Sailor Bob - Nonduality. Nothing to get in no future... 7 Apr 2019

Tony, Sarah, Tony, David, Adrian, Ross, Terry, Steve, silence. What's your name? Yeah, he's cheating. Okay, well, we say the same thing over and over again, and over and over again. I've been saying for over 40 years, I've been saying the same thing. Why wouldn't I change it? Well, maybe there's nothing to change. I can go into all sorts of stories, which most people do, but it doesn't. We say right from the start, we can't teach you anything, and we can't tell you anything. All we do is point toward and ask you to look to where we're pointing to, to see for yourself. Because that's all that can actually happen.

No matter what you've been told or what you believe, nobody can tell you anything, and nobody can teach you anything. When you recognize what you actually are. And you are like everything else in this manifestation. There's really no thing. What we call things is actually no thing. Things are the pattern, shapes, and forms. They appear as expressions of that one essence. In Hinduism, they call it non-duality. And non-duality, translated, means one without a second. And they put that one without a second. If you look at that, even the idea of one implies there could be other than one. So again, they're pointing directly to the directness of this.

It is always and ever that. It is immediate. It doesn't take any time or any place. There's no beginning. If there's no beginning, there can be no start. There can be no finish. Or no destination. So that's why we say here, right? Whether you recognize it or not, start from the fact that you are already that. And if you're already that, what happens to the search then? You've got nothing to seek for, nothing to say. Because you see, the search is the problem. When you're on the so-called path, and you believe you've got... If you do this and do that, read this book, go to this satsang, go to this mantra, go here, there, and everywhere else, you will become something.

Now if you look into that closely, becoming is not being. Have you ever actually moved away from being? Any of the so-called things that have seemingly become, didn't they happen in the beingness? And isn't there a continuity of that beingness? It's not becoming at all. So then you might realize that time itself is a fiction. There is no such thing as time. Time has a beginning, a middle, and an end. But when does now begin? Try and grasp it. You'll say, well, it's the only time I can grasp it. I'll try to grasp it right now. But even as you're grasping it, isn't it ending?

And isn't it beginning again? So there's no static point or no duration to it. No duration to it. No duration to it. It's spontaneous. And that's why we call it spontaneity is timeless. Now, is that what we need to do? Or whether you think you need to do it or don't, or whether you do it or don't do it, it doesn't matter. And the recognition of this, you will either do it, if you don't recognize it, you'll move it on, go along your merry way. But come back to the, what they call it, the mahavakya or the great mantra is, I am that. Telling you, you already are.

The I am is there, the presence of presence, which translates through the mind as the thought I am. The thatness is already happening in the thatness. Can't be anything else. Everybody innately knows it. Because you don't say, when you say, that's the chair, that's the carpet, that's you, that's me, that's the room, that's the tree, that's the flower. You know everything innately is that. Which we put labels on. Name and form. And Hinduism begins, sat, chitta, danda, nama, rupa, the five factors. Sat is existence. Anyone who is not existing right now. Look at it, can you say you're not existing? You can say it as much as you like, but you're denying your very being.

By saying I'm not existing. Anyone who is not conscious. If you're unconscious, if you're out of it, there's a deep sleep inside, you couldn't say you were conscious. But in the consciousness you can't say you are not conscious. Again you'd be denying your own fact. Anyone who's not happy to be. Someone who's come along right now and is going to blow all your heads off, you wouldn't be too happy about that, would you? You'd rather be than not be. So you already are that, sat, chitta, danda. And the other two factors are nama, rupa. Nama is name and rupa is form. And the form is that body.

You're expressing through. And the name is what you're giving it. Bob, whoever else there is, Ross, Terry, Steve. All the names we put on these patterns. And they say that the name and form are maya. They're illusion. They have no substance or reality of themselves at all. And they haven't. We've only put names and labels on that vibrating essence. Which is no thing. There's never been anything. There never will be anything. But see, in the vibrating patterns, it seems to take the shape and form of something. And all this manifestation is the content of that basic space. The cognising emptiness. They give it the name cognising emptiness.

Not that we are cognising emptiness. But the emptiness suffused with that innate intelligence, which is the cognising activity that's going on. It's cognising emptiness. Not that we are, but the emptiness itself is cognising it. And the Buddha told you that emptiness is form. It's that basic space where all these things or forms are patterning, shaping and forming and appearing in. And he said the form can be nothing other than the emptiness. Seemingly patterning, shaping and forming in all these different manifestations. Emptiness is form and the form is nothing but the emptiness. So it's never a way of saying emptiness. It's a way of saying emptiness.

And that's why I say we're going to change the story and tell you something different just to keep you occupied, keep you happy. Or keep pointing back to the one essence that I'm saying each and every time I come here. Direct and immediate. Take it or leave it. And the only way you can take it is to investigate and see for yourself. Because nobody's going to pat you on the head with a peacock feather. Or repeat a mantra in your ear or press you between the eyes and give you some ecstatic state. Ecstatic state. Okay. Okay. You can hypnotise yourself and people can hypnotise themselves.

It's just a mesmerism or an idea or a concept you've got about yourself. But go beyond that. Can you negate that existence? Can you say I'm not existing? Can you negate that consciousness? Or awareness? You can't say you are unaware right now even though you're not thinking of that. Unawareness is where? If you're not unaware you must be aware. And aren't you happy to be? As I say you wouldn't be dead for quids. So you are that sat-shitter there. Might have to get a chair out. But you are not the name and form which we believe we are. And how do you believe you are that?

Because it's been told you in childhood. It's been reinforced by your schools, your society, everybody around you. And when you've taken on that belief you've constantly reinforced yourself. Day in, day out. Every chance you get. I am Bob the Australian, the good fella. I'm not so good. I'm unhappy. I'm just... Constantly reinforced a belief. Look in your dictionary and look up the word belief. The word belief, the definition of belief is an unquestioned acceptance. Unquestioned acceptance of something in the absence of reason. Instead of reasoning it out, we've accepted it on what our parents, school, society and everybody else has told us. Without investigating. Acceptance of an alleged fact.

It's allegedly so. And you can't convict somebody on alleging. They've got to prove the fact. Acceptance of an alleged fact without positive knowledge or proof. Investigate it. The positive knowledge of proof. Are you this body? Are you this mind? Are you this person? Are you this separate entity? And look at that word person. We take ourselves to be this person. This separate entity. This individual. Where does that word come from? An ancient language. I think it was Latin thousands of years ago. It came from the persona. The mask. We only got this mask. A conceptual image. We've put upon ourselves. And look at that behind Bob the Australian.

The good fella. Blah, blah, blah. That's all concepts. Based on past events, experience and conditioning. It's a dead image. That I'm wearing as the believed in entity. Me. And it's not true. It's not factual. But until it's looked into and really investigated and seen, you're going to believe in it. And you hear people say, you're going to believe in it. And you hear people say, I saw it. It was not to me. But it came back. If something is not a fact and you've really seen it, can it ever be true again? Like you look at the sea, go down to the ocean and say, what a wonderful blue sea.

But you and I know the sea is not blue. It's been investigated. It appears to be and it will continue to be. That's the metaphor they use. It never was. The blue sky is not blue. The water in the mirror. It never ever was any water. It never ever was any water in a mirror arch. A rainbow. There was never any colour attached to the sky up there in space. It's the sun shining through a mist. Appearing on that background of space, it forms colours. I've got a crystal in the mirror over there. When the sun turns around to the west there, it shines through that crystal and breaks up into colours on the wall.

Several different colours. Not in one place, but hundreds of them. Go and try and grab one of those colours off the wall. You can't. Go and look in the crystal and see if there's any colours. There's nothing there. But it appears to be. Question along those things. You see the forces. Investigate yourself the same way. And nobody's ever going to do it. We can point towards it and ask it to look to see where we're pointing to. If you've got any doubts or questions, ask them and we'll point to it. Somebody will point to it and try and point it out to you again. Investigate and see for yourselves.

