Friday, January 26, 2007

Knowing is the immediacy of all knowledge

Knowing is the immediacy of all knowledge (without exception).
I just listened to an interview with a well known professor of Mathematics from Cambridge University, an expert it seems on the subject of “Infinity”. - He was awarded a million dollars for his ‘work’ and publications on the subject. - Listening to it, it all sounds very entertaining, however within a very short time he introduces different types of infinity and so turns it all into a mind game. - Intellectuals love such mind games, especially when they can get a ‘handle on it’. – This fragmentary approach is typical of science and intellectuals alike. - When the subject is too vast for them, they have to introduce their limited ideas and ‘become’ experts on the hypothetical notions they dream up, thus staying one step ahead of every other intellect.
Infinity is infinity. – Some scientists say that infinity started with the big bang. - How ridiculous is such a statement. – Infinity has no beginning or end, for if it had, it would not be ‘infinity’ that we are talking about. – Even ‘the big bang’ is a theory and it will remain so because that is what it is.
An 'endless universe' is beyond the capacity of any thought bound mind to embrace.
In the same way, non-conceptual awareness, even as a concept, appears to confound the intellectuals. – What could be more obvious than the very ground of all thought, that open and clear nature of mind, which provides the space for thought to appear?
(Let me use the word 'we' for the sake of convenience) 'We' are most familiar with the relative experiences that come and go, simply because we can name them from the past and so a story can build up. – We miss the fact that all experiences appear nowhere else than in this moment of ‘experiencing’. – All so-called knowledge is ‘seemingly’ acquired via immediate knowing. – Memories and experiences are all of the past and can only ever appear in this moment of immediate knowing.
What is more, you have never left this immediate knowing. (Where would you go?)
This immediate space of knowing is all there is.
If you wish to argue over that point, you can only do so in this moment and your argument will be nowhere else then in this immediacy, even if you wait until that famous ‘tomorrow’ (which never comes).
There is an obvious open space in which ‘all that appears’, all observable phenomena appears and disappears, as the active display of ‘life’ - of awareness. – Phenomena, energy, movement, all of it is being witnessed just as it is. – In the relativity if ‘time’ the mind labels as much of it as it does, according to the capacity of ‘its education’ and then says “Yes, I know the world”. – Or “I am an expert on Infinity”. – Give that man a prize!
A biologist will see one kind of world, while an economist will see another kind of world.
A mathematician or a prostitute will see things in a certain light, while a philosopher or a ‘punter’ see ‘the same world’ quite differently. – In the light of their own conditioned mind. - We all see the same world of ‘things’ but these things are interpreted very differently. – Imagine a long row of individuals, all from different cultures and even ‘times’. – All standing in a row looking at a hill with one tree on top. – All see the same impressions (relatively the same) but each may have a different set of words to describe what they see. – Each one may not even be able to discuss with one of the others and so disagreement can’t even come into it. – The scene is just as it is but the diversity of mind translation can vary tremendously.
Any concept we have about ourselves is basically a set of concepts and feelings, colored by the past conditioning and experiences.
This ‘present moment’ is unique. – What can you say about it, without referring to some ‘data’ from memory? - Even simple sensations in the body have been named and these are automatically recalled, superimposed onto the present and maybe a ‘story’ gets attached. – In this way, the uniqueness of this present moment can appear to be obscured.
The ‘story’ takes over. – The opportunity of profound insight may appear to have been lost. – But wait on. – This present moment has not gone away. – The uniqueness is still here. – Let the thought subside for a short ‘time’. – A mystery reveals itself.
The mind will soon start to construct a new ‘story’ about that ‘peaceful experiencing’ (if we can call it that). In being a witness to the mind activity it may well be quiet, long enough to see something subtle, which we miss otherwise.
Life, not only as the dramatic conflicting stuff in the mind, throws up all manner of unexpected events and ‘happenings’. – Thus ‘we’, as a fleeting limited conceptual being, are constantly challenged by that drama of life.
Finding some extended ‘pattern of security’ to hide in, away from the onslaught of life, is something that we call success but it is a fallacy and whatever that pattern of security is, it will crumble one way or another because it is ‘time’ and ‘circumstance’ itself. – Observe a multi-millionaire – Being a slave to the god ‘money’, is not freedom.
– But we digress with such ‘stories’.
As the mind appears to separate this space of knowing into objects, ‘word’ plays its part in that ‘apparent separation’ of what is obviously oneness. – One ‘world’, if you like that word.
As a witness appears, the observed appears. – Duality. - So it is that a ‘seer’ and the ‘seen’ ‘appear’ in this undivided space of knowing.
Since your true nature can never leave this clear and empty space of knowing, the ‘you’ that ‘you think’ you are can never enter into it, with a conceptual notion because it is already appearing in it. – Analogy – How can you enter the house when you are already in it?
In actuality, what you are has never left this space of knowing, neither can you ever leave it and nor will you ever leave it.
‘Who’ does not know this obvious fact?
That conceptual ‘you’, which is mere belief, has apparently ‘become’ something that is addicted to the process of ‘becoming’ - becoming ‘something more’ than it is, by adding more and more concepts to itself. – Take for example, a high official in some church or religious foundation. – How many concepts are needed to maintain that ‘special-ness’ and how distorted is that image of self? – What a burden to bear in the mind.
What is more, such a one spends all its time trying to maintain the illusion and even tries to convince others to copy itself and be like it. – How absurd is that? - It is all conceptual – architecture in the mind and it can crumble at any moment, if life throws some devastation at its tentative structure. (all in the mind).
All spiritual practice is an attempt ‘to become’ something that the practitioner can never be. – Can you be a concept? - Is that what you are?
Whether you know it or not, your true nature is already beyond all practices and all methods as simply that, ‘that-ness’ - what you are.
Nothing can bring what you are to you - nor can anything take it away.
As this revelation reveals itself, effort ceases to inhabit the organism.
The ‘seekers’ realm of unease and constant contrived activity is (can be) seen at the moment that it appears. – (Then) What I am is not fooled by that old habitual nonsense.
The drama of life will still appear as it always does, for and in the mind, but that essence which lies behind all things is known right there in that space of knowing, to be untouched. - It is wakefulness. - It is beyond manipulation by any ‘personality’.
Metaphor: The circus comes to town, sets up the big top, does its thing for awhile and then packs up and leaves town. - So what? - Even the remaining Elephant dung disappears into the ground and no trace is left.
You cannot ‘become’ what you already are. – To believe that there is ‘more’ ‘to get’ is ignorance.
To know that you are complete just as you are is wisdom.
For the hungry mind, the ego-ic sense of self, it is never enough just to be what you are.