Non-Duality Nisargadatta Maharaj Dialog

                          Maharaj Dialog

...realization is explosive. It takes place spontaneously, or at the slightest
hint. The quick is not better than the slow. Slow ripening and rapid flowering
alternate. Both are natural and right. Yet, all this is so in the mind only. As I
see it, there is really nothing of the kind. In the great mirror of
consciousness images arise and disappear and only memory gives them
continuity. And memory is material -- destructible, perishable, transient. On
such flimsy foundations we build a sense of personal existence -- vague,
intermittent, dreamlike. This vague persuasion: 'I-am-so-and-so' obscures
the changeless state of pure awareness and makes us believe that we are
born to suffer and to die.

Seeker

I was told that a realized person will never do anything unseemly. That they
will behave in an exemplary way.

Maharaj

Who sets the example? Why should a liberated one necessarily follow
conventions? The moment one becomes predictable, one cannot be free.
Ones freedom lies in being free to fulfill the need of the moment, to obey the
necessity of the situation. Freedom to do what one likes is really bondage,
while being free to do what one must, what is right, is real freedom.

Seeker

What about cause and effect?

Maharaj 

Each moment contains the whole of the past and creates the whole of the
future.

Seeker

But past and future exist?

Maharaj

In the mind only. Time is in the mind, space is in the mind. The law of cause
and effect is also a way of thinking. In reality all is here and now and all is
one. Multiplicity and diversity are in the mind only.

Non Dualism - The Sense 'I am' - The Sense of Consciousness - N. Maharaj

                          The Sense 'I am'

                                   

When I met my Guru, he told me: "You are not what you take yourself
to be. Find out what you are. Watch the sense 'I am', find your real
Self." I obeyed him, because I trusted him. I did as he told me. All
my spare time I would spend looking at myself in silence. And what a
difference it made, and how soon!

My teacher told me to hold on to the sense 'I am' tenaciously and not
to swerve from it even for a moment. I did my best to follow his
advice and in a comparatively short time I realized within myself the
truth of his teaching. All I did was to remember his teaching, his
face, his words constantly. This brought an end to the mind; in the
stillness of the mind I saw myself as I am -- unbound.

I simply followed (my teacher's) instruction which was to focus the
mind on pure being 'I am', and stay in it. I used to sit for hours
together, with nothing but the 'I am' in my mind and soon peace and
joy and a deep all-embracing love became my normal state. In it all
disappeared -- myself, my Guru, the life I lived, the world around
me. Only peace remained and unfathomable silence.


- Nisargadatta Maharaj

Extract from 'Perfect Madness'

Osho:  

'The more man becomes aware of the mysterious side of life, the less he is political; the less he is a Hindu, a Mohammedan, a Christian; the less is the possibility for his being a fanatic. A man in tune with the mysterious is humble, loving, caring, accepting the uniqueness of everybody. He is rejoicing in the freedom of each individual, because only with freedom can this garden of humanity be a rich place.'
He also said: why would you be Christian instead of being a Christ, why not choose Buddha instead of Buddhist. Why follow someone and choose to be a servant, instead of being a King yourself.

