I am saying that this very thing [Points to surroundings] …, as you perceive this, whose conception is this? Only in the light of Your Existence ‘I Am’ does it appear.

See, the thing is that we would never be able to say ‘Everything is the will of Consciousness’ if it was not this. So, it’s all-interlinked. Because it is the will of Consciousness therefore, it is a conception of Consciousness; a conceiving of Consciousness (not a conceptualization). See?

I know these terms can be a bit like ‘What’s going on?’ But it’s good to sometimes just separate them. Otherwise our mental process gets mixed with our sensory (or even our inner) perception and it can all seem like a big muddle. But the thing is that we have to use terms so that we can discard them. [Chuckles] Not that we can hold onto them; it’s so that we can discard them.

Now, we are saying that ‘Okay, I perceive something, then my attention is on it.’ So, I say ‘Bring your attention to the sound on the road, bring your attention to this body, bring your attention to a sensation in the body.’ We can say it like that and it can seem like ‘I, as Consciousness, seem to have this power, seem to be able to work with this power called attention.’ And then the question remains:

Is attention going to an object which already exists?

Or is it that the power of perception is the same as the power of conception itself?

Now what I would say is that: only that exists which you perceive. And yet, the potential for unlimited perception is here. So, you can never run out of the world; in the sense that you can go further, further, further into this realm and you can never run out of it …, because it comes from this unlimited potential. So, in that way, I would propose that there is no actual difference between perceiving and conceiving; which is how I would look at what Guruji said, that ‘Your perceiving of it is your conceiving of it’ or ‘Your conceiving of it is your perceiving of it.’

So, it is talking about not some subconscious manifestation. It is talking about just: Your power to perceive is the same as your power to conceive; and your power to conceive is the same as your power to perceive. Just like in a dream.

Now, the same thing you can apply to the dream idea. Like I sometimes say ‘You are reading (in the dream) a newspaper that something happened in America.’ [Chuckles] So, it’s then only that the newspaper seems to actually exist for you. There is no America there. And yet, if you have some device over there and can you travel to America or you can look it up, then that appears. You see? It is the same for this realm like that. [Chuckles] All of these things; you don’t have to stress to figure it out. Just allow them to be your own insights. And even if we don’t agree on these insights, that’s completely fine. What we will agree upon is Your ultimate Reality.

The nature of this phenomenal appearance, we can always even agree to disagree on. [Chuckles] That is why all the disagreements even in Advaita Vedanta are about the relationship of the phenomenal appearance with relation to the Absolute. Some will say there is no difference; it is one; Abheda. Some will say actually there is a difference; bheda. Some will say there is actually no difference but actually, some difference. We are taking about what? We’re talking about the Absolute, the appearance of the seeming individualized Consciousness, and the world: these are the three things.

(Okay let me go slowly.) [Chuckles] We are talking about the relationship between the Absolute, the seeming individualization of Consciousness which is called Jivatma, and the appearance of the world which is called Jagat: these are the three variables.

Now, one thing that everybody will agree upon (in Advaita Vedanta) is that the Absolute remains a forever unchanging, non-qualitative Self. The Unchanging, non-phenomenal; non-qualitative Self; everybody agrees on that. But everybody disagrees (all the main paths within Advaita Vedanta) will disagree on what is the relationship of this Absolute and the seeming-appearance of this Consciousness …, and the seeming appearance of this world. Now, based on all of these various combinations, we have all of these various paths. Advaita-Vedanta can seem like it is one path but it is ‘full’ of differences. There is Vishist Advaita, Shudh Advaita, Keval Advaita, Bheda, Abheda, Bheda Abheda…, all of these paths which are basically talking about the difference in their concept of the appearance. But on the Absolute, they agree.

As long as we, from a place of an insight, find that this is My Absolute Unchanging Reality, then what terms we put around rest of it (the worldly appearance and the seeming-existence of an individualized Consciousness) that we can say [something about].

So, I just speak from what insights are here and what term seems most applicable. But I am not really attached to that terminology. I am happy with whatever you are finding for yourself. But my proposition is for you to explore. Everything that I’m saying is just for you to explore; not like a final gospel Truth or something like this.

My proposition to you is to See whether there is really any difference between perception and conception.

And then to see what happens when this perception gets muddled up with our conceptualization.

Is there any trouble in the naked perception?

(…phenomenal as it might be? And whether you choose to call it illusory or real, that is okay.)

But in the appearance of this naked perception, is there any trouble?

Or do you need to mix it with conceptualization for this sense of trouble to come?

Q: But where I felt the problem arises still, again, is that when I just say ‘This Knowingness’ it’s hard to conceptualize it.

A: Impossible! It’s not hard, it’s impossible. Are you okay without conceptualizing it? Ultimately that’s the thing; in Satsang, ultimately that’s the thing. Are you okay without your concepts of the truth or right or wrong? Or you just have to know it conceptually?

Q: There’s like a …, you know …, like a flip needs to take place.

A: But you don’t know this. [Chuckles]

Q: True actually. [Chuckles] But it’s not coming from the mind…

A: Any project, shift, flip, whatever, is still a concept. If a project was needed, if a shift was needed, if a flip was needed (or not needed; either position) then that would mean that the naked truth is not enough. Which is Now. If it had a condition, then it cannot be the eternal Truth.

Q2: Then why is it called enlightenment?

A: Why is it called enlightenment?

Q2: Why is it sort of made into an event?

A: Why? [Said with unspoken reference to the recent Satsang pointings of: For every ‘why’ question, the answer is ‘Consciousness.’] [Sangha laughs]

Q: No, no, you know what I mean. You know that all of us are here for that.

A: The thing is that now how it appears to seeming-other eyes is like that. Like you are struggling with the need to know; the need to know and to understand. And suddenly the struggle dropped! You see? For you [it dropped]. You saw that This was always Here; this Truth. But to others, it will appear that the struggle has gone away. ‘She must be enlightened!’ So, in the play of the world it can seem like a switch happened. But what You find for YourSelf is that Reality has always been This. You see? Now, if you were playing with an imaginary friend for thirty years, it was never there …, and then you realize that the imaginary friend is never there.

Q2: So, it’s kind of an event.

A: Yeah, it’s ‘kind of’ an event. But not in Reality. Because the imaginary friend was never there. It was never there! You were always This! How it appears to your eyes and to the world’s eyes can be that ‘Oh! Something changed.’ But what actually changed? It’s just that something false (which was seemingly-carried) has now dropped away. But the thing is that the false was never really there anyway. That’s why it is false.

But question first. I’ll answer the question, as I always do. There’s one answerer sitting here [Chuckles] which is a habit. But I’m saying:

Before that thing comes that ‘I have to crack this’ …, before that movement, what is there?

Something can feel unsettled. But what will the answer give to you?

Like you ask a good question and I give a good answer. (Hopefully.) [Chuckles] So, then what will that answer give to you? You see? It is just like satisfying a desire which has become a knot. And the desire is what? The desire is our need to understand.

Q2: Yes, but you’re also opening our eyes at one level.

A: Yes. But now, before you can close your eyes, are they open? …, in the sense that before the desire to conceptually know, are your eyes open or closed?

Q2: Open.

A: They’re open. So, I’m not averse to questions. I’m just like pushing you all to a deeper looking, which is that: Before that impulse comes, before the conclusions (even as subtle as they might be) that ‘I don’t know this and I have to understand this!’ …, then, when the answer comes, what kind of understanding actually takes place? I’m proposing that it’s like a knot and an unknotting; whereas the Witness of the knotting and unknotting is just untouched by all of this.

Q2: Yeah, it’s always this way that ‘Oh! But if I saw this, then I will have a deeper insight and then I will have a more peaceful (whatever) life.’

A: Exactly. But it’s like yesterday we were joking that if you desire something and then you find a way to manifest it (we were talking about some chanting) then something can happen that you can do and you can get your desire. Then I said ‘Okay, then after that?’ Then you wait until your next desire comes and then you chant for that. Then you wait for next desire. So, this is a treadmill.

Q2: So, wanting to be smart in a ….

A: Wanting ‘to know’. What is this knowing itself? Like, what is it that after seemingly-knowing so much, that we actually know? This is a valid question: What is it that we actually know after seemingly-having this human experience (for whatever period of time)? Presumably we know something by now. But can anybody tell me conclusively what you know?

Q: So, that is why it is effortless.

A: It is effortless, yes.

Q: That is like, in Itself, It has this inherent quality too. It is like magically fresh, and effortless.

