September 2005
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September 1st 2005
From Consciousness -- Closer Than Your Heartbeat
However you identify yourself -- as a child, an adolescent, a mother, a father, an older person, a healthy person, a sick person, a suffering person, or an enlightened person -- always, behind all of that, is the truth of yourself.
It is not foreign to you. It is so close that you cannot believe it is you.
Instead, you have taken on the conditioning of parents, cultures, and religions as the reality of yourself rather than what has always been with you -- closer than your heartbeat, closer than any thought, closer than any experience.
Gangaji -- The Diamond in Your Pocket
From Consciousness -- A Vivid, Radiant Awakeness
True inquiry is like a childlike wondering, "Is this really who I am?" Not thinking about it, but allowing yourself to be more and more disarmed through the question.
The more sincerely you experientially enter the unknown, the more you become disarmed. Have you noticed the mind doesn't know what to do? Invite that sense of unknowing, and do not be concerned about being disarmed.
Notice that right in the middle of it there is a vivid, radiant awakeness. Mysteriously, by allowing the recognition of that awakeness in, you can awaken as that.
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
From Consciousness -- What Real Surrender Is
When you allow awakeness in, you will find that it plays games with your life. It doesn't move according to the agenda of the little me, the one who has all these ideas about this or that happening when you awaken.
The awakeness couldn't care less about the agendas you have. It's moving, and it's not listening to what you want, and you are grateful that it's not listening. You discover that it has its own movement, which I suppose is what real surrender is -- following that movement.
This is the real meaning of 'Thy will be done."
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
From Consciousness -- You Don't Care
The mind may get concerned about being disarmed and letting go of all its concepts and scripts. It might say, "I may not get what I want." And I say, you're damned lucky if you don't get what you want!
I got nothing I wanted out of awakening. I thought it would solve lots of things. I had lots of ideas about what it was going to give me. Forget it!
Not that you don't get what you want, but you don't care if you get what you want. I can't think of one thing I got that I thought I would get. The only thing that did happen was that I no longer cared.
What a hideous dream it was -- thinking those things were needed for me to be happy.
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
From Consciousness -- Satsang (saht-sahng)
To welcome the mystery of your own being is satsang. This is in contrast to what spirituality often is -- pushing your own being away, or defining the mystery, or dressing it up with pearls and flowers, etc., so it looks like a powerful mystery.
Satsang is a welcoming, such a welcoming, until the identification snaps and the mystery realizes, "Oh, this is what I am! I thought I was the one over there with that agenda. I thought I was the actor of roles. I thought I was the roles." None of that is true.
When the role called "I'm a human being" ends, we call that death. It's a lot easier if you let that role die before the body dies, and let it be put to rest now.
Through satsang you can awaken to being what you eternally are and have true life.
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
From Consciousness -- Openness
An important part of satsang, when we gather together to explore Truth, is being open-hearted. Some human beings find it easier to be open-minded, and some find it easier to be open-hearted, but to really be here now is to be both.
When you are open, you do not filter your experience, nor do you barricade yourself. You do not try to defend yourself, but you open to the mystery by questioning what you believe.
When you give yourself this amazing gift of not trying to find yourself within some particular concept or feeling, then the openness expands until your identity becomes more and more the openness itself, rather than some point of reference in the mind called a belief or a particular feeling in the body.
The point is not to get rid of thoughts or feelings, but just not to feel located inside of them.
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
From Consciousness -- Whatever is Happening is Okay
Openness has no particular location. It seems to be everywhere. It has room fo anything. There can be a thought or no thought. There can be a feeling or no feeling.
There can be sounds. There can be silence. Nothing disturbs openness. Nothing disturbs your true nature.
We only get disturbed when we close ourselves by identifying with a particular point of view, a concept of who I am or who I believe or feel myself to be; we go into opposition against what's happening.
But when we are being our true nature, which is openness, we find that we're actually not in opposition to anything. Whatever is happening in the openness is perfectly okay, and so we are able to respond to life in a spontaneous and wise way.
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
From Consciousness -- Check For Resistance
When you enter the timeless dimension of the present, change often comes about in strange ways without the need for a great deal of doing on your part. Life becomes helpful and cooperative.
If inner factors such as fear, guilt, or inertia prevented you from taking action, they will dissolve in the light of your conscious presence.
Do not confuse surrender with an attitude of "I can't be bothered anymore" or "I just don't care anymore." If you look at it closely, you wil find that such an attitude is tainted with negativity in the form of hidden resentment and so is not surrender at all but masked resistance.
