This transcript was made by speech-recognition software, so names and some words may be misheard. The recording is the original: watch on YouTube.
Yes, okay, so we are about to go live now and I'm gonna ask everyone to say their names. So we have Charlie, Michael, Joe, Joe, Anthony, we have Black and Pesto. And okay, so There we are. And we have Jane with us on Zoom. And if anyone who is watching us wants to join on Zoom, www.silorbob.com slash meetings, and you will have all the links. Just click the button and be there with us. Have your own voice. We will still read the comments from Facebook Live, but it would be nice to just hear some voices. The explorations, non-duality explorations, as usually, as always, the invitations on the table.
Who wants to open it up? We can swap the chair or just drive the camera to you. It's very, very simple, very basic. Everybody is 100% certain that they exist. And just resting in that certainty of existence, which is sometimes called Sat Chit Ananda or reality, just from that perspective, see what comes up, potentially either express it or obscures it. If there is an expression, there may be an eyes,soothing words of pointers to stillness or joy of being if there is something that obscures it if there is a thought formation coming up feeling of vibration coming up that is labeled whatever anxiety performance anxiety whatever the label comes up usually is just a sensation showing up on the screen of awareness and usually it is the processor there quickly compares it with what was recognizes it as something from the past relates it from the past and gives it a label so the same vibration in the situation of public speaking is called anxiety performance or performance anxiety in different setting it might be excitement or it might be anything else it's just that Okay.
So anyone would like to begin?Thank you. No, thank you. What? No, no. Okay, so you just grab another mic and just interrupt me, build up on it. If anything comes up for anyone, just feel free to participate. It's an exploration. So just change the direction or anything. So basically, it's... It's about that.It is about the, some perspectives would say, finding the freedom from psychological suffering already here, not finding it tomorrow, not finding it in seven lifetimes, but finding it already here, underneath the turmoil of the obstructions. There may be a veil of stories, of dramas showing up and hiding this peaceful, natural state of just pure contentment.
But that contentment is still there underneath the drama, underneath the veil of story. So really just looking at the mechanics of the appearance and seeing that while you are looking at it, you are free from it. When you are looking at the mechanics of the veiling, of the drama of yes, but, yes, but my son is really having an issue or my husband is really dead or whatever the story is. In this moment right now, it only exists as mental image. It only exists as imagination. And what is currently present, without the story is not disturbed in any way, even if there isthe vibration present in the body, there is no problem unless the thought, the story comes and labeled as a problem.
You can't have a problem without the thought, without the judgment. So primarily there is this ever fresh moment And of course, there is some content to it. There is some sensations, some perceptions. But unless there is an interpretation going on, calling it a problem, there is nothing wrong. Even if the sensation is unpleasant or uncomfortable, if there is no thought that it shouldn't be there, there is no problem. So there is no suffering. Suffering the psychological suffering as we understand it is resistance is arguing with what is showing up arguing with what is so if there is no arguing you see there are two cats around our legs they may be hungry or they may be anxious but they don't have a clue they don't have an idea that the things should be any different So there is no resistance, there is no dis-ease, there is no lack of ease in being.
And when we look at the whole manifested world, he was missing Tanya. He's going to hop on. We have a little friend here.Yeah, of course. Surveying the land. So that's how simple presence is. You know, look at this animal and see how it is constantly connected with the whole environment. It's constantly aware of the sounds, of the sensations. There is awareness. There is a knowing there.Yeah, the flutter cushions are better. And he doesn't have a concept of what is happening and why things are happening. And this is the peaceful natural state. And that peaceful natural state is still there when the overlay of concepts comes.
It is just right underneath that overlay. So if there is just a peaceful natural stay of us sitting here and looking underneath the overlay of veil of concepts, using concepts, speaking, speaking words, making sounds. Focusing on what the words mean or what the words point to. So the overlay of concepts, the stories, dramas, they don't touch that natural contentment, that natural freedom from psychological suffering. It is always there. It is space-like. It is clear.So even if the whole system is absolutely shaken by a drama, let's say, you know, the near miss, the accident on the road or nasty phone call with what stick and stones don't break bonds, but someone just criticized us and judged us and did some nasty stick, some nasty labels.
The body is shaken because the whole biocomputer is programmed to survive. And if you are rejected by someone who may tell someone and someone and someone, suddenly you are excluded. And that is a threat for survival. So response to any sort of judgment or criticism or threat of any kind will be shakiness. And what's wrong with that? What's wrong with the healthy response coming from the loving to be and the protection? Nothing. It's quite beautiful in its own way. Only the idea that I don't want it to be there or I believe that's true. And I have to do something. And what can you do?
You can see how doing happens and there is no doer. The beating around the bush happens. The panic happens. The craze happens. The mind can go nuts around the idea that someone told me a nasty label. And oh, they shouldn't. What do I do?Nothing. It's just that storm appearing in stillness. And if you can actually see the mental activity running by itself, completely mechanically, completely habitually, without any doing, any action, on autopilot, What bother is that for you? For the watching, for the presence? You are the pure presence. And within that, there is that belief system running, the judgment running, or the fear or anxiety.
Let it be there. Leave it. Leave it as it is. Don't touch it. unaltered, unmodified, uncorrected, as it is. And enjoy it because it's not going to last. And guess what is going to happen if that is not fed continuously with that energy of belief?You can make yourself think of Santa or flat earth, unless you are like some sort of a conspiracy follower, you won't be able to make yourself to believe in that. And then how long is that thought going to haunt you? Is it going to touch anything? The belief, the alleged acceptance, no, the acceptance of the alleged fact, the belief that the haunting label is true.That is what causes suffering.
Seeing the label as it is without that belief in it, Without holding on to it. Yeah. Without holding on to it. Hold no beliefs. Yeah, hold no opinions. Hold no opinions without a trace of a concept. That's, you know, that's not... Nothing like nothing ever happened it's not that everything stopped happening of course their wheels will continue to turn you know the stone will continue to roll down you gathering moss whatever it does but as you say that's the freedom from the so-called psychological suffering is that it's also it's not happening to me. Yeah. And that's the whole beauty of Bob's encouragement to do the investigation for yourself.
