The Daily Niz (NO DISCUSSION)

[laughter]

seeker: Pain is not acceptable.

Niz: Why not? Did you ever try? Do try and you will find in pain a joy which pleasure cannot yield, for the simple reason that acceptance of pain takes you much deeper than pleasure does. The personal self by its very nature is constantly pursuing pleasure and avoiding pain. The ending of this pattern is the ending of the self. The ending of the self with its desires and fears enables you to return to your real nature, the source of all happiness and peace. The perennial desire for pleasure is the reflection of the timeless harmony within. It is an observable fact that one becomes self- conscious only when caught in the conflict between pleasure and pain, which demands choice and decision. It is this clash between desire and fear that causes anger, which is the great destroyer of sanity in life. When pain is accepted for what it is, a lesson and a warning, and deeply looked into and heeded, the separation between pain and pleasure breaks down, both become experience -- painful when resisted, joyful when accepted.

seeker: Do you advise shunning pleasure and pursuing pain?

Niz: No, nor pursuing pleasure and shunning pain. Accept both as they come, enjoy both while they last, let them go, as they must.

(para's 9-11, chapter 59 of "I AM THAT", "Desire and Fear: Self-Centered States")

[maxdprophet]

[Not sure if this is a direct quote or remembered paraphrase --  not indicated in two places I've seen it. From The Last Days : Last Teachings]


What I want to tell you is astonishingly simple if only it would be apperceived. And the amusing part of it is that it can be apperceived only if the 'listener' is totally absent!



Then, only apperceiving remains and you are that apperceiving. What happens is that the unmanifest Absolute expresses itself in manifestation: Manifestation takes place through millions of forms; consciousness functions through each form, the conduct and working of each form being, generally, according to the basic nature of the category to which the form belongs (whether it is a plant, or an insect, or a lion, or a man), and particularly, according to the nature of the particular combination of the basic elements in each form.



No two human beings are alike (the fingerprints of no two persons are exactly alike) because the permutations and combinations of the millions of shades of the eight aspects (the five basic elements and the three Gunas) result in billions and trillions of forms, the nature of no two forms being exactly alike. Millions of such forms are constantly being created and destroyed in the process of manifestation. A clear perception of this process of manifestation comports the understanding:



(a) that there is really no question of any identification with any individual form because the very basis of this manifestation-show is duration (of each form) and duration is a concept of time; and



(b) that our true nature is the witnessing of this show. It goes without saying that the witnessing can take place only so long as the show goes on, and the show can go on only so long as there is consciousness.



And who is to understand all this? Consciousness, of course, trying to seek its source and not finding it, because the seeker is the sought. Apperceiving this truth is the final and the only liberation and 'the joker in the pack' is the fact that even 'liberation' is a concept! Now, go and ponder this.

[anja]

"If you know that there is no such thing as enlightenment, you're enlightened."

[laughter]

"Look at the mind as a function of matter and you have science; look at matter as the product of the mind and you have religion."

(para 33 from dialog #80 of "I AM THAT": "Awareness")

[laughter]

"We must remember that words are used in many ways, according to context".

(para 66 of dialog #101 from "I AM THAT": "A Jnani Does Not Grasp Or Hold")

[laughter]

seeker: Yet, you must believe in having lived before.

Niz: The scriptures say so, but I know nothing about it. I know myself as I am; as I appeared or will appear is not within my experience. It is not that I do not remember. In fact there is nothing to remember. Reincarnation implies a reincarnating self. There is no such thing.

(para 10, chapter 56 from "I AM THAT": "Consciousness Arising, World Arises")

[silver]

xyz xyz


“All you want is to be happy. All your desires, whatever they may be, are longing for happiness. Basically, you wish yourself well...desire by itself is not wrong. It is life itself, the urge to grow in knowledge and experience. It is choices you make that are wrong. To imagine that some little thing-food, sex, power, fame-will make you happy is to deceive oneself. Only something as vast and deep as your real self can make you truly and lastingly happy.”


Nisargadatta Maharaj

[laughter]

Q: There are very interesting books written by apparently very competent people, in which the illusoriness of the world is denied (though not its transitoriness). According to them, there exists a hierarchy of beings, from the lowest to the highest; on each level the complexity of the organism enables and reflects the depth, breadth and intensity of consciousness, without any visible or knowable culmination. One law supreme rules throughout: evolution of forms for the growth and enrichment of consciousness and manifestation of its infinite potentialities.

