This transcript was made by speech-recognition software, so names and some words may be misheard. The recording is the original: watch on YouTube.
So we say it's a fiction and we point that out and ask you to have a look at that direction also. Everybody is seeing right now. And that's just an ordinary question, not a true question. So everybody who isn't seeing, and tell me this, did you have to start seeing? Did you say, sometime today, now I'm going to start seeing? Even when you opened your eyes this morning, did you say, now I'm going to start seeing? Well we're seeing spontaneously and effortlessly there. And everybody is hearing right now, the same applies to that. And ask yourself this, does my eye tell me I see? Well my eye doesn't tell me I see, that doesn't mean yours doesn't tell me I see.
The seeing is happening through the eye. And it's translated by this thought, this mind, into the thought I see. Just the same as that sense of presence is translated by the thought I am. It's not the thought I am. It's the way it's translated into the thought that's been learned or taught. Understand that all these thoughts, all these words, that we've got, are not your natural state. They've all been learned. Next time you see a little baby, before it's time to ask, ask him any words he knows. He hasn't learned any. He can't even reply to that. So the eye can't tell you, doesn't say I see, and the ear doesn't tell you I hear.
Translated into I see and I hear. Now tell me this, can that thought I see, and remember the thought referring to this entity you believe yourself to be, me, Bob, this Australian, this good fellow. Can I see? Well the thought I see cannot see. If you don't have to be a Rhodes Scholar to work that one out either, you'll think well the thought is not doing any same. It's just translating into a quiet, labelable word with you. The thought I hear, can't hear. So can the thought I am aware, when you say I am aware, you believe yourself to be this awareness, this concept you've got.
The thought I am aware, is that your awareness? The thought is not. Does the thought I choose, is that the choice maker? You see, the thought hasn't got any power whatsoever of itself to do any of those things. The thought can't see. Can't hear, can't be aware, can't choose. It can't think. Thinking is happening, it's translated by the thought I think. The thought I think is not the thinker. It is the so-called thinker. The thinker is the thought. And the thinker is the pseudo-subject. The erroneous belief in a me. So you see, this ego, this self-centred that we've got, the seemingly concretised from the energy of belief, going into it constantly, day in, day out, over you, the semi-substantial thing, something with some substance and some reality with itself.
But you see, when a thought has got no power, and it's got no independent nature, so this egoic image I've got hasn't got any power, and hasn't got any independent nature. I've been by that independent nature, but that's some independent nature. That thought could stand on its own. Tell me this, how many thoughts can you have with that awareness or consciousness, whatever you like to call it, that's another level of problem, where life essence is not functioning and patterning in that body? Take the life essence out of it, and how many thoughts have you got? Can't see, can't hear, you can do an autopsy on it, and you can't feel it, can't think, can't do any of those things without that life essence functioning through it.
Because what must you do? Are you the body? Or are you that life essence that's patterning, shaping, and shaping? So this ego that's causing all our problems is a fiction, a total fiction. So it doesn't have to be sublimated, it doesn't have to be stamped on and rubbed out. Just see that it doesn't really exist. Look into it, investigate and see for yourself. That's a fiction. Now realise that this has been the cause of all your psychological suffering. This ego, me, I believe it's only a me that can be anxious, only a me that can be fearful, only a me that can be full of self-pity or resentful or unhappy.
So me is the cause of all my problems. And the effects are my anxiety, my fear, my self-pity, my resentment, my unhappiness. They're effects. Now that's all that's so-called karma is. I quit this trip about karma. That's all that's so-called karma is, is cause and effect. But what happens if I see that the cause is a fiction, has no substance, no independent nature, and ask myself, can there be an effect without a cause? And again, can there be? And what happens if I'm not relating all these things to this cause, to me? Where are they going to lodge? Who are they going to attack? Where are they going to have me?