And that's what needs to happen there. How did it all come about? If you want to know the story, I guess, we'll have a look at it. You'll say, I was born. But can anyone remember your birth? You go back and investigate and you say, no, I can't remember my birth. And when you look into it closely, when did you start to remember? It wasn't until you were around about two, two and a half. It might have been earlier if you're smart. It might have been a bit later if you're a bit stupid or whatever it was. But then it didn't until you learnt words.

And that's when you started to... Before that, you couldn't say, I was born, because you had no words. You couldn't say anything at all. And you were nine months in the womb forming and you went two years before that capacity of reasoning come about when you learnt words. But you were still living, still being, still knowing. Spontaneously, naturally and effortlessly. There were no problems there. If you were happy, you were happy. If something comes up, you weren't saying, oh, I'm sad. It was... The miserableness might come up for a moment, but it would change. Because it was not fixated. Just as like as nothing in this manifestation is fixated on the static.

The Earth is rolling around the Sun right now. And here, when the Earth is facing the sunlight, it's daylight. On the other side of the Earth, when the Earth is facing away from us, it's dark. Does the Earth know anything about daylight or dusk or darkness? Or the movement of its rolling around? It doesn't. Does the Sun know anything about the daylight? It doesn't. But it's a spontaneous happening. We've taken ourselves to be this body-mind. Question it. Are you the body? You've had a look at it and you say, my body. Innately, you know you're not the body because you say, my body. You've got a coat or a car or a house.

You say, my house, my car, my coat. And you know damn well you're not the house, the car or the coat. You're saying, my or me. The same with the mind. You say, my mind. And are you the mind when you say, my mind? No, but it's called that my self. Instead of realizing what the scriptures down through the ancient scriptures down through as I told you, there is only one self. One self. There's not many selves. It's a non-dual, one spontaneous self. And when you say, my self, you've taken to be a personal self with this, labelling all this mind to be a self.

You've all this mind to persona you've got on it and taking it to be real. And you take that me or mind to be the self. But it's not the self. What the self is, is that one essence. It's self-seeing. It's what's seeing you right now. It's the life that's expressing through the eyes. It's the self that's hearing. It's expressing and hearing through the ears. It's the self that's breathing you. It's the self that's beating your heart. It's the self that's growing your hair and your hair. It's the self that's growing your hair and your fingernails and replacing cells in your body. It's that one self that's rolling the sun around the earth and causing the sun to be running the earth around the sun, I should say.

It's the one self that's patterning, shaping, forming all this manifestation. It's only the soul self. And we've taken the belief S-O-U-L. My soul. Anybody ever seen a soul? All the scientists and the physicists and all the rest of it look different. All the great saints, the theologians, the theologians, have ever found a soul? Maybe they're expressing it the wrong way. Maybe it's S-O-L-E they're referring to. Soul, the singular. The one soul. And then you can relate to that if you see it's the self. It's the one soul. And you are that. And notice again, it's I am that. I am that essence. What we call an essence, which is not a true term.

There are no essence. It's got no substance or any independent. I am that life. And that's what Christ told you. I am the way. I am the truth. He wasn't referring to himself. People think he's referring to himself. He was a great being. He was the one. He wasn't referring to that. We're saying I am. That sense of presence. The knowing that you are that translates through the mind as the thought I am. That's the essence. And that's what the Sagrada Teller tells you. Stay with the I am-ness. He's not telling you to stay with the thought I am. Stay with that sense of presence which translates through the mind as the thought I am.

And that's what you're referred to when you say I am. You give this idea that I or me. You can't do much with the I or me until that capacity of reasoning comes on you. But we add to it. But we add to it events, experiences and conditioning. I'm Bob the Australian, the good fella. I was told that by my parents. I'm a good guy or a bad child. I'm unhappy. I'm introverted. I'm depressed. All these concepts are added onto it. And they're all dead images based on past events, experiences and conditioning. Not what is right now. What are you right now without a concept?

Can you put any of this conceptual image you've got, been carrying around for years? You can't. You can't say anything without going into the background of what's happened or anticipating and imagining what will happen. In the actuality of this moment you can't say anything at all about it. Except you can't negate that beingness. And being is not becoming. Becoming implies a future time. If I do this practice or read this book or go to this section. Or go along this path. I will reach the destination. I will become something. And it never happens. Because you're implying some future time. And investigate time and seeing time is a fiction.

You can't. There's only this spontaneous, you can't even call it a moment. This spontaneous happening. Negate your beingness right now. And look at that word being. You call yourself a human being. If you believe in God. Or someone. I think you'll say a supreme being. So you've separated the beingness into something higher. And you're a bit lower. Then you've got to reach that higher stage. But take the word, the label you put on it, supreme off. Take the label you put on it, human off. Separate the beingness that's in this room right now without a label. Then you realise that's being a chair, is it not?

That's being a carpet. That's being the room. Look outside. It's being the tree. It's being the flower. It's being the sky. It's being everything. Everything is that pure beingness, the spontaneous actuality of this moment. Rest in that. Recognise it. And come back to it. Abide as that. Remind yourself. Remind yourself. Instead of going into the old mind and continuing it. And it tells you in the Bible, well the scriptural statement's in the Bible. Be ye renewed. Be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind. Renew your mind back into this immensity as much as you possibly can until you abide as that. And that's another thing they tell you.

Abide as that. Let it rest in its uncontrived singularity. It's been told or expressed down through the ages. That's what you can get out of the ancient text. And all the ancient texts started and they all come back to the basis of that singularity. But the different saints, sages, saviours and seers pointed it out and others have put their own take on it and the religions have formed around that. And each have got their different concepts and ideas and concepts and taken their concept to be real. Instead of realising it all started from the one. Hinduism they call it the statute of Nanda, existence, consciousness, bliss.

Anyone who is not being rightly existent. That's the way it is. If you're not being rightly existing right now then you realise no one is not conscious. Anyone who is not happy to be you're happy to be. Buddhism will tell you that great perfection is non-conceptual awareness. Are you unaware right now? No, I am aware. But what sort of, what am I into that awareness? All sorts of different concepts, different thoughts, ideas and images. Drop the concepts. Does the awareness go away? You can't say give any pattern to awareness. You can put on it but you can't say what it is because it has no shape or form, no beginning, no end but it's something non-negatable.

And the consciousness comes about which is an existence and that existence is awareness, utterly aware of that existence. That's all it is. It's aware of that existence only. But we put the labels, shapes and forms on it. The Hebrews will say, Hero of Israel, the Lord thy God is one God. There is no, nothing other. Pointing out it's only the one. The Christians say it's omnipresence, omnipotence, omniscience. Break that down into omnipresence, total presence. Omnipotence, total power, not higher power, lower power, thought power or mind power. It's the one power. And omniscience is total intelligence. The Buddhists say, I said the Buddhists. The Muslims will say there's no God but God.

Allah is his name. They put a label on it, you see, and they've gone into the scriptures and things, the way that people have written on it and taken what's been written on it in this set of rules and things you've got to take and believe in. But seeing it as singularity. And you can take, which I do, from all those great traditions, you can take what resonates and what can be used. So I'm not a Christian. I'm not a Buddhist. I'm not a Hebrew. I'm not a Muslim. I'm not an atheist. I'm not an agnostic. I've got no shape or form. But I can utilise all of those things which comes up necessary.

And it's not me as the entity to utilise. They're recognised and being utilised. And the mind still vibrates in the patterns of opposites like it always did. But instead of trying to divide, instead of trying to block one out, I use the term, there's no one-ended stick. Each stick's got two ends to it. And one end will be thick and the other thin. And I might like the thick end better than the thin end. So here we like the good things and we don't want the bad things. But when you realise it's the one stick, or the one-sided coin, it's only the one essence, whether it's got two sides to it or not, you're not going to be frightened or fearful of the opposite of the truth.

It's just going to keep coming up. Because it'll come up. But if you can no longer, which it does here, which it no longer believed in, how long is it going to last? Where we believed in and the energy of belief went into it and hung around for days, weeks and sometimes years. Some of the old beliefs we've had, we're sticking around forever. After all, I'm only human and it's poor me. I had this traumatic experience in childhood and it's still there. Keep regurgitating and bringing it up again and again. But it's dead. Don't you realise or recognise that all these images you've had, all these concepts of what happened to you when you were a child, are dead now?

