The human mind is an extraordinary tool, especially when it is used wisely. However, most of humanity has given over their autonomy to this conceptualizing organ. It is the tool that has been primarily responsible for raising humans to be the apex species on this planet and it is also the capacity that has caused us (and other earthly creatures) to suffer greatly. Iti is a useful tool for survival on a personal level, but when multiplied by 8 billion, it counter-productively threatens our survival as a species. Why? Although there are an almost infinite number of causes when we try to ask "why" questions, there does seem to be an enticement to control our existence by figuring out everything, trying to manage everything, and by seeking the rewards that life seems to offer by virtue of acquisition. Life does have that alluring quality to it and we seem to want to drink deeply of it. However, in the drinking deeply, we muddy the water - almost like jumping into the pond to get a drink. Best wishes.

Thank you for your very kind comment, Ebrahim. Perhaps some people will find these pointers useful. I'm good with that. Everyone has their own path that will unfold in their own utterly unique way. I'm in no position to say it should be different. When I look back on my own journey, it could easily be said that many false starts were made, detours taken and time wasted, but now, in retrospect, it all seems to have been somehow necessary.

Even when things go our way, it is preferable to receive the gift with gratitude rather than believing the Life has succumbed to our personal willpower.

You are very welcome.

He might be talking about attachment to the idea of being always right and not about disagreements of points of view that are legitimate and are actually helpful .

Sounds like this hypothetical doctor lacked the courage to act when needed. Since all pointers are only ever relatively true, at best, and none are absolutely true, it's best to use them when helpful and not when they aren't. Being right is problematic if that is the goal no matter what the facts. Being right is in defense of the ego. Ideally, if I were on the table, I would want my team of surgeons to be responding to circumstances and not out of an egoic need to be right.

I'm glad that it resonated for you. Best wishes.

Yes, there is plenty of information about awakening now available. As with many things, this is a double-edged sword. We no longer have to find a cave in the Himalayas to get some pointers about Truth, but we do have to use our own discretion to sort through all the various (and often conflicting) information out there. So, the burden is on the seeker to find their way. This requires basic spiritual virtues like self-honesty, curiosity, and some courage. It also requires considerable effort (until it doesn't). And it requires the seeker to want to know what is really true versus just wanting to feel better. And you are right: having a moment of clear seeing is not enlightenment; it is a moment of clear seeing when everything appears obvious. (And of course, an adopted groovy, New-Agey belief doesn't change anything of substance.) Unless there is a deep commitment to plumbing the depths of this Life experience, there will not be the "gravitational field" to hold the realization in an abiding, effortless way.

My pleasure!

We may point the fingers of blame, but the only person we have any real chance of changing is ourselves. When we discover who we truly are, perhaps we can be of service.

Yes, it seems so obvious once seen for oneself that it is puzzling that it is not as obvious to everyone. But it is so contrary to everything that we were taught and what mainstream culture assumes that it is clear only in retrospect. And it seems that many (not all) highly intelligent people are less inclined to consider it; or, they may like the trappings of it, but not the reality of it. Intelligence may actually be more of a barrier than a benefit. What we commonly take for intelligence is a knowingness about things and how to get things done. If we happen to be good at making our way in the world, there can be payoff in the form of wealth, comfort and mental security. If things are going our way, why rock the boat? It is often when our game plan for the evolution of our life's dreams fail to deliver that we become willing to consider other perspectives. It often a difficult divorce, severe illness, death of a loved one, loss of a career, addictions, or other shocks to our equilibrium that bring people to spirituality. Yes, perhaps past lives or karma can explain our tendency to be open to this spiritual path, but, in any event, we have to work with what we have. I like Byron Katie's take on karma: "Karma is just an unexplored belief." Until we have examined our conditioned nehavior, we tend to repeat it. Life is very generous in this regard: it will give us as many chances as needed to learn the lessons we need to learn. Since separation from Source is an illusion (it is not possible to be separate from the only thing that exists, we can only imagine that we are), relief from that illusion is a one-at-a-time change of perspective. Best wishes to you David.

@@donoakley I think a teacher of mine once said something like "If you are enjoying your dream keep dreaming, eventually we all wake up." 😉

Yes, eventually we all wake up. We can't avoid recognizing what we already are. For a very long time perhaps, but not forever.

