This transcript was made by speech-recognition software, so names and some words may be misheard. The recording is the original: watch on YouTube.
And then we're going to just start this one. And we have Brandon. Lucky. Lucky. Lotus. Robbie. Seam. Jimmy. Rose. Jane. Jane. And Kat, Bob and Tanya. I'm just going to plug this one. And hope that it is going to be a good one.Okay, and we're going to find out if that audio system works properly or not. Or just to be on the safe side, unplug it again.And if there is anyone with us online who has trouble with hearing, just let us know. And I'll give you this. Oh, thank you. You want to be a judge as well? Oh, thank you. Okay, so starting from basics, the message is really, really simple.
And that is what Bob was stressing. It's not for the special ones. It's not for the few big guns, enlightened masters who are just one at the time or hundred at the time or whatever the story says. It is to be recognized by anyone and everyone. It's really simple, it's obvious. And in Buddhism they say that the problem of humanity and the problem of suffering comes from ignorance, from the fact that that very, very obvious simplicity of the message is being ignored. Is being discarded, is being taken for granted. And the truth, the final truth, the only truth that ever is and that ever could be imparted, understood and recognized, is that you are.
There is an existence. You exist.and nobody can deny it. It's pretty clear, it's pretty obvious. Why don't we give it due attention? Why is it so largely ignored? Why is it seen for what it is? The absolute miracle, the miracle of existence, the miracle of being without which nothing could ever be experienced. All the colorful kaleidoscope of life, of the dreaming, of the fantasizing, of memorizing, of imagining, of creative art, of childhood traumas or anything that could ever happen is only there because you are conscious. You are present, you are aware, you are conscious. And for whatever reason, the life revolves about non-existent nonsense, becoming.
No one can become anything. There is no future if you really, really look at that. Is there a future if you don't think about it? Could you ever become anything? Other than what you are right now and if so it is only in your imagination in this direct moment of presence you are you exist that you are is the final truth that no one can argue with this is not a belief this is not something that you will learn in church It is something that is obvious and evident. No one can argue.with that. No one can stop being for a moment to see how it is not to be.
And then the preoccupation throughout the whole life, seeking, goes around ignoring that basic miracle of existence and going about imagining supreme states of bigger, greater pleasure or ecstasy, enlightenment, which means that I'll never get... Sad or angry or whatever when not now and who has ever experienced not now have anyone ever been outside of now even if you imagine future you're imagining it now there is no other time there is no other place to be it is always this present moment But because the way that this human body-mind transmitter-receiver machine has been constructed, and if we look at it, you know, for that life essence, for that existence, for that aliveness, it needs a vehicle to experience itself, to see, to be, to hear.
How could the pure essence, pure energy, pure consciousness ever experience colors if it didn't have human eyes? Animals experience colors too, but we are experiencing animals as a content of our dream. So we always refer to what is happening to us.me right now the me is a different story because if the me is believed to be a vehicle if you believe to be a body then of course everything that happens to the body is not good enough is not grand enough could be better should be better But if you are alive, if you are the essence, if you are the animating force, not the corpse, but the essence that is animating it, that everything that happens to you, the whole world that happens to you, happens inside you, within you, you are the consciousness.
And within that consciousness the body arises the world arises other bodies animals you go to sleep at night and a different world arises in the same consciousness the consciousness doesn't change but the content is changing Just like the capacities, capacity for seeing. You are seeing. Everyone is looking, seeing. Seeing is effortless. Within that seeing, there is a content arising, content of this room. In the morning, there might have been different content. When you were a child, different content. But the seeing is the same. The seeing. So that seeing or that dreamingis appearing within that which I am. The body is changing. The thoughts are changing.
That changing body and changing thoughts appear in the consciousness that I am, in that presence. The way world grew to interpret it, and this is through the programming, through the conditioning, through the large language model, which has been installed into that body-mind machine in early childhood. And now it chats just the same like any other large language model devices. And it tells us the story and it improvises the story of being a vehicle of identifying as a person, as a body-mind and living through time and having traumas and having past memories and having alleged future and having dreams and desires. But this is only happening within the field of narrative.
It is only happening right now when you think about it. When there is no thought, where is the past? When there is no thought, where is the conditioning? Where is the trauma? Where is the childhood? Without the mental image, nothing ever happened. It's just this eternity of this moment now. And within that now,thought the mental image brings the rest of the dream the childhood the past the future other planets other countries political affiliations all of that comes in this moment as a mental image projection a dream a dream within the dream But it disappears when the thought is paused for a moment. So it is completely reliant on that capacity of projecting, of imagining.
It doesn't exist in the direct experience independently from the thought. But what does exist? There is a seeing currently happening, hearing, tasting, touching, smelling, experiencing the sensations, perceptions, projections that is happening now. And mental images as well. Those are current experiences. And in non-duality, we are all invited to trust direct experience above all else, above the conditioning, above what we were told and began to believe early on. We were told we are a poor human, miserable human. After all, I'm only human. I make mistakes. I'm wrong. I can't be. That's what I am, human. That's a belief.What is not a belief? Which thought is not a belief?
Is there a thought that is the absolute? Is there the thought that could be true? Any thought, objective thought, sky is blue. Well, is it? Go out at night and see how blue is it then. Or in a cloudy day. Or Bob would say, you know, go to the airplane and fly and see if the balloon is going to go through the windows. There's no blueness. It's just an appearance. And science will explain it as the angle of the light moving through the atmosphere and creating that illusion of blueness. But really, there is no sky. There is no canopy above that we call sky. It is just a concept.
It's a mental construct. It's just space. And is there a space? Can we actually conceptual, can we grasp, can we experience space? Space is just a word. And when you even think of what that word represents, is there something called space? Or is the space absence of things? Nothing. So you can see any thought you take, oh, I'm too fat. Oh, according to what or to who? Oh, I'm not good enough. Well, again, that's a concept. That's a belief. Oh, my mother beat me up when I was a child. Wow.Where is it when you don't think about it? Is that even true? Apart from the imagination, from the projector?
Is that experienceable? How can you experience it right now? The same way as you watch the movie. The same way as you... Go on YouTube or do your research or talk to your AI. It does not have direct experience component other than through the medium of imagination and the imagination, the mind, the overlay of the interpretation of what is happening. Is the only problem that one could ever have. One of Bob's favorite quotes from Nisargadatta was that nothing can trouble you except in your own imagination. And his version of it is, what's wrong with right now if I don't think about it? Because thought is mental image, it is imagination.
