Right now, take a look at what you've taken yourself to be.
You take yourself to be an individual, sitting there, reading a blog. You have a beginning and will have an end.
You are seeking something, enlightenment or freedom from suffering. You are reading because there is a hope that something will click, something will make sense, something will happen.
But you must be standing upon a platform of assumptions - there must be a separate person to achieve enlightenment. There must be a separate person who is reading. There must be a separate person for whom something will click.
So just stop and look at what is going on. You are seeking a "state" where there is no separation - you - the individual - are seeking a "state" where there is no individual. You - the individual - are seeking a "state" where the individual is NOT.
How can you resolve this? Can an individual see that there IS no individual? So what are you doing? Why are you seeking? Why are you wasting your time reading this blog?
An individual cannot see that there is no individual.
So what is the point? What is all the fuss about? What the Hell is the point of any of it?
With the existing assumption, that you are an individual doing this, it's a chinese finger trap - the harder you pull, the tighter it gets. The more you seek, the stronger the illusion of the seeker becomes.
So give up! What is the use? As an individual, you will NEVER find what you're seeking, because the answer would require YOU to be non-existent. But there you are, reading, seeking...
The only possible alternative is that the individual isn't actually there - that it's just a translation, a false sensation, a false identification. The only possible alternative is that the individual is ALREADY false.
That would mean that THIS, right here and now, is ALREADY what's being sought after. That would mean that THIS, right here and now, is ALREADY IT. But we don't want to hear that, do we? We don't want THIS to be it, because we think THIS is SHIT - we think THIS is something to be rid of, some speed bump on the way to enlightenment.
As long as we want it to be about something different, something better, something MORE than THIS, right here and now, that YOU-THE-INDIVIDUAL are seeking, then the only alternative is to give up.
As long as the search is undertaken from the perspective of the individual, it's all bullshit - it's a recurring lie - it's a ME who wants enlightenment - it's a ME looking for Oneness. That's always going to be false, no matter how it's sliced and diced, no matter how much the honesty is swept under the rug, no matter how many times THIS is overlooked in preference for some special spiritual state.
THIS is it. Just THIS and nothing else. Is there any room for an individual in THIS?
What can possibly be done to bring about the end of THAT which is already FALSE?
38 comments:
yes..there are many things that I do that I don't make sense and lead to suffering. It's a combination of lack of intelligence and ignorance but at least I know that's not me. I don't know what I am and I don't think I'll ever know. There's just so many feelings of difficulty living without identifying with what you do.
Thank you Randall for your response as well as this latest post.
Shiva
Beloved Randall,
I would so love to stop the bullshit.
But obviously consciousness enjoys it.
I guess it will carry on till it stops.
I can understand your frustration at the constant refusal to see This as That which we are seeking.
Always looking to modify, add, improve on the actuality of this moment.
Stop the bullshit now - if only that was possible.
Raj,
It has nothing to do with a lack of intelligence - "bullshit" means continuing to gloss over the fact that you already ARE what you're seeking in preference for some future "state" or experience. It's only your own bullshit which is continually overlooked which obscures.
This very instant is the only focus of inquiry - the exact point - right here and now. Until this very instant is examined, it will always intellectual and lead to frustration.
You are limitless and perfect already - this is continually overlooked in searching for perfection in the so-called world and in looking for some future "experience".
The experiencing itself is already fully present. THAT is not gained anew. That presence of knowing is the simplest and easiest, not requiring mental intelligence but the very intelligence which is the form and function of the Universe itself.
You are that, already.
love
randall
Shiva,
Love to you.
randall
Su,
Yes - it will carry on until it stops. Even that recognition is peace.
It's not about frustration - it's a strong relating to the searching - the "reason" this wasn't seen for so long is just because THIS was constantly overlooked in preference for something yet to come, some "state", some special experience - the always-evident and obvious KNOWING was overlooked in preference for the content of knowing, the condition of the content, making that content just right, making it spiritual, making it different than THIS.
We can say that you are limitless, boundless, perfect already. But then we're off looking for that limitlessness and perfection, looking for some "thing" to validate.
There is always a glossing over of this immediacy - ALWAYS - on the journey to becoming. Yet the very capacity to search is THAT which you are. So "bullshit" is what you're constantly telling yourself.
As you say - it will carry on till it stops.
love
randall
Especially when a major part of one's programming was placed there by a much revered teacher who insisted that we must want awakening as much as a drowning man wants air.
That implies that there is such a thing as awakening and a person to receive it.
More and more there is a resting in This, and yet above This is the mind ferreting, stressing, manipulating, worrying, and all of this in This.
