TODAY'S CONSIDERATIONS
THE RATIONALE FOR UNDERSTANDING "THE REASONS" AND BEING FREED FROM THEIR INFLUENCE, PART SEVEN (Continued)
Yesterday: "Finally, Maharaj recommended only what would lead to natural abidance; to what would result in freedom from entrapment on paths and in journeys; to what would result in a sense of lightness."
And that is what this series has been about, about seeing that magical thinking adds to the heaviness of a relative existence; that deep and philosophical thinking add to the heaviness of a relative existence; that excessive seriousness adds to the heaviness of a relative existence; that abiding unnaturally and supernaturally adds to the heaviness of a relative existence;
that constant seeking adds to the heaviness of a relative existence (whether that which one is seeking is enlightenment, realization, eternal life and an eternal reward, a man to solve one's problems, a woman to fill one's "needs," or many women to fill one's "needs," ad infinitum); that constant going and doing and zooming - be it of an adventurous sort, of a religious sort, or of a spiritual sort - add to the heaviness of a relative existence; and personality assumption adds to the heaviness of a relative existence.
TO REACH A STATE OF LIGHTNESS, LIGHTEN UP YOUR PERSONALITY LOAD.
So when Maharaj shifted from recommending a Seven Step path to recommending a Four Step Path, he said that it is enough to know what you are not (an understanding which comes when the third step is completed, the step at which all personality identifications are finally abandoned, including the three which are usually the final false identifications to be forfeited: "The Super Religious One" and "The Spiritual Giant" and "The Super Seeker").
Thus, two of his key pointers from his later talks:
“It is enough to know what you are not”
and
“Don’t try to understand! It’s enough if you do not misunderstand.”
So stop it all: the entrapment on endless paths and endless journeys; the valuing of heaviness; magical thinking; deep and philosophical thinking; excessive seriousness; abiding unnaturally and supernaturally; constant seeking; constant going and doing and zooming (often driven by an addiction to chaos and / or adrenaline in an effort to escape boredom); and the constant accumulation of more and more personality identifications.
TO REACH A STATE OF LIGHTNESS, LIGHTEN UP YOUR MIND LOAD.
Maharaj, on rejecting that notion that you can finally attain “peace of mind," said "there is no such thing as peace of mind." Added here is the caveat, "There is only peace if you are out of your mind."
There is no peace when the belief is stored your mind that . . .
if you just work hard enough and long enough or worship enough or study enough holy scriptures or Big Books or go to a church / temple / mosque / synagogue regularly or visit enough holy sites or go to enough retreats or listen to enough talks or visit enough holy men or read and accumulate enough books by “Big Name Teachers” or refuse to eat certain foods or wear special clothes or wear a special hairdo or have no hair at all or attend enough meetings or listen to enough speakers at speaker meetings or hang out with enough religious people or hang out with enough spiritual people or go into complete isolation and drop out and mentally dissociate that . . .
then only can you finally be free and at peace.
What is being done to try to be free are the very things which prevent freedom. It's all just nonsense. Peace begins when mental imprisonment ends. Freedom precedes peace. It does not follow peace.
One might as well think, "I can't control my drinking. It has put me in bondage. Therefore, please handcuff my hands behind my back so that I can stop drinking and then finally be free"
or
"Doc, you haven't been able to end my Irritable Bowel Syndrome and now I'm suffering from Inflammatory Bowel Disease and all you can tell me is to give up all of the things I love to eat and drink, like fiber, alcohol, carbonated drinks, fried foods, and fatty foods, so just remove my colon to put an end to my misery once and for all."
Maharaj would say, "Find the means by which you can put an end to the insanity that was passed down to you. Try putting an end to your belief in all of the nonsense that 'they' pumped into your mind."
TO REACH A STATE OF LIGHTNESS, LIGHTEN UP ON YOURSELF.
Most humans either have a job or need a job to meet the basic requirements of a relative existence, namely, food, clothing and shelter. (Ego-states and egotism can drive some to believe that they must have only gourmet food, only designer apparel, and only the largest and grandest and most expensive shelter available).