As you surrender, direct your attention inward to check if there is any trace of resistance left inside you. Be very alert when you do so; otherwise, a pocket of resistance may continue to hide in some dark corner in the form of a thought or an unacknowledged emotion.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing The Power of Now
From Consciousness -- Witnessing the Resistance
Start by acknowledging that there is resistance. Be there when it happens, when the resistance arises. Observe how your mind creates it, how it labels the situation, yourself, or others. Look at the thought process involved. Feel the energy of the emotion.
By witnessing the resistance, you will see that it serves no purpose. By focusing all your attention on the Now, the unconscious resistance is made conscious, and that is the end of it.
You cannot be conscious and unhappy, conscious and in negativity. Negativity, unhappiness, or suffering in whatever form means that there is resistance, and resistance is always unconscious,
Would you choose unhappiness? If you did not choose it, how did it arise? What is its purpose? Who is keeping it alive?
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing The Power of Now
From Consciousness -- Keeping Your Unhappiness Alive
When you are conscious of your unhappy feelings, the truth is that you are identified with them and keep the process alive through compulsive thinking. All that is unconscious.
If you were conscious, that is to say totally present in the Now, all negativity would dissolve almost instantly. It could not survive in your presence. It can only survive in your absence.
Even the pain-body cannot survive for long in your presence. You keep your unhappiness alive by giving it time. That is its lifeblood.
Remove time through intense present-moment awareness and it dies. But do you want it to die? Have you truly had enough? Who would you be without it?
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing The Power of Now
From Consciousness -- The Spiritual Dimension
Until you practice surrender, the spiritual dimension is something you read about, talk about, get excited about, write books about, think about, believe in -- or don't, as the case may be. It makes no difference.
Not until you surrender does the spiritual dimension become a living reality in your life.
When you do, the energy that you emanate and that then runs your life is of a much higher vibrational frequency than the mind energy that still runs our world.
Through surrender, spiritual energy comes into this world. It creates no suffering for yourself, for other humans, or any other life form on the planet.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing The Power of Now
From Consciousness -- Unconscious Behavior
It is true that only an unconscious person will try to use or manipulate others, but it is equally true that only an unconscious person can be used and manipulated.
If you resist or fight unconscious behavior in others, you become unconscious yourself.
But surrender doesn't mean that you allow yourself to be used by unconscious people. Not at all.
It is perfectly possible to say "no" firmly and clearly to a person or to walk away from a situation and be in a state of complete inner nonresistance at the same time.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing The Power of Now
From Consciousness -- Take Responsibility for Your Life
When you say "no" to a person or a situation, let it come not from reaction but from insight, from a clear realization of what is right or not right for you at that moment.
Let it be a nonreactive "no," a high-quality "no," a "no" that is free of all negativity and so creates no further suffering.
If you cannot surrender, take action immediately: Speak up or do something to bring about a change in the situation -- or remove yourself from it. Take responsibility for your life.
Do not pollute your beautiful, radiant inner Being nor the Earth with negativity. Do not give unhappiness in any form whatsoever a dwelling place inside you.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing The Power of Now
From Consciousness -- Action and Responsibility
The basis of legal responsibility is supposed to be action of the individual. An analysis of the action of the individual entity reveals a curious situation. An individual, in any given situation, decides to do something with the object of achieving some particular result. He decides on the means he will use, and puts in his effort.
It is everyone's experience in life that the result has never been in his control. The result may be a) what he had intended or b) not at all what he had intended or c) something in between.
In actual fact, his responsibility is judged by the society not on what he has 'done' but on what has 'happened', over which he did not have much control.
Actual practical life would seem to substantiate what the Buddha said: "Events happen, deeds are done, but no deed is done by any individual doer."
Ramesh Balsekar -- Nuggets of Wisdom
From Consciousness -- Mind Creates the Image
Emanuel Kant held that there is an underlying reality, but we cannot know it directly. All we can ever know is how it appears in our mind. Peter Russell explains as follows:
When I look at a tree, light reflected from the tree forms an image of the tree on the retina of my eye. Photosensitive cells in the retina discharge electrons, triggering electro-chemical impulses that travel down the optic nerve to the visual cortex of the brain.
There the data undergoes complex processing that reveals shapes, patterns, colours and movements. The brain then integrates this information into a coherent whole, creating its own reconstruction of the external world. Finally, an image of the tree appears in my consciousness.
Similar activities take place with the other senses. In other words, whatever we perceive -- everything I see, hear, smell, taste and touch -- has been reconstructed from sensory data. It takes the brain about a fifth of a second to process the sensory information and construct the relevant picture of reality.
