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11 / 30 / 2011
Jnana Yoga
The purpose of the Yoga of knowledge is beyond any kind of spiritual experience.
Self-realization is not an experience.
Our true nature is a fact that everybody knows and nobody perceives.
Why?
Desire, choice, thought and will, again and again and always!
A very old story that we rediscover life after life without understanding its real meaning.
Searching for...
and not to qualify,
ie. characterize by a linguistic sign.
In the Yoga of knowledge,
one practices self-inquiry and renunciation without thinking.
The magic word in the Yoga of knowledge is
"to understand."
Understanding beyond any kind of reasoning and thinking,
beyond every mental processes.
This understanding is pure silence.
12 / 5 / 2011
Everything living on our planet comes from nature, including ourselves. So what's the point of a brain gifted with the power of thinking, intelligence, ego and mind?
If we think carefully about spiritual liberation, the annihilation of the ego or the mind is not what nature expects from us. It seems logical that Gaya or Mother nature didn't create human beings in order to destroy but preserve their mental faculties.
Did she create human beings to destroy herself?
It's impossible to conceive that nature or even God made a mistake for a simple reason : "Here, we are!"
It's not arrogance, but just a fact... with a very natural touch of self-importance.
So liberation or Self-realization is maybe a phase that nature didn't succeed to reach yet.
Who knows?
For sure we know right now that as far as spirituality is concerned we have to do the job alone and expect nothing from nature, God, the cosmos or some spacemen to do it for us. Those who are waiting for a mysterious cosmic connection in order to become without the least effort pure spiritual beings and be liberated from their illusions and sufferings are really dreaming. It's like waiting for the Grace of God without practicing any spiritual discipline and having no Dharma starting of course by "Truthfulness". Up to now, the delirium of imagination is not included in any spiritual quest.
Choice :
You control the mind or
the mind controls you.
When you control the mind,
you control yourself.
When you control yourself,
who controls what ?
Jnana Yoga :
The path of renouncement and self-inquiry.
What a paradox!
How to carry on a spiritual quest by practicing renunciation to oneself and self-inquiry if you already renounce to every desire, including the desire to know and liberate yourself?
But that's how it works.
And not to forget:
who is treading this dangerous path where you can loose yourself?
You or your ego?
If you think you can liberate yourself from your ego, why to practice renunciation of oneself and self-inquiry?
Did you miss the essential point?
Do you know that there is 2 processes of thinking?
One with words and another without.
See by yourself.
Practice meditation just 5 minutes per day.
5 minutes are better than nothing
And very quickly you will ask for more.
12 / 6 / 2011
You look for perfection outside yourself.
That's the game of life.
Then you realize that it's inside yourself.
But you don't find it.
Why?
Because it's your Self.
12 / 7 / 2011
Above the entrance of the Kuti of Brahma Chaitanya In Gangotri.
"Live the present
and don't hurt anybody"
Above the door of my Guru in Uttarkashi, there is nothing.
Enjoy yourself and do what you want.
Above my door? Which door?
There are so many doors that before to get in, you are already out.
What's the point with spiritual practices?
Between Haridwar and Rishikesh, there are on the road commemorative steles of the "Divine Life Society" on which it is written:
"Be good
Do good"
The phonetic and the simplicity of the formula always made me laughing.
But finally, is there anything else to be do?
One of the best spiritual practices :
"Stop dreaming."
Reality is thousand times more interesting than any fantasy.
To take oneself seriously,
it's to fantasize.
Jnana Yoga :
A important philosophical concept:
"In itself"
"En soi" (in French)
means "which exists independently of the content of the mind"
and for Kant "independently of any kind of appearance and of human knowledge".
So, what could be this being in itself?
You are.
This cannot be an illusion
because before to know anything, illusory or not,
you have to be,
to be present and something
which cannot be an illusion.
So what is the true nature of "to be" or being in itself?
Only experience can make you realizing it.
And then, this is not anymore philosophy but knowledge.
What are you really looking for?
Enlightenment, liberation, Self-realization, the end of suffering, the truth, the paradise...?
If you don't know what you are looking for and where to discover it,
how are you going to find it?
12 / 8 / 2011
You cannot force yourself to fall asleep or to stop thinking.
It's in fact the absence of effort which determines the silence of the mind.
To watch the mind and realize that there is nothing inside is without doubt the most obvious way to stop thinking.
Can we carry on living without thinking?
Yes, absolutely.
Just to try.
12 / 10 / 2011
Jnana Yoga :
In English, there are 2 words : "Awareness" and "Consciousness." It's the same power or faculty. But the subject who is aware is different of the one who is conscious. The ego is aware,
consciousness is obviously conscious.
When we practice Jnana Yoga, first of all what do we really do? We develop our faculty to watch... our body and mind, and so become the witness of the body and the mind. This witness doesn't come out of the blue. It's the ego watching its body and its mind without identification. It's a passive ego very aware and peaceful. We don't realize the Self or incarnate suddenly "Chit", pure consciousness, just because we are watching the body and the mind. To enjoy Sahaja Samadhi or achieve Self-realization, this witness or passive ego has to disappear. Yes, but how?
Wrong answer, but not far from the truth:
The witness, this passive ego, "I" or self-consciousness, has to be aware of itself, that is to say of its own faculty to watch, not to watch something, just to watch and be fully aware. If it has the impression that it can watch the universal power of consciousness itself, it's an illusion. The spiritual entity that it represents as a witness during this introspection will never discover the presence of consciousness. But it can realize the Self by annihilating its illusory power to be aware, which means when it surrenders to the true power of pure consciousness. So the key is to surrender to one's own power of consciousness which means renunciation of oneself and self-inquiry. So Jnana Yoga is really the path of Self-realization. And don't fool yourself when it is said that "Brahman is the witness". It's not by only watching your body or the content of your mind that you become Brahman, pure consciousness.
True answer, but not far from ignorance :
I don't know.
In order to realize the Self, maybe the Guru is responsible, maybe your own effort, maybe you Karma, maybe your spiritual practice, maybe because you have arrived to a point of no return, maybe out of exhaustion and despair. "I don't know" is the only true answer. But I will never say that spiritual practices are useless because this is what precisely means "I don't know".
12 / 3 / 2011
In the Himalaya, children love to sing :
"No Bhakti, no Shakti."
"No Dharma, no Karma."
As we say : "The truth comes out of the mouth of children."
12 / 13 / 2011
There is in fact only one yoga for the ego :
"Practice the spiritual discipline that you like, which please you and enhances your self-importance, the best for your character and personality, the one with which you can achieve greater psychological balance. There is nothing bad with that. Quite the opposite! "
Everything else is interesting,
but it's not more than words already very well known.
The absence of spiritual discipline is not the practice of the yoga of knowledge.
To understand that "there is nothing to do",
you must start with "to do".
To realize that there is no ego,
you must stop thinking that you are different of the ego.
First thing first!
"To ponder" is the less important of every Yoga.
It's not useless too.
12 / 17 / 2011
_ How to improve my spiritual life ?
_ Face yourself and see by yourself that there is nothing there.
We are nothing in the universe.
And if on top of it we cannot do anything truly good,
we can at least thank the Divine of making us conscious of it.
It's always better than to complain.
The heavy weight champion of the world of devotion and love was walking in the country side. When he saw right in front of him a snake basking in the sun waiting for a kiss, he changed immediately of direction.
Self-realization becomes an eventuality when we stop to look for it by getting a deep interest in the one who is looking for it, and why he's looking for it. If he doesn't see any egocentricityin his spiritual quest, he's far from the truth. And if he doesn't realize that he's himself the ego who try to destroy his ego, he's far from going out of his illusions.
Free will.
Yes, I have the choice.
No, I do not have the choice.
Both are true.
The choice offers the opportunity to realize the Self.
The absence of choice gives us the power to surrender to the Self.
We can choose to free ourself from suffering.
We can accept life as it is too.
Anyway, it's just the same.
12 / 28 / 2011
The power of renouncement
To give before to be asked for is very easy.
You just need to be generous or have nothing.
1 / 12 / 2012
How to explain that the path of knowledge is identical to the search for the truth and this search is impossible without being absolutely honest and sincere.
No lies in this discipline.
Not lying is this discipline also called truthfulness.