Dead conditioning. What conditioning is there if you don't think about it? See that none of those thoughts are there. Where is your conditioning? They're here, fresh and new, right in this moment. And if you need to relate to some of these past inventions and experiences, it can be very useful, some of the experiences, well you'll do that. But you're not going to cling to it and fixate on it and say, this is what I am. What is this am-ness without any concepts? Can you negate the am-ness with a sense of presence? And you say, you can't. Are you this body? No, you're not the body, because you say, my body.

Have a look at that. What's this body made up of? Here are these bodies made up of elements. Earth, air, fire, water, space. All of these elements around you are earth, water, fire, air and space. Separate yourself from the earth. Separate yourself from the air. Stop breathing. Separate yourself from the water. What is 80% water? Take the body temperature, the fire. Get out of space or off the earth if you can. You can't. So when you investigate, you're not really separate from anything at all. There is no separate element. There is no entity or pattern shape or form. As the Buddha will tell you, there is no static point anywhere in this manifestation.

No static point. Not you or me as a static point, or the earth, the stars, or anything else as a static point. There's not. It's all spontaneous emanations, constantly changing. And there is no static point anywhere, and there is no self-nature to anything. What's going to happen to my self if I see there is actually no self-nature to anything? It's that one self that is everything. No static point or no living thing. It's just vibrating constantly in this immediacy. To where must the relationship go? Relationship is dualism. Me and the other. And they tell you that clearly and loudly. You read over it, you read any other scripture and you go to their base.

There is absolutely no duality in non-duality. Duality is a fiction. And non-duality is a fiction. There is neither one nor the other. There are two labels we put on it. We talk about non-duality by the way, but that's the description we put on. The idea of duality. Try and see, get the recognition of the oneness. And that's all it needs to happen, to re-cognise. They call it a cognising emptiness. The Buddha called it that, a cognising emptiness. Not that we are cognising emptiness. But the emptiness that fused with our intelligence has taken on the habit or belief that it is doing the cognising. An empty pattern, shape or form thinks it can cognise.

A lot of crap isn't it when you look at it? But we believe it and take it to be real. Emptiness is form. And it's that cognising emptiness that's vibrating as different patterns, shapes and forms. The capacity of reasoning, we take the reasoning capacity to be real and to see these shapes and forms to be real. And he clearly said the emptiness is form, but the form can be nothing other than the emptiness. Nothing other than the emptiness. So you and my, I and everything in this pattern here right now, are all that emptiness. Appearing to be real. And they call it, they call it again in Buddhism, it's a transient.

It's not static, it's constantly changing. And they call it Maya, the pattern, shape and form. They call it Maya. An illusion. Maya is an illusion. And it's transient. Recognise that, it's constantly changing. And you realise you haven't got the same body you walked into this room with. There are thousands of bodies. There are thousands of cells dying in it right now. And being replaced. You mightn't realise it. But go back to last week or a couple of years ago. Have you got the same body as you had then? Have you got the same concepts and thoughts? Or some thoughts and concepts you were bound in?

Or that's happened to me. It's changed and something else is coming up right now that you're fixating on. Taking to be real. And this is the worst thing, poor me, it's happening to me again. So it's constantly transient. Have a look in nature. And that's why we call it the natural state. As in nature. Omnipresence, omnipotence, omniscience. I call it intelligence energy. Which is just a label. And that label's not it. But it's suitable to express something as at the moment. Transient. Constantly changing. And when I'm talking about it, it's changing. When I'm talking about intelligence, I'm not talking about your intellect. People say I've got an intellectual understanding.

And you have. But that's not the reality. The intellectual understanding is not. It's only a conceptual image. You're trying to work it out in the mind with a concept. Intelligence is the activity of knowing. Look out there in nature and see for yourself. Because that's what they tell us. The natural state. And you'll see that happening. And you'll see that out in nature. That galaxies are forming. Imploding, exploding, but they're constantly changing. Stars, planets are forming, imploding, exploding. Earth's going around the sun. The seasons are coming and going. The tides are coming in and out. Volcanoes are rising. Tsunamis are coming. Ice ages are coming and going.

Doesn't it imply for all those things to seemingly occur to happen? Doesn't that imply that nature itself is coming? Doesn't that imply that nature itself is suffused with an innate intelligence? There's not some old guy out there in a cloud going to beat the shit out of you and send you to do one of these things or punish you. But there's one essence. There's not even any old guy out there in the sky. It's the one essence that's suffusing through everything and appearing and expressing as it, which you are expressing and appearing as that. And it's doing it naturally and effortlessly. We've taken on the belief we're separate and apart from it and think we're running the show.

No wonder we're suffering. No wonder we're fearful. No wonder we're... Whatever the other things are, I'm forgetting. I'm getting very forgetful and that doesn't matter either. This pattern, shape and form is constantly changing. That's what intelligence is. The activity of knowing. And as anybody who is not knowing right now, I'm not meaning what was known or what will be knowing, but what is happening right now, is that anybody unknowing in this amenity or unaware, that's another name for awareness, unaware right now, and you've questioned it and said it before, you realize, no, I'm not unaware, so you must be aware. You must be its opposite without trying to grasp it with an intellectual concept of what you think consciousness or awareness is and go into some story about it, which I'm going to get at some future time.

And you might understand why I continually pointed out the direct and immediate way constantly every day without going into the story or what science has said or what physics has found out, what this is saying and what's that going to find out. Trying to work it out in the mind. Everybody is trying to work it out in the mind. I try to work it out in the mind. In the years I've given up, a long time ago because the answer wasn't there. And you'll never ever find the answer in the mind. That's what I was told. That's what I was pointed out. And that was the truth.

Continue to do it. You'll never know what you're doing if you want to. But you can get out of it quite easily, inevitably. It's entirely up to each and every one of you. So we ask you to look along these lines. What have we done? When the reasoning comes about you, what do you do? You can't do much with I or me. That's the primary thought. Your parents told you I, your little Johnny or your little Billy, whatever your name is, and you realize this is what I am. This is me. This is I. But you can't do much with I or me. With the capacity of reasoning, you've learned other words.

And every word you've ever learned or ever likely to learn has been picked up along the way because you weren't born with any words. Have a look. As I pointed out before, the first two years of your life, you didn't have any words. So it's been learned along the way. Before the words, you didn't have any words. And it tells you in the Bible, in the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God. The Word was God. And that's all that God is. And that's another word, another label we put on that wordless intelligence energy, which I call... There are labels I put on it to try and expose it, but they're not real either.

In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God. The Word was God. Nothing was made without Him. All things were made by the Word. Nothing was made without the Word. And that's not what you're doing. We label things, our parents, things at all. We're giving a name, shape and form and taking the Word to be real. And we've done the same with ourselves. When we learned the word, I am God, the Australian, the good fella, unhappy childhood, a bad child, put all these past events, experience and conditioning and believe in Him. And they've got a conceptual image, which is a dead image. Constantly relating to the dead image.

Now, how the hell can a dead image keep up with this spontaneous, ever-changing, ever-fresh moment? Don't you see the impossibility of that? No wonder the so-called suffering is there. The me's trying to catch up and relate to a dead image. And it doesn't happen. And it won't happen. It never will happen. It never can happen. Until it's investigated and you've never left this realised, and never left this spontaneous, what we call the moment, this actuality, the beingness of right now. And that's what they tell you. Let it rest in its uncontrived singularity. That's a singularity. It's one non-dual essence. Relax or not contriving any concepts.

Let it rest in that. And the Sargadatta says, Now I abide as that. Abiding again means resting in it. As that. Not the conceptual image, but that. And we know that everything is that. That's a chair, that's a carpet, that's me, that's you. That's its basic essence. The thatness of it. The one essence. Then who is there to seek? What is there to seek? Who's going to become, or who's going to get something? Who's going to be enlightened? Who's going to be realised? Or are you going to drop the concepts and just be as you are? What is? Unhalted, unmodified, correct. How does it come about?

