You Have To Leave the Hand of Maya To Meet the Truth - 10th September 2021

I'm hoping to see you, Father, soon, so next week. Very happy to hear that. Thank you, thank you so much. I also visualize you and I meet you every time I visualize you, and I'm keeping that as part of my sadhana because you are the presence. So that's the way I just make sure that we are together. Okay, let's go to Keisha.

My heart always starts racing before I talk to you, so but it's okay. Just start racing. Yeah, I'm always so happy to see you and I'm so grateful for these Satsangs. They really are my lifeline and just a wonderful reminder, and I'm just so grateful. So thank you for having these. Thank you so much. So, I just haven't talked to you in a while face to face and verbally, so I thought I would check in today this morning for me. I rewatched our last Satsang that we had together last week and specifically the ending when you were talking to Jada and I don't remember who else it was, but you were talking about work and the best thing—your answer is always the same, but in different ways—but this one really resonated with me and I've been using it as a just remain open and empty. The best thing you can do for your life, for your future, is just remain open and empty. So that's been my reminder. And the insights keep coming, you know, gradually here and there, and they just come and go, they come and go, they come and go. The freshest insight has been that you cannot insert yourself in time. There's only—you can only be here. There's only this space here. There's no way to be in the future. It's not possible. And that's been really present.

Yes, as long as the idea of 'here' is not like a something in a time sandwich, not something stuck between past and future and I'm just like here and I'm just moving like that, you know, slice of cheese or something, and I can only leave that slice of cheese. The hereness which the sages are talking about is beyond space and time. So that's an important distinction to make because many times you can just be like, 'Oh, I'm just here,' which means like I'm in the content of what is here, like I'm in this—like when the time is 5:17 and so many seconds, I'm here, you see. So I can only be here because I cannot reach into the future and I cannot reach into the past, so I'm just like this piece of vegetable or something. So thank you for giving me the opportunity to clarify this point. The present and the hereness which is pointed to in Satsang is that which is beyond the notion of space and time, beyond both the notions actually—one big notion, but we usually understand it as two. So your being actually is not limited to any sort of time. So that hereness is opposed to the conceptual idea of the present because the mind's idea of present is, 'Okay, here, jumping from moment to moment into its idea of the present moment,' you see. But the being's hereness or the being's present is beyond the play of space and time, beyond all the content of creation. As you're recognizing yourself, you're seeing this, that this linear flow is a notional flow, but actually for my being and definitely for that which is aware of my being, my absolute unadulterated Self is completely beyond any such motions.

Yes, yes. And I have to admit sometimes it's both. It's not always so. Yeah, I have to confess that for sure. Sometimes it's notional and sometimes it's not. But when it's not notional, it's not—it cannot—there's nothing that has been done to know that.

Yeah, the good way to experiment with that is to see, because sometimes earlier in Satsang when I started sharing, then many of the sangha would say, 'But I'm just here.' And I would say, 'What does it mean to be here?' And they were speaking spatially in terms of just sitting here or, you know, then also it can be in terms of here in terms of time, now. See from your direct experience, your pure perception of even that which is manifesting, whether you can truly conclude any spatial boundary or any temporal boundary of any sort naturally, notionlessly. Do you find yourself in any constraint of space or time? Are you like an object being carried forward into something, or are you something which is limited by any sensational boundary? And all these experiments to check whether the boundaries are sensations within you or you are within the sensations which we call the body or the boundary, you see, are helpful to see that actually all of this, we may say—if you have to say something—all of this, we may say, arises within us, but we can never say that I am within this time or space. Okay? So the reminder to come into the present is a reminder actually to recognize your true nature which is beyond the universe. So we may say it also includes the universe, but it is definitely not constricted by the universe. So it is not the same as the worldly reminder where, in some other ways of teaching, you may say, 'Okay, but just see that you're here,' which means you are here as an object. The objective body-mind functioning is just here. So it may work in all of that differently, but here the reminder to recognize what you are is to recognize that your presence, you see, that is present is not constrained or not limited to just the notional ideas of space and time. Otherwise, what can happen is the one that says, 'Okay, I'm just here, I cannot go into the future, I cannot be in the past,' you see, many times can also take itself to be the body-mind which is just stuck in this moment in time or something. So the representation that we are buying about ourselves is of primary importance in the pointing. If we end up saying, 'Okay, I'm just this stuff which is just here, it has no ability to speed in time or go back in time in a time machine,' you know, that kind of stuff, then that is still taking yourself to be something which is too limited. Yes. But to see that you just are, or even when you say 'I' here, you're just talking about your presence which is always palpable, which is always tangible, but it is unconstrained by any sort of constraint of either space or time. How can we put this into a narrative? 'I came to Satsang with Ananta and I recognize that I am not in time.' But then you saw that you're not in time, then who came to Satsang? It's irreconcilable in some way. We cannot compute both of those and put them together. It's like the Zen koan that Chanda was talking about before this, where it's not computable in that way. My intellect cannot fathom this.

Yes, I hear I hear you say even one thing is too much.

Yes, so it is too much in the sense just like one speck of dust is too much, you see. A speck of dust is too much because it has the ability to blur our vision. In the same way, even one conceptual idea can make everything seem so blurry, whereas I'm constantly pointing you to that which you know without having to know conceptually anything, and to free ourselves from the condition of trying to squeeze this non-conceptual understanding into making it a verbal or a conceptual stateable sort of notion. So if I was to ask all of you, 'What did you understand?' If you were able to say, 'Ah, this I saw, that I am not in time,' actually like that, that is just scratching the surface of it. But I'm hoping that the insight beyond the concept, the true seeing that you have about yourself with these pointings, you are completely tongue-tied in trying to explain them. So in the tangible tasting of your beingness, can you say something true about it?

I want to, but there's a knowing that it's just a thought. Like, that's what's a thought. Is that knowing also too much?

So we can use it, of course, to communicate and to express, but like a thought, just like the body or the world or even consciousness or whatever, is just labels for things which we can't truly understand. And our thoughts especially are tricky because it's a self-referential thing; it's claiming to define itself in some way which it cannot do. So in the same way, when we say 'body,' for example, what is body? What is the body? It's just that there is a soup of sensation and then we're trying to make sense of the soup and we're saying, 'Okay, this is the alphabet soup, now this is the A, this is B, this is C.' So all this soup of sensation is there, and as the soup, it is too much for the mind to handle. So the mind is lost, like, 'I can't navigate this stuff till you give me layers.' When he was talking about this last time, layers of abstraction, so that I can then reach them as objects and say, 'Okay, now this whole thing is the world,' and now I can deal with it because the world is like this. But as the whole ocean of perception, it's unmeetable by the mind. Now once we have one object, then you can also say, 'Okay, within the world, this set of perceptions that I perceive, let's call that body,' because otherwise to meet it like that is too crazy. There's too much light in the eyes, there's too much other perception, so I can't meet it like this. So let me not even—let me avoid looking at it by giving it a label. So that is why it is mental slavery, because it's an avoidance of a true and open meeting by using labels. And then what happens is we use those labels to make a narrative, and then you spend the rest of our life just dealing with the narrative and never with what is being.

Because otherwise to meet it like that is too crazy. There's too much light in the eyes, there's too much other perception, so I can't meet like this. So let me not even—let me avoid looking at it by giving it a label. So that is why it is mental slavery, because it's an avoidance of a true and open meeting by using labels. And then what happens is we use those labels to make a narrative, and then you spend the rest of our life just dealing with the narrative and never with what is being perceived.

Yes, I confess to that.

All of us. It's universal. This story is—so this is the human condition. So what happens, that's why I keep talking about direct perception, because meet everything as it is, you see, absent of even the notion of meeting. And then you may lose the ability to put your life into a narrative, but you will find yourself free and, to cut a long story short, just find yourself. But to then deal with it at a conceptual layer and say, 'Okay, now this is my Sangha, they want to hear the truth, and the Guru, you see, I'm going to speak the right stuff, you know,' and all of that, and say, 'Okay, now what came out of this?' So then dealing with it conceptually, then I'm not meeting you open and I'm just now caught up in the mental story about what this is and what should happen, which is too constrictive. Whereas in this moment, there's so much on this Zoom screen, you see, that has so much to meet in this beautiful play of God that I miss all of that if I was to just meet it like, 'Okay, this is what's happening here.'

Yeah, I think it's selfish too because it's like it's wanting to experience it all as a person. It's wanting to connect with you as a person and it's wanting to have these experiences as a person. So it's very selfish, you know.

And the thing about small 's' selfishness is that what it claims to experience, you see, is nothing because it's just a yearning for opportunities to add to its narrative, you see. Whereas in the true meeting, which is empty of this selfishness, you see, you're meeting your own divinity, your own presence, you see, and there's no greater experience than that. So although grasping actually is counterproductive—it is the definition of counterproductivity—anytime we grasp at something, you see, we may be able to insert something into a narrative, but that doesn't give us anything really. But empty of the grasping, you see, that one moment of openness and emptiness is so vast. You see, your mind may not be able to narrate it, but your heart truly meets itself so open, so naked. And that is my constant, relentless advice: that don't insert yourself into any sort of narrative and meet yourself open and empty. Because it will only be a mind trick to try to expand yourself through the process of grasping, but nobody is ever able to do that, you see, because your starting point itself is completely flawed.

The starting point, if it is that 'I am this body-mind and then I can make myself greater by improving upon my story and claiming a mine-ness over a lot of other things that I see objectively,' you see, in this manifest play, just by the time of 'this is mine, this is mine, this is mine,' I'm able to grow myself—you're missing the universality of your being already, which contains everything is what you are now. Once you take on the pose as well as the wave and then say, 'I want to have this wave also, I want to have that wave also,' I want to see so that I can be a bigger wave. And the ultimate ego desire is also to try and become the ocean, isn't it? Now the thing is that it can never become; it always already you are, but your conceptual idea of yourself can never become that, you see. So this is the whole Leela in a way. It's like the dropping can seem a bit difficult because it feels scary for a while that if I let go, see, will I lose this, will I lose that? And of course, I've been told that you won't lose anything that is true, but can I really take the risk? Can I take the chance?

And moving from head to heart is all about taking the chance. That cow that jumped over the moon that Guruji talks about is this quantum leap. You have to leave the hand of Maya to meet the truth. You can't hope to hedge your bets at some time and say, 'Okay, let me just try to like have more and more and more like this and come to the truth about what happened.' It just doesn't work like that, you see. Somewhere you just have to—no, it doesn't work. It doesn't work and it basically also feeds suffering, I've noticed too.

Yeah.

So if I said to you that, 'Okay, now Paula and you are best friends,' you see, 'Is he your best friend? Yeah, yeah, he's just completely devoted to you and you are going to be completely different now.' What actually happened? Nothing really happened except that you added this to your narrative, you see, and both of you added that to the narrative and said, 'Okay, now we have this conceptual relationship now.' And then in the conceptual relationship, we can claim that we are better off than what we were a few seconds ago because now my circle is broader. Okay, my circle is broader, but what really happened? She continues to be an object in your perception and nothing can change that. And whatever reality there is to her is always already in your heart. And this is good advice for everyone, anyone who's grasping for relationships or stuck in some sort of oppressive sort of relationship, to see that. To see that what really happens, you see, you have a conceptual notion of mine-ness or something, you see. So yeah, there's a label which seemingly connects to objects which don't actually ever exist anyway, and then with that claim the mind feels better that 'I can insert this one also into my narrative now and therefore he or she has become mine,' you see. And then I feel like I'm better off than I was before this conceptual connection was made, you see.

