Pure Experiences

In the Wakeup Sermon, Bodhidharma points at the need to go beyond mind. The words engage the mind and delusion follows. Not using the mind to know that which cannot be known via mind is Zen. When this is known, everything we do and every state of the mind is Zen.

How to bring the mind to higher layers? Can one stop it completely? Is it required? Why is this ordinary moment most spiritual? Will I become spiritual in future? What if Advaita is wrong? What should I believe?

The doctrines are useless and so are hardships or devotion. Bodhidharma delivers only one message - that of instantaneous knowledge of one's true nature, nothing more. This mind is the Buddha mind. This mind is the movement. No motion, no mind, and since its essence is emptiness, it never really moves.

Is enlightenment instantaneous, or is it gradual? Which practice will lead to enlightenment? How to be the witness and remain as non-doer? Is there a supreme doer? What happens when I let go of doership and ownership? Lets discuss these questions.

We start with Bloodstream sermon. Bodhidharma explains the mind and the self-nature. He puts it clearly that the mind itself is the self-nature and trying to find the self-nature beyond this mind is impossible. This mind is the Buddha. To realize this is Zen.

There is often this question that, given our current existence as a human being with a body and a mind, what one should do? In other words how to live this human life? Most of us blindly follow what others are doing, or whatever we were told to do, resulting in a less than optimal experience. We will see that the goal has been already set for you, and it is - Happiness and Freedom. No matter what you do, you end up choosing an action that leads to happiness and freedom. We are incapable of choosing anything else. We will discuss about how to achieve this effortlessly and practically. (This is a remastered and edited version of an earlier podcast).

Reading the book - "The Zen teaching of Bodhidharma", with commentary and discussion. Bodhidharma is the father of Zen, which is based on the path of knowledge, as taught by Siddhartha Gautama Buddha himself. We explore its similarities with Advaita and other Nondual philosophies.

Mankind's greatest discovery is realization of their own essential nature. When we act in knowledge, we reach our goals of happiness and freedom. In ignorance we remain a slave of situations and obey the will of others, we remain in misery and bondage. Rising above the lower planes is possible via mental transmutation. Know the mind, and transmute the mind. This is real magic.

If the consciousness is only one, if it is universal, why is my experience limited to this mind and body? Why can't everything become an objective experience at once? Why the experience is necessarily limited, although the experiencer is not? Let's introspect and find out.

The Gender is the creative principle active in all the planes of existence. Without the opposites, there is no creation, no structures are formed. Creation is a dance of opposites. The I and Me are two aspects, masculine and feminine. The I is the Will, the Me is the creative energy. I influences the Me, and hence it becomes necessary to wake up to this truth, exercise the will of the I and shield Me from undesirable influences from other minds.

The individual mind, although it appears to be segregated, resides in a sea of minds, all present right here and right now. It is always influencing other minds and is being influenced by them. Supernatural influences are the ones, where the source is nonphysical. Its always our own tendencies that allow, other minds to influence us. Since a mind cannot remain unaffected by influences, it is useful to know which influences are beneficial for us, and which ones are not.

The polarity is not static, the poles are reversed sooner or later. Everything has highs and lows, a rhythm. A Master understands this law and neutralizes it by staying steady amidst the flow of polarities. Nothing is uncaused and everything has an effect. One can remain unaffected by consequences by acting with awareness, and thus can rise above the law of cause and effect.

Everything exists as vibrations. The mental phenomena are just higher vibrations compared to the material. Understanding of vibrations brings powers. Everything has opposites, and they are simply different degrees of the same thing, appearing as two poles of it. This understanding enables us, to transmute that thing, into something of a higher vibration. The most important application of which, is transmutation of our own mind.

The planes of existence are experiences of various vibratory states of the ALL. Entities find themselves in one or the other vibratory plane, depending on their level of evolution. Higher the rate of vibration, higher is the level of evolution. There is a huge continuous spectrum of vibrations, which can be divided into arbitrary planes or dimensions for the purpose of study.

Mentalism does not mean a denial of life, nor does it mean reigning over the world of illusions. A Master simply rises above the material world, fully respecting the laws of the matter. The ALL descends in vibration and creates mental forms, and then it ascends and dissolves everything back into itself. The creation and the creator are One. This play happens for no reason, it just is.

The universe is a dream in the mind of the ALL, its an illusion, imagination, unreal. This is established via observation and the principle of correspondence. Although its unreal, one should not make a mistake of treating it as such. From a relative point of view, it appears real and is rule bound. The way out of it is not by changing it, but by transcending it via self transmutation.

Beliefs are assumptions, ideas not founded on the evidence gained via direct experience or logic. Beliefs lead to suffering, for they are just ignorance. They can be difficult to get rid of, they are parasitic. A gyani must always keep his guard up against blind beliefs. Not knowing is of more value than knowing.

The essence of I cannot be seen as an object. This puts the mind in a difficult position, which can know only objects. We see limitations of the mind or intellect immediately. We take the next step, and see the experience and the experiencer as two sides of the same coin, inseparable and an appearance in that which is not-two.

The concepts of transmutation and the wholeness of the existence, the ALL, are described. Transmutation is always of the mind, because that is what there is. The ALL, which is exactly the same as the word Brahman, is the only reality, the only substance, infinite and unchanging.

Who am I or what is my essence is the most important question one can ask. This is the Self Enquiry. This talk is an introduction to the enquiry and is meant for beginners. We define the essence as that which remains unchanged, and progressively eliminate all that is non-essential, changing and unnecessary. In this way we arrive at the real I.