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I AM That (36 Final) > Ron > 07/02/2023
Posted by Holger:
Sunday, July 2, 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!
This weekend is a lovely opportunity to celebrate our Freedom!
Freedom from what?
I hope we all are coming to the same conclusion!
Here is a link, discovered by Holger, where highlights are
read by Philip Evan Cowlishaw from I Am That…
particularly appealing to those who are tired of reading.
Chapter 36 covers pages 154-160.
Nice to listen to before going to bed!
Enjoy!
https://intheiam.com/category/i-am-that-excerpts
Roy will be facilitating this week. Should be fun!
Freedom Freedom Freedom
Chapter 36
Killing Hurts the Killer, Not the Killed
Q: A thousand years ago a man lived and died. His identity (antahkarana) re-appeared in a new body. Why does he not remember his previous life?
NM: Why play with ideas? Be content with what you are sure of. And the only thing that you can be sure of is ‘I am’. Stay with it, and reject everything else. This is Yoga. 155
Q: I can reject only verbally. At best I remember to repeat the formula: ‘This is not me, this is not mine. I am beyond all this.’?
NM: Good enough. First verbally, then mentally and emotionally, then in action. Give attention to the reality within you and it will come to light. 155
Q: How can the Absolute be the result of a process?
NM: You are right, the relative cannot result in the Absolute. But the relative can block the Absolute… Take care of the power that projects all this and your problems will come to an end. 155
Q: What is wrong with purposeful action?
NM: It does not apply. In these matters there is no question of purpose, nor of action. All you need is to listen, remember, ponder… All is of the mind and you are not of the mind. The mind is born and reborn, not you. 155-156
Q: Nobody suffers in a play?
NM: Unless one identifies oneself with it.
Don’t identify yourself with the world
and you will not suffer. 156
Q: What is the relationship between identity and memory?
NM: What is identity, after all? Continuity in memory? Can you talk of identity without memory? …Don’t you see that memory is the warp of your mental life. And identity is merely a pattern of mental events in time and space. Change the pattern and you have changed the man. 156
Q: Identity is valuable because it is the basis of individuality; that which makes us unique and irreplaceable. ‘I am’, is the intuition of uniqueness?
NM: Yes and no. Identity, individuality, uniqueness – they are the most valuable aspects of the mind, yet of the mind only. ‘I am all there is’ also is an experience equally valid. The particular and the universal are inseparable. They are the two aspects of the nameless, as seen from without and from within.
Unfortunately, words only mention, but don’t convey. Try to go beyond the words. 156-157
Q: What dies with death?
NM: The idea ‘I am the body’ dies;
the witness does not. 157
Q: Sri Ramana Maharishi died.
What difference did it make to him?
NM: None. What he was, he is
– the Absolute Reality. 157
Q: It is easy to justify everything by referring to custom and tradition. Customs may be cruel and tradition corrupt. They explain but do not justify?
NM: I never meant to say that lawlessness follows self-realization. A liberated man is extremely law-abiding. But his laws are the laws of his real Self, not of his society. These he observes, or breaks according to circumstances and necessity. But he will never be fanciful and disorderly. 157
Q: What I cannot accept is justification by custom and habit?
NM: The difficulty lies in our differing points of view. You speak from the body-mind’s. Mine is of the witness. The difference is basic. 157
Q: Taking advantage of other people’s cruelty is cruelty by proxy?
NM: None compels you to be cruel… If you look into living processes closely, you will find cruelty everywhere, for life feeds on life. This is a fact, but it does not make you feel guilty of being alive… The cruelty lies in the motive, not the fact. Killing hurts the killer, not the killed. 158
Q: A man like you should set an example?
NM: How quickly you accuse, condemn, sentence and execute! Why begin with me and not with yourself? …Are you ready to follow my example? I am dead to the world, I want nothing, not even to live. Be as I am, do as I do. You are judging me by my clothes and food; while I only look at your motives; if you believe yourself to be the body and the mind and act on it, you are guilty of the greatest cruelty – cruelty to your own real being. Compared to it all other cruelties do not count. 158
Q: How can I best serve?
NM: All causes are served best by the man or woman
who has returned to their source. 158
Q: When I was at Sri Ramana ashram,
I felt Bhagwan all over the place,
all-pervading, all-perceiving?
NM: You had the necessary faith.
Those who have true faith in him
will see him everywhere and at all times.
All happens according to your faith
and your faith is the shape of your desire. 158-159
Q: What do you mean when you say ‘I am’?
NM: When I say: ‘I am’, I do not mean a separate entity with a body as its nucleus. I mean the totality of being, the ocean of consciousness, the entire universe of all that is and knows. I have nothing to desire for I am complete forever. 159
Q: I am not your projection, nor are you mine… No, something is wrong somewhere?
NM: Words betray their hollowness. The real cannot be described, it must be experienced. I cannot find better words for what I know. What I say may sound ridiculous. But what the words try to convey is the highest truth. All is one, however much we quibble. And all is done to please the one source and goal of every desire, whom we all know as the ‘I am’. 159
Q: What is the relationship between pain and desire?
NM: What is the root of pain? Ignorance of yourself. What is the root of desire? The urge to find yourself. All creation toils for its self and will not rest until it returns to it. 159
Q: Must I wait with helping the world until I reach perfection?
NM: By all means help the world. You will not help much, but the effort will make you grow. There is nothing wrong in trying to help the world… When the time comes for the world to be helped, some people are given the will, the wisdom and the power to cause great changes. 160
Please RSVP to Ron@Nondual.Community
and you will receive a free Zoom link ❤️
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“File:’I Am That’ by Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, Book Cover.jpg”
by Vyacheslav Argenberg is licensed under CC BY 4.0.
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Created: July 1, 2023
Last modified: July 16, 2023
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