Take a look. Take a look. What's nothing? There's nothing holding you back, stopping you. Just take a look. Can you find this central point, the reference point to whichthe criticisms right to whom are they addressed find that person that mini me that central controller to to whom all the thoughts all the concerns all the concepts are addressed and then see from where are you seeing yourself looking? Yeah. It's happening in, within, not outside of, somewhere distant from. It's all occurring in this same, we're going to call it space. Arena of consciousness. It's not got a boundary. It's not, you know, limited in any way. It's just as it is.
And it's suchness, however it's referred to, as it is. So that doesn't mean that, as Kat was saying, something will arise in the body like a heart rate pounding or sweating or shaking okay without the labeling holding on to the label of what it is what it represents the meaning oh it's free to just Move on. Dissolve. Part. I don't accord. Nothing.Nothing sticks. I like that differentiation, Tanya, because you can have all these thoughts, but it's whether your innocence is lost by those thoughts. So, yeah, I found that particularly interesting, how you differentiated from that cat seed. Yeah. Not taking it and making it personal.
Yeah, rather than saying, hey, look, it's immoral. I shouldn't be having conspiracy theories or whatever it is. No, it's not you. Yeah. No, you. But curiosity, oh, this is interesting. Yeah. You know, wow. But you can leave it there. You don't have to ask why. No, it just happens. Just, oh, okay, this is interesting. And then it will, you know, depart. But if you focus attention, not hold to it, well, then more will come. That's it. Right? Yeah. It's like a toilet roll. It's like, you know, I'm right. I know it. I get it right, you know. I get it right and you get it wrong.
I have it and you don't have it. And I'll have to defend it. I have it. Jesus is my savior. I have it. I've seen through the illusion. Any idea of that sense of... Righteousness is traditionally called ego.any sort of like judgment and comparison like yeah you got it wrong you don't really understand anything are you doing it wrong are you saying it wrong and i i am the judge i know better oh bugger Well, he actually may do, but it's taking responsibility for who you are in the moment. And who's taking that responsibility? You are taking that responsibility as an individual. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And who is the individual? The individual is represented by the entity. And what power does it have if you switch the light off? It has power to itself, but it's taking the responsibility. What I'm saying is it's taking the responsibility for being what it is. So what's responsibility? Is it taking the blame for, taking the credit for? Is that saying I did it? I am the doer of that? To an extent, yes. And then, okay, where am I? From where did I operate the levers and the buttons to make that happen? That's the next step because there is the detachment for that. You take the responsibility and you let go.
See through it. That's what I'm talking about.See through it. Don't hold it. You don't hold it. But you see it come up. Oh, that's interesting. Even that, even that not beating yourself up for having an ego. Right. Or an expression of what we call an ego or me as a, because you're starting to continue to have. Before you can come to this non-duality, you start as an individual. Mostly launching from that platform because if you weren't you wouldn't body will be here and that's the point you see the way uh this is bob's style if you want to go to some schools that will tell you that you are individual now you are 30 individual and 60 absolute and then you have to spend another 10 000 hours meditating then you will be 60 absolute and whatever else bob says start from the fact that you are already that recognize where is it true strengthen it hold on to it don't go back to the idea that no no no i'm individual half and half and i have to get rid of an individual you know bury the ego or chop off the ego no recognize that even the arrogance of the ego is coming up by itself there is no one there having it no one there that needs to be responsible for it because if you start from the fact that you are the life essence appearingthrough this particular instrument as this particular music.
And this particular music may be arrogance, or it may be blaming or criticizing, or ego, or whatever it is. It may be harsh, or it may be very soft. But you are the life, you are the presence in which this character is playing out. Now, I wonder, what is this character going to do next? Is it going to kiss that guy or punch him? Who knows? Let me see. You prefer punch? That's a compliment. See, the thing is, if I am the life and the character is a surprise, is something to discover, is the body-mind machine, it has been conditioned, it has been, it had all these experiences, and it doesn't know its next thought.
It doesn't know what it's going to say next minute. It doesn't know what it's going to feel. And I'm the witnessing, the consciousness, the cognizing emptiness. Hmm, let me see. Wow, interesting. Okay, that comes up. Wow, interesting. So now I'm childlike. I'm the discoverer. I'm the explorer. I am the witnessing presence. I'm the space-like, sky-like awareness. And behavior comes through. Why like this? Why not like this? Why is that? I don't care. The story is not required. But the fact that the movement is...being witnessed in that cognizing emptiness does not mean that I have to construct, oh my, there is someone here that is doing the witnessing.
There is a witness and now I have to get rid of the witness. But who is the I? To get rid of who? Of what? We don't go into all that, you know, stages of diminishing illusion. We start from the fact that I already am present, seeing, hearing, tasting. I am the seeing. Yes. I've realised it though because you can say that like a, you can repeat it like a monkey. You're right. You're right. You're right. Have you realised that? Have you taken responsibility for that realisation? Yeah, I see what you say. Yes, there may be mind learning. So what you said before about the two different texts, Bob's text, of course, is what we're studying here.
But I see the other text that you mentioned suitable for certain people as well. So it depends on what teaching draws you. It's not the root, it's the end that matters, genuinely. The end is a fascinating concept, right? The end implies the beginning. Something started, right? Were you ever anything else?Philosophically, no. Yeah. So, because it's so hard to talk about, isn't it? It's so hard because all we have is words, which are concepts and labels and everything. Even observing what comes up, what seemingly comes up and saying, oh, it's registering as anger. It's a concept. That's a concept, to call it anger. A tree is not a tree.
It's just that. The centre is not anger. It's just that. Can you see it all and remain neutral? It's so hard to point at it, but you've never been anything else but that. It's an illusion. It's holding on to the illusion that it's happening to somebody. A person, a standalone entity, a separate being.That's what Bob asks, you know. It's simple as taking yourself, can you not be? Can you not be? Try and not be. All, when there's true focus on that, well, it's like there's nothing else. It's like the thoughts are dropped, everything. Can you not be? Well, I can't compute that. It doesn't compute.