We learn this capacity of reason. We put all these concepts. Now we function as I am Bob. The Australian, or the good fella, or whatever your name is. And our schools, we go to school, we learn more words. Our society, our nation, and everybody around us reinforce those words. And we believe in ourselves. Now we reinforce them ourselves. Every day, every hour, and every chance we get. We're reinforcing this dead image. No wonder we can't keep up with life. Because life is ever fresh. It's ever fresh, it's left those images to me. And you realise that when you realise that, as I said before, there's no static entity there.

That body is transient right now. It's constantly changing. But we're relating to the dead image. And this dead image is what we call me. Me becomes the reference point. The self-centre. Or the ego, three different labels we put on that. Everything becomes relative to that me. How does this fit to me? How does this fit me or I? Related to the dead image, and in this day and age we're constantly relating to this image. And that's duality. Relationship is relativity, is dualism. Me and the other. So no wonder we're in strife all the time. Realise there is absolutely no duality and non-duality. And realise also that every ism comes from the belief in dualism.

That's capitalism, communism, catholicism, positism, hinduism, buddhism. All come from ism, the duality, the belief in duality. See the fiction of it all. Toss it all in. So me becomes the cause. The reference point or the ego. And you're told in the scriptures that ego, this terrible thing called ego, is the problem. Kill it. Stamp on it. Jump on it. How are you going to kill something when it's looked into that never existed in the first place? See the futility of it all. It never ever existed. It's a fiction. So we've got to look at it and see if it is a fiction. I've got this conceptual image.

It's just like you've got a bucket of water. You pull it out of the river. And sitting on the bank, what happens to it when it's on the bank? Doesn't that water become stagnant still? And dead? What's happened to the river? Hasn't the river lifted behind? It's floating away, merrily away. It can go through sandy banks or through forests or deserts. Or it's even to flat places where it's hardly moving. Or cataracts. It flows along until it merges back in the ocean again. And there's no change in the water. It comes and goes. It might come up and be heated by the sun and comes as a cloud.

A cloud will be. The radiation of the sun will heat that cloud and blow the cloud as rain. It'll bring it down as rain and it'll fall into the river again. But there's nothing lost. Nothing born, nothing dies, nothing lost, nothing gained. Continues functioning. But we've got this cause to relate to. Me, Bob. I'm unhappy. I'm depressed. I'm anxious. I've had a bad childhood. People don't like me. I'm introverted. I'm a little bit of a child. I'm a little bit of a child. Because we're related as me. And that's causing all my unhappiness, my despair, my jealousy, my envy, my guilt. All this psychological suffering comes about from relating to the me.

And relationship, relativity, is dualism. What was it necessary to do? For me, it was necessary to see whether this me was real or whether it was a fiction like it was pointed to. And told the me, the conceptual image, the ego doesn't really exist. Because up till then we're told in the scriptures, a lot of them, we've got to get rid of this ego. You've got to kill it. You've got to stamp on it. You've got to get rid of it. But who would be trying to kill it, stamp on it, and get rid of it? Don't you recognise it with the ego itself? That we're trying to get rid of the ego?

And as they tell you in the scriptures, it's like trying to wash away blood with blood. Can you ever wash away blood with blood? You can't. Because can you ever destroy the ego or see the falsest ego? Looking into the ego to find the answer. So you can see why all these years we've searched and searched sincerely and earnestly, tried our hardest, and never found the answer in the mind. And I did for years and years and years. Thought I was close. Thought I was close. And of course this had happened in the next sex thing, the next Kundalini experience, the next meditation. I'd get it.

Never ever did. I went to this Agadatta, and I didn't want to go there, but things forced me to go and have a look at him. And he told me something that I'd heard many, many times. Just like Muktananda had told me, you know, You are that, and I'd never heard that for many, many years. And I'd tell the story about that and they'd say, I've told it many times. Like the bloke that went to the guru and he said, he said, teach me the truth. And the truth says, you are that. And he says, oh yeah, I've heard that before. And he says, that's all I've got.

And there's a guru down the road. He says, all right, he knows. I'll go and see him. And the guru down the road, he goes to him, he says, I've come to see you, know the truth. And the guru says, where you been? He says, well, I've been the upper guru up the road. What did he tell you? He says, he told me I am that. And he says, all right, you want to serve me? Serve me for 12 years. And then I'll tell you. So he served him for 12 years, doing all the savor, all the work, all the meditation, all the trance, repeating the mantra.

And he called the guru manager over. He said, what job have we got for this bloke? He's going to serve me for 12 years. He says, the only job we've got left is picking up the cow shit. And he says, that's your job. OK. He says, I'll do anything. I'll find the trap. So he picked up 12 years. And when he gets back to the guru, he says, all right, I've served you truly. Teach me the truth. He says, how about that? But this time, he heard it. Dr. Nandy used to tell that story, and people would burst out laughing, not realizing that's what they were doing.

They were still doing the savor, still doing the meditation, still seeing what he was saying, doing all this. I did it for years and years until I got to this. I don't know. I don't know. And he told me the same thing, that you are that. But this time, like the fellow that served the 12 years, I was able to hear it. And I heard it, and all that discipline and all the search dropped away. It was no longer necessary to do it. But the old thoughts, feelings, emotions had come up. And I still had to look at them. But when they lost their intensity, they couldn't be believed in again.

And not being believed, how are you going to continue to fixate on? Yeah. And the intensity in them would get less and less, and they wouldn't bother me at all after a while. The clarity, if there's no chatter going on, there's more and more clarity coming. All the clarity is is seeing clearly, like the sun shines more brightly if the clouds are not obscuring it. And when you realize that the sun itself is forming the cloud and seemingly blocking out the sun, and the sun itself's continues to radiate, it doesn't know anything about the cloud, and then it continued radiation. It'll cool this will cause that coldness to come about and bring the cloud down as rain or disperse it, or a wind will stir and blow the cloud away.

So that's what happened there. And the recognition of it, the belief in it dropped away, and the intensity had dropped away. And still it still comes up. The clouds will still appear in the sky, but they're not binding on me. I know whether it's a cloud or not. It's still going to move away after a while. And I can indulge in it if I want to, but it's not going to, who's it going to indulge in? Who's it going to affect? Doesn't happen. That's what needs to do. So I don't point out again what this ego is. You can have a look at that yourself and question it and see for yourself.

If you don't, it doesn't matter again. You'll do what you're meant to do. And take it where you got to go. People come over here from different parts of the country or hear about it in different parts of the world. Why do they hear about it? Because something's taken me to come to where they come, not taken them to somewhere where they'll hear it. Just like Nisargadatta. Being an Indian and living in a little slum place in Bombay, he would have thousands of people go past his door every day, thousands of them. Wouldn't have a clue he was there or who he was or anything about him, probably might never, never hear him.

And they're walking past him every day. But others, would find their way to him from all parts of the world and hear about him just the same as I found him. From Australia over there and didn't even know about him until I got there. And didn't even know I went and got up and didn't want to go to him. But things forced me to go. And there I was able to see through this egoic viewpoint and it's never been a problem ever since. Things have come and gone. It hasn't been the same smooth sailing all throughout my life. Things have gone and been taken away, but been renewed again and will probably disappear again.

Doesn't really matter. And it's aging and falling apart right now. But investigate this believed in me. We're asked to look along these lines. Everybody is seeing right now. Isn't that a basic fact? And everybody is hearing right now. When you opened your eyes this morning, now you say, now, I'm going to see. Did you? No, you didn't. You knew the seeing was there. You didn't even have to question it. Didn't say, I'm going to start to see. And then you went, now I'm going to hear. You didn't. The hearing and the seeing was there. But ask yourself this. The seeing and hearing there. But is it the same seeing?

You mightn't realize it. It's the same seeing you had yesterday, the same hearing you had last night. It's the same seeing you had last week. As far back as you can remember, it's the same seeing that's going on. You say, no, the seeing has changed. But when you investigate, you say, no, the seeing hasn't changed. It's the same seeing I've always had. Seeing hasn't changed, but the content has changed. When do I wake up in my room or wherever it was in somebody else's room? I don't know. It's up to you. It's the same seeing that's going on. But the content has changed. The content, what was going on in that seeing has changed.