My pleasure

Yes, of course, but it is also 100% dependent on our capacity to hear silence.

Great question! I agree that both words (as all words) have their limitations. I can understand Ramana's famous use of "Who am I?" as a self-inquiry. (Ramana never struck me as a trickster nor careless with words.) When people hear this inquiry tool, as you point out, this "I" is almost always assumed to be what we commonly take ourselves to be as a separate person; this sense of "me," the subject of our experience (and almost always also including the physicality of this body/mind). Ramana calls this sense the "self," which is the false self or the "little me." As you say, this false self uses its mental capacity to look for something it can obtain that it believes it lacks. But here's the surprising thing: when this inquiry is taken deeply, there is a shift of identity to (big "S") Self, which is (as it has always been) the true subject of our experience. There is still this subjectivity; it's just not personal. And we discover that this Self is not separate from that which appears within it. If we were to pursue the "what am I?" inquiry, we might first discover the empty nature of all this appearance (including these bodies) and then notice that within which all of it is appearing. The "what am I? question, having the downside that you point out, can lead us to look conceptually which is always directed outwardly. So, either "who" or "what" gets us to the same place ultimately once we get past the limitation of words. (I sometimes ask, "What is living this Life?, but that too can be misinterpreted as pointing to an external divine energy (a foreign hand in me as the puppet!). So, at the end of a long response, I don't have a better word to use than "who" or "what."

Ha! Great news. We miss what is there all along because it is not what we expect to find.

Yes, Bankei consistently pointed to one's Unborn nature, that is, this awake spaciousness that is not ever born into this world of form. No birth, no death.

Clearly, as these bodies and their organs deteriorate, we become less able to function through them. But the fundamental question is: Is awareness diminished? For example, when when the body feels tired, there is an awareness of feeling tired. When eyesight is failing, there is awareness of not being able to read fine print. And when we are in deep sleep we are not conscious of even having a body, but awareness remains to keep the body alive and to respond to the alarm clock. Yes, functionality diminishes, but awareness, not being of the world of form, remains.

Yes, in this culture particularly in the male gender, there is a prevalent attitude to want to fix everything. (I presume we aren't talking about plumbing.) While this can-do attitude may be preferable to apathy, it requires discretion. Byron Katie distinguishes between one's own business, other people's business and God's business. She suggests that the more we can stay in our own business, the better. When someone is going on about their sorrows, we can be empathetic and present to what they are saying without engaging in the story, that is, without helping to decide who is right, who is to blame, what someone else should do. We can simply be present for their expression of their experience: attentive but not interfering. Adyashanti said something very interesting about trying to relieve someone else's suffering. (We're talking about psychological suffering not physical suffering. If some needs immediate physical help, then obviously do what you can.) What he said can sound harsh when first heard. He recalled his teacher telling him when she first asked him to teach to be very cautious about taking away someone's suffering because it may be exactly what is needed to awaken. Harsh, yes, but true. Awakening to one's own essential beingness resolves the fundamental question of Life. Compared to the relief from that realization, whatever psychological suffering may have been needed to compel us to release our strangle-hold on personal self-identity is a relatively small price to pay. It is also useful to keep history in mind: there has perhaps been as much suffering that has been caused in the name of making the world a better place and insisting my view of the divine is the correct one than in all the wars, famines, plagues and murders combined. In this regard, the Hippocratic Oath is useful to remember: "First, do no harm." If we do act, an appropriate degree of humility is appropriate; we can only be of service to the degree of our own understanding. If we have not yet discovered our own essential beingness (True Nature, Unborn Self and so on), we will be limited to trying to fix things on the level of form, which is by its nature, transient. In response to this question, some spiritual teacher (I can't remember who) said, "Wake up first and then do whatever you love." Similarly, Jesus said, "Seek Ye first the Kingdom of Heaven and all else will be given." Best wishes.

Yes, that's about it.

What a relief to discover! Namaste.

Yes, just one thing can be known with certainty. Discover that and it is "game over." I correct myself, it is "game on." It is the end of seeking (from a sense of lack) yes, but it is the beginning of the true spiritual journey that has no end.

A fool perhaps. But intellectual?? Hardly.

If the statement that "no belief is true" is taken aboard as a concept, it has no value. No, actually it is worse than that: it creates a barrier to understanding. But if such a statement is received a pointer which may or may not turn out to be true if it is deeply investigated oneself, then it may have value.

