Preetom

@SoonHei It all comes together seemingly out of nowhere. Things just click. Then when you reflect back on it and demand an explanation on a 'conventional' level, the 'I' arises to claim ownership of it. Do we really need that adjunct called 'I'? What purpose does it really serve other than providing a false sense of intellectual security? The downside seems to be too troublesome..

That voice in your head, that ego(you) is absolutely alone! ABSOLUTELY ALONE! There is no other party involved. The mind is simultaneously the thinker, the receiver, the believer, the denier of thoughts. According to itself, it holds the authority of Truth and Judgment! On what ground? ON ABSOLUTELY NO GROUND!! But it can't afford to see this system as it is. OR ELSE IT WILL SELF-EXPLODE!! That's why the mind must continuously shove all the evidence under the rug and play it's silly games! It must continuously affirm things like, ''NO NO NO!! I'M NOT ALONE! THERE IS A WORLD OUT THERE. THERE ARE PEOPLE WHO AGREE WITH ME!! WHAT I SAY IS TRUE!!! MY JUDGMENTS ARE LEGIT!! THERE CAN'T BE ANY OTHER WAY THAN I SAY!! I'M NOT MAKING THIS UP! THIS IS TRUE!!''...all the while acting innocent as if it is Not actively and passively running this business. Even if God herself came down from the heavens playing an Irish bagpipe and telling all the secret's of the Universe, ultimately all of it will be translated by your mind! It's your mind thats running all the business! It's simultaneously the businessman, the consumer, the corrupter, the victim and everything else in between! Do these lines of thoughts make you uncomfortable? Who is it that is resisting and denying? Who must shove all the evidence under the rug? YOU?? or that thought? YOU? or that Corrupt dictator?

Who is it that must have a place of security? The more I see the limit of knowledge, it's utter dryness, it makes me wanna puke. oh wait, is that more knowledge coming in through the back door?

Why do you have to label this whole thing as a 'problem' from the get go? Why not watch it...? Why not 'wait'?...like a cat in front of a mouse hole.. You never know what Santa is hiding under that rug

''Death is the solution to all problems. No man - no problem.'' -Joseph Stalin EVEN HE INTUITED A KERNEL OF TRUTH

@SoonHei ''There is no free will'' or any non dual truths translated by the mind never works as a mantra. It only enables the ego to come in through the back door and co-opt the nondual teaching. Unfortunately this is the case I'm waking up to every single day The better and legit strategy is to dump all this business and fix everything you have on that I AM, until it's truth gets revealed to you once and for all Also another important thing I'm realizing is, never..I mean NEVER refer to a thought about the state of your Consciousness or who you really are; no matter how clever and sweet that sounds. The sooner you realize the folly of thoughts, the better.

@SriBhagwanYogi Reread The power of Now and A New Earth literally after seeing this thread. I read them first about 4 years ago. 4 years later, I can honestly say that these books do have all the necessary hints one needs to wake up. But chances are, you'll probably find this simple teaching as weak just like I did because the mind always craves MORE!!

Sending blessings through Ether

See ya at the other side.. hmmm...interesting question.. but that's Picasso's issue. Does painting require a Picasso to be as it is?

What if I told you that you're already at stage 10 AND forgot about all things related non-duality?

and your niece is 1 week 'older' now..

THERE IS NOT! But if you still persist on an intellectual answer, then the answer is, ''There is something rather than nothing because you simply imagine it'' in other words, Something=Nothing=Everything

For those who are very curious about Post-Enlightenment living experience. Take it as you may..

@Ampresus If you're interested in Osho, then I highly recommend you slowly start doing this. You're only 14 and trust me you'll feel tremendous gratitude one day that you started this early. This is the essence of Osho's message. 100% practical. You don't need to read his 20-30 books. Most of them are just gossips anyway. https://nellaishanmugam.wordpress.com/2018/01/15/witnessing-meditation-by-osho-a-technique-of-everyday-mindfulness/

Actually both affirmation and negation techniques have it's place in Vedic tradition. The seeker would affirm ''I am HE'' or ''I am BRAHMAN'' as a mantra million times a day in meditation. The seeker would do neti neti (negation); which is mentally negating everything in present experience that is not me. Ramana Maharshi criticized both these techniques as not being direct enough. He said when you ask ''Who am I?'', you are not after an affirmation or answer like ''I am Brahman'' nor you just mentally label things as ''not me not me''. ''Who am I?'' is a question that invites you to take a silent journey deeper and deeper into your present experience...this is what Ramana Maharshi declared as the most direct path. With that being said, neti neti is a very helpful technique that refines intellect to discriminate between the Seer and the seen. It builds a solid intellectual foundation and later helps a lot in self inquiry.

