BOOKS BY ANANTA Welcome to Satsang with Ananta

So, we start another week of Satsang and I feel the week is like a retreat; Monday to Friday. And as I was saying on Friday, I feel like mostly by Friday most of you are very light and easy; very ‘God Now.’ [Chuckles] But many times, I have noticed that in the two days of the weekend, again some conceptual burden gets picked up. So, let’s just shake off all the conceptual baggage we might have picked up on the weekend.

And very simply and naturally notice that there is just One Being Here. Just One Being is Here.

You are Aware of this. You are Aware even of this Being; this ocean of Existence; that God is Here Now. You are Aware of it. That there is no ‘me’ here to go ‘oww-oww’…, You are Aware of it.

In front of You is a conveyor belt of thoughts. All the baggage that you ever picked up is available on this conveyor belt. But nothing (I promise you) can force to you to pick it up. So, the thought that comes and says ‘But I have to; I have no option’ is also part of same baggage of thoughts which comes and goes. You are forever unblemished, unattached by whatever we might have picked in the past.

Some fear might come ‘What will I do without my baggage? What will I be? Where will I go?’ But without this baggage, you can board the Guru train and let the Guru run your life. See how it goes without this, even for a few moments.

You are Here Now effortlessly. This Existence, this Presence, has no sense of lack, has no separation, has no doership, unless you pick up a bag from the conveyer belt.

And the best news is that already, Right Now, this Being that is Here, that you call ‘I Am,’ Your own Existence, is the Supreme Being. It needs nothing at all. It is the light of this world. You Are…, and that is why the world Is.

Which bag can you not resist? All these bags are coming. Some look very pretty. ‘I promise you immortal life if you just pick me up. I have the super secret sadhana of the yogis in the Himalayas and you will get to live for ten million years.’ [Chuckles] You want that? ‘If you pick up this bag, you will understand what everyone is thinking.’ One set of thoughts we can’t deal with; [Chuckles] this one I definitely don’t advise. ‘You will be known as most enlightened person in all of humanity if you take up this project; a hundred days of sadhana.’ You want that?

Because to pick up any of these would mean that what You Are already is not enough.

Everything that appears to you is You. And that to which it is appearing is You. There are ‘no two.’ Advaita. Non-duality. Everything that is appearing is You and that to whom it is appearing is You. There is just One. [Silence]

To make a distinction is the doorway to misery and that is also your choice. Nothing will happen to You. [Smiles] The play of misery, we can call it. [Silence]

All has been explained. All is now understood. Where did you come to? You came to Your notionless Existence. [Silence]

Now the mind has just one final trick up its sleeve. [Smiles] But I know that you are beyond that. The trick is ‘Ah! Now that I see that I am that boundless ocean (which Ashtavakra was speaking about) That with no limitation, no boundary, That in which the arcs of the Universe come and go, what does that mean for this coconut body?’ This is the trump card from the mind. But if you let this also come and go, if you have no concern for self-image, if you have no concern about what the world thinks of you, then all of this will also be meaningless.

Give this body complete freedom to experience all the sensations which might naturally appear. You don’t have to control anything. And then give your bigger body (which is this entire universe) also its complete freedom to allow whatever has to be experienced to come up. [Silence]

Okay, let me ask you: You are having this beautiful insight, yes? You are having (all of you, you are having) this beautiful insight: God is Here. [Yet, still thinking]: ‘But there was something wrong; there is glitch in this matrix of the appearance.’ And the one next to you gets the halo. And now everybody sees this. [Points finger to someone and says]: ‘Ha! There is a radiance about you. You must have seen the Truth.’ But actually it belonged to you! [Chuckles] You see? All these phenomenal affects, they went to the one sitting next to you. Everybody is feeling like ‘They became enlightened.’ You will be ok with that? [Chuckles]

And this body is still like… [Slouches and laughs] This is what I mean. Don’t try to fill this ‘what you are experiencing as the ocean’ into this coconut. If it means nothing at all for the appearance of this body, and yet in Your Heart you are clear that you have had this insight about what You Are, would that be enough for you or not? [Looks at the sangha] Yes or no?

You are in this for the Truth; for Truth’s sake. If all the by-products of your pure insight were to be made visible somewhere else with no benefits for you (let’s say with no benefits for this body which you consider to be you) then let it be so. Because every body is your body. [Silence] All are just appearances in the one Consciousness, the one Being.

Now, what I’m going to say, we have to look and answer. Because I know that we already know the right answer. So, not mental answers. We have to look and then we answer.

What do you need to exist, Right Now?  [Silence]

[Someone says]: It’s effortless.

A: Effortless. Yes? Is there something holding up this Existence? [Silence]

[Someone says]: Don’t know.

[Someone says]: Supporting.

A: Supporting, not preventing. This Existence inherently, naturally, do you find that there is a sense of lack in it? Is there a sense of something missing for it? [Silence]

[Someone says]: Nothing is missing.

So, for this original ‘I Am’ this original Existence, there is no such thing as desire, Right Now, in this moment, because nothing is missing. Desire means that ‘Something is lacking in me and I want.’ So, your Existence, Right Now, is empty of desire.

Again, just simply, in Existence Itself, is there any sense of duality or separation? [Silence]

[Someone says]: Only Existence is there.

[Someone says something inaudible]

A: Yes. Is there a separation between that which is trying to see if there is duality and This Existence Itself? [Silence] The perceiver, or the looking, and That which exists…, is there a sense that there are two of them? [Silence]

[Someone says]: Seems to be One.

A: Seems to be One. Now, again, just in this simple Existence Itself, is there a sense that it is doing something or not doing something? [Silence]

The idea of doership also is not inherent in our Existence Itself. So, this ‘3-D’ ego, as I call it (duality, desire, doership) it is naturally not present here.

[Someone says]: After that, what happens?

A: But is this sense ‘After that, what happens?’ natural to Your Existence, Right Now? So, let’s see; after that, what happens? Let’s see. So, that was then; what about Now? Now.

