Nobody Is Confused Unless They Start Using the Head - 15th January 2020

This is the crux of Vedanta, but just a conceptual understanding of 'Aham Brahmasmi' doesn't mean anything at all. In fact, maybe it's better to believe—if it is a question of beliefs—then maybe it's better to believe that I am a person than believe I am the One. Just believe. So it's not going to be a product of your belief system because in every term there is a limitation. Every term is a definition and therefore limiting. To define is to limit. So if this is the wrong way—waiting for some phenomenal change, waiting for some deep intellectual understanding—then what is the right way?

So there is—let's call it a place provisionally, it's not really a place—there is a place within you where all that is to be known, including your own Self, is already known. It is already known. So spirituality is coming to the recognition or the discovery of this place. And this is what we call intuitive knowledge, or self-knowledge, or Atma Gyan. And I will point you to that place. How do you know that you are aware? Do you perceive this awareness? Is it phenomenal? Is it just a concept that you heard in satsang, that's why you're claiming it?

Like, how do you know the world is round? Let's compare the two questions. How do you know the world is round? It's very simple. We have seen perceptual evidence, we've seen photographs, and we have been told by credible sources. So that's why if somebody says, 'What is the shape of the earth?' you say it's a sphere or it's round. Now, are you aware? Are you aware now? Now, the basis for this 'yes' is different than the basis for the 'yes' that came for 'the world is round.' What is the basis for this 'yes'? Am I to not see this awareness? And it is not just a conceptual answer. Everybody has this. And that hurts some spiritual seekers who just feel like, 'I've been at this fifty years and this boy or girl just came to satsang and says so?' It can hurt a specialist somewhere, but it is like that. We can't help it. Self-knowledge is universal.

So there where you know—but the term 'know' is used in a different way—that you are aware, that is your intuitive knowledge. Now, who's confused about this? Because I'm happy to repeat this a hundred times, because this is the crux of what I'm saying. If you're still climbing the wrong tree, then no point, we'll keep climbing it for a lifetime maybe. So I want to get you off that tree. Like the metaphor I was using yesterday, it was like God is sitting in your living room but we are digging a tunnel to find God. So try to make God an object of a phenomenal perception or an object of high intellectual understanding—that is the fallacy. And then you will say, 'What is the right way?' It could be actually to let go of the wrong way is the right way. That is more than enough.

But because we're still in our minds a bit, that's why we have to point further. And I can point with a very potent pointer: Are you aware now? Now, when you say 'yes' and I say, 'What is the basis for this yes?' if you go to your mind, you will only say, 'I don't know,' if you're being honest. If you're being honest, you will say, 'I don't know.' What you're actually saying is, 'I don't know in my head. I don't know in my head, but I know somewhere.' That's why I'm saying yes. I'm not saying no. Is there a football in my hand? You say no. If you don't perceive something, you say no. Here, you don't perceive awareness and yet you say yes. It's a strange thing. That's why it can seem real. This is called the intuitive insight.

Is it because you perceive me?

Yes. Okay, I hadn't got that question, but it's good to hear that again. So, I am sitting on the couch. So you know couch and you know sitting, isn't it? Because you can distinguish between standing, sitting, lying down. Now, I am aware of perception. I know we're saying that it is because just of the perception we are not able to confirm awareness. It's a bit tricky for the intellect to handle. We can go very slowly. We are saying, 'I'm aware of my perception.' See, we are not saying, 'I am smelling my perception, I am tasting my perception, I am using my perception.' If I say, what you mean when you say 'I am aware of my perception' is that you are smelling your perception, are you with me? I can go very slowly.

If I were to say that what is actually happening for you when you say 'I am aware of my perception' is you are just smelling your perception, would that sound true to you? Because you are able to distinguish the quality of smell versus the quality-lessness of awareness. Is it able to clarify? It's not smelling. It is empty of that quality. But because it is strange business, because you are not able to perceive it phenomenally, you are feeling that you're just presuming it is awareness. Is that what you say? That the perception is happening, I am presuming that I'm aware?

The same with the presence.

Yes, you are aware of your presence. You are aware of your being, you see. So I use my lingo. Are you? Is it an object of sight? So how are you able to make this so clear? No, you just know, you see. And that 'just know' for the mind sounds like, 'I don't actually know. I don't actually know, I am just inferring.' But you actually just know, you see. Therefore, to the mind, this intuitive understanding seems baseless. What you are saying is baseless. And actually, it is baseless. It is baseless. But that baselessness, to make it sound nice, we call it intuition. We just know. That doesn't sound so clear, so we have to say it is intuitive understanding. Because that's how it is, at least I have something. So we can reconstruct all these tricks of spirituality also while we're at it.

So there is only your Self, which you just know like this. Is there anything which you just know like that? You know, baseless? You say yes, in spite of not seeing it, in spite of being empty of concepts about it, you still say yes. What is the color of the cat on the couch? No cat on the couch. Yeah, because you're denying its existence because it is not perceived. Here, you are certain of the existence, or that which is prior to existence, of awareness without perceiving it. And how do you know that? You just do. Now let me take it one step further if at all possible.

