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Asalamu alaykum arahmatu la mubarakat cholesterol is one of the major causes of heart disease. And cholesterol is a substance that clogs your arteries, your veins, and people take a pill called statin to clear their arteries and veins. These blockages prevent blood flow. They prevent clear blood flow. They interfere with blood flow through the body. And if they get strong enough, if there's enough cholesterol in your system, it can actually cause a blockage to your heart, so the blood flow stops, and then you're in great difficulty. We have other kinds of blockages too. We're always talking about becoming pure and about becoming clear and becoming freed of our mental images and our memories. But we're not. She was afraid she would be carried away, and she didn't have the strength, she didn't think she had the strength to cross the river. So the older monk told her to get on his back, and he walked her across the river, put her down, and the two monks continued talking, uh walking. The uh younger monk uh didn't talk to the older monk while they were moving along, and the older monk said to him, What's the matter? This is after a few hours went by. And he said, You know, we've taken certain vows, we've taken certain oaths, we're not allowed to touch women, yet you picked up this woman and took her across the river. And the older monk said to the younger monk, I set her down on the other bank of the river four hours ago. You're still carrying her, and it's like that with us. We carry all of our experiences and all of our memories, and they go with us wherever we go, and we react to them, we react to our memories almost exactly in the same way as if they happened to us now, and we are constantly in the midst of situations that bring these memories into action. Now, they don't actually come into action as visual memories because we've already suppressed and blocked the visual memories, but the reaction to what has happened causes a blockage in the flow of our energy within ourselves that causes us to react in certain ways in order to make ourselves feel better. And these ways of reaction come out in usually negative qualities, they come out in anger, they come out in jealousy, they come out in resentment, they come out in some way that tries to suppress what's been difficult. Now, when a child is young, and a child is put into a state of fear, let's say they have mean parents, the child will develop anger to suppress his fear. Anger is easier for the child to bear than fear. So all of a sudden, because of the mistreatment of the child and putting the child in fear, you've created a very angry person. And that person carries that anger with them. Every time they come into a situation that's difficult, they become angry. They no longer are able to just handle the situation, but they become angry. In order for us to be able to clear all of these things from us, to be able to clear these passageways that block our energy, that don't allow us to become who we truly are capable of being, that trap us in illusion and trap us in maya, that trap us in situations that we don't even know where being trapped by is one of the difficulties that we have to be able to break through. Two children were standing in line, and one of them smacks the other one, and the teacher comes up to the child and says, Why did you smack him? And the child says, He started it. And the other child says, and the teacher says, No, he didn't. I was watching you the whole time. He didn't do anything to you, you just smacked him out of nowhere. And he said, Oh, yes, he did. A year ago, he smacked me, and I'm just getting even now. And it's like this with the things that we carry, we have delayed reactions, but we've forgotten what those reactions are about. Now, various people prescribe various remedies for trying to get rid of these things. And of course, some talk about meditation, and some talk about prayer, various methodologies. Bawa's discussion on meditation comes down to the only true meditation there is, is to be able to rid ourselves of our aggressive qualities, of our satanic qualities, of our qualities that are other than the gracious qualities of God, that are other than the divine qualities of his ninety-nine names. So when we go into negative qualities, we need to recognize that these negative qualities are caused within us by reaction to situations that have happened to us in the past that we are continuing to react to because of triggers in the present. Now, psychoanalysis will try and get you to talk out your situations so that you can finally get to the root or back to where it was. Bawa says we need to be able to pull these things out from the roots. Forget about why they're there. If you pull them out and you don't allow these emotional reactions, these emotional traumas to happen, and you don't allow these negative feelings to jump out of you, you will be conquering your attachment to your past. Allah has three major duties that he performs all the time on behalf of humanity. He creates, he nurtures, and he sustains. Actually, sustain and nurture are the same. He creates, protects, and sustains. Man's duties, the major duty in his life is to clear the vision of our attachment to the world and our attachment to our memories. So we need to clear ourselves of our attachment to illusion through our memories and through our sense perception. If we can clear ourselves from our attachment to our sense perception and our reaction to our sense perception, and can clear ourselves of our reaction to our memory bank, we can become clear so that the energy flow within us won't have the blocks that