– Transcript 162
R: Good afternoon. It is good to be with you again. I welcome you with all my heart.
What is your purpose for coming here this afternoon? Ponder this. You could have gone to a good movie, and your purpose would be to enjoy the movie. You could have gone to Las Vegas. The purpose would be to gamble and win a lot of money. You could have gone to play bingo. Again you would want win money.
We always believe, as human beings, there has to be a purpose to what we do. Yet life has no purpose whatsoever. Life, as it appears, is purposeless. Is there such a word as purposeless? There is now. We come to groups like this, we have some vague idea in our mind we should become liberated, we wish to become totally free, have bliss.
This is very foolish. Bliss, liberation, is already your very nature. You are that.
That’s what you are. There is absolutely nothing you have to do attain realization, nothing.
You do not have to practice any sadhana. You do not have to meditate. You do not have to go to meetings. There is absolutely nothing you have to do. God’s grace brings liberation to you at the right time.
You can be the greatest sinner, yet you can be liberated. Another person can be a great sadhana doer, meditating for thirty, forty, fifty years, and nothing ever happens.
When you realize these things, you come here without any purpose, without any motivation whatsoever.
We always feel we have to add something to our knowledge. It is our so called material knowledge that keeps us back from liberation. We have to empty ourselves out totally and completely. And then we will be in our true state. There is really nothing else you have to learn. There is really nothing else you have to do. When you do practice sadhana, meditation, it is only to take you out of this world for a while, so you can be at peace, feel a bliss within yourself for a while, feel something that you do not have now. Yet this does not bring you all the way, does not bring you to total liberation. Only being, not being this or being that, just being, will finally liberate you.
You probably heard the story about the lion cub who became lost in the jungle, and was adopted by a herd of sheep. The lion cub grew and became mature, and thought he was a sheep. And he used to say baa, and travel with the other sheep. When some hyenas would come chasing them, he would run with the sheep.
Then one day some other lions saw him and said, “What is this?” They took him to a pond and told him to look into the pond and see who he is. As soon as he saw himself his entire stature changed. Something happened at that time, when he lost the idea he was a sheep, and he came to himself again as a great lion of the jungle.
Most of us believe we are sheep. We believe we are human and go through experiences of lack, limitation, illness, man’s inhumanity to man, or we think we are wealthy, and healthy, and strong. We are none of these things at all. If you are only aware of who you were, who you are. You are not the person in between who you were and who you are. You’ve always been that which always has existed. You have always been Brahman, absolute reality, pure awareness. This is your nature. This is your true Self. You do not have to pray to attain this. You simply have to awaken, awaken from the mortal dream.
Does the rose have to declare its fragrance? By its very nature you know it’s a rose.
We do not have to go around shouting, “I am divine, I am Brahman, I am absolute reality.”
We simply have to let go. Stop fighting life. Stop trying to make things happen.
Your body knows what to do, yet you are not your body. It appears you are a body. It appears you have a mind. Yet none of this is true. Who are you? If you have to say, “I am absolute reality,” then you are not that at all. For when I ask the question, “Who are you?” there should be total silence in your mind. You are that silence, the silence beyond words, beyond thoughts, beyond being, beyond desire, that perfect silence, the stillness, beyond the void, beyond no mind. You are that. You have always been that.
There is nothing to say. There are no eloquent lectures you have to listen to. There are no profound teachings you have to accept. You have to become like a little child, and just be. There is nothing holding you back. There is no force trying to stop you, or do anything to you. You are like boundless space. Boundless space permeates everything and yet stays itself, never changes. You are consciousness, like boundless space. You are everywhere present. If you knew you were everywhere present, there would be absolutely nothing for you to do. There would be no purpose. What purpose would you have if you were everything right now? What could you possibly want? What could possibly desire?
Think of yourself as all pervading, all pervading boundless space, pure consciousness.
Can you feel it?
Let go of this world, right now. This world, this universe, is nothing but a superimposition on the screen of life. Do not identify with the world. Identify with the screen of life. Things come and things go. This has nothing to do with you. Leave the world alone.
Do not attempt to change things. There’s a mysterious power that takes care of everything.