Niz: This may or may not be so. Even if it is, it is only so from the mind’s point of view, but In fact the entire universe (mahadakash) exists only in consciousness (chidakash), while I have my stand in the Absolute (paramakash). In pure being consciousness arises; in consciousness the world appears and disappears. All there is is me, all there is is mine. Before all beginnings, after all endings -- I am. All has its being in me, in the ‘I am’, that shines in every living being. Even not-being is unthinkable without me. Whatever happens, I must be there to witness it.

(from dialog #7 of "I AM THAT": The Mind)

[laughter]

Q: Can we talk of witnessing the real?

Niz: How can we? We can talk only of the unreal, the illusory, the transient, the conditioned. To go beyond, we must pass through total negation of everything as having independent existence. All things depend.

Q: On what do they depend?

Niz: On consciousness. And consciousness depends on the witness.

Q: And the witness depends on the real?

Niz: The witness is the reflection of the real in all its purity. It depends on the condition of the mind. Where clarity and detachment predominate, the witness-consciousness comes into being. It is just like saying that where the water is clear and quiet, the image of the moon appears. Or like daylight that appears as sparkle in the diamond.

(para's 25-30, #39 from I AM THAT, "By Itself, Nothing has Existence")

[laughter]

Dial 54 from I AM THAT: "Body and Mind are Symptoms of Ignorance"

===

Questioner: We were discussing one day the person -- the witness -- the absolute (vyakti-vyakta-
avyakta). As far as I remember, you said that the absolute alone is real and the witness is absolute
only at a given point of space and time. The person is the organism, gross and subtle, illumined by
the presence of the witness. I do not seem to grasp the matter clearly; could we discuss it again?
You also use the terms mahadakash, chidakash and paramakash. How are they related to person,
witness, and the absolute?

Niz: Mahadakash is nature, the ocean of existences, the physical space with all that can be
contacted through the senses. Chidakash is the expanse of awareness, the mental space of time,
perception and cognition. Paramakash is the timeless and spaceless reality, mindless,
undifferentiated, the infinite potentiality, the source and origin, the substance and the essence, both
matter and consciousness -- yet beyond both. It cannot be perceived, but can be experienced as
ever witnessing the witness, perceiving the perceiver, the origin and the end of all manifestation, the
root of time and space, the prime cause in every chain of causation.

Q: What is the difference between vyakta and avyakta?

Niz: There is no difference. It is like light and daylight. The universe is full of light which you do not
see; but the same light you see as daylight. And what the daylight reveals is the vyakti, The person
is always the object, the witness is the subject and their relation of mutual dependence is the
reflection of their absolute identity. You imagine that they are distinct and separate states. They are
not. They are the same consciousness at rest and in movement, each state conscious of the other.
In chit man knows God and God knows man. In chit the man shapes the world and the world
shapes man. Chit is the link, the bridge between extremes, the balancing and uniting factor in every
experience. The totality of the perceived is what you call matter. The totality of all perceivers is what
you call the universal mind. The identity of the two, manifesting itself as perceptibility and
perceiving, harmony and intelligence, loveliness and loving, reasserts itself eternally.

Q: The three gunas, sattva--rajas--tamas, are they only in matter, or also in the mind?

Niz: In both, of course, because the two are not separate. It is only the absolute that is beyond
gunas. In fact, these are but points of view, ways of looking. They exist only in the mind. Beyond the
mind all distinctions cease.

Q: Is the universe a product of the senses?

Niz: Just as you recreate your world on waking up, so is the universe unrolled. The mind with its five
organs of perception, five organs of action, and five vehicles of consciousness appears as memory,
thought, reason and selfhood.

Q: The sciences have made much progress. We know the body and the mind much better than
our ancestors. Your traditional way, describing and analysing mind and matter, is no longer valid.

Niz: But where are your scientists with their sciences? Are they not again images in your own mind?

Q: Here lies the basic difference! To me they are not my own projections. They were before I was
born and shall be there when I am dead.

Niz: Of course. Once you accept time and space as real, you will consider yourself minute and short-
lived. But are they real? Do they depend on you, or you on them? As body, you are in space. As
mind, you are in time. But are you mere body with a mind in it? Have you ever investigated?