We can't label it. We can't come at it directly because it can't be expressed. But it's impossible not to be knowing it all the time. It's an illusion that you don't. It's an illusion that you're imperfect, something to fix, something not whole, somewhere to get to. So start from the complete opposite of that. Perfection as it is. Nothing. It couldn't be any other way. Can you see?Just accepting. There's different words to say, relaxing, surrendering, accepting. None of this is meant to imply a person who does anything. See through that. That it's not happening to a person, an individual. Nothing of this is. It's just, Jesus, it's an illusion that you know, that you think, that you believe, that you can even understand it.
All that is a construct. Yes, or own it, or, yeah. But I see where you're coming from, and that's beautiful. You know, the peacemaker, everyone is in the right place. Those are drawn there. Those are drawn there. Absolutely. And beautiful point. Though from life's perspective, that is just, you know, the bird is singing and the cat is meowing. And yes, everyone is in the right place. And ultimately, it doesn't really matter whether they'll get Jehovah or Jesus is your savior or whether the experience of life in this particular body will be meowing or barking or singing. It doesn't really matter, but we are drawn here.
So we do this so-called direct recognition, which is a recognition of something that's already clear and obvious just to highlight. But we have Jane has the hand up. We're going to give her a voice. But what's confusing? is you're talking about things in different levels. Because on the one hand you say, oh, well, nothing's happening, nobody was born, nobody dies. And then you start talking about the mind-body and it does people's heads. Oh, I don't want to have my thing. I don't want to be. All right. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah. So that's very confusing for people. Wonderful. Not to qualify. Yes. What level? Are you talking about it in the appearance or are you talking about it, you know, like we're all vibrations in the empty nothingness, you know?
It's confusing. Yes. I accept that, you know, I'm just, there's the mind body or there's no one here. On the other hand, if I get, if somebody... You know, bashes me in a car crash or something, then, and I'm bleeding or have broken a leg, I'm well and truly feeling it. So, you know, in this conversation, you know, it's very confusing when people are talking about it at different levels. Yeah, yeah, you're right. You see, there is a very, very basic way of making it clear. And this is what we are trying to do, make it as clear and asas simple as possible but on the other hand it's still no matter how it is spoken about it still cannot be grasped by the mind and any way of trying to grasp it by the mind is moving further away from the truth So try, okay, I understand this aspect.
Now I want to understand this aspect. And this is a natural desire, wanting to understand it. But accepting right at the start that it is beyond the mind, it is beyond the comprehension and relaxing into resonating. Ah, this rings a bell. Oh, this, okay, this resonates. Rather resonates than makes sense. Because you resonate with a lot of those things, but when you try to make sense, you find contradictions. And I can tell you, I promise you, I can rubbish every single pointer with a pure delight. Because, of course. Because you're a devil. I'm devil, yeah. Thank you. But I'm not doing it to be a smarty pants.
I'm doing it. No, no. Look, Jane, I'll take your point. What I'm saying is... Let me change the subject, Charlie. What I'm doing is I'm trying to... Do what you guys keep on doing, saying. And Bob says, investigate, because I need to understand it. And I understand the limitations.of language and stuff but where there are inconsistencies um it's you know it's it's hard to just surrender um you know what i mean yeah yeah wonderful i mean look you know tanya just nailed it you know you're trying and okay you know that's just part of the journey trying but you know the trying will never get you there it's impossible trying is the attempt it's an excuse really for for uh not really going there you know try to lift a chair And if you lift it, you already failed trying.
If you keep trying, the chair is standing on the floor. It's the trying. But when you actually really start from the fact that, of course, you know, it is already so. I just need to recognize it. And then in the moments you recognize it, you recognize that you are alive, that you are aware of your existence. You can't deny that. No, but what I do, I guess what I do is I apply risk management to this stuff. And so I say, well, I'll hedge my bets. I still like to meditate, so I meditate. I understand that that won't get me there, but that has meaning to me and it makes sense.
Then I can spend a good amount of time just sitting here and not investigating. And then I spend more, some part of my time investigating.So I'm not doing just one or the other. You understand what I mean? Yes, but can you actually step down from the idea of I'm doing this, then I'm doing that, and then I'm doing this, and just see how those things are actually happening? You know, the thought comes up, I want to sit still. The thought comes up or the urge comes up to sit still yeah the next thing sitting still happens but you are not really doing it it just happens and then you just recognize from the perspective of being pure presence sitting happening now singing happening now going to the toilet or cooking this all that content is happening now what is unchanging there is Here, here, now, there is an existence.
Within that existence, all that activity are happening. Activities are secondary. Existence is first. Whether the activities or the content is surrendering or beating around the bush or resisting or cooking, doesn't really matter what the content is. Underneath that, You are always present. You are always here. Yeah, and I understand that and I experience that. Of course. I do experience that. The experiencing is ever and always. Yes.always experiencing yes you none of this change things occur outside of experiencing recognizing registering discovering no matter what happens that if you're if it's it comes to your attention it's happening in that experiencing it's not separate from it's that It's that.
Can you not be? To answer that question, that question is raised in experiencing. You know it's occurred. You know you forgot. You know you so-called forgot to be aware. You know you got focused on this, on that. Because experiencing never stops.It is always, doesn't have a beginning and an end. It's just a word experiencing. Fundamentally, you know what I'm saying and it's not something that you have to understand logically in the head. It just is. In fact, you can't. Because all of that is happening within experiencing. That's it, is the ining, the ining, the ongoing ining. Some people say suchness, and it is just as it is.
But it doesn't, it's not as in it has a, it's not time bound in any way, obviously. It's continuous, but then it's continuous in what? It implies time. Actually, it's never, there's no beginning and end to it. This experiencing is always, it's... Not been had a beginning or an end. It is just always, always.Don't have to work it out, Jane. You don't have to understand it. You can't. Forget. It's beyond words, beyond concepts, beyond mind. But you can't deny it. But can you not be? That's it. Full stop. Don't stop torturing yourself. I was going to say to Jane, I mean, if she's got difficulty, it's instructive to read about the experiences of other people that have delved into the non-personal self.
And by whatever means. And there's plenty of that material out there to study that. And I found it helped. I don't know whether you'll find it helped, but I can recommend that if you're at a crossroads. I totally understand it. Though there is also a danger, and this is what Bob was recommending against. He was recommending when people were asking him about his experiences, he would say, who cares? It's just an experience. What is ongoing, ongoing is the presence. And he would occasionally tap on the experience. And I was asked, I put in the bag of pointers about, I think, 10 different people and their experiences, the little stories.
