A DAILY CONSIDERATION FOR YOU
F.: Worthwhile to those seeking to grasp the non-dual understanding is a term that some social psychologists have identified as one of the key sources of "relationship problems," namely, "a fundamental attribution error."
That error involves judging others (without understanding what is driving their thoughts and words and actions); assigning blame to others for the way one feels; and misunderstanding cause (and not understanding the non-dual pointer that "the cause of all is all").
In duality, one fundamental attribution error is believing that there is an "I" that is making choices when, in fact, the agendas of multiple personalities are determining all thoughts and words and actions. Another attribution error is believing that there are "others" who are also choosing their thoughts and words and actions and allowing their thoughts and words and actions to generate "personal" offense.
Additionally, domestication and acculturation also result in persons - either consciously or, more often, unconsciously - ascribing to false identities that, in turn, each credit that ego-state's happiness to another or to attribute blame to another for the way that one feels inside. What greater duality is there than belief in inner things and outer things?
Millions of workers - including counselors, therapists, ministers, psychoanalysts, and others - pay their bills by dealing with couples who think that they are having "relationship problems." Many of those therapists will work with couples for months or years on end, allowing the two to come to an office where - occasionally - both might be interested in solving their problems;
where- more often - one is far more willing than the other; and where - also very often - one is bringing a mate with the hope of using the counselor to triangulate (to pit two-against-one) to reform the other and to change the other so that the one with the motive to triangulate can then supposedly be happy.
[The most unhappy of the two is always the one engaging in a fundamental attribution error, namely, that she or he is miserable because of another person and that he or she will be happy if the other person - or really, if all persons - would just change.]
The wisest counselors, though, only work with the couple together about 1/3 of time. Why? Because the wisest counselors know that together they will become more emotionally-intoxicated than ever as each has an audience for the couple's fighting and each has a desire to prove to a third party how right he or she is and how wrong the other is.
And the wisest counselor knows that the problems are not "couple problems" but are "individualized problems" rooted in self (or many false selves). The wisest counselor also knows that one's problems are not rooted in another's programming, conditioning, acculturation, domestication, brainwashing, and indoctrination but are rooted instead in one's own programming, conditioning, acculturation, domestication, brainwashing, and indoctrination.
Therefore, the wisest counselor will, early on, give a couple one session together to appease their appetite for exposing the flaws of the other in the presence of a witness, but the most effective method happens when there is a session together, then a session with one partner, then a session with the other partner, and then a session together to address the individual issues that were uncovered in separate sessions.
Likewise, the wisest non-duality teacher knows as well that the requirement for any seekers who want to discuss how someone else is causing their misery is to have their focus redirected to self (or to their many false selves.)
It was noted in yesterday's post that if one is dependent on any external nexus of power or esteem or a sense of well-being, then any perceived benefits of those externals will soon be lost. To allow the way one feels inside to be determined by externals is guaranteed to assure that the way one feels inside will be in a constant state of flux, generating anxiety as the constant shifting between high's and low's can only result in a chaotic state within.
The post-Realized Jesus reportedly said, "A duality-minded person is unstable in all ways," and the mind is within, not without. It is the influence of the content of the mind within that one must be free of if one would know happiness and bliss, and that has nothing to do with anything "without."
The non-dualist knows what nonsense it is to allow externals to determine the internal state. As also mentioned yesterday, with the Realized, there are no "relationship problems," "relationships" being a dualistic concept, dealing with a supposed "A" and a supposed "B." In the absence of that concept, the result is this:
With the Realized, there is no need to try to impress; there is no drive to enter into tedious and boring debates; there is no willingness to engage with any who would argue the pointers offered here; and there is no inclination to respond in lengthy and wordy responses to criticisms of any sort.
Never is there an agenda to change anyone's mind. The process offered here - if completed - will eliminate the mind (and all of the fictional concepts and bogus beliefs that are stored therein).
The Realized know that any discontentment, disapproval, restlessness, irritability, anger, misery and / or suffering are rooted in the Ultimate Sickness, and the Realized understand that the task at hand is to address one's own case of that Sickness, not the millions of cases that others are experiencing.
Sure, healing of the Sickness can happen when a Realized teacher is willing to work with seekers who are ready, but that cannot happen unless the teacher is fully well; yet it is the practice among the non-Realized to try to correct others, to blame others, and to attribute false blame and cause to others.
The "others" can include a partner; a member of another political party; people in the office; the people of other nations, etc. Yet if one takes the steps to Realized Fully, there are no others; there are no Subject-Object beliefs; there is no "A" and "B" combination / duality in a relationship. There is peace ... within.
[Out of state over the weekend. To be continued later.]
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
October 3, 2013
That error involves judging others (without understanding what is driving their thoughts and words and actions); assigning blame to others for the way one feels; and misunderstanding cause (and not understanding the non-dual pointer that "the cause of all is all").
In duality, one fundamental attribution error is believing that there is an "I" that is making choices when, in fact, the agendas of multiple personalities are determining all thoughts and words and actions. Another attribution error is believing that there are "others" who are also choosing their thoughts and words and actions and allowing their thoughts and words and actions to generate "personal" offense.
Additionally, domestication and acculturation also result in persons - either consciously or, more often, unconsciously - ascribing to false identities that, in turn, each credit that ego-state's happiness to another or to attribute blame to another for the way that one feels inside. What greater duality is there than belief in inner things and outer things?
Millions of workers - including counselors, therapists, ministers, psychoanalysts, and others - pay their bills by dealing with couples who think that they are having "relationship problems." Many of those therapists will work with couples for months or years on end, allowing the two to come to an office where - occasionally - both might be interested in solving their problems;
where- more often - one is far more willing than the other; and where - also very often - one is bringing a mate with the hope of using the counselor to triangulate (to pit two-against-one) to reform the other and to change the other so that the one with the motive to triangulate can then supposedly be happy.
[The most unhappy of the two is always the one engaging in a fundamental attribution error, namely, that she or he is miserable because of another person and that he or she will be happy if the other person - or really, if all persons - would just change.]
The wisest counselors, though, only work with the couple together about 1/3 of time. Why? Because the wisest counselors know that together they will become more emotionally-intoxicated than ever as each has an audience for the couple's fighting and each has a desire to prove to a third party how right he or she is and how wrong the other is.
And the wisest counselor knows that the problems are not "couple problems" but are "individualized problems" rooted in self (or many false selves). The wisest counselor also knows that one's problems are not rooted in another's programming, conditioning, acculturation, domestication, brainwashing, and indoctrination but are rooted instead in one's own programming, conditioning, acculturation, domestication, brainwashing, and indoctrination.
Therefore, the wisest counselor will, early on, give a couple one session together to appease their appetite for exposing the flaws of the other in the presence of a witness, but the most effective method happens when there is a session together, then a session with one partner, then a session with the other partner, and then a session together to address the individual issues that were uncovered in separate sessions.
Likewise, the wisest non-duality teacher knows as well that the requirement for any seekers who want to discuss how someone else is causing their misery is to have their focus redirected to self (or to their many false selves.)
It was noted in yesterday's post that if one is dependent on any external nexus of power or esteem or a sense of well-being, then any perceived benefits of those externals will soon be lost. To allow the way one feels inside to be determined by externals is guaranteed to assure that the way one feels inside will be in a constant state of flux, generating anxiety as the constant shifting between high's and low's can only result in a chaotic state within.
The post-Realized Jesus reportedly said, "A duality-minded person is unstable in all ways," and the mind is within, not without. It is the influence of the content of the mind within that one must be free of if one would know happiness and bliss, and that has nothing to do with anything "without."
The non-dualist knows what nonsense it is to allow externals to determine the internal state. As also mentioned yesterday, with the Realized, there are no "relationship problems," "relationships" being a dualistic concept, dealing with a supposed "A" and a supposed "B." In the absence of that concept, the result is this:
With the Realized, there is no need to try to impress; there is no drive to enter into tedious and boring debates; there is no willingness to engage with any who would argue the pointers offered here; and there is no inclination to respond in lengthy and wordy responses to criticisms of any sort.
Never is there an agenda to change anyone's mind. The process offered here - if completed - will eliminate the mind (and all of the fictional concepts and bogus beliefs that are stored therein).
The Realized know that any discontentment, disapproval, restlessness, irritability, anger, misery and / or suffering are rooted in the Ultimate Sickness, and the Realized understand that the task at hand is to address one's own case of that Sickness, not the millions of cases that others are experiencing.
Sure, healing of the Sickness can happen when a Realized teacher is willing to work with seekers who are ready, but that cannot happen unless the teacher is fully well; yet it is the practice among the non-Realized to try to correct others, to blame others, and to attribute false blame and cause to others.
The "others" can include a partner; a member of another political party; people in the office; the people of other nations, etc. Yet if one takes the steps to Realized Fully, there are no others; there are no Subject-Object beliefs; there is no "A" and "B" combination / duality in a relationship. There is peace ... within.
[Out of state over the weekend. To be continued later.]
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
October 3, 2013
A DAILY CONSIDERATION FOR YOU
F.: It has been said that he who relishes the praise of the village must soon be prepared to accept the scorn of the town. If one is dependent on any external nexus of power or esteem or a sense of well-being, then any perceived benefits of those externals will soon be lost.
To allow the way one feels inside to be determined by externals is guaranteed to assure that the way one feels inside will be in a constant state of flux, generating anxiety as the constant shifting between high's and low's can only result in a chaotic state within.
Yet dependency is the abnormal norm among the non-Realized masses, as if anything they are depending on has any history of being continuously reliable; thus, there is among the masses a subconscious drive to talk, to try to impress, to form dependencies and co-dependencies, to try to astound persons with the depths of one's knowledge, and to engage with others who claim to have knowledge about things "on a higher plane" that must be learned and accepted in order to assure acceptance and to solidify dependencies.
That mindset will generate long-winded diatribes, rambling letters or emails, lengthy discussions, and tedious and boring debates about whose concepts are right or better.
