The FREEDOM Blog

Enlightenment... Is simply a word that points to... Bondage... Is simply a word that points to... Enlightment... Is simply a word...

Well, the last blog, as well as the following satsang, precipitated quite a diverse mixture of responses, and if nothing else, response (whether "good" or "bad") shows that at least it is registering on some level. Looking up something, I came across a quote that my teacher had written. Throughout the Vedic scriptures, satyam, or truthfulness is touted as one of the highest principles. Indeed, Kali yuga, or the present age, is defined by the fact that the last leg of dharma IS truthfulness, and that it steadily declines as we progress through this age, until it basically disappears altogether. I have often quoted Orwell, and his "To speak the truth in times of universal deceit is an act of rebellion," and those who know me, know that I love to rant and rave regarding political, spiritual or cultural 'correctness' which is generally little more than ignoring Truth, in the name of how we would 'like' it to be. But what we want and what is don...

Okay, this one may piss a few people off, but that's okay. It's 'Perfect' right. And that, in fact, is what I'm going to talk about. First, let me define a few terms: (I love acronyms) NAD - Narcissistic Advaita Disorder NDA - Non-Dual Apathy POD - Philosophical One-ness Destructionism First, POD. Philosophical One-ness Destructionism is essentially where the 'individual' holds to the One-ness view as a philosophy, a theory, an intellectual understanding. It basically states that "my understanding from the teachers, scriptures, and everything, is that all is One, all is Perfect, exactly as it is. 'I' don't need to do anything to change it, because it is Perfect as it is." Now while, in Reality, this is a truism, that ultimately, nothing can happen if it isn't perfect for it to happen, doesn't mean that it is necessarily perfect that it STAYS THAT WAY! So, let's give a very simple and practical example. You are sitting at a ...

Problems in language so often tend to take us astray, and I fall prey to it as much as the next. Take the word 'glimpse'. We use it, suggesting that the 'individual' which is in fact part of the dream, can experience the Absolute. In reality, what occurs is that for a moment, the Self shines, or reflects (all inadequate) through to the mind and says it has a glimpse of the Reality. So imagine it like this. You are dreaming, and for half a moment, you wake up, and then fall back asleep. The dreaming self, which is entirely a dream creation (the dream body, the dream mind, the dream world) and 'remembers' a moment of being awake and 'thinks' that it had a 'glimpse' of being awake. So from this 'awake' perspective, we can recognize that the dream person had no experience or glimpse of being awake; they simply remember in the dream state that there was a place of not being asleep. That dream person will not ever wake up...they will disappear ...

What many people don't get, particularly here in the West, is that there is a difference between recognition of the Self and Recognition of God. Ultimately, God and the Self are one, but it is a oneness like the wave and the ocean, the sunlight and the sun. Recognition of the Self is relatively easy. It can be done in an instant. After all, it is who you are. When you simply stop and be, letting go of the stuff that is in awareness, what is left is always the Self, the light of consciousness. However, at this point, the so-called litte self, or ego, remains. However, the experience is so profound, compared to the normal moment to moment infatuation with the mind, that many feel this is the end. This is only the beginning. It is, as I have said, like landing in India and thinking you have seen the entirety of the country. You have only walked through the door. This is where the real work begins. Now begins the work of staying there, of remaining situated in that Self, in that ...