Knowledge and Religion

This strange substance called ignorance

If you’ve followed this blog for any length of time you know that you are God; that this is not an egotistical statement. In fact I am sure you have seen that it is more egotistical to think that you are separate from God. That God is everywhere except one little spot; and that spot is you.

 But now that you understand this, I’m afraid you will come to the wrong conclusion. You will now assume that you are a small part of God like a spark shooting out of a fire, or a drop of water in the ocean. The reason for this is that you may take the limitations that you see to be your limitations. That’s why I spent so much time in showing you, from many different angles, how you are not limited by what you see.

Since you see the body, the breath, the emotions, the intellect, the state of deep sleep, and the ego, these limitations do not pertain to you. You are the ultimate seer, unbound by these limitations. Even now, this is your direct experience. To find out more about this read back over the past entries in this blog. If you start with the oldest ones and work forward you will be amazed at how clear this will become.

But I think you will have the perfect right to ask, “If I am God, why do I feel limited?” The answer is that it is out of ignorance of your true nature. Remember the story on www.light-up-your-life.com. It’s the same ignorance as being in San Francisco and asking, “Where is San Francisco?”

So because you don’t know you are in San Francisco you act as if you’re lost. What can you do to cure your problem, nothing! The only cure for your problem is knowledge. To find out where you stand already.

Just think, how are you going to get to San Francisco? You can’t walk and you can’t run. Positive thinking won’t work. Neither will negative thinking. Will chanting work? Even doing your favorite martial art won’t get you there. The only cure for your problem is knowledge of where you are already.

But, if you want to press me you may ask, why am I ignorant? If you think about it ignorance is an interesting substance. For instance until today you were ignorant of this blog, “Meditation on Wisdom”. Where did that ignorance come from? It was beginning-less, wasn’t it? But in an instant you found out about this blog. In that instant your ignorance ended.

A room could be dark for a thousand years. But in an instant a candle can light it up. Similarly, for your whole life you could have been ignorant of your true nature. But in a second that could change and with that knowledge your life would change.

That’s why we call this path self-knowledge instead of self-action. Because here we don’t create anything new. What we do is throw off limitations like warn out clothing and stand in our natural state of freedom.

Here you do not know every detail of the universe. But you know what everything is … it is your own being, not separate in any way. In time the universe will pass away. But your new found freedom will never die.

As you can see this ignorance is flimsy stuff. No matter how much you may be suffering right now, you should know that your natural freedom is very close. Questioning will rip the veil of ignorance so that you can find the freedom that is always yours. So don’t assume that you know how things are. Question and be ready for some surprises. The kind of surprises that make life fresh and new.

And if you need help you can ask right here and I will help you to find the answers that you need. If the comment section of this blog doesn’t work, please send your questions and comments to michael@ananya.com. To find out where this all leads go to, www.light-up-your-life.com. And finally, if you enjoy these blogs please tell your friends.

Best Wishes,

Michael

How valuable is self-knowledge?

It is often hard for me to show the value of this meditation on self-knowledge. Maybe that’s because I don’t charge for it, and in this culture if its free it must not be worth much.

But the reason I keep this knowledge free is not that it is valueless. On the contrary here is the source of value. In fact when you feel that an object, or knowledge has value, the feeling of value spring right from the core of your being.

Just think of it. What good is a gold bar, a diamond ring, or a degree in medicine if we don’t value it? If you don’t understand this, just give a two year old child a gold bar and you’ll see it’s value. As long as the child has fun playing with it, the bar has value. But when the child gets board and wants something else, the value is gone.

See, the gold bar is just a bar; the value comes from our perception. But once you uncover the boundless diamond that you have inside, the things that you thought were valuable lose their allure. This is because you return value to its rightful place; the place where value springs from.

When you know yourself you have everything and need nothing else. Whether you choose to play in the world or not is just a matter of preference and not a matter of need. Why, because now you stand as the source of happiness. You are what everyone wants.

