So, if we think we are a person (and feel unhappy as a result) there are two things that can be done. One, is to seek the source of that apparent person. As we turn our attention towards our own Being, this very one, the apparent entity who seemed to turn his attention, is revealed to be none other than Presence itself. And two, taking our stand as this aware presence, we can cooperate with the realignment of the mind and the body, and indeed the world, with this new stance. It just requires patience, clarity and courage. Presence has seemed to veil itself from itself by taking the shape of dualistic thought. But being the very substance of all experience, Presence has also provided within every experience, the way back to itself, a golden thread....the way of investigation and contemplation. From the point of view of a person these two possibilities will inevitably feel like a doing - so be it. They are Presence's gift of grace to itself.  

  It is because the "I am" is false that it wants to continue. Reality need not continue - knowing itself indestructible, it is indifferent of forms and expressions. To strengthen and stabilize the "I am", we do all sorts of things - all in vain, for the "I am" is being rebuilt from moment to moment. It is unceasing work, and the only radical solution is to dissolve the separative sense of "I am such and such person" once and for good. Being remains, but not self- being.  

  Relax and watch the "I am". Reality is just behind it. Keep quiet, keep silent; it will emerge, or, rather, it will take you in.  

  A reflection of the watcher in the mind creates the sense of "I" and the person acquires an apparently independent existence. In reality there is no person, only the watcher identifying himself with the "I" and the "mine". The teacher tells the watcher: you are not this, there is nothing of yours in this, except the little point of "I am", which is the bridge between the watcher and his dream. "I am this, I am that" is dream, while pure "I am" has the stamp of reality on it.  

  Give all your attention to the question: "What is it that makes me conscious ?", until your mind becomes the question itself and cannot think of anything else.  

  When we concentrate our attention on the origin of thought, the thought process itself comes to an end.  

  Moods are in the mind and do not matter. Go within, go beyond. Cease being fascinated by the content of your consciousness. When you reach the deep layers of your true being, you will find that the mind's surface-play affects you very little.  

  Look at yourself steadily - it is enough. The door that locks you in is also the door that lets you out. The "I am" is the door. Stay at it until it opens. As a matter of fact, it is open, only you are not at it. You are waiting at the non- existing painted doors, which will never open.  

  First of all, establish a constant contact with your self, be with yourself all the time. Into self-awareness all blessings flow. Begin as a centre of observation, deliberate cognizance, and grow into a centre of love in action. "I am" is a tiny seed which will grow into a mighty tree - quite naturally, without a trace of effort.  

  If there is no I-thought, no other thing will exist.  

  It is not necessary to scrutinize each and every thought, a scrutiny of only the I-thought, the root of all thoughts, is quite sufficient.  

  The first person thought, 'I', has this peculiar property: if (by enquiring 'Who am I ?') attention is focused on it in order to discover what it is, this 'I' thought will subside.  

  The problem is not yours - it is your mind's only. Begin by disassociating yourself from your mind. Resolutely remind yourself that you are not the mind and that its problems are not yours.  

  The perceiving is not suffering.  

  You say, "Thoughts seem to cloud and block awareness". The problem here is that you are constantly watching the thoughts, instead of noticing what the thoughts are appearing in. Get interested in that instead of always talking about the mind activities ! If you put your hand in front of the sun, can you complain that the sun is coming and going ? If you are staring at your hand, this is what you will say. But you cannot even see your hand without the sunlight. It is the same with thoughts and awareness.  

  What drives the interest in thoughts is the seeking for reality or identity in them. When one finds that these do not lie in the thoughts, but in that which is the substratum of the thoughts, the identification with thoughts automatically subsides.  

  Learn to live without self concern. For this you must know your own true being as indomitable, fearless, ever victorious. Once you know with absolute certainty that nothing can trouble you but your own imagination, you come to disregard your desires and fears, concepts and ideas, and live by truth alone.  

