nonduality
The truth about the spiritual journey
Letting go of Liberation
It usually starts off with a ‘me’ or ‘I’ wanting to be happy.
If ‘I’ meditate ‘I’ will become happy or enlightened. If ‘I’ do the right practices, listen to the right teachers, read the right books, etc…’I’ will become liberated.
Here there is the triad of the ‘I’, the desire, and the desired object (that will bring the desired lasting happiness). All of these three are mental projections. Contemplate on this. Each one of the three: the me-subject, the desire, and desired object, are all mental projections.
Though almost everyone inevitably comes to spirituality and nonduality in this way, a true teaching encourages or facilitates a deep letting go, in which all our concepts of attainment (desired objects) and ‘me’ (conceptual subject) are let go of and ultimately lost.
This is the liberation that we were looking for, and it is never found by the me, and cannot be put into words.
Its depth is profound, as is its superficiality and obviousness. It is always here, as it were, as it is simply everything and all-inclusive.
There is no concept of freedom or bondage here, for both these are projections of the ‘I’, itself a projection. Or, if these concepts are here, they are not clung onto and taken seriously.
We could put it like this:
We start off as ‘I want to be happy/realised/free/enlightened’.
Later on it is seen more like: ‘no-I…only freedom…simply this’.
Now this too is liable to be made into a concept and grasped by the mind.
My advice is to listen and absorb and think about what is written above, so it is understood on a conceptual level initially by the mind. Ask questions if you need to and allow a teacher/teaching to resolve any major doubts (in Sanskrit: sravana and manana or listening and reflecting).
Then, once contemplated and understood, to let go and forget everything. Allow all notions and ideas of self and liberation to fall away. (in Sanskrit: nididhyasana or meditation/actualisation)
Perhaps sit still with a straight back, and after some chanting and simple deep breathing exercises to calm the energies, let go and simply relax. Maybe follow the breath (my preference) or use a mantra to allow the mind to become calm, then let go of these practices too.
Allow thoughts to settle down and do as they please.
Relax. Let go. Breathe. Be happy.
Allow everything to be as it is.
Notice awareness is untouched by everything and is one with everything, and you are that awareness.
Let go of all distinctions.
Notice that which was thought of as being ‘I’ or ‘me’ is actually just empty, objects on a screen, a play of colourful light and shadow, insubstantial.
The body and mind that were formally taken to be you, are just objects arising and not you at all.
Every-thing is like this, empty and formless, a play of awareness.
Don’t make this into a concept, but in letting go, let go of these phrases and allow a deep seeing to arise in its own time by itself.
Insight and clarity will naturally arise, naturally and spontaneously, in the depths of silence. There is no need to believe the teachings. Intend for any realisation to be genuine and not a mere copy of my or someone else’s words.
All insights too are just a play of Oneness, worthless and wonderful, just like everything else. Allow them to come and go in your Light.
In the midst of daily life allow yourself to meet life fully with the insight-intelligence that has been gained. This is just a letting go of the triad of me, desire and desired amidst daily living. (this is still nididhyasana)
Where there are no operative thoughts (in Sanskrit: samadhi), where are you? Where am I? Where is this precious teaching? Where is this bondage? Where is this liberation?
This cannot be put into words, but for some reason, right now, I am moved to express it like this: total peace, only peace, everything is peace, totally unattached yet excluding nothing. The illusory me not in play, plunged into the depths of stillness, one with everything. Pure innocence, total naivety, suffused with natural innate intelligence, natural, raw, ordinary, all-inclusive, no thing and simply this.
Yes, this really cannot be put into words. Re-reading the above paragraph is like reading the poetic rantings of an infatuated dog! Don’t be fooled by poetic sounding verbal expressions, no matter how nice or right they seem. It is all more illusion. Don’t get (too) involved in the poetry and words! They are a breeding ground for ego. Much better to let go of concepts, be still and be happy: allow all illusions and projections to fall away and see for yourself.
In Peace, Love and Light
❤
3 stories of awakening: no path vs sudden path vs gradual paths to enlightenment. Is practice required for liberation?
Here are 3 stories for you:
Story 1
One morning God wakes up. She realises, non-verbally, intuitively, that she is whole-complete and lives happily ever after.
Story 2
One morning God wakes up. God thinks he is small, separate and vulnerable. This leads him to fear for his survival and desire security and relief from his fear (pleasure).
He meets a friend of his called Spiritual Seeker. Spiritual Seeker tells him to visit Guru.
God visits Guru and Guru says all is well, you are already whole and complete. Separation and the ‘small me’ are illusions.