This knowledge is free because it points to something that you have already. I don’t even want to give the impression that you lack this and have to do something, like pay a fee, to gain your long lost self. The value of self-knowledge is that you did not create your self. And since you are uncreated, you will not die, even when the body passes away. You don’t have to die to experience this. You can experience it even now while the body lives.

But there is a price that you must pay so you can discover the meaning of these words. How much is it? You must desire this freedom so much, that you must be willing to set aside any and every assumption of limitation. Once you know better, to live with limitation, is just dullness. There is no room for dullness here.

If you see an object you are not limited by it. You are the seer and not the object that you see. The seer is what you are looking for and you can know this without standing separate. You know the seer because you are the seer, not as a separate thing. Find out the meaning of this last paragraph and you will find your freedom.

And if you are curious and have just stumbled upon this blog, read over the entries in the archives. Start with the oldest ones and read forward. You will be surprised how clear self-knowledge really is.

You will also see that assumptions of limitation are made out of flimsy stuff. A little questioning and they are dead. So send me questions about your experience and about this teaching and we will bring the two together. Tomorrow, what is ignorance anyway? So stay tuned to your own nature.

And if the comment section of this blog doesn’t work, please send your questions and comments to michael@ananya.com. To find out where this all leads go to, www.light-up-your-life.com. And finally, if you enjoy these blogs please tell your friends.

Best Wishes,

Michael

The hidden factor in Self Inquiry

The aim here is to find out who we are. Not as a person, limited to a mind and a body. But who are we if we strip away our limitations, and stand in our true glory.

I know that this is surprising if you never heard of self inquiry before. That’s because most of the time in life we see objects in the world. Then we either attach our happiness or our suffering to these objects. Subsequently we either run towards them or away from them.

These objects can be physical objects like a new house, car, vacation, new career, or a relationship. They can also be mental objects like thoughts that bring us happiness or misery, new knowledge, or fears that we have.

The reason I use the word object is because we perceive these objects as being outside and separate from us. Then we think, if we can only get these objects, or in some cases get away from them, we will find our fulfillment and peace.

But as we experience more of what life has to offer, we start to feel like a donkey with a carrot dangling in front of him. If you don’t understand this analogy, the secret for getting a stubborn donkey to move is to put a carrot on a stick in front of him. The donkey chases after the carrot and never quite gets it.

Similarly, we start to feel that we are chasing after the things that we see, and never really getting the happiness that we hope for. We get married but that doesn’t give us what we want; we have children, a good job, and lots of money; the Hawaiian vacation was pleasant but didn’t quite give us what the ads had promised. Somehow we never quite get the fulfillment that we want.

So we wonder, “Perhaps the happiness that we want lies in a different direction.” We start to question, “When by hit or miss we do experience happiness in life, where do we experience it?” Does happiness come from the objects that we see, or does it well up from our own self-nature, the place where we actually experience it.

If we can get a sense from our own experience of where our happiness comes from, then we can start to see the value of self-inquiry. We see that the substance and fulfillment in life does not come from what we see, it comes from what we are.

The method of self-inquiry is to find the real subject of our experience. We know that we are not an object that we see. We are the ultimate subject. But if we do mix ourselves up with the limitations that we see it is time to inquire.

This is like mistaking a crystal to be red or blue; that would be the time to separate the clearness of the crystal from the blueness of the sky around it. If we were to think that the nature of water is hot because we see boiling water, it would be time to separate the coolness of water from the heat of fire.

Similarly if we take our nature to be limited to a body or mind it is time to separate the limitations that we see from the consciousness and bliss that we are.

Here’s how you do this. First look simply. This is not a complicated intellectual exercise. It has the same feeling of simplicity that resting in happiness has.

Second, know that you do not see yourself as an object. You know yourself in a more direct manner. You know yourself because you are yourself.