  Whatever you may have to do, watch your mind. Also you must have moments of complete inner peace and quiet, when your mind is absolutely still. If you miss it, you miss the entire thing. If you do not, the silence of the mind will dissolve and absorb all else.  

  Freedom comes through renunciation. All possession is bondage. If you do not have the wisdom and the strength to give up, just look at your possessions. Your mere looking will burn them up. If you can stand outside your mind, you will soon find that total renunciation of possessions and desires is the most obviously reasonable thing to do. You create the world and then worry about it. Becoming selfish makes you weak. If you think you have the strength and courage to desire, it is because you are young and inexperienced. Invariably the object of desire destroys the means of acquiring it and then itself withers away. It is all for the best, because it teaches you to shun desire like poison. No need of any acts of renunciation. Just turn your mind away, that is all. Desire is merely the fixation of the mind on an idea. Get it out of its grove by denying it attention. Whatever may be the desire or fear, don't dwell upon it. Here and there you may forget, it does not matter. Go back to your attempts till the brushing away of every desire and fear, of every reaction, becomes automatic.  

  Witness the disappearance of thought. Observe the absence of a witness. Witness the disappearance of thought. This directive will stop the mind. Thought will cease. The witness is nothing but a descriptive thought arising that 'I am seeing'. The actuality is simply 'seeing is happening'. There is no 'I' that sees. SEEING that simple fact is enough. It may appear 'for the mind' as a small opening, a glimpse of pure open cognition happening. It is not a small opening, it is actually the vastness of presence-awareness, which has no size, small or large. It has no dimensions at all. The 3 Dimensional world appears in THAT and is THAT. Everything appears in the SEEING. The mind believes in a point of view and adds a story of 'me' the seer. It is just words appearing. Thoughts appear and disappear, yet they have no substance whatsoever. See that. Know that.  

  Keep quiet, undisturbed, and the wisdom and the power will come on their own. You need not hanker. Wait in silence of the heart and mind. It is very easy to be quiet, but willingness is rare.  

  What prevents the insight into one's true nature is the weakness and obtuseness of the mind and its tendency to skip the subtle and focus the gross only. When you follow my advice and try to keep your mind on the notion of "I am" only, you become fully aware of your mind and its vagaries. Awareness, being lucid harmony (satva) in action, dissolves dullness and quietens the restlessness of the mind, and gently but steadily changes its very substance. This change need not be spectacular; it may be hardly noticeable; yet it is a deep and fundamental shift from darkness into light, from inadvertence to awarenesss. For this, keep steadily in the focus of consciousness the only clue you have: your certainty of being. Be with it, play with it, ponder over it, delve deeply into it, till the shell of ignorance breaks open and you emerge into the realm of reality.  

  Search and you shall discover the Universal Person, who is yourself and infinitely more. Anyhow, begin by realizing that the world is in you, not you in the world. Your personal body is a part in which the whole is wonderfully reflected. But you have also a universal body. You cannot even say that you do not know it, because you see and experience it all the time. Only you call it "the world" and are afraid of it. Both anatomy and astronomy describe you. You know the world exactly as you know your body - through your senses. It is your mind that has separated the world outside your skin from the world inside and put them in opposition.  

  To know that you are neither body nor mind, watch yourself steadily and live unaffected by your body and mind, completely aloof, as if you were dead. It means you have no vested interests, either in the body or in the mind. Just remain unaffected. This complete aloofness, unconcern with mind and body is the best proof that at the core of your being you are neither mind nor body. What happens to the body and the mind may not be within your power to change, but you can always put an end to your imagining yourself to be body and mind. Whatever happens, remind yourself that only your body and mind are affected, not yourself.  

  Keep the "I am" in the focus of awareness, remember that you are, watch yourself ceaselessly and the unconscious will flow into the conscious without any special effort on your part. Wrong desires and fears, false ideas, social inhibitions are blocking and preventing its free interplay with the conscious. Once free to mingle, the two become one and the one becomes all.  

  Remember to remember that the perceived cannot be the perceiver. Whatever you see, hear or think of, remember - you are not what happens, you are he to whom it happens.  

