Advaita Vedanta: PERSONALITY PREEMPTS CHOICE, Part Thirty-Six

Today's "DAILY CONSIDERATION" for You

Next, the Realized understand that there is no such thing as "choice" among the nearly seven billion non-Realized persons on the planet. That is just one more of the countless bogus concepts that persons attach to. Being non-Realized, they are identified with their personalities / personas; being identified with those personalities - each of which has a primary agenda and a primary fear - the thoughts and words and actions of those among the non-Realized masses will be determined by combinations of their personalities' fears and desires.

To fail to understand that very basic fact about what motivates persons to do what they do (whether the majority label what some "others" do as "good" or what some "others" do as "bad" or "evil") is to believe erroneously that persons are making choices.

Yet as referenced above, when being driven by the subconscious agendas of a persona (or more often the hidden agendas of multiple personalities) then no one is choosing to do or not do anything.

When persons make arrangements to complete the two-session enneagram personality inventory class offered here, the first session begins with this explanation of that phenomenon:

This scenario is set forth: "Pretend that you are in an automobile and that you are being driven. Where can you be in that car?" Most answer incorrectly. After they offer their theories, they are reminded that the key word used in the question was "driven."

If one is being driven in an automobile, then that person is not driving. Such persons cannot be behind the wheel. Being driven, they can be in the passenger seat, the back seat, or the trunk / boot, but someone else is behind the steering wheel.

You see, when being driven, someone (or something) else is in charge; someone (or something) else has the ultimate ability to determine if the car goes to the left, to the right, straight ahead, or off into a ditch. If driven, you have no choice. You have no say. You cannot choose where you'll go, when you'll go, how you'll go, or if you will go or not. Your "journey" through the relative existence will follow a course that is being controlled by other persons.

Initially, those other persons are your programmers, conditioners, acculturators, domesticators, brainwashers and indoctrinators. That group will expand in number to include any and all other influential persons who assign roles to you or who inspire the assumption of roles. Either way, the fears and desires of those roles (personas, personalities, stage characters, assumed false identities, guises, facades, fronts, images, ego-states, whatever) will ultimately drive you and your every thought and word and action.

Maharaj spoke of mass "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity." One who is stupid in English could be said to be "a dummy."

Consider the parallel: a ventriloquist might set a dummy on her or his knee. With a hand up the dummy's back, and talking through lips squeezed together tightly, it can appear that the dummy is choosing to talk and to lean to the left and right and front;

it can appear that the dummy is thinking thoughts and then choosing its words and deciding what it is saying; it can appear that it is functioning independently of the ventriloquist. Yet it is not, is it?

And that is the way persons function when abiding under the influence of external forces: they act like "dummies." They act in stupid ways and / or ignorant ways and / or insane ways, and they never once made a conscious choice about their actions.

As with the dummy that has no ability to think or talk or behave on its own, a programmed, conditioned, acculturated, domesticated, brainwashed, and indoctrinated person has no ability to think or behave or act on its own.

Consider how that process unfolds in North Korea:

Above: Class time in North Korea: the systematic indoctrination of anti-Americanism starts as early as kindergarten and is as much a part of the curriculum as learning to count.

Above: "Hate will last." This poster at a North Korean kindergarten reads "Drive out the American imperialists. Let's reunify our fatherland" as students there learn that one of their country's main enemies is the U.S.

Above, art time: Many of the drawings by students depict U.S. soldiers being brutally attacked, and "the best" of the children's work is pinned up on a board inside the classroom.

In math class, assignments include questions such as this:

"If you have one dead American bastard and three dead American bastards, how maybe dead American bastards do you have in all?

So what about in the U.S. nowadays? This blog is being published from a town in Central Louisiana. On the trip from the lake to this city yesterday, in the span of four hours there were witnessed no fewer than four flagpoles - some quite expensive - flying the Confederate flag ... a flag that remains a very popular symbol of the racist southern states that left the Union in the 1860's and began a civil war in the U.S. (a war in which over 750,000 soldiers from the South and the North killed each other, along with killing an unknown number of "non-military civilians") in a fight over whether or not to free the slaves brought to the States from Africa.

After watching the movie "Lincoln" recently, it was said to the companion who watched it as well, "Too bad that war never really came to an end." Racial prejudice is alive and well in the U.S., an African-America man having been elected twice to the presidency notwithstanding. In fact, those elections actually brought the racists out of the darkness and back into the spotlight.

As a child growing up in the racist South, the dualistic, racial message was made clear by word and by example: blacks are inferior, blacks have no intelligence; blacks are thieves; blacks are takers; blacks deserve less than; etc., etc. etc. A father (who had been raised by a Cherokee mother and knew something about non-duality) provided some of the rare contradictory messages heard during those years.

Yet today, those same beliefs are still being heard. A series here pointed out that the current Texas Governor Rick Perry (also a former Republican presidential candidate who still has an eye on the White House) had a hunting camp in Texas called "Niggerhead."

