The Seer

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Dear Carrie,Thank you for your inquiry. What I understand Gangaji to be saying in the passage below is that most people identify very strongly and only with the ’story’ of their life up to the present moment. They feel defined by what they have done or not done, and what others have done or not done to them. They feel that life began for them when they were born and wlll end when their body/mind/personality dies. Because such people seem not to be conscious of any other dimension of their life … they could be said to be ‘unconscious’ in this sense.

As consciousness arises in an unconscious person, however, they begin to ‘notice’ their thoughts, feelings and sensory perceptions etc. and as more consciousness arises, they begin to notice that they are noticing these internal phenomena.

You could say that first there is awareness of things and then there is awareness of Awareness itself which is a no-thing or what might be called ‘Spirit’.

It is then seen that while things in awareness come and go, Awareness Itself does not — it is always there and changeless, because it is not a ‘thing’ that can change. At this point, it may be recognized or understood, that one’s previous total identification with the body/mind/personality and its ’story’ was incorrect — and it is then understood, that in fact, one is much more than this — that there is an infinite and eternal dimension to us as well as a finite and temporal dimension. It is then seen that we are Life Itself and not merely our life experience.

The ego here is very subtle or tricky and there is the possibility if we are not properly guided, that we will swing from identifying totally with the body/mind/personality and its (poor me?) story, to total identification with ‘Spirit’ or the formless Self. The egoic mind then thinks it must reject the material things as being ‘unspiritual’ and if it is ‘allowed’ to do so, then one form or separation and division is simply replaced with another. Also, one story — “I am what happened to this body/mind etc.” is neatly replaced with another story, ie. “I am this spiritual ’being’ who is no longer a body/mind etc.”

The truth that Gangaji is pointing to in the passage below, as I see it, is that in reality, It is all one — and there is no separation or division, or in other words, It’s all God! We are not either finite or infinite, but both at the same time and that neither dimension should be ignored or denied. The truth is, she asserts, is that we are already and always Source and temporarily a particular expression of Source. It can be said, that while being inseparable from the Formless, we are a particular form and within that form, there arise countless other forms — thoughts, ideas, concepts, emotions, bodily sensations, sensory perceptions etc.

The person who is truly awake or conscious, Gangaji is saying, is a two-dimensional being, whereas, the person who is unawake or unconscious could be said to function only in one dimension (even though they too are inately two-dimensional). The barely awake or deluded person will have some understanding of the formless (compared with form) dimension of their life but will identify with only one or the other, and may even alternate between one or the other at various stages in their life experience … which would amount to just another episode in the old self-defining story.

Carrie, I hope this has clarified the quote a little for you. If not, please get back to me with more specific questions. Of course, if you can pick up a copy of Gangaji’s excellent book, The Diamond in Your Pocket’ and read the quote in its context, I’m sure that would bring even more clarification for you.

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For most spiritual seekers, the belief that personal identification
obstructs self-realization gives rise to the drive to get rid of the
personal story. But this is still just another part of the story. It
is so important to recognize this. Attempting to get rid of the story
is just another tangent of the story, another example of the power of
mind to control.

I have often seen in spiritual circles that instead of a real
examination of our storylines, there is a tendency to suppress the
story. In that suppression, the story may seem to be removed, but
there is still no peace. You cannot rest in the beauty and
transcendence of yourself while suppressing the story of yourself.

The story is still going on, but since you identify yourself as a
spiritual seeker, you push it out of conscious awareness. Spiritual
conditioning has simply taken the place of worldly conditioning. The
story is still operating, but now it operates subconsciously. And you
are confused as to why you still suffer.

Continued suffering is proof that your story is still being told. If
you are willing to not label that suffering as bad, then you can be
willing to simply see what the story is.

From: The Diamond in Your Pocket by Gangaji>

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In the Sept/Oct Advaita Fellowship Newsletter, Wayne Liquorman writes:

I am periodically taken to task for not having a teaching style more like some of my preceptors - most notably, Nisargadatta Maharaj. Maharaj was famous for speaking from the standpoint of the Absolute. He would say things such as, “I was never born and I will never die” and “I am awake even when I am asleep.” Such assertively non-dual statements sometimes had the effect of shocking his listeners into a profound, transcendent Seeing.

I am sympathetic to this approach but I have rarely been comfortable using it. I feel much more at home when I am meeting my listeners where THEY are…most of them believing that they were born and will die and that they are asleep while asleep. From this point of “obvious” truth we can then proceed to examine the more profound, underlying nature of this “one” who lives and dies and sleeps.