                                                        Perfect Madness

Life doesn't have to be the way we live it! As soon as we become aware of our name, parents, relatives, society, race, country, our intellectual capacity, the looks - we start believing that we are an individual entity, this person (mask). 
Now this person becomes angry, defensive, jealous, envious, competitive and its suffering starts. 
Then we start searching for love 'outside', we want an object to fulfill us. This object is supposed to fulfill us and make us happy at all times. We also go to school and we have to get good grades and make our parents and society proud. Then we find a job and we serve our governments by paying taxes for the rest of our lives - exactly the same way our parents and grandparents did.
Once we turn 45-50-60, we realise we missed out on our life but it is apparently 'too late' as we lost our youth. We now dwell on the past and 'live' in our mind, remembering the events when our body was young. Then we regret that we didn't live the life the way we have always imagined it: "I could have married someone wealthy, shouldn't have gotten married, should have lived in different country, should have done what I loved but got stuck working in this dreadful industry and spent more time with some dreadful people than with my family. I wish I could avoid this work but I had to pay off the mortgage, had to send children to school, needed a new car, a better house like my relatives, I needed another holiday to share photos on facebook so the friends and the relatives could 'like it' but also envious." 
All of a sudden we get sick and depressed and we realise none of this made us happy for long. Each time our desires were fulfilled we wanted to attain more, the next thing, successful career, more money, something else that will happen in the future. Now we become psychologically ill and this turns into physical illness. We get depressed as we keep talking about our past, the memory, and we comment on what was 'good' or 'wrong'. The mind then goes into the future either to get rescued or out of fear, which causes anticipation, anxiety. 
We start seeing doctors that cannot help. They ask us to have a rest which is 'easy said than done as we will miss out on work. We need money to feed our family, we might get sacked if we do not perform well' - our thoughts keep going in circles, a constant chatter.
Now we might ask to get referred to a psychologist but it doesn't help much. They might patch us up for the next couple of weeks if lucky or half a way to the next meeting. Even after visiting them we still have to continue living the way we did - constantly working in a demanding environment, trying to please our employer and our family (we are never good enough), we drive to and from work in peak hours, we travel to work on congested, dirty, smelly and ever late public transport with all these mad people to get to work on time. Then we get more and more worried that we are unwell but still have unpaid mortgage, enormous electricity bills, even more enormous medical bills that we struggle paying (what we earn we give to medical industry that showed no results in helping us anyway) - more depression and anxiety, more fear from the unknown future. 
Now we regret our life and the way it turned out. Our mind goes back to our childhood when concept of individuality formed and our parents named us and told us we were such and such, part of this family, originating from a certain country, nation, religion. We got introduced to our aunty, uncle, cousin, our sibling. Then we get sent to school to learn more concepts, a prescription of how to live our life.The problem is that we often overdose on this prescription which happens sooner or later. The purpose of schooling is to prepare us to become a good servant to the nation and government for their profit driven purpose. Our parents were convinced that obtaining this thing called 'degree' would give their children respectful spot in this society. The parents can be proud of their child now. This thing called 'degree' is so valuable. You complete your education and make your parents proud for a few weeks so they can proudly share it with their relatives and friends.Now they expect more of their child: to get a PhD as the children are supposed to continue where their parents stopped - their child needs to complete its parents.
Now, as a good citizen you can vote: you have about 3 top parties to choose from and you vote for the one that will turn your life into heaven: this political party promised to build the roads, education, public transport, charge less tax, they promise more money for you and your family, safer future. All this will happen with your tax money. Your political party gets elected but your excitement is short lived as you realise that they haven't delivered anything promised but made you struggle more. Your politicians tell you that such high tax is good for you and you believe it: 'They are in charge, they know what is right for me.'
Now you form your own family as a good citizen - you have to follow scenario, your prescription. You need to find an appropriate partner so you don't have to spend your life on your own. You need someone to fulfill you. Then you have children, continuation of your own kind, the next generation of tax payers. Your children make you happy but this happiness is short lived as it is additional burden to you. There are more bills and additional hours at work, occasionally two jobs. There are endless school bills, children did not meet your expectations, fear for their future, more stress. You need a bigger house and an additional car. You need to work longer hours. 
