How Can You Suffer Without Identification? - 8th June 2019

Hang on to the limitedness, and maybe that is what seems so dear to us now. At least, maybe it feels like, 'At least I can hang on to my suffering.' He's saying you let go of identity, but don't hang on to anything else. So it is just like that 'let go' joke that you told us, you see? 'What should I do?' The Master says, 'Let go.' You see? 'How can I let go? What will happen to me?' And the Master says, 'Let go.' And it may seem like a joke, the last part, but with the seat of your pants, it is. Let me say, and once I just keep saying, 'Let go, let go,' all of us actually end up asking, 'Who is the anyone else out there who can help us?' Because he is definitely not helping. For your reality, life is the simplest. For your ignorance, life has too many reviews. We do plunge. We start to take care of one part, the other part starts falling apart. It starts another, then the third part starts falling apart. It's just too much for our idea of ourselves to be able to balance. But when we find what we are, then all these parts will keep playing out, but without your attachment. You're feeling true, then it will not seem like such a burden.

Dear Father, after investigation I have come to the firm, firm conclusion that I am neither the body nor the mind, but extremely subtle awareness, witness. Yet this does not mean the body-mind has got over all its problems and becomes super blissfully absorbed in the Self. It still runs after a better lifestyle, etc. It gets depressed, happy, etc. There is still time to suffer.

To conclude is the same, and this point I want to spend a few minutes on. It may seem to you that in satsang I am saying to you that you must come to a very, very solid conclusion that you are awareness. So it may seem like the purpose is to move from the idea and the person to a new idea: 'I am awareness.' But this recognition which I am speaking of, this truth that I am pointing to, cannot be captured in an idea, including the idea that 'I am awareness.' So when it is said that you are not that, it is meant to dissolve the personal idea of yourselves, but not to pick up a new conclusion. Because even like in this example, what is happening is that the minute you come to this, you try to use this conclusion: 'But I am awareness, and therefore that should mean that I am free from suffering. I should not be depressed. These things should not happen in our lives. Everything should become a certain way.' Now, whatever has so many 'shoulds' cannot be the truth. This cannot be freedom. That means freedom is not free if it has so many 'shoulds.' Then all the 'shoulds' are defining a box.

So suffering means identity, and identity can be built on even the highest notion. See what I'm suffering from in this example: 'But I see that I'm awareness, but why is this body still choosing good stuff, pleasure?' So to be empty of all positions, to not be in opposition to anything, is what I'm pointing to. And whenever it is pointed to you that you are the Self, or you are awareness, or you are God, it is so that the limited idea you have about ourselves can be negated and can be dropped. It is not so that you become certain about the new idea. The truth cannot be spoken, and therefore it cannot be captured in any idea. Every idea can be spoken; that's what we're speaking, ideas. But the truth cannot be spoken.

Now, all the suffering also there is like 'me' and 'you.' It's just ideas that we have about ourselves. We cannot say anything about the past. You cannot even say whether there is one. Time itself is just notional. Then nobody is suffering right now. So it is really when we give ourselves this history, anytime they become like this, that feels like to me is central to the story. And we feel like the 'me' used to consider itself to be 'me,' but now the 'me' considers itself to be awareness. 'Now life should become better for me.' You see? 'But why is it not helping me?' You see? So this centrality of the non-existent one has to go. We can use what is realism for our selfishness, and we can use spirituality, philosophy, you see? But true spirituality is not talking of this selfishness, which is what? What do we mean, selfishness? 'What about me?' So now that I found awareness, what should that mean for me? Now that you are finding awareness, what should that mean for you? You see? And if the answer is truly 'nothing,' then notice what the answer is: 'Oh, now that I found that I am awareness, my life should be better.' So these tricks, these two tricks did not work, and it is my job to keep pointing them out because we don't realize the tricks.

