Self-Knowledge and Self-Realization

From P

Good to hear from you. No plans for travel this summer. I plan to go back to Arunachula for a longer time – maybe 6 weeks -during Jan and Feb. My plan is to spend the summer getting my house ready to put on the market so that by winter I am out of the house and into some cozy apt that is easy to leave. I do not know how to explain my strong desire to return to the mountain, but it is certainly there.

P

By all means return to it. It sounds like you are not done there yet. Of course, Ramana was never done.

Thanks for the heads up about the new transcription. I am eager to read it! I continue to listen to the other 2 CD sets frequently. My hour commute gives me a lot of opportunity! What can I say in response to those CD’s? Every single thing that is thought/felt/spoken/ believed/perceived etc., is illusory. The world is only the mind’s interpretation. Minus the interpretation, there is no separate one, no world.

The world is not the mind's interpretation. The mind IS the world. The world is thought only. That is why it is called a dream. There is not something the mind interprets which becomes an illusion when interpreted. You might say mind obfuscates pure awareness.

With the seeing that there is no separate one, there is the seeing that there is no control. Somehow, when there is a slipping into what feels like a direct seeing of this Truth, as opposed to an intellectual understanding, there is such immense peace, stillness, love, joy – beyond words. And yet, there is (mostly) a barrier to the direct experience of Truth and a frequent falling into bouts (short but intense) of despair and depression, seemingly out of nowhere. There is a pulling into deeper and deeper stillness in meditation and an unshakeable disinterest in “the world.”

Yes, yes, good, good. Abide in yourself as often as possible. Self inquiry is only inverting attention to a hypothetical source; but even that is misdirection. There is no source and no manifestation. No inner, no outer. That is mind only, and mind is not real.

My draw to Ramana, years ago, was so profound. Connecting with Robert, and you, and more with Robert through you is beautiful. It feels like such a gift.

We gift each other. Robert would be happy.


Hi Ed,

A couple of weeks ago I had two dreams on back-to-back nights that really had an impact. In the second dream I was milling around with a huge number of people getting ready to run a marathon race. I decided I had better use the restroom before the race started so I looked around and located one just a few yards away. I asked a couple of people whether they thought I had time and they assured me there was more than enough time. So I jogged over and as soon as I had closed the door to the restroom, a woman started to pound on the door wanting in. I hurried and was pulling up my pants as she was shoving her way in. When I got outside, I couldn't’t believe it; there was no one there. The race had started without me. I looked down the road and could just barely see the last runner.

There was this rock solid knowing that instead of running the marathon, I was supposed to go find a spot to sit and not move. The feelings in the dream were devastating -- deep hopelessness and helplessness. There was no way to compete, much less even catch up to the other runners. And how could it be that one moment you think you are running a marathon and the next moment you know for certain you are supposed to sit still until, who knows? And what good is sitting still, and all by yourself?

Anyway, I am telling you all of this because, “It’s All A Cosmic Joke!” is the perfect answer to that dream. Something heavy carried from the dream lifted in the reading. There has remained some level of attachment to at least limping along in the marathon; and that lessened. I love Robert’s directness and humor. His words were just perfect. And so are yours in the Introduction. Thank you!

P

PS In the last email I didn't really mean that the mind interprets something that becomes an illusion when interpreted. I meant that the mind interprets that there is something when there is nothing . . . and therefore obfuscates pure awareness. (If this clarification of what I meant is not accurate, I would love to know!)


Your ego sees its own end but does not comprehend that it is liberation.

Dear Ed,

When I was at Arunachula I slept, at best, half the hours I usually sleep. I was always meditating by 3:00 am. There was this energy that seemed to replace my need to sleep. Last night I read your email a few minutes before I went to bed. I woke up in the middle of the night with the same energy I experienced at the mountain and was up the rest of the night. It’s still with me. Ramana spoke through Robert, Robert speaks through Ed. I feel much joy in hearing that you will begin Satsang! How perfect that you are the vehicle for this transmission in ever growing ways!

