72.
What is Pure, Unalloyed, Unattached is Real
Nisargadatta:
You are back in India! Where have you been, what have you seen?
Questioner:
I come from Switzerland. I stayed there with a remarkable man who
claims to have
realised.
He has done many Yogas in his past and had many experiences that
passed away. Now
he
claims no special abilities, nor knowledge; the only unusual thing
about him is connected with
sensations;
he is unable to separate the seer from the seen. For instance, when he
sees a car
rushing
at him, he does not know whether the car is rushing at him, or he at a
car. He seems to be
both
at the same time, the seer and the seen. They become one. Whatever he
sees, he sees
himself.
When I asked him some Vedantic questions he said: 'I really cannot
answer. I do not know.
All
I know is this strange identity with whatever I perceive. You know, I
expected anything but this.'
He
is on the whole a humble man; he makes no disciples and in no way puts
himself on a pedestal.
He
is willing to talk about his strange condition, but that is all.
Nisargadatta:
Now he knows what he knows. All else is over. At least he still talks.
Soon he may cease talking.
Questioner:
What will he do then?
Nisargadatta:
Immobility and silence are not inactive. The flower fills the space
with perfume, the candle --
with
light. They do nothing yet they change everything by their mere
presence. You can photograph
the
candle, but not its light. You can know the man, his name and
appearance, but not his influence.
His
very presence is action.
Questioner:
Is it not natural to be active?
Nisargadatta:
Everybody wants to be active, but where do his actions originate?
There is no central point each
action
begets another, meaninglessly and painfully, in endless succession.
The alternation of work
and
pause is not there. First find the immutable centre where all movement
takes birth. Just like a
wheel
turns round an axle, so must you be always at the axle in the centre
and not whirling at the
periphery.
Questioner:
How do I go about it in practice?
Nisargadatta:
Whenever a thought or emotion of desire or fear comes to your mind,
just turn away from it.
Questioner:
By suppressing my thoughts and feelings I shall provoke a reaction.
Nisargadatta:
I am not talking of suppression. Just refuse attention.
Questioner:
Must I not use effort to arrest the movements of the mind?
Nisargadatta:
It has nothing to do with effort. Just turn away, look between the
thoughts, rather than at the
thoughts.
When you happen to walk in a crowd, you do not fight every man you
meet -- you just find
your
way between.
Questioner:
If I use my will to control the mind, it only strengthens the ego.
Nisargadatta:
Of course. When you fight, you invite a fight. But when you do not
resist, you meet with no
resistance.
When you refuse to play the game, you are out of it.
Questioner:
How long will it take me to get free of the mind?
Nisargadatta:
It may take a thousand years, but really no time is required. All you
need is to be in dead
earnest.
Here the will is the deed. If you are sincere, you have it. After all,
it is a matter of attitude.
Nothing
stops you from being a jnani here and now, except fear. You are afraid
of being impersonal,
of
impersonal being. It is all quite simple. Turn away from your desires
and fears and from the
thoughts
they create and you are at once in your natural state.
Questioner:
No question of reconditioning, changing, or eliminating the mind?
Nisargadatta:
Absolutely none. Leave your mind alone, that is all. Don't go along
with it. After all, there is no
such
thing as mind apart from thoughts which come and go obeying their own
laws, not yours. They
dominate
you only because you are interested in them. It is exactly as Christ
said 'Resist not evil'.
By
resisting evil you merely strengthen it.
Questioner:
Yes, I see now. All I have to do is to deny existence to evil. Then it
fades away. But does it not
boil
down to some kind of auto-suggestion?
Nisargadatta:
The auto-suggestion is in full swing now, when you think yourself to
be a person, caught
between
good and evil. What I am asking you to do is to put an end to it, to
wake up and see things
as
they are.
About
your stay in Switzerland with that strange friend of yours: what did
you gain in his company?
Questioner:
Nothing absolutely. His experience did not affect me at all. One thing
I have understood: there
is
nothing to search for. Wherever I may go, nothing waits for me at the
end of the journey.
