The Seer

The important thing in self-inquiry is to not change anything. Don’t try to make the mind still, don’t try to stop the thoughts. You don’t have to do anything. Just be aware of the sounds in the room. Be aware of the feelings and sensations in the body. Be aware of any thoughts arising, passing, and falling. If you check carefully there is awareness of your body, there is awareness of thoughts, there is awareness of feelings. There is awareness of sound, there is awareness of the greyness of your eye lids. But the interesting part is that when we stop and check:

Where is the experiencer? Where is the one watching the body? Where is the one watching the feelings? Where is the one aware of the thoughts?

Right now there is something that is experiencing something. Something is experiencing your feelings, your thoughts, and your body. Something is experiencing the sound of my voice. So if you are something that is aware of the body, you can’t therefore be the body. If you are something that is aware of the thoughts, you can’t be the thoughts, you can’t be the feelings or the emotions. And it’s as if you don’t exist, it’s as if you are invisible.

Mind is in a point. To believe that you are only thoughts, feelings, emotions, beliefs, or circumstances, your attention must be focused in a sharp point. Who you are is not in any point but more in every point at the same time and what the points appear in. So you just totally, absolutely, completely relax your attention. You let it un-focus, so that it feels like it’s everywhere. Now this is very simply resting in who you are. You are making no effort.

You can’t see or feel You as a separate thing. The closest you can say is, I am. Nothing or Everything. If you check in this one second of resting, is there any problem here? Is there anything missing? Is there something like peace here? Is there some gentle sweetness?

That’s who you are.

~ From: Unseasonable Happiness, by Alex Vartman.

BTW: Alex Vartman comes originally from Adelaide, South Australia, and was greatly helped toward spiritual awakening by Gangaji. He has lived and worked as spiritua teacher in Skandinavia for the past ten years or so, but is presently touring eastern Australia offering satangs. For more details, contact >>>Clearsight.

Unconditional love is not based on what the other person does or does not do. It is not based on whether someone lives up to some image you have in your mind. It is not based on whether you get a return on your investment in a relationship. Those are conditions.

Love is who we are. It is what life is. You cannot give love. To love someone is not to give them anything but to recognize the love that is already there. To pretend that you have something that others need, including love, is arrogant. This pretense fuels separation. It is spiritual violence.

To seek, expect, or demand love is not love at all. It is egoic neediness. Love wants nothing because it lacks nothing. Love does not seek love. It places no conditions on life and others. It simply recognizes itself everywhere, in everyone.

It does not buy into the illusion of separation.

Unconditional love is not something that thought could ever show you. To realize it, find out what is prior to that thought-based story of “me” in the mind.

What is reading these words — not the thoughts that arise to agree or disagree with what is being said — but rather the simple presence itself?

What is resonating beyond these ideas? That presence is love. Realize that what you truly are, beyond all mental conditions, is unconditional love.

~ From: Reflections of the One Life, by Scott Kiloby www.kiloby.com

BTW: If you enjoy Scott’s writing, why not get one of his insightful quotes every day for free via our Peter’s Pearls service? It’s easy to >>>Subscribe.

Ramesh S. Balsekar was born in Mumbai, India, in 1917, and after a distinguished career in banking, was for several years an interpreter for Nisargadatta Maharaj. Then, after his own awakening, Ramesh became a truth-teacher himself and offered Satsang daily in his home right up to the time of his final illness. Pete & Pearl sat with him there for five memorable days in 1995.

He also authored many books on enlightenment spirituality including: Consciousness Speaks.

Sadly, Ramesh passed away at his home after a short illness on Sept. 27, aged 92.

The author/teacher, Wayne LIquorman, was foremost among those influenced by Ramesh and wrote: “Having met Ramesh was one of the defining moments of my life. His generous spirit, open, loving presence and spiritual understanding combined to make him one of the truly great sages of the 20th century. His spirit will live on in his books and in the hearts of all of us who have known him and loved him.”

“When we dare to doubt what we are told and take a fresh look at what’s going on, we are in for lots of pleasant and fascinating and useful surprises. A new and more satisfying way of life begins to open up, just by noticing what we see.”

~ by Douglas Harding Headless.org

For more ‘Wisdom Quotes’: >>>Click Here.

Old habits of mind
Want to box and label
What is seen,
Safely containing
All things, all experience,
In the known world.

But a new wind
Blows through the mind
Not looking for refuge from life.
Seeing beyond itself
Into the alive world
Of happenings and presences,
Mysterious and unfathomable.
So far beyond thought
That mind lies down
In the deepest bow possible
Dumbfounded and reverent.

Then rising again,
From its bow
In hopeful adoration
Only wanting to serve
What it doesn’t understand.

~ by Alice Gardner

A man was walking through the grounds of a university one morning when he noticed a young blind woman struggling with her guide-dog.

The animal was resolutely pulling in one direction, she in another.

When he offered assistance, the woman replied, “No thanks, this is a family argument. The dog knows I’m supposed to go to a lecture right now — but I want to miss it.”

