MY NEAR FINAL TRUTH

I keep getting very angry or very sarcastic emails and blog comments about how arrogant I am, or about my huge ego for daring to criticize Ramana and Nisargadatta.  In other words, who am I to dare criticize Ramana, Nisargadatta, or Robert Adams?  Who do I think I am compared to those great ones?

The problem with these critics is that they are not hearing what I am saying.  They are so wrapped in their worship of these great ones, and their idealized understanding of what they are saying, that any discussion that is now filled with an awe similar to what they feel, is considered blasphemous, from someone who has an inflated sense of self, and who does not feel the idealized awe they feel. I call these idealization-deluded people Ramana or Nisargadatta toe-kissers for their slavish clinging to their own delusional understandings of these great teachers.

But there is a huge difference between clarifying exactly what Ramana, Robert, or Nisargadatta said, versus common misunderstandings of what they said.  For example, Ramana was all about the Atman, the Manifest Self, the God in man, while Nisargadatta said this Self too was illusion, and by that he meant temporary, not permanent.  One common illusion is that all gurus announce exactly the same truth and come from exactly the same state of Consciousness or awareness, and any differences are only apparent, or are the mistaken understandings of the reader.

This is a primary mistake of almost all spiritual seekers: all fully realized gurus attain the same final state and speak identical truth.  Any differences are mistaken understandings, or else the teacher is speaking in different ways based on the relative understanding of the listener, in layers of understanding.  The presumption here is also that if a great master were speaking to peers or long term students, that would speak in absolutely consistent ways; there would be no inconsistencies, there would be no “evolution” of understanding over the period of a teacher’s life.  They always spoke from a position of having realized the final truth.

The person who believes this still believes truth can be conveyed in words.  It cannot be.  Words are only maps, and Ramana’s maps are different from Nisargadatta’s and from Robert’s.

Now for the last “truth” of my arrogance.

All of these teachers taught Self-Realization, not Ramana-Realization or Nisargadatta-Realization which is what you find in their maps, their speaking.  Until you realize your own Self, for yourself, you are not Self-Realized.  Before that you follow or wear different maps: your own map of your self before Ramana; your then added Ramana map; and finally, when you abandon trying to understand Ramana or Nisargadatta, and just dedicate yourself to meditation on your sense of Self, the I Am, which ultimately CAN result in your own realization of your own Self.

But most people spend a lifetime trying to find the experience of their own Self by using their minds trying to find their own Self-experience in Ramana’s map or Nisargadatta’s map.

But to do this you need to step off the cliff so-to-speak, and jump totally into the unknown and ultimately unknowable Self. Ultimately you can only be the Self with the awareness that you are the Self without all the map fragments that prevented ‘feeling’ this truth before.

This is what I am trying to do with all of you; I am killing your Buddha for you by stripping away the illusios and idealizations you have about Ramana and Nisargadatta, their realizations and their truths.

It is your false understandings that prevent you from realizing your own Self.  Constant meditation is needed, meditation on your own Self, not just by looking within, but also by FEELING within, feeling your sense of I Am and following it to its root.  Stay in the I Am, and when it disappears, continue to feel within for emotions, energies, the Void, and whatever else arises as visions or experiences.

Then after you Realize YOUR Self as opposed to the Ramana map, you will clearly understand what he said as a peer, but you will express your own Self differently because it will be your map of Self, and soon you will have a large gallery or critics that call you arrogant, deluded, or egotistical because you dare discuss Ramana’s map versus Nisargadatta’s or your own map.
MY NEAR-FINAL TRUTH

I keep getting very angry or very sarcastic emails and blog comments about how arrogant I am, or about my huge ego for daring to criticize Ramana and Nisargadatta.  In other words, who am I to dare criticize Ramana, Nisargadatta, or Robert Adams?  Who do I think I am compared to those great ones?

The problem with these critics is that they are not hearing what I am saying.  They are so wrapped in their worship of these great ones, and their idealized understanding of what they are saying, that any discussion that is now filled with an awe similar to what they feel, is considered blasphemous, from someone who has an inflated sense of self, and who does not feel the idealized awe they feel. I call these idealization-deluded people Ramana or Nisargadatta toe-kissers for their slavish clinging to their own delusional understandings of these great teachers.

But there is a huge difference between clarifying exactly what Ramana, Robert, or Nisargadatta said, versus common misunderstandings of what they said.  For example, Ramana was all about the Atman, the Manifest Self, the God in man, while Nisargadatta said this Self too was illusion, and by that he meant temporary, not permanent.  One common illusion is that all gurus announce exactly the same truth and come from exactly the same state of Consciousness or awareness, and any differences are only apparent, or are the mistaken understandings of the reader.

This is a primary mistake of almost all spiritual seekers: all fully realized gurus attain the same final state and speak identical truth.  Any differences are mistaken understandings, or else the teacher is speaking in different ways based on the relative understanding of the listener, in layers of understanding.  The presumption here is also that if a great master were speaking to peers or long term students, that would speak in absolutely consistent ways; there would be no inconsistencies, there would be no “evolution” of understanding over the period of a teacher’s life.  They always spoke from a position of having realized the final truth.

The person who believes this still believes truth can be conveyed in words.  It cannot be.  Words are only maps, and Ramana’s maps are different from Nisargadatta’s and from Robert’s.

Now for the last “truth” of my arrogance.

All of these teachers taught Self-Realization, not Ramana-Realization or Nisargadatta-Realization which is what you find in their maps, their speaking.  Until you realize your own Self, for yourself, you are not Self-Realized.  Before that you follow or wear different maps: your own map of your self before Ramana; your then added Ramana map; and finally, when you abandon trying to understand Ramana or Nisargadatta, and just dedicate yourself to meditation on your sense of Self, the I Am, which ultimately CAN result in your own realization of your own Self.

But most people spend a lifetime trying to find the experience of their own Self by using their minds trying to find their own Self-experience in Ramana’s map or Nisargadatta’s map.

But to do this you need to step off the cliff so-to-speak, and jump totally into the unknown and ultimately unknowable Self. Ultimately you can only be the Self with the awareness that you are the Self without all the map fragments that prevented ‘feeling’ this truth before.

This is what I am trying to do with all of you; I am killing your Buddha for you by stripping away the illusios and idealizations you have about Ramana and Nisargadatta, their realizations and their truths.

It is your false understandings that prevent you from realizing your own Self.  Constant meditation is needed, meditation on your own Self, not just by looking within, but also by FEELING within, feeling your sense of I Am and following it to its root.  Stay in the I Am, and when it disappears, continue to feel within for emotions, energies, the Void, and whatever else arises as visions or experiences.

Then after you Realize YOUR Self as opposed to the Ramana map, you will clearly understand what he said as a peer, but you will express your own Self differently because it will be your map of Self, and soon you will have a large gallery or critics that call you arrogant, deluded, or egotistical because you dare discuss Ramana’s map versus Nisargadatta’s or your own map.


The answer to the question "Who do I think I am compared to those great ones?" is I am exactly as they are, and as you are too, but I know this within my heart of hearts, and you do not--yet.


The answer to the question "Who do I think I am compared to those great ones?" is I am exactly as they are, and as you are too, but I know this within my heart of hearts, and you do not--yet.