Contemplation on the Ashtavakra Gita Ch. 18, Vs. 27-38 - 1st September 2017

Come to the end of your story now. Nothing has to happen. No explosion, no spiritual fireworks, no halo, nothing. This is the meaning of that: the sage coming to a rest after being done with the endless workings of the mind. Everything will take care of itself as it has always been doing. Nobody has been individually running your life. It's a big myth; it's a fallacy. Let's do this small experiment. Bring to your attention something that you feel like you're very attached to, can't do without in life. If that something was taken away, then you might feel like you will not be able to survive or some great suffering will come which lasts for a long, long time. The strongest attachment that you can think of, bring that into your attention now. Find the one who is concerned about that. Don't worry about what the attachment is. That is more like... I could help you something if you were to delve into what the nature of the attachment is and whether it is valid or invalid, but that is a different approach.

I am the one who is concerned about what? What does that one look like? If someone says, 'I'm really concerned about not having money in my life,' find this one. Who is this one who is concerned? At what level are they? Is it the body that is so concerned about money? Is the body in itself—the sensations that we call body—does it have any sense of relationship with money, with job, with emotion, with relationships, even with freedom? Is freedom a part of the biological functioning where the body becomes thirsty? Like if the body is not given water, then you start experiencing the sensations called thirst. Freedom is not like that, although the 'thirst for freedom' we use the term. It is something else that we consider ourselves to be that is thirsting for all of this. Can we identify this one? Who is this one? And if you can't even find this one, how can the one that it is attached to have so much value? How can the attachments of this invisible man have so much value?

So what's going on? So even this play must be part of some divine magic when the unlimited one, you, have the power to consider yourself to be something with limitations, with boundaries. So is it possible for you for a few minutes to identify what you consider to be in your boundaries? What do you really consider to be 'me'? Be honest with at least your own inquiry; you don't have to expose it to the rest of the satsang. Find out for yourself: what is it that I truly still consider to be me? With no sense of judgment or guilt, bring these ideas into your own light. Who is this 'me'? What is its size, shape, color? When was it born? Where did you come from? Where are you going? You must already know that there is something beyond this body, otherwise the answers for this body are very simple. Where did the body come from? It came from the mother's womb. Where is it going? The cremation grounds, ultimately. There would be not so much confusion. Already there is a knowing that there is something that I am which is beyond this body. Who is that one?

And if you don't have an intuitive insight about it yet, allow yourself to remain in the 'I don't know.' Don't make a conclusion which is just imaginary and mental. Don't be in a rush also to use any big words like consciousness and awareness. Consciousness and awareness which are just words from the mind are completely useless. An 'I don't know' is much more useful. This is how you will go from being in a world of things into the knowingness itself. You will go from considering yourself to be an object to seeing that you are this awareness itself. Now, any idea that you found about this 'me,' find out when it came. When was this idea born? And what were you before that? And you will find that all ideas were picked up at one point or the other. Anything that you can say about yourself was not original to you. Your own limited identity has no basis in reality. This 'me' is not real; 'me' is not the truth, just an idea. You already saw that every idea can have the opposite, therefore no idea really defines the reality which is all-encompassing, which contains all opposites. You cannot define yourself using this mind. You cannot find yourself through concepts.

I'm here to remind you of this now. The mind is just selling you identity. Like Ashtavakra: 'Having had enough of the endless workings of the mind, the wise one comes to rest. Neither thinks, nor knows.' You know very well by now that appearance of thinking can still happen, so appearance of thought can still come. It is not that they just stop, even believing you neither thinks nor knows nor hears nor sees. So basically the idea of doership has fallen away. Yes, we did this exercise of not taking one step. Not taking one step because the Self, they said—the sages said—that it is at no distance from you. In fact, you are it. If you are it and the Self is at no distance from you, you don't need to move one step. Referring to your thoughts is one step. No need for that. Referring to your senses is one step. No need for them. Referring to any sensation is a step. Pain and pleasure is a step. Or is it that you naturally are? Are you contained in these phenomenal appearances, or are you something which witnesses that?

What is your greater position? All that is appearing is disappearing. Can you be an appearance? And if you are an appearance, who are you appearing to? That must be the eternal one. That must be the unborn, unchanging. Who is that? Is it not you at no distance? What is there? I think where the sages said 'Don't go to your senses,' it is because there is an aversion to the phenomenal appearance only because very quickly we latch on to the idea that 'I am something phenomenal.' But before that, what witnesses this phenomenal world? One step, as it is, is at no distance from you. What are you most naturally now? What is here which is unchanging? And many of you will have this recognition. Many of you are having this recognition, but quickly you will take on the next project: 'Okay, so I am this Self which is non-phenomenal. How do I live this?' You don't. Living goes on if it has to. As the sage has to be, life continued without him. You don't have to take on the project of trying to live an enlightened life. That is still a big idea.

