Awareness Speaks: Explorations into the teaching of Sailor Bob Adamson - by Andrew Lynn

Would anyone like to give us a little burst to start? I'll go for it. Wonderful. Thank you, Andrew. I'll actually read from a book I wrote about 15 years ago. This I wrote, I wrote this whole thing down in about, I don't know, an hour or two. And I've never been back to change it once. I've never altered or modified it once. And it was just... I had a bit of a, I don't think you were there, you were on the scene already, I had a, it was a bit of a blue about it because I wanted to put Bob's name on it and Bob said, no, you put your name on it.

Then somebody else came in and said I was stealing his book and blah, blah, blah. So I just deleted it. But a friend of mine kept a copy of it and he sent it to me the other day. And so I... After all these years it came back again so i thought well i'll i'll read some of it to you ready if you inquire earnestly you will find you are not what you think you are there is no ego self-centered or any entity of any substance apart from thought. There is only an awareness, a sense of presence or livingness that can't be negated. There is only pure subjectivity infused with intelligence.Just as the sun is infused with light, just like the sun infused with light is self-shining, you are not the body, the thoughts or the emotions.

Many people seek, inquire and do practices for years and never ask who or what is doing the practicing. How much effort is needed to just be? The questioner and the questions asked both stem from the same source. If it is seen the questioner is just a thought and the question is just another thought, who wants or who needs to know?The concept of surrendering is another trap, as who is going to surrender and who or what are you going to surrender to? Beingness, awareness or wakefulness are useful pointers. But that is all they are. Nobody can give you awareness as you are awareness right here, right now, eternally.

Or words like me, you, him, they, or us. I just use the convenience of communication.When thoughts arise in this pure subjectivity, a seeming subjective entity then thinks it is observing something objective or separate from itself. Instead of seeing this as one all-inclusive functioning, we fall into the duality of I and the other, and we feel separate and insecure. We are always measuring and evaluating the other against the beliefs and imaginings of the I.The I, ego or entity created by thought is a phantom, a fiction. It has no power, independence or nature of its own. You have never been separate. See the mechanical nature of thought and how it creates an illusionary person.

Start from the fact that you are already complete and whole. Any so-called spiritual search then becomes invalid as there is nobody to do anything and nothing to get. We label ourselves as human beings and God as the supreme being when all there is is being. Beingness just is. It doesn't need to develop. It does not come and go and it has no dimension, shape or form. Yet you cannot perceive anything outside or separate from it. You do not need to search or seek your beingness as you are that. You do not need to get anything and you do not need to get rid of anything.

Who would be able to do that?There is no mind. Mind is a word given to the process of thinking and memory. The past is conceptualized and cognized in the present or projected into an imaginary future with expectations or desires. This gives the impression we are an entity moving through time from a past to a future. In reality, time is created and perpetuated by thinking. Time is in us. We are not in time. All seeming abstractions of time are seen from the timeless omnipotence of present awareness.If it is constantly seen there is no ego or entity, thoughts that arise will have nobody to take ownership of them and like the river will keep flowing.

The natural state prior to thought will be then self-evident. You have always been that natural non-dual subjectivity. All that happened was similar to clouds covering the sun. The sun is always there self-shining like our own pure awareness. The sun itself forms the clouds spontaneously without being bothered or concerned. Pure awareness can never be objectified. It is the field in which all phenomena arise and dissipate. Thoughts arise. It is an attempt to modify or alter them that causes conflict, as that can only be done by an imaginary entity, which is just another thought.There can be no free will as there is nobody to have free will.

The idea of free will needs somebody to have it. Free will implies autonomy or a separate functioning independent of the totality. On investigation, no entity can exist except the thought created one. The imaginary ego assigns itself free will. All culture, secular religion and education appear, propagate and ultimately vanish in awareness. In awareness, nothing has happened or will ever happen. The only thing born is the thought I am and the idea of being a separate individual with free will and autonomy. From that first thought, events and experiences are accumulated and we think we are living a life, a dreamer dreaming his dream.We are the pure awareness.

We have always been that. It has no beginning, no end. It is not subject to time or space. You cannot negate it. I am that. You are that. Everything is that. There are no individuals in awareness. Nothing substantial or permanent abides in it. As all is that, we are the eternal witnessing of the transient. The witnessing creates both the subjective witness and the objective witnessed, one whole all-inclusive functioning without anything exclusive from it.Time and space have no ultimate reality. They are both created by dualistic thinking with an imaginary subjective individual viewing an objective reality. This creates a me and you, a here and there, etc.

When a thought concerning the past arises, it is now. When a thought concerning the future arises, it is still now. You are always in the now. You can never move away from the now. You don't need to search for the now as you are the now. Awareness or knowingness has the ability to perceive, to feel, or to be conscious of events, objects, or sensory patterns. The word is never the thing. You are that self-cognizing emptiness, and you have always been that and will always be that, infinite and eternal, no beginning and no end. Nothing can touch or harm that as it is the essence of everything, and you are that.Anything that has a beginning or an end is not ultimately real.

It is a mental construction with a conceptual beginning and end. Try to find a beginning or end to your wakefulness and space-like awareness. Try to find a centre or point of reference to measure from. This is like trying to write on water. All appearances appear in awareness, have a seeming duration in awareness, and then disappear back into awareness. This process gives the illusion of time. Your wakefulness is never modified or changed by what appears in it. Thinking creates a linear paradigm where we think we are moving in time from a seeming past through the present into the future. It must be seen that the conceptual movement of thought is always seen from the omnipresent awareness.

You are always aware and present. You cannot be anything anywhere else. You cannot be anywhere else.The ego reference point or self-centre is created by an accumulation of thoughts of the past or past experiences. Memory serves a useful purpose for the survival of the physical organism. Thought is very useful, but it also can be very destructive when it patterns in negative forms. It creates conflict, anxiety, fear, sadness and depressions. If the mechanical nature of thought, if the mechanical nature of thinking is seen, and it is seen there is no entity that these thoughts apply to, who or what can suffer?I is the source of all our problems, anxieties, angers and depressions.