But the reality of what anyone ever is, is always fully available in your heart. That one being is not just lip service; it's truly just one being. And all that is, that is the ocean, and all these expressions are just waves of that ocean. So where to meet? Where to meet your full kingdom, where to meet your full vastness? It can never be through adding conceptual emotions to your narratives. All that is manifest and that which is beyond all manifestation is already yours, but nothing that is anything can ever belong to that which never existed. So how to check whether we are talking about something which is true or something that is non-existent? If it is insertable in a narrative, you see, it is non-existent. If you are able to insert yourself in the narrative, then that one is not existing, no matter how high-sounding or terrible-sounding that narrative may be, no matter what justifications you may have for that narrative, no matter how many 'buts' go and say, 'But like this, but like that, but also I have to manage,' you see. There's a relative and there's absolute, there's all these ideas are there as excuses to shy away from our vastness which we are finding in our heart, you see.

Then we want to cut up the world into different sort of, 'Okay, but at a relative level this is happening.' You see, we cannot say—like nobody can say, and we've been doing this experiment for the last many weeks—can anyone tell me what is happening in one moment at the relative level? Nobody. And yet we want to have ways in which we can control the way the relative goes, you see. It's impossible. But I'm just sharing this because this is the human condition, you see. And all of our deciphering of what this is, is only so that we can have some sort of conceptual advantage about where we want to go. And we feel like, 'Unless I know what's happening right now, how can I tell you where to go or tell myself that this is what you should do or this is what not what you should do?' So all of this is the defense against meeting yourself open and empty and fully, fully innocent. All strategies, all tactics, no matter what they may be—they may be the most spiritual ones, you see—but if the reference point always keeps coming back to 'me' as body-mind, you see, then no matter what the strategy or the tactic is, it is just going to end up as a story. And the human story always then has its role with us and we are tired of that roller coaster in some way.

So just how to say, how to say what does this mean now? What am I supposed to do? Just out of it. Like even that is not an instruction, it is just like I'm presuming it's happened. You see, that's where I want to meet all of you, beyond the—beyond your ability to understand what I'm saying and yet not gibberish. It may sound like gibberish to your mind and yet there is some aspect of you where it will sound like pure nectar, but to your mind it may sound like pure gibberish, you see. So I want to bypass that there and meet you where these words are coming from, because there we are one and there we'll see that all idea of separation itself is just story. Thank you for allowing this segue into making it broader so that we are looking at it, because this is the only problem with the human condition. No matter what the objective grasping may be about, it is ultimately that the idea that 'If only it was like this, if only it was like this.' But you're not validating your starting point. If you are able to say, 'Okay, now if I just had this in my life, then my life would be better,' you have definitely mistaken your starting point. Okay, grasping is only a result of that. Can you be all there is and say, 'Okay, I want one more'? Cannot be. So already if you say, 'I want this also' or 'I want only this,' then what are you taking yourself to be? Definitely not all there is. So that's what I mean when I say the starting point itself is then wrong. If that can be corrected, then it's better than going on the whole adventure and then realizing that, 'Oh, it is always about the starting point.'

There's still like an urge though of someone wanting to now take the advice to remain open and empty, you know. Like there's still that reminder that will happen and it's still like just on our conversation that that's still a concept, maybe. I don't know yet.

I don't know. It is a neutralizing agent only. As a neutralizing agent. So if you say honestly, right, if you see honestly that that is the only urge now, just to remain open and empty, then even that pointing can be dropped. But if you find that, 'Okay, at this moment it may be true, but what happens is that okay, I have this urge, I want this sometimes, I don't want that sometimes, I have this worry about that sometimes,' you see, then we feel like, 'Okay, we need a spiritual neutralizing agent,' which is the pointing from the mouth of the Master, which does the work of neutralizing all of that and zeroes in on just bringing us back to this openness. But if you can say with full integrity that there's nothing else except now the even the desire to be open and empty is spotted as a desire or an urge, then that I also you can be empty of. But it needs full, full, full integrity to be able to say that. Because as long as there are rodents in the kitchen, you may need the traps. But if it's all clear—and we're talking because we had some mice in the Sangha—so my advice would be that let the final pointer take care of itself. Don't worry about dropping the final one. It is just the last stick in a way, and it will also dissolve when it has no work to do. If it is unutilized, it will just vanish. Thank you so much. I love you.

Love you too.

Let's go to next one. Let's go to Paula.

Hello, Father. I feel I just want to say hello and connect with you for a while, and because now it's all clear after this and very good.

Good. That means that the answer that was given was also heard as your answer. And that is the best approach you come to Satsang, which is to realize that since the problem...

In a way, and it will also dissolve when it has no work to do. If it is unutilized, it will just vanish. Thank you so much. I love you.

Love you too. Let's go to the next one. Let's go to Paula.

Hello, Father. I feel I just want to say hello and connect with you for a while because now it's all clear after this.

Very good. Good. That means that the answer that was given was also heard as your answer, and that is the best approach you come to satsang with, which is to realize that since the problem is in the human condition and it's pretty much universal in the human condition, then what is being spoken is also the antidote to that universal problem. You see, sometimes we may use instances of a particular narrative to demystify that, but actually we are looking at it at the root cause. The root cause being the only spiritual problem, which is the mistaken identity of taking yourself to be one that doesn't exist. The only spiritual problem is that. The only spiritual solution is to see that you're not that. Yes?

Yes.

So if you look at the world problems, you see what are the world problems? Relationship, health of body, financial security, and a certain meaning. These are the main world problems. All of them have the wrong guy in the center. But if you look at the root of all four of those, you have to take yourself to be something first. Who wants to have a relationship? And so in satsang, after maybe the search for the Self, the relationship problems are number one. So what do you have to take yourself to be to grasp a better relationship? I'm not saying relationships are bad; in the worldly play, relationships can go on. But the idea of completion through relationship is what I'm checking. What do you have to be to complete yourself with a relationship? And you look at it in all ways like that. What do you have to be to be insecure about your future?

An object. Someone. Exactly. Yeah. And that satsang, you leave us just with ourselves, nothing else but ourselves. And that sometimes is scary, maybe, or very... I don't know, they feel too open. You can feel too good at times, but...

Allow yourself to experience the feeling without allowing your narrative to grasp hold of that too strongly, you know what I mean? Otherwise, what could happen is the feeling could have long come and gone, also the mind is saying, 'But that is really scary, you know, I'm left with nothing.' And it's left again in the same model which we just spoke about, with the conceptual understanding of what is happening, whereas what is happening is far, far beyond just some little bit of experiences of fear that may come up. You see, with an atomic question like 'Are you aware now?' you're meeting yourself in the most non-objective, non-phenomenal way instantly. And that is beyond anything that you can experience in this manifest universe.

Now, naturally in the human play, when you have these insights, then some fear may come, some doubts may start coming. All of these may come. And then what may happen is that we may not focus so much on that pristine insight and start to focus a lot more onto these little by-products that are coming because the mind can only insert this into the narrative. The insight it cannot take, you see, by definition, because you can only know that. You see, let go of your dependency on knowing anything else. You always know that, and yet it becomes apparent and tangible and palpable when you're not holding on to any branch of conceptual knowing. But what can the mind write about it or say about it? What happens to you when you discover that you are aware, that you are not an object, that you have no shape, that you are just this pure awareness itself? Nothing. The mind can't say anything really about that except to doubt it, maybe. 'Does that really happen to you? Is that really my experience? I'm just seeing some dark empty space.' Talk to another and tell him, because everybody else nods very vigorously that, 'Yeah...'

So these are common mind tricks. Your mind will play on you and say, 'Am I really aware? How to sit in this satsang where we just talked about awareness so much, and for months I've been here, and then finally say I'm not really sure what is the difference between perception and awareness?' So these are the common tricks the mind will play at you, and then they will grab you and say, 'Yeah, but now it's too late, you know, I should have asked these questions in the beginning.' But if I come out of months of this inquiry and say, 'This is just not my perception, how is it different from awareness?' Dude, I'm aware of these tricks. They are aware that the mind plays these tricks and he'll question your insight. But I'm also aware that you can't miss it. You see, to miss it is impossible. The instant you check and see that 'Am I aware?' the answer is apparent. Not even in the instant beyond that instant, it just 'I am aware.' And even that conclusion is so insipid to what you are discovering, so tasteless just as a mere signboard compared to your direct experience of yourself now.

If you did not have any desire to make anything in your narrative now, not even freedom, not even the prayer at the end of this conversation which is 'I only want to come to this, Father bless me,' not even then, then...

Just myself. Yes, myself, myself. Because and that is the most terrible story, but it is the best. Once upon the most terrible story and yet the best.

So now, so now suppose that you said, 'Okay, now all I want now is myself,' which you have the ability to include in your narrative. So you picked up the spiritual seeker pose, which already is a bit more brittle compared to just myself, myself, myself, myself. You're getting a sense of what I'm saying, no? Of course, the words are all Japanese, but you're able to meet with them somewhere. So just like that, just innocent pure instance. I... the mind is again trying to manipulate all this right now, yeah?

But see through the manipulation. Don't avoid it, you see? Don't avoid it and say, 'No, no, you come back.' Oh, you see, because that is also part of the mind trick. You see, the appearance of these thought patterns and the ideas that they should not come, 'It's coming back, oh,' you see, all of that is both. It tries to grab you both ways. Either take this position or take this position; either way, you're stuck with the mind. That when I say the mind, actually it's 'I.' The mind is speaking, 'I feel that this...' No, it's confusing again, no? Because like an excuse from the mind to say the mind is...

Yeah, that's what I'm saying. So either way, whether you take the mind's ideas or you take the spiritual knowledge which is saying, 'Oh, the mind is coming back,' you see, both are the mind, isn't it? So what I'm saying is just meet it and don't insert them into a narrative. So either position then can be discarded. So the mind can say, 'But what about this? But am I really there?' Yeah, and then the call the mind which is talking about the mind itself is saying, 'Oh, see, the mind is coming back and this is what it always does,' and you see this, it goes on like this. So then there can just be this game going on. But what's happening to you? Nothing's happening to me. I'm just perceiving.

Where is your boundary in perception? As you perceive, where do you start? And where all of us can try, as you are perceiving and many of you will see this body which is showing up as Ananta on the screen or in front of you now, in the pure perception itself, it's coming with the labels like augmented reality. So what do you need to do to determine separation? Let's see. So to see like this, if you did not have the ability for a few moments to categorize, you forgot about all categories of color, shapes, sizes, big, small, red, blue, black, all that you learned and were born with it. So you didn't have the ability to categorize, not perceive; you can still perceive just like a little bit. Then where do you end? Where do you start? There's no beginning, no end. Not even words can put 'end' because how can it be possible?

And without this categorization, are you lost? Are you missing something? When I say lost, because that's the mind's idea that 'I need these ideas, these categories, these labels to be able to live a productive life or to be able to live a meaningful life.' But have you lost meaning to your existence because we lost the labels? Has your existence lost its vibrance, or is it actually that you taste your vibrance now for a change compared to just trying to meet life and its narrative at the same time? That's a dissipation of attention, and we never truly meet life. Or not never, but maybe since you were young children, we've not really met life because we're trying to manage the story of our life along with life itself. What is shining in all of this? I don't want you to visualize anything to make this like a mystical experience. Just regularly, what is here? Whose light is shining? The light of your experiences is coming from where? Without whom no experience would be possible?