It’s simple and far from easy, especially when we cannot lie anymore to ourself.
Then there is only the search for true understanding left if we don’t want to become totally mad.
That’s how the path of knowledge really starts.
We have to understand.
We just need to understand.
Knowledge, understanding and consciousness are one and the same.
2 / 8 / 2012
Ethic : "Yamas and Niyamas"
There is no spirituality without a basic ethic. Yamas, and its complement, Niyamas, represent a series of rules, the very foundation of any spiritual life and spiritual practice. These are codes of conduct to end selfishness, greed and hypocrisy, that is to say "the cult of the ego".
A Yama, word which means literally "death", is a rule which helps to bring a compassionate death to the ego also called "the lower self". The Yamas comprise the "shall-not" in our dealings with the outside world and the Niyamas comprise the "shall-do" in our dealings with the inner self.
The Five Yamas according the Yoga Sutra of Patanjali are:
- Ahimsa : non-injury and non-violence. It leads naturally to Kshama : patience and renouncement to instinctive impulses of the ego.
- Satya : sincerity, honesty or truthfulness in word and thought. The absence of falsehood leads naturally to the quest for truth or path of knowledge.
- Asteya : non-stealing or not to take without permission. This leads to Arjava : honesty and straightforwardness, and not stealing in thought leads naturally to the silence of the mind.
- Bramacharya : control of all bodily instincts, especially sex. This practice leads naturally to introspection and renouncement.
- Aparigraha : absence of avarice or selfishness leads naturally to the practice of renouncement.
The five Niyamas are :
- Shaucha : purity. Avoidance of impurity in body, thought and speech leads naturally to self-inquiry and renunciation and finally to the silence of the mind which stops the manifestations of the ego with its toughts.
- Santosha : satisfaction and contentment. To be satisfied with what one has leads naturally to a peaceful state of mind and plenitude opposed to the manifestations of the ego who is generally always unsatisfied.
- Tapas : austerity. To understand this very strong word, it’s only necessary to practice every day a spiritual discipline. Very quickly, one can be sure to understand what means the word "austerity" whatever the spiritual discipline is and how long it is practiced. It's a way to watch very clearly the ego game in front of a repetitive practice. This concept doesn't mean violence or suffering, but regularity of a spiritual practice, just what the ego will hate very quickly.
- Svadhyaya : study of the scriptures which leads naturally to the path of knowledge and realization of the truth. The study of Vedanta helps also to understand that the ego as a personal identity is not a mental monster that has to be destroyed.
- Ishvarapranidhana : surrender to the Divine. In the Yoga of knowledge, this practice could be understood as surrendering to the presence of consciousness within oneself and by this way to relize that "our true nature is not thinking" as Ramana Maharshi explained so well.
Whatever is the purpose of our beliefs, our ordinary or spiritual life, we are obviously not looking for a lie or something fake. So somehow, we are on a quest for truth and on the path of knowledge. Jnana Yoga is nothing more than this quest carried to its logical extreme.
What is really true? From limited sensory perceptions of an external world that will never be understood despite what science claims, we arrive naturally to the introspection of the inner self, a depth psychology which doesn’t seem to have any end, and finally to the absence of thoughts which will also never explain what truly reality is, but which, on the other hand, show very well the complexity and vastness of the mind. So what’s left after realizing that nothing is really true? What’s could be absolutely true if not the fact of being and being conscious of it which will never be denied at the extreme limit of the practice of introspection and renunciation that defines the path of Jnana Yoga?
2 / 9 / 2011
Not this, not that.
The yoga of knowledge is usually divided in 3 practices : introspection or self-inquiry, renouncement or imperturbability, and the practice of "Neti Neti" (not this, not that) which could be understood as the path of negation or negative way ("Via negativa" in Latin).
Excerpt from letters mostly unknown for good reason to people who practice Jnana Yoga and study Advaita Vedanta :
"Well," you will say, "where am I to be? Nowhere, according to you!" And you will be quite right! "Nowhere" is where I want you! Why, when you are "nowhere" physically, you are everywhere spiritually. Make it your business then to see that your spirit is tied to nothing physical, and you will find that wherever that thing is that you are giving your mind to, there you are too in spirit, just as surely as your body is where you are bodily! And, though your natural mind can now find "nothing" to feed on, for it thinks you are doing no thing, go on doing this no thing… Therefore, do not give up but work vigorously on that nothing, with vigilant longing and will… For I tell you that I would much rather be nowhere physically, wrestling with that obscure nothing, than I would be some great potentate who whenever I wanted could be anywhere I liked, and enjoy everything as if it were my own.
Let go this "everywhere" and this "everything" in exchange for this "nowhere" and this "nothing". Never mind if you cannot fathom this nothing, for I love it surely so much the better. It is so worthwhile in itself that no thinking about it will do it justice. One can feel this nothing more easily than see it, for it is completely dark and hidden to those who have only just begun to look at it. Yet, to speak more accurately, it is overwhelming spiritual light that blinds the soul that is experiencing it, rather than actual darkness or absence of physical light. Who is it then who is calling it "nothing"? Our outer self, to be sure, not our inner. Our inner self calls it "All", for through it he is learning the secret of all things, physical and spiritual alike, without having to consider every single one separately on its own.
This excerpt comes from a book called "The cloud of unknowing" written by an anonymous English priest of the XIV century, published by Penguin Classics Books and translated into modern English by Clifton Wolters. It’s a beautiful classic of Christian mysticism and it has nothing to do with Vedanta. But the path of knowledge taught by this great master to a disciple is amazingly close to the practice of Jnana Yoga. Every tradition speaks about the same mystery and the same truth with its own cultural concepts. There is only one truth and many words to speak about.
"Better to search something where there is nothing
than to find nothing where there is something."
Confucius
2 / 23 / 2012
The Tao governs the universe not by ruling over but by allowing everything to happen and follow its own way. To tread this path is to do the same.
How?
By watching and not by stopping to do.
What would be a machine without function? A work of art, a corpse?
We make a difference between life and "I" or myself because we are unable to live our life as it is. There is obviously no difference between "me" and "my life".
Yoga, Zen, Tao, etc. are about living in the reality and not anymore in the mind.
The problem of the ego.
Do I breath or breathing happens naturally?
It’s like to choose, both are true.
It happens naturally when I don’t think about it. And it doesn’t when I control my breath.
And when I just watch it, the ego is still doing something,
but only the minimum because the ego is me, 'I'.
To intellectualize is not the way. What a shame for westerners!
Once I asked to a Chinese friend what he thinks about the Tao. The answer was very clear : "Just practice. Useless to think about."
2 / 27 / 2012
Any actions are maybe an illusion in a world of delusion, they nevertheless bear fruits and we have to enjoy their consequences.
Lies on the other hand always create more confusion.
In the kingdom of ignorance, i.e. the mind, we don't need more of it.
Better the truth and reality as it is.
Spirituality is just about that and not a new dream.
"Discretion is the polite word for hypocrisy." Christine Keeler
Circumspection is not a proof of wisdom, but of hypocrisy and cowardice. Instead of learning to look after our speech and actions very cautiously for not showing our true thoughts and intentions, we can watch very carefully our thoughts and intentions by practicing meditation to discover their origin. But it takes some courage and the will to find out the truth about ourself.
For those who don't have time to loose because they have better to do, but who nevertheless appreciate spirituality, there is a shock treatment they cannot miss : the 10 days Vipassana meditation retreat. And there, nobody needs courage or will. You just sit and watch, and before the end of the retreat, you will know what spirituality is all about. Not only it's free or almost (donations), but it's worth 10 years of psychoanalysis. Who living in a western country doesn't sometimes really need it?
3 / 12 / 2012
"Don't do unto others what you would not have done unto you"
Everybody knows it.
Everybody agrees with it.
Nobody cares.
Why that?
Ask the ego!
It will tell you that you just need to listen to your own thoughts to know why.
Keep your lesson for yourself!
Instead of forcing oneself to follow moral precepts, it's better to understand the necessity of them.
But the ego doesn't need to understand anything because it already knows everything.
The game of life
We play the game or we don't.
But what means "we don't"?
How can we stop playing the game like everybody else?
If we have the choice, it cannot be at the level of the game.
We are the player or we watch the player playing the game.
This is our only true freedom.
Not playing the game or to be free from the game is an illusion unless to be suicidal.