You are perceiving this hand. So are you aware of this perception? Are you aware of this perception of the hand? Yes. How do you know that it is you that is aware? Did you see such a 'you'? And yet you're clearly—'I am perceiving it.' See, even if your Master comes and tells you, 'You are not perceiving it,' you may just be like, 'What's going on with him? He needs to get some sleep.' It is so clear that it is I which is first aware of my perception. So how do you know that, again, without basis? You just do. So that is intuitive. So everybody has this self-knowledge.

So this 'awareness is I' is very, very clear to everyone. Nobody is confused unless you start using your head. It is clear. Now there is only one problem. It will be pure if you have left yourself independent of perception, if you have left yourself independent of conceptual understanding, and you're coming to the simple insight which everybody has. Then only one problem will trip you up, which is: 'What is in it for me? How does that help me? My three years, are we there yet?' But there is no deal like that. The discovery of this simple truth is not meant to help the false reality. It is not meant to help the emotion.

Shankara says very beautifully in the commentary of the Bhagavad Gita: Self-knowledge, Atma Gyan, is the only way to be free from this cycle of suffering, this cycle of birth and death. And it has only one prerequisite. One prerequisite is the non-attachment to actions and their fruits. And it's so strange, all of us notice this, but we keep applying it to a spiritual action as well. We keep applying it to spiritual insight as well. 'Now that I know myself, am I free? What happened for me?' But you just discovered that you are not this body-mind, that you are that pure awareness which is not perceivable and yet from which all that is perceivable arises on its own screen of existence, of being. This is your discovery. And yet, because of the deeply conditioned selfishness, we want this to mean something for one particular body-mind. And the moment we get into that trap, we're back into our limited frame of reference of the first person.

So independent of perception, independent of conceptual understanding, you have a deep intuitive insight into the nature of yourself, which is completely clear. If you leave it unburdened with any expectation, that is called freedom. Now the mind will come with two cards. Number one: 'It can't be that simple. It can't be that simple. What are those yogis doing in the caves for thousands of years?' He is using everybody. 'Hurry up and finish, finish, finish. It can't be...'

Way back into our limited frame of reference of first-person, independent of perception, independent of conceptual understanding, you have a deep intuitive insight into the nature of yourself which is completely clear. If you leave it unburdened with any expectation, that is called freedom. Now the mind often comes with cards. Number one: 'It can't be that simple. It can't be that simple. What are those Yogis doing in the caves for forty years?' He is using everybody. 'Hurry up and finish, finish, finish. I can't get it.' No, it works in a tone: 'How can I confirm this?' It played that card, but you didn't control me so simply. But it fundamentally boils down to: what did we expect out of this? Or what do we expect out of this? What do we expect it to mean for me? It doesn't mean anything. In fact, it is the meaning-making that gets us in trouble. We have a meaning-making machine called the mind, and that is making meaning out of that which is beyond meaning and meaninglessness.

And in the mind, it has these opposites. If I say it doesn't have meaning, 'Oh, that means it is meaningless,' you see? But that is also meaning-making. So we're not in that boundary at all. What we are speaking of is neither meaningful nor meaningless. Neither meaning is true; it just is. So what happens when we buy into the interpretation from the mind? This version of reality, which it whispers to us, to consciousness itself, and consciousness gives it its assent and says, 'This is how it is,' you see? Not only does it make a shape of the world, it makes the shape of you. And once you take a shape, you will be shaken. That is called suffering. You cannot be shaken without a shape, and all shapes are just ghostly meanings, interpretations of the mind.

See, he's already looking a bit shaken. It means some shape has been taken. Some shape is taken. How will you shake this space? Your job is to shake the space in this room. It's not possible. So you cannot buy the presumption of your suffering unless first you buy the idea of your shape. But what you're discovering is empty or full. Formless is a very timid word compared to what you are discovering. That's why I'm saying that the only solution to this problem is to see that there never really is a problem. Otherwise, we start to believe that the problem is real, you see? Then you give a shape out of yourself and you try to solve it at that level. It just cannot work. You will never be able to fill your perception with truth and fill your intellect with truth. Those are the only tools. What else is a spiritual seeker struggling with? Only this: 'I had an experience of that. That was it. I want that again.' But that which comes and goes is not real. 'Yeah, I know, but still...' That is just attachment. It is desire, spiritual materialism. If something is coming and going, how can it be that? At best, it is the byproduct. It is Prasad of the darshan. So don't confuse the Prasad with the darshan.

Most spiritual seekers are doing this: interpreting the Prasad to be the darshan and the darshan to be Prasad, or the darshan just as a way to get to the Prasad. That is what I call spiritual materialism, spiritual selfishness, because it is phenomenal. It is phenomenon. So byproducts are always phenomenal. So until we come to a point where this just becomes about the truth for truth's sake and nothing else, although the insight will always be there for you, always available, you will still not feel free because you will try to match it against the benchmark which is phenomenal and say, 'How do I have this yet?'

