BOOKS BY ANANTA Welcome to Satsang with Ananta

Got it? Instant, no? Didn’t get it? Such a small box, such a small box: ‘Got it’ then ‘Didn’t get it.’ But where is the seeker roaming? The seeker just roams in this tiny box. One day like this, one day like that. Where are You? [Silence] If you keep identifying with this one, then like I was saying to him: ‘How was mid-week break?’ He said ‘A bit of a roller-coaster.’ But can you actually get on the roller-coaster? Can you actually get on? But if you identify, then you’re on. To identify… What is identity? In language also (funnily) there are lots of clues. Identity is like a separate entity, you know? Id-entity. So, if you separate, if you discriminate, if you make distinctions, then it can feel like you separated yourself from yourself and you then get onto this roller-coaster. And what is the spiritual roller-coaster? What are the boundaries of it? Just this: ‘Got it; didn’t get it. Got it; didn’t get it.’  That’s all. And the minute you indentify with that aspect, it can seem like that’s it. To ‘get it’ is my nirvana; to ‘not get it’ is hell. But You are not that. [Silence] I want to break you out of this groove, to push you beyond these boundaries.

So, all these positions are the ‘sicknesses’ the Master was talking about. [Ananta was reading aloud] ‘This way or that way.’ What’s outside this box? Are you inside or outside? It’s a trick question. It’s a trick question, because I said ‘Break out of all these framing of opposites’ yet I said ‘inside and outside.’ And you buy in to that framing, in a way. There is no meaning to inside and outside. There is no meaning in ‘Got it’ and ‘Didn’t get it’. But neither is it meaningless.

How to cure you from this ‘sickness’? What is the cure? The cure is just to be empty of conclusions, including this one. Allow this silly one to make these claims for now; you don’t bother with them. Allow this deluded one to make these claims for now; you don’t bother with them. The Sage spoke about something very beautiful which is pertinent also, because we can come into this sort of mental not-knowing. We said ‘To know even one thing is to know too much’ we can get too much into the ‘knowing’ of ‘I don’t know.’ Like ‘All I know is I don’t know.’ Like that. ‘But I don’t know.’ This kind of thing. So, this is also to know too much. Even ‘I don’t know’ is to know too much.

Here you are not lost. That is just an idea. The belief in the identity, even the seeker identity, is when you are lost. If the objective of the mind, in a way, is to make you lost, then when it comes and says ‘But I’m lost’ … if you were really lost then would it come complaining that ‘I’m lost?’ Because it’s fulfilling its objective. It would feel very comfortable, confident, and opinionated. [Smiles] Get it? [Chuckling] In its complaint: ‘I’m lost’ then how come it’s not celebrating? I’m asking you not to mind when you feel lost … because it is a misinterpreted feeling.

S: Just don’t believe what it is saying?

A: Yes, that is what it means ‘Don’t mind.’ Not to mind is the same thing. Stop grasping towards getting it. If it can be gotten, that is not it … and yet, if you haven’t got it, it’s not it. These are our boxes. I’m just exposing them at the risk of confounding you or confusing you, in a way. But I’m just exposing our intellectual boxes.

In an instant, the mind can make a move. (‘Swoosh’) ‘Ah, the ‘me’ is back. I’m back.’ [Chuckles] ‘But …’  [Silence] Notice your doubts. I notice they will follow a pattern like this maybe, like ‘Satsang is great, but…’ [Chuckles] ‘Yes, Right Now I am free, but…’

Nothing meaningful has ever come out after that ‘but…’ no matter how much you believe it. Nothing meaningful has ever been spoken after that. ‘Yes, yes, Right Now, no person, but…’ And we feel like something as relevant as what we said before the ‘but…’ is coming after it. It is just story. And the ridiculousness of the story is apparent to you because you could say this every Right Now. ‘Right Now, there is no person.’ It’s just like saying (if you were to expand on what we usually buy into, is) ‘Right Now, there is no person. But … what about that non-existent one in my projections? What to do with that?’ Because in every Right Now, you could say this.

Even in our manifest existence, there is never the experience of this person. So then, what are we asking? We’re coming to the doctor and saying ‘I have no illness right now, but in my mind, there is a possibility that there could be some cancer or something. What can I do to treat that or what can you do to treat that?’ The doctor says ‘But there’s no illness.’ [Chuckles]

And then you might say ‘Take away this power of projecting.’ … ‘But if it was taken away, how would we meet in this way?’ Like she made a request that day (I’m paraphrasing what she said) like ‘You take care of it. Done. I don’t want to have these projections anymore.’ Then, what is all this? This is also projection. [Chuckles] That is taking the content of the projection itself as the reality and then saying ‘Within the projection, the projection should not be there anymore; within the projection, within the dream, the dream should stop.’

That’s why I’ve been pushing you out of this paradigm that you are here in this way anyway, that any of this is tangible anyway. Because all of this movement only happens once we first give some reality to this.

It’s just a thought, just a thought. In that, we can go as far as to say that everything which comes and goes is just a thought. Everything that comes and goes is just a thought; broadening the definition of thought using the broader definition of mind. But it couldn’t hurt. Once you see that all these interpretations are just thoughts, you will also see that what we take to be the so-called ‘phenomenal reality’ is also just a thought.

So, this is the pretense which I want to break you out of; giving too much credence to this phenomenal appearance … and the request within the phenomenal appearance being ‘Rid me of this’. Like the dream-character within the dream should be freed from the delusion. But that one itself is the delusion; that itself is the delusion.

A: This is like a quick expression of that roller coaster: ‘Got it’ and ‘Didn’t get it’. ‘I’m getting it, getting it, getting it’ and the Master comes and … [Gestures a sudden fall] ‘How dare he!?’ [Chuckles]

Q: It makes the seeking very visible.

A: The seeking? Yeah. Because what is our ailment right now? The number one ailment for all of us is the seeker identity. [Silence] But our ploys will not work. Our tactics will not work. So, if you say ‘I see that if my number one identity is the seeker identity so, actually, if I stop seeking, that is when I will get it.’ That is still the seeker. We can’t just say stop seeking or keep seeking, because that is also advice for you as to how to get it.

If we have a ploy like that which says ‘Yeah, I see that my seeker doesn’t actually find, so if I stop playing the seeker, then I will find. But that is still the seeker, still trying to find. Like ‘I can either get it by getting it or I can get it by giving up’ are both the same thing; The ploy of ‘Getting it’ is still in that roller coaster, is still in that box.

It’s the same way that we talk about the dissolution of the ego. Our ploys don’t work. If it was as simple as these ploys then it could just work. Our ploys are like ‘I can transcend the ego by killing it or by destroying it or I can be rid of the ego by loving it’. But the wanting to be rid of something is not really loving it. [Chuckles] Then it is just a ploy. It is just a pose.

So, the Truth is not to be found in these boxes. Our greatest tactics mean nothing.

What are you then left with? If your experiences and perceptions, if your perceptual experiences mean nothing, if your conceptual things, either position, mean nothing, are you now fully empty?

Where are you Now?

Where are you Now?

The simple way is to say it is that whatever you can consider yourself to be, you cannot be. Whatever you consider yourself to be, you cannot be. Because even that will be stuck in the highest or the lowest. [Chuckles] It’s a very tiny box for You, in Reality. What is the highest you can consider yourself to be? You know, come on… [Laughs]

S: Everything.

A: Everything, good, or the Absolute or the Self, or Awareness, something. What is the lowest?

S: Nothing.

A: No what? No quality is nothing? What is nothing?

S: Maybe worthless.

A: Worthless, okay maybe that is something different. ‘Worthless’ that is another way of looking at it. But when we say ‘nothing’ we mean like no entity, no existence, no tangibility. That way of nothing?

So, between that ‘everything’ and ‘nothing’… now, besides that, on top of that everything, what is that? Beyond that everything? This is where mind will protest. Observe this; observe this moment, even if it is irritating the hell out of you! [Laughs] Observe it. Because I’m saying that if you have put everything in the definition of everything, I am still asking: What is beyond that everything?

S: That which knows it.

A: Okay, so now you put that which knows it also in that everything and I am still asking: What is beyond that?

S: It’s like that irritation in that. It’s like that saying: What was before being and not-being?