@@donoakley If no 'beilef" is true, than how can it have any value at all?! Which also then begs the question, 'what is the value of the claim that 'No belief is true."? It seems to me the belief that 'no belief is true' cannot have any value at all - because it is not true - at least according to you. Moreover, 'understanding' is a claim of 'true belief'. To understand something is to know something accurately which is a belief. So in your epistemology 'understanding' is also a barrier. Ironically, in your view to 'understand' something is a barrier to understanding that 'no belief' is true.

We believe things that we don't know. All beliefs are concepts; they are not reality itself. They are concepts about reality and therefore at least one step removed from reality. Some beliefs may turn out to be more true than others, but none are absolutely true. So, if a person's intention is to discover that essential beingness that is living this life, it won't be found in belief. Realizing that limitation of he very nature of belief can save such a person an enormous amount of time.

@@donoakley It seems like your saying 'We all should believe that you can't find your being-ness through what you believe.' Moreover, since 'Some beliefs may turn out to be more true than others.' What is belief that you hold to be 'true' - that informs you that it is 'true enough' to be a belief 'that wouldn't be worth discovering. I hope by now you realize you can't hold to beliefs while simultaneously removing the foundations of your beliefs, Because you end up either refuting your own believes or dismissing them through skepticism. I actually think you might have a point but your words are too ambiguous and vague for me to be sure.

Thank you. Yes, this path is prone to complication.

Thank you Universe for everything. Yes, Gratitude is always appropriate!

Yes, grand events are very attractive to the mind. But awareness is equally present for all so-called ordinary events also. Our attention goes here and there, but we remain aware of wherever our attention pulls us. We may not often be aware of this capacity of awareness, but it is functioning perfectly well already.

As you know, the goal (if we can use such a term) in spirituality is to discover that there is no separate individual self that imagines itself to be the doer of their actions and the thinker of their thoughts; there is only Source (by whatever name). There is the realization of that ultimate truth and there is holding that conceptual understanding as a practice. Two different things. Ramana acknowledged that, in addition to the self-inquiry for which he is best known, holding the understanding that it is all the will of God also has the effect of diminishing and ultimately extinguishing the sense of a separate personal "me." Adyashanti also often talks about the practice of "allowing everything to be as it is," which amounts to the same thing. If everything is One and everything that happens is the will of Source, then by dispelling all argument with how life is unfolding at each moment is equivalent to surrender to the will of God. There is the truth of that and then there is realizing the truth of that. The purpose of this talk is to address a particular tension that I believe is confusing to many seekers, which is this desire to fall into the arms of the Infinite and concurrently, this holding on to the familiar egoic patterns. It may be useful to some to see that such hesitation is not a sign of spiritual failure, but rather the all-too-common, protective movement of the thoroughly conditioned mind. If it can be seen as a merely a conditioned pattern rather than a spiritual shortcoming, it is far easier to let it go.

Glad it was helpful!

I hope you enjoy it!

Notice that everything that you see, hear, think, feel and experience happens within an innate capacity to be aware. This awareness is fundamental and is already complete, fully functional, and does not need to be improved upon. It is a formless presence that is the one constant in our lives. You are that formless presence aka spirit, True Nature, Self and so on. Rest as this formless awareness that you already are and resist any desire to get to the truth conceptually. All will be revealed if this essential beingness is explored as a felt sense.

Yes, the thinking mind likes to come to a nice conceptual conclusion so it can go back to its complacent slumber. It is uncomfortable with not knowing. But that which is our essential beingness is not knowable in the conventional sense. We can be it; we can become familiar with it, but we will never understand it.

Yes, it's a habit kept alive by our fascination with it. When we see that thoughts, however clever or profound, can never rise above the conceptual, the thinking mind begins to lose its allure.

Yes, that transition makes all the difference.

I have no doubt that you're right. However, people for the last 2,000 years have been TRYing to love their neighbor on the basis if scriptural instruction with limited success. You can do it unless you don't like your neighbor or don't like what they are doing or don't agree with their politics and so on. I am suggesting that the innate awareness that is functioning in you is the same innate awareness functioning in your neighbor. When that is recognized, we still may not want to hang out with that neighbor, but there will be a deep connection there anyway that some have called love.