  Just remember what you are. Use every incident of the day to remind you that without you as the witness there would be neither animal nor God. Understand that you are both, the essence and the surface of all there is, and remain firm in your understanding.  

  By looking tirelessly, I became quite empty and with that emptiness all came back to me except the mind. I find I have lost the mind irretrievably. I am neither conscious nor unconscious, I am beyond the mind and its various states and conditions. Distinctions are created by the mind and apply to the mind only. I am pure Consciousness itself, unbroken awareness of all that is.  

  If you believe you are suffering and you are going to get enlightened, and then embody the enlightenment, there is an imaginary story playing in your head. Do you see this ? But when you see there is only consciousness, the whole story falls apart. There is no one to get enlightened, and there was never anyone suffering. It was happening in the story, as a story. So this is why many say, "No one gets enlightened". And also, at the same time, you see there was never anyone suffering. All your stories get thrown away. All there is, is consciousness and the stories that are playing in your head—stories of a suffering person, stories of an enlightened person, or stories of an awakened person who must embody his awakening. They are all stories and none of them are true. The only truth is "I Am", this consciousness is, and you're done. There is nothing else. There are no levels of attainment. No levels of embodiment. There is no one to embody anything. That is all conceptual nonsense. Believing in that conceptual nonsense is delusional and creates more suffering for yourself ! Get out of your head, drop all the concepts and you are free, as you are, right now. Try it !  

  The 'I' is a thought and it cannot think. The belief that the 'I' can think is delusion and dualistic nonsense.  

  To go beyond, you need alert immobility, quiet attention.  

  The whole apparent arena of self-help is a presently arising pipedream. If you like the idea of a dreamed person feeling better about their dreamed life then great, go ahead; seek help. Why not ? You have no control in the matter anyway. There IS no-one there. There IS no 'you' ! It's just imagination arising presently. So who or what could be found ? Imagination.  

  So in terms of apparent enlightenment, you are it already. Nothing need be said or recommended. A feeling of not quite seeing this is a feeling of not quite seeing this; utterly perfect and divine – a fresh, pristine ignorance! - The miracle of ignorance at all ! The oceans and the mountains; deserts and great cities; aeroplanes and squirrels; your memory of an apparent past and the apparent ability to read these words (squiggles) just happen - is just happening. From nothing to everything. An incredible illusion. Ultimately, nothing has ever happened - and nothing WILL ever happen; yet everything is just happening. This is what the word heaven is pointing to in the bible - Your timeless Life right now.  

  Anything that claims to be 'the way it is' or 'a higher truth' is paradoxically, both 'correct' and erroneous at the same time – as valid as saying muflaterfog. The word Muflaterfog is just sound, SOUND happening - As are all so called spiritual teachings... Just sound happening. Written words are just squiggles happening on a screen or piece of paper. So called powerful or enlightened spiritual writings (squiggles) are no no more or less meaningful than reading a Charles Dickens novel (squiggles). Amazing, unique, perfect - yet ultimately, meaningless. So really, no reason whatsoever to write these words here, but life's a bit like that really - It just happens. These squiggles just happen. Forget seeking 'enlightenment'. All is well.  

  Just look away from all that happens in your mind and bring it to the feeling "I am". The "I am" is not a direction. It is the negation of all direction. Ultimately even the "I am" will have to go, for you need not keep on asserting what is obvious. Bringing the mind to the feeling "I am" merely helps in turning the mind away from everyting else. When the mind is kept away from its preoccupations, it becomes quiet. If you do not disturb this quiet and stay in it, you find that it is permeated with a light and a love you have never known; and yet you recognize it at one as your own nature. Once you have passed through this experience, you will never be the same man again; the unruly mind may break its peace and obliterate its vision; but it is bound to return, provided the effort is sustained; until the day when all bonds are broken, delusions and attachments end, and life becomes supremely concentrated in the present.  

  It's very easy to discern between reality and illusion, because there's only illusion.  

