SHIFTS IN CONSCIOUSNESS, SHIFTS IN DEEDS, Part Two

FROM A SITE VISITOR: Do you think that the realized should be able to tolerate any kind of environment or any kind of people? It sounds like you are saying that. I’ve been reading your writings for several months and lately, there are people I spent a lot of time with before but now I’m not spending time with them at all. I’m not realized, but even if I were, I feel certain that there are some people I just wouldn’t want to be around. Art

F.: It was noted yesterday that “the forest dweller stage” need not happen literally, yet the stage must be entered into in some fashion in order to transition through the entire consciousness re-purification process. Some form of retreat for contemplation and consideration must happen. The requirements of that stage can be met among some seekers by readings that clarify the teachings; by attending an Advaita retreat or seminar or series of satsang sessions; or by receiving pointers and then engaging in meditation in the originally-intended fashion.

(PLS. NOTE: The original purpose of meditation was not to move into and out of a samadhi state or into and out of different levels of consciousness. The original intent was to be removed from the “maddening crowd” in order to enter the silence so that one could more effectively take a teacher’s pointers into consideration and thereby understand the teachings.

That forest dweller type of “removal from the masses” is required, but it does not require that one abandon employment or other relative existence tasks. The original intent of meditation, instead of being used to try to reach a “no-consciousness state,” called for a highly-focused concentration upon the content and meaning of pointers.

Since the intent is to provide an opportunity to focus on pointers that guide seekers to Realization, then post-Realization the tool is no longer used. Should the Realized seem to be engaged in any Advaita-related happenings post-Realization, it is for the sake of entertainment only.)

Remember also, Art, this fact as you consider the people you “want to be around, or not” during the relative existence: any pointers dealing with “relative living” suggest that it should happen in a natural fashion, and sometimes it is natural to take the action to move toward a place where peculiar, external effects cannot exert an influence.

Consider: long before scientists confirmed the existence of Neptune, they predicted that it existed and they predicted where it was located in relation to other bodies in the outer band of this galaxy. How?

Long before they saw Neptune, they saw effects being exerted on other nearby planets or bodies, causing them to behave in a peculiar fashion. Similarly, persons can exert effects on nearby persons, effects that result in peculiar fashions of living. The non-Realized are like soybeans in that they take on the flavor of whatever they are next to. That does not happen with the Realized, but as noted yesterday, the Realized gravitate toward the silence and solitude anyway.

You may be seeing that some persons in your physical vicinity are exerting a peculiar effect. The effect that Realization might have on that occurrence is irrelevant since you are not realized at this point. Realized, neither “tolerance” nor “a lack of tolerance” will be an issue.

Unlike the bodies being affected in a peculiar way by Nepture, which cannot choose to move to a different location, the Realized can move toward other places and other things as the Advaita Teachings provide freedom from attachments that had formerly paralyzed them and/or held them hostage.

In contrast, the “pecularity” of non-Realized persons with attachments is that that they would prefer company in prison rather than being alone and free. Therefore, while you ask about moving away from some types of persons that you are no longer comfortable with, many persons will stay with those very types.

Their attachments and agendas result in forms of bondage that can generate a “tolerance” for pain if the source has an air of familiarity; that can generate acceptance of misery if in denial; and that can generate a tendency to distort into what they call "love" that which is really a desire to gain power or a desire to have someone meet their financial or sexual needs. So it is. Tomorrow, examples of all three will be discussed. Please enter the silence of contemplation.(To be continued)

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“LOVE,” “FEAR” AND EMOTIONAL INTOXICATION, Part Two

[Received 31 July 2007] You mentioned love-hate in today’s post, but in satsanga you told us that the only two emotions that persons experience are love or fear. Que pasa? Ricardo

F.: You were also told in satsanga, Ricardo, that "truth cannot be stated but it can be known." What if, similarly, that which “Love” is cannot be stated but can be known? You were also told that “Persons desiring to know what love is might benefit more (relatively speaking, of course) if they were able to understand what love is not." Just as all false selves must be seen as false before the True Self can be known, so all false beliefs about “love” must be seen before you can even begin to know what “True Love” is. Thus, the list of what love is not continues from yesterday’s post:

2. Is it possible that love is NOT the love-of-self that drives persons to seek “a compatible partner”? What is a “compatible partner”? Many heterosexual persons actually want an opposite-sex version of themselves. Many homosexual persons want a same-sex version of themselves. Dating services promise to put you in contact with someone who is “compatible with you”…with someone who is “exactly like you,” so it will be easier for “love to bloom” (since that person will really be a version of “you”—of your false selves). If a person is not Realized and is matched by test to someone else, that someone else will also be non-Realized.