So a tip I have for you is the minute you notice complexity, be certain there it is: the mind. Because the truth, the truth is always, always, always super simple. If you're trying to solve something, you're climbing the wrong tree. If you try to resolve something, if you're trying to see something, if you are trying to have the final experience, it's all nonsense. So this unperceivable Himself as He is, knowingness itself, is knowledge itself, but not the one that we got used to—not the conceptual or perceptual knowledge. It's just simple self-knowledge. It means no prerequisites. It means no Sadhna. You could be deeply identified—okay, this is not a license—deeply identified for a million lifetimes, but in this moment you could come to this insight and you could be free. You could be a very advanced adhikari, all yoga practices and everything for four thousand lifetimes we generated, and still you are so attached to climbing the wrong tree that you may not hear this simplicity. Not against anything, I'm just saying that this is just so simple that it is independent of all of them. Phenomenal things can have phenomenal effects, and phenomenal effects, as long as we want them, they are fine. But don't confuse them with your reality.

And again, I'm saying that what I'm saying is not necessarily a bed of roses because many are attached to this, and it is not fun to hear that what you've been trying to accomplish is just so. Because the mind will say, 'But so far, so many years, you can't get us to pretend.' It'll try to poke your ego and it will poke your specialness and everything. So another card the ego has is to say, 'But there must be something more. Where are the bells and whistles? Where are my siddhis?' I mean, there used to be another confusion coming up when I say 'I.' I know that they're going to say, 'Yes, I,' and traditionally, 'Yes, yes.' This is the struggle because we have used it. I think we have had a confusion between cats and dogs, for example.

Suppose English is not your natural language and we learned it, but the one who taught you the language, they were just messing with you. They told you that cats were dogs and dogs were cats. So every time a cat went by, you said, 'Dog, dog,' and everybody just laughs. Everybody knew the joke that your friends had. Now suddenly you realize that no, actually cats are cats and dogs are dogs. It's the point before you. It's the opposite of what you thought dogs were. So the same thing is happening because we have used 'I' personally for so long, you see? This 'I' which remains after all the neti-neti, after all the 'not this, not this.' It is 'I' removes 'I' and in the meantime... the Lacan said 'I' removes 'I' and yet in the meantime, but this to call it 'I' seems a bit strange because we've been using that for this person, using it for the ego. So you can feel like now to call a cat a cat can seem a bit strange because we've been calling it a dog for so long. So the same problem will happen, but it is undeniable. It is you. You are aware of your perception. It is you. It is not something that Guruji is telling you. Guruji is telling you you are perceiving the hand; it's not coming from somewhere else. You are aware of this perception. So this 'you' that is aware of your perception, it is you.

So you don't have to speak so much about it, you see? You know, if it is uncomfortable to say 'I,' we know this is not usual conversation. And you don't even have to work at fixing the 'I' in the right place now, you see? It's just more organic. It's more simple in that naturally it will come to some comfort about it. So don't use the term. It's just a word. Maybe the word 'I' is just a term for silence. It is not really 'I.' The term has been burdened with misunderstanding, and that's why to use it for right understanding can seem a bit strange. So let me see if we can clarify a bit. So this part about 'no I' means that you are not making any reference to yourself—not as person, not as being, not as remaining. Any reference you make to yourself is mental and therefore it is the I-thought. The I-thought is just a thought. Firstly, there's a lot of mystical ideas about this I-thought because they say that you have to lose the I-thought and then you're free, you see? But it's just a thought. It's an I-thought, and all thoughts are just thoughts.

What is the thought? It is the proposal. It is a proposal that something is that we see. And when we say it is just a thought and we notice that that proposal is not really clarifying reality... you see, I know that you are not used to this expression, so the word means you know, a bit confusing. A thought is just proposing something to you, saying that this is how it is. To accept that version of reality is to believe that, or to accept that this is how it is is to believe that thought. But it is never how the thought is proposing. That's why in spirituality, especially Gyana yoga, you see, it is just a thought. Now any reference that you make to 'I' in any way is just a comment. Even if you say 'I am Brahman,' it is just a comment. So lose all references. In fact, you don't even have to lose; you lost it. You lost it. So don't buy into any reference to what you are, and then you are truly Brahman. See, that is to lose the I-thought.

So if you want to look at the falsity of the proposition from the mind, even phenomenally right now we can check. If I ask each of you, you will have a different understanding as to what's happening in this room. One will say there are just twenty-five, thirty people listening to something. One will say, 'Oh, there's so much bliss today, please Father.' One will say, 'Since I've come, my mind has been so...' We started the truth. Every one of you will have a different notion. Which is the truth? At best you can say it is a photocopy of actual, and that too very bad ones. So no thought really represents reality. Forget reality; it does not even represent phenomena well. So any reference you make to yourself—'I am this' or 'I am that'—is false. Is it possible to be without reference? Yes, you start like that. Yes, forget it. Forget the distinction between practical and spiritual because nobody's intelligent enough to make this distinction.

So now at the root of the problem, what is it then? That is further good news I have for you because in life, in this understanding, there are just three main problems, isn't it? What is actually true, you see? What actually is, which includes 'Who am I?' What is true? Second is: what is knowing, and can something actually be known? What is true knowing, and can something actually be known? That is the second problem. And the third problem is: if I exist and I know of my existence, then how do I live? This is the third problem: how do I live? So we try to make this box between practical and spiritual and try to distinguish: for what can I use the mind and for what can I not use the mind? So the good news I have for you is in that again, probe is merely calling place where you know who you are. There, there is no confusion about how to live either. From that deep intelligence, the life is living itself. All the rest that we think on top of that is just the delusion. It is not true.