Alright, something wants to run away from this. It feels very uncomfortable. What is your relationship with that something? So it's like you're looking out the window, there's a girl who's running away. What does that have to do with you? What does that have to do with you? If it's a pure observation that, 'Okay, that is the proposal that the mind is giving me,' she's saying, 'Okay, now enough, enough, let's see the rest later' or something, you see. 'Let me just assimilate this first.' All these ideas can also be ideas of avoidance. But who's the protagonist? Who's the central character of that?

A kind of me, like the usual.

Yeah, the 'me' sense. Yes, yes. Dive into that. Dive into that and see if you find something. Don't avoid that 'I want to run away' or the 'me' wants to run away. Find the essence of this. It's a sensation, maybe a sensation which we got used to living. But remember the Maya's trump card: it will convince you that your presence itself is a limited presence of 'me'.

Can you say it again, please?

The main trick or the trump card of the mind is to convince you that your unlimited presence, the presence of God itself, is the presence of 'me'. And then spirituality becomes so convoluted because once we label that as the person, we are trying to then get rid of our very sense of being, which is the light of the waking state. You see, in the waking state, we want to get rid of the light of the waking state, and then spirituality becomes a never-ending problem. And the mind is celebrating if it can convince you that this presence, the beingness itself, is 'me', is a limited one, you see, and you must be free from that. Then we can keep... we can do whatever we want. But the being is the substratum of the waking state, so you can never get rid of it. It's better to then examine instead and say, 'How is this being personal? Is it personal at all?' You find no limitation to size. You find no desire except when proposed by notions. All that we assign to this 'me' is not here in the being unless being takes on the pose of being something. It's not naturally present.

I'm again trying to understand. It's like in and out, something like this, trying to understand what you're saying and...

When you don't understand, you don't understand. Are you lost?

No, no, no, no. I'm lost when I'm trying to understand, actually, kind of.

Kind of. But if you notice it, then you're not, you see? If you're noticing it and you're seeing the mind's attempts to try and solidify the story, then actually, noticing, nothing gets solidified. And the good news is what? That even if it is completely solidified, next moment you're free. That's why we're trying to solve the simplest problem in the world, which also seems like the most difficult one, isn't it? Because it's already solved. Yes.

But when I'm trying to understand, actually kind of, kind of... but if you notice it, then you're not, you see? If you're noticing it and you're seeing the mind's attempts to try and solidify the story, then actually, no, noticing nothing gets solidified. And the good news is what? That even if it is completely solidified, next moment you're free. That's why we're trying to solve the simplest problem in the world, which also seems like the most difficult one, isn't it? Because it's already solved. Yes, so the problem is solved, but we are solving the 'solved but,' resolving the 'butt' part of it.

So if you just take to heart that everything that follows the 'but' is a narrative and it's an invitation to the mind, just forget about it, whatever it may say. 'Oh, but the mind is trying this now. Oh, but energetically I feel this now. Oh, but there's an attempt for this now.' Once you recognize that your starting point is freedom and not your destination, the spiritual journey becomes very, very, by definition, non-existent. You take on the presumption of a limited starting point, then you already walked on a journey to delusion looking for an antidote. As I keep saying, before you can embark on the search for the Self, can you first confirm that you have lost it? Okay, just an idea. Yes, they're only ideas. Don't track your progress. Don't have a good list for freedom. Don't try to be in a particular state. I love you so much. Thank you.

Okay, let's go to MK for a moment. Ah, the two MKs. We'll go to Marin in a bit, but we'll go to MK. Sorry, are you able to join, my dear? Okay, doesn't seem like she's able to join. Let's go to Marin. It's funny that both of you were MK.

Great joy in my heart to be here and your presence in this moment. As always, it's spectacular, no? In a way, yeah. Something gave me the urge yesterday to really check in and share with you, but now over the course of the satsang, I'm also kind of really sensing like, is this necessary in a way, to really feel what's alive now? Yeah, so let's see. Take a moment.

Yes, take your time.

Thanks. Yeah, I'm happy to share actually this report, and it's a little bit into the story of my life. So yesterday I met... currently life put me in position of a coaching student here in the university, and yesterday I had an interview with one of these students. And so there was a moment, it's quite reflective kind of, it's not about content, it's quite like a reflective kind of a talk, yeah. And there was a moment that I really felt strong resentment in me in something that I saw in him. Like, I would even say, if I can find the right word, like what's the word... walking... I don't know the English word, there's a really good Dutch word, but I don't think you have it. It's like repugnant, like repulsed. Repulsed, this is the word. Like really repulsed by something that I saw in him.

And I just sat with it, you know, and I really felt like, what is this that I feel now? And it made me reflect actually on my past a bit. So it's part of my life that I studied economics. This is like before Guruji came in my life. I was really like immersed in this field of economics, which is basically such a strong field of self-interest in this very personal way, like profit and power and money. And all these aspects of life are really like the main drive there, you know. So it was really, it became in that time, it became my reality actually, and my filter, you know, on myself and with the world.

And then all through it, I always felt this hint, like, this is not full, you know, this is not... I'm not fully in this. I always had this sense. And then at some point, you know, by grace, my deeper prayer was answered and Guruji came into my life and my eyes opened up basically. And my experience and my sense of life and myself in the world just moved beyond this field. But yes, so yesterday in speaking to the students, I kind of realized that in that, I also kind of pushed something away in a way from myself, which is this also part of life and God in a way, of you know, self-interest, power, money. Like, there's nothing essentially wrong with it.

And I see that in that movement of me kind of breaking out of that, I really... like kind of, there's a strong judgment in it, strong notion actually. And now I see, you know, yesterday I see how it served me, kind of this movement to kind of break from that, but now I also see that it doesn't serve me anymore, that look, you know, that judgment of ego you could say in a way, or like all these drives. So yeah, I'm very grateful now in this moment that I can give it words, you know, that I can kind of affirm this inner process in a way and burn this judgment basically of that outside of me and inside of me, you know, that whatever it is.

Yeah, that's very good because you bring up an important point about the mind's template of what a spiritual seeker should be like. The idea that 'I should have only this, I should not have this, and this is how I should be,' which is as much an aspect of an ego—like the spiritual ego is as much an ego as any other ego, if not worse.

Exactly, yeah.

I think ego at least, they're a little more flexible. The spiritual ego especially, the spiritual ego is very like definitive, you see? While, 'Oh, it is like that and like this,' and we seem to be so clear about how life should be and how life should not be. But it's great maturity to see that all of this is also conceptual, all of this is also just egoic. And to notice that in every expression of consciousness, consciousness can play in its own way, and there is nothing here which has the capacity to judge something as good or bad. I'm saying that even if there was something which is good or bad or better or worse, at least the mind does not have the capacity to judge that.

And the guidance which comes intuitively is non-judgmental in the sense that it is universal and not in opposition to really anything, because everything is playing within consciousness itself. So this is good to see this thing, that we can have a certain set of ideas which we feel like is better for my freedom: 'I should only become like this or should only be this way, and people who are in the working life or a household life, they are not spiritual enough and they are walking down the wrong path.' Or some spiritual arrogance like that is uncalled for, and I'm glad you're seeing that and you're transcending that. It's very good. It's very important for everyone hearing as well. There's nothing so special that we are in a quest to find God. Every seeking is a seeking ultimately, so the spiritual arrogance can be squeezed out of us. Thank you.

Thank you, yeah. And I just think life, you know, and God's mystery of perfectly weaving the tapestry that I need, you know, to see the things that need to be seen and coming to the light. So it's so unfathomable something. Thank God for that. Love you, Father.

Okay, let's try MK again. It doesn't look like she's able to come. Let me go to Govinda, who I don't feel like we've met here, so let me give him the right to jump the queue for a moment.

Yeah, this is the first time we are talking. I attended a few satsangs, a few today after like a long gap. I think one, one and a half months after, I am seeing you.

Take your time, my dear. Take your time. Don't just do that. Okay.

So, Father, I understand, you know, what is like a meaning of here, being here, like we say 'I am here' and awareness, right? So I worked on myself also, like listening to Mooji, you, and Osho and many other masters. So I worked on myself and I did meditation, many Vipassana, other meditation also. And finally I realized, you know, what is the meaning of being here. Then after that, I could not meditate also anymore. So I started contemplating only: 'I, who? Like, if any problem arise, it is for whom, right?'

So I did it for one, one or two years and then those things also start dropping. So today, today what's happening is I feel intuitively what I can see is... so I understand, but there is no living experience. Or I feel something, you know, if I have to start... I'm not working on myself like I was doing before, like inquiry, contemplation, meditation, or even I'm not sitting for an hour in the morning, evening. But there is... so I see also like I'm not staying here and like 90 plus percentage I am outside, worldly sensual pleasure, right? And I'm not happy with it also. I'm not happy that I'm not staying. I am here, but it's not living, living every time, you know? It's so beautiful to be here, no nothing here and I... I work in IT and I'm not working from last four months, five months. I'm not working. I took sabbatical leave and so I want to quit job. I don't want to go back. One month left to join and I don't have much clarity. I took sabbatical leave six months to be more, you know, grounded and so that I become one, that... yeah, I don't want to work. I don't want to go back to that structure, you know, which has a lot of limitation. So that is a different thing.

So main important thing, yeah, it's like I'm... you can say, my dear, what is the important thing? Yeah, so I understand this and but still I'm not living here. Whenever I reminded, I come here. Good, nothing, nothing, nothing, then no nothing, right? This time also I understand whatever I am talking to you, I am so... I don't know.

Good, good, good. So you gave me some good clues and we can start a conversation based on that, and then we can modify it based on what is resonating and what is not resonating. So firstly, I don't feel like you're doing badly at all. You're doing well. You're following the masters, you've tried self-inquiry, you've come to insights about yourself as awareness, you've transcended the mind at times, you see?

Now what seems to be happening, and this is just... it's not a diagnosis, it's just a conversation starter. So what seems to be happening is that there's the conceptual 'I' or the ego 'I' is trying to now juggle between your spirituality and your work life and trying to find the balance and 'How do I always stay here?' you see? So it is almost as if the non-existent ego is now trying to help you resolve your life, you see? But in the inquiry, the 'I' that you found, or what you found yourself to be, you see, is there really another one compared to that? And if there isn't another one, then who is trying to manage life or their existence in this life?

So who are we trying to help? Whose problem are we solving? Is the self-inquiry such that I can discover an aspect of myself which will help my idea of what my life should be? Or is the self-inquiry to come to the truth of what I am, and then automatically the tentacles with which we want to control this life get chopped away? What is your insight into that?

Can you repeat again last time?

Now we're just saying... I'm not sure if I'll be able to repeat, I usually forget everything, but let me see what comes. So is the self-inquiry such that we discover something so that this 'I' which wants to have a certain standard of life or the way of living, so it can achieve that? Or is the self-inquiry bringing us to a point where we discover ourselves to be that to which the idea of controlling any aspect of life seems alien?

Yes, second thing. Yes, second.

So if it is that, then who are we attempting to help now, you see? Because if this life belongs to the Self, if it belongs to God, then we can allow God to run it the way it wants. Who is concerned about what texture life may take? We can start even simpler than that. So we have a sense that 'I was doing inquiry, I was doing meditation, I was doing Vipassana, now I'm not doing.' Can we identify this doer or non-doer?

Yeah, even now when I am trying to think, understand...

Yes, second thing. So if it is that, then who are we attempting to help now? You see, because if this life belongs to the Self, if it belongs to God, then we can allow God to run it the way it wants. Who is concerned about what texture life may take? We can start even simpler than that. So we have a sense that 'I was doing inquiry, I was doing meditation, I was doing Vipassana, now I'm not doing.' Can we identify this doer or non-doer?