But it's still the same seeing. And it's continually changing. It's changing right in this moment. Because it's transient. Everything is changing in this room. And it's the same hearing. Hearing was happening. Somebody called you in loudly in deep sleep. The hearing wouldn't be there. I say would be there when it woke you up. You didn't have to say, now I'm going to start hearing. The hearing was there. The seeing was aware. Just like the awareness. The unawareness was not there. You weren't unaware. Your awareness was there. You didn't have to say, I'm aware. So these things were happening. But ask yourself, this investigated self, it's that I, this ego, that believes that there's an entity.

Does my I tell me I see? Well, I'm looking around here. My I's not saying, look at this bubble. Look at that. It's yours. Have a test of that for yourself. See if your I is saying, I see. It's not. But you realize the seeing is happening through the I. That is the instrument through which the seeing is happening. And it's translated by this thought up egoic thing, I see. And it is an all going egoic thing now. Because it's not the natural seeing anymore. Because we're related to this conceptual image we've got. It's me, Bob, now. Thinks it has the capacity of seeing. A conceptual image.

A dead image of that. Thinks it is seeing. It thinks it's that egoic image of seeing you, me, and others. But it's not that at all. The seeing is still the same basic seeing. The conceptual, not the conceptual image, but the pure activity of seeing. The same with the hearing. Is my ear telling me I hear? My ear is not saying, listen to this, Bob. Well, listen to that. But it's translated by the thought, I see. Not a pure thought. So the seeing is happening is translated by the thought, I see. The hearing is happening is translated by the thought, I hear. So you see, the thought, I hear and the thought, I see, the conceptual image now seem to be some substantial thing that is seeing and hearing.

A me or an I. The conceptual image, it thinks it can see or hear. And thinks it's the where. But investigate it a little bit further. Can that thought, I see, that think it's running the show, just maybe it can hear it right now? running the show doing this. Can the thought I see, see? Shut your eyes and look around the room and see if you can see anything with the thought. With this conceptual image, the thought. See what you can see in the room. You can imagine and anticipate and conjuve something up in your mind, but the actual seeing, the fresh and new and the here and now, can't be conceptualized with a thought.

So the thought I see cannot see. Put your hands over your ears, look at your ears and see how much you can hear with the thought. So you see that thought up image can't see, it cannot hear. And is that, you're not unaware right now, so you must be aware. So is the thought I am aware, is a thought your awareness? The thought I am aware is not your awareness. It's the thought I choose. We think we choose our thoughts. I can choose my thoughts. I can choose my thoughts. But why the hell would you have an unhappy or a miserable or a painful or thought if you can choose your thoughts?

Do we choose to be that? Do we choose to be anxious? Do we choose to be fearful? Do we choose to be depressed? I don't. Do you? If you believe you are, question it. You can be out of it. And we try to get out of it. We think there's this big daddy up in the sky. Pray to him, he's gonna take me out of it. He's gonna give me the freedom. Gonna take me out and gonna leave me my sins. Don't hope for it too much. Just seeing the conceptual conditioning we put upon ourselves and what problem is there if it's non-conceptual awareness? What conditioning is there if it's not a concept based on the past?

So you realize the thought I see can't see. The thought I hear can't hear. The thought I'm aware is not your awareness. The thought I choose can't choose. So this thought up, imagined conceptual image can't do anything at all. What's doing it? The thought can't do anything. What's doing it? Isn't the same life essence, the same intelligence, the same activity that's rolling around the planet, the Earth around the sun, forming the planets, forming galaxies and pulling galaxies apart, whatever it's doing out there, causing tsunamis. Doing everything that's out there and happening. It's breathing you. It's beating your heart. It's growing your hair and your fingernails.

It's digesting your food. It's replacing cells in your body. See if you can do any of that of yourself. So it's the same life essence, if you like to call it that, or intelligence, if you like to call it that, or God, if you like to use those terms, that's doing it all and realizing I am that essence. I am that essence. Not the conceptual image me, but as I as not that personal self, but I as that one self. The self-realization, the self-knowing, the self-recognition, the self-shining, that self that's appearing, patterning, shaping, forming, and expressing as everything. That's what's pointed out here. That's what we ask and look at.

Question yourself, see for yourself. If you've got any questions or any doubts, for any arguments, or as some people have been doing, been coming here a while, can see through it, probably expressing a slightly different way to what I do, or might a bit more clearly, because I'm losing a lot of it in the, in the forgetting, the patterns of forgetting now, and sometimes refreshing you, but it's available for each and every one in this room. If you think it's gonna take time, what you need to do is investigate the concept of time, which we point out that time is a fiction. So, if we don't point it out right now, if you wanna know about it later on, I can or somebody else will point out.

It's always immediate. It's always this presence, awareness. And that's what it means, pre-sense. It's going on right now before the senses come up with it, which are conceptual, put the concepts on the senses. And it's awareness. They're not unaware right now, so you must be aware. It's that immediacy that is awareness right now. You are aware. You're aware of that. But what do we do? We immediately relate to the past event or experience. It wasn't me. It couldn't possibly be me. I'm not good enough. Look what I've done. Look what I'm fearful. Look what happened to me as a child. Now, it's up to you.

Get into it. The immediacy of it right now, when you went and saw the Magata, the sound of the car, just another label, another label, and you saw through the, the identity that you think you are, or the ego. Once you saw through that, you were saying that then you sort of, a lot of stuff started to drop away after that point. So in a sense, there's a bit of time in that, or it's just dropping away in the awareness that is right now all the time. Yeah. So. Well, it's wrong. By now, they saw through it, and they immediately say, right, yeah. And it all dropped away.

Yes. And then it says, I'll never be caught in the mind again. But naturally, I was. The old habit patterns would come up, which they naturally do. But they were seen for what, and then, and the seeing through, and they'd come up, and I couldn't relate over them, because after a while, they'd come, hang on. You saw through this the other day. Is it right, or is it wrong? I'll have another look, investigate it then. What am I seeing clearly? Have another look at it. And every time you question it, if it's not real, if it's false, you must see through it if you're looking the right way.

It'll drop off again. And each time it dropped off, and the belief, old belief would come up, you couldn't get the same intensity into it again, because it'd come up, and they'd tell you, hey, you saw through this, it's not the same. And when that intensity, same intensity of belief was going in, it made it seem real. Each time that dropped off, there'd be a little more clarity. When the cloud stops clovering, it's gone. When the sun stops clovering, the sun, there's no cloud over the sun, and the sky is very clear. When it's obscured by clouds, you can't even see the sun out. And that's what happened.

But the clouds come back. But does the sun know there's anything like a cloud? It doesn't. And when you recognize that, that you are that self-signing, ever-fresh, present awareness, no matter how the clouds come up, you're going to believe them again. So you don't have to look for the clarity all the time. After a bit of shit's coming up, you know it's not binding on you, you're not going to stay there for very long. See that? Be that. Through me and the other. So, so when, when you, the minute there's the recognition of that. And is there a me? No. Is there another? No. So what makes you think the cloud's coming in?

Cosmonizing emptiness. Yeah, so what I mean is, you know, in the early days, a lot of clouds were obscuring the sun. Mm-hmm. And it was less and less and less and less and less, you know. And I know, because I hear what's coming out of you. Thank you. What a relief. Yeah, because, you know, because I love, you still love that analogy that you used, was when you're exposed to who you really are, it's like a match in a haystack. Yeah. You're never doing anything. You can't change the mind with the mind. All conflict arises with me and the other. So, cosmonizing of emptiness, each time, not that there is time.

And all of a sudden you notice you're not reacting to the same thing anymore. Mm-hmm. And if you do react to it, it's not going to stay long. No, no, that's right. But sometimes you're not reacting to it at all. Yeah, that's right. And you go, wow! Yeah. Why should I bother doing it? Yeah. Yeah. I know about unit as well. It's such a travelling lighter. Yeah. It's such a French lighter. Yeah. It's such a French lighter. Wow. Oh my God. It's such a huge area. you know. Taking the burden of conditioning and consistently dropped away. And you used to say it's effortless living and I'd go, what's he talking about?