But mainly to highlight that ifSomeone has experienced it this way, this infinite creativity of God, the creator, the omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, that story has been taken. It is not going to happen to you this way. First of all, because there is no you. Second of all, because it's taken. And third, because there is no future in it. In which you could imagine yourself happening this way. Like apparently one of the guys who actually hated Bob and defamed him publicly had an experience walking through park and then 100 people wanted to know which exact park he was walking through. How ridiculous is that? Or Eckhart Tolle was sitting on the bench.
Oh, which bench? Or someone else had a bike. Okay, if they want to know it, let them know. For Christ's sake. No, it's not up to you. It's not up to you. I understand that experiences are individual. Yes. But as a didactic tool. Yeah, it is entertaining, absolutely. Entertaining? Entertaining, totally entertaining. To imagine, you know, if you go to Muktanandai and look and listen to people. So he was a jerk, was he? No, listen to people. You know, I had also in Bob's biography book, I have written down a couple of situations what actually was a put-off for Bob. Women screaming and rolling on the corridors in the ecstasy.
Of elation for him it was like zoo nights like delirium tremensexperiences beginning and an end there is so many experiences or go and don't don't go and do drugs but they are potential experiences but the subtleness of that space in which all those experiences are coming and going is already present reading about other people's experiences yes entertaining supremely But recognizing of what is already present does not require any information, any knowledge about anything that happened at any point to anyone. And it is a danger. It might be also mind opening in a way that look, you know, this is why I actually wrote in the Sailor Bob box of pointers, some of those experiences being very unassuming, very unamusing that suddenly, oh shit, you know, I'm here.
Wow. The time stops. Oh, gosh, there really is nothing wrong with this moment, just as it is. And then the mind kicks in and starts rolling but oh right but what's wrong nothing it's though they were also experiences of a thunderbolt and but what does it matter all of them happened to them to whom to whom bob had that experience he heard nisargadatta rightfrom the first meeting and I had one individual meeting with Bob yes and that was transformational I can pinpoint the date almost the hour but it matters to who to the cat that realized that the cat itself was just a mental image a mask a costume dead That costume, that mask is there, dead.
Nothing matters to it because it isn't sentient. Nothing could possibly matter to a mask, to something that is not even real. So the individual who had the breakthrough to realize that the individual isn't real, doesn't even exist. And it has always been only that cognizing emptiness, that pure presence, life, shining through this eyes, through this, through that, through every single, through the cat's eyes, singing through the bird, never ever being any broken, never needing any breakthrough, always just being itself. Nothing ever has been wrong, even if it felt like there was a prison of psychological suffering. And now that prison was only coming from the story that was relating whatever is happening to the imagined self-me that can never be found.It is that, it's that ridiculously simple.
Try as you might, as much effort as you put in to make realization happen, it's impossible. You cannot make realization happen. No. You cannot make yourself become enlightened. No. It is, if there is such a thing to say, that's going in the opposite direction, if there is ever such a thing. It's a recognition that the idea, the concept of a me that this is all happening to is a hallucination. And it's never been that way. You've never been trapped as a person. You've never been trapped as a person. You've always been free. It's see through the hallucination that you've been trapped. You can't tell somebody in the street quite.
It's that simple. It's that, but it's that simple. Yeah, yeah. But someone on the street, you know, like you have, Bob has this metaphor, and it has been largely used by many, many people around the world, you know, playing a role.You are playing a role of whatever Hamlet in the play and you're being paid for that role and you do the best you can. What's the problem with that? You know, people on the street are assuming the roles. This is life dressing up as Hamlets. They're all Hamlets. They don't want to stop playing. They enjoy it. They love it. Life loves its costumes. There is no requirement for life to break through the costume and the role in every single vehicle.
It's enough if it breaks in here. That's it. Everything else is just expression. And there is no way out. Life is still itself, no matter what mask it puts on. And it is all Lila, divine game. It's all play. And it all ends. That every play ends when the lights go off and the curtains fall and the body drops away and life the energy the essence that can never be destroyed It's just the story that ends. It's the story of me that ends. And it ends every night when you go to sleep. Every night that story of me is dying into non-existence and then next morning it picks up where it left before, the night before.
Automatic, on autopilot, there is no one orchestrating any of it. And we have quite a few people. Oh, my goodness. This one is really.small print we have people on Facebook say say Gilbert says entire psychological dance is self-centered activity as Bob pointed out you will never work it in the mind never work it in the mind that's it and there is no other enemy they are inconceivable I, man's toy language, that's Stephen says, no one points and nothing to be pointed at. Exactly. And what is happening here, if anyone is actually putting a story on that there is here someone pointing to someone else who get it or doesn't get it, recognize the story.
There's nothing going on, just like the bird on the tree is singing the song, this bird is singing that song. It can't stop it, it can't start it, it has no agenda, it doesn't do it for any purpose, unless of course the story arises. But that will just be a story. And we have also, Stephen says, our separation is illusory. This new consciousness, no mind or body is nourished by intuition, not words. And Anthony says, these meetings can't be all people talking from the place where there is nothing to get. And I'm grateful for those that speak up from the place of not getting it.
How spicy. And thank you, Anthony. And so are we.So are we. Absolutely. And thank you for every contribution, Charlie and Jane and everyone who contributes. Yes, pop in the questions, arguments, all of it. And we have tons of also comments on Zoom here. We have six people, eight people on Zoom with us. I wish you guys actually unmute and read your comments because there is such a fine print here. I say Rohan says here ego goes the other way to thinking I'm wrong. I don't get this, etc. Good point, Rohan. Absolutely. And more often than not, I'm not good enough and all that stuff. Yeah, beautiful.
Relating anything to I is exactly the fiction. That's that's well said. And Julia says there is no responsibility Julia would you like to unmute maybe and read what you wrote because I have to put my nose on the computer yeah I was just commenting It's kind of the moment's passed. It doesn't seem relevant anymore. But when you were talking earlier, there was this guy in the room talking about the doer, the one who has responsibility. And my comment was just there is no responsibility, but there appears to be, and this is kind of where it helps to see it in writing, you know, response ability.
