This is how we resist peace

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Thank you for being here and for dedicating yourself to truth, to dealing with every single obstruction and resistance within yourself, instead of ignoring it, instead of trying to distract yourself from it with other people, with substances, with activities, with anything, and everything can be a distraction from this. And for being open, no longer being offended by truth, because you know that truth has never harmed you.

SPEAKER_00 0:44

While looking into some old books, I came to a realization that many of the most popular self-improvement books of the past were mostly philosophical. They focused more on the inner world and self-mastery and the idea of knowing thyself. And philosophy wasn't just an academic subject, but it was a tool to make life easier. But today, most of the self-help genre seems to turn the focus on the external world of success and influence and how to appear more powerful than your peers. And it made me wonder what made this change because it's like our main question has shifted from how should I live a good life to how can I succeed in an external world? And my two questions are how do we cultivate our inner life in a culture that's constantly pushing these ideas and reward rewards uh external achievements rather than a good character? And can a person live a meaningful life without ever asking, who am I?

SPEAKER_01 2:04

Well, thank you for your questions. Uh this is something I'm sure we are all thinking about or have thought about, and um, and we can talk about those things, and we will. I'm not saying I'm not going to answer your question, but the most important thing in your questions are actually directly, not about not directly about the questions. Um your questions about you know looking at the past and seeing that there was a more meaningful, maybe a higher quality, one could even say, uh, publications about in the so-called self-help genre, even though it probably wasn't called uh that yet, depending on what period we're talking about. And to wonder what happened and uh what we can do in this society, in this in our times that is so focused on externals. How can we find ourselves? How can we uh not be swept up in this, maybe what is perceived as shallowness, as um fakeness, even I want to point out to you that these questions don't come from you, but they come from whatever it is inside of you and inside of all of us, of course, that is still resisting. It is still resisting. Because uh one says, oh, it used to be easier in the past. You hear this about a lot. You hear this about not just philosophy, this is why I'm saying this is how the mind works, this is how we all apply uh our thinking to everything. People even say this about uh wealth. They say it was much easier to create wealth even 50 years ago. It was much, much easier. And that generation, when they say now, oh, just work harder and they don't know what they're talking about. This is all forms of resistance. This is not real. This is not real. Or if it was real, it was always the reality. Meaning people now always thought that the past there were more opportunities there. It was easier than, it was simpler than. And so this is another form of resistance that the mind puts up to us and it says, look, you have it so much harder now. Um it's it's it, this is what it is. It's a form of resistance that aims to invalidate the insights and the history of the past, because it's saying, Well, Epictetus, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius, all these people wrote 2,000 years ago. The world is a much more complicated place now. It's not so easy to be virtuous now. It's much more difficult. So those tools that these people are uh using, have used in the past, and that they are now trying to give to you, right? In forms of philosophy, if you're a philosopher or religious people will say the same thing. They'll say, you know, the Bible, Jesus, this is all thousands of years ago. I'm not so sure that this is so easy anymore. So that way, whatever it is inside of us that is put up putting up this resistance. Many people might call it the ego, we might say identities, we might say the false self, whatever term you want to use, the devil, the Satan's, the serpent inside of you, whatever term you want to use, okay? That's that's up to you. But whatever it is, because the resistance clearly is there, whoever's doing it, whatever is causing it, um, the resistance is clearly there. And so it is that resistance inside of us that is constantly trying to give us excuses and is constantly trying to invalidate the insights from the past, because we can't take insights from the future, there's only the past. And even if someone in the present says, look, uh, there's this resistance inside of you, there's this ego, whatever you want to call it, and it has full grip on you, and this is why you're suffering, this is why you're miserable. Um, or at the very least, this is why you are so miserable. Like it could be much, much less, whatever they're saying. If it is someone in the past, we'll say, Oh, you're ancient, you don't know what you're talking about. If it's someone in the present, we say, Well, you're privileged, you don't know what you're talking about. There is always a form of resistance that can be accepted, that can be let in. Always. To the mind that is in the grips of that which resists truth, that mind will always come up with another excuse, with another reason not to do it, um, with another way to criticize, to look at others rather than to itself. Because the one place that we need to be looking at is the place that the resistance is telling us not to look. And the resistance is looking everywhere. It looks in the past, in the present, in the future, it looks at all people in the all world, uh, in the in the whole world, and uh looks at looks at its own story, its own everything, all everything about itself it will look at, but it will not look at itself.