Yeah, even now when I am trying to think, understand, and reply to you, even now, yes, I can see that you are as a sort of conceptual creation, isn't it? Sometimes there is blank, like even when I come back to here, or when I am lost, forget about fairness and you know, busy in worldly life, and then I again come back here. I choose to be here. And so this is, both oscillations are also seen sometimes. But my heart is like, I let this be finished now. How long will it go, this oscillation, you know? And is it something that I am not giving my best? Is it something that, you know, I go somewhere for one month or I do completely first finish this then start something else? Like this thing goes on sometimes. And sometimes it says nothing, I have to serve my family and do my karmas. So the mixture of this thing goes on.

So my first advice to you would be to completely surrender. First advice would be to completely surrender. Everything that is happening is the Satguru's problem. Everything that is happening is the Satguru's grace. Nothing you have to do or deal with or sort out. Allow yourself to be fully open and empty in that surrender, which means surrender does not mean 'If I surrender to Guruji, then my life will go where I want it to go.' Surrender means that outcomes, actions, everything is surrendered. If that complete surrender seems like too much, you know, it seems like too much, 'My temperament is not that, I am more of an inquirer,' then I would suggest that you take your inquiry to solution to a point that every time you start believing an idea about yourself which is in the narrative—which is like you are a body-mind, you see—then that becomes less and less and it becomes laughable over a period of time.

So if you feel more comfortable with the inquiry to investigate who you are, then stay with that to such an extent that when you pick up the wrong idea about yourself as somebody limited in time and between birth and death, then you see, when you check, you are able to immediately drop that. So don't give up on the inquiry if surrender does not seem natural to you. So surrender means whatever proposals the mind is making, we allow it to be the Guru's problem.

Yeah, actually both are same thing what you said, very, very. Yeah.

So and like that, come to this point where there's a lot of like self-concern for this non-existent one which will get dissolved in the surrender and the inquiry. Like, 'What should I do now? Am I dropping it? Am I missing it? I don't want to be lost again. I want to finish it all.' In all these proposals, who is the 'I'? Who are you taking yourself to be? Not the reality of what you discovered in your own insight. It is still the one which is proposing this limited body-mind identity. What is time for the infinite one? When you say, 'Now, how long will this go on? I want it to be over,' whose tantrum is that? Sometimes it's okay, sometimes it gives you momentum to inquire even deeper. But if it's just like a frustration thing—'No, no, I don't know, how long does this even work? Should I just go back to normal life? This thing is all, you know, not working'—you see, this kind of frustration, we're just buying into an idea about ourselves which is contrary to your own discovery about yourself because you say that 'I have seen my reality as awareness.'

So my tip would be don't make an understanding out of that every time you see the... because then what will happen is that your understanding of yourself as a limited you and an understanding of yourself as awareness will have a fight, you see? But that is not what we want. We want the understanding of you as limited you to drown in the insight of yourself as you really are. So the truth doesn't have to be remembered, actually. So you do not create a conceptual Mahabharata in your head. What you're doing is anytime you start taking your limited being too seriously, then you just look and say, 'Okay, who am I? What am I?' and you recognize that you are this awareness. And then once you see that the main character which the thoughts are proposing you to be doesn't exist at all in the first place, then you will find it very difficult to take those thoughts seriously. You will just laugh at them.

So stay with your inquiry, stay with your surrender, and don't try to convince your mind about whether they are effective or not. That's why trust comes in, that's where devotion comes in, that the masters are pointing you to this. You do not take the mind's diagnosis about your progress and things. They are bound to work; they are working already very well. That is why the mind is throwing bigger tantrums. If there was no danger to its supremacy, then it would not throw tantrums. If there is any trouble in any aspect of the inquiry, I am always available, always happy to answer those as well. Okay? And the one thing I want to end with is to give you a lot of space, a lot of freedom, is that don't check on your spiritual progress. Let that be the Master's problem, okay? Like this judgment about '90% of the time I'm out and only a little bit I'm in.' You see, you don't even remember 90% of the moments in your life. How can you make that judgment? Maybe it is the other way around. You cannot really say.

We may say, 'See, but yesterday I got so angry,' or 'Yesterday I was feeling so lustful,' or something like that, and based on that we may make a judgment about ourselves. But actually, just a few moments don't define life. Maybe you were completely open and empty. So leave that tracking and that progress to the Satguru, which is taking care of everything. When we were children, then our job was to study and follow what the teacher was saying, and the teacher's job was to give the marks. Now you want to have the teacher job also and the student job. So you follow the teacher's instruction, let the teacher do all the spreadsheet and report card and tracking. Yes. If you have fallen back into identification, rather than thinking more about identification—'Why I got identified?' all of that—use that opportunity to let go of that identification fully in that moment instead of analyzing the past.

Like I was saying to someone the other day, and I feel like it's a useful pointing: when you are identified, you are identified, so you are suffering. Suffer, it's okay. When you are not identified in that moment, what most of us are doing in spirituality is thinking about the times we got identified and beating ourselves up for those times and saying, 'I shouldn't have done that. Why did I get identified again? My masters have told me.' You see, all of that. Instead of that, meet God fully. Meet yourself. Meet yourself as awareness fully in that moment. So I was saying to someone last time that when you are not identified and you notice you got identified, what is the best gift you can give to yourself? Embrace God fully. Hold God deeply in your heart instead of thinking about 'I should, why should.' All of that is continuing the same thing, the identification, yes? In the garb of trying to fix the identification, the mind finds a way to continue the identification through that kind of mental process. Instead of that, you notice, 'Ah, I got identified.' Finished. It's over. You see? Now God is here. Enjoy that.

Like I think sometimes, like, 'Why I'm not choosing to be here?' and then I immediately see that it is here, there is nothing to choose. It's an idea. And I then feel, is it the mind bluffing with me? What is happening? Is it this true or this true? Then all this thing happening and I am also seeing that this is here, this thing is also going on.

What happens is because maybe there is a software engineer conditioning there, and there's software engineer conditioning here also. So what happens is we try to find solutions to everything, like answers to everything in our minds, like 'Why does this happen? What is the root cause? What can I change?' See, all of this. But what happens is that in this process, it is very different. It is you notice that you were going with the mind, and as you notice that, you drop into your heart, you drop into your presence, you drop into your being. That's it. We don't have to fix anything there because there is no solution over there. You may think and think and think one lakh times, but you will not find a solution to it. You will not find God there. And discard all 'why' questions. 'Why' questions are all pointless questions. It puts us in time. 'Why' means causation. Causation implies there's cause and effect, you see? That means there's time. So we're putting ourselves back in limitation. If you want a three-letter question which starts with 'W' and 'H', pick the 'Who' question, not the 'Why' question. Yes. And don't touch your mind when it is telling you you're not doing well. I can see you're doing well. Don't worry.

Thank you. Thank you so much. I'm very happy that today I have raised my hand and talked to you. Yeah, I was waiting for that also, but today I did it. I'm happy for myself.

I'm also very happy to meet you. Thank you. Okay, bye for now. Okay, let's go to Lorraine.

Hello. Hello. Hello. I have no camera today. I'm borrowing cameras and today that didn't work. Is it okay?

Yeah, it's fine. No video.

Thank you very much. This is almost a continuation of what you talked with the previous person about, because I see it, yeah, it's like, you know, seemingly there's these two pulls: one's towards self-freedom and one's towards identification. And it is experienced as these pulls are getting stronger and stronger and stronger and—

Wait, who's the poor one stuck between the two pulls? Who's getting pulled?

No one is getting pulled. No one is getting pulled. It's but it's like shifts, you know? And when identification is there, there's a desperate seeking, and it's turned into being desperate now. And when opening is there, everything, you know, there cannot be any problem.

Yeah, okay. So when identification is there, yeah, then firstly, the first stage of identification, we are identified, you know? Then what is that? Either because we start to suffer or something starts to get a bit lit up inside, we start to see that, 'Oh, this is identification. I'm not taking myself to be real.' And then what happens is because we have spiritual conditioning, we start to beat ourselves up about why we get identified. 'I should not identify,' all of those things.

I don't do that.

Very good. So it is over. Because what happens is that those moments of just identification and not the afterthought about identification, this part is very small actually. It is the dessert, the final course, which is the most calorie, you see? So if you're not doing that, and the minute you spot it, you sort of drop it, you see? 'Ah, there was identification. Fine.' Then you'll see that that does not have so much pull. Like the mind may be convincing you that it's very strong, but if you're noticing for yourselves that there are moments of identification, but when they're over you're not trying to problem-solve it, you're just out of it, then you're not doing badly at all. And the pull towards identification is not as strong as your mind may convince you that it is, because no mind is that powerful. No mind has that much juice.

No, I don't think it's mind, or there's no 'me' here to do it, so I'm blaming God. No, it's just, oh, there's such a longing and it's so painful, and it feels like the heart gets broken again and again and again and again. And you know, but what I wanted to ask you, and then...

If you're just out of it, then you're not doing badly at all. And the pull towards identification is not as strong as your mind may convince you that it is, because no mind is that powerful. No mind has that much music.

No, I don't think it's mind, or there's no 'me' here to do it, so I'm blaming God. No, it's just, oh, there's such a longing and it's so painful. And it feels like the heart gets broken again and again and again and again. And you know, but what I wanted to ask you—and then Sita Ji was you—because it seemed that in the openings there's this absolute bliss. That's the only thing I can say. And maybe there's some sort of an addiction to that, you know? Addiction like a peekaboo; you don't like the blanket over your face, but wow, when it's lifted, wow. And therefore it goes on and on and on. I don't know, I don't know.

That's a very good point, and I have not mentioned it for quite some time, so I'm happy you brought that up. You see, so what happens—and this is the downside of spiritual experiences—so what happens is once we see, and there's so much spaciousness, and many times we experience joy, great joy, great bliss, great love, yes. And what happens is that the byproducts sometimes don't last, you see? They're not constant. So then we feel like, 'Oh, but that was really nice, you see? That was really nice.' So my advice always is: the truth is worth it for itself. You see, even if it came with no sweet byproducts, we are not willing to live a lie anymore. And that is the quest for freedom or the quest for the Self. It is worth it just because it is true. There's a longing for what is true, and all the byproducts which are sweet are just a bonus on top of that.

So I'm not saying have an aversion to them, but don't judge anything based on whether bliss is there or bliss is not there. Don't judge anything on the basis of any byproduct. Just clarify to yourself in that moment: 'Am I aware now?' or 'Can I stop being now?' 'Is God here? Where is my presence?' Any of these questions which you know very well now. So just use that, but don't make any benchmark or state of progress about yourself based on any appearance which is sweet and has a particular sort of taste, you see? Love the neutrality of the truth, and everything else is allowed to come and go.

Can I ask you, how can there be only truth and no byproducts?

No, I'm not saying that it should be like that. I'm saying allow the byproducts to come if they have to, or not come if they don't have to. Yeah, so sometimes it can seem too sober. It can seem too sober. Oh, this... and then the mind might throw a question: 'But this can't be it. Where is the love?' You see, for this kind of thing. Then the truth can display in a completely sober way, and sometimes in a completely blissful way. It's completely fine. And actually, the truth as we are speaking about it—the capital 'T' Truth—is untouched by either state, isn't it?

