This Truth Is the Simplest to Find, Simpler Than Finding. It Is You

Very good, I’m happy with your report. There’s a beautiful contemplation available with this, and that is a contemplation really about knowledge. Even with the notion of beauty, how do we really know what is beauty? Which aspect of us knows what is beautiful? Where can we go? Where can we go? So, this [holds up his eyeglasses] is it beauty or not beauty? Now, based on each of your concepts, you may say, “What’s the big deal in this?” Another one may say, “Oh, look at the way the lenses, they’re so beautiful! Oh, there’s some blue in this lens, blue cut or whatever, how beautiful.” Another will say, “No, no, but I prefer to be without specs because natural is most beautiful.” Each of you can have a notion of what is beautiful, but where can we go for true beauty or an identification of real beauty? So, when we take a step further from a notional idea of something, then that is only going to lead to trouble in the future. If we can have a condition about something and that becomes a prerequisite before we can determine the nature of how something is, that this is beautiful or this is not so beautiful, the mind can use this in oppressive ways: “But this is not, I’m not looking so beautiful,” or some idea like that. But can we really know? How can we know? What is the basis on which we can know these things? And let’s include beauty with love, truth, Self—how can we know any of these things? What is the basis for our determination of the nature of something?

What does direct experience mean?

Okay, what would indirect mean? What would non-direct be? To approach it through an intermediary, no? Non-direct means that there’s an intermediary, like there’s a lens [takes off his eyeglasses away and holds them out] which makes it indirect, you see? So, when we approach things from the lens of the mind, then that is non-direct. If we take the interpretations from the mind to be valid and real, then that is not direct. But what is direct? Direct is that which is unopposed or unfiltered through the lens of the mind, you see? It’s just direct, whether we call it pure perception or direct experience. Now, in direct experience, which is like pure perception, what do you find? [Pauses] You find yourself much beyond this game of playing ‘beauty beauty or not beauty beauty’. None of these things are valuable in that openness.

It’s not true in one sense, in the sense that you may be pointing to the beauty that you’re experiencing, you may be having a direct experience or an intuitive insight into something, and the best way you can talk about it is to say, “It is so beautiful.” I may say that in Satsang as well, but in the notion of beautifulness, its reality is not captured, no? So, at best it’s a nice signpost, but can we say the signpost is ultimately true? We cannot. Tell me if in your direct experience there is an opposite to beauty.

Is it possible to determine either way? We cannot, isn’t it? That’s why many Masters will struggle with this, in terms of struggle with putting it in words and they will just say, “It is as it is.” And then when their disciples will pester them and say, “No, no, but will it all be alright, will it be alright? Please tell me how! It doesn’t help me to know ‘It is as it is.’ Please, please, tell me.” And they say, “No, no, don’t worry, it’s all perfect as it is.” So, there comes a word which has the potential to cause more confusion with the idea of ‘perfection’, but sometimes you have to use words to point or reassure, and that’s where a word like “It’s so beautiful” can be reassuring in that way, or pointing in that way. But does it really encapsulate your discovery of pure perception?

So, as long as you use the word for communication, when somebody asks you or you feel someone is open, then that is fine. But if you need the word to convince you that that was so great, then that is troublesome. To convince yourself—many times it is this kind of mental talk that we think we need to convince ourself on the validity of our own experience or the value of our own experience, that is where the trouble comes.

And more so, whatever you needed to “know” about the experience was inherent in the experience itself, but it cannot be conceptually known. But the thing is, the mind is so restless without that conclusion. So, you’re facing a “beautiful mountain” and in the experiencing of it, whatever there is to offer in that experience is already available to you, you see? It is only when we feel like, “Okay, did I spend this time creating some value for myself?” we say, “Yes, yes, we went to that place and it was so beautiful,” you see? Because, we need the value in the narrative, not the value in the taste. Because value in the taste of it, the direct taste of it, you cannot insert it in any narrative, and the mind is completely dissatisfied with gaps in narrative. But let your narrative be full of gaps, if not completely non-existent.

Very good.

Thank you, thank you.