But that doesn't concern the practice of spirituality.
"Know Thyself"
or in plain English, "Know yourself by yourself".
The question "Who am I?" points to the ego and goes beyond. The practice of Jnana Yoga is all about the ego and nothing else. What really is this ego which prevents you to realize the truth? Is there a difference between the ego and you? If you think there is a difference, investigate what it could be beyond any thought about yourself. Thoughts cannot answer to the question "Who am I?" because thoughts about yourself are only beliefs and concepts which will never tell you the truth.
To be, nothing more
"It's not because things are difficult that we don't dare. It's because we don't dare that things are difficult." Seneque
The practice of meditation is to attempt the impossible, trying to grasp what we are in the absence of relation.
It's extremely difficult.
And there is nothing easier too.
We just have to be and to be fully conscious of it.
Know that you don't know and dive deep into yourself.
If you really practice the Yoga of knowledge, the only important question you can have in your mind is "Who am I?". It sounds pretty extreme but what could be the purpose of asking any other questions if you don't know the true nature of the one who is asking them? When you ask to yourself a question, you expect to know the truth about a certain subject. When you judge in your thoughts something or someone, you're supposed to know the truth about this thing or this person. But what could be the value of any question or judgment if you don't know first the truth about the one who expresses this question or judgment, that is to say you? And if you sincerely ask to yourself the question "Who am I?", how are you going to proceed if you don't practice "introspection" and "renouncement", a silent introspective meditation or self-inquiry and the renouncement to what you thought to be and obviously are not because that's the subject of your quest?
Live "here and now" or in the mind.
"My interest is in the future because I am going to spend the rest of my life there." Charles F Kettering
My dear Charles, take your time because you won't arrive soon.
Isn't it what we are doing with our thoughts?
4 / 14 / 2012
Useless to dream as far as the ego is concerned
To look for who you are is obviously the expression of egocentricity and at last the end of the cult of personality because what the ego discovers about itself can only be extremely disappointing. But of course, this psychological entity called 'ego' is still enjoying its self-importance during its search. It takes time to understand the real purpose of introspection because the one who practices this self-inquiry is nothing less than the ego seeking the impossible, to realize and become the Self, what it will never be able to do before disappearing itself. If the Yoga of knowledge is not an ego-trip, what is it? It's the ultimate and best ego-trip in order to end it.
Spirituality in general
If you are the master of yourself, you obviously are the slave too. This cannot be a good solution. Soon or late, you will have to find another spiritual practice, something more plausible and subtle.
"If you don’t have a disciplined life - by disciplined I mean watching what you eat, what you drink, what you say, how you think, being pure, purified - if you manage to be disciplined, you can receive visions, knowledge, enter into contact with the spirits and go to the extremes of your spiritual part." Words from the Amazonian shaman Kestenbetsa, Guillermo Aravalo Valera, in the documentary "Other words" of Jan Kounen available for free on Internet.
We have to know what we really are looking for and stop to go astray
"Sahaja Samadhi" is the natural state that we discover when we realize the Self or during anexperience of non-duality. If it’s our natural state that we discover, does it mean that we have lost it in the past? Are we born in this state or is it about a state unrelated to birth and death? Why is it so difficult to discover the state which is the most natural for us? Is it a state of mind or what being and consciousness are? What could be the difference between a state of mind and the state of consciousness as it is, as it has always been and as it will be forever? Because we are conscious beings, we should know our natural state easily…, if we are not looking for something else. Perseverance and simplicity are very well known secrets of spirituality.
5 / 10 / 2012
Karma : relation of cause and effect.
Did I become selfish, greedy and hypocrite because I’m unhappy?
Or am I unhappy because I’m selfish, greedy and hypocrite?
Whatever the answer, the point is not to find a more or less psychological and hypocritical explanation to justify oneself of being an idiot. It’s to end this vicious circle. How? To stop being selfish, greedy and hypocrite could be a good solution. But the ego would probably think that it’s too simple and would prefer a much more complicated spiritual quest which doesn’t tackle this kind of subject. What a shame! It's the only subject which truly concerns spirituality.
What technique do you need for knowing if it’s day or night?
All the techniques to free oneself from the mind are the means which preserve the mind because the ego itself is a projection of the mind and it’s him or her who thinks that he or she can break free from it. In other words:
- the ego thinks that it can free itself from the mind,
- the mind thinks that it can free itself from the ego,
- the ego thinks that it can free itself from the ego,
- the mind thinks that it can free itself from the mind.
And beyond thinking, who would wish to be free and from what?
Power to the people
You already understand almost nothing about the reality of the world and your life, and you want magical powers. Are you nuts?
6 / 5 / 2012
So simple !
Why is it so difficult to realize the Self?
Because we are always looking for something else,
something always more complicated than what the Self is,
something unknown which can only be found somewhere else than here and now.
In other words, we don't know what we are looking for.
The ego doesn't know the real purpose of its spiritual quest.
However the aim of knowledge is to explain it very clearly.
And to understand it, it's to realize that the Self is pure consciousness.
But there is no true understanding without the experience of it.
Being already conscious, what's really the point of this experience?
Without it, the ego will never believe in it.
The most sacred truth is so simple that nobody could believe it.
Simple, of course!
How could it be otherwise?
The truth is for everybody.
7 / 22 / 2012
Practice of meditation
"When thoughts move in the silence like clouds in the sky, everything is peaceful in the middle of the storm."
Chinese poetry
9 / 23 / 2012
The most obvious logic :
"Those who seek must find."
"Am I an hallucination of myself?"
When practicing the Yoga of knowledge, you can sometimes really wonder if you still have some kind of reality. Does it mean that this Yoga makes people crazy? No, it’s an introspection which proves that "I exist", then which reveals that this "I" is not what really exist.
"So who am I?"
11 / 2 / 2012
Is it impossible or very difficult to understand?
How to be true in a world of hypocrisy?
By stopping to lie!
Nothing more.
The brain
The brain has 2 hemispheres :
- the left is for analytical thoughts
- the right is for creative thoughts
As far as intelligence is concerned, the size of the brain doesn’t matter.
But 20% of the oxygen you inhale will be used by the brain.
Enjoy a good walk in the nature.
There is nothing better to refresh your thoughts.
It’s good to know : it’s better to do it.
And when you walk in the silent space of consciousness,
it's really a practice of meditation.
"Who am I?"
Is the intent of a question like "Who am I?" to discover my true identity? Of course not! An identity will never be anything else than an identity obviously personal, as far as I’m personally concerned. My identity can only determine the person that I am, that is to say, a body and a brain gifted with multiple mental faculties. The intent of this question is simply to stop asking the question, to ask any questions, i.e. to stop the mind because each one of our thoughts always expresses in some way the question "Who am I?", "Who is the one that is thinking?", "Who really is the thinker who thinks to know or not to know, to be right or to be wrong?", "What is true nature of the one who is thinking?". If we don’t understand the intent of the question "Who am I?", the answer can only be "I am I", "I am myself", "I am", an answer which clearly doesn’t answer to any questions.
Owing to the fact that I am the person who inevitably determines my presence here and now, in space and time, I cannot expect a sensible answer to the question "Who am I?", which itself can only express the existence of a person, and in the present case, the person I represent physically and mentally. The question "Who am I?" therefore raises another question somehow more serious, the question "What am I? ", "What is my true nature?", because if I do not go beyond the fact that I am a person, that is to say, a body and a brain, the question "Who am I?" has no importance and doesn’t concern a spiritual quest.
"Sahaja Samadhi" determines a state which is referred to as natural, and to be more precise, it’s the natural state of consciousness, the natural state of being in itself, and one might even say the natural state of bliss. "Sahaja Samadhi" is the experience of "Sat-Chit-Ananda." It’s Brahman, the Divine. It’s also the Atman, the Self. But how does this affect me personally because I am obviously a person and not God? Hindus say that a person is not only a body and a brain. It’s what they call a Jivatman, a person deified or divine by the presence of the Self, the being and consciousness that this person embodies. Everyone, even the most wretched, incarnates the Divine because he or she’s conscious, because he or she is a conscious being and not only a person with a body and mind. Anybody determines the presence of being and consciousness, a presence that nobody really knows. The question "Who am I?" has no other intention than to make the person aware of this sacred presence which is "being, consciousness and bliss".
