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#2148 -
This issue features a book review of This
is Unimaginable and Unavoidable: Irresponsible Writings on
Non-Duality, by Guy Smith.
Some excerpts were given in issue #2120: http://www.nonduality.com/hl2120.htm
Book Review, by Jerry Katz
This is Unimaginable and
Unavoidable: Irresponsible Writings on Non-Duality, by Guy Smith
Ordering info and excerpts: http://www.non-dualitybooks.com/Unimaginable.htm
Guy Smith is a 24 year old man living in
The writings are unstructured. Each chapter
is brief, one to four pages. The author could have
included the writings on sex, pre-enlighenment, and nondual
perspectives, for example, in separate chapters or sections,
but instead he scattered them throughout the book. The
author explains: "This text is best treated like a
treasure-chest filled with diamonds, as opposed to, say, a
treasure map." It's an effective way to present the
material since it corresponds to what is: "this
is." Neither reality nor the book is a bunch of
"this is-es" linked together in order to teach
something or to capture someone in an entrancing flow of ideas.
Almost half the book is poetry, which
ordinarily would make me cringe, as the inclusion of poems
by spiritual teachers or confessors is usually
self-indulgent. But Smith's poetry is varied in style,
easy to read, and not obtrusive. On the other hand, the
poetry isn't literary either. Often it is nothing more
than prose layed out to look like poetry. And more often
than not it is pedestrian nonduality:
Imagine water -
Pure water without limit,
With nothing in it
Or outside it.
Not even motion
Nor shape, nor shade,
No cavity
No gravity -
Just water,
Pure water without limit -
Nothing in it
Or out of it
But for some reason I either don't mind or
actually like the poetry in this book as it exists scattered
among the other writings. It's part of the whole work
which carries the author's exuberance at being freshly
enlightened. And a couple of the poems are actually
good.
Sometimes the author makes you wonder,
though. The following is entitled,"An insincere, purely
mischievous, ridiculous poem."
If woman is God's gift to man,
He couldn't have chosen much better.
Legs a little longer, breasts fatter
perhaps,
And perhaps just that bit wetter.
If woman is God's gift to man
(As I am God's gift to women),
The fact that the gift comes so well chosen
Shows God, without doubt, is man.
Clearly, such a poem comes out of the
author's new sense of freedom. He's simply speaking and that
speaking is enough, regardless of what comes out of his
mouth. Perhaps he is so enamored with all his utterances
that he wants to share it all, whatever it is. I appreciate
that and I like it. It's brash and out of line. Unlike Bob
Adamson and others of his ilk, this book is not flat; it
is carbonated with Guy Smith's personality.
Smith is quite taken with his new ability,
since enlightenment, to write freely. "The [writing about
nonduality] is basically effortless. It writes itself. This is
actually the same with any literature... . ... There is a certain
zing to this direct expressing of oneness that is
incomparable."
While Guy Smith is a smart guy and
enlightened, I wouldn't call his work literature, nor would I say
all literature comes about in an effortless way. It is probably
very carefully honed in most cases. What carries this book
isn't the uttered truths or the novel structure, and it's
certainly not any literary quality; it's the personality, the
youthful energy. Yes, it is the zing. Here he is coming
from the streets; he's bringing it home:
"There is a song by The White
Stripes called The Hardest Button To Button. This is one
of the best metaphors for selfhood I have every come across. I am
the hardest button to button because however much there is
bragging and asserting, defending and justifying, however much
effort is put in, there is still no one here, this is still
purely the activity of impersonal, characterless consciousness.
One tries over and over again to make that button appear through
the buttonhole, to make self a real, stable, forceful reality,
this effort to be a someone, a free will; but it just won't
happen, because it is a lie. There is only consciousness, trying
to believe it is a person, but deep down knowing there is no
one."
On the next page he's an old nondual fart
again:
"To talk about an object called 'Guy
Smith' who one day got or became another object called
'enlightenment' is nonsensical, mistaken.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
In other places he shows some life
again. There are several emails in this book and
they possess an appealing honesty and normalcy. This is a
portion of an email he sent to a friend.
"But the fact is, the fact that is so
clear and obvious now and which makes all this so simple, that
all of this, everything, including all desire, including the
desire for desirelessness, is the presence, oneness, that is
absolutely unmoving, desireless. ... One very annoying thing
Phil. I have found it impossible to open your jam-jar. Not only
is it sealed so hard it is even a match for Guru Guy here - the
lid is serrated. I have tried pouring hot water on the lid and
also using a cloth to dampen the sharp bits, but all in vain. I
guess that's it in a nutshell (or rather a jam-jar). Guy has
spent all day trying to get into the jam-jar, when really there
is no jam. 'What is' is redness and the idea of sweetness...and
nothing else."