Discovery
is not the result of transportation.
Nisargadatta:
Yes, you are quite apart from anything that can be gained or lost.
Questioner:
Do you call it vairagya, relinquishment, renunciation?
Nisargadatta:
There is nothing to renounce. Enough if you stop acquiring. To give
you must have, and to have
you
must take. Better don't take. It is simpler than to practice
renunciation, which leads to a
dangerous
form of 'spiritual' pride.
All
this weighing, selecting, choosing, exchanging -- it is all shopping
in some 'spiritual' market.
What
is your business there? What deal are you out to strike? When you are
not out for business,
what
is the use of this endless anxiety of choice? Restlessness takes you
nowhere. Something
prevents
you from seeing that there is nothing you need. Find it out and see
its falseness. It is like
having
swallowed some poison and suffering from unquenchable craving for
water. Instead of
drinking
beyond all measure, why not eliminate the poison and be free of this
burning thirst?
Questioner:
I shall have to eliminate the ego!
Nisargadatta:
The sense 'I am a person in time and space' is the poison. In a way,
time itself is the poison. In
time
all things come to an end and new are born, to be devoured in their
turn. Do not identify
yourself
with time, do not ask anxiously: 'what next, what next?' Step out of
time and see it devour
the
world. Say: 'Well, it is in the nature of time to put an end to
everything. Let it be. It does not
concern
me. I am not combustible, nor do I need to collect fuel'.
Questioner:
Can the witness be without the things to witness?
Nisargadatta:
There is always something to witness. If not a thing, then its
absence. Witnessing is natural and
no
problem. The problem is excessive interest, leading to
self-identification. Whatever you are
engrossed
in you take to be real.
Questioner:
Is the 'I am' real or unreal? Is the 'I am' the witness? Is the
witness real or unreal?
Nisargadatta:
What is pure, unalloyed, unattached, is real. What is tainted, mixed
up, dependent and transient
is
unreal. Do not be misled by words -- one word may convey several and
even contradictory
meanings.
The 'I am’ that pursues the pleasant and shuns the unpleasant is
false; the 'I am' that
sees
pleasure and pain as inseparable sees rightly. The witness that is
enmeshed in what he
perceives
is the person; the witness who stands aloof, unmoved and untouched, is
the watch-tower
of
the real, the point at which awareness, inherent in the unmanifested,
contacts the manifested.
There
can be no universe without the witness, there can be no witness
without the universe.
Questioner:
Time consumes the world. Who is the witness of time?
Nisargadatta:
He who is beyond time -- the Un-nameable. A glowing ember, moved round
and round quickly
enough,
appears as a glowing circle. When the movement ceases, the ember
remains. Similarly,
the
'I am' in movement creates the world. The 'I am' at peace becomes the
Absolute. You are like a
man
with an electric torch walking through a gallery. You can see only
what is within the beam. The
rest
is in darkness.
Questioner:
If I project the world, I should be able to change it.
Nisargadatta:
Of course, you can. But you must cease identifying yourself with it
and go beyond. Then you
have
the power to destroy and re-create.
Questioner:
All I want is to be free.
Nisargadatta:
You must know two things: What are you to be free from and what keeps
you bound.
Questioner:
Why do you want to annihilate the universe?
Nisargadatta:
I am not concerned with the universe. Let it be or not be. It is
enough if I know myself.
Questioner:
If you are beyond the world, then you are of no use to the world.
Nisargadatta:
Pity the self that is, not the world that is not! Engrossed in a dream
you have forgotten your true
self.
Questioner:
Without the world there is no place for love.
Nisargadatta:
Quite so. All these attributes; being, consciousness, love and beauty
are reflections of the real
in
the world. No real -- no reflection.
Questioner:
The world is full of desirable things and people. How can I imagine it
non-existent?
Nisargadatta:
Leave the desirable to those who desire. Change the current of your
desire from taking to
giving.
The passion for giving, for sharing, will naturally wash the idea of
an external world out of
your
mind, and of giving as well. Only the pure radiance of love will
remain, beyond giving and
receiving.