If you think it’s interesting, find it by yourself
Nothingness cannot generate anything.
There is obviously something at the origin.
And it’s obviously present here and now.
What is it?
Anything else is blablabla
If you really want to know the Self and look for it, you will find it.
Natural meditation
We practice spirituality by a continual meditation on the presence of consciousness. Anything else help to understand why, why to renounce to action, why to seek silence and peace inside ourself, why to learn to concentrate and stop thinking, why to look for solitary confinement and stillness. And once it’s understood, there is only the natural practice of meditation left because everything which helps to understand "why" is obviously not natural.
The Tao as a watercourse
Anything which requires too many efforts is absolutely useless in order to find your true nature, the natural state of the being you are. There is always better than running after yourself. Stop desiring and there you are.
1 / 29 / 2013
Rediscovering peace of mind
Peace of mind is the best state of mind.
There is no better meditation too.
But it’s very often too simple for a complicated mind.
Jnana Yoga
On the path of knowledge, you don’t need to believe in anything. You seek and see by yourself if it’s true. Belief and truth are very different.
The easiest is always the best
Stop commenting everything with endless thoughts by developing the power of attention. That’s an excellent and peaceful spiritual discipline that one can practice everywhere and everytime.
Problem, what problem?
If you think clearly of your problems, the renunciation of one's self is the only true solution. But unless you understand what really means renunciation of one’s self, the solution seems worse than the problem.
"Who am I?"
The more you try to free yourself from your egocentricity, the more you are a slave to it. So go to the end of your ego-trip otherwise it will be one more lie.
To stop thinking instead of listening to the absence of thought
The more we try not to think about something, the more we end up thinking about it.
The more we try to stop thinking, the more we think about everything and nothing.
It's called the ego's headache.
The reality of what is not a reality
"I know myself" means that I know the manifestations of my character, my psychology, my tastes, my qualities and weaknesses, my intelligence, my mind, my past, my body, my personality…, everything I have except what I am, so the question "Who am I?" which reveals of course that "I" itself is not a reality without the manifestations of what it owns. You just need to sit five minutes, to close your eyes and look for the reality of this "I" who cannot be in itself a reality and you will understand that "I know myself" is not true. It’s nevertheless the purpose of the Yoga of knowledge and this quest is called Vichara : self-inquiry, introspection, quest for the truth, bliss, being, pure consciousness, the Divine, etc.
The thinker doesn’t really exist
The practice of meditation reveals an extraordinary fact that every psychologists and psychoanalysts should know, the process of thinking could be impersonal, i.e. automatic when we stop to identify ourselves with it. This simply means that we have the power to be the thinker which expresses his or her thoughts or the observer of a mental process which doesn’t express anymore our own thoughts when the aim of meditation is only to watch them. It’s a fact that we have to experience by practicing meditation of mindfulness and insight if we want to truly understand the implications of it. And once understood, what a riddle! And it isn't by thinking that we can solve this riddle.
Some numbers which explain more than a long speech:
Researches in psychology and how works the brain show that we have about 60 000 thoughts everyday during our waking state, one thought per second, and that 95 % of these thoughts are repetitive and 80 % are negative. They also highlight that the subconscious mind (the unconscious for the Freudians who don’t accept the concept of subconscious) leads 95 % of our daily activities and that we are fully conscious of only 5 % of them.
This means that 95 % of our actions are carried out automatically without the intervention of 'I am doing this and that' and that 95 % of our thoughts are useless although we spend our day to think and always repeat more or less the same negative thoughts. In other words, we spend most of our time to do something and to think about something else in a repetitive and negative way.
The aim of spirituality and in particular meditation is to become fully aware of this fact and to change it in order to be free from the mind after having understood the uselessness of its functioning. We have to become aware of this fact by watching it and to understand the consequences of it before hoping to change the functioning of the mind or to suppress it, otherwise the personal identity 'I' will consider soon or late that this quest is insane and absolutely useless.
When it’s said that 5 % of our activities are truly carried out consciously, we can assume that thoughts and volition are at the origin of an action. But to what extend thoughts and will to act are not as spontaneous and automatic as all of our other thoughts and actions? How to be sure that we choose our thoughts and consequently our actions? "How can I decide before thinking what I’m going to think about?" Where does the impulsion to think about come from? Am I at the origin of this impulsion or is it the natural need to think which spontaneously expresses itself? This subject of meditation inevitably questions the so-called free will and the existence of the personal identity, the ego, the 'I' who thinks and decides what to do. And contrarily to what we could believe, it doesn’t deny the possibility of a creative thinking which distinguishes us without doubt from animals. It seems there are different ways to use the same mind.
2 / 11 / 2013
This is not a love song, this is not about well-being.
On the path of knowledge, abdication is not a solution. Only renunciation and introspection, Vairagya et Vichara, lead to Self-realization. Anyway, is it possible to conceive a spiritual quest without self-renunciation and the introspection which gives the means to know what the renunciation is all about? To know the truth, don’t we have to renounce to our dreams, lies and illusions? Spirituality is not a quest for well-being. It’s always a practice of renunciation. Be ready to loose at least your illusions.
Vairagya
If you understood that you are not the body and mind, it must become a fact that you permanently notice otherwise you didn’t understand the meaning of self-renunciation which is essential in order to realize the Self.
You can deny the authenticity of all your perceptions of the world or of what the mind manifests and even pretend that the entire universe is an illusion, but you will never be able to deny the authenticity of being conscious of them. The purpose of the Yoga of knowledge is to fix your attention on this fact and not to theorize on the existence or the non-existence of the reality in which you live.
Mouna
The best communication we can have with the Self is silence. In the past, it is said that the only prayer that God can hear is the silent prayer.
3 / 4 / 2013
Probably too simple and difficult
As Ramana Maharshi told and repeated during all his life, there is only one question truly worth to ask: "Who am I?"
Empty your bowl
All you can do is to empty your 'bowl'. But the filling of it with bliss won’t depend of your choice. And if you don’t empty it, it will of course never be refilled with bliss.
And if someone pretends that Self-realization means in fact there has never been a bowl, he should know that he’s speaking about Maha Samadhi (after death), not Sahaja Samadhi, the natural state of a person well alive who has a brain working like the one of anybody else.
Self-enquiry
To suffer and enjoy are very well known experiences that express the importance you give to yourself. But what’s the point of any kind of experiences if you don’t know the true nature ofthis egocentric entity who thinks to be so important, that is to say yourself. It’s by realizing what is their true existence that for thousands of years people free themselves from suffering and also pleasure.
3 / 21 / 2013
It’ s a wonderful thing
In a snap of fingers, sit in consciousness and see by yourself.
That’s meditation!
The best meditation is the one you can practice everywhere and at anytime.
The technology to realize the Self cannot change. The most basic means are Vairagya, renouncement or surrendering, and Vichara, self-inquiry, i.e. to look for in consciousness the answer to the question "Who am I?". Whatever is your spiritual practices, you will have soon or late to renounce and inquire into yourself. So why not to start directly with these practices? They are called the Yoga of knowledge.
Contemplation, the tip top
The ultimate purpose of life is contemplation.
What else could be left after the satisfaction of every desire..., their absence?
And to begin with the practice of contemplation, just sit.
Then do everything you like, but don't stop to contemplate because you are not anymore sitting.
Carry on the enlightenment.
What means a choice when you have no other choice than to choose
You have no other choice:
it’s the cult of the ego or the cult of consciousness.
It's up to you.
On spiritual practice
"Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today."
4 / 7 / 2013
"It’s easier to start than to finish."
Plaute
The logic of Karma
One of the uses of meditation is that it allows us to understand better our mistakes
and that not one of them was useless in order to arrive at this understanding.
Before to let it go, we have to know very well what we are letting go otherwise it’ s a mind trick.
"Trust yourself, and you will know how to live."
Goethe "Faust"
Self-inquiry
Could I exist without the mind telling me that I exist?
"Am I an hallucination of myself?"
After practicing self-inquiry, we can wonder if we are more than an illusion. Does it mean that this practice lead to madness? No, It’s an introspection which prove a priori that "I exist", then it reveals that this "I" is not really what I am. So the question "What am I?"