I've got to do this and I've got to do that and blah blah blah. If there's no one to have any effort, everything's effortless. In your heart, breathing effortlessly. Yeah. And you're breathing effortless and the cells being replaced in your body effortless. Even the thinking. Like you say, the clouds come as long as you don't attach to it. If you do attach to it for a while, recognise it as soon as you can. Remind. As I said before, be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Not fixing it now, just reminding yourself. I was going to say it feels like the sun seeing the cloud but it's really just another little cloud seeing the cloud.

That's a very subtle cloud. It's a cumulus cloud. Look at that analogy. The sun's so vast, it's got no idea that it's a cloud there. It couldn't possibly have. And the cloud is never completely, the sun's always going to be shining brightly in some other part of the world. It might seem to cover this part where we're seeing from. And does the sun know anything about the cloud? It doesn't, can it? What forms the cloud? The sun's, the radiation of the sun that shines to itself. In that self-shining, ever-fresh presence awareness, the radiation, the warmth or heat evaporates water. A simple process. That evaporates and water rises, it gets a bit cool, it condenses and forms a cloud.

Now does the cloud know anything about the sun? And does the sun know anything about the cloud? Sort of does. Sort of does. The sun's hot. As I said... We've got to witness the cloud, right? No, the sun doesn't know anything, the cloud doesn't know anything. It doesn't have any brain. And the eyes. But this conceptual image we form about it, we take that to be real still. A subtle bit of a blur in it, and we think we're witnessing the sun, the cloud. We're witnessing the blood of the sun. We are witnessing the idea that the sea is blue. But you investigated that. When was the sea ever blue?

When you really investigated it. You walk away from it, it appears to be blue. The sky appears to be blue right now without any clouds in it. But go up 30,000 feet in the plane or higher, where's the blueness? It's always further out. You know the truth about those things. And even though the seeming belief is coming into this conceptual image, you know it's not so. Never was. Presence awareness, never changing. That presence awareness. So everything else is a bit... Or you could look on it, you could look on it as... Change analogies, if you like. I love the railway station analogy. The railway station is always a railway station.

And the trains are always trains. The railway station doesn't go anywhere. It never changes. But the trains will always come and go. So whatever pointer resonates with you, to bring you back to. Or not that there's anyone to bring you back to, but to see. To cognise that you're falling into that trap the me's trying to keep an intricate little... Yeah, it's just that with the disguised me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's the one that keeps... I just... Yeah, I'm taking it in, yeah. I think whenever we say but, who's saying it? It's got to be the mind. Whenever there's a but. And not one on a chair.

But whenever there's a but, you know, it's usually the mind going, but hang on a sec, you know. But hang on a minute. Can't it be this or can't it be that? Or it's the nature of the mind. It's clunky, you know. It's the other thing. Show me your mind. Nobody stood up and said, this is mine, now show me. Show me your mind. Is there such a thing really as mind? Innately, you know, my mind. Whose mind? This little self-centered that believes in entity me, myself, to think that knows the mind? It can't. So there's no such thing as mind when you investigate mind apart from thought.

Now all mind is a thought. And if you were the mind, which thought would you be? Wouldn't you be this I or me thought? But which is a mental concept or word or something? Yeah. A mental concept or word is I, the concept. Is that what you are? Is the me, is that what you are? There is absolutely no such thing as mind apart from a concept. It's a label, a word. And there's no word that is the real. My house, my car. You know, you're not the car, you're not the house. Is the car, car, without that word, what is it? We have someone online, Bob, that is asking a question or rather maybe confirming their understanding.

If nothing is static, is the conceptual image or I static? Or is the attachment static? Well, no. They never were. How can an image be static? Because when you see through it, it's what makes it seemingly solid, gives it the same, the conceptual belief that's gone into it over the years. It's reinforcing it. It's reinforcing it every moment instead of questioning it. And I think the question came up from understanding or observation that someone, Gad Potter, I don't know him, realised that seeing that the image is changing actually helped him to realise that image, mental image or attachment is a content of the mind. So it's a good thing to ponder upon.

Is my self-image of me the same as when I was five-year-old? Probably not. Yeah. So the self-image that is changing, it cannot be me because I'm aware of it. I'm watching it. So that's a nice way to look at it. And that's kind of what you were saying. Yeah. Yeah, I think. And also that the cloud is watching the clouds. Absolutely. Beautiful. Yeah. It's like you're in awareness. Sorry, I'm talking too much. But awareness, you know, you see the thoughts, you realise they're not thoughts. That's just an illusion. So seeing the set, it's coming back a step of me seeing the thoughts. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And you don't have to throw away the thoughts. Thoughts can be very useful. Yeah. But it's self-destructive when it's believed to be some separate entity, and if it was related to a so-called seeming individual that thinks it's my thoughts, it's me that's thinking. But that's the way the so-called mind functions dualistically in the pairs of opposites, good and bad, pleasant and painful, happy and sad, loving, hating. Watch your mind and see the so-called mind and see if it functions any other way. It's always vibrating in the ellipses, it always will. But as Shakespeare told you, nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes us that.

Nothing can trouble you except your own imagination. As Nisargadatta tells you, image in. We're creating conceptual images and believing them to be real. And that's the point, we reinforce them every day, because we're never questioning, we're never taught to question it. Schools, society and everybody around us reinforce it also. We're never told to look in, even though it's been pointed out down through the ages. We've got to learn, we're appointed to look in and acquire, amass, accumulate, add to. A good education, more wealth, better car, better this, better that. Trying to make ourselves whole or complete when we were never ever separate at all. Yes, there is another question or comment.

From someone who is watching us online about the difficult paths of meditation or vipassana that somebody just graduated from another course. I did a few also. And the question is, because it's such a long and demanding path, sitting for hours all together, what would you want to say about instant enlightenment, rather than going on to... Well, looking for enlightenment. Yes. Enlightenment is never going to happen anyway. But recognise your true nature and that can be instantaneous. And it will be. But the dropping away of all the conceptual ideas, what we fix out of you, might take a little bit longer. But just sitting and abiding in that essence that you are, has always and ever been so.

When you look into it and say you've always been that, you can't negate it. Yeah, that's the unfortunate truth. The one who is seeking and striving and trying and doing everything in their heart and their power to wake up, is not going to wake up. Because that's a false image. The one who is waking up is the consciousness that has never fallen asleep. It's just the image that gets off the way. The consciousness is waking up from identification with the image. So regardless of whether someone is doing meditation or asceticism or starving or whatever, that one is the one that stands in the way. And the consciousness to freely experience, express itself.

And it doesn't. It's just a dream. The consciousness doesn't really carry their way. And that's what happened there. For years and years, every mantra I chanted, every meditation I did, every activity I did, getting closer, getting closer. And that becomes a habit with us. I've seen people come here and meditate for years and years. Oh, I'm not going to let that go. I'm that close to it. Tell it for us now. It tends to reinforce the separate self and approach. So it's taking you... It might. It doesn't have to. Because ultimately you are not the meditator. You are not the doer. Life does everything. But it might.

Absolutely. I used to live with a guy called Brendan. And he was definitely addicted to sitting. He was addicted to sitting. And it was an escape. It was an escape away from... life. You know, the life that was happening around him. It was an addiction. I don't know if it's an escape. No, not really. Not in reality. No, but I can see that that often happens. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. Well, see yourselves whether it's going to take time or not. Start with the fact that you're already that. Whether you believe it or not at this moment. That's a good one. Can you get away? From being that?

Yeah, the train station. You're the train station, mate. No worries. The trouble with this, that analogy, the Victoria will move the railway station. We live in the wrong state. They're moving railway crossings. So we'll move the station. Sorry. Come up with another one. That's the trouble, Dave. You can put everything apart with the concept and idea. Everything. You have to take it as a pointer. And that pointer is very good. If we don't do that, we question the pointers. Oh, no, this is that and that. Go into another long story and the story will go on forever and ever and ever. Amen. In other words, when someone is pointing the moon, don't look at the finger.