Yes. Yeah, I know. And that's what's so crazy, because in the opening I have no words for it and there's only truth. None of what I've talked about is true and none of it matters. And then when identification shows up, oh, it's like going from heaven to hell. It really is really tough, but it's physically tough.

Yeah, you define the human condition very well. But I feel in my heart that you're transcending it very well, and that is a prediction and a blessing. And the pulls of identification also get lighter and lighter as long as you are not measuring them and you allow them to be. It will be that way. Yeah.

Thank you. So can I, very shortly, because and that's really a mind idea... because can I ask you... and what I'm going to ask you is really an idea from mind, not from mine, but you know what I mean. Because there's been this sense of ripening and ripening and ripening like a fruit on a tree. And there's been this, when closing, when identification has been here, there's been this awaiting of dropping from the tree. And then on one of my walks, I saw one of these fruits that actually stuck so much to the tree that it just, you know, got dry and just stayed there. And I thought, 'Oh, that cannot happen. I have to drop.' Yes, please, can I have your blessing for that? Oh, and then I don't want to do this.

Yeah, and like I said, the most important thing in this—and we may not realize how important it is—is for you not to track how much you are ripening. You see, because the mind convinces you from the beginning of spirituality... most people are always convinced that they are almost there. And it could be years and we are still almost there. So the trouble is the idea that we pick up about ourselves when we make a spiritual conclusion about ourselves. Yeah. So my full blessing and my full prediction is there that it is happening, but the only condition is if you don't make any report cards about yourself.

Yeah, I won't. Thank you.

None that you take seriously anyway. If you come to satsang and you just share because you want to express something, that is fine. But nothing that you're taking too seriously for yourself. Thank you. Love you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, let's go to Audron.

Namaskar. Good to see you. I miss you very much because I really have a question, but it's just tough to come up because it's been a few months since the last time I talked to you. And I know I listened to a lot of your satsangs, and it seems that other people, my brothers and sisters, they are able to express those questions. I even didn't know I had those questions, and they just say it aloud and you get answers to them, but just to me. Like you talk today, like you said that you talk to the human conditioning in a broad sense. So thank you for that, because I really feel that you are taking, layer by layer, all the burdens from me. And so good to be together. Very happy to be here. And I cannot stop listening to you because I know sometimes, you know, there's some doubt because I really cannot... earlier I was able to meditate, now I would rather watch your satsangs than meditate or inquire. I don't know, is it good?

It's fine, because most things which are being put in satsang, if not everything, is a guided self-inquiry. Meditation is happening in the questions which are posed to you, in the responses that come from here, you see? The meditation is all happening during the time that you listen to satsang. So you're not giving up something. I feel like it's better than I can do it on my own. Is there the insight about what you are? Is that... I don't know, how's it going?

Well, maybe I have to say that sometimes, sometimes... but you know, like from you, I really clearly heard the message that everything is the Master's problem. You know, give everything to the Master. And I'm very glad to do this because earlier, somehow, I was trying even imitation, somehow to do something with the problem. Now I would rather surrender, and it brings a lot of space and freedom and joy. So I cannot say that I do this in every moment of my life, but like we just speak, I cannot measure all those moments. I just feel that something in the view, just my life is opening, and sometimes I really feel this, 'Wow, there's no me.' It's beautiful. So happy to be together. Thanks.

Let's go. Hello, hello. I lost you now. Is your internet back? Is it for everyone like this? They can't hear, or is it just my connection? For everyone? Can you hear me a little bit now, my dear? It's still very... a lot of work. You can put on my earphones if it's not good like this. This is sounding good now. Okay, no, it should be better here, but let me try the ear. Can you hear me now? I can hear you. Wait, did I see you? Okay, we lost you now. It's not in the room anymore. Okay, welcome back to Devi in a moment. Let's try MK, sir.

So, can you hear me? Yes, yes. Thank you, thank you, sir. So, can everyone hear me? Yes, yes. Do you want to not have everyone hear you? I wanted that, but I have a question for you. Yes, but right now I'm just making it clear. Yes, understood, sir. Good. So, have you checked your chat messages? Please leave your question and not read it out loud, just answer you. Is that what it is? No, so you can just read it and then I'll just talk it out. Okay, I see. Okay, yes, yes. Okay, yes, sir. Do you believe in spirits?

Not so much in belief, but that may not appeal to you so much at this point. So, in God's kingdom, in the play of consciousness, every expression of consciousness is not just possible, it is completely tasteable, it's completely tangible. But the important thing about that is that it can appear within consciousness. Nothing can truly be in opposition to God's will or the will of consciousness. So whatever experience you may be having or not having, it is all part of the play of consciousness, and it can never truly be strong enough or big enough to hurt consciousness itself.

So many things show up in our life which may attack identity, may attack our belief system, may attack the body-mind idea about ourselves. But if you rest in the true presence of God, then all this experience which you may be experiencing is experienced as a small, small popcorn. Because nothing... there is no force in the universe which is greater than that which is the projective light of the universe itself. And it is that light which is your presence, which is your very being. So nothing can hurt, just like no scene in the movie hurts the light of the projector. So whatever may be recorded and may show up on the screen, it cannot hurt the screen and it cannot hurt the projective light.

Play of love, your divinity, everything in fact you will find is... you can refer to it as a child of yours because you are this consciousness. So don't have any fear about anything that is coming. You just stay in your holy presence and just give love to everything, although it may sound difficult. Just have a loving attitude towards anything that may be appearing for you. You'll notice that there is nothing for you to fear. Please hear. And then my love, my full blessings are there and all my prayers.

I needed that, so thank you for your intro. Don't, don't...

You have Guruji's grace with you and don't worry about anything at all. Thank you, sir. And one final tip for you: don't try to conceptually decipher too much. Don't try to understand too much about what this is. Nobody can really make sense of it. And the mind thing... sometimes you will see like this kind of thing, other times it will say the imagination appears in the projector, is part of the... as you carry this God in your heart as you said, because there's such a presence in your heart. Thank you, sir. Thank you, sir. I know that Subhash is already in touch with you, one of the sweetest members we have, so I'm sure he can help you as a sangha brother in a very beautiful way. Thank you. Most important is...

Yes, yes. Thank you, Ananta. And I'm preparing myself to come to raise my hand already for a few weeks, and now I said I have to do it. I have to expose this stronger and stronger believing back to the person-mind. And just rarely, rarely I can see through your guidance, through 'Can you be aware?' or 'Are you aware of perceiving my hand?' so that I can be, or be what I know I am. And it is like I'm somehow... I have these beliefs in mind in that the mind can be very strong. And it is like I'm picking up from Mooji Ji and from you the pointers for making my mind stronger in a way, and it's hard to let it go. And now I can't even come to a position of 'I don't understand.' And not understanding... it's not understanding, but what is open and empty. It's like these openings which were such a blessing, like they are closing up and I'm in a not a good position. So I ask you for your help or guidance or blessing or whatever. Thank you. Thank you for that report.

It is like I'm picking up from Mooji Ji and from you the pointers for making my mind stronger in a way, and it's hard to let it go. And now I can't even come to a position of... I don't understand and not understand. It's not understanding, but what is open and empty. It is like these openings, which were such a blessing, they are closing up and I'm in a not-a-good position. So I ask you for your help or guidance or blessing or whatever. Thank you.

Thank you for that report and thank you for coming up. Sometimes there can be a lot of fear or apprehension about how we will present ourselves, what we will say, you see. But I'm happy that you did come up today. Now let's really look at this. You say that it's so difficult to be open and empty because the mind's presentations, representations, are so strong. But I want to really look at this now. Suppose the idea was the opposite. So now you have to be as closed and not open as possible, and the next moment, no matter what happens, you cannot be open and empty. Okay? So can you do that? This moment, you'll be completely closed. Don't be open. I can't see your face so well; is it possible to change the angle a bit? Yes, is it better? It's a bit better. That source of light cannot be reduced at the back? There's a window. So now, don't try to be open and empty. Try to be closed and identify this moment. Right now, be closed. Tell me if you succeed.

So you can notice that the mind's representation of the problem versus what your direct experience may be could be quite opposite. So of course the mind will now say, 'Oh, it's because you're in satsang and you know you've come up, that's why it's not happening; otherwise you're mostly...' Don't buy into any of that, you see.

I somehow fall in the dialogue with the mind. I immediate... like an immediate reaction that I start a dialogue.

But actually both sides of the dialogue are the mind, you see. So don't feel like you are starting the dialogue with the mind. It is the mind posing, sometimes like this, sometimes like that. It is like two lawyers which are arguing, but both lawyers are the mind itself. And sometimes the third lawyer will come, which will be the spiritual lawyer, and say, 'Oh, that is all just the mind,' which is also the mind. So just what you hear from your intuitive guidance, from your heart—and you may not hear it as audio, you may hear it in a different qualitative way—that is guidance which is not from the mind. Every other thought is a thought; is the mind. So don't worry about trying to resolve it. Sometimes the mind plays that way, you see? It plays that way. Sometimes it poses as if it is you on this side and you on the other side. Don't worry. Let that play continue in that playground. What is happening in the rest of you?

Like there is no rest of me in that. It is like full screen, just narrative happening, and my mind is involved in it. And I don't recognize that, I don't discern the distance to this body-mind. I take myself then as a body-mind again.

Now, in times which are not like that, you see—because those are the important times. In the times as you say, 'full screen,' everything seems to be about that, all attention, all belief is going—it's fine, you see. We cannot avoid those. Those are fine. Now, in the times when it is not like that, like right now, what about the rest of you? The playground of the mind, intellect... there can still be debates happening, but how big is that compared to the rest of your being?

It's not so big. And I must say why I had to raise my hand is that I was trying to follow through what you are saying to others and it functioned, but somehow I really strongly felt that I have to speak with you on my own.

It's very good. I'm very happy you've come up. I'm very happy you've come up, and also that you followed through along with the conversation with everyone else. But sometimes it just feels like, 'I have to go up now and share directly from my experience.' It's completely fine, completely fine. So the trick in this is that the mind serves as the starter, you see, which is the whole drama about judgments and interpretations, all posing as the truth. But then it comes in the spiritual pose and says, 'See, now that is my problem, that should stop happening,' you see? But this is the mind. And then it says, 'I don't know if I'm making any progress, whether I'm a worthy seeker, whether all this thing is really helping me, or where am I going.' All of these are just the mind, you see.

So like I was saying, the times in which it seems too strong and our attention is fully on it and there seems no way I can withdraw my belief, you see—all of it seems that we are stuck. It's fine. Be stuck, you see? But on all the other times, enjoy the divinity of your presence. Don't fall into trying to fix that when that is not so strong then. And then you'll notice that even that will be taken over by God. That's fine. But don't track that, don't judge that.

It felt like, or it's feeling also—not really at the moment, but yes, in fact—that lately it took all the screen and all the attention, and that very rarely I could come out. For let's say, normally after... yeah, I'm coming to satsang quite regularly and I'm following Mooji, but somehow I have also... I cannot listen to the Invitation. I'm like, when you say, 'Don't think about this or that,' then it comes strongly. And the Invitation functions like that lately. So your satsangs were so rare moments of the clarity, and now like this was somehow... it felt like it is closing down and that's why I had to come.

It's completely good that you've come. I just want to remind you also that the mind has no capacity to judge where we are spiritually. The mind has no capacity to judge where we are spiritually. So that is why I leave progress to God, leave progress to Guruji. Because if we keep relying on our mind's judgments, you see, we are just shuttling between 'almost there' and 'hopeless.' Those are the two ends of the mind's judgment about our spiritual progress, isn't it? Or even if it is saying, 'Yes, yes, you made it,' it is talking to you with a sense of specialness or as if you are somebody limited, you see. So don't fall for your mind's conclusions about how well or how badly your spiritual search is doing, especially when it is giving you feedback about, 'Oh, the Invitation is not working so well as it used to,' some idea like that.