A: Yes. It is like when we go from deep sleep, dreamless sleep to waking state, there is no lever that is pressed; there is no effort. It might seem like, after waking up, that there is an effort for this body to move. We are not talking about that. I am saying that the arising of the waking state itself and the rising of the dream state itself is completely effortless. Then, if the arising of it is effortless, then the play within it also continues to be effortless. [Smiles]

You are not making an effort to exist. And in Your Existence, everything is functioning completely fine. We don’t need that term ‘completely fine.’ It’s just functioning …, in the sense that ‘What Is’ in its manifest aspect is completely taking care of itself. It needs no mental intervention (although it creates that, as part of its play). [Smiles]

Like, what thought are you using to exist Right Now?

Your Existence is prior to whatever thought might be there. So, you are not using a thought to exist. And in your Existence, you see a realm which is full of movement. So, it is not an effortful conception or an effortful movement. The effort is required to consider yourself to be something that you’re not. To consider something to be something that you’re not is effortful.

I was saying yesterday that you cannot take the lie with you in the next moment. Only the Truth remains. What simpler shortcut can there can be? Until the ‘but’ comes, you are fine. You are ‘Is.’ [Chuckles] Now, whether you say ‘Is-ness’ or ‘Am-ness’ or ‘such-ness’ or Beingness, You just Are.

So, who is the one that is actually struggling?

Right Now, there is God; there is ‘Is.’

The struggle comes because there is a notion that ‘I must know something or resolve it.’ The struggle can come because of that. That’s why we’re exploring this need to know. Actually, the true Knowing is present before you can know something. The true Knowingness is present before you can know something.

So, the need to know is just an imitator. It is just an imitation of the true Knowingness. Conceptual knowing and even ultimately a perceptual knowing is just like an imitation of Your true Knowingness Itself. Before you put on this mask of imitator, all is truly Known …, (with a capital ‘K’ Known. This small ‘k’ known is the imitator).

The thing is that it is a very primal sort of need in our human existence. Because even as I say this, there can be like this thing that ‘Ah, do I know this?’ For me to know even this, the true Knowing is present before I can know something. ‘How can I know?’ Like that.

I am talking about a very primal movement here; a very, very primal movement …, even before ‘What I know’ and ‘Whether it is true or false’ and ‘What is true or not.’

What is this impulse to know?

So, after seemingly knowing so much, what do you actually know? This is a valid question because what is it that we actually know? After seemingly having this human experience for whatever period of time, presumably we know something by now. But then, can anyone tell me conclusively what you know?

Q: Only that ‘I Am.’

A: But even this ‘I Am’ came to you this morning. What woke up? You say ‘This I Am-ness woke up.’ Now this ‘I’ which witnessed even the waking up of this ‘I Am’ …, is that known?

It is, in a way, but that is the [Knowing with a] capital ‘K.’ You don’t have a concept of it, you don’t have a perception of it and yet you know it. This astounds me, even as I say it. Because you cannot really conceptualize the ‘I’ that witnesses Your Being; That which is Aware even of Your Existence. You cannot really conceptualize it, you know that. And you cannot perceive it objectively with any quality. And yet, you Know. So, it is not a mental knowing, it is not a perceptual knowing. And yet, who is Aware? You are. ‘I Am Aware’ …, even of ‘I Am.’

Guruji [Sri Mooji] said ‘Before I Am.’ The ‘I’ which is before ‘I Am.’ Now, this is the thing; you already know that you cannot conceptualize this Truth because everything you can conceptualize has an opposite concept. But This does not have an opposite.

Now, how will you bring this to your mind?

Can you bring this to your mind?

Like in the words of Guruji when I went to Him in the hot seat [He said] ‘If you ‘know’ it only messes it up and it is never true anyway.’ So, this attempt to bring our inner insight, intuitive insight, to our conceptual mind is what causes the frustration on the spiritual path. Because you feel like the certificate of Freedom will only come ‘When I am able to translate it conceptually’ or it can even feel like ‘When I am able to speak like Ananta; when I am able to share insights like this …, then …! Because he seems to have the right concepts to [speak about it].’ But nobody does. These are not right concepts; these are just, at best, pointers. Nothing that I can ever say can truly actually even point to that.

(I don’t know what we are doing here then.) [Laugher in the room] (But somehow it seems more auspicious than other worldly activity.) [Laughter] (Maybe that’s just a concept.)

The thing is that this, which is your intuitive insight, in that moment of looking for the answer to ‘Are you Aware now’ it is clear to you. This cannot be brought to your mind. And this is why Satsang (this type of Satsang) is actually anti-concept, anti-intellect almost, in a way. To the mind, it is really a journey to forgetfulness …, or even to go to the extreme of saying stupidity. Mental emptiness is the recognition of an unchanging fullness. Because it is apparent to You Now! But you are not able to conceptualize it because it is so empty of quality.

Are you Aware Now? You know it is ‘Yes.’ But you are not able to conceptualize this entity on the basis of which you are saying ‘Yes.’ You are not able to conceptualize it, you are not able to perceive it. That is why it can feel like ‘I haven’t found it.’ Then how can you say ‘Yes’? It is apparent! It is too obvious! And yet it is not perceptual, it is not conceptual.

If these terms are confusing, I can use simpler ones. When I am saying ‘conceptual’ it is just like mental. Saying ‘It is not perceptual’ means you are not perceiving it as an object.

And yet, You Are.

Who is unaware of their Existence?

(‘As what?’ …, I’m not asking that. Just ‘…of their Existence.’) Because even to be unaware of it, You have to be Awareness. [Chuckles] You say ‘I am unaware’ but then you are aware that you are unaware. There is no escaping it. That is why it does not have an opposite. It is not ‘aware’ with the opposite ‘unaware.’ You cannot say ‘aware’ and ‘not aware; there is no Awareness.’ Like some people say that ‘I have discovered a higher Truth which is that I am not even Aware.’ So, then you must be saying that ‘I am aware now that I am unaware.’ So, don’t get trapped into any of these mental concepts.

This contemplation is good:

What does an answer provide to you?

What is the question really asking?

And what does the answer provide to you?

Is it a true Knowing?

Or it is, at best, something which demolishes something which you already know?

You might feel like you ask a question and you’ll get a good answer but actually you’re asking for a bomb which demolishes everything you know about anything.

Q: It dissipates the notion, which is kind of like the question without the notion that you’re holding…

A: Yes exactly, that is why I liked what Adya [Adyashanti] said (someone had put it in the Seva group) saying that ‘The Master does not answer your question; he questions your answer.’ Because for all our answers (he is talking about these conceptual answers where we feel like we know something) he [the Master] will bring that into Your light and say ‘What is it that we actually know?’

So, now, if this is jnana yoga, as opposed to other paths, this means ‘This is shining the light of true Knowing.’ And true Knowing is non-conceptual. Right Now, You are empty of concepts …, then Right Now, you have achieved jnana yoga. [Chuckles]

The light of Your True Knowing is already Here. That is why it is lovely, beautiful, what Bhagavan [Sri Ramana Maharshi] said. He said ‘True knowledge is just the dropping of false.’ The dropping of the false. It is not the learning of something new. You see? Some of these things are so pristine and if we just take them to heart for a bit, that ‘To come to knowledge, I don’t have to gain anything. It is not a plus. It is just a dropping of that which is false.’ Otherwise, it can feel like ‘When will I really know? When will I know the Truth? When will I come to true Knowing?’ It is there!

So, what it means is that if it is only a process of removal of the dust (which is another example which the Sages use) then it is just the concept of removing the dust from our eyes; like that. That means the pure Seeing must already be there at your core.

So, in a sense, the Guru is just the garbage collector. [Chuckles] He is the garbage collector who is taking all your conceptual knowledge. Sometimes shaking things up and saying ‘Give it all to me, this nonsense you are talking about.’ [Laughing] And sometimes, saying ‘My child, my child, just surrender it.’ You see?

But in whatever way he is asking for it, this is the ‘Guru Dakshina’ …, which is [giving him] everything that we think we know, everything we think we know and feel right about. And sometimes, like a child, sometimes we don’t want to give it actually. Like ‘But Father I want this. This is my favorite toy! This is my favorite toy.’ The Father will say ‘Okay, okay, we will see tomorrow.’ [Then mimics snatching it away from the child anyway] [Laughter] You know, just like that. Because the Father knows it is not good for the child. Because if they are truly asking for the Truth, then you cannot provide them more dust to put in their eyes. ‘Here is some more dust for you.’ So, it must be ‘Come, come, let me wash your eyes for you.’