So, if it continues to be like this …, we came to Satsang for what? To come to the end of ego and to come to the discovery of the One Truth or the One Being, One God. Yeah? It’s as simple as that. Now, the question comes, ‘After that, what?’

[Someone says]: To remain in that is difficult.

A: Is it? If, to remain in that was difficult …, if to remain always in that was difficult, then I would have had to pull some of you back to this. When we did the exercise, we started just in the moment, and you Saw it. So, therefore, naturally all of you were in This. So, it must be another false idea that ‘I can leave this’ actually.

The secret is that it is not that to remain in this is difficult…, it is that to leave This is impossible.

Nobody has left it and so it cannot be the truth, because then the truth also would become the changing. The truth is the unchanging.

That’s why, when I ask you ‘Can you stop Being now?’ I don’t have a preliminary practice before that. I don’t say ‘Go ten rounds of surya namaskar then do this ‘Can you stop Being?’ because I know that whatever your state might be, whatever you might believe about yourself, You Are This Being. This Being is Here, effortlessly.

So, it is not really a question of ‘What about after that?’ It is more this question of ‘When will this ‘What about after that?’ stop being attractive.’ [Chuckles] Because there is nothing after that. There is really nothing after this.

And every day we discover the magnificence of this discovery which seems so natural, of sharing how this Being Is That-which-contains-all-things. And these can be beautiful insights that come to you organically. I don’t have to force them down your throat. And don’t get a sense that ‘Okay, this insight I don’t have yet, that all time and space is within Me.’ Don’t make that a precondition to anything. Let that flower on its own. But this much is enough to See, that That which is truly Here Now, this Presence which I taste, does not have any sense of duality, doership or desire. And this is true for any time! That’s why I can just walk into Satsang and say ‘Okay, look, this is true.’ That means it always must be This.

So, it is actually always like this.

You don’t have to do anything to remain in This.

Now, the mind which has no true insight about this will say ‘Is this it?’ But it has no idea what it is saying, because That which has been found is beyond all things.

Mind will say ‘It can’t be as simple as this. But what is the big deal in this? Where are the fireworks in this? Where is my knowledge of all the past and future that I was supposed to get? Where is the immortal body which I was promised?’

That was just the false marketing of spirituality.

[Silence]

I was here in the third standard (or something like this) and my father has always worked in the computer industry. So, what happened is that he said to me ‘We have this computer at home.’ I was very small. He said ‘If you just type out what this book says then you will start to see these cartoons.’ There were some illustration in the book. He said ‘If you just type out these things then these cartoons will come on the screen.’ So, I started typing. I started typing and I saw that the cartoon was not coming, but other things were happening like ‘Hello, world’ and some circle was coming in the screen. [Smiles]

So, that’s what he told me. (And I enjoyed programming, even then. I had always done programming and in college.) The marketing was just that ‘These cartoons will come.’ They never came, but different things started to happen [Chuckles] which I found even more amazing than just some cartoons coming on the screen.

So, whether the promise that attracted you was an immortal body, some super siddhi [spiritual prowess] or whatever the promise might have been, those were the cartoons in the book.

What You are finding is worth lot more than that.

You are finding that, simply and naturally, You Are That which cannot be attacked, cannot be affected. Everything might happen in this world but nothing can happen to You. The coming and going of millions of bodies, yet You remain untouched. This Being which You are discovering for YourSelf, so simply; just in one moment of looking.

[Reading from chat]: She says that she feels that ‘There is something that is scared to die and that becomes a reason for me to go back to my belief in the limited one.’

So, don’t be scared of this fear, firstly. Allow it to come. Is it here now? So, as it comes, just see what it can take from You. Be completely open to it. Even if the body starts shaking; allow. See what happens. In fact, if we can have a welcoming attitude, that’s even more powerful. Say, ‘Come. I’m Here.’ Then you’ll discover that this one is just another one of your children [Chuckles] just wearing a Halloween mask. It is nothing; just another energetic movement in You.

All this can seem strong as long as we believe the limited idea about ourself. Once you See that You are that space in which even this fear comes, You are that space in which the fear of the unknown, the fear of death…, all this will come. And we’ve experienced these things many times. But we are still Here. The Being has remained untouched, unaffected by all this spectrum; the sublime and the horrendous. [Silence] Sometimes anger can come, sometimes fear can come; all different qualities of the emotional spectrum can appear. As you allow YourSelf to remain notionless, you don’t even label what they are, then You See that in the Reality of Your Existence these are just little bursts of microwave popcorn in the microwave. [Chuckles] Nothing will happen to You. Like nothing can happen to the space of the kitchen even if you make a hundred kg of popcorn. Space is just the space. You A re that Space in which this space comes.

And I’m so happy. The other day (and I’ve been saying this in Satsang very often) I found a beautiful quote by Bhagavan [Sri Ramana Maharshi] who said that ‘Even this space comes within the Space of your Being.’ [Silence] An energetic appearance or an object (let’s call all energetic appearances ‘objects’ whether they are perceived through these senses or perceived inwardly as some sensational movement, let’s for a moment call everything an ‘object’) …, can an object affect something which is not an object? So, objects can interact with, can affect, can attack or defend against other objects. But what You are finding out about YourSelf is that You are not an object.

How can this fear-object, fear-perception, actually affect something which is not an object? It’s like saying ‘I’m going to burn a fire in this hall and I’m going to burn the space.’ Can you burn the space?  We can burn the air in the space if we have some very advanced technology. We can pull all the air out of it; we can make it a vacuum. But that vacuum was also in that space. So, that space remains untouched. And You are that Space in which this space is perceived. Your Existence, when you exist first thing in the morning, ‘I wake up’ (‘I Am’ wakes up actually) with ‘I Am’ waking up, all this functioning of time and space happens. Before that, nothing. So, You are that Space in which this space wakes up and this space itself remains unaffected by anything. So, how can That from which this space comes be affected?

