The you that you think of as you (and that thinks of you as you, and so on) is not you, it’s just the character that the underlying truth of you is dreaming into brief existence. Enlightenment isn’t in the character, it’s in the underlying truth. Now, there’s nothing wrong with being a dream character, of course, unless it’s your goal to wake up, in which case the dream character must be ruthlessly annihilated. If your desire is to experience transcendental bliss or supreme love or altered states of consciousness or awakened kundalini, or to quality for heaven, or to liberate all sentient beings, or simply to become the best dang person you can be, then rejoice!, you’re in the right place: the dream state, the dualistic universe. However, if your interest is to cut the crap and figure out what’s true, then you’re in the wrong place and you’ve got a very messy fight ahead and there’s no point in pretending otherwise.
But beauty, real beauty, ends where intellectual expression begins. Intellect is in itself a mode of exaggeration, and destroys the harmony of a face. The moment one sits down to think, one becomes all nose, or all forehead, or something horrid. Look at the successful men in any of the learned professions. How perfectly hideous they are! Except, of course, in the Church. But then in the Church they don’t think. A bishop keeps on saying at the age of eighty what he was told to say when he was a boy of eighteen, and as a natural consequence he always looks absolutely delightful.
Intelligent practice always deals with just one thing: the fear at the base of human existence, the fear that I am not. And of course I am not, but the last thing I want to know is that.
Q: Since all is pre-ordained, is our self-realization also pre-ordained? Or are we free there at least?
A: Destiny refers only to name and shape. Since you are neither body nor mind, destiny has no control over you. You are completely free. The cup is conditioned by its shape, material, use and so on. But the space within the cup is free. It happens to be in the cup only when viewed in connection with the cup. Otherwise, it is just space. As long as there is a body, you appear to be embodied. Without the body you are not disembodied — you just are.
So the most important thing to realize is this: Your life has an inner purpose and an outer purpose. Inner purpose concerns Being and is primary. Outer purpose concerns doing and is secondary…. Your inner purpose is to awaken. It is as simple as that. You share that purpose with every other person on the planet – because it is the purpose of humanity. Your inner purpose is an essential part of the purpose of the whole, the universe and its emerging intelligence.
Buddhism stands unique in the history of human thought in denying the existence of a Soul, Self or Atman. According to the teachings of the Buddha, the idea of self is an imaginary, false belief which has no corresponding reality, and it produces harmful thoughts of ‘me’ and ‘mine’, selfish desire, craving, attachment, hatred, ill-will, conceit, pride, egoism, and other defilements, impurities and problems. It is the source of all troubles in the world from personal conflicts to wars between nations. In short, to this false view can be traced all the evil in the world.
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on April 8th, 2008 at 12:41 am
Tom, My fist inclination was to come back later and re read your post. “I” mean really. 2:36 am is pretty early to absorb what your writing. Especially with only one “eye” open.
My false I tried to tell me to come back later. But the one that is slowing waking up, says. “Great post Tom,I’m looking forward to other comments on this post and will come back later.
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on April 8th, 2008 at 9:52 am
Each time I read a quote like this, or anything on non-duality, I feel that I nearly – but not quite – grasp what it means. I can’t even point to which part doesn’t click with me, to ask for explanation. I understand what’s being said, but it itches at the back of my mind.
*sigh* Hopefully, someday I’ll manage to scratch that itch.
on April 8th, 2008 at 6:54 pm
An absolute being that can’t think? Hmm
But if I question I’m guilty of thought and so must be wrong? Hmm
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on April 8th, 2008 at 8:38 pm
@Shadowduck Interesting, though, that something in your gets it. Something in you understands. These type of statements aren’t really meant for the mind. They are meant for that which knows, the itch at the back of your mind. That’s why I like them.
@Evan There is nothing wrong with thought. Thinking is neither good nor bad. Thought just won’t tell you who you are. Ramana is pointing that the thought “I” is the thought that causes all the trouble. What you are is beyond the thought of who you are. So, you can think all you want. But just don’t believe what it tells you about who you are.
on April 9th, 2008 at 7:18 am
Tom I agree with you when you say “there is nothing wrong with thought. Thinking is neither good or bad.”That leads me back to my own quote from 1970 that I may have borrowed at the time. “He who thinks has never really thought.Think about it!! It makes you think, doesn’t it.