A: Yeah, but that is also practice now, because we’ve heard this from [Nisargadatta] Maharaj and we’ve heard Guruji [Sri Mooji] saying ‘Before I Am’ so that is not causing enough irritation. So, I have to change that to a new thing. [Laughs] (Of course ‘Before I Am’ …)

So, now I’m saying that everything is included in everything. Now, what is more than that? He said (we have learned this over the years) ‘That which knows it, that which sees it, that which is aware of that, all of that is also included.’ Now, what is more than that?

S: I Am.

A: ‘I Am’ is also included in that; like this also is included in everything. Whatever we consider ‘I Am’ to be is included in that. And I’m still asking.

It’s the same on the other side, like this nothing has nothing, includes nothing; there is nothing in it. But what is smaller than that?

Watch what happens, just watch for yourself.

S: Still trying to compare.

A: Still trying to compare; still trying to understand. But we can also not take this position that ‘Ah, he is purposely doing this, because actually he is just showing that we can’t understand so I am not even playing with this stuff.’ Some of you are playing that way. So, when I am saying what is greater, it’s like: [Makes a gesture of indifference. Laughs] ‘What is smaller than nothing?’ [Again makes a gesture of indifference] ‘I’m not falling into his trap.’ Like that, you see?

But I want you to really check: What is smaller than that which already is nothing?

S: It’s an ill-logical question, Father. I mean, if there is nothing then how can something be smaller than nothing?

A: Yes. You have to observe this stuff because … (Okay, I don’t know whether I should say so much, okay, let me see). So, it is this stuff (like for example, logic) which defines your boundaries. What is logic? It defines what is right, what is wrong, what is true, what is not.

S: It defines within the parameters of language.

A: But did I say to check within the parameters of language? What is smaller than nothing?

S: No, but it was like a default. It goes that way.

A: So, you observed this; that the fight will come and say ‘But that doesn’t make any sense.’ Yet, I’m asking you to look. [Chuckles] The whole reason I’m asking you to look is because I know it makes no sense. If we were still to play in the boundaries of only that which makes sense, then these boundaries are well defined by intellect. We never need to come to Satsang actually.

What is greater than everything and yet smaller than nothing?

[Silence]

S: It doesn’t go in the box of ‘everything and nothing’.

A: What doesn’t?

S: What makes this whole thing; what Sees that.

A: Yeah, whatever we perceive or understand or know about what Sees all of this, put that also in the box of everything. [Looks around]

The goose has flown yet? [Referring to the Zen koan]

S: Whatever answer we give to this will also be in the conceptual framework. So, greater than everything and smaller than nothing, whatever the mind will come up with as the answer will also be in the conceptual framework.

A: Now, is the mind all that you have?

S: No.

A: So, where else can the answer come from?

S: Beyond mind.

A: What is beyond mind?

We said: Everything included, including the one that Sees, that knows, that understands, even the one we think is always Here, which does not come and go, which is the unchanging Self, all of this; everything is included in everything. What is greater than that?

S: There is no word for that.

A: Even that one for which there is no word …

I’m going to make a scream room instead of the library, because nobody uses the library anyway, so we can sound-proof it like a studio cum screaming room. [Laughs] Yes? Possible? If some material is available, we’ll just block it off. After that we can … [Laughs]

What is getting attacked? Something very fundamental is gets poked in this kind of thing. Like if you were a one-year-old, it would not attack you. So, what grew up?

S: Father, for me it doesn’t really feel like an uncomfortable feeling to be looking actually. And now you are talking about our frustrations. What I rather see is that (you know; I don’t really know) … it’s just the limitations of the mind and that’s it. I can’t say what’s above and what’s beyond because it’s just the limitations. I think that’s what’s getting obvious. And even if we would try to see what is greater than the greatest, it always just points again to the limitations of the mind. There’s just nothing I can know beyond … or you, know, it’s just not possible. In a way it comforts me.

A: In a way, it is fine. [Chuckles] But That which cannot be known by the mind … That is also included in everything?

S: Can’t know.

A: Do you? I’m not saying it’s good news or bad news. I’m just asking: Is this true?

S: I don’t know. With your question I just got into the box. I don’t want to be in the box.

A: Yeah, this one is included in the everything.

S: Just feel trapped.

A: This one that wants or doesn’t want is included in the everything?

S: There has to be some proof, you know? [Laughter]

A: Yes, yes. This ‘I’ … this ‘I’ is the one we have to [Gestures: removing the thorns from]

A: You define your boundary. I won’t push. There’s no feeling here actually to push beyond where you want to be pushed. But if you say ‘Take it all’ then I’m happy to point out to you that our whole representation of all of this is just notional, is just a thought.

Q: Wow. It’s crazy. The entire planet, you know?

A: … is just a thought. It’s fine. Sometimes this wonder comes, like ‘What is going on here really? What is really going on?’ This kind of thing can come and you see that everything that you try to define, it doesn’t add up, it doesn’t hold up.

Q: But can we give any quality to Presence, at least?

A: Except the quality of being present?

Q: No. Then how do we trust that truth wants the good of us?

A: [Smiles] What if it is beyond good and bad?

Q: No, my growth or my wanting.

A: So, there is a Presence and there is a ‘you’?

Q: No, the Presence is what we say; the Divine way or Guru Kripa. [Guru’s Grace] Like ‘Guru Kripa’ … all these positive things, they exist, right?

A: Yeah.

Q:  Or there is really a difference? Presence is…

A: ‘Kripa’ [Grace] is not in the bounds of our mental boundaries of what is good or what is bad. We might have this idea … (let’s leave the world out of it for a bit; like ‘What is good for the world? What is bad for it?’ because we don’t know anyway) … let’s say ‘Okay, I know what is good for me.’ But you’ve always had this notion. Even when we were children, we used to think that ‘Having twenty éclairs is good for me.’ The parent would come and say ‘No, this is not good for you.’ You might have gotten many patients who feel like ‘If I take this, this brand of medicine, it is good for me.’ But you have to correct them because you are the doctor saying ‘No, you don’t know what is good for you.’

So, if ‘Kripa’ [Grace] has to conform to our idea of what is good and bad then it would be like that: ‘Yeah, eat twenty more éclairs, or have that medicine which is actually poisoning the body’ or something like that.

So, to surrender to Guru Kripa [Guru’s Grace] means that ‘I’m letting go of my ideas of what is good and what is bad.’ If you try to do both, then it will seem very stretched. Because if you feel like ‘I know what is good, so Kripa [Grace] should now just conform to that box of what I define as good’ … then if something seems to then step out of the box (like ‘Give me one éclair)’ then it can feel like’ I don’t know whether this ‘Kripa’ [Grace] thing is good for me.’ Because we made a definition which we feel is good for us but our bases of our definitions have always been changing and we cannot really say.

So, in your paradigm of how you are looking, it’s kind of like a risk. It is a big risk, in fact. It is not reassuring to our concept of ‘How my life should go’ or ‘How will I find if this is true? What will happen to me after that?’ It is not reassuring.

Some of these fears happen to everyone. Like Guruji [Sri Mooji] also said ‘I was scared of what this is going to do to me.’ (I’m paraphrasing.) ‘Am I going to become a beggar on the streets? Am I going to become a hunch-back like Quasimodo, a beggar on the street?’

So, for this fear to come is natural. Okay? Guruji may be more reassuring than me, so I can just give you his reassurance, which is that nobody who has come to this truth has then regretted it and said ‘Give me that back.’ So. that much reassurance is there.

A: If we can’t find what something applies to, does it continue to have meaning?

Q: Sometimes there are thoughts appearing.

A: Whose choice are they; the appearing of thoughts?
Q:  You said that it’s not a choice.
A: Exactly. So, it will just come and go, you see? But one way to say it is that ‘What thought appears is also the choice of Consciousness’ or something like that. But actually, when we are empty of that notion of choice-making, then you see everything is just … [Gestures with hands indicating ‘flowing’]

Q: So, in this unfolding, sometimes thoughts come and go; it’s fine. They’re not picked up. But sometimes they are.

A: What is that? [Gestures: grabbing and catching them]

Q: That’s the question.

A: Now, you look and tell me. Let the thoughts come and you tell me when you … [Gestures: grab for them and catch them] and when they … [Gestures: just float by]

(What are those things called? A smaller version of tongs? The bigger version would be tongs. They’re called … pinchers?)