The recognition that you got about the Self is very simple, very clean. In fact, it can be very super exciting. Byproducts can come or not, it's okay. The recognition that you got is non-phenomenal witnessing, very straightforward. But if, as you are coming to this recognition, you buy into the story from the mind again—'Yes, now how do I live life like this?'—again you go to a limited idea of yourself. 'How do I live life like this?' You cannot live. Life is living itself. Life is in service to the Self. It is an aspect of you; it is not the entirety of you. You are the greater beyond, stillness beyond distraction. 'The great soul thinks nothing of liberation or bondage, having seen the universe is void, even though it seems to exist. He is God.' He who stands beyond distraction, the great soul thinks nothing of liberation or bondage, having seen the universe is void, even though it seems to exist. He is God. Like the dream you had last night, it seemed to exist. Where does this world go when you go to dreamless sleep? Doesn't it seem to exist right now? Don't be concerned about these states which are coming and going. Let them come and go. Don't try to control life. Let it come into the state. Yesterday we were saying you are the owner of existence and non-existence. These are not trigger words because existence, consciousness, I Am, beingness—it's the light of this manifestation.

Though it seems to exist, he is gone. Like the dream you had last night, it seemed to exist. Where does this world go when you go to dreamless sleep? Doesn't it seem to exist right now? Don't be concerned about these states which are coming and going. Let them come and go. Don't try to control life. Let it come into the state. Yesterday we were saying you are the own existence and non-existence. These are not trigger words because existence, consciousness, I-am-beingness—it's the light of this manifestation. And here the sage is saying you are this. All these four states are contained within you. You are not contained within any of them. You go beyond them; they do not go beyond you. You aren't even stillness or distraction; even these operate in the plane. The key witness creates all things. Nothing of liberation or bondage, so don't think of yourself as bound and don't think of yourself as free. Freedom does not need a thought. Bondage needs a thought. To consider yourself limited means a thought. To be everything is natural. Everything and ultimately the more thing which witnesses everything... we are aware of our existence thoughtlessly. You know, talk to your bondage and you will just see that naturally freedom is here. You don't have to think about freedom, especially thoughts which are related to an enlightened person or a free person that you will never be. There is no such thing. Enlightenment and freedom will happen; they will not happen to you. Those are the only things that can happen to the non-existent one.

He who believes he is a person is constantly acting even when the body is at rest. The sage knows he is not a person and therefore does nothing even when the body is in motion. Beautiful. He who believes he is a person is constantly acting even when the body is at rest. The sage knows he is not a person and therefore does nothing even when the body is actually... what you're saying earlier. Then if I tell you, 'Drop all effort,' you say, 'Okay, how do I drop my all effort? I will go lie down.' You see that lying down is also doing that you're doing. You're not talking to do it. But for a sage, all this movement can continue to happen and yet he is not considering himself a limited doer of them. That's why I encourage all of you, when you speak your next words, see who is speaking them. And when you write the next thing or when you take the next step, find out who is taking it. Is the person sitting there somewhere doing it? In the presence, only consciousness is. Both light is all of this movement happening, apparent movement. So don't get this idea that the sage has come to some special kind of escape. It is a very simple thing. See, everything phenomenal is just appearing and disappearing. You witness this appearance and disappearance, and yet you are not phenomenal.

He who believes he is a person is constantly acting. What did he say yesterday, day before? Himself, everybody in the world is suffering because of their constant effort. This is what human... considering ourselves to be the doer, we are doing. Even in spirituality, a doing. Meditation, we are doing. In Sadhna, we are doing. In our satsang, find out the one who does. The mind of the liberated one is neither troubled nor pleased. It is actionless, motionless, desireless, and free of doubt. To make yourself troubled... if I said in the next ten seconds you have to find a way to trouble yourself, can you do it without going to a thought? You... what is the escape? Before that, it was not in the duality of this clue of having desire then the relief of fulfilling a desire. We stepped back from this play and see that no matter what comes and goes, the reality of what I am remains untouched. No phenomena can ever make a dent on the non-phenomenal. Nothing is going to happen in this world that is going to make a scratch on awareness. Therefore, there is nothing to fear.