Because the Invitation is very direct, you see. It is very direct. The questions are asked, you just have to put on the tape or the file and Guruji's voice is taking over, and you just, with the innocence of a child, as the answers come—not conceptually, but just from your intuitive insight—just answer whatever the answers come. So it is impossible for it not to work, just like it is impossible for self-inquiry not to work. But in the mind's ideas, it can get bored. It can say, 'Oh, but this is now... I'm just using the mind to answer,' you see. The mind itself will keep complaining about the mind and say, 'It's not really helping me,' and this kind of thing.

So use every opportunity where you feel like you're not completely inundated by the mind, not to think about those times that you are inundated by the mind, but to immerse yourself in your being, in the recognition of yourself as the Self. And in that, you will notice that the rest of the time will also start to thin out. But if you had a bad breakfast, you see, but now it's lunch time, but you're not eating the lunch fresh in front of you but you're just thinking about why you had a bad breakfast, then even lunch time is gone. So any opportunity that life gives you to meet God fully, use that to meet God fully and not to dwell on the past. In that way, the mind will run out of all its tricks to play because the mind cannot constantly be at you. It's not endless. Only God is endless. Only the Self is endless.

For me it's like I come from the atheistical background and the God for me, it's truth, the real truth. So it's like I... oh, this... I'm listening to the mind, you know, like complaining about the word God.

Yes, I was an atheist for a long part of my life and I can completely understand what you're saying. For me, the idea of God was for losers, like people who don't know anything are just stupid, they believe in this notion of God. And then I noticed that I had not explored my own presence, like: who is sitting here? What word we use is not so important, but to explore whose being is here, whose presence is this. Is it that exploration is worthy? Whether you call that consciousness, beingness, you invent a new word for it, or you call it God, that is fine. That is not so important.

Today when you said like it is possible that also the ego takes over the being, you know, it's like then I start to, you know, 'Oh, maybe this is happening, maybe when...' you know, it's like all these negativities joined together and I'm completely frightened, you know, that things are going wrongly and that my mind is stronger and that maybe I should give up and I don't know, I don't know.

Yes, yes, yes. So if I said that, let me rephrase it. So what I was attempting to say is that the mission of the ego, or the mission of the mind, is to—in the design of consciousness itself—play as if the presence of being is the presence of somebody personal. And who does it try to convince? Consciousness itself. This is the consciousness playing this game of getting identified and freeing itself from this decision. So it can never truly be trapped. And I'm sorry if I conveyed that sort of impression about consciousness. It is just in the play of Maya, the mind is designed to play as if its job is to convince consciousness that it is limited.

Just like when I see the kids playing video games, there's a voice of a narrator which tells you, 'Oh, Mr. James Bond, your next mission is to do this and go rescue this princess' or something like that. This is what is trying to convince the player that it is James Bond. In the same way, it is the job of this narrative mind to convince consciousness that it is only this body-mind, you see. That is the job. Because when you search, you find that, 'Oh, I am here.' The I am-ness is undeniable. But the mind will convince you that this I am-ness is personal. That is its job. But to see through that, you see, being in satsang, to see through that lie is very easy actually.

Because even to identify with your name, you need to think about it, you see. Who is here? Don't think anything right now. Who's here? Who's here? You see, even... you are here, but you're not Sneza yet. You're not yet, you see? For Sneza, you need the thought, the label. So this limitless beingness, nameless, formless, just pure being, it's just always here. So it's the mind which has a difficult job; it is not the being.

Being is always... it's since I remember. So from my youth, you know, I was subtitling what is happening. Such a strong, strong habit which is hard to pull the distance over this.

I notice as a tip: don't try to stop the subtitles. Just allow them to come and go. Be as less concerned about them as possible, you see? Because we try to stop the mind, we try to push the mind away, it doesn't work. Then it seems to come back with more force. Let the subtitles happen. That's why I'm saying that how much of your being does it take up? What about the rest of you? There's an aspect of you where the subtitling is happening, the judgments are happening, the debates are happening, but bring some focus into the rest of you when life makes the space for it. And then that space will only keep expanding and expanding. Whatever now... if you refer to a thought about now, it's talking about the past series. Now, what about now? There are no words now.

Yes.

So easy. So easy. Without words, are you lost? Is something missing? You see? So it is this language, these words, these labels which have created all these struggles. So let them continue in their playground. You have the rest of the...

Bring some focus into the rest of you when life makes the space for it, and then that space will only keep expanding and expanding. Whatever now—if you refer to a thought about now, it's talking about past series. Now, what about now? There are no words now. Yes, so easy. So easy. Without words, are you lost? Is something missing? You see, so it is this language, these words, these labels which have created all these struggles. So let them continue in their playground; you have the rest of the universe to play with. Please keep me in your heart, and you are welcome to come up anytime because I noticed that you can feel a bit apprehensive or shy about raising your hand. So I want you to raise your hand whenever you feel like, whenever you feel you want to, just raise it without thinking too much about it. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, let's go quickly, quickly to Chicken's answers. Yes, yes.

Yeah, I don't know what will come out of me. Same thing. I've been attending your satsang since I have attended satsang last year, and then I never raised my hand. Somehow, since the past few weeks, I am thinking that I have to raise my hand, but somehow as the satsang starts, I think like everything is fine and there's no point in this. But once the satsang is over, then everything is just... things happen the way they have to happen. I mean, there is no one who can control. Maybe I have to say that I lost control, maybe.

And then you lost it?

I feel like I lost it. And then there is this... I used to think that I have it. I'm just waking everyone, of course, in the process.

So you used to think you had it, and then you realized that you never had it? Okay. And this 'you' that doesn't have it is which one now? Poor thing with no control? I don't know, but I don't like to teach that way because that one who's not the doer doesn't exist anyway. So who's not the doer? Maybe it's my mind, it's altered my mind. So I knew that now, which is like a puppet on strings being controlled by a higher force, you see. Are you just that puppet? Are you the higher force itself?

I don't know.

Maybe that's the right answer, I guess. Don't worry about right or wrong. Just expanding, you see, expanding you beyond your concepts of what you could be and leaving you in the space of your heart rather than any conceptual conclusion is more than enough. You don't have to determine this way or that way, but I'm enjoying your openness in this conversation, which is fun for me too. If you're open and you can laugh at yourself, then this is very easy. This is very easy for us.

Yeah, since I raised my hand today, I just thought continuously coming to me: 'What will you talk? What will you talk about? Anyways, he's answering your questions, then why did you list?' And then I thought, let's see, if he calls, we'll see how it goes.

Very... sometimes you have to take the risk. You just have to dive in. It's very good. Now, what is left of you?

Yes, I could see there is some tension, right? And then there is a seeing of the tension.

Yes. And what is more primal, what is more intimate to you: the seeing or the tension?

The seeing.

Now, what can appear? How big, how much bigger can the tension become so that it can hurt the seeing itself?

I didn't get you for this.

So allow the tension to expand. Allow it to become big. Invite it to become big and see if there can come a point where it can become so big that it can hurt the seeing itself or attack the seeing itself.

I could see that the tension is like becoming big, but the seeing is still untouched.

Now allow your mind to throw the worst-case scenarios about anything in any realm of your existing: outer body realm, emotional realm, thought, imagination realm, any realm. Allow it to bring the worst to you and see if that which is aware even of perception can be hurt in any way.

Nothing is happening.

So the mistaken identity of taking yourself as something which can be attacked or can be hurt or was born or is going to die—you see that it's a fallacy, right? Am I forcing you into these answers?

No, no, Father.

Now what problem can remain?

I don't see any problem now.

You have to find a way to stay like this. No, I'm just checking if there is any problem coming up. Usually the mind will say to you, 'You have to find a way to always stay like this,' you see. So it creates a nonsensical sort of strategy for that which you already are, for that which you cannot leave. It says you need to find a way to stay.

I didn't get this.

You see, you are only this pure witnessing, isn't it? You cannot become something else. With the innocence of a child, try to become something else other than the pure witnessing. And yet what happens after more satsang is the mind will come and tell you, 'No, no, you have to remain like that. Don't switch your state now. It has to be like this.' But you can't leave it. And that which you can never become, it keeps proposing that you are, you see. And it applies these notions of doership, non-doership, all of these ideas on that.

I could still see some anxiety in my... but it's fine.

Meet every sensation as a tip, I'm telling you. Meet every sensation without its label because you never experience the same thing twice anyway. Our mind's labels, like I said in the beginning of satsang, are just so that the mind can deal with what is appearing, not to help you, you see. They are just to be able to allow the mind to storify, to make narratives. When it says, 'Oh, this is anxiety,' that is also anxiety, but there are two very different vibrations. It just uses some broad terms. Like Guruji says sometimes, suppose you were going on holiday and you're very excited, so you say, 'I'm so excited, I'm so happy, I can sense this excitement.' But if you're feeling the same sensation before your speech or something, you would say, 'Oh, I'm so nervous, there's so much anxiety,' you see. So we cannot... our mind actually cannot determine these things. Just allow these sensations to play out and meet them as empty as possible of all the labels. Then you will see that nothing is in opposition to you, you see. Because first you will say, 'Oh, there is anxiety.' Then what will it say? You predict. First it's determined something to be something it is not, and then it will tell you you have to fix that. 'Only if you fix that, because not feeling anxiety, so he is free. When you are through with your anxiety, you can be free,' you see. So it's proposed a non-existent problem, a non-existent appearance, and then made a problem out of it and said, 'Now you fix that,' then yourself the fancy.

Why this trust doesn't come that easily? I often ask who is that who has to trust, but then like I was telling the one earlier...

Which why do we have an answer to? Tell me why anything. Why do you exist? Why are you? That is primary, you know. That is primary. It is because you are, then all of these experiences are. The world is, all of this is being perceived because you are. So first answer why you are. Who has the answer to why you are? So the answer to every other 'why' is because you are. Why are you? So what I'm saying is you let go of the 'why' question. It is the most pointless question. You change the 'why' question to the 'who' question. The 'why' question is an intellect question. The 'who' question is the transcendence question. Why are you? Some will say it is all God's Lila. Some will say it's an evolution of consciousness. Some will say because the unmanifest wanted to taste itself in a manifest way. Some will say because love can only happen in this manifest way. All nonsense. It's just answers to take the question away. It doesn't mean that there's an answer. It is the intellect or the mind's arrogance which presumes that it can decipher the cause of creation in itself, you see, which proposes all this 'why' nonsense. But actually, it is more relevant to us who once were able to determine 'who,' then the 'why' will go away. So for whom does the trust not come? But why the trust does not come? Who is not trusting yet? Stay with this 'who' and next time when we meet, you come and report on this.

Sure, thank you. You like it? I'm so happy to meet you. It's like talking to my biologicals. Somehow I met Mooji in Tiruvannamalai in the last day of the satsang. I reported that since I saw that everything is happening the way it's happening, and would you also say the same? I mean, I can relate it to you because it's happened to me the same way and then... thank you. Hello, thank you for calling me today. It's also the first time that I'm speaking to you, so I just... that way, that way, maybe spoken in so-called person in real life, maybe, I don't know. I'm also diving in. I thought I had a question in the beginning of satsang and then it went away. So I don't know really what I'm going to say.