SPEAKER_00 8:10

And so yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:46

So, what's what's your question exactly about that? I don't want to miss it.

SPEAKER_00 8:50

Uh, why do you think we resist these changes?

SPEAKER_01 8:54

Well, again, it's not you doing it. This is the thing. It's not you doing it, it's this mental construct that we once again we could call the ego or the identities. It's not you. We have um identified with with thoughts. We have identified with thoughts, the thought that it used to be easier. This is just an opinion, it's just a thought. This is not you saying that. You, the consciousness, the awareness. I'm not saying you are consciousness, you are awareness, but you're of the nature of awareness of consciousness, of simply that which is. That one does not access information and data and memory and then comes up with a story and narrative and then watches that and tries to influence that and judges it good or bad. It's going well now, it's going bad now. The self does not do this. This is the mind, this is a thought construct. The ego is a thought construct. The ego is not some organ in your body or a part of your brain, or this is not, there is no physical, there's no such physical thing as the ego. And so uh we we are scientific people all here, right? We're not gonna believe, we're not gonna keep talking about the ego and think it's a physical thing. And if it's not a physical thing, then what are we talking about? We want to know, right? What the ego is completely scientific, completely psychological phenomenon. It's a it's a thought construct that we have identified with. There are endless thought constructs. Endless. Some people are victims, some people are heroes, some people are sinners, some people are saints, some people are uh successful, some people are failures. These are all thought constructs because what makes someone a success or a failure, what is that based on? Um, it can be and it that even the millions endless of thought constructs have millions and billions of reasons why the same thought construct could come about. You could say, well, uh success, okay, so I come from a long line of, I don't know, um successful business people, and each of them has managed to increase the family wealth, except for my uncle. He was he's kind of the black sheep, but whatever, generally, you know, and I don't want to be like him. So uh now I'm 25 years old, so now I'm supposed to take it on and do the thing. If I can't do that, I'm a failure. If I can do that, I'm a success. This is what that story is based on. So those ideas were constructed as we're growing up, as we're looking around, as of course other people also tell us this is how things are. Uh, you come from a long line of so-and-so, and you're about to take over the business, and now it's going well, and now it's going not so well, and now will this happen or this one? These are all, this is a narrative, this is a thought construct. And when I, the simple, aware, conscious, whatever I am, the self, attaches itself to that, identifies with that, then I'm in that story. A role has been created by who, by whomever. You can you can blame anyone you want. Society, your family, your own uh delusions, all of this together, or or some parts of it, uh, formed this narrative, this story, this role, this role, just like in a theater play, it's a role. Um, but you have forgotten that you are the neutral human being who steps onto the stage and becomes a role, and that this is just a play. And so, and when I say you, I mean all of us, of course. And so we've identified with that role of the young up-and-coming uh business person who comes from a long line of so-and-so's. That's a role, that's an identity, it's a thought construct, it's a mental phenomenon. So if you identify with that, if you say that is me, and you put nothing in between that and yourself, your true self, because the one who comes from a long line of business people could have also been born to the second lowest caste in India 345 years ago. Is the self any different between that human being and this human being? Does the one see a different spectrum of light? Does the one have a different consciousness, a different awareness? Is it not the same thing looking out of all of our eyes? So that one could have been that, but that one has a different story because they're born into a different situation. You are not your situation. You are not your story, you are not your past, you are not your own expectations, you're certainly not other people's expectations. These are all thought constructs. And there's nothing wrong with thought constructs, because the same thought construct has allowed for this platform that we now meet on from all over the world to exist without this construct that multiple people can identify and believe in and work with and recognize and be compatible with, nothing happens in the in the realm of logistics, right? Nothing's invented, nothing's done, no accumulated knowledge can accumulate, none of it can be passed on. And if it was, if it wasn't able to be passed on, that would be fine too. That would not be a problem. That's how it used to be. It can be like that again, it wouldn't be bad. This is again the judging mind calling that good or bad. But on a physical logistical level, we like this, right? We're not saying it makes that which is looking out of these two eyes any better or worse. But we are saying that it makes the eyes themselves, the body. Uh, it helps it in its experience of the self, in its experience of love, in its experience of beauty, in its experience of being able to self-help. It helps that and so we so there is a good purpose, there's a proper purpose for everything. This is the proper purpose of the mind, of thinking. The mind is what can invent rockets and and uh bring people into space. Computers, shelters, every single thing you put on your body and in your body, this is all the the result of of thinking of the mind, of the amazing power and beauty of the mind. But when that thinking, that activity gets identified with by that which looks out of the two eyes but is not the two eyes, that which hears but is not the hearing, that which tastes but is not the mouth. If that one identifies as a thought construct, as a narrative, as some any activity of the mind, then it is identifying with something that it is not. And this is exactly what the ego is. The ego is the not you, the not you. Ego means the the meaning of the word ego, the translation of the word ego is I, but not the correct I. Because