Even less than was the case in that loft in Bombay / Mumbai, the case in the electronic loft here is that only a few moments are spent some mornings while sitting before a keyboard and witnessing what happens ... witnessing what comes forth that is always, ultimately, an invitation to learn nothing more, to instead know less, and to unlearn all that is the source of misery and suffering (namely, all that was acquired via programming, conditioning, acculturation, brainwashing, indoctrination, and domestication).
Moreover, there is no attachment to - or concern with - outcome here; there is no desire at all, much less a need to receive the praise of the village; and, therefore, there is no fearing or dreading the scorn of the town.
As a result of that, there is no need to try to impress; there is no drive to enter into tedious and boring debates; there is no willingness to engage with any who would argue the pointers offered here; and there is no inclination to respond in lengthy and wordy responses to criticisms of any sort.
Never is there an agenda to change anyone's mind. The process offered here - if completed - will eliminate the mind (and all of the fictional concepts and bogus beliefs that are stored therein).
When there is no personality, there are none of the fears that are generated by personalities and none of the desires that are also generated by personalities.
If emails are answered, they are answered with brevity. If calls are received, they are kept brief. Then the remainder of every day is spent primarily in the silence, seeking not, teaching not, educating not but always, instead, coming out of the silence only if it is obvious that a seeker is truly ready to hear and willing to take all of the steps required to be free of all personal identifications (which are the viruses that carry the Ultimate Sickness ... the nutrients that feed all ego-state assumption and all of the egotism that is used to try to sustain all false identities).
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
October 2, 2013
To allow the way one feels inside to be determined by externals is guaranteed to assure that the way one feels inside will be in a constant state of flux, generating anxiety as the constant shifting between high's and low's can only result in a chaotic state within.
Yet dependency is the abnormal norm among the non-Realized masses, as if anything they are depending on has any history of being continuously reliable; thus, there is among the masses a subconscious drive to talk, to try to impress, to form dependencies and co-dependencies, to try to astound persons with the depths of one's knowledge, and to engage with others who claim to have knowledge about things "on a higher plane" that must be learned and accepted in order to assure acceptance and to solidify dependencies.
That mindset will generate long-winded diatribes, rambling letters or emails, lengthy discussions, and tedious and boring debates about whose concepts are right or better.
Even less than was the case in that loft in Bombay / Mumbai, the case in the electronic loft here is that only a few moments are spent some mornings while sitting before a keyboard and witnessing what happens ... witnessing what comes forth that is always, ultimately, an invitation to learn nothing more, to instead know less, and to unlearn all that is the source of misery and suffering (namely, all that was acquired via programming, conditioning, acculturation, brainwashing, indoctrination, and domestication).
Moreover, there is no attachment to - or concern with - outcome here; there is no desire at all, much less a need to receive the praise of the village; and, therefore, there is no fearing or dreading the scorn of the town.
As a result of that, there is no need to try to impress; there is no drive to enter into tedious and boring debates; there is no willingness to engage with any who would argue the pointers offered here; and there is no inclination to respond in lengthy and wordy responses to criticisms of any sort.
Never is there an agenda to change anyone's mind. The process offered here - if completed - will eliminate the mind (and all of the fictional concepts and bogus beliefs that are stored therein).
When there is no personality, there are none of the fears that are generated by personalities and none of the desires that are also generated by personalities.
If emails are answered, they are answered with brevity. If calls are received, they are kept brief. Then the remainder of every day is spent primarily in the silence, seeking not, teaching not, educating not but always, instead, coming out of the silence only if it is obvious that a seeker is truly ready to hear and willing to take all of the steps required to be free of all personal identifications (which are the viruses that carry the Ultimate Sickness ... the nutrients that feed all ego-state assumption and all of the egotism that is used to try to sustain all false identities).
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
October 2, 2013
A DAILY CONSIDERATION FOR YOU
F.: If "brevity is the soul of wit," then one might conclude that "extensiveness and lengthiness are the soul of dullness." In fact, verbosity and wordiness and long-windedness are actually the soul of self-ish-ness, of preoccupation with the issues dealing with one or more of the plethora of personas that the non-Realized masses (or that not-yet-Fully-Realized seekers) are still preoccupied with.
Maharaj spoke to visitors two times per day. More accurately, the pure consciousness spoke two times per day. Then, the silence prevailed.
Maharaj's neighborhood was a constant source of noise, so after the morning satsang sessions came to an end, a friend often drove M. through the countryside in order that he might enjoy without interruption the inner peace and quiet that he spoke of. At other times, he sat on the bank of a river, watching the waters flow by and, again, enjoying the uninterrupted quiet and peace.
In addition to verbosity and wordiness and long-windedness being the soul of self-ish-ness, so too is loudness and noise-making. During a visit to L.A., California, a great deal of time was spent sitting in freeway traffic with thousands of cars that were not moving at all.
One common sound heard over and over was that coming from the trunks of cars that were filled with massive speakers. The intent of the owners of those sound systems seemed to be involved far less with the reproduction of lyrics and far more with generating the highest possible decibels of bass sounds that could be heard from a block away.
Later, we were shown a posting on a website there from a man calling himself "Prince." ("Sics" will not be used in quoting his words since they would be almost as long as the post itself.) He asked this: "When I open my trunk i get so much bass i can not only hear it from 20-30ft away but feel it. The ext is amazing. When I close my trunk, its all gone and i hear nothing but rattling...the trunk that is. How can I get the loudness from when my trunk is open?"
He admits that loudness is his goal. The people who were subjecting others to the noise and loudness coming from their vehicles happened in the morning, throughout the day, and throughout the night. Again, "self-ish-ness," the implication being, "You will listen to the high-decibel noise I make and you will not have any choice in that regard. You will hear me. You will not ignore me. I will not disappear."
That is the same with those who send 4-or-5-paragraph emails and expect that someone should take the time to read their every word.
That is the same with irritated partners or spouses who go on and on about whatever it is that they think has angered them and who are willing to continue their arguing - and their noise-making - into the night.
That is the same with spoiled children that tosses a loud, screaming fit after being told, "No."
That is the same with the loud party sitting at a table in an otherwise quiet restaurant.
That is the same with those who modify the mufflers on their cars or motorcycles to make them even louder.
It has been suggested that the planet is dealing with persons who, as children, were at the pool with a parent and were readying themselves to dive into the water but wanted an audience to watch them do so. It's called "The-Look-at-me-mommy!-Look!-You're not looking!-Look-at-me mommy-Syndrome."
It is rooted in the egotism that comes with ego-state assumption and that drives persons to think that they should be focused upon and to believe that others have nothing better to do than to listen to them.
Again, Maharaj described "the supreme state" as "a state of utter stillness and silence. Whoever goes there, disappears."
It is the "Who" (the false self, the supposedly personal self) that does not want to disappear, and the way that an ego-state makes certain that it does not disappear - that it is not ignored - is to subject others to their excessively long letters or emails or to their incessant talking which they think will assure that they are being heard and not ignored (either by "mommy" or by "others").
It is the arrogance of the irritated "Super Partner" or "Super Spouse" that will drive them to rant into the night to assure that they are being seen and heard so that their assumed persona does not disappear.
It is the arrogance of irritated and spoiled children that inspires them to toss a loud, screaming fit after being told, "No," attempting to assure that they will be paid attention to and will get whatever they desire.
It is the arrogance of the loud party gathered at a table in an otherwise quiet restaurant that drives them to ignore the fact that the rest of those dining in the same room prefer quiet conversation, and it that same self-ish-ness that is the inspiration for the term "The Ugly American Abroad."
It is arrogance that drives persons to modify the mufflers on their cars or motorcycles in order to make them even louder.
The Realized do not fear the notion of "disappearing." "Disappearing" happens spontaneously and naturally when Realization happens.
To paraphrase Maharaj, since there is no desire or fear, there is perfect silence.
Personalities all have hidden agendas. The Realized, being personality-free, have no agenda and thus have no fear of disappearing, of being ignored, of not being heard, or of being quiet.
Again, " ... Brevity is the soul of wit." -- William Shakespeare
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
September 30, 2013
Maharaj spoke to visitors two times per day. More accurately, the pure consciousness spoke two times per day. Then, the silence prevailed.
Maharaj's neighborhood was a constant source of noise, so after the morning satsang sessions came to an end, a friend often drove M. through the countryside in order that he might enjoy without interruption the inner peace and quiet that he spoke of. At other times, he sat on the bank of a river, watching the waters flow by and, again, enjoying the uninterrupted quiet and peace.
In addition to verbosity and wordiness and long-windedness being the soul of self-ish-ness, so too is loudness and noise-making. During a visit to L.A., California, a great deal of time was spent sitting in freeway traffic with thousands of cars that were not moving at all.
One common sound heard over and over was that coming from the trunks of cars that were filled with massive speakers. The intent of the owners of those sound systems seemed to be involved far less with the reproduction of lyrics and far more with generating the highest possible decibels of bass sounds that could be heard from a block away.
Later, we were shown a posting on a website there from a man calling himself "Prince." ("Sics" will not be used in quoting his words since they would be almost as long as the post itself.) He asked this: "When I open my trunk i get so much bass i can not only hear it from 20-30ft away but feel it. The ext is amazing. When I close my trunk, its all gone and i hear nothing but rattling...the trunk that is. How can I get the loudness from when my trunk is open?"
He admits that loudness is his goal. The people who were subjecting others to the noise and loudness coming from their vehicles happened in the morning, throughout the day, and throughout the night. Again, "self-ish-ness," the implication being, "You will listen to the high-decibel noise I make and you will not have any choice in that regard. You will hear me. You will not ignore me. I will not disappear."
That is the same with those who send 4-or-5-paragraph emails and expect that someone should take the time to read their every word.
That is the same with irritated partners or spouses who go on and on about whatever it is that they think has angered them and who are willing to continue their arguing - and their noise-making - into the night.
That is the same with spoiled children that tosses a loud, screaming fit after being told, "No."