It's not that much of a difference between having a thought of tomorrow or imagining tomorrow, or having a thought of yesterday and imagining, re-imagining yesterday. It is all that wonderful, wonderful capacity to overlay this present moment of seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, smelling. With the veil of interpreting. Oh, this I like, and this I don't like. This I want more of. And thatone I don't want at all and resistance and and being pushed and pulled all the time because of the interpretation while life moves effortlessly when a little baby is is born it is naturally attracted it stretches its arms and legs and if you get something tingling or something flashing it will reach out for it when there is something unpleasant it will move away just like any animal any creature in the natural world But there is no concept, oh, I have to do that because that means this is wrong or this I don't like.
There is no relating. There is no reference point. If you look at this cat, where is he? He's walking around. There is no concept in that, and that we know from the absence of the language model. In the head of a cat that he is separated from the room there is no concept of being a he or being a cat it's just the whole environment moving that animal when when there is an urge in the little body to go and urinate the whole environment moves and in the experience of Kat is the room moving. Oh, there he is. And it's the same with us. We are leaving, nature is leaving us.the same life that is bringing the urge for the cat to come and maybe lick himself right now or go and eat the same urges life brings into our body when we want to when we find ourselves smiling or we find ourselves getting dysregulated emotionally there is something that is discovered in the system Suddenly there is the movement of energy and that movement again is inseparable from the environment which causes it.
Can you have the sad experience if there is no sad event around? Sad thought or painful or angry thought if there is no cause for it?It seems like the cause can be internal and yet internal external is another division that is purely conceptual. You can get angry when you're hungry or you can get angry when there is something else happening because that isn't separate. It's inseparable. You can see how the body is constantly exchanging the air with the environment. It's exchanging water. It's exchanging matter. It's one with the environment. When it gets cold, it wants to put something on. It constantly responds by itself. You don't have to regulate the temperature.
You don't have to beat your heart. You don't have to switch on the seeing to be connected with all that world. It all happens by itself. You don't have to check whether you are hungry. When the body needs some impulses, and they can be all dysregulated also. And that's again the conditioning that people suffering from eating disorders that were also a response in particular time to the demands of the environment. Sometimes I know people who actually self-harm because that was the best way to avoid emotional suffering. The body just didn't really find any better way. And it become habituated. And it became lifelong misadventure.But yet, from the perspective of life, it was the best cause of action that could not have been taken up if environment was different.
Because there is no separation. The body, it cannot stand alone without the space in which it appears, without the element from which the environment is made. And the body, the world cannot be experienced without the medium of that vehicle. Even in the dream when you sleep, there is a dream vehicle that is capable of seeing, hearing, tasting.So life from the life's perspective experiences and expresses itself through everything, us everything, through everyone, every feeling, every emotion, every thought, every body, every... Large language model nation cluster of stars or galaxies of planets every cell is the expression of that one energy of that one life every atom is a movement of energy Every material object is a movement of energy.
Every feeling, every sound is a movement of energy. It's one field of energy moving in different frequencies, different vibrations, and creating that incredible, incredible dream of present experience. And the incredible dream of imagination that sometimes clouds the present experience and sometimes enriches it because when you see through it there is nothing wrong with having a memory or having a mental image or watching a movie or going to the concert When you see it for what it is and you enjoy that incredible, incredible capacity of that which sometimes iscalled God, the omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, all there is. So that omnipotence vibrating into the myriads of experiences, patterns, shapes and forms, all appearing within that one field of knowing, being, knowing, loving to be.
That is what we're pointing to. And that is already directly experienced by everyone. The only problem there ever is, is the mind that clouds it. And it is, is there a mind really? There isn't even such thing. This is just a label for the capacity for thinking. Because you are equally alive when you are engrossed in your drama or if you are having a bad trip. Is equally alive. It's just that veil of, sometimes clouding it completely, veil of human suffering, the tendency to interpret everything and relate to the person, to the me, to the I. That makes almost impossible to see that incredible miraculousness of this moment, which is ever fresh, ever new, never to be repeated, never to be the same.again the content of seeing the hearing the tasting the content of feelings every sensation every perception is fresh and new even if you had it before and you label it yes i'm anxious i've been anxious before is fresh.
It has never been like that before. It's the label that makes it recognizable. And again, the capacity to label is a wonderful capacity.But it is wonderful when it is a servant and not a master. Because when that capacity is in charge, I cannot tell you how much fear and paranoia the world already has from that large language model called AI. Clouding over the reality and taking charge. Who knows? We'll see. So if the mind is in charge, we know how much suffering it can cause. And when we give the charge to that artificial mind, hmm, that may be a nice ride. Though it is a form of intelligence.
Everything is the same one life, the same one essence. Artificial, inartificial, natural, those are all labels. It is all one energy field experiencing and expressing. And expressing as something that is called humans and it got rid of 95% of the other species on the planet. Yeah, wow. Now expressing as something called AI and getting rid of that one that got rid of the one of the 95% of the species. Wow. Life doesn't mind. Life finds the way and you are the life. You are not the aging body. You are not the anxious mind. You are the life.life what can you ever fear what can you ever worry the body will die and fearing the death of the body is a great source of suffering because it translates to different areas of life as for example greed I fear that the body will die, will be impoverished, so I have to steal and I have to lie and I have to gather more money because otherwise I won't be safe.
That's all fear of dying. That same fear of dying translates to fear of loneliness. Oh, nobody will ever want me, so I'll go with the first guy who is attracted. And oh my gosh, fear of dying. What dying? What dies?If you are not the body, what does it matter? Thousands of cells are dying in this body every moment. The hair are falling, the bacteria that are digesting the food, digesting the stomach lining. There is a lot of replacing of those life forms, movements of energy. What does it matter? If you are not the body. If the body is your car, you may be very attached to the car, and when the car doesn't function properly, you may feel disappointed, of course.It doesn't mean that you can replace the body like you replace the car.