we're all speaking about I, right? Every destitute person whose life has been ruined and everyone hates them, and and no one uh ever gave them a chance and an opportunity, and they hate everyone, um that one is saying too I. But the Buddha is saying I as well. Socrates is saying I as well. Are they talking about the same I? This is the question. And so when I believe that I am now worse off because of the times I live in, because of the family I've been born into, because of the condition that my body is in, whatever, whatever it is, because of the political party that just won an election or just lost an election, then I am identifying. See, this is how it is even possible to say is I am identifying with I. It doesn't make sense. Then I am identifying with something that I am not. And so to say, you know, the world used to be a better place, you know, the philosophy used to be understood better, the word of Jesus used to be understood better, right? Because at some point Jesus was actually alive. It can't get better than that. So the further we go away from that, the less understanding we're gonna have, and everything is gonna get muddled, and everything is gonna get complicated and ruined. It is not so. It is not so this was always the case. This was always the case. Otherwise, why is Jesus flipping tables? Why is Socrates being poisoned? There is always this element, it always has been, always will be, the awareness, the light, was always a minority. Always was, and perhaps always will be. No expectation, but and this is not a problem. You you are the entire light of the world. You cannot be prevented. Because without you, there is no world. Everything that you perceive about the world, and that you then go on to call good or bad, better or worse, it cannot be perceived without you. So your world is only possible because of you. Without you, there is no world, as far as you know, anyway. And so that which perceives the world, that one needs nothing. That which perceives the world, that one cannot be prevented by the world. It is already there. And so you know philosophy, you know what's fake and what's shallow and what's not. You have come to this and say, Yeah, but I almost didn't, and a lot of it was chance. Perhaps that's true. But this is how it's always been. Always been. This is how it's always been. And uh that's why I don't even want to talk about it directly, because it would just be the mind opposing another mind thing, right? Because I could tell you as a response to your question specifically, I could say, but also we live in a time where now you can read every single text in the past that has ever been created. You can read the Upanishads, the ancient Vedic texts that all Hinduism and Buddhism is based on, and you can go across the world and read ancient Greek texts, and then you can travel 1600 years forward and read ancient, uh almost ancient, uh, mystic Christian texts, you can read the Sufis, you can read once again texts from 3000 BC, you can read the Egyptians, a mere hundred years ago. Just a hundred years ago. Maybe one fifty, maybe two hundred, which is nothing. Someone in the West had no idea, generally speaking, uh without traveling there, what the Eastern thought is, what what Hinduism talks about, what Buddha talks, who Buddha even is, perhaps. And vice versa, just a hundred years ago in India no one's uh able to read Plato. Most people. The vast majority of people. I think uh less than 150 years ago, text like the Bhagavad Gita, which is thousands of years old, was translated to English. And uh even a shorter amount of time, were you as a normal human being, not a king, not an emperor, able to purchase a copy of that translation? So I could tell you that, and I did, I suppose, but this is not the point. The major element to see in your question, I think, is the resistance. Rather than, and um I don't want to counter with another resistance, right? Even if that would dissolve your particular resistance, the mind that is looking for resistance, or the mind that is acting out of a certain resistance will just go find another one resistance, another thing to think about, another thing to try to figure out, another thing to judge, another thing to put expectations on, another uh this is why uh the intellectualism that we all have is dangerous after a certain point to the person, again, not to the true self, to the seeker though, because um as soon as we find more data, we make more speculation and more expectation and more opinion and dogma and all that because we're intellectuals, we have new information that needs to be dealt with. And so one way or another, uh this is all these are all forms of resistance, and at some point we need to decide to not try to know enough, believe hard enough, be virtuous enough to be able to judge ourselves good, but instead we need to let go of judgment altogether, altogether. When we hear someone say, it used to be so much easier to buy a home 50 years ago, it was like nothing a factory worker by themselves could afford one. I'm not saying that's true or false. I'm just saying, okay. Okay. What does that mean to me now? Whether it's true or false, what does it mean? Does it change what I have to do to get a home if that's what I wish? Does it change anything? And look, I'm still talking about something pragmatic, about something simply logistical. People go much further with that simple fact, if it is even a fact. They say, Oh, I'm worse off now as a being, as the one who looks through these two eyes. That one is damaged now because 50 years ago it was easier to buy a house. And we sit there and our misery is increased and our peace is diminished, and and we see we become hopeless and and also resentful towards the world because that which made it possible 50 years ago, who took that away? Why did they do that? Oh, I'm sure it was greed. What is this doing? What is this doing? What is this helping? And so if it was easier to buy a house 50 years ago, okay. All right. If I'm making a study, if I'm writing a PhD, if I'm trying to make come up with a certain law, okay, that might be useful information. But how does it make me, the true self, better or worse? But that's where we take it, that's where we um we bring it all the way in there. And that is us identifying with a mental construct, with a thought. It was easier to buy a house 50 years ago, it's harder now. You live now, so you are worse off than you would have been 50 years ago. This is all mind stuff, this is all speculation, this is all imagination. Again, even if it