You will always be taken care of. You do not have to worry about your life.
It seems strange that the more you let go, the greater the peace and happiness that comes to you. The more you try to achieve anything like peace and happiness, your problems, your chaos, your confusion, it comes with the so called happiness you try to achieve.
In other words, do not seek happiness. Do not seek anything. Remember that if you realize that you’re omnipresent, you are everything. Always remember this. There is
nothing that is lacking from you. It is your mind that causes the problems by telling you you’re lacking, something is wrong, you have to correct this and fix that.
Inquire, “To whom does this mind come? To whom does the body come? To whom do the thoughts come? Where did I come from? Who am I?” This is what you should be doing most of the day.
Many of you still believe and think that your work is so important, your home life is so important, that you have no time to do these things. It makes no difference what you’re doing, where you are. Always stop, catch yourself, and inquire, “To whom do these thoughts come? To whom do these feelings come? To whom do these ideas come?” You will find, as you practice this, the thoughts become weaker and weaker, until they totally disappear.
You are never alone. The absolute reality is always with you. Pure awareness is always with you. Everything is okay. There is nothing wrong anywhere. All is well. You are free. Feel your freedom. You are free from the confusions of your mind, free from karma, free from samskaras, free from reincarnation, free from God, free from bondage.
Feel that. What can hurt you now? What can possibly come to you to hurt you, to cause you pain and suffering? If you’re really feeling your freedom, there is nothing else.
The freedom is I am. The freedom is pure awareness. This is you.
Do you feel the bliss? Do you feel the joy, the happiness? This is not a lecture you’re listening to. This is the one voice of freedom, the one consciousness, the one reality.
It is you!
(long silence)
It is now time to play stump the guru. (Q - Robert reads then A-Robert answers) Q: May we gather together a group so we can sit together for the sole purpose of saying our love to your physical body? With the desire that this love will manifest as strength, comfort and your highest physical well-being, a group would be stronger than on our own?
A: Somebody wants to sit together to send strength and power and all kinds of stuff. If you feel like doing something like this, do it. That’s up to you. But remember all is well. There are no mistakes and nobody is anything but divine consciousness.
Q: When you use the statement, “The body will take care of itself,” are you including the mind, the subtle body?
A: When I use the statement, “The body will take care of itself,” I mean the body as it appears will do whatever it came here to do on this planet. But you have absolutely nothing to do with it. Your body is motivated by karma which doesn’t exist. And it appears to be motivated by karma, you appear to have a body. So you do not have to worry about your body or concern yourself about your body. Something will take care of it. You simply remove your mind from thinking thoughts. Keep your body still. Do not think about it too much. Keep yourself on the Self. Keep yourself always asking the question, “To whom do the thoughts come? To whom does the body come? To whom does the I come?” And don’t concern yourself too much about your body. Everything takes care of itself.
Q: Can you detail for us the processes of the “I am” meditation? Is this a practice anyone can use and how does it differ from self inquiry?
A: We have a meditation that we use sometimes called the “I-am” meditation. The “I-am” meditation is something that we use in order to become still, one pointed and quiet.
Self inquiry is not meditation. Self inquiry is when you inquire, “Who am I? To whom does the I come?” Then I-am meditation is when you breath with your respiration. You inhale and you say, “I,” you exhale and you say, “am.” This is a very good tool to use at home.
When you feel like meditating. You become still and quiet in your body and mind. And you inhale and you say, “I,” and you exhale and you say, “am.” This makes you very quiet, makes you very still. In order to go deeper and deeper into the Self. Do all of these things.
Q: If we are already free, from whence coming the thought, “I want to be free?”
A: The thought comes form your mind where else. It is your mind that believes it’s bound. It is your mind that believes something is wrong. That you are not free. But when you realize that you do not have a mind there is no one to think these thoughts.
Know the truth about yourself. You are absolute reality. You have absolutely to do with the mind. The thought comes, “I want liberation, I want to be free,” this is part of human thinking. But to sit in the silence and try to stop the thoughts, your freedom will arise by itself.
Q: Can one have advanced in a previous existence to a higher state but through fear dropped back to another so called lifetime?