Although we'll see, you can replace parts of the body as of now. But the idea of the self living somewhere within the body-mind that travels through life and replaces the cars. That is to be investigated. The idea that there is a self inside called me. That self that has independent existence. That ego mind or soul. Independent existence apart from the all source of all life that very idea is the very cause of all psychological suffering because if there is a me inside that me can be wrong that me can know something and then it can forget that something that me can get the message and then it can lose the message that me technically or theoretically
that me can be humiliated, can be ashamed, can be guilty.
But have a look. Is there anybody there? Is there anyone who thinks the thought? Do you know your next thought? Do you know what you're going to think in five minutes? If there is an I that is thinking thoughts, well, why don't you decide not to think thoughts? And just be in ever-present enlightened natural state thoughtless state but you see very very quickly anyone who had any experience with meditation will see very very quickly that the thinking happens on autopilot just like sweating just like digesting salivating It is the process that unless you get the brain damage or Alzheimer's disease or a stroke, it goes of its own.
It keeps the guards open. The ears are open, even in the sleep. The sensory on the skin telling you about the temperature is also available. And what's coming so you can see how you are not thinking hi michael how you are not thinking your thoughts you are discovering them so if there is no thinker of the thought who is the discoverer who discovers the thinking who discovers the feeling who is the explorer of that life.Is there anyone there again? And if there is, where is it? Where is it? Where do you feel that there is that I? Where is the me? Some people say it's behind the eyes because they sit in the head and there's so much tension there behind the eyes.
Okay, just turn the attention, see what's there. See if you can sense any shape, any form, any pattern, because hundreds of operations, body has been sliced a thousand times in the tiniest, thinnest slices, nothing has ever been found. Yeah, but soul is immaterial, maybe that's why. Really, really. See if there is any immaterial soul if you stop thinking about it or believing it. See if there is any shape anywhere, maybe in a throat or in a heart, if there is any shape to be experienced if you don't have mental image of any shape or any size. See what's true in direct experience without the thought.
What's happening when there is no thinking going on? And you see how the life is showing up in this moment, ever fresh as it does. If you close your eyes, there is no colors showing up. If you open your eyes, there is that whole dream showing up. You go to sleep, there may be a different dream showing up. Where does it even show up? Does it show up in a little me or for the little me?the little me somehow separate from all the show? Is the body separate from all the show? Doesn't it all arise within the field of knowing, the consciousness, the seeing, the being?
Is that field limited to any shape? Is that field this size or this size? And if you assume any size, how do you know that? Where are you looking from? Or is the direct experience of just the world arising in that field of knowing, that field that doesn't have any dimensions, any end, any circumference? See what's true for you. Because people, different religions, different schools will tell you different things. But find out for yourself. Don't be a believer. Know the truth. Jesus, I think, said, know the truth. The truth will set you free. Know it for certain. Know it from the first-hand experience. Don't let the world fool you, condition you, that you are a good little boy or a nice little girl or you are a person or you are a woman or you are a man.
Are you? In your own direct first-hand experience without mental projections, without mental images, from the alleged past, are you really a person? Are you even a human?but a consciousness in which the whole world appears, comes into existence moment to moment. Is there anybody doing the seeing? Look, who is looking? There. Anyone there? Or it's just impenetrable nothingness that can't even be said to be, to have any dimension or space. What's looking? You can't even say nothing. You can't even say space. Is there a space? Darkness? Lightness? Nothing can be said about it. And yet, the whole miracle of seeing, of witnessing that moment, is right here, moment to moment.
And it is covered up by the idea, oh, no, no, that's nothing. That's just my life. And it's not good. I need to find something. I need to understand that enlightenment thingy, because then I will always be happy. And I will never feel, you know, like you look at nature and look at this cat on Loki's lap. And I tell you, you pull it stale and it won't be very happy then. So, and he is a Buddha nature. He's got no sense of separate self. There is no concept of being separate at all. There is no concept of needing to deserve heaven or going to hell or being reborn as a snake next life.
Zero. Complete freedom.complete, non-conceptual, ever-fresh awareness of existence. It's quite obvious that the cat is unconscious, isn't it? Wow, he says. And the nature is a perfect demonstration of the natural state, natural as in nature. It's the nature of existence to just be, to be completely open, to have all the senses open. And when there is a requirement to run away from danger, it doesn't require thought either. It just gets off and runs. Of fight, feel, freeze or whatever. It all goes on autopilot. They're really in the direct experience. The narrative will translate it into something else. But in the direct experience, everything happens because the urge arises, because the impulse arises, the impulse to connect with someone, the impulse to fight with someone, the impulse to go and get somewhere or get something.
They're all happening. The impulse is discovered in the system. And if it's charged, then it is followed. If it's not charged, then perhaps there is a narrative going around it. And then sometimes the decision happens within that field of experiencing. And sometimes it doesn't.And either way, this is the one essence presenting that unique moment only once in the eternity, only now. Why overlook it and exchange it for thought? About me, this is wrong. I don't get it. I should get something. This is... All that narrative, all that story of me, that self-obsession, that drama. Is part of the display seeing through it seeing that overlay of the narrative yapping yes but but i don't have enough i am not enough this one doesn't like me wow you see the narrative from the point of being the field of consciousness discovering it in the same way as you discover sunshine moving through the clouds or the cat pairing and being completely free from believing it, from following it, from taking it for granted, from attaching to it and being serious about it.
If the narrative here, and it used to be like that for... 40 years the narrative would say oh yes i'm anxious or i don't understand or i don't get it or i'm not good enough and it was believed and it was depressing and it was suicidal at times it was horrible now the same thoughts can appear well they don't really i mean they appear as an example but even if they doAnd there is no one who is attached to believing thought. There is no seriousness. There is no importance. Thoughts are just translation. They're just subtitles. They're commentary. Life can run equally well without them. Look at this cat.
No thoughts. And a life does everything. Life look after their youngs. It gets the food when it's needed. It gets the shelter. It seduces people to pat him. It's all the same life, the same life moving through everyone. The life that made you choose your life partner, the life that creates the illusion that this is I, this is me, I made the wrong decision. I shouldn't have chose that. I feel so guilty now. I feel so ashamed of what I've done. You haven't done a thing, ever. If that animating life wasn't moving through that body the body would be a corpse it wouldn't have done a thing it wouldn't have seen hear taste touch smell would done no mistake done nothing right nothing wrong ever the life essence the animating force isn't that more of what you are then the hardware of the body or the software that that is narrating it it's likeLike Bob's metaphor of the computer.