Don't look at the nail polish on the finger. Don't worry about the finger. Just look at the moon. And it includes also what Bob is saying about the messenger, worshipping the messenger. It doesn't matter where the message comes from. Look at the message. Look at the message, not at the messenger. Down through the ages, that's what everybody did that was pointing. They looked at the messenger and revered them and put them on a pedestal and thought they were separate from them. And all they were trying to do was point to the truth of their own being. Alternatively, they would crucify them or burn them at stake.

I had somebody that I've been talking with online. And there was some confusion that came up around the train station analogy. And what she was saying was quite valid. But what she was saying was that the analogy still implies some kind of doership in it, in that. Because I can either be taken away with the thoughts or I can just be taken away with the train. Or I can just see the trains coming and going and not getting on board with the thoughts. So she had some questions around that. and it kind of came up for me a little bit when I was hearing Adrian share before, that what we tend to do, that train station, Ed's touched on it, that train station, we still believe that me is the train station, and me is aware of the thoughts or the trains coming and going.

Yeah, that's what Adrian touched on, yeah. But that's not the point of it. So what's really being pointed at there is, if there's any entity, if there's the sense of any meanness, or any personalised sense of self, if we're using that analogy, that believes it's watching the thoughts coming and going, or watching the trains coming and going, because I'm now no longer... getting on the train, I'm not getting affected as much. Yeah? If there's any of that kind of dialogue, that dialogue, you know, I'm not getting affected as much, or whatever, is also just another train. Agreed. Or just another thought. Agreed. And that goes to what Kat was saying too, that you get caught up in the pointer and you start analysing the pointer, and you start, you know, like looking at the...

the nail polish in the hand instead of what's being pointed at. That's the same, that sort of validates what Kat was saying. Yeah. And also this is what Bob was saying on the beginning of the story about the 12 years of serving. See, when you ask... when you ask who is hearing it, or who are you talking to, or who are you pointing to, who cares? I mean, really, the analogy is heard by the one who is capable of hearing. Yeah. And that's what I was saying. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. If that one is identified individual, yes, I'm talking to identified individual because nobody else is there.

So if the one who is hearing the analogy is the consciousness, the consciousness will be responding. So really, when Bob is speaking, or anyone is speaking, we don't really know how it is going to be received and heard. If the individual is hearing it, it can still be very, very helpful. If I am still identified as someone who is watching the trains, and then I'll still manage not to embark, I'm the doer, I've decided, whatever the story I'm telling myself, that is still helpful because my suffering will lessen. But if I am the consciousness, hearing it, totally, totally aware that I cannot choose to identify or not identify, or go with the train, or not go...

You can't do anything else. Exactly. And it's like the fire, the match in the haystack again. You know, all these pointers are useful, but the truth will lead away the lie. You know? That's what happens. People try and get some value. Instead of trying to get some value out of the concept, they want to pull it apart. Yeah. Every pointer can be utilised, but every pointer, everything I've ever said or ever likened to, can be pulled apart. That's right. And it doesn't worry me a shit whether they do or whether they don't, or any of the other so-called same-sager things that are seen through it.

It doesn't matter. A pointer is just a pointer. Yeah, because it's one part of the mind analysing another part of the mind. Yeah. So, yeah, and that's okay, because you've got to use the thorn to pick out the other thorns in that pointer. Yeah. So it's all good. And they'll see that in the rat race that goes on and round these circles, like the pointers will all pull apart. This one's got to go away. The concept about the next one's got to go away. And it goes on forever and ever. Yeah. And because there is no, like, common vocabulary around this thing, people are often using contrasting or completely contradictory vocabulary.

So, you know, if you have a glimpse of the pointer, you will get stuck with the words, which is totally not the meaning of pointing. But it's all good. Yeah. And at certain point, I actually kind of really find it sweet to wake up from the idea that the pointer can do anything for you. It's because it comes naturally. Bob is saying it in every spiel, that the word is not the only thing that can do anything for you. It's the same thing. It's the same thing. Yeah. It's not the thing. Yeah. No word, awareness, God, whatever, is the thing. And if you are that, how can you really even speak about that?

You can't. So, to realise that every pointer is wrong is bullshit. It can be teared apart. Yeah, okay. It can. So that's why Bob says, you know, it doesn't worry me the slightest. Yeah, of course it doesn't. Why would, you know, like, he doesn't really believe the pointer is the thing. He says it many, many times. Absolutely. So, if somebody... Of course. If somebody has the need to pull the pointer apart and it kind of entertains them intellectually, well, fine. Or if that helps, well, even better. If it happens or it doesn't happen, one thing that you can do, don't take credit for it. You know, this is the habit pattern of that mind, to tear pointers apart.

I'm not doing it. I'm just kind of seeing that happening. I see the attraction to rubbish someone else or to rubbish a pointer. Yeah, that's what's happening. I'm not, you know, like... I can, of course, take responsibility in a way that I will be taking consequences. I'll be eating that, you know, that shit that I created. But again, that's just part of the happening because the eye that will be eating it is also part of the pattern in the mind that is just playing the game. But it's good, actually. I do really like when, Terry, you said somebody is actually trying to verify or kind of make the pointer more precise.

And asking valid questions that see there is some sort of assumed doership. Wonderful. That's a fantastic thing to do. I mean, contemplating on pointers can be a wonderful tool, can be the way that mind is actually being used instead of mind using the whole body machine to do whatever it pleases. How about you guys? Oh, I don't know. Not me. Not me. There is no you. There's no me. Cool. Just listening. Yeah. Listening is happening. Yes. Listening is happening. Yeah. It's catch 22, isn't it? Yes. When you talk, it's catch 22. Yeah. You can say whatever and then until it resonates with you, it's just intellectual.

Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. So, got to take the intellectuality out of it. Good luck with that. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Well, you know, when the fires, they're strong enough, you will do it. Yes. No one to do that. Yep. Well, yes. That's going to happen. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They're going to do it. Oops. Right. That's the right time to do. Yeah. When the right time comes. Yeah. It's just like what Bob was saying. You know. You may need to serve someone throwing the cow shit for 12 years.

How? Before it happens. You might have your 12 years done already. Yeah. That's right. That's right. Through the painful childhood or whatever. Through the seeking. Something will take you there. Yeah. I remember when the guru that I had in India used to say that people believe very often in Hindu religion that you need a thousand lives or seven lives or different amount of lives before you wake up. And he says, how do you know which life are you on right now? Yeah. Because there is only one. There's only now. In the saga it says there's only life. That's all there is. Nobody who lives a life.

We think we're living a life, but there's nobody that's living that life. It is life, living, expressing, patterning, shaping and forming as itself. And you are that. So, Bob, going on to that question. So when people go hunt, and we've got books on this, go under hypnosis and they go previous lives, past lives, and under hypnosis, and I've seen myself, other lives. I've seen other lives that I'm supposed to live. I mean, now I understand it a little bit different. So really, because it's the one, even though you go under hypnosis and you can name all these lives, it's not actually separate. I'll put it this way.

Every sentient being has been your father and your mother. And you are a sentient being. So whether you realise or not, you've been the father and mother of everybody else. It's not, it didn't just come to you and stopped. You've been that before. There's no... No static point to it anywhere. And also, apparently, the science now is discovering that the brain, the mind, the human mind, the neuronal connection, the whole network, is the most amazing improviser in the world. You don't even need to be hypnotised. You know, look at the book writers, people who write the novels and stories. Whenever you have, you hear the question, and you have the willingness to answer it, you will come up with spontaneous, amazingly creative stories.

And believable stories. Because it's all the while, it connects to anything. Yes. If that past life, is it any more real than what this one is? That's a good point. It's the same thing. It's like the night dream is the same as the day dream. Same thing. Yeah, this is a waking dream, yeah. That's what I said, everything's catch 22. Absolutely. That's right. How about your past? I actually like, Terry used to say, I loved it when he would say about, oh, you know, how many things I've done in all my past lives. You know, I've been in martial arts, and I've been this, this.

Past lives, you know, it's kind of, it's an attractive idea, because it is past, and it has been life. So, childhood is my past life. Working on the ships, my past lives. Martial arts, past lives. Whatever. This, how different. But this is another life too, when you look back. Oh, yesterday is past life. It doesn't seem like, you know, it was you. No. It was like another person, but taking the thing of you. That's true, yes. It's like all stories. Absolutely. It's like all stories. All stories are interesting and creative, and the story is not the real, the story of you isn't here. It never was here.