4 / 11 / 2013
Self-inquiry, Vichara
The one who negates everything will never be able to negate himself or herself. It’s in this self-consciousness that he or she realizes the supreme Self.
It’s maybe not what you expected, but it’s worth to know
Meditation and Self-inquiry show us that it’s easier to blame others and claim to be the victim.
Then what? Is it going to solve our problems or make them worse?
And to make the ego responsible of our problems is not going to help either.
Goodness is still a spiritual path
Altruism is always based on a search for personal interest. So what? When some people profit from our egocentricity, it’s not a problem. It’s always better than selfishness.
4 / 18 / 2013
Every day is a new day
Never take anything for granted in spiritual life because it’s all about the mind. This intangible and mental universe is far too sensitive and powerful to be mastered. We can only play with it knowing that we will only have to loose in order to win. This is the rule.
Natural meditation
Watch it appearing and let it disappearing by itself.
Let it go!
5 / 12 / 2013
Reality of meditation as it is
Face your own demons and they will be scare of you.
Immanent presence
The problem with the divine presence of pure consciousness is, as Paul Valery wrote : "What looks like nothing doesn’t exist."
So how to discover it?
By seeking nothing or what looks like nothing!
5 / 31 / 2013
It happens in our daily life
We can progress in our spiritual practices.
And we only progress spiritually in our ordinary life.
You got to step out and start walking
The Dharma is a path for walking on and not for sitting on a bench to watch others passing by.
You won’t find the substance in the appearances
If you look for the Self, don’t look for it where it isn’t.
Don’t look for God in the creation.
Don’t look for consciousness in what you perceive.
Don't look for being outside yourself.
6 / 4 / 2013
"Be still and know that I am God." Psalm 46.10
In other words : "Quieten the mind in order to make it still and silent, and see by yourself that I'm the Divine, being, consciousness and bliss." It's just a cultural difference.
"Carpe Diem"
Nothing new under the sky.
The pendulum still swings both ways
When I say "I", you agree that it’s nothing more than a word and a concept.
So why isn’t it for you?
6 / 16 / 2013
Highly metaphysical question:
Will your spiritual liberation help the plastic bag that you find on your way to go back by itself in the garbage can where it should be?
Without Dharma, a just and correct path, Self-realization doesn’t have the slightest value. This realization is impersonal only insofar as it reveals the absence of self-identity, that is to say the ego. But be sure if you realize that your true nature is an ocean of bliss, it will not affect the life of your neighbor, the cat crossing the street or the morning dew in the middle of the Amazon. On the other hand, the Dharma will include everything you encounter in your life, the entire universe, the one in which you really live. And it’s on the same Dharma that you will experience a just and correct liberation.
With words, you can prove anything you want if you know how to play with them. With your doings, it will be quite different. If self-realization allows you to discover that you are not the body and the mind, know however that the person you embody will go on living. Without the person's body, no liberation or realization is possible. And without Dharma, your life won’t be worth more than that the one of a person who ignores his or her true divine nature. Without ethics, life is worth nothing. And finally one can really wander if the Dharma wouldn’t be in fact more important than this so-called spiritual liberation.
A message from a very famous Western Guru to those who think that doctrines and spiritual practices which lead to liberation only exacerbate the problem they address by reinforcing the idea that the illusory self is able to be free from bondage and suffering.
"But here I am…, Mr. Spiritual.
And in my own death,
I didn’t, I didn’t, I didn’t…,
I didn’t orient towards the spirit.
It shows that I have some work to do."
Ram Dass speaking about his stroke in the beautiful movie "Fierce Grace" of Mickey Lemle (2001).
6 / 23 / 2013
Breathe
You never forget to breathe.
But you very rarely remember that you breathe.
It’s the same with the Self.
That’s why we practice Self-inquiry until we realize it.
8 / 7 / 2013
Watch it manifesting in the vastness of consciousness, but don't touch it
Meditation is not a fight with yourself, with your mind, thoughts, emotions or sensations,
with your past and the future,
with what you are and what you should be.
It’s simply to watch anything happening in the mind and the body,
then going, coming and leaving.
When nothing comes, nothing needs to go either.
And consciousness is as it is.
This is the path of freedom and peace in the middle of the hellish mind.
Let it come is the expression of kindness, love and compassion.
Let it go is the mean to forgive.
Who thinks that spiritual practices are useless? The ego?
Unless to be very lucky, you have to practice meditation in order to experience consciousness as it is, vast and blissful. Not one spiritual practice is useless if you look for the truth.
8 / 8 / 2013
"God helps those who help themselves"
Æsope’s Fables
Jnana, Bakti and Karma, there is obviously only one Yoga
If "non-duality" means among other things "no difference, it’s quite clear that Self-inquiry, renouncement, love, compassion and selfless actions cannot be separated.
Choose what you prefer
It’s your problem
and it will never be the problem of others.
Happy and peaceful?
After all, why not!
It’s nothing more than a state of mind among many others.
So better to choose this one!
Loving kindness is good for everybody
There is no small gesture of goodwill.
Every action has many consequences.
But the bad ones too!
Those who think to be beyond good and bad should think about.
8 / 22 / 2013
Good luck with neo Advaita more pseudo than absolutist
If after many years of spiritual quest you still are at the same point, know that it's never to late to go back to the basics and a traditional system because you obviously get lost in the teaching of a charlatan. And with buffoons who think to be no one, nowhere and where nothing ever happens and who teach that every spiritual practices are useless, you might recede maybe not far from the Big Bang but surely to the border of stupidity.
Challenge the ego to see what you really are, the ego or something else?
The ego hates disciplines.
That's why there are many disciplines in spiritual life in order to challenge what he thinks to be freedom which in fact is only the hidden expression of his sufferings.
We do what we can as long as we can
You practice with your body and your mind, with what you are. Meditation is not a competition. Some can go for a retreat of many years and practice 14 hours a day. Others sit and meditate only 20 minutes every evening. It simply doesn't matter. Some go in a cave far away in the mountains to meditate and only think about their city life. Others meditate in the city and stop thinking to enjoy bliss. Bliss and eternity are one. If you can enjoy bliss during a minute, it will still be the minute of eternity, nothing less than an eternal moment.
8 / 30 / 2013
More simple than thinking
Any perception is associated to a sensation.
Watch the conscious space where it happens
before becoming a thought.
Be a seeker,
never the finder.
10 / 3 / 2013
Only one Yoga
Everybody lives with a brain, a heart and a body. So why to separate Jnana, Bakti and Karma Yoga? Let us celebrate life as a Yoga if we really are on a spiritual path.
The same applies with the practice of sitting and dynamic meditation. As for Dharma, this is the very foundation of any spiritual quest.
Without Dharma, there is no spirituality; our practices become nothing more than an entertainment, an ego-trip which is not going to help in the long run, but which soon or late will lead to an existential emptiness even worse than the one which initiated our spiritual quest.
Positive vibration and not positivism
If you have a spiritual life, you have no time to indulge in bad moods and psychological problems because you always have something more interesting to do than losing your time with this kind of mental manifestations. You may enjoy watching them in a peaceful state of bliss for instance.
May peace and truth prevail on earth.
Somewhere else
When you realize that there is absolutely nothing interesting to find in the mind, usually after a lot of practice of meditation, you start seeking somewhere else and that’s the very purpose of meditation.
But where precisely? In this incredibly vast conscious space which is not strictly speaking the mind, but which makes possible to know its manifestations.
One has to practice meditation and watch carefully in order to really understand what "somewhere else" means in a spiritual context because, as a matter of fact, this "space somewhere else" is closer to you that you own eyes.
10 / 8 / 2013
Just watching
We can only subdue the mind with a much stronger power.
And there is nothing stronger than emptiness, the complete absence of control and resistance.
The attention is this amazing power of emptiness; no thought and no emotion are able to stand it.
It’s only necessary to watch attentively the manifestations of the mind without trying to fight them.
Then it’s amazing to see them disappearing instantly without letting a trace.
What is left is a silent attention in direct touch with the vastness of pure consciousness.
Ockham's razor
The "Ockham's razor" is a principle of philosophical thinking which states that, among competing hypotheses, the hypothesis with the fewest assumptions should be the most plausible. Also called "principle of simplicity", "principle of parsimony" or "principle of economy", this system of reasoning considers in other terms that it always better to choose the most simple and obvious. It’s very useful to solve a problem or to keep logical thinking when, for instance, we get lost in spiritual, metaphysical or scientific thoughts which sometimes could go far beyond common sense. There are today many examples in the domain of spirituality concerning non-duality and popularization of quantum physics.
