the target

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Nisargadatta: That state is not to be experienced, about that you can’t speak. Just be that state, what is experienced is not truth. What is experienced is not truth that is the primary problem. I did not know that I was in that state, suddenly I knew, I am, thus all the trouble. In that state there was no knowingness, suddenly ‘I am’ and I caught hold of the body. My identity of ‘I amness’ is the entire manifestation, not individual body. All the trouble began with the ‘otherness’, a quality that came with ‘I amness’. Whenever there is a problem you ask: ‘let us find the state of affairs as they are’, don’t try to bluff, and then the solution comes. So in this fraudulent play of the manifest world I went on to find the actual position, the ‘I amness’ means world manifestation and it is a time bound state, so why should I bother?

Presently ‘I amness’ is bubbling and challenging, but all this is time bound, pride will go along with the ‘I am’ (So Hum), later on, no ‘I am’ (No Hum). Whatever you do is as per your concepts, nothing was, here or there. In the Brahman aperture there is sprouting of ‘I amness” and all manifestation too, but I am not that. Yogis after penetrating all the ‘chakras’, take up the breath in the Brahma Chakra and hibernate. If the body does not swell, his ‘I am’ is in the tranquil state in the aperture, but once the ‘I am’ is dissolved his body will swell. Any being when born with that ‘I am’ still inside, will have an outside manifest world; each being having its own inside and outside world. The one who has attained the target, he is no more an individual, thus he has no ego, when ego is gone, it will be realized that the ‘I amness’ is felt no more.

source: Nisargadatta,  I am Unborn, 30th January 1980, PDF p 102

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the universe in me

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My Comment:

We focus on the name and form (nama rupa) of what we perceive as being outside of us. The act of seeing the name and form instead of the one substance (the Absolute) obstructs the Absolute and projects instead the selfhood character onto a phantom of our own making. It has no Reality. Withdraw from the name and the form and be with the Absolute that is the inner Reality of all we see as the universe.

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millions of forms

For your spiritual entertainment ~

~ Nisargadatta responding to questions

Nisargadatta:

Dream occurs in objective, material, manifestation, in the consciousness. It is not you, it is something other – objective, material.

What you call “I Am” and birth, you are not that, it is material.

Suppose that there is a Muslim boy that I have adopted; I have not sired that boy, but
I now claim him as “my” boy. Like that, this “I Amness” is not directly me, it is something other, something material, something Muslim (in this context), I am not that.

I, the Absolute, have nothing to do with that.

People are sometimes confused because they expect an answer which is based on their concepts. You ask someone to bring you a spoon, and instead he brings you a needle. Both are words, both are knowledge, but that is not what you want. What you will receive is the true knowledge, even if what you are asking for is not the true knowledge.

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Q: I must reach that level to be able to understand.

Nisargadatta:

There are millions of grains, made into millions of forms, but the seed is only one. All these millions of forms are because of some particular seed, but I am not that seed.

The Ultimate knowledge does not have any knowledge. This knowledge “I Am” has appeared spontaneously, as a result of the body.

See it as it is, understand it as it is.

When the waking state is gone, sleep begins, when sleep is gone, the waking state begins. When both are gone, I am at home. Why did they leave me? Because it was all foreign, it was not me.

Take this advice: better not to be trapped in the spiritual knowledge business; have a nice time, a good life, be of service to others, and in due course, when the time is ripe, you will die.

(source: Nisargadatta, Prior to Consciousness, PDF file p. 111)

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My Comment:

Nisargadatta uses the term knowledge to mean “to know something” and also to mean “the sense of being”, or also “the sense of ‘I Am'”. In this statement: “The Ultimate knowledge does not have any knowledge. This knowledge ‘I Am’ has appeared spontaneously, as a result of the body.” he is pointing us to the state of the Absolute which does not “know” Itself as a subject knows an object. That is why we have such difficulty realizing that our search is pointless as long as we are looking for something outside or other than ourselves.

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who am I? where am I? what am I?

All of these questions contain the little words “am” and “I”. They refer to the state that we call ‘I am”. Is it possible to know of a state that is not of the ‘I am” quality? All that we are conscious of has to do with the ‘I am” state. Is it possible for there to be a state that is free of consciousness? What if I told you that all the worlds that make up the realm of consciousness, no matter how many billions and perhaps trillions of galaxies are contained in that realm, are but an infinitesimal speck compared to the absolute, which is not of the realm of consciousness. All that is of consciousness is within the absolute, but the absolute is not of that realm. Consciousness is like a hiccup that just happened.