We still feel like, 'But that is—I used to be chasing materialistic things. I used to consider myself to be the body-mind, but there was so much suffering in that. But now, now I changed my direction and now I'm convinced that I'm awareness, but nothing happened. I think I'm still suffering is happening.' So who is that at the center of this? Has anything ever changed for awareness? All these plays of life and death and waking and dreaming, do they happen to awareness? So the 'who' tries to co-opt awareness into its game. So it's a strange play. If the Self is playing as if it is the ego, and as the ego wants to play as if it is finding the Self and therefore that should help the ego in something. This is what the one was talking about, and you're saying that the thief dressed up as the policeman pretending to catch the thief. So whose story is this feeling? 'I was taking myself to be a person, but now I'm taking myself to be awareness, but my life is not improving.' The story is that, is it? And it is not that we have not had the experience or the insight about ourselves. All of us have, even those not in satsang have. It is just that we are using those insights to somehow come to benefit 'me.' And that is why one of the most common questions in the world, if you asked—so if somebody asked me, 'What do you share in satsang?' and I say, 'We just look at who we are,' around the question of self-inquiry, your mind sometimes an answer comes like that. And then you say, 'Okay, so then what will they get once they find out?' I mean, the others also feel like, 'I came and do satsang for peace or joy or bliss or eternal life or something.' Now you say the truth, which is this, but I don't find any such benefit coming to me.

So the idea that the discovery of the truth is supposed to help the non-existent one is false. How can the truth help the false? You see? Ego is false, Self or God is truth. You see? Now, in the discovery of the truth, the false should be helped? For what? That's the word, 'makeover.' The mind makes us believe, you see? So it is the same cat story. The cat tried to get material things and tried to be forever happy, and then the cat tried to get the final nectar of immortality, which shows that the cat is not there. But in the finding of this immortal truth, is the cat real then? So if it doesn't remain, how can it be helped? So how is the discovery of the truth meant to help you, the non-existent one? Now, you may be hearing him coming to a conclusion that what he's saying is that once you stop caring about yourself, that is the time where you will really be helped. That he's just playing a trick on you. We're saying that you will not be helped, so that once you feel that 'I don't have to be helped,' I'll actually have—no, I am already saying truth for truth's sake, no matter what happens. And strangely enough, in the world we pretend to be like that: truth for truth's sake, no matter what the suffering that comes because of them or whatever the consequences. It's like if you had children, you see? Suppose you have teenage children like I do, and then you were suspecting that one of your children was drinking or smoking or doing drugs or something like that. Wouldn't you tell them, 'Tell me the truth, I don't care'? Even if that truth might not provide you ease, but most of them, they will tell me the truth. But this truth of your own unchanging nature, you feel like it must do something for you in a good way. As I sometimes feel, it is better if we just call it Sat-Chit. How much focus goes on Sat-Chit and how much goes on Ananda? But the Ananda which is being spoken about over there is what you are. Sat-Chit-Ananda is the same thing. Now, if you try to fit it into your idea...

Take the booze. I don't care even if that rope might not provide you ease, but most of them, they will tell me the truth. But this truth of your own changing meter, you feel like it must do something for you in a good way. As I sometimes feel, it is better if it will just call such. How much you focus goes on certain chips and how much goes on another night? But the Ananda which is being spoken about over there is what you are. Sat-Chit-Ananda is the same thing. Now, if you try to fit it into your idea of an entire joy, then it seems like it is not. But in that process, you've already obscured such phenomena and trying to benchmark it against your idea of what joy is, it is already seemingly obscure. You never really lost it.

Now, your very existence is the purest joy you will experience ever. The objective joy, like the sweetness of fruits or something like that, will come and go. It's not activity, but the joy of your very existence, our existence of that which is beyond even being and non-being. Before 'I am,' there is no greater joy because this joy is actually beyond even experience. See, I know it won't fit into our usual definition of joy. It's like, what is the point of that joy which is beyond experience? But give it the chance. That Ananda, that joy which is your very nature, if that was lost, you could not taste any other joy. What has to be there for you to experience anything?

So all experiences depend on you, but the one that you consider yourself to be is completely dependent on your experiences. The reality is that all experiences depend on you, is it? But won't you take yourself to be very dependent on your experience? You wake up in the morning and start experiencing something: 'Oh, this is nice. This is not so nice. This is very good. This should be more. This should be less. I hope it becomes like this. I hope my days don't always go like this.' You see? So dependent on the experiencing is the ego. But you are that on which experiences depend for their existence. Perception depends for its existence. Even being depends for its existence. You are.