We have placed limitations and conceptual boundaries on our infinite omnipresent awareness. If there is no me, where are all these things going to attach to? Who could cure, fix or modify them? The attempt to modify or correct them is what causes a conflict between what is and what should be desired by an illusionary ego or entity.Nature is never in conflict. The seasons change effortlessly. The tides come in and go out. Day follows night and the planets orbit the sun. The functions of the physical body also function effortlessly. The hair on the body grows as do the fingernails. Nobody needs to oversee or control these functions.

You cannot change or alter these thoughts. Sorry, you cannot change or alter these things with thought. Thought only labels the natural functioning.Negative thoughts and confusion naturally subside when it is clear there is no one or nobody for them to attach to. What is left after the thoughts subside is the natural thought-free awareness. If you then see there is no you, you must realize there could never have ever been a you. When you are free from the concept of being a separate individual or person, you automatically know there was never any bondage as there was never anybody to be bound. It is a big joke to think there is a person in bondage that needs to do something to be free or enlightened.

See, there never was or ever will be an ego entity or individual. Your very nature is free, peaceful and unbound.The idea of becoming or developing into something implies a future time. There is only beingness and it is ever present. Once it is seen there is no entity, ego or self-centre, it is obvious there could never have ever been one. Life goes on as before, only there is nobody to alter, modify or correct anything. Yet modifications, alterations and changes will still take place.All the events, experiences and things going on around you are appearances in your wakefulness or awareness. You do not need to do anything to find awareness or wakefulness as you are that and have always been that.

You do not need to ask yourself, am I aware or am I awake? Awareness is omnipresent, ever-present, omnipotent, all-powerful, and omniscient, all-knowing. That does not leave room for a you, a me, or anything else. Everything is that, one without a second. It has been given many names like wakefulness or godliness. It is intelligence energy, the activity of knowing. This is not what was known or not will be known, as that would just be another mental abstraction. We are talking about the omnipresence of right here, right now, without a knower or the known.Any movement of thought is a vibration of energy, hence the term intelligence energy.

This intelligence energy is patterning and shaping into infinite patterns and forms. Thoughts and feelings appear and disappear, yet awareness remains uncontaminated and unconcerned, like the image appearing on a TV cannot damage or affect it. Thoughts cannot alter or affect what we really are. Prayer is similar to meditation in that it implies somebody trying to petition for or to get something from a god or from whatever. This can only apply to an entity that sees itself as incomplete and lacking in something. If abiding in the natural state of pure awareness, there is completeness and nothing is lacking. Stop pretending to be what you are not and start seeing what you really are.

You cannot not be that anyway.Meditation implies two things. The first that there is a meditator. The second there is the meditation that will lead to some form of peace or altered state. As long as there is a concept of a meditator doing meditation, you can get caught in a dualistic paradigm of trying to become something or achieve something. Meditation can be a transient state. If contemplated, it is seen that life itself is a meditation, awareness patterning in infinite patterns and forms.The imaginary reference point or ego can be likened to the reflections in the mirror. The reflection doesn't hurt, change or alter the mirror. The mirror stands unconcerned by what is reflected in it.

If thought had any power or you were a thought, you would cease to exist when thinking stopped. The definition of reality is that which does not change. Thoughts come and go, but the field or emptiness they arise in is infinite and eternal.Thinking is sustained by the energy of belief that fixates on certain patterns. It must be seen thoughts are like skyriding and appear and disappear on the unchanging awareness. Awareness is free of all concepts, thoughts and abstractions. Some call it non-conceptual awareness and that is your true nature, just that and nothing else. You cannot add anything to awareness. You cannot take anything away from awareness.

It has no center, no dimensions.no beginning and no end. It is not subject to time or space as both appear within it. It is the substratum of all phenomenal appearances. A phenomenon is an appearance, an image, and it has no independent nature separate from awareness. Omnipresence means ever-present. So there is no coming or going in awareness. You don't have it one day and lose it the next. Omnipotent means all-powerful or total power. So what power can a you have? Omniscience means all-knowing. So can you have even one thought without awareness? Those three powers don't mean three separate things, but one integrated, all-inclusive functioning.Right here, right now, you are that sense of presence, that pure awareness before the thought I am arises.

If this is seen in the immediacy of the presence, you are face to face with your natural state, non-conceptually aware, without the division of subject-object thinking taking place. This is your natural state. This natural non-dual state of pure awareness is ignored because of the fixation on the dualistic thinking that is taken to be real or have some permanent reality. One thought chases another like a dog chasing its tail. No other can do anything for you as there is no other and no you. You cannot say what you are. As awareness is pure subjectivity. It cannot be objectified. You can only say what you are not, not the body, not the mind, emotions or anything.

On eliminating what you are not, you are... What you are is revealed like a solar eclipse when the stars suddenly appear in the daytime. They were always there, but just not seen whilst the sun was shining, just like awareness is obscured by thinking.If you think there is something like enlightenment or self-realization to get, it implies two things. The first is that you are not complete and whole already. Secondly, it implies something to get at some future time, which requires duration. This is the thought he added space-time paradigm, which doesn't stand up to investigation. Pure awareness registers and cognizes everything. It is all inclusive of thought and activity.

There is no doer of the deed. Sorry, there's no doer of the deed. These are the thought-created structures of subjective doer and the objective deed. The doing creates both like the two ends of a stick. There is no subject and object, no doer or deed, no here and there, no me and you in reality.When lost in thought, this subject-object thinking is obscuring the natural state of emptiness. Seeing, hearing, and all the senses are functioning effortlessly. Thought claims it's functioning with I see, I hear, or I feel. Which is where all our problems start as we then try to alter, modify or correct things, ignorant or ignoring the fact there is no entity that can do anything.

Nothing outside of your own awareness can be perceived or conceived. The kingdom of heaven is within thyself, is a scriptural pointer. If you see everything appears within you, your own wakefulness is self-evident. Nothing is separate or has any power of its own. In appearance, everything is valid as an appearance only. In essence, it is one and you are not separate from that oneness.Thoughts create images, ideas and emotions. They appear in an awareness, but they are not separate from awareness as they are awareness vibrating. Emptiness is form and form is emptiness is a classic statement from the scripture. You cannot perceive anything outside of awareness. It has no second version as everything is that.

You are that. All is that. One without a second. Once it is clearly seen, this division and awareness doesn't exist and there is no seer and the seen, but just seeing, it is then self-evident there could never have been an ego entity or entity with any free will or volition. All the opposites like victim and the victimizer, friend, enemy, believer, non-believer, etc. Must fall away and seem to only exist in a thought-created mental construction. Without a reference point to measure from everything just is. Without a reference point to measure from everything just is. No, sorry.a reference point to measure from, everything just is. Okay. Right or wrong can only be measured from a seeming reference point or separate entity.

Without that reference point, which is only a memory or a collection of thoughts, who is there to say what is right or wrong? Where am I? Truth or reality cannot be stored or amassed. It cannot develop and it has no levels. Oh, sorry. Truth or reality cannot be stored or amassed. It cannot be developed and it has no levels. The value of any insight or realization is only in the ever fresh presence of the moment. Yesterday's realization is useless. It is dead and it's lost its vitality. It is useless to try and cling or hold onto any insight or realization. For only in its movement can new insights, understandings or realizations appear.Understanding there is no subject or object.

with any independent nature that can stand on its own apart from awareness, it is realized That is the emptiness itself that is cognizing as seeing, hearing, thinking, feeling, etc. There is no fate or destiny for anybody as there isn't anybody. The term present awareness implies that in essence we are already pure and complete. The term pure awareness implies that in essence we are already pure and complete. Many people spend years in an attempt to purify themselves or control their thinking with meditation or practices. If the natural thought-free pure awareness is seen clearly, Thinking takes its natural place as a useful function. Thinking is duality, creating all the polar opposites like light and dark, here and there, happy and sad, right or wrong.

See this and know you are the witnessing of all this transient mentation.The sky and sun are never separate from each other. Pure awareness and the thoughts arising are also not separate, but the one inclusive functioning. We use the term lost in thought, and that's exactly what happens as we give our attention to the thinking and the pure awareness is seemingly ignored. There is no self-centered ego or entity separate from awareness. This is just an erroneous belief in an imagined me, which is just a collection of past events and experiences. All that there ever is is the empty awareness that is self-cognizing, like waves appearing on the ocean.

Nothing is separate. The sky and sun are never separate from each other. Pure awareness and the thoughts arising are also not separate, but the one inclusive functioning. We use the term lost in thought. We use the term lost in thought, and that's exactly what happens. We give our attention to the thinking and the pure awareness is seemingly ignored. Sorry, I already read that. This is the last one. Thought appears and disappears in pure awareness, like ripples are just movements on the ocean. Waves, ripples and space.or just the ocean, even if in appearance they seem separate from it. Is this any different from the thoughts, I, I am, I am this or I am that?

The thought is just labelling the functioning. The natural state of free thoughts is empty, peaceful and devoid of any objects. It is not subject to time, space or any manifestation of the five elements. It is like the sky. Many things appear in the sky, but nothing can attach to that emptiness. All thoughts are transient, like clouds appearing and disappearing in the sky. Be the sky unbound and free, not bound or caught up in the conceptual structures that thinking creates. Okay, that's it. Finished.Yeah, thank you, Andrew. And Yvonne also says, beautiful, Andrew, thank you. And Marianne says, sends a heart. I can see the echo of Bob's words.

And a lot of those paragraphs are just directly the same as Beyond Words, Beyond Mind. And I have Bob's handwriting of those notes. It's been definitely some influence cross-travelling. Well, Bob gave me that book, Beyond Words and Beyond Mind, and I said to him, look, this could be a good book, Bob, right? But I said, it needs a bit of work. He said, well, you take it and rewrite it. So I took it and rewrote it. And, of course, somebody threw a tantrum and said, oh, it's my book, you know. You know. And so, of course, I just said, oh, well, you know, stuff it.

So I just left it aside. But Bob actually gave me the draft of Beyond Words, Beyond Minds and said, here, take this and if you think you can do something with it, do it. And so, yes, of course, there's little bits that are copied directly from Beyond Words, Beyond Mind. But I've also, each thing I was reading there is like a paragraph on one page. So it's about 30 pages of just,one paragraph. There's some helpful expansions in there and elaborations. Well, that's what I did because I thought beyond words or beyond minds, I thought it was okay, but I thought you could expand on a little bit more, just give a little bit more.

Because you know who wrote that and, you know, I don't even want to talk about the guy, you know. Yeah. He just threw a jai in his fit and said I was stealing his book. And, oh, it was just, I just couldn't believe it. I just thought, you know, I was just trying to help out, you know. You authors, you've all got such big toes. So easy to step on. Yeah, but I actually, I like what you, what you said about, you know, so when you were talking about time and it resonated nicely where you talk about how the, you know, imagining or planning into the future is really just taking the past.

And projecting it. Well, that creates the linear paradigm. You create a linear paradigm because you think of the past, then you project it into the future.and all of a sudden you've got this linear paradigm that doesn't exist. It's like I always say to people, it's like you drive from Melbourne to Sydney, right? Now, Melbourne to Sydney is already there, but you're looking out the window and you're only seeing it frame by frame, you know? You're only seeing like a little section of it at a time. So you think you're moving through this space because you're only seeing it frame by frame. But in reality, the whole thing's there, the beginning.

It's like Bob always used to say, when something's beginning, it's an ending at the same time. It's all happening in awareness now. So you have to see that, that whatever's happening, like it's like they say, anything that has a beginning and end, it's not, anything that has a beginning and end is not real. It's not real because it's not reality. It's really only snapshots, isn't it? But it's the mind which creates, which is time, you know, mind equals time, which creates the illusion of time by putting them seemingly together in a sequence. It's actually a physicist who's done a really good job of, what's his name, Babor, I can never, Julian Babor, I think he's done a nice job of describing it in physics terms.

And it's not unlike.Vision. You know, how the brain puts snapshot vision works a bit like that also. But anyway, other people have got things to say. Yeah, so we have Nick and Jenny. Would you like to start, Nick? I think you were first and then Jenny was after. Yeah. Hi, everyone. First of all, as I was listening to him, he was like, It was like food for the soul, so to speak. You know, it was the way he was sharing what he was sharing and the way he was exposing it. It was the beauty of watching how the same thing is being said, but... Seeming to be approached from different angles.

But in the end, it's like if the minds try to go this way, okay, that's fine. Let's go this way. Let's bring you back to here. And I was really enjoying it to the point that the couple of suggestions is number one is that I would suggest to upload this particular video or zoom online because he was so beautiful the way he was expressing it and he was reminding it's like seeing bob speaking in a different voice in a different thing saying the same thing and uh since i can relate because i well not the but that's the way it seems to have happened I translate Bob's book into Spanish.See, I was so paranoid to make sure that everything was exactly as Bob was saying it.

But at the same time, that also makes sense as well. And for example, you can, if you were to translate his book into Polish, right? I think that's your language, right? I'm not sure. I'm pretty sure that you would say, okay, I see what he's saying. And if I translate it into Polish, honoring exactly how he's saying, I will do my best to stay with what he's saying, but I would say it differently. You see? Because somehow, and I did run into that a lot, because he speaks in the English very poetical and everything, but when I translated to Spanish, I do see kind of what maybe what he was pointing or he was referring to, because I can see this is how I would say it, but I don't want to take any chances over here, so I will translate exactly how he's saying.

Unless it doesn't make any sense in Spanish at all, then I would have to somehow just kind of give a little tweak here, but always respecting that. And as I was listening to him, and because I'm also listening to Bob and all that kind of stuff, I feel that the way he was sharing what he shared, it was beautiful. It was just like, I can understand how he was, you know, when Bob says, hey, do this, whatever you think. And so my encouragement to him is to, is to.publish it if it doesn't contradict or it doesn't go into any kind of uh uh what's it called uh uh conflict with bob's book and everybody sees that there's no conflict in there that he's just basically saying the same thing or whatever i would publish that because it's a beautiful and hey i'll translate to spanish if you want to do because it's a beautiful way of expressing the way again i was with my eyes closed just just basking into what he was saying i'm saying this is this is yeah it's bob it's it's it's it's starting that it's it's all saying the same thing but so i would encourage if if he feels like again i don't know that's up to you and if you guys feel okay i mean you cat and tanya and him i would just upload that because he was so beautiful listening to those It doesn't matter where it comes from.

There's no author of this. It's consciousness through different expressions. But the way he exposed it, I thought it was beautiful. I really enjoy it, you know. So this is just a thought, a suggestion. And I just throw it up in the air. And whatever happens will happen.Thank you, Nick. And we have Ivan says time is not horizontal, but vertical. Only now is crossing. And Jenny, would you like to unmute? And I'm taking my hand down. Yeah, I just wanted to also say, Andrew, I want to honor also your integrity. I could see there's so little. The ego is really not bearing you. Because otherwise this would have been published, you know, a long time ago.

And you did not write it. I can so feel it when I hear your words that you did not write it to boost yourself and to make a name. Out of yourself that you were a new non-dual teacher or anything like that. I so felt Bob. And I can just imagine the times when now, as I've seen when you've been on our call during the past year and you've said something and I've seen Bob light up, you know, when you have said something and and you know seen him nudge in cat you know kind of almost wanting you to speak you know and he and nudging you so what what i what i felt was I so felt the presence.of this oneness that you were expressing, you know, there were so many wordings that were exactly the same as, you know, as Bob would have said it.

And then others were, as Kat also said, and Nick, where there was elaboration on it, but it was like, It was, I felt the one. I felt the one. And I had the same thought somehow as Nick. I would love also to read it again. I found it was beautiful. And there's so many ways one can do that. I mean, it's still... It's still saying Bob's words. You know, I don't know how you do it. It's Bob's words and it's through your tweaks, but I just felt the camaraderie. I just felt the... I felt Bob's selflessness and may I actually dare to say I also felt your selflessness and I want to thank you for sharing this and thank your friend too for not throwing it in the bin.

I mean, if you didn't even have the piece, that would have been such a loss. So that's what I wanted to share. If you would like a copy of it, I'm happy to give it to anybody who likes a copy of it. It's been formatted into a book format.So you can print it out and it comes out in the same size as Beyond Words, Beyond Mind. It's the same, so it's been formatted. That's why my friend had it. He formatted it for me. And so I've got it here on an email. So if anyone wants it, I'm happy to forward it to you. Because as far as I'm concerned, Bob handed me the book and he said, do something with it.

So I thought, you know, I took it very seriously and thought, well, look, I've got to make something good of this. And so I went home and just, but it's amazing the way it came out. Like I said, I wrote it all out and I never went back, never went back to check it. I just said, no, that's it. That's the way I'm functioning. I thought. That is all right as it came out as it was. And I feel that that's Bob talking through me anyway. So if anyone wants a copy of it, just send me an email. Andrew, you can send me a copy as well, because when I sell the hundreds of the already printed books for which I spent thousands of dollars to pay for, to get them back, I may actually publish it on Amazon in both versions.

That might be interesting. Yeah, I was just going to say, you know. Please put Bob.Bob's name on it, you know, I'm just a nobody, so don't worry about putting my name on it. Bob said, no, you wrote it, you put your name on it, you know. I said, no, no, no, it's your words, Bob, you know. I'll put both. Yeah, that was my idea, you know, that it's like, It is. I just felt the camaraderie, you know, I really because you to me, Andrew, you're also this maybe a little bit less old Australian bloke than what Bob was, but I could really sense the camaraderie and and.

You know, maybe it was just me projecting, but who gives a shit? That's at least what I saw on the screen and then how I interpreted. And thank you for your generosity. I would also love to read it again. So. Okay, we have Yvonne also has the hand up. Would you like to unmute? Yes, I'm very thankful to Andrew and I gave my email address and thank you. Yesterday I was on my bike and suddenly I heard Bob saying, what's the first thing that you see? That is space. And the next moment I passed a car that was parked and it said, happy space. And I was thinking, hey, that's a nice joke.So I wanted to share that.

It is nice. Yeah. Yeah. Synchronicities are like keys of the universe, isn't it? Yes. Something like that. Yes. Lovely. Okay. I just had a question. So our thoughts are not separate from our senses. Is that right?Well, nothing is really separate from anything. Everything is interdependent. If there was no activity of the senses, thought is one of the activities. So I'd like, no, I'm probably going a bit deep here. See, like in Buddhism, they're talking about six senses, you know, five senses wide open. We say seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, smelling. In Buddhism, it would include thinking as a sixth sense. It's another sensory activity. It's also the way through which the world or the environment is processed through smelling and through thinking.

