The I

The “I” is almost never satisfied. It gets what it thinks it wants, and then something else is wanted. The “I” is deeply afraid it won’t exist someday and is continuously concocting schemes to protect itself and to get what it wants. It doesn’t know that it is feeling separation, yet it still experiences a deep feeling that something is missing or not whole. There is no end to it. Even though you can’t find an “I” anywhere in reality, this truth lies unquestioned by the world.

Traditional Advaita

The teaching of “Traditional Advaita” has no relevance to liberation because it is born out of a fundamental misconception. Its logical and sensibly progressive recommendations include meditation, selfenquiry, self restraint, and to quote “the renunciation of the ego and all desire”. Of course there is nothing right or wrong with the idea of desiring to renounce desire. However, these idealistic recommendations and teachings are based on the fundamental misconception that there is such a thing as a separate individual with free will and the choice to become.

The belief that there is a separate seeker (subject) who can choose to attain or become worthy of something called enlightenment (object) is a direct denial of abiding oneness (Advaita).

Stalker

Stalk the "I" thought, see where it leads you. To be identified with and trapped in the confines of circumstantial response patterns, one after another, without rest, is hell on earth and the cause of our needless suffering. To be free is to reside in that which does not change, yet is aware, and does nothing.

ro ro ro your boat

Since I had not been a spiritual or religious seeker, I had no clue there was such a thing as ultimate freedom. I only knew about the freedom that is commonly recognized and understood in our world - the worldly kind of relative freedom. That's the one I was after since childhood, driven to have a happier, more meaningful, more peaceful, more true and authentic life. So, when the other freedom appeared one day without warning, collapsing in the process my entire life as I had known and understood it, it was a shock to say the least.

Bill Hicks

A method /technique

Someone asked me to suggest a method or technique to help the “shift” to awakening. But, there is no need of any technique or shift, in order to be what we already are. When we have spent years making so much effort trying to become more, trying to fix and improve who we think we are, we can not believe that the truth can be in absolute simplicity. It sounds too easy. No effort required? Surely not. We are so used to complication that simplicity seems too difficult. We can not hear that the answer is not in adding or taking away anything. It is not in doing or even in not doing.

And in not knowing what to do or not do, this can feel incredibly frustrating. All you know is to try hard, and do a lot. But what you already are, is not known, or understood, and doesn't require any effort at all, because it is you.

So then the next question is naturally, "well, how can I know this myself, rather than just believing your words?" You can't because the one who is trying to know this, is the thinking. The thinking will never be able to know that that is aware of it. So you are left with simply feeling the frustration. There is no escape from feeling it while it is here. There is no point in trying hard to fix it with an imagined perfectly clever answer. It doesn't work anyway. There are endless questions and endless answers. At some point you see how pointlessly simple it really is.

And in acknowledging this simplicity, you may have to face your feelings of disappointment at how easy it really is.