So instead of checking what is the quality of the experience or what am I experiencing, why don't we check what is there on top of which you can have this thing that we call an experience? What is the prerequisite for an experience to happen? You are. So that which is the substratum of all experiences that seems to be forgotten. And the idea that we have that I should only have this kind of experiences, constantly be changing, or who should walk into the door, or who should walk into your house, has made us paranoid, fearful, anxious. What a life it is, constantly you're just worried about who's walking through you because every moment of our life is like that. Something is playing out, and if you start becoming worried about this thing, it will become angry, fearful. I am so sorry. There is to let go, not judge anything based on our idea of what it should be. That is surrender.

So he says, 'I don't know, they don't have been into awareness.' Yes, it's good. So let's look at this little bit then. You see that there is still suffering, but there is a condition of difference. What is it that, how is, how does that actually clear? What is suffering?

We often say there is actually no such thing as suffering itself. It is just a term that we use to define other things like guilt, pride, unworthiness, or exact remorse, regret. What do we suffer from now? In all of these, what is needed? Identification. We are not saying, 'Oh, God should not have done...' Oh, maybe sometimes we are. But we sometimes are saying, 'God should not have done that to me.' But we are not really saying always, 'One, there is one, always one, one Self, one God.' And that one should not have done this, or should not have done that. 'I wish life had gone a bit differently.' We're not speaking as the Self. So without this identification, how do you actually suffer? Even in pain, how do we suffer? By resistance to it, by saying, 'This should not be.' Is it? Is pain? Yes, it is. Pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional.

So what is the distinction being made there? The distinction only is: what is the openness with which it is accepted? So suffering is like the clenched fist. The openness is empty of resistance in which the truth of your Self is apparent. Now, how do you clench and open at the same time? How can you suffer without identification? So if you are awareness, if you are the Self, how can you feel guilty, or proud, or unworthy, or remorseful, or anxious, or fearful? All of these need for you to identify as a limited one who is subject to all of these things of the world. Of course, I am nowhere am I proposing that if you now... because there's no idea that 'I should not suffer' because you will suffer from that. I am saying that all of this has an idea at the center of it, which is the idea of 'me.' But this 'me' is not part of your inherent experience. It is not part of your life inherently. It is just a made-up thing.

If you woke up one morning and you were confident that you were a frog, then how should we help? Suppose we had a group of friends, okay? I'm very disgusting, right? And one friend, he just had this conviction suddenly that he's a frog. Then he stopped being our friend, so he went to a pond. So the other friends are now discussing it: 'If this ever happens to me, please help me. Don't let me go.' So how should you be helped if you ever fall into this misidentification as a frog? You decide. What would you want me to tell you?

He says, 'Give me one slap.'

Then that is the same way then. Let's listen. Think of some non-violent... 'You are not.' Now, all this, whatever you will get as an answer, this is what you're hearing in Satsang and everything. It's just that I take these examples so that this, you know, bit exaggerated, this was a frog. But person is more ludicrous than frog. You may say that considering yourself to be a person is less ludicrous than considering yourself to be a frog. I will tell you how it is more ludicrous. At least a frog you have seen. A person you have never seen. Who is this one? The one that owns the body? The one that has relationships? The one that has money in the bank account? The one that has judgments about the manager at work? The one that wants freedom? I have never met. And yet we consider that. So what is more ludicrous? At least frog you can say, 'Oh, that frog.' All these things you can tangibly say. Yeah, but this person, 'I'm the person who wants freedom.' Can you find such a one? Body doesn't want freedom. So who is the one that you take yourself to be? That is even less tangible than our idea of a frog. It's the most strangest, most absurd idea.

What is the one who wants freedom? You want to know. So that one that wants freedom, what does that one look like? The body? What will the body do with freedom? Ice cream, better idea for the body. This freedom thing, which is beyond time and space, what will the body do beyond time and space? That which itself is just an object in time and space. What does that atom of beyond time... it's a strange idea. And yet, humanity, because there is a very popular notion even today, they act shocked sometimes. You see that it is our organs which are manifest in the world, but our organs are part of the world. So are our organs manifesting? Our organs are also seen. So these are very strange sort of ideas, like the brain. The brain is manifesting this to the world. So the brain is separate from the world, is it? Lying in Olympus or somewhere? It is in this world. It is not material like the world is like that. So we can have these ideas, but I have to see if they're true. Admit that we don't know.