You start seeing more 'madness' created by the humans - there is global warming, endless wars, more fears served on a plate on TV news by your government. Your tax that gets invested in weapon production industry, in support to 'our troops' regardless that you were never asked if you wanted this to happen. Another war is yet required to build the world peace. For the good of your own family you have to keep quiet and join the masses with a silent 'm'.
Now you decide to get yourself a dog, cat or a bird. 'It is a human act to save a dog or a cat from a rescue home.' You start contributing to such a home, thinking you are doing the right thing. Do you really know what is good or bad?! It doesn't occur to you that you cannot resolve this issue by pulling a weed by the leaves but only taking it by the roots to finish with it.The problem might be in over-manufacturing men-kept animals that will spend their lives in human captivity. Isn't ego-driven human often danger for himself, let alone a dog, cat or a bird?! Don't most humans believe they are the most important beings on this planet? What an ignorance! Only because humans believe in this thing called 'ego', 'self centre' or a 'reference point' and because they have capacity of reasoning. Most humans also believe they are very special -'me' is a VIP (very important person).
How do we know that a microbe, a bacteria that lives in our body or skin is less important than us - just because we are 'human' and have this important 'me'?
How many microbes do we get rid of when we wipe or hands or face? We don't even see it. We humans don't even believe what we cannot see. 
Realise that you constantly live in the present moment, in the Now but not the now that implies time! Time is illusion, invented by humans. In the Now there is no need to learn anything, in fact we unlearn what we learned so far by dropping believed in concepts we have learned through the life. Everything obtained, accumulated or learned by our parents, society, civilisation is false. By dropping the false truth reveals itself. All of us must have had some insight about our true self but we didn't recognize what it was at the time. It was usually a moment of relaxation, for an instance when we were relaxing on the beach with eyes closed but could still hear waves and people swimming or children playing. You might have even heard silence underneath. As simple as this. In that moment of relaxation you were reconnected with your true being. Mind wasn't commenting anything and there was a sense of peace and joy. You could even hear dog barking and then silence. That is all there is. You were part of nature with it. There was no 'me' to comment or claim anything. There was hearing or witnessing. That is this great thing some call 'Enlightenment' - nothing. That is who you truly are or what you are. You don't seek Enlightenment in the future moment or in a certain place. It is not with a certain 'guru'. They might point you to That but no-one can give it to you. It is what you are - the Awareness underneath all that is happening, watching, forms vibrating, people talking, tree swaying in the wind. The awareness is always there and no 'me' to claim participation in what is happening in this world of the apparent forms.
Maybe start by listening to the silence underneath the noise, even before you hear a voice, a sound of a passing car. There is even silence between the thoughts. There are gaps. Mind makes too much noise as it hates silence. It loves madness, the chatter, the noise or comments. 
We go to sleep every night voluntarily.  We don't think if we will fall apart when asleep and when the mind goes to rest. How about swapping daily activities and seeing that as a dream and seeing night sleep as the reality? If you continued night sleep where you left off previous night, what would you see as reality: so-called daily life or night sleep? Does 'me' get involved in your dream at night or is there only awareness of your dream without any involvement? How about you don't get involved in this dream called world?! You also need to realise that you are not separate from anything. If your body like everything else is made out of atoms and subatomic particles that are 99.99% empty space, can you be separate by leaving the space? Isn't your body play of five elements that are also in the nature. Take one element out and how long would you last? Take space, air, water, temperature, matter - how long would you exist in that apparent body in your current life?
Nature knows no separation or resistance. What happens to a tree when it resists strong winds? - it breaks. After the darkest clouds, the sky appears again, intact, unchanged. The sky is always there, unmoved, same as the Ultimate state. Bottom of the ocean remains stable and unmoved when there is a storm and the waves appear disturbed and unruly.
.
This world of duality seems like a coin that has two sides. All is OK as long as we do not choose one side that suits us and reject what we do not like. Remember that good wouldn't exist if there was no bad! It is same with happy or sad - would we know happy without a sad?! Wouldn't we get bored with having one side all the time - good only? Happy or sad, pleasant or painful are only the labels. Everything or anything called by a certain name is labeling only. What would be wrong with the world if we didn't label anything?! Could we tell that something is right or wrong?! If you looked around without labeling, you couldn't tell the difference between various shapes and forms, people, nature, animals, buildings or furniture. It would appear like a shade - it is there, it follows you but it has no relationship or involvement with you. There is awareness of it only. See the world as a shade, as an image in a mirror. You cannot grab it as it is an image - imagination.
Only with resistance, preference or relationship with objects, a belief that we are separate entity, our suffering continues.With realising that we are one with all human suffering drops away permanently.
.Everything is perfect in unborn mind. Why exchange unborn for born. The unborn resolves itself. 
You are unborn!