I cannot express what I am feeling

born out of nothing

The roaring silence of the diamond. What do I want here on this planet as I see every view that anyone holds as true and valid. There is only emptiness as all views are conjured up by the beholder’s repertoire of images. Combinations of what each one projects as per their personal distortions. We all are fragments of perception, each from a unique standpoint. As such we do see what our individual perceptions mosaic together. It’s a living kaleidoscope and we want to give what appears in a given moment a meaning. It is as if you took thousands of frames of a film and then took one single frame and said “this is the movie”.

watch the flashing – Zen

My Comment:
I find another beautiful example of divine paradox in statements from two sages. One is Nisargadatta who says “You are without knowledge”, and the other is Shunryu Suzuki stating that “If your mind is clear, true knowledge is already yours.” This seeming paradox is really only a different use of the term ‘knowledge’ within the context of these different, though closely related and complementary teachings. Nisargadatta speaks of knowledge as the sense of beingness, the “I Am”, and he speaks of this ‘knowledge’ as being a sort of overlay, a super-imposition, on the Absolute. This is due to the spontaneous “stirring of consciousness” that results in the sense of “I Am”. He uses the term ‘knowledge’ because only when consciousness stirs does the Absolute know Itself as consciousness. The statement “You are without knowledge” expresses the state of the Absolute, which has no awareness of Itself as the Absolute. We all are in actuality this Absolute that is in no way involved in all that happens in the domain of consciousness. When we allow ourselves to release our belief in the state of consciousness and “I Am” as our actual true nature, we are able to realize the Absolute as our true Self. We then realize that we never were born and do not die. We are not affected by all the forms that arise, exist for a while and then subside again within the realm of consciousness. A shift in our focus occurs such that we witness all that is happening in consciousness, but from the platform of the Absolute.

a jnani – he who knows

A jnani can transcend consciousness and be the Absolute on demand; he can come into consciousness because that particular body is still available – through that body communication takes place with the beings in consciousness.

You have an ocean and the water from the ocean in a pot, now that pot is dipped into the ocean, the pot is still there, but the water in the pot merges with the ocean water, so that water does not feel any difference, but the water in the pot can also witness the pot. It has the advantage of being one with the Absolute and to use the body also. With this example I am able to understand what the state of a jnani could be.

source: Nisargadatta, Prior to Consciousness, November 23, 1980

My comment: We see ourselves as beings in consciousness. The jnani is in the Absolute state, sometimes called the ‘no-state-state’ because it is not a state with a subject and objects of perception as in the state of consciousness. According to the jnani, all of consciousness is a minuscule realm when seen from the platform of the Absolute. For those of us who identify ourselves as beings in consciousness, this realm is “All That Is” and the “I Am Presence” and it appears immense, infinite. The jnani  recognizes that all of consciousness is a kind of super-imposition, an overlay, if you so will, of the sense of “I am” on our original state, our true nature, as the Absolute. The jnani interfaces with us, as beings in consciousness, through the instrument of a mind-body complex without identification with this instrument. This communication from the Absolute can be seen as coming from the Ultimate Dimension into our limited and relative dimension of consciousness, much like we now feel we are receiving messages from beings in higher densities. Some of these beings (Blue Avians) tell us that they are able to create a physical form in our world in order to interface with us, after which they then recede from physicality and reside in their own density which we do not perceive.  The jnani tells us that the Absolute is the one natural state and thus each of us is the Absolute right now. Our focus on the super-imposition (the projection) of our phenomenal world, which includes all of the most subtle ‘energy’ realms, is what fills our organs of perception and thus there is ‘no room in the inn’ for the realization of us as the Absolute.

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Purusha – The Cosmic Witness

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Purusha is a Sanskrit word that is often translated as the Cosmic Witness (although it has other related meanings).

My comments on Nisargadatta’s statements below:

Basically when we can be aware of the fact that we are aware – then we are not just witnessing the content of consciousness, but we are That first principle quality which is untouched by all content. For me such contemplation is useful to “end” the involvement with or attachment to Consciousness even as the Witness. It is almost like all of Consciousness, starting with the sense “I am” entangles us within the web of manifestation of phenomena.

I was not

 

“I didn’t know I was, presently I know I am, this is the same “I” with the knowingness mantle over it. This is the way the very Absolute transformed Itself into this grosser consciousness state, the state of appearance.”

“Nobody wants to inquire about the Self deeply and thoroughly, everybody inquires on a superficial level.” (Nisargadatta, Prior to Consciousness p. 54)

I was not. Then suddenly, I was. It feels like I am, but actually, I am not. If I had known what a trap I was getting into, I would not have gone into my mother’s womb. This sounds like a rejection of being alive, but it is not. It is neither rejection nor acceptance. This is the fine line of the paradox that my consciousness has to walk in order to find my way out of the labyrinth of consciousness.

serenity

Serenity is one of the most important quality of my experience on this physical plane. There are many ways to maintain serenity. The one I have been most attracted to lately is mindfulness. For me this means continually bringing my mind back to my body so as to be physically present in all I do more and more.