No, who wants freedom? And it's a very natural feeling, the sense that I have somebody sitting inside my head. Yeah, but then you look at it, it is just not possible. If a brain surgeon... oh, they would have found me by now. Someone found some person sitting finally: 'This is the person.' There's no such entity there. And the minute you put on a virtual reality headset, or you have a dream or something like that, which is a different head, so which head are you inside? It is because the centrality of visual perspective, as I call it, seems to center around this seeming object. That's where. Yeah, but the minute a dream starts, there's another central object and it seems like you're inside that head. Because in today's world, you don't even need to have a dream. You can put on a headset and get transported into a different world and you check on your body or in these new environments, check on a meter how different it is. So which head are you inside? And as what? If you are something inside a head, what could we be? Awareness inside a process.

So it is these sensations and these perceptions which seem to create this illusion or delusion of limitedness, of our location or duration. But we are beyond this. So this too, maybe belabor this example a bit more because it is quite probably sitting in humanity, we had this sort of idea. So what is our experience of life? There's a beautiful actually teacher, I forget his name, who had this experiment called 'On Having No Head.' And it was not an intellectual experiment. He just really spontaneously said, 'You have no head right now.' At best, you have a little bit of a nose which you can experience, and all there is is this gaze. And that is what your experience is like. More like it is not as if you are something which is contained inside a head and you'll be surrounded by the head stuff. It's not like that. Your experience of yourself is mostly spacious.

So he said you have no head right now. It is your space. You can't think about it. And that is their experience. What they experience here, unless you put this sensation, then it feels like, okay, it is something solid. Yeah, but otherwise you're experiencing space. The sensation called ache around it, huh? If there is a sensation called ache around the head, that's when a sensation that we label... doesn't mean, 'Yes, headache.' Called headache, nausea, makes it seem like it gives more tangibility to that object. But you investigate that. Do you find yourself to be something that is contained within these sensations, or do you find that these sensations are contained within you? So the sensation of the head and they are both... if there is a headache or something, so the rules continue, then that would mean that that sensational boundary then becomes your boundary. That means you are on one side of the sensation and out on that second. But observe your experience. You will see that the sensation is completely felt within you and it does not bind everything, but more or less the side of that.

So, and it can seem like it is easier to do with eyes closed, but actually that's just a basic idea again that you've built up. How am I? I'm all in this and this, then in the space in the middle, I don't see it. How am I contained more inside this thing and this thing than the space in the middle? These are just ideas that we've learned. I see that these sensations are experienced within my space, within my being. So is this space also experienced within my being? So how is it that this is more me than this space, or that camera, or that body in front? I don't see what makes the defining characteristics, what makes the separating line between me and the other.

We know this story holds true. Being in India, one disciple, he was with the master for three years, doing very well. He was with the master, but then something happened, then he had to get back into the world. And the master gave him his blessing and said, 'Okay, okay, you have some things to do in the world. You do that and then you come back.' So he goes into the world, and these are the olden times. And this man, he was out of the ashram many, many years, didn't come back. So once the master was wondering what happened to this boy. He was supposed to come back after some time. But you know what happened? My bishop. So this master then goes looking for this man in the world. But he doesn't want to disturb that man's life. He's like, 'Okay, please settle.' And he doesn't really want this. 'Let me not. I'm just going to go see how he's doing,' you see. So he was in her designs like a beggar, he...

In the olden times, there was this man who was out of the ashram for many years and didn't come back. So once the master was wondering what happened to this boy; he was supposed to come back after some time. But you know what happened? He became a minister. So this master then goes looking for this man in the world. But he doesn't want to disturb that man's life. He's like, 'Okay, he is settled.' He doesn't really want this, let me not... 'I'm just going to go see how he's doing,' you see. So he was in disguise like a beggar. He goes like a hunchback there. And then he goes to the village. When he goes to the village, he sees that at the same time that he sees this man, the king is also going in his procession. And the king is riding an elephant.