So within that illusion, there appears to be responsibility, but it's just an ability to respond.So the entity who can be responsible only exists within the illusion of thinking and without a thought who or what is responsible. And then the other comment that I put on it on the same level is there's no entity which does anything. That said, the false belief in the entity with free will is the parent of all judgment and hatred. So because you believe there's a doer, you believe in free will. And that there is someone who can be responsible. And so because you believe in that responsibility, you blame. Because you blame, you judge.
So to be clear, nobody does anything. And there is no you who can do any of this. And none of this exists without a thought either. You know, that said, it can be insightful to notice the effects of the, within the appearance of a cause. That made any sense. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, beautiful. And anyone else had a good comment there to read for themselves by themselves? Circo, would you like to read your comment or would you like to unmute and read it?I can read one. It's really small. Following on from what Jane said, does one being only experience itself when localized as mind bodies?
Or does it experience itself directly? If so, does the one... What does the one experience? Yeah, that's a good point, Circo. The what? It's always a content and it's always individualized. You know, if the body is blind, it does not experience colors, but it may have other senses heightened. But the experiencing, the capacity to experience. This is what the one or the one essence or one life, the existence, the pure existence. But how would you describe the existence? Is it colorful? You can't say. Does it smell nice? You can't say. Is it warm or cold? You can't say. Is it big or small or comfortable or uncomfortable, pleasant or painful?
None of that can be said. That's why Bob would often say the pre-sense, sense of presence, is not even a sense. It's pre-sense, presence, pre-sense, prior to any sensory distinctions.that you know the presence the pure existence has no sensory components you go to the body of a bat and you will have that sonar you go to the body of a cat and you will have an excellent night vision you go to the body of the human and you will have yet different sensory experience crocodile have sense of temperature completely different but the existence the pure existence prior to senses cannot be denied so it isn't the question isn't what is the one experiencing but it is recognizing that the one is experiencing so that you are that you are present that you exist you know for certain But now the what, the colors, the temperatures, the smells, the stories, the imagination, the trauma, all of that will be tinted by the lens of the body.
That is the human element.Oh, maybe it was a neighbour. Oh, okay. Oh, heater. Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah, so thank you for the question. This is a really good question. This is always... Oh, Rohan, would you like to unmute? Yes. Hi, Kat. Hi, Tanya. Hi, everyone. Hi. I just wanted to... Make the just pick up on that point about experience before there's a lot of talk about you know the experience of this and experiencing that and that being is some kind of benchmark i think an important point is that this infinite is is infinite which means it can include any experience And so like that doesn't actually exclude, you know, people that say I saw lights, I had these visions and, you know, I was in this heavenly place.
So it doesn't exclude any of that. But there's something more fundamental than that, which is independent of any of those experiences playing out. And I think there can be a risk in like wanting to hold on to any of those experiences and, you know, say that you need to have gone through these experiences and then you've got it like that. How could it be? That's, again, putting it at some future point in time. And it's conditioning it on something which is actually unconditional and infinite. Yeah, that's all I wanted to say. Thanks. Yeah, that's a beautiful point and well delivered too. Thank you for that.
Yeah, independent from, I know exactly what you're saying. But yes and no, because, you know, it's so hard to describe it as something beneath or underneath, underlying in the background, the screen, the blah, blah, blah. But it's, it's. That's the limitation of the language. But it is everything. Nothing happens without it. It's just the clarification is you are not this limited, little, imaginary, hallucinated, independent, individual separate self. Everything is connected, interconnected in that nothing is separate or truly independent in that nothing in the illusion, the dream, exists from its own independent self. It's not, it doesn't, everything is relative. Everything is relative. That cat is, is relative to what is not cat.that this body is in this, is relative to that there appears to be stuff that isn't this body.
Same with the chair, everything else. In their dream, in what is relative, there is only one. Thing and for lack of another another word thing that is not relative that is not that isself-reifying, that is real, and that is what all the appearances of separate things occur inside of, cannot occur without. That's probably the better way to say it, in the negative. Rather than trying to say it's inside of something, implies a vessel or something with limits, but cannot be separate from. It's just, you know, all is one. Everything is that. That is everything. Yin and yang, black and white. Yes. And you know what else?
I just want to say that it is, somebody made a comment that how important it is for questions to arise. That's when the best discussions occur, when there's courage to push back and say, but that's, but, but, but, but, but, that's wonderful. We get excited. Yeah, it's exciting, right? But it's not to sort of put down or a criticism or anything. It is magic. We love it. We love it, right? It's beautiful. Thank you. Thank you. Absolutely. Yes. Yes. And also, we call it exploration. We are exploring.So if there is anything that shows up in that field of exploration, yeah, bring it on. Because that is also the same life dancing in front of itself.
Just kind of, you know, like this is Maya in a more colorful dress. Look, you know, recognize me now. Yeah, please. Do you want to say something, Michael? Because at some point. Oh, Jane, would you like to? Yeah. Michael's been moving a lot. Oh, yeah. It's fine. I can't say something. I'll actually say. It's, does Jane want to go? I mean, maybe for Jane, like what I was thinking, because. It is like we've been trained for so many years, decades and decades in my case, to believe the mind and we trust the mind. We need the mind to survive and it's kind of a useful thing to survive in the 3D reality.
So over and over again, we're told we are this and that's separate and this is dangerous and that's dangerous. So for me, it does take a continual reminding. Why am I here? You know, because I love sitting in the reminding. Remember, remember, remember. Because it's, we're constantly, you know, all those neurons were wired to believe that we are separate. And then, you know, even coming here today. I found myself shouting in the car and screaming.Which is great because I just didn't hold on to it as much as I would have otherwise. I had a phone call before coming. But, I mean, and even then I'm starting to think, oh, well, this shouldn't be happening.
But it kind of felt good. But the thing is, yeah, the natural, all that wiring is in there still. And so I'm doing my best attempt to just leave it uncorrected, unmodified, unaltered. It just is what it is. It's energy moving through. And then there's the story coming out. Well, maybe this person I was talking to, maybe they're, I'll grab them because I helped them with something. They've put their energy on me. Now I've got this entity in me, you know. So it's always. Thoughts coming in about stuff like that, nothing really. But it is just that continually reminding of just being in it and just keep remembering, keep remembering, keep coming back, keep coming back, keep coming back.
