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 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.)
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?
6. 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 to visit Floyd's bookstore which offers both digital books and paperback books which deal with non-duality, non-duality-based fictional adventures, recovery, and financial budgeting.
ARE YOU AT THE WET CHARCOAL STAGE OR THE GUNPOWDER STAGE?
(Most haven’t a clue and must be told)
“It has been observed that 'wet charcoal' stage seekers often believe that they are at the gunpowder stage, or beyond”
and
“That especially applies to ‘Religios’ and ‘Spiritual Giants’.”
--floyd
Visitor to Loft: “A man like you should set an example.”
Maharaj: “Are you ready to follow my example?”
and
“Everything
happens all the time, but you must be ready for it. Readiness is ripeness. You
do not see the real because your mind is not ready for it.”
--Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
“The
readiness is all.”
--William Shakespeare
LEVELS OF SEEKERS
The non-dual British playwright William Shakespeare of the late 1500’s and the early 1600’s said, “The readiness is all.”
To clarify the readiness levels of seekers:
The Lowest Level: PSEUDO-SEEKERS:
Pseudo-Seekers are, as the name implies, not really seekers at all. They are cons, and they have conned others so much that they now unconsciously con themselves as well.
When “threatened” by a spouse that they need to join a “self-help” group and get free of their problem, they might join such a group.
I met a fellow in one such group who for years had conned his rich grandmother into being one of his enablers. He was comfortable quitting a job the first time a boss demanded he actually complete his tasks or he was going to be fired.
He could go to his grandmother’s home and cry about being mistreated and she would replace the income he had just lost because he told the boss to “shove it.” He could do the same when he needed money to pay off gambling debts when threatened by “collectors.”
He could go to her when he had blown on drugs and alcohol and prostitutes the funds she had already given him. But finally, her children got through to the grandmother and showed her that she was an enabler and begged her to cut him off. She did.
So with a wife threatening to take the children and leave and with his chief financial enabler ending the cash flow into his bank account, he decided he’d join AA as part of his con to keep his wife and to get his grandmother to get her money tap flowing once more.
On the anniversary of his first year in the group, they brought a celebratory cake to their meeting place and he was allowed to speak to them.
Ah what a story he told of the miracles he had experienced after having been “restored to sanity.” His dry drunk was mistaken for sobriety.
Armed with pictures of him behind a podium and with his cake and photos of him being hugged by many, he headed back to his grandmother’s house. His story would include the fact that he had spent a year focused on his sobriety and that is why he did not seek employment during that period.
Then, he proudly announced, hoping to be rewarded with money from her, “Grandmother, I haven’t had a drink for 365 days.”
She replied, “And I haven’t had a drink for 82 years. Get the hell out of my house and don’t come back.” She saw him for the con and the pseudo-seeker that he was. He was as asleep to his truth as ever, but she was finally awake to his con and aware of what enabling was all about.
The Next Level: Those similar to WET CHARCOAL:
True seekers at the highest level are “on fire,” ready to do whatever is required to realize and become awake and aware and conscious. Those possibly seeking to some degree but still at the lowest level are said to be at the “Wet Charcoal Stage.” They often practice denial.
They are not on fire. They are not ready for the level of awareness of truth which can begin to burn away their ignorance and insanity, no matter how convinced they are that they have arrived at that point.
Then: Those similar to DRY CHARCOAL:
The dry charcoalers are becoming honest enough to witness their past insanity. Insanity is universal but manifests to greater or lesser degrees. They are awakening to that fact. Being “dry,” getting them fired up and starting to burn might be possible.
As Maharaj said, “Insanity is universal. Sanity is rare. Yet there is hope, because the moment we perceive our insanity, we are on the way to sanity.” Those at the dry charcoal level may well be “on the way to sanity.”
Those approaching The Highest Level of Readiness: GUNPOWDER
Seekers at the gunpowder stage are among a very small group. Only a few will reach a point where they are ready for the Ultimate Medicine to dissolve away the fiction-based beliefs they have been taught or to explode their belief systems and allow them to give up all attachment to the false beliefs which they have stored in the mind-parts of their brain.
Maharaj’s “game plan” was this: If you come here as gunpowder, I will provide the spark to trigger its denotation.
Some said that they visited Maharaj but he gave them nothing to hang onto. The same has happened here. Does that mean that the pointers offered in the loft or offered here were useless? Or does it mean that the listener’s hearing was blocked by accumulations in the ears (or by egotism-generated beliefs stored in the listeners / non-listener’s mind)?
It has been said that, “Any person who thinks that he or she knows anything (or, even more debilitating, knows it all), actually understands nothing yet.”
To be continued.
Please enter into the silence of contemplation.
To watch the most recent talk and Q&A with Walter and his guests, click:
Walter Driscoll and Floyd Henderson
To watch the interview when Walter and Floyd discussed the fact that the Ultimate Sickness is a mental / mind sickness and why learning more is not the answer and why unlearning is the answer, click:
