THE FOUR METHODS FOR TEACHING ADVAITA VEDANTA, Part Two

FROM A SITE VISITOR: I’m lost. I’ve read every book I can get my hands on about Advaita Vedanta. I’ve studied the words of Adi Shankaracharya, Ramakrishna, Ramana Maharshi, Swami Vivekanada, Nisargadatta Maharaj, and now you. And it all seems like one contradiction after another. That was the whole problem with everything I tried before Advaita Vedanta--one contradiction after another. Some teachers say I have to love everyone. The next teacher doesn’t even mention love. Some talk poetically. Others talk in what I would call a realistic way and delivery their points in a hard, smack you between-the-eyes style. So what’s the deal? I got involved with AV because I was looking for sanity but I’m going nuts in the process. Greg.

F.: Today, the fourth method of teaching Advaita will be discussed:

TEACHING METHOD: The Direct Path
First, all of the following pointers about the Direct Path Method come either from Dennis Waite or from Advaitins quoted in his book BACK TO THE TRUTH: 5000 Years of Advaita, (including pointers from Atmananda Krishna Menon, Francis Lucille, Ramana Maharshi, Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, Gregory Goode, and John Wheeler). These are the basic principles of the Direct Path Method which distinguish it from the other methods:

· This method provisionally acknowledges "the seeker" and "the guru" though proclaiming unambiguously that there is only the Self.

· The Direct Path provides a means by which untruth is removed via arguments.

· The teachers that use this method understand that once Realization happens, life carries on with itself, by itself, without our intervention.

· Self-Inquiry—not bhakti or worship or disciplines—is the principle means of Realizing.

· There is no do-er.

· Beliefs must be deconstructed for Realization to happen.

· Rather than seeking without (via god, gods, or “holy” writings) the Direct Path Method emphasizes seeing directly that truth which can be known from within, via the inner guru or the inner resource. (NOTE: The gurus/teachers that use this method always eventually invite the seeker to go within but only after the obstacles which block seeing with clarity—namely, obstacles such as concepts and beliefs—have been removed. fh]

· After Realization comes about via an understanding of the pointers offered via the Direct Path Method, the natural freedom of one’s true nature prevails for the remainder of the manifestation (hence, the connection with the nisarga yoga, or natural yoga, approach).

· The Direct Path Method is not goal-oriented or prescriptive (as is Neo-Vedanta, for example) and attempts to simply point out the way things are.

· Often using present experiences as data or examples, the Direct Path Method deconstructs the existing body of presumptions, the belief systems, and the psychological structures—all of which make persons feel separate, vulnerable, and cut off from reality. [NOTE: What persons call “problems” all arise via the warped consciousness, the bogus “mind,” the ego-states assumed as identities by persons, and the personality disorders that result; therefore, the teacher that uses the Direct Path Method must have some advanced understanding of the principles of psychology. fh]

· When the illogical, unreasonable, and irrational nature of psychological structures are held up to the light of awareness for a seeker that is capable of being logical and reasonable and rational, the psychological structures peacefully dissolve.

· An awakening happens that is marked by sweetness, by an immediacy, and by a gapless clarity which is awareness itself. And quite often, there’s laughter!

· The Direct Path Method actually does not prescribe a “path” or “journey” as such since You Are already That Which you seek; however, a student-guru arrangement is usually required since the understanding must be delivered in a series of progressive “steps” that must be taken in an exact order. The advanced steps are built on the foundation of the preceding steps, so each step must be understood completely before a seeker can move to the next.

· Rather than practicing disciplines and adhering to esoteric paths and preachings, this method attempts instead to deconstruct persons’ everyday view of “the world” and “themselves” in order to guide protégés to an understanding of what they are not in order to understand That Which They Truly Are. [NOTE: With Realization, Consciousness, Awareness, the beingness, the non-beingness, and the Absolute are all understood; thereafter, the relative existence happens spontaneously for the remainder of the manifestation of consciousness.]

So that is the take on the Direct Path from several Advaitin teachers as offered in Dennis Waite's book. Others aspects of the method will now be offered.

This method does not try to “give” seekers anything since Direct Path teachers know that, ultimately, there is no seeker and that there is no “one” to “gain” and that there is nothing to be gained; conversely, the Direct Path teachers know that too much has been given to seekers already (namely, all of the false dogma and concepts and ideas and beliefs which now block seekers from seeing reality and from Realizing truth). Please enter the silence of contemplation. (To be continued)
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THE DIRECT (SEVEN-STEP) PATH TO REALIZATION, Part One

FROM A SITE VISITOR: Do some people just suddenly realize or does everyone have to go through the seven steps you talk about? If so, why seven and why any exact order.

