If we don't use concepts, assumptions, beliefs, associations, abstractions, labels... if we simply look without any overlay at what IS, right now, what is here?
How can you say? The moment we speak of it, think of it - we're already quantifying and qualifying it in some way. And inherently these quantifications/qualifications ASSUME their opposite, something "other".
The first assumption is "I AM". From this pure perspective of naked awareness, the first assumption to come in is "I AM" - I am looking. I am sitting here looking out and trying not to quantify or qualify. I am doing this or that. I Am.
From that very first assumption, the world is assumed. Because if there is a ME "in here" there must be a WORLD - "out there".
Yet we may see this initial spark of mind is on top of or added on to the already-present pure naked awareness - it happens "within" awareness - it comes and goes within this consciousness which never passes and never changes.
And from there the spark ignites the rest of the concepts we have about ourselves - I am in a body. I am thinking. I am in the world, separate and alone. I am seeking to know the Truth.
None of these are true.
This mental fireworks show is learned. It's conditioned. It's a way to make sense out of the inherently unknowable. Direct Reality is pure Mystery. Knowledge is illusion.
There is literally nothing that is known for certain, except the certainty of presence. Something is present - that "presence" is One - only separated into "things" by this process of conceptualization, starting with the first spark of "I AM".
It's a head-on collision with Mystery. And what remains of the wreckage? Pure Nondual and Timeless Being, untouched, unshakable Peace.
If you were born right this very moment, what could affect that Peace?
8 comments:
Hi Randall,
I am some cognising thing, some 'awareness' that is sometimes aware of being aware and sometimes unaware of being aware (such as in deep sleep). But of course I was THERE, AND I was aware (else I would not even know of a state called Sleep).
I know I am constant through all experiences for eg: aging - I notice aging only because I am changless and hence able to experience it.
IF even that "I am" is an assumpton then what?
In short, I DO exist. And i KNOW i exist. Can I exist without knowing i exist? thats not possible. If I exist I must know it. Are you saying the KNOWING that i exist or knowing that i AM, is the assumption? I dont see....
namaste
A
Hello my friend.
Yes, you remain changeless while the world, the body and mind change in appearance, come and go, even to witness the passing of the three "states" of waking, dreaming and deep sleep.
The only certainty is that you are. Yet that absolute undeniable certainty is conceptualized, translated by the mind into the thought "I AM" - "I am the body", "I am the mind", "I am separate from the world."
This is the platform from which all else is seen - then there is an "I", as a separate entity from the world, seeking wholeness.
When we stay with that "I AM" only, we see the mechanism at work. We see the translation happen. We know the translation can never describe that which it's translating.
That certainty of Being is obvious - yet it's not accurately represented by the body-mind. This primary assumption automatically assumes an "outside world".
All there is, is Consciousness. What we call "awareness". The "presence" of this certain knowingness is Being. So Consciousness and Being or Existence are one and the same.
Being, knowing itself, recognizing the limitlessness or nondual nature of itself.
This is sometimes called Intelligence - Life - aware of itself, living itself. Life has no concepts about itself, Life can only identify as an "I AM" through the prism of the human experience.
Once we're standing on this conceptual platform, then there seems to be a need to find wholeness. What is missed is that the wholeness being sought is the wholeness, seeking itself.
Simply stay with the simplicity of pure certainty of existence - you know you are. No further concepts can add to that. That knowledge that you are doesn't lead to more knowledge, more concepts... it leads us straight into the Mystery of Life, of THIS, right here and now.
You've obviously recognized the certainty of Being. From there, there is nowhere else to go - no more knowledge to gain, no more to figure out. To take one single step more is to stand on the first platform of illusion, I AM.
If that platform crumbles, seen to be a false assumption, from where will you seek? Who remains as a seeker?
Then only THIS remains, this very moment, whatever this moment might be conceptually is irrelevant. Being IS. Full stop.
love to you
randall
Dear Randall,
Love your clear pointers.
Randall,
thank you from the bottom of my heart.
(original question poster)
Thank you so much Randall!!
Being is. Presence is. Yes, thats it. With or without a thought. Being is.
It still feels a bit unsafe. My father is addicted to alcohol and my mother has cancer. The physicall health of both is very bad. And because of this situation thoughts arise like:
"Ok. Now you are feeling peace. But that is only the case now, because in your current life situation ther are no big problems. But when your mother and your fahter will die in the near future, then this will not be enough. Then your recognition is not enough. Then being will not be enough. Or if i get a very strong and painful disease - then being is not enough."
But then it is recognized again, that this is only a story the mind is telling, appearing in presence. Only waves on the ocean. The pull of this story is seemingly very strong.
But more and more it is recognized as a story.
Being still is. Presence is. No thinking or story needed for being.
Warm regards
Josef
Being is ALL there is. Existence. Intelligence. Saying Being will not be enough is to speak from the platform of I AM - the primary assumption of being-someone, of the individual. There is no such thing as an individual. There is only the Undivided.
You are the Undivided Intelligence - seemingly lost in a dream of separation... yet as a character in the dream, "Josef's life story", Josef seeks a way out.
It is only the assumption of the separate existence of "josef" that creates this apparent split - Reality is undivided - one seamless totality - the thoughts which create this apparent split are not outside of Consciousness, nor are the objects which we call mind, body and world.
You are already home, my friend. You've never left for one instant. The individual Josef is only a conceptual story which has never ever split up Reality, limitless and timeless.
Then the individual and his story takes its rightful place - as only story, as only descriptions of the inherently indescribable, as conceptual knowledge about the totally unknowable. Just a game Consciousness is playing.
Isn't this already obvious? If not, what assumption sticks out?
love
randall
Its already obvious. Yes.
Sometimes thougts seem to obscure it and there is a strong pull in the stories. Being is forgeting its own nature and is dreaming the dream of an "I" seperate from the world. But the story gets more and more porous and implausible. And the story is seen through more and more. Many fears are there. But it seems, that they slowly loose there power.
It also seems that the story is getting dropped more often and often and there is the reminder of this aliveness, this being or presence.
But what can "I" do to speed up that process in order to see through the stories more often?
The answer is that "I" can do nothing. There is now "I". To be lost in a story and to wake up from the story happens. No one is doing that. It happens on its own way. In "my" perception it is not possible to controll the direction of "my" attention. Who should controll that if there is no one there?
Thats why "I" can relax. Nothing left to do for an "I". To be caught up in a story happens. And to see through the appearing story happens also on its own way.
It is so stupid to believe, that first there was matter and from this matter consciousness develeoped. What a stupid belief. It is the other way round. In consciousness everything else appears.
Warm regards to you, Randall. Thanks so much for your passionate writings and answers to the questions from all of us.
Josef
Josef,
Yes, exactly correct. "I" can do nothing because "I" is only an assumption - all that appears to happen is only ever an appearance of Consciousness - finding, not finding, irrelevant...
Consciousness is aware of itself, manifesting as the reflection manifests only ever AS mirror.
This is what you are - not a small, limited piece of Life but Life itself - the totality - intelligence which is the form and function of the totality of appearance.
There is nowhere to go and nothing to get - already Consciousness is aware of itself - this conceptual prism of "I AM" never separates Consciousness from itself. How could it?
Actual experience right here and now is nondual - Oneness. Right now! Nothing needed to make this happen - no additional knowledge brings this new "vision" - no spiritual experience colors the appearance in a new way. Right now there is no boundary in direct experience which actually creates a "seer" and a "seen" - there is only EVER the SEEING.
The separate ME was only ever a concept.
love
randall
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