Are you IN the mind?
Email question:
Dear Gilbert, - I am new to this spiritual search and I came across your website. - I gather from what you are saying there, that most if not all seekers never become 'finders'. – Do I need a long association with the spiritual traditions to get this understanding of Non Duality?
Answer: - It so happens that many, after decades of seeking and no finding, get a shock that is devistating to that ego sense of being a seeker. - A moment of honesty strikes them. - They realize that they have acquired nothing but concepts and that those concepts are actually useless. - Without belief in them they slide away into the abyss, along with the idea of who I am. - To come across a message that points directly at your freedom is unusal. - Most take awhile to hear it.
- Even though it is innocent, your question is loaded with erroneous factors. – Let's break some of it down into those basic erroneous concepts and expose them.
– Some will insist that one needs to be ready for it. - They will send you on a journey of self discovery and then years pass and that is unnecessary.
Right here, right Now is always the case and your true nature is THAT. - So NO journey is needed at all.
- All these concepts can be revealed for what they are. - They all fall apart once they are examined – just like any belief falls apart when it is questioned thoroughly.
Your question: "Do I need a long association.....etc"
"Do I need…" – What you ARE is commonly called 'I'. – What you truly ARE is in need of nothing whatsoever. – That may sound more like a hopeful wish than a fact and the mind may react with a quick denial of such information. – Be vigilant and watch what the mind does. – It will lead you astray without warning so you have to be mindfully watching it. – Everything that 'appears' (all things are 'appearances') in that 'essence' that you ARE, Awareness, is actually OF the same Essence, so there is equilibrium in what you ARE. – Nothing 'outside' can truly disturb what you ARE. – Outside and Inside is only a long standing habitual division of THAT which is actually One. – One Essence - I am That.
Any apparent NEED appears due to some sort of differentiation and that is a perceived difference – quite natural from the ordinary point of view – a tree is not a dog etc.
So a need is based on a sense of a lacking of 'something'. – Then an imagination suggests that something 'out there' will supply what that needs for its fulfillment. – All of it is related to 'me' and that is a conceptual 'point' of reference, a phantom which can never be satisfied. – Like a ghost at a food festival, it can't digest or eat or retain anything. – Even the ghost's hunger is a phantom need.
You refer to "Spiritual Traditions" – they are all conceptual notions and they depend on 'time' - 'past' - 'future' and a mind full of conceptual nonsense about the 'present'. - The mind is loaded down by dead images and second hand notions and so the clear and present evidence is missed.
What you ARE is timeless.
You say you want to "Get this understanding". (a common mindset)
Understanding is already 'with you' as what you ARE.
There is NO Great Understanding. - 2 and 2 are 4. - That understanding is clearly obvious. - High and mighty intellectuals bind their minds with great conceptual postulations and so preposterous, pretentious attitudes flourish like bacteria in a cesspit. - They form clubs and institutes so that they can demonstrate their mental gymnastics with flare. - Degrees and doctorates follow and letters are added to the 'me's' name tag. - Fabricated identities that differ little from cartoon characters.
Ramana's "Who am I?" is a potent 'pointer' - "What am I?" is another potent question to ask.
It is only the erroneous beliefs in uninvestigated notions that 'appear' to bring conflict in mind. – The mind by its nature is a restless activity and as long as one takes oneself to be IN the mind, so the tossing and turning will 'appear' to dominate that 'me'.
The 'me' in itself is harmless and quite necessary for what we call daily life.
The activities of the mind are similarly harmless.
So, I ask one question: Are you 'in the mind' or are you beyond the mind?
As Nisargadatta says: The mind is a good servant – it is a bad master. (paraphrased)
So, the spiritual path is a dream and you do not have to take one step away from this moment. – In essence you are free. – All that is needed is to investigate that 'me', the one you think you are and what you are is found to be expansive and beyond the mind content. – Getting 'another' to recognize this is like trying to push the universe through the eye of a needle. – Seekers put up so much resistance it is a total wonder that any teacher even bothers to sit with them. –Such is the dualistic drama of life. – Enjoy it.