I mean, you can't have an idea of something without a someone, without a seeing, you know, like Bob says. Yeah, there's something here that sees something, there's something that's here seeing it, and there's a seeing. I don't remember any one of them. It's only one thing. Yes. The seer and the seen. So the seer and the seen are occurring in the seeing. It's the inging that never...That is always and ever there. Not only have the sea and the sea, there must be sea. It's not separate from. You are not the seer or the seeing or seeing. It's all of it. It's the sea, the whole shebang, the whole thing.
You can't, yeah, yeah. And you're absolutely right. Keep what you said. Keep seeing and knowing that there's no one that's doing the keeping seeing. Yeah. So, Jane? Yeah, well, I mean, a lot of what I am on about is this, you know, massive having to keep reminding myself because I've been so schooled in the other way of thinking. The other thing that drives me is I... Get on to Netflix and these other places where there's these documentaries of these people who are in RNFD or all these weird religions that believe this really wacko stuff and they live in a complete world where they don't question and they do really, really nasty things and they're crazy or really extreme right wing or other things and you think well haven't they really thought about what they're doing and that's what drives you've got itIf you suspend your own judgment and say, oh, well, just, you know, just take all this.
Well, you can't because that's another issue that drives me. That's all I want to say. You know, you have to be, you have to be. In the appearance, you have to be responsible for what you think and feel and advocate. And if it doesn't, if it's not coherent, it's not good. Now I've said enough. Thanks. Beautiful. And now if you actually suspend your own judgment about all those assholes, you start teaching your own universe. You can have a judgment about, and people used to do that, about you know rain coming on the crops that's the devil we have to burn few witches that's evil or you know like if you if you look at the history uh it's just black and white is just part of the appearance good and bad and pleasant and painful and all those things are just part of of the way and there is no appearance without the duality It has to be dualistic.
But my own freedom is to just sit back and realize thatOf course, of course there have to be night. Otherwise there would be no day. There would be nothing at all. So of course for the goodness to exist, there have to be bad guys. But if I don't put those labels, if I don't subscribe to my own opinions and my own judgments, everything is as it is, including mortality of babies, which are not as big of an issue today as it was a couple of hundred years ago. Or things are getting worse or things are getting better. I think we have Rohan has to hand up.
Would you like to unmute? Sure. Just to pick up on what Jane said. So because as Tanya was saying, everything's inside the scene. That doesn't exclude anything. So these so-called people who follow these religions or traditions and they might do seemingly horrific things because they say, oh, we go to heaven after we, you know, if we do this. And the seeing doesn't preclude anything. It's quite possible that seeing experiences heaven for, you know, as they describe it, right? So it's not like it's, but it's still a part of the seeing. It's not separate from it. And we only, we have to take a position to say it's good or bad somewhere.
We have to say, okay, I'm here and I've got this moral code and this is what's good and this is what's bad. And yeah, that appears. And as many people as they will be doing.these crazy things. There'll also be people who are saying, no, this is wrong. But it's all still part of the scene. That's all I wanted to say. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, moral codes, self-organizing universe brings up the judgments and the ideas of what is good, what is changing. Don't worry about other people. Don't worry about other people. Ask, how do I know? How do I know? And trust. And look for that. Life is self-organizing.
It will just bring on like weather, everything. The political, historical, biological, all of those changes are just to be curious about, really. But I see Anthony has the mic. Would you? Yeah, I see. Pointing to what Michael was talking about, that there is a difference between, well, from my perspective, there is a difference between and our automatic reactions. And stepping back and taking action based on being in a space of cause. As an example, like, you know, you're talking about being on the phone and pissed off and seeing, whoa, whoa, this is not good. So one example, in fact, I was mentioning it this morning.
How one of the realizations that I had a long time ago was, you know, in the Bay Area, I would drive like a bloody maniac, you know?And there were all these buttholes on the road, right? And when I slowed down, suddenly there weren't as many assholes on the road. And I certainly became less angry behind the wheel. And since I've been practicing, doing the investigation. And seeing what occurs as I walk through the dream.There are things that I see that. Changes that are being made to My perspective is a lot better than the opposite. So kind of like realizing that you're doing something and. I don't know, because I know choosing is not a good word to use.
I don't know other word to use, but making a choice, that's not good. Acting in a different way that benefits, that has a much pleasurable experience throughout the whole.And once you see something, It's forever changed. Kind of like if you see what happens to the male baby cows in the milking industry, get thrown into a big bucket immediately after birth and hauled off for processing. So if you see something like that, Yeah, probably. It's most likely you're not going to eat veal anymore. So stuff like that, you know, so that's what I'm talking about. So what would, does it make sense? So, so as a, you have an aware experience seeing things.
Based on how it's occurring and acting differently that is a much different, more beneficial experience in the whole, ongoingly. And so I have used the wordchoosing, but obviously, but you guys don't like that word. So, so, so, so what's happening in the space of taking different actions around how it's all occurring that are more beneficial to one's experience. And I know this is second nature stuff, but it's not second nature because it all happens by being aware and watching it. So you see what makes a difference. The awareness makes a difference. And it is relaxed awareness that makes a difference. When your ass is tight and you are stressed and angry and worked up, there is no relaxation.
And there is this sense of control i must push through when the relaxation that sense of serenity that oneness with life that natural state is allowed without any action without even a choice it's really just a just just just much healthier habit that is being created because it's always available underneath that habitual tension and controlling. So it is more of a cessation of that overlay of that controlling mechanism and trusting that serenity, serenity for no one. So suspending conceptualization.suspension, suspending belief. Nobody's doing it, right? That's key. But the suspension, suspending of belief, conceptualization about what's occurring and just seeing it for what it is. As it's occurring and seems to open up the way for the natural functioning.
Appears that way, appears that way. And we can put all sorts of concepts on it again as to why it's occurring how it is, but see that again. See that again as another arising of a concept. And see again that I've seen that there's an arising of a concept and see it again. Keep seeing. Keep seeing. Yeah, but sometimes it's required to take action. And I like driving. It will happen. Right? You know, you got to take action driving. It will happen. You cannot not take that action. Action happens through you. Yes. You can't even say that you have chosen to put that brake on because you wouldn't be able to even think fast enough.