Q: I had neither the motive nor the method.

Niz: I am suggesting both. But the actual work of insight and detachment (viveka-vairagya) is yours.

Q: The only motive I can perceive is my own causeless and timeless happiness. And what is the
method?

Niz: Happiness is incidental. The true and effective motive is love. You see people suffer and you
seek the best way of helping them. The answer is obvious -- first put yourself beyond the need of
help. Be sure your attitude is of pure goodwill, free of expectation of any kind.
Those who seek mere happiness may end up in sublime indifference, while love will never rest.
As to method, there is only one -- you must come to know yourself -- both what you appear to be
and what you are. Clarity and charity go together -- each needs and strengthens the other.

Q: Compassion implies the existence of an objective world, full of avoidable sorrow.

Niz: The world is not objective and the sorrow of it is not avoidable. Compassion is but another word
for the refusal to suffer for imaginary reasons.

Q: If the reasons are imaginary, why should the suffering be inevitable?

Niz: It is always the false that makes you suffer, the false desires and fears, the false values and
ideas, the false relationships between people. Abandon the false and you are free of pain; truth
makes happy -- truth liberates.

Q: The truth is that I am a mind imprisoned in a body and this is a very unhappy truth.

Niz: You are neither the body nor in the body -- there is no such thing as body. You have grievously
misunderstood yourself; to understand rightly -- investigate.

Q: But I was born as a body, in a body and shall die with the body, as a body.

Niz: This is your misconception. Enquire, investigate, doubt yourself and others. To find truth, you
must not cling to your convictions; if you are sure of the immediate, you will never reach the
ultimate. Your idea that you were born and that you will die is absurd: both logic and experience
contradict it.

Q: All right, I shall not insist that I am the body. You have a point here. But here and now, as I talk
to you, I am in my body -- obviously. The body may not be me, but it is mine.

Niz: The entire universe contributes incessantly to your existence. Hence the entire universe is your
body. In that sense -- I agree.

Q: My body influences me deeply. In more than one way my body is my destiny. My character, my
moods, the nature of my reactions, my desires and fears -- inborn or acquired -- they are all based
on the body. A little alcohol, some drug or other and all changes. Until the drug wears off I become
another man.

Niz: All this happens because you think yourself to be the body. realise your real self and even drugs
will have no power over you.

Q: You smoke?

Niz: My body kept a few habits which may as well continue till it dies. There is no harm in them.

Q: You eat meat?Niz: I was born among meat-eating people and my children are eating meat. I eat very little -- and
make no fuss.

Q: Meat-eating implies killing.

Niz: Obviously. I make no claims of consistency. You think absolute consistency is possible; prove it
by example. Don't preach what you do not practise.

Coming back to the idea of having been born. You are stuck with what your parents told you: all
about conception, pregnancy and birth, infant, child, youngster, teenager, and so on. Now, divest
yourself of the idea that you are the body with the help of the contrary idea that you are not the
body. It is also an idea, no doubt; treat it like something to be abandoned when its work is done.
The idea that I am not the body gives reality to the body, when in fact, there is no such thing as
body, it is but a state of mind. You can have as many bodies and as diverse as you like; just
remember steadily what you want and reject the incompatibles.

Q: I am like a box within box, within box, the outer box acting as the body and the one next to it --
as the indwelling soul. Abstract the outer box and the next becomes the body and the one next to it
the soul. It is an infinite series, an endless opening of boxes, is the last one the ultimate soul?

Niz: If you have a body, you must have a soul; here your simile of a nest of boxes applies. But here
and now, through all your bodies and souls shines awareness, the pure light of chit. Hold on to it
unswervingly. Without awareness, the body would not last a second. There is in the body a current
of energy, affection and intelligence, which guides, maintains and energises the body. Discover that
current and stay with it.
Of course, all these are manners of speaking. Words are as much a barrier, as a bridge. Find the
spark of life that weaves the tissues of your body and be with it. It is the only reality the body has.

Q: What happens to that spark of life after death?

Niz: It is beyond time. Birth and death are but points in time. Life weaves eternally its many webs.
The weaving is in time, but life itself is timeless. Whatever name and shape you give to its
expressions, it is like the ocean -- never changing, ever changing.

