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 newer 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.)
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CONSCIOUSNESS vs. AWARENESS
Understand then, that it is this conscious presence that you are, so long as the body is there. Once your body is gone, along with the vital breath, consciousness also will leave. Only that which was prior to the appearance of this body-cum-consciousness, the Absolute, the ever-present, is your true identity. That is what we all really are. That is reality. It is here and now. Where is the question of anyone reaching for it?
-Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
ON CONSCIOUSNESS
Maharaj made clear that, if the Understanding comes, no person will remain who could try to meddle in the play of consciousness. He also affirmed that there is no omniscient creator that is meddling in the play.
All is merely happening spontaneously. How did he define spirituality then? Spirituality is merely understanding that (1) a spontaneous play is happening, (2) recognizing the play is a fraud, and then (3) finding the basis of the play.
Maharaj was asked, “Where does consciousness come from?” He answered, “It never comes or goes; it just appears to have come.”
He was also asked, “Where is the seat of consciousness.” He replied, “In every particle of the juice of the body.”
ON AWARENESS
During the days when his body was tormented with the pain of cancer, he said: “I told the consciousness, ‘It is you who is suffering, not I’.”
Unmanifested, awareness is not aware of its
awareness. Neither is consciousness.
Maharaj explained that That which he truly is was prior to consciousness. He made clear that there is no “he” or “who” to experience anything or do anything and that what persons take to be an experience is actually just the consciousness experiencing itself.
He explained that the realized understand that the world, indeed the entire universe, exists in consciousness alone. Neither the world nor the universe is real, and both only seem to appear in consciousness.
Knowing that, he was able to take his stand in the Absolute. In the Absolute, no consciousness of the I-Amness or the Beingness or the Is-ness happens. In the Absolute, there are neither thoughts nor words nor deeds. The Absolute is prior to all of that . . . is prior to consciousness.
Among the non-realized, the consciousness has become identified with the space or form. A few move beyond body identification. Fewer still reach an understanding of what lies beyond the body-mind-personality identities. Even fewer will come to know the source that is beyond all acculturation, programming, and conditioning of the consciousness.
He said: “I am really not manifested. Can you live like that, as the non-manifest?”
Now transcendence of the consciousness has also occurred. With the appearance of consciousness, the Absolute knows it is, knows I Am, temporarily.
Even this primary concept, I-am-ness, is dishonest, just because it is still only a concept. Finally, one has to transcend that also and be in the nirvikalpa state, which means the concept-free state. Then you have no concept at all, not even of I am. In that state one does not know that one is.
Full realization, contrary to “Self-Realization,” is the same as total enlightenment, that is, understanding that You Are the light. Not only does abidance then happen beyond the I am but it also happens beyond the I.
AN OVERVIEW OF CONSCIOUSNESS / AWARENESS
All is matter or energy. Neither was created. Neither can be destroyed. Thus, Consciousness was not created by anyone, nor was it created by any Supreme One.
Just as a mirage is a phenomenonal manifestation that can be witnessed by the naked eye, that which it appears to be can vary from one witness to the next. The identification of what a mirage is remains open to interpretation, depending upon the imaginings of the observer of the image.
In the end, though, it really is just an image. The same happens when consciousness is perceived by the naked eye and is imagined to be something that it is not, such as I am this body.
Does the body / space / form play a role in the manifestation process? Of course, but with no more significance than the space or form known as a plant plays a role in the manifestation process.
Thus Maharaj’s point that the seat of consciousness is in every particle of the juice of the body. The body can be perceived, just as a mirage can be seen, but that does not mean that either is what it is perceived to be. Both are frauds, images only.
Thus, while seekers at one level can be told that consciousness is all there is, at this highest level, another understanding is presented: that which is perceived is not that which is real, and even that which is perceiving is not the real, either.
Maharaj explained that the realized understand that the world, indeed the entire universe, exists in consciousness alone; but since that which persons take to be this world or the universe is not the reality that it is taken to be via consciousness, then consciousness is the perpetrator of myths as well. If the world that the I Am takes to be its place of existence is a lie, then the I am is also a lie.
Since neither the world nor the universe is real, both only seem to appear in Consciousness. Knowing that, the realized take their stand in the Absolute. In the Absolute, no consciousness of the I-Amness or the Beingness or the Is-ness happens. In the Absolute, there are neither thoughts nor words nor deeds. The Absolute is prior to all of that . . . is prior to consciousness.
Recall that Maharaj said, “Understand then, that it is this conscious presence that you are, so long as the body is there. Once your body is gone, along with the vital breath, consciousness also will leave.
Only that which was prior to the appearance of this body-cum-consciousness, the Absolute (the ever-present) is your true identity. That is what we all really are. That is reality. It is here and now. Where is the question of anyone reaching for it?”
He said, “Awareness is not
aware of its awareness. How dissociated was he from body identification? Again,
while that elemental plant food body was in the throes of the physical pain of debilitating cancer,
he said, I told the consciousness, ‘It is you who is suffering, not I’.”
Once consciousness manifests, the Absolute knows it is, knows ‘I Am’, but among the fully realized, transcendence of the consciousness has occurred. Only when abidance happens as the Absolute can peace happen every day.
Beyond the Myth of “SELF”-Realization
If it is understood how the consciousness is corrupted among humans after manifestation, then it also becomes understood why seekers need a guide (or a guidebook with clear-cut directions, or both).
As a basis for understanding consciousness / Awareness, see why the seeker must transition at least three steps and reach a fourth step in order to reach a state f realization and only thereafter can reach the final understanding:
In the limitless expanse of energy called The Absolute, that energy which has the ability to be aware of, if manifested, is uncontaminated, unconditional, unconditioned, unqualified, unlimited, pure, unadulterated, and unambiguous.
When the consciousness manifests in the space called a human, programming and conditioning and acculturation soon result in it being contaminated, conditioned, impure, adulterated, and ambiguous.
That contaminating process results in multiple degrees of separation from Reality, in multiple degrees of separation from awareness of that which the consciousness truly is and from awareness of its original, unadulterated nature.
Multiple steps were involved in the-gradual-bastardization-of-the-consciousness process, so multiple steps of re-purification must happen if the consciousness is to be restored to its natural, non-dual, no-concept, unadulterated state.
Only after realization can the movement to the next level happen, which is abidance
not merely as the (re-purified) consciousness but as the Absolute.
Even the realized, abiding as the re-purified consciousness, will experience
instability since all manifested consciousness must necessarily involve some
element of duality, conscious of-ness being inescapable in that abidance.
Absolute stabilization can only happen via abidance as the Absolute whereby
awareness happens without anyone thinking there is someone or something that is
present and able to be aware of.
Realization is beyond the playing of the roles of The Super Religious One and / or The Spiritual Giant, and awareness is even beyond that which understands the unicity and the beingness and the non-beingness.
Abidance as the consciousness guarantees that duality will never be forfeited completely. Only the awareness is one without any one. While the pure, universal consciousness can understand the not two. Awareness is the absolute not two.
If you stay alert to the reality of not two-ness, then for the sake of discussion you might take consciousness to be the essence of beingness, the re-purified consciousness to be the essence of non-beingness, and awareness to be the essence of the Reality beyond both beingness and non-beingness.
Now, all that having been said, the basic pointer is this: in the no-concept, non-dual Reality, there is no one thing as opposed to some other thing; therefore, the realized understand that the summative phrase I AM THAT; I AM can be stated and understood without any sense of duality at all. So can consciousness / awareness.
A seeker asked, “Isn’t consciousness all there is?” Yes, if you want to accept that there are levels of consciousness ranging from pure and unadulterated to totally corrupted and that there are modalities of consciousness ranging from manifested or not manifested.
Then you would consider some levels of consciousness to be pure and unmanifested and some levels of consciousness to be manifest and soon-to-be corrupted.
Next, you would likely speak of the THAT state as opposed to the I AM state. If you take that stance, then you would also have to conclude that sugar and sweetness or glue and stickiness are the same.
In the no-concept, non-dual Reality, the key point is that an understanding of awareness / consciousness is only relevant if it guides seekers to the total freedom (during the relative existence) which manifests if abidance happens not as the consciousness but as the unadulterated awareness or the Absolute.
To be continued.
Please enter into the silence of contemplation.
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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.