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on April 11th, 2008 at 5:30 pm
@Mark “He who thinks has never really thought.” You got it, Mark. That’s the idea. Thinking is just the noise between our ears.
on April 18th, 2008 at 4:54 pm
@Tom Great quote, thanks. ‘I’ needed that. ‘I’ was just thinking about this. Then I saw the blog link under the other article. At first we seem to be the false ‘I’. The we wake up from that illusion. The ego, which has been pretending to be I, is shown for what it is. We find ourselves nyeti – not this. Gradually, what we are opens and moves forward. We drown in the ocean of love, then all of our world is lost in infinity. We wake up from the final illusion of the world.
Then the Upanishadic saying is true – I am That, Thou art That, All This is That. As the unity deepens, a new value emerges. Another surprise.
In quite a bit of the literature, people say things like “any teacher that says I am enlightened is not because they said I” I becomes the dirty word. (laughs) But heres the surprise – its back. Only now, ‘I’ is everything, unbroken, unbounded.
It illustrates from where Ramana Maharishi spoke.
(PS – Yogananda was the originator of the quote (without the because) in response to a reporter. I think his statement was directed more at enlightenment as a concept. Any concept of enlightenment is automatically wrong.(laughs) It is not something the mind can conceive. So teachers tend not to make claims like this.
PS – thanks for all the inspiration
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on April 18th, 2008 at 5:09 pm
@Davidya Now you know why I do these quotes. They are useful and powerful.
As for the “you can’t be enlightened because you said “I am enlightened”: the first time I heard that I thought “what a crock of sh*t!” It was a semi-popular spiritual teacher who has had some experience with awakening. He goes to great lengths to say “this body-mind” instead of “I”. Ridiculous. I’m glad to know where it came from. And it is still a crock. The word “I” is completely empty, at least as it refers to the point in space called Tom or Davidya. It refers to nothing. Yet look at Nisargadatta. He’s saying things like “I’m everything.” He clearly means more than the little Indian man sitting on the rug.
All I can say is Words, Words, Words!! You can say whatever you want, because none of them are really true. Adya says, “all words are simply teaching strategies.” Much better! Or the Zen concept of two words canceling each other out like two arrows meeting in midair.
on April 18th, 2008 at 5:27 pm
Well put, Tom. I do notice that the awake tend to be subtle about it, to try and circumvent concepts. Like Adya talks about his experience but doesn’t go making statements about it. Making postures and artificial avoidance points to self-concepts and an immature realization.
For some reason “All I can say is Words, Words, Words!! You can say whatever you want, because none of them are really true.” struck me as like words to a song. (laughs)
on April 18th, 2008 at 5:37 pm
There is a deeper value to words though, one thats harder to see with English. Words have a meaning – and that is the part thats the illusion as it may not be the same meaning from one person to another. But words also have another characteristic – sound. Sound is vibration and it moves out and reverberates around. Vibration is the fundamental thing that expresses everything.
In Sanskrit (unlike most languages), there is a relationship between the sound of a word and its meaning (form). This draws the meaning much closer to sync with reality. Also, when things first express, they start as vibration alone, give rise to fields and so forth into expression. If one can be still and silent at that level of first vibration (called Ritam Bara Pragyan – that consciousness which accepts only truth), we can listen to sounds and they will trigger related forms. In other words, they are a way to codify and share experience. This is the hidden secret of Sanskrit chants. They are encoded experiences. Cool eh?
on April 18th, 2008 at 7:00 pm
And yet you guys seem to be communicating fine with words.
Words are social as well as individual. Between everything and nothing there lies . . .
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on April 18th, 2008 at 7:23 pm
@Evan Excellent!! Thanks for pointing that out. As Nisargadatta Maharaj said, “And between these two my life turns.”
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