While a job is needed by most, what is not needed is the taking on of a second job which focuses on a mirage - on dreamed up needs - such as the dreamed up need to work for an entire lifetime to nurture a dreamed up “soul” or the dreamed up need to work on earning a place in a dreamed up “heaven” or “paradise” or “nirvana” or "Zion" or “the next world” or “the next life” or “Elysian Fields” or “Valhalla” or “the hereafter” or “the next life” or “a state of supreme bliss” or “a later life with eternal rewards rather than eternal punishment” or “the firmament” or “the wild blue yonder” or “the upper regions” or “the celestial sphere,” ad infinitum.
Maharaj said: “I have no faith in anything which has ever been told, not even what has been told by the Vedas. Only my own experience”
and
“Whatever you have tried to understand during your spiritual search will prove false”
and
"Just give up spirituality"
and
"Abide naturally" (meaning, not "supernaturally" / spiritually and not "unnaturally" / religiously).
While their numbers are decreasing, there are still 2.2 billion persons on the planet who claim to be "A Christian" (or, when they're speaking honestly, "A Super Christian") and who identify Christ as "their Lord" but who ignore his words when he told them that there is no “heaven” or “paradise” or “the next world” or “the next life” or “a hereafter” or “the next life” or “a state of supreme bliss” or “a later life with eternal rewards rather than eternal punishment” or “a firmament” or “a celestial sphere,” saying:
“No one shall ever see ‘the kingdom of heaven’ . . . it is within.”
(Did he offer different, level-appropriate messages to those who were not ready or who could never understand that truth? Yes, just as Maharaj did. But for those who might "get it," he made clear: there is no heaven.)
Some may ask, "Then where does the Creator live? The reply, "No 'Creator' or 'creator' lives at all." All is energy-matter, and neither energy nor matter can be created or destroyed. No creation? No Creator. Just as "parents" do not "create" children but merely participate in the cycling of elements which already exist, so no "Heavenly Father" has ever created "His Children.")
Moreover, there is no human - and there is no "invisible part" of a human (a.k.a., "soul") - which will be forever. Additionally, when humans take mahasamadhi (or, as the masses call it, "die") they do not sprout wings and become half-human / half-bird creatures.
[Grandmother recounted how she and her family members smiled one night when sitting around a campfire as one of the elders who had spoken to an officer in the U.S. military reported that the officer had told the elder that he needed to believe that, when he died, he would sprout wings and either float about in heaven and worship God and His Son Christ, or float about invisibly on earth while guarding people who were still alive, or go to hell and suffer mental and physical anguish forever. "And they think that we are the ones who are crazy!"]
Maharaj: “You cannot eternalise a transient thing - only the changeless is eternal.”
He said: “Only the process of change continues. Nothing lasts” (except, of course, energy-matter, which can neither be created nor destroyed).
TO REACH A STATE OF LIGHTNESS, LIGHTEN UP.
Give yourself a break from the going and doing and zooming which are inspired by personality-based fears and desires. Stop all of the religious going and doing and zooming to escape the fear of eternal punishment. Stop all of the religious going and doing and zooming in an effort to earn the eternal rewards which you desire.
Stop all of the spiritual going and doing and zooming to elevate, to be Something Special, to be Something Supreme, to be different from and to be better than.
Again,
Maharaj said: “I got involved in spirituality, in the business of spirituality; finally, I lost that love of Self also. I have no more love for the Self."
The summative statement of the non-dual understanding is, “I AM THAT; I AM.”
As a child, how much attention did you have to give to understanding THAT in order to enjoy unconditional happiness? None. On the other hand, how much did you enjoy the milk or food you were given as a child? Considerably. No attention was paid to things Noumenal. All attention which was paid was paid to things phenomenal, and the child did just find while abiding in that manner.
Give my granddaughter a few English peas to snack on and you will see the peace that peas can bring during the pre-programmed, pre-conditioned, Child No-Knowing State:
but try to give her a boring-ass lecture about all of the philosophical things that you know and about all of the Noumenal things that you understand and about all of the things that you have learned from your vast library of books and she will crawl away from you very quickly, find one of her own books, and suck on the corner of it.
As a child, how much thought and time and effort did you give to seeking "Enlightenment" or to understanding the concept of “Your Supreme Self” in order to enjoy unconditional happiness? None. It was not required then for unconditional happiness to manifest and it will not be required for unconditional happiness to manifest now if one merely returns once more to the same no-mind and no-concept condition as existed then.