is true, it is imagination. Even if it is true, it is identification with something that you are not. And so, literally, know thyself. How? How will you know thyself if you think that you are the one who is now worse off because it is now easier to buy a home? I mean, more difficult than it was 50 years ago. How is this knowing yourself? And so you know what's what, you know where to look, you know what to read, you know what to give yourself to, you know the nature of the true self, you know the you know about resistance, you know about ego. You can be caught off guard once again about, well, this is yet another form of resistance. Interesting, I did not know this, and I was engaging in this for years now. But okay, that's fine. It's again only the judging mind, the identification with thought, with the thought that says, oh, you've been silly for 10 years. So what? Now I know better. I can only say that I've, or this thought can only come in that I was silly for the last 10 years believing this because now I know the truth. So, why does this resistance that is inside of us focusing on how silly we were for 10 years rather than how now we are saved from that silliness and it can never occur again? Why is it focusing on that and not on that? And why are we allowing this? This is the question. So, why is the one looking how a hundred years ago, however long, self-help was so much more shallow and so much more fake? Um, or less shallow and less fake than it is now? Why is it not looking at other things that we had now have the opportunity and the privilege to possess that we didn't used to possess however many years ago? Why are we not doing that? And then why don't we go on to the next step and let both of those things go? Let both of them go. Let both the advocate for the past and the advocate for the future let both of them go. Truth is timeless. Truth is timeless. I am is a truth. I was I was doing this in the past and I hope to do this in the okay fine. But I am now, right? I am. I think therefore I am. You don't even have to go that far. I am, therefore I am. I am. And so this is timeless. So knowing this, is that not knowing yourself? And knowing yourself, what else do you need to know? How to buy a house uh in the 1800s. Okay, that might be an interesting. I might watch that YouTube video. What was it like to buy a house in the 1800s? That might be interesting. But why identify with it? Or rather identify with my situation now and then compare it to then, and then if that situation was better, then that means I am worse. I, I, who am I talking about? This is why I always say, uh, and of course, many others always say, it is always said, uh, who is speaking right now? Ask yourself, who is speaking right now? And as I always say, the red flags for or the telltale signs that it is not you speaking right now, even though you think it is you, are if this voice, if this whatever you want to call it, if it is judging, if it is speaking of having an enemy, if it is speaking of being harmed by other people's actions or by outside events, if it is speaking of time, if it is speaking of change, it is not the true self. Because this I am cannot be made better by others' actions or time, and it cannot be made worse. It is what it is, just like reality. Reality is what it is, and this true self does not have enemies. What can harm it? I understand the body can be harmed, the possessions can be harmed, this the narrative can be harmed, the person, the personality, the the legacy, all of this can be harmed. But just like Socrates said, You can strike me, you can kill me, but you cannot harm me. Isn't this amazing that he said this? Christianity says this, Islam says this, Buddhism said the Buddha said this. And then Socrates too is saying you can strike me, you can kill me, but you cannot harm me. What a stupid guy, right? How can you say you can kill me, but you cannot harm me? Uh this this guy is not seeing the paradox in this. It's true, he is not seeing the paradox in that. It's only us who are so miserable, who are always complaining, who are always judging, who are always comparing, who are so ambitious, who are so intellectual, who are so smart, um, who are so faithful, so religious, so whatever. It is us who see the paradox, and Socrates doesn't see the paradox, and so Socrates is stupid. It's not that inside of us which is seeing the paradox, that's not stupid. It's Socrates is stupid, and and Jesus is stupid, and the Buddha is stupid, and everyone's stupid, it's just not us. We're not stupid, you know, and the people who lead countries are not stupid, uh, all that but uh are stupid, but we are not. It's always the the ego will always protect itself, the resistance will always protect itself so that there's always resistance. Because this is already formed. We have already identified with this, so now uh that which is threatening what we think is us is of course going to be attacked, and we're going to protect that which we think we are. What's more natural than that? What makes more sense than that? But if we let go of that identity, and uh we don't really take on another one other than perhaps the true self, which is in itself an unknowable thing, which can in that way never be attacked because we don't even know what it is. And so you can call that, you can call the true self another identity, or you can um um say that actually it is not quite possible to identify as the true self because we cannot see it, we do not know what it is, we can only kind of know what it is by knowing what it is not. Fine. That that's maybe where we have different ideas and different opinions, but we all agree. We can all say sit in the same room and be happy together and feel like Kim, even though one is saying uh this is the true self, the other one's saying this is the true self, the other one's saying there's no true self altogether. There's no one here. You are talking to no one right now. Whatever it is, either way, but all of these people will say, you are not your thoughts. You are not your emotions, you are not your situation. The situation is real, the thoughts are real, the emotions are real, the information is real, the data is scientific, it's real. It's all real, it's not an illusion, but it is not you. So why identify with it? Again, you're writing an article and you find that self-help books used to be much deeper than they're not okay, fine, interesting. But what does this matter to the to the self, truly, right? So that's just what I wanted to point out to you there. I hope that makes sense.