So the Guru then goes to this man and says, 'So what is happening here?' And this man is irritated. He's like, 'But can't you see the king is having the procession?' 'Sir, which one is the king?' 'Oh, you stupid man, you have no idea? What do you think? The one on top is the king and the one below is the elephant.' So this Guru says, 'So what is top and what is bottom?' This man, who was the minister, was very irritated. He's upset. So he actually climbed on top of the beggar, the Guru, in this way and says, 'Now you see? I am on top and you are on the bottom.' The Guru says, 'Oh, thank you, sir. Thank you. It's much clearer to me. But just one question is left now: Which one is I and which one is you?' And in that moment, that minister realized that this is nobody but his master. And then he gets down on his knees, begs forgiveness, and he gets back on track.

So you might have all these notions of up and down and all these material ideas about the world, but what separates 'I' and 'you'? What defines your circle, the separating line? Again, I keep saying almost every day now that if you truly, truly consider yourself to be just the body, then what are you doing here? Even to say that 'I want to be rid of my identification as the body' is already to be rid of it. Then you're no longer considering yourself to be the body. You're not saying the body has to be rid of identification with the body. If you say, 'I want to be rid of my identification with the body,' finish—you are no longer considering yourself that. But this new one that you consider yourself to be is withdrawn. If it was apparent to you that you are the body, then you would not even call it an identification. The instant where you say 'I want to be rid of body identification,' you've already taken yourself to be something other than the body.

Father, do you mean that if suffering occurs to the body-mind...?

No. So let me elaborate. Suffering is not happening. Suffering is based on our interpretation of the perception. So we can say for a moment that perception is happening. Okay, let's take this classic example, right? So you might experience for a moment what we call anger. And we may even say that anger can come without identification, you see. But how does anger become resentment? Resentment is the substrate in the arising of this perception that we label. And provisionally, is there resentment inherent in that? No. So the arising of these perceptions mixed with our identity, our notions about what they are and what should and should not be, that is what is called suffering.

So suffering is never happening to the body-mind. Maybe we have other experiences that are really... I mean, a lot of this is originally what we are talking about could be happening. But all this that we call suffering—like we said: guilt, pride, remorse, unworthiness, apprehension, resentment—all of these, and the idea that 'I am the body-mind' mixed into that, they are never actually happening to the body. So this is the critical distinction between pain and suffering. That is why it is said that pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional, you see. If suffering was inherent in the pain itself, you wouldn't even need to have two terms for it. So the arising of the sensations in themselves is not suffering. The resistance, or the resistance seeming like its opposite—that this should just come and stay, you see—our attachment or our pushing things away is what is called suffering.

Another one says: In me, I get a strong feeling that if I am in an ashram, always in satsang, that is a conducive atmosphere, then I will easily be established in the Self. I know this is just an idea. Kindly blast this, sitting at your feet.

Yes, happy to blast this one. It is not necessarily so. In India, we have seen so many, so many ashrams where things seem to become about everything else except being yourself. It seems to become about a lot of other things. It is not really about the physical circumstances, the material phenomenal experiences. Wherever you are, whatever the condition of your body, maybe it is the most conducive atmosphere for this recognition. God is not messing up your recipe. He's cooking you perfectly fine. So you don't have to renounce, you don't have to leave that thing. It has to be this: renounce your next thought. And not that, not by picking up a new thought, 'No more thoughts.' If a thought is there now, it's like a button—let it come and go. Renounce everything in your openness. Renounce your mind in your openness, not in the resistance. And it's only renunciation that is needed.

Where do you have to go to find yourself? Where do you lose yourself? Who is the one that loses themselves? And if you lose that one who loses themselves, you do not lose yourself. But if you try and make an experience out of yourself, then it will be another coming and going. If you make an experience out of the truth, then it seems like sometimes it's caught and sometimes it goes. Like, 'I just want to be with the truth,' you see. So how will you be with the truth? If it means an experience out of it, what value is that truth which comes and goes?