-Sabine Hamm

Non - Duality with Sailor Bob Adamson - Introductory Talk

I would like to share Bob Adamson's introductory talk with you. This is the usual talk he gives in his Kew (Deepdeene) home each time a newcomer is present. I love it as it is straight to the point. It points straight to the source and recognition of our true nature. It puts smile on my face each time I hear it. I listen to it every morning on my way to work. I hope you will be open to it and take it on board the way I did. Enjoy!

If you are seeking truth, reality, God or whatever you like to call it, I suggest that you start with the only reality you are absolutely certain of – that is, the fact of your own being. There is no one sitting here who can say “I am not.” Each one of us knows ‘I am, but that thought ‘I am’ is not the reality. It is the closest you will ever get to it with the mind.

That ‘I am’ is just a translation by the mind of that sense of presence, the awareness of presence or the presence of that awareness. That is the only reality we are absolutely certain of. Nobody under any circumstances can say ‘I am not.’ That knowing is constantly and ever with us, and that is why we say that what you are seeking you already are.

We base what we talk about here on what the ancient traditions tell us. In Advaita, for instance, they call it non-dual; one-without-a-second. The one-without-a-second part means that even one could imply that there is something other than one. In the Dzogchen scriptures they call it non-conceptual, ever-fresh, self-shining, presence awareness, just this and nothing else. And if you look at what they are saying, that is describing you, me and everything else.

That presence of awareness is non-conceptual. You don’t have to hold a concept about it. It’s ever fresh because it has no beginning and no end. It is self-shining like the sun. It shines of itself. It doesn’t need a light to say ‘I am shining’. And that is what it is, just that, which you cannot escape from; you cannot get away from-presence-awareness.

All the traditions will tell you that it is omnipresence, omniscience, omnipotence. That is, all presence, all knowing, and all power. It has been continually pointed out down through the ages, and is nothing new. It is obvious and evident, and simplicity itself. There can be nothing simpler than one, and yet we miss it. We miss it, purely and simply, because we look for an answer in the mind.

If you question the mind, you will see that mind is time, and time can never be omnipresence. Even the concept ‘presence’ is not what the is-ness or the actuality is, because presence (as a concept) is time: past, present and future.

The very idea there is something to seek and someone to seek implies time, and time is mind. That is why you will never find the answer in the mind. To the mind, presence-awareness is no-thing. It hasn’t got any shape, it hasn’t got any form, hasn’t got any time, hasn’t got any space, hasn’t got any beginning or any end. So it is no-thing. They call it ‘emptiness’.

The mind can’t grasp no-thing; it doesn’t like no-thing. The mind, being a thing itself, is dualistic. It is always dividing into the pairs of opposites, into things. It cannot know or grasp or understand no-thing. The fact is that you may have been looking in the wrong direction. You are all intelligent people, but you may have been seeking for years. You have worked out so many things in the mind, yet you can’t find this because you believe it’s some sensation or concept or idea that has been read about, or people have talked about. We look for something similar and miss the ‘no-thingness’ of it.

You have got to look at these things. They need to be looked at and understood. Am I this body, for instance? What is this body made up of? We investigate it, have a look and we see it is nothing but the elements. It is 80% water. Then there is air, space, matter, fire. It is only the elements. The elements can be broken down into subatomic particles, into no-thing. Look at that again and also see that you can’t be separate from the elements. This body is the elements. It is not separate from the elements. See how far you can go without air! See where you get to without water, space, bodily heat (the fire) or matter.