So it's just another activity. It's just a vibration of energy in that awareness that we identify with for our attention. Yeah, we don't even do that. It's just identification is the automatic program that arises. The attention goes into the content of thinking. The content of thinking has the I in it. And then attention floods it and it creates fake identity. It creates the image, which kind of it embodies, the life embodies the image and that's identification. It's a program.It's not, animals don't have it. They're not identified. And that's like the pure awareness is like when we were a baby, it was just pure. Yeah. And then it became aware of itself.

There isn't anything there to be aware of itself. You know, awareness is not a thing that is aware of itself. They call it sometimes self-aware, but it doesn't mean that there is something that is aware. It is just the pure knowing, the capacity. Just like seeing is not aware of itself. It's just the pure seeing. The sea year that would be aware of the seeing happening through the sea year is already too much thinking. It's much simpler. It's really singular, just like smelling. It's not self-aware.And then everything just arises in that awareness. Yes. And then goes back into it. Yeah. You, as the seeming entity, don't cause the thought.

Yeah. Just like you as a seeming entity don't cause the smell. That is sensed through the nose. You don't cause the... Sensation of contact. You don't cause the hearing. It's like we've said before, you know, there is really only a discovering or an experiencing of the experience, what's happening. Yeah.You as the apparent entity, because there is no entity, are not the cause of the experience. Yeah. It's just happening. Yeah. That goes for thoughts as well as everything else. It's just misidentification, isn't it? Yes, it's a problem. The idea that baby is pure and clean and later on it becomes aware of itself, where later on it kind of loses the pure, clean.

See because it gets distracted by the ideas of separation yeah but that distraction doesn't change anything the capacity for knowing the pure no ink just like pure seeing the seeing doesn't change if there is a focus exclusively on one thing or whether it is unfixated seeing, the attention is not fixated, or whether it is focus, the seeing is not affected by any of it. Yeah.So if you try to work it out in the mind, how does it happen? You know, the little child is born pure and then it gets trapped or it gets self-conscious. It's just a certain program started going online. Program of narrative starts going online.

And it is inevitable. That's what's necessary for this pattern to happen. Just like you have an eagle and certain programs come online when the eagle is big and strong enough to open the wings and then to fly. Certain programs in the machine just come online. But the awareness in which it happens is never touched by any of the activity. And to realize that awareness is to disengage from that running programs. It's not even realizing. It's to try to deny it is the easiest way. And realizing that it can't be done. And the ego is not even real. No. No, it's the narrative software. It's a commentator.

Why do people say it? Good question. It's a belief, like the same as believing in Santa Claus. People believe it's real. Children believe it's real. And adults believe in ego. Yeah.I can see that would create a lot of problems too. Yeah. Still creating separation, yeah. Yeah. And the big problem with the concept of ego is then, of course, that feeds right into the seeker narrative of having to lose the ego. Right. And as if you're not that already. Yeah. And so then you have this dream of becoming instead of this acknowledgement of being. Yeah. Beautifully said. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you, Brendan.

And we have Stephen was unmute first and then Nick. Would you like to unmute Stephen? Just some ideas about thinking. So, and Brendan, what I find helpful was something Tanya said a few weeks ago, really, five years ago, about we hear thoughts, really, just think of it like hearing. And so what's wrong with right now if we don't think about it? Just sit here quietly. Fine. If a bird chirps, I hear it. If there's a thought runs through the head, which again, not caused, it just happened because of whatever memories, something popping up, it can be seen as just cause. It just happens. And it's heard.

And there's no problem at all. If it's a me thought, I was talking the other day about a bitch. I won't go on about it again, the bitch problem, because the interesting thing was there's a slight embarrassment. When it gets pointed out, there's a slight embarrassment. And that's like the insight coming in about. You know,something and it's an indulgence because it's so habitual these things can be so habitual and then we die if it's not seen to rise it's just a heard thought there can be a dive into it and then there's a belief in a me and there's a problem to sort out and all the rest of it and then from that point all the problems seemingly occur.

If that doesn't happen, there's no problem. Leave it alone. Not that, again, not that there's anybody here doing that. It's just that... It's just sitting back. There's nowhere to get to. We're okay. It's all right just as it is. And that is so freeing because it frees it from all this idea that we have to meditate for years and years and years to sort out all these terrible problems that this me was doing. To save our soul or something, you know? And so I hope I'm on the right track, but for me, it seems to be that idea. Stay with just the quiet awareness of whatever, and everything will be just revealed as things appear.

And it is just awareness. And as the thought appears, as it's heard, the awareness hasn't disappeared. It's clearly there. The thought can't appear without the awareness. So it is the awareness.all that sort of stuff as well. And everything's on all fours with exactly what Andrew was saying and his talking, just like Nick was saying. I was just, I was lapping that up. That was great. Really loved it. Oh. You muted, Steven. Oh, now you're unmuted. Okay. Yeah. You need to unmute again. You click it and unmute. And now. Now you're good. Yeah, I should say when I'm going to stop. So just like over and out.That was beautifully said, Stephen.

Yes. Really lovely to hear you articulate that. Yeah. Beautiful. Thank you. And we have Nick, would you like to unmute? Yeah, it's interesting because when I see, for example, Brandon asking a question or saying something and then I said, OK, maybe I can share something there. I raised my hand, but then all of you are expressing what you're expressing. So I'm thinking maybe I just shut up. So I know they already said it. So what am I going to say? So then I said, well, should I say it? Should I say it anyway? And I said, OK, I'm going to help Kat and Tanya to add more time.

So I'll say something. That's it. But just another color of kind of the same thing when the question was, I think it was, if thoughts and senses or something or the sense appear or thought or whatever, what came through me is that thought as well as senses seem to appear in it.So there's not really an issue what the cause or not is that if I overlook that what I am is I am. Yeah, thoughts as well as senses, they seem to appear in what I am. And once the identification goes to thought and senses, that's when we get into. If thought is what creates the sensing or whatever, but if you always remember that I am, then yeah, thoughts will appear in I am, senses will appear in I am, but I am.

And that's where it all stops. You see? And the second thing is that when it was asked, about the ego, that why people keep talking about the ego? Because people believe that they are people.You see? As long as I believe that I am a person, I will talk about the ego. Because I'm overlooking that the problem is I am believing I'm a person. And because I'm believing I'm a person, then I'll talk about the ego. That's a subtle way of bringing the attention away, you know, from what I am. But in reality, if I look at what the ego is, the ego is a thought.