  THIS is the "Peace of Nothing Wrong" !  

  Stay open and quiet, that is all. What you seek is so near you that there is no place for a way.  

  In reality nothing happens, there is no past nor future; all appears and nothing is.  

  [For a Westerner] the right procedure is to adhere to the thought that he is the ground of all knowledge, the immutable and perennial awareness of all that happens to the senses and the mind. If he keeps it in mind all the time, aware and alert, he is bound to break the bounds of non-awareness and emerge into pure life, light and love. The idea "I am the witness only" will purify the body and the mind and open the eye of wisdom. Then man goes beyond illusion and his heart is free of all desires.  

  Evil is the shadow of inattention. In the light of self-awareness it will wither and fall off.  

  True awareness (samvid) is a state of pure witnessing, without the least attempt to do anything about the event witnessed. Your thoughts and feelings, words and actions may also be a part of the event; you watch all unconcerned, in the full light of clarity and understanding. You understand precisely what is going on, because it does not affect you. It may seem to be an attitude of cold aloofness, but it is not really so. Once you are in it, you will find that you love what you see, whatever may be its nature. This choiceless love is the touchstone of awareness. If it is not there, you are merely interested, for some personal reasons.  

  Your true home is in nothingness, in emptiness of all content.  

  Don't you see that it is your very search for happiness that makes you feel miserable? Try the other way: indifferent to pain and pleasure, neither asking nor refusing, give all your attention to the level on which "I am" is timelessly present. Soon you will realize that peace and happiness are in your very nature and it is only seeking them through some particular channels that disturbs. Avoid the disturbance, that is all.  

  You are not what you think yourself to be, I assure you. The image you have of yourself is made up from memories and is purely accidental. You have never been, nor shall ever be, a person. Refuse to consider yourself as one. But as long as you do not even doubt yourself to be Mr So-and-so, there is little hope.  

  Stop making use of your mind and see what happens. Do this one thing thoroughly. That is all.  

  Nothing you do will change you, for you need no change. You may change your mind or your body, but it is always something external to you that has changed, not yourself. Why bother at all to change? Realize once for all that neither your body nor your mind, nor even your consciousness is yourself and stand alone in your true nature beyond consciousness and unconsciousness. No effort can take you there, only the clarity of understanding.  

  Hold on to the 'I am' to the exclusion of everything else, the 'I am' in movement creates the world, the 'I am' at peace becomes the Absolute.  

  Just keep in mind the feeling "I am", merge in it, till your mind and feeling become one. By repeated attempts, you will stumble on the right balance of attention and affection, and your mind will be firmly established in the thought-feeling "I am". Whatever you think, say or do, this sense of immutable and affectionate being remains as the ever-present background of the mind.  

  We have the feeling that to get to Truth you must work through something: some method, some process, to untangle some knots, climb some mountain, sit in some cave... and THEN Truth is the prize at the end of your striving. But Awareness, which is synonymous with Truth, is that already within which the very striving, the attempt and the practice arises and is perceived. This is an atomic discovery.  

  All of this is so incredibly simple. We learnt that whatever happens in our mind somehow is blocking you from going somewhere. I am saying that Awareness, the goal of all enquiry, cannot be on the other side of working through any process, because Awareness is that within which even the attempt to work through to get to something arises and is perceived.  

  Above all, we want to remain conscious. We shall bear every suffering and humiliation, but we shall rather remain conscious. Unless we revolt against this craving for experience and let go the manifested altogether, there can be no relief. We shall remain trapped.  

  Leave it all behind you. Forget it. Go forth, unburdened with ideas and beliefs. Abandon all verbal structures, all relative truth, all tangible objectives.  

  Try to be, only to be. The all-important word is "try". Allow enough time daily for sitting quietly and trying, just trying, to go beyond the personality with its addictions and obsessions. Don't ask how, it cannot be explained. You just keep on trying until you succeed. If you persevere, there can be no failure. What matters supremely is sincerity, earnestness; you must really have had surfeit of being the person you are; now see the urgent need of being free of this unnecessary self-identification with a bundle of memories and habits. This steady resistance against the unnecessary is the secret of success.  