You've got it spot on my friend! The very purpose of doing neti neti is to refine the intellect more and more. Normally, a person is totally identified with the contents of his experience. At one point, this discrimination skill gets so sharp that clever thoughts like 'I want enlightnement' and intellect itself is seen as another subtle object. At this point, neti neti collapses as a mental labeling or intellectual categorizing. A holistic, pure, effortless Witnessing takes place. This is what J. Krishnamurti called choiceless Awareness. It was always there, now it shines and you know it first hand. Great that you've had this breakthrough

Yes it's really simple. You just be present and follow the 'I' feeling honestly...without any judgment or agenda. Only mind makes it complex with arguments and clever distractions. It is an ongoing 'felt' experiment... Unfortunately, I've found that people who criticize or bash on Self-inquiry, don't really have a holistic understanding of this process. They have reduced it to a mere clever argument and discarded it. From my own experience I've found that Self-inquiry is a complete package that contains many many things. A total recontextualuzation of attention and thus perception. 1) Concentration practice 2) Asking questions and bringing out unquestioned assumptions and beliefs into light and thus unwiring them 3) Detachment from all objects until pure I AM/Witnessing shines 4) Progressive layers of relaxation and peace as the mind and body starts to relax. 5) Having mini breakthroughs more and more easily and frequently. These mini insights ARE enlightenment. But the latent mental tendencies bring you out of it. Self-inquiry must continue until all seeds of Vasanas (tendencies) are burnt once and for all. 6) Final irreversible breakthrough into Enlightenment (Only thing I haven't verified by myself ) All that is necessary is you spending time with it. Really sink into it. The more you do it, the easier and effortless it becomes. More and more you will put attention on your attention (relaxation of attention); instead of putting attention on objects and identifying with them.

@SoonHei Glad you found it helpful You're welcome. Yes you need to come to this technique over and over again until it becomes unbroken (That's how Ramana Maharshi originally prescribed it and he saw no conflict in day to day action and continuing self inquiry) . In the beginner stages, you need to cultivate a lot of interest for the 'perceiver' that knows, not the experiences that are known. That love for your Self, for your Consciousness will motivate you to self inquire more and more. Just stay with that sense of 'I'. If it stays in the head for 1 hour, let it be. Keep watching it. You don't have to deny or fight against it. At best you can ask ''who is the perceiver of this feeling?'' to gently relax your attention. Either way, you are not getting lost in thoughts but staying more present. I'll share one more helpful pointer I got from Adyashanti about self inquiry. If it takes you into thoughts, complaining, judging etc no matter how logical or clever or non-dual it sounds, that's a clear indication that you're not doing self-inquiry as it should be done. Rather you've been tricked and lured by the traps of your mind. It's not a thinking or figuring out process. If it takes you into deeper and deeper all pervasive feelings, deep emotions etc..which you keep on dis-identifying from...until you reach a thoughtless pure observation or I AM; then you're doing it right. Self-inquiry should make you more and more grounded and hyper alert in present moment. Yeah sometimes mental storms can come up but the point is not to fight them or start a clever argument with thoughts against thoughts. The point is gently disidentifying and tracing the attention to fall back on itself... It's almost like learning a musical instrument. You can get lessons from a dozen masters, but when all is said and done, you must sit with that guitar consistently...learning your way day after day, month after month. One day, you start to get a 'feel' of it for yourself and from then on you don't need any pointer or master anymore. You carve your own way. You are fine as long as you check these 2 things. 1) Don't stop inquiry while identifying as an experience, no matter how gross or subtle that object is. Remember, you are not an object but the 'knower' of all objects. 2) Don't look at a thought like ''there is no me'', ''I'm now enlightened'' or any clever argument to confirm your progress at all. I strongly take it as a hypothesis that if I'm really Enlightened, I won't need the thought, ''I am Enlightened'' as a verification to end the search. It is direct BEING! Anyone can think that thought anytime. You'll know when it happens. YOU can't miss YOURSELF. After that, you won't need any confirmation from anyone

One has to sit and willingly look at the movement of thoughts in order to understand the deceptive nature of thoughts. Mere hearsay from someone or believing something won't do it. Yeah one can have a new trophy in his intellectual showcase, but not real living insight.