Dear Gilbert, - I am new to this spiritual search and I came across your website. - I gather from what you are saying there, that most if not all seekers never become 'finders'. – Do I need a long association with the spiritual traditions to get this understanding of Non Duality?
Answer: - It so happens that many, after decades of seeking and no finding, get a shock that is devistating to that ego sense of being a seeker. - A moment of honesty strikes them. - They realize that they have acquired nothing but concepts and that those concepts are actually useless. - Without belief in them they slide away into the abyss, along with the idea of who I am. - To come across a message that points directly at your freedom is unusal. - Most take awhile to hear it.
- Even though it is innocent, your question is loaded with erroneous factors. – Let's break some of it down into those basic erroneous concepts and expose them.
– Some will insist that one needs to be ready for it. - They will send you on a journey of self discovery and then years pass and that is unnecessary.
Right here, right Now is always the case and your true nature is THAT. - So NO journey is needed at all.
- All these concepts can be revealed for what they are. - They all fall apart once they are examined – just like any belief falls apart when it is questioned thoroughly.
Your question: "Do I need a long association.....etc"
"Do I need…" – What you ARE is commonly called 'I'. – What you truly ARE is in need of nothing whatsoever. – That may sound more like a hopeful wish than a fact and the mind may react with a quick denial of such information. – Be vigilant and watch what the mind does. – It will lead you astray without warning so you have to be mindfully watching it. – Everything that 'appears' (all things are 'appearances') in that 'essence' that you ARE, Awareness, is actually OF the same Essence, so there is equilibrium in what you ARE. – Nothing 'outside' can truly disturb what you ARE. – Outside and Inside is only a long standing habitual division of THAT which is actually One. – One Essence - I am That.
Any apparent NEED appears due to some sort of differentiation and that is a perceived difference – quite natural from the ordinary point of view – a tree is not a dog etc.
So a need is based on a sense of a lacking of 'something'. – Then an imagination suggests that something 'out there' will supply what that needs for its fulfillment. – All of it is related to 'me' and that is a conceptual 'point' of reference, a phantom which can never be satisfied. – Like a ghost at a food festival, it can't digest or eat or retain anything. – Even the ghost's hunger is a phantom need.
You refer to "Spiritual Traditions" – they are all conceptual notions and they depend on 'time' - 'past' - 'future' and a mind full of conceptual nonsense about the 'present'. - The mind is loaded down by dead images and second hand notions and so the clear and present evidence is missed.
What you ARE is timeless.
You say you want to "Get this understanding". (a common mindset)
Understanding is already 'with you' as what you ARE.
There is NO Great Understanding. - 2 and 2 are 4. - That understanding is clearly obvious. - High and mighty intellectuals bind their minds with great conceptual postulations and so preposterous, pretentious attitudes flourish like bacteria in a cesspit. - They form clubs and institutes so that they can demonstrate their mental gymnastics with flare. - Degrees and doctorates follow and letters are added to the 'me's' name tag. - Fabricated identities that differ little from cartoon characters.
Ramana's "Who am I?" is a potent 'pointer' - "What am I?" is another potent question to ask.
It is only the erroneous beliefs in uninvestigated notions that 'appear' to bring conflict in mind. – The mind by its nature is a restless activity and as long as one takes oneself to be IN the mind, so the tossing and turning will 'appear' to dominate that 'me'.
The 'me' in itself is harmless and quite necessary for what we call daily life.
The activities of the mind are similarly harmless.
So, I ask one question: Are you 'in the mind' or are you beyond the mind?
As Nisargadatta says: The mind is a good servant – it is a bad master. (paraphrased)
So, the spiritual path is a dream and you do not have to take one step away from this moment. – In essence you are free. – All that is needed is to investigate that 'me', the one you think you are and what you are is found to be expansive and beyond the mind content. – Getting 'another' to recognize this is like trying to push the universe through the eye of a needle. – Seekers put up so much resistance it is a total wonder that any teacher even bothers to sit with them. –Such is the dualistic drama of life. – Enjoy it.
posted by Gilbert Schultz at Wednesday, February 07, 2007
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