AMENDED--August 13, 2011 Satsang--AMENDED
The Manifest and the Unmanifest
Dear Edji,
Last nights satsang was, without out a doubt, the most powerful one to date for me. I had quite a headache through most of the day on Saturday, but that disappeared very quickly when satsang started. Right from the start, I felt a sense of peace, calm and tranquility, the like of which I have not experienced for quite some time and, even then, very rarely. I was at peace with the world and the world was at peace with me.
As the first chant started and I began to sink and go deeper, I experienced not a sinking, but rather an upwelling of what I can only describe as a huge, expanding void which totally engulfed me and which I became a part of. It felt very tranquil and nurturing. A very comfortable place to be. The physical body and the sensations of that body ceased to exist and there was just a deep sense of being. A knowing arose that the entire universe, all existence, everything, was passing through me but, at the same time there was no me, just an awareness that I wasn’t just part of it, I was it, I was the universe, I was all existence, all that was. I felt connected to everyone in the satsang and felt a love for everyone there. This soon spread beyond the satsang to encompass everything. We were all one. Yet at the same time individual parts of the one. Hard to describe in words.
This happened very quickly and prolonged through the first two chants and, while I came out of it for periods, it set the tone for the rest of the satsang. I heard and felt the chants more clearly than I ever done so before. It was as though I had not heard them before but was hearing them for the first time with a clarity that had not existed. I had felt them within me before, not just hearing them with my ears, but now I wasn’t just hearing them internally, they were part of me but there was no me, with no blockages and just the pure essence and vibration of the chants.
A truly powerful and gratifying experience indeed. For that I thank you and everyone else in the sangha for making all of this possible. We are all one, so let’s grow together.
Deep love and gratitude.
Alan
Ryan:
Hi Edji,
Wow! Tonight's Satsang was so powerful! Thank you!! The only times I've felt an 'expansive' feeling are during Satsang, and tonight it was very pervasive during the beginning of Satsang. You said go deeper than you ever have before, and I think I did!
The sense of presence filled me more prominently than I've previously experienced. It was strange. I could still feel various parts of my body, however the notable thing was the expanded sense of presence swallowed the sensations of the body, sort of containing them and subduing them, and in the case of my arms making their sensation disappear! It felt like the sense of presence was 'closer' than the bodily sensations which are usually at the forefront of experience in waking state, and therefore obscured their normal perception. The experience lasted from the end of Govinda, through Jyote se Jyote, to the shortly before you began speaking.
I just want to thank you for Satsang. There is something so special about our Sangha coming together the way it has. I think Alan summed it up perfectly tonight: the more our love grows within the Sangha, the more intense and deep Satsang becomes. I can only imagine what it will be like in the future if our love continues to grow!
Thank you again for everything, Edji!
K:
Your satsang today was incredible. I can't find words... I had to lie on the floor and try to recover enough to "act normal" around my family in the afternoon.
I agree that this was the most powerful satsang so far and I am so grateful that you are sharing this with us.
J:
Tortured by Love
Where are you my Beloved,
That this aching is still within this heart?
I have looked for you under every leaf,
Behind every cloud,
In every face I see.
How can you be so elusive?
How can you escape my grasping?
You mystify me.
You come to me like a haunting presence.
I'm sure I hear your footsteps.
I open my eyes
And lo, no one is there.
But I know you were.
You were careless and left your presence.
I close my eyes
and you repeat this game again and again.
Why do you torture me such?
My heart is aching.
My flesh is on fire.
My mind is crazed.
How long my Beloved can you deny me?
How do you bear to torture me so?
Is your tenderness not provoked
By the ocean of tears I have poured at your feet?
Is your compassion not arrested
by the continual crying out of your name?
How, please tell me Beloved,
How can you deny me?
Thank you Edji, I miss you and love you all...
ReplyDeleteI remain, as ever, grateful you are my teacher. I am truly fortunate.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed your recent Satsang. Maybe someday I will have access to the right technology so I can participate in Satsang with you. Until then I am happy to watch. I especially appreciated the metaphor of space in a vessel, shattered, and what remains but the same space. This sense has always felt closer to me when considering thoughts that comprise mind. These packets of thought--shift when watched, and more importantly for me always shortly end as little more than arbitrary boundary lines in mind creating inside/outside, you/me and patiently watched diffuse. Much like the dark outlined images in coloring books--The lines being congested thoughts--but with close inspection empty, and fairly easily enveloped. It is the perpetuating need to maintain these boundary lines that make lack, division, something to change, something to protect.
I keep thinking about students' critiques to your presentation of Advaita and Satsang lately. I personally love them and continue to respond more fully to your ever unfolding expression of the Absolute and I AM. I wonder though if many readers hold an all together different understanding of what Satsang is, of what you offer. Concepts beyond calming the mind enough to be still enough so one can fully abide while useful can't be necessary as Satsang is beingness, and being in this pure beingness. You could read us movie reviews and you will still sit with me watching, deep in my heart.
I wonder Lord, if we could discuss unknowing and the awareness that re-experiences this. I have brought this up for years. I wish to again. As you might remember, for me each moment is the beginning of a dream--usually with some identity, vested interestes, engagement of sorts, etc. Yet as I am aware of each blip, of dream, I must also feel the preceding blankness where there was no story, backdrop or actor--this darkness and my often jolted suprised awareness of seeing I do not exist and am unknowing still. As you said dumb as a brick. I believe you said this was your state for decades me for many years. What is this? Further as you know I feel I do not persist. At times I feel I see the murky layers of waking experience, and dream experience happening on top of one another, always moving out of darkness and forgetfulness. As you say, even in Bliss, so full so satisfying so vibrant I feel I see that I watch without opinion or choice--on-going turiya. The deeper expressions of I AM, sat-chit-ananda rise and fall too. But this unknowing that is aware of the blackness, it remains unknowing moment to moment, (though can engage in identifying with I AM aspects) cannot just be void expressions or even turiya, it does not appear to be attention to movement in consciousness. But awareness that I am not ever aware how I would expect, came out of nothing, from the unknow, thus unknowing, and oddly then knowing that I do not know. Ahh goobly gook!