How much did you enjoy a dry diaper and a comfortable ambient temperature? Considerably. How light did you feel “just being” as opposed to later on when you were programmed, conditioned, etc. in a way that led you to enter into a lifetime of going and doing and zooming?
[Sadly, the “wiring” of many has been so backwards that they are so uncomfortable in their own Am-ness skin that they are most on edge and uneasy when sitting in the silence. Again, those types are so bored that they become addicted to chaos just to get the adrenal glands pumping so they might “feel alive.”]
To be able to accept Maharaj’s recommendation to “relax in the cool blue shade,” one must find all that one is not, see the effects that the assumption of false identities has had throughout the relative existence, and then - via that realization - stop allowing what one is not to determine what one thinks and says and does. Instead, be free of all mind and personality identifications.
Then see that the only “time” when unconditional happiness has ever happened for you was during the early childhood period when there were zero concepts stored in the part of your brain which would come to be called “the mind.”
Only then in a mindless state were you able to enjoy unconditional happiness, and now, the only chance you have to enjoy unconditional happiness again is if you return to that no-concept, no-mind condition.
There will be no “one” post-manifestation to enjoy anything, so enjoy whatever can be enjoyed at the only time anything can be enjoyed: now.
How can that be known? By understanding this:
You are presently nothing more than a composite unity which is cycling plant food elements to sustain a physical body which is circulating air and which is circulating conscious-energy. The consumption of plants – or things which ate plants – is required to ingest plant cells which can convert to human body cells, and the consumption of plants – or things which ate plants – is required to restore the conscious-energy which is manifest only on a finite basis and must constantly be replaced throughout the manifestation.
If bliss is to be enjoyed, it can only happen NOW. The AM-ness you can impact; the THAT-ness you cannot. The THAT-ness will do what it does automatically, both prior to manifestation and post manifestation. It needs no attention from you or from me.
What could use some attention?
The way that the IS-ness is unfolding. If you are feeling great and your entire digestive tract has been checked out and you have been given a clean bill of health, why undergo a surgery and have your colon removed? It’s fine. What it does, it does spontaneously without any attention from you (sane maintenance notwithstanding). So leave it alone.
Like a scabbed-over wound, it will take care of itself automatically and spontaneously. Leave it alone. Stop picking at it obsessively. And leave THAT alone as well. It is faring far better than the typical human's IS-ness. If energy is going to be expended, expend it on something that you can affect, not on that / THAT which you cannot affect.
One need not give any attention at all to the THAT-ness which had worked just fine for eternity and which shall function just fine, all on its own, for eternity. If you are feeling great and your lungs have been checked out and you have been given a clean bill of health, why undergo a surgery to have a lung removed? Both are fine.
What your lungs do, they do spontaneously without any attention from you (sane maintenance notwithstanding).
Similarly, one need not give any attention to the THAT-ness which had worked just fine for eternity and which shall function just fine, all on its own, for eternity. If your indoor plumbing is working fine, why call out a plumber and spend hundreds of dollars to pay him to exert a needless effort to pay attention to your commode and sewer pipes? They are fine. Leave them alone.
The same applies to the THAT-ness and the AM-ness: find the means by which you can change that which involves the AM-ness if it is calling for change, but see that the THAT-ness has never changed, cannot change now, and will never change.
It does not need you; it does not need me; it does not need anyone or Anyone to do what it does spontaneously and automatically.
The invitation is to put your energy into what can be affected, and stop putting your energy into what can never be affected.
Maharaj: “You cannot change the course of events, but you can change your attitude and what really matters is the attitude and not the bare event.”
Too, he said, “It is neither necessary, nor possible to change others. But if you can change yourself you will find that no other change is needed.”
So, again, “Heal thyself,” thy false selves which always block persons from enjoying the sense of lightness which comes with unconditional happiness.
And that is what this series has been about: about offering a chance to see that any sense of actually being free among humans is more often than not a total illusion; about offering an alternate perspective; about understanding what absolute independence looks like; about seeing how to reach that state and enjoy it by taking it easy - or at least easier - and enjoying a doer-free and doingness-free relative existence (just as every living thing on the planet does for the most part, except for humans).
To be continued.
Please enter into the silence of contemplation.
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