This is Openness, This is Freedom - 27 Mar 2015

So in this way, we leave the body completely free. It already is, actually. It is doing exactly what it wants, but we are just pretending that 'I am moving my hand up and down,' 'I am breathing.' You know, some may even pretend that 'I am beating my heart.' All of it is happening on its own. We are just the pure witnessing of all of this movement of appearance. So when I say it is imaginary resistance, it is this. When it comes to the body, it is this sense of doership: 'What must I do next? Where should I go next?' All of these things are just the pretense problems that we like to deal with. So leave your body completely free to be exactly how it is, and the breath also, you leave it completely free.

Completely in the other area of trouble which many of you have is you try to control your thoughts because you hear that thoughts are the cause of trouble, you see? So then the mind itself comes up with the solution: 'Okay, if thoughts are the cause of trouble, let me try to stop all thoughts from coming.' Then you find all the yogis sitting in the caves doing all kinds of sadhana to prevent this flow of thoughts. But actually, you have seen now—most of you have been in satsang for some time—and you see that it's actually not trouble. Thoughts are allowed to just come and go and then there is no trouble. But it is only through our belief in them, when we buy what they are selling, then it seems to create this imaginary resistance. So be completely open. Don't resist any thought. It will scare you that 'I'm very scary, I'm very horrendous.' Sometimes some of us are scared of beautiful thoughts also, because 'I don't want to think that because it might become a desire.' Nothing can happen like this without your belief. So let all thoughts come, let all thoughts go.

Then what are the other forces you have in your command? Very few people in the world look at this actually. We seem to have the force of attention and the force of belief. Attention is very troublesome. The more you try to control it, the more it wants to jump around here and there. So freedom again is not a constricted state where you are trying to control your attention and keep it at a particular point, although many spiritual practices prescribe this and it's okay. It's a path, and if you're fully into that particular path, that's okay. But my submission to all of you is much more important: let this attention also completely go free. Let it go wherever it wants. Don't try to exert any sense of control over even attention.

Now everything is set free. Body is set free, breath is set free, thoughts are set free, even emotions are set free, and also attention is set free. And now you remember that there was one thing which was left, which was belief. And belief, what does it mean to set it free? That we don't take any effort, don't make any effort. To give meaning to something, to give belief to something, is some effort; it is a doing, a seeming doing. So don't do this also. Don't give belief to anything else. What is belief? Belief is the power to pretend. The truth does not need belief, yes, but the false needs constant reinforcement through this belief. So to believe that you are a person, you have to work hard practically the entire waking state and consume the content of your thoughts with your belief. Without this, the person idea cannot survive for too long. Drop belief also. This is the way of the sage, the simple way.

Also I want to tell you that the sage has no intentions. There are no intentions. Everything is just appearing spontaneously. The game can be played; there can be some pretend planning, all of that can go on, but there is no intention and there is no attachment to any outcome. This way, everything that you seemingly pretended to pick up is dropped. And then naturally, naturally in this simple surrender, just to see that I never was separate, I never was a person, you see that everything has been flowing on its own. And this way you will then experience the presence of unassociated being. You will experience pure love, pure joy, pure peace without any desire for any of them. So I can honestly say that it is they, these energies, that come to be in your presence, not the other way around. We are not meant to chase them; these energies are in service to your own unassociated being.

So very simple like this: don't resist anything at all. Drop all effort. And don't believe this thought which says, 'Oh, dropping of effort is seeming like effort to me.' That is just a mind trick. Yes, I know it can seem initially because the habit is to pick up. The habit is to pick up and do all this heavy lifting. So initially when I say to keep down your heavy bags, it seems like, 'Oh, it takes so much effort. I'm just comfortable carrying this heavy load on my head. Why do you say keep it down?' It can seem like that is effort, but it's not really. And it can seem a little uncomfortable because you lost this seeming mischievous teacher which is inside your head, always saying 'do this next, do this you'll be happy, go there, go here.' And to be without this voice, or with this voice having no power, it seems a little bit of a limbo state initially. I know this. But if you can just hold my hand during this time, I'm telling you that you are just learning to fly. You are not falling; you're learning to fly.

Then you will find that this is the most natural, most effortless state. And even this thought very quickly will be dissolved—that it is the dropping of efforts seeming like effort. It's like saying that you go to work every day and I come and tell you, 'No, actually today is Sunday, you don't have to go to work.' And then the mind will come and say, 'But I'm used to going to work, so it's seeming like effort not to go to work on this Sunday.' It's just like this, nothing more than this. Then what trouble can you have? It is only resistance which is trouble. This is openness, this is freedom.

And I promise you that you will not say that there is something missing in this. You will only say that, 'I have lost my ability to suffer now. What have you done to me? I have lost my ability to suffer.' Because it will seem like so much hard work to suffer with anything. And if somebody comes to you and says, 'I will give you a million dollars but you come back to how you were,' it will sound like the stupidest deal possible. And if somebody says, 'I will give you the best partner, but you become a person again,' it will sound like the stupidest deal possible. If somebody says, 'I will give you the body which is in the best shape, you can run ten miles without stopping,' they say, 'That sounds like the stupidest deal possible.'