Sunday, September 06, 2009

REFLECTIONS on ADVAITA: PART 6– GUEST WRITER: LOUISE STERLING

Table of Contents

Today's Considerations
Recent Posts and Archives
Tools for Realization
Author's eBooks
Author's Paperback Books
Free eBooks
The Deep Silence of Reality

Let’s apply a teaching metaphor to the red geranium from the wild, natural garden scene explored yesterday. (Thanks to Dennis Waite for this teaching device). Imagine holding the red geranium. Remove the petals one by one until they lie in a heap. Pick the stalk and tear it into pieces. Observe the individual pieces. Is it still a flower? Is it still a red geranium? The answer of course, is “No”. “Flower” or “Red Geranium” are just labels used to describe the temporary form. Later, even the flower fragments of “red geranium” will decay, the natural elements will uncombine and return to the pool of energy. What remains?

Advaitans use a similar teaching metaphor to unhook the seeker from the myth of body identification. You are invited to remove limb after limb, organ after organ until nothing physical remains. Are you a body? “No.” Just like the red geranium, the words “body” or “louise” are simply labels used to describe the temporary form. These labels and this temporary form is not Who You Are. What happens when the disparate body parts, the flesh and bones decay? The natural elements uncombine and return to the pool of energy. There is no death, simply a recycling of energy into and out of manifestation. Yet, even without the body, the sense “I am” is still present. The question repeats: In the absence of the body, Who Are You? What are YOU? What remains?

You are invited to read the words of Maharaj below with this question in awareness:

“By knowing what you are not, you come to know your Self. The way back to your Self is through refusal and rejection. One thing is certain: the real is not imaginary, it is not a product of the mind. Even the sense 'I am' is not continuous, though it is a useful pointer; it shows where to seek, but not what to seek. Just have a good look at it. Once you are convinced that you cannot truthfully say anything except 'I am', and that nothing that can be pointed at, can be your Self, the need for the 'I am' is over -- you are no longer intent on verbalizing what you are. All you need is to get rid of the tendency to define yourself. All definitions apply to your body only and to its expressions. Once this obsession with the body goes, you will revert to your natural state, spontaneously and effortlessly. ... . We discover it by being earnest, by searching, enquiring, questioning daily and hourly, by giving one's life to this discovery.”

What You are is beyond understanding by the mind; beyond descriptions in words. You are already THAT, but this direct knowledge is covered over with the fog of misunderstanding.

“Try not to see with eyes that have only looked at things through a mask of darkness the things that can only be seen in the unmasked light.” – Floyd Henderson

Can You see that the red geranium, if lost in a dream or fog of love for its “redness” or “specialness” or “great location” is caught in the bondage of the limited temporary form? Can You see that the brown dog, if enraptured with becoming a “better dog”, or “an enlightened dog”, or “a more abundant dog” is caught in the bondage of the limited temporary form? Can You see that a human being if preoccupied with stabilizing good qualities and eliminating bad qualities, praying to a God for safe passage into an afterlife, and raising children who are special and different is caught in the bondage of the limited temporary form?

[Note: Fortunately red geraniums and brown dogs are free from the suffering of an evaluative mind that would create these pointless desires and attachments. Not so humans.]

So – what are You? What are You when every attribute is removed? What are you when every desire and every fear have dissolved to nothing? What are You outside of the bondage of the temporary human form? What are You when You are manifest? What are You when You are unmanifest? Listen to the pointers the Teaching offers again and again. You are not who You take yourself to be. You are beyond Being and Non-being. Fall in love with the questions, the Unknowing Mystery that will take You home.

"In reality only the Ultimate is. The rest is a matter of name and form, and as long as you cling to the idea that only what has name and shape exists, the Supreme will appear to you non-existing. When you understand that names and shapes are hollow shells without any content whatsoever, and what is real is nameless and formless, pure energy of life and light of consciousness, you will be at peace -- immersed in the deep silence of reality." – Nisargadatta Maharaj

Any attributes that are attached to this temporary human form are untruths; fleeting descriptions of a temporary form that is not Who You Are. Every label, every attribute, every fear, every desire, every attachment, every false identification is a rope that binds You; a strip of cloth that blindfolds and suffocates. Be free. Nothing that you cherish is worth anything – mere writing in the sand that will be washed away in the next tide. Let go of it all.

Accept the invitation offered via “ginny” in this haiku:

Rainfall on ocean.
See unicity, no form.
Come, dissolution.

(For extended teaching on the removal of the attributes and conditioning that cloud pure awareness, see the ebook: From the I to the Absolute.)