This that is beating your heart, you see, that is making your blood flow... this what I've been asking: if you could pick between that intelligence, which is very intelligent, beating your heart at a very constant rate, you see, which has very intelligently attracted two objects of mass with a gravitational constant which is decided in a way, decided the speed of light, very beautiful constant, you see? So that intelligence which is doing all of this is making the flowers flower and making the trees grow. It has no trouble with leading this life, and that is the one that is leading it anyway. So if you had to pick between that one and what you think you know in your head, what would you pick? Now most people believe that it's not a question, of course, of picking between one or two. Maybe nobody will let their heart stop beating while they do what they do with their knowledge. So nobody is going to pick option two. But if you let that intelligence, which is naturally you, play now, you see, it needs to be helped by the mind? It needs this help from this mind? Otherwise, it is just going to make a mess? But it's not. It's not limited. It's supremely intelligent. It's supremely intelligent, but you cannot bottle it up in your mind. Yeah, and that's why it's called mysterious. It's not really actually mysterious. It's very apparent what it is doing, you see? I don't know how to speak these words, and yet they can be spoken. In my mind, I believed...

Naturally you play now. You see, that needs to be helped by the mind; it needs this help from this mind, otherwise it is going to make a mess. But it's not limited. It's supremely intelligent. It's supremely intelligent, but you cannot bottle it up in your mind. Yeah, and that's why it's called mysterious. It's not really actually mysterious; it's very apparent what it is doing. You see, I don't know how to speak these words, and yet they can be spoken. In my mind, I believed when I was younger that I am speaking them personally, you see? Now that illusion is gone. There was also this presumption that I am on this side of speaking and you are on that side of speaking. Now that presumption is gone. I am nodding my head, I am speaking these words here; I can't make any boundary. So, conversation, of course, I can exit this corner with memory.

So this intelligence which is running this universe, it is very, very much the basis for the egoic presumption that it needs to be able to play some sort of conceptual understanding. And the evidence of its beauty is all around us. I was seeing a documentary the other day and it says the tree knows on which part of the branch the fruit is forming, so the fruit only comes to that particular weight that the plant can handle. How does the tree know? Is it sitting and thinking, 'Okay, these many millimeters, this is kgs'? It doesn't have any of that. Then the other example I've been taking is that on a Netflix documentary, Our Planet, in that it said that birds can fly 150 kilometers away. In a desert, what happened? Suddenly it rained sporadically, unexpectedly. So birds from 150 kilometers away, they flew to the rain because they got some sort of signal. What is that signal? Do they have some radar? So what is that intelligence which led them to the water? What makes the flowers so beautiful? And you mean, what is making the millions of processes in your body function right now? What is making this body able to sit on the couch with a certain gravitational pull? What is making the electrons move? All around us, we are surrounded by these miracles.

But we think, 'No, I have to... the non-existent one has to think something and then something will happen.' You don't know how to move a finger. The mind doesn't know how to move a finger. Do you know how to move things? I don't know. You might have some crazy ideas about neurons having to fire, then the nerves get activated and the finger moves. But who knows how to fire a neuron? This is just such a fallacy that if people were to look at our own ego involved in this fallacy, we would treat it as a ridiculous way. Nobody knows how to move a finger. Do you think we are in control in this life? So I am completely becoming against that idea that human birth is the most evolved and you come to the most evolved quality. I feel like it's the silliest birth, it's like the most foolish, you know? Because birds are not confused. They are just... they are not contemplating, 'Who is doing this?' Look at that. The mind frames a stupid question, you see, and we get caught up in that reference. In either way, we are stuck as 'me', you see.

Do I have free will or is it all God's will? Making the supreme separation. Whatever answer you come to, you made yourself separate. 'Do I have free will? No, it's all God's will.' The mind loves these questions. So many spiritual seekers ask this question. 'Because if I do it, it wins. No, I am just a chair which God is moving around. I have no free will.' He is separate. 'Oh, I have some freedom, you see. God does 90 percent, I have some.' Still, I am something there. 'There is no God's will, all this is my will.' Still, I am separate. So it's win-win-win for the mind. Now the question that I would propose is that if there was free will, who would it belong to? We have now made this 'me'. So this is the one-two punch of the mind. First, it frames a question for you, even in the garb of contemplation. Inherent in that, it is winning either way. And I have to tell you that most personal questions are like that. What we are thinking about is not leading to this discovery. And that's why I've been saying that the Master is playing football while we are playing volleyball, and we think that finally, this is the end of confusion. In a way, it depends on whether you are tired. If you are tired of using your mind, your intellect, and coming to false conclusions, this is very simple. But if you still feel like, 'I have invested so much in this and finally we will come to something viable or meaningful in my head,' then it takes some more time, no? Whether tiredness is just a provisional... it could be anything. Just be done with it in some way. And that is where the mind-lifting... anyhow, that is where those Zen koans are so helpful.

