A Little Bit of Openness is All That is Needed - 2nd October 2017

Changing.

So what else is there? Body changing. Then what else is there? Not experience, aliveness. Aliveness changing? We'll come to that and see if that exists before we come to aliveness. Body, sensations, feelings, emotions—all clearly changing. So what is there beyond that? Then you said aliveness. Like you stop being? Not really. This is what you mean, but is it what we call 'me'? Now, this is a beautiful point to get to. As long as we are looking, this Being is the one. The Master is the deity. Guruji says the deity of the waking state is the God of the waking state. But then everything goes. Everything goes. That which we call sleep—even this presence, in this Being, in this sense of existence, is not there. And yet you are. Thank you. Even aliveness? I don't know. We can only rely on how Guruji says it; we cannot conceptualize it at all.

And a good way to check is: what wakes up in the morning? What woke up today? Say, 'I woke up,' which was the sense that I existed. This sense that 'I am'—the same sense that I'm alive. That which you were in the sleep state was beyond life and death, unborn. And the presence or absence of even the waking state or the dream state does not touch that one. The concept of 'two' does not exist here. The concept of 'one' also does not exist there. It is not true to equate them. This thing, because it is the simplest recognition, even a child recognizes it. And the simpler it gets, the more complicated it is for the mind because everybody knows, 'I woke up just five minutes ago.' What came? The sense that I exist now. The sage is able to say, my Guruji was able to say, that don't touch this also. Don't even touch this sense of existence. Are you the one that woke up? Let the waking state take care of that one. We cannot have an idea about the one that woke up. Let that one take care of itself. Let the waking state take care of itself.

Can you take any object from here? So if I decide, 'Okay, I am going to take the coconut into my dreamless sleep,' can I do it? I say, 'I want to take this hand into my dreamless sleep.' Can we take it there? No. Dreamless sleep is just that one. Can I take some emotion with me? All is left. Of course, the example is very beautiful: that you could be on your wedding night in the arms of a beloved, but when sleep comes, even that beloved is left. No object. But you see, it is not a third-party experience. Not to another one. You sleep for yourself. And yet this 'you' is beyond all attributes and qualities because all qualities were left behind. Nothing is there. And yet this 'you' has gotten no attention, has gotten no focus for us, has been given no value. The waking state comes; it is the speed of light and sound and excitement, all kinds of things. So the substratum has lost its focus.

So this Satsang, this recognition, is just about this looking for the banner, saying 'Who am I? Am I some object of the waking state, or do I remain untouched by which appearances might appear?' This week, one of our members has been there right from the beginning, for years ago. He's been there. He said, 'Anytime Ananta says something here, nobody is there. Who are you?' He says, 'Anything, but what am I supposed to do?' But you see, it's not that I have to do. That's true because the source of all confusion at the root is the conclusion at all. It might seem like whatever else it is, it might seem like it is a question of desire, a question we have. At the root of that confusion is a confusion about the 'who'.

Now, if you come to Satsang, then you will not escape these questions. If you're not in Satsang, I can go to work and ask, but Satsang means that I'm open to this question. It is this kind of certainty: I'm open to this. I might not be very inclined to inquire, but I'm open to learning the content as it is filtered day after day. Leave all of this psychological suffering, all of these problems, and this recognition—this is to be. But what can happen sometimes is that the mind can come in very quickly after the moment of recognition and try to co-opt the recognition personally. That is what is called spiritual ego. In whatever form it might take, whatever color or flavor it might dress itself in, that is what the idea that 'the person has come to spiritual insight' is. But as you're coming through this, this recognition has what we call the 'invented ego' in its worst form. The claimant to it is the most difficult one to meet with because it is the most closed.

But if there is a quality about a spiritual seeker which is useful, it is openness to 'I don't know.' But even after recognition, it's the most real. No, I'll say, 'You don't mind, I'm done with this. You have nothing now that you give me.' This kind of thing. 'Yes, I'm already there. Why can't you understand that I'm spiritually there?' This claimant, you can't hold the wanting to proclaim, wanting to give some attention, wanting to get some specialness as a result of it. Almost like a child who's very relevant in exams for the first time, they want to go all over the marketplace and say, 'You see my report?' When the Master says, 'Keep quiet, sit down,' this claimant will reveal much more to you. And you see, nobody is innocent, but stuck. I see so much of you because of this cannot pick up a new position.

I was saying after Satsang yesterday where I'm really enjoying these insights which are so much inviting you to drop all positions. So what we call ego is position: ultimate position, subordinate position, new position, personal position. The position has gone. The position as a person—all this is forgettable. Forget about it. Not going to have it. Then you see that Satsang is not a classroom. Well, then we might feel like a classroom where there's this teacher who keeps talking and 'What am I learning?' Then you see that actually, this is absolute unlearning. So yesterday, someone was saying, 'But I don't know anything.' I said that 'I don't know anything'—how can you be troubled? How could that be a burden? There must be an idea that 'I don't know anything, but I must know something.' If that is not there, then what can bother us? The truth? I don't know. 'I don't know' is very good. We'll do this now. Who will do this? 'I don't know' belonging to someone—that 'I don't know' belongs to somebody with name and form, then it can be a painful agony. But if 'I don't know' is part of the natural functioning of this body, there's no claimant even of the 'I don't know.' Then we are not troubled.

Even if the worst type of feelings are given, with the worst type of toxins, what you are remains untouched by the flow of any object. It could be a feeling, it could be a thought, it could be some state of the body. Ultimately, it all must boil down to you. You are the clues are really, really available. What is needed is this typical openness. Inquire: what is it which is unchanging? If you use your mind and say, 'Oh yeah, I mean the Self is that,' that doesn't help. That is where knowledge gets in the way. If you're not open, then when the pointer is being given, then you already claim it with some learned concept or based on some past insight, and that doesn't help. The clue is there: find out that which is the non-phenomenal witness of everything that is phenomenal. Then you apply a knowledge of phenomenon and witness—that doesn't help. You just have to see.