Why is there a belief that This should look different from all the negatives mentioned above.
Sort of have this notion of being in This would mean being in effect of nothing.
On the one hand I understand that I am This as is, in perfection.
On the other hand I understand that if I just stop identifying with the body and mind then......
But surely if there is identification with the body/mind mechanism - then there is identification in This. Nothing to be done, resolved, understood, eliminated. Identification as it is is perfection itself.
Because if there is a notion to see through this, then that immediately removes me from the This and puts me back on desires plate.
Beloved one.
Su,
Nothing changes. Nothing looks different. Only the template of ME-SEEING-WORLD falls away as false.
So then THIS, right here and now - isn't Su-SEEING. It's SEEING in which the idea of Su arises and is immediately know to be only a thought-story.
So Su can arise - there is no problem with it at all. It's known for what it is. Nothing but a false template.
love
randall
Thanks Randall.
is there consciousness seeing the world including the 'me-seer' then, or are you saying objects see themselves in a way?
Anonymous,
Consciousness IS the world, the totality of this appearance, which includes the body, thoughts, feelings, the chattering intellect, the vast open space...
Consciousness comes and goes - it isn't seeing anything - Consciousness is the very reflection of your Self - you knowing your existence.
And when Consciousness passes, there is only pure being and nothing appearing - yet you remain. You remain to know that Consciousness passed.
We might say Consciousness is how Beingness knows itself. And that template called ME-SEEING is only a superimposition upon Consciousness. Once seen as false, Consciousness IS all there is.
love
randall
Hi Randall, thanks for the lovely clear pointers. Wherever there is expectation, there is a story in time, where what IS is overlooked for something "better". How could "this", just as it is, possibly be enough? Yet it is. The story of humanity seeking is a sweet story, full of the pathos that makes all these stories possible; Oneness apprehending itself in all its many guises. Love the blog.
Hello again Suzanne. Well said.
love
randall
isn't oneness realized after or at the same time of knowing ones trueself to be pure awareness? I think it is foolish to ask anyone to pursue oneness or realize oneness or point toward it. It is not even necessary for the world as one appears as many, but it is known all is one, but it might as well be 10 thousand. First check if you are the content or the watcher of the content? So shall we watch the content randall?
Anonymous,
Not sure I understand the question, my friend. To speak of realization in reality is false - realization points to a future point in time for an individual, both concepts are false. There is only the Self or Oneness already.
You are already watching the content, only the content is not other, not separate from what you are. Life is looking at itself, right now.
love
randall
if thought are me as well, what is the conflict, I guess it is believing the content of thoughts to be exclusively me? or believing the thoughts instead of just watching them pass by and not attaching? hmmm too many options
Anonymous,
There is no conflict. All is THAT, thoughts, body, world.... It is all Consciousness and Consciousness is a reflection of the Self.
We may start with neti-neti - it is a negation of what you've taken yourself to be - thoughts/body are objective content - what you are is obviously the presence of knowing or pure "I"-awareness - like the mirror, reflecting yet never touched by the objects reflected.
We may then recognize that the reflections themselves are MADE OF mirror.
love
randall
Brilliant, can you answer me this, is self-inquiry a MUST? I really just want to be aware, or be the wordless I AM, so is that alright? and saying I want to stay in the I AM is for language purposes, of course I AM. And secondly, even the wordless I AM is not what we are, according to Maharaj the I AM drops as well and we are left as the absolute, is that true and what is the absolute , awareness?
How does one lost in the bullshit SEE ?
Anonymous,
You say "is self-inquiry a MUST?"
If you take yourself to be separate individual and suffering or the intense desire to know the truth of reality, the search will take it's own path. There will be no choice. It will go on anyway.
If you're asking about self-inquiry as opposed to other so-called "methods" of seeking, then no, it's not a must. Whatever resonates will be followed - meditation, satsang, whatever. Yet all these end up as self-inquiry eventually - meditation done as a means to an end will always be futile - it is when meditation is truly seen for what it is - resting in being with no goal - witnessing the appearance with no conditions - then meditation is truly done.
Self-inquiry is the most direct means to knowing what you are. Why? Because self-inquiry is to question the very "I"-thought - to follow it to it's source - to discard the content of thought and to inquire to whom the thought arises.
You say "I really want to be aware or the wordless I AM". You ARE already THAT.
The I AM drops - means the I AM in thought is seen for what it is - mind's division or taking I AM to be a "thing". I AM is not a thing - it is the pure and formless subjectivity at the source of all experience - the very condition or principle necessary to presently know that you ARE.