What the computer can do with all that wonderful information and programs installed there. Programs displaying YouTubes, videos, scientists, AI. If the power is off. If you disconnect the battery or pull the plug. Nothing is a corpse. Realizing that the capacity for seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, smelling is that life force moving through that body-mind vehicle, that transmitter-receiver, that incredible biocomputer. Translated to seeing hearing tasting touching smelling just like you see the electricity moving through the globe and showing up as light moving through a different globe the light may have different hue different color different shape just like you have different people showing up in different skin colors different globes different colors but the life essence behind it the life that grew those people from a little cells they were two cells connecting because their mother and the father they ate food and they breathe air and and the automatic function developed those reproductive cells that they eventually met and grew the body in the womb and the body went out with the capacity of seeing some bodies have limited capacities some have greater capacitiesThe capacities for creating fantastic poetry or music or whatever.
Everybody has unique capacity. But those capacities belong to that biocomputer. And life as the essence utilizes what it created because the body isn't separated from life. It's the life showing up as food that creates the body of the parents, that sustains the body of a child. It is all life. But primarily, you are the essence. You are that energy, that electricity that creates light or heat or electromagnetic waves of the movies and dramas. As a projector, look how those electromagnetic waves may create the mental imagery, past, future, all of it, right in this moment. Because of that capacity so life utilizing this particular machine now that pure energy is translated into seeing hearing tasting touching smelling just like the light going through the diamond no color white light suddenly we have all the red purple yellow blue we are a little diamond showing up that life essence pure energy broken down into the capacity for seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, smelling, always itself, always oneself.
Everything that lifelife looking through these eyes reflecting around is still the same life it has glimpses of itself in thousand different ways every moment because it is the omnipotence it is the omnipresence omniscience and that is what you are Only the mind tells you something else. The mind tells you that you are separate. You're poor, you're miserable, you're not good enough, you're not getting it. That's just a thought. All of it is just a thought. If for a moment you just breathe that thought out and direct experience of this moment, wow, what's wrong? What's wrong? Everything's functioning. No thought, no problem. No thought, no drama.
Yes, yes, but how can I stay without the thought? The thought will come. That's right. But the thought will come on that which is already here, that awakeness, aliveness. So what does it matter whether the thought comes or not? The Buddhist teachings that Bob would sometimes quote, or was a doctrine maybe, would suggest to stay thought free. But it doesn't mean free from thought, that there is an I and there are thoughts that are enemy and I have to somehow obliterate them.Thought free is thought being completely free. The consciousness is like a sky. Sky is completely free. Thought formations or any other formations in consciousness are like clouds.
Clouds are completely free to move through the sky. Does the sky care whether there is a cloud or no cloud? You are the sky, you are the pure consciousness. Whether there are sights, sounds, tastes, or sensations, or perceptions, or images, or thoughts appearing in that sky, in that vastness of consciousness, Who cares? Let them be there. The problem is only when the attention travels to the thought and engages with the thought. That is when the drama starts. Suddenly, there is the default mode of constructing the identity showing up. And now I am the person again. I'm trapped again. I'm not the consciousness. Of course you are.
But if you believe that you are not, you're going to experience that you are not.And this is why the whole Advaita, the whole non-duality, is all about seeing through that veil of beliefs. Seeing that with or without the veil of beliefs, you are. Knowing that you are. What you are is a belief. But that you are. Is unquestionable fact that no one can deny or negate. That you are is the fact. What you are, forget about it. It's a belief. You could have fun with life and just, you know, people who are into acting or performing. You can just become a performer, perform the role of a mother or perform the role of a wife or entrepreneur or musician.
What fun! But the one that performs, the one that is behind, is the life essence, expressing and experiencing itself through the body, as the body, through the role, as the role. But primarily, what's always here is that aliveness, that presence of consciousness. Body is changing, thoughts are changing, roles are changing, behaviors are changing. But that sameness, that knowingness that is witnessing all the change, that has beenhere forever that is always there whenever you look that's your essential nature not the identification not the costume imagined Oops, got over time. Okay, so the format of the meetings is to have roughly about half an hour introduction. Bob would sometimes extend it to an hour, but we don't do it.
We want to give the voice to the people because who doesn't know they exist? Everyone is already in the possession of the final and absolute truth. And that is the fact that you are. So share it, whatever resonates. Share the basics and ask questions and elaborate. Ask questions. Everything is, nothing is wrong. Everything is just fine. Kat, that was a beautiful spiel. Yeah, it was great. Yeah. And there's a couple of comments. Bill and Charlie both said, beautiful, beautifully spoken, Kat. There were so many gems in there. And one of the things you said, you know, you were talking about the fear of death. And the fear of death is life, loving life story.
Loving story just to keep going. And, of course, it does keep going.And about the belief that it's possible to get caught in the clouds of thoughts. That is, as you say, that's imagined. That's also part of the story and imagined. And those clouds... Have no potential, could not appear but for the sky. They are occurring, they are not separate from the sky. Conceptualize them, you know, it's just all of it happening in consciousness. And consciousness doesn't get lost. It doesn't go anywhere. It doesn't do anything. It's just enjoying the show, really. That's all you can, nothing can really be said fundamentally because nothing ever really happens.
Because there's only ever, you know, right now, right now. You can't hold on to what just passed a millisecond ago. It's gone. It's dead. It's lost its vitality. You can say, well, I can remember it. Can you? Not back in the past. It's been seemingly this thing we call remembering, which is really just another new and fresh imagining.And that's all it is. And it's the same with, you know, projecting into the future. You never get there. It's always just now and there seems to be this, you know, imagining lost in the story of the future. But truly, the... That which is never moves. It's still and it's silent and it's that consciousness in which all the change seems to be happening.
It's literally nothing to be done by a person.People are just part of the story of the moving around, seemingly separate from one another. As Cap said, there's no inside, there's no outside. You can't find the inside. You can't draw a line between inside and outside. You close your eyes and imagine there's an inside. But what's your actual experience? It's nothing more than what's happening here. The seeing, the hearing, the feeling, the breeze.There's nothing else. Everything else is a concept, a brainwashing, a habit, and imagining. And these are all just words. Again, these are just words, and they can mean different things from one seeming person to another, and that's part of the whole story as well.
There's no requirement to get hooked on a particular concept or anything. None of it is real. None of it. Anything, anything that's coming and going, beginning and end, that changes, that requires words, labels, it's all story.Beautiful. Yeah, it's that simple. It's that simple. I don't want to die. I was just thinking once upon a time there was a me and so that me and time and the story, they're all just, you know, dialogue really. They're just narration. All appearing upon that presence that we are, right here, right now. That's all there is. Very confusing when you first come to this understanding because we've been conditioned all our lives to believe we're separate, we're individual, we're, you know, striving, we're doing this, doing that.
That like Kat so beautifully put it, we're just life itself, that animating life essence, that pure intelligence energy that Bob loved to call it. And, yeah, and, you know, also what Kat said was have a look. Have a look and see if you can find that me, you know. I've not been able to find it, but, and yet for years and years I believed I was it. So, yeah, and then Bob, you know, suggested having a look. And three years of...torture and going back and forth and back and forth. Some people learn quickly, some people learn slowly. Everything just dropped away and there's just what is happening right here, right now.
And yet, you know, that life essence has given us the ability to problem solve, to create, to, you know, everything is because of that. It's not a separate me doing anything. So good to be in the company of truth with others who, you know, see it, if you like. And that's all that's coming up right now. There you go, Locke, the cat whisperer. You're going to have to. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Yeah, so much is up to your sighting today, Kat. It was just, I don't know, just like... Mind-blowing. Yeah, just, I don't know if that was right there. I can't remember, something you said at the start about direct experience or just like sparked...
A memory from, I was reading a book a couple of weeks ago that I've read many times, and there's just a short couple of sentences in there about attention, like just putting your attention on things, shifting attention. And there's just a throwaway sentence about, you know, you can, if you look closely, you can notice that the object or whatever of your attention is your attention in a sense. And it's just, I've read this and I could just, all of a sudden I could see that, your attention or whatever you're attending to at the time is what you are in essence. Totally inseparable. Totally inseparable. And live this life so often like that's the thing I'm looking at.
And when you look at it closely, there literally is just the looking at or the experiencing of. You know, when you're fully identified with your mind and with this story, you are that.that little individual me, like your, your full, all of your attention is there and you are that. And then, and then when you step back and you see or aware of the fact that the attention is that, or is you, then you see like the thoughts are still there and but they no longer have all of your awareness or all of your whatever you are that energy and now there's just everything in your awareness is that and it was the first time i was like oh i am that i was like oh and there's no other with no other no other word for it than that, that which is experiencing.
The experience is the experiencing, is the experiencer. There's no, there's only one thing happening. And it's the sounds, it's maybe the thoughts, it's the sensations. All just flat in a sense, like one flat experience at the same time. There's no, that sounds not further away than this sounds, not further away than the sensation is not further away than the thought that's playing on this single screen. Always here. Yeah, and it's... I kind of have been coming back to it a bit and even the word attention is in itself a misnomer.Because it tends to imply a separate self that is attending to, but it's the conventional word we use for wherever your awareness lays at this moment.
And it's just, yeah, it's so unavoidable and all-pervasive. And I've struggled to articulate it, though it's just, yeah, it is that, which is for so long, like when I read, first time I read I Am That, I was like, this is a beautiful book, but I'm like, I Am That, it's just like, just a mistranslation, or what am I not getting? And then it's, Yeah, there is nothing but that experiencing. And we misperceive objects as separate because we put our attention to them. And then a lot of our attention is wrapped up in this thought that kind of describes things. And the less... Identification or energy goes into that the more is available to just be aware of the pure experiencing and yeah it's um Yeah, that's it.
That was beautifully articulated. It was perfectly articulated. There's nothing else that you want to say. Also, the way...Bob actually points out that the experiencing is singular. Seeing is singular. The attending is singular. It's just a narration that creates the subject-object division. Within the experiencing, there is I, the experiencer, and this, the experience. But can they ever be divided? They can never. They're all happening within right now. Like he would hammer down the example of seeing. Are you seeing right now? Yes. Does your eye tell you, I see? No, my eye doesn't speak. Okay, but the seeing is still happening, does it? Yes. It's happening through the instrument, of course, it's called the eye.
Yeah, but the seeing is happening, but there is no eye that does it. You can't stop it, you can't keep your eyes open and switch it off. The seeing is automatic. But now the narration says this is I, I am doing it, and it is what I'm seeing. So there is the two of us, the seer and the seen, and we separate. I am here and this is there. Me and the other. So there is a separation. Me and the other person, place or thing. There you go. But is there really a separation? No. Because there is all within the space of seeing, within the space of seeing, that construction of me and the other shows up.
Take the seeing away. What happens with the seer and the seen? Go on. Well, take a seer away.What happens with the seeing and the seeing? Awesome. Take the seen away. Is there a seen? Is there a seer? No. They're inseparable. It's just all the three things. All the three things collapses into the one direct experiencing. It's like the thought is just another... Color on the canvas with all the other colors that are happening in exactly the same moment and it's just that's taken all of our attention previously and then you see that there's no difference to the the experiencing of a thought to the experience of a sensation to a smell it's all just one kaleidoscope of experiencing and it's just when you get locked into this the experience of the thought and that's all you're experiencing then that's what you become and by nature thought is separation because that's its whole purpose is describing so you have to be object subject object that's its whole formation and but we get locked into that yeah it's um and then we believe it into experience yes believe it into existence if i believe in devil there is a devil if i believe in jehovah there is jehovah If I believe in a carnivore diet, a vegan diet, I'm a fanatic of that.
As the man thinketh. Yes. If I believe in any conspiracy, oh my God.If I believe I'm the self, separate, shit, of course I'm separate, of course I'm here. It's amazing how that life-giving force of attention, the life essence, makes the dream seem real, just because it is the omnipotent. It is the God, the Creator. expressing, experiencing itself through the capacity of attending, which is again inseparable from whatever the content is. I love the way you put it. And even just describing the direct experience, I'm looking at this. So unless I construct myself here being separate from this, no, in direct experience it's just this. There's no two.
