Dear Edji,
Yes I am understanding Nisargadatta Maharaj and you properly these days. The book, Ultimate Medicine, is curing me from my illness/illusions.
My observations:
This sense of presence and consciousness seems to be one and the same. But consciousness in its purity is not anyway associated with the body. This I am sense is the first spark of the manifestation of the consciousness in the physical body. Is it so? I come to this conclusion because after some time of abiding in this 'I AM' it just becomes a being; a dynamic force, energy only with space like character. There is no feeling of being-me but just Being-ness. So, in a way consciousness and this I am ness is one but not exactly the same. Is my observation correct sir?
You are so true about emotions. When I start feeling this presence, various emotions are coming. Yesterday gloomy mood in its totality came. It tore me apart and for some time I forgot everything. I forgot teachings, self, presence- everything. That ate me, my heart and this presence. first time i understand what a strong emotion do to us. It really eats us. This morning when I wake up that depression is still there in its full swing. In meditation I welcome it. I really said; you are welcome. Please come, I welcome you with my full heart. And I put that emotion in my heart. Accepting it for whatever it is. I felt it like another entity. A living entity. I literally felt ache and pain in my heart for some time. But slowly it started to dissolve and melt into light. That unknowingly strengthened my presence. My sense of presence glowed and light manifested in the inner void. Again there was peace and silence as if heavy clouds have moved away from the sky.
Sometimes in meditation and sometimes in normal condition I feel as if the inside and outside has disappeared. 2 days ago while walking in the road I felt that everything is one movement. This body, the road and cars moving are one phenomena. A deep sense of peace and heartfelt love is almost always there in those experiences. I do not feel this all the time but sometime I slip into this condition unknowingly. Somehow the division between inner and outer is little bit disrupted. I really do not know what this is. But I enjoy these moments of non-differentiation. Is this somehow relate with your teaching sir?
Dear Edji, I can live my remaining life this way as I have this peace and understanding that whatever comes will disappear. I was always a chronic sufferer as all of us human beings are :) But somehow with your grace and glance upon me, I am curing my illnesses of identifications with body/mind and the happenings of the world. But I want to complete my training under your guidance. Is it possible sir? Your words matters too much to me because they are for me. I can read many things in many ways but they don't work for me. Your words has become Bija-mantra for me.
Take care,
Purushottam
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Dear Purushottam:
The truth is almost everyone is caught up in their minds. They interpret sense data creating inner worlds and outer worlds. They create politics, create the deep state, create gravity, create the sun and the earth rotating about the sun. From the time we are six months old we are immersed in a sea of concepts, some conflicting, others consistent. The ideas that make up our world are similar to those of our neighbors, but very dissimilar to those of people in Iraq, Somalia, or Pakistan. It is differences in the concepts we hold is true or judge as true, versus the concepts and people that hold them that are conflicting or different, which creates unnecessary strife in our human reality.
Oh, only to become simple again. No concepts. Just sense data and resting there, without a division into inner and outer, without consideration of right or wrong, who is evil or is good, who is right or who is wrong. Just to rest as self, devoid of judging concepts, fake or real news, and just be yourself without concepts or position. No identity. No understanding. Nobody. No mind. No heart. No soul. No birth. No rebirth. Just resting in no-concept, peace pervades, the self is everywhere, unidentified, known and unknown both.
Letting go of concepts is a different experience for everyone. Some need to hear the words of Nisargadatta which presents a universal worldview with the intent of freeing you from identification with your body, with your mind, with your humanity, and to take you beyond even identification with God.
Others use mantra or japa, and repeat a phrase or name over and over again to get out of the mind.
Others deliberately lower their consciousness into their heart, near one’s internal sense of heart, and from one's new location within the heart, the mind becomes like a chattering radio two rooms away, easily ignored, yet still open to its’ content which may be relevant in the moment. With one's consciousness centered in the heart, you are open to everything, to emotions, to the world as it is, to war, to peace, to unrest, to fulfillment.