Third you are conscious and the source of bliss. This is non-volitional consciousness. To give you a sense of what this means, you are meditating when your mind starts to wander. About 10 minutes later you notice that your mind is wandering. Here you did not bring in the awareness; you were aware the whole time. You were aware when your mind wandered, and you were aware when it came back.

Now let’s say you fall asleep. When you wake up again you said, “Darn, I was sleeping through my meditation.” You knew you were asleep because you are awareness. This awareness does not depend on the presence or absence of your mind. So shift your identity from the limitations of your mind to the open space of awareness. This is the meaning of the statement, “Know thyself.”

Now here’s the final secret for completing this shift from limitation to your innate freedom. When you say, “I am meditating.” You are aware of the “I” as well as the meditating. So even this thought of “I” is not you.

See when people feel trapped in something that they see, like the state of their mind, they certainly notice what their mind is thinking. But what they miss is that they are also aware of the one going through this difficulty, the one they are calling “I”.

So the secret to finding your freedom through self-inquiry is to notice that you not only see the object, the state of your mind, you see the one you take to be the subject, and you see the relationship between these two.

If you want to find freedom and happiness pull yourself out of this imposture and return you identity to its rightful place as consciousness and bliss. You’ll be surprised how things look from here.

I hope that this blog raises lots of questions. That’s because when you question limitation you will find your freedom. You will find that limitation cannot hold up to the brightness of a curious mind. 

And if the comment section of this blog doesn’t work, please send your questions and comments to michael@ananya.com. To find out where this all leads go to, www.light-up-your-life.com. And finally, if you enjoy these blogs please tell your friends.

Best Wishes,

Michael

Here’s the secret

One of the advantages of practicing the art of Aikido, a soft style martial art, is that it allows you the opportunity to see the difference between thinking about your experience and your experience itself.

In Aikido you often get to see that what you think is happening has nothing to do with what you are really experiencing. The reason is that your experience is a lot richer and more subtle than the mind’s ability to record it.

In Aikido you stand in a place that is beyond what the mind can comprehend. At the most your thinking can scramble to try and get a handle on what’s going on. But somehow it falls short. That’s because the thinking process works by comparing opposites, while in Aikido you bring apparent opposites into their natural oneness.

Now, self-knowledge is even more subtle than the experience of Aikido. That’s because in Aikido at least you get feedback from the way the movements are going. Often you notice that things are happening differently than you thought they should.

But in self-knowledge the only feedback that you get comes from the place where you stand. Here there is no one who can stand separate and suffer. You know yourself by yourself without anything outside of you to measure your freedom. Just think of it, whatever stands outside of you is just an object in your awareness, and not you, the ultimate subject. That’s why Christ asked, “Why are you looking for signs where there are no signs?”

Still your mind is useful in your quest for self-knowledge. It is just that you have to know what your mind can do and what it can’t. You know that the mind cannot tell you who you are. You have to know that directly. But still it can show you what you are not. Or more precisely, it can show you the boundaries that aren’t yours.

By eliminating every object in your awareness you get to rest as the ultimate subject which is awareness and bliss. There are many books written on meditation and most of them tell you how to deal with the objects that you see. They tell you about the posture of the body; they tell you how to breathe, and how to still the mind. But the effect of anything you do with limitation will be limited.

So here’s our secret; return to your natural state; step out of limitation completely and abide as you naturally are. Why spent years working on limitation when even now you can be free. Abiding here you will find a place that is free of creation and destruction. It is the source and the substance of all that we see. And when the universe disappears nothing changes.

And for all of this, do you know the most remarkable thing about your self-nature? It’s just who you are even now. So here our task is not to create a new and improved self. It is only to abide as we are even now. Thus our secret teaching is, you are what you’re looking for.

This teaching turns things on their head. We assume that we are limited individuals, and what we see is what we’re looking for. But now we know that what we are, is the boundless wisdom and happiness that we’re looking for, and what we see is just limitation.

But limitation is based on flimsy assumptions. When you question them, they’ll disappear. Remember you can ask questions without already knowing the answers. We can work together so that you will find the answers.

