Experience is dumb

[amoyaan]

From the Arsha Vidya Facebook page, this neatly sums up the enormously important experience vs knowledge issue:

 

 

"A much debated topic, pujya swAmiji clarifies the abundance of misconceptions floating around the subject of "experience", especially concerning a purported "experience of the self". Traditional teachers of advaita (as opposed to neo-advaitins/modern advaitins) are together on this with regards to their teaching. The self is NOT an object of experience, if it were, it could not possibly be the subject. Furthermore, if something were to be experienced, it would be the associated guNas, not the substantive itself. Any experience that appears to one as an experience of the self is misleading, in that experiences are only a function of the mind, and most likely what is being experienced *is* the very mind- however subtle the thoughts, an experience can only come in the form of vRttis. Certainly the Atman is not to be reduced to a mere vRtti."

 

Here's a short video of Swami Dayananda explaining it beautifully

 

 

The gist: we are always experiencing the self. It's a nondual reality. The problem is therefore not with experience, it's a problem with knowledge. I'm ignorant that I'm the self, and think I'm a jiva, an individual. The only solution to ignorance is knowledge. 

 

Chasing after samadhis and mind-blowing cosmic orgasms will not in itself bring knowledge (although it might - if I correctly assimilate the experience and extract the knowledge that I am the self). They may be very good at purifying the mind and making it fit to assimilate knowledge...assuming it doesn't just reinforce the doer aspect of me and give me a craving for more and more samadhis and cosmic orgasms. In which case I'm still just a jiva in samsara, chasing after experience to make me feel whole -- the only difference being I'm chasing spiritual rather than worldly experience. Same trap though, same bondage to experience.

 

I'm thinking aloud now! I had to share this. It was one of the most important realisations and distinctions I ever learned, and I am grateful to James Swartz for first teaching me this. It turns the 'spiritual world' on its head and changes everything

Edited May 14, 2015 by amoyaan

[Songtsan]

I concur. When the chasing stops and we dwell in the center of everything neither seeking to be here nor there, in/out, to be understood/accepted, nor seeking some state of all-acceptance is when we 'get it.' If we are like a child with our hand out begging for candy (samadhi), that is like the spoiled brat. God/dess knows how to raise his/her children's right, so will reward right effort, and cut one off from source for wrong intent...so in the long run, experience chasing will meet dead ends, although in the short run we will be given some leeway...

[amoyaan]

I concur. When the chasing stops and we dwell in the center of everything neither seeking to be here nor there, in/out, to be understood/accepted, nor seeking some state of all-acceptance is when we 'get it.' 

 

Hi Songstan! Yes, that's exactly it! The experience chasing can be so subtle, especially when it comes to spiritual seeking, but it's there nonetheless, and it kind of tends to perpetuate. The letting go you speak of, and knowing that we ARE what we've been seeking, and have been all along, is an amazing realisation...and kinda funny too

[Boy]

Nice! Nothing like traditional vedanta. Does knowledge provoke an experience?

[johndoe2012]

I don't think this matters that much because you are still experiencing yourself as an individual with an ego, no?

 

So it is not just about knowledge, but knowledge can help you relax that you are it and that something is blocking you from seeing that.

[Boy]

Yes. Well put. What is the "something"?

[johndoe2012]

Sense of self, the I structure

[Boy]

I’ve led us slightly off topic. Mea culpa. I submit: knowledge is only for the qualified.

[johndoe2012]

Everyone is qualified as is no-one.

[Boy]

Not according to vedanta. Anyway, you seem to know already so it's all good.