When you are open to yourself as you experience yourself in the deepest way, one is totally free from the external world, totally free from the divisions of mind, totally free from the wants of the body, in peace, complete, needing nothing.
Thus, his teachings are a universal tool, and only as a tool not as absolute truth, I recommend that everyone read the Nisargadatta Gita, and the three books of Nisargadatta talks as translated and explained by Robert Powell, namely the ultimate medicine, the experience of nothingness, and the nectar of immortality. These should be read daily, and daily ponder the meaning of teachings he is offering. It was ask yourself, “why does Nisargadatta say what he is saying? What is the point of his teaching? What is he trying to do with these words to my mind and heart? Can his words help free me from my own misconceptions?” You must understand, Nisargadatta’s words are used as a tool to free you, not as an alternative theory of reality that is truly real or more true than the viewpoint you have now.
In addition, you need to practice self inquiry which has so many different ways of pursuit: the first way is to look within and one's own thoughts, and after a long period of time being able to isolate the I thought, which is the linchpin of one's identity as a human in the world. Watch where that thought arises from, and where it disappears to. This is the fundamental teaching of self-inquiry suggested by Robert Adams and Ramana. There are many other ways also. However, practicing this method alone allows one to experience total emptiness, the deep void of consciousness, the place where all experiential appearances arise and into which they all disappear. The void.
Another way of practicing self-inquiry and which is completely different, is instead to "look" inside, and "feel" inside for the I am sensation, the experiential experience of being alive, which is often felt first as a spark of energy near the heart or in the chest somewhere. Focus on this I am sensation. But focus in a relaxed way, not tightly holding onto the sensation because of you focus tightly, it (the I am sensation) freezes and dies. Just hold on lightly, attend lightly to the sensation, the feeling that you exist. This method is most extraordinary in its results.
Holding onto the feeling of I am, one gradually becomes aware of the internal energy system within the body, the so-called subtle body, attending to which, gradually builds a sense of "presence." This sense of presence becomes like an internal body that pervades one's physical body and extends beyond it into the space around your body. When one can feel one's sense of presence it becomes more real than your experience of your body, because it is deeper than the body and the experience of the body. One identifies with one's sense of presence as the real you. But this is still an incomplete truth, a provisional truth on the way to deeper understanding, and deeper peace.
Looking closely at the sense of presence, you will see it has a quality of emptiness or void within, and it has no physical aspect or solidity. It is purely space and the life energy pervading that space. It’s form varies from moment to moment, and its essence is sentience, or awareness, and that awareness consists of light and emptiness, and experiences or appearances within that light and emptiness, which appeared to be objects or actions within an external ‘reality’.
From this practice of attending to the felt sense of I am, and the growing sense of presence, can come the awakening from within to the divine, which may take the form of the divine as infinite power and light and love and bliss, arising within you, in your body and in your sense of presence, coursing upwards in an explosion of light, love and bliss, where you become aware of the divine within you for the first time, and ever more share the divinity of God as your own characteristic. Unfortunately, if you still retain a strong identity with your humanity, your body, and your personal identity, that flooding by the divine may become an obsession with your own divinity, and you feel that you, personally, are God, as opposed that God is living through you, and you are a mere functionary allowing for his manifestation within and through you.
Lastly, after seeing through the illusion of I am, watching the arising of the divine from within and manifesting That in your everyday life, the explosion of bliss and energy gradually subsides into a constant and subtle presence, and you have for the first time, an ability to do a new kind of self-inquiry, which is just to rest as oneself, rest in an as one's own self, which means doing nothing except falling back into your sense of self, dwelling there in silence, with no mind, no emotions, no intent, no direction, no goal. Just rest in yourself, the joy and peace of being your own self. At this point you will begin to feel a peace you would never thought possible, so deep, so complete, so total, with nothing more for you to do, nowhere else to go, except be you as you.
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