it has that cause negative emotions, negative reactions to happen. So in meditation, we're not trying to stop the mind because the mind is very similar to the ocean. The waves in the ocean don't stop. And if you stand in the ocean and try to stop the waves, you're kidding yourself, and it's obvious you're kidding yourself. Well, the mind has many, many layers, and you're not going to stop the flow of thoughts. But what we can do, and what we need to do, is stop the reaction to those thoughts. In other words, in a train, the various cars are all linked to each other. So when one car is moving, it pulls the next car. Now imagine if you decoupled the link to your mind that carries you when you're moving. Like think about being in a car that's going 100 miles an hour and you're sitting in the back seat. Well, there's not a whole lot you can do about it. You're going wherever the car takes you. But if you can somehow get out of the car, then it doesn't matter how fast the car is traveling. Say, well, that's interesting, that car's going pretty fast. Well, it's interesting my mind's going pretty fast. It has nothing to do with me. The recognition that our mind is a tool and it's not who we are is at the beginning of a very long journey of getting to know the truth about ourselves. And until we recognize that we aren't our mind, we continue to live as if, in fact, we were our mind. The process of decoupling, the process of detaching, the process of not being under the influence of our mind is the great work that we are in. It's our big responsibility. Once we give up this vision of the world, once we give up this vision of illusion, and once we are no longer under the influence of it, we become different because we no longer react to outside stimuli. The outside world is not what we are interested in anymore. We're interested in finding out the truth that exists within ourselves, the reality that exists when we are outside of the influence of the external world and our senses. One of the methodologies that was used in Sufism, and in some places it's still done, and when I traveled to various locations where Sufis lived and had their dargas, their places of meeting, there would often be an area set aside, usually underground, that people within the order would go for a certain period of time, usually about 40 days, and it was cave-like, without lights, and they would live in there, and food would be brought to them but a very small amount, and there would be no communication between the person going into isolation and the rest of the world for 40 days. And the reason was to create a situation where they were without the stimuli of the world, where they were without the constant interaction with the world, so that they could spend time inside themselves and get in touch with that reality. Now, we don't have underground caves to go into isolation, but we should spend a period of time trying to isolate ourselves and find out what's going on inside of us. What's going on within us to understand the wisdom that is inherent with us and to find the light that is within us. There was a truck driver who just was taking his instruction on how to drive a truck, and finally he got a job, and his job was to drive across Canada from one end to the other. And this was his first night on the job, and most of the driving was going to be done at night. And he got into the truck, turned the light on. It was pitch black outside, and the lights went on, and he thought to himself, you know, I've got this light that only goes in front of me for a few feet, and I've got to cover this entire country with that little bit of light. And he had two choices to make at that moment. He could either give up, or he could realize that the light travels with him wherever he goes, it isn't limited. Well, the light that we have travels with us wherever we go. We just have to find that light. And we can't find that light as long as we are overwhelmed by our sensory interaction with the world because our life begins to depend on that sensory interaction with the world, and that sensory interaction with the world becomes a reality. You have to go into a dark hole for an extended period of time to figure out that in the midst of a darkness, there is a light that is with you and that stays within you. The understanding that this goes on like this takes time for people to learn. One of the things that holds us back is that we go through our existence with constant suspicion. Suspicion about what's around the corner, suspicion about why people are doing what they're doing, suspicion as to will whatever is going to happen next be good or be bad. This constant worrying. To be able to live life without suspicion is a divine gift and a divine quality. To be able to take everything for its divine nature and see its divine goodness, and to be able to look beyond the possibilities of what can go wrong and just understand God's perfection is a great blessing for our being and a great blessing for our way of life. To be able to clear ourselves of suspicion alone allows us to be friendly towards everybody we see, allows us to have positive interaction with everybody that we see. But as long as we have suspicion, that can't happen. If you go into a city like New York or any big city, and you see people walking on the street, people don't interact. People just mind their own business and keep going because they never know what that interaction is going to lead to. Small towns have less of that because people know each other in small towns and have had interaction previously. It's difficult under circumstances. To come to appropriate conclusions. But when you realize that the