And if the comment section of this blog doesn’t work, please send your questions and comments to michael@ananya.com. To find out where this all leads go to, www.light-up-your-life.com. And finally, if you enjoy these blogs please tell your friends.

Best Wishes,

Michael

Quickly put an end to suffering

Here our focus in on our natural state, sometimes called liberation or self-knowledge. If we are on the path fine, meditation and self-inquiry are useful tools for us to use. They helps us to discover who we really are – to wake up to the truth of our own nature. However, over the years I’ve noticed a curious thing. People seemingly get addicted to the path. They seem to identify as the yogi on an endless path, instead of the aspirant seeking liberation.

What is going on here? After looking at this I think that people are picking up practices to calm their mind. Now I agree that it is important to have peace. But peace not a state of mind, it is our natural state. Peace is the awareness the sees the flow of the mind, not some particular state of mind. This awareness was there before the mind was; it is there as the witness of the flow of the mind, and when the mind ceases this awareness remains.

So the aim of our practice is to shift our identity from being a limited state of mind to being the ever-present and undying awareness. Our aim is to face and let go of limiting frameworks and views in our mind so that we can stand as we really are. Now, I agree that peace of mind is a pleasant state. It feels really good to be calm and alert. When at peace it feels as if you are on top of the world.

The one problem with just aiming for peace of mind is that it won’t last. There are two reasons for this. First by nature the mind flows and changes. In fact if the mind didn’t change, you wouldn’t even know it was there.

To hold the mind in one state is like trying to stop the ripples in a lake. The more you try to stop them with your hand the more ripples you create. With your mind it is like trying to hold thoughts in place with other thoughts. Ramana Maharshi called this a thief, dressing up as a policeman and trying to catch the thief. Will he ever succeed?

The second problem for an aspirant when he or she tries to quiet the mind is that limitations and suffering wants to come up. That’s so you can examine them, let go of them, and return to your natural state of peace. See, you can’t tolerate limitation and suffering. That’s because you are meant to be so much more. You might think of this like vomiting. You vomit so your stomach can return to its natural state, which is pain free.

So it never seems to fail. Here you are in the middle of a peaceful and wonderful meditation. Then what do you do? You allowed the space for those ideas that cause limitation and suffering to come to the surface. You know, those little ideas about yourself and the other people around you. Or about the world being a scary place etc. etc. So all of the sudden, right in the middle of your wonderful meditation you feel a horrendous amount of pain and suffering.

If you don’t know what’s going on here this can be quite scary. But once you realize what’s actually going on, you know that you have been given a great gift, the opportunity to examine and let go of limitation. I’ll tell you from my own experience that there’s a time in your practice when you start to look forward to these opportunities. At that point you feel empowered to let go of every limitation that seems to bind you so that you can stand in your natural freedom.

When you have this willingness you will wake up before you even get through the whole laundry list of limitation. That’s because you will begin to wonder who is the one practicing. You will see clearly that you aren’t what you thought. With the separate ‘I’ destroyed the foundation of ignorance will crumble and you will stand in your natural freedom and joy – the peace that passes all understanding.

Ok that’s the good news and as you see I always get distracted by the wonder of our own self-nature. But let’s get back to the purpose of this talk. What if you don’t know what’s going on when suffering seems to knock at your door?

You want to get back to your peace, right? But you do it by attempting to distract the mind. So, what do you do? You listen to music, chant, put on the TV, go out for a jog, or practice one of the many meditations designed to quiet your mind. You may even take certain pills like tranquilizers.

But the problem with all of these distractions is that they don’t get to the root of the problem. And so the suffering still tries to come to the surface for you to examine, and you still try to push it down. It feels like you have to try harder and harder just to get to the results that you are used to.

Pretty soon you’ll find your life consumed with your practices, and you are just treading water. Maybe that’s what being addicted to the path means.

