Where It Is Apparent That You Are Aware, That Is Your Intuition

So what Joanna is saying is that I've given her this homework that stay with the heart region, and then she's reporting about what all has happened. Now, one thing I may have also said is that don't evaluate, yeah, you see? And that's fine. It's very natural for us because progress is sort of a deep part of our condition at the moment. It feels like, 'I need to be able to self-evaluate and that is the only way I can come to some progress or get further along in this.' But you'll notice that these evaluative tendencies are just conditions from the mind. So now, I may have also said, 'But you come and tell me what is happening,' you see. So it may seem like a contradiction.

So now can we try? Recognize that when you're taking yourself to be the limited 'me,' then you're using the mind as an instrument, you see. How to know you're being intuitive? When what you are is apparent to you. So let's experiment with this. Are you aware now?

Yeah, we are aware now.

Now, where this answer was apparent, give me a report from there. Go on, don't be shy and don't feel like, 'I sound arrogant.' There isn't anything there to say of anything that I've been talking about, yeah? How does your limited life seem now? When I say limited life, I just mean that the identity, the story, the narrative—how real does that seem? Don't go to your head for the answer.

Just... I mean, it doesn't... it doesn't apply. Like, to this, it doesn't apply.

What is yesterday for you? Sriram starts talking, okay? He just starts talking and he's talking about some girl called Joanna. What does that mean for you right here?

It doesn't... it's not... yes, and I know it can seem a bit like there's like something pulling. This is something pulling, but we're just neglecting that. You're not bothering so much with it.

So it can feel a bit like that. Now, is this what you are experiencing? Is it a question of here or there? Is it a special state?

Oh, the mind has a little something on the outside to say that, but um, no. It's just before the mind coming in, so it's just... just here.

Is it something for you or something for you to do? Who are you here?

It feels hard to answer that.

Mixing can happen. Some mixing can happen. Don't... just take your time again. Rest in your heart, relax fully. Don't worry, there are no right or wrong answers.

Some other things that... yeah, see, some other things they're like trying to creep in.

Yeah, but just notice them lightly. Don't bother with them. I promise you, I guarantee you that they do not bring any truth into your lives. So what are we doing here? We are recognizing that there are two different instruments. They're two different instruments. One instrument is like a storyteller; it has the limited identity at the center of the story and all it can do is tell stories. It is just determining the nature of what this is, what is happening to you, what is better, what is worse. It is just story.

The other instrument is intuition, your heart, where anything that is valuable, that is true, is known only here. It is from here that you recognize your being. It is here that you recognize existence, love, joy, truths. Even some of you were enjoying this music without understanding a word of it, so it is not in your head that you are enjoying it. So something intuitively resonates. So that where Self is known without needing any concept, without needing any effort, without needing any mechanics, without needing any problems—there everything is known.

It is not as if, 'Oh, that is where you go to in Satsang because there Self is only known.' There is only the Self; there is nothing to be known outside of this Self. So don't allow your mind to create a category which says, 'No, no, but that is Satsang, but when I have to work and I have to send an email or I have to talk to my boss, then I need to become mental.' That is not true. And over the years we've taken so many examples of this intelligence, how it moves this whole universe and all the organisms in this universe.

Now the mind will offer you something which tells you, 'This is what's happening.' Tell me if this is... if this is what's happening, you take it to be true. But it should cover everything that is happening right now. What is happening? What is this? If you take a limited definition of what is happening, then you will take yourself to be limited. Tell me everything that's happening: every experience, every phenomena, every vibration, every sensation. Capture the entirety of the story of your story in a narrative if you can.

Yeah, this with the capturing, making comments of this, that, and the other is just an area, right?

No, so just notice that, but don't use anything to beat yourself up with. So these observations, you just observe them, but you don't take them personally. Just... they can feel very like they're coming from you, really personal. That which feels like or just seems like is 'mine.' That it just seems like or feels like 'my I' is designed to feel like.

So if you're just going with what this feels like—it feels true, it feels alive, it feels like this, it seems like that, you see—are you aware now? Does it feel like or seem like? It just is. So go with that 'just is.' Not just because it feels like or seems like. This whole world is a big 'seem,' and if you keep going with what it feels like, which is just like saying it seems so true, it seemed like, then we keep falling for that trickster which is just the narrator of what feels like but not what is.

It can feel strange because we were taught initially in spirituality that don't go with your head, you see, just follow your feelings, your feelings will guide you. That's utter bunkum. Don't follow your feelings. Your feeling is like a crazy bull; you keep dancing like just all over the place. So don't go with that kind of spirituality, you see. Don't follow your head, don't follow your feelings, just follow your heart. And your heart is not the center of feeling; it is the center of the universal intelligence called intuition.

And you have no excuses left, you see, because many over many years you try to demystify this intuition and now it is just... the pointer is very clear: whether it is apparent that you are aware, that is your intuition. And when it comes of feeling and doubtful thoughts and feelings that 'Just nothing is working, nothing's happening, this is too strong,' what to do with that when it comes? Okay, let's take both the scenarios.

In the first scenario, take it to be true. Just take it to be: 'All this you are trying, nothing is working.' Yes, now what? What does that do? So one seeming taken to be true leads to another seeming which all of us are here to cure, and that seeming is called suffering. That seeming is called identity. What do you want to juggle along with self-knowledge? Nothing, actually.

I don't know, right. Joanna, how are you going to run this life? There may be... yeah, there's something with this, the doer, that... that doership of it still, of like trying to do something.

Yeah, if you did everything that you could, where would it get you? Would your awareness become more aware? Would your being become more being?

Well, it becomes like this... um, you have to do this and it goes to that extreme like, 'Don't talk.' I was literally saying to you, 'I don't speak, I can't speak because if I speak it's just the mind. I need to just stay here.' It was just getting a bit too much, it's over-intensive, you know.

What is the root of all of this is the evaluative tendency. If you make a state out of this, then you'll make a state out of its opposite and both will seem personal. Whose awareness is this? Are you a Joanna being aware? Are you a Joanna being aware? Because if that seems like it is true and that 'seems like' we take to be true, then you will also take yourself to be a Joanna which is not aware, that is being mindy, you see.

So if the Joanna or whatever identity you take yourself to be, it becomes the primary which is then going to the awareness state and then the mind state. A little of this, this sounds of it, yeah? So don't worry, you see. Right now, show me Joanna. Who does this awareness belong to? Where will you go for this answer? That is more important than the answer itself.

Because it's like, I don't want this to... to be the mind answering, but that's also the mind saying that. The thief, the policeman... it just is. It's better not to give... uh, its evaluation. Better not to pause too long.

I was going to say, don't make any conclusion. Oh please, just get rid of this watch; it's gone. It's completely up to you. And Mahesh asked this question a little earlier, you see. When I say it's up to you, it's up to you as consciousness. Satsang is consciousness speaking with consciousness only. Consciousness is here; there is nobody else. So consciousness is playing this game of identification and disidentification. So your being has full power. You can never say, 'But this has too much power, the mind is too strong.' It cannot be stronger than the being itself, you.