The liberated one does not exert effort to meditate or act. Action and meditation just happen. Action without the actor, meditation without the meditator. That is how it actually has been always. It is only a conclusion that we keep making that there is some individual one here sitting here. Put your name over there. Individual, this one sitting here. There is no such one. We have just labeled a set of sensations, a set of appearances, and called it this name, given it this form. Reality, all of this appearance is one appearance. Action and meditation just hearing ultimate truths, the dull-witted man is bewildered. A wise man hearing truth, he retreats within and appears dull-witted. It is probably realized that by the time we come to this point in Ashtavakra Gita, we also need some human. Hearing the ultimate truth, the dull-witted man is bewildered. The wise man hearing truth retreats within and appears dull-witted.

I reported like this. I also said that after I met Mooji and I came back, I just felt like sitting for a few months. Not much outward activity seemed to move for some months. I was just kneeling with this inner insight. Then my family started to consider me a bit dull-witted. 'What's wrong with you? When you went, you went with so much enthusiasm. You just did such a big project at work and then you went over there for a bit. Why isn't it going through the eyes? Are you depressed?' So it appeared... it can appear outwardly something is wrong with you because no longer swinging to the beat of the world, coming to the drums of the regular, so-called regular life. It can be that way. But it can be many times like this and that when you come to this inner darshan of your true self, something... it takes a bit of time before it can come back into life energy, can be back to come back to this outward play with enthusiasm. In fact, it might not be wrong to say that in those one or two years, I might not have spoken as much about spirituality as I do share now every day in satsang. In the entirety of that time, I must not have spoken this much about the truth. From that, we as today get shake. That emptying out can seem like to the world, 'What's wrong with you?' See, that's why they say, 'Wait till you retire.' Isn't that in India? It's a popular thing to say. Young people shouldn't see this. It's sorry to go. Why? Because you can feel like you lose your ambition. You feel like you have no goals and it can feel like without this, how will you survive? The world runs on ambition, that's the idea, isn't it? Then you come to see the world runs on God, God running himself. All these individualistic ideas fall away and yet nobody can predict how the play will happen. It might be that one day we wake up with so much energy, life energy is cool, pulsating through your entire system.

I am saying that as many times we can have this idea... okay, like this also said that he sat for many months in his sister's house not doing anything, so that must be the way to go. There is no such template. But one thing that will really become common is that this body will start to be looked at more and more as an instrument. Consider it so much to be at war... you will not consider it definitely to be you, but it should be seen that it's a particular appearance which is now surrendered to the divine presence. Hearing the ultimate truth, the dull-witted man is bewildered. What does this mean? This means that if you try to approach all of what Ashtavakra said mentally, that's just crazy business. 'Oh my, I thought this is going to improve my life.' He's not telling one thing how to improve my life. So if we approach it in the mental way, or the maha-monitor of the mind, 'What's in it for me?' Now in the eighteen chapters and thirty-three verses, we have not found one thing for 'me'. And if you think that you have found something for 'me', then that you get squeezed out of you. Better throw it away while there is time. There is nothing here personally.

So many times it can happen that... I won't go as far as to say that they are not used to this kind of sharing and they've only known this idea of 'me' and not look beyond this 'me'. To them, Ashtavakra Gita and India actually... to them, they are not shared. So these cultures are kept in secret. We prefer our liberated ones dull-witted and not be retired. The ignorant practice meditation and no-thought. The ignorant practice meditation and no-thought. The wise man is like a man in deep sleep, doing nothing. It only takes a certain instead of years to hear this, then you open to the possibility of your true existence being beyond this body-mind. Then these words will not seem too out there. If you are very strongly attached to your object-like identity, then it will just sound like gibberish. The ignorant practice meditation and no-thought. But again, I am reinforcing: nothing against meditation or any practice. It is the meditator which is the identity, you see, which can be held on to a long time. It can be an aspect of the seeker identity itself. The play of the meditator, the practitioner, is the trouble. Any limited notion of yourself is the trouble. Never the action in itself, because moving in this world is moving in this world. It is the conclusion, the belief in your ego, which is the cause of identity, the cause of suffering.

The wise is like a man in deep sleep, doing nothing. So at one level, this is a very straightforward point, but at a deeper level, something very beautiful. As the state changed from sleep to waking, what happened to awareness? And if that is the greater of your reality, then the allowing happens on its own once we see this. And you don't pick up the 'allow' position and you come to the same... that sleep and dream and waking and whatever the states might be, they come and go, I remain untouched. Then in the play of your dynamism, when in the play of your consciousness also, it seems to play with a lot of ease. The resistance falls away. Like I told you, nothing can happen in this waking state that will ever make the tiniest scratch on awareness, which means that you cannot be hurt. There is nothing to defend. It is only identity that can be attacked. Only the defenses that you put up can be attacked. And the identity is nothing but a defense against what is. You are trying to fight your unlimited nature. You are trying to fight your God presence. You've taken your 'I am' and said that that is a person, 'me'. Well then, that 'I am' itself... 'I am' is playing as 'I have something'. Now 'I am' is reminding itself that 'I am not something, I just am'.