  Right now, recognize present awareness. Don't move to manipulate any appearance within awareness. See that the appearance is not separate from awareness. This is the main pointer in Living Realization.  

  Let the dream unroll itself to its very end. You cannot help it. But you can look at the dream as a dream, refuse it the stamp of reality.  

  Watch your thoughts as you watch the street traffic. People come and go; you register without response. It may not be easy in the beginning, but with some practice you will find that your mind can function on many levels at the same time and you can be aware of them all. It is only when you have a vested interest in any particular level that your attention gets caught in it and you black out on other levels.  

  You are too full of gibberish, you know too much. Because of your borrowed knowledge and too many words moving inside you, you cannot see the wordless beauty that can only be experienced in silence.  

  When your consciousness is directed outward, mind and world arise. When it is directed inward, it realizes its own Source and returns home into the Unmanifested.  

  When you stop searching and you calm down and you put your books away, and you confront yourself and see what you are all about, that will bring about bliss faster than anything you can ever imagine or ever do.  

  It does not need to be complicated. Just simply sense your self and do not worry about inside or outside or going deeper. Sense that you exist right now, and then stay with that sense of 'I' or 'me'. But do not worry about whether it is the right way of sensing your self. Simply sense your self just as you are right now. Once you sense your self just as you are right now, simply stay with that sense of your self. If a thought or feeling arises, notice who is having the thought or feeling. Obviously 'I' am having the thought or feeling. And so then you just return to staying with that sense of 'I'. That is all you need to do. Just rest while sensing your self. Everything else is up to divine grace, and it is taking good care of you.  

  Relax and watch the "I am". Reality is just behind it. Keep quiet, keep silent; it will emerge, or, rather, it will take you in.  

  The most sublime truth of all has never been stated or written or sung. Not because it is far away, but because it is so intimately close.  

  Be still, absolutely, completely still. Receive yourself. Drink yourself. Be nourished by yourself. You are Stillness. Be who you are.  

  Every thought, every feeling, is a visitor. You just say: Welcome. Come in and sit with me.  

  The pleasure to be is the simplest form of self-love, which later grows into love of the self. Be like an infant with nothing standing between the body and the self. The constant noise of the psychic life is absent. In deep silence, the self contemplates the body. It is like the white paper on which nothing is written yet. Be like that infant, instead of trying to be this or that, be happy to be. You will be a fully awakened witness of the field of consciousness. But there should be no feelings and ideas to stand between you and the field.  

  The most uncomfortable, tragic event can unfold into wisdom. The most futile, unprofitable enterprise is a journey of revelation. Some games may be more enjoyed than others, but each game is the expression of perfection, the reflection of that which longs to see itself, which is that longing and nothing more. The frustrated longing of the seeker is the sweetest, most apropos feeling, the clearest reflection of life's yearning to be. How strange and paradoxical that we cannot see what we are, when what we are is all we are.  

  Do not try to make yourself happy, rather question your very search for happiness. It is because you are not happy that you want to be happy. Find out why you are unhappy. Because you are not happy you seek happiness in pleasure; pleasure brings in pain and therefore you call it worldly; you then long for some other pleasure, without pain, which you call divine. In reality, pleasure is but a respite from pain.  

  When there's exclusive identification with the content of awareness, with the story of 'me' as an imagined entity, there's a tendency for the awareness aspect of Consciousness to be objectified as 'the beyond', a state or realm which once attained will offer oneness, lasting peace. But in actuality there is no beyond, nothing to be attained 'ultimately'. There's simply this as it is: simple presence. This is already that 'realm'. Consciousness (awareness and the presently appearing content of awareness) is already one or whole, and when the story of 'me' - of identification - is seen as just a play, a movie, then all pursuit of oneness, all pursuit of the beyond or whatever, quite naturally becomes obsolete.  