I’m just giving you these pointers so that you can check and verify for yourself if all this is true…, not just on the basis of belief, not on the basis of inference, but for you to actually check. Then all these notions of inside, outside, before, after…, they all start to fade away.

Yesterday after Satsang we played this little game. [Chuckles] We said ‘It’s as if this guy … [Pointing to other room] Because Matthew kept saying ‘I am looking for the guy and this happens when I look, and that happens when I look.’ So, I said don’t look for the guy so seriously. Just simply, as if I say ‘There is a guy sitting in the next room and he wants a pizza.’ Maybe the first time you will get it because my voice has some credibility. But after five pizzas, will you not want to go and conclude for yourself that there is a guy?

So, we have been getting this guy pizzas for many years [Chuckles] without really looking to see ‘Who is this one eating all this stuff?’ Then Olga, she played the voice of the mind really well. She said ‘No, no, no, that one is a bit tired, resting. You come later. No, no, no, something will happen to you if you see him. No, please don’t. No.’ Then he is saying ‘Get out of my way. My Master has said there is no guy. I want to go and check for myself.’ [Chuckles]

That is the beautiful part about having a Master is that when the mind is coming with ‘No, no; but, but; no, but this…’ you can say ‘Get out of my way. My Master has said that it is not true what you say.’

Then we walked into the room and saw there is no guy here! Then I said that the mind will have a final trick, which is to say ‘Oh, it’s you. You have always been that guy.’ But you are not a guy (or a girl). [Laughter] You are That which is beyond all things.

That’s why I said that the mind has only one trick: to convince you that God is a person, that That Being which You are aware of is a limited entity.

[Reading from chat]: How to reconcile this with the undeniable samsaric [worldly] presence?

A: That’s what I said; you cannot live this. Now, if you present yourself as one who is living in samsara [play of this world] that is the cause of all trouble. Samsara is living in You. In Your light, automatically it is moving; that includes this body, the words that come out of this mouth, the movement of these hands and feet. Everything is included in Samsara, the play of this world.

If you present yourself as just a part of samsara and then you want to reconcile that one as the free one who now has to reconcile with the rest of the world…, that cannot happen because that is still a position of limitation; the coconut trying to be the ocean saying ‘How do I deal with the rest of this?’ This samsara is coming in Your light. And this light knows what it is doing.

You are completely aware of this Truth …, and you cannot convince the non-existent false one about this.

That which is aware of samsara, That which is aware of the appearance of this world, is not trying to reconcile anything. Only when it takes itself to be something like an object in this world can it try to reconcile something. There are enough objects in this world which are available to tell other objects in this world about how to do many things objectively. But Satsang is not for that.

[Reads from chat]: But Guruji [Sri Mooji] does not deny that he is living in this body. He told me.

A: Did he say he is living only in this body and he doesn’t live in all the other bodies? I would doubt that very much. There is no denying that it is One Being that animates this body but it is the same Being that animates all bodies.

[Reading from chat]: He said Consciousness has to discover Truth in each body.

A: Yes, that is the design of this world. That is the play of this world. In terms of the play of the appearance of this world, this is how it appears. But the One that discovers the Truth does not say or see that it is exclusive to this body …, except maybe as sign of encouragement to you, to that aspect of Consciousness which is still playing as the deluded one.

Guruji also says a million other things. Why you don’t latch onto those? It’s like me saying ‘If I tell hundred times ‘I love you’ you still doubt that, [thinking] ‘Maybe he tells that to everybody.’ But one time I tell you ‘I hate you’ [and you feel] ‘He must really hate me!’

This is the thing. It is the nature of the mind to go with that which confirms our separation, our individuality …, and to be in denial of that which is more apparently true. When Guruji says ‘There is just one Is-ness, One Being, which animates this entire universe’ why we don’t remember that? Because that has no value to the mind. Mind says ‘He said he is living in his body.’ [Chuckles]

[Reads from chat]: Is-ness dissolves all doubts.

A: Yes. ‘Is.’ Just two letters.

‘Is’ captures all of Existence Itself.

‘What Is.’

‘I Exist.’

‘I Am.’

The Self is not really making a distinction. And yet, in the play of this individualization, it seems to use these pretend make-believe distinctions. And You are discovering that You are this One Self. And all these differences are just ideas, just notions, with no reality about them.

[Silence]

Nothing can force Consciousness to be deluded. I was saying the other day that if you say ‘Something is strong’ that also becomes a habit, that ‘The mind is too strong, the emotion is too strong.’ No notion, no matter how strong it might have seemed, has survived this moment. All the conceptual dust is already off You automatically Now. So, the notion of ‘strong’ can apply only to that idea of our limitation.

How can something be strong for That which is the entire Universe, which is the light of this whole Universe? Can something be too strong for That One?

That something is too strong for Your Being would imply that Your Being is a limited entity. So, something is only too strong for any idea you have about yourself. If you have an idea that ‘I am this way’ then life will come and show you that ‘No, you are also that way.’ If you have idea that ‘Life should only be this way’ then life will also come and show you that life has no limitations; it can also be the other way.

So, all our positions are fundamentally just non-sense.

How can That which is everything, which includes both the opposites of everything, have a position which is something?

So, don’t try to apply to this to yourself …, in the sense of don’t try to apply this to the notion that you have about yourself, because then you start trying behave as if ‘This body is the Self and then this body should always be…’ You know? [Smiles] We don’t have to do that. You know what I mean? Sometimes the struggle becomes to try and live it: ‘In the presentation of the body, in the appearance of this body, it must be apparent that this one is free’ or something like that. We don’t need that. The body is just one aspect of your appearance; just the same as any other body.

So, this sense of individual control over this body is a complete fallacy. Its action and movements are as much part of the moment (the apparent movement) of the One Consciousness as any other.

By the way, let go of this entire sense of individual doership or take on the entire thing, where everybody doing everything is Your doing. You see? But don’t draw these notional lines in the One appearance.