There are lots of little enjoyable
confessions and utterances that could be pointed out, like this
smooth comparison between postmodern and nondual expression:
"One of the differences between
postmodern discourse and nondualistic expression is that the
former falsely interprets this to be a state of terrifying
existential uncertainty and disorientation, what it calls
'undecidability'. In the case of 'womanhood' considered above,
for example, the postmodern might revel and wallow in an
endless questioning of 'what is a woman?', 'where is the woman?'
and so on. In contrast, nonduality sees with crystal-clarity and
concrete-certainty that there is no woman anywhere, womanhood is
a misconception. There are no objects in reality: reality is
no-thing appearing."
He speaks about art:
"The whole energy of 'consumer art' --
say, Stephen King, Harry Potter -- is invested in the
solicitation of a desire that is suspended in a seductive manner
until the end of the book, so the reader reads not for the
present but for the future. In 'good art', it is the 'what is
present now' that is the emphasis, the immediate beauty or power
of the art's very fabric, the colour, the image, the sound. It is
sensate reality at its most sensitive, sensuous and
sensual."
He speaks about sex after enlightenment:
"With regards to sex, I have so far
noticed little or no change in this organism's sexual activity,
subsequent to realisation. It periodically craves arousal
and orgasm, and afterwards, the craving is not there...until it
is there again! All very normal I feel. ... [Sex] is a very
potent pointer to the nature of reality, the fact that there is
no power, no directive, just uncontrollable happenings."
He speaks about David Lynch movies:
"This, this text here, and also this
life happening right now, this reading, is a David Lynch
movie." You'll have to get the book to read the rest. You'll
find many other enjoyable writings, as well, as I have tried to
demonstrate.
Guy Smith sees what any nonduality talker
sees right away: that there are two fundamental ways of looking
at nonduality: "On the one hand one talks in terms of
'awakening' and 'seeing the true nature of things', which sounds
unavoidably like an event, a happening; and on the other hand,
when it happens, or rather, when it doesn't happen, it is known
that nothing has ever happened, nothing will ever happen, and
there is only ever 'perception', or 'oneness'.
Elsewhere he addresses the issue again:
"That which is called 'unity' and that which is called
'unicity' are absolutely unrealted. 'Unicity is oneness that is
indivisible and limitless. 'Unity' is a wholeness that is both
divisible and limited." ... The reason this difference
between 'unity' and 'unicity' is being cited here is that many
so-called nondualistic expressions erroneously speak as if these
two were the same thing, or at least related."
In a third place in his book, Smith says
this about the matter: "Nondual expression is very often
contradictory. ... One says, 'There is no one here', and then one
says, 'Today when I was going to the shops to buy some egges...'
This contradiction happens ony because words describe the
limited. ... attempting to talk about nonduality is a bit like
dancing on hot coals. Everywhere you tread, each word you choose,
each phrase, each subject, is dangerous, is misleading, is
conducive to perpetuating the idea of separative selfhood and all
its difficulties and hurtfulness. One dances on coals; one dances
to keep moving away from words, to keep eluding thought, while at
the same time, leaping right onto fresh problems, fresh
structures."
One of the last writings in the book
reveals Guy Smith's alignment with other nondualists:
Sailor Bob Adamson, Leo Hartong, Nathan Gill, Tony Parsons. He
calls their approach "pure nondualty." Guy Smith makes
it clear that he and the others mentioned are not part of a
"pure nonduality" movement. He calls it a
non-movement. He calls it stillness, and because it is
characterized by stillness there can be no such thing as
movement. He writes, "In the appearance of life, within
the last twenty years, something new has emerged and is emerging
still. Because it is all about stillness, it should not be called
a 'movement', so let it be called 'non-movement', or 'stillness'.
Haha. Okay. Listen carefully: It
is a movement. If it's not a movement, why even mention
it. It has a lineage, sometimes clear, sometimes
vague. Because there is a core group of nonduality talkers
at its center of gravity it will cause movement,
clashes, organization, and disorganization. Anything but
stillness. These talkers declare who is nondually correct
and who is not correct; who is enlightened and who is not
enlightened. They have followings. They have fans. It is nothing less
than a movement. And it is organized.
However, that's life. Those who are part of
the movement do speak beautifully about nonduality. I recommend
experiencing the utterance of "pure
nonduality" through Guy Smith and all those people
mentioned.
Jerry Katz
This is Unimaginable and
Unavoidable: Irresponsible Writings on Non-Duality, by Guy Smith
Ordering info and excerpts: http://www.non-dualitybooks.com/Unimaginable.htm