And so I said the other day, isn't it, that we sitting... what is this identity? It is just taking this presence and considering it something personal. What is the ego? Which is that... isn't it? You know we exist, but we just consider it to be something limited or something personal. That is called the ego. And then what are we unraveling here in satsang every day? What are we checking? You are finding that there is nothing personal in this 'I am'. I can find no boundary to it. All the boundaries that are considered for my boundaries are just found as appearances within it. Might be this insight drops the idea that 'I am something'. 'I am something' means I am playing as a limited entity. I am operating with an egoic belief. So often I've said that when the sages have said, 'Be quiet, keep quiet,' it is not so much the outer silence that they have been concerned about, although the outer silence also is a beautiful tool. But it is the absence of egoic belief. 'Be quiet' only means the same thing as 'don't take the step, don't move, don't go to your mind for an answer or a conclusion.' Just look. No effort. The looking is happening on its own. The sensations are being experienced, sounds are being heard, visuals are being seen. All of this, all of these are experiences within you, within your existence. If you did not exist, would you have this experience? It is not possible. This movement of attention, all happening within you, within yourself.

The ignorant man finds no peace. Okay, again I'm saying that this 'man' is not a gender thing. The ignorant man finds no peace either by effort or non-effort. The wise man by truth alone is still. A parent mind finds no peace either by effort or non-effort. It is all about the position, all about what we consider ourselves to be. As long as we consider ourselves to be a person, then the person is making...

When you have this experience, it is not possible. This movement of attention is all happening within the yogi, within yourself. The ignorant man finds no peace. Okay, again I'm saying that this 'man' is not a gender thing. The ignorant man finds no peace either by effort or non-effort. The wise man, by truth alone, is still. Apparently, the mind finds no peace either by effort or non-effort. It is all about the position; all about what we consider ourselves to be. As long as we consider ourselves to be a person, then the person is making lots of effort—lots of effort reading lots of books and scriptures, watching hundreds of satsangs. Or the mind, this one is considering himself a person lying in bed already. It is the consideration which is important, not the outward appearances.

So, the ignorant man finds no peace either by effort or non-effort. The wise man, by truth alone, is still. What is it? It is 'I am that I am.' The Self. Not the concept of the truth of the words in themselves, but the insight of this truth. Then, whether the sleeping is happening or satsang is happening, it doesn't make any difference what you are then. That's why I'm saying that when I started speaking again, sharing in the broadcast, I said: What do you consider your starting point to be? Have you come here as people trying to get to freedom? Why don't we investigate it right in the beginning, whether it is true that there is a person sitting there who wants his freedom? And if you were open at least to the possibility that there is no person, there is something beyond the person, then all of these satsangs would have been very enjoyable for you.

Like using a spear, the learned one actually thinks that they know. The learned one thinks they know. The wise ones know that freedom is openness; its maturity is wisdom and openness. That's why the saint said yesterday: the wise one knows that he knows nothing. And there is a big, big conditioning in the world which is against this kind of openness. It says you must know, you must form... what are you doing? You must know where your life is going. Nobody knows that! And yet this concept is very popular: you must know what you're doing, what is your plan for yourself, where are you going? And those who have this kind of conceptual knowledge, they are considered in the world as wise. The sages put it upside down. Those who are confused, the world considers them fools. Those who seem to move mentally alone, those ones will just get bewildered by what the sage is saying.

But if you don't know who you are, you don't know where your life is going, and you are open to this, because that is when you will look. Though they are by nature Self alone, pure intelligence, love, and perfection, though they transcend the universe and are clearness itself, men of the world will not see this through meditation and practice. Though they are by nature Self alone. So, there is no real difference between the appearance of a sage and a worldly man; everything is the Self alone. Yet in the outer play, it comes to light, they open differently. Though they are by nature Self alone, pure intelligence, love, and perfection, though they transcend the universe and are clearness itself.

So when I say I am taking you on a voyage on every satsang beyond the universe, it doesn't mean that you have to move. You are already beyond the universe. Why? It is the recognition of this. You are beyond time and space. This is the recognition that you are coming to in satsang. Though they transcend the universe and are clearness itself. In reality, awareness has no confusion, no doubt about anything. Men of the world will not see this through meditation and practices. As long as we continue to give meaning to this world and our appearance in it as something individualistic, try as we might, whatever effort we make, unless we drop this idea that 'I am something,' coming to this recognition will seem more and more like a struggle.