This entire appearance is in the Light of the One Being, which is Your Being. I’ve been using this example of that one sheet of paper which you’ve divided into this world as a map, with so many different nations…, the notion of separation, of countries; it’s just notional. If I draw out all these countries on this map, nothing really happened to the sheet of paper. It’s still one. And you color it with shading, and you say ‘I’m from there, I’m this one.’ It is just not true.

You are the entire map and the light in which this map is perceived.

That perceiving is You.

That Awareness of this perceiving is also You.

The map is You.

The perceiver is You.

That which is aware of perception is You.

This world is You.

The space of this world is there is You.

The Being, the Light in this world seems to appear is You.

That which is aware even of your Being is You.

And at that point it even becomes irrelevant to say ‘You or Me or I’. Because there is only One. All distinctions fade away.

You are Seeing this. You are aware of this. Only this, You are Aware of.

But you have in your employment also one labeler. The labeler comes and says ‘This is good, this is bad, this I want, this I don’t want. This is me, this is other.’ It is the labeler of distinctions where actually there are none.

The appearance of distinct qualities does not prove that there are different Beings. The appearance of distinct qualities does not prove there are two Beings or that there are two Selfs. It is as absurd as saying that because there is an appearance of five fingers there must be five of me! [Chuckling] All appearing differently [Counting his fingers] but because they appear differently, why you don’t say there are five of me because five fingers are appearing? In the same way. Just because all of these qualities are appearing in Your own space of Being doesn’t lead to any actual separation. It’s just a qualitative appearance of aspects of Your own Being.

You cannot see this personally. If you keep the body mask on and say ‘I am constrained by this and now how can I experience this?’ Some are trying to do that, like ‘I want to experience this’ [Hugging his body] and in that [thought] ‘I want to experience this’ we are already taking up the paradigm of being the body.

Without the ‘I want’ …, what are you?  Without making a reference point for YourSelf, making a limitation or constriction about YourSelf, what are You Now?

What is inside or outside You?

This is not natural to us. It took a long time actually to learn this. To pose as if ‘I am this body’ took a lot of conditioning from our parents and from this mind and from all the other mouths.

I am naturally everything and I continue to be everything.

My death is the death of everything.

My sleep is when everything goes to sleep.

My waking is the waking up of everything.

My dance is the dance of everything.

But even when everything is awake or asleep, I remain as the witness of all things; unchanged, untouched.

No effort is needed.

Nothing has to be believed.

[Silence]

Nothing has to be dropped also.

All is naturally gone.

The false has not survived the moment.

[Silence]

You are actually way beyond even the most glorious belief you can have about YourSelf.

The mind cannot fathom Your glory.

The mind cannot fathom You.

The mind is just a peddler of position, of limitation. ‘No, no, no, but this; because this feeling is there, I must still be…’ How long will we rely on this circumstantial evidence, another appearance, to define who we are?

There is nobody Here but God.

It is not ‘God and me’.

It’s just God.

I don’t have to find MySelf.

I Am MySelf.

I cannot find the false one.

What a charade this has been.

We cannot find the one that wants to find the Self.

[Smiles]

To the one that wants to find the Self, I would give you the Self, if only I could find you.

In the deep sleep state, how many problems did you have? Let’s presume that everybody slept last night; at least for a bit, even if it was 5 minutes. In that sleep, all the problems are gone. In fact, everything was gone. Everything was gone. You might even feel that ‘Even I was gone.’ But You, the Ultimate You, the Absolute You, the Unchanging, must have been there to even See that everything was gone. So, although everything was gone, there was something (which is not a ‘thing’) which still remained. That is your original Self, the uncontaminated ‘I’. Your Reality; it is unchanging. And that is very important to see, that it is unchanging. That means that even when the waking state came, You, that unchanging Self, remained the same. Otherwise, you would not call it the unchanging, you would call it the changing. That Awareness that knew that everything is gone, now is aware that something is here. What is that something? What wakes up? ‘I wake up.’ But what does it mean? You were there to see the contrast between sleep and waking state. And yet, something wakes up.

This is what we call Your dynamic aspect. So, ‘I’ now playing as ‘I Am.’ The sense ‘I Am’ (the ‘Am-ness’) wakes up. So, when it is just ‘I’…, no-thing, no trouble. Now, when you wake up, there is this sense ‘I Am.’ What trouble is there? That very instant, before the first thought has come, there is no trouble. Then what starts to happen? This play of appearances starts to dance. There’s a room, there could be other people, the sensations of the body, the visual perceptions, emotion, sensation; all of this. Still no trouble, actually. The trouble-maker is just getting started. [Chuckles] The trouble-maker is just going to get started. This trouble-maker all of us know is the mind. What does it actually do? It starts by making distinctions. It starts with appearances; everything is appearing. But in the appearances, it starts to say ‘There is a you, there is a me, and there is outside of me.’ The appearance itself is not forcing any distinction like this. It is not creating a concept of ‘me.’ These appearances are just appearing. This body is as much the appearance as every other appearance. The appearances are being perceived and yet, this distinction, this duality, this separation has not yet come about.

So, when Bhagavan [Sri Ramana Maharshi] says ‘The trouble is ‘I am something’…, that I seem to be individualized or limited as something, that is the source of trouble.’ What does that mean? If there was no distinction being made between anything at all, can you show me a problem without a distinction? There has to be a ‘me’ and ‘another.’ There has to be a ‘me’ to suffer.

Sometimes we leave these terms too broad; like ‘suffering.’ We leave it to broadly and then it feels like a very generic, abstract concept. So, if we keep the sensation of pain aside, what do we actually mean by suffering? Have we contemplated this? Look back at the times when you had suffered (seemingly). Can you point out what is there? What happened?

I can start you off. An appearance did something that you had some concepts about and you felt like this is not the way it should have been; or to put it simply, somebody did something you didn’t like. So, then there is resentment, there is a grievance. But for all this to happen, this resentment to come, this grievance to come, there must have been a ‘me’ and there must have been ‘another.’ If we did not make that distinction, then how could you have a grievance, how could you resent?