Now here's a way that I can make a little extra money. I'll advertise a new and improved meditation. What I could do is have you pay for each step. When one step wears out and is no longer effective, I'll sell you the next step. What a great lifelong way for me to make money.

But if you discover the secret of facing your suffering and dissolving it in wisdom I will quickly lose my job. That’s because you will stand free and will not be in need of my help any more.

One of the quickest ways to alleviate suffering is to question it. Remember you do not have to know the answers. Just ask and we can work together to find the answers.

If the comment section of this blog doesn’t work, please send your questions and comments to michael@ananya.com. To find out where this all leads go to, www.light-up-your-life.com. And finally, if you enjoy these blogs please tell your friends.

Best Wishes,

Michael

The experience of God

I love the Tao and the beauty of its poetry. But let me clarify something here. Where poetry helps you to find your being and abide there it is beautiful. But one of the biggest misconceptions that we find here is that spirituality and reason are at opposite poles.

Here's the way many people look at this. You can use reason to help find something that you can know, but you can't know God. So the best you can do is to have faith in God. But where did God go anyway? Did God disappear when the creation came into being?

Why assume that you can't know God? “How is it possible to know God?” you might ask. Well, you know God because you are God. “But” you might think, “If he didn't have a big enough ego before now he claims to be God.”

Nevertheless, how did God create the universe anyway? She couldn't go to the hardware store to get the wood. That's because the wood and the hardware store hadn't been created yet, neither had anything else. So the only place where God could get the material, the power to create, and the intelligence was from God.

So without exception everything that we see, feel and think must be none other than God. So if I said, “I am not God.” that would be egotistical. It would mean that God is everywhere except one little place, ‘me'.

Now how big is that ‘me' to think it stands apart and limits God. And even while thinking that I am separate, it would be impossible to stand separate from the creation. The thought wouldn't even make separation or describe reality.

Moreover, the ‘I' describes God and nothing else, and as God we not only stand as the creation; we are greater than the creation. We are not limited by birth and death, time and space or any other attribute of the universe.

To illustrate this point think of a dream. When inside last night's dream the people seemed separate and real. I had a family history with grandparents, parents, and children. I had many happy and many miserable experiences.

But while in the dream a friend told me that this was just a dream and I could wake up. I took my friends advice and woke up. Then what happened to the people and the family etc. Where did it all occur? What made the dream seem so real? The reality behind the dream was just my mind. It was the substance that was there before the dream was created, while it lasted, and when it came to an end.

In the dream we call it mind; now we call it God. You can know God directly, because you are God. How could you ever be separate? So since you are God, you can know God. And since you can know God directly the path of reason becomes a valid path.

If you read through these blogs from oldest to newest you will see that we systematically eliminated anything that would appear to limit you, so you can stand as God directly in the form of limitless consciousness and bliss.

These blog entries were written in such a way so that you could experience each step directly. Just remember that the purpose of these blogs is to guide you to your own self-nature. They are not meant to be an interesting intellectual exercise.

So read these blogs with the intention of not only understand them, but of experiencing directly what they pointing to. I think you will be amazed at what you will find – welcome home!

And as always I say questions are the gateway to your freedom. It is only flimsy assumptions that keep us in limitation. Questioning is the drug that helps you to step out of these assumptions so you can stand in your own natural glory.

If the comment section of this blog doesn't work, please send your questions and comments to michael@ananya.com. To find out where this all leads go to, www.light-up-your-life.com. And finally, if you enjoy these blogs please tell your friends.

Best Wishes,

Michael

How to meditate so I can experience wisdom

Questions from Grace:

Hi,

I bought your book in 2003. Each time I have read it I have been so amazed by your questioning of the various aspects of life I have never thought of questioning before.

I have been reading your blog but my question is how do I realize or experience what you lay bare. At this point in my life every morning I meditate for one hour using holosync sound tracks. Within the listening to the tracks I do the body scan for the first 30 minutes and say a mantra for the remainder of the period. Jokingly  I read this months blog and realize how it applies to me 'prepractice upon prepractice'.

