A single, indivisible reality.....Rupert Spira

Mind definition..... Rupert Spira

witnessing - nisargadatta

nothing ever happens

To me nothing ever happens. There is something changeless, motionless, immovable, rock-like, unassailable; a solid mass of pure being-consciousness-bliss. I am never out of it. Nothing can take me out of it, no torture, no calamity.

Nisargadatta

become so small no one can see you nisargadatta

“Leave greatness to others. Become so small that no one can see you. This conviction results from growing devotion to the supreme reality.”
- Nisargadatta Maharaj

"Those who decide to will always become more conscious. Those who are looking for something larger than themselves will find it. Those who are disciplined and open and curious and willing to engage humbly with spirit, seeing it as a never-ending vast expanse in which we become smaller and smaller, are those who will evolve the most." 
- Mary Mueller Shutan

Thank you Chris Gartner

ego is imagination

If you can understand that 'ego' never at any time had any existence outside your imagination, you will not be concerned about ways and means of getting rid of it. Annamalai Swami

The 'ego' is something which only appears to be real. If you can understand that it has no real existence, it will disappear, leaving behind it the experience of the real and only Self. Annamalai Swami

annihilating the mind - adams

There was once a great king who heard of a Sage who was traveling through the kingdom, a famous Sage. This Sage was known for his great compassion, his great love, and his great humility. He didn't speak much. The king called his wise man to him and said,

"Quick, go and find the Sage and bring him here, so that he can give us a talk on spirituality."

The wise man obeyed. He inquired as to the whereabouts of the Sage and finally located him. He related to the Sage what the king had said. The Sage said,

"I'm not interested."

He beseeched the Sage again and again to come to the kingdom. The king would give him bags of gold, fine meals, beautiful women. The Sage said,

"Sorry, not interested."

Finally the wise man left the Sage and returned to the king and reported the story, what happened. The king became furious. He said,

"I want you to go back and use whatever means you can to bring the Sage here. Otherwise I'll cut off your head and use it as a hockey puck."

The wise man said,

"Yes, OK,"

and again left. He searched for the Sage. He found him, fell at his feet admonished,

"Master, please come and give a talk on spirituality for the king, or he will cut off my head and use it as a hockey puck."

The Sage, having a great compassion, a great love, a great humility, said,

"OK, I will come. Make all the arrangements. I will give a discourse on silence."

The wise man was so happy, he returned to the king and told what had happened. The king became ecstatic, joyful. He ran to the royal ballroom, had his servants put out 300 chairs in preparation for the Sage, invited the entire council, all of the ministers, their families. Hundreds of people attended. The Sage appeared at the promised time. He sat down on a chair, turned his head slowly to the right, slowly to the left, looked at everyone, got up, and he left, and left the palace and the kingdom. The king became furious.

"This is an insult,"

he shouted. The wise man came over, and he said,

"How can he do this to me? He has insulted me in front of all of my friends. Why was he so disrespectful?"

The wise man said,

"Sire, don't you get the point? He said he was going to come and give us a discourse on silence. What better way to give a discourse on silence than to be silent?"

{…}

This story is the truth about us also. It shows us that in silence there is power, in silence there is the highest truth, in silence there is pure awareness. When we talk too much, when we get involved in too much discourse with people, when we talk too much about philosophical teachings, spirituality, it loses the essence of the teaching. When you hear about your self, you hear me telling you, you are pure awareness, boundless space, sat-chit-ananda, you are the Self, when you've practiced observation, observing, being the witness, when you've practiced vichara, self-inquiry, and you've done this for many years, it is then time to be silent. It is then time to keep quiet, not to allow your thoughts to go any further. When I say to keep silence, I do not mean just keeping quiet, when your mind keeps thinking, thinking, thinking, I am referring to quieting the mind. When there is no longer any noise in your mind, when the mind becomes quiescent, the reality appears by itself.

Why do you want to experience the reality? Because you have read in books, teachers have told you, the reality is infinite peace and wisdom, the reality is pure knowledge, the reality is immortality, and everyone wants this. So we practice all forms of sadhana, we go and see various teachers, we read many books. Now what all these things should lead to is the silence. After a few years it should not lead to further books, it should not lead to further running around the world, looking for Masters who can give you the secret potion, so that you can become self-realized. It means to be quiet, to cause the mind to become totally still, not to get involved in talking, talking, talking, about nonsense, to talk very little. Notice as you keep still this way, how thoughts enter your mind, how they begin to tell you things about yourself, about the speaker, about the room. The thoughts tell you everything that keeps you back from achieving your realization.