No one can deny that there is EXISTENCE here. The nature of that EXISTENCE can (and has been) debated endlessly. But this EXISTENCE is self-proving. It is not a philosophical debating point but a self-affirming Truth. It is here at the center when you pull off the onion-like layers of your apparent self - the self that lives and dies and sleeps and wakes.

We are the victims of our beliefs. When you “believe” the pointers of a teacher such as Maharaj the inevitable result is a kind of nihilism in which all that is apparent (including yourself) is denied as meaningless and illusory. When you believe the pointers of a teacher such as myself the inevitable result is the sense of having a progressively deeper and truer knowledge about the nature of Existence.

So pick your poison. With a little luck…either one will kill “you.”

With much love,
Wayne

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Awareness is peace. It’s prior to, during and after all experience. It’s the constant underlying state — The Natural State. It’s the underlying essence of everything. If you’re reading these words then you are aware right now. In your daily experience, you’re always aware of something — whether it’s your daily activities, or it’s a series of thoughts about your career, your relationships, your finances. And you are always present as awareness watching, noticing.

What we want in life is peace, love, and the sense that everything is okay, isn’t it? Find out for yourself. Because if that’s what you want, it’s already here. It’s free. There are no requirements. No requirements at all. You don’t have to make any money. You don’t have to have any relationships. You don’t have to have a career. You need nothing! Absolutely nothing. It’s free! It’s absolutely free. It’s what you are — awareness.

Just notice, I am aware. Notice the awareness that you are — not the concept of awareness. If you can hear anything, see anything, feel anything — it’s the awareness that’s hearing, seeing, and feeling. Awareness is timelessly present. It’s not yesterday, it’s not tomorrow. It’s always now. You don’t have to wait five minutes, nor can you go back in time five minutes. It’s this point of timeless, spaceless awareness that’s always seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, smelling.

The experience that arises in awareness is absolutely irrelevant — it does not touch the peace. Whether I lose every penny I have, or I win the lottery — I am untouched as awareness. Because I am here watching, feeling, sensing.

This awareness is absolutely free. It doesn’t cost anything. You don’t have to invest time manipulating your relationships, your career, or your finances. You don’t have to do anything! It’s free. This is the resolution to all psychological suffering. This awareness is what I am. So, knowing what I am, what we are — we are the peace, the love, the sense that everything is okay — this is what I am. This is what we are.

by Stephen Wingate

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Nearly always, a “miserable experience” arises from the evaluation of “things,” but the equanimity everyone wants resides beyond “things” with the Real — and the Real is That which is being this consciousness of things.

For a time one seems bound to the belief that his misery is “out there,” even while his agony is the “awful feeling of fear and foreboding within.” One may believe an errant member of a family is the cause the agony, but it’s the agony of that belief which is felt within as a disturbance of one’s equanimity.

To eliminate the agony, for the past ten thousand years we have been doing everything possible to change the suspected cause of it ”out there” with the husband, daughter, business or something else.

We have believed that if we could see an external situation change, automatically we would feel the restoration of some degree of equanimity; and we did, perhaps, for short time, until something else “out there” failed to gee-haw.

Now listen: This procedure puts us and leaves us at the mercy of “thing”! This makes the ‘feeling within” tributary to appearances without. This is self-imposed slavery.

The presence (or absence) of something we see is good or bad only as we are of the opinion that it is good or bad. The image has no value of its own. We have given it value (hence power) based on its desirability — “I like it; or don’t like it.” Yet, all enlightened instruction speaks of the joy to be experienced when desire is overcome. Can one conceive of a more immediate way to overcome the desire for things than to recognize their valuelessness and then to perceive the impossibility of being one who desires

We have been told that Heaven, Tranquillity, is within. Heaven is opinionless, desireless Awareness. As long as we look to people, things, or conditions for happiness, we are making “heaven” tributary to the object of perception. One who stands identified as tranquil Awareness itself finds people, things and conditions tributary to his harmonious Identity.

Tranquility is our Identity. We are not another identity attempting to experience the absence of desire. If we believe we find happiness and harmony, then we must believe we can lose them. In addition, we must believe they are absent (or can be) at the moment. We can no more be absent from Identity than light can be absent from light.

From: A Guide To Awareness And Tranquillity pp 188, by William Samuel