That is the same with the loud party sitting at a table in an otherwise quiet restaurant.
That is the same with those who modify the mufflers on their cars or motorcycles to make them even louder.
It has been suggested that the planet is dealing with persons who, as children, were at the pool with a parent and were readying themselves to dive into the water but wanted an audience to watch them do so. It's called "The-Look-at-me-mommy!-Look!-You're not looking!-Look-at-me mommy-Syndrome."
It is rooted in the egotism that comes with ego-state assumption and that drives persons to think that they should be focused upon and to believe that others have nothing better to do than to listen to them.
Again, Maharaj described "the supreme state" as "a state of utter stillness and silence. Whoever goes there, disappears."
It is the "Who" (the false self, the supposedly personal self) that does not want to disappear, and the way that an ego-state makes certain that it does not disappear - that it is not ignored - is to subject others to their excessively long letters or emails or to their incessant talking which they think will assure that they are being heard and not ignored (either by "mommy" or by "others").
It is the arrogance of the irritated "Super Partner" or "Super Spouse" that will drive them to rant into the night to assure that they are being seen and heard so that their assumed persona does not disappear.
It is the arrogance of irritated and spoiled children that inspires them to toss a loud, screaming fit after being told, "No," attempting to assure that they will be paid attention to and will get whatever they desire.
It is the arrogance of the loud party gathered at a table in an otherwise quiet restaurant that drives them to ignore the fact that the rest of those dining in the same room prefer quiet conversation, and it that same self-ish-ness that is the inspiration for the term "The Ugly American Abroad."
It is arrogance that drives persons to modify the mufflers on their cars or motorcycles in order to make them even louder.
The Realized do not fear the notion of "disappearing." "Disappearing" happens spontaneously and naturally when Realization happens.
To paraphrase Maharaj, since there is no desire or fear, there is perfect silence.
Personalities all have hidden agendas. The Realized, being personality-free, have no agenda and thus have no fear of disappearing, of being ignored, of not being heard, or of being quiet.
Again, " ... Brevity is the soul of wit." -- William Shakespeare
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
September 30, 2013
A DAILY CONSIDERATION FOR YOU
F.: Maharaj: " ... You must have moments of complete inner peace and quiet, when your mind is absolutely still. If you miss it, you miss the entire thing. If you do not, the silence of the mind will dissolve and absorb all else"
and
"No particular thought can be mind's natural state, only silence. Not the idea of silence, but silence itself. When the mind is in its natural state, it reverts to silence spontaneously after every experience, or, rather, every experience happens against the background of silence"
and
"Your hope lies in keeping silent in your mind and quiet in your heart. Realized people are very quiet. You must realize yourself as the immovable behind and beyond the movable, the silent witness of all that happens."
The variety of emails received here are telling:
Some contain a one-line question. (Those are read and usually answered.)
Some contain a few sentences. They might be glanced at to see if their emails contain a question. (No question? No further reading.)
Some are from those whose paths have crossed this one and have Realized. Now, we are engaged together in the dance, dancing lightly. They write what they write, and what they write is read.
The rest are essays - long, extensive treatises - either focusing on the writer's present personal issues or on their present personal state or on their present desire to escape boredom by setting up daily contact or on their present belief that they really have realized many things that they want me to know they know. In those cases, this response in inserted into their emails in a cut-and-paste fashion and returned to the senders:
I regularly receive many hundreds of emails a week, so here is the first "assignment" I give to seekers who want to communicate but who need to develop an appreciation for both the silence and for brevity in speech. You'll need to revise your latest email before I can read it, making it as concise as possible. I limit those whom I begin this work with to five-sentence emails. Let's see how you can do with that task, eliminating all "extras" and getting to the heart of the subject when communicating.
Of the nine basic personality types, Type Two's are the most long-winded. With their agenda to make people like (or, preferably, love) them, they believe (on a subconscious level, of course) that they must talk to impress, to win over, to hook.
Ones are driven to talk because they want to reform others and the entire world.
Eights are driven to talk because they want to give orders and control and dominate.
Threes are driven to talk because they want to garner admiration.
Sixes are driven to talk because they want to convince people to care for them.
Sevens are driven to talk because they are anxious, as are Sixes, and simply are not at peace enough to be able to sit still and to sit quietly.
Nines are often quiet because they are avoiders who go along to get along.
Fives are often quiet because they are avoiders of the highest level, preferring to be alone while reading or studying and gathering knowledge.
Fours are quiet for one of two reasons: if not Realized, they isolate; if Realized, they relish the peace and silence; however, Type Fours only make up about 1.5% of the planet's population. The result: this is a very noisy planet with about 98.5% of the humans who abide on this globe being driven to talk and talk and talk.
Know any who love their "recovery group discussion meetings"? Why? It's called "a captive audience."
Know a teacher who prefers the lecture method over all other approaches? Why? It's called "a captive audience."
Have a mate or friend who simply has to be talking if you are in the room? Why? It's called "a captive audience."
Maharaj: "Peace and silence, silence and peace - this is the way beyond"
and
" ... Moments of inner quiet will burn out all obstacles without fail. Don't doubt its efficacy. Try it. Silence is the main factor. In peace and silence you grow. In peace and silence, the skin of the 'I' dissolves and the inner and the outer become one"
and
The Realized poet William Shakespeare: " ... Brevity is the soul of wit."
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
September 25, 2013
and
"No particular thought can be mind's natural state, only silence. Not the idea of silence, but silence itself. When the mind is in its natural state, it reverts to silence spontaneously after every experience, or, rather, every experience happens against the background of silence"
and
"Your hope lies in keeping silent in your mind and quiet in your heart. Realized people are very quiet. You must realize yourself as the immovable behind and beyond the movable, the silent witness of all that happens."
The variety of emails received here are telling:
Some contain a one-line question. (Those are read and usually answered.)
Some contain a few sentences. They might be glanced at to see if their emails contain a question. (No question? No further reading.)
Some are from those whose paths have crossed this one and have Realized. Now, we are engaged together in the dance, dancing lightly. They write what they write, and what they write is read.
The rest are essays - long, extensive treatises - either focusing on the writer's present personal issues or on their present personal state or on their present desire to escape boredom by setting up daily contact or on their present belief that they really have realized many things that they want me to know they know. In those cases, this response in inserted into their emails in a cut-and-paste fashion and returned to the senders:
I regularly receive many hundreds of emails a week, so here is the first "assignment" I give to seekers who want to communicate but who need to develop an appreciation for both the silence and for brevity in speech. You'll need to revise your latest email before I can read it, making it as concise as possible. I limit those whom I begin this work with to five-sentence emails. Let's see how you can do with that task, eliminating all "extras" and getting to the heart of the subject when communicating.
Of the nine basic personality types, Type Two's are the most long-winded. With their agenda to make people like (or, preferably, love) them, they believe (on a subconscious level, of course) that they must talk to impress, to win over, to hook.
Ones are driven to talk because they want to reform others and the entire world.
Eights are driven to talk because they want to give orders and control and dominate.
Threes are driven to talk because they want to garner admiration.
Sixes are driven to talk because they want to convince people to care for them.
Sevens are driven to talk because they are anxious, as are Sixes, and simply are not at peace enough to be able to sit still and to sit quietly.
Nines are often quiet because they are avoiders who go along to get along.
Fives are often quiet because they are avoiders of the highest level, preferring to be alone while reading or studying and gathering knowledge.
Fours are quiet for one of two reasons: if not Realized, they isolate; if Realized, they relish the peace and silence; however, Type Fours only make up about 1.5% of the planet's population. The result: this is a very noisy planet with about 98.5% of the humans who abide on this globe being driven to talk and talk and talk.
Know any who love their "recovery group discussion meetings"? Why? It's called "a captive audience."
Know a teacher who prefers the lecture method over all other approaches? Why? It's called "a captive audience."
Have a mate or friend who simply has to be talking if you are in the room? Why? It's called "a captive audience."
Maharaj: "Peace and silence, silence and peace - this is the way beyond"
and
" ... Moments of inner quiet will burn out all obstacles without fail. Don't doubt its efficacy. Try it. Silence is the main factor. In peace and silence you grow. In peace and silence, the skin of the 'I' dissolves and the inner and the outer become one"
and
The Realized poet William Shakespeare: " ... Brevity is the soul of wit."
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
September 25, 2013
A DAILY CONSIDERATION FOR YOU
F.: This week an email was received from "A Seeker" - even a "Super Seeker" maybe - whose seeking (whose "desires") drove him to move away from Western Europe and to resettle in the Far East. He has finally awakened at least enough to be able to start questioning the "route" that he has taken so far. He asked: "Exactly WHERE am I supposed to be?" along with "Exactly what am I supposed to be?"
The reply:
IF you would abide naturally (and peacefully and blissfully) then you would abide in a fashion similar to that of the deer that live all around here: they rise from sleep, move about to get food, then rest, have sex, relax in the "cool blue shade" (Maharaj), seek shelter during storms, and sleep in the most modest of surrounding. Simple, yes? As for what to do, there is no "do-er" here - all is merely happening; and there is nothing you are supposed to be. Instead, know the void ... become immersed in the peace of the nothingness (at least in terms of identity and trying to be someone or something). As for where you should be, there can be no "where" that you have to go to, or that you can go to, in order to find that which is already - and has always been - within. The inner resource - the inner guru - has always been right where you were, but your programming, conditioning, etc. have blocked you from seeing it and from hearing its wise counsel. That which you sought was not found in the West; nor has that which you have sought been found in the East. There is no geographic cure or special geographic place. Forget "where-ness" and just BE (rather than trying to "be someone" or trying to "be something").
