Message 157

Paris, 26 January 2009

‘You’ and the problem are one, not two separate processes

To be told that “you are the problem and no answer, whether given by another or arrived at by ‘yourself’, will solve the problem and in fact seeking to solve is to continue the problem” – is not what you want to listen when you come to Shibendu. But that is what he conveys respectfully, because he is not in the business of a ‘sympathetic’ psychiatrist or a priest.

Awakening of a serious understanding of ‘I’, not sympathetically perpetuating the ‘I’, is Swadhyaya. ‘Sympathy’ serves to pander to a problem, ‘advice’ provides a means of circumventing the problem. Such responses do not help to get at the truth of the problem. It is not negative or cruel to frankly point out that ‘I’ is the problem. Swadhyay catalyzes understanding and therefore does not dispense comfort by promoting the divisive process in the human consciousness by pampering the fictitious psyche ‘I’ in any manner whatsoever.

To escape from Swadhyay process of looking at ‘I’ without an ‘onlooker’, is to opt for living in falsehood and deception. Advisers helping to accommodate the illusion ‘I’ under the banner of sympathy or compassion, are actually engaging in complicity with the false fragmentation ‘I’ giving rise to the phenomenon of ‘becoming’ and covering up the bliss of ‘being’ – the living quality of life.

‘Being’ is treasure (Sampatti), ‘becoming’ is terror (Vipatti). Self-awareness is not self-promotion, nor self-accusation. Swadhyay is not the adjustment therapy for the shoddy little ‘I’. It is the annihilation of thuggery of the ‘I’ with all its ache, agony and antagonism. Awareness (Swadhyay) is honest and hard work, but the ‘I’ is infinitely resourceful in circumventing it by settling for borrowed knowledge.

Knowledge flatters the ‘I’, it permits the illusion of ‘growth’ and ‘change’ which are mere modified continuity of the same ‘I’. Knowledge does not produce action but inertia!

Someone protested that “without knowledge we are nothing”, and he was told: “You are nothing... And why not be that!”... The perception of that nothingness is the beginning of wisdom. When wisdom is complete and whole, there is the energy of emptiness, of equanimity, of serenity, of sanctity. Sustained awareness would eventually dissolve the maker of all problems – the proud and mischievously cunning ‘I’. Action does not follow clarity. Clarity is action.

To name feelings, to speak of jealousy, fear, desire, beliefs, does not help understanding and awareness. Words are loaded with implications of condemnation or justification. Verbalising process is part of the ‘I’ which denies veracity. When there is no naming, then ‘I-ness’ is dissolved for ‘Is-ness’ to dawn.

sarvameva parityajya mahāmaunī bhavānagha

Be available to silent seeing without spectatorship and naming.

The lie (‘I’) unacknowledged, the explanation grasped for solace, the word masquerading as the thing, the solution found by thought – all these kill awareness and perpetuate the protective mechanism of ‘I’. To transcend the fake fragments of the ugly consciousness and thus to usher in the undivided awareness, is to open up to the most profound wisdom of humanity.

avibhaktaṁ vibhakteṣu tajjñānaṁ viddhi sāttvikam

Jai ‘No-naming’