vision of your mind and the vision of your eyes are not that which is reality, it becomes easier for you to go inwardly and find truth inwardly. As long as we believe that everything that we see is real and that everything that we encounter is real, and that our life is dependent on these external encounters, we will never find the truth of existence. This interaction with the world that we go through is a temporary situation. There are lines on each of our necks. These lines represent the eventual strangling that's going to happen to each of us, the eventual death that's going to happen to each of us when this interaction with all of these externalities finishes, goes away, and is done with. Now, desire is dependent on we getting certain things that we want within this world of illusion. Desire is never fulfilled because every desire that comes, once you have somehow gotten what you think you need, it's replaced by another desire because that's the nature of the mind. The waves just keep going and they keep creating more thought patterns that you need to somehow bring to fruition, bring to some kind of conclusion on behalf of yourself. When you detach from these thought patterns and you detach from this desire, then you can begin to deal with the reality of your existence. As long as we deal with the creation as opposed to dealing with the creator, we are never going to find true solutions to our situation. And they they get what they're after, and they think, well, I've got it now, but I don't seem to be satisfied. What's the problem? And then Satan whispers in their ear, it's not that you got it, you got some of it. You didn't get enough of it. So if it's money that you're after, whatever amount of money you get, Satan will whisper in your ear, you need more. If it's fame that you want and you get some, Satan will whisper in your ear, you don't have enough fame. And that goes into every single category. Whatever you have, the reason that there isn't a satisfaction is you don't have enough. Now, for some people, these difficulties with the mind become so overwhelming that they have to do something to stop this constant nagging that's going on inside of themselves. And again, they look to external solutions to the problem, and that leads to alcohol consumption, drug consumption, something that numbs you so that you are no longer under the influence of your own mind. Well, there are other ways to break this connection of being under the influence of your mind, and that's recognizing that you can detach from it and that it's not real, and you don't have to pay attention to it, you don't have to listen to it. You know, most people uh in America are involved in one of two one or two one of two political parties, because that's all we have, and you'll often hear people arguing about their point of view based on their political parties. And what's happened is we now have television stations that cater to your inclination. If you're a Democrat, you'll listen to certain stations, and if you're a Republican, you'll listen to other stations. They cater to your inclinations because the news, to use the Wall Street vernacular, has become monetized. That means the news has become a money commodity, politics has become monetized through TV. It's become a way to make money, and people fall right into it. Um, you may or may not know that the ratings of certain anti-Trump stations have declined dramatically since Trump is out of office because they can't bash him any longer. And people really enjoyed watching that. Now, I'm not making any uh judgment as to whether it's right or wrong, I'm just talking about the nature of man, and what goes on is we tend to create entire scenarios within this world, and we tend to follow them, and then we tend to form cliques and separate ourselves into these various um different clubs. Some of these clubs are religions, some of these clubs are political, some of these clubs have to do with economic reality, capitalism or Marxism, some of these clubs have to do with race, some of these clubs have to do with our colors, our languages. They're all of these clubs that we belong to that separate us one from the other, that make distinctions about us one from the other. There was a time when missionaries went to Australia to try to convert the Aboriginal people, and the priests would come and they would say that the people had to go to Mass. And some went all of the time, some went some of the time, and some never went. And it went on like this. The priest that they had was okay with the situation as it was. He passed, another priest came to replace him, and this priest was a little harsher than the previous priest, and he told everybody that if they didn't go to mass, they were damned, and they would end up in hell, which he described for them. Well, this didn't have much effect on the people. Some went some of the time, some went all of the time, and some never went. And it went on like that until the chief of the tribe died. Now, the chief of the tribe never went. His wife always went, everybody did what they wanted, but because of the harshness of the new priest, he couldn't be buried within the sacred cemetery that was next to the church. But the Aboriginal people still gave him full burial honors, but they did this outside of the cemetery, and they went through all of the usual ritual, and then late that evening, when it was dark, the strongest men in the tribe came and moved the fence so that it included the chief of the tribe. Well, people can say what they want to you, but in truth, things are inclusive, and either you will see them inclusively or you won't. The people in the tribe were