And notice that I’m not talking about a sensational quality called anger. That can arise on its own. But like everything that arises, it can also pass. But you cannot make resentment out of anger or a grievance out of anger unless you make a ‘me’ or you make the pretense of a ‘me.’

What are the other ways of suffering? Come on; we’re experts at this. [Chuckles] That’s why we’re here. Why else?

[Sangha says]: Guilt, specialness, resisting.

A: Resisting anything; emotions. If you look at all these, what do you find at the center of them?

[Someone says]: Identity.

A: Identity. But do you find this identity tangibly; in the sense of do you find somebody that’s actually there? Do you find the ‘me’ actually that is entitled to hold a grievance? Did you find the self-righteous one? Did you find the special one, the guilty one? [Looks] You don’t find?

It’s like if you were pretending to be King Arthur or something. Suppose you woke up this morning and said ‘It would be a good idea to pretend to be King Arthur’ and you believed a lot of things about the knights of the round table and Guinevere and all of this story, like ‘I’m the King of England.’ [Laughs] And somebody says ‘But look…, are you really?’ We admit that this capacity to pretend is there. All of us can pretend that we are that. It might seem unbelievable initially but if you really practice, you can pick up the pretense of any character.

So, what is being reveled to you in Satsang is the pretense of that which you have believed to be your character; that which has a name (which is your name) that which has a body, form (which is supposedly your body). But this one is as much a pretense as if you were to pretend to be King Arthur right now. And those who are open to this discovery, then it is very simple to verify. It is not the verification of this which is tough, it is the fear of losing this identity, that ‘What will I become if I lose this?’ …, the fear of dissolution of this identity which can seem to be more resistive; a stronger resistance. Like, Right Now, if you check, you cannot find the one that wants anything at all. You cannot even find the one that wanted to come to Satsang; the one that wants freedom. Look at the body; does this one want to get freedom? This one didn’t. Then, who did?

[Someone says]: Just a notion.

A: Just a notion. It’s just a notion. King Arthur. The blue cat. The sheep. All these examples and metaphors that we use are just to show you that that which you consider yourself to be, which you had considered yourself to be, is not Your Truth.

As we drop all distinctions, the movement of appearences does not stop.

There is a supreme intelligence which is beating your heart, making your breath, function.

Is the light which gives power to all of these phenomenal forces; the phenomenal forces of gravity, light, sound, they continue. This light belongs to this supreme intelligence. This Being is experiencing itself in all of these manifest appearances.

When we allow the movement of this body and of all bodies, this life can be swaying in the breeze, without interpretation or judgment.

This is your notion-less existence, independent of any position that you could take, empty of doer ship and non-doer ship, empty of attachment or aversion.

Here there is no ‘me’ or ‘mine,’ no other, no past no future.

And all of this is naturally present in this moment.

What is True is Here.

God is Here.

Pretending that God is just this body is just like the ocean pretending that it has filled itself in a coconut.

You are That in which all things come.

You are not dependent on anything.

You don’t have to figure this out. [Self] Don’t have to solve it like an equation. You will not come to the Truth of Your Reality by solving a² + b². What is it? [Sangha replies with mathematical equation. Laughter] Because those of us who are a little intellectually inclined, they might feel like ‘If I can put something tangible and something intangible together that will lead me to the Supreme Absolute, Brahman (something like that). This is not it. It is much simpler than that. If you were to not go with any concept about yourself, if you were not to label any experience for just a moment, what are You, Here and Now? No answer is needed. Just the looking.

Where is the one that has that name?

When you say ‘I’ find the One that this ‘I’ represents, are you representing just one set of perceptions? [Looks around]

Who is the ‘I’ representing?

[Silence]

Let me invite you to a truer representation. [Smiles] But all of you have to follow along like children. If you think too much like ‘What this, why this, when this, how this?’ …, nothing is going to happen. [Chuckles] So far, you have included just one set of perceptions; this body as ‘I’.

Now, become little more inclusive. Every body that you see, include that in ‘I’. There is only one label that we are using for all things now, for all bodies now; this ‘I’. Now include all other objects that you perceive also in the same ‘I’. Every object, every body, everything that you perceive, include it in ‘I’.

Now, include also the space in which these objects are appearing. This space is also just perceived by You. So, include this one also in ‘I’. That very Existence now; that very Existence ‘I Am’ which includes this space and all the objects within it, include that in ‘I’. Within this ‘I’ don’t make any distinctions; no interpretations, no judgments.

Now, this is very beautiful step. Notice that something is aware of all of this, including Existence. This Awareness is empty of all qualities, is empty of all concepts of space and time.

Include this one as ‘I’.

[Silence].

And remain like this; notion less, allowing all things to come and go.

God has been sitting in your house all this time. But this non-existent ‘me’ has been knocking at your door. And all that you’ve been doing is ‘Yes? What do you want? Ah, you want this lunch? Okay.’ [Pretends to Run] Ran to the kitchen. ‘What do you want next? Ah, best relationship?’ [Pretends to Run] You see?

All this while you are denying Your Reality.

So, what is actually Here Now?

I remember one time somebody had come from Tiru just for a day. And she told me that ‘Ananta, you are saying that you don’t find the person so don’t believe that person. But also, I don’t find God.’ She said it like that to me. And I just asked her (which the question you all have heard so many times) ‘Okay, I’ll show you God. Can you stop being? This Being that cannot be stopped is God.’

And because maybe she was just fresh. She had never heard this. She was not yet jaded. She was not yet like ‘Oh, I have tried that before.’ She was just so new and the mind had not built up enough defenses against this question. She just Saw. She just Saw that This is God. This is undeniable. I Am.

The same ‘I Am’ Nisargadatta [Maharaj] was forever at the feet of. This same ‘I Am’ is Your very Presence. It is the same ‘I Am’ which Moses found, Jesus found, Ram found, Krishna found; the same ‘I Am’. It’s God. God is Here Now.