I hear regularly from those just like that young man, persons who have gone "the multi-ashram-route"; persons who have gone the "I'm going to become a monk route"; persons who report: "I have become a devotee of [then insert here the name of some big name teacher who has bastardized the non-dual message by blending with it all sorts of popular relative concepts - such as those that deal with "power" and "success" and "improving the mind" - concepts which guarantee both popular appeal and millions of dollars annually from those among the non-Realized and gullible masses];
and there are persons who have gone the religious or spiritual route as a result of a spouse's persuasion or demand: "My wife and I are so connected by the sharing and practicing of our faith together and by our common morals and values"; or "My husband and I are so close as a result of doing all of our spiritual exercises together and growing together."
Of the trillions of species of life-forms on this planet, none (save one, namely, non-Realized humans) have even a single belief. Of the trillions of species of life-forms on this planet, none (save one, namely, non-Realized humans) have a belief that they must seek some external nexus of power beyond themselves to be able to simply abide ... and to abide simply).
Not a single member of any species (same humans) thinks it has to do religious activities or spiritual exercises in order to survive, to have power, and to be guided from without rather than from within. None (save non-Realized humans) think, and none (save non-Realized humans) think that they have to make a second job out of mere abidance and thereby abide dogmatically or "supernaturally" rather than nisarga-ly / naturally.
As far as those who have "gone back out in reverse of the way they came in" and now think that they are living in a better way than other and in "a holy way" or "in a spiritual way" or "in a totally-noumenal way," rock and roll.
Yet for those who ask, this point is offered:
I do visit nor live "there," in some special, holy place on the planet. [The place of the greatest continuing conflict and war and chaos and mayhem alongside a sense of different-from-ment and better-than-ment is one they call there "The Holy Land." Have a "special place" where merely by being "there" supposedly makes you special and different and better? No thank you.]
Nor do I live "there" in the Absolute. It might be said that one IS the Absolute for the sake of the teachings for those still moving along "the path, yet THAT is nothing more than one of many forms of energy. Therefore, so what?
In the foreword to "The Advanced Seekers' Series" anthology of books and "The Blissful Abidance Series" anthology, Advaitin Louise Sterling in Cape Town, South Africa shared this:
WHO IS FLOYD HENDERSON?
The literary tradition is to preface a book with a biographical snapshot of the author as a person. What can be said then, about the Advaitin Teacher, who has moved beyond personal biography?
To describe the person or the personal (the date of birth, the nationality, the job, the interests, the home, the child, the books read, the path followed) is to describe the attributes that actually take us further away from uncovering the teacher’s identity.
The reality is that this "Who Is ..." question itself brings us to deeper and more authentic questions. What is this understanding in which the teacher resides? The state of Realization is not different from teacher to teacher. That Self-Knowledge is unchanging. In this way, there is no difference between a Nisargadatta Maharaj, a Floyd Henderson, or any other Realized teacher.
The Realisation of SELF means the shattering of the shell of separation so that the non-dual nature of Reality is directly known. How can this be different from person to person? Only in the ABSENCE of the person is this nature revealed. In this way, Floyd Henderson invites us to strip away all that is personal, all that is dualistic, all that separates us from this understanding of Oneness – from our True Selves.
The summative statement "I AM THAT; I AM" describes that understanding of SELF in absolute terms as well as its expression in the relative. Floyd Henderson is THAT – just like all human beings; however, Floyd is fixed unshakably in this understanding, so all functioning, relatively speaking, flows directly from this SELF-Knowledge.
In this way, the biographical details (such as, “born” in Louisiana; moved to Texas; worked as a teacher and business owner over several decades before taking early retirement to write; father of a daughter named Ashley; current resident in the community of Walden on Lake Conroe in Texas; years of seeking followed by twenty-five months in the forest dweller stage and experiencing a vision that resulted in the dramatic peripetia or flash of Realization; functioning as a Direct Path, Nisargan teacher; and author of over forty Advaita books) are the attributes or flavourings which coloured the pure consciousness in the particular shape and form at the relative level.
Yet, these attributes are false ingredients. They cannot provide a true answer to the question "Who is Floyd Henderson?" because he recognizes no who-ness at all ... believes in no "who" that is living "here" at all. He once explained it this way when asked if he was ever bothered by people:
“... How could persons possibly bother Me? They do not have even the slightest clue about where I truly live. Only a few on the entire planet called “earth” have a clue. Some might enter what is called ‘floyd’s house’ or ‘floyd’s home,’ but that is not where I live; in fact, ‘where’ I live has nothing to do with a ‘where’ at all.
In this regard, there is actually only the ‘how.’ ‘How’ I abide is as the awareness, as the Original Nature, as the natural state which has no boundaries, which has no defining traits, and which does not change. ‘How’ I abide is without conditions or conditioning, without qualifications, and without limitations.
I can seem to be ‘here’ one second and ‘there’ the next, but that is about ‘how-ness,’ not any actual ‘here-ness’ or ‘there-ness.’ I am not confined to a space or form; furthermore, I can enter other spaces and forms, and do so regularly (as might happen the instant You read these words).
Abiding beyond consciousness and beyond beingness and beyond non-beingness, I can span the globe … I can span the universe … I have spanned all universes. Yet such 'while manifested' spannings seldom happen anymore, requiring far more energy than is worth the effort, and it most assuredly need not happen with You.
As for Me, abidance will continue to happen in a whole and unadulterated and unambiguous manner until the consciousness unmanifests. Until that happens, then abidance will happen as Reality is overlaid on the relative without exception. When the consciousness unmanifests, then the drop shall enter the ocean of energy from which it came and will span the Absolute;
Awareness shall be, but aware of-ness shall not. Later, other universes might be spanned as well, or might not. Yet all of that is stated, so it, too, cannot be the Truth which You know but do not yet know that You know. Tap into the source and know Truth, but even then, do not suppose that You will be able to express Truth in words."
Thus, Floyd describes the AM-ness regarding "floyd" as a "composite unity" of an elemental plant food body that is circulating air and that is temporarily housing the manifested consciousness.
The THAT-ness he sees as a field of energy from which the conscious-energy manifests and to which it will return.
As for identification with any WHO-ness, he discarded that when identification with the Nothingness came, followed eventually by not even identifying with Nothing - or anything else.
See? No need for an identity, for "There-ness," for "Doingness," or for "Being-This-or-That-or-THAT-ness."
[To be continued after allowing the eyes a rest from the computer screen for a few days, per the doc's instructions]
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
September 24, 2013
The reply:
IF you would abide naturally (and peacefully and blissfully) then you would abide in a fashion similar to that of the deer that live all around here: they rise from sleep, move about to get food, then rest, have sex, relax in the "cool blue shade" (Maharaj), seek shelter during storms, and sleep in the most modest of surrounding. Simple, yes? As for what to do, there is no "do-er" here - all is merely happening; and there is nothing you are supposed to be. Instead, know the void ... become immersed in the peace of the nothingness (at least in terms of identity and trying to be someone or something). As for where you should be, there can be no "where" that you have to go to, or that you can go to, in order to find that which is already - and has always been - within. The inner resource - the inner guru - has always been right where you were, but your programming, conditioning, etc. have blocked you from seeing it and from hearing its wise counsel. That which you sought was not found in the West; nor has that which you have sought been found in the East. There is no geographic cure or special geographic place. Forget "where-ness" and just BE (rather than trying to "be someone" or trying to "be something").
I hear regularly from those just like that young man, persons who have gone "the multi-ashram-route"; persons who have gone the "I'm going to become a monk route"; persons who report: "I have become a devotee of [then insert here the name of some big name teacher who has bastardized the non-dual message by blending with it all sorts of popular relative concepts - such as those that deal with "power" and "success" and "improving the mind" - concepts which guarantee both popular appeal and millions of dollars annually from those among the non-Realized and gullible masses];
and there are persons who have gone the religious or spiritual route as a result of a spouse's persuasion or demand: "My wife and I are so connected by the sharing and practicing of our faith together and by our common morals and values"; or "My husband and I are so close as a result of doing all of our spiritual exercises together and growing together."
Of the trillions of species of life-forms on this planet, none (save one, namely, non-Realized humans) have even a single belief. Of the trillions of species of life-forms on this planet, none (save one, namely, non-Realized humans) have a belief that they must seek some external nexus of power beyond themselves to be able to simply abide ... and to abide simply).
Not a single member of any species (same humans) thinks it has to do religious activities or spiritual exercises in order to survive, to have power, and to be guided from without rather than from within. None (save non-Realized humans) think, and none (save non-Realized humans) think that they have to make a second job out of mere abidance and thereby abide dogmatically or "supernaturally" rather than nisarga-ly / naturally.
As far as those who have "gone back out in reverse of the way they came in" and now think that they are living in a better way than other and in "a holy way" or "in a spiritual way" or "in a totally-noumenal way," rock and roll.
Yet for those who ask, this point is offered:
I do visit nor live "there," in some special, holy place on the planet. [The place of the greatest continuing conflict and war and chaos and mayhem alongside a sense of different-from-ment and better-than-ment is one they call there "The Holy Land." Have a "special place" where merely by being "there" supposedly makes you special and different and better? No thank you.]
Nor do I live "there" in the Absolute. It might be said that one IS the Absolute for the sake of the teachings for those still moving along "the path, yet THAT is nothing more than one of many forms of energy. Therefore, so what?
In the foreword to "The Advanced Seekers' Series" anthology of books and "The Blissful Abidance Series" anthology, Advaitin Louise Sterling in Cape Town, South Africa shared this:
WHO IS FLOYD HENDERSON?
The literary tradition is to preface a book with a biographical snapshot of the author as a person. What can be said then, about the Advaitin Teacher, who has moved beyond personal biography?
To describe the person or the personal (the date of birth, the nationality, the job, the interests, the home, the child, the books read, the path followed) is to describe the attributes that actually take us further away from uncovering the teacher’s identity.
The reality is that this "Who Is ..." question itself brings us to deeper and more authentic questions. What is this understanding in which the teacher resides? The state of Realization is not different from teacher to teacher. That Self-Knowledge is unchanging. In this way, there is no difference between a Nisargadatta Maharaj, a Floyd Henderson, or any other Realized teacher.