What was it in the beginning of satsang? What was it in the beginning?

I wanted to expose some trouble I seem to be having. Maybe there's something in it, so I'll just say anyways. So I just returned to university last week after two years without studying, and I have to read lots of things and think about questions and there's lots of information and content. And I find myself resisting a little bit. I feel like I don't want to think so much about those things, and I'm not able to remember a sentence—I'm reading the beginning and I forget at the end—and it takes a lot of energy and thoughts to do those things. So yes, and I just wanted to put that at your feet. And it's okay, I feel everything is fine, but yes.

It can be a bit of a strange experience to go back to studies after two years of break, and you just feel like, 'Oh, but this is so much mental overload,' and then I have to memorize things and things like that. It can feel a bit strange, but meet it as much as possible from the spaciousness of your heart, from the space of Brahman, from the open and empty. All the worldly functioning of the body and the mind can happen in its most natural way without identifying with anything at all. So if consciousness moves the body in such a way that it goes to university and it moves your mind in such a way that these facts are getting memorized and learned up, it's fine. It can do it very naturally. Every role that it creates for itself in this human place, it can play in its most beautiful way. Just you don't identify with either student or not student. Identify with the one who's resisting any of that, you see. 'I don't want to do this, this is pointless, I just want to be free'—you know, these kind of ideas are still referring to you as if you are somebody. So don't fall into that sort of spiritual trap which tells you, 'No, no, no.' You see, if it naturally moves in that direction, that is fine. I'm not saying you have to only study or something, but don't have like a spiritual identity to take you away from, you know, your life as it is functioning in its natural way. And similarly, don't pick up on a student identity that 'I have to be the student and I have to do that.' Just allow. You see that in the allowing, just like the body takes care of itself, the heart beats, you see, and the breathing happens, all of that, and consciousness can also make sure that whatever needs to be assimilated in the mind, intellect can use it in its most natural way. Don't worry about that. As long as you are not picking up any false identification, all this can happen naturally.

Thank you so much and I love you.

I love you. So happy to see you and don't hesitate to come up anytime. Thank you anyway. Let's go to Satyam. Namaste.

I have nothing, nothing in particular to... and then prepare anything to speak or just... and see what comes out. And it feels strange because normally there's a preparation. Okay, I will... especially in my case, it's the spiritual part which is so...

Just like this. Just like this. Isn't it more fun like this? Because anything can happen. You may just say anything that you never imagined. I may just respond something which I've never said before. It's so much more fun like this. Not knowing what the next scene will be like is the best way. This is very... because normally I would...

What comes out, it feels strange because normally there's a preparation. Especially in my case, it's the spiritual part which is so... just like this. Isn't it more fun like this? Because anything can happen. You may just say anything that you never imagined; I may just respond something which I've never said before. It's so much more fun like this. Not knowing what the next scene will be like is the best way. This is very... because normally I would... something would be that, oh, Mooji Ji's last words were trying to go back, but I said, okay, I'm just gonna leave it open just like this now. Yes, is there anything missing? There's nothing missing. It's just a complete sense of just being here. Yes, yeah. And I really... it's the first time I'm doing this because it's really... I don't have any agenda to talk now. Though I can go to an agenda and talk about it, but I don't have any agenda and I'm not going to the agenda, actually.

That's very good, very good. The unborn life is the no-agenda life. It's very strange that this... to talk to you, to sense you in this, that this is what is called the heart or Self or whatever you want to call it. Even this we don't determine, actually. It's very beautiful. But even this is okay, no? It's open, because the mind can grasp at some spiritual agenda then quietly and say, 'Ah, our true meeting is like that only.' So then quickly it becomes an agenda for next time. What here doesn't need any deciphering, you see? Love doesn't need deciphering. Being doesn't need any deciphering. Truth doesn't need any deciphering. We don't need to determine connections or non-connections. So beautiful without any of that support system or crutches.

Because on my walls there are images of Papaji, you, Mooji Baba, and all these saints. And looking at them, there's always that sense: I have to reach that, one day I will be like them, I will be like them.

You know, you should look at them and say, 'That one is done, that one is done.' So this one will play a unique, unique expression of Consciousness. I used to wonder why in India we have this tradition, and initially maybe somebody asked me also—because initially a lot of foreigners were coming and staying here in Bangalore to be in satsang—and one of them may have asked me, 'Why do you have these photos of sages and masters on the walls?' And I just felt like they are very good reminders. Many times we get caught up in the mind, we just look at the one's photo and we just... like that, yeah. Just to give some sort of reasoning for something which has no reason. But don't feel like you have to climb that mountain or achieve something. Your being is fully, fully being, as much being as it can be. You see, there is no progress possible on that. Your unadulterated being, which means uncontaminated by limited thoughts about yourself, is as sage-like as Bhagavan itself. But if you try to make it into like a narrative with steps and achievement and goals and things like that, then it becomes all convoluted and strange.

Because there was that try, that I want to be like them. I can never be like them. I can only be me.

Or me. So your being is completely one with them. You are them, you see? You are them already. In your outer expression of this being, being loves variety, so let that be how it is playing out. We don't have to emulate the outer expression of everything because being will play. All the masters themselves have different expressions. Even masters in our tradition, all of them have such unique and beautiful expressions, yeah? And yet in the heart they are one being. It's the one Satguru presence. Don't put any sort of pressure on yourself to be like this one or be like that one. I can intuitively feel your heart; it's very beautiful. Thank you for my blessings.

And then I'm... there's no... of course there are certain outside outer circumstances. I'm living in Denmark for the last 25-plus years and there's a movement towards moving back to India. And the government of this country is offering some money, something like 22 lakhs, to go back.

Take the money and tell them, yeah! [Laughter]

So there is that movement, there's that topic in and out. And looking at my body condition with the stent and the heart and the medical system, there is that. And normally I don't like to bring this up, but I just leave it up to this: that it will solve itself forever, whatever this is. Because normally talking about these little things... intuitively I know that if you catch the highest, then these little down things, they somehow will solve. What will happen will happen.

All this, like gorgeous grace, all will get resolved and only auspiciousness will flow through. This will happen. Thank you.

Yes. Don't see me in a bit... I mean, I have seen you but not asking a question. Even to some, like to satsang, I didn't come. We were still with the Brahman... I thought to come today. I don't know, right now it's not so present, but it's my birthday.

Oh yeah, yeah! Great, very good. Real thing for you. But all my love, all my blessings. Such an auspicious birthday. You in Sahaja and Guruji's feet, and life is already endowing you with so much auspiciousness. And my blessings are that may that just expand and expand to cover you fully, fully in the truth and freedom, love, peace, joy. May all of them be in service to your truth. Thank you so much. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Right now, like, there is no problem, even though sometimes during the day... yeah, it is... um, yeah, I don't know right now. I don't feel to bring anything in so much. Somehow...

You can write to me if something is strong later. You can write. Thank you, thank you, thank you so much. Okay, let's try Divi again. Did you change your computer? You can hear me now?

Yes, yes, yes. Okay, good. I don't know what to say. The weekly report, and just the weekly report. Actually, I wanted to say something because I felt like there is a fear sometimes to share something good or to speak that some good things that come inside, and then there's so much fear about sharing about that. Because one part I feel maybe it will go away if I speak about it. I just want to like keep it inside.

That sounds like the Indian superstition. We have the superstition that something is...

Yeah, but I feel like I could see many little things, good things happening inside, like little insights or something. And yeah, it's not big, but it's very essential in a way, this little thing. And also the talks we had, they are like still working inside. I feel you told me a lot of good things that I can still be with them. And even though sometimes I feel like I don't understand all of the things you say, or maybe even just a few, but these few I can just stay with this few, and that's the most important. And the biggest thing is like everything is Master's problem, so then... yeah. And I just hope that things go on, continue to grow and to be more like open and... yeah, problem is there.

Yeah, it's very good, very good. I'm very happy to hear the support and I'm very happy to hear you laughing and smiling. Very good, good. Thank you. Please stay with me. Thank you. Very good. Let's go.

Father, just wanted to say I love you, Father, so much. And thank you, thank you, thank you so much for everything. Nothing much today, everything is just perfectly fine the way it is. Coming Tuesday, Monday, Monday. Thank you so much, love you so much.

Let's go to Dave. Hi, Father. How are you? I'm good, thank you. How are you? Say again, did you have a good Vipassana program? You were going for a Vipassana.

Yeah, it was really beautiful, thank you. Yeah, I just wanted to bring to you... I just at the moment I have so much exhaustion, so much exhaustion. And I have this thing about, even when you mention the Vipassana there, when I sit and meditate, I can sit and I can focus on the physical sensations of the body like they tell you to, but there's so much... I end up sitting as the awareness a lot of the time. And I think it brings this kind of confusion between the two. And I just kind of wanted to ask for your guidance because I feel now there's so much more, wherever I am, I'm just resting as awareness. But then so much stuff is coming up like a whirlwind, like being in a relationship, it's bringing so much to the forefront. So there's this kind of oscillation between sitting as awareness but then just being in this washing machine of this person. And I just kind of wanted to come to you and lay it all at your feet, but just ask, like, what do you feel? What is the best way for me to go, you know?

Thank you, thank you for that. And I'm so happy to see you. It's been quite a while and I know we've not been able to connect so easily on what's happened, so I'm so happy you're here. So let me first repeat the question in a way to see if I've got it correctly. So when you say, 'I'm sitting as awareness,' you're obviously saying that you're not taking yourself to be the limited body-mind which the mind is proposing you to be. And as you're not taking yourself in those false representations, the fact that you are this awareness is apparent to you and you find it quite restful and natural to be like that. So it is not that you're taking on a new position; it is just that in the discarding of the false positions, your reality is apparent, you see? Now in that unborn state, the body-mind is free to also function and operate in whichever way Consciousness moves it. And you're saying that sometimes in the movement of that body-mind, and especially in the context of relationships and things like that, it can seem like there's too much content there and you feel like you're wondering whether there's another position with which to meet those things when they seem so strong. Is that somewhat close to what you're asking?

Yeah, okay, yeah. I feel somehow it's just very difficult to play at this whole game of life. I find myself like, even sometimes with the fatigue and stuff, it's just doing the simplest of things is very, very difficult, you know? The energy that seems to run through the system, it's just... the game of life is, I would say, impossible to win at.

As long as you're taking yourself to be that which you are not. So not only is it difficult, it's actually impossible because whichever position we may take ends up in suffering, ends up in misidentification, misunderstandings, relationships which are troublesome, security which never seems to be enough no matter how much money we have, body which is always deteriorating no matter how fit we keep it—it is always working towards its final death. So the design of this play is not so that we can win at it from any personal position, no matter what that position may be. So don't try to play it with a sense of winning; play it with the sense of it being a leela, whereas every moment of its play is just meant for your entertainment, for your joy, you see? And that you can only truly take when you're not identifying as an object within the play, you see? You can only have that distance when you're operating from the unborn position. So you do very well, actually, where you're saying that 'I'm able to just remain as awareness and not take myself to be an object in this world.' But sometimes the forces of the world seem so compelling that they want to pull me in. And there will be times where we do get pulled in, and it's fine, you see? But return to your natural, true so-called position which is beyond all positions, and that is the best, best way to play this game, if there is a way to play. So yes, you're not on the wrong track. You're there, and some of these things like relationships are bound...