inclusive. The fact that the priest tried to separate that inclusion wasn't going to happen. We are constantly under the influence of people who are trying to separate us, trying to tell us that there are differences among us, and these differences somehow make one person worse, one person better. The reality is that there is a unity among all of existence that overrides all of these differences, that overrides religious differences, that overrides caste differences, that overrides color differences, that overrides nationalities. And until we can understand that truth, we are going to have blockages within us that are going to cause reactions. Now, you've all seen people pre-during the time of segregation in America when people were trying to break through segregation. The fact that they had these blockages against certain races caused people to be putting dogs on people, caused people to be using fire hydrants to keep people in place, caused people to not allow people to eat with each other, caused all of these separations because they had a blockage within them that had been grown by outside influences that caused reaction. In India, they have a very entrenched caste system, and this caste system has taken years and years and years to try and do away with, but in fact, it still exists. And within India, you have all of these very powerful separations trying to separate people and keep them in their place to create a hierarchical structure. As long as we have within us blockages that tell us we need to maintain a hierarchical structure for our own benefit to make us more important, we are never going to be able to be free enough to enter into that space of unity which we have to enter into in order to find our true connection to reality. Reality can't be found if we insist on separation. Reality can't be found if we insist on exclusionary situations in our life. They can give you statin for the cholesterol blockages. What are they going to give you for these blockages that separate men from each other, that separate your mental images from each other? The only way out is through developing wisdom and be able and being able to do away with the lies that the world teaches you and put truth into place. And the only way that that happens is to find somebody who tells the truth and to listen to that somebody who tells the truth and to give yourself over to that truth and accept that as reality. So you have to almost become an outcast in order to enter into reality. You almost have to separate yourself from all of the influence, not almost, you have to separate yourself from all of the influences of the world in order to create a space for yourself that's real. And this space exists. And what you'll find in this space is even though others may exclude you, you include them, and you can do it without any hesitation and without the blockages that cause them to exclude you. So we have to act contra to what's going on in society. Society moves pretty slowly, and it attempts to create unity almost through separation. It doesn't understand that we have to give up all of our connections to all of our cultures and all of our ideas. Culture is an interesting word. Cut it in half. First part is cult, the second part is your. Turn it upside down. What's it become? Your cult. Each of us is involved in our own cults, and we've made these cults the mainstay of our lives and the mainstay of our ideas, and the mainstay of what we consider important. None of these ideas can be held on to if they separate us one from the other, if they separate mankind one from the other. It's only when we enter into a state of unity with all existence that the truth can be known for us. And to do that, we have to disconnect to almost everything that we have been taught that's contra to that kind of thinking. We have to disconnect from the belief system that our religion alone is the only religion that works. We have to deconnect from the system that our race is the only race that understands things. We have to deconnect from all of these things. And we can't just give it lip service. It has to become our reality. And when it becomes our reality, that's when the borders that we have placed around ourselves are broken open and we're allowed to go where we want, and everybody's allowed to come in where they want. All understood this. The great wise ones who've walked the earth all understood this. All understood the unity of existence and preached the unity of existence. We have to take on this unity and make it real within ourselves. We have to take it on and do away with all of our inherent negative qualities. And where did we inherit them from? We inherited them from the karma of our parents, the karma of our society, the karma of our teachers, the karma of our politics, the karma of our nation. We have to give it all up. We have to give up all of this karma that's attached to us and become free. And in that freedom, we will be able to find the truth of existence, the truth that is real beyond this physical form. The truth that is not manifest in form, but manifest in qualities, and manifest in the qualities that are Allah's qualities. This is the secret to finding the truth and finding our own freedom. If we can understand mercy and that mercy is limitless, not limited, we can understand the truth. If we can understand gratitude and understand that gratitude is not limited, we can understand the truth. God's qualities are not limited. We have to stop ourselves from being limited. And once we become unlimited, then the truth can flow within us. May it be so for each and every one of us. Amin, Amin. Ya Rabbilal Amin Asalamu Alaykum Arahmatullawa Barakatu.