That’s why this question is poking a lot; is pushing a lot of buttons: What is it that you insist upon being right about?

[Reading from chat]: “I’m scared of my thoughts, they bring fear. Even if a happy thought comes, I’m scared of them, too. I can’t trust them anymore. I feel like I am lost.”

Something will become very simple if you hear what I’m going to say:

All confusion, all frustration, is about who you are.

It is not about the content of your thoughts; it is about who you are.

Now when you say ‘I’m scared of my thoughts’ what is this ‘I’ that you are referring to yourself as? This ‘I’ which is scared of your thoughts, is also just a thought construct, you see? Because if I ask you in this moment ‘Can you produce the one who is scared of his thoughts?’ you won’t find it.

So, then this becomes like a vicious cycle. ‘I’m scared of my thoughts, they bring fear’ and then we fear the arising of fear. But actually, your nature is more spacious than this space itself. Now, in this space, whether there is fire burning, whether there is something ice cold, is the Space concerned about that? No, you see?  So, everything can come and everything can go. You are that space in which space is coming. Unless you confuse yourself to be a limited entity, unless you believe yourself to be a limited entity, then all of these things can come; like fear.

So, I would say that if you have really truly boarded the Guru train, then don’t fear this fear, to start with. In fact, now you invite this fear and say ‘Come. Mr. Fear you come. I’m here in Satsang with the Master. You please tell me what you can do.’ Then you will find this fear is nothing but a jumping energy.   It can’t do anything to you because you are more spacious than space.

But if you consider yourself to be ‘something’ then that ‘something’ can always be attacked. But to consider yourself to be something is hard work. And maybe now you are tired of this hard work.

So, leave it. Because You are Here Now and You that is Here Now is God Itself, is the most enlightened Being you will ever meet, is Your own Presence Now, uncontaminated by judgment.

The mind will come and tell you ‘But it can’t be this simple; but I have struggled for so long, it can’t be this simple to be free.’ But it actually is too simple for the mind to comprehend.

The ‘I’ that feels it is lost, can you produce it?

The ‘I’ that feels it is lost or it is fearful or something happens to it, where is it?

Where is this ‘I’?

Can you produce this one?

That is the question.

[Reading from chat]: “The ‘I’ is what I have believed so far. I feel it; my body, my mind.”

So, let’s go really slowly. Firstly, because something has been believed for a long time doesn’t make it true. And for a long time, there was a belief that all the planets and all the stars that are revolving around the earth and the earth is one flat object. And then it was discovered that this is not the case. So, a belief system being carried for a long time doesn’t make it true.

Secondly, (this part is good). You say ‘I feel it; the body, the mind.’ Now, the ‘I’ that feels the body … (and what is the body? Just experiences; a set of sensations, isn’t it? Like a visual perspective and a set of sensations) … which space is this sensation happening in? You see? Where is all of this happening? And does that have a boundary?

Then you said ‘My mind.’ Now, mind is what? Just when there is a thought, we call that mind. When there is no thought, we call that no-mind. So, that which comes and goes cannot be I. This set of sensations; these sensations alone cannot be I.  Because the sensations are also constantly changing.

[Reading from chat]: “The pain I feel.” you say.

But the pain is also not constant. Sometimes there is pain, sometimes there is pleasure. Otherwise, you would not be able to say there is pain.

So very good. [Reading from chat]: You say “I am aware of it.”

So, this ‘I’ that is aware of it, what is happening to that one?

You say [Reading from chat]: “Even that keeps fluctuating.”

Okay. So, suppose the light in this room was to fluctuate. If I was going along with the fluctuation, every time the light went off, if I was not there, would I be able to say it is fluctuating? No. I have to be a constant witness to notice the change happening, only then can I say something is fluctuating. Isn’t it? So, to be the witness of this change, to be the witness of the coming of the waking state, the going of it; the coming of the dream state, the going of it; the coming of the deep sleep state where there is nothing and the going of it …, who is that to witness? Who remains untouched? … by the coming and going of this body? … by these mental thoughts?

All of this, does somebody witness it?

Or does something witness it?

Is it a body or a thing?

[Reading from chat]: “It is always there, I know, the one that witnesses.”

Now, the minute you say ‘It is there’ we have made a distance between ourself and it.

Where are you in relation to it?

Now, if you were to say ‘It is there’ You must be aware of it to make that report that it is there. That which is aware of even it, which one is that one?

[Reading from chat]: “That’s not me.”

Then who is it? If the one that is aware is not you, then who is aware?

[Reading from chat]: “I don’t feel it.”

It’s not a feeling. It is beyond any perception that you can have; it is beyond any concept and any experience. When I ask you if you are aware now …, this awareness is not a feeling, it’s not a perception, and it is not a concept. What is it?

[Reading from chat]: “I don’t feel it as I Am.”

So, this ‘I’ that doesn’t feel it …, which one is that?

Can you identify that?

[Reading from chat]: “The body and mind, which I believe.”

You just have to investigate rather than just going along with just a belief. Many of your beliefs about yourself have been false, isn’t it? Beliefs you had 10 years ago about who you were turned out to be false. Then you will say ‘No, no, I used to believe that but now I believe this.’ So, that has changed.

If you just go along with what you already believe, then Satsang is not that place where you come to get reinforcement of what you already believe. When you come to Satsang, you have to be open to be confronted about what you believe. I cannot tell you what I am saying if you continue to hold onto your belief about who you are because what I am saying is completely in opposition to this belief system of limitation.

So, the question then is: Are you willing for one moment to be open to the idea that you don’t know who you are?

[Reading from chat]: “I am open.”

Very good. Because actually, it is more accurate that you don’t know who you are. But we shy away from this because we have been taught to believe or to consider ourself to be a body, a mind.

Now, a set of perceptions are appearing. All these perceptions are there. What forces you to draw a boundary and say ‘Only this perception is me and everything else is outside me’?

And as I was saying (and I’ve said this often): We have taught this as children, that ‘This is you. This is your head, this is your nose.’ A child does not distinguish between his hand and a toy until he’s taught to do so.

[Reading from chat]: “Should I do something to be open?”

No. Don’t do something to be closed. [Chuckles] Don’t do something to be closed; open is your natural state.

In fact, ‘open’ is one of my favorite words ever. Open. Because in that one word, most of what is being shared in Satsang is there. Because the false is just a resistance; is a closed-ness.

[Reading from chat]: “This body is in my direct Awareness. I sense the world through this body, even though it is not me. Would this be correct to say?”

In a way, it is fine to say this …, in the sense that when we have a dream, even a daydream right now, then we can conceptualize a world where there is a body and the visuals are coming through that body’s eyes, through that body’s ears. But that whole world, which seems as endless as this world, as the dream, where does that appear? On which screen is the dream world? And although in the dream-story, there can be a body which seems like the central character, and when the dream is on, it might feel like we’re perceiving that dream through the senses of that body …, but where is it actually? That is why so many have these out-of-body experiences, all kinds of experiences even in this so-called waking state where it seems like even this body is being perceived from a distance.

[Reading from chat]: “Teach me to be open.”

[Smiles] We have unfortunately been taught how to close ourselves. So, the teaching which neutralizes all other teaching, the Knowing which neutralizes all other knowing, is what I’m trying to offer to all of you; to get empty of all concepts about yourself, which is naturally Here, Right Now, as openness. One moment of notion-less-ness is enough.

Q: Is this the same feeling like, if we share something, we feel relieved?

A: In the sense of …, what is the source of agitation? Can you identify that? [Silence] Objects in themselves …, do they have the potential to cause agitation or to cause suffering?

Q: Expressing. The need to express something.

A: Yes, so whatever is the restlessness or agitation or frustration or suffering or whatever you call it, can it come through just objects in themselves? Like the computer is sitting there in front of you. Can it, in itself, cause some agitation?

Q: No.

A: What do you need for it to cause you agitation?

Q: Some thought.

A: You need to interpret it in some way. ‘I don’t like this black color cover. It should be shining white.’ Something. ‘Oh, it’s so dirty, it looks like some oily hands have touched it.’ You see? Once you have all the ideas about it, then the agitation can come. Then you can get an answer. ‘But black is good because it doesn’t get dirty easily, it’s nice, so you should have it.’ So, it removes the agitation.

Now the thing is: What is your original [nature]? Without a fig leaf, in your nakedness, what is just here?

Q: Space.