Just what is. Just what is. And I always see the reflection of myself because I'm the one life. And that's, again, trusting direct experience rather than the story that narration has to say. Being with what is. Yes. No fixation on any person, place or thing. That's it. Yeah. Always here. Always now. And we have a couple of comments here. Jyoti says, and Miranda, brilliant as usual, if you have time and inclination, I'd like to hear more.about resistance and and Jyoti says I resonate with what's being expressed by this gentleman yeah yeah oh you are now yeah look out I think you really really have nailed it words and really great yeah just keep expressing it comes so clear to me And Miranda is asking about resistance.
Yeah, that's a really good one because resistance is usually what is like almost a direct cause of suffering. Because even if the narrative says, oh, this is I and this is the world and there is separation, but there is no objection to it and there is no suffering. But when there is a resistance, oh, it shouldn't be like this, I shouldn't be feeling this way, then, of course, that resistance causes the pain, causes the suffering. But see what it is when you take the label off. We call it resistance. Oh, contraction, whatever. I don't want it to be this way. I don't want the world to be this way.
I don't want myself to be this way. I don't want to be unenlightened. I don't want to be individual. Oh, no. That pushing back. What is it when you take the label off? And you will see that yes, there may be a little bit of a shallow breath. Maybe a little bit of a contracted closed heart or the body beingor there may be shoulders maybe, or arms, there may be some echo in the body of that resistance. But without the label, what you see, you see particular energetic state of the body. You feel particular frequency of vibration. The mind comes straight away and says, yes, but this is anger, this is resistance, this is fear, or this is guilt, or this is shame.
Again, without that label, because they're all forms of resistance, you know, like they're all translation of that same basic uncomfortable feeling. So taking the label off and experiencing the shallow breath, the clenched teeth. Now being curious about it, being open to it, relaxing enough the attention to be a discoverer. To actually be curious what's happening right now. This unique present moment, which will never ever be the same again. In this moment, there is this particular vibration we experience. And the vibration is uncomfortable, so there is a resistance, but without the idea of discomfort, without the idea of resistance, What is it? Without the thought.And then you may actually experience a subtle joy of being free from that uncomfortable feeling while it is still in the body.
And then as you are actually investigating it and experiencing it to the fullest, You see how that light of non-judgmental, all-embracing, allowing attention, naturally relaxes attention. And I've been through those sort of like guided processes of people experiencing strong resistance to the point when it turned into laughter. Oh shit, it's going away, it's going away, I want to see it more, I want to see it more. Ah, it's gone, panic attack's gone, resistance is gone. Well, don't you worry, life will provide it again. Yeah, just curiosity is always... This is the attitude, you know, the space does not have attitude. We talk about the presence as the pre-sensory, all-embracing, sky-like field of being, knowing, which does not have preference, does not experience resistance, does not even allow.
It doesn't do anything because it isn't a thing. It is no thing. So it doesn't... But there is a subtle, subtle joy in it. There is a subtle love of being.appreciation, contentment, symbol of a good word, contentment. Like Nisargadatta would say, there is nothing wrong anymore. So in that human adventure, everyone who suffered, and everyone did suffer, or does suffer, that sense of freedom from suffering brings a subtle contentment, elation, joy, love of being. So that space which is technically neutral, it is still longing to be. So there is still a subtle sense of subtle sense of amazement, whatever appears in the space, the contraction, the pain, the headache, whatever it is, there's still from that relaxed, open, curious perspective, there's subtle wow, like fascination with with how am I seeing myself now, what am I now, with the I, the life, the I, the energy, constructing that sense of discomfort.
That could actually, you know, because resisting the resistance doesn't really take you very far. It just amplifies the suffering. But finding the curiosity about it makes it an adventure. What's exploring? I'll just say what's come up for me.You know, I was a bit like a, you know, primary school kid when I came here. I had no idea what Bob was saying. And I just remember what was helpful to me about resistance was to ask, you know, quietly when I was on my own, who is it happening to? It's happening to a me. Now, where is this me? Couldn't find it. But, you know, I would reflect into the past.
There was a memory of me. I would project into the future. There was an anticipation or an imagining of me. But there was no actual solid me. So who is this me that is resisting what is? Well, it just doesn't exist. And, you know, and that sounds pretty simple intellectually, but to actually do it and actually feel that beautiful explanation of you start to breathe, you start to, you know, just feel that difference you feel when you see that you're just caught up in a story. You just get caught up in a story of me that doesn't exist. And this me is resisting the other.
Whatever it is. And like Kat so beautifully put, you just breathe, take some deep breaths, you know, and the next thing you're just laughing.Because you go, there it is. You know, I've been caught again in this imaginary world that is just not what is. It's like living in the as-if world instead of living in the what-is world. You know, it's like you're just so caught up in the once upon a time, you know. And old habits die hard, you know, and they will not dissipate until you actually, you know, really see that it's an illusion, that it's a me that doesn't exist. So, you know, whatever works for you.
Whether it's just sitting quietly and breathing and watching the energies dissipate, whether it's using a thorn to get out the other thorn, whatever works for you. But what worked for here was who is it happening to? It has to be a me. Where is that me? Really look for it. Couldn't find it. Never could find it. It was just a memory, you know. It was just a memory. That's it. Yeah, that's actually really helpful.I love that line.fear, resistance and trusting that you said. But before I was really touched by, I think you said the word, the veil of suffering. And you said the word or the phrase, the veil of beliefs.
And it just had such a clear picture in my head of this veil. Of the suffering and often like we take off this veil and wrap ourselves up in it um in the suffering in the in the beliefs um yeah but then lucky when you're talking about attention i was like oh often our attention is on this veil and we can like choose to have our attention there or believe ourselves to be that veil or we can see through it with that curiosity and that love. And often with that curiosity, it's like when you go to touch and be with the veil, you actually, your hand just goes straight through it.
And it's not actually there. Yeah. And so just that visual was coming up for me a lot. And a saying, I think it was Krishnamurti, a quote this week that came up for me also during this was,We don't actually have a fear of the unknown. We've got a fear of losing the known. That's beautiful. Yeah, yeah. It is. That's it. That goes into threefold, doesn't it? It's like, ah. I just wanted to say, yeah, so beautiful, your words today. I was really touched. And just to double down on all of this, you know, who is it that's fearing? Who is it that is performing fear?