Openness is the only criteria for the recognition. Are you open to the possibility that you are not an object? Are you open to the possibility that you have no boundaries? Is it possible that you are not a thing? If you feel it is possible, if you feel it is possible that you are not something that was born and will die, if you feel that you are something beyond this body, then that much openness we can work with. But even if your spirituality, your meditation, and practice are for this identity, this body-mind, then try as you might, it can seem like that shift in perspective has become more and more difficult because everything you do reinforces that. If you're taking satsang also personally, it will be reinforcing the identity.

The ignorant man will never be liberated by his repetitious practices. Blessed is he who, by simple understanding, enters timeless freedom. You see, it is trying to... he must have seen some conditioning which is attached to practices and attached to that entity which stays alive. It must be this: for a practitioner, meditation and practice creates an identity. That's why he's coming so strongly on that and saying, 'Oh, it will be...' Sometimes jokingly he said, and maybe it was better if I told you some spiritual push-ups to do, at least you feel like you're becoming, you're developing more muscles or something like that. Because it is so direct and so effortless, beyond the concept of doing or not doing.

You think, 'Why is it done with openness?' How long does the doing of the inquiry last? Not even a moment. The doing doesn't last even a moment. 'Hey, I'm going to do the inquiry.' Say 'Who am I?' and it is seen that I remain as the witness of everything that is moving, being thought, with the body, with anything else that is appearing and disappearing, pain and pleasure. The doing is so fast you could say it seemed that there was nobody doing the inquiry. Or go in the outward way of the world, it might have seemed like... Blessed is he who, by simple understanding, enters timeless freedom.

If you read a Ramanasramam book, 'Be As You Are,' it's a unique book. And you see, you don't need to read this entire thing. You read chapter by chapter, and if you feel like it is clear to you in that chapter, that's why you stop. The first chapter is something like 'The Self for the Self' and some description about how you are the Self. No inquiry, nothing. And if it just becomes clear, 'I am the Self,' it needs some openness, the innocence of a child. When you are not the body-mind—the body-mind is just an appearance within you—you are not this world. The world exists as an appearance within you. You are not even your presence; presence and all its stories are ultimately an appearance within you. You are the one solitary witness of all there is.

If it is accepted like a small child listening to the mother's words, because it can never be that these words are really heard within you and that the insight is following. The insight is there all the time. To see this: what witnesses this world? What witnesses this universe? I do. 'I' is what it is. This awareness. Anyway, the book goes on like this. So then the next chapter is self-inquiry, the next chapter is meditation, the next chapter is mantra. Again, I don't know how it ends; I should find out. Because he desires to know God, the ignorant man can never become That. The wise man is That because he is free of desire and knows nothing.

He desires to know God; the ignorant man can never become That. And this whole small 'I'—'I want to know God, can I know, can I see Him?'—you want to know God as a visual or a concept or a form or a feeling of God, then you will not find the phenomenal God. There's no God with a capital G. You must come to the recognition that you are That. The great sage Nisargadatta Maharaj actually said, 'Everything that I went looking for, I found myself. And I'm looking for myself and I found God.' Because he desires to know God, the ignorant man can never become That. The wise man is That because he is free of desire and knows nothing.

Unable to stand steady and eager for salvation, the ignorant perpetuate the illusion of the world. Seeing the world as a source of all misery, the wise cut it off at the root. That's a good excuse, it's the last one for today. You don't have to do all this. Don't try to cut off the world from its world. Just see: what is your true position? Are you an object within this world? And the world will take care of itself. The misery-causing potential of the world will vanish once you see what you truly are. When the sage is talking about the world, cutting it off from the root, he is saying that the relationship that the 'me' has with this world, that is completely changed. It goes from the idea that 'I am something' in this world to seeing that the world is just an aspect of my being. I am the creator.

So the reality of the separation, the reality of a separate world, is cut off at the root. You see that it is not true. Always one, always within me. It is your experience even now; it might not be your interpretation. Don't feel like you have to come to some higher level of seeing. Don't feel like you will have some supernatural vision where the world becomes tiny or anything. It doesn't have to be that. Those can come. But right now, all of this, the universe which you are calling outside of you, is only an experience within you. It is how it is now. So this way we chop off the root of the identity, the false separation, the idea that 'I am something,' and the world cannot cause any misery.

What was the theme for today? You cannot do this, you cannot not do this. One cannot take a position with respect to anything at all. See what you are without taking a step. What is your most natural, what is the most original position that does not come and go? What is the witness of all things? Stop with the capital S. Thank you all so much for being in satsang today. Om Shanti Shanti Shanti. Moojiji ki Jai.