To apply this principle when you are looking for a solution in a critical situation, start by asking the right questions and surely you will get the right answers.
10 / 24 / 2013
Take it easy
"Every step you take towards Krishna, Krishna takes 10 steps towards you."
At this speed, the encounter should be shocking if I understood correctly.
Don’t run on the path; you never know.
Better to sit down, meditate and just step forward into consciousness.
There you are in any case.
"All things come to those who wait"
Meditation is also the art of being endlessly patient,
so much so that, at the end, you don't wait for anything.
You only enjoy the ride because meditation is the most subtle pleasure for the mind.
What did you expect?
A cheap definition of enlightenment
"Everybody is already enlightened. Now, go in peace."
Yes sure, but who really can do it?
12 / 8 / 2013
Love and compassion
Why to emphasize so much the importance of love in Christianity?
Why to pay particular importance to compassion in Buddhism?
Would it be because Jesus and Buddha were especially sentimental
or because they understood that in fact it’s the only solution
whatever happens?
The mind is the foundation of suffering
If you are not able to control your mind,
be sure that someone will do it for you,
but also for his or her own interest and not yours.
12 / 19 / 2013
It’s all in your mind
The good news is that you can change it at will.
But "mindfulness", "Sati" as Buddhists call it, is even better
because you don’t have to change anything.
And it quickly becomes a state of mind extremely pleasant
because much more natural than thinking all the time.
And this "mindfulness" doesn't prevent us to think too.
There is no secret,
but only practice.
If
With a lot of 'if', it could be of course very different
and only in our imagination.
But what we have now is precisely what we need…
to carry on the quest.
Just what we need!
Mind versus consciousness
The true war is against consciousness.
Realize what consciousness is
and the war is over.
Alone
You must be absolutely alone in order to know the truth.
That’s as much frightening as death.
Then, it’s okay!
The big break
Everybody needs a break.
Meditation is this ultimate break.
And before anything else, it’s a state of complete relaxation.
After and only if necessary, we can seek who is relaxing.
Always first thing first.
And if it becomes tedious to relax,
it’s only because we are not relaxing,
but thinking about what it should be.
To meditate and to think that "I" meditate is not quite the same.
Egocentrism
Egocentrism is the problem.
But you can use the problem to free yourself from egocentrism.
That’s the purpose of self-inquiry, Vichara.
12 / 23 / 2013
Forgiveness
The practice of forgiveness is the only way to free yourself from past Karma.
As one ex-prisoner of war said when visiting a fellow survivor:
"Have you forgiven those who imprison you yet?"
The survivor said: "No, I haven’t. Never!"
So the first one said: "Then somehow, they still have you in prison. Don’t they?"
This is an interesting story told by Jack Kornfield in some of his teachings. Jack Kornfield is one of the first teachers to have introduced Theravada Buddhism in the West. He’s the author of many good books such "After the Ecstasy, the Laundry".
Consciousness has never changed since the beginning of the Creation
Do you think that it’s easy to practice meditation after spending a day lying, stealing or killing?
If you think that it would be pretty difficult, ask yourself why? What's the problem?
There is something very simple and important to understand, something we never think about.
Simple and efficient, nothing more, but pretty much less
In order to realize the Self, you must first be a person,
just an ordinary human being.
Any problem with that?
Oh yes, and it's just the beginning!
Just meditation
You can always come back to the center of awareness and stay there,
and stay there perfectly aware and peaceful.
This is a perfect meditation as long as it lasts.
Anywhere, anytime.
Lux ex tenebris
Don’t seek the sun at night.
Enjoy it during daytime.
1 / 5 / 2014
Peaceful
We can only get stronger by finding a greater stability in our psychological life.
Of course, but what does it mean practically? How to get this psychological balance which in fact determines almost everything good happening in our life?
We simply have to stop thinking anywhere at any moment in order to be fully aware of this absence of thought, then fully aware of whatever comes, thoughts included.
It’s a practice and a training which doesn’t prevent sitting meditation. On the contrary, it’s one of its most useful consequences.
"Never despair. Let infuse more."
Henri Michaux
1 / 9 / 2014
Entertainment !
The purpose of a Satsang is to answer questions in order to facilitate and encourage the practice of a spiritual discipline. It’s not an intellectual entertainment for Saturday afternoon.
Maybe sometimes
Except for sitting in Satsang with the master, Papaji said that no other practice were necessary in order to be liberated.
And me, I tell you: "Good luck!"
3 / 18 / 2014
Karma
"What goes around comes around."
Useless to complain!
There is always something better to do.
But only if you know what to do.
And with gurus who teach that spiritual disciplines are useless,
guess what?
4 / 20 / 2014
Beyond
When pleasure is not enough, what do we do?
Compassion
What’s beautiful with compassion is that we cannot react instinctively.
We have to think and try to understand,
just a little in order to make sure that we still are human.
6 / 23 / 2014
To do in order to simply be and so to "realize" it
Every Yoga is a Karma, a good action.
Vichara is simply the exploration of being as such.
"Being" is the ultimate purpose of a spiritual quest.
But most of the time, in order to simply be fully conscious of it
and realize what it really means, we have to do a lot.
An injunction such as "Be as you are" has no power
unless we experience the origin of being
and because our true nature cannot be compared
with what we are used to know about ourselves,
i.e. the body and the mind.
It’s truly another dimension.
Inquiry or just to be
In Self-inquiry, the subject who is supposed to introspect him or herself and discover it's true nature is always becoming an object of contemplation, some kind of manifestation.
So we always have to come back to the subject which again will inevitably become a new object of contemplation
until we understand that there is no subject and object in the fact of being as such or in other words in the Self.
So the true practice of Vichara is in fact only being and exploring what it is.
But what this being truly is?
We don’t know.
That’s why we practice Self-inquiry and how the subject always becomes a new object.
And so on as long as it's necessary to understand the true power of the mind.
Morality blues: "Take it easy and enjoy the show, the performance of yourself until you realize what the power of the mind really is." This Self-inquiry is a obviously a mind game because the mind cannot look at itself.
But it can stop.
And in order to stop, we have to realize who practices this Self-inquiry?
The "I" and "me", that is to say the ego, or consciousness itself?
Hello!
During the practice of meditation, just don’t forget that you are practicing meditation.
It’s so easy to be carried away by thoughts.
The witness
You cannot watch the source of the power which is watching.
You only need to be still and see.
The path itself is already liberation
Should our priority in life be the quest for liberation or more precisely Self-Realization, the term liberation being far too subjective to understand what really means "non-duality"?
Yes of course! There is absolutely no doubt once you understood that life is sooner or later synonym of suffering.
But this quest can only happen if you tread the path of righteousness and understand the necessity of a Dharma otherwise it’s nothing more than a new dream and especially an egocentric quest leading to always more suffering.
7 / 13 / 2014
Verb
Mathematics is obsolete beyond the technical nature of existence.
We have to study the language, the true code.
We learn by feeling sensations and emotions.
Words awaken sensations and emotions.
But numbers are only dead letters.
Mantra are love sentences.
Equations are insensitive tools.
They were used to say that at the beginning was the verb
and not a mathematical calculation.
9 / 6 / 2014
Doing nothing is really not the path of enlightenment
"Be the change that you want to see in the world."
Mahatma Gandhi
Realization
To look for consciousness inside the mind is like exploring the outside world in order to find the space which contains it.
If you don’t discover consciousness without looking for it, it will be impossible to find it.
10 / 9 / 2014
Extreme
To really live on the edge, watch constantly the mind.
And just on the borderline, there is the emotion.
10 / 25 / 2014
Nothing to lose
Some people don’t understand very well what "the axis of signification" mentioned in my book is.
So let us take an example in order to better get the meaning of this concept. It’s very easy, sometimes and especially when we are tired, to read some pages of a book without understanding one word. Reading becomes an automatic functioning although it requires a concentration of the attention. Without this "axis of signification", the attention can be brought on reading itself but have no meaning.
