The Seer

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Question: What do we experience when we connect with our real self? How does that experience change the way we live our own life?

Eckhart: You no longer create suffering for yourself. Anger, resentment, regret, grievances, anxiety, guilt, etc, which are all inseparable from the egoic state of consciousness, no longer arise. And when you no longer create suffering for yourself, you no longer create suffering for others.

You have deep empathy, not only with other human beings, but also with nature and all life forms. You see all life forms as manifestations of the one formless and eternal Life, which is what you are in essence, and you can sense that essence not only in yourself, but in all beings. In other words, everywhere you encounter yourself.

Question: Wouldn’t it be more encouraging to set ones goals and try to fulfill them? That could also give us a strong purpose in life … What is the difference between the two approaches?

Eckhart: There’s nothing wrong with goals and trying to fulfill them – as long as the main focal point of your attention remains the present moment. It’s like being on a journey and knowing where you want to get to, but realizing at the same time that the entire journey ultimately consists of one step – the step you’re taking at this moment. That one step is all there ever is, and so you give it your fullest attention.

In other words, the step you’re taking now is primary, the destination – the goal – is secondary. If the destination becomes primary, you will become stressed and anxious and you will miss life. You will suffer, and the destination will not make you happy even when you get there, when you attain your goals.

From an interview with Eckhart Tolle published in the May 2007 issue (#25) of the Spanish-language magazine Mente Sana

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Aham-Brahma-Asmi — I am Brahman (God); Tat-Twam-Asi — THAT You Are

These statements from the Indian scriptures have caused considerable confusion among spiritual seekers because their inner meaning has not been comprehended.

Every twam is not Tat: every you (the form) are not THAT (the Formless). THAT is every you, THAT will always be there without you, but you cannot be there without THAT.

Unless this is very clearly understood, every seeker will want to be one with THAT and will, therefore, be frustrated. What is to be very clearly understood is that every human being, in his or her daily living, must continuously remain connected (in awareness) to THAT Source and never be disconnected from it.

The individual entity — the Ego — gets disconnected from the Source whenever he considers himself or the ‘other’ as the doer of some action, and blames and condemns him for some action.

The connection finally ends when the body dies and the Ego no longer exists as a separate entity.

To remain continuously connected to the Source in one’s daily living means doing whatever is necessary to be done in any situation as if one is the doer — and, therefore, to witness whatever is happening as something that is precisely supposed to happen according to the Cosmic Law, without regrets about the past, without any complaints in the present, without any expectation in the future, and, importantly, without condemning anyone for anything — neither himself nor the other.

Ramesh Balsekar

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It’s hard to believe that Adyashanti will be here in Perth (Western Australia) in just over seven weeks! Hundreds are planning to hear him at he Fremantle Town Hall and the places are filling up rapidly for his intensive at Cottesloe. We strongly advise you to register for Adya’s intensive if you’re planning to be there.

The recording of the satsangs in Perth, Sydney and Byron Bay will be availabe online for download within a week of each event. The recordings will be uploaded to Adya’s Cafe Dharma site so anyone can go online and purchase them for download. A card explaining this will be available at the bookstore at each event.

“To try to get beyond yourself is the ultimate act of self-obsession. If you’re going to do anything, put your attention on what’s already free. Your mind would say, Well, where is that? I would say, It’s the awareness that you’re using right now to look, to listen, that awareness itself. It’s already free. Just abide in what’s already free.” ~ Adyashanti

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When time brings its own message

That the way to truth is there,

The feeling is not to be found

The sight cannot be sought.

The void of time and thought

Brings its own clarity

The way is not there, not here

It is all things, every moment.

The joy of finding it

The bliss of knowing it

Dissolves into infinity

Along with the seeker.

Beyond all knowing and seeing

Where self cannot reach,

Living in the still void

We exist for all time.

by Larry Davis

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One morning at a lake resort, the husband returns after several hours of fishing and decides to take a nap.

Although not familiar with the lake, the wife decides to take the boat out on the placid waters. She motors out a short distance, anchors, and reads her book.

Along comes a Fisheries Inspector in his boat. he pulls up alongside the woman and says,
“Good morning, Ma’am. what are you doing?”

“Reading a book,” she replies, (thinking, Isn’t that obvious?)

“You’re in a Restricted Fishing Area,” he informs her.

“I’m sorry, officer, but I’m not fishing. I’m reading.”