Whether it is children in the U.S. who are still being taught to believe in racial inequality or children in North Korea who are being taught to hate anyone from the U.S., programming, conditioning, acculturation, domestication, brainwashing, and indoctrinating are removing early on from children any possibility of choosing.

In the U.S., if that involves Muslims, it is said that "they have been radicalized"; in it involves U.S. citizens who are anti-Muslim, it is said that "they are patriots who love their country."

So it is on a planet where programming-induced "ignorance, stupidity and insanity" run rampart. Persons have no ability to choose, so no one can choose to be "good" or "evil." If programmed, conditioned, acculturated, domesticated, brainwashed, and indoctrinated, any and all ability to choose or not choose anything has been preempted.

Persons on the planet are being driven; therefore, they have no say at all about where they'll go, when they'll go, how they'll go, or if they will go or not. Whether bombing citizens on the streets of Baghdad or Boston, the perpetrators are all being driven by the ignorant and stupid and insane results of the false identities that have been assigned or assumed.

It need not be so.

TOMORROW: Why the masses absolutely love their belief in the concept of "evil."

Please enter the silence of contemplation.

Questions? Submit to:

Comments?

Just hang on to those please.

A Non-Duality Online Course is currently available at a reduced rate. See above for details.

[Received from Mac, 10/17/12]:

"Glad to see the online teaching offered at a discount. Hopefully, more who are ready will be able to take the course. For me, the course was the beginning of the unlearning that led to the trip to the lake for a retreat and the understanding."

SHIFTING THE FOCUS FROM THAT WHICH DOES NOT WORK TO THAT WHICH DOES, Part One

A "movement" or "shift" happened here that added another parallel to the many parallels in terms of the phenomenal "experiences" and the noumenal revelations that "Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj" and "Floyd" share in common. (Many visitors over the years have said that they also shared the same parallels with "Maharaj" and "Floyd" as well.) In the case of "Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj" and "Floyd": 1. both grew up in very poor families 2. both moved to populated areas to seek employment opportunities 3. both exhibited business skills that led to their opening and operating many businesses and to their having a large number of employees working for them 4. both succeeded financially 5. both became attached to accumulating; 6. both married and had a family 7. both were initially religious 8. both moved away from organized religion and became interested in "spiritual" matters, finding and following the teachings of a big name teacher (or, in "Floyd's" case, many big name teachers) 9. both had highly religious wives who were quite displeased with the shift away from religion and toward "spirituality" 10. both began to feel empty in spite of all of their "spiritual seeking" and in spite of all of their accumulated "spiritual knowledge";

11. both began to de-accumulate after both saw that they could survive quite well on a fraction of the income they had been making 12. both had wives who were unhappy when the de-accumulation stage was entered and both had wives who became unhappy about their husbands' focus on non-duality and who blamed their unhappiness on no longer having a religious husband (The facts be known, in both cases the unhappiness involved the fact that their husbands were no longer interested in - or willing - to work 80+ hours per week and that their husbands were no longer interested in accumulating wealth and possessions and providing the rich lifestyle to which their wives had grown accustomed) 13. both eventually came to see that the religious and spiritual states were also ego-states, and both saw that there are far more steps on the "path" to complete after reaching the religious and spiritual steps and after playing those roles which are the third of seven steps on the entire "path" 14. both "lost" their wives (one via "death," the other through divorce); 15. both accelerated their seeking; 16. both entered into the "forest dweller stage" 17. both Realized 18. both began to de-accumulate even more 19. both began sharing the teachings 20. for years, both answered questions in whatever order those questions were received, though both said that the movement from identification with the false "I" / "I's" involved an exact, step-wise manner of moving along a "path" that involved "going back" in the same (but reverse order) of the way they "came in" - that is, the way that the manifestation happened and the way that the consciousness was blocked through seven stages that resulted in their becoming identified solely with their false personas, with the content of the "mind," and eventually, with the body. But the most significant awareness that finally came to both after years of offering satsang and after having answered thousands and thousands of questions was this: After years of "Maharaj" offering satsang in his loft, and after years of "Floyd" offering satsang in meeting halls and in his home and via what one site visitor called "Floyd's electronic loft," this fact became obvious to both: "Maharaj" came to see in the 1970's and into 1980 and 1981 that his approach was not working and "Floyd" finally came to see the same.

21. Both saw that many who heard the teachings are not going to understand (Maharaj reporting that "only 1 in 100,000 are going to 'get' this" understanding) 22. both soon saw that even more than expected of those who heard the teachings were not going to understand (Maharaj modifying his "guesstimate" and reporting that "only 1 in 1,000,000 are going to 'get' this" understanding) 23. eventually both saw that even far more than expected of those who heard the teachings were not going to understand (Maharaj eventually concluding that "only 1 in 10,000,000 are going to 'get' this" understanding). And the failings were not the fault of seekers. A "one -in-ten-million" estimate is proof that satsang was not working for most seekers, and the evidence here lately is proof of the same.