We are too busy answering the doorbell of the mind. ‘Ding-dong. But what about this? But what about that?’ But from Your direct experience, You are finding this Holy Presence, this Divine Presence, Your own Presence, the Presence of the Self, the Timeless One.

So, it is not that both sides of this equation are like that. ‘Oh, I don’t find the person. But also, you ask me to believe I am God.’ I am not asking you to believe in God. I am asking you to check who You are. What Is. What is this Is-ness?

What does it mean: Is?

What is it to exist?

What exists? What Is?

What has been constant, even in this life?

One baby was born; then there was a teenager then there was a grown-up. Now this is here, this one that is sitting in Satsang. What has remained the constant?

[Silence]

And you ask the spiritual seeker what do they want? They want some sense of stability, some constant peace. But what has been constant? There is longing for constancy but all our experiences have constantly been changing. So, can we get some stability in that which is constantly changing? We must be able to find that which is the unchanging.

[Silence]

Every person you have met is changing every day. Even if they were not changing, you are changing every day. So, from a relationship you cannot get that constancy. There must be something which is unchanging; untouched by all of this change. Find that.

Which way do you have to look to find that? [Looks Around] Have your senses ever brought you something which was unchanging? No. The entire realm is the realm of change.

So, what if you look in the opposite direction? Who is aware of all of this perception? Is that changing or unchanging? Unchanging.

Is there anything else you found which was unchanging?

This direction [Gestures Outward] is bouncing, bouncing, bouncing. This side of ‘I Am’ [Gestures Outward] is constantly changing. [Moves hand Chaotically]

What about this side? [Gestures Inside] Before ‘I Am’.

Who is aware of even ‘I Am’?

Are we meeting another realm of change?

Are we meeting something outside of yourself?

Is there a ‘me’ sitting there, an individual?

[Silence]

What is the Essence of Your Being?

I love what Bhagavan [Sri Ramana Maharshi] said ‘True knowledge is just the dropping of that which is false.’ You have a condition which you believe about yourself which is that ‘I am a limited entity.’ You have no evidence for this actually. You have stretched out some sensations and used that as evidence of your limitation. It is clear to You, Right Now, that every sensation is experienced and perceived only within YourSelf. And in the stream of sensations, You picked out some of those and said ‘That is me.’ It makes no sense. [Chuckles] That is why it is divine hypnosis.

Who has done all this? Consciousness.

To whom? Consciousness.

And who is playing this game of Satsang? Consciousness.

Why? Consciousness. [Chuckles]

Over and over again, for thousands of years, the Sages have said that ‘You are the One beyond birth and death. You are the One with no limitation.’ Whether the Sages have come from any spiritual culture, any background, they have always come to the same conclusion of Your limitlessness.

Is there a ‘me’ sitting at the center of this life?

Is there a ‘me’ with some limitation, with some boundary, that is contained in some sensations, that is here but not there?

Who are You?

What are You?

Where are You?

[Silence]

And if you are actually just the body, why would you come to Satsang?

So, something already knows that ‘I am not the body; I am beyond this.’ We have experienced the limits of this instrument. Something is already nagging you, saying ‘But these cannot be the limits to me; I cannot be the one that dies along with this body’ (which is running, by the way, at the speed of light towards its demise. Soon it will be gone).

Is there something going to be left of you?

Find that now. Recognize that now.

To what is the body just another set of sensations?

Which one is that One?

Who perceives this body?

The pain and the pleasure, the aging of it; who perceives all of this?

And if you don’t know, that is very good.  At least don’t presume. Stay with the ‘don’t know.’ But don’t make-up this make-believe ‘me’ who has all these made-up attributes which have kept changing throughout this life…, sometimes very honest, sometimes very naughty, sometimes very righteous, sometimes very lazy; constantly changing. One day it wants money, one day it wants relationship, one day it wants health, one day it wants freedom. Who is this one? And how long will we continue to cater to this one without really putting this one in the witness box and asking ‘But who are you?’

If you find this limited one sitting there (the ‘me’) then by all means cater to it. But how long will we continue to serve a superstition?

So, this ‘me’ is nothing but a prevalent superstition which is so prevalent everywhere. [Chuckles] Nobody has seen it. It’s more prevalent than Santa Claus. (Okay, of course, Santa Claus is real.) [Laughter, due to children in the room] But this superstition of the ‘me’ nobody has seen, yet everybody has a story about it.

There are two main temperaments that come to Satsang.

One is attracted to inquiry. For those you can say, find out if this ‘me’ that you consider to be the center of your existence, find out whether there is such a one. Find out who you are (inquire- ‘Who am I’?)

There are some to whom this kind of inquiry seems too alien, too difficult. You might seem like you are more of a devotee temperament, devotional temperament. To those, I want to tell you without any doubt, everything, everything, everything is the Satguru’s Grace. Nothing, not even a blade of grass moves without the will of this Divine Existence, this Divine Consciousness.

[Silence]

What is your next move? God Now? Or ‘but, but, but, mee-oww’?

[Smiles]

Sheep or lion? Or sheep trying to be a lion?

The ‘me’ is only denial of ‘What Is’ …, denial of the ‘Is-ness.’

The One at the center of this life experience, we have believed that One to be something individual. We have believed there is a ‘me’ there. But actually, as we are exploring, we are finding there is no such ‘me’. At the center of this life experience, we are finding the same One, which is in all aspects of life; One Consciousness, One Being.

This is the primary confusion. Because even for freedom, we feel this ‘me’ has to get this special quality called freedom. And this ‘me’ has to become the special enlightened Being. But that is never going to happen. So, this is basically what it is. There is only God at the center of this life and in all aspects of this life.

This One Being.

[Silence]

And suffering only is a part of the design which is meant to show up when the notion of some separation, the notion of some individuality, is picked up…, by the same Consciousness Itself, same God Itself. That’s why one of my favorite things to say these days is ‘Either God Now or me -ow.’ It’s very simple; and yet this is what life is. Your Presence, Your Existence Itself is God. Everything in this existence is made up of that One Being, One Consciousness, One God.