Yeah, of course. Sometimes people would say, you know, when you are the most relaxed, most natural on your...best there is no tension in the system that is when you act as if you are in the natural state okay there is less resistance less resistance less suffering and everything flows and we do have that natural serenity that natural compassion natural love to share if we are happy we share happiness if we are miserable full of self-pity resentment fear anxiety of course we we tense and controlling and and and us hauling and all that but it's it's really just that finding back that natural serene relaxed state which is always underneathAnd that doesn't happen through doing.
We can't talk ourselves into it. It is like when the anxiety is raving and the need for control is raving, I can't logically, oh shit, but Bob says stop controlling. How do I make myself stop controlling? Now I'm trying to control the controlling. Tension is even more it can't happen this way but the way it naturally happens is if there is recognizing aha this urge to control is just rolling by itself there's not even me doing it it's just the urge moving by itself Okay, so I'm the seeing. I don't even need to touch it. I need to do absolutely nothing. Non-doing. I am the presence witnessing that tension rolling by itself, controlling.
I can't do anything. There's no me. No. I'm not a character in a story. Yeah. I am in the story. The story is not separate from. what's always been and that you've never known a beginning or an end to in the experiencing. And, you know, take again.Can you not be? Accept. We have to use all these words. Accept, surrender, see, let it be, let it go, stop it, you know, full stop. All of that is the opposite of believing you are the doer who has got to get somewhere. Do something to be whole, to be perfect, to be fixed, to be mended, that you're lacking something.
See that there is no one who lacks.then what's this non-existent person going to do? What have they ever done? And you might say, well, you know, if you don't put your foot on the brake, you're going to go through the red light and kill people. Try not to. Try not putting your foot on the brake when the time comes. You have recognised that you truly do not know, cannot predict, cannot say what your next thought or action will be. This is not a planned movement. It's not on schedule or there's no routine going on that I can identify right out as evidence of me doing this.It's a hallucination that you have ever been in control of anything.
It's a hallucination that, oh, but the mind is useful and it's helped me avoid accidents and da, da, da. That is a concept that is part of the hallucination. You've never been a mind doing anything. See through that. Nothing will be lost ever.There's nothing, it's again, some people talk about fearing self-realisation. If I become self-realised, then I won't be bothered about my children's future. I won't worry about my children's future. Things won't happen. See, that's all a beautiful story. That keeps the story going. But it's, again, when that stuff occurs, Keep seeing that there's no one who sees. It's just seeing is just happening. It's just that.
Despite all the labels, all the concepts, all the beautiful golden pointers,That's all in the dream. It's all of it is in the dream. Nothing is separate from this cognizing emptiness, the knowing, the registering. You could not know about the people on the other side of the world behaving badly versus you behaving so well. If there wasn't the knowing. Don't worry about what he's doing, what she's doing, or what he's experienced, and I have to have that experience to get somewhere. Forget it all. And, you know, there's no one to do anything. So that's why the word grace is bandied around so often in lots of the traditional for invader religions because they say, meh, it'll happen when it happens.
Grace. It's a great, well, because it doesn't matter how much effort you think you're putting in, how surrendered you are. You're never going to get anywhere because there's nowhere to go. You can't go anywhere. That's it. How about the responsibility I'm going to take about my cubs? I'm a lioness and I am the doer. Animals don't have those problems. They never have the conceptual self created by the narrative. And they look after their children just as well, if not better.They don't traumatize them as well. They much more rarely sexually abuse them too. But I want to include you because you are a person. Okay, but you just...
What would I say? Yeah, you know, you always highlight the beautiful aspect of one essence. Everyone's covered a lot of topics today. like starting like responsibility and like I think Julia mentioned, like the ability, it's really like does anyone, is there anyone? Is there anyone? This is one essence appearing as all these people. So is there anyone? So already we're already, is there anyone who has responsibility like as we know it's there's an ability to respond and the whole essence is making that ability respond or not respond or respond in this way or that way let's make some dinner now tonight or respond in a way that's good or bad or right or wrong or But there's no right or wrong or good or bad.
There's just responding. So that's my little take on that. You know, at one point in the conversation, we talked about all these different levels, levels of knowing, levels of understanding, levels of cognition. You could talk about etheric levels and, you know, higher levels and where are all these levels? You could look at things through a lens. We could describe looking at a lens. We could look at it through a psychological lens, a philosophical lens, a theological lens, the lens of this particular thing. Pepper, garlic, parmesan. Italian herb seasoning. Add the seasoning. A recipe called for olive oil.I like to sit up for a moment. Okay.
Yes, so different lenses. Lenses, yeah, lenses and levels as well. Are there all these different categories or different, it's all this, it's all right here, right now. And all these are different little superimposed ideas describing or explaining or showing different energies, subtle energies, stronger energies, higher energies, lower energies. It's all energy. It really is all energy and all these levels and dimensions and everything is appearing in the same appearance of now, of this spontaneous nowness, this now, this moment, this central moment of presence that's been described again and again and again. It was a reminder of our existence, our existence, life itself. And so all of that appears in the appearance.
So everything is an appearance. So watching a Netflix movie and judging it is an appearance happening. Is the response is able to respond by a judgment? Like no one's actually doing it. It's the whole of creation making it appear that I am judging. This is right. This is wrong. No one created the thought. No one created the...The appearance is appearing. So, and everything in the appearance is experienced, experiencing. Like it's been pointed out so well. Go for it, Jo. Thanks, Anthony. I like what you said, though, but you just said no one's doing it, the judgment, you know, and all that sort of stuff. And the but comes in because words were invented.
If we never had the word judgment, then we wouldn't have the thought. So who invented the word, the words, who came up with the language? Yeah, crucify him. And the, sorry? Yeah, crucify him. You know, those bastards that ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, Adam and Eve. And got kicked out from the paradise they deserved it yeah the beginning was the word and the word was god that's it yeah yeah yeah i know i just like what you know just when you say you know no one no one had the thing of judgment or something yeah something happened yeah something happened and language came in but the other thing i'm noticing today and this is just i'm noticing today you know i didn't notice it last week i didn't know last night but i'm noticing it today and even what jane was saying about watching netflix and having a judgmenton the show and those people and that religion or whatever it is they believe what they're doing is beautiful and fantastic and wonderful oh yeah and there's nothing wrong with it and then you've got the people who believe in god or jesus or christianity again nothing wrong with it and it could be exactly on the lines of what we're talking about However, instead we say there's no me and there's no nothing, you know, blah, blah, blah.