A: If you are self-realized. If you have been liberated. There is no lifetime for you.
There is no coming or going for you. There is no dying for you or no being born for you.
You just stay the way you’ve always been. It is only when you are not realized that his happens.
You can advance to a higher state and you can drop back again, this is true. But we’re not talking about realization, we’re not talking about liberation. We’re talking about a higher state of meditation. If you have advanced spiritually and physically on this plane, you leave your body, depending on your karma will determine what happens to you. You may have a lot of karma to work out.
So even if you have advanced to a higher state this is not forgotten, you take this with you. But yet you may have other karma to work out from a previous life. And the higher state is in abeyance for a while. Until you come into another life. Where the higher state will manifest itself. But again if you become totally liberated then there is no such thing as higher states or lower states or death or birth or liberation or anything else. You stay the same in your own svarupa. In your own reality, your own nature, pure awareness. There is absolutely nothing you have to do any longer. Death cannot hurt you, birth cannot hurt you, you are totally free.
Q: What value does the study of Kundalini yoga have for this work? And how is that energy related to inquiry?
A: Kundalini yoga is of the mind. It is a practice of the mind. Trying to make the kundalini arise in the spine is a process of the mind, it’s a mental condition. For whom is kundalini? Who needs kundalini? The one who believes they’re human. And are trying to make powers arise in them. They’re different from what they are now. In truth you are spirit. In truth you are Brahman.
You want to practice self-inquiry to stop the mind from thinking of kundalini.
Who needs kundalini? It’s all a mental process. Every yoga, every spiritual practice is a mental process. Why not start from the top? Ask, “To whom do these thoughts come? To whom do these methods come? Who has to do these things?”
There are many people who you realize in this world, who have practiced kundalini yoga, they develop certain siddhis, they have occult powers but who are not self-realized. This is all the mind. With these powers you still have sadness, you still have fears, you have frustrations, you have everything human beings have.
But when you transcend these occult powers you become totally free then there is no longer any question about happiness and joy. This is your very nature, freedom. So I suggest you just don’t mess with your kundalini. (laughter) Besides it will get you in trouble. (laughter) SE: Don’t mess with kundalini. (laughs)
Anyone like to say something?
SY: Robert when you’re enlightened does your kundalini automatically just open up by itself?
R: Why does it have to open up? (SY: No, no I didn’t say it had to, I’m asking you will it do that?) There is no one left for it to do it to. (SY: Your physical body would not…) The physical body doesn’t exist. Even though it appears to exist there is no physical body. The liberated person knows they are not a physical body. It is only the ajnani that feels there is a physical body that has kundalini awakened inside of them. But a realized being has no body. There is no body home. (SY: Looking at it another way, is your kundalini opened?) Where is it? (students laugh)
SH: He lost it long ago. (laughter)
R: If there was a kundalini opened there would be no realization. Who needs a kundalini? (SY: Even in the illusion. (laughter) Would the illusion of a body have an illusion of a kundalini that had an illusion of rising?) Of course. (laughter) So why live in the illusion?
Remove the illusion once and for all and be free. Be free of all these things. Can you see this? Kundalini, siddhas, all of these things are for the body. But if there is no body to whom are these things at all? They do not exist. Only for the body they exist.
Fred (SF): They are all in the mind of the individual?R: Yes. Kundalini has absolutely nothing to do with enlightenment. Two different classes. (SY: So the energy that you feel surging through your body has nothing to do with Kundalini?) The energy that you feel surging through your body maybe Kundalini? We’re speaking of a body’s energy. Again when there is liberation there is no one left to have any energy to feel anything. There is no longer energy surging through your body. There is no Kundalini surging through your body. There is nothing surging anywhere. Because there has to be a body for it to surge through. If there is no body how can it surge.