Ramesh Balsekar -- Nuggets of Wisdom
From Consciousness -- Source is My Home
I know the Source is my home. What is the point in my being asked all the time to remember that I am the Source?
Living my life means facing life from moment to moment, dealing with the situation in the moment. How do I deal with the situation if I am to remember that I am the Source?
In practical living, the more useful concept is to deal with any situation according to what I think I should do, with the understanding -- not remembering -- that what I think I should do is based on my programming -- genes and conditioning -- which God, the Source created, and over which I had absolutely no control.
In actual fact, therefore, I cannot be the doer of any deed; and thus whatever the actual result of 'my' action, I cannot make a mistake, nor can I ever commit a sin.
Ramesh Balsekar -- Nuggets of Wisdom
From Consciousness -- The World is Yourself
The traditional Hindu text says: "I am Brahman". Nisargadatta Maharaj says: "I am That".
But I would be more inclined to say that That -- the Source -- is me and you and he and she. In other words, the One Unmanifest Source has become the many in the manifest phenomenal universe.
And then I have come across the fact that the sage Swami Nityananda of Vajreshwari, Mumbai has declared: "It is not right to say, 'I am Brahman'. One should rather say, 'You are all All; the whole world is yourself."
Ramesh Balsekar -- Nuggets of Wisdom
From Consciousness -- Within and Without
Our 'normal' living, based on nothing but mental image-forming, has become so abnormal, that we are rarely able to give any attention to anything natural.
It is only when one is able to be one with nature -- witness what happens in nature without any personal reaction -- that it is possible to step out of the bind of the thinking mind, and be connected with the Being in which everything exists as part of Nature.
This is not really difficult. All it means is to forget oneself for the moment, as an individual entity, and feel the same stillness within and without. And then you see nature not as something stationary but as life, as movement.
All things in nature are one with totality, that they do not claim a separate existence as me and the other. There is total acceptance in nature.
Ramesh Balsekar -- Nuggets of Wisdom
From Consciousness -- Am I Enlightened?
At some point or other, when a seeker has progressed beyond a certain stage, it is natural for a curiosity to arise: "Have I 'arrived'? Has it happened?" He or she would like to know.
it has not happened if you find yourself foisting and forcing your concepts on others and thereby find yourself being avoided by friends.
In my own case, I had noticed that I was no longer interested even a little bit, in winning an argument. Indeed which way events happened just did not seem to matter in the least.
One more aspect of life I think I should mention is the fact that the basis of my relationship with the 'other' was utter humility and tolerance.
Ramesh Balsekar -- Nuggets of Wisdom
From Consciousness -- The Truth of Who You Are
The truth of who you are is untouched by any 'concept' of who you are, whether ignorant or enlightened, worthless or grand.
The truth of who you are is free of it all.
You are already free, and all that blocks your realization of that freedom is your attachment to some thought of who you are.
This thought doesn't keep you from being the truth of who you are. You already are that. It separates you from the 'realization' of who you are.
Gangaji -- The Diamond in Your Pocket
From Consciousness -- It Does Not Come and Go
I invite you to let your attention dive into what has always been here, waiting openly for its own self-realization.
Who are you, really? Are you some image that appears in your mind? Are you some sensation that appears in your body? Are you some emotion that passes through your mind and body? Are you something that someone else has said you are, or are you the rebellion against something that someone else has said you are?
These are some of the many avenues of misidentification. All of these definitions come and go, are born and then die.
The truth of who you are does not come and go. It is present before birth, throughout a lifetime, and after death.
Gangaji -- The Diamond in Your Pocket
From Consciousness -- Tricks of the Mind
To discover the truth of who you are is not only possible; it is your birthright.
Any thoughts that this discovery is not for you -- now is not the time, you are not worthy, you are not ready, you already know who you are -- are all just tricks of the mind.
It is time to investigate this I-thought and see what validity it really has.
In this examination, there is an opening for the conscious intelligence that you are to finally recognize itself.
Gangaji -- The Diamond in Your Pocket
From Consciousness -- The Most Important Question
The most important question you can ever ask yourself is, Who am I?
In a certain way, this has been an implicit question asked throughout every stage of your life. Every activity, whether individual or collective, is motivated at its root by a search for self-definition.
Typically, you search for a positive answer to this question and run away from a negative answer.
Once this question becomes explicit, the momentum and the power of the question direct the search for the true answer, which is open-ended, alive, and filled with ever deepening insight.
Gangaji -- The Diamond in Your Pocket
From Consciousness -- The Moment of Spiritual Maturity
The external world tells you who you are. Beginning with your parents, you are told that you are a particular name, a particular gender, and that you play a particular role as a child in the family.