God resonates with this teaching, intuitively sees what is being pointed at is already the present-reality, and the sense of inadequacy associated with the belief in separation dissolves. God realises that the separation between God, Guru and Life are themselves illusory. There is no teacher or teaching.
He lives happily ever after
Story 3
It is the same as story 2, except for the last line:
Once God’s meeting with Guru ends, due to the force of the momentum of past beliefs which have been so deeply ingrained over a lifetime, God quickly starts to re-believe that she is a separate ‘me’.
Every time she meets Guru, the ‘me’ temporarily collapses and great relief is experienced, but after sometime the false beliefs keep on rising up. The belief in the false me seems to have a mind of its own, rising up choicelessly, seemingly wreaking havoc and destruction.
Guru gives God some practices for her to do: chanting, devotion, meditation, being still, letting go, relaxing, mindfulness. Guru says pretend everything is an illusion, pretend everything is consciousness, pretend everything is God, have gratitude for everything that comes your way. Be still. Follow your heart and let your heart guide you Home, to Love and Peace.
Over time God’s mind becomes peaceful, happier and less interested in and addicted to thoughts and beliefs. The habitual tendency to believe in a ‘me’ is lessened.
Guru has also all the time has been saying all is well, you are already whole and complete. Separation and the ‘small me’ are illusions.
Now when God is away from Guru, the old beliefs in ‘me’ no longer arise. God sees that all practices are for the illusory ‘me’ and they perpetuate the illusory ‘me’, but they were still part of her apparent journey.
The sense of inadequacy associated with the belief in separation dissolves. God realises that the separation between God, Guru and Life are themselves illusory. There is no teacher or teaching.
She lives happily ever after.
“The Sage tells us that disciples are of four grades,
comparable to gun-powder, dry charcoal, ordinary fuel, and wet fuel.
The first kind of disciple needs only a word, like a spark, to consume his ignorance at once.
The second kind needs some teaching and personal effort.
The third kind needs a long course of teaching, training and practice.
The fourth kind needs to be made fit for discipleship by practices suitable to his condition.”
Maha Yoga, Chapter 11
Q: If all is one, why is there this duality? Does consciousness really want to know itself?
Q. This has been a source of confusion to me. If Brahman, Presence, whatever you want to call it is unconditioned, one without a second, then why do teachers go on to explain how it manifests the universe. Or, encloses itself in matter. Once an action takes place, it is no longer unconditioned…So then what is this dream, and why do so many non-dualists talk about it as though it is the Source wanting to know itself, or something like that. Thank you.
Tom: In my view, and also in the view of many of the traditional scriptures, nobody really understands Maya. It is mysterious. How can the unconditioned give rise to the conditioned? How can One appear to be many? It’s a mystery.
And why does it (appear to) happen? Again, it’s a mystery.
However, to please seekers of differing levels of understanding, different explanations are given, such as ‘consciousness wanting to know itself’, etc. The various theories are given to appease the seeker’s mind and stop the questions so that the seeker can then get on with the real work of turning inwards and keeping quiet.
That is what all the teachings are pointing to:
Be still.
Be unconcerned with the world.
Be unattached and happy.
All is well.
No need to worry.
Have faith.
Best wishes and pranams
No person, no problem
We had a lovely meeting in Kingston at the Druids’s Head Pub yesterday, and it’s amazing how a spontaneous teaching can apparently arise through interactions with others. This morning I felt moved to write down some of what was said, so here it is:
Towards the end of the apparent seeker’s apparent journey, the very interest in non-duality or liberation itself becomes a hindrance. What are you looking for? And who or what is looking?
The answer to the first question is you are looking to feel better/not feel bad. The answer to the second question is that it is the illusory ego/’small self’ that is looking. So the seeking is perpetuating the ego, or the seeking is the ego.
The ego/mind can logically start to realise that lasting freedom cannot be found in any object whatsoever, gross or subtle, and it can also recognise that all experiences or states of consciousness, no matter how lofty or sublime, are all objects that are fleeting and so eventually lead to suffering and so push the motion of the hamster wheel that is called samsara (suffering). Therefore chasing experiences and states of consciousness is not the answer – this just leads to more suffering.
What is the solution?
1. It can be seen that there is no lasting satisfaction resulting from the search, so there is no point to seeking.
2. It can be intellectually known that Liberation is not an object and that Liberation must already be here (if it exists at all) if it is something permanent or lasting.
Reflect on these.
More fundamentally than either of these 2 above, which are both forms of ego-intellectual understanding, it can be seen that there is no person/body/mind, that these are illusory appearances that we engender with an artificial sense of self by conceptual projection and overlay and self-reinforcing labelling of felt/perceived energies.