The Realisation of SELF means the shattering of the shell of separation so that the non-dual nature of Reality is directly known. How can this be different from person to person? Only in the ABSENCE of the person is this nature revealed. In this way, Floyd Henderson invites us to strip away all that is personal, all that is dualistic, all that separates us from this understanding of Oneness – from our True Selves.
The summative statement "I AM THAT; I AM" describes that understanding of SELF in absolute terms as well as its expression in the relative. Floyd Henderson is THAT – just like all human beings; however, Floyd is fixed unshakably in this understanding, so all functioning, relatively speaking, flows directly from this SELF-Knowledge.
In this way, the biographical details (such as, “born” in Louisiana; moved to Texas; worked as a teacher and business owner over several decades before taking early retirement to write; father of a daughter named Ashley; current resident in the community of Walden on Lake Conroe in Texas; years of seeking followed by twenty-five months in the forest dweller stage and experiencing a vision that resulted in the dramatic peripetia or flash of Realization; functioning as a Direct Path, Nisargan teacher; and author of over forty Advaita books) are the attributes or flavourings which coloured the pure consciousness in the particular shape and form at the relative level.
Yet, these attributes are false ingredients. They cannot provide a true answer to the question "Who is Floyd Henderson?" because he recognizes no who-ness at all ... believes in no "who" that is living "here" at all. He once explained it this way when asked if he was ever bothered by people:
“... How could persons possibly bother Me? They do not have even the slightest clue about where I truly live. Only a few on the entire planet called “earth” have a clue. Some might enter what is called ‘floyd’s house’ or ‘floyd’s home,’ but that is not where I live; in fact, ‘where’ I live has nothing to do with a ‘where’ at all.
In this regard, there is actually only the ‘how.’ ‘How’ I abide is as the awareness, as the Original Nature, as the natural state which has no boundaries, which has no defining traits, and which does not change. ‘How’ I abide is without conditions or conditioning, without qualifications, and without limitations.
I can seem to be ‘here’ one second and ‘there’ the next, but that is about ‘how-ness,’ not any actual ‘here-ness’ or ‘there-ness.’ I am not confined to a space or form; furthermore, I can enter other spaces and forms, and do so regularly (as might happen the instant You read these words).
Abiding beyond consciousness and beyond beingness and beyond non-beingness, I can span the globe … I can span the universe … I have spanned all universes. Yet such 'while manifested' spannings seldom happen anymore, requiring far more energy than is worth the effort, and it most assuredly need not happen with You.
As for Me, abidance will continue to happen in a whole and unadulterated and unambiguous manner until the consciousness unmanifests. Until that happens, then abidance will happen as Reality is overlaid on the relative without exception. When the consciousness unmanifests, then the drop shall enter the ocean of energy from which it came and will span the Absolute;
Awareness shall be, but aware of-ness shall not. Later, other universes might be spanned as well, or might not. Yet all of that is stated, so it, too, cannot be the Truth which You know but do not yet know that You know. Tap into the source and know Truth, but even then, do not suppose that You will be able to express Truth in words."
Thus, Floyd describes the AM-ness regarding "floyd" as a "composite unity" of an elemental plant food body that is circulating air and that is temporarily housing the manifested consciousness.
The THAT-ness he sees as a field of energy from which the conscious-energy manifests and to which it will return.
As for identification with any WHO-ness, he discarded that when identification with the Nothingness came, followed eventually by not even identifying with Nothing - or anything else.
See? No need for an identity, for "There-ness," for "Doingness," or for "Being-This-or-That-or-THAT-ness."
[To be continued after allowing the eyes a rest from the computer screen for a few days, per the doc's instructions]
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
September 24, 2013
A DAILY CONSIDERATION FOR YOU
F.: In recent posts, "being free" and "freedom" were referenced, specifically being free of the bizarre effects of the programming and the conditioning and the domestication and the acculturation and the brainwashing and the indoctrination that block the pure consciousness from seeing accurately and that also form a "mind.
A "mind," in turn, is nothing more than a repository of falsehoods and distortions and warped perceptions and concepts and ideas and notions and thoughts and theories and views (a.k.a., "beliefs") which are the nutrients that feed and sustain all illusions and delusions and misapprehensions and deceptions and trickery and which, eventually, lead to chaos and misery and suffering.
Maharaj spoke of all of those elements of the Ultimate Sickness, but he used three words to identify the contaminates that generate the sickness, that define the sickness, and that spread the sickness: "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity."
Again, note that neither (a) in the loft nor (b) here will one find any suggestion that there are "ignorant persons" or "stupid persons" or "insane persons"; instead, there are simply (1) the parasites of "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity" and there are persons (non-Realized humans) who are (2) the hosts of the parasites (which suck from the hosts any and all ability to be sane, to be logical, to be rational, to be at peace, to be free, and to be joyous).
So human hosts are simply the vehicles that carry about "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity" and that spread the diseases (the dis-ease) of "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity."
(See that and some additional peace can come to you because then you'll never again be able to rant and rave about "all of the ignorant and stupid and insane people you have to deal with on a daily basis.")
Because those three contaminants generate the most sickness on the planet - and because they can manifest only during the relative existence - then the non-dual teachings (actually, "un-teachings") should really focus more on the "I AM" part of the summative statement of non-duality than on the "I AM THAT" part. Most seekers miss that point completely.
Post-manifestation, there is no one to be concerned with anything noumenal or heavenly or spiritual. That is why Maharaj, especially in his later talks, invited visitors to move away from things "spiritual" (a.k.a., "supernatural") and to simply abide naturally instead.
Note that many who think that they "have finally gotten it" really only "got" a one-way ticket to "Foo-Foo Land." They experienced the first leg of the "journey in" from the Absolute to their identification with the false "I"; they may have completed the second leg of the "journey back out"; but they never completed the final part of the entire "journey."
(So now, they are simply "way out there" and "totally out of it" ... totally out of touch with the only opportunity that they will ever have to enjoy peace and bliss and lightness, namely, the relative existence when Realized).
That is, they never completed the third leg of what is actually a three-leg "journey" and then "come back in," overlaying Reality and Awareness upon the relative and then abiding naturally and peacefully for the remainder of the manifestation.
[To be continued]
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
September 23, 2013
A "mind," in turn, is nothing more than a repository of falsehoods and distortions and warped perceptions and concepts and ideas and notions and thoughts and theories and views (a.k.a., "beliefs") which are the nutrients that feed and sustain all illusions and delusions and misapprehensions and deceptions and trickery and which, eventually, lead to chaos and misery and suffering.
Maharaj spoke of all of those elements of the Ultimate Sickness, but he used three words to identify the contaminates that generate the sickness, that define the sickness, and that spread the sickness: "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity."
Again, note that neither (a) in the loft nor (b) here will one find any suggestion that there are "ignorant persons" or "stupid persons" or "insane persons"; instead, there are simply (1) the parasites of "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity" and there are persons (non-Realized humans) who are (2) the hosts of the parasites (which suck from the hosts any and all ability to be sane, to be logical, to be rational, to be at peace, to be free, and to be joyous).
So human hosts are simply the vehicles that carry about "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity" and that spread the diseases (the dis-ease) of "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity."
(See that and some additional peace can come to you because then you'll never again be able to rant and rave about "all of the ignorant and stupid and insane people you have to deal with on a daily basis.")
Because those three contaminants generate the most sickness on the planet - and because they can manifest only during the relative existence - then the non-dual teachings (actually, "un-teachings") should really focus more on the "I AM" part of the summative statement of non-duality than on the "I AM THAT" part. Most seekers miss that point completely.
Post-manifestation, there is no one to be concerned with anything noumenal or heavenly or spiritual. That is why Maharaj, especially in his later talks, invited visitors to move away from things "spiritual" (a.k.a., "supernatural") and to simply abide naturally instead.
Note that many who think that they "have finally gotten it" really only "got" a one-way ticket to "Foo-Foo Land." They experienced the first leg of the "journey in" from the Absolute to their identification with the false "I"; they may have completed the second leg of the "journey back out"; but they never completed the final part of the entire "journey."
(So now, they are simply "way out there" and "totally out of it" ... totally out of touch with the only opportunity that they will ever have to enjoy peace and bliss and lightness, namely, the relative existence when Realized).
That is, they never completed the third leg of what is actually a three-leg "journey" and then "come back in," overlaying Reality and Awareness upon the relative and then abiding naturally and peacefully for the remainder of the manifestation.
[To be continued]
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
September 23, 2013
A DAILY CONSIDERATION FOR YOU
F.: [Continued from yesterday. You may gain a deeper understanding if you read yesterday's post and if you read "The Vision" at floydhenderson.com before reading today's post.]
I dissolved into the light and saw the beginning of this universe and of all universes. The Functioning of the Totality was revealed and understood completely. At that moment, I knew the perfect peace, the bliss of the Oneness and the Real-ness, the joy — no, the ecstasy — of Full Awareness. An exhausting search that had lasted a lifetime was completed with the joyous end of searching ... with the blissful end of the illusion of a false timeline involving birth-this-life-this-world-death-judgment-an-afterlife ... and even with the merry end of time itself.
What did not end at that moment was the AS IF existence. What has not ended are the happenings that happen. The True I - the re-purified consciousness, the Pure Witnessing - now simply observes this space (still called "floyd" by most) as it trudges onward through a relative existence that (to use some of the words of the Realized poet Shakepspeare) "signifies nothing"; that is disassociated from any belief in the "tales told by idiots"; that has been, in fact, freed of all concepts, ideas, notions, (a.k.a., "beliefs); and that is invested not at all in that which actually amounts to nothing more than "much ado about nothing."
All now happens without any basis; all that happens is a result of all causes and has nothing to do with a "me" (with any "self") at all; all merely happens spontaneously and without the slightest worry or attachment to outcome.
