You Can Only Be In Now

So, what are we doing here? What are we looking for? Make it more specific, looking for what? (Turns and looks at a sangha member) Looking for nothing? Nothing? (She is new, she’s not probably thinking he’s going to say, ‘Oh, who is looking?’) Nothing? Okay bye then. [Laughter in the room] Nobody’s looking for anything?

Yes, for?

Number one, what is number one?

Number one is that?

Freedom from all kinds of confusion, number one is that?

That’s it?

So right now, you’re not confused?

You can’t be.

So, you’re free from all confusion, so you’re done.

In ‘right now’? Right now believe and show. [Silence] So that is confusion,

So that which you’re saying that ‘This happens to me’, this itself is confusion, but you’re free from it. [Silence] Are we just playing with words? This is the strange thing, so this is Maya in a way, we believe something that can never happen and we feel that it is true. Right now nobody is ever confused and yet you can only be in the Now. Can you leave the Now? S1: That is Self-Knowledge. There is no percepHon, no thinking…

Yeah, it is clear. S1: Then why do we have to sit for long, and recogniHon…

The Self has to sit? Who has to sit? [Silence] So that is called another form of confusion which is called level confusion. Level confusion means the Self is just there, I don’t have to think anything, I don’t have to perceive anything, it is just apparent. Then ‘Why do I have to sit?’ Which ‘I’ is that? So we are mixing two I’s, one the Self – I and one is this Hny I which never really exists. And that is called suffering, this confusion is called suffering. S1: Already right away, you’re recognizing your Awareness…

Yourself. S1: So that’s it.

Yes, that’s what I’m saying. S1: Because the mind has to stay for long to (inaudible), that sort of concept…

To come to this ‘That’s it’ it may appear as if all these prerequisites are required. But you are at ‘That’s it’ no? Then? For one who can say that right now, without needing any concept or any percepHon, the Self is apparent to me without any color, quality, shape, size, it is apparent, then no prerequisites. Confusion is what? [Silence] You took yourself to be something that you are not and now you see you can never be that. And all these examples in Satsang are for that. If you imagined yourself to be a cat all your life but you came to a Satsang and you saw in a mirror that there is no cat, then what does the cat have to do? Then you will say ‘Okay, but why did the cat have to do so many downward dogs to realize it is not a cat?’ - whose problem is that? The cats no? SHll the one that has been condiHoned to take itself to be something? Who’s with me?

So should we cater to the one that we cannot find or should we talk about the One that always Is. So what can we say about the One which always is? S2: It’s always there.

Is always there. What trouble is that One having? Is that One confused? [Silence] Now the trouble is that we expect that One to be something. That’s why I say, what are we looking for? If we are looking for an ‘experience’ of the Self we must talk about what we mean by experience. Because mostly when we talk about experience we are talking about like some sweetness or we are talking about some color, size, shape, some vastness, smallness, subtle or very large. But the experience of the Self is not this type of experience, if you just understand this much, if most spiritual seekers understood this much they would save themselves maybe life Hmes of struggle. Because even the most advanced spiritual seekers someHmes are looking for the Self as if it will be some phenomenal experience (which it is never going to be). If the Self was a phenomenal experience then that would also change, it would also come and go, then we could not call it the Self. Isn’t it? Then what is lee to look for, if it can’t be a phenomenal experience then you say, it must be some sort of an understanding. Means what? Like, I understand that the capital of America is Washington D.C. (that sort of understanding). So you have a concept about the Truth and you feel like one day that concept will just be the Self. Like the concept could be ‘I am Brahman’, once you understood the concept ‘I am Brahman’ and you truly, truly, truly believed it - I am Brahman - then that would be Freedom. But it is not that, it is not a product of our belief. And this is the second point. So with these two, then, the spiritual seeking journey can become very very instant (Snaps his fingers) because our struggle is only in the first two. We are looking for a phenomenal experience of the Self - I will have a vision of something that will be the Self, and that will be it. Or I will have some great understanding or I will increase in my convicHon or a belief that I am the Absolute or I am the Self or I am God. But it is not a product of our belief or convicHon. Then what lee? [Silence] So far with me everyone? We can repeat because this is where the mind will really play really strong, ‘Blah, blah, blah, blee, blee, blee, what is he saying, I’m not understanding. But what I’m saying is really very simple, very very simple. All I’ve said is don’t expect the Self to be a phenomenal experience, that means with some quality or aZribute and don’t expect the Self to be some phenomenal concept, some big idea that once you believe that big idea strongly enough then you’re free. It is neither of these. Clear? So if these two are clear then what tools of the search do you have lee? How will you look for (the) Self, how will you come to Self-knowledge or Self realizaHon? That is why it is a strange discovery, because we have mistaken this discovery to be one of these two we keep searching for a very long Hme. Why is it a strange discovery, because you will discover your Self, you do discover your Self, you do re-cognize your Self but it is a strange discovery because it is neither of the first two - Neither phenomenal nor conceptual. That’s why these pointers are made available to you, then I ask you ‘Who is aware of your Being?’ You are discovering that it is I that is aware of my Being, (If the term is confusing then you can stop me and I can elaborate) it is apparent to you, it is clear to everybody that it is I that is aware of my Presence, of my Being, of my Atma, Consciousness. Because it is so natural, because it is so natural the mind will come and say, ‘What is so special in that?’, so humor me for a few moments, this I that is aware of your Being, to recognize this, to ‘know’ this is Self- knowledge, is Brahma Vidya, is Atma Gyana, whatever fancy term you want to use. As simple as that. This ‘I’ how are you confirming, how are you confirming? Are you seeing it perceptually?

Correct, correct, in that spontaneity did you see some bright light and that was it, that was the Self, that bright light? Even if you saw bright light, it is on that side of aZenHon isn’t it? So that aZenHon is reporHng back to who that this is perceived? That itself is the bright light? That’s what I’m asking, that spontaneously, what happened spontaneously? Was it a phenomenal experience?

But I am saying that is enough unless… now that is the third point. So the first two we understood neither percepHon nor concept, the third point is, what do we expect this discovery of this non phenomenal, non-conceptual Self - to do for me? So enough for whom? Or not enough for whom? That’s what trips us up, this is the only thing that trips us up because the discovery is available for everyone. This sounds very strange because we hear that Self realizaHon is very rare, actually Self realizaHon, Self-knowledge everybody has but they misinterpret it as if it has to mean something for the non-existent ego. What does the Truth have to do for ‘me’? The Truth must help the false one now, the false one must be in the state of constant contentment or their experiences must only become candy flavored. So, we were looking the other day when it is said that we must have a burning desire for the Truth, all the Sages used to say in the past (Vedan%n ones) mumukshatava - all must have a burning desire for the Truth. I am saying that if you want Truth for Truths sake, that much is enough. It means that if we have no expectaHons of what the Truth must do for the false, what the ocean must do for the wave, then this Self recogniHon is un-miss-able.