Questioner:
In love there must be duality, the lover and the beloved.
Nisargadatta:
In love there is not the one even, how can there be two? Love is the
refusal to separate, to
make
distinctions. Before you can think of unity, you must first create
duality. When you truly love,
you
do not say: 'I love you'; where there is mentation, there is duality.
Questioner:
What is it that brings me again and again to India? It cannot be only
the comparative
cheapness
of life here? Nor the colourfulness and variety of impressions. There
must be some
more
important factor.
Nisargadatta:
There is also the spiritual aspect. The division between the outer and
the inner is less in India. It
is
easier here to express the inner in the outer. Integration is easier.
Society is not so oppressive.
Questioner:
Yes, in the West it is all tamas and rajas. In India there is more of
sattva, of harmony and
balance.
Nisargadatta:
Can't you go beyond the gunas? Why choose the sattva? Be what you are,
wherever you are
and
worry not about gunas.
Questioner:
I have not the strength.
Nisargadatta:
It merely shows that you have gained little in India. What you truly
have you cannot lose. Were
you
well-grounded in your self, change of place would not affect it.
Questioner:
In India spiritual life is easy. It is not so in the West. One has to
conform to environment to a
much
greater extent.
Nisargadatta:
Why don't you create your own environment? The world has only as much
power over you as
you
give it. Rebel. Go beyond duality, make no difference between east and
west.
Questioner:
What can one do when one finds oneself in a very unspiritual
environment?
Nisargadatta:
Do nothing. Be yourself. Stay out. Look beyond.
Questioner:
There may be clashes at home. Parents rarely understand.
Nisargadatta:
When you know your true being, you have no problems. You may please
your parents or not,
marry
or not, make a lot of money or not; it is all the same to you. Just
act according to
circumstances,
yet in close touch with the facts, with the reality in every
situation.
Questioner:
Is it not a very high state?
Nisargadatta:
Oh no, it is the normal state. You call it high because you are afraid
of it. First be free from fear.
See
that there is nothing to be afraid of. Fearlessness is the door to the
Supreme.
Questioner:
No amount of effort can make me fearless.
Nisargadatta:
Fearlessness comes by itself, when you see that there is nothing to be
afraid of. When you walk
in
a crowded street, you just bypass people. Some you see, some you just
glance at, but you do not
stop.
It is the stopping that creates the bottleneck. Keep moving! Disregard
names and shapes,
don't
be attached to them; your attachment is your bondage.
Questioner:
What should I do when a man slaps me on my face?
Nisargadatta:
You will react according to your character, inborn or acquired.
Questioner:
Is it inevitable? Am I, is the world, condemned to remain as we are?
Nisargadatta:
A jeweller who wants to refashion an ornament, first melts it town to
shapeless gold. Similarly,
one
must return to one's original state before a new name and form can
emerge. Death is essential
for
renewal.
Questioner:
You are always stressing the need of going beyond, of aloofness, of
solitude. You hardly ever
use
the words 'right' and 'wrong'. Why is it so?
Nisargadatta:
It is right to be oneself, it is wrong not to be. All else is
conditional. You are eager to separate
right
from wrong, because you need some basis for action. You are always
after doing something or
other.
But, personally motivated action, based on some scale of values,
aiming at some result is
worse
than inaction, for its fruits are always bitter.
Questioner:
Are awareness and love one and the same?
Nisargadatta:
Of course. Awareness is dynamic, love is being. Awareness is love in
action. By itself the mind
can
actualise any number of possibilities, but unless they are prompted by
love, they are valueless.
Love
precedes creation. Without it there is only chaos.
Questioner:
Where is the action in awareness?
Nisargadatta:
You are so incurably operational! Unless there is movement,
restlessness, turmoil, you do not
call
it action. Chaos is movement for movement's sake. True action does not
displace; it transforms.
A
change of place is mere transportation; a change of heart is action.
Just remember, nothing
perceivable
is real. Activity is not action. Action is hidden, unknown,
unknowable. You can only
know
the fruit.
Questioner:
Is not God the all-doer?
