ANNOUNCEMENTS
[Walter Driscoll asked to interview me in order to preserve on video some of the latest modifications and evolutions in the versions of the message offered here since 1989. He would label the discussion, "Unlearning with Floyd Henderson."
Please note: For those who have a problem hearing what is being shared, the video offers a fairly accurate set of closed captions which some listeners might want to activate.
The interview is available for viewing by clicking on video "NUMBER THIRTEEN" in the column to the right.]
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.)
4. Some prefer paperback books even if they have to wait a day or so to receive it and have to pay more for a printed book and its shipment. Now, 10 paperback books by Henderson are in print and available in two anthologies through Barnes and Noble, Amazon, and over 40,000+ booksellers around the globe including in the Americas, Germany, India, Italy, Poland, Russia, China, Spain, Brazil and South Korea. See the end of this post in red text for details.
5. Would you like to have us send to someone as a gift from you a copy of any ebook in our inventory? See the offer in purple text at the end of this post.
6. Or, you may purchase a Floyd Henderson Shopify Gift Card here for someone and offer recommendations for the books in Floyd's store which might be of assistance to them.
7. You may click here
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deal with non-duality, non-duality-based fictional adventures, recovery,
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Grasping a Clearer Understanding of Non-Dual Terms
Sleepwalking and sleep talking persons dominate most cultures on planet earth. Wherever nonsense and ignorance are normalized, there is a higher than usual level of the unquestioning acceptance.
The most outrageous statements or claims can be spoken or written and the masses there allow concepts to be implanted in their minds without being even slightly aware of what just happened.
In such cultures, the use of oxymorons always prevails and are seldom questioned; thus, the masses in those cultures are conditioned to accept self-contradictory words and term and pointers as truth.
An oxymoron is defined as “a self-contradicting word or pair of words or groups of words.” An example was offered yesterday, namely, “conventional wisdom.” Of course there is no such thing.
Examples offered in the past include such contradictory terms as “military intelligence,” a “definite possibility,” “imperfect perfection,” “controlled chaos,” an “organized mess,” “jumbo shrimp,” the “American dream,” “true myth,” a “wide fool,” George Bush’s a “compassionate conservative,” etc.
The non-dual understanding should be a simple message. Maharaj noted time and again that it is a simple understanding.
Yet it has become a near-impossible-to-grasp message as a result of pedantic, sophistic persons complicating the message as happened with the non-duality-based pointers offered by “Yeshu’a” (a.k.a., known incorrectly as “Jesus” or “Jesus the Christ” meaning “Jesus the Anointed One,” meaning “the anointed son of King David, based in the belief of some Jews that Yeshu’a was expected to restore the fortunes of Israel”).
The current discussion is attempting to cast some light on the plethora of totally-misunderstood-but now-commonplace terms / concepts which have become commonplace among some “non-dual seekers and Big Name teachers.”
The next self-contradictory group of words to be discussed are “becoming who you are.”
Is there anything that can be something other than what it
is? Is it possible to not be what you are but to someday become what you are? Ignoring the fact that there is no "who" or "WHO" to begin with or to end with, do you see the ignorance behind that notion of "becoming who / what you are"?
“Becoming what you are” would involve changing one’s identity at some point, while “realized non-dualists” understand that any identity is false, so whatever persons think they are now - and whatever they think they will supposedly be at some future point - is all an impossibility.
As with oxymorons, that belief is totally contradictory, yet one can read the writings of Danna Yahav, James Martin, Dutch Sheets, Thomas Merton, Stasi Eldredge, Michael Bryant (who goes farther and discusses “becoming who you are meant to be”), and with an assortment of teachers who claim to be non-dualists, there are many who will be glad to explain how you can become what you are.
Even Alan Watts, whose pointers were often spot on, wrote a book entitled “Become What You Are.” Of course, it’s been made clear here that both Maharaj and I “missed the boat” time and again as well. This “Mea Culpa” and “Maharaj Culpa” was written seven years ago on this site:
In the case of the first 8,000 or so who came to hear "floyd," and in the case of the hundreds of thousands who went to hear Maharaj, the fact is this:
the pure consciousness - blocked in both cases throughout the early years of sharing - was not able to speak as the totally-unblocked, pure, universal consciousness speaks (to the relative misfortune of those who listened back then).