Thoughts can do you no good, no matter what kind of thoughts they are. They can only take you so far, confuse you. You have to see this about yourself. You have to be totally honest with yourself, see where you are coming from, examine your feelings, your emotions. Again, what is going through your mind. Most people cannot sit in the silence even for a second. The mind waves begin to move. As long as your mind keeps feeding you information, you can never really awaken, for what you call the mind is merely a bundle of thoughts about the past, and about the future and about the present. That's all the mind is. The mind keeps you earthbound. That is its job, to make you part of this earth, to attach you to person, place and thing. Therefore the wise person, from the very beginning, begins to do things to keep the mind still, to quiet the mind. What is the highest thing you can possibly do to quiet the mind? And the answer is nothing.

As long as you're doing something you're using the mind. Therefore the highest teaching is, do nothing. When you learn to do nothing, the mind will stop thinking all by itself, but when you do something, the mind will accumulate more knowledge, of things that you are doing, and become ever stronger, and stronger and stronger. Remember you are not trying to acquire more knowledge, and add on to the knowledge you already have. You want to empty yourself totally, absolutely and completely, of all so called knowledge. You're afraid to do this, for you think you will become a vegetable. It's hard to imagine a person with no mind. But, when you begin to realize your mind is only an accumulation of thoughts, thoughts from past lives, thoughts from this life, only thoughts, then you begin to see that the mind has to be totally transcended and transmuted. And those of you who have been practicing sadhana for many years, have come to the point where now you can do nothing.

You no longer have to meditate. You no longer have to practice atma-vichara. You no longer have to practice being the witness, vipassana meditation. Those things are no longer necessary. They have taken you to a certain point, and here you are. You now have absolutely nothing to do.

You are free.

Silence

–– Robert Adams, T166: Annihilating The Mind

realness - ramana

life is like a boat - suzuki

let um believe what they want in classroom - adams

And Jesus said ... "Agree quickly with thy adversary." Don't argue with someone. “A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still.”

Let people believe what they want. Every human being on this earth is in a different grade in school. The universe is like a school room. We're all in different grades. Some people have to believe this and some people have to believe that. That is what makes maya so interesting. There are multiplicity of thoughts, of forms, of things, of everything. And everybody wants to stick up for their rights and for their point of view. So let them, they're all right. The reason it's all right is because it is all coming from their mind. They are creating God in their image.

Think of the God you believe in, Jehovah, Christ, Allah these are all names given to the one God by man. And people worship these Gods in different ways. It's all good. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this. But when you begin to practice Advaita Vedanta, non-duality, you transcend all the belief systems, you transcend the whole world, the whole universe, you get rid of everything so there is nothing left for you to hold on to. And when there is nothing left for you to hold onto you then become the Self. Until then believe all the things you want to believe.

Robert Adams

dont ask your thoughts about awareness - spira

Thought is to awareness what a character in a movie is to the screen: the character is made out of the screen and yet knows nothing of the screen.

Thought is made out of awareness but knows nothing of awareness. So if you want to know what you essentially are, don’t ask your thoughts. They will never give you the right answer.

If you want to know the nature of awareness, you have to ask the one that is aware of awareness, that is, you have to ask awareness itself. Thought can ask the question, but don’t let it answer the question.

~~ Rupert Spira

absence wu hsin

Does the Brain Produce the Mind? (jeff foster-spira)

Awareness Cannot Know Itself as an Object but Is Never Not Known

Love - anandamayee ma

NOT ME

NOT ME,,,NOT MY BUSINESS

DEPENDENCE ON OTHER - SPIRA

IF SOMETHING IS KNOWN BY SOMETHING OTHER THAN ITSELF IT DEPENDS ON THAT SOMETHING OTHER.