“Yes, but you have all the equipment. For all I know you could start at any moment. I’ll have to take you in and write you up.”

“If you do that, I’ll have to charge you with sexual assault,” says the woman.

“But I haven’t even touched you,” says the game warden.

“That’s true, but you have all the equipment. For all I know you could start at any moment.”

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We’ve just had the most extraordinary time at Gurukula, over the last week, with our dojo packed out at every event with friends from all over Perth keen to hear the direct, loving and insightful teaching of Leonard Jacobson on The Two-step Dance of Awakening.

The energy and Presence in the room at times was quite palpable. Almost all who attended these memorable events have expressed deep appreciation for the new depths of understanding and deliverance (from ego control) they received.

Ever since we’ve stocked Leonard’s latest (of 4) book, Journey into Now, they’ve been selling like hot-cakes, mainly as a result of reader recommendations. My wife, Pearl, has been encouraging her counselling clients to get a copy as Leonard’s book is as practical as it is profound in its approach to spirituality and personal well-being. It’s certainly one of the best books I’ve read on Presence awareness.

Even if you weren’t able to be with us, you can still get an idea of what he said and be encouraged to live in Presence via the audio and video clips etc. you will find (constantly updated) at Leonard’s Web site.

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Mankind says NOW isn’t good enough. So, he leaves it, he thinks, to go scampering around in the imaginary world of not-now. Exactly so, he says this Center-Peace is not good enough. Ecstasy and elation are bound to be so much better, he believes. Don’t believe it! They aren’t.

It is the belief of a “better” and a “worse” that has humanity bouncing back and forth like a puppet on a string, swinging between valley and mountain, life and death, sickness and health, poverty and wealth. Who can convince another to stop at the NOW? To stop at Tranquillity? To stop at the center called Sufficiency?

It happens that Now-Tranquillity and Now-Sufficiency is this Identity we are. It is time to stop desiring the positive, “good” side of the old misidentity. It is not good that we want, neither wealth nor health, not even illumination.

Ours is the Identity that is unjudged and unjudging. This instant — this NOW — Tranquillity am I! Peace am I! Sufficiency am I! Love am I! The One Identity am I; and there is no other “I” but Isness being Itself! Here Identity stands as I!

From: A Guide to Awareness & Tranquillity, by William Samuel

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Meister Eckhart (1260-1328) was a German Dominican monk and undoubtedly a seer or as we would say today, an awakened spiritual teacher. His vision of the intimate presence of God veered perilously close in the minds of the inquisitors to the heretical position called pantheism — the view that everything is somehow God.

Eckhart never taught pantheism. But he did develop the classical Christian teaching which for a century now has been known as “panentheism” — the view that God is present in all things, and conversely that all things mediate God’s presence to those able and willing to grasp the reality of that presence.

Further, God is present in particular acuteness in the spiritual essence of the human soul — another classical tenet that Eckhart made a touchstone of his preaching and teaching. That belief, too, came under official scrutiny and condemnation. The Meister said, “… God is unseparated from all things, for God is in all things and is more inwardly in them than they are in themselves.”

Again, he said, “God is in all things. The more He is in things, the more He is out of things; the more in, the more out, and the more out, the more in. (…) God is in all things; but as God is divine and intelligible, so God is nowhere so truly as in the soul, and in the angels if you will, in the inmost soul, in the summit of the soul. And when I say the inmost, I mean the highest, and when I say the highest, I mean the inmost part of the soul. In the inmost and the highest part of the soul — there I mean. them both together in one.”

… The all-important transition from darkness to light was for Eckhart the passage from ignorance to awareness of God’s constant presence in the depths of conscious experience — the birth of the Word in the soul.

From: Eckhart’s Way, by Richard Wood pp 52

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“One day I will be free of the ego.” Who is talking? The ego. To become free of the ego’s control is not really a big job, but a very small one.

All you need to do is be aware of your thoughts and emotions — as they happen. This is not really a doing, but an alert seeing. In that sense, it is true that there is nothing you can do to become free of the ego’s domination.

When that shift happens, which is the shift from thinking to awareness, an intelligence far greater than the ego’s cleverness begins to operate in your life. Emotions and even thoughts become depersonalized through awareness.

You are the light of Presence, the awareness that is prior to and deeper than any thoughts and emotions.

Eckhart Tolle

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Satsang is the invitation to step into the fire of Self-discovery. This fire will not burn you; it will only burn away what you are not.

Mooji