Affirmations or negations don't work because self inquiry is not an intellectual process, but a tracing of present moment feeling. Through thoughts, you can reach an intellectual understanding but never the 'felt' realization. Let's say you feel that 'i' is in the head. Then ask yourself 'who is the perceiver'?' or 'what is it, that knows this experience in the head?'... and gently notice what happens to that sensation and your attention. The logic is 'I' can't be the sensation because I am aware of it. The moment you realize this, your attention starts to loosen from that sensation and relaxes more and more...attention starts to revert back to wherever the hell it came from. This is what is called attention turned on itself or being aware of being aware or sinking the mind into the Heart One of 2 thing can happen 1) the grip on that sensation in head will either dissolve or loosen and you'll 'experience' pure I AM without any particular identification. Then just stay there. 2) or that sensation will loose it's grip BUT another subtler sensation will feel like 'I'. Then you dis-identify from that as well...until you reach I AM. Stay there...until a thought/sensation takes you away again. So the questions are not the purpose of self inquiry. They are just tools in order to relax the obsessive focus from objects to the Subject. You won't locate the subject but you'll know when a shift happens. That's why it is said mind can never go there. Even if you're 'stuck' in that head sensation, keep watching that I feeling. That's concentration practice happening right there. Eventually, that identification must dissolve and attention will fall back on its source. Note: this is the spiritual effort one must exert. Self inquiry is not an idle formula. It needs tremendous focus and perseverance. It is such a complete technique that it builds your concentration and detachment simultaneously along the way. At final stages, the 'I' will never identify with anything ever again. That's why it is known as the direct path, meaning that you don't need any pre-requisites. Only requirement is 100% willingness and desire to walk through the path all the way...until the nut cracks...no matter how stupid or boring it feels along the way. These boring moods and labels are usually associated with thoughts. It doesn't mean that the process is a hoax, it means that mind is trying to trick you to stop. Final note: this technique can't be mentally discussed. One has to spend hours after hours with this until one gets a 'feel' of it. It's exactly like an adventure in the jungle I mentioned. You must take that adventure yourself, whatever you need to know or fine-tune, you'll learn them on your own along the way. Just remember this mantra, "Nothing perceivable or conceivable can be I"

@Jack River It's done through refined intellect or clear seeing without any judgement. Anything that is perceivable or conceivable is seen as unreal because they are all subject to change. If this process is consciously kept up, all 'objects' of Consciousness are seen as unreal and only Pure Consciousness remains. The self ceases to identify itself with any object ever again and shines as THE SELF. It was always THE SELF...it only appeared as the ego self due to ignorant identification. When that spell of ignorance is broken, only the Absolute is... That's when neti neti spontaneously comes to its end and what is prevails as it always is.

That's a trap!!!!! God help us. Self-inquiry is a super simple method. It's so simple that everyone needs to complicate it. Self inquiry is neither a 'who am i' or 'there is no me' mantra, nor a concentration practice, nor a clever intellectual mental gymnastic to brainwash and convince yourself. Self inquiry is.. 1) become present right now 2) then whatever rises at this moment as an I feeling (a thought/sensation etc); gently following that to its source. You must start from exactly where you are. If the 'i' feels to be in the head, that's the starting point. 3) along the way seeing every objective identification as 'perceived', while you keep falling into the 'perceiver' 4) a non-located subjective experience is reached at one point. Pure sense of I AM. Stay there. 5) eventually you'll drop from that state due to latent mental tendencies. That means repeat from step 1. NOTE: 'there is no me' is thought. That means you've already lost it. Restart from step 1. Repeat this thing for millions of time if necessary... day after day, hour after hour...until all delusion is burnt once and for all and nothing takes you away from Enlightenment. I'll finish with an amazing metaphor for self inquiry I heard from Rupert Spira. It's like you're lost in a jungle but there is your private camp at its center. You take days to trace your way back to your camp. Again you get lost somewhere else in the jungle....again you trace back to your camp....this cycle goes on... After a while, you start returning to your camp quicker and quicker....after some time, the entire jungle becomes familiar to you...so much so that you are NEVER lost again in that jungle. Self inquiry is just like that. You actually need to trace your attention or I-ness back to its source over and over...you need to take those steps back to YOU. At the final stages of self inquiry, it becomes so easy that just the thought 'I' immediately takes you to the Self. Getting lost in the jungle and shouting, "there is no me, I'm not lost, I have a camp" etc won't bring you back to your camp. You actually have to trace back. Get lost. Trace back. Get lost. Trace back....

@winterknight Can you suggest how to nurture an intense desire for Enlightenment?

20 years balls deep in nonduality plus having family background supporting this, and yet this guy hasn't been able to crack the nut? I feel pity.. Nonduality is a very defined philosophy with defined methodology. If you wanted to be a swimmer but you instead jogged for 20 years and then wonder how come you can't make it as a swimmer, then I hate to break it to you that you need to see your own error instead of bashing against swimming. The instruction says unbroken self-inquiry/witnessing is necessary to break free the prison of the mind. Am I doing that? No? Then why the fuck am I complaining? Is it the fault of the method or fault of myself who isn't following the instruction?

Yes that's the idea. You don't let the 'I AM' to become 'I am this or that'. When you continuously separate the subject from the objects and don't let the subject cling with any further objects, that fictitious ego 'I' vanishes. Because this ego 'I' has no independent existence of it's own. It can only claim it's validity by sticking itself with an object (thoughts, sensations, attachments). Then in it's place, the True Self shines