FROM A SITE VISITOR: [Received 25 October]: What did you mean in today’s post when you talked about varieties of determinism rather than choice and logic and reason? Sounds interesting in a way but I have no clue what you’re talking about, Thank you, Stephen.
F.: That will take some space to address, so look for the response beginning tomorrow.
FROM A SITE VISITOR: See the
F.: So, Anonymous, the name you used to sign your e-mail may be more accurate then you realize. The fact is that you are anonymous…you don’t have a clue about Who or What You Are. That is not a criticism, since it is not by choice, but it is fact. That could change if you were to follow the Advaitin pointers to the end of the “path.”
Yesterday, the point was made that “your work with the Twelve Steps may have moved you past your earlier suicidal thoughts. Fine. Yet it has not eliminated such thoughts completely. Furthermore, that work will never move you beyond the assumption of false selves. It will, in fact, reinforce them. Moreover, a failure to move beyond the assumption of false selves will prevent the peace you seek from ever manifesting.”
Furthermore, that work may have moved you into some spiritual or religious phase, but fixation at that phase will block continuation along the “path,” will block You from knowing the True Self, and will block you from ever attaining any steady and lasting peace.
In the book FROM THE I TO THE ABSOLUTE—which includes the transcripts from a series of satsang sessions that were taped—the pointer above was explained by use of a canoe metaphor, referenced in an e-mail received yesterday from site visitor Lisa (whose turn of the phrase always makes hearing from her such delightful entertainment):
Floyd, From the I to the Absolute is remarkable. I seem to read a page, no more than 3, every day or so. It builds beautifully on itself. Much I recognize immediately as truth, some is pointing me to even deeper awareness, even spontaneous “detachment” of little velcro-ed pieces of Mind that were still sticking. More subtle beliefs spontaneously unbelieved. There is less and less of me! No-one left to fix after years of “fixing”. No wonder there was such a feeling of “offness.” It is a canoe. Never necessary but nonetheless...it is gently left behind as the next river is crossed (although there is the awareness that there is nothing to cross and nowhere to go). I love your analogies. Since words can only point to these truths, it is wonderful to come across someone who slices through all of it with such precision of words.
The canoe analogy Lisa referenced from the book was offered to one seeker during satsang:
F.: “What is ‘help’? [Pause] Let’s try this: can a canoe help one cross a river?”
Questioner: “Of course.”
F.: “Then imagine that seven rivers separate you from a destination. Imagine also that at each crossing point is a canoe. I ask you, if you use a canoe to cross a river, do you need to drag that canoe along to the next river if a guide assures you that another canoe will be ready to help cross the next obstacle? Is there any reason you should carry along the first and second and third canoes as you approach the fourth river? Why drag with those three canoes the fourth, fifth, and sixth canoes when the seventh canoe awaits? Why burden yourself by dragging along all those canoes that can only inhibit free movement along the path? Now, did the canoes help? They were there and you used them. So be it. But to say, ‘Well, I had to do everything I did on my journey’ is a lie. The truth is that you could have crossed the rivers in other ways, and some of those other ways might have been much easier. Not far from the canoes were footbridges. In some places, the rivers narrowed to shallow streams that you could have walked across. Large traffic bridges crossed the rivers elsewhere. Did the canoes help...or hinder? The more relevant question now, since you’ve gone the canoe route, is ‘Don’t the canoes now need to be abandoned so you can move on effectively?’ The answer to that is, ‘Yes’.”
So, Anonymous, might it be time to set aside the canoes you’ve used and move on along the “path” rather than fixating/stagnating where you are? Had you been able to illustrate convincingly that the program you’ve tried has provided all that you have been seeking, then nothing more would have been said. Your words make clear that is not the case, and to still be speaking of suicide shows that their offerings are at least partly lacking.
If you are merely not drinking while still wanting to die and while still not feeling complete and while not having attained the promised happiness and joy and freedom, then is it not an appropriate consideration to ask if there might be wisdom in setting aside all of the canoes that have brought you to the third step of a seven-step journey and then move on?
Are you aware that, before he died, the co-founder of the program you’ve tried wrote disparagingly of the fact that the program was no longer succeeding in its mission?
He explained that the original program was being abandoned and replaced by a watered down shadow of the original. He wrote that the soaring failure rate was due not to the shortcomings of the people coming to seek help but was due to the failure of members to offer the work the way it had been done in the beginning.
Egotism, he said, had driven people to do it their way, to replace "the work" with discussion meetings which were never a part of the original program. Again, the consideration is this:
If you have spent years in a program that has still left you feeling empty, left you feeling as if there is more, and left you still feeling suicidal on occasion, is it not time to say, “Thanks for the use of your canoe but I must move beyond this third level”?
Is it time to admit, “Now I must seek that which is still missing. I must move farther along the ‘path,’ for it is now clear that I accepted as truth your erroneous belief that we were standing in the full light of high noon when, in fact, it was only the dawn that I was mistaking for the noon.
"Thanks, but now ‘the rest’ must be sought and found and understood. The source of the light, a full awareness of the light that I Am, must be found if I am to live…and to live a life worth living.” Please enter the silence of contemplation.
FOR MORE INFORMATION ON TODAY’S POST:
TWO OTHER OFFERINGS ARE AVAILABLE:
More and more seekers are requesting an understanding of how a personality formed in childhood is still determining and controlling everything that is thought or said or done in adulthood. Others have inquired about an opportunity to speak one-on-one about the seven-step “path” to Realization.
Thus, two opportunities are being offered from now until Dec 15th at 50% off:
PERSONALITY TYPING:
Here’s what is included in the package that is available for the next two months (the service available to international visitors but these price being only for the Continental U.S.):
A copy of the personality test (B) Priority mailing of the test (C) Analysis of the test results (D) a one-hour telephone session to discuss the results (E) the cost of the telephone conference. Cost is US$95.
ONE-ON-ONE SATSANG VIA TELE-CONFERENCE
For the next two months, a tele-conference to discuss any aspects of the Advaita teachings one-on-one will be offered. [Rich from the
To arrange either package, >Click ARRANGE PACKAGES provide all of the information requested, and in the message box at the bottom, indicate that you want to make arrangements for the PERSONALITY TYPING or for the ONE-ON-ONE ADVAITA SESSION or both.