  What has been sought all along is found to be none other than this which is the seeking. The ultimate goal or prize turns out to be what already is. There is nothing and no one to find. There is awareness with no one being aware. All along You have been the butt of your own cosmic joke. The magnificence of all appearances, everywhere you look and seek is simply Your own play or dream of being. There is nothing and no one and yet there is awareness whereby everything appears, including this appearance as an ordinary man or woman. You are, and always have been, completely awake, aware and present, but merely mesmerised by Your own cosmic play. The character, Nathan, sought enlightenment as an escape from what appeared as the problems, trials and boredom of ordinary life. The ordinary life continues but no longer in distraction from presence. The search for the extraordinary is over – life is as it is.  

  You are Consciousness, oneness, all that is, the source and appearance of all. All appearances rise and fall in awareness, nothing else is ever happening. People are passing, clouds are going by, conversations are going on, thoughts appear and disappear. All unfolds presently in awareness. This appearance as the character is already the perfect expression of oneness - nothing needs to change for this to be so. No awakening or enlightenment is needed – all of this is simply the story in the play. There is only already awakeness as oneness, regardless of whether there is mesmerisation with the play of images, or resting in recognition as your true nature. This present appearance, however ordinary or extraordinary, is the content of awareness. Awareness and content are one – Consciousness. You are Consciousness – awake and aware and presently appearing as everything.  

  Seen in clarity, life appears as a great play. You – Consciousness – play all the roles and it is part of the play that You usually play the roles without knowing Your real identity. But sometimes, as part of the show, there is recognition of Your true nature. When there is involvement as a character in the play without recognition of Your true nature the role is taken seriously and all the dramas of life seemingly appear from this. If a role is played where there is recognition of Your true nature, the play is seen for what it is. When Your true nature becomes obvious, the character doesn't disappear in a flash of light, nor put on ochre robes and have disciples, nor teach 'spiritual' truths – although any of these is possible, depending on the pattern of the character's role in the play. The character will likely appear as he or she did before recognition. The character is likely to continue to lead what is an ordinary life in the play. It is not even necessarily so that the character tells anyone or communicates what is now obvious. The whole play has no purpose or point beyond present appearance. It is Your cosmic entertainment. You are Your play. It has no existence separate from You.  

  When the whole conceptual story of a life extended in thought beyond the present content of awareness is no longer seriously entertained, there is a natural relaxing into ease. Identification as the 'I', or psychological self-sense, is merely an appearance in awareness, an addition to the appearance of the body image. The allowing of life as it is – rather than any efforts to be rid of thought or 'I', or to become ‘enlightened' – allows seeking to fall naturally away. Within the play, all efforts to be rid of 'I' merely reinforce identification with it. Resting in life as it is does not bring ordinary bodily life to an end in some magical firework display of enlightenment. Thought continues to arise, life carries on, but it is no longer burdened by the complication of the search for unity. Life is seen as the expression of wholeness, rather than as a search for it. You are Consciousness. Whatever Your present appearance, it is already perfect, including any play of identification as 'I', and also any seeking to be rid of 'I'. Life as the character is simply the play of appearances in awareness and has no requirement for awakening. There is only already awakeness.  

  The play of life is not a separate creation watched and presided over by You. You – Consciousness – appear presently as the play, already wide awake, unable therefore to awaken. You are always obvious to Yourself; never hidden. The characters in the play have no separate existence, only an apparent one. The characters are You celebrating Yourself, immersed in the great play of life, playing the game of looking for Yourself, sometimes recognising Yourself within and as the appearance of Your play. This communication about clarity has no particular relevance or significance over any other part of the play. It carries no merit and has no point. There is no purpose for You to find Yourself. With clarity, all of this is made obvious – Your present appearance as the play in all its myriad forms, the recognition of the non-necessity of everything. Right now You are Consciousness, appearing as a character in Your play. Maybe You think You need confirmation. Forget it. Relax. You already are That.  