I would ask you to tell me how exactly you do your meditations. For example in the mantra meditation we are told to sit straight and say the mantra through out the period.

By my questioning you will realize that I have appreciated the teaching intellectually but I want to experience what these teachings point to.

Thank you, Grace, for your questions. You are a great example of someone with a steady practice and a desire to know where practice leads.

Like your example, I do recommend spending some time everyday in meditation – on getting to the core of your own self-nature. But as the body and mind changes due to old-age, disease and death, you may find yourself unable to sit up straight and concentrate for a half hour on a mantra. But even then you are not forsaken; you can still abide in your own self-nature. That’s because even now, before you chant the first mantra or listen to the first holosync sound tract you are yourself.

But now we dress ourselves up with cloths that are much too tight. These cloths are the limitations of the body, and the frameworks and views of the mind. But in reality we are so free that we are not even limited by the ultimate imposture, the ‘I’ thought.

So the practice of self-inquiry is undressing. You take off your worn out clothing so that you can stand naked and free in your original state. As you know from reading the book, you are the source of consciousness and joy.

So if you want to see some quick and surprising changes in your meditation and life, start questioning what you assume is true. What you take to be your natural state. If it is anything less than complete and undying freedom notice that you are just looking at limitation.

Remember that when you see limitation and suffering it is not proof that you are limited. It is proof that you are the seer – that you are consciousness itself. You do not see consciousness, you know consciousness directly because that’s who you are. If you want to find your freedom, stop calling the limitations that you see your natural state. Then as if by magic they will fall off.

Ok, now that we have the theory down let’s give a practical example. Now in your meditations you listen to holosync sound tracts and then say a mantra. By doing all of this you hope to get into a better state than you’re in now. What do you assume is true about yourself even before you do all of this. So fill on the blanks. Now I am like ________ then I will be like _______.

See, the thing is you will always come back to what you take to be your natural state. So any improvements that you make in your present meditation will be temporary. But if you can find out who you are even now, you will find yourself making natural and permanent changes. The kind of changes that will be there even when you are not looking.

There is one more angle that we should look at this from. The aim of mantra is to affect your mind, to quiet it down and make it more subtle. But the nature of the mind is to flow like a river. It is in constant motion. So if you feel that the purpose of meditation is to affect your mind, you are going to have a constant maintenance job. As soon as you stop meditating, you are going to feel the effects of your meditation wearing off. So what can you do, meditate more often or longer?

But the creators of these meditations forgot one important point. You are not the mind. The peace and stillness that you are looking for is consciousness, which is the ever-present witness of the changes in the mind. So here, rather than attempting to get the mind in the “right state” you shift your identity out of the mind and into the place where it is anyway.

Once you experience a state where you mind is misbehaving, but you are free of its ranting and at peace, you will never again go back to trying to control the mind. As for your mind, it will come to its natural balance. In its power, its peace, and its beauty you will find that the mind is perfect in itself without the need for you to interfere at all.

Incidentally there is an end to this practice. When you wake up you will find yourself standing in your natural state without the least need for meditation or maintenance. Then when you meditate it will be joy meditating on joy, and consciousness will be meditating on wisdom.

So above I described the most important part of my meditation. If you want to know more details here is a link to an article that I wrote:

http://www.light-up-your-life.com/Newsletter/Vol_I_number6.html.

Although both articles here are good, the one at the bottom is called “Sitting Meditation” and describes how we meditate. I think now you see now that the most important part of our meditation is looking within and becoming who we really are anyway. As for the rest, you can choose the forms that inspire you.

Please let me know if this answers your questions. As you look inside you may find that you have even more specific questions about your mind and about your life. Never hesitate to ask. As I always say questions are the gateway to your freedom. It is only flimsy assumptions that keep us in limitation.