But if I look at it from the perspective of a person talking about the ego, I am overlooking that I am the ego. Now is the ego trying to put the attention away. If I am talking from the perspective of a person, I am the ego. Because the ego is the thought, is the belief. But if I am, then I am. And there's no ego. There's no me. There's no person talking about ego. It's just what is. And that's when everything collapses and we rest into the I am. You see? That's kind of what came through. That's it. Is that it? I just, yeah, you're right.

It's the whole joke. It's the hilarious joke that cannot be solved by thinking about it because just that's why, you know, Bob has always said you won't find the answer in the mind. Just relax.into that presence awareness and uh it's like jenny's you know it's about dropping or striptease it's the striptease it's dropping all the concepts and just rest stop trying to understand it stop trying to figure it out it's just just be you you it's It's a hilarious joke because it is incredibly circular in a way of speaking and you won't figure it out. So just relax and that's the piece of it, the freedom.

That's it. Yes, and we have Nick was first and then Brendan was next. So Nick, do you want to say something? Yeah, that is why it's very interesting because it's kind of a loop. Okay. When I, again, I have to use this language. When I ask myself, what's the point of being here in this meeting? You see, what is the point of talking about this? You see, and I had to wrestle with that a lot because in life in general, I was seeing like that. And it's somehow it settles into this is what's happening. And if the instrument is being moved to say something, it will say something.In the same way, when the instrument, it seems to be experiencing distressing thoughts and believing them sometimes for a period of time, even that is what's happening.

So it's very interesting because it's finally get to a place where. Where life is and that's all there is to it. So in this character, in the same way that is like, for example, a cat, Bob would say to her, you should continue talking. Well, in the end, she's not in charge of that decision yet. It's undeniable, at least from my experience, that when I see her cat speaking, that's something that she has to do. I mean, how could imagine Jesus saying, Jesus, OK, only you know this. Don't tell anybody. Imagine Buddha saying, you know this, don't tell anybody. Well, they didn't tell anybody really.

They just simply being and then as being instruments, they cannot not be used through it. And I struggle with this because for many years, I realized that I was led to speak about some of this stuff, even when I was really, I'm not saying that I was or I wasn't, I hope you understand. When I was really immersed in the egocentric fear, yes, As a speaker, somebodycould say, man, this guy has something to say. Yeah, come to live with me for a week so you can get to see the other thing you don't see when I'm on the stage. And that incoherence to me was very, I couldn't get it.

And yet I see myself doing videos. I see myself writing. I said, God, I mean, what the heck is going on here? It's like, it was like, I'm thinking, I just want to be perfect first so that then I can speak from there. And life will say, no, that's not the way it works. You're going to do what you're going to do no matter what, you know, and if you're abilities to speak, you're going to speak, even if you're not incoherent. It doesn't matter because it's not what about that. And that's why I keep referring this back again. What the click is not that hasn't happened before that, but somehow the click for me was when I was talking to Kat and Bob and I said, so you're telling me that you who are already, who know all this and you're perfectly and whatever, that you don't have problems or I mean all this stuff and they both said oh I mean Bob actually went of course he's kind of saying of course what do you think I am you know I'm just just like you what happens is that yes it's kind of giving me permission of being imperfect that's okay look if my if I'm supposed to be a speaker and I speak about this stuff I never whatever it doesn't matterHowever, somehow there is a weight is being really pulled off.

I feel that somehow there's more congruency with what I'm sharing because now I feel that through this character, It's living from that space. Yeah, the characters still have the thoughts and the things like Jenny said last time, which is beautiful. Exactly. Yeah, okay, the thoughts. Well, she sings Sabrina Spears. Okay, Nick is going to have these thoughts too. But somehow... There is a piece around it. Okay, that's fine. That's the human character. It's not who I am. It has nothing to do with what I am. It's just what it is. If Nick is supposed to speak, he will speak, even though if it's coherent or incoherent.

But that is what the instrument is doing. But I am not even the instrument. I am. And that's kind of what... Where it all points to. So this is something that I had to wrestle for a while, for a while. Now there's a part of me that is kind of at peace with it now, you know, and that's okay. That's it. This is what I'm supposed to do. And God, I don't know what the instruments will be doing in the next moment. I don't know. Maybe I'll completely move away from all of this and I'll do something else. So I don't know, but. This is what seems to be happening, but I am.

And that's where I can, words cannot go beyond that. You know, just stay with I am. I am and everything else.It is what it is. That's it. Yeah, that's really lovely. That's beautiful to hear. And that's the sort of the state, if you use words, of, you know, leaving it unchanged, unaltered, unmodified. It just is what it is. And that's it. And there is this little story. Bob often is asked, has been asked by people, did Nisargadatta name you his successor? Did Nisargadatta tell you that you have permission to speak? And Bob would just laugh. And he says, what does it matter? If he told me not to speak, he wouldn't have been able to stop me.

This is what is happening. It's just what is happening. There is no one to give permission to anyone. There is no one to obey any order or any suggestions. There is really no one there. If there is an illusion of self being, you know, nearing any of that, it's just another bogus idea. Like I'll read just a couple of things here. Jenny says kids believe in Santa, grown-ups believe in ego. Brilliant. And Marlies gives her email address also. I don't know, Andrew, if you can actually get them. Yvonne says, that must there always be a point. I love it. Yeah, just the pointlessness. Just being as I am.in this moment passing by, little children, Santa Claus, don't stick for a point.

They are just playful now. Beautifully said, Yvonne. And Jose says, or Jose, or Jose, I don't know how to pronounce you. Sorry if I do it wrongly. No matter, absolutely, nothing matters. And Brendan, would you like to unmute? Yeah, sure. So it seems like whatever's going on in my programming is trying to work things out, like sometimes. I guess it doesn't matter at the end of the day because it's, yeah, it doesn't matter. It just happens and it's gone again. But I think it's just recognizing that I'm actually just doing that. That's it. Recognizing the tendency. I can't change my programming and it's not me anyway, so why does it matter?