A: There is a space. But is it like a spatial space that can be measured? Like, what is the size of that space? How many centimeters by how many centimeters? It is not a space like this space. [Indicates the space of the room] Now you have to say. You can’t just accept my answer. That’s all I am saying, actually. [Chuckles] What is naturally here? You say; with the simplicity of a child. ‘I am looking at you, one body is in front of me, some sensations which I call my body are here.’ You say like that: What is here?

Q: People, objects.

A: There are objects around. Then? And?

Q: There are some sensations in my body.

A: There are sensations. Let’s also call them objects (inner objects). So, besides objects, what is there?

Q:  There is something that is perceiving all of this.

A: Is it a thing?

Q: It’s my body, that’s what I’m feeling.

A: Body is perceiving?

Q: My eyes.

A: Eyes perceiving. If you close your eyes, does perceiving stop? Imagine a tree. [Chuckles] Who’s perceiving that?

Q: Somewhere here, maybe not the eyes, but…

A: And who perceives your dreams?

Q: Right now, I’m not in a dream.

A: You can have a day dream also though. [Chuckles] You can start imagining that you’re sitting somewhere else, by the banks of Ganga or something like that. It is possible. If you close your eyes, it can feel like ‘I am contained in this body which is sitting here’.

Q: Perception …, I feel it happens naturally in the head part. That’s my experience.

A: So, what perceives the foot part?

Q: What perceives?

A:  The foot. You said ‘Perception is in the head’ so, [what is] the foot is perceived by? Does something have to move to perceive the foot …, like the perceiver went from the head to the foot? Is it like that?

Q: Some sensations are happening. It’s naturally perceiving.

A: Good. Now, how is this voice perceived that you are hearing?

Q: Through the ears.

A: This is inference. [Chuckles] Suppose you didn’t have the label ‘ears’ …, the perceiving of this voice, is it happening in the same space where the perceiving of your foot is happening? Or are there two different spaces of perception?

Q: It’s all in the body.

A: What do you see? This is what you think. What do you see?

[Silence]

Does this ‘I don’t know’ feel bad?

Q: No.

A: It’s fine, no?

Q: Feels like space.

A: ‘I don’t know’ is good because..,

Q: Right now, it’s not feeling bad. Sometimes it feels bad. [Chuckles]

A: So, this is what I am actually talking about. This ‘I don’t know’ is very beautiful actually. We’re quick to rush to a conclusion because we can feel that it’s a bit unstable, this ‘I don’t know-ness.’ But true insights (if there is such a thing) are revealed only in this ‘I don’t know-ness.’ If you already can conclude that ‘This is what it is’ …, like you said ‘All of this is in my body.’ So, if I get a surgeon to cut open the body, will you see all of this? (No) These things are not there. These are not atoms and molecules. The body is made up of what? Atoms and molecules. So, what can it contain?

Q: Atoms; molecules.

A: Exactly. [Smiles] So, if this glass is atoms and molecules, it can contain atoms and molecules. When you say ‘All of this is just within my body’ are you talking about the atoms and molecules of all of this? Or …

Q: Sensations. Are they also atoms and molecules? Are they also visible?  We talk about energy fields, energy centers.

A: So, you can say, for example (let’s make it specific) so you can say ‘I am feeling so much hurt. I am feeling so much hurt in my heart because he behaved like this to me’ but if a surgeon was to open the body, will he find the traces of hurt? No. [Chuckles] They will have other explanations of brain chemicals and this and that. But what is it that is our true experience? Our experience is that there is the perception of some sensation, which feels like it coincides with the heart. In the same way Bhagavan [Sri Ramana Maharshi] would refer to this Being, this Atma as the Heart. Was he saying that there is a physical object called the Atma in the heart? No. He was talking about another layer of his Existence, another level of his Existence, which was beyond physical. And if you are not quick to label …, if you are not quick to label that ‘This is what this is’ you will find that this is your own insight.

Q: I believe memory is labeling it as energy body.

A: Yeah, you start labeling it as [energy body] this kosha, that kosha. This is what happens when we know a lot. [Chuckles] This knowing seems to get in the way of true insight.

So, what is it that we find? We said ‘…in all of these objects…’ and you said ‘There is something which perceives it.’ Guruji [Sri Mooji] has what he calls the piranha question. He says ‘Can this perceiver be perceived?’ Can it?

It’s a beautiful thing. I say ‘Do you perceive a phone on this couch?’ You see it. ‘Do you perceive a phone on this couch?’ Now you are saying ‘Something perceives it’ but also that you don’t have a perception of it. (Stay with me if you can, because here the mind will start shaking up a bit.) You are saying ‘Something perceives all of this.’ But to answer the question ‘Can it be perceived?’ it seems to take a lot of inquiry. Then how do we testify that ‘Something perceives it’ if we don’t see it? [Looks around] It’s a strange sort of thing because you cannot deny it and yet you cannot tell me the color of it.

I ask you: ‘Are you aware now?’ … Are you aware?

Q: Yes.

A: So, what did you see to confirm this?

Q: My Presence.

A: The Presence you saw. So, you are aware of Presence. That ‘OF’ part keeps changing; you’re aware OF the world, you’re aware OF people, you’re aware OF everything. You’re saying ‘It’s only because of the ‘OF’ part (the content) that I say that I am aware.’ But that is like saying that ‘I’m standing on the road. I can only say this because there is road.’ But you also know what standing is, no? Standing is different from sitting. So, how is it that you don’t know ‘Aware’ apart: you only know what is after the ‘of’? Because we actually know it but we don’t know it here. [Points to head] We don’t know it here; we don’t have a sensation of it.

Awareness is not a sensation, it is not a concept, it is not a perception. And yet you say ‘I am Aware.’ [I ask]: How do you say this? [You say]: ‘Because I am aware OF the room, I am aware OF your voice.’ But what’s on that side of the ‘OF’? What tells you that?

And I keep asking you if the ‘I don’t know’ is okay. Because if ‘I don’t know’ is okay, then I can keep asking you these things. But if you feel like ‘I don’t know’ is not a good feeling, then you start to struggle. Then you say ‘This is frustrating. What are we getting anyway? What’s the point of these inquiries? It just goes nowhere.’ …, these kinds of things.

Can I go as far as to say: Start enjoying the ‘I don’t know’? [Chuckles] Maybe it’s a bit too much to say. Maybe don’t even know that; whether I’m enjoying it or not. See, we don’t know. Like we said, we don’t know what is up and what is down. We don’t know what is true and what is false. Even to say something is true, we need a benchmark. The Sages said ‘That which is the unchanging is true’ but even that is a benchmark. ‘What is right? What is wrong?’ If you were born in upside-down world…, [Chuckles] if people said in this world ‘How dare you tell the Truth? You must always speak lies.’ It can be an ethical way to live, according to them. Who has made true ‘true’ and the false ‘false’? We don’t know even the very fundamentals of our Existence. But we claim to know like so much; that ‘This is this and this is that.’ That’s what I’m asking you to look into:

What is it that we really know?

And what does it mean to know?

When ‘I know something’ what does it mean?

Does it just mean that I have a concept of something and I know it? What keeps us attached to ground?’ … ‘I know it, it’s the gravity’ No, you don’t know it; you just have a term for it. Are we now willing to move beyond just terms into a deeper insight? Because all the terms you know now. Who has come to Satsang that doesn’t know the terms ‘Awareness, Self, Consciousness, Is-ness, This, What-Is’? We know all these terms. Are we willing to just make our house based on these terms? Then be willing to fight with anybody who is using different terms. ‘Self verses non-Self’ [Chuckles] ‘What-Is verses what-is-not, Being verses not-being.’ These are just terms. Or are they your living tasted insights?

It was very beautiful; something I read the other day. I feel like it was Jean Klein. He said that ‘You cannot really truly perceive and conceptualize at the same time.’ So, the minute we leave our perception and go to conceptualization, then we have left it midway. That’s what I call the photocopy. [Smiles] We live in this photocopy idea of the world because we feel like now we can label what is happening here based on some terminology that we have. Like ‘Okay, fifteen people are sitting in this Satsang hall, having Satsang.’ Is that what this is? According to the mind, it is, because those are the terms we have. But what is happening here? So much more; so much different than that. [Chuckles] What about Presence, energy, transmission? All of this cannot be captured. Truly, even in these terms, it cannot be captured. So far, we have lived in the photocopy version. We think ‘My life is like this, I did this and I did that, I woke up this morning and this is where I went.’ It’s all made up: this conceptual thing. When will we go beyond terms? And is it even possible?