I don’t like to use the word ‘God’ or ‘the Supreme’ purely and simply for the reason that each of us will probably have a different concept of what we have come to believe God to be or not be. If we are agnostic or atheist, we will have a concept about that also. I use the term ‘intelligence-energy,’ but I’m not speaking about your intellect because there are many different degrees of intellect.

What I’m talking about is that same intelligence that functions the universe. The very fact that the planets can orbit around the earth and form out of the gases into the particular shape and form and hold that form implies an intelligence. That which keeps the seasons coming and going implies an intelligence. The tides coming in and out implies an intelligence. Look at it closely. It is beating your heart right now, it is growing your hair and your fingernails, digesting your food, replacing the cells in your body.

The patterning and functioning of this body implies that there is a wonderful intelligence expressing through it, as it. And that is actually what you are – that intelligence-energy. It formed you, grew you and is continuing to grow you. It is replacing the cells in your body and doing other things quite naturally, the same as it is in the universe. But that natural state has seemingly been clouded over by the reasoning or the functioning of the mind.

Look at the body and break it down. There is no center here in this body that I can say ‘This is what I am’. It started with the sperm and the ovum coming together. If the body had any centre it would be that original cell. But that has long since gone. Right now, there are many cells dying in this body and being replaced.

Another question is ‘Am I this mind?’ Am I this primary thought “I am”? That sense of presence expresses through the mind as that thought ‘I am’. Look at thought. Is there really such a thing as mind, apart from thinking? I cannot grasp anything that I can call mind.

What is thinking? Thinking at the subtle level is a very, very subtle vibration. At the spoken word level it is a sound. Sound is a vibration, and a vibration is a movement of energy. So it’s the same. You still have not separated that intelligence-energy. If you look at your mind again, you will see it is always vibrating in the interrelated opposites. If it is not past, which is memory, it is anticipation and imagination, which is future. And within that range, it is constantly vibrating as the interrelated pairs of opposites. It is either good or bad, pleasant or painful, happy or sad, loving or hating, or whatever.

Have a look at your mind. It is constantly vibrating in those patterns. See if it is doing anything other than that. So you see, though it is a wonderful instrument when utilized, it’s activity is very mechanical. A little child, when he is born, has not left that natural state. He is still functioning in that natural state. If he is hungry he will cry. If he is happy he will gurgle. He defecates and urinates without any sense of concern. It just happens, just the same as his food is digested.

He is doing activities, moving his hands, moving his arms, all sorts of activities are going on. At that stage he is not attributing these things to a me (‘I am doing this’ or ‘I am doing that’). He doesn’t know. Reasoning hasn’t started. As the body grows, that line of reasoning begins to function also. His parents tell him, ‘Your name is Johnny, you’re a good little boy, you’re a bad little boy. You are this, you are that.’

He hears this, and it starts to impinge on him. He learns what this word means or what this thought is. He translates it into labels which he is being taught. Then sooner or later he comes to realize that this is me that they’re talking about (‘This is me. I am Johnny’), whereas before it was just ‘Little Johnny’.

When that idea of an ‘I’ or a ‘me’ comes upon him, naturally the mind, functioning in the opposite, asks, ‘What is the opposite of I or me? Isn’t it other than me, or not- I?’ Now he is seeing things which he previously did not have any discrimination about at all. It was just the seeing; it was just the hearing. Now that sense of ‘me’ or ‘I’ has come upon him. He is seeing these things as ‘not me’ or ‘not I’ (or other than I), and feels separate from them.

With a sense of separation there comes insecurity and vulnerability. That is when our search actually starts because insecurity and vulnerability is not happiness. It is not completeness. It is not wholeness. The search starts to try and make ourselves whole or complete or more secure and less vulnerable. And naturally, because our parents have not looked at it or understood it, our society and nations have not looked at it or understood it, the search starts ‘out there’. Nobody ever says to him ‘Look back’ or ‘Stay with that essence that you are, that natural state that you were and still are, before those clouds of thought began to form.’