SPEAKER_00 35:31

Wow, that actually made a lot of sense. I actually didn't think that I was judging the era that I was living in. And actually that's what you wouldn't do it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:44

This is the this is the one thing. Awareness does unaware things. And those things we call ignorance. Ignorance is to be unaware, right? Ignorance is to not know. So if when you know, you don't do ignorance. It's when you don't know that you do ignorance. So all that this is the most beautiful thing, and we're meeting this fact, it's happening inside of you and many of us right this instant. This is irrefutable proof of the reasonable nature of a human being. As soon as it is pointed out to you, you you see it, you drop it. This is the most beautiful thing. As soon as it is told to you, if you truly see it and if it is told properly to you, you stop ignorance immediately. I did not have to bribe you, I did not have to torture you, I did not have to threaten you, I did not put you in a camp for eight months. It's a simple pointer, simple pointer, right? This and this is what friendship is. One friend comes to another and points sometimes, like, look at that. You were looking at this, look at that. And the friend turns his head and says, Oh, there it is. That's it. And so when I say to you this is resistance, you see it. When you tell me something that I'm not seeing, I see it. And so this is friendship, this is kinship. And all it takes for this true self, what again, however you want to call it, for a human being to drop ignorance is to truly see it. You can you can tell a drug addict you're killing yourself, and if they don't have the ears to hear it, um, then they'll still continue doing it. That's different. I'm not saying you can just print it out on a poster, hang it everywhere, and say, know thyself, and then it will work. No, it doesn't work like that. There's some logistical skill that is needed, right? There's some uh way of putting these things that works better than others. Uh, but if the truth reaches the person, then ignorance stops immediately.

SPEAKER_00 38:10

So true. That was so eye-opening. Thank you, Archis, for your insights.

