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I AM That (34 + 35) > Ron > 06/18/2023
Posted by Holger:
Sunday, June 18, 2023 3:45 pm (California Time)
We are a small group of friends;
together we read some paragraphs in
Nisargadatta’s I AM THAT
and then talk about it.
Feel warmly welcome
Please RSVP to Ron@Nondual.Community
and you will receive a free Zoom link ❤️
Greetings to One and All!
Another Perfect week.
Looking forward to Satsang.
Our newest member, Jon, will facilitate.
Be kind and loving!
Peace Peace Peace
Ron@Nondual.Community
Chapter 34 – Mind is Restlessness Itself
Q: How does one go beyond the need of help?
And can one help another to do so?
NM: When you have understood that all existence,
in separation and limitation, is painful,
and when you are willing and able to live integrally,
in oneness with all life, as pure being,
you have gone beyond all need of help.
You can help another by precept and example and,
above all, by your being. 146
Q: If what I am, as I am, the person I take myself to be,
cannot be happy, then what am I to do?
NM: You can only cease to be – as you seem to be now.
There is nothing cruel in what I say.
To wake up a man from a nightmare is compassion.
You came here because you are in pain, and all I say is:
wake up, know yourself, be yourself. 146
Q: In the ultimate state there can be no happiness?
NM: Nor sorrow. Only freedom.
Happiness depends on something or other and can be lost;
freedom from everything depends on nothing and cannot be lost.
Freedom from sorrow has no cause and, therefore,
cannot be destroyed. Realize that freedom. 147
Q: My knowledge is limited, my power negligible?
NM: Have your being outside the body of birth and death
and all your problems will be solved.
They exist because you believe yourself born to die.
Undeceive yourself and be free.
You are not a person. 147
Chapter 35 – Greatest Guru Is Your Inner Self
Q: Ignorance of oneself causes desires
and desires perpetuate ignorance.
I find the condition impossible of fulfillment?
NM: There are no conditions to fulfill.
There is nothing to be done,
nothing to be given up…
It is your idea that you have to do things
that entangle you in the results of your efforts…
Simply look at whatever happens
and know that you are beyond it. 148
Q: Where is the Self?
NM: There is no Self in the ideas in the mind,
and the words that express them…
To look for it on the mental level is futile.
Stop searching, and see – it is here and now –
it is that ‘I am’ you know so well.
All you need to do is to cease taking yourself
to be within the field of consciousness. 148
Q: Has devotion (bhakti) any place in your teaching?
NM: Without trust there is no peace.
Somebody or other you always trust…
Of all the people the knower of the Self,
the liberated man, is the most trustworthy.
But merely trust is not enough.
You must also desire…
The greatest Guru is helpless
as long as the disciple is not eager to learn.
Eagerness and earnestness are all-important. 149
Q: Who is the greatest Guru?
NM: The greatest Guru is your inner Self…
He alone can take you to your goal
and he alone meets you at the end of the road…
And do not waste energy and time on regrets.
Learn from your mistakes and do not repeat them. 149
Q: What is the greatest injury?
NM: Forgetting your Self is the greatest injury;
all the calamities flow from it.
Take care of the most important,
the lesser will take care of itself…
So, let us wait with improving others
until we have seen ourselves as we are
– and have changed. 150
Q: Are not the body and the dweller in the body one?
NM: The body and the embodied
are not the same order of reality.
The body exists in time and space,
transient and limited, while the dweller
is timeless and spaceless,
eternal and all-pervading.
To identify the two is a grievous mistake
and the cause of endless suffering.
[in other words: Confusing the body with the dweller
is a serious error and leads to constant suffering.]
150
Q: So I can do as I like and put the blame on some universal power?
How easy!
NM: Yes, very easy.
Just realize the One Mover behind all that moves
and leave all to Him.
If you do not hesitate, or cheat,
this is the shortest way to reality.
Stand without desire and fear,
relinquishing all control and all responsibility. 151
Q: What madness!
NM: Yes, divine madness.
What is wrong with letting go of the illusion
of personal control and personal responsibility?
Both are in the mind only.
Of course, as long as you imagine yourself
to be in control,
you should also imagine yourself to be responsible.
One implies the other. 151
Q: You say I cannot quarrel with facts.
Whose facts? Yours or mine?
NM: Yours. You cannot deny my facts, for you do not know them.
Could you know them, you would not deny them.
Here lies the trouble.
You take your imagining for facts and my facts for imagination.
I know for certain that all is one.
Differences do not separate.
Either you are responsible for nothing, or for everything.
To imagine that you are in control and responsible
for one body only is the aberration of the mind-body. 151
Q: I live in a world quite different from yours…
My world is an evil world, full of tears, toil and pain…
The God of an evil world is a cruel God?
NM: None compels…
You are the god of your world and you are both stupid and cruel.
Let God be a concept – your own creation.
Find out who you are, how did you come to live,
longing for truth, goodness and beauty
in a world full of evil…
The God born of fear and hope,
shaped by desire and imagination,
cannot be the Power That Is,
the Mind and Heart of the universe. 152
Q: You say you are free.
Of what are you free?
NM: When I say I am free, I merely state a fact.
If you are an adult, you are free of infancy.
I am free from all description and identification.
Whatever you may hear, see, or think of, I am not that.
I am free from being a percept, or a concept. 152
Q: We are jumping from level to level all the time?
NM: There are two levels to consider – the physical – of facts,
and mental – of ideas. I am beyond both.
Neither your facts, nor ideas are mine.
What I see is beyond.
Cross-over to my side and see with me. 153
Q: That is why I am here?
NM: You are not yet here. I am here. Come in!
But you don’t.
You want me to live your life,
feel your way, use your language.
I cannot, and it will not help you.
You must come to me.
Words are of the mind
and the mind obscures and distorts.
Hence the absolute need to go beyond words
and move over to my side. 153-154
Q: Can you take me over?
NM: I am doing it, but you resist.
You give reality to concepts,
while concepts are distortions of reality.
Abandon all conceptualization
and stay silent and attentive.
Be earnest about it
and all will be well with you. 154
Please RSVP to Ron@Nondual.Community
and you will receive a free Zoom link for Sunday ❤️
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by Vyacheslav Argenberg is licensed under CC BY 4.0.
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Created: June 18, 2023
Last modified: July 16, 2023
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