~ For more on guide-dogs, see this inspiring YouTube clip entitled: Soul Mates: guide dogs and independence

When awakening happens, the heart has to open. For realization to be complete it has to really hit on three levels — head, heart, and gut — because you can have a very clear, enlightened mind, which you’ll know in a deep way, but your being won’t be dancing.

Then, when the heart starts to open just like the mind, your being starts to dance. Then everything comes alive. And when your gut opens up, there is that deep, deep, unfathomable stability where that opening, who is you, just died into transparency. It’s become the absolute. You are That.

There is an expression, “solid emptiness.” In the mind, the emptiness isn’t so solid. It’s very space-like, ethereal, and that’s enlightenment on the level of mind. Enlightenment on the level of heart is an aliveness, a sense that all of me is dancing. The enlightenment on the level of gut is an emptiness that is similar to that of the mind, but it’s like a mountain, a transparent mountain. All of these are expressions in the human being of the Truth.

Many times when people are awakening to this love, they will tell me, “Adya, it’s just too much for me — its going to tear me apart.” Ridiculous! Too much for you? You’re transparent. You are empty. It just goes through you and beyond. Through you and beyond! It’s only when you hold yourself in a particular way that it feels like too much. You are holding an idea of your personal boundary, your edge, and of course you can’t contain it. Love was never meant to be contained.

~ From: Emptiness Dancing, by Adyashanti

If you haven’t visited our Web Site recently, now would be a great time to do so because it’s just been completely redesigned and upgraded. Sam & Navi Blight have done a wonderful job of making all our information, articles, services and products much more accessible.

The new site now features an on-line store so you can more easily find and order books, DVDs and CDs by leading truth-teachers, and a new and better way to receive our free daily inspirational quote service — Peter’s Pearls. We’ve also made it easier for you to find out about the special activities and workshops at Gurukula that may be of benefit to you. There are pages on counselling and spiritual mentoring … and much more.

And if that’s not enough, there’s a treasure-trove of interesting articles on the site to help and encourage you in your understanding of Who or What we really are — the truth that sets us free in every area of life. So click through now to: www.peterspearls.com.au/ and let us know if the upgrade meets with your approval.

Sitting quietly, doing nothing and everything happens by itself. No input is needed to maintain this life; this microcosm we call our body. The eyes see without any need of the effort to look. The ears hear, again with no need to listen.

They work perfectly smoothly and spontaneously all by themselves. Likewise the heart continues to beat without a reminder from us, the lungs, digestion and all the organs do their jobs quite uninterrupted.

Do we even give a thought as to how nutrients are broken down, get into the bloodstream and are transported around the body to the desired spot? Do we have input into how wastes are selected and carried away. Does the ‘me’ build the muscle tissue and bones piece by piece? Do we even know how they fit together? Can you explain the simplest actions like how to lift a finger?

If I were a Martian come down to Earth and inhabited this body would you be able to explain to me how to operate this body – even the simplest actions?

So why do we need the idea of a ‘me’ to function. On close inspection it becomes clear we don’t but the belief doesn’t just go away. What does this imaginary ‘me’ do while the rest of the body is looking after itself, sourcing water when thirsty, food when hungry. When hunger happens you may think it’s you that prepares the food to eat and in a sense it is since you have to locate and prepare the food – or is that automatic too?

Does the brain that put the food away after shopping already know where it’s to be found, without a ‘me’? When hunger strikes did you create the hunger, the feelings of hunger? Did you decide to be thirsty in the first place? Why is it that you like certain foods when another person has other tastes? Why am I lactose intolerant – did I choose that?

Do people choose the terrible illnesses and accidents that befall them? If the body is programmed to look after itself then why do I need to maintain this conviction there is a ‘me’ in control? And am I maintaining this belief or is the belief self sustaining giving the impression there is a ‘me’ doing it?

The sense organs receive energy from the outside and channels it to the brain that sorts it out in a meaningful way and creates the finished and ongoing conscious perception that is witnessed. The internal sensors gauge levels of nutrients and fluids in order to maintain the necessary balance, corrects imbalances, breaks and breakdowns. And it all happens spontaneously.

“Sitting quietly, doing nothing, spring comes and the grass grows by itself.” Zen proverb.

~ by Roy Townsend, who was a much appreciated guest-teacher at Gurukula earlier this month.

“The reality of your own self-nature, the absence of cause and effect, is what’s meant by mind (in Zen truth-teaching). This mind has no form or characteristics. It is basically empty, neither pure nor impure. It has never lived or died, appeared or disappeared, increased or decreased. It’s like space. It’s not the same as the sensual mind.

“Only the wise know this mind, this mind called dharma-nature, this mind called liberation. Its names vary but not its essence. The mind’s capacity is limitless, and its manifestations are inexhaustible. Your nature is essentially pure. Your real body is basically pure. Is has no sensation, no hunger or thirst, no good or bad.”

~ by Bodhidharma: the first patriarch of Zen (translation by Red Pine).