So the Christian might say, oh, that was God's doing. Same, same. It's exactly the same. Or Buddha or Muhammad. And the physicists and the scientists and we'll all give you a different way why it was done. That's right. There's nothing wrong, is there? There's no right or wrong. And anybody, somebody could walk into this room, which we've had happen, you know, a Christian or a Buddhist or something like that, and they stand out and storm out because they go, this is a load of shit. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's fascinating. Yeah. But it's still, so there was, so what you just said, Katerina, first there was the word?
Yeah, in the beginning was the word. In the beginning, that was the fuck up. That was the fuck up. It's not Adam and Eve. It's not anything. It was in the beginning was the word. If you take away the word and you've just got us and you've got the land and beautiful. It upped the game, you know. It upped the stakes. Otherwise, you would just remain animal.And now you have all that. That would have been great. Not even a fuck up. It's not even a fuck up. It's you can't know white without black. That's the stakes. Right? You can't know. You can't be pain free without the concept of pain.
It was a judgment. But, you know, we all understand what you're saying. But would you know, without the illusion of being trapped as a person, limited person, how could you know? The illusion of freedom.from being a person. Being and the A. It's all, the two ends of the stick are unavoidable and completely necessary to have the stick. But that's only the humans doing that. The animals don't know their, well, this is, this is, this is, yes. But they just, that's where, you know, the brilliance of Bob Spiel about prior to conceptualization of words, you were not born with words. Correct. In this story. Right. But like Bob would say, it's very difficult to articulate, if not impossible, anything that happened prior to having the capacity for words and speech.
But what, so what sustained the baby prior to gaining language? How did that baby survive if it wasn't able to think about its, you know, about worry about where its next bottle was coming from? It's nonsense to even say that. Because we all know with a baby, we'll just do what babies do, right? It'll cry.Just like cats is with the bird, we'll just, you know, lay eggs, raise its young, instinct, we use the word instinctively without the concept of requiring the concept of words or worrying about what's going to happen to the baby birds in two years time. It's just, it's never not there. That babiness, if you like, that, you know, unborn Buddha mind is just a hallucination that there is a mini me, someone, individual separate from everything else that's going on that makes a decision about what's happening with this body that changes the course of experience.
So wouldn't it be interesting, what if we changed the language? That would be interesting. What if we changed the language? What if there was no word for judgment? What if there was no word for judgment? What if there was nothing in the language that said me or I or as in ownership? I think there have been some tribes, some cultures. In the dream where that's been demonstrated, where everything is we or us. And so there's a less of a propensity for identifying oneself as an individual separate from. There are cultures. And it's interesting to observe. English words, what we use. Yeah. They don't have their cultures.
And see that. They don't separate. That's right. And see that this discussion about those.cultures that do that is appearing right now in this not separate from being It's amazing. I love it. I do love it. We have a couple of comments here. Ram says, the thought I see can't see. The thought I hear can't hear. The thought I have to take action does not do a dumb thing, period. Exactly. And Gilbert says, everyone writes their own prescription. There are no prescriptions. No prescriptions. This moment is fresh and new. Beautiful. And James says, what form does a word have? Brilliant. And we have Rohan. Would you like to unmute?
Yeah, just on that point before we were saying how, you know, is something wrong with any of these religions or whatever people are doing? I think all we need to do is go back to Bob's point of what's wrong with right now if you don't think about it, which says that the very idea of something being wrong is just coming from the thought. And it's always about right here and right now. It's never about, you know, because to even talk about, you know, something being wrong or even being right, you're creating some kind of story around it.And you're saying, you know, these people have been doing these things and, you know, now they're doing these things.
That's really good that they're doing that, you know, even to talk about our cultures, like they don't use the word I and look at what their life is turned out like. It's still positing time. It's still positing, you know, something that's not out of something that we're imagining is out of right here, right now, which it couldn't be. Yeah, that's all I wanted to say. Beautiful, beautiful. It's not happening right here, right now. It's still imagination. Go on, Dean. Well, exactly. Thanks. And, you know, what's such a thing about thinking makes it so. You know, all these things, all these words and descriptions. They're endless.
And what can be seen as good in this moment is seen as bad in the next moment. What is seen good by this one is seen bad by that one or in a different time or in different context. What was once the great discovery of this, which was actually the discovery that's going to kill humanity. You know what I mean? Like there's no, there's no perspective that can, that can be satisfied in any way. So, but end of perspectives, like there isn't, isn't that naturally like a process of, there's no solution to be found in, in searching and seeking and looking for an answer in the mind in that particular manner or that particular way.
So shouldn't it dawn on you eventually or on us that there is no solution in that way? So what is the solution? The solution is the end of the seeking pattern to continue.continue. So I guess like, you know, this whole meeting, I mean, if you just watch the functioning of the mind, watch how it's operating, watch how it's continually coming up with endless, endless shit, whether it's disputing language, whether it's disputing teachings, whether it's disputing pointers, whether it's disputing the very essence of my being or not being or right or wrong or good or bad or judgment. It's an endless movement in the mind. And just watch the mechanics of it and watching it sees there's a watcher.
Is there a watcher? The watcher is also part of the mind. So there's a watcher of the watcher. And then there's the higher watcher, which is the supreme watcher. And then there is only just watching in itself. You know, and that's the whole point of all this, like all these permutations and machinations and discussions are really like a collapsation of the whole old system, the whole paradigm, the whole way of viewing. And then what is left is a simplicity of aliveness itself, life itself, livingness itself, expressed and experienced and in its infinite potentiality, beauty, angry, happy, good, bad, everything is included and nothing is really it.So there's like freedom in all of it.
And that's the end for me. Thank you. Delightful. Yeah, just openness, just openness and that field of curiosity. All the lenses, you know, we can see the lenses. What is seeing all those different lenses? It's just all the perspectives just arising here, always here, always presently. Yeah. Thank you, everyone.