What is that thing? What catches it?

Q: It says ‘I want to know.’

A: ‘I want to know.’ This thought came. And something went … [Gestures: catching it] What is that?

Q: It seems it’s like an image or it’s something hiding what I already am.

A: Spell it out a little more; how is it an image?

Q: For instance, I want to know specifically what is the thing that is getting me away from what I am. It’s a limitation. It’s like…

A: So, what is that? [Gestures: catching something] What catches? You said that sometimes they just come and go, and sometimes you pick them up. So, I picked up on that [Chuckles] and said: What is it that picks up? Don’t use anything that you’ve heard in Satsang. Check fresh.

Q: It’s just a thought! [Big laugh]

A: A thought picks up another thought. [Chuckling]

Q: It’s something just appearing like this.

A: So, it’s appearing. You say there is distinction because some come (‘swoosh, swoosh’) and they go; it’s fine. But some come and … [Gestures: catching and contraction] So, what is this?

Q: It’s seems that there is more interest on this thought, on this image, on this idea.

A: What does it mean ‘interest’?

Q: Like attention.

A: Attention … more staring at it?

Q: [Laughing]

A: No, it’s good that we unravel these things because otherwise we’ll keep hearing it. Okay, so you stared at the thought harder, is that it? [Laughs and laughter in the room]

Q: No. Because every time you say something (as you say, you cannot have two thoughts at the same time) I see that I don’t stay caught in a thought for 5 seconds. It’s not possible.

A: It just comes and goes, no matter how hard you stare at it. So, attention can be full, but it still comes and goes.

No thought comes and stays.

And yet, that feeling of … [Gesturing: catching something in mid-air like a fly with pinchers]: What is this one?

Q: I have to answer to that?

A: Look; just look. You don’t have to answer, but looking because looking is useful. You say that a thought comes ‘I’m a French girl’. So, is it just a question of how much attention was on this thought?

Q: It seems that the attention is very quick on it. But the intensity of the effect and the belief…

A: So, what is this intensity, effect, belief? What is it?

Q: What is it?

A: Yeah, what is belief?

Q: It seems like more of a vibration; something …

A: What positions can it take? Like, a thought is coming, attention is on it …

What is the posture of this belief?

Q: What is the …?

A: So, let’s make it simpler. Just look at the thoughts as they come. Give your attention, let it play back and forth a little bit and then see if that pattern-grabbing which you were talking about happens with any of that. And then just share a little more about what that grabbing feels like. What is happening?

All of you can look. Let all thoughts come, let them go. Play with your attention on them. And if something grabs in this way, just look at: What is that? What is that …thing? What is the grabbing? What is the …? Which hand grabs it?

Q: If it feels real; if it feels true…

A: Real If it feels true. This is what I was saying, the posture is like this posture of ‘It’s the truth’ … the posture of giving assent: ‘Yes’. What is that? What has that sense? Where is that?

Q: Mind, ego.

A: What is that, this mind, ego?

Q: It feels like it’s more like it’s going and … it’s like something, just some sort of change, and it sort of gets my attention; like more attention is given.

A: Attention is given. A lot of attention. Suppose it has full attention. Then?

Q: It’s not even that attention on that thought. What happens here is that maybe there’s one thought it went to, and there is something that wants to approve it.

A: Yeah. So, what is that, which wants to approve or disprove? What is this, like she says… approve or not?

Sangha: Identity?

Q: Guruji talks about the self-image, that we have a limited image of ourself, limited perception. I don’t know exactly how it works…

A: Yeah. Is that the product of this? Is that the product of this or is it that itself which grasps?

Q: Sorry, I need to hear it again.

A: So, is that limitation or self-image the outcome of this grasping? Or is it already sitting over there …? [Gestures: catching. Clasps hands together]

Q: When you say ‘it’ …?

A: Yeah, the self-image, like the limited self or something like that. Is that a seeming-product of this process of grasping? Or is it just naturally here and waiting to grasp? Or is it neither? What is it?

Q: I feel it’s not here naturally; it is a construct … of this thought.

A: That’s what I’m saying. It’s an outcome or a product of this process. It is not just naturally here.

Q: Yes.

A: Can it be… just notionlessly … be the limited one?

Q: Notionlessly… no.

A: So, therefore, it has to be that this comes, attention goes, then the grasping happens and then it feels like [Gestures: weighted down or heaviness] … this one.

Q: Yes.

A: What you say yourself, … naturally, without notion, in the Unborn; nothing…

It’s clear, this much?

So, then, if that limited one, the self-image, is just a construct of these thoughts and the belief system, then what is naturally here?

Q: It is not the self-image.

A: It’s not the self-image. Then what is it?

Q: [Laughs] You know that I can’t say much about it. How can I even tell you this?

A: So, it’s easier to answer that which is constructed [Chuckles] and not easy to answer that which is just natural. What causes this difficulty?

Q: There are no words in the dictionary!

A: [Laughs] No words; there are no words to describe it. Is that in a bad way or in a good way?

Q: In a beautiful way.

A: So, it’s That which is indescribable, beyond even description … (correct me if you don’t see this) … beyond the greatest descriptions we can have … because it just can’t be limited in any box like that. You see? Not even in the box of, say, peace or joy or bliss or love. It cannot be put into this box. That is just Here naturally.

And is this all just words, just inferences, that we’re saying?

Q: Not at all.

A: So, naturally, this indescribable One is Here. And the limited or the sense of limitation, the suffering … all of that is a product of construct.

And we notice also how the construct works: It’s just a thought that comes, attention is on it, and this grasping happens. Intellect or belief (whatever you want to call it) grasps onto it saying ‘Yes, yes’ or ‘No, no’ or something. And then that adds to the construct.

So, now, the only question is: [Gestures: reaching out to catch something quickly] This is what bothers you often. Does this [Gesture of reaching out to catch something quickly] happen on its own? Or can I just stand back and not do it?

So, this would then be at the point of criticality. Isn’t it? Because otherwise your natural self is just so naturally Here. No limited construct, no ego; nothing.

So, therefore, more than anything else, it feels like this must be tested, experimented with: Is it possible to just stay back … and let go?

Q: Totally.

A: You say ‘Totally’. That’s all!

So, what we’ve discussed now is all I’m saying in Satsang. [Chuckles]

Q: Thank you for doing this exercise with us because if we really have the time and really look, you know, and not just give answers, like this and that, or get answers, like we really look, then like now … because my mind answered to this one question. You know, you have this concept which kind of gets your attention. ‘The limited one … is it the one who takes it? [grabs the idea] Is it like that?’ And my mind said ‘No, of course it’s the one who takes it. I’ve seen that before.’

A: Yeah, you have to check. Exactly.

Q: ‘What it is?’ But then I look and then it was like ‘No.’ It sounds stupid, but it’s a new revelation, in a way also. Each time, I feel like it’s a new thing, again and again.

A: Yes, it’s very beautiful. Because we can have this presumption that the one that never exists is actually just sitting there waiting to grab, but it cannot. It’s just the product of an idea and not even a real product. It’s just like if you had the idea that you are sitting in Maui or something. It is just like this. It’s just not true and yet … So, what is that? This … [Gestures: grabbing]

Q: And it is quick to say or give an answer like ‘It is identity, it is the ego’.

A: Yeah, yeah, because it is all learned.

Q: Yeah, but it doesn’t reveal anything.

A: Yeah, it doesn’t answer anything; exactly, exactly.

Q: It actually imposes some entity. It’s like this identity, we take it for granted. Thank you.

A: It’s very good, because you have learned all this and you have heard all this and you know the terms now: ‘It is ego, it is identity.’ But have you met it? And who would meet who? Have you met it like that? So, that’s why this exercise is good, in a way, because then we’re going beyond the terms and saying ‘What are you actually tasting? What are you actually seeing? What are you actually finding for yourself?’

This is very good. Because you can say ‘Yes, it is identity, it is ego; limitation is what it is.’ But then, with all of these things, we are just going back to the level of mind and inference and saying ‘Okay, I know this is what it is.’ But when we are made to look, actually look, then: Who is that? What is it?