The absolute is THAT - pure being or existence - your true nature.
love
randall
Anonymous,
There is no one lost in the bullshit. There is bullshit going on in thought, thought chasing thought, thought glossing over what is pointed to habitually in preference for some future state or experience.
You are not lost anywhere. You are self-evident, right here and now. Yet the bullshit is taken to be what you are. It is irrelevant if it's SEEN or not, simply because you already ARE what you're seeking and cannot be anything else.
love
randall
Nisargadatta clearly stated that presence isn't the final state, nor even is absence, he also stated that the wordless I AM will drop as well, and the closest you can express the absolute is absence of absence. But he said you get to the absolute through staying with the sense or wordless I AM. So either you are hiding from us the fact that the wordless I AM drops away, or you are not speaking from the absolute. Or nisargadatta is full of shit.
Anonymous,
Have it as you will, my friend. The mind's attempt at analysis or parsing words or measuring one quote against another is futile.
The spiritual search, made in the mind, can only lead to more mind, more grasping for experiences, more placing conditions on experiencing.
Look right here and now - there is nothing BUT the absolute. THIS is it. The one who gets TO the absolute is only a concept. Who can be apart? The WHO is only mind.
The I AM is the strongest clue - the strongest scent of yourSelf. Stay with it - see that this mental analysis is an appearance, objective, and not the reality.
When THIS right here and now is enough, the absolute reveals itself clearly and obviously as ALL that IS.
love
randall
Okay it is just that I read that presence drops away, and everyone is saying presence is it! I thought the wordless I Am is it, since the I AM thought is definitely not it. Can you tell me exactly what the I AM is or the wordless one I should watch? thank you
Presence is the evidence of Consciousness, and that DOES pass away. What you are, in reality, is prior to Consciousness. The only capital you have to investigate is Consciousness - otherwise there is nothing - you do not know of your existence in deep sleep.
Yet you know you ARE. Awareness IS with no objective content, no Consciousness, no state - the stateless state.
THAT is the Absolute - and that isn't hidden - that is present right here and now as the very essence or beingness of this very moment. THAT TO WHICH Consciousness comes and goes. THAT which is presently aware of Consciousness and also aware of the absence of Consciousness.
That "state", the natural state, doesn't need to be reached for you are already THAT - you cannot be anything BUT THAT. It is only the overlay of I AM-ness or the concept of being a separate person which seems to obscure. It's a filter or template or translation of THIS.
The correction isn't the acquisition of a new state or experience - the correction is recognizing that you already ARE THAT. You already ARE the timeless and limitless being.
The source of ego or identification is the "I"-thought. It comes with every activity - "I am thinking", "I am speaking", "I am walking". Who is this "I" doing this? Seek the source of this "I"-thought.
In reality you are absolutely certain of your existence - you know for certain that you ARE. How do you know? BY WHAT do you know? What evidence do you have? Why is it so certain?
Isn't it certain because you are always HERE? The body appears TO you. The thoughts appear TO you. Yet YOU do not appear. YOU are the pure formless subjectivity - that is what "I" REALLY means. And that "I" is always known yet it's not known as some "thing". It's not objective. It's purely subjective. It's always the source of the seeing.
Instead of asking "who AM I?" ask "what IS 'I'?" Seek the true identity or reality of "I". It is not hidden - it is clearly and obviously known in ANY and ALL experiences, yet it is tied in with the body and thoughts, which are completely objective.
You absolutely know "I" - the exact point of inquiry is to see where or how the objects body-mind are mixed up with this pure formless subjectivity-"I".
love
randall
randall,
my daughter's hamster died last night, only I left it out on a hot porch and it died of heat exhaustion.
I killed it.
something is not quite right with this body I still call mine for several reasons, not because of the fact that 'I' supposedly killed the hamster, I know that there is no me to do the killing, but because:
I feel detached from life,
I feel unemotional about death,
I feel my actions are neither right or wrong.
I do not feel emotional about the hamster's suffering, yet it is not actually this that is the problem. I have an inherent trust that love will come knocking on the door and slowly push out detachment, all-that-is trusts this trust to come in. At the moment, I feel a no-mans-land stretching out all around. my intellect understand that i do not exist, yet i still listen to my thoughts. I have dropped the seeking/the seeker and am resting as a witnessing awareness, though there is a gap between the person I was and the wholeness i understand myself to be.
could you comment on this?
love x
Lune,
There is still trying to place a condition on experience - according to this particular story of the "hamster death" it mustn't be detachment, it must be Love. There is still some idea about what this is all about and there seems to be the need to force-fit experience into some mold.