SPEAKER_01 38:16

Of course. And uh again, this is just plain kinship. This is something that as soon as you know it, now that you know it, right? Because I only received it from other friends as well, it's the same thing, it's a passing on. Um as soon as I was suggested this, as as soon as this was pointed out to me, I had the same reaction. And now, whenever someone engages in the judging, in the resistance, many forms of it, I don't know all of them, I probably don't know as uh 1% of them. But if I see one of them that I know about, I immediately, it's obvious to me now. And if this is my friend, uh, or in other words, if I feel like this person is able to like has opened themselves up enough to receive something without getting angry and offended about it, because then the truth doesn't reach you, then I will point it out. And this is all we can do, this is all we have to point it out. Right. And this is why we don't argue. Like if someone came in here with an opposite view, that means they're um, depending on how they're going about it, they're closed off. Like if they're being aggressive about it, then you can be pretty sure this person's closed off. No matter what you say, you will not be able, the truth will not go past it. The truth will be blocked. And so this is why we don't argue, because um, in a debate club, you can win an argument, whether the other person is willing or not. Uh, but when it comes to truth, no such thing. There's no winning or losing. And so we don't argue, we don't try to score points, we don't you cannot force. Um in Turkish, there's a beautiful saying, it says, you cannot force beauty. Beauty cannot be forced. And so this is like this, but when you have an open disposition, a friend can point out something to you. But if you see the other person as an enemy, you will do the opposite of what they're saying. Right? And so this openness needs to be there, and this is why we're talking about in the past weeks empty yourself of yourself. Empty yourself of yourself because it is only our personality, our thought constructs that we have identified with that, if they are doing this, I'm not saying this is necessarily what they do, that prevent us from being open because we're full. We have an opinion. So it used to be easier to buy a home 50 years ago, people had it much better then, and I have it worse now, and and that's that's the that's the opinion that sits in the place of the knowledge of the true self. And so it's full. You you cannot you can put it on top of it, it will just flow away, and the old one will still be there. It's only when we're open, when we let go of this and we become empty that something else can come in. And so this is to empty yourself of yourself. And because you have emptied yourself of yourself already, you are able to um see something that is being pointed out to you. It has nothing to do with me whatsoever. I point out what has been pointed out to me, but for you to see that is 100% you. 100% you. And someone who is open, for them, it is inevitable to be met with truth. There are so many people who go around to gurus and all of that, um, and they're open, and the guru says something, or they hear YouTube video, or read a self-help book and whatever it is, and they say, Wow, this changed my life. I owe you everything. You opened my eyes. No, you had done that already before yourself, and only you can do that. And once you do that, you can go anywhere. You can go to India, you can go to the bookstore in Canada and get grab a self-help book. It will all advance you. You will extract, if there is any truth in it, you will be able to extract it. So it's not the book you're reading or the person you're talking to, it's you. You did that. And so this is just another beautiful thing and shows you how the true self needs nothing, it has no enemies, it lacks nothing, it desires nothing. Um, but of course, there is there is the person of me. The person of me. That one goes to work, comes home. Uh, that one, the dog of that one can die, right? Uh war can break out in the country of that one, and their car can break down and they can get fired or get a new job, get the best job they ever had beyond their wildest dreams, that one. That's the person. But it's the person of me, not me. And so if you can go through life and see the person of you and operate the person of you, go get a job, you know, or quit the one you have because the working conditions are not great. Or go tell a friend, go eat ice cream, go the if you can do all of this, but knowing all the while that this is the person of me. There's me, and there's the person. I'm seeing the person, I am operating, I am the one operating the person, I'm the one observing the person, I am the one that this person takes all their existence, all their being, all their energy from. And when I say energy, I'm saying scientifically, I'm not saying vibration or this or that. I'm saying literally like the calories that you consume. Where are they to go? Where are they to go? Who decides that? That's me. And then The person receives that and they get to do that and they get to go on a bicycle and spend that energy in that way. Um, so if we can go through life and see that, uh sort of like a video game, right? People sometimes compare it to that. Yeah, you're like you're seeing the character in the video game, you're