It’s very nice. And it’s very good also because you find sometimes that you will see how persistent this mind is. It keeps going ‘But … tweew-tweew-tooo.’ Like that day you were saying ‘We’re crossing these levels in a mall’ or something like that, and you cross this toy store or car store or whatever and then it keeps making these announcements of offers: ‘Now, twenty-five percent discount: happiness.’ And then you’re like ‘I could buy that. It might be true.’ All these millions of past offers have been fraud but this one could still be true.’ [Announcement]: ‘This is especially for you now, because you know you’re almost there.’ You see? ‘Especially for you now: thirty-five percent discount.’ Like: come, come.

And for many, it has become the ‘checker guy’ making spiritual interpretations: ‘Now, this is what always happens with you. You better take care of this problem.’ But in that moment, except for that thought, that offer, there is no problem.

So, when it is making these conclusions about us that ‘This is our spiritual problem’ … in that moment, there is nothing but that offer for sale … which is the problem. It’s saying ‘Now is the chance. You’d better sort this out because this is where you always get stuck.’ It is coming now with conclusions. That’s why I call this ‘checker guy’ my arch-nemesis because everything I could say, it could add to its checklist and say ‘This should not happen. Okay, now you are doing seventy percent.’ You see? Like that. It’s just feeding you these offers and then you feel like ‘Yes … because this is about my freedom, it’s about my spiritual journey, therefore, I must listen to it, it might be meaningful; maybe I’m missing out on truth’ or something like that. But it is not that.

The truth is more natural, simpler, than any conclusion. So, once you start to See like that, that it has so many offers for us, all these conclusions, with such confidence and authority …

Q: ‘Yes, I understand.’

A: ‘Yeah, I understand.’ Or ‘This is where you always get stuck’ … said with so much authority because it has all this evidence that it seems to pull out. But we can’t say anything about that. We can’t say that any past has ever happened anyway. [Chuckles] But the mind will say ‘See now: this is what your current condition is and this is what causes your problem.’ But it’s just that. As you come into more and more openness, just letting go, not latching on so much to these …

That’s why I also asked you to check. Because many times the mind will also feed us this idea that ‘But you are just a hostage. You are just hostage to these thoughts now. You’re stuck.’ As you just check: ‘Is it possible that one thought can just come and go … just one thought can just come and go, without me taking it to be valid representation of ‘What Is’?

That’s all. To be empty only means that … to not take any construct, mental construct, to be a valid representation of ‘What Is’.

Like if somebody came and offered you a painting of ‘Is-ness’. This painting of ‘Is-ness’ is there. It costs a hundred dollars. Would you buy it? You may buy a painting of Krishna, Buddha, Christ, of the Masters and Prophets; you may buy paintings of all of them. But if someone comes and says ‘I have this beautiful painting of ‘Is-ness’ made three-thousand two-hundred years ago and ‘Is-ness’ is in full glory! This panting captures it fully. But you have to give me the money and then I’ll give it to you.’ … would you buy such an offer? But every time we buy our spiritual conclusion, that’s exactly what we’re doing. We are buying a representation to truly be representative of ‘Reality’ or ‘Is-ness’.

If someone came and said ‘I have a sentence. Now, this sentence captures ‘Is-ness’ completely! It is just seven words and I am going to reveal it to you’ … would you fall for such an offer?

Q: Depends…

A: You have that look, like ‘Only if it comes from you.’

Q: Yeah, exactly. [Sangha and Ananta Chuckle]

A: That is why it’s important to keep reminding everyone that it cannot be spoken. It cannot be represented. At best, it can be pointed. All the Masters keep reminding you. So, if it cannot be painted, if it cannot be represented in any concept, then…?

If it was not naturally Here, then there was just no chance. Because if it had to come … and only experiences come … (An experience means some attributes, some color, shape, size, whatever… Time; because ‘coming and going’ is time) but if there is such a thing as the Truth that we are looking for then it must be natural and available Right Here, Right Now, independent of any conclusion that the mind can make, of any visual representation that the mind is painting for you.

Q: There is the feeling of a ‘me’ but … IT is here. There is no question about it. But there is this thought that comes regularly, that is ‘Okay, I’m aware of it. I’m here. It’s fine.’ But I still get caught very, very, very, regularly in this identity. And so, the thought comes that ‘Okay, but Ananta is aware of this; aware of his own nature all the time or almost all the time.’ Because sometimes, there is still this, you know, like …

A: Now, suppose the tables were turned. Okay? This is Satsang with Atma, and Ananta has come down. So, Ananta says to Atma ‘Of course, everything you say is very clear. It’s just naturally here. I’ll tell you something funny, though. The only thing that seems to catch me is that I still think, I still feel that I get caught sometimes.’

I did something to work with your report, just to make the irony clearer … which is that ‘The only thing which seems to catch me is the idea that I get caught more than you.’ What would you say?

Q: Does it change? Does it affect the nature you are?

A: No, it does not affect anything.

Q: And isn’t it just a thought right now, because effectively actually …

A: Ohh, but it comes every day! [Sangha and Ananta Chuckle]

Q: Come to Satsang. [Sangha and Ananta Chuckle]

A: I am coming. You take it, you take it. [Sangha laughs]

Q: Okay, my child. I’ll take it. [Sangha and Ananta laugh]

A: But you see what I was saying there? I was saying that ‘The only thing that catches me is that it keeps catching it.’ In that itself, in the so-called problem itself, that is the only seeming- obstacle, is that conclusion we make about ourselves that ‘I am this way, but he is not.’ So, from that clarity of ‘It’s just so clear; there is no he, me, all of this, other, all of that’ … to even this ‘mini-but’ (as you called it) this ‘mini-doubt’… all of this was sold [as ideas]. No? Suddenly now there is a him, there is a me, there is something that always happens for him; there is time, there is space. [Sangha laughter] All of this. ‘He has something that doesn’t happen here for me.’ This kind of thing. But again, going back to looking at [the coconut (body) floating on] the ocean, we’re still asking ‘So, what does this mean for this coconut? What does that mean for only this coconut? And why can’t this coconut be exactly like that other coconut?’

Q: Yeah.

A: It’s in that one small thing. But what is it? Like your first question was good. You said ‘Does it affect anything in reality? Does is touch what is naturally here?’ No. In a way, it is still reporting on something, like ‘But I still have this concern about ‘me’. When will this one will be like that one?’

But what is your discovery about yourself? You are neither this nor that … or you are everything there is. All these conclusions are also made up but in your Seeing of that, there definitely wasn’t a ‘me’ and a ‘him’.

So, sometimes, even though they might seem harmless (and this is just a small doubt) in that one sentence is all the separation, duality; all of that. And the minute we start presuming it to be still valid … then again, we are framing ourself back into the limited one.

And this is, in a way, the sort of pitfall of having this kind of dual sort of thing; that ‘Ah, yes, yes, what is true is just the truth. But still there is…’ You know, like that. Because then, you are again back to duality.

Now, in That which is that empty of having that notion … does this body not continue to play out, like it is playing out? It does. So, if you still put that sort of condition, that ‘Therefore, that makes the limited version still here’ (which is not my experience; which I have never experienced, which you have never experienced) then you are back to the realm of fantasy, back to the realm of imagination.

So, that’s what I’m saying, that either we produce that one and say ‘Here it is. There must be something flawed in your design …’

Q: ‘We’ as what? We produce what?

A: ‘We’ … whoever is reporting now.

Either we say ‘Here it is’ or we just say ‘I can’t find it’ … which is much more honest, because we can’t find it.

So, you have to get away from this fantasification about it. Because again, it can be [Makes a fist, a gesture of ‘I want to keep this’] like that. One tiny thing, like ‘Yes, yes, it is the Self but actually, there is also a person’ … or something like that.

It can then just be like ‘Then, what did we find? What did we look for? What did we see?’ We did not find any evidence.

A: In a way, what you’re saying is that if God doesn’t remember this thought (or Consciousness (because you were using ‘Consciousness’) doesn’t remember this thought, then Consciousness won’t know what to do.

Q: Yes.

A: But what is the source of this thought? And where does it appear? (You say):

Q: Consciousness.

A: So, is it like Consciousness’s reminder system for Itself? Or what is it?

Q: No.