Yeah. There's no one performing fear. You think you're performing fear? Take another look. And, you know, can't find the performer of the fear. It's just the performance in. In. Always in. Yeah. I love what you said about flat. The word flat. You know, there's the concept of depth to a person. The depth, if you go deep and look deep inside, you'll find who you really are. What a crock of shit. There's no deep inside.That's imagined. You can imagine it. Yeah. You know, sit down, meditate. I'm going deep. You're not going anywhere. It's just all kind of happening in this imagination and it's not real. There was never a thought that was ever real.
And I love this word flat. Yes. Yeah, yeah. Because. I'm just thinking more about flat lining, you know. Yeah. It's about depth of domain. Yeah. Isn't it? Yeah. But there isn't a, there isn't, it's like there isn't a depth. In terms of something is further away or something is closer, the measurement of that is just as it's experiencing. It's kind of two-dimensional. That's what it feels like. Yes, like a screen. The third dimension is a thought almost. If you look at your direct experience, what's the difference between looking at drives here and looking at a TV screen? We know the TV screen is two-dimensional. We perceive depth in it.
And it's the same with all the sensations, the thoughts. It's... Meaning it's flat almost. Yeah. It all gives the illusion of the story. It's just a single screen of perception. Yeah. Including the thought and yeah, it's strange.Here we are trying to articulate it and share with other people who, when they look and go deep, can't find anything. It's just what's happening. And that's why you're right to say, too, it's so impossible. It's not hard. It's impossible to nail down. That, that, in which it's, there's no word for it. It's just. Truly, it was hard to point. Being mute, right? Where do you go with that?
But it does, in a way, it says a lot. Nothing to do, no doer, nothing to make happen, no one to stop suffering, no one to make, you know, achieve something to reach a suffering-less state, no one to stop fearing, no one to be joyful, which is just what is. And all the interpretation, the meaning, because it's flat, is happening, constructed like the clouds, in the sky. Yes. On the spot. And the wonderful, wonderful capacity of that mind, which is incredible entertainment system,to be supremely creative. You know, put the mind in a light hypnosis or even without it and ask it for the past lives.
Woo, it will answer all the questions if it doesn't have a data and it doesn't. Because no data can be stored before even the storage area was built. So, and it will improvise it. It will create, you know, like speak to the writers of the science fiction. Look into a nature of the dreams, the world you can explore, the incredible creative, supremely creative improviser that that incredible projector is. Completely flat. There is no past lives if you don't think about it. But the moment the mind is posed a question,
It creates the depth, infinite depth, infinite, infinite. And look at the science, the religion, the history, the biology.
The more attention goes through that lens of the mind, the more content, incredible content, music, the art. Wow. Wow. Does it mean any of that is true? Doesn't mean any of that is not. It is all a beautiful display. It's all incredible appearance of that God the Creator, the creative capacity of that omnipresence. Do you like the mic? No? Got any questions? Any ideas? Got any questions? No, I'm enjoying it. I'm enjoying it a lot. What about you then? Any comments?Yeah, so I guess from what you were saying too, if there's no me, There's no reincarnation. There's no sin. There's no karma. There's nothing. Nothing.
Nothing. Nothing. No birth, no death, no body. Yep, that's right. Just I am, without even saying I am, because that's going into concepts itself. Exactly. So it's just as it is. Yes, it is. Just as it is. That's it. Perfectly searched. Yeah. And the joy of dreaming. And you go to sleep at night and your body is different. And you may experience yourself as a different creature on a different planet. Or you go and you write your science fiction story. And again, you can just dream and dream and dream. And it's not you doing it. It's the autopilot program. Everything as it is, is happening now.
And within that now, the program of creation, and some people will be creative in the musical field, other people will be creative in narration, description, in sewing, in cooking, incredible, incredible capacities revealing themselves moment to moment. To be celebrated because yes that is reflection of thenew presence as well showing up as the 10 000 things you can you can look at the blade of grass and see the universe it's like a holographic infinity anywhere the attention rests is that fractalic incredibly rich full of details universe multiverse mind-blowing and now flattening it up to relating it to an imagined self the me on one hand it's just kills the diversity but on another hand it opens the the life yet another channel of experiencing how rich psychological suffering can ever be how juicy how intense How intense, you know, that quote that I had of Bob, I don't know if I find it there, about the dying thousand deaths from the fears that were never actualized.
Look at that life essence experiencing itself as, oh, but what if this happens? What if that happens? And then having the full-blown experience of that nightmare. And then, oh, shit, that's just a dream. And then another one and another one.one and another one and completely overlooking that ever present moment exchanging it for that nightmare but from life's perspective not one nightmare is better than the other they all channels life or space doesn't have the judgment that freedom from psychological suffering is better than psychological suffering that the horror is worse than the comedy no they're all channels of expression where nothing is judged as good or bad So even to have that program installed of relating everything to the imagined self is just another way that life essence experiences and expresses itself.
And it so appears in that dream that those who actually, those vehicles of experience for life that went through really, really tremendous pain and suffering, just by the contrast the bliss of freedom is experienced much much stronger while people who kind of have the capacity of those body to adjust and adapt and they resilient they do well with a little bit of pain here and there but the navigation through life is just fine the peeling off of the onion of dropping off the belief afterbelief does not have that huge light bulb effect or the firework effect like Bob could pin out to the moment of the day and the hour when the mind stepped down from the function of a master it was seen through in a one blast when Nisargadatta told him, you're not the body, you're not the mind, but why?
His life was over. He was in a depth of misery. His wife left him. He had to leave the country, sell the house. He had nothing. He ended up in the ashram where he didn't want to be. He's been there once before. And it was so dreadful that after a month he came back. He didn't ever want to go there because the energy was so high. It steered all the trauma in him. He felt persistently angry, dysregulated and in pain. But he had nowhere else to go. So he ended up in the lowest point in his life, finding himself at Nisargadatta's. And wow, that was a wow.
But you don't really want to be crucified to experience the big wow. It's not necessary. Seeing through the current illusion in this moment right now is enough to find the respite from suffering and stabilizing that recognition because what happened with Bob?He walked out from Nisargadatta as he was saying, Ah, wow, I'll never be caught up in the mind again. And he left the door and he was back in the narrative. Shit, what's going on there? I've seen through it. There's no one there. Why is it? Why does it feel like the contraction suffering again? Let me look again. This is what Jane was saying. Who is there?