And remember my qualifications are not that I am this really high guy. My qualifications are that I had the most limitations to free myself from. So given the wreck of a mind that I started with, if I could wake up to this wisdom, I can guarantee that you will wake up much faster than I did. The only qualification that I had was the willingness to question.

If the comment section of this blog doesn’t work, please send your questions and comments to michael@ananya.com. To find out where this all leads go to, www.light-up-your-life.com. And finally, if you enjoy these blogs please tell your friends.

Best Wishes,

Michael

To know the Tao, be the Tao

Here is another verse from the Tao:

Four

The Tao is an empty vessel; it is used, but never filled.

Oh unfathomable source of ten thousand things!

Blunt the sharpness,

Untangle the knot,

Soften the glare,

Merge with dust.

Oh, hidden deep but ever present!

I do not know from whence it comes.

It is the forefather of the emperors.

Translated by Gia-Fu Feng and Jane English
Vintage Books Edition, September 1972
Copyright © 1972 by Gia-Fu Feng and Jane English 

The beauty of this verse is that it describes something that cannot be known by your mind. That’s because it’s closer than your mind. Although you may think that the Tao is nothing but emptiness, there’s a lot more to her than you notice at first glance.

But she is shy and seems to conceal her beauty. If you want to keep limitation in tact, she will hide as if she’s not seen. But once you catch sight of her, you fall in love. There is no need for sharpness of wit when you have her. The knots of the heart quickly come untied. The harsh noon light turns into the softness of recognition.

You take off your limitations like worn out clothes and merge in wisdom and love. With one loving glance the ego turns to dust. There, with no separation, you see her greatness.   

How can I ever know her greatness while standing separate? And yet the whole time, as this play of light goes on, she is the very core, the source of the universe. When I reach out to touch the universe I touch the Tao.

This commentary is offered as a guided meditation. Just stand here, in the place described by this poem and to your astonishment this place will reveal itself by itself. Then from your own experience, you will see that you know the Tao by standing as the Tao. Not by standing as a separate knower.

And if this raises questions for you, that’s good. Questions are the doorway to your freedom. If the comment section of this blog doesn’t work, please send your questions and comments to michael@ananya.com. To find out where this all leads go to, www.light-up-your-life.com. And finally, if you enjoy these blogs please tell your friends.

Best Wishes,

Michael

In celebration of freedom

Some comments from Chris:

It is so wonderful. You share the Truth so happily. I am so happy that I stumbled upon you and my own self nature. When I read these blogs I am so happy. I am so happy because I am sure that those reading will wake up.

It is nice to see the real thing. Someone really, really helping people to 'know thyself'. So many people are searching, but who is searching? Who is the one looking? Who is the one looking for what?

Such a simple obvious question. Yet all of God is right there, right here, right everywhere, nowhere. This is like an apple tree looking for apples. The tree looks out and says, "Where are apples! Where are apples! Where are apples! Oh no! I'm doomed! I can't find apples anywhere! What will I do!" If only the apple tree knew that it was an apple tree. If only the apple tree knew that it was the source of all the apples. It is all so comical.

I really enjoyed the way you talked about it with the present. The way I have always though about it was like a crystal covered in cloth. I liked the way you talked about it with the present though. That was truly beautiful.

All Yours Love,

Chris

Chris got it right. We spend our whole life looking for happiness and peace. Who would have thought that we are what we’re looking for, that, “The kingdom of heaven is really within you?” That Self-Knowledge will really set you free.

But once you get a sense of where to look, it is just a matter of time before limitation falls and you abide as the source of the universe. So be like a dog who finds the scent of her master. She does not let go of that scent until her master stands before her.

Once you know where to look for your freedom, don’t let up until freedom and you become one. Then you will know the real meaning of these words. You will know for sure that these words are not a theory, but a description of your own natural state.

Here we laugh from the joy that springs from our own self-nature. Although we laugh from freedom, we also see that people who seem to be inexorably caught in their suffering are really so close to this freedom. It is just a matter of letting go of limitation as one or two little assumptions. Reality is waiting for them with an open hand.