And so it shall be as long as the elements cycle into and out of the thousands of ever-changing bodies called "floyd" which the non-Realized mistakenly take to be the one, same body. And so it shall be with this composite unity until those elements reunite with the pool of the universal elements, until the breath is released and rejoins the universal air, and until the consciousness is freed from the space and returns to the universal pool of energy wherein it had "rested" prior to manifestation.
It is the detachment from all that deals with the body and mind and personality that explains why one of O’Neill’s characters was not insane but was sane when he suggested that one " . . . must always be a little in love with death." When John Donne asked, "O Death, where is thy sting?" he was not insanely suicidal. He was Realized, fully aware of the truth that death has no sting but also fully aware that "life" has no sting either . . . if Realized.
How many times have you felt stung by "this life," by events in "your life"? Has the effort to point toward the joy of Realization struck the cord of pure consciousness which You Are? Is that conscious-energy now vibrating with an awareness of the restrictions of the body-mind-personality triad and, conversely, with the freedom of (a) limitless beingness and (b) limitless non-beingness and (c) That which is beyond both of those?
[To be continued]
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
September 23, 2013
I dissolved into the light and saw the beginning of this universe and of all universes. The Functioning of the Totality was revealed and understood completely. At that moment, I knew the perfect peace, the bliss of the Oneness and the Real-ness, the joy — no, the ecstasy — of Full Awareness. An exhausting search that had lasted a lifetime was completed with the joyous end of searching ... with the blissful end of the illusion of a false timeline involving birth-this-life-this-world-death-judgment-an-afterlife ... and even with the merry end of time itself.
What did not end at that moment was the AS IF existence. What has not ended are the happenings that happen. The True I - the re-purified consciousness, the Pure Witnessing - now simply observes this space (still called "floyd" by most) as it trudges onward through a relative existence that (to use some of the words of the Realized poet Shakepspeare) "signifies nothing"; that is disassociated from any belief in the "tales told by idiots"; that has been, in fact, freed of all concepts, ideas, notions, (a.k.a., "beliefs); and that is invested not at all in that which actually amounts to nothing more than "much ado about nothing."
All now happens without any basis; all that happens is a result of all causes and has nothing to do with a "me" (with any "self") at all; all merely happens spontaneously and without the slightest worry or attachment to outcome.
And so it shall be as long as the elements cycle into and out of the thousands of ever-changing bodies called "floyd" which the non-Realized mistakenly take to be the one, same body. And so it shall be with this composite unity until those elements reunite with the pool of the universal elements, until the breath is released and rejoins the universal air, and until the consciousness is freed from the space and returns to the universal pool of energy wherein it had "rested" prior to manifestation.
It is the detachment from all that deals with the body and mind and personality that explains why one of O’Neill’s characters was not insane but was sane when he suggested that one " . . . must always be a little in love with death." When John Donne asked, "O Death, where is thy sting?" he was not insanely suicidal. He was Realized, fully aware of the truth that death has no sting but also fully aware that "life" has no sting either . . . if Realized.
How many times have you felt stung by "this life," by events in "your life"? Has the effort to point toward the joy of Realization struck the cord of pure consciousness which You Are? Is that conscious-energy now vibrating with an awareness of the restrictions of the body-mind-personality triad and, conversely, with the freedom of (a) limitless beingness and (b) limitless non-beingness and (c) That which is beyond both of those?
[To be continued]
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
September 23, 2013
A DAILY CONSIDERATION FOR YOU
F.: [Continued from yesterday]
Visitor: Since you realized after reading Maharaj I would like to know what you read - I AM THAT I guess. Anything else? If you read more than one book of his talks to realize, what was the order of the readings?
F.: Sorry. It can't happen the way your query implies, and here, it certainly did not work that way at all.
Reaching a state of complete impersonality came not after reading Maharaj but came, instead, after a vision that revealed the seven-step "path" from identification to abiding as the no-identity Original State.
Did reading some of Maharaj's earlier talks plant the seeds for that vision? Maybe. Maybe not. Did Maharaj provide all that was required to travel the seven-step "path" and then Realize Fully? No.
Did he, in fact, ever lay out a step-by-step explanation of how to move along the "path"? No. That was not his teaching style. Did he discuss in detail - though not in a specific order - the steps that came to me in the vision. Yes.
After the vision and after seeing the seven steps required to traveled the entire "path," did Maharaj provide the additional clarification required to abide in a fully independent manner - that is, that brought to an end not only unnatural living but also ended previous efforts to try to abide supernaturally? Yes.
After the vision and after seeing the seven steps required to traveled the entire "path, "did Maharaj provide the additional clarification required to abide in a fully natural mode of living? Yes. [If interested, you can visit floydhenderson.com and read the content of that vision.]
The process and results have been explained this way:
After studying the pointers offered by Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, a vision revealed the multiple degrees of separation that block an understanding of what "The True Self" is (which has not a whit to do with anything deemed "personal" or "Personal").
Though Maharaj spoke of "stages" that had to be transitioned, nowhere were they delineated. The understanding of the stages and of exactly what had to occur for Full Realization to manifest came via the content of a vision. Of course, all of the preparation and all of the studying of those words played an integral part in bringing about the full understanding.
The vision came one afternoon when the consciousness settled into the Theta state, and it was the vision that revealed the entire, direct "path" (step-by-step) and the exact order in which the direct path had to be followed if Realization was to happen.
Here, in the end, after months of reading Maharaj, most of the BS beliefs that had previously been so prized were revealed to have been nothing more than BS (though M.'s early talks about "spirituality" - which he would abandon later - did cause some of the BS beliefs in that regard to linger). Thus, many of the prior nonsensical beliefs were discarded but the Truth and the specific steps on the "path" were still not seen until the vision came, and that came via the inner resource.
Once the vision came, it was understood how the void to energy to awareness to manifested consciousness to blocked consciousness happened. The vision then revealed the way to back out of that mess.
After the vision, when Maharaj was read, his pointers were finally understood perfectly. Then his later, no-religious-and-no-spiritual teachings paved the way for Nisarga / AS IF living. (You can use the search feature at the top right of this page to search AS IF for more explanation.)
Then, the following became clear (but some parts of the discussion below will only make sense if you read the description of the vision first):
Truth cannot be stated. Nor can words even begin to describe the bliss of Realization and the type of existence that could happen if all were in touch with Reality. Yet the effort will be made to try to capture in words - to at least some degree - what the moment of Realization is like and what AS IF living is like afterwards.
Realization happened just after 9 o’clock PM one spring evening a little more than twenty-four years ago as I lay prone on a love seat in the silence of contemplation. Years of "studying" the non-dual teachings had passed, but then the vision came and laid out in a specific, clear-cut order the exact steps that had to be followed to Realization. Thus, it happened.
After decades of being out of tune with the music of the universe, I felt the rhythm for the first time ever and fell into a harmonious step that corresponded with All. After decades of being out of step with Reality (and after decades of trampling about chaotically as a result of being out of tune with All) I was lifted up from this physical-realm-only and felt the metrical cyclings of the harmony of the universe.
I finally heard its silent melody and felt in tune with All. The decades of suffering as a result of having been "out of sync" ended and evaporated into a synchronicity with Reality, with Self and, therefore, with All. The illusion of "I" had died, and in the fleeting moments during the death throes that brought to a final conclusion that imaginary "physical and mental floyd," the fictitious elements of a life of lies passed across the screen of consciousness. It was seeing that play for what it had been—nothing more than the Drama of the Lie—that killed off all of the false notions about "me" and killed off the belief in the false "I."
In losing the illusory "me" and "I," the concept of "my life" was also lost. With that, all notions about a "birth" came to an end. And in losing "birth" and "my life," I lost "death." With the lost of the concept of "death," all fear ended as well, including the earlier fear of living.
I was set free by that liberator called "Awareness." The breath was seen to be leaving the body like a hazy fog and dissolving into the universal air; the physical body was witnessed as it dissolved into the elements from which it came. Like an eagle soaring above, I saw clearly as I had lost every component of my "self." I was free.
[Free of what? Free especially of the ignorance and stupidity and insanity that were a result of ignorant and stupid and insane programming and conditioning and domestication and acculturation and brainwashing. Thus, I was free of distortion and delusion and illusions as well as all identification(s). I was also free of all that is misunderstood by the masses about the body, about the mind, and about personality / personalities.]
In the absence of a physical body, I witnessed those elements that had wrongly been taken to be Me as they dissolved into the trees, the mountains, the stream running across a desert floor, and into thin air. Then the Pure Witness watched the At-one-ment unfold as I came to know I Was All, I Am All, and I Shall Forever Be That Which All Is. In losing self, I found Self at the fifth step, yet there was still more to be realized.
In losing the uniqueness of "floyd," in losing all self-consciousness, I gained the limitless expanse of Self-Consciousness and an understanding of exactly what is beyond even the Self. I understood the true unicity beyond the perceived multiplicity; I knew the illusion of past and future and came to know the truth of Now; and the functioning of the totality became clear.
I saw the insignificance of humankind’s pettiness ... of persons’ fears and desires and identification with body and mind and personality. I saw the suffering that evolves from the egotism that is used to sustain imaginary ego-states. I saw that which inspires a belief in separation and duality. I saw the darkness of ignorance and arrogance.
The rear curtain was pulled back on the mystery of the Drama of the Lie and that allowed all falsehoods to be seen for what they are; the light shown down and cast away the darkness in which the enigma had flourished and in an instant the riddle of "life" was solved.
In seeing that all the lies of all cultures have been nothing more than personal fabrications, I was able to see that the greatest lie had been the lie of my self. I had not been living a lie, as some had suggested. "I" was the lie. I saw the lies about the body, the lies about the mind, the lies about being religious or spiritual, and the lies about the advantages thereof. I saw the truth of the Child Ignorance stage via a seagull in a vision and knew that being a no-knowing, concept-less gull would have been so much more wonderful than believing I was the person / persona / personas that I had thought I was.
[To be continued]
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
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Visitor: Since you realized after reading Maharaj I would like to know what you read - I AM THAT I guess. Anything else? If you read more than one book of his talks to realize, what was the order of the readings?