See right now most of you believe you’re a body. So you’re speaking of the bodily experience. But if you knew you were not a body those questions would never enter your mind. For there is no one left to experience these things. This is why we work on removing the idea of a body. The body is simply an idea. It is not a reality. If the body was a reality wouldn’t it stay the same forever. You would never change from a baby to a teenager to a mature person, to an old person. You would stay the same forever. But since the body is nothing at all it always changes its appearance until it disappears completely. But you don’t go anywhere. You stay where you are, where you’ve always been. You are pure awareness, you are Parabrahman, nothing to do with kundalini in a body. (dog barks) Toku agrees with me. (laughter)
ST: He knows. (S: Just another dream.) (laughs)
R: Anyone else like to say something?
SP: So is this revelation, if I can call it that, was always being revealed through Sages of different cultures? Is it always the same? Or did they color it?
R: The truth is always the same. Different beings since the beginning of time have simply realized this. There is one reality. There is one pure awareness. And this is our real nature. So we cannot experience two different states of consciousness. There is only the one. Consequently there have been many beings on this earth who for some reason or another have been able to experience their own reality. When you experience your own reality you realize that you are everybody and everything. It’s omnipresence. You’re aware of all that is. There is not my reality and your reality. There is the one and we’re all that. All this is the Self and I am that. (SP: So in different words, in different languages this very revelation has been making itself known.) Of course. (SP: I was just in Arunachala and hearing how they relate.) Right, of course.
R: It’s just like gold. You can find gold in various places, in different places in the world. But you have to dig for it and make it come out so you can have it and keep it. So it is with us people hear of this truth they hear of reality. They need to be able to dig within themselves. Awaken to themselves and become free. For it is the same realization. It’s the same Self. (SP: But some Sages may not speak as frankly as you do about it to the other people in their culture.) It depends what place they’re coming from. It depends on their karma, their training that they’ve been through. If someone is called a Sage, it means they have transcended their body totally, completely and transcended the world. This is the meaning of a
real Sage. When they have transcended the world they have become the real Self. The absolute reality. When they are the Self they’re absolute reality.
They know, so does everyone else and everything else. They are not so unique.
They are something that which is the substratum of all existence. Or they are like the screen and the universe is like images on the screen. The images change, change, change constantly. The screen remains the same. Yet the images cover the screen. If you try to grab the images you grab the screen there are no images. They never existed.
Again it’s like the water in the mirage. You see a mirage with water and when you try to grab water you grab sand. Like the snake in the rope. Like the sky is blue. There is no sky, there is no blue. But it appears that way. So we appear as human beings, we appear as individuals but it’s an illusion, it’s a dream. The world does not exist. It never existed at all. There is no human race. It’s an optical illusion. Therefore when a Sage awakens he speaks through his absolute truth because that all there is. ( SP: Or he might maintain silence and just let the images continue to appear…) Yes. (SP: …and he finds that he is a priest, a politician and…) True this is possible. You can be anything it makes no difference. Be a garbage man but you aware that you are not the body or the garbage. (SP: Thank you.) Would you like to read the Jnani? (SM: Oh yes, Robert.) (Mary reads the Jnani refer to the beginning of this book) R: Thank you Mary. (SM: Thank you Robert.)
Do we have any announcements?
Mary (SM): No Robert I don’t have anything.
ST: I’d like to remind people that there is a box full of transcripts over there and they’re to borrow and make copies of and bring back. They’re starting to disappear again. That library is…
anybody can help themselves just take them home and make a copy of them…you can make two copies if you like and bring them back so they’re available to everybody. If anybody wants to get a few numbers and bring in the copies from their home I appreciate it. (R: Thank you.) Bring the supply back up.
R: We have prashad. Delicious cookies. As I always say, the entire lesson is the prashad. Eat the prashad and you’ll be liberated. (students laugh) And we have a bowl of cherries…
(passing around prashad as tape ends)
Absätze ohne Sprecherpräfix gehören dem zuletzt genannten Sprecher — so steht es im Buch, wo der Präfix nur den Anfang einer Rede markiert. Die Zuordnung ist eine Folgerung dieser Ausgabe. Namen in Klammern sind aus dem Text erschlossen: sicher belegt sind SM = Mary, SF = Fred, SJ = Jay, SC = Nate, wahrscheinlich SG = Glen, SR = Jorge. Alle anderen Kürzel bleiben stehen, weil der Beleg nicht trägt.