TODAY'S CONSIDERATIONS
ANNOUNCEMENTS
1. [See the offer in gold text following this post for details on how you can watch a retreat on video which includes a detailed discussion of all seven of the steps on the path as used by Maharaj]
2. 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 green text after today's post for the full meaning and implications of that.
3. A new video ("Number Ten: Awakening Together Satsang, March 2018") has now been added in the far right column of this page, offering the opportunity to view a recent 2018 satsang session with Floyd being interviewed by Regina and Jacqueline of "The Awakening Together Group." (See the details in the blue text after this post.)
YOU ARE NOT A BODY
(and you are not a composite unity
nor
anything created
nor
anything born
nor
anything personal
nor
anything which shall survive in any human or human-like form)
So what did Maharaj have to say about the body specifically?
"Subsequent to that 'I Am' and body-mind [that is, following the manifestation of the consciousness and the assumption of false identifications] there occurs what you call 'spiritual seeking' or 'spiritual knowledge'. This is nonsense."
"Looking outside for light and sound, all disciples undergo some spiritual experience and that itself is bondage. They compare their experiences with others. Those disciples think they are very advanced.”
“They are attracted to the experiences of sound and light, etc., because they identify themselves with the body. They want a shape and design; therefore, they revel in experiences which indicate shape and design."
"I appear to hear and see and talk and act, but to me it just happens, as to you digestion or perspiration happens. The body-mind machine looks after it, but leaves me out of it. Just as you do not need to worry about growing hair, so I need not worry about words and actions. They just happen and leave me unconcerned, for in my 'world,' nothing ever goes wrong."
" . . . Remain unaffected. This complete aloofness, unconcern with mind and body, is the best proof that - at the core of your being - you are neither mind nor body."
“From the Absolute no-knowing state, spontaneously, this consciousness ‘I am’ has appeared—there is no reason, no cause.”
"Prior to taking this form, you were formless; spontaneously the form came, and when the form came there was a natural longing to return to the formless state. When you want to return to the formless, desireless state, then only you come here, [to the loft] to seek what you are. The consciousness has to know the consciousness. When it realizes itself, then only do you return to normal."
"After the information given to you by the mother, that you are a boy or girl, all your further acquisitions are by hearsay."
"Understand that it is not the individual which has consciousness; it is the consciousness which assumes innumerable forms."
“In order to manifest itself, the consciousness needs a frame, a particular construct in which it can appear.”
“Consciousness is present everywhere, but knowledge of that consciousness is dependent on the form.”
“Every organic being, whether an insect or a human, depends on food. All these flowers, this foliage, is our antecedent state.”
[Emphasizing that you are not the body]: “When you travel in a car, are you the car?”
[So what "you" which is "traveling in or moving about in "the car" called "the body"? The conscious-energy.]
“ . . . You are the light.”
[That is, you are energy, specifically, the conscious-energy. As scientist Szent-Gyorgyi said, “What drives life is thus a little electric current, set up by the sunshine.”]
“From birth, what has made the body grow? It is no power in the world. It is the power of beingness, the atom, the Self, the consciousness . . . call it what you will.”
“When the birth is disproved, the great noble meaning of spirituality and the meaning of this world—everything—is disproved" and “If they come face-to-face with that root, they will be stunned into silence.”
[Thus those who talk and talk and talk have not realized that root.]
" . . . By clinging to the body, you hand yourself over to time and death - you are imposing it on yourself."
"Don’t you see that all your problems are your body’s problems - food, clothing, shelter, family, friends, name, fame, security, survival; all these lose their meaning the moment you realise that you may not be a mere body."
"I cramped myself into a small thing, a body; I made myself a fragment and became needful. I need so many things as a body."
"Consciousness opens the gate for you to transcend consciousness. There are two aspects; one is conceptual, dynamic consciousness which is full of concepts, and the other is transcendent consciousness. Even the concept 'I Am' is not there. Conceptual, qualitative Brahman, the one that is full of concepts and is qualitative, is the outcome of the functioning body."
"It is selfishness, due to a self-identification with the body, that is the main problem and the cause of all other problems."
"Consciousness has identified with a form. Later, it understands that it is not that form and goes further. In a few cases it may reach the space, and very often, there it stops. In a very few cases, it reaches its real source, beyond all conditioning."
"It is difficult to give up that inclination of identifying the body as the self. I am not talking to an individual, I am talking to the consciousness."
"I have told you many times what your true state is, but, through force of habit, you again descend into body identification. A stage has now arrived at which you must give up this bodily identification. The bodily activities will continue until the body drops off, but you should not identify with them."
"It is not identification as a person, as you think. The body is an aid for the manifestation of consciousness, for experiencing. So long as this consciousness exists, it needs an instrument; without the body, consciousness cannot exist in that form.”
“What is lost is the feeling of being a separate entity. A jñani is like an unborn child: the consciousness is the child when it is born, and the child is sick. This material, objective body is sick. The jñani cannot be sick."