A: So, that is why this exploration is important. Practical or impractical, spiritual or phenomenal, if we keep these aside, for whom would they apply? No matter what type of thought it might be. Is there a practical ‘you’ to whom the practical thought then applies? If there was some distinction like that (‘Okay, there is a Self but there is also a practical me and here it is, and that one has to do everything practically, it uses every practical thought, it’s just practical’) … but that one we can’t find.

Q: That’s the thing. Lately, I started to look at this thought because you say ‘I am going to give one-thousand dollars to the one who finds the ‘me’. But I was not really looking for it fresh. But now…

A: Now you’re looking. Good, good. So, irrespective of the quality of the thought and what it’s pointing to, whether it is spiritual or making lunch (something like that) who is it talking about? The one who ‘has to’ buy it … is which one? (And I’m not even saying that the ‘has to’ is wrong or something like that. You see? That can be also questioned, of course, but we can keep that for later.) But the I who ‘has to’ is which one?

Q: It’s the Consciousness.

A: So, if Consciousness has to, Consciousness will. [Laughter] And if it doesn’t have to, it won’t. So, what is the function of this aspect of it?

Q: It’s to make the body move … [Laughing] … towards the boutique.

A: Towards the flower shop or boutique. But this also is unexamined, that without these thoughts, the body action cannot happen. Because so many actions happen. Like right now, you are not saying ‘I better move. I should move my head left and right.’ It’s not saying that and yet, it is moving. So, to go to the shop is nothing but a movement of feet; feet move, hands move. All of this activity, when we ascribe some doer-ship to it, then it makes some limitation about what you are. Because all this is happening, so much is just unfolding. It is not the belief or the notion. That ‘Consciousness has to pick up an idea or believe a construct for it to move this body’ is invalidated in a moment.  Because so much movement is happening in the body and not all of it is accompanied by thought.

Many times, what happens that the action happens and later a thought comes and says ‘You shouldn’t have done that.’ This is called guilt. A thought can come later, saying ‘Very good, you did that. It’s a good thing.’ This is called pride. But the ‘you’ is still not found; this one is still not found. So, the one who should do or should not do … if you can’t find it, it’s almost like saying ‘Nobody is allowed into this room, okay? Now, for the ones who enter, they should sit down in this way.’ It’s absurd, isn’t it? [Chuckles] Because nobody is there, then who should and should not? And it’s a very strange part of our human conditioning (and especially Satsang conditioning) that for most of us now, we have seen over and over that there is no such person; over and over that there is no such one to whom these apply. And yet, it can seem like ‘It is not there but these thoughts might be valid for someone.’ If that one is not there (just like the imaginary friend) then to say that ‘Okay, it might still be valid, but for nobody’ … that’s kind of a strange conclusion, that the thought is still valid but for nobody.

Q: So, when a choice is made, it’s made by Consciousness.

A: Yes, we can say it like that. I’m happy to say: All is the will of Consciousness. Consciousness’s choice is made.’ But what I really what I want is to push you (in a way) beyond these notions of choice and doing.

Q: Push me, please. [Laughs]

A: That’s what I’m doing. Choice also implies doer-ship, non-doer-ship. And in our need to understand the functioning of this realm of activity, we then use these concepts of ‘Who is choosing this? Whose will is this? Who is doing this?’ If you saw that there is no such agent, no such agent with that kind of will or lack of will, there is no such agent at all, then what choice can that one make?

Q: Yes, because there is a feeling of doing this rather than that.

A: Yes, and that is just on the basis of just how we are interpreting it. It’s just like looking at the ocean and saying ‘See what that wave is doing?’ You might speak to children like that. ‘See how far it’s jumping? And the other wave is taking it easy, just chilling.’ We can say that to a child.  ‘Look at that wave, how much it is jumping.’ But would you say it really; that this wave is doing that? No, because you see that it has no such agent or volition. That capability just doesn’t apply to it.

It’s the same way for this body; the same way for all actions. That’s why Guruji [Sri Mooji] said ‘You are neither the thinker of your thoughts nor the doer of your actions.’ It’s only because it is interpreted.

Okay, let’s rewind a bit. We saw that the non-existent one cannot have a choice of either ‘do’ or ‘not do’ because it doesn’t exist. Now, one way to say it from a broader level is to say ‘All is the will of Consciousness or the choice of Consciousness.’ But if All-Is-That, then there can be nothing else. I mean, there is no such thing as Consciousness not choosing because it doesn’t appear. So, even to ascribe choice or will to even Consciousness is nonsense actually, because It just Is what It Is. But because we have to make a conclusion as to whose will it has to be, it feels safer down to say ‘Oh, it must be the will of Consciousness.’ But what I’m questioning is the notion of will itself.

The one who could have it doesn’t exist; it can’t have it. That one we have checked over and over again; it doesn’t exist so it doesn’t have it. And everything else, Is just That. So, what is the point of saying ‘will’? It has no contrast, no choice or not-choice. [Smiles] You’re with me?

Q: Yeah, yeah, totally.

A: So, if this is clear, what I am saying about Consciousness, then even the need to say that ‘Ah, this is happening because it is the will of Consciousness’ or ‘This is happening because I must have chosen’ or ‘The person must have chosen’ or something like that, then we see that it is all just made up.

So, the limited one doesn’t exist so it can have nothing including will. And the one that Is the Being, the Is-ness itself, it Is; it just Is … so, where is the question of It using will or not? It’s only that when we need to have to have a conceptual explanation for some movement or lack of movement, then we say ‘Okay, why is this happening?’

Suppose this was not part of your paradigm at all, like you didn’t know what it meant: ‘choice, will, do’ … then?

I’m saying: Go beyond even this higher choice and lower choice; beyond choice itself. Because it doesn’t actually apply to anyone.

[Dim then basically complete darkness in Satsang; electricity off in Bangalore]
~ ~ ~
The truth is much simpler than anyone thinks. Is there a silver-colored object on this drum? Yes. Is there a hand on this couch? Yes. Simpler than that, what do you know? It’s not more difficult; realization is more difficult. What is simpler? Silver object on the drum, hand on the couch. What is simpler than that?

Sangha: I recognize it.

A: I recognize it. ‘I’ … I recognize it. So simply you just said ‘I recognize it.’ Were you making it up?

Sangha: No.

A: If you say ‘I recognize it’ how can you say ‘I is unknown to me?’

If you go with the mind, you will lose me completely and start hearing some ‘blah, blah’. [Chuckles] Because as you are being led to this simplicity, you are being asked to go beyond just what your mind is saying.

Let’s start again. Silver object on the drum, hand on the couch; simple. I said ‘What is simpler than that?’ She said ‘I see this’ or ‘I recognize this.’ I said ‘Are you just making this up?’ She said ‘No. Of course, I recognize it.’ So, if it is true ‘I recognize this’ then how do you say that ‘The ‘I’ is unknown to me?’

So, this ‘I’ that recognizes it, are you making it up?

Sangha: No.

A: No. What do you know about it?

Sangha: It’s here.

A: It’s here. Here. But is it here spatially?

Sangha: No.

A: No. So, not ‘here and there’ here, but Here in the sense that ‘It Is.’

What is its color? What is its size? How old is it?

Sangha: None. No age.

A: This ‘I’ which is color-less, size-less, ageless, empty of phenomena, how are you aware of it?

Sangha: Because I am it.

A: Is this inference?

Sangha: No, I’m not inferring myself.

A: You are it?

Sangha: Yeah.

A: Then what are you looking for?
Or: Can you lose this, that now you have to find it?

What is missing? … is just our idea of what Self-realization should mean. ‘Where are the fireworks? Where are the chakras? Where are my siddhis?’ And in the grasping after them, even if they were going to come, they don’t.

I’m not dangling any carrot, okay? [Chuckles] Nothing has to come. But in just grasping after these, rather than just staying with Sat [Truth] we start running after Ananda [Bliss] and Chit [Consciousness] is forgotten.

So, this ‘I’ which you say is so mysterious ‘I’m looking for who I am, I want to recognize who I am’ … I ask you: Are you aware now? Or no?

Sangha: Yes.

A: How do you confirm that?

Sangha: It’s the only thing I’m sure of.

A: Okay, so let’s start in a different way. Are you feeling hot in the moment?

Sangha: Yes.