Please enter into the silence of contemplation. (To be continued)

Comments / clarifications may be sent to louise.advaita@gmail.com – a temporary email address available for the duration of these guest postings.

Recent Posts and Archives

Tools Used by Other Seekers of Realization

WATCHING an Advaita Vedanta Retreat: Watch a Downloadable computer file version of the Four-Day Advaita Retreat (Downloadable on PC only, not Apple.)

ENROLLING in the Online Advaita Classes For information, visit Information on the Advaita Classes on the Internet To enroll visit Enroll in the Advaita Internet Course

ATTENDING an Advaitin retreat with Floyd and being guided through all seven steps. For details of the retreats offered, please visit the retreat information site.

ARRANGING a one-hour session via Skype or telephone with Floyd. (Skype is a free service.) Click the button to pay and you will be contacted to arrange a date and time for the call.

Five Free eBooks

Compliments of Andy Gugar, Jr.,
the following eBooks are available without charge for you or for friends:

I.
"GOOD vs. EVIL?" or "IGNORANCE, STUPIDITY, and INSANITY?"

The content of this eBook deals with one of the most common but erroneous beliefs that the non-Realized masses cling to and which they will fight about (and even kill over), namely, that there is a planet-wide duel going on between “the forces of good and evil” in the universe.

Either (1) the ancient view is spot on: that the "ills of the planet" are rooted in evil people, in people not being religious enough or spiritual enough, and are caused solely by bad morality; or, (2) the "ills of the planet" are rooted in ignorance, stupidity and insanity and "being good" or "being moral" does not put an end to ignorance, does not eliminate stupidity, and does not treat insanity in any way.

II.
"THE VISION"

Comments regarding the free eBook entitled “THE VISION”:

“My thanks to you and Andy.” – Andrew “Mac” McMaster

“Thanks so much for the book! And, by the way, it is brilliant and the most effective pointing that you have done. It has served to help clear the remaining blockages.” – Stan Cross

“Greatly appreciate having “THE VISION” added to my Henderson resource library that is situated on the right side of my bed for easy access! Eternally grateful for what was received and what was given.” – Robert Rigby

“‘THE VISION’ is such a well-written, condensed version of the Nisarga Yoga approach to understanding and enjoying Reality that I feel it can serve as a must-read ‘meditation guide’ for all earnest seekers.” – Andy Gugar, Jr.

III.
"Sapolsky, Maharaj, and the Non-Dual Teachings"

Dr. Robert Maurice Sapolsky is an American neuroendocrinologist; a professor of biology, neuroscience, and neurosurgery at Stanford University; a researcher; an author; and a Research Associate at the National Museums of Kenya.

There is much that a non-dualist or Advaitin or Nisargan can relate to by comparing and contrasting what Sapolsky reveals about the way certain troops of baboons live in Africa with the way that humans abide all around the globe.

This 152-page eBook catalogues the common, non-dual message shared by Sapolsky and Maharaj and reveals the ways that Sapolsky’s scientific research supports the non-dual pointers offered by Maharaj.

IV.
Seeking

In “PART ONE” it will be seen that most persons on the planet are not seeking, and most will never seek, but for those who are seeking, most will face several obstacles:

In “PART TWO” of this book, it will be seen why many criticized Maharaj for “changing his message in his later talks.” It will be seen that the changes were not about changing the message per se as much as about changing his methodology as he experimented with one version of the Ultimate Medicine after another in order to try to find an effective means for addressing the Ultimate Sickness.

He tried a religious version of the Medicine, a Spiritual version of the Medicine, and finally settled on a version which addressed to Sickness at its core . . . at the mental and emotional level.

V.
"THE MOST DANGEROUS BELIEF OF ALL"

“Dangerous” is a term that can only apply during the relative existence, but of those who do commit suicide, for example, how many shoot themselves in the foot over and over until they “bleed out”? None. They shoot themselves in the head. Why? In order to try to stop the noise - to try to stop the chatter of a thousand monkeys – to stop the noisy mind which is the area that stores the ideas, notions, concepts, mind-stuff, etc. which drives them into the depths of insanity.

And what are those ideas, notions, concepts, etc. called, collectively? "Their beliefs." The irony? They are not their beliefs at all. They are the beliefs of “others” that were set in place via programming, conditioning, etc. and which persons then think are their own.

And what are those beliefs rooted in, and what reinforces those beliefs and convinces persons that they are sacred and worth fighting over and even sometimes worth dying for? Blind faith.

This 337-page eBook discusses those issues in detail.

To read any or all of the free eBooks, please double-click the "FREEBIES" link at the top of this page