~ ~ ~

Today maybe we can look at just this itself, this itself …, in the sense that: What is the pre-answer state? If the question seems to be there, then when the answer actually comes, what is it that actually changes? What would an answer be?

I can tell you that it’s just the concept (which is the answer) which can seem to provide some relief because it can seem to feel like something is settled. This noisiness of the mind is saying ‘What is this? What is the capital of Norway?’ for example. Saying anything, anything. And it seems to be like ‘I don’t know’ …, which can be an uncomfortable feeling. ‘Oh, this tune I remember from my childhood. But who was the singer? What is this song?’ You see? It can be anything, but something feels unsettled if this ‘I don’t know’ feeling is there.

But this is something we have learned. We have learned to not like the ‘I don’t know’. The child is not suffering from it till his parents condition him or till he goes to school and they say ‘You have to know otherwise you get a black dot or big red star.’ All these systems where we were taught that if you know, then you are doing better.

So then, the same thing happens also in spirituality, that ‘I want the highest Truth.’ And what we initially mean by that is we feel like ‘If we come to the highest concept of what God is or Self is then I will know it really, and I can succeed in this class with flying colors and I can give myself this certificate of enlightenment.’

But what happens usually in Satsang is one day you can feel a bit settled with the answer, the next day the Master comes and says ‘You know, that…, can we look beyond, can we go beyond.’ And you feel ‘But I came to the Absolute!’ But it’s very easy to convert this insight, beyond which you cannot go, into a concept which you feel like is the concept of the Absolute. So, I jokingly say about …, in the Ribhu Gita. For many chapters it is spoken about Brahman, the Absolute, this is Absolute, everything is the Absolute, Brahman, Brahman, Brahman. Then there comes a point (Chapter 26, if I am not mistaken) where they say: No Brahman, no Self. You say ‘What?’ (And some you know, you actually memorize the Sanskrit verses, internalize them, chant them: Brahman. I want Brahman, the Self.) Then what happens when you get to this point? What gets triggered? If you came to the insight of the Absolute, nothing happened there. It’s just that the concept that you were attaching to that ‘I have found something which is the Absolute’ and then the Sage says (just to poke you) ‘There is no Brahman like that.’ Then what happens? Then again, we come back to this conceptual emptiness.

That is why Nagarjuna and Chandarkirti said that when people accuse them that ‘If you keep saying that ‘There is nothing, there is nothing…’ (People used to accuse them) ‘…that means what you are saying is that there is no Buddha, there is no Truth and there is no Sangha. Then how can you call yourself Buddhist then?’ They had this thing; they were saying that ‘It is all empty, there is nothing, the nothingness of nothingness or the emptiness of emptiness.’ This was famous about them. So, when they were faced with this criticism they responded very beautifully and said ‘You are misunderstanding the purpose of the prayojan.’ (According to them). ‘You are misunderstanding the purpose because if you have the concept of the Absolute then that has the potential to cause you as much suffering as any worldly concept that you might have and the Buddha said: Clinging is Suffering.’ So, sometimes we come to Satsang and we cling onto concepts. Now we have this fresh set of concepts and we want to hang on to them. So, then the Sage has to come and say ‘No, not even that.’ That doesn’t mean that they are in denial of the Absolute. Because even to deny It, you must Exist.

The point is that this conceptual emptiness …, even if it feels like an ‘I don’t know’ and ‘It’s better that ‘Now I do know’ than ‘Now I don’t know. I feel like this is it and this is not it.’ It is not like that. No concept is actually able to replicate reality in even the tiniest way. Not a patch. Even if you use the highest terms, it is not meeting up the highest. But for us, we can get attached. Like we can get attached to Advaita-Vedanta. ‘No, I am an Advaita-Vedantin, I am a Buddhist, I am a Zen, I am a (something).’ But what is the Master really saying? That you cannot capture it in anything that you identify with. No identification is an identification with the Truth.

So, this is where something starts shaking up a bit and this is where we really can explore: ‘What is this feeling of incompleteness if I don’t know? This feeling of shakiness unless I have the right answer?’ And once we have these answers then we have to choose, that ‘No, my answer is right, my answer is the best one.’ It is not like that.

As we have been exploring over the past few days that even to say very basic things like ‘up and down’ you need to localize yourself. You need to give yourself a position to be able to say ‘This is up and down’ and ‘This is left and this is right.’ But it is not your true position. If you’re not contained in this body/mind instrument …, then is your position that which is contained in this three-dimensional realm?

So, of course, I am not saying that we must become weird conversationally, where we are looking for a house on the road and somebody says ‘Go left’ and we’re like ‘What is left? There is no ‘left’ to me. I am everywhere.’ [Giggles] Not like that. But I am saying truly, truly: What is it that you are finding? Like, where are You now? What is to the left of You? What is to the right of You? …, unless you buy a notion that you are contained in this instrument or you buy another notion which is limiting in some sense, that ‘I am this!’ That is why Bhagavan Ramana Maharshi said ‘The true knowledge does not have to be acquired, it is just the false which has to be dropped.’ It is such a beautiful reminder.

So, what can we testify to that is truly true? And to use the parameters of the Sages themselves, they said ‘That which is truly true is not subject to coming and going.’ If it comes and goes, it is an appearance. Actually, it doesn’t matter if you deny it and call it an illusion or whether you accept it and you call it ‘the play of Consciousness’ or you say it is completely real; it is completely fine. But ultimately, there is a higher Reality which witnesses all that comes and goes. Otherwise you cannot say coming and going. If you yourself also came and went, then to nothing you could say ‘This comes and goes.’ So, coming and going is always in relation to something which is constant.

Now, this that you find, that is beyond the subject/object relationship, what can you say which is true about It? Can you say anything which actually matches up with what our own inner insight is?

There is really nothing. That is why Guruji (and all the Masters) said that ‘What is said in Satsang, at best, are pointers.’ At best, it points to something. But it, in itself, is not the Truth. [Nisargadatta] Maharaj said ‘Everything I say is lies except ‘I Am’ …, but ultimately even that is a lie.’ So, basically, he is saying ‘Everything I have spoken of, in itself is not the Truth but, at best, points to something which is true.’ So, this is the thing.

Now, if we are just settling for conceptual answers like ‘Who Am I?’… ‘Oh, you are the Self’ or ‘There is no self’ (whatever the answer might be) if it is just a concept of that, then it can be shaken. Tomorrow a higher authority, a more credible source, can come and say ‘No, no, no. That which you are calling the non-Self is the Self!’ (And in some way, that happened in India with Buddhism and Vedanta. But we won’t get into that story.)

The main point is that the acquisition of a concept: What does that do for you? If you asked a question which you felt was your highest question and you got a concept for an answer which you felt was the highest answer …, what actually changed for you? [Silence] It just added another concept in your bag of concepts.

Q: It gives some direction to us also.

A: That’s what I said. At best, it is a pointer.

So, you had a question so ‘What should I do next?’ I say you take 50 Ujjain breaths; suppose. [A breathing technique in Yoga] So, then what happens? You had a question of ‘I don’t know what to do.’ You got an answer: ‘You have to take very deep Ujjain breathing 50 times.’ So, then what happened?

Q: I’m relieved.

A: You are relieved of…?

Q: …of the question.

A: You are relieved of the question! You see, this is the thing. I was just reading the other day where Adyashanti (or somebody) said ‘The Master is not answering your question; he is questioning your answers.’ So, basically, your sense of relief is coming from the fact that the question has gone away. But does it go away permanently? You will take 50 Ujjain breaths in five minutes or something and then you will say ‘What’s next?’ So, the question keeps changing and the answer keeps changing.

At best, the best answer can be that which removes the question …, like an answer like: ‘Inquire into who you are. Who am I?’

Then ask another question about it. ‘Oh, my mind gets very disturbed when I start looking.’ Okay, it’s fine. Find out who witnesses the disturbed mind?

So, it seems like there’s a consistency in those answers.

Now, how was it before you had the question?

You said that the answer removed the question, so there’s peace.

Peace, but still there is another question: ‘What next?’

Right Now, Now, Now …, is there a question?

Q: No.

A: Now? Peace Now. Did you do something to create it?

Q: No.

A: So, what is that answer that I can give you which can make you comfortable with not having an answer?

[Silence]

If a question came and it did not disturb our peace, that would be fine.

The struggle with your mind will be that it will say ‘But what is the Truth then? I want to know:  What is the Truth?’

But the Truth is apparent even before the question came.

[Silence]

But it is not a verbalize-able Truth.