Absolutely. That's beautiful. That's beautiful. All you can do is you can see the program just kicked in and is running. Just like the program of sweating of the skin. It kicks in and is running. Okay, that's it. Embarrassment, the rest of it, who cares? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, they're all autopilot. Jenny, would you like to unmute? And Andrew repeated his email, Marlies and those who didn't get it, please copy from the screen.Yes. You know, sometimes a word stands out, probably because, you know, when English isn't your mother tongue. And today I just wanted to highlight for those who have maybe English as a mother tongue or even who don't.

Tanya's use of wording when she said, we don't cause the smell. I thought that was brilliant. And really, it's like a caramel, because causing something means that you're responsible for it, you know, if you use the meaning of the word. And it's so obvious that you don't cause what you're picking up with your nose, what you smell, and you don't cause what you hear. And I just wanted to highlight that, Tanya, that was brilliant, because then to make a transition to, I don't cause my thoughts, or I don't cause my emotions, then it becomes so much clearer in a sense that there is no doer, which is the concept that sometimes it is so hard to grasp, you know, because we're so we've been, oh, don't do that.

Do this. Do this.that instead. Oh, oh no, stop doing that. I mean, we've heard that since we were small children. It's all been about doing and not doing. So we are so used to that is like, sometimes I have this analogy or this thing that I use when I try to explain something about programming. Imagine you're in a bowling alley. And the groove that is there where the ball runs into if we're not good at bowling are all the times that we have heard the same thing, the concept about I'm doing this, I'm doing this, I'm doing this. It's so much easier for the ball to roll into the groove if you just throw it sloppy.

But imagine you want to carve a new groove, a strike groove in the middle, and have that ball go in that direction as many times so that the mold gets as deep as the one where the ball goes onto the side, the old groove. That's kind of hard work, so we have to cut ourselves some slack. When we see that old programming or, you know, just old beingness just shows up. So that with the cause, I just wanted to highlight the word cause, that we don't cause shit.You know, it's just happening. That's so beautiful. Yeah, we don't cause shit. Shit just happens. Yeah, lovely. And Isabel, would you like to unmute?

I find the bottom finally, the hand up. Yeah, I want to share something because for me it was a long time of struggling. When I wake up, the dance is there, that movie. The beauty. And then I hear Bob say one time, and it dawns on me because before I didn't recognize it really. He said one time, this whole universe, this body lives on the five elements. And then I saw for myself everything that we have made here. But appearance, it's made from that five elements. And that's such a mystery because you see the form is empty, emptiness is form. Then he say consciousness lives on consciousness.And that was such a strange, it's a word for sure, it's a strange, it's a touch.

And then he said, consciousness lives on consciousness. And then it really dawns on me that everything is such a mystery. And then I hear everything is consciousness. That was also the big, big mystery. But now I feel, yeah, I see that There was nobody there. And the strange thing is, everything is made of that all, yeah, I don't know the word, the three things, but also in Christ say, all knowing, all power, all And that's such a...good seeing for me now to see, I cannot tell it, I cannot grasp it, I see now I will put this in this word, but I feel I want to say this, because that mystery is really all is consciousness, and we don't know what consciousness is for sure.

But that was for me a big thing to wake up and to see this movie and it is empty. And then to see my grandchild, my baby, the baby from my daughter. And then when you think... You don't even know your birth because she was before the birth and then the consciousness come with the eye cell and the seed cell and now start to do and forms a body and the body is get all like i see in the mirror and yeah that's that mystery is such a mystery and for me gives now reallyI don't know. I don't want to know it because I cannot know it.

But that was a great gift. And Bob say, consciousness lives on consciousness. Yeah, that I want to share today. No story, but sorry for that. No, it was lovely. And congratulations on finding the hand up. Yeah, but I did a new thing before I get, but that's also a long story. Like Shani said, it's not our language. And I would put so much more words and things in it. The shitty computer here. Don't know the English, right? The computer is transmitting fantastically between the words. Apparently, it's only 37% according to NLP of the communication being verbal. The rest of it is non-verbal, is the energetic delivery.

And your computer is absolutely fantastic with it. It really resonated for me what you were saying about the not knowing. And that's the true wisdom really, isn't it? Is knowing that we can't know, that we don't know, we won't know, we'll never know.The only thing we can be absolutely certain about is that sameness, that word we, the description we used a couple of weeks ago, that is-ness, that presence awareness, that unchanging. Sense of being that's been there since forever. Yeah. And it is unchanging, untainted. No matter what happens on the screen, it just stays the same. It's the same. And that's it. That's it. There's nothing else.

Nothing else. And then also when you say it's nothing else, when Bob points

The knowingness, loving to be, no time, not here, not, yeah, it is here, but yeah, that's the beauty, always come back to the, then it's nothing happened, because it goes, you can only, take time on a picture or on a fan or in the old ages they painted. But that is the only frozen memory is a picture. But for the rest it is floating in the ocean and then pops up my voice and your voice. That's such a reminder, always come back. It's like Andrew says, the mind creates the illusion of time.

There is only ever now. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's it. That's all there is. That's it. But the illusion is created. Yeah. Seeming link, which appears to be a progression. It's just snapshots of instantaneousness now. Yeah. And now when we say this, it's history because it is gone. It's a flop, flop, flop, flop, flop, flop, flop, flop, flop, flop, flop, flop, flop, flop, flop. It's such a beauty thing. I have some nice story about me was really helping.He makes an egg in the pan and the egg was burning. And then he goes to his car and he forgot the key. And then in the evening he was telling his wife, fuck it man, my ex was burning and I forgot my key.

And one hour later he repeat, repeat, repeat. And then he said, wait a minute. That was only... One minute. Yeah. On the whole storyline. And that was for me also a good reminder of when I complained when I was a young woman. Yeah, that's such a nice thing. That's it. Yeah. Yeah. Amazing. The whole thing is just amazing. Amazing. Amazing. Amazing. Amazing. And then also the amazing that it makes this body uniform to go, to smell the consciousness in a rose or to make a little bit. In the morning. It's all such a great mystery from We don't know. Yeah, that's it. And then the native cup of coffee.