We know that this knowledge is their hope. That their suffering, no matter how intense it seems to be, is thinner than the thinnest cloth, and that their freedom is right before their eyes. Just look on this side.

And as always I encourage questions. When you question limitation you are taking the fist step towards your freedom. When you start to wonder where your freedom is it will come knocking at your door.

If the comment section of this blog doesn’t work, please send your questions and comments to michael@ananya.com. To find out where this all leads go to, www.light-up-your-life.com. And finally, if you enjoy these blogs please tell your friends.

Best Wishes,

Michael

Trouble at work

This is a response to a comment by Craig, who is a teacher.

Hi Craig, thank you for your comments. Here we love trouble. Trouble equals the opportunity to grow. I know that this is different from many spiritual practices where the aim is to find a peaceful and quiet mind. According to these practices, you should to quit your job and move into a monastery in the country.

But here we are talking about self-knowledge. We know that as things change in life, the self is always present. It is Consciousness, which is the knower of these changes, and the source of our bliss. That self is you. Yes, you are the source of the peace that you feel. If that’s the case, when things get turbulent and out of hand at your job, you have the opportunity to find this peace.

“But”, you might be thinking, “How am I ever going to find peace? My boss is expecting ten times more work from me than I can possibly do. All of the deadlines were actually a week ago. My mind feels cluttered by all of the pressure, and I think I’m going to get fired any day.”

Ok, here’s the first hint, you're not looking for a better state of mind. Your mind is already too busy with work. Where would you have room for spiritual thoughts? See, when people look for a better state of mind they don’t know that they already stand beyond their mind.

If you heard that you are the witness of your thoughts then here’s what that means. You stand free of your mind. Some people, though, think that the practice of witnessing is a practice of splitting their mind in half, and having half of their mind, trying to watch the other half. But your mind is already challenged even when your full attention is on your job. How can you possibly split your mind in half?

But even when you are extremely busy you still know what is going on in your mind. You might think, “I was so busy that the time flew by.” or “There where so many demands on me that I was miserable all day.” In either of these cases you didn't intend to be the witness. Yet you knew exactly what was going on in your mind.

The reason you knew your mind is that you are consciousness, and as consciousness you naturally witness the mind. However, now like a cat chasing a mouse, you take the movement of your mind to be the most important part of your experience. In reality though, the mind is just a tiny speck in your natural state, which is consciousness. I think you will be surprised to find that this knowledge will bring you freedom right in the midst of your hectic job.

What you are doing is shifting you identity from the limitations of your mind to your natural state as the background of the universe. Just try this and see how your experience at work changes. From this state of awareness you may discover options that you never realized were available to you. It is only the mind that thinks in terms of suffer or get fired. But from here many possibilities open up. But most important, here, whether you can change your situation or not you will still be free.

Now one more thing to consider. Why wait to be happy and at peace. How many people go through life thinking that they will suffer through work so on Friday they can be happy. In fact in America there is even the saying,” Thank God it’s Friday.” What a shame that you have to spend five days of your life suffering so that you can be happy for two.

Now that you know the source of happiness, you can easily step out of this limitation. So don’t set up the framework in your mind that work is the opposite of happiness. See that you can be happy, even in the most hectic situation. Then you will see the real power of this teaching.

And even if in the end you decide to change your work situation, I recommend that you take the time to see this meditation through. That way you will see how deep your innate freedom really is. That you can stand free even in the worst possible situations. And for a teacher this will be a great example to the next generation. So Craig, please let me know if this answers your question.

Remember, your questions are the key to your freedom. The only thing you should assume is that your natural state is freedom. You can even ask how that is true. But never assume that it is natural for you to suffer. By questioning your suffering you will end up free.

If the comment section of this blog doesn’t work, please send your questions and comments to michael@ananya.com. To find out where this all leads go to, www.light-up-your-life.com. And finally, if you enjoy these blogs please tell your friends.

Best Wishes,

Michael