It never will be here. Of course it will be. Who is you? Yeah. Every story has a beginning and will have an end. What is beginningless and endless? When does now begin? Now. When's it ending? Now. When's it beginning again? Now. So that's eternity, beginningless and endless. We think eternity is some billion light years away, when some big bang or something happened. But that'll have an ending somewhere along the line. But this moment, we can't even call it a moment. It's beginningless and endless. And are you existing in any other moment than this one? Everything's a trick of the mind to make you believe that such a thing has happened, or will happen, or has happened.

But in reality, nothing's happening. It's just a thing. But in reality, nothing has happened. Exactly. Nothing happened. Yeah. Yeah. Happening is occurring right now. Just the same as seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, smelling, anything is occurring right now. I see, put a conceptual image on it. You formed a subject. I see it. I see the chair. I see the carpet. It formed an object. So seeing has been split up into subject, object, dualism. So I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it.

I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. I see it. But can there be the seer? I see. If you're not seeing, can you say, I see, you can. Without the seeing, can you say, what a scene, can you say there's a chair without seeing, you can't? So even though we conceptualise them and thinking they're separate, they're not. They're still only seeing. They're still only hearing, still only tasting, touching, smelling, thinking. The ING on it gives us something that's happening right now in the Simedezi.

So let's get a little clear about what's happening. Come with me. not some time-bound thing. You said the seer and the seeing, that implies duality, doesn't it? Yes, here's the subject-object. So because there's no duality, so there's no seer, there's no seeing, it's just seeing. And the subject is always I or me. The seeing is caused by the seeing. Yeah? It's caused by just that power. Yeah, what is it caused by? You see that life, that space. Yes, it's just spontaneous. The presence. Yeah, see, because the life force or the presence expresses through the body-mind. Body-mind is like a crystal. Like Bob was saying, there is nothing in the crystal, but when the sun shines through, it goes into all the different beautiful colours.

So you have the body-mind, the life or the energy goes through it, and through the eyes it appears as seeing, a space of seeing. Through the ears, a space of hearing, a space of tasting, touching, smelling, thinking. It's the same one life, kind of filtered through that crystal, and showing up as different colours. Space of this, space of that. Good point. Good analogy. So going back to past lives, that implies that there is somebody coming back, which is also duality, so that cannot be possible. That's beautiful, yeah. Absolutely. Trick of the mind. Yeah. You got it, babe. Where's that, Livia? Where is that? Present? Still present?

Still aware? Yeah. The presence is aware in it. And just as much as we can admire beautiful flowers, or beautiful birds, or beautiful waves on the ocean and the clouds, because of the space of seeing, and we can admire the beautiful music, because of the space of hearing, we can admire beautiful stories, because of the space of thinking. So if you want to, if you want to enjoy the stories about past lives, and you know they are just passing phenomena, well, why not? I mean, who doesn't love the good story? But if you take them to be reality, ouch, that hurts. But if you know that the beautiful story is as much unreal as a beautiful sound, sights, and tastes, and touches, and smells, you can really fully appreciate it.

You can fall in love with life as it is, and really enjoy them, because they don't, they don't hurt you anymore. So even if, believing in them is the act of believing, is the act of identifying them as the reality, as truth. Naming, claiming, yes. So that can be pretty painful. And waking up from identifying or believing into things is the freedom to actually appreciate things as they pass, as the phenomena that are passing. So the people, the way I see it now is that the people are saying they've seen their past lives, all they're doing because of their oneness, and it's all their lives, they're just clicking on one of those, and that's it.

You know what I mean? It's just a memory there. Some stories. It was a past life, what can they do with it anyway? No, that's right. Yeah, it's just like that you've seen, you know, you've probably heard some musical concert, or you've seen some beautiful scenes in the past. Yeah, and now what are they? There's some sort of a memory, we don't even know what the memory is, some sort of a frequency of vibration. I think the catch is that if I say I saw my past life as I'm an individual, but the reality is that I'm not the individual, and what I see is actually all the lives, you know, or just touch on one of them, but it's not me as an individual seeing it, it's me as one seeing it.

Yeah, but what you see is always an image, it's a mental image. The past life is a story which consists of images and thoughts and all that. It's all different sensations, so it's just a movie. Oh yeah, I used to have, years ago, fear of death. I mean, that's a common thing. And when I used to meditate and whatever, I used to see a lot of lives to where everything at point of death. I asked myself for different lives at point of death. I mean, now I've realized that all that took me here to show me that there's no death, and it was just images showing me all that.

But because when I was doing metaphysics, we sort of got to believe that there was past lives and there was reincarnation, there was, there was, there was. So the fear of death kept showing me all that. And now I've realized that there's no... Now you've got the real lesson, the true lesson. There's nothing. That's right. Just the mind. If you are the totality, where are you going to go anyway? Exactly. And also Bob said at the end of the spiel that it's really worthy on contemplating on the concept of time. Because if the past really happened, where is it now? Very important to see time.

There's no self center and there's no time. Like you say, go back a minute ago or go forward another minute, the next minute. There's no such thing. You can't. No. And when the only way you can experience the past is when you recall it. And when you recall it, you actually form a mental image. Again, the imagination. That's right. Right in the now. When you're recalling it, you don't recall it right now. You can only imagine and anticipate right now in the future. So you haven't made a doubt of everything. But if you don't recall it, where is the past? Where is the past if we don't think about it?

If you don't have enough thoughts, where are you? Exactly. Exactly. It doesn't exist. The time doesn't exist unless we think. Yes. To elude us. To elude us. To elude us. To elude us. To elude us. To elude us. To elude us. To elude us. To elude us. To elude us. To elude us. To elude us. To elude us in this reality. In my down-time, it sound like I'm doing, but the investigation has to continue to a degree doesn't it? Or do I stay vigilant and continue to investigate? Keep reminding yourself. Yes. It almost feels like Bob is talking to doer now. He's talking to whoever is hearing.

So if he says, keep reminding yourself he's not you know if adrian is hearing it adrian will follow but if consciousness is hearing it consciousness will follow ultimately it's only the consciousness is the only doer but whether it is filtered by someone who says no no i have to investigate contemplate meditate or whatever it's just a story yeah yeah that's what i say you can hear it again if my dear i'm not speaking to anybody i'm not speaking to any mind i'm speaking to that that i am but i am and the i am is that sense of presence which expresses through the mind as the thought i am that sense of presence expresses as the thought so i'm not speaking to the thought or there's no i am expressing it it's one essence talking to itself not even talking to itself or expressing itself last 40 odd years i don't know how many times i've said that yeah and then it's all a fair every time you said that and there was a question lately on youtube just about this one why even speak about it why you know if there is no one to to go no one to hear no one to listen why is even bob talking about it and then you know this is such an obvious answer why is he breathing why are birds singing why are you know like this why why question is an invitation to go for the ride on the story why he is talking i remember he said this beautiful story about uh nisargadatta telling him nothing and whether he would or he wouldn't that would have no influence someone asked him did nisargadatta appoint you to speak so what did you say then i said no he didn't if he had told me not to speak that couldn't have happened either exactly he just had to come in it's not that he is a doer that has chosen to speak to save the world or to do whatever speaking is his nature thak like the same way as the nature of the dog is to bark so that's why he's speaking because he's a speaker i mean that's that's it you know it's not not much that could be said more about it i mean why entertain ourselves with a story of mission or whatever if someone is a speaker the point where nothing is wrong anymore that fundamental self that nothing is wrong so he doesn't really come out from the point that oh you know you are all suffering I have to save you bullshit is not that is is just doing whatever we are moved to do you know Jane is singing because she's a singer why do you do it do you do it to save the world or do you do it to help suffer whatever come on you do exactly helps some people then so be it yeah and if it doesn't so be it yes yes some people go resonate and that's when the actual thing happens so it's all part of the reply part of the play exactly oh yeah that went pretty quickly