Detachment or not, emotions or not, right or wrong actions, dropping the seeker or not, resting as witnessing awareness or not - you already ARE what you're seeking.
The "I"-thought is functioning stronger than ever in this "I feel detached" or "I have dropped the seeking". The spiritual ego is the strongest ego.
You are absolutely intimately familiar with this "I" - trying to conceptually "get rid" of it is missing the point. This "I" isn't what it's taken to be - this "I" is intimately familiar, that's why it seems so difficult to see through the ME.
ME-LUNA is that "I" mixed up with objective content - body and mind. Then the body must be a certain way, thoughts must be a certain way (detached or not). This is placing a condition on experience.
"I" is ever-present as the pure subjectivity - formless and unconditioned. It isn't detached or loving. It isn't seeking. It isn't dropping the seeker. It just IS - and all that goes on, goes on within this pure and ever-present "I".
Trying to mold or expect experience to change, in ANY way, is still overlooking the obvious. "I" does not and can not change - it is the changeless reality - the presence of knowing or being - at the "center" of any experience, no matter what that experience is.
Find out "what IS I". It's not the one who is detached and it never killed any hamsters.
love
randall
Lmao, Arms and hands are an extension of reality!
Dear Randal, when I ask what am I? The question merges into what is, is this the point? am I on the right track?
Although beingness never killed any hamster, as the owner proxima of my children's hamsters, around which loving the hamsters a lot arises, there is great compassion for lune's tale. In apparent separation, great hatred of the illusory self can arise, especially when a mistake is apparently made. A mental health professional would probably advise taking it easy on oneself, and not beating oneself up for being human, or simply existing. If the story is taken seriously - by no one, but taking the story seriously is what seems to arise a lot - mistakes are often the doorway to learning, and so many stories involve a twist or turn, the outcome of which could never have been imagined. "We don't know what is good for us" is the message of many a parable. Even the worst mistakes often prelude some story of redemption. However, the story is what it is, yet there is no story at all; just this; the paradox the mind can never resolve. Those dreadful feelings of guilt and remorse are love in another guise, everything is available; mental health professionals would say something like, there is sorrow as well as joy in life, and a healthy human can bear it all; it is all needed for wholeness. And wholeness is this, wholeness is life, wholeness is the perfection of whatever seems to be happening; it can be no other.
Scarfox,
Any answer that comes due to the question "what am I" must be something you HAVE - you have a name, a body, a mind, a role in family, a feeling, a sensation, a perception. Everything you HAVE is objective - you know OF it - it appears - it's describable.
"What am I" is the same as neti-neti - seeing that all these "things" aren't really WHAT you are, they are no longer identified AS you, but only what is appearing, what you HAVE.
Through this we see how we've taken ourselves (identified) to be so many things which we are not.
So flip the question around - ask "what IS I"? "I" then cannot be the name, cannot be the body, cannot be the mind or thoughts or intellect. "I" then cannot be any "thing" at all. "I" is clearly formless knowing or awareness - pure subjectivity that doesn't appear.
Isn't THAT what "I" really means? And the objective content simply comes and goes IN that ever-present presence of "I".
love
randall
thank you randall,
you say: according to this particular story of the "hamster death" it mustn't be detachment, it must be Love.
why must?
Lune x
Lune,
It was your comment which seemed to require the "must be Love" as opposed to detachment, that detachment seems to be the prevalent view and in the case of the hamster death you feel it should be Love instead.
love
randall
yes and this 'i' was the one doing the requiring.....yes.
as if one state of being was preferable to the other....yes.
Hi, Randall Friend
Your article is so interesting. But I agree with Raj. Especially,”yes. There are many things that I do that I don't make sense and lead to suffering” with this sentence.
Chris,
Hello my friend.
Consider that the mind's goal is always to want. When what is wanted is received or achieved, there is happiness. When not, there is suffering. This all presupposes the object or the relationship or the situation provides happiness.
Yet if we consider that happiness is not found in the objective, in situations - we cannot go out and find happiness. It is when the wanting ceases that happiness is revealed. It is revealed because it is your true and actual nature.
The object does not bring happiness - it is the ceasing of wanting - the ceasing of seeking - which removes the overlay or obstruction to the happiness which you are. This is called ananda.
So recognize the wanting mind - the seeking mind - recognize that it IS the mechanism of suffering. When nothing is needed, how far away is happiness?
love
randall
bullshit!?
to say "bullshit", is taking the dream too seriously
does it matter what the dream people do?
bullshit!?
to say "bullshit", is taking the dream too seriously
does it matter what the dream people do?
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