from self to Self

[roger]

Until we realize we are not the self, or ego, we have created, we cannot fully see that we are the Self, which never was "created."

 

 

I've found that the main reason so many people, including myself, have spent so much time and energy denying Truth, is because the very existence of the "self" they believe they are is dependent on their doing so.

 

 

It's a great relief to be free of the need to defend one's identity/self/ego, when they no longer take that self to be the real them.

[Nikolai1]

So to acknowledge truth spells death for the false self? And this makes us afraid.

 

I think if we continue to avoid the final truth our lives became so empty and meaningless because the truth inside us knows that the world is not enough for us. We reach a point where we no longer fear death because there is nothing left to live for anyway.

 

Maybe this is the moment when we can acknowledge truth without fear, without even the care for our death.

 

Does anyone willingly confront truth? Or must our lives be a living hell before we will be forced to do so?

[9th]

So to acknowledge truth spells death for the false self? And this makes us afraid.

 

Does anyone willingly confront truth? Or must our lives be a living hell before we will be forced to do so?

 

 

B.: The fear of death arises only after the ‘I’-thought arises. Whose death do you fear? To whom does the fear come? So long as

there is identification of the Self with the body, there will be fear.

 

D.: But I am not aware of my body.

 

B.: Who says that he is not aware?

 

D.: I don’t understand. (He was then asked to say what exactly was his method of

meditation. He said: Aham Brahmasmi ‘I am Brahman’.)

 

B.: ‘I am Brahman’ is only a thought. Who says it? Brahman himself does not say so. What need is there for him to say it? Nor can the real ‘I’ say so. For ‘I’ always abides as Brahman. So it is only a thought. Whose thought is it? All thoughts come from the unreal ‘I’, that is the ‘I’-thought. Remain without thinking. So long as there is thought, there will be fear.

 

D.: When I go on thinking on this line, forgetfulness ensues. The brain becomes heated and I become afraid.

 

B.: Yes, the mind is concentrated in the brain and hence you get a hot sensation there. That is because of the ‘I’-thought. So long as there is thought, there will be forgetfulness. There is the thought ‘I am Brahman’; then forgetfulness supervenes; then the ‘I’-thought arises and simultaneously the fear of death also. Forgetfulness and thought exist only for the ‘I’-thought. Investigate this and it will disappear like a phantom. What remains then is the real ‘I’. That is the Self.

 

The thought ‘I am Brahman’ may be an aid to concentration insofar as it keeps other thoughts away and persists alone. But then you have to

ask whose thought it is. It will be found to come from the ‘I’. But where does the ‘I’-thought come from? Probe into it and it will vanish. The Supreme Self will shine forth of itself. No further effort is needed.

 

When the one real ‘I’ remains alone, it will not need to say, ‘I am Brahman’. Does a man go on repeating ‘I am a man’? Unless he is challenged why should he declare himself a man? Does anyone mistake himself for an animal that he should say ‘No, I am not an animal, I am a man?’. Similarly, since Brahman or ‘I’ alone is, there is no one to challenge it, and so there is no need to repeat ‘I am Brahman.”

 

D.: Is a set meditation necessary for strengthening the mind?

 

B.: Not if you keep the idea always before you, that it is not your work. At first effort is needed to remind yourself of it, but later on it becomes natural and continuous. The work will go on of its own accord and your peace will remain undisturbed. Meditation is your true nature. You call it meditation now, because there are other thoughts distracting you. When these thoughts are dispelled, you remain alone – that is, in the state

of meditation, free from thoughts; and that is your real nature, which you are now trying to realise by keeping away other thoughts. Such keeping away of other thoughts is now called ‘meditation’. But when the practice becomes firm, your real nature shows itself as true meditation.

 

 

 What is this true meditation? It is to make everything: coughing, swallowing, waving the arms, motion, stillness, words, action, the evil and the good, prosperity and shame, gain and loss, right and wrong, into one single koan.

 

- Hakuin Ekaku

 

[4bsolute]

Until we realize we are not the self, or ego, we have created, we cannot fully see that we are the Self, which never was "created."

 

 

I've found that the main reason so many people, including myself, have spent so much time and energy denying Truth, is because the very existence of the "self" they believe they are is dependent on their doing so.

 

 

It's a great relief to be free of the need to defend one's identity/self/ego, when they no longer take that self to be the real them.

 

yes, if you live in a cave and dont want to participate any longer in this world, all of that applies how would you relate to other individuals from a point of assumed non-individual?

 

in essence, yes, to know the mind (which is the self) one has to go beyond the mind. but what point is it to chat about it all the time, there is no "gain" in it. there is no need for chatting about it when you have been there and any chat will not bring you there. only to the edge of it, but not actually there. the ultimate gain is to have been in this stateless state and come back. and then to lower one's self and talk about it / radiate it.

 

go in meditation with your conscious through your subconscious into your void state. Or at least touch it "slightly". Or at least get out of your conscious mind into the subconscious where you have no more control. And then come back out here into this world and tell us how it feels. I see the stage inbetween as the most difficult. Not really the stage of not being there or how to get there or when actually being in it. The stage inbetween, especially when being in the subconscious leaves you completely puzzled and your ego is on the way to be "shattered". It is so easy to adopt multiple-personalities on this way, when you not continuously go further and further into your Heart.

 

There are so many individuals just talking and having philosophical chats about "how it is / could be" but have they actually been there? No.

 

The good thing is, that once you have been there, or deeper inside on the way to "there" and came back out, you can distinquish any ego from non-ego or having only a tiny ego very effortlessly. Just like when your throat is clean and you have no interest in telling lies anymore, for you know what it does with your energies, you can pickup lies so easily. The tough part might then be not get convinced by the other person lying ontop that s/he was not lying, but is just too embarassed to admit it. Of course that again is all subject to the sensitivity / intelligence of the perceiver.

 

And also, you can not talk about no-mind / ego with any ego, if it is not willing to venture in this direction. For example wanting to talk about benefits of no ego and how much pain the ego actually creates. All ears are like "What, you talking to me? What do I do wrong?" lol. Any ego sees all the negative aspects in this talk and will not have any interest communicating with you further.

 

ESPECIALLY problematic do I currently see that we here in the West or countries where we are for ourselves, not in religious or spiritual communities yet and discover all of that by our selves. When we come into the stage of feeling we are not relating anymore, my self experienced it as truly nasty. I felt like whatever I am about to experience next and whatever problems might occur, I am so completely alone. I could talk to a human mind, even my own parents, and they could not help me.

 

A friend of mine, connected on facebook, wrote me the same. It's a stage somewhere between subconscious mind (throat) and heart.

 

It is the end of all ends and the beginning of all beginnings. That is why being with one's self and not talking about so important. Having the ultimate faith in one's self being in all things and coming back stronger than ever before.

 

Thank God I am so thankful for Lincoln for providing a map towards the heart in several of his videos that actually works with my self experiences and questions I had.

Edited March 18, 2015 by 4bsolute