F.: Sorry. It can't happen the way your query implies, and here, it certainly did not work that way at all.
Reaching a state of complete impersonality came not after reading Maharaj but came, instead, after a vision that revealed the seven-step "path" from identification to abiding as the no-identity Original State.
Did reading some of Maharaj's earlier talks plant the seeds for that vision? Maybe. Maybe not. Did Maharaj provide all that was required to travel the seven-step "path" and then Realize Fully? No.
Did he, in fact, ever lay out a step-by-step explanation of how to move along the "path"? No. That was not his teaching style. Did he discuss in detail - though not in a specific order - the steps that came to me in the vision. Yes.
After the vision and after seeing the seven steps required to traveled the entire "path," did Maharaj provide the additional clarification required to abide in a fully independent manner - that is, that brought to an end not only unnatural living but also ended previous efforts to try to abide supernaturally? Yes.
After the vision and after seeing the seven steps required to traveled the entire "path, "did Maharaj provide the additional clarification required to abide in a fully natural mode of living? Yes. [If interested, you can visit floydhenderson.com and read the content of that vision.]
The process and results have been explained this way:
After studying the pointers offered by Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, a vision revealed the multiple degrees of separation that block an understanding of what "The True Self" is (which has not a whit to do with anything deemed "personal" or "Personal").
Though Maharaj spoke of "stages" that had to be transitioned, nowhere were they delineated. The understanding of the stages and of exactly what had to occur for Full Realization to manifest came via the content of a vision. Of course, all of the preparation and all of the studying of those words played an integral part in bringing about the full understanding.
The vision came one afternoon when the consciousness settled into the Theta state, and it was the vision that revealed the entire, direct "path" (step-by-step) and the exact order in which the direct path had to be followed if Realization was to happen.
Here, in the end, after months of reading Maharaj, most of the BS beliefs that had previously been so prized were revealed to have been nothing more than BS (though M.'s early talks about "spirituality" - which he would abandon later - did cause some of the BS beliefs in that regard to linger). Thus, many of the prior nonsensical beliefs were discarded but the Truth and the specific steps on the "path" were still not seen until the vision came, and that came via the inner resource.
Once the vision came, it was understood how the void to energy to awareness to manifested consciousness to blocked consciousness happened. The vision then revealed the way to back out of that mess.
After the vision, when Maharaj was read, his pointers were finally understood perfectly. Then his later, no-religious-and-no-spiritual teachings paved the way for Nisarga / AS IF living. (You can use the search feature at the top right of this page to search AS IF for more explanation.)
Then, the following became clear (but some parts of the discussion below will only make sense if you read the description of the vision first):
Truth cannot be stated. Nor can words even begin to describe the bliss of Realization and the type of existence that could happen if all were in touch with Reality. Yet the effort will be made to try to capture in words - to at least some degree - what the moment of Realization is like and what AS IF living is like afterwards.
Realization happened just after 9 o’clock PM one spring evening a little more than twenty-four years ago as I lay prone on a love seat in the silence of contemplation. Years of "studying" the non-dual teachings had passed, but then the vision came and laid out in a specific, clear-cut order the exact steps that had to be followed to Realization. Thus, it happened.
After decades of being out of tune with the music of the universe, I felt the rhythm for the first time ever and fell into a harmonious step that corresponded with All. After decades of being out of step with Reality (and after decades of trampling about chaotically as a result of being out of tune with All) I was lifted up from this physical-realm-only and felt the metrical cyclings of the harmony of the universe.
I finally heard its silent melody and felt in tune with All. The decades of suffering as a result of having been "out of sync" ended and evaporated into a synchronicity with Reality, with Self and, therefore, with All. The illusion of "I" had died, and in the fleeting moments during the death throes that brought to a final conclusion that imaginary "physical and mental floyd," the fictitious elements of a life of lies passed across the screen of consciousness. It was seeing that play for what it had been—nothing more than the Drama of the Lie—that killed off all of the false notions about "me" and killed off the belief in the false "I."
In losing the illusory "me" and "I," the concept of "my life" was also lost. With that, all notions about a "birth" came to an end. And in losing "birth" and "my life," I lost "death." With the lost of the concept of "death," all fear ended as well, including the earlier fear of living.
I was set free by that liberator called "Awareness." The breath was seen to be leaving the body like a hazy fog and dissolving into the universal air; the physical body was witnessed as it dissolved into the elements from which it came. Like an eagle soaring above, I saw clearly as I had lost every component of my "self." I was free.
[Free of what? Free especially of the ignorance and stupidity and insanity that were a result of ignorant and stupid and insane programming and conditioning and domestication and acculturation and brainwashing. Thus, I was free of distortion and delusion and illusions as well as all identification(s). I was also free of all that is misunderstood by the masses about the body, about the mind, and about personality / personalities.]
In the absence of a physical body, I witnessed those elements that had wrongly been taken to be Me as they dissolved into the trees, the mountains, the stream running across a desert floor, and into thin air. Then the Pure Witness watched the At-one-ment unfold as I came to know I Was All, I Am All, and I Shall Forever Be That Which All Is. In losing self, I found Self at the fifth step, yet there was still more to be realized.
In losing the uniqueness of "floyd," in losing all self-consciousness, I gained the limitless expanse of Self-Consciousness and an understanding of exactly what is beyond even the Self. I understood the true unicity beyond the perceived multiplicity; I knew the illusion of past and future and came to know the truth of Now; and the functioning of the totality became clear.
I saw the insignificance of humankind’s pettiness ... of persons’ fears and desires and identification with body and mind and personality. I saw the suffering that evolves from the egotism that is used to sustain imaginary ego-states. I saw that which inspires a belief in separation and duality. I saw the darkness of ignorance and arrogance.
The rear curtain was pulled back on the mystery of the Drama of the Lie and that allowed all falsehoods to be seen for what they are; the light shown down and cast away the darkness in which the enigma had flourished and in an instant the riddle of "life" was solved.
In seeing that all the lies of all cultures have been nothing more than personal fabrications, I was able to see that the greatest lie had been the lie of my self. I had not been living a lie, as some had suggested. "I" was the lie. I saw the lies about the body, the lies about the mind, the lies about being religious or spiritual, and the lies about the advantages thereof. I saw the truth of the Child Ignorance stage via a seagull in a vision and knew that being a no-knowing, concept-less gull would have been so much more wonderful than believing I was the person / persona / personas that I had thought I was.
[To be continued]
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
You can also scroll down through the book section below if interested in receiving a free copy of the eBook
entitled
"GOOD vs. EVIL?" or "IGNORANCE, STUPIDITY, and INSANITY?"
Submit to:
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.
* * * * * * *
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entitled
"GOOD vs. EVIL?" or "IGNORANCE, STUPIDITY, and INSANITY?"
Questions?
Submit to:
Comments?
Just hang on to those please.
Just hang on to those please.
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";
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.
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
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.
THESE PAPERBACK BOOKS ARE AVAILABLE THROUGH AMAZON.COM
(Four by Floyd Henderson and two by Dennis Waite. Click the picture for more information or to order)
(Four by Floyd Henderson and two by Dennis Waite. Click the picture for more information or to order)
* * * * * * *
ALL EBOOK AND PAPERBACK VERSION OF HENDERSON'S NON-DUALITY BOOKS
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International buyers: note the separate option for those outside the continental U.S.
II. BY READING the explanations offered in the collection of non-duality books that are available on this site and at www.floydhenderson.com.
III. BY 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
IV. BY 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.
V. BY 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.
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FOR THOSE SEEKING FURTHER EXPLANATION OF THE NON-DUALITY UNDERSTANDING, AS NOTED ABOVE, SOME SEEKERS HAVE REALIZED BY USING THE METHODS BELOW, OR A COMBINATION OF THE METHODS:
FOR THOSE SEEKING FURTHER EXPLANATION OF THE NON-DUALITY UNDERSTANDING, AS NOTED ABOVE, SOME SEEKERS HAVE REALIZED BY USING THE METHODS BELOW, OR A COMBINATION OF THE METHODS:
WAYS THAT SEEKERS HAVE REALIZED:
I. BY WATCHING the 4-Disk, Seven-Hour Video (DVD) Set of an advaita retreat, or the downloadable file version. To find out more or to purchase the DVD or downloadable computer file version of the retreat, DVD or Downloadable computer file versions of the Four-Day Advaita Retreat
I. BY WATCHING the 4-Disk, Seven-Hour Video (DVD) Set of an advaita retreat, or the downloadable file version. To find out more or to purchase the DVD or downloadable computer file version of the retreat, DVD or Downloadable computer file versions of the Four-Day Advaita Retreat
International buyers: note the separate option for those outside the continental U.S.
II. BY READING the explanations offered in the collection of non-duality books that are available on this site and at www.floydhenderson.com.
III. BY 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
IV. BY 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.
V. BY 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.
VI. ALL OF THE FOLLOWING BOOKS are available at
Floyd Henderson's Website
and
ALL CAN BE SENT TO FRIENDS OR FAMILY MEMBERS AS GIFTS
[details at floydhenderson.com. Once on that site, click on the picture of the book you would like to send as a gift for details]
This anthology of four books by Floyd Henderson contains the volumes that make up what has been called "The Advanced Seekers' Series" for those seeking Realization via the Advaita teachings
This anthology contains the six books that make up what has been called "The Blissful Abidance Series" for those seeking to live blissfully and happily for the remainder of the manifestation, including these books
This book can be read as a "Stand-Alone eBook" or as a "Companion Piece" or "Follow-Up" to be read after "When Only Three Hours of Manifestation Remain."
After having guided over 8,000 people through the Twelve Steps, the focus eventually turned toward working with the few who have been seeking recovery for some time but sense that "there must be something more" or who have said, "I am still not where I want to be." A few - even with double-digit "sobriety" - have said, "I don't want to drink ... I want to die."