The same is true of thinking. The mind can talk with itself, what it does most of the time, become extremely tiresome, not to say quite painful, irrational, excessive or aberrant, if not sometimes insane. Just imagine if we could not walk in the street without expressing verbally every thought which crosses our mind; nobody would dare anymore to go outside.
Consequently with all these crazy thoughts, we can arrive to the point of living in a world without meaning. So where is this "axis of signification" which prevents us to live with thoughts unrelated to any kind of reality ? Inside ourselves without any doubt. But how to find it in order to know who we truly are and in what world we really live ? By developing the power of attention and meditation, dynamic and passive, but also by practicing insight and the cult of tranquility, Vichara and Vairagya. What else could we have in order not to be carried away by the power of the mind ? Neuroleptics ? Autosuggestion ? Drugs ? We know it doesn’t work on a middle and long term basis.
To understand what a spiritual quest is, we have to practice and not only think about it. Thinking reaches very quickly its limits even for very smart people. Beyond, we are alone with the power of consciousness. And it’s there the true party begins and the cosmic play becomes divine.
Are we not like children who play in a beautiful garden to which they understand nothing or very little ?
No thoughts
Why silence of the mind doesn’t seem natural although it’s so sweet and peaceful ?
What pleasure do we have in constantly thinking ?
But is it really a pleasure or a necessity ?
It seems that it’s a need as breathing.
So if it’s a vital need, what is disappearing when we stop thinking ?
The mind itself or only thoughts ?
This question should concern those who practice meditation in order to understand the difference between Dhyana and Vichara, the quest for emptiness and Self-inquiry.
12 / 3 / 2014
Becoming very thirsty and not knowing why
Don’t mistake "positive thinking" for "positive discrimination".
"Positive thinking" as it’s taught today by so-called spiritual guides is a complete absence of critical thinking, some kind of a systematic stupefying effect also called brain washing.
"Positive discrimination", essential principle of any quest for truth, Advaita Vedanta and practice of the Yoga of knowledge, as it has always been taught since time immemorial and also called the "sword of discrimination", determine an action of the mind to recognize between what is true and what is illusory, or in other terms, an intelligence able to watch carefully, evaluate, criticize and judge.
"Positive thinking" is sheer stupidity.
"Positive discrimination" is a process to improve oneself and realize a truth, including the ultimate truth, the Self.
It’s obviously better to see our glass half full than half empty, but to see it full when it’s empty is surely the best way to die of thirst.
2 / 5 / 2015
Ego and mind
"What if a machine can only defeat a machine ?"
In the movie "The Imitation Game" of Morten Tyldum
The power of love
What is love, pure love, divine love, devotion… ?
Enjoy it and you will know it without any explanation :
"Lingashtakam"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMaeHLVu6IM
Love
I love God.
God is love.
In other words, I love love.
Is it nonsense ? To love love ? The love of love ?
No, I’m not speaking about "love of love" or "Love love".
I say "I love love".
This claim means my personal love is attracted to the impersonal love that is God.
5 / 1 / 2015
Power
There is no power without fighting for.
So "the power of now" is truly nonsense
instead of simply living our life as it is.
But some clever people will tell that’s what this is all about
despite the fact that it cannot be taught and really be what this is all about.
Who sincerely can live and think somewhere else than now ?
Power cannot be about what we already are and live.
Power is always about what we don’t have and are not,
otherwise what would be the point of it ?
Power is always in the process of realization.
It’s never a realization
and even less the realization of now that doesn’t need any power to be...
quite obviously here and now !
Right ?
If we understand the meaning of concepts such as "right", "correct" and consequently "noble" and "sacred", we already know everything about spirituality and its real purpose.
That’s all we need to know, but we may study and practice a lot before understanding what these words really means. And life itself will always be there to teach us and challenge our understanding. You can be absolutely sure of that.
This noble path of righteousness challenges our individual and universal nature ; it determines a search for balance between survival and altruism, instinct of preservation and intelligence based on experiences, our human nature and its evolution, mind and consciousness.
6 / 2 / 2015
"The true birthplace is that wherein for the first time one looks intelligently upon oneself."
Marguerite Yourcenar.
"The world hates change, yet it is the only thing that has brought progress."
Charles Kettering
True power and free will
Free will resides in the power of bringing attention on a mental process and therefore being able to suddenly control it.
It’s quite easy to verify with the ordinary thought process. As soon as we attentively watch it running by itself, it stops and we can start having completely different thoughts, and thus acting differently too.
But who is this "we" or "I" who seems controlling the power of attention ? It’s not the body, and it’s not the mind. It’s something much more alive, alert and smart : self-consciousness, the individual consciousness that separates us from each others.
This self-consciousness is not the universal and pure consciousness, but its reflection on the intellect acting as the power of attention. It’s the individual and personal faculty that can radically change the life of a person. It’s even the only true faculty able to realize the Self and awakened the mind to spirituality. It doesn't obviously exclude the faculties of heart.
7 / 5 / 2015
Peace of mind or mind in a peaceful state
Is there anything more precious than peace of mind or in other words, just having the mind in a peaceful state ?
By peace of mind, I don’t mean something extraordinary like bliss, ecstasy, the absence of all mental manifestations, the experience of a supernatural state also called 'no-mind state', spiritual awakening, enlightenment, spiritual liberation, etc. I simply mean a state of mind that everybody has already experienced in the past without doing anything remarkable…, and even without searching for it (a quite important point about spiritual inquiry).
For some people, there are maybe more important things than this peace of mind for the time being at least, but on a long run, everyone will agree, I guess, that this peace inside oneself is the most precious state we can experience, whatever the situations we have to deal with, because somehow, and even without really understanding why, this state reveals that everything is perfect and harmonious. So the real problem is to discover how to achieve this peace of mind anywhere and at any time. Does it depend of our material life ? The relationship we have with others ? Our personal and very private life ? Our thoughts, actions, intelligence, behaviors, set of beliefs, spirituality, ethic, job, bank account, friends, pets, leisure time, bed, car, shoes, gurus, the music we listen to, the food we eat… ?
It’s a question that we should ask ourselves in order to find an answer, a very 'personal' answer, because we obviously don’t have the same life, needs, desires and aspirations. But whatever our life or Karma are, contentment and peace inside ourselves should be about the same state of mind for everybody. There is nothing more to understand, for instance, that the satisfaction of a desire is a release, the end of a tension in the mind for you, me and anybody else. So the real question is how to achieve such a peace if we already experience it ? Apart from that question, there is of course a lot of intellectual blah blah blah that could be interesting to find the answer – that’s how the mind works. Is that speech with oneself or others going to help ? Maybe…, who knows ? If we understand that’s the mind… and nobody else, that is searching for a peaceful state, and not "me" or "I" separated from it, it might help a lot and at last, our spiritual quest could make sense.
But the first thing coming in the mind, at the very least mine, and only after having clearly understood that that this 'mine' imply a relation between subject and object "that are not separated from each other", is quite simple : let us 'sit'…, then watch peacefully what the answer to this question could be… without too much mental exertion. If we already lived this peace of mind sometime in the past, and we obviously did, we should know the answer to this question. A complicated answer to a simple question doesn’t make sense. The answer must be obvious, or there is none. It could be so simple that in fact, sitting and watching could be enough. Do you see what I mean ? The mind, that is to say 'I' and 'me', will always look for an intellectual answer to what is not intellectual. Peace of mind is a state that has absolutely no relation with thinking if we try to experience it as it is. On the other hand, this state of mind can give rise to another way of thinking. One doesn’t preclude the other !
9 / 11 / 2015
Upside down spirituality
In the past, before to start practicing any spiritual disciplines and look for mystical experiences, grace from God, liberation or Self-realization, everyone without exception was taught to be good, to cultivate a Dharma of good behavior and good thinking, to purify the mind and the heart, to respect a social and moral code such as Yama and Niyama, the basics of any Yoga and spiritual disciplines, because that was and still is the foundation of spirituality and every spiritual quest.
But now we start by the end, the so-called awakening or liberation, and that’s it…, even without any practice, but only by going to a Satsang and very soon, only by connecting a webinar on the Internet because it’s cheaper and especially more profitable … for the Neo gurus. I guess we are so busy that we cannot lose our time with traditional practices and have to go right to the essential.