A: So, you saw that there was a feeling, some heat, so then ‘hot’. Is this room light or dark?

Sangha: Dark.

A: Because there’s a perception of it. You see? Then: Is there a thought passing through your head right now?

Sangha: [Immediate] Yes.

A: [Chuckles] That was a quick thought. So, you had the perception of all of these so you said ‘Yes’ or ‘No’.

Are you aware now?

Sangha: Yes.

A: What did you see to confirm it.

Sangha: Nothing.

A: You didn’t see anything because you say yourself ‘It is not size, shape, color, quality; any sort of attributes. Then how do you say ‘Yes’?

Is there a red mobile phone on this couch where the hand was? (I know, it’s too dark to see.)

Is there a bright source of light on this leg of the couch? [Covers battery-powered-computer ‘on’ light]

Sangha: No.

A: You didn’t see it, so you said ‘No.’
This Awareness you can’t see, and yet, you say ‘Yes.’
What magic is this?

And this is why the mind does not give you this certificate where it says ‘Until you have an experience that confirms yourself, you have not recognized yourself.’ But it is not an objective experience, as you yourself are saying. It is an experience without experience.

What is That which is aware?

Sangha: It.

A: You can’t even use the word ‘It’.

Sangha: Awareness is…

A: Awareness is. Who is aware that Awareness is aware?
Is there a ‘someone’ there who can now make this claim that ‘Awareness is aware’?

Sangha: It’s not the mind.

A: Ah. It’s not the mind. It’s an inference. Now, because I know many of you will be making this conclusion, I just have to stay with this.

What I want you to do is throw it out. Instead of trying to stay with it, throw out Awareness. Throw it away for one moment.

Whoever succeeds gets a prize. [Jokingly] Whoever can throw out Awareness or become unaware for one moment, gets a special price. [Chuckling in the room]

Don’t be the witness.

Did it? It’s a trick question, as you know. But even to say that ‘Yes, I was unaware’ is actually saying that ‘Yes, I was aware that I was unaware.’ So, this is inescapable.

Now, This one which is color-less, shape-less, size-less, does not come and go, is neither a thing nor a no-thing, is not subject to time and space…did you want it to be something else; the Self?

Sangha: The idea was that it had to be a part of me.

A: It had to be a part of you. The Self had to be a part of you. And the ‘you’ would be…?

[Someone shines the light from the laptop onto Ananta, saying ‘The ones watching online don’t see you at all. It’s totally dark.’ Ananta says ‘Ghost Ananta.’ Laughter as he makes scary faces]

A: It had to be a part of which ‘you’?

Sangha: The dream ‘me’.

A: The dream ‘you’. Reality has to be a part of that?

You see the absurdity of the mental offerings? Did you expect that you would look for the Self and find a super-natural ability or something like that? It is much beyond that. That which is without attributes, without shape, size, color, does not age, does not come and go, that is the very substratum, the basis of your very existence. It is so naturally Here.

So, it is not the realization or the recognition of this that is actually difficult, it’s the letting go of what we thought we are. Or the idea of letting go of ‘What this means to me’ … the ‘me’ that we can never find.

So, this ‘Who Am I?’ must be the pre-requisite before you can say ‘I want this, I don’t want this, I am like this, I am not like this.’ And somehow, we don’t ask ourselves this. We are convinced that we are this body/mind and we are willing to continue with that presumption and keep perpetuating this notion, even in our spirituality. So, how is it that you pick out one object from the entire world of perceptions and say ‘Just this is me and the rest isn’t’? Does this come naturally to you?

The funny thing is that we don’t even leave it at that. If it was about just this body, then every cell in this body is changing; five years back maybe none of the cells that are here now were there. Still you say ‘I was born on this particular day’ but you have nothing in common with that baby. So, it’s not even that (the body) that you identify with. It is just a notional ‘I’.

Very few in this world want to question themselves in this way. Because it attacks the very root of our identity. And suddenly things start to feel a bit like this room [electricity was off in Bangalore] …  no light, no air; everything starts to get a bit stuffy.

‘What am I getting by asking myself: who am I?’ Because when we start looking for the true I then all the falsity becomes apparent. ‘I believed myself to be this, I believed myself to be that.’ You start to see that they are just thoughts; just ideas. Everything that you think is true about yourself was picked up at some time.

But what were you originally?

Where are you Right Now?

Where do we go to for these answers? Usually we go to the same ‘merchant’ who has sold us the previous stories. ‘What do you think about this?’ And what will this guy say? ‘Your job is just to live in the moment’ or ‘You job is just to …’ whatever; some strategy, some ploy. But who is it about? That it cannot fathom because the mind is an instrument which can tell you about things in time and space and at best make some conclusion about something that is not in time and space.

But what is That which is not in time and space?

What is That no-thing … and yet not nothing?

Many of us in spirituality are still waiting for a mental certificate. ‘When my mind says I am free, I will be free.’ The Master can come every day and say ‘You are free Right Now. Right Now, you are free!’ … ‘No, no, I will wait for the mind certificate.’ And then the game of ‘I am free but…’ starts. ‘I am free, but I lose it. I am free, but I can’t stay. I am free, but how come I am not like you?’ These are the usual ones. Are they really so strong, these objections, these doubts, that you have to buy them … Right Now? [Laughs]

Now where will we go? Back to what we think about that? Are you happy to be a slave to this mind, this made-up prison which is made up of mind/intellect? This or that, yes or no, true or false, right or wrong, up or down’ … where is all of this stuff? Past or future, doing or not-doing, wanting and not wanting.

Who is all of this about?

Who are you Now?

And many times, the mind will say ‘But this is too intellectual’. But it’s opposite of intellectual (in a way) because what I am saying is: Don’t infer anything, don’t compute anything, don’t figure it out. Just look … and tell me who you are.

It’s specially irritating to many of you when I say that: The Truth is completely apparent to you Right Now. Because the mind will come and say ‘What do you mean? Nothing is apparent to me. It may be apparent to you.’

So, when it is said that ‘The Buddha nature is never concealed’ what could that mean then? We are still hoping to find it, in some way, isn’t it; then it must be concealed.

What is Here Now, just naturally?

What is apparent to you?

He said that ‘I have to recognize it. It is here, the Self is here.’ Or he said ‘The soul is here…. and the soul is happy, it is free … but I have to recognize it.’

Now whose voice is this one?

If the soul is here, who else is here?

Are there two of you: the ‘soul’ and the ‘me’?

And then the ‘me’ has to recognize the ‘soul’ … and then the ‘me’ becomes free?

S: So, who am I?

Can you locate the two?

The one that is looking at this world, which one is that?

The one that is hearing these words, which one is that?

S: It is the Self.

A: Is the Self. Who else is here?

S: No one.

A: No one else is here and only the Self is.

And if this is not just inferences but what you actually See, then this Self is Self-recognition.

‘I’ am looking at the world. This ‘I’ is which one?

What are its boundaries?

How old is it?

And what knows that ‘I’ is looking at the world?

What is aware of even of this ‘I’?

This is the crux of it. But for the mind, it’s the most pointless.

‘What will I get if I find this? [the mind says] What is the point of this?’

S: ‘How will it change the phenomenal?’

A: ‘And how will it change the phenomenal?’ … that is, in a way, same as ‘What will I get?’

[Chuckles]

It’s like everything in this world is on conveyor belts. Objects of perception… sometimes they seem like they are coming closer but as they come close, then they seem to go off again. Our emotions, our sensations, pain and pleasure, everything is like on conveyor belts. But there is one conveyor belt which is especially troublesome, which is the conveyor belt of thoughts. Because what is this conveyor belt? This is the conveyor belt of labels. It is labeling everything. Everything has a label. And as we start picking up from this conveyor belt, we imagine ourselves to be something that we are not. We give ourself a label, which is ‘I’ or ‘me’.

But, without this reference, what are you really?

Without any reference, what are you really?

What is true will not go away.

But the label will.

So, in a way, we can say:

The only true reference to ‘I’ is to make no reference to ‘I’

Otherwise, can you tell me what you are referring to?

Now, what happens is the mind will take you on side-tracks and say ‘Every time I ask this question ‘Who am I?’ this is what happens to me.’