Nisargadatta:
Why do you bring in an outer doer? The world recreates itself out of
itself. It is an endless
process,
the transitory begetting the transitory. It is your ego that makes you
think that there must
be
a doer. You create a God to your own Image, however dismal the image.
Through the film of
your
mind you project a world and also a God to give it cause and purpose.
It is all imagination --
step
out of it.
Questioner:
How difficult it is to see the world as purely mental! The tangible
reality of it seems so very
convincing.
Nisargadatta:
This is the mystery of imagination, that it seems to be so real. You
may be celibate or married, a
monk
or a family man; that is not the point. Are you a slave of your
imagination, or are you not?
Whatever
decision you take, whatever work you do, it will be invariably based
on imagination, on
assumptions
parading as facts.
Questioner:
Here I am sitting in front of you. What part of it is imagination?
Nisargadatta:
The whole of it. Even space and time are imagined.
Questioner:
Does it mean that I don't exist?
Nisargadatta:
I too do not exist. All existence is imaginary.
Questioner:
Is being too imaginary?
Nisargadatta:
Pure being, filling all and beyond all, is not existence which is
limited. All limitation is imaginary,
only
the unlimited is real.
Questioner:
When you look at me, what do you see?
Nisargadatta:
I see you imagining yourself to be.
Questioner:
There are many like me. Yet each is different.
Nisargadatta:
The totality of all projections is what is called maha-maya, the Great
Illusion.
Questioner:
But when you look at yourself, what do you see?
Nisargadatta:
It depends how I look. When I look through the mind, I see numberless
people. When I look
beyond
the mind, I see the witness. Beyond the witness there is the infinite
intensity of emptiness
and
silence.
Questioner:
How to deal with people?
Nisargadatta:
Why make plans and what for? Such questions show anxiety. Relationship
is a living thing. Be
at
peace with your inner self and you will be at peace with everybody.
realise
that you are not the master of what happens, you cannot control the
future except in purely
technical
matters. Human relationship cannot be planned, it is too rich and
varied. Just be
understanding
and compassionate, free of all self seeking.
Questioner:
Surely, I am not the master of what happens. Its slave rather.
Nisargadatta:
Be neither master, nor slave. Stand aloof.
Questioner:
Does it imply avoidance of action?
Nisargadatta:
You cannot avoid action. It happens, like everything else.
Questioner:
My actions, surely, I can control.
Nisargadatta:
Try. You will soon see that you do what you must.
Questioner:
I can act according to my will.
Nisargadatta:
You know your will only after you have acted.
Questioner:
I remember my desires, the choices made, the decisions taken and act
accordingly.
Nisargadatta:
Then your memory decides, not you.
Questioner:
Where do I come in?
Nisargadatta:
You make it possible by giving it attention.
Questioner:
Is there no such thing as free will? Am I not free to desire?
Nisargadatta:
Oh no, you are compelled to desire. In Hinduism the very idea of free
will is non-existent, so
there
is no word for it. Will is commitment, fixation, bondage.
Questioner:
I am free to choose my limitations.
Nisargadatta:
You must be free first. To be free in the world you must be free of
the world. Otherwise your
past
decides for you and your future. Between what had happened and what
must happen you are
caught.
Call it destiny or karma, but never -- freedom. First return to your
true being and then act
from
the heart of love.
Questioner:
Within the manifested what is the stamp of the unmanifested?
Nisargadatta:
There is none. The moment you begin to look for the stamp of the
unmanifested, the manifested
dissolves.
If you try to understand the unmanifested with the mind, you at once
go beyond the mind,
like
when you stir the fire with a wooden stick, you burn the stick. Use
the mind to investigate the
manifested.
Be like the chick that pecks at the shell. Speculating about life
outside the shell would
have
been of little use to it, but pecking at the shell breaks the shell
from within and liberates the
chick.
Similarly, break the mind from within by investigation and exposure of
its contradictions and
absurdities.
Questioner:
The longing to break the shell, where does it come from?
Nisargadatta:
From the unmanifested.