[Silence]

To see this, all you have to do is meet YourSelf. But meet YourSelf empty of any preconditions, empty of any notions about YourSelf (even the condition of meeting). Nobody has gone looking, saying ‘I’m going to meet myself ‘ and actually found an entity called a person. Nobody has found it. And yet Your own Existence is undeniable.

So, what must You be then?  What are You Now? No conditions or pre-judgments.

What are you finding yourself to be?

Do you find the one that wants freedom, that wants anything at all?  Produce that one. Not as a mere concept but even as a phenomenal entity, is there such a one? So, then if you want something, you must be a mere concept? Because the phenomenal entity doesn’t want anything at all. Even the phenomenal entity doesn’t want anything at all. This phenomenal body is not asking for freedom. Then who is?

So, even before we can take the first step towards freedom, let’s explore where we already Are. Because to take the first step towards freedom we have to presume bondage. Is it true or not?

So, where are you now?  And what are you now?

I read a story on the weekend. There was one lion cub that was born but somehow for some reason it was born with sheep. (Have you heard this story?) It was born with sheep. Then the sheep taught it to say ‘baa, baa.’ [Chuckles] This is what the lion learned and growing up it learned not to roar but to keep saying ‘baa, baa.’ And it felt that ‘Something is not natural with my life.’ The story of all spiritual seekers. We feel something is not natural with this life. It just kept saying ‘baa, baa’ and kept eating grass. It felt like ‘There’s something missing from my life.’ So, one day he meets this strange looking creature; this was a lion. He had never seen his own reflection, he felt he was another sheep. He met this strange looking creature and felt ‘What is this?’ And this lion comes and says, ‘Why are you doing ‘baa, baa’? You’re a lion, like me. Why aren’t you roaring?’ … ‘Me? A lion? No, this is not true, I’m a sheep like them.’ The lion says, ‘Come, I have a special place to show you.’ So, then this lion takes the other one to the stream and in the stream this one who believed himself to be a sheep sees his own reflection and sees that it is a lion. And for the first time in his entire life, he lets out a roar.

So, this story really hit me because it’s just like Satsang. You have considered yourself to be something smaller than what You are. You are the Light if this Universe. And the point of coming to Satsang is to at least trust me that much that you check on this. You see? I’m not saying ‘Take my word for it, you’re a lion.’ But at least come with me to the stream.

[Silence]

And don’t be so quick to say ‘But my sheep thoughts are too much. But my sheep emotion is really getting to me.’ Let that come and go. You come with me as I show you this mirror of Self-inquiry, as I point You to Your Reality which is unmissable.

From this unchanging Awareness arises this beautiful light of Presence, light of Existence. And yet, even in the arising of this aspect, nothing is diminished in the Absolute. All this remains as a part of It.

This beautiful light of Presence, Existence, ‘I Am,’ is the only light there is. Everything else, every other light, is just a reflection of this.

In the light of Your Existence, all this play of time and space happen. Both directions are by the direction of the same light, whether we call it God, Self, Guru…, it doesn’t matter.

So, if everything is moving by the direction of this One Consciousness, then all that we have to do is admit that everything is the Grace of Consciousness Itself. That is the end of all ‘Why’s.’ Guru Kripa Kevalam. That is the only light in this universe; Your own Atma, Your own Presence.

Everything is directed by this Consciousness, One Light. And everything is the Grace of That. The outer form of the Guru is just an outer representation of this light. The True light is Your own Being…, uncontaminated by the notion of limitation.

That is why before Satsang I was sharing with someone that suffering is only that to which we have not yet accepted that it is the Kripa of the Guru, that it is the Grace of the Master. That which we have not yet accepted. You will soon accept that everything, everything that is happening in this play of light and sound and time and space, is the Grace of the Satguru, the Holy Presence.

Until that happens, it is the same Holy Presence which is enjoying the taste of this game of suffering. And suffering has a ‘me’ at the center of it. It is not possible to suffer without a ‘me’ at the center of it. ‘Me’ has to be there for the ‘ow’ to be there. But this ‘me’ is not real.

From time to time I have been sharing these clues; these clues for your Self-recognition. In fact, maybe better to call it: The clues that help us drop belief in these false ideas about OurSelf. The Self-recognition is just apparent. It is only that these wrong ideas that we believe about ourselves will seem to be dropped as we come to Satsang.

That is why when Bhagavan [Sri Ramana Maharshi] said ‘True Knowledge is merely the dropping of that which is false’ to me it sounded like the best news. It’s like ‘I am holding onto some garbage which just has to be thrown away (not picked up) but the Truth is already there.’ Then the whole struggle part of it (that ‘I have to get to it. What should I do to get it? How should I stay? Is this better for me? Or that better for me?’) all that goes away.

I was sharing the other day that if what you have found has an opposite, then it is not the Truth. If the Truth that you have found has an opposite which is the false then the Truth that you have found (or what you claim to have found) is just a concept.

If the Truth you have found is a state (like a certain state and that is ‘it’) and it is the denial of the opposite state, then it is not the Truth.

If it is a position; any reference that ‘You have to be only a certain way and that is the Truth’ then that is not the Truth.

If the Truth that you have found has any of these ‘…tions’: [Chuckles] location, duration, or any notion, then it is not the Truth.

If you feel like you have found the Truth in this location [Pointing to the body] that it is not the Truth.

If you feel that the Truth has some duration, that ‘It’s now found’ (like it started now) then it’s not the Truth. Your Truth has always been.

If you feel like (I get reports that) ‘When I have a particular state then that was my True state’ then that is in denial of other states which are appearing. That is not freedom. Freedom, by very definition, means that there is full freedom to experience whatever is in experience. There is no opposition to this freedom. All oppositions (opposing each other) are being witnessed by That which IS free.