Yes sure, but the essential of what ? Of the stupidity to believe that we can free ourselves from suffering just by listening to an idiot who tells us that we are already enlightened and liberated ?
Suffering is the true problem…, and it has never been about the ignorance of being already enlightened. If such knowledge was enough, there would be no suffering at all. Just think about it after listening to any Satsang where someone stuffed your head with very cute fairy tales for adults completely out of any reality.
6 / 14 / 2016
Surfing
A surfer doesn’t need to go in Heaven to learn how to surf.
He only has to start with a small wave, then a bigger one and a bigger one…
And so on until the surfer can play with every wave.
There is no teaching in Heaven, but only bliss making you stupid !
Get out of your cloud of awakening if you want to see the wave coming.
You will see it anyway, but maybe not standing and playing with it.
Surfing might quickly become diving, but without any gear
and knowledge of how to swim very deep !
7 / 5 / 2016
Renoucement
Without self-abnegation (Vairagya), meditative introspection (Vichara) is meaningless because it is exclusive and most of all the expression of a desire, which as all other desires is at the origin of suffering in general.
Such a spiritual practice would be nothing more than an ego-trip in search of a purely egoistical and unrealistic transcendental experience, exactly what it has become now in Neo Advaita, a big carrot at the end of a so-called "Direct Path", so direct than it is supposed to stop where it starts.
The search for spiritual liberation or awakening in the form of non ordinary experience can only be nonsense.
What remains then ? Wisdom, bliss, non-duality, Dharma and Tao, the only true spiritual liberation, the one which frees from desire, greed, hypocrisy, selfishness, silly pretension, arrogance and self-image…, suffering in a word !
5 / 5 / 2017
Meditation beyond space and time
If you really want to know and experience
if “being as such” is beyond space and especially time,
you don't need more than watching very carefully
that you are not feeling in any way impatient,
nothing more and indeed nothing extraordinary.
"Watching and realizing" are the secret you are searching.
Don't look for any experiences beyond your ordinary life.
That's what I think “here and now” truly means.
Impatience is an “ego-trap”, which enhance self-importance.
The complete absence of impatience is just “being as such”,
and strangely enough, it reveals also the complete absence of thoughts.
Draw any conclusions you like !
Meditative question
"What has a real value in my life? "
This is a question we should ask every day when waking up
and whose echo should be preserved all day long.
I think it could be summed up to very little,
so little that we could almost say "nothing".
But it is in this nothing that we could also discover the true value of life.
Don't try to understand, it's only about meditation : "being".
9 / 1 / 2018
"He who dies with the most toys wins…,"
but wins what…, nobody would really want to know
Everyone knows the mountains of material stuff we all love to accumulate in our drawers and especially in our supreme Lego, the so-called private property that most of us can only rent or dream of. But what about all the much less material toys we still like to pile up in our defensive tower made of ivory, our thoughts, definitions, belief systems, self-esteem, self-images, self-centeredness, inner demons, mind-stuff, ego-trips, I am this, I am that, but for nothing in the world I would like to be this or that, etc. ?
If we really want to talk about spiritual liberation, it may well be possible that it starts with a good cleaning up at home with a very powerful vacuum cleaner. And there we face instantly a new and bigger problem. The more we get rid of our mental garbage at the municipal dump, which is just as mental and dirty as our own rubbish, the more we can actually feel like throwing our existential waste in a place that is nowhere else than right up in our home, the very same mind that is obviously ours.
This dirty comment for the least smelly might actually be about renunciation and non-attachment to ourselves, the only real stripper used for millennium. I don’t really know, but we will have somehow to make sense out of it… and make it clean ! That will be the challenge of all our life if we do choose to accept this impossible mission, which is not unattainable too.
11/5/2018
No meditation without concentration
Nobody practices Mindfulness, a state of self-awareness or reflected consciousness, for the sake of mindfulness itself, which in fact is nothing but a state of mind, i.e. a specific mental modality that everyone can willingly experience for a very short time. There is always and necessarily an object of concentration in that type of practice of meditation, most of the time that on breathing, and that’s why it’s usually called Mindfulness of breathing, or in other words « Self-awareness with concentration on the breath".
If anyone could really practice Mindfulness without effort and a technique of concentration, but only for the pleasure of being constantly immersed in a fully conscious state completely detached from all mental manifestations, sensation, emotions and other phenomenon, that person would already be a Buddha, that is to say free from all attachment, and of course, he or she would not need to meditate or practice other spiritual disciplines.
The cessation of thought is what first determines the practice of meditation, the second being the cessation of all mental fluctuation : sensation, emotion, ecstasy or other non-ordinary states, truly speaking the cessation of any possible experiences. And as everyone can easily notice without even practicing meditation, it’s almost impossible to stop thinking for a while without focusing the attention on an object of concentration.
The object of concentration itself is not the point of the practice of meditation, but it is indispensable to go beyond the cessation of thought. In other words, it remains present even when it becomes easy to stop thinking throughout the session of meditation because we don’t seek in fact a particular state of mind, but the total absence of any experience of conditioned states that would inevitably awaken some mental fluctuations. That very peculiar state of mind is called Mindfulness or unconditioned self-awareness.
The great difficulty in the practice of meditation is therefore in the first place the cessation of thought. The other difficulties will be rather to not give oneself up to the fascinating pleasures of meditating and interrupting the ordinary thinking process. And to overcome this initial difficulty, it’s important contrary to understand contrary what Neo gurus teach today that it is essential to fix one's attention on an object of concentration, but also and especially to totally relax the mind during that concentration.
This may seem contradictory because concentration in principle requires a constant and very intense effort and relaxation supposes the total absence of effort and concentration. But when we clearly understand that it’s absolutely impossible to practice a mental concentration for a certain length of time without relaxing the very same mind, it’s not anymore necessary to try to stop thinking because that the thought process stops instantly without the slightest effort. These two principles are not contradictory, but complementary, and moreover, one doesn’t go without the other. In order to truly understand this apparent incompatibility of principles, we only need to practice. In other words, it's up to you to experience it because it’s very simple and self-evident.
One last word on the practice of meditation. Even if you only practice 20 minutes a day and, of course, every day since it’s the prerequisite for any spiritual practice, and your session of meditation becomes the best time of your day, a « quality time » as some would say, you are definitely treading on an excellent spiritual path.
A discipline or spiritual life in general are not and above all should not become frustrating, but exactly the opposite, something we cannot figure out without living it. In regard to the practice of meditation when it is well understood, it’s a moment of contemplation, admiration, sublimation, and quite relaxing, of course. Those who indulge in their suffering as part of their spiritual practice don’t realize what they are really doing, but perhaps that’s what they need in order not to sink into an existential void even worse – « I suffer therefore I am ».
Everyone's taste is different, the Karma of others too. And it’s impossible to understand it since it’s already very difficult to understand our own. The practice of meditation is an extraordinary spiritual path, and, very fortunately, there are others.
12 / 1 / 2018
Nothing else
Whatever the spiritual experience, as authentic, sublime and divine as it could be, it will never be anything more than an experience, and moreover an extraordinary experience, nothing more than the manifestation of an amazing phenomenon, and then unfortunately its disappearance, i.e. the object of a perception revealing in fact absolutely nothing on the subject who perceives it, the so-called "witness" who is really aware and conscious of it, and even less about the true nature of the very fact of being conscious, the only real purpose of a true spiritual quest, Self-realization, enlightenment, liberation, absolute knowledge, the truth, the end of suffering, etc.
In other words, the quest for liberation and Self-realization is the perfect antithesis of mysticism. No experience has any importance and to make the most authentic spiritual quest even worse, as long as there are experiences, liberation, perfect peace of mind and the end of delusion will be an utopia, a big dream and a hallucination.
During Self-inquiry, we must always come back to ourselves until there is nothing to perceive, and please, without going into a trance. On the contrary, we have to keep perfectly natural, at the very opposite of any non-ordinary states and experiences. The natural state of being purely conscious cannot and should not be ecstatic, not even unknown since it’s, of course, already there in every ordinary and non-ordinary state and experience. And it’s so natural that we will truly wonder why so much trouble to realize it.
Simplicity will never be easy for what is complicated. And so that’s how the ego ship sails into an oceanic mind of uncertainty, incredible complications, and finally misunderstanding and confusion, that is to say pure ignorance.
Now, have a good realization !