As all your concepts went away, did you go away?

Did you go away?

What exists without needing a notion?

Okay, what goes away when all notions are gone?

Let’s start over there.

How will you have a grievance?

Can you have a grievance notion-less-ly?

What is a grievance? How many ideas do you need to have to have a grievance? Have you looked? ‘I need to have an idea of me, I need to have an idea of another, I need to have the idea of doership, I need to have the idea of somebody doing something which can possibly hurt something here.’ All this is lies, no? Just made up. For one simple grievance, we need to have so many concepts; ‘me, other, doing, not doing, doing to me.’ What can hurt you? What appearance can come that can touch you really, and scratch you and dent you? Nothing. You have to first identify, you have to make a boundary (in this sensational realm) and say ‘This is me.’ Like a piece of paper…, you’re the paper, but you make a map and you say ‘India is me.’ Then you say ‘This is my enemy.’ [Pointing to another place on the pretend-map] Like that. But without drawing those boundaries, what is it? You see? What is it?

How can you say ‘me’ and ‘mine’ unless you have a notion that something divides something naturally? And this we had to be taught, actually. And this is what happens because you were taught so well (or badly) [Chuckles] because a child did not have these notions of separation. A child did not have the idea that everything is happening within my body, as if there is something special about my body. The body was just another set of sensations experienced in the one existence. But we were taught ‘No. This is you. Your head. Your nose.’ I remember doing it as a parent. [Smiles] ‘Beta, [son] where’s your nose, where’s your nose?’ Until he got it, we kept saying ‘Where’s your nose?’ [Laughs] What to do? We were parents like this! He learned it like that. And sometimes we’d say ‘Where’s your nose’ and he’ll be like ‘Here’ [Pointing to his head] and I say ‘No, no, no. Wrong! Like this.’ There was maybe a better answer. [Chuckles] We are so deeply conditioned that ‘This has to be. The understanding you give your children, it has to be like that.’

I also take this example of the hand and a toy. We bought a toy for my son. We put it on the crib. We hung it over there and obviously, money was spent on it so we wanted it to be used. So, we said ‘Play with this, play with this, play with this.’ Then we were happy because the hand started to go up. Hand went up. After a while, he started playing with his hand only. So, there’s no difference whether it’s a toy or their hand. You see? It’s like that. They have not yet come to these concepts that ‘This is good, this is a toy.’ Like this famous example of how children love playing with cardboard boxes until they are a certain age and then they get the concept ‘toy.’ Then they know ‘This has been a special gift for me. This is a toy.’ Then they don’t want to play with cardboard boxes anymore. ‘Where’s my Lego? Where’s my (this thing)?’ Then they start getting this conceptual, photocopy version of life. But it is not natural. It has been taught. It has been conditioned.

It can sound like terrible news, that we have been conditioned so much. But the good news is …, you know what? The good news is that this conditioning is struggling to catch up with you every moment. You; leaving it behind. All your conditioning is actually struggling to catch up with You, Now. Now. You have left it. Now. Now. You have left it. But if you give it time ‘Okay, come, come’ (and usually you start looking upwards) ‘Ah!’ [Laughs] Once you start to think about it (not just that thoughts are coming, but that you’re actually consuming them) then it can feel like ‘Oh! Caught up.’

The thing with conditioning is you pick up one branch and it seems like the entire is tree is back. But who is the one struggling? It is your conditioning struggling to keep up with You. It is your conditioning which is struggling to keep up with you. If you can just see that, it will bring a lot of space. You see? Because otherwise you keep thinking ‘I must get rid of my conditioning.’ That itself is conditioning.

Carry some conditioning to the next moment and show me how you do it. You can’t do it. You can’t take any conditioning. Completely naked you will come; every moment. But you have to say ‘Did it happen?’ Then, when you say ‘Did it really happen?’ …, then you are looking for ‘Did it really happen?’ And you say ‘No, no, no, of course it didn’t happen.’ (In your case. It might be true for him but in your case, you’re still carrying it.) So, then you pick up that branch, then you feel like the whole identity is back. But still the struggle belongs to the conditioning.

The mind is struggling to convince the unlimited one that it is limited. The unlimited one is not struggling. So much lightness, na?

So, like this; moment-to-moment, just open, light. Even if there is some feeling (which we don’t have to label as light or heavy) which can feel a bit oppressive or constricted, that’s fine …, because nothing is greater than Your Being. Unless you make that map of yourself and say ‘This defines me’ …, tell me, what is too much?

Yesterday we were talking about ‘too much.’ These quantitative things we say like ‘This is just too much for me.’ Too much for me. How big are you then? Because everything then becomes relative. So, if it is grief and I am like this [Holds hands together to make a small space] then it is too much for me. But if I am the unlimited Source, the Being Itself, then what is too much? Then everything is just images dancing in front of Me. So, no need to get irritated with [Sri Nisargadatta] Maharaj when he said ‘The whole universe is just like a firefly for Me.’ Because we can get irritated, like ‘What is he saying?’

Here and Now, You are notion-less. And Here and Now, therefore, there must be some underlying peace. It is just This. That is Our original-ness.

Now, what can you do to spoil it? Suppose the attempt, the project, was to spoil it. Not to keep it but to spoil it. ‘There’s too much peace, man! Come on! Let’s shake things up a bit.’ [Laughs] So, what will you do?

Let’s go slowly. So, there’s peace and anything can come in front of You. With the arising of that, suppose some ex-girlfriend comes or ex-boyfriend comes. With the arising of that appearance, automatically is there lack of peace? Suppose then, okay, some sensation is also coming. That ex-boyfriend has come and the sensation is also coming. So, even the appearance of both of these objects…, is this what you call suffering? It still needs us to have a notion about it. ‘He’s this way. I wish I could give him one slap!’ You know, something. [Laughs] (I don’t know why I’m saying all this. Are you guys giving me ideas?) [Laughs] So, for this kind of suffering, for you to suffer, you need to do work. This again is upside-down compared to the mind’s paradigm that ‘To suffer, I have to put effort in.’ But to be at peace, it is just normally Here.

Once we start to See this for ourself, we’ll understand what Papaji [Sri Poonjaji] meant when he said ‘To be unhappy, you need something. To be happy, you just Are.’ Its natural. You don’t need anything at all. The thing with the Masters is that they say it so simply that the depth of it gets missed sometimes. You’re like ‘Yeah, I can just be happy, you know…’ [Laughs] But really, just in my naturalness…

So, this is the seeming design of this play, where Consciousness is playing as ‘God Now’ or as ‘me-ow’ …, as ‘God now’ or ‘me-ow’. And I was saying the other day (because it’s happening to a few in Satsang) that this idea is coming that ‘I can play with ‘me, me, me, me, me’ but the minute the trouble starts to come, I’ll go to ‘God now.’ [Laughs] But maybe don’t venture into these expeditions so soon. Don’t venture into any sort of arrogance, any sort of play like that, too early. Of course, God is always going to be there. But you might remember this after like 50 thousand years or something like that [Laughs] …, (which is nothing for You so it’s ultimately fine). [Laughs]

[Reading from chat]: “In this moment, you are free, before picking up the next thought or sensation…”

Actually, I would say ‘without the next thought’ because sensations can come and go. To pick up a sensation only means to believe a thought about it. There is no other tool you have. Attention is on it therefore, you can report there is sensation. Besides that, you can only give assent to a thought about it; an interpretation. There is no other way to pick up or identify with a sensation. So, even that part we don’t need to worry about.

[Reading from chat]: “In this moment, you are free, before picking up the next thought or the sensation has resonated and takes me to a deeper place. But do I need to discard this as a notion or stay with it as long as it helps?”

Stay with it as long as it helps …, and I will help you discard it. Like Guruji [Sri Mooji] says ‘Don’t shoot the sheep dog’ or Bhagavan [Sri Ramana Maharshi] said ‘This is the stick you’re setting on fire so that you can burn the funeral pyre. If you throw away that stick then you can’t burn it.’ Or like he said ‘This is the thorn you are using to remove other thorns; and ultimately you will also throw that away.’

But don’t be too quick to throw it away. ‘Oh, this is a thorn. No, I don’t like thorns.’ [Makes a movement of throwing it away] But all these embedded thorns are still there. Like my Master would sometimes say strongly ‘Don’t become over-smart too soon.’ Like ‘Oh, who needs to do the inquiry? I’m not the doer.’ You see? Like that. [Chuckling] We still feel we are the doer with everything else and that everybody else is doing things to us. We still have all of that. ‘But inquiry I cannot do because I’ve been told by the Master that I’m not the doer.’ So, it’s good you asked. Because otherwise we can just take it on and say ‘Yes, yes, even this is a notion, so let me throw away this first.’ You see? But other notions are still getting belief; they still seem to have power.