What happened there? You picked up a reference, which is ‘me’ … again, un-inquired. Whatever makes you pick up a reference to yourself, without your actual seeing of yourself, is just an inference, is just a presumption.

Sangha: There’s a deep-rooted belief in the existence of the individual.

A: Very good. He says ‘There’s a deep rooted belief in the existence of the individual.’ But it’s good to see that it’s just a belief. And what actually can you believe? So, I’ve been asking some of them, like believe this: [Holds up a circular yellow object] [Silence] Believed it?

S: Nothing to believe.

A: Nothing to believe and yet it is apparent. You see? So, what could you believe? You could believe, for example, that yellow is a good color or that this is a coaster or a glass protector or something. That’s a notion about it which you could believe. So, all beliefs are just about notions. And this individual is just a notion. There’s a deep-rooted belief in the existence of this notion called ‘me’. And that’s why Bhagavan [Sri Ramana Maharshi] called it ‘The I thought’. It is just a thought. Even a perception in itself cannot be believed or disbelieved; it is just an interpretation of it.

To interpret ‘What Is’ is the birth of the notional ‘I’. So, then it is not as deep-rooted as we think it is. Because on the conveyor belt of the mind came this idea that ‘It’s actually very deeply rooted.’ And we picked it up as our bag. But actually, let it go. It’s somebody else’s bag.

If it was deep-rooted, it would naturally be Here Now. I can promise you Right Now, Right Now, Now, you are empty of it: Now. [Chuckles] I know that if I give you a minute to think about it, you will say ‘But, but, it’s here.’ But it is so shallowly rooted that it cannot survive this Now. Before the ‘but’ comes, you are free. This belief is gone. So, every moment is your opportunity to see that you are free … just thinking that you are bound.

This individual is not even an object of perception like this: [Holding up the same yellow object] It’s just a belief. You have never found it. Some of you have been coming for four or five years and I’ve said from the beginning that there is a thousand-dollar cash prize, a thousand-dollar cash prize for the one who can show me the person, the individual. Then after a couple of years, Shivam got enough confidence and said, ‘Father I’ll come in on the bet with you, I’ll add a thousand.’ So, now two-thousand dollars is at stake for anyone who can show me this person!

S: If we turn it around and let’s say if I make the mistake, I have to give you two-thousand dollars. That would really put me into a serious seeing.

A: I’m okay with that. [Chuckles] If that works for you, I’m fine. Start now. [Laughter in the room; extends his hand] Two-thousand dollars, already done. Two-thousand dollars, madam. [Big laughter in the room] Even that proposition was it, that ‘This will work better for ‘me’ if it was like this.’ Gone, two-thousand dollars. [Chuckling]

The point is that I want to break you from this mental hold that tells you that you are this bound individual right now and you have to get to freedom. I’m telling you that you are this free Being Right Now, just pretending as if you are this individual. In fact, to go greater and to say: You Are God, You are All There Is … just drawing boundaries around YourSelf using these notions.

So, our fight is this fight. I’m saying ‘You are so great, you are so great!’ You’re saying ‘No, no, I’m just this tiny object.’ It’s a very strange fight. [Chuckling] Usually in the world you are trying to fight and show how great you are. ‘Don’t you know who I am?! Tu janta nahin mein kaun hoon?’ I’m saying that ‘You are All-There-Is’ but you’re saying ‘No, no, I’m just this small guy.’

Just show me the person. Where is it? What does it look like? The one who has the money in the bank, the one that has a manager at work (or the one that doesn’t have the money in the bank? [Chuckling] More appropriate?) the one who has had relationships, has a relationship now, wants a relationship; even the one that wants freedom … show me that one. Where is it?

To the body sitting here, if it was ten rupees in the bank or ten crore rupees in the bank, that would be just the way it is here. So, the body that is sitting here is unconcerned about how good or bad your boss is.

Which one is this person?

S: I have to create him.

A: You have to create him. You have to create a version of him, a narrative of him, but you cannot actually create him. You create a belief. That’s what we were talking about. You can create a belief system about him, just like you can create a belief system about anything. You can invent a character right now in your head and say ‘There once was a man who lived in Nagpur’ (whatever). ‘He had this challenge and that challenge.’ And if you believe enough notions about him, you’ll start to get attached to this character. In a way, that’s what we’ve done. This character itself, tangibly, substantively, even phenomenally, is a second-level delusion. Like we said, the body is unconcerned about tomorrow, yesterday. So, the one who has this timeline, that one we cannot find … although we can believe ‘as if’ it is real, ‘as if’ he or she is real.

Are you willing to give up on this investment?

S: Yes.

A: Because what holds us back is that ‘I’ve invested so long in this identity. Let me get it to its glorious end. Let me make it to Super-Sage and then I will give up on it.’ Because we’ve been told that this is the glorious end. But what if your Sage-like nature was more naturally present than that; it was not the product of some ‘becoming’? And if, in fact, it was the dropping of this idea of ‘becoming’ that would make your Sagely-ness more apparent?

What if you could meet yourself with unjudging eyes?

A: What if the Truth was here so apparently and palpably before A of ABC? What is there?

If the Truth could go missing that would be a serious difficulty. If the Self went missing then all of us would have to come to special places to look for the Self. Sounds insane and yet, sounds familiar. So, what makes us refuse to meet Our Self? How can it be that such an intimate meeting could have an obstacle?

What stops you now? Are you not Your Self? … And if you’re not Your Self, how much will you flap around your limbs and get to It? What new thought will you think that will be the Self? What new experience needs to be experienced that you’ll hang your hat on it and say ‘This is my Self’? What are You waiting for? Get out of this habit of pretending as if there is something left. Stop buying into this notion of ‘almost there’ … ‘got it’ … ‘lost it’. That ‘there’ that you think it is, is not there. That ‘It’ which you got is not It. If It can be lost, it cannot be It. All this is stubborn refusal to look at what Is are all just ploys.

I ask you every day: What Is, just naturally? And you say ‘Yesterday, tomorrow, five minutes ago, ten minutes later, here, there. Is that ‘What Is’ naturally?

I ask you who you are and you say ‘I think this, I feel this, I see this’ but the ‘I’ is who?

How long will you keep wandering, keep hiding this ‘monkey me’ in your backpack, attempting to sneak in the gates of freedom, still wanting it for ‘me’? Who is this about? If that body/mind that we have identified with for so long apparently … if that one got nothing (and it will get nothing) there is only one destination for this body. (Maybe two.) [Chuckles] So, who is this about? What keeps you caught up is the same old stuff, storyfication, fantasyfication, specialness, giving no value to the Truth but giving lot of value to needless fantasy? The same old grooves of the mind; it doesn’t even have anything fresh. Same old ‘relationships, money, body, freedom.’ [The four problems] What else you got? At least play with some new type of trouble. These ones have been going on for thousands of years. All because of what? Because you think you know. Because you think you are right about something. This is the loss of innocence.

If you didn’t know anything, if you didn’t want to know anything, is your Knowingness lost? Have you become unaware? What is lost when you keep your concepts down? How long will we keep saying ‘But the mind says, but the mind says, but the mind says!’ We’ve heard every story that the mind can say. Is there something fresh that the mind can say? Still enamored by it?

It’s okay to feel lost. Don’t pick up the mind’s conclusion about what is true. It’s okay to feel lost but you’re more lost when you buy the minds version of your reality. This little bit; if you heard just this much, that is enough for today. It is alright to feel a little lost but it is still less lost than believing the mind’s version of what is real, of what is your reality … including the now super-smart, super-Advaita mind that many of us have.

Just open up.

There is really nothing that you can do. In fact, further than that (because even this is misunderstood and then you will try to do the not-doing) further than that, there is no such thing as doing. There is actually no such thing as doing.

Our mind has made a concept out of some apparent movement or activity (we can call it). But there is no doing and not-doing. It just does not apply. And then, when we see that there is no individual doer, then we give it to the God and say ‘You…’ We are so unwilling to give up the concept of doer-ship that you say ‘Okay, there must be a doer. I am not it individually but You must be.’ And then a new variation of suffering starts, which is: ‘Why you are doing this to me? When will you do the good things?’ or ‘Why do you do bad things to good people?’ All of this fancy stuff. Because we have picked up a concept which is not natural.

Not only is there nobody doing anything, there is no actual thing called doing.