Ah, come on. I'm not... I can't let something... Me? Apologize? No. Yeah, because you've explained it. It sent me inside the same patient the other way. And as I listened to the first thought, the king was like, 'Oh, I sent it.' And it's like, it's almost like if I get it out and have it say... but also you're just allowing them to come and go. Why it or not? Yes, by now. Then why are you picking on these? I appreciate that peace, little business, but I didn't mean... yeah, and apart...

So this positionlessness is like a bit uncomfortable at times. Today, like this, like this, like this. All of them, I do all of them. 'I should just be the witness.' No, no, not even that. 'Then I should just be.' No, no, not even that. But then what are you saying? Nothing. If he gives us very... makes it very empty. Because all these tactics, they only work temporarily. You might have an idea that 'I have to just be.' When did you first hear 'just be'? Or a simpler example is: When did you first hear about the Power of Now? At least 10 years ago, or even 5 years ago. So how's it going from then? You realized, you discovered a secret that in the now there is no trouble, there is no suffering possible in the now. And then so what happens? What happens is that our intention or our position, even to try and be in the now, just gets in the way of now.

In the same way, when we hear 'just be,' then we try to. And the 'try to' then becomes the new position. So satsang is more immediate. It's more before you can decide it's already this way or that way. Before you can take a call, empty of our positions, empty of our judgments, the Self is apparent. So don't worry about the right way to be here, or how to be. All this activity, whatever it is, exists as long as you are not taking any position to suggest how to, how to try to not try to be, or how to try to not try to just be. Oh yeah, that. 'Okay, just be' also won't work. To try and be in the now also won't work. So then do we pick up a new trying, that 'Now I should be empty'? Or even this: you get a rest, but it's empty of all our trying or not trying.

And so, little Bhagavan, what about me? Oh yeah, okay. Erases. Thank you for allowing me to listen to you where there are no words. Thank you for allowing me to love you with no 'you' and 'I'. Thank you, Father, for dissolving this frog. Your presence in satsang is just pure love and gratitude. Thank you.

Next one says: Father, the 'me' is found to be only a collection of ideas. Sometimes it feels very zero and imposing too. Yes, but that time is never now. Though sometimes we do now, so maybe they just imagined, my Father. So much good. That which is not now, what strength does that have? That which is not ever now, right now? So what is that? Not only is it a collection of ideas, but the idea that it is imposing is also an idea. Like the idea that 'My mind is too strong' or 'It can be very strong itself.' This is an idea. Maybe it is the weakest mind that you have, but the only bullet it has left stored up is to say, 'My mind is very strong.' You don't know how to measure. So come more and more into your innocence. And innocence means not being attached to what we think we know.

Anything else? Let us work. Going... any... next sentence: 'Tormented more by the idea of fear rather than the occasions.' Yes, the idea of fear is to see how much it's not experienced, you know. It ends here. So not looking forward to something happening, and we spend weeks worrying about that, but when it happens, it's fine. Resistance. So this torment of the apprehension, things are empty of... 'It should not be that way, I hope it is not that way.' It really is much... the actual perception of anything there is really not... which no perception in itself can hurt you in any way. What does the perception have to be for it to hurt the reality of you? The biggest fire, if it is burnt in this world, can it touch the reality of you? What has to happen in the realm of perception for you to be apparent?

So like that creature in the yoga vasistha which is just problem itself by its own motions, by its own ideas. The thousand hands of this creature are nothing but its own ideas about itself. So who is this creature? It is representing us in our human existence. We are only hurting ourselves with our concepts of what should be and what should not be, what is better, what is worse. If you are not trying at all to be in any better state, and not worried about coming into any worse state... I would like not trying to come into any better state or worried about anything worse. How is that possible? What could you do with the mind? The mind also is always with the claim that 'I am going to make life better' or at least 'prevent it from getting worse.' If you no longer had that trouble... the mind says, 'Oh, just do this spiritual practice for 55 days and you will become a much better spiritual seeker.' But it's the idea of 'better' itself or not there? Because what is, just is. Then the attachment to this idea of who I am... again, I am emphasizing that I am not speaking about us not doing a spiritual practice or something. I am saying that the idea can come and go, but whatever activity has to unfold will unfold, but without a tremendous play of life things. Thank you all so much for being in this satsang. Mooji Baba Ki Jai. Guru Kripa Ki Jai.