Moreover, it is a tendency among many other persons to only
"hear" what they want to hear. As with "Early Maharaj,"
some came for what they took to be "a religious message," and they
heard one. Others came later for what they took to be "a spiritual
message," and they heard that.
In both cases, seekers were hearing "Maharaj Lite" (and here, the
earliest visitors were hearing "Diet Floyd"). Both drinks were
intoxicating for those who came for nothing more than reinforcement of their
bogus beliefs but who were actually, subconsciously, content to remain thirsty
. . . totally dry . . . even parched.
Both "Maharaj Lite" and "Diet Floyd" were yet adulterated and therefore unable to quench the thirst for truth or understanding or realization or freedom from the ravages of the Ultimate Sickness which some were seeking.
Later, when the unadulterated versions of the drinks were offered, those seekers sought out more popular “Big Name Teachers” who offered - and still offer - the yummy kind of drinks which they desired.
Many who visit nowadays claim that they really are placing an order for a "Big Gulp of a BS-Free Beverage," but when the order is filled and they receive their first no-BS taste, it becomes clear that what they really desire is a big dollop of "Super Sweet Spiritual Cream" dropped on as a topping in order for that "Heavenly Splotch of Sugary Syrupiness" to provide a more palatable taste, a flavor more like what they are accustomed to.
So the simple message regarding this topic is the following:
Since all is energy / matter and neither of those can be created or destroyed, then “what one is” is something that has always been, namely, THAT energy / matter which has always been and which can be cycled but cannot be “made.”
One cannot “become” what one is and has always been, namely, THAT.
As for the IS-ness or AM-ness, that is a temporary state which exists when a speck of consciousness / conscious-energy manifests when it is pulled into a process of cycling, be it cycling in the elemental plant body knows as a fish or a bird or a human; but any label or identity assigned or assumed during the manifestation is a total falsehood.
Humans might “play a role or roles,” but they are not players or those roles or anything else.
Is the non-dual summative statement “I AM THAT; I AM” a contradiction? No. The terms merely point to the fact that energy / matter can change locations, not identities, so . . .
energy-matter might be located in the actual, real, universal, eternal and infinite no-knowing, no-awareness field of unmanifested energy or in the temporary, finite field of manifested (conscious-) energy which will return eventually to the unmanifested field from which it came.
The point: you . . .
(currently a manifested “composite unity” called “a human,” both terms to be used for the sake of discussion only and then tossed aside) . . .
are THAT.
Manifested or not, you can never be anything but THAT, also a term used for the sake of discussion only.
So ignore even THAT as a label, and ignore ignorance-based instructions on “how you can become what you are.”
Thus, you need not spend your life involved in religious or spiritual or non-dual workaholism, trying to do the impossible and “become what you are.”
Maharaj said, “Living is life’s only purpose,” not “Spending all of your energy for an entire lifetime, working and working and working to become what you already are, is your purpose.”
Most humans will not accept that pointer, but the deer and
the fish and the birds - all with much smaller brains and far less intelligence
- seem to be doing quite well abiding by that truism and abiding by it . . . naturally and spontaneously.
To be continued.
Please enter into the silence of contemplation.
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For NON-DUALITY AUDIENCES
The Advanced Seekers' Series (344 pages) is an anthology of four books that share Advaita-based, non-duality pointers that can guide seekers to abide as their original nature. Included in the anthology are
"From the I to the Absolute (A Seven-Step Journey to Reality");
"Consciousness / Awareness: The Nature of Reality Beyond SELF-Realization (Peace Every Day When Abiding As the Absolute)";
"From the Absolute to the Nothingness";
and
"The Final Understanding."
from BARNES AND NOBLE by clicking here
or (sometimes less efficiently nowadays in terms of paperback delivery)
This anthology (438 pages) 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:
“What BLISS is and what BLISS is not”
“There’s No Such Thing As Peace of Mind (There’s Only Peace If You’re ‘Out of Your Mind’)”
“Liberation (Attaining Freedom from Personality via Realization)”
“Freedom from Shifting Between States of Happiness and Unhappiness”
“Why You Must Be Empty If You Would Be Full”
and
“When REALITY Is Overlaid on the RELATIVE.”
Order a PAPERBACK copy of The Blissful Abidance Series
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THE EXPLANATION
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
"There is no hell."
teachings which become a part of the Papal Magisterium.