You see that all our problems arise from that insecurity and vulnerability. The little child, before he saw his separation or realized that he was separate or believed that he was separate, didn’t feel that insecurity or vulnerability. Now he senses it and he wants a warm, loving family around him. He feels more secure and less vulnerable if he has got a warm and loving family. And in the old days families would form into tribes. The bigger and stronger my tribe is, the more secure, less vulnerable I am. Today nations go to war with nations purely and simply because of that insecurity, fearful that the nation next door will take me over, take away my wealth or whatever. Or ‘I’ll get him first because I am insecure and vulnerable and will make myself stronger by taking them over’. This is all based on that self-centredness.

But there is no self centre. The self centre, or ego is the cause of all our problems and is a fiction. The little child adds to the ‘I’ thought all the events, experiences and conditioning, which are mental concepts, and forms a picture about himself based on those concepts. He thinks ‘I am little Johnny, and I have been a good boy or a bad boy, or somebody said something to me and I feel ashamed or guilty or fearful or whatever’. All of these concepts seem to be concretized.

They seem to become real and become a reference point (the ‘me’ or the ego), to which everything is related). Something hits that reference point, that image he has about himself, and it doesn’t fit that image, he doesn’t like it. If something else hits that image and it does fit the image, and he likes it and wants more of it. The thing that isn’t liked he resists and wants to get away from, and so he is in conflict. All of our problems arise from that belief in the self centre. Everything is relative to that fictitious image we have come to believe is real.

The energy of belief has gone into it and made it seemingly real and strong through that habitual belief. But it’s not real and it has no power, so it has no strength. Look at that and see that there is no spot in this body that I can say, ‘This is me’. See that this image that I have got about myself has no substance. It is nothing solid, though it is seemingly concretized. You can never grasp hold of it. Try and grasp hold of a thought! And above all, and this is very important, it has no independent nature.

That thought or image could not even be there if it were not for that intelligence-energy or presence of awareness. We call it intelligence-energy, awareness, consciousness or spirit. That is the label we put on it. But the label is not it. We have many different names or labels for it but none of them really fit. You cannot have a single thought without that functioning intelligence. So the thought is not independent and has no power of itself.

This is the thing we have been in bondage to (that erroneous belief in a substantial, independent centre or ego). It is a phantom, something that does not exist. All it takes is an investigation into what is being pointed out. See it for yourself by questioning and having a look. Have a look into it and see if anything can be found there that has any substance or independent nature. And it is realized that it is not going to take 20 years, 10 years or 5 years – it’s not going to take any time at all. Seeing is right now, it is immediate. It always has been immediate and always will be. Purely and simply because it is timeless.

See that the search itself is a trap, because the search implies that there is an entity needing to become something. And becoming implies some future time – it is not being. Becoming can never be being and what we are talking about is being. We call ourselves ‘human beings’ and we call God the ‘Supreme Being’. Take those two labels away (human and Supreme) and try to separate the beingness. I might call this being here Bob, and that being there I might call Joan. The chair we are sitting on we call a chair. But take away all those labels and what’s left?

The substratum or the base, the beingness, the pattern and form they are taking the shape of or appearing as. But the pattern and form are appearance only. Their essence is still that energy (pure being) vibrating into those patterns. So there is really nowhere to go and there is no one to go there. And, there is nothing to get and no one to get it.

If you look at that, the first question that will come up is, ‘Well, how do I live my life?’ You live your life the same way you have always lived it. If you see that there is no ‘me’ here with any substance or independent nature now,
when could there ever have been one? In seeing that it has no substance or independent nature now, that thing we believed in for so long, could it ever have had any substance or independent nature?

So you can go back again to the sperm and the ovum. You can go back before that to the essence of the food of your father and the essence of the food of your mother. You can go back to the thing that that essence of food lived on before that. You can see that it has no beginning. That sperm and ovum came together, the cell doubled and redoubled and grew this little embryo and little fetus and little child. There was no entity doing any of that. There was no entity when it was born and took its first breath. There was no entity as such before the reasoning came on. And when the reasoning came on, there could still be no entity. If you look at it and see it is a fiction now, it must have been a fiction then.

