No ME to Get Rid Of

Q: How can I see that there is no "ME"?

A: The question itself assumes that there is a "ME" to see that there is no "ME". So as an intellectual exercise it is always going to fail. We generally approach this question by looking and trying to make sense of present experience in a different way, of waiting for experience to change somehow. Yet we don't really want to dig deep into this idea of "ME" - find out what that means, find out what it's based on.

"ME" has a very deep and strong foundation. It is the idea that what you are began at a certain date and time. It is that entity which is "ME". And that "entity" isn't a tree, it isn't the desk, it isn't the wall. It IS the body, it IS the mind, this is what we believe to be the case.

So it is this most basic and deeply-held belief about what we are which asserts that you are separate absolutely. THAT is who is trying to see that there is no "ME". That entity. But because that entity is false, it cannot find anything. It is an idea trying to eliminate another idea, or an idea trying to eliminate itself.

The spiritual search is very conceptual. Just look into the idea of separate existence itself, look into the idea of things, the idea of matter, the idea of energy. See what is the essence of each "thing" that we arrive at via some means of knowledge. We find that we are always chasing something which never appears, something which is the essence of what appears to be yet we can never pin it down. We find that existence is never arrived at, we are only ever left holding onto forms OF that essence, appearance OF that essence, like trying to capture running water in our hands.

The idea of separated existences is found to be false, therefore the "ME" was always false. It didn't need to be eliminated because it was never there, it was a false idea, it was a false assumption. So we didn't get RID of "ME" - the bottom fell out of the idea.

And therefore what IS was always IT, already. What we know AS "ME" is then all there IS. Or as Shankara put it, there is ultimately no difference between Brahman and Individual Self.

Intro to Vedanta Videos

A set of videos has been created in the Second Life Urban Guru Cafe by Avastu Maruti - a 10-part intro to Vedanta and posted on YouTube. Avastu Maruti is the Second Life avatar for Randall Friend.

More on What is Vedanta can be read at the following blog page.

Full recordings of the weekly meetings in Second Life can be heard at Avastu Design. Information on the meetings can be found here.

Other meetings in SL are held by Jason Swanson.

You Are IT

If we are truly serious about getting to the bottom of this spirituality stuff, if we are really sick of the frustrating and miserable fact of deeply wanting to know the truth of what we are yet forever being stuck in an intellectual understanding, then an openness will come.  A willingness to actually and truly take a look at the deepest conviction we have, which is that you are inherently separate, inherently a separate BEING, a being which began at a particular date and a particular time.  A being which stands alone, a being which stands apart from other beings, from other existences.

Meanwhile we are just sitting there trying to mentally figure it out.  WHO is doing this?  WHO wants it?  WHO has an intellectual understanding?  The answer is always a reference to a separate independent existence.  THAT is the WHO.  So that reference is either true or false.  If it's true, then separate existence is FACT - separate existence is then true - so why seek this wholeness stuff?  Why beat your head against the wall?  Why continue to waste your time with all this and remain frustrated?

The only other possibility is that separate existence is FALSE.  The other possibility is that this idea that your existence is owned, that it began and will end, that it is an existence that stands apart, is FALSE.  So if that openness is there, existence or BEING will be inquired into.  That idea you have about yourself will be looked into, investigated.  A light will be shone upon that idea itself - the possibility that it is false will be allowed. 

Appearance will be traced back - what IS it?  What IS it?  IS appearance indication of separate existence?  DOES an appearance have an existence of it's own?  We may find that it doesn't.  We may find that appearance is the result, not the cause.  We may find that appearance is a form OF something, an expression OF something.

That "something" we can never arrive at - WHAT it is can never be found, because all we have are various means of measurement or knowledge - when that means changes, the appearance changes.  Yet we are only ever "measuring" or "knowing" one existence.  One reality.  What IS.  What APPEARS IS that reality, appearing in infinite ways, available via infinite means of knowledge.  Yet it is only one IS-ness.  One existence, one reality. 

You are THAT.  You ARE that one existence.  Your true nature is the essence itself, the intelligence which manifests or expresses as everything.  That body-mind is just one expression which you happen to identify with.  There is nothing wrong with this identification yet if there is that overwhelming and uninvited desire to get to the bottom of what you are, then the veil of appearance will be seen through naturally.

All that remains is one reality, one IS-ness.

YOU.

Existence

The root idea that you have about yourself is that you are a separate existence, an existence which began, a differentiated existence, a "tube" of existence, an existence which is on its own, apart from the existence of everything else.  This idea is at the very root of your idea of yourself.

Now you are seeking enlightenment, which really is a fancy way of saying that all is one, wholeness, oneness...  you are seeking that wholeness - you are seeking a realization that reality isn't divided.  Yet the core idea that your existence is separate and standing alone remains.  And somehow that individual existence can find that reality is not individual existences.

The core idea you have about yourself presupposes the opposite of what is being searched for.  Your very existence as you take it eliminates wholeness as a possibility, before the search even began.

So push aside all the spiritual bullshit and just be one-pointed in the questioning and inquiry into that idea about existence itself.  Is it separate and definable?  Is existence's nature definable by these little tubes called "bodies"?  Did your existence begin at a certain date and time?  Will that existence end at some date and time?

Or is existence itself the whole?  What appears is that one existence, that singular reality.  No "thing" stands by itself in existence.  No "thing" possesses it's own existence.  Existence cannot begin.  Forms begin.  Expressions begin.  Existence itself expresses in infinite ways yet never becomes anything.  The form takes shape, stays for a while then breaks down, yet nothing happens to that existence which is the essence of the form.

If we are open enough to allow doubt about the very nature of existence itself, we may find that it is the very idea we have of ourself which binds.  Freedom is then not an individual finding freedom but freedom from the individual itself.

You are a False Idea

How far away is Oneness?  How long until you reach Wholeness?  What additional knowledge or experience is required for Limitless to come in? 

If we are looking for this, this ineffable "state" or reality referred by these words, we must come to a point where we understand that if Limitless IS, then there is nothing outside of that.  There is no reaching that.  It must already be the case.

So what IS, is limitless, already.  What IS, is whole.  What can you be in this but an idea, a thought which asserts limitation, an entity which is somehow apart from the whole.  It is only this idea which goes, gets "corrected" in realizing that you cannot be apart from the whole, that existence or Being cannot be two, is not separate Beings, separate existenc-es. 

It is the idea that you came into existence, that you are a new and independent existence, which is the only bondage.  Freedom isn't then in reaching a new state but in seeing the falseness of that idea.

Look at that idea and forget about some new state yet to come.  If it can come in new it cannot last.  Existence itself is the only reality and that never came or went.

No Objective Knowledge is Required

What is your expectation in coming to know what you are?  What form will it take?  What sort of experience will it be? 

Will it be a light, a bright light shining?  Will it be a feeling, a sensation?  Will it be a thought?  Will it be a vision of God?

If any of these come, they will come to you, to be known by you, appearing to YOU.  Still YOU remain undiscovered, still only the subject to these objective experiences.

What we are looking for is the subject, the Self.  So by what means can we come to know the subject?  Can we turn around and look?  If we see it, it's still objective.  The Self remains subjective.  Maybe we can spin around really quick and get a fleeting glimpse?

We are concerned only with knowing what we are.  Yet we are already familiar with it.   You are present and aware.  Do you not already know this?

That's it.  And is that presence which is present and aware something other than what appears?  Is that presence of awareness somehow divided from what appears?

Aren't they the same thing?  Aren't they actually the very same reality, the same IS-ness, this present "happening"? 

Without knowing anything else, it is clear that reality is already whole and you are THAT.