Put simply, there is no-one here. There was never anyone here. It was all just an illusion in consciousness (when this is seen, then it is also seen that the path to enlightenment and the spiritual practices are also illusory). We don’t even need to use the word consciousness really, but it can be a useful pointer.
No person, no problem.
Meditate/reflect on this: as long as there is a person (ie. belief in being a person, or thinking the body or mind are real), there is suffering, and there must be suffering, for the body is subject to change and decline and all the other things that come along with this that you can hopefully reason out for yourselves.
Lastly, may I point that all of this is a teaching, and these words work to remove the ignorance. The teachings are antidotes given to the seeker and wielded by the seeker. No words are the truth. Please read the above in this context. The words are never quite it (and of course they are it, as everything is it, and there is no ‘it’, ‘it’ being just an expression…oh dear!)
Pranams and blessings to you
🙏
Is there anything you can do to become enlightened?
Q. Hi Tom. Thanks for your blogs posts. Ever since I stumbled across your site I’ve been trawling through your writings and videos and found them to be quite insightful. I wanted to ask if you think there is anything you can do to become enlightened? I’ve heard it said that there is nothing you can do, it either happens or it doesn’t, but that feels kinda hopeless to me. I know hope is not the arbiter of truth but I’d like to know what you think.
Tom: Hi _____. It’s a tough one to answer as depending on how you look at it, you could either say there is nothing you can do, because there is no ‘I’, and whatever happens will happen, which is true. Similarly all seeking implies the existence of ignorance, and all paths are for the ego and so can serve to reinforce the sense of ‘I’ or ‘me’.
But you can also talk on the level of the apparent seeker and give teachings that apparently help the apparent seeker realise that there is no separate seeker at all. The essence of these teachings is to relax, still thoughts and look, and then it can be more easily seen that the ‘me’ is an illusion, and that it always was an illusion, and then it is obvious that all paths are also a part of this grand illusion too, although they seemed apparently useful at the time.
Even when this is seen, the habitual force of ignorance can be so strong that it keeps on reasserting its hold and so a post-realisation practice or sadhana can be practiced, either formally, or often it naturally happens by itself over time.
So in summary I tend to do both, sometimes radically pointing out there is no ‘separate me’, other times meeting the apparent seeker where they are, depending on whom I’m taking to and where they are at with respect to the teachings. This tends not to be something I deliberate much over, but it’s just how the interaction tends to manifest itself when I am talking with someone seeking.
Here’s a more straightforward response I gave someone else to this question:
https://tomdas.com/2018/01/15/is-there-anything-i-can-do-to-become-enlightened/
Trying to figure out enlightenment
ROBERT ADAMS ON DEVOTION
“YOU HAVE TO PUT GOD FIRST.” This is why people like Ramana Maharshi always said that devotion, faith and self-inquiry are the same thing. You can’t just have dry self-inquiry. You have to feel love. You have to feel devotion. You have to put God first. Unless you put God first you’re going to just have dry words, and the words will give you a sharp intellect. You will be able to recite all sorts of things, memorize books, hear lectures and remember them, yet you will never really awaken.
This is why sometimes Advaita Vedanta can be dangerous to some people. Yet if they really read the books on Advaita Vedanta, they’ll understand that they have to develop a tremendous faith.
Think of some of the teachers that you know or heard about. Nisargadatta, he always prayed. He realized that he was consciousness. He was self-realized, but at the same time he chanted, he prayed, he had devotion. It sounds like a contradiction. For you may say “If someone is self-realized and he knows himself or herself to be all there is, to whom do they pray?“
Try to remember that all spiritual life is a contradiction. It’s a contradiction because words cannot explain it. Even when you are the self, you can pray to the self, which is you.
Ramana Maharshi always had chanting at the ashram, prayers, devotional hymns. These things are very important. Many westerners, who profess to be atheists, come to listen to lectures on Advaita Vedanta, and yet nothing ever happens in their lives. As long as you do not have devotion, faith, love, discrimination, dispassion, it will be very difficult to awaken.
Therefore those of you who become bored with practicing self-inquiry may become very devotional. Surrender everything. Give up your body, your thoughts, all the things that bind you, whatever problems you may believe you have. Surrender them to your favorite deity. You are emptying yourself out as you do this. Do a lot of it. Become humble. Have a tremendous humility.
If you can just do that you will become a favorite of God and you’ll not have to search any longer.
~Robert Adams
If enlightenment is unconditioned and causeless, then how can a ‘spiritual practice’ lead you to it?
Q. If enlightenment is unconditioned and causeless, then how can a ‘spiritual practice’ lead you to it, as all practices are in the conditioned realm of cause and effect? I’ve heard teachers (some of whom claim not to be teachers) say that Enlightenment is uncaused: it either happens or it doesn’t, and there is nothing you can do about it because there is no you anyway. Does this sound right to you?