They're so helpful because if you are not yet tired, then you will make... you will get the juice out of it. And all the answers are nonsense. I hear about this Korean Zen. One form of Korean Zen is where you sit in front of a white wall and you just ask, 'What is this? What is this?' No explanation is given as to what 'this' we are talking about. You let go of meaning-making and the presumption that what you have in your head is a true representation of what is. And as you let go of that, the place where it is already apparent becomes clear to you. Because inherent in that question, 'What does it all mean?' is the unstated notion, 'What does it all mean for me?' And that is again a spiritual question wrongly framed to get you trapped in the 'me'. And it's strange because there's hardly any other aspect in this world which is as strange as spirituality, right? What is the question we are asking? Once I see that there is no 'me', what's in it for me? Of course, the mind will say, 'What will happen?' or something, you see. What we actually want to know is what's in it for me. Once I see there is no 'me', what's in it for me? That is the most absurd of things. 'I saw that there is no me, and then I really am the doer.' But you, who is not the doer? Who is the one who is not the doer? It's such a popular notion in spirituality: 'I am not the doer.' Who's the 'I' that is not the doer? If there's no 'me', then who's not the doer?

That's it. Like, yeah, you know, when I just kind of drop into that space, it's really like everything's a mystery. Yes, even just like the experience of the body, for example. Yeah, it's like, how can I be that which all this is appearing to, and at the same time, people look at this thing and it's like, what's going on?

So again, you see, when we start to refer to this deeper insight, then... so this is the conundrum. Those who refer to this deeper insight, those are they who are called sages. And it is said that the sage knows everything, knows everything. So here, everything is already known. Everything is already known. But when we try to translate that into what is actually known in our head, it sounds mysterious. So we can call it a great mystery, the greatest mystery, or you can call it the all-knowing. And strangely, both are true because we are speaking of different levels. From the level of the head, it just seems like such a beautiful mystery, you see? How is all this happening? Who is speaking these words? How does everything have a certain mystery? But in my intuition, I'm not confused or I'm not mystified. But in words, it is thought of as a representation of it as a mystery, and yet it is so all-known.

Yeah, it's just... yeah, it's true. And it's like just that all-knowing is basically what the ego wants.

Oh yes, oh yes, yes. The ego is not happy because the experience... what the ego wants is... I've been making this joke. Someone going to a Bhagavan and saying, 'Bhagavan, what is the capital of Timbuktu?' And he says, 'One second.' So like that, the ego feels like this is what it wants, you know? 'The one who knows must be able to tell me what I had for breakfast yesterday.' The all-knowing means like it's like Google, you see? Or in my vintage, Encyclopedia Britannica or something like that, where you just like be able to refer to any conceptual knowledge about everything. It should be an ability. But that is not all-knowing at all. In fact, the Masters say, 'I know nothing,' and yet all they know is the Self. It's all... to the mind, all of this is very crazy stuff. So that's why it sounds so strange. Spirituality sounds so full of contradictions to the seeker because sometimes it is said the Master knows nothing. You could ask anything and he says, 'I know nothing.' But it is also said the Master is all-knowing, he knows everything. So does he know everything or does he know nothing? It's all level confusion. But to put it simply, whatever we think freedom should be like, freedom is broader than that. It cannot be captured in that destination.

Even questioning the 'what' and 'how' is entertaining. Many times it can feel like I'm getting something true as an answer, but I am very, very clear about this: I am not speaking anything that is true. So don't fit it into your conceptual framework and say, 'Yeah, these are the answers.' Now please, it will come down like a house of cards. And the only purpose, if there is a project, the only project is to empty you of your answers. So it's only for a dissolutive effect; it will not create.

And you say about the sage, yeah, for some reason the word that just comes in my body is like intimacy. Intimacy.

But real intimacy. Because when you say 'knows everything', maybe there's just some shadow of an ego, like, 'Yes, they have something like secret knowledge.' Well, actually, when you say 'knows everything', it's not just that they know themselves. It's like what we spoke about: how does the tree grow? How do the flowers bloom? This is what the sages see themselves as: their supreme intelligence. In a way, we can describe this as the way of truth, this is the way of life. There's no difference between the way of God and the way of life. So to come to the truth is to not be confused about any of these three aspects: what is real, what can be known and what is true knowing, and how to live or how to exist. It is the end of confusion about this. And the end of intellectual confusion. There is like a deep-seated knowingness which is not trying to resolve anything. It is just moving and so dutifully, and that is moving, animating this body and all of the bodies, everything. So to be in touch with that, or to see themselves as not distinct from that... that intimacy that you are speaking of, to see themselves as that, like more intimate than intimacy. There is no distinction between myself and the truth. There is no distinction between myself and knowingness.

That's why... and how's that for like everything's included, including like also phenomena?

Yeah, yeah. So it's correct. And what I'm saying is that so that is independent of whatever conclusion we make in this moment, you see? Because we will never nail it down. You can try it. You can try to point precisely. Maharaj is pointing, pointing as precisely as possible. And that is the constant endeavor here: as precisely as possible to empty you from all of the confusions that the mind can throw at you. But you'll never nail it down perfectly. Because what can happen is that, you know, it is like we're trying to make an idol out of reality, you know? It's like, 'This is how it is.' But that idol will never represent it exactly. So quickly, because basically what I'm asking is: when you're not going to your head, are you lost? The mind will try to work hard to make you believe that you're lost. 'You can't run your life this way.' Another thought comes: 'Can you live like this? Really? Okay, live like this.' And the living Masters are there to show you that it is possible to be independent of mental constructs. Their life can go on. I don't even want to say in a beautiful way, because then we go to another expectation. But it is big news. It's like putting this heavy bag down. Gita says, 'Hand over your existence.' Just like that, you see? Because the mind, which is the notion that is telling you that...

