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#1620 - Tuesday, November 18, 2003 -
Editor: Jerry
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The following excerpt is exclusive to the Highlights and was
typed out
from a new book: Self Knowledge, by Nome. Read more about this
book and
order it from the following web page:
http://www.satramana.org/html/self_knowledge.htm. It is an
in-depth
treatise on the teaching of nonduality and Self-inquiry
instruction.
--Jerry
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That you find this teaching is reasonable is fine, but the actual
practice is the inquiry. The explanations are the
great-grandchildren
of the original Truth. Truth, itself, is silent. It is the
Reality of
the Self. When some question is present, some expression is
given. The
expression may be subtle in thought, and it then appears in
words.
Listening to those words, the mind creates a thought. That mind
should
be turned inward to arrive at the meaning of what was said. To
arrive
at the meaning, you must know who you are. All the words and
thoughts
turn back, unable to grasp that. Where words and thoughts turn
back,
the Ungraspable, there is no duality. There is no one who has
instructed and no one who has been instructed. The seer and the
seen
are identical. Inquiring to know yourself, what do you see?
Q: When I am really inquiring, I do not see anything.
N: Are there times when you are not really inquiring?
Q: I think that I am missing what is being pointed out.
N: You said that, when you are really inquiring, you see
accordingly,
which implies that there are times when you are not really
inquiring.
Q: Yes, certainly.
N: These are two states, one extroverted and the other
introverted. For
whom are both states? The extroverted state is delusive. The
introverted state leads to Knowledge, real Wisdom. The
introverted
state leads to the inquiry as to who it is that has both states.
We
are not speaking about a topic. We are speaking about you.
Q: I am starting to understand.
N: Continue to inquire, applying what you hear and read to your
own
experience of the Self. Wherever there is a contrast, inquire. If
it
is said that the Self that you are is not a body, yet you feel as
if
embodied, inquire, "Who am I?" and entirely rid
yourself of the
misidentification, so that you remain as only That which is
actually
"I."
Q: Until now, I have not always been inquiring into the
"I." I have
been thinking of a conception of Being.
N: Are you a concept?
Q: No.
N: What are you inquiring into now?
Q: Why do I consider myself to be a concept when I know that I am
not
one?
N: You have expressed the problem well. Who is the one who
considers?
Turn you mind inward.
Q: I am not the mind that considers.
N: Who is that "I"? What is your nature?
Q: The inquiry does not stop, but it does resolve itself. The
confusion
goes away, and who I am becomes clearer for a moment. Is this the
right direction?
N: For whom are the cloudy and clear states? Who are you? You are
attempting to look at the inquiry, but the inquiry in
nonobjective.
The intellect can measure only the passing images of what the
inquiry and your Self are not. This is not an objective study.
Turn
your mind inward to understand what is meant by
"nonobjective." Do
not think about the inquiry; inquire. Do not think about the
"I;"
know what the "I" is.
Q: At times, I feel that I am completely clueless.
N: Clueless can be a good state.
Q: Please explain.
N: That state in which your mind ceases to have an idea about
your Self
is a good state. From that state, inquire, and such inquiry is
off
the mental level. In one sense you are clueless, yet, in another
sense you have the most important clue, which is your undoubted
existence. Even when you say that you are clueless, you know that
you are existent to perceive the clueless state. You never doubt
your own existence. You exist, and you have an intuitive
knowledge
of that existence. The knowing and the existence are identical.
Being and Consciousness are the same. That is the end, and it is
also the way, which is the dissolution into its source. It is the
finality. Inquiring, do not keep your focus on thoughts, but keep
your focus on the "I."