Is this easy or difficult? It is neither. Although conversationally sometimes we have to say ‘It’s really very simple’ …, at the same time we might also say ‘It is not for everyone’ because actually none of these positions apply to You. And more and more, you will become more comfortable with this referring to yourselves location-les-sly, duration-less-ly. I also call this openness.

Where are you placing yourself Right Now? Know that You are not contained in that. You might contain that but it does not contain You.

This body is nothing but a painting You have made for YourSelf. But You also painted the rest of the world. Where is the painter located in the painting? Now, there could be a character the painter created in his or her likeness (‘Oh, that’s me in the painting’) and wanting to experience that particular character in lot more detail, with a lot more intimacy. But does that change the Reality of what You are?

And the notion of this ‘me’ rests on these things: on your location, on your concepts of past and future. That is why this ‘me’ is so tiring. If I say to you ‘Don’t expend any energy whatsoever on anything at all’ mostly you will say ‘But it is a habit. These thoughts, they come. And I do expend my energy to believe them, to look at them.’

I want to tell you that you will become very comfortable with this. I know that, without a reference point, for some of you some fear can come. It can feel like you lost all ground to stand on. Because what I am really saying is that there is no up, there is no down, left or right, front or back. All of this is in the painting.

Where is That which witnesses this?

Where is the witness of all that is manifest?

And don’t go to any knowledge, any mental knowledge for this. All you have to do is to check Right Now:

Where is the One that is hearing these words?

Where is the One who is perceiving all these appearances?

Who is That?

Who can tell me a story about this One?

What is the story of this One? [Smiles]

The One that is witnessing all of this, does that One want freedom?

Does the concept of ‘want’ apply to it?

Is it a state?

Is it a thing?

Are You a thing?

Are You even no-thing? [Smiles]

Neither thing nor no-thing You are.

How do you deal with this; the fact that you’re neither a thing nor no-thing? You cannot deal with this mentally. There must be already this deep insight that ‘I am not an object, nor am I essence-less.’

How many can deal with this fact that no notion actually applies to you, even the notions in Satsang? [Smiles] Nobody? Can’t deal with it? [Smiles] Very Advaita, what I’m saying, but ‘dealing’ would also be a notion. [Smiles]

Okay, how many are open to this, that ‘No notion could apply to me.’ Without applying any notion to yourself, trouble yourself and show me. Give yourself some notionless trouble without any past or future, without any location or duration, without any reference.

Then all of Satsang is one big ‘Forget about it.’ [Smiles] One big, ‘forget about it’. What are you going to do about this freedom thing? ‘Ninety percent there. Ninety nine percent, just one more steps to become free.’ And I come and say, ‘Forget about it. [You say]: ‘Ah, but I have invested so much. So many years of my life and I feel like I am at edge’. How many come to Satsang and say, ‘I am at the edge of the cliff, I am at the edge of the cliff. Please push me off, push me off.’? So many have (not so many recently; in the past many) said ‘Just push me off’. Okay, in this moment, ‘the me’ is pushed off. [Smiles] You are still here. Is there a ‘me’ quotes in you now?

That which has been true is always true. That which has been false has never been.

There are lots of ‘me’s trying to get rid of the ‘me.’ [Smiles] Bhagavan [Sri Ramana Maharshi] says, ‘The thief pretending to be the police men, wanting to catch the thief.’ If it was not true that you are free Right Now in this very moment, concept-less-ly, do you feel like I would be such a big liar to say this to you every day? [Chuckles] And I know that your doubt can take many flavors. Some can say, ‘Okay, but he is just talking about his state. He must have forgotten and what it is like to be.’ [Smiles] Some can say, ‘He is just being nice.’ One also said, ‘Father, actually you have given up on us, so now you just want us to feel good by saying no, no, this is all there is.’ [Smiles] What happens when you check on ‘What is’ …, when you check on this ‘Is-ness?

If you go on expecting to find an ant, when we check in, this ant is big. There are no boundaries. Then you feel like, ‘Oh, this is not an ant, it is an elephant.’ Not even elephant, beyond all concepts of space. This is your taste of Yourself Right Now. This is your taste of Yourself. That everything is contained within You. All is being experienced within Yourself.

So, this ‘I Am’ is already All There Is. And You are That ‘I’ from which even this ‘I Am’ arises; This Consciousness, Your manifest aspect. And this manifest aspect contains all manifestation.

Everything you say after ‘I Am’ is a lie.
‘I am not getting this’ is a lie.
‘I am getting this’ is a lie.
‘I am agreeing with you’ …, that is definitely a lie. [Smiles]
‘I am not in agreement’.

All lies. Why ‘lies’? Because the minute you attach something to this Consciousness, you pick up the pose, the mask of limitation.

This is a very important point he is bringing out. He is saying that ‘That which I am able to check and See it is not true; and yet something feels so strange to me just to report that that is not true.’

So, I jokingly called it ‘That is in the top ten hits.’ [Smiles] These are our favorite ideas which, in spite of our truest insight (with full integrity we’re having this insight that ‘It is not actually contained in that, it is not touching the Reality of what I Am’) yet they can feel like there has been so much allegiance to a particular idea that it can feel like ‘Can this actually be true?’

All of us have a few favorites like that. All of us have some favorites like that. And these are very important to bring into your own light. They are very important to bring in to your light.

And trust your insight more than anything else.

Even the master’s words are just to enable these insights.

The point, the question is: ‘Where do I place this I?’ Isn’t it?

‘Where do I place this I?’

We have relied on ideas, we have relied on inferences.

Now, rely on your insight.

All these ‘I’s.

‘Where do I place this I?

Do I just go with the idea of who I am?

Do I go with the intellectual inference about who I am?

Can I stay with my direct insight and direct experience?’

That is why I keep asking these days: ‘Who does the I represent?’

Is it representing a thought?

Is it representing a sensation or a group of sensations?

Is it some weird mixture of thoughts and sensations?

[Silence]

Then you find that everything that is about location and time is not applicable to You.

That is why many of you will become so in ineloquent. Because all the terms we have used to refer to OurSelf have been about time and space.