So, these atomic notions, these inquiry notions …, even the devotion notion like ‘Guru Kripa Kevalam’ ultimately is also a notion. But until it blows away everything else, use it. While it is doing the job of cleaning up all the other thorns; use it. Then there comes a point when you don’t have to say anything, including ‘Guru Kripa Kevalam.’ This is for all of us, not only for the one who asked this question but for all of us. Something in the mind wants us to become the champion; like fast! [Swings his hand downward very swiftly] ‘I want to become the champion; beyond!’ Something like that. So, just see that that is also a notion. ‘I must get it really fast’ or ‘I’m getting it really slowly’ or ‘Maybe if I can just get it that way or that way.’

[Silence]

If you want a shortcut, then I’m giving you the final shortcut anyway. Don’t try to apply any other shortcuts.

I’m saying that: You are already free Now.

Let’s say there are (fifteen in the room, thirty on the chat) forty-five [here in Satsang]: There are forty-five Enlightened Beings (if there is such a thing) Here Now. Now, Now, Now. Okay? Anything shorter than that? Nothing is shorter than Now. This is a shortcut. But then don’t try to apply any other shortcut.

[Silence]

So, fundamentally, I’ve just said a couple of things today (although it seemed like I rambled on for quite a bit). [Chuckling] I said:

Don’t buy into any inferences or any so-called claims of knowledge unless they are your true insight.

[Silence]

And when you come to this insight you will see that all these boundaries, all this so-called wanting to get freedom itself is a sham because you find no bondage when you’re truly looking. All bondage was conceptual therefore, even the idea of freedom is conceptual.

So, fundamentally, going back to this whole thing about: What is it that you feel that you are so right about that you cannot surrender it to the Master or burn it in your own Self-inquiry?

[Silence]

Like this child was saying the other day ‘But that is right! Only this, Father!’ Something becomes like ‘Only this is right.’ There is no such thing! These things …, it can feel like we are being light about them but actually, they can take a hold. Our lightness of Being. Then, with the tiniest of conceptual righteousness, it can feel like [holding his hands close to his chest]. Then we come [spreading his arms out wide] to a bigger Openness. ‘What? Oh. I truly can’t say anything; yesterday, today, tomorrow. Nothing. And I was feeling like this is like that, this is like that.’

It’s just a burden advertised as if it’s a benefit. Like in software development …, we do this. [Chuckling] There are a lot of bugs but we just say they are features.

What is not apparent to you, Right Now?

What Is just Is. Is-ness does it need to be helped.

Like do you need to have a concept on top of Is-ness to ‘is’?

For Beingness to Be, do we need to reinforce it with a concept?

That is the claim. For the mind, that is the claim that ‘Unless you know this, unless you do this, unless you want truth, your life is not complete.’ And we’ve gone along with these notions without truly checking: Is that true? Is this true?

If I give you encyclopedia full of Advaita notions, will it will make one tiny scratch worth of difference to the Is-ness? Your Being is just being. And yet, in the play of this world, it seems as if it is burdened the more concepts it has.

That is fundamentally why we have Satsang every day because our existence is burdened and heavy. Sometimes, have you seen these people who know a lot? Sometimes I have meetings with people who know a lot and they feel so constricted and very defensive. Once you start with like ‘So, what is this?’ …, you start poking their ideas and they’re like ‘I studied this; this scripture and this scripture…’ [Chuckles] But such a burden exists with so much defensiveness because it can seem like ‘I invested fifty years learning all the Upanishads’ for example.’ [Chuckles] And someone comes and says ‘But what did that get you …, besides what you already were?’ It can sound like I am the worst enemy! I am not saying that. We have full Vedanta here, as you know. I am just saying that if each of those terms are not being used as pointers for us to look within and it is just being memorized and being conceptually collected as if ‘I know more and more and more’ …, can you tell me one concept that can add to anything to Being-ness …, to Your Being?

Then the mind comes up with another idea (which also I have looked at; contemplated deeply) which says ‘If that is true, then nothing we can speak is true; then wouldn’t silence be the best?’ [Smiles] I have looked at that and I have seen that when it means just outward silence, then sometimes this outward silence is not the best because sometimes, in this outward way, you have to hear the contradiction, you have to be confronted with your beliefs, about your beliefs, so that they can be shaken up a bit. And outward silence can also be a very complacent holding onto of the inner beliefs.

So, it is very helpful to come to Satsang and get a bit shaken up. It is very helpful because, as I have been saying, everybody feels that their beliefs are true. [Chuckles] Nobody feels like ‘What I’m believing is false.’ Belief means that ‘I feel it is true. I have given assent to the fact that this is true, this is meaningful.’ So, when it is confronted, then it is not initially an enjoyable experience. After a while, we got used to Satsang and then when the confrontation comes, it comes as a sense of ‘Aha, look! I was holding on to even this.’ It can become like that. ‘Look at that! The mind is so sneaky that it was selling me this belief; then it seemed completely true. Then I heard from the Master that: Have you looked at this? Is it really true?’

Initially that conversation can be like ‘What do you mean?’ You know? You want to hold onto it. ‘What do you mean? My precious…’ [Chuckles] Our beliefs can be like that. Then, as you get opener, opener, opener (if there is such a term) [Smiles] then you find that (not just with the Master, but with everything in the world) they are not so sticky. ‘How could you say that? That sounds completely wrong!’ (like that) goes to ‘Ahh, is it like this? Maybe I can look at this.’

This spaciousness gets more and more spacious. As with the clutter of these concepts, you see that even these beliefs which we seem to rely on so much, life confronts them. And initially, there is sense of discomfort about this confrontation. Then there is a sense of welcoming that can come. ‘Ah…’ Then you can make a prayer like ‘Father, I do not see any dark spots of belief or conceptual identity but please, if you spot something, just chop it off.’ This feeling can come. ‘…just chop it away.’

Of course, when the chopping away comes [Chuckles] it does not always feel so comfortable. Many times, we actually forget that this is the answer to our prayer. [Smiles] Otherwise, it would not feel like a chop anyway. If it is always remembered that this is an answered prayer, then would not feel like a chop anyway. [Smiles] Then it’s more like a beautiful giving away. ‘I am just unburdening myself.’ And you say ‘Ah, Satguru please, whatever is here; burn it, chop it.’

But know that the burning will come when you feel like you forget; when you forget that this is an answered prayer. If you are in remembrance of that, if you are in the Seeing of that, then it does not feel like a burning or a chopping. So, what you are actually praying for is you are saying that ‘Even if I am fighting it, you please take it. Especially when I am fighting it. Especially when I am fighting it, you take it. If the burning has to burn, if it has to feel like my life is being squeezed out of me, you please take it.’ That is what the prayer implies. Not just like ‘Ah, burn me, burn me; ah, burn me.’ That is not burning. Because then, that is like you’re Seeing that all your concepts are been given away. What you’re actually saying is that ‘If I’m holding onto something but I cannot even see it, if I’m holding on to some identity…’ (which could even be ‘best disciple, best devotee’ and some identity; something) ‘… then burn me; take it away. Even if my hands as fists are tightly clenched, take it away.’ When they are open, then it’s simple. Then everything is given away anyway. There is no burning or chopping there. [Smiles] So, burning means ‘I invite you to squeeze my fist open and take whatever I might be holding onto.’ This is good.

[Continues reading the original question from chat]: “…in the idea of my voice, my intuition, my expression. One minute the ego says ‘I am special’ the next minute, arrogant.”

See, everything that it’s trying, to prop you up (which is basically a big set-up) is a set-up for failure. It is playing that game of propping you up, of saying that ‘You’re so special, you’re so good, you are really getting this, you’re almost there, almost there; you’re doing so well.’ It props you up. And then it has its version of vigilance, like ‘But I am keeping my eye on you. Okay? If you mess up, I am going to take away the certificate.’ [Smiles] It’s like ‘You are so good’ then for one moment, some anger came against someone. It is just like that. So, sometimes I call this very spontaneous thing ‘the starter; the salad.’ [Chuckles] The salad comes, it’s picked up [like when] you believe a thought about something. Somebody is not treating you right. You believe something like that momentarily. And then the play of Consciousness starts where anger can come and all this can happen.