Can you live like this, really? Okay, live like this. And the living masters are there to show you that it is possible to be independent of mental constructs. Their life can go on—I don't even want to say in a beautiful way because then we go to network expectation—but it is big news. It's like putting this heavy bag down. Goethe says, 'Hand over your existing slave just like that.' Is it because the mind, which is the notion, is telling you that this deep intuitive intelligence is not intelligent enough? It needs help from my notions of what I am. To buy into that idea is to become a shape for yourself, like a mythical myth about ourselves, and start the story. Then starts the story of me.

What is it? You're saying that the mind tries to thin their time and money, so what is that? What thoughts? That aspect of consciousness which is designed to try to convince consciousness itself that it is limited? Why? Why would this be the same as all the cinema, TV shows on Netflix? We have a deal that in the desert in the morning there was morning frost and a bird just came and drank the water that is melting from this morning frost. Or to the human of them, you said in the desert is frost. How did it happen? Why is it here? What does it mean? I'm learning so much from birds, you see.

The first is what you think it is. Do you have any valid answers? I mean, something I've seen. Tell me something true. What do you actually know? You're not, but if you heard me today, you'll save yourself a lot of struggle. This turtle is just climbing the wrong tree. No matter how hard you climb the wrong tree, since you will not come to reality, no matter how well you do it, it is still climbing the wrong tree. The truth is simpler than that. Just a number, it's simpler than that. What is the simplest thing you can do now? Come on, let's hear something so reckless. What is the simplest thing you can do?

Enjoy the moment.

What is even simpler than that? It's a good answer, wait. What is even simpler than that?

Doing nothing.

Okay, that's almost it. Even simpler than doing nothing. That's it. So usually how it goes, if somebody says, 'I can just be,' even simpler than that. Like nothing. They just want to last beyond even that. Not because the bird is not doing nothing or just being. The minute you decide 'I am just going to be,' you no longer be. That's why it's like Eckhart Tolle wrote 'The Power of Now' some 15, 20 years ago. Almost everybody knows about it, or at least knows the essence of the point. In that book, to be in the power of now, there is never any struggle or worry. And yet, what happened there? If you can actually do it, the minute you decide to remain in the now, you are no longer in the now. 'I'm just going to always be in the now'—gone already. So it has to be a little end here and then a little bit too far into where we have nothing and we have everything, and that is the box. And it's a very human condition, so just jump out of that.

Nothing was how?

Nothing. There's no how. You are climbing the wrong tree. If you go that way, you will never find the midway. If you use your head, you will never leave. It will never get to any good. If you're trying to understand what I'm saying, still wrong. You don't need to even do that. One more than infinity, we are stretching the limits of your intellect because otherwise... so this is the attempt, right? 'I will come to the perfect conclusion that this is how it is.' Really, the coop model, almost there. Where your mind does not go is where you already are. Where your mind does not go is where you already are.

I can see that. The last however long, that's noticing me now. The secret identity that was so strong for so long, yet not necessary, I suppose. Then constantly, it says he came like searching for the evidence that something needs to be done. Yes. And then, but now, no, it's noticed. No. So now it's just obvious to shake moves now. And then maybe there's a checking: does anything need to be done? That's best. Yeah. So then I also noticed sometimes there's identification and, you know, 'I am the seeker.' Uh-huh. And then as soon as it's recognized, that never happened. Yeah. You know, then there's no, that never happened. And so then I was looking, you know, there's some integrity of, okay, yes, from one space I can say yes I was, I can say no and it never was. And there's a known integrity of the same to just reflect that we both are true or something, you know? It's just quite reflective.

Okay, just make it simpler than that. Yeah. Or does the report then... no one morsel everything. Like even with the mildest inference, complexity of this is coming out of the bird mode into humans. It's a very useful tip because the minute you start to think, something starts to become a little convoluted or complex. Like some chance, you don't even have to conclude whether something is happening, nothing is happening. 'Am I speaking with integrity? Am I just making...?' Like I try to speak with integrity, nothing comes out. What is what to say? Which is so beautiful in a way because these three are the main philosophical issues that great thinkers have been dealing with for thousands of years: ontology, epistemology, and ethics. Ontology means what actually exists, what is real. Epistemology is the nature of knowing, what can be known. And ethics is how to live. And all of this intuitively is already clear and apparent even now. But what's happening is that the human condition is the attempt to translate this into some sort of mental understanding, which is just not viable because you try to fill the ocean into a jar as big about it as you can, you still can't do it.

But what is the good news? That that which we thought we need to rely on to conclude something about ourselves—without relying on it, you are not lost at all. You're beyond lost and found. But if you were to force me and say, 'Are you lost or found?' I would say, of course, found, not lost. But this is our deepest fear: without the mind, how can I live my life? Or what's happening to me? How can I check on my progress or condition? Now, what is all this made-up stuff? Good one. The one who wants it will never get it. The one who has it always has it. So the one who wants it can keep throwing whatever tantrum, it won't make no difference. It's not just the same question you ask, you achieve the same conversation we've been having for the last... so do you recognize what the one who wants to do it? Just in your head, there is like a stubborn child. It's just like a stubborn child which is keeping up this tantrum and it expects everything and everyone to dance to his tune. Because you start dancing, then you expect everyone around you to start dancing to that.