Now - mooji

"Here as you are now, what is your experience?
This now-ness, this Now of now. Past is past—gone!
It is only perpetuated through memory,
but the actuality of what you call past is unrepeatable.
The future—it is only an idea.
Nobody has ever experienced the future.
You only experience now-ness.
What are you right now?
Whatever has passed, meaningfully,
is embodied in the Now; the debris discharged.
You are Here, whole and One.
If you don’t touch past or project any idea of future,
as you are in this moment, without going to the mind
or stirring up unnecessary thought—who are you?
What has happened? Where is any problem?
What is reality?
You are Here. If you move in Here as Here itself,
even as your legs move,
can you say when you arrive ‘there’?
What exactly is ‘here’ or ‘there’ for that
which perceives both?
No imagination is needed now, no creativity required.
In your sober being, no image is lastingly true.
Don’t wait for the next hit, the next movement
or the next experience for that too will pass.
You are Here, simply Here.
Here is the great Silence, the great Stillness.
The uncreated Stillness. The impeccable Silence.
The fullness of Being. The concept-free Reality.
Your unblemished Self.
How are you when you are not in a state of waiting?
Neither wishing for change nor holding onto any story.
Free from attachment to any ideal.
Who is there to suffer? Or even rejoice?
Notice that all things come and go of their own accord.
All things pass—except This—your Self.
See with your true inner eyes and confirm."

~Mooji

do not hurt - nisargadatta

to know - spira

divine light

empty your boat - chuang tzu

If a man is crossing a river 
And an empty boat collides with his own skiff, 
Even though he be a bad-tempered man 
He will not become very angry. 
But if he sees a man in the boat, 
He will shout at him to steer clear. 
If the shout is not heard, he will shout again, 
And yet again, and begin cursing. 
And all because there is somebody in the boat. 
Yet if the boat were empty. 
He would not be shouting, and not angry.

If you can empty your own boat 
Crossing the river of the world, 
No one will oppose you, 
No one will seek to harm you.

The Self is everywhere - Ashtavakra Gita

Ashtavakra Gita bot‏ @_AshtavakraGita

The self is everywhere. One. Still. Free. Perfect. The witness of all things, Awareness Without action, clinging or desire.

only God

how can we define ourselves - spira

Rupert Spira
How Can We Define Ourselves?

Look in your own experience and ask yourself what qualities are inseparable from the experience of yourself. What do we refer to when we say ‘I?’

The first one is obviously Presence. ‘I, by definition, am.’ There is Being.

Now in order to be able to say from experience, ‘I am,’ we must know that ‘I am,’ that is, we must know our own Being. In other words, to be sure that ‘I am’ (and we are sure that ‘I am’) we must know it. So, knowing is also inherent in or inseparable from ‘I.’

Therefore ‘I’ is both Knowing and Present. What else can we say about it?

Normally we add all kinds of accretions to this Knowing Presence. We assign it a location, a colour, a shape, an age, an gender, a size, beliefs, abilities, characteristics etc. However, all these are intermittent and as ‘I’ is not intermittent, they cannot be qualities that are inherent in our self.

If we look again at this experience of our self, there are other things we can say. For instance, whilst it is undoubtedly knowing and present, we have never experienced its appearance, disappearance, birth, death or change because we, as Knowing Presence, would have to be there, present and knowing, in order to register such an experience. Therefore ever-presence, birthless, deathless and changeless are qualities of our self.

Our self is not known by anything other than its own self. It is ‘I’ that knows that ‘I am.’ The self knows itself by itself. It does not need any other agent, such as a mind or a body, to know itself. Therefore ‘I’ is self-knowing or self-luminous.

Because ‘I’ is the only ‘thing’ that knows itself, it is its own evidence. It cannot be proven by anything other than its own experience of itself.

‘I,’ Knowing Presence, being present and knowing but without objective qualities, cannot move, change or become anything other than what it always already is.

It cannot increase or diminish. Nothing can be added to it or removed from it. It is fullness itself and is therefore known as Happiness or Fulfilment.

It cannot be disturbed, because only an apparent object can be disturbed and it therefore knows itself as Peace.

When any apparent object appears, the object is found to be made only out of Knowing Presence. It gives its own substance intimately and utterly to every appearance. For this reason it is known as Love.

Although it is always itself it can take all possible apparent forms, including the form of ignorance, and freedom is therefore inherent within it.

All these qualities may seem to imply that ‘I’ is one thing and not another - for instance that it is limitless rather then limited - and from an intellectual point of view some may argue that this is an expression of duality. It is not!

These qualities, such as changeless, birthless, deathless, ever-presence etc., are given only in response to the implicit belief some of us have that ‘I’ changes, is born, dies, disappears etc.

If we superimpose no qualities on ‘I’ such as objective, limited, located, birth, death, change, then there is no need to counter this with qualities such as non-objective, unlimited, unlocated, birthless, deathless etc.