And then it makes that you canTasted. That's such a... Oh, that's such a beauty. But I see Nick has also the hand up. I gave him space. No, I mean, finish whatever you're going to say. It doesn't matter. I just want to share a quick anecdote concerning to what Tanya says regarding to the nonverbal communication. But if you don't, don't, don't, no pressure. Nothing is important. Yeah, she's helping. Go on. Yeah, yeah. Oh, okay. So, no, it's something very interesting when Kat was talking about nonverbal communication. I'm going to tell you, this is, nothing is true here. We know that, but it's just actually a seeming anecdote that happened.

Many years ago in Miami, I met someone who, he went to Miami. He didn't speak English at all, nothing. But a friend of his says, you know, there's a particular meeting about this particular individual who's talking about, you know, this theme or spirituality. We don't have to get into any of that. And this guy said to him, look, I don't speak English. What's even the point of going there if I don't speak the language? And his friend says, you know what? Come on anyway. It doesn't matter. You know, so so he did. And what this guy said, you know, I call it a friend, but I don't remember his name right now because so many years ago, because, you know, whatever.

He said he told me the story. He says, well, I remember that I was sitting there. And I didn't understand anything the guy was saying, nothing. But I said, you know,You know what? What I'm going to do is I'm just going to relax. I'm going to breathe in and I'm just going to take in all that there is. That's all I'm going to do. Nothing else. And he stayed there. And that's what he did for the next two days. Well, once they call it the talk or the encounter, whatever was finished after the second day. The person who was on the podium says to everybody, okay, I want every one of you to write down what you think you got from this encounter, what you think was what you got out of it.

And his friend says, you know, he asked this, whatever. So this particular individual wrote down. In Spanish, whatever he think we get out of it. And he let it be. That's all. Forgot about it. But the whole thing. So about two weeks later, he gets a personal email from this particular speaker saying, out of everyone who went to the meeting, you are the only one who understood the message. Wow. Because everybody was here. You see? Yeah. He was not there. He was just being. So in the end, language is, like you said, God is deep. Yes. He's beyond that. That's it. Yes, and Bob often says in the meetings, you know, just leave your ego behind the door, listen with your heart, not with your head, because yes, the answer can't be found.

And Amin, would you like to...Say something. Yeah, hi everyone. Hi Kat, hi Tanja. It's just, I don't know, I don't know, I don't have any idea why I put this hand up. Just want to maybe... Say hello. Coucou. Yeah. Yeah, just thank you for this. Resonation this yeah it's nice again i can feel my feet uh vibrating and and dancing that's good and thanks thank you and we have We have Andrew who has the hand up. Andrew, would you like to say something?Sorry, can you hear me? Yes, yes, we can hear you now. Brendan was asking about the senses. Well, the senses are not in the body.

The senses are in the life force, in the awareness. And the simplest way of seeing that is how many senses does the corpse have? None. So the senses use... Well, to use a yoga type term, they say the senses use the organs of action. So you've got the five senses and they operate on the five organs of action. But once they're withdrawn with the life force, no, a corpse can't see, a corpse can't hear, a corpse can't do anything. Yeah, isn't it a great point? That's why I sometimes like to actually say, you know, instead of seeing, I say capacity for seeing. Because I had people asking, so what do you mean seeing?

And it is the capacity that is utilized through the organ. Like Bob often says, the seeing happens through the organ, through the eyes. And of course, if there is no eyes, there is no seeing. If there is no sin, there is also no seeing. They interconnect.They're inseparable. But the seeing as a capacity is like a field of potentiality that is utilized when there is an organ and there is something to be seen. But that's a good point that the corpse does not have the capacity. So even though organ is there, capacity is not. And thank you for highlighting it. And we have another two minutes.

Anyone would like to have a last word? I don't know if I hear you, Andrew. Steve. Oh, Steve. Steve has the hand up. Would you like to unmute Steve?I think just a reminder for myself, really, what brought me to all of this sort of thing was a sense of distress. I mean, that's what this sense of separation has, isn't it? And it can be. What's the term? A sense of wretchedness, I suppose, isn't it? When you're very young and you feel very isolated. And it's because we're totally caught up in the mind in this idea of a separate being. And so all of this is coming to see that that's just not true.

And and. So when we're all talking and we're sort of on the same page, it can seem like, you know, it's very obvious. But for many people, they're not even in this idea that this, you know, I don't mean people are functioning perfectly well, but. Imagine somebody really caught up in terrible mental distress because of the thought processes that are going on. That is a lot of suffering. Now, we might say, well, it's not, you know, it's only still just the awareness. But that's the nub of it, isn't it? The nub of all of this is that we're coming to this because we want to find out what...

You know,what it's all about. And I just think it's great to hear everybody's understanding of things in whatever they come across, because nobody, and I said it, we never know what we're going to hear from somebody, even somebody who might not, who just sort of grafting little bits of this, it might be just the little bit that, you know, really has an effect. And so that's why I think it's so great. That everybody um people talk and all that and not having to listen to just one one idea i know it's just one idea just one take on it so it's all coming at it from different different um you knowdifferent experiences and viewpoints.

And I just think it's great. So that's all I wanted to say, really. So that's me done. Thank you, Stephen. And thank you, everyone. I absolutely second to that. Yes. It's a beautiful space for me. It's just, it's great. It's awesome. Yeah. Really good. Really great. So I didn't put up my hand. I just wanted to butt in quickly at the end and say big love and big hugs. And I'm so aware of that tomorrow is first Valentine's Day. And yeah, and yeah, no, it's really present. I know that it's Valentine's Day tomorrow. And I also know somebody who has recently lost the beloved form of a Valentine.

And I just wanted to extend. My love to you, Kat, and also for Saturday, for the memorial, you know. And I wanted to ask what time, it's probably written somewhere, but what time it is so that one can tune in. We decided not to live stream because we would have to... I know, I know. I just want to connect. You know, yeah, connect. Of course, of course.It's two o'clock in the afternoon, so it will be very early hour in the morning, your time. Okay, I'll probably be asleep, so I will just program myself before I go to bed. Have a good sweet dream, maybe four in the morning or something.

Oh, yeah, perfect. That's perfect. Yeah, no, I just wanted to. Yeah, just to also hold that piece of the human experience. I wanted to lift that too. So you know what I mean. Yeah, beautiful. Thank you very, very much. Yes, lots of love and hugs to everyone. All the best with it, Kat. Yeah, thank you. I'm wearing black today. Bye, everyone. Thanks a lot. Bye. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Thank you. Bye.