By the way, it does not have to come in that order. Sometimes the anger can come first and then the thought comes. Sometimes just anger comes; no thought comes. Sometimes only the thought comes and you’re waiting for the anger to come and there is nothing coming. [Smiles] So, I’m not saying any sequence has to be a certain way. But if this [salad] is the starter, then the ‘dessert’ is the guilt, the unworthiness. ‘I felt that I was doing so well. But I see that I’ve not gotten anything. I have not understood anything. I’ve not made any progress. I’m not a worthy disciple. I’m not really getting this stuff.’ …, these kinds of thoughts. That’s why I say this is a dessert. Because the calories of this one are much more. They seem to lost a lot longer. The anger just came and went. [Snaps fingers] But the guilt usually lasts a bit longer. Sometimes I see you after a week and ask you ‘How was your week?’ [You say] ‘Oh, I spent the whole week feeling unworthy.’ But hardly anyone says ‘I spent the whole week feeling angry.’

The anger came at the start of the week (boom, boom, boom). But the guilt can last lifetimes; or at least you can say that for years, this guilt can last. Sometimes we grew up and we can’t find any reason; we can’t find the reason why I feel so guilty or unworthy. Sometimes this condition seems to last for appearance after appearance. Realm after realm, these things can continue. (It’s fine; don’t worry about it.) [Chuckles] So, the ‘starter’ is okay, at times. Anger came, some boom, boom, boom happened, some argument; like that. But then don’t hold onto unworthiness, guilt; these ideas. These are the desserts. These are high calorific, high egoic value. [Chuckles]

So, when talk about doership, then there are many things which can be clarified in this. One thing which is important to clarify is going from no-surrender to half-surrender to full-surrender.

‘No-surrender’ means ‘I am the doer. I, identity, am the doer. And I am the experiencer.’

Then we go to ‘Half-surrender.’ The usual form of half-surrender is ‘I am not the doer, Father. I am not the doer, God/Guruji, but make sure my experiences are good, please.’ So, we’re still holding on to the experiencer mind-set but we want to surrender our doership. That’s what I call surrendering with one eye open ‘I am surrendering to you, Father, but I’m keeping an eye on you, okay? You better make sure things go in the way I want them to otherwise, you know, this deal if off.’ [Laughs] And how many times have we surrendered like this? And how many times the deal has been off? We surrender and then we don’t like the outcome. ‘Father, I am forever at your feet …, but when you say ‘that’ then that really gets to me so I’m really starting to doubt.’ So, this kind of half-surrender (which is very natural in our human existence) many can start like this and then it can develop into a fuller surrender.

Then, sometimes it can be (this is rare but it can also happen for some) that ‘I don’t care about the outcome so much, whatever experience, but just make sure I do only righteous deeds’ …, or even not ‘make sure I do’ but ‘I want to make sure I do only righteous deed but I am not so concerned about the outcome.’ Some get so caught up in the sense of doership that the sense of experiencer-ship is not so strong, but they get caught up in this ‘right or wrong’ wanting to do right, wanting to be a particular way, in terms of what they do.

Then (this is becoming a long treatise on doer-ship) [Chuckles] there are other forms of half- surrender, also. What are they? Some who are attracted to guilt, conditionally attracted to guilt, they will say ‘Father, all the good stuff you are doing. But I was very wrong when I did that.’ So, those who are attracted to the sense of guilt in a conditional way, then it can feel like all the good stuff has been surrendered to the Lord but for all the bad stuff you say ‘No, No. God couldn’t have done that. That, I must still be the doer.’ And this is a very popular form of half-surrender. But ultimately, it is not helpful. Initially, it might feel like you’re being very humble and things like this, but this guilt can be very strong, in the sense that it can get a strong hold on us. So, all the good stuff, all the bad stuff …, both are the doing of Father. Both are the Satguru’s doing.

Then it can be that those who are attracted to pride can be other way. ‘I’ve been very good. I’ve been a good boy. I’ve spoken the truth. I’ve tried my best. I’ve tried to love the Sangha. I’ve tried to be nice to everyone but, you know, you still have to put me in these positions. You still do this to me.’ So, then all the good stuff we can take ownership of. ‘I did the right things but you still made me say ‘Shut up’ to somebody’ or something like that. [Laughs] ‘All the bad stuff is the Divine’s doing but all the good stuff is mine.’ This is another form of half-surrender.

So, there are many variations in our surrender. But more and more, as we come to Satsang, we find that all this sense of doership and sense of experiencer-ship, both are let-go of. And then You taste Your own Being to be the universal light, which means the universal will, the universal doer.

That’s why they say ‘Not a blade of grass moves without the will of God.’ And then you will find that there is nobody here individually who is suffering from anything.

Suffering is actually an individual term. For the universal experience, we never say ‘suffering’ because God is not suffering. God is tasting this world. God is tasting all phenomena but God is not suffering. For suffering to be there, there needs to be a sense of individuality. So, therefore we say that (in terms of: the experience can continue but) the sense of suffering, the sense of resisting, that dissolves.

[Reading from chat]: “Father, I always used to have a very good intuition. I always had some sudden insights about situations, people and so on. I always used to have very good intuition. I always had some sudden insights about some situation, people and so on. Now, this is not working any more. I realize that they come from conditioning or the habit to judge or how I look at the people, most of the time. Means that the mind knows something about the situation or people and seems to wear the mask of the higher self. This brings me in a strange situation.”

This is very beautiful. Because what we mean then (initially, what we mean) is that [paraphrasing] ‘My influences used to be very accurate. I could always predict or suddenly predict something, which I just felt, or thought or sometimes a combination of feeling and thought. It would tell me something which seemed very accurate about this phenomenal world. Now, this is failing. [Smiles] Now this is failing. I realize that they come from a conditioning or a habit to judge.’ Even if they come form like a faculty, which is available to you phenomenally, which is extraordinary …, it is good in a way that it is failing.

Because you’re coming to this beautiful ‘I don’t know.’

For example, in India, there is a popular notion that a true Master knows everything that is going to happen to him in the future, tomorrow, today. He knows everything that is going to happen to everyone.

This is a popular notion. Why? Because they feel like this intuitive Presence, this Satguru’s Presence, must be ‘The All-Knowing’ …, which it is, of course. However, the fact is that I do not know about others. I do not want to make judgments about that. But here, at least, I cannot imagine going to this intuitive Presence with an idea of ‘Father, please tell me what is going to happen to Ananta’s life tomorrow.’ It just feels like it is not meant for that. It just feels like this entity of this Presence is so much …, it is so beyond time and space that to go to it with ‘What is going to happen in particular situations?

How will the business meeting go? How many of my Sangha children will enlightened?’ …, it just seems too trivial to go to this inner Presence with specific requests and things like this. Also, over the years, I found that whatever It wants to convey, It does convey in anyway in the worldly sense (even in the worldly sense). So, there comes so much trust in this Presence that you know that whatever it needs to speak, it will share and whatever it does not need to tell you (for the joy of this play) then it doesn’t.

That is why Guruji [Sri Mooji] can say ’I don’t know anything at all.’ This ‘I don’t know anything at all’ means that ‘Really, cannot bear testimony to any of the concepts. I don’t know if anything is true or not conceptually.’ But there is a deeper Knowing and this intuitive Presence then conveys the insight of this deeper Knowing …., which is not selfish. It is not for grasping things like ‘How can I get this?’ It is not needy. It is spacious. It is not rushed for time.

So, it’s very good in the sense that our inferences, our ‘readings’ even of situations, sometimes it is very good for them to fail, then we can know that we cannot truly really on this. We lose this concept of control. Because our earlier influences were about control; and then when these influences were coming, there is a feeling like ‘There is a cheat code I have in life. I can always tell; what this one’s intention is, what they really thinking about me.’ And when it starts to fail, then this sense of individual control …, you are losing one more clutch, you are losing one more gear. [Chuckles] Then you are just ‘I don’t know anything; what they are thinking, what they want to do. It is all the Satguru’s problem.’ [Smiles] ‘Guru Kripa Kevalam’ takes hold when we let go of this individual control.

Because around this faculty …, (which in the world it could be fine; for people who are still participating in that way in the world it could be fine) but as we come to Satsang we are letting go of all sense of individual control and doership, and especially all sense of specialness and arrogance. And sometimes these things all add to all of that. As we coming to ‘nothing’ as we are seeing that this ego is nothing, this idea of my-self is nothing, then we cannot prop it up with a special factuality. So, this is also Satguru’s grace, actually.