If we superimpose no qualities onto Presence, there is no need to define it in a any way. We simply leave it free to be what it is, knowing and being its own self alone, beyond all such defining qualities such as limited or unlimited, changing or unchanging etc.

your are God - Adams

Yes you are God whether you
like it or not. Whether you care
or you don't, you are God.
So what are you going to
do about it?

Robert Adams

einstein - letter to daughter

A friend Nela Quinlan, posted this today and wanted to share here.
When Einstein placed this letter in his daughter’s safe-keeping, he instructed it not be published “for decades" after his death “until society is advanced enough to accept” its contents. Though humankind tragically HASN’T “advanced enough to accept” what Einstein writes, this moment is of such imperative.
“If we want our species to survive, if we are to find meaning in life, if we want to save the world and every sentient being that inhabits it, love is the one and only answer.”
--- EINSTEIN’S LETTER TO HIS DAUGHTER LIESERI:

"When I proposed the theory of relativity, very few understood me, and what I will reveal now to transmit to mankind will also collide with the misunderstanding and prejudice in the world. I ask you to guard the letters as long as necessary, years, decades, until society is advanced enough to accept what I will explain below. There is an extremely powerful force that, so far, science has not found a formal explanation to. It is a force that includes and governs all others, and is even behind any phenomenon operating in the universe and has not yet been identified by us. This universal force is LOVE. When scientists looked for a unified theory of the universe, they forgot the most powerful unseen force. Love is Light that enlightens those who give and receive it. Love is gravity because it makes some people feel attracted to others. Love is power because it multiplies the best we have and allows humanity not to be extinguished in their blind selfishness. Love unfolds and reveals. For love, we live and die. Love is God and God is Love. This force explains everything and gives meaning to life. This is the variable that we have ignored for too long, maybe because we are afraid of love because it is the only energy in the universe that man has not learned to drive at will. To give visibility to love, I made a simple substitution in my most famous equation. If instead of E = mc2, we accept that the energy to heal the world can be obtained through love multiplied by the speed of light squared, we arrive at the conclusion that love is the most powerful force there is, because it has no limits.

After the failure of humanity in the use and control of the other forces of the universe that have turned against us, it is urgent that we nourish ourselves with another kind of energy. … If we want our species to survive, if we are to find meaning in life, if we want to save the world and every sentient being that inhabits it, love is the one and only answer. Perhaps we are not yet ready to make a bomb of love, a device powerful enough to entirely destroy the hate, selfishness and greed that devastate the planet. However, each individual carries within them a small but powerful generator of love whose energy is waiting to be released. When we learn to give and receive this universal energy, dear Lieserl, we will have affirmed that love conquers all and is able to transcend everything and anything because love is the quintessence of life.

I deeply regret not having been able to express what is in my heart which has quietly beaten for you all my life. Maybe it's too late to apologize, but as time is relative, I need to tell you that I love you and, thanks to you, I have reached the ultimate answer!

Your father, 

equipose - ramana

the impersonal is real - nisargadatta

knowing - spira

i don't mind - bhagavan, mooji

The Miracle of Experience

suffering - spira

"Suffering is to the mind what pain is to the body. When you put your hand in the fire, you experience pain. The pain is not a mistake, it's the intelligence of the body, telling you: 'Take your hand out of the fire!' So pain is working on behalf of your wellbeing. Suffering is exactly the same at the level of the mind. It is cooperating with your desire for happiness. It's a wakeup call. Suffering is telling you: 'You have mistaken yourself for a separate limited self. Have another look!'"

~ Rupert Spira

be content - nisargadatta

adams - get the hell off

beautiful and free - mooji

try not chuang tzu

ego mirage

I Awareness - spira

~ Rupert Spira

Like empty space I have no agenda with appearances. It makes no difference to Me whether the mind is silent or not, whether the body is young, old, healthy or not, nor what is happening in the world. I allow all appearances unconditionally and impartially.

Thought likes and dislikes but I neither like nor dislike these likes and dislikes. Thought resists and seeks but I neither resist nor seek the end of resistance or seeking. Being empty, I do not even know resistance and am, therefore, causeless happiness itself.