Q: All you say sounds beautifully convincing. yet my feeling of being just a person in a world
strange and alien, often inimical and dangerous, does not cease. Being a person, limited in space
and time, how can I possibly realise myself as the opposite; a de-personalised, universalised
awareness of nothing in particular?

Niz: You assert yourself to be what you are not and deny yourself to be what you are. You omit the
element of pure cognition, of awareness free from all personal distortions. Unless you admit the
reality of chit, you will never know yourself.

Q: What am I to do? I do not see myself as you see me. Maybe you are right and I am wrong, but
how can I cease to be what I feel I am?

Niz: A prince who believes himself to be a beggar can be convinced conclusively in one way only: he
must behave as a prince and see what happens. Behave as if what I say is true and judge by what
actually happens. All I ask is the little faith needed for making the first step. With experience will
come confidence and you will not need me any more. I know what you are and I am telling you.
Trust me for a while.

Q: To be here and now, I need my body and its senses. To understand, I need a mind.

Niz: The body and the mind are only symptoms of ignorance, of misapprehension. Behave as if you
were pure awareness, bodiless and mindless, spaceless and timeless, beyond 'where' and 'when'
and 'how'. Dwell on it, think of it, learn to accept its reality. Don't oppose it and deny it all the time.
Keep an open mind at least. Yoga is bending the outer to the inner. Make your mind and body
express the real which is all and beyond all. By doing you succeed, not by arguing.

Q: Kindly allow me to come back to my first question. How does the error of being a person
originate?

Niz: The absolute precedes time. Awareness comes first. A bundle of memories and mental habits
attracts attention, awareness gets focalised and a person suddenly appears. Remove the light of
awareness, go to sleep or swoon away -- and the person disappears. The person (vyakti) flickers,
awareness (vyakta) contains all space and time, the absolute (avyakta) is.

[inavalan]

Jan 23, 2023 2:40:02 GMT -5 laughter said:

from I AM THAT: "Body and Mind are Symptoms of Ignorance":

Q: Is the universe a product of the senses?
Niz: Just as you recreate your world on waking up, so is the universe unrolled. The mind with its five organs of perception, five organs of action, and five vehicles of consciousness appears as memory, thought, reason and selfhood.

Q: Compassion implies the existence of an objective world, full of avoidable sorrow.
Niz: The world is not objective and the sorrow of it is not avoidable. Compassion is but another word for the refusal to suffer for imaginary reasons.

Q: If the reasons are imaginary, why should the suffering be inevitable?
Niz: It is always the false that makes you suffer, the false desires and fears, the false values and ideas, the false relationships between people. Abandon the false and you are free of pain; truth makes happy -- truth liberates.

Q: The truth is that I am a mind imprisoned in a body and this is a very unhappy truth.
Niz: You are neither the body nor in the body -- there is no such thing as body. You have grievously misunderstood yourself; to understand rightly -- investigate.

Q: But I was born as a body, in a body and shall die with the body, as a body.
Niz: This is your misconception. Enquire, investigate, doubt yourself and others. To find truth, you must not cling to your convictions; if you are sure of the immediate, you will never reach the ultimate. Your idea that you were born and that you will die is absurd: both logic and experience contradict it.

Q: All right, I shall not insist that I am the body. You have a point here. But here and now, as I talk to you, I am in my body -- obviously. The body may not be me, but it is mine.
Niz: The entire universe contributes incessantly to your existence. Hence the entire universe is your body. In that sense -- I agree.

Q: My body influences me deeply. In more than one way my body is my destiny. My character, my moods, the nature of my reactions, my desires and fears -- inborn or acquired -- they are all based on the body. A little alcohol, some drug or other and all changes. Until the drug wears off I become another man.
Niz: All this happens because you think yourself to be the body. Realise your real self and even drugs will have no power over you.

[justlikeyou]

Q: Don’t you have desires and fears any more?

M: My destiny was to be born a simple man, a commoner, a humble tradesman, with little of formal
education. My life was the common kind, with common desires and fears. When, through my faith in
my teacher and obedience to his words, I realised my true being, I left behind my human nature to
look after itself, until its destiny is exhausted. Occasionally an old reaction, emotional or mental,
happens in the mind, but it is at once noticed and discarded. After all, as long as one is bur-dened
with a person, one is exposed to its idiosyncrasies and habits.