TODAY'S CONSIDERATIONS
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Here, with those who are still driven to talk about
"God," the "Son of God," the "Holy Spirit,"
"Buddha," "Krishna," etc., etc., etc., the invitation to
them is to view those as verbs, not nouns. See the end of the post for the full
meaning and implications of that.
Offered yesterday for consideration:
I one would realize - that is, per Maharaj, be free of all of the learned ignorance and insanity which generated dualistic thinking and dualistic talking and duality-based behavior and the dual-mindedness which leads persons be "unstable in all ways" - then a reasonable and sane and logical seeker would see that the last place to seek such freedom from dualistic beliefs would be in the place which has generated most of the dualistic beliefs which have long plagued humankind by storing duality-based nonsense in the minds of humans.
Thus it should be clear why Maharaj eventually advised seekers to avoid those, leading to this totally different option:
REALIZING WITHOUT DOGMA, WITHOUT CONTINUOUS SPIRITUAL PRACTICES, AND WITHOUT A PREOCCUPATION WITH “THE NATURE OF REALITY AND THINGS NOUMENAL”:
Abandoning ALL identifications and "Identifications"
If Maharaj was so dedicated to abandoning all religious personalities and all spiritual personalities, then for the sake of honesty and consistently, he also had to abandon all other personal self-identities and Self-Identities as well.
The self-identities had to go because they trigger the use of ego-defense mechanisms which generate arrogance and thoughts and feelings and desires and fears. Recall that Maharaj said of arrogance that it "pollutes and dulls the psyche."
And what inspires self-identity assumption or even Self-Identity assumption? He said: When it comes to thoughts and feelings, desires and fears you become acutely self-conscious." Yes, both self-identifications and Self-Identification are rooted in "thoughts and feelings, desires and fears."
Both
(1) Reality and (2) natural abidance NOW
happen beyond any religious identification and role-assumption and role-playing; happen beyond spiritual identification and role-assumption and role-playing; and happen beyond any self or Self or Supreme Self-identification and role-assumption and role-playing.
There in the loft and here as well, the invitation has been to abide naturally, to abide as Your Original, pure awareness nature. And what - according to Maharaj - is the evidence if one is abiding as that original nature of pure awareness? He said that the abidance happens “without the least trace of self-consciousness.”
He said: “Freedom happens when self-consciousness is no more” (and when “Self”- consciousness is no more, too, saying: “Self-remembering is a mental state" and "reality is beyond” that).
He said: "The basic unity operates in spite of all. At the root of it all lies Self-forgetfulness; not knowing who I am." But he clarified that point later: "Self-remembering is a mental state and self-forgetting is another. They alternate like day and night. Reality is beyond both."
Thus, Maharaj made clear that seekers were to be rid of all self-identification, asking, “Are you a person during the gaps in self-consciousness?” The answer is, of course not. Yet he also said: “You cannot possibly say that you are what you think yourself to be! Your ideas about yourself change from day to day and from moment to moment. Your self-image is the most changeful thing you have”
and
“Self-identifications are patently false and the cause of bondage.”
But he did not stop there. Speaking of what some term “the True Self,” Maharaj said: “Get rid of all ideas about Your Self, even of the idea that You are God. No Self-definition is valid.”
A name familiar to most who have studied the pointers offered by Maharaj, Douwe Tiemersma, said: “Most people live in the world of self-consciousness and do not have the desire or power to leave it.”
Maharaj: “Selfishness is always destructive. Desire and fear, both are self-centred states. Between desire and fear anger arises; with anger, hatred; with hatred, passion for destruction.”
A man named Mark has been mentioned in this series. It was he who shot his wife in the back as she was trying to run away from him. That came after he had assumed multiple self-identities which felt threatened, including "The Husband," "The Father," "The Homeowner," "The Finance Man," etc. When the false identities he desired to maintain felt threatened, that first triggered fear. Then, “between desire and fear, anger arose; with anger, hatred; with hatred, passion for destruction.”
Another person discussed in this series, Dylann Roof, shot nine black people in a church. He wrote in his online “manifesto” that he had been “inspired by a national ‘white rights’ group that opposes the mixing of the races.” That is, his assumption of multiple self-identities was inspired by a group which arrogantly believes in and spreads their beliefs about the concepts of “separate from,” “different-from” and “better-than.”
Roof then wrote: “We have no skinheads, no real KKK, no one doing anything but talking on the Internet. Well someone has to have the bravery to take it to the real world, and I guess that has to be me.”
“I am ‘The Brave One’” and “We need a race war and I am “The One To Start A Race War” and "I Am The One to Get Done What Skinheads and KKK Members Are Not Getting Done." In his case also, “between desire and fear, anger arose; with anger, hatred; with hatred, passion for destruction.”
Maharaj: "The realised man is egoless; he has lost the capacity of identifying himself with anything"
and
"Your burden is of false self-identifications -- abandon them all."
That must include all personal identities, all religious self-identifications, all spiritual self-identifications, and all Supreme Self-identities as well.
Maharaj ran out of the loft those who came and who were subsumed in their Supreme Self Identity. Those playing that role do not come here, either, and if they do happen to show up, the case has always been that they do not stay here long.
Neither a self-conscious one nor a Self-conscious one can tolerate even the slightest exposure to the kind of authenticity which results from a no-identity and no-Identity state. It is anathema to them. Only the counterfeit feels "right" to them. Only the false feels comfortable to them. Only a "righteous" or "lofty" or "supreme" image feel good to them. So it is.
To be continued.
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Here, with those who are still driven to talk about "God," the "Son of God," the "Holy Spirit," "Buddha," "Krishna," etc., etc., etc., the invitation to them is to view those as verbs, not nouns.
THE EXPLANATION
If looked at as nouns, they point to illusions and are, therefore, a total waste of time to even discuss; if looked at as verbs which are resulting in certain sane but rare behaviors among humanity, then they are worthy of some attention during the relative existence.
Meaning? There are members of certain groups who say things such as "My concept of God in the past was of a weak God, an absentee God, A Santa Claus-type God, a mean, punishing, vindictive God, etc. Today, I am in close contact with a loving and caring God whom I worship and praise and glorify and give thanks to."
The reply to that usually goes like this: "If you are in contact with a God that wants to be worshipped and praised and glorified, then you're dealing with someone like yourself - a narcissist - and hanging out with narcissists will never bring an end to your narcissism (that narcissism evidenced by the fact that you think you are "godly").
Next, in the phrase 'loving and caring God,' any supposed God that truly had her or his act together would tell you that the totally irrelevant part of that phrase is 'God' and that the only part
"That is, a non-narcissistic god / goddess would say, "I care not an iota about being worshipped and praised and glorified by you or anyone else. How arrogant and insecure and needy would I have to be to want that? Forget the man-made, dreamed up noun 'God' and focus on the 'God as a verb' understanding and then go forth and let loving and caring be verbs - not adjectives - and let them generate the act of love and the act of caring and let those actions manifest through you."
Yeshu'a (Jesus) and Pope John Paul II and Pope Francis were spot on:
"No one shall ever see 'the kingdom of heaven.' It is within"
and
"Heaven and earth shall fade away."
and
"Heaven and hell are not geographic places but are states of mind, nothing more than concepts dreamed up by men"
and
"There is no hell."