I'll tell you, and I hear you, and not just one time. Now I see you. Now I could gladly... there's one time, okay, this was three or four years ago. There is only one thing I ever want to say to anyone in my life now is thank you. Thank you ten thousand times. You said it and I do use that.

And then the same thing, do you notice? If you notice it, you don't have to buy into everything it says. Because for whom it is, it is not you. This is another mode of the same stuff in turn. This is like, 'Okay, not listening to my tantrum anymore, let's use some other wise way.' No, why? Simple. And it's fine. Why? I ask you, if your head is empty, are you lost? This is the fear we have: 'How will I lead my life? What's happening to me?' If you don't know any of this here, you're just fine. Yeah. So not too long the gun thing, this time go to get refills all the time. This is how it starts. Who doesn't want? If we bind to the proposition that it is representing reality, that there is such an 'I' who does, then gone, gone. We've seen the mind framing into non-existent problems. It wins. Like if you say, 'Father, give me what I want,' you separated yourself. 'Father didn't give me what I want,' you separated yourself. So for the mind, it is win-win. So sometimes I have to give you what you need, not what you want. And that's what our dance is like. And it's okay.

Simple to understand. Please do more of that. More of not understanding as much as you can. Don't understand. Is it because whatever conclusion you draw now are the same conclusions that the mind itself will attack tomorrow? You see, we feel like something is incomplete till we have drawn the conclusion about what happened to me or what is happening or what did I find. Allow everything to be uninterpreted. You'll be just fine. Whatever we would have apart... like if you look at Vedanta, it is a very rational-seeming path to go beyond your intellect. And if you look at another path, none of these are progeny, but if you look at them, they're irrational-seeming paths to go beyond your intellect. The point is just leave your intellect aside. You are no struggle. There is nothing that is left unknown, and yet your heart results in the simplest and most difficult. Simple because it just is; most difficult if you try to understand, try to figure out what it all means.

Only at one layer of your existence is there rest. But the look is that you are like gazing after the broadcast went over, that there is a battlefield there. There are opposing concepts. There is like you're trying to build a beautiful castle of concepts, but concepts are opposing and they cause trouble. Is it this way? Is it that way? All that battlefield. Exactly to see that it is not your battle. It will never be between that battlefield. So you can think that you see the Kurukshetra of them, but you realize that you are a character from the Ramayana. It will have nothing to do with you. Ram's story. You cannot figure out your way to the truth. You just have to step out of that and realize that the truth is always clear and apparent, never in that battle. And yet our addiction is to that battle. Our habit is to time in that battle. But you do not come to the truth there because both sides are just a wine. All the opposites are just clear intellect to go to the place where you are aware that you are aware. You cannot figure this moment. You're just aware that you are aware, and that place has no trouble leading this life. Then you will become like that bird. It sees what? In a desert, frost exists. It didn't see, 'How can I get more of this? Where did it come from? Is it possible? Is it magic?'

Let's look at some of the questions on the chat. One says, 'Father, please... perhaps there is seeking here for deeply satisfying immersion in reality wherein naturally, very naturally, beliefs don't go into the mind to anything to say. This is seeking, Father. Oh please dissolve, you remain open.' Ananta, and may all of these tortures be like light feathers going through the sky that is your peace. Then one is informing me that Timbuktu is the city in Mali, Africa. It is good, thank you. Thank you. What is the capital of Mali? One says, 'Father, I'm yearning for nothingness. I am yearning for nothingness. Please hold me up in silence. Let me be baptized, bring us in total silence.' Please forget every idea, including the idea of nothingness. As I said, one more simplicity, because every idea is limited. If nothing is the opposite of everything, then that is not the nothing what we are talking about. If it can happen, then it is not nothing that we are talking about. If it is not there yet, it is not the nothing that we are talking about. Step out as well.

This one says, 'Father, though I have heard you say truthful truth's sake before, when you said it today, a mind bypass somehow occurred that experientially confirmed it as isness. Had in isness as isness. Isness was not a notion but the experiential fact of it. That is one of my unlimited... it instantly causes a new level of unburdening of the mind and a great sense of peace. Thank you so much, Father, for the light of your grace.' Very good. Just don't attach to the peace. Don't attach to anything at all. Remember not to mix up between the Darshan and the Prasad. If you do that... the next one says, 'Father, I wanted to report that very often I observed the person, the small I. The person has gotten weaker but still exists. There is still some interest...'

Very good. Just don't attach to the pieces. Don't attach to anything at all. Remember not to mix up between the Darshan and the Prasad if you do that.

Father, I wanted to report that very often I observed the person, the small 'I'. The person has gotten weaker but still exists. There is still some interest in the world. I submit this small 'I' to you. Thank you.