Like empty space, I do not share the qualities nor the destiny of the objects that appear within Me; I do not move and change when they move and change; I do not appear nor disappear when they appear or disappear; I am not born and do not die. The body and mind are always on a journey but I never undertake the journey with them. They journey through Me but I never journey in them. I am the unchanging and ever-present Knower of all that is known.
~~~

awareness speaks - mooji

“She ask - Mooji points to a Sangha member -
will I pray for her."

"Sitting talking with you, I have been praying for you.
My being with you is praying for you. 
My being with you is blessing you.
My being with you is being with you.
And as long as you have inside you
the aspirations to be free, I will stay with you.
If you don't hold on to you, God will hold you.
If you don't carry you, God will hold you.
From right now its like that."

You think, you are a girl sitting on Ganga Beach
talking to Mooji, but you don't exist, not like that.

Some of you by being here,
you cannot go back now,
I don't want to point you out.
Something is going to be very different about you.
And not because you change.
It is not that there is a you who changed,
you are exchanged
for what you cannot not be.
Let's see, but not wait.
Thank You Thank You Thank You.

Everything said here, is only the expression
of the Supreme Consciousness.
It is not the words of a man or some person,
don't look at me like anything special.
Everything is just the God-power speaking,
consciousness is speaking with consciousness
about consciousness.
If you want to give Gratitude to something
give Gratitude to consciousness.
If you want to pray to something,
give prayer to consciousness,
give prayer to God.

~ Mooji Baba
from Ganga Beach Satsang —
"If God Is Everywhere, What Must You Wait For?"
24 February 2019 Rishikesh, India
Sahaja Express

the mind as a mirror - chuang tzu

Time Is Never Actually Experienced

there comes a time - rumi

the burden

Abiding as myself ......Rupert Spira

Even Illness Has A Wisdom In It And Can Be Regarded As A Form Of Healing...

optical illusion - adams

let go - mooji

“It is as if on meeting for the first time, all you want to show me is the photo album of your childhood. I say, ‘But we are here now.’

You say,’This was me when I was six, seven, and, look, fifteen.’

I say, ‘But you are here now! You are better and greater than any photo album. You are fresh. That album is not fresh.’

You are fresh, but something doesn’t trust that. You want to retain something, as if that were to make the ground you stand upon more solid.

Why are we afraid to just be what we really are? Because if you say to yourself, ‘I have to let go of my story,’ it feels like you are losing something valuable, and this is seen as increasing your suffering. But actually, this is how you let go of your suffering.”

~ Mooji

succinct wisdom from ramana; grateful

Mrs. Rosita Forbes was said to be in India. Sri
Bhagavan said : The explorers seek happiness in finding curiosities, discovering new lands and undergoing risks in adventures. They are thrilling. But where is the pleasure
found ? Only within. Pleasure is not to be sought in the external world.

~~~Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi ~~~
Talk. 457. --- 12th February, 1938

no mind = bliss - mooji

shanti always here - papa

Question: I am not aware of that presence while I am asleep.

Papaji: Yes, it is because "you" are not present. It is the "you" that you live through that decides these matters. For "you" presence is only felt when there is some obstruction to the awareness of the presence.

Question: "When there's obstruction, I can feel presence, but when there isn't, I can't." This sounds very paradoxical.

Papaji: Your sense of being a person is the obstruction.
Everything, all your experiences, or the lack of them, are mediated through this idea of individuality.
This obstruction rises from the presence and you either feel the presence through it, or you are aware of its absence.

The presence is there all the time, but you don't feel it in your deep-sleep state because this mediator, this "I", is not there. You don't know how to be aware of anything when this "I" is absent, so you declare, "Presence is not there when I sleep."

You use this obstruction to validate all your experiences but it has no inherent validity of its own.
Shanti, peace, was there before the obstruction arose, and when the obstruction subsides, shanti still prevails.

Your inherent nature is this shanti.
It is there both when the experiencer is there and when the experiencer is absent.

~ Papaji

being present and not present; what remains - adya

“Remembering and forgetting to be present oscillate like the waves of the ocean coming in and going back out. And they both occur within the greater expanse of awareness. Just let things be natural, even the coming and going of being present. Just watch the coming and going of being present like you’d watch the rhythms of waves coming and going. There is abundant awareness of both remembering and forgetting to be present. What is present in all states?”

~ Adyashanti


mandala

Gangaji - Still In Awareness

The Highest Activity the Separate Self Can Engage In

How to Face Discomfort in the Body

The Surrendering of Everything

nothing but God

a prayer to start the day

leave it alone - adams

ramana - no one can ever be away from the self