  What is, right now, is perfection. Presence has not arisen from the past and is not leading to the future. All appears presently as a play in awareness. The apparently separate individual may be involved with self-improvement, spiritual life or anything else throughout the unfolding of that life. But only the clarity of what You really are undermines the search for awakening or for being anything other than what already is.  

  If all there is is Consciousness, if there is only Consciousness, then why or for what are you still seeking ? If there is only Consciousness then right now you must be That and every thing else that appears in and as awareness must also be That, including any sense of separate self. Any appearance of mundane, ordinary existence can be no less of Consciousness than any appearance of unconditional love, wholeness, bliss, stillness, silence or anything else. Does anything really need to be transcended, found or let go of ?  

  To be free is to be simple, and to be simple is to simply be. It is not a state to attain, nor an attainment to state. The simplicity of being excludes no particular state or experience, nor does it depend on any particular state or experience. It embraces and includes all states and experiences, while being free of and prior to all states and experiences. To simply be is absolutely inevitable. As everything simply is. Including any and all imaginable complexification and complication. You simply are. Including any and all imaginable striving and yearning to become – whatever you may want to become. Nothing will change whether you realize this or not. Nothing will change whether you relax into simple being or not. So you can as well relax. Whether relaxation happens or not.  

  The mind is discontinuous. Again and again it blanks out, like in sleep or swoon or distraction. There must be something continuous to register discontinuity. Memory is always partial, unreliable and evanescent. It does not explain the strong sense of identity pervading consciousness, the sense "I am". Find out what is at the root of it.  

  You are not the body. You are the immensity and infinity of consciousness.  

  Nothing is wrong with you, but the ideas you have of yourself are altogether wrong. It is not you who desires, fears and suffers, it is the person built on the foundation of your body by circumstances and influences. You are not that person.  

  Be fully aware of your own being, and you will be in bliss consciously. Because you take your mind off yourself and make it dwell on what you are not, you lose your sense of well-being, of being well.  

  Silence is the main factor. In peace and silence you grow.  

  Awareness is complete perceptual openness in all experience. It is freedom in immediate perception rather than being focused on stories. The whole field of perception opens up in timeless awareness to include all perceptions. We may find ourselves having a lot of thoughts and a lot of emotions, even very strong emotions that we could have never tolerated before we began gaining confidence in awareness. This is the source of compassion : to allow everything about ourselves to be as it is.  

  In "sitting in silence", there is no goal of attaining silence. There is just the sitting in silence and recognizing yourself to be the silence, and everything else to be a mental projection. Everything. If it doesn't exist, when you sitting in silence, then it doesn't actually exist. If it doesn't exist when I'm not thinking about it, that means it doesn't exist, it cannot be ultimately real.  

  As long as the 'I' is looking for peace, there will be no peace.  

  You are the Self. You just have to stop giving energy to the thoughts that make you feel you are other than the self.  

  As far as the search for truth is concerned, 98% of our thinking is rubbish. The remaining 2% is garbage. Throw it all out and be empty ! Truth cannot be caught by intellect alone - grace is needed. Satsang is the call of grace.  

  Go back to knowing that it is simple. The fun is in the busy-ness as long as it's fun for you. And when you see that it's just more of the same stories, all about 'me', drop it. You can observe what goes on benignly, but keep going. From the position of observer, take that last step. Who's the one observing ? Go there. Who is that ultimate, absolute observer, where 'seeing itself' arises from ? Let attention rest there. Let it be ok that nothing has happening. Let the show be over, let the movie, the story of 'I' as an individual person, be over. And see what happens. Truth will reveal itself, absolute clarity of how this matrix works, will show itself to be no more than a matrix. And somehow, a capacity to enjoy what ever is unfolding is always there. You don't have to be perfect, you don't have to have good health, you don't have to do it before your body dies, it's got nothing to do with anything : it's right now, place your attention behind any stories, any concepts. From there, freedom arises, beauty arises, love arises. But don't take my word for it, do it. And prove me wrong, I'd be delighted. I'll take on that challenge any day (laughter). Do it and find out. So, blessings on all of us, who're pretending to be human.  