You see, life has been lived. It is that presence-awareness expressing through these patterns of energy. They are that presence-awareness, in essence, in all its diversity. In each and every one of our lives, there has been no one who has ever lived a life. Life is living and expressing itself as itself. It might seemingly take us away in expression into that erroneous belief. But just as easily as it got us into it, again it can take us out of it by seeing it was a false belief. We are mistaking the shadow for the substance or the essence, whatever you like to call it. And that is basically what it is all about.

Because of that erroneous belief (in a ‘me’) there is this so-called human suffering. It is only a ‘me’ that can be fearful. It is only a ‘me’ that can be anxious. It is only this ‘me’ that can be angry or full of self-pity or anxiety or stressed out. The constant belief in that builds it up and snowballs it until it seemingly becomes overwhelming. But it is not necessary for that suffering to be there. See that the ‘me’ is the cause of all my problems. The effects are the stress, the anxiety, the fear, the self-pity, the remorse, the guilt, the shame.

And we try for years to overcome them, to do something about them, to get rid of them some way or another. But if you just realize that the cause is a fiction – and there cannot be an effect without a cause, then the energy of belief can no longer go into it as being real or having any substance or any independent nature. If all of this manifestation is energy and the energy is no longer going into some pattern, what must happen to the pattern? Must not the pattern drop off by itself?

The experience here is that this is so. I was in those self-centered, emotional, psychological fears, anxieties and stresses. But today, and for quite some time now, quite a few years, they haven’t been there. That doesn’t mean to say that I am an emotionless, thoughtless zombie. It means to say that all the activity, the functioning still goes on – the seeing, the hearing, the tasting, the touching, the smelling, the thinking, the feeling, the positive and negative thoughts functioning in all their opposites.

Emotions and things are there, but they are not fixated on. They don’t hang around. They come up, play their part and disappear, just like the cloud is not attached to the sky. The cloud comes into the sky, plays its part and disappears. The cloud not attached to the sky, the sun can never fall out of the sky. It is always and ever self-shining. And you realize that the sun itself causes the cloud, and the sun itself blows the cloud away. So you see that these thoughts coming up are nothing but the activity of that intelligence-energy. They are not attached anywhere. Knowing the truth about them, they’ll move on. Life continues to function without that self-centred activity.

- Sailor Bob Adamson

Nisargadatta Maharaj - Pointers to Enlightenment (Self Realisation)

• "When I see I am nothing, that is wisdom. When I see I am everything, that is love. My life is a movement between these two."

• "The search for Reality is the most dangerous of all undertakings, for it destroys the world in which you live."
• "Truth is not a reward for good behaviour, nor a prize for passing some tests. It cannot be brought about. It is the primary, the unborn, the ancient source of all that is. You are eligible because you are. You need not merit truth. It is your own. Just stop running away by running after. Stand still, be quiet"
• "My advice to you is very simple – just remember yourself, ‘I am’, it is enough to heal your mind and take you beyond, just have some trust. I don’t mislead you. Why should I? Do I want anything from you? I wish you well – such is my nature. Why should I mislead you? Common sense too will tell you that to fulfill a desire you must keep your mind on it. If you want to know your true nature, you must have yourself in mind all the time, until the secret of your being stands revealed
• "There is only life, there is nobody who lives a life." - I Am That
• "A quiet mind is all you need. All else will happen rightly, once your mind is quiet. As the sun on rising makes the world active, so does self-awareness effect changes in the mind. In the light of calm and steady self-awareness inner energies wake up and work miracles without effort on your part."
• "There is nothing to practice. To know yourself, be yourself. To be yourself, stop imagining yourself to be this or that. Just be. Let your true nature emerge. Don't disturb your mind with seeking.^[25] "