Persons are so “in love” with themselves—with their false “selves” and their false identities—that they believe that they can only be happy if they find other persons to associate with who mirror them...who think as they think, feel as they feel, and believe as they believe. Any deviation from that pattern is almost always grounds for war eventually, either among individuals or among individuals comprising nations. The Oneness is not known among the non-Realized, so they are driven to live in the mirror. Their entire life seemingly takes place in the looking glass. To love your own "self" when it is reflected by another is not love at all.

3. Is it possible that love in NOT “the missing ingredient in your life” that can bring you happiness if attained? All absence of happiness and all presence of misery is rooted in perceptions of need, in desires, and in fears. Try to name another area that generates more desire or more fear than “love.” Try to name anything else sought out so vigorously in order to meet perceived needs (that are not truly needs at all but are merely more “wants”). Few areas of your relative existence have superceded “love” in fostering desire, fear, short-term happiness, and long-term misery. If you can boast that you have never experienced the latter, just be patient.

4. Is it possible that love is NOT the gateway to having your needs and wishes met? Your needs are perceived and the actual driving force behind your desires cannot be seen until well along the path to Realization.

5. Is it possible that love is NOT a tool to be used for the manipulation of “others” or “another” to gain more or to satisfy your sense of entitlement…the sense that you are entitled to be taken care of or the sense that you deserve more than you have? Happiness begins when the search for more goes and a contentment with less comes. Happiness becomes fixed when nothing is desired. It reaches a new height during AS IF living when the Void is enjoyed. It reaches the ultimate bliss after it is seen that the Void is the fullness.

6. Is it possible that love is NOT “caring enough” to meet the needs and desires of “another”? That is attachment. That is ego-state defense. That is delusion. And more often than not, if you dig one layer below what many claim to be their “altruistic giving,” what is revealed is a hidden agenda to “get.” The drive toward accumulation follows twenty years of early programming. The shift toward true happiness begins when it is seen that one is left with a sense of emptiness in spite of all that has been accumulated, when one enters into Self-Inquiry, when one finds the Real, and when de-accumulation then happens spontaneously.

7. Is it possible that love is NOT because of? The closest that "love" could be to what is real happens when it is not because of but when it remains in spite of instead.

8. Is it possible that love, needs, and “relationships” are NOT that which is the answer to all your problems but are instead the source of much of your misery?

9. Is it possible that love is NOT that which results when your limbic brain system releases pleasure-producing chemicals when you are attracted to someone? That part of the brain recognizes the familiarity of your “caretakers,” ignoring whether that caretaking was effective or harmful, relatively speaking. It is a chemical reaction, not a “love-reaction,” when “others” attract you because of a subconscious response that you can neither trigger willingly nor halt on your own. There is no such thing as "falling in love" or "love at first sight." There can be "chemical attraction at first sight," which has everything to do with archetypal influences, genetic coding and physiological factors but nothing at all to do with True Love. Please enter the silence of contemplation. (To be continued)
ADDITIONAL READINGS RELATED TO TODAY’S POST:
THE FULL DISUCSSION ON “LOVE” AND THE WAY THAT REALIZATION CAN IMPROVE ALL ASPECTS OF THE RELATIVE EXISTENCE IS DISCUSSED IN CASTING LIGHT ON THE DARK SIDE OF RELATIONSHIPS
WORKING ON ISSUES ARISING IN RELATIONSHIPS WITH THE NON-REALIZED AND ON FINDING SOLUTIONS TO “RELATIONSHIP PROBLEMS”?

Click CASTING LIGHT ON THE DARK SIDE OF RELATIONSHIPS