  Look clearly and penetratively at that which your mind fears to see. Until it fades in the neutrality of your seeing. Anything come, you can look at it. What is its validity ? Check out the credential of any thought now. In fact, when you are aware that without yourself they cannot come, that you are the witness of them, then, they will be reduced to a trickle.  

  All the while a silent laughter sings, like wind through an open window saying : be deeper still, stand at Zero.  

  Whatever arises, love that.  

  Ignoring the mind is a beautiful sadhana. This is what many of the sages did. They ignored the mind out of existence. It loses its influence and its potency when it is ignored. When the attention is not straying, when it is not picking up all types of nonsense, then you will find that you are in peace.  

  While there may always be some level of conditioning arising, in time you'll see, there isn't an "I" with whom it belongs.  

  Q: The seer and the seen: are they one or two ? M: There is only seeing; both the seer and the seen are contained in it. Don't create differences where there are none.  

  In all the great spiritual traditions, at their heart is tenderness - just to be kind inside, and then everything rights itself. Fear rests, confusion rests, everything that was perturbing the system rests, because they know that when you are tender inside you no longer need their services, because you have returned to your true nature.  

  Your thoughts are not you, so why be so concerned with controlling, quieting, or stopping the mind ? Just dont get caught in thought ! Thats it !  

  I used to try really hard to "be in the now"... until I realized that it's actually impossible to NOT be in the now.  

  Space is the ultimate allower of All That Is. Fear may be here. Don't run. Love may be here. Don't run. Be the spaciousness that you are.  

  What if you discovered not a single thought you've ever thought was absolutely true ? Not ONE ?  

  Learn to live without self concern. For this you must know your own true being as indomitable, fearless, ever victorious. Once you know with absolute certainty that nothing can trouble you but your own imagination, you come to disregard your desires and fears, concepts and ideas, and live by truth alone.  

  What IS contains in itself everything that you ever wanted.  

  Life is about the journey, not the destination. Don't seek a result from reading this sentence. Enjoy the reading itself !  

  Whatever's held seeks to be experienced. Usually what's uncomfortable is the resistance to the emotion. Pose questions. "Is it possible to experience this fear wholly without resistance ?" Invite, not demand. We'd all much rather be invited, than demanded to try something. It's not unnatural to feel fear, but when it's held as "I don't want to experience this right now!", it can be toxic. When it originally came up, we were not able to be fully conscious so gets trapped. It waits until you are ready to be conscious. Then it moves through your body. It's just the pulsing flow of life and Life knows how to process what isn't needed. Your system is literally detoxifying emotionally. Your only job when it arises is to stay conscious. If you stay conscious, it moves of its own accord. This often happens after a period of openness. The mind has an idea that openness is dangerous. So fear arises. Actually what's dangerous is contracting life.  

  Who are you ? Keiji, a long-time Zen student, approached his master and said : "I don't see how there can be any enlightenment that sets you free once and for all. I think we just get ever greater glimpses of Buddha-nature, the vastness that is our true Reality. It's an ever-expanding process". The master, looking penetratingly at Keiji, replied. "That may be what you think. But what is your experience, your experience right now ?". Keiji looked momentarily confused. "My experience right now, Master ?". "Yes. Do you know yourself as Keiji, having ever-expanding experiences of Buddha-nature ? Or do you know yourself as Buddha-nature, having the experience of Keiji ?"  

  The greater part of human pain is unnecessary. It is self-created as long as the unobserved mind runs your life.  

  The truth is that you already are what you are seeking.  

  Has it ever occurred to you that you are seeking God with His eyes ?  

  The problem is the seeking. Relax the mind, relax the looking completely, drop everything for short moments, do not try to be in a state. If a thought arise and make you feel you have to do something about it, then the solution is "nothing need be done", if an emotion arise and make you feel you have to do something about it, then the solutions is "nothing need be done". In not doing anything for short moments, the Obvious is seen, only the "Naked looking effortlessly". Trust that.