Show me if you have met it. Show me.

Have you ever met this doing or doer?

Waves are moving. Is the wave doing it? Is the object called ocean doing it?

All this is conceptual. We have never met the ocean, except the waves.

The waves are not the doer. Then the conceptual ocean is …

This movement of blame and pride will not help.

To see that this does not apply at all; to see that this is all nonsense….

Same for duality. Nobody has ever met this duality.

Yet, we have to have Satsang to talk about non-duality; Advaita. [Chuckles]

Have you met duality? Where is she? Where is duality?

Only in our labels. Only in our notions. Only in our mind. Only a thought.

None of you have ever experienced duality.

This is what [Nisargadatta] Maharaj was trying to say when he said that ‘You are not experiencing suffering … you are suffering your experiencing.’ And there is no suffering except duality. There are no lines inherently drawn defining you and I, me and other.

Don’t be scared to not understand. This is very fearful for most of humanity because of our education system, the way we have built this society, there’s a fear of feeling stupid by not understanding. I can tell you: I can’t tell you what’s going on. I have no idea what’s going on.

Q: So, is that okay, like when you said ‘What is natural and what was learned?’ to see who is it learned by?

A: Wait, wait, slowly. ‘What is natural and what was learned?’ was the question. Now, you see it was learned, then ‘learned’ is gone. Then you don’t have to pick up what else was learned, like to ask ‘To whom, by whom was it learned?’ That is also learned, no? Was that natural?

You said ‘When you pointed and said ‘What is natural and what was learned?’ then is it okay if I look at that and then say I saw that it was learned … but then I’m looking now at who is it learned by and then progressing in my investigation.’

But I’m talking about something which is instant; it is non-progressive. Because even to ask ‘Who was it learned by?’ then is something that you have learned. [Silence] What I’m saying is not even an instant; like if there was a word less than ‘instant’. If you give that to your learning again then we go on the same treadmill. And most of your minds now have very solid grooves for ‘Who am I?’ Very solid grooves: ‘Awareness, Self, Unchanging, Absolute’ … something.

S: Duality is the easiest concept. Everybody can take to it. That’s why every religion is dualist except ‘Advaita.’

A: [Chuckles] There is too much duality in that statement.

S: No, at once, it comes very easily to everybody. You don’t have to learn it.

A: It comes easily in the sense that every notion is imbibed in it. If I say ‘Drop it, drop it, drop it’ will you drop it or will you become the dropper? If I say ‘Empty, empty, empty’ will you be empty or will you become now being empty, trying to do emptiness? What is this? It is just a question: Will you continue to judge yourself; interpret yourself?

In this moment, you are the most enlightened that you will ever be.

Is that good news or disappointing? [Chuckles]

Again, the judgment will come. ‘Oh, is that it?’ or ‘Yes, yes, this is it!’ This is the thing. So then, the enlightened one is playing as if it is the limited one. In this moment: this, this, this, now, now, now, fresh, fresh, fresh … it is not the outcome of something.

So, we have gathered. Now what? Should something happen? [Smiles]

As far as exposing notions goes, that might be a good place to start. Something should happen or should not happen or nothing needs to happen …

So, if it was not about ‘getting it’ or even not about ‘nothing to get’….? Because many times in Satsang it is said ‘There is nothing to get’ but do you get that … in the sense that, do you then keep that?

How to point to this? How to point to this? [Looks around]

What can I say to you? What pointer can I use that you will not then hug the pointer itself?

Which finger can point to the Truth, that the finger itself is not mistaken to be the Truth?

It may appear then that we are stuck. [Laughs] But would this being stuck without conclusions be a bad thing?

If you can’t locate what this mouth is speaking, don’t judge that.

Don’t rest on what you already know.

Come to your infancy. In your infancy, this ‘Is-ness’ is completely apparent. Now, don’t imagine yourself to be a baby or something. [Laughs] An infant is not imagining themselves to be an infant. More innocent than that; more empty, more open than that. It is not in your imagination, in your conceptualization; not even in the realm of your experiences … and it is not not there also.

What if this mental lost-ness was actually to be found? … and when we can conclude that ‘We have found’ then you are really lost?

A: Do you have to rest on a conclusion?

Q: Feels good, comfortable.

A: [Smiles] To rest on a conclusion?

Q:  To have conclusion.

A: Yes, I see what you mean there. Because you can feel a bit wobbly to not have one.

Q: Yeah.

A: But, if I invite to there, to the wobbliness, will you come with me?

Q: Do I have a choice?

[Laughter in the room]

A: [Chuckles] Suppose you did.

Q: Hmmm.

A: Come away from your certainties to this seeming wobbliness.

How big is the wobble?

Do not fear it.

Let all conclusions pass by, like somebody else’s bag in on the conveyor belt.

Just like that. Somebody else’s bag in on the conveyer belt …, all going.

Q: It’s like boarding the train and putting the luggage on your head.

A:  Yes, yes. That is what we have been doing. Carrying our burdens, carrying our conclusions.

Even sitting in Satsang, some of us are listening a lot to what the mind is saying and a little bit to what this voice is saying. Others are listening half-and-half to what the mind is saying and this voice is saying. And some are listening more toward what this voice is saying and a little to what the mind is saying. If you’re in this kind of dual relationship, it can feel a bit painful because it’s like each hand being pulled from both sides, trying to manage, to juggle both. And both sides want you fully; just like ‘No, no, leave the other one. Come to this side, leave the other one. It’s no good for you.’ The mind is saying ‘Leave this one, he’s no good for you.’ This one is saying ‘Leave the mind, it’s not good for you.’ This is the only seeming-choice. It’s saying ‘I can do it. I can manage both of you.’ [Chuckles]

Q: What I’m feeling is that I can try this; be in a state of ‘I don’t know’ and allow whatever comes, and watch.

A: Yes. Yes, but don’t start the ‘I don’t know’ by knowing so much. You see what I’m saying? Because ‘I’m going to leave myself undefined’ … you’re defining that. Just like, as I was saying: the innocence of a child. A child is not saying ‘Now, I’m just going to be natural.’ So, it is not about taking a position. I know it’s a bit frustrating … ‘He’s like ‘Not this but not that also’. Just let go of any position-taking. Don’t take any position, including the one of not taking a position. It is not as weird as it sounds, or as impossible as it sounds. It’s how you are Now, before you start thinking about it.

Don’t conclude anything that you are going to say, you are going to do; you’re not going to say, not going to do. Don’t rest on any conclusion. Don’t take on any position to be the truth. Then what happens?

Q: Feels a bit strange.

A: It can be … it can seem a bit strange. It doesn’t have to. For some, it can immediately feel okay. For some, it can feel a bit strange, like ‘What’s going on? To see that I don’t know, is this freedom?’ This kind of thing. But let this get released out of you. You got so used to living with conditions that living openly seems a bit too much.

[Someone in sangha says]: It’s not allowed, like ‘You shouldn’t be like that.’

A: Yeah. ‘You shouldn’t be like that because that is just crazy or lazy or something.’ [Chuckles] But also, it makes that ‘this and that’. In that also (‘You shouldn’t be like that’) it’s trying to define how you are. But you’re not being any way.

Leave yourself undefined.

[Silence]

Even all the fancy stuff will not help you. They’re just words. Leave yourself undefined. Because even in the highest notion is the ‘I’ thought … and it’s just a thought, just a notion.

Don’t fear the fear.

Q: So, should you believe the mind? Or never believe it? The mind is saying ‘I’m your best friend.’

A: The mind is saying ‘I’m your best friend.’ Just let it go, like somebody else’s bags on the conveyor belt. Don’t fight it, don’t accept it. No acceptance or renunciation; neither way. Now, the mind will be offering you conclusions about what that means. It will say ‘But then you’ll just…’ But don’t rest on those. Let them also come and go.

It’s a simple switch. [Snaps fingers] But for the mind, it’s an impossible switch. The mind will keep saying ‘Is it on or off?’ Then it will say ‘Okay. What he’s saying is about the middle, neither this nor that.’ But I’m not saying any of that. It is not fathomable, compute-able.

All these ideas, you will see through them: I, you. I and you is just like A and B. What is the difference between A and B? [Chuckles] It’s the same difference between you and I.