"Having stabilized in the consciousness, the next step is to be in a position to observe the consciousness, and all the play that is happening in the consciousness, just to understand. Attachment to the body and to the consciousness is very strong; to get rid of it is very difficult."
"You did not know your own existence after you were born. Nine months in the womb and for sometime afterwards that 'I am so and so' is absent. When you start recognizing your mother, then you also come to be aware of your own existence. That 'I Amness' comes sometime later. Mother teaches you, in ignorance, that you are the body and you begin to believe that.”
“Your mind also starts slowly to develop. So right from the beginning, because of ignorance, the Absolute does not know itself; and because of the body, it started knowing that it is - 'I AM'. Because of the ignorance, you had to ask somebody, 'Who am I?'; otherwise, you would not have asked anybody. Even so-called incarnations such as Rama were like this, they had to be taught.”
“The incarnations are just like you. The bondage with the body came because of wrong teaching, and then the guru came and told you that you are not the body, and then you were liberated. That is why all these births are taking place.”
“If you knew of the bondage, you would refuse the birth. But because the 'I Amness' is absent, you are trapped. Because the 'I Amness' is a quality of the body, later on you come to know you are and that you are trapped. But once You know, you are liberated."
"You can watch the body, so you are not the body. You can watch the breath, so you are not the vital breath. In the same way, you are not the consciousness; but you have to become one with the consciousness.”
“As you stabilize in the consciousness, dispassion for the body and for the expressions through the body occur spontaneously. It is a natural renunciation, not a deliberate one. It does not mean that you should neglect your worldly duties; carry these out with full zest."
"Before you were 'born', could you have felt or sensed or known that you exist? A jñani is free because he sees that the body is made up of five elements and it works according to the nature of these elements. I see that body, but I am not concerned with whatever that body does. There is nothing in it with which I identify.”
“The sense of the combination of the five elements is the sense of being, of existing. It has all come simultaneously. I have no part in it. Feeling that I am present depends on having a body. I am neither the body nor the conscious presence. In this body is the subtle principle 'I Am'; that principle witnesses all this. You are not the words. Words are the expression of space; they are not yours. Still further, you are not that 'I Am'."
[So, to be completely accurate, “you” are not even the temporarily-manifested composite unity but are that which is conscious of the composite unity. Moreover, the closest thing there is to a “True Self” or “Real Self” is not even “The Witness” but is, instead, “Pure Witnessing.”]
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 relevant is the "loving and caring" part.
"That is, a non-narcissistic their god / their 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"
--Yeshu'a (Jesus)
and
"Heaven and earth shall fade away."
--Yeshu'a (Jesus)
and
"Heaven and hell are not geographic places
but are states of mind, nothing more than
concepts dreamed up by men."
--Pope John Paul II
"There is no hell."
--Pope Francis, the current pope
in an interview with journalist Eugenio Scalfari,
a writer used by the Pope to issue off the record
teachings which become a part of the Papal Magisterium.
[That said, would that the popes who have shown the courage to reject a core concept of their dogma - namely, "hell" - would find the additional courage required to question the very existence of their institution in light of the centuries-long cover-up of their history of raping children and in light of the mental and emotional and psychological scarring of billions of their members past and present.
And that need for courage also applies as questions need to be asked about why so many other sky cults are still being supported and allowed to continue to exist as well. When certain types of programming and conditioning have been shown to blind the masses, they should end. Will they? Not likely. Why?
Because what the masses think and say and do is most influenced by the international crime families which hold sway over the masses as criminals conduct their planet-wide operations. What are the major international crime families and which are the most influential and have the largest memberships?
The Mafia / La Cosa Nostra; the Catholic Church (with it 1.2 billion followers) whose Vatican Bank worked for decades with the Mafia while laundering mob earnings (for a 15% all-profit charge by the Bank); Protestant and Evangelical Churches (with over 1.2 billion followers) like the one I was raised in where the youth director molested and sexually assaulted young girls; big business which has long created environments in which people have been abused; powerful political bodies like the U.S. Congress, etc., etc., etc.)
With all of those crime families, neither the followers nor the leadership ever voluntarily step down or shut down their criminal activities. Be they gangs, organized crime families, religions, big business, politicians, etc., they all want control and they all want power and they all want money, and nothing internal will interfere with the driving forces at play.
The masses must demand that all those in charge must step down and their groups and institutions must shut down, and there's the real problem because the continuation of their crimes are enabled not as much by the people running such crime organizations as they are enabled by the masses of people who - wanting some perceived "payoff" - remain involved with them and give them money and support them and aid and abet the continued existence of those criminal enterprises and thus facilitate the ability of church criminals and political criminals and other types of criminals to continue to commit their crimes.]
Here's
the direct link to the VIDEO VERSION
of the "Awakening Together" satsang session with Regina and Jacqueline referenced earlier, 18 MARCH 2018
or
You can click on the picture link which has now been added for video "Number Ten" in the upper right-hand column on this page.
If preferred, here's
the direct link to the AUDIO VERSION
of that session.