Tom: Hi _____, thanks for your question. It depends how you use the words. I actually think the more radical expression of non-duality that you describe is incredibly potent and hits right at the nub of the matter, but that it is not for everyone, and for many it can also be detrimental, at least initially, as it can lead to a premature hopelessness and despair. I say premature, as later on this may be exactly what is needed to stop the apparent seeker in their tracks and for realisation to beautifully dawn!
Enlightenment is a conditioned event in time
Regarding enlightenment, I would not say that enlightenment is unconditioned or causeless, in fact quite the opposite, but let me first explain what I mean by the word ‘enlightenment’ in this context. Enlightenment, as I use the word, is a phenomena or event that occurs ‘within the dream’, so to speak, in which, figuratively speaking, the dream character realises they are in a dream and that they are a dream. Note that I say figuratively speaking as I am not saying that life is actually a dream, but just using a dream as an imperfect analogy.
There is a before enlightenment and after enlightenment, so it is something that occurs in time. Sure, when enlightenment happens, it is also seen that the enlightenment was always fully present the whole entire time, even when it wasn’t realised, but that is only realised after enlightenment! For me, I don’t even know when exactly my enlightenment happened, as it was a slow burn, and I only realised what had happened sometime afterwards, but even in this example, we can see there was still a before enlightenment and after enlightenment, and in this way enlightenment could still be said to have been an event, albeit one that took place over a longer time-frame.
Prior to enlightenment, Freedom or Wholeness is not realised, even though it was always present. It is this realisation I am referring to here as ‘enlightenment’. So that’s the first thing, to realise that enlightenment is a conditioned phenomenal time-bound event in which ever-present unconditioned Freedom is recognised.
So that’s the first thing, to realise that enlightenment is a conditioned phenomenal time-bound event in which ever-present unconditioned Freedom is recognised.
All events have (apparent) causes
Once we accept this, then we can start to look to see if there are any proximate causes of enlightenment. As all phenomena (apparently) exist in a world of cause and effect, in which there is the appearance of rule and laws, such as the law of gravity and so forth, we should be able to investigate and see if there are certain factors that can increase the chances of enlightenment happening. If we can find out what these factors are, then perhaps we can increase our own chances of enlightenment, and this is where various spiritual-type practices and activities can come into play.
Isn’t this all just reinforcing the false notion of a ‘me’?
At this point in the conversation, some people counter this by saying that there is nobody here who can do any of this, that there is no ‘I’. Enlightenment either happens or it doesn’t happen, and there is nothing you can do about it because the ‘I’ that thinks it can do something is actually an illusion.
Now this is true. These statements are directly pointing at the heart of the matter, pointing out to the apparent seeker the illusion of separation.
However, does relentlessly pointing this out actually help the apparent seeker break through the veil of illusion? Well, yes, it definitely can. Simple repetitive hammering home the essential point can eventually work, which is why at the start of this response I said that this type of teaching is incredibly potent.
However it is not the only way, and sometimes it is less effective than other ways (and of course sometimes is more effective than other ways too).
If someone asked you how to play tennis, would you say there is nothing you can do to play tennis? That playing tennis will either happen or not happen as the ‘I’ that thinks it can chose to learn to play tennis is an illusion? Or would you perhaps suggest tennis lessons or something similar, as you know that in the (apparent) world of cause and effect, tennis lessons increases the chances of being able to play tennis, even though this is not guaranteed?
Enlightenment is a phenomenon like any other – it has causes and effects
You see, once you have realised that enlightenment is an event like any other, that it occurs following an apparent set of causes and conditions, some of which can be determined and modified, then we can start to see how powerful practices can be along this path.
If we find a set of factors that increases the likelihood of enlightenment occurring, then we can start to put these factors into place, just like the person who wants to play tennis can book themselves onto tennis lessons, buy a decent tennis racket and a good pair of tennis shoes, and learn the rules of the game.
When looking at more traditional teachings, sages in centuries gone past have discovered a variety of these factors that increase the likelihood of enlightenment. I discuss some of them here.
The Grand Illusion
On one hand there is no choice, there is nobody here, and all there is is Freedom – yes – and there is nothing you can do about any of this. On the other hand, there are proximate causes to enlightenment, which, from the point of the (illusory) seeker who has not realised ‘there is nobody here’, can be utilised to their advantage in seeing this.
When it is seen, then it is also seen that all practices are also part of this Grand Illusion, often, at least initially, fuelling the ‘I’ and the suffering that goes alongside it.
See also: Can you teach enlightenment?
.
Tom Das 