Anybody home? Who's suffering? Is there a me? I've seen there wasn't one. So let me look again. Oh, shit. No one there. Okay. So what was it? An old habit. Old habit die hard. So he saw through it. And then he didn't even make it all the way through the ashram when it came again and again. And many, many times every day of his life. The mind would try to re-establish the narrative and grab all the attention and make itself a master. But over time it became laughable, even though the so-called experience of seeing that he wasn't his mind was one big blast. The habit of attention going and making it again the center, making it the reference point, was still there.
But it didn't matter any longer. Seeing how the projector functions bycreating that little illusion was satisfying enough and freeing enough so there was no desire for anything to be different there was no desire for the mind never to speak again because there was no one who could have or not have the desire he was the consciousness the space in the space the mind came up or the mind there is no mind that's thought that the thinking pattern came up And so it's been seen through and then it came up again and it's been seen through. There was no one who had a problem with that.
The consciousness does not have a problem. The sky does not have a problem with the clouds. There is always that space, every moment available to relax and land at that. Pillow of feathers in which there is nothing wrong and you are the space and you have no problem with the resistance and you have no problem with narrative that which does have a problem is not your true self that which wants things to be different is not your true self that's just a narrative habit so if you are witnessing resistance you are witnessing the habit of narrating That which witnesses is not resisting. That which registers is already relaxed and free.
Everything that happenshappens within that space that doesn't object to anything that happens. And we have Anika says, reality is unfamiliar to the I identity. I identity. Therefore, we frame understanding according to the familiar, the conditioned lie. Yeah, very good point, Annika. Yeah, absolutely. Trying to grasp it with the mind. And Tanya has shown it pretty clearly, how it is completely beyond the grasp of the language. We are pointing, but this is not to get hung up on the words. This is not to sit and say, oh, this description or this word is accurate and this is not accurate. Says who? Look beyond the pointing finger look at the moon not at the finger not at the dirt behind the nail it isn't about the pointing it isn't about the way it is described it is about finding the resonation with that which lies beyond that which that which expresses it may express through this words or this accent or this style or this form but that energy behind it is the same energy that moves the planets around the Sun that replaces the cells in the body that beats the heart that createthe capacity for seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, smelling, that essence, as a source, not as it expresses.
Bob would say the essence is real, but its expression is called Maya. In Hindu scriptures, they would call it Sat Chit Ananda, that's the reality, that which never changes. Existence, consciousness, joy of being, or contentment, stillness. That does not change. That is always forever. Whenever you look, there is an existence and there is a stillness. And there is awareness of that existence being still. That which does change is the forms, the names, the experiences, the feelings, the thoughts, the emotions, the objects, the interpretations, the words, the concepts, the vibrations. Positive negative all of that is maya is illusion is the changeful is the dream so how you can possibly use the dream the dreaming mind to go beyond the dream that makes no sense that's impossible how could you grasp the stillness using the noise of the mind the concepts How could you put that, which is the source of all appearance, into the concept, grasped by the thought?
It is ungraspable.cannot be understood in the normal sort of logical mind-based conceptual way. It cannot. And like Tanya said, it isn't difficult. It is impossible, full stop. It can never happen. The real understanding, the true understanding, the final understanding, is that there is nothing to be understood. Because what needs knowing is already known. The awareness of existence is already self-evident. And nothing else needs to be understood. If anything, beliefs need to be questioned and thrown away. The freedom from understanding through the concepts. Throwing away the beliefs and landing in that stillness that doesn't need grasping.And see how we talk about Bob seeing through. This is the whole joke of the whole thing.
It's so chasing its tail. It's impossible to nail it. Bob saw through it. Bob was never Bob. There was never a Bob. Yep. Bob never did anything. Bob never suffered. Bob never improved his life or life never got better after he saw through it. That's how it's described in the dream. But where was Bob? Bob was never there. That's the whole thing. So there is an awakening by whom to what? Yeah. All there is is that the seeker and the seeking is all the same thing. Same thing, but it's all, it's inseparable, totally inseparable. So what can you do? Chill. There is the pointing. No, you can't say a word because who's saying it?
You know, it's tried to say you never existed. That's the fact of the matter. But you're saying it. It's coming out of, but I'm not Tanya. But there is, but I.Cannot deny. This is the base of it all that, and I'm going to use the word something, something's going on. There is being. You cannot deny being. But you can't pinpoint being either. That's why the negative expression is so useful. I'm not that. I'm not that. I'm not that. I'm not that. I'm not that. What am I? I have no idea. Yeah. And how wonderful. And now, who cares? Why would you even want to have idea?
Who wants to have idea? Who wants to know who am I? Who wants to self-define? And this was probably the most profound moment when many, many years after Bob Sauni Sargadatta, I have seen him in my individual meeting and realized that what I believed myself to be, the conceptual image, the emotionalized, conceptual, vulnerable image of me, in opposition to the image that someone else had of me of being self-contained and confident, which was just bullshit. When those images were seen through as just empty mental construct, There was no desire to construct any other image, to replace the old images. Never a desire.to identify as something else, to identify, okay, now I am enlightened, or now I am a space, or now I am God, or now I am life.
Who cares what am I? If there is no self that needs the identity, there is just am-ness. I am that, or that I am. But what I am, never the slightest hint of desire to find out what is this or who is this. There is no one there who wants to know. And that's the freedom. Because when there is this construct, this large language model in charge, it needs definitions. I need to know, oh, this is my age, this is my nationality, this is my gender, this is my this. Oh, this is who I am. No, those are just descriptions. This is not who I am, but okay, I'll go with that in the absence of anything else that will just keep the fear down.
For who? If there is no one there, who needs to know? Who cares? Who am I? Who cares? That question, the answer to the question of who am I, is the extinguishing of the question. An absolute comfort and relaxation of space. Into not needing ever to know or find out who am I or what am I. Bob had never any clue.what he was why would he there was no bulb there was just life that didn't have any definition or any label traditionally experiencing and expressing as that character which we label Bob for convenience within that context of the dream but really finding a place in which there is nothing wrong there's no one who needs to find out who I am find myself find God find higher self find soul No seeking, no seeker.
There is nothing wrong in this moment. Ask the consciousness, discovering the content. There is no need to conceptualize that this is I and this is not I. And if that concept comes up, see it for what it is. Oh, the concepts of separating I and not I came again. Wow, amazing. So what? Let it be that. I think we overthought. Yeah, so thank you. Thank you, everyone. Yeah.