NOW ACCEPTING REQUESTS FOR FREE COPIES OF THE FOLLOWING EBOOK:
A free copy of the 278-page eBook entitled
"GOOD vs. EVIL?" or "IGNORANCE, STUPIDITY, and INSANITY?"
is available to be sent to you and anyone else you choose.
The book will be emailed to you as a PFD attachment upon request
Gift copies can also be sent to your friends and relatives. The eBook
can be read on any computer (using Adobe, for example) or can be
transferred to any electronic reader or tablet or phone for reading.
Open the attachment via the email on your iPad or Android tablet or
phone and begin reading.
[Please note: When the Direct Path Teaching Method is offered in conjunction with the Nisarga Yoga, something unique results when compared to what happens via the approach used by religions, spiritual movements, philosophies, ideologies, etc.:
rather than inviting seekers to learn more, the invitation here is to unlearn all; rather than offerings teachings, what is offered are unteachings; rather than offering to provide seekers more of anything, seekers will find that the process will take away everything. And via that process, the bliss of Your Original Nature will manifest and remain until mahasamadhi is taken.
To that end, the content of this book will seem radical to the seekers of more, but for those truly ready to be totally free and totally independent - and for those who are truly ready to abandon efforts to accumulate and to de-accumulate instead - the pointers in this book might be relevant.]
To receive your free copy, or to have us send a free copy to your friends or relatives, send your email address (or their addresses) to the following:
(Sorry, but for security reasons, we no longer have a clickable link. You will have to type in our gmail address above. By the way, your email addresses will never be used to contact you or your friends or relatives and email addresses will never be shared with anyone else.)
Simply state in your email that you want the book sent as a gift to you (or as a gift from you to as many people as you like. Copies are now ready to be sent.)
FROM THE I TO THE ABSOLUTE: A Seven-Step Journey to the Absolute
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CONSCIOUSNESS / AWARENESS
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FROM THE ABSOLUTE TO THE NOTHINGNESS
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THE FINAL UNDERSTANDING
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THE ADVANCED SEEKERS' SERIES
This anthology of four books by Floyd Henderson contains the volumes that make up what has been called "The Advanced Seekers' Series" for those seeking Realization via the Advaita teachings
For more information on this book, or to purchase a copy now, click:
THE BLISSFUL ABIDANCE SERIES
This anthology contains the six books that make up what has been called "The Blissful Abidance Series" for those seeking to live blissfully and happily for the remainder of the manifestation, including these books
For more information on this book, or to purchase a copy now, click:
SRI NISARGADATTA MAHARAJ AND HIS EVOLUTION
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THE FINAL FIFTEEN TOPICS DISCUSSED BY SRI NISARGADATTA MAHARAJ
This book can be read as a "Stand-Alone eBook" or as a "Companion Piece" or "Follow-Up" to be read after "When Only Three Hours of Manifestation Remain."
For more information on this book, or to purchase a copy now, click:
A TWELVE-STEP JOURNEY TO SELF-TRANSFORMATION
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A GUIDE FOR WORKING THE STEPS (IN THE MANNER USED BY THE FOUNDERS)
The author of this book is also the co-author of a book with Mark Houston entitled "A Twelve-Step Journey to SELF-Transformation" 
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THE TWELVE STEPS AND ADVAITA / NON-DUALITY: A 21-DAY PLAN FOR A PSYCHIC CHANGE
After having guided over 8,000 people through the Twelve Steps, the focus eventually turned toward working with the few who have been seeking recovery for some time but sense that "there must be something more" or who have said, "I am still not where I want to be." A few - even with double-digit "sobriety" - have said, "I don't want to drink ... I want to die."
For more information on this book, or to purchase a copy now, click:
SELF-TRANSFORMATION MEDITATION GUIDE (VOLUME ONE)
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SELF-TRANSFORMATION MEDITATION GUIDE (VOLUME TWO)
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WHY NISARGA YOGA IN ADDITION TO THE ADVAITA TEACHINGS?
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A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE via the Non-Duality Teachings and the Nisarga Yoga
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YOUR ORIGINAL NATURE
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GOING CRAZY / GOING SANE
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INSTABILITY / INSANITY: WHAT THE ADVAITA TEACHINGS CAN (AND CANNOT) ADDRESS
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THERE'S NO SUCH THING AS "PEACE OF MIND" (THERE IS ONLY PEACE IF YOU'RE OUT OF YOUR MIND)
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FREEDOM FROM SHIFTING BETWEEN STATES OF HAPPINESS AND UNHAPPINESS
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THE ULTIMATE SICKNESS / THE ULTIMATE MEDICINE
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PROGRAMMING, CONDITIONING, DOMESTICATION, AND ACCULTURATION (THE SOURCES OF THE ULTIMATE SICKNESS & THE NON-DUALITY TREATMENT)
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"WHAT HAPPENS WHEN I DIE?"
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THE MYTH OF "DEATH"
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THE ESSENCE OF THE TEACHINGS: THE SIMPLICITY OF REALIZATION
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FINDING REAL LOVE IN AN UNREAL WORLD
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CASTING LIGHT ON THE DARK SIDE OF RELATIONSHIPS
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OVERCOMING THE FEAR OF BEING TOTALLY INDEPENDENT
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THE NON-DUALITY POINTERS OFFERED BY YESHU'A ("JESUS THE CHRIST")
For more information on this book, or to purchase a copy now, click:
NOW ACCEPTING REQUESTS FOR FREE COPIES OF THE FOLLOWING EBOOK:
A free copy of the 278-page eBook entitled
"GOOD vs. EVIL?" or "IGNORANCE, STUPIDITY, and INSANITY?"
is available to be sent to you and anyone else you choose.
The book will be emailed to you as a PFD attachment upon request
[Please note: When the Direct Path Teaching Method is offered in conjunction with the Nisarga Yoga, something unique results when compared to what happens via the approach used by religions, spiritual movements, philosophies, ideologies, etc.:
rather than inviting seekers to learn more, the invitation here is to unlearn all; rather than offerings teachings, what is offered are unteachings; rather than offering to provide seekers more of anything, seekers will find that the process will take away everything. And via that process, the bliss of Your Original Nature will manifest and remain until mahasamadhi is taken.
To that end, the content of this book will seem radical to the seekers of more, but for those truly ready to be totally free and totally independent - and for those who are truly ready to abandon efforts to accumulate and to de-accumulate instead - the pointers in this book might be relevant.]
To receive your free copy, or to have us send a free copy to your friends or relatives, send your email address (or their addresses) to the following:
(Sorry, but for security reasons, we no longer have a clickable link. You will have to type in our gmail address above. By the way, your email addresses will never be used to contact you or your friends or relatives and email addresses will never be shared with anyone else.)
Simply state in your email that you want the book sent as a gift to you (or as a gift from you to as many people as you like. Copies are now ready to be sent.)
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE THE ADVAITIN
For more information on this book, or to purchase a copy now, click:
WHEN ONLY THREE HOURS OF MANIFESTATION REMAIN (THE "FINAL" TALKS OF FLOYD HENDERSON)
For more information on this book, or to purchase a copy now, click:
I AM THAT (vs. "This Is Who I Think I Am")
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QUOTATIONS AND POINTERS DEALING WITH NON-DUALITY, ADVAITA, NISARGA YOGA, AND MORE
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DANCING LIGHTLY
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THE PATH TO FREEDOM VS. THE PATH TO MISERY
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THERE IS NOTHING THAT IS PERSONAL (INCLUDING YOU AND INCLUDING GOD)
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LIBERATION (ATTAINING FREEDOM FROM PERSONALITY VIA REALIZATION)
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WHY YOU MUST BE EMPTY IF YOU WOULD BE FULL
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FREEDOM FROM BELIEFS (Believers, Non-Believers, and "No-Belief-ers")
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WHEN REALITY IS OVERLAID ON THE RELATIVE
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THE RELATIVE RESULTS OF RETURNING TO "THE CHILD IGNORANCE STAGE" OR "THE CHILD NO-KNOWING STATE"
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WHAT BLISS IS AND WHAT BLISS IS NOT
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THE TWICE-STOLEN NECKLACE MURDERS
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THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS OF WARS
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LESSONS IN NON-DUALITY FROM TRAVELS IN SOUTH AFRICA
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A SERIES OF ESSAYS DISCUSSING THE FIRST STEP ON THE SEVEN-STEP PATH TO REALIZATION
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A SERIES OF ESSAYS DISCUSSING THE SECOND STEP ON THE SEVEN-STEP PATH TO REALIZATION
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A SERIES OF ESSAYS DISCUSSING THE THIRD STEP ON THE SEVEN-STEP PATH TO REALIZATION
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A SERIES OF ESSAYS DISCUSSING THE FOURTH STEP ON THE SEVEN-STEP PATH TO REALIZATION
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A SERIES OF ESSAYS DISCUSSING THE FIFTH STEP ON THE SEVEN-STEP PATH TO REALIZATION
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A SERIES OF ESSAYS DISCUSSING THE SIXTH STEP ON THE SEVEN-STEP PATH TO REALIZATION
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A SERIES OF ESSAYS DISCUSSING THE SEVENTH STEP ON THE SEVEN-STEP PATH TO REALIZATION
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SPIRITUAL SOBRIETY (RECOVERING WHAT RELIGIONS LOST)
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IT'S ALL BULLSHIT (AND WHY KNOWING IT SETS YOU FREE)
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RELATED TOPICS: alcoholism treatment, enneagram, addiction, Mark Houston, non-duality, non-duality ebooks, liberation, enlightenment, liberation, realization, Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, unity, oneness.
THERE'S NO SUCH THING AS "PEACE OF MIND" (THERE IS ONLY PEACE IF YOU'RE OUT OF YOUR MIND)
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TWO BOOKS THAT EXPLAIN IN DETAIL THE PROCESS OF BEING FREE OF FALSE BELIEFS AND FREE OF THE BOGUS CONTENT OF "THE MIND":
FREEDOM FROM BELIEFS (Believers, Non-Believers, and "No-Belief-ers")
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