Sailor Bob Adamson

Questioner: "Bob, are you a Sage?"
Sailor Bob: "No, I'm parsley, rosemary and thyme"
                                                                                                                

Sailor Bob Adamson at his house in Kew in March 2014 expecting Sunday visitors.
I called it Sunday Advaita Atheist Service with Sailor Bob. Even that was another concept

                                                   VISITING BOB FOR THE FIRST TIME

    

     We went to see Amma, the 'hugging saint' in Melbourne in April 2012, after trying everything we could think of in order to improve my psychological health, now turned into physical, and was not getting any better. Visiting Amma has changed our lives for good as we have learned about  Sailor Bob Adamson's existence at this very event. 

      At this stage I was listening to Eckhart Tolle's Power of Now, A New Earth and Simplicity of Enlightenment as my psychologist I was seeing for a short while has advised to practice 'mindfulness' (which should be translated as mind-emptiness). I was heavily overworked then, spending years at work without taking annual leave and working long hours. 'Non-for-profit' organisation I worked for at the time didn't have budget to provide enough staff so I had to cover most of the areas in the department I was managing. Now that I changed my jobs and left this ‘for charity’ place, my health was so damaged that I could not recover all that easy.

Now back to Amma event: finally it was our turn to receive Amma's loving hug. It seemed that she didn't discriminate. Many were touched by this loving energy and some wiped their eyes. The whole place was filled with enormous energy and love. There were many people who followed Amma around the world. My partner started conversation with one of Amma’s followers who came from US. He mentioned Advaita (non-duality) where apparently you didn’t need to live many lives before you can get enlightenment. He expressed his love for Papaji and Mooji whom he watched on Youtube often.  Amma’s follower then said that there was someone like that who teaches Non-duality in Melbourne and she was going to visit them that very night. She handed Sailor Bob's brochure explaining that he lived in Deepdene. We didn't realise that it was actually Kew, only 20 minutes drive from our place. It still took us a year and a half to get up on time on September Sunday morning and finally visit Bob. I was probably too depressed to do anything about it. Still anxious and without energy, with many body aches and issues, I was struggling. My mind was constantly in the future, thinking about my work for the following day – the old habit

     As we knocked at the door that Sunday morning, Ram opened it and we paid $20 each. Bob was sitting on his chair holding his walking stick, greeting us with a smile and a big bear hug, asking for our names and if we were there for the first time. He asked where we found out about him. Smile never left my face since, each time we visited Bob. I loved the old man from the first moment I saw him. There was this immediate liking and love coming from around my heart. Few people were sitting around the room waiting Bob’s spiel.

     About three to four months after visiting Bob almost every Sunday, the very same love came from the divine emptiness as I couldn't point to my body or mind any longer. Actually, that was no longer my mind or body. That was end of my seeking and end of this apparent thing called ego or reference point - as Bob calls it. If I had the wings, I could have spread them like a bird that has escaped its cage. There was a sense of freedom and I felt light, losing all that burden off my back. I suddenly entered different dimension and felt untouchable, zombie-like. I felt as I died before my death and it was indescribable. My anxiety attacks, my fears from the uncertain future, fear from death, the illnesses - it all disappeared. The life was and still is so much easier every day. I felt like sharing this with everyone but I couldn’t talk about it. Life is no longer burden. This is simply shortcut to ‘enlightenment’ (note: even the word enlightenment is a concept as there is no-one to get enlightened). It cannot be grasped with the false – mind.

 "There is only life, there is nobody who lives a life" - Nisargadatta Maharaj - I am that
    
"Subject-object thinking seems to cover the natural state (awareness). But without awareness, thinking could not take place. Because thinking appears in awareness (like a cloud appears in the sky), realise that thinking in essence is awareness. Understanding this, thinking cannot obscure awareness". - Sailor Bob Adamson

http://www.sailorbobadamson.com/