But when you say that, 'I see it,' you don't see it. You don't actually see it. You just see the circumstantial evidence, which means that if this body is working in a certain way, you can make an inference that that is the equaling of the ego activism. But actually, it is never to be found. This small 'I' has no tangible existence of any sort, even phenomenally. So you are already rid of it. If you take on the project that 'I want to be rid of the small I,' it is just the thief dressed up as the policeman trying to catch the thief. You are free of it right now. But even now, if you take on the project and say, 'No, no, but I noticed it has to be, and I must become forever free from it,' it's still the same guy dressed up in clothes pretending to help you.

So one tip I have for you, and all of you, is that anytime you notice yourself making a linear story about yourself—I mean a linear story about yourself—know that it is just the mind. You are not an object in time. You have no yesterday or today at all. So sometimes in our most humble-sounding story, still the texture can peep through. Are you an object in time right now? Are you looking at the perceptions that we call the body? Are you in this universe? Only objects are here. Are you looking at this world at all? Do you have time? Do you have a story there? There is nothing in spirituality, there is nothing in satsang, for who you think you are. That is my greatest gift for you. I don't want to give you what you want because I don't have the patience to wait for you to want what I want, which is to be zero. Maybe I'm not so optimistic, but if I keep giving you what you want, then when do you want what I want you to do?

So what is that? As you are coming to this, some of you will experience a sense of fear, a sense of wobbly knees, which the mind will present to you as bad news or something, which is just fine. You have to look at it as intermittent fasting. When you start intermittent fasting, what happens? A couple of days will be tough because the body is so used to getting instant gratification from the stomach and always expecting food to be there. So the first couple of days when it doesn't find it there, you see, it feels a bit like a headache. You can have all of these things. But then, soon, what happens? You discover that the reserves you stored up of energy—it's like the generator was there, but it was forgotten because there was a constant electric supply. So you start to discover the generator, and then it feels comfortable even if there is no food in my stomach; it knows it can go to the reserves.

In the same way, as you're learning to keep your head empty of conclusions, empty of notions, something can wobble. But that's just because you are discovering your internal reserves, deeper insights, and you can touch that. It will be like, 'I don't know how to run my life anymore. What am I supposed to do?' You are just getting in touch with the greater Grace. So this wobbliness is like the development of trust. Develop trust away from your mental projections into the supreme intelligence, which is your own being in the play of the world. It may seem absurd; it is a wobbly period. How it plays out may seem very absurd to the life because people with a traditional mind will not always be able to understand what's happening. Don't mind, honestly, but there is nothing to fear. Thank you all so much for being in satsang today.

Satguru Deva, even if I understand today in the satsang, my mind always pulls me later. Maybe it is just pulling now that it fooled you later. Then you say, 'Guruji says that you must confirm that you are the formless witness.' So I need to confirm. The practice of negation or self-inquiry also leads to confusion. Could you please clarify what to practice in order to avoid the mind's habits?

It's exactly like I am saying. Where can you confirm? Are you aware now? It's the same place where you confirm that you are the formless witness. I don't see much confusion unless you're trying to resolve any of these questions. If you try to resolve it in your head, of course it is confusing. Yes, yes, just as much as you can, remain open and empty. Open and empty means you are allowing everything to move as it has to. Empty means you're not concluding or making assertions, mental conclusions, about anything you see. And don't do 'open and empty' as a doing. Don't do it as the body or as somebody, because that doesn't work. That is not open enough or empty enough. When I say you remain open and empty, they think they're doing open and empty as a body, so they're taking the body to remain open and empty. You're putting on a yogic posture or something, like 'Anything can happen in the world, I am open and empty,' but that is to identify. Be open and empty about this body also. What is moving from here, not moving from here? I'm not speaking to you as the body. So open and empty is not like this or like this. The body can play out there, but it is just in your inner space, in your inner attitude. Unclasping means you are not holding onto anything, including the body in the world. So being open to everything being played out means allowing everything in the world, including this body, to play out as it is, as it is playing now.

Please clarify what to practice in order to avoid the mind's habit? Just this. And then, I don't know if it was in the broadcast, but I was sharing one of my favorite metaphors now in satsang. For how many years have I used this metaphor of the sushi restaurant? So this is a song called, you know, sushi, where there is a conveyor belt and the sushi comes to you on this conveyor belt. In the same way, the mind is like that. These thoughts come to you on the conveyor belt of the mind. Now you have one job, which is to just let them all come and go, not picking up any sushi. Not picking up the starter, not picking up the dessert side. And if you do pick up, then don't pick up the next one. It's as simple as that. It's not that we pick up the dessert and then think, 'Oh, I'm not doing it right' or 'Progress is nothing.' Just one plate will only come to you at a time. It may seem to come very fast.

It means open, empty. I mean unborn. So when Master Bankei said to remain in the unborn, he was talking about the same unborn things. Don't give birth to a shape. The mind is just being a shape-maker. You don't buy into any shape. Don't give birth to any shape. See, that is as simple as that. To remain open and empty is to remain unborn. Whether you call it remaining in your notional-less existence or you call it remaining in your presence, it doesn't really matter. It is very, very simple, very natural. It is very effortless already, actually. But initially, it can seem a bit like you have to make some effort to let go. What is effortless? To pick up this or to not pick up? It depends on how addicted you are to it. It depends on how much interest is in it. So initially, if there is an addiction or a habit to pick up, then it seems like a bit of a struggle to not pick up this. But actually, it is effortless.