As for the dream I wrote about in the previous email, I did have a sense that there was a specific place I was supposed to go sit. My sense was that it was on the ground under a tree . It was a pretty vague sense though. My resistance was so great in the dream, I did not move; I just kind of stood in place, paralyzed.

P


P,

It is like this. When you wake in the morning and the dreams begin to disappear, it feels like cobwebs in your mind are leaving. Same with daydreaming. You come out of it and it feels like you were coming out of a mental fog.

So is it with awakening. It feels like the clouds of sleep, of mental fogginess, of ignorance are lifting. In all cases, that fog, the conceptual mind so to speak, is the apparent objects of dreams or of the world.

There is nothing except these thought forms or thought like forms. They are the beginning and end of existence. There is nothing in existence except for thought.

But, there really is not a mind. There are just thoughts, mental space cloud forms of ignorance which are the objects of dream and of the waking dream world.

To say anything about pure consciousness is a speculation of the mind, which itself does not exist. Even consciousness, pure awareness and all that are just concepts before you attain.

Then you see that ideas, concepts, images are all that anything in "reality" is and therefore, everything is unreal and mindstuff.

When Ramana talks about Consciousness like he does, it is because people needed something to hang their hats on; that is, using concepts to end concepts.

But, it is not the final truth.

There is only thought and you are not that. Those thought forms comes to you and lie on top of you so to speak, but you are not that. It, the fog of concepts and images cannot touch you.

That final truth comes to you and it is inexpressible because it is far beyond anything revealed or imagined by thought. Thought is but a poor reflection of Self and as such, cannot comprehend that which is far beyond it and greater than it.

I am not sure if I expressed myself well, or if I misunderstand what you are trying to say.


Dear Ed,

Thank-you for this email. I know what you express is the final truth. I would like to try to tell you something that happened about two years ago. I was driving to my favorite bagel store across town one morning, (thinking of nothing more profound than whether I was in the mood for a poppy seed bagel or maybe a cheese bagel) when, completely out of the blue, there was this feeling like I was in a tiny rowboat about to be completely consumed by a gigantic wave. I wanted desperately to get out of the way but it was totally impossible. There was an inner voice that said something like “You are now going to know what is true – you sincerely want to know, so you will know.” My body started to feel very strange, like it wasn’t really there, and, as soon as I parked in the parking lot (only about a minute or two passed) I completely lost all body awareness. I was taken (for lack of better words) on a journey through “everything” – all of the universes – and was shown that nothing at all was there. An impossible paradox to express but, that’s what was shown. It was like I was traveling through something that was nothing –completely empty sameness -- on and on and on, seemingly at great speed. I was given a tremendous amount of knowledge but I have no memory of the specifics other than nothing exists, despite appearances. When I came back into body awareness, I felt profound despair, depression, fear. At first I had no memory of anything in this life but I knew I was supposed to know. (I have wondered if this is how people with dementia feel.) My mind struggled frantically to find something that would make the world come back. My oldest son’s name came up and then everything in the world came back very quickly. The ego had a memory again and the world was back in place. At some point I got out of the car and walked to the bagel store. I passed by another form and, even though there was this deep confusion and despair, there was also the most amazing feeling of utter love for this form (no memory of any detail of the form). This experience has been the backdrop of everything ever since. I know that this is an experience expressed by an experiencer but, so goes the boundaries of _expression.

The fogginess you wrote about feels very true – just more (albeit fading) objects of mind. To follow this fog analogy – it feels as though there have been breakthroughs when the fog is not there. At these times, there is just awareness – like there is no container – just awareness without a boundary of a separate “me.” Not a “me” perceiving something that is separate and not “me.” At these times everything is exactly the same as it has always been but seen as completely different. But these experiences are always fleeting. Are these truly experiences of the fog lifting – if it comes back, did it ever really go away completely? Is awakening always something sudden and lasting or is it possible for the fog to slowly lift and then be permanently gone?

Thanks,
P