F.: Thx for the questions. If you were to, first, understand the seven steps that are explained in the book FROM THE I TO THE ABSOLUTE (A Seven-Step Journey to Reality) and then, next, read the pointers offered by the “sages” over the centuries, you would see references to all seven of the steps (or "stages," to use Maharaj's word) in the pointers offered. The same seven steps referenced on this site can all be found in the talks or in the writings of most of the earliest “Spiritual Masters” as well as in the talks or in the writings of some of the more recent “Masters” such as Sri Ramana Maharshi and Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj. The only difference is, no one before has presented the steps in their specific order.

Yet Maharaj did advise those seeking to shift from identifying with the false “I” to abiding as the Absolute to “follow the same path by which you came” and “…You should go back, reverse, to the source.” To “go back” to the Absolute in the ‘”reverse” order in which the movement from the Absolute to identification with the “I” happened, why must the steps be followed in a particular order (just as Maharaj said), and why are they not always presented in that exact fashion? Both of those will be explained in the next few postings.

Traditionally, when a seeker arrived at the feet of a “Realized Master” to discuss THAT which is eternal, he/she would be allowed to make brief comments and/or ask a question. (Another format involves the "Master" offering opening remarks and then taking questions that reveal "path location of the questioner" and then providing level-appropriate answers.) There is a sound, logical reason for that approach: a jnani, after hearing a few comments by (or questions from) a seeker can pinpoint immediately “where” the seeker is on the “path.” For example, is the seeker still fixated in body identification? Or is the seeker still trapped in the obsession-of-the-mind stage? Or has the seeker moved beyond that stage, stopped identifying with most of the false identities that had been assigned or adopted in the past, but is now trapped in a religious or spiritual false identity/ego-state?

A sage’s response is, and always has been, “level-appropriate.” Responses should provide the pointer(s) required for a seeker to shift to the next stage of re-purification or to at least be free of certain specific deceptions that are revealed in the seeker’s words. The result of any such daily sessions was, and is, a shift of one level, not a movement through several steps to Full Realization all at once.

While the nine satsanga sessions offered in the retreats linked on this site use a direct path approach that reveals all seven steps in order, the more traditional approach described above (whereby seekers at varied stages are responded to in varied ways) is the one used on this site. Why? Questions are answered in whatever order they are received, and questions arrive in no particular order from seekers who are at varied stages on the “journey.” The response to one, therefore, will not be the same response to another. Further, the chances are nil that seven persons at seven levels will submit seven questions in the exact order of the seven steps, and even if they did, the explanations and guidance through the seven steps are book-length, not post-length. So visitors to this site might read a response to a seeker at level 6 on one day and an entirely different response to a seeker at level 1 on the next day.

For example, the March 7, 2007 response was aimed at the level of one trapped in the identification of a specific persona (husband). The March 9, 2007 response was to one enamored with his accumulated knowledge—trapped in the dilemma of wanting to show off his knowledge to people on one hand but wanting to isolate from people on the other hand. The invitation to him, therefore, was to consider abandoning the ego-state that loves to display accumulated knowledge and seek SELF-knowledge instead. The March 10, 2007 was geared to one still at the rudimentary levels. Note that those three discussions were not presented in the order in which the steps are taken in order for Full Realization to happen. The questions were answered in the order received. In the multi-day retreats, however, where attendees are being guided through all of the steps, the specific order is observed.

The “Masters” showed that the level of each seeker much be determined and then the specific seeker must be responded to accordingly. If some seeker is at the “wet charcoal” stage rather than at the “dry charcoal” stage, that seeker will be addressed at the “wet charcoal” stage with pointers intended to allow a movement to the “dry charcoal” stage. If one is at the “gunpowder stage” and only requires a few key pointers in order for Realization to explode into consciousness, that seeker will be provided those pointers, not “wet-charcoal-level pointers.”

Are you beginning to see why level-appropriate responses might cause confusion when you read something one day that is written for a seeker at level 5 but then you read the next day a response that is for a seeker at level 2? That explains why confusion happens so often when seekers read collections of transcripted talks (such as Maharaj's I AM THAT) wherein pointers offered on one page seemingly contradict pointers offered on the very next page. It is the audience that is varied, not the answer, but confusion often results among readers nevertheless. That is why, at some point, you need to know the exact order in which the stages must be transitioned, and that is why most do require a "guide," at least temporarily, that can point the way along the "path." Please enter the silence of contemplation.

[ www.floydhenderson.com/iamabsolute.htm ]