In as awareness and not take myself to be an object in this world, but sometimes the forces of the world seem so compelling that they want to pull me in. And there will be times where we do get pulled in, and it's fine, you see. But return to your natural true so-called position, which is beyond all positions, and that is the best way to play this game, if there is a way to play. So yes, you're not on the wrong track. You're there. And some of these things like relationships are bound to have some of that spice and masala, so don't try to gain any complete mastery over it or something; there's no such thing. So just allow, enjoy the play while it is happening, and with as much openness and emptiness as possible.

Yeah, I was just wondering about work and creativity as well, because I find myself a lot of the time I don't enter fully into something because I always have—and this is probably just the mind—it's like, 'Oh, what's the point?' You know, what's the point? So then I don't really... I stop myself from playing at this Leela so much, and then it maybe causes a lot of kind of dryness and stagnation because I'm not fully entering into it because I don't know what's the point anyway. You know, I'm just... because it can feel like when we enter fully, we mean that we give it so much meaning, we're fully, fully, fully involved. But then what happens is because of our spiritual experiences, we can feel like, 'Oh, what's the point?' You know, it's meaningless.

But what you're being pointed to in satsang is neither position. Neither 'Oh, this is the point, you must achieve this' or 'Oh, it's so pointless.' Life is being blessed because both are actually meaning to be open and empty. It's neither desire nor aversion. It's neither pushing something away nor pulling something closer. You will find that in that spaciousness, when it is time for enthusiasm to come or work to happen, it will come. And when it's not time for it to come, it won't come. But if you take a position like 'What's the point?' then you've made a conceptual meaning out of your spiritual understanding, and that can become like an opposition or aversion to life.

It doesn't mean that you take a position of aversion towards the objects of the Leela. It doesn't harm us, but we are not to determine conceptually how much to participate or not. Given the idea that it is just an idea, it is just a pointing tool just to take away the question of this existential sort of crisis about why is all of this. And then various answers have been proposed. The Leela is just one of those answers which is meant to take the question away, not truly to tell you that, 'Oh, God was a bit bored, so He wanted to play.' You know, God cannot have a desire, you see. There was no want in the heart of God to want to play. So, it's a provisional answer just meant to take away the question.

But what is the answer? It is not conceptualizable. It is not expressible. But in your heart, there is no such problem. There is no such 'Why is all of this?' and 'What is the point of all of this?' This is all the suffering of the intellect, not the problems of the heart.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Thank you, Father. Yes, and it's really, really beautiful to speak to you again.

Your intuitive intelligence, which we call the heart or Satguru presence or Being, you see, that will guide you. And how to go to it for guidance? When you are not so dependent on your mental judgments, that guidance will become very, very apparent and clear. See, it is the same intelligence which is having this conversation.

Sorry, I think my question was... you said the mind is not capable of changing one's spiritual... yes. So is there something else other than the mind which is capable of choosing spirituality?

Yeah, so in the sense of what would you do with that judgment? You would say, 'Okay, now this is what's missing. What should I do to become better at it?' which is what I'm referring to as guidance. The mind operates under the paradigm of 'Let's determine the current state scenario and then propose solutions.' Your intuition will typically not make a judgment like that and say you're lacking in this area; it will just say, 'Just go to... let's go visit satsang.' Something came from you don't know where it came from, so it just guides you in this way.

So I was just saying that how to refer to this intuitive guidance, and that is the usual question that comes, no? Somebody says our mind cannot determine it, but in our heart we know our intuition, we know. The natural question to ask is: how do we go to our heart for that kind of guidance? So that's what I was saying, that any time that you're not referring to the mind or dependent on the mind's conclusions, then your intuitive guidance, your intuitive sense, will be very clear. Otherwise, like, why would we want a judgment about our spiritual problems? We only want it so that we can improve, we know what to do next. And some may want it just to beat themselves up or be proud of where they are, but their intuition will typically not make these sort of conclusions. Everything's fine.

Okay, let's go to Sriram and Joanne. Hello, hello. Good to see you guys. I see you sometimes in the Zoom, but I'm happy that you came up as well. It's been a while. Yes, how is everything? Good? Yeah, that's a scary question though, obviously, because first I'll ask you to make a report, then I'll ask you where that report is coming from and whether the mind is capable of making such a report. But that's just how this whole thing functions.

I felt to come up in front of you before and then haven't, and then maybe felt nervous and a little bit of an avoidance. And then there's been moments of things coming up and then it's fine, and a bit like this, maybe.

Today in satsang, you had written to me a few months... it seemed like a few months, it may be longer, but certain challenges you're facing. Are they a bit lighter now than they were?

Yeah, lighter. It's better. There's still moments of this doubt which niggles a bit occasionally, but actually the past time, like past days, I've been just not interacting with them at all. It was this feeling of like, 'I can't even be bothered to go there.' It's so... when you get too involved into it and go with it, then it's so horrendous and you're lost in it and it's not nice and it's draining. So just, no, I can't be bothered. Leave it be. And that was very, very good.

There was something today, a bit... I feel I need to give credit for what is also being noticed. And there is something more there than the thought. Yeah, than thought. Like, there is this awareness behind. Just still this little fear comes, 'Oh, there was this thought and did I believe it?' kind of thing, or 'I believe that was true' or something like this. And then I've seemingly gone again and just feeling rubbish a bit, but then fine. And then, I don't know. Yeah, I don't know.

Right. These things, a little bit like that will happen. The seeming oscillations and some self-judgment about 'Am I believing my thoughts?' which is obviously also a thought. The yes or no either way is a thought. So it can get us in this way from time to time. But you said very beautifully that there's more space to see that there's something beyond thought, and that is the thing. And the same witnessing is witnessing thoughts, is witnessing the change in emotions. And as you're exploring whether that witnessing is affected in any way by the content of what is appearing in front of it, you will also see that the fear, although it will play out at times, will generally start reducing because you will see that that which is witnessing cannot be hurt by whatever may come. And as the fear starts to deplete, you will notice that your spaciousness, your openness, all of that will just expand. So you're doing well. Continue to be in satsang, continue to look in this way, and I'm sure both of you are supporting each other beautifully in this exploration.

I just had, like, four days ago, I had an operation, so I cannot sit now and so I'm kind of half-lying. Everything went well and what is good, you're saying.

Yeah, they did. There's something else as well. It's maybe this like... I'm not looking enough. Like maybe just resting on this, 'Oh yeah, things are feeling good,' and so you're just getting on and not checking in or not sitting, not looking, and maybe not watching enough satsang. A bit too... yeah, I don't know.

Don't worry, you don't have to worry about that at all. Life has the built-in alarm clock, and the minute you start... something is poking you, something's starting to suffer, it will pull you back into the inquiry then. So you don't have to micromanage it so much or keep track of how much satsang you're watching or are you doing enough inquiry or looking enough. As long as things are fine, you're seeming natural and open, then that's fine. You're doing well.

Because the mind does not have the capacity, like I was saying, to judge whether how well you're doing spiritually or not. But what we should not do is once when some poking, some suffering starts to come, we should not try to tie it away or just say, 'No, no, I'm the Self, nothing is happening to me,' you see, because something is getting picked up in terms of some false identification, some idea. So it's good to take a moment or two and say, 'Okay, who is it? Who am I? Or who is getting affected by this particular appearance or situation?' Then we're back to being light and easy. Sometimes we just keep allowing it to fester and then it becomes really big and then it can feel like, 'Oh, I have to deal with this again,' all this kind of stuff. But you can let yourself be guided intuitively more than conceptually because, especially in your case, the mind is very oppressive and you say, 'Oh, you're not good enough, you're not doing well enough, you're not inquiring enough.' Don't fall for that kind of trick. You'll know intuitively whether you're taking yourself to be something that you're not. You'll have a heart sense more than a conceptual sense, and you can follow your heart sense about that. It was very nice to be in front of me. Are you in Lithuania or UK?

Yeah, yeah, we spent all summer. So big love. We'd love to go.

Thank you. I still remember Joanna singing the Aarti. We'll ask her to sing at one of these. 820, let's go. Hello.

Thank you, Father. Here I am again. I just wanted to give some report and I have something to offer also. The negative forces which I have opened to you before, it's still in the body somehow and working underlying. I can see this, and yeah, I offer this to you. And after my connection with someone again, it's coming from him and again it was here in my body, etc. And actually, this topic of negative forces, it was just kind of my nightmare. So actually, what I realized now by this experience, it's like even though I can observe how it functions, something also experiences how I became very detached. Like even though I can see how it really functions, something feels very detached, and it makes me so happy to find myself in that position.

I was kind of in a dark state which I haven't experienced in a very, very long time—like a very dark state. And I wanted to check. First position was to go and to be socialized, and then I said, 'No, it's not time for socializing.' So I just sit and I just look, and I realize that it's just a dark state. It's nothing at all. And when I see that I'm just observing the dark state, I find that it's actually a joy because it's just an experience and I enjoyed it. And the dark state didn't vanish at all; it was there, but I was detached and I was just experiencing that state. So I'm just incredibly, of course, happy to see that because you have given me this experience, and this is what freedom means, whatever states come.

So I just sit and I just look and I realize that it's just a dark state. It's nothing at all. And when I see that I'm just observing the dark state, I find that it's actually a joy because it's just an experience and I enjoyed it. And the dark state didn't vanish at all; it was there, but I was detached and I was just experiencing that state. So I'm just incredibly, of course, happy to see that because you have given me this experience, and this must be what freedom means. Whatever states come and go, they are just here and I'm just experiencing them.

I'm very happy to hear this report, and this is what freedom is. Just allow everything to come and go. And you said we do that even in that consciousness was experiencing some joy, even in that which we call dark. But actually, this light and dark, once you see that everything is in the will of consciousness, in the light of consciousness, for the joy of consciousness, there is no such real distinction like that. But even that which we previously used to call dark is all in the play of consciousness. So this is freedom.

Yeah, it's just a taste. It's just a taste like others. And of course, I still want to offer whatever energy is in this body, if it has any importance, because I also see that it can affect other people. And just for the sake of this actually, because Father, I also come to know that I want to say this too. Recently I started to meet with people again and it just makes me so happy. It's such a joy to meet with people truly, and I just come to know that I actually meet with myself. And it's a joy to meet with myself. I don't know how to put it now, but I know that you can understand me. Maybe it's a new experience, I'm not able to express it now. And it's like I'm holding the space, and it's not I as a person. I don't know, I just want to try to explain this so much now, but because I'm feeling everywhere, I just want to clean this space. I don't know. And that's why I just wanted to offer those energies if, yeah, like this.

I'm just running on to the first part because that takes care of the second part of your report. The first part of it actually takes care of the second part of your report, and I'm very happy and my full blessings and love for that. And may you continue to deepen them. Yeah, I can hear my voice is now full blank. Let's help; the others will forgive me for some new ones also that I haven't spoken to, but if I explain this voice too much then it goes out for weeks, so I don't want to do that. But I'm sending all of you my love, all of you my blessings. Put up your hands and peace here.

You just raise your hand, my dear. Let's give him the Hindi, it's a birthday song, and then maybe the English one is 'Happy Birthday to you, Happy Birthday to you.' Happy Kuruchia notice also and Rajan. I just, when I went through the message, I think I noticed also has, but yeah, Rajan, I think he wrote me a message that happy birthday and that he also has, yeah, he has birthday today too. Rajan Narayan and has also birthday. But yes, if you're here, just raise your hand, my dear. Doesn't look like he's here, but if you watch this later, all our love, all our blessings. And informed about are you, and I'm so happy to hear the report every time. So much more, so much love. Have a wonderful, wonderful auspicious year. Full love and blessings. Thank you all so much for being in Satsang today.