Both "Maharaj" and "Floyd" invited seekers to focus on the exact, step-wise "path." Yes, during satsang, "Maharaj" sometimes alluded to the steps while discussing them in no particular order - but he never once laid out the steps in the exact order in which they had to be completed. That was not his teachings style or approach.

Therefore, another movement or shift is happening here spontaneously after reflecting on the more than two decades since the teachings were first offered here and looking at the results of Maharaj sharing pointers in his loft and looking at the results of "Floyd" sharing pointers in this electronic loft: Looking objectively at his results, Maharaj's satsang method of sharing - in the end and by his own admission (only "one out of 10,000,000") - did not produce the intended outcome.

Looking objectively at the results here when using an "electronic loft" satsang method of sharing has not produced the intended outcome nearly as often as any of the three "face-to-face" methods used with seekers by which they have been led through the seven steps in order. Here, the body is growing older, of course. Mahasamadhi could be taken today, or it could be taken in twenty years.

Obviously, that cannot be known. But the decision here has been made that whatever amount of the relative existence remains shall be spent in sharing the teachings in the ways that have been seen over the last 20+ years to be the most effective methods.

Looking back over the list of those that have truly received the understanding, it is seen that Robert R. read all of the books, then took the online Advaita course and then completed some face-to-face Skype sessions to receive the final clarifications required. It was seen that Mac read all of the books, completed the online course, and then attended a retreat where he was guided through the seven steps. Mac said that the online course work inspired him to attend the retreat in order to be able to receive the final "pieces." It was seen that Andy Gugar, Jr. read all of the books, then came here for a retreat and was taken through the seven steps in order, and then returned once more for the final clarifications required. After reviewing the shifts that happened with him after attending two retreats, he reaffirmed this past week his commitment to helping spread the non-duality, nisarga understanding as presented here. As a result of seeing what has "worked" during the last 20+ years of sharing the non-duality understanding - and seeing what had not "worked" as well - changes will be made.

SHIFTING THE FOCUS FROM THAT WHICH DOES NOT WORK TO THAT WHICH DOES, Part Two

In "Part One," examples were given of seekers that were led to Realization not by satsang but by following the various protocols outlined farther down this page which provide the understanding in the step-wise, orderly, required fashion which moves seekers along a "path" that is as prescribed by Maharaj ... "going back" in the "reverse order" by which the consciousness manifested and became blocked.

However, conversations with some that just read the majority of the books have revealed that they certainly seem to have grasped the understanding and Realized as well. As a result of seeing what has "worked" during the last 20+ years of sharing the non-duality understanding - and seeing what has "not worked" as well - changes are being made. There are seven specific steps that happen when awareness-energy is "pulled" into a cycle of manifestation. When that energy manifests as conscious-energy, that formerly pure and unadulterated energy becomes "corrupted" (or "blocked" from seeing clearly) via programming, conditioning, domestication, acculturation, and brainwashing. Soon, there is a belief in the not-Real as a result of seven degrees of separation from an understanding of the Real. Using the method that was also employed by his contemporaries - a method which focused on offering non-duality pointers via satsang - Maharaj addressed questions in the order in which they were received. He might receive a question from a seeker at the third step and his reply would include what amounted to an invitation to move to the fourth step. The next question might come from a seeker at the first step, and the reply would include an invitation to move to the second step. The information offered to the second seeker would seemingly contradict what was offered to the first seeker, so visitors who have come here for decades have asked questions which showed how confused they were by the fact that Maharaj's statements to each visitor in his loft were "level-appropriate" yet were provided in no precise order, resulting in what seemed to be an inconsistent message. So the process overall was confusing in that seekers were told to follow the "path back" in the same way that they "came in," except in reverse order, but pointers were not given in a specific, step-wise order at all. Maharaj did recognize the seven steps that are taught here, but by offering the teachings in an order that was dictated by the order in which questions were received from seekers who were at different steps on the "path," the result was this: a pointer about moving beyond the fourth step might be followed by a pointer about moving beyond the first step, and that pointer might be followed by a pointer about how to move beyond the sixth step. The same was done on this site for seven years. The result is a collection of 1,800 or so essays discussing almost every non-duality topic that can be discussed, and the search button on the top right side of this page will now allow seekers with a question about a specific topic to find an explanation. That method, however, will never provide the manner in which the seven steps on the "path" must be transmitted and received in order to Realize Fully. An objective study of the history here of more than twenty years of offering non-duality pointers reveals this: seekers that were given pointers in the exact order in which they needed to receive them were the ones that Realized.

They read the books, then they completed the online course and / or completed seven Skype or telephone sessions or came here for a retreat (or watched the downloadable DVD version of an actual retreat, available below).

Some found that which they were seeking by reading the author's book that deal with non-duality subject matter. Via all of those venues, the steps are taught in their proper order. The essays available on this site will remain for those interested in searching for a discussion of a particular non-duality topic without charge, but the focus here until mahasamadhi is taken is going to be on offering the teachings in the step-wise fashion that has been seen to work.

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FROM THE I TO THE ABSOLUTE: A Seven-Step Journey to the Absolute