The conditioning continues through your schooling. You are a good student, a bad student, a good person, a bad person, someone who can do it, someone who can't do it, and on and on.
You have experienced both success and failure. After a certain stage, early or late, you realize that who you are, however that is defined, is not satisfying.
The moment of recognizing that no answer has ever satisfied the question (Who am I?) is crucial. It is often referred to as the moment of spiritual ripeness, the moment of spiritual maturity. At this point, you can consciously investigate who you really are.
Gangaji -- The Diamond in Your Pocket
From Consciousness -- The End of the Search
When you turn your attention toward the question, Who am I? perhaps you will see an entity that has your face and your body.
But who is 'aware' of that entity? Are you the object, or are you the awareness of the object? The object comes and goes. The parent, the child, the lover, the abandoned one, the enlightened one, the victorious one, the defeated one -- these identifications all come and go.
The awareness of these identifications is always present. The misidentification of yourself as some obiect in awareness leads to extreme pleasure or extreme pain and endless cycles of suffering.
When you are willing to stop the misidentification and discover directly and completely that you are the awareness itself and not these impermanent definitions, the search for yourself in thought ends.
Gangaji -- The Diamond in Your Pocket
From Consciousness -- It's About Remembrance
Satsang is about remembrance. It's as if you forgot you were this openness and thought that you were something. Humans have spun endless mythologies of how we forgot, but it doesn't really matter how.
The heart of satsang is not to change and alter yourself, but to remember what you are. Truth is about just remembering, recognizing, or realizing your true nature.
Do you know the experience of forgetting something even though it was right there in your mind a moment ago? The mind may struggle to remember, but this just makes it more difiqcult. What finally helps? You relax a little bit. You forget that you're trying to remember, and you relax. "Oh yes, that's it!" The answer comes out of nowhere.
Self-realization is just like that -- just now. It happens in the willingness to relax and not know.
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
From Consciousness -- Just Feel the Experience
You can have an experience of openness right now. You do not need to open or to become more open. Just recognize the openness that is already being experienced here and now. This is known inside, outside, and everywhere.
Just feel the experience of it. Let go of the word "openness." Let it disappear, and the experience gets deeper and becomes more and more wordless.
Simply be from the place that is wordless. Then you are not confused by words, and you do not limit your experience by believing in the words.
But as soon as you impose the word "openness," your experience takes on a certain flavor, which isn't quite right. It may be very close, but it is not quite what it was when you didn't have the concept.
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
From Consciousness -- When the Self is Liberated Th experience of letting go can deepen. That deepening may seem like falling into the unknown to the mind, which tends to conceptualize it and limit the experience, but it's actually a deeper knowing of the experience of being itself.
In that deeper experience, the limited person you thought you were starts to realize that you are this openness instead. You will also see that this is what others are.
When you liberate yourself, it's not just your self, it is the Self that is liberated. You're remembering everybody's Self because it's the same Self.
When this is realized, it enables the total transformation of human interaction.
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
From Consciousness -- The Kit of Identity
Open mind, open heart. Realize that there isn't somebody in there to protect. There is no need for an emotional barrier or the feelings of separation and isolation that come from that barrier.
The only reason you ever thought that you needed protection was because of a very innocent misunderstanding. This happened because when you were given a concept of yourself in very early childhood, you also received a kit with which to build walls that would protect this concept.
You learned to add to the kit as circumstances arose. Ifa good dose of anger seemed useful, you would add that to the kit, or perhaps you added resentment, shame, blame, or victimization.
Whether you cling to a self-image as a good person or an inadequate person, the kit of identity is used to protect that image.
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
From Consciousness -- The Walls Come Down
When you drop your protection, the truth comes in and takes away the self-image. That's why the self-image came with a wall because, without the wall, the remembrance of your true nature is going to jump in fast and take away the self-image, whether good or bad.
There is no self-image that doesn't have a wall and no self-image that doesn't entail suffering. Not only do you have your own walls, but there are also walls you project onto other people, the images you have of them that prevent you from seeing their true nature.
With the willingness to see that an image is not real, the walls come down. When the intellectual wall opens up, you become open-minded. When the emotional wall opens up, you become open-hearted. When realization of the Truth removes the limited me, there is suddenly no self-image -- but only total presence.
Total presence! This openness is present and imageless. There is no need to protect it. Somebody can yell at it, and sound goes through space. That's okay. Someone can love it. That's nice, but it doesn't add anything to it or subtract anything from it.
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
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