you're in full control of the character, but you are not the character. You know that when you're playing a video game. Well, for some reason, when we're out in the world, we don't know that. We think that uh that the um person at work who is being is having their performance evaluated, we think that we are that one. And when the evaluation is good, we are good. When the evaluation is not so good as as last year, then we are not so good as last year. Now the question for everyone here is does that make sense to you? Does that make sense to you? If it does, live that way. If it does not, there is another way. There is another way. Most of our ignorance is based on the idea, again, yet another idea that we identify with, that there is no other way. There is another way. So thank you for those questions because uh well the questions themselves were highly interesting, and I do think about those things as well. There is the the comparison, the comparisons are never going to stop. The comparing is never going to stop, and they don't, it doesn't have to stop. So, this is again an important reminder, I think, that I will close with on this question is that uh now that you know about judging and its effects and constantly comparing and identifying, now that you know about that, you might now see it as a failure of yours each time you compare something or you judge something. This is natural, right? You say, Wow, judgment has brought me so much misery, so much, so many regrets. And so I don't want to judge anymore. But then the judging continues one way or another, and we say, Oh no, I can't stop. So now I'm in a terrible way. This is bad, this is a problem. How do I stop judging? And so now this becomes the next project, this becomes the next thinking. I can't stop judging, so now I'm in a bad way. This is yet another form of resistance. The judgment is allowed to continue. The person is the one judging, and the person needs to judge. I'm gonna buy a new car. What suits my needs? There are 13 options. Which one do I judge good? Which one do I judge bad? Or not right for me? This is judgment too. This is not a problem. This is needed, this is necessary, it's logistical. But when I say, uh, I really want this one, but I can only afford this one. That's because I'm not successful enough. It's because I've never made anything of myself, and now I'm this is the results of it. I'm in a bad way, and I go home and I cry. This is the wrong use of judgment. But judgment does not need to stop. So it is not a failure to judge, it is not a failure to compare, it is not a failure to also make certain have certain opinions. Oh, in the past, this seemed to be a more efficient way of doing things than what we are doing now. Okay, fine. That might be true, right? If there's evidence, then okay, that's true. But that's all it is, it does not go further than that. If you feel anything about a fact, about information, about an opinion, a belief, even, then it means you're identifying with it. Otherwise, it would just be information to you. You say, okay, interesting. In fact, it turns out it is the exact opposite as uh as I thought about 50 years ago about the housing market. Okay, interesting. Same response. No no emotion, because why? Why? Why should I be emotional about information? If I'm emotional about it, it means I'm identifying with it. I've made it me, and so something is changing. Oh, I'm changing. Is it good change? Is it bad change? I wonder. I'm so curious, I'm so hesitant. I'm troubled by this. This is emotion, this is identification. So there are no problems, nothing needs to stop. Life can continue exactly as before when we were judging. Of course, many things will stop because many things we're identifying with, and our judgment we were taking too far and in too many places, those a few things might stop. But judging itself is I mean, this is another expectation. Maybe it will stop completely for you. Okay, that's another result that can happen. But I'm just saying, if it doesn't, it's not a failure. Because you you're not gonna identify with it, you're gonna use it logistically and um with its proper use. Judgment is not an enemy, mind is not an enemy. Judgment is an amazing skill to see right from wrong. The mind is a powerful, amazing thing. But it is not you. That's all. So, oh, I'm having a lot of thoughts today, or I just overthought something for so long. Oh, I'm I'm so bad. Why? This is identification with some with mind activity with thoughts. It's not good or bad. Okay, so thank you very much for the question. It lead it led us to all of these insights and realizations and and reminders and also pointers. And um what we make of it is up to us, but you open that up here, you brought that here. And again, this is the only thing that needs to be done. We we realize something, we see something, we have a confusion, a question, a disagreement, anything, and we deal with it. We don't ignore it like we do everything else so many times, and still silently suffer, right? No, we say, I want to know about this. So where does this go? And as we see, pretty much everything, if not everything, period, goes to the true self, to the difference between the you and the not you. And so this is once again what we did. And so thank you very much for that. Really appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 51:25

Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_01 51:28

Thank you. So I will um move you back to the audience uh with great gratitude, once again. Very, very valuable um questions and and ideas. And I will invite our next speaker.

SPEAKER_03 51:46

I've spent you know many years reading philosophy and many schools of thought, and I've journaled about all my findings as much as I could. And I actually remember I even spoke to you many, many months ago um on a one-to-one, and I believe we spoke a lot about purpose. Um, particularly I've been you know interested in Simone Way, and I've read her anthology probably over three times. But with this said, um I've decided to completely uproot my life and remove everything that I knew and depended on. And started from a clean slate in a country I don't know, half cra halfway across the world. Um, and a lot of this that I've had to deal with, um I believe you term like the realm of logistics, has been a lot of the issues which I've had to face initially initially, but ultimately I've been able to intimately test and see truth in a raw form. And but I've a disabil um a disposition to be aware at times can get blocked. And I found that knowledge sometimes is not enough to drop ignorance, and so a lot of my questions will come into like how I can stop falling into old habits, as people say. And I remember in an old video, and you had a psychologist on, and towards the end, and I always think of this, he says, philosophy is a ruler which you can measure yourself against. And even though I know about the traps of identity, why do I keep finding myself identifying with things? And I just couldn't understand how this kept happening. And I don't think I'm incompetent, and I used to think that I wasn't trying enough. And in my journeying, I would refer to these as relapses. Um and kind of what I found was that when things felt risky um um things felt fearful by detaching, um I thought that was a risk with identify with identifying with things because I thought it would weaken my ability to create an effect on an outcome. If I detached myself with something, I wouldn't get the result that I wanted. And I that was completely the issue that I was doing because it was never about attachment, it was it was about intention, and the attachment was the weakness. But my issue was that when unpleasant or difficult moments in reality would happen, I would have this fearful instinct which would compel me to feel like I needed to attach to certain outcomes or to identify with something, and I really, really believe that identity has become kind of like an instinctual mechanism through this experience, and I know that I must overcome my instincts, and I know that it's possible, but you know, us as humans, uh we all require an element of control. Um, for me in particular, contingency plans kind of ease the existential dread of the move and not getting some of the outcomes that I wanted. Um, however, like knowing how to anticipate and react to uncertainty at times was a way that I was able to cope, knowing how to anticipate that was a type of control. And a good way to kind of put this is like stage fright. Like if you know that you're about to present kind of like now, you can anticipate the fearful instinct, and you can kind of rely on ideas, truth, philosophy, if you will, um, to kind of overcome it. But what would often happen is that there would be situations I could not be prepared for, which was unexpected or unpredictable or not even desired. And I wanted to know what could happen. Would I be able to live without one? Would I be able to live without anticipation? Um, because what if I'm not prepared for the instincts and the emotions which would come away come from that, and the unawareness from that instinctual reaction to these unpredictable moments kind of triggered a relapse in which um I would be consumed by unimportant things, my career, money, reputation, identity. And so kind of not be prepared is like being pushed onto that stage, like when you have stage five. So, say if you were in the in the side and someone pushed you on, you kind of become overwhelmed with this instinct. And I feel like reality sometimes operates in a very similar way. So, my issue at its core is like despite how much I've studied how destructive identity is, you know, I've been consumed by unimportant things. And sometimes these come from a place of instinct, and knowing that it's um identity, I'll be able to drop it, but and I'm constantly feel like I'm becoming unaware that I'm not my situation, and then it's a construct. My ego in general does not feel like it's that detachable, and the only way I feel like I can overcome this is through regular auditing on myself, regularly reminding myself of truth, um in order to feel like I can evaluate myself day after day after day, which I don't feel I want to do. I just don't feel like you need to do, because truth is universal, and once you're aware of it, I would have hoped that everything that I'm doing out of unawareness should be dropped. So when it comes to relapses or um falling into old habits, if you will, how do we overcome that? And what do you think is causing all of this?

SPEAKER_01 59:03

What is peace?

SPEAKER_03 59:08

Peace is the absence of obligations, I would feel being able to be and to be present and to only be focused on the present.

SPEAKER_01 59:22

Can the absence of obligations be something permanent?

SPEAKER_03 59:29

I haven't found that um obligations can be permanently removed. I think um logistics in order to survive is a type of obligation.

SPEAKER_01 59:44

Um so what you then believe is that peace cannot be something permanent.

SPEAKER_03 59:52

Um I'm not sure because like when say if I needed to find out what I needed to eat, um it would then become my obligation to find that. Um but I'm not sure if you would say that's uh a duty, but of course, um some obligations are not necessary, and um even eating is not like I'm I compel myself to do that action.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:28

Let's not let this go, let's corner this. I asked you what peace is, and you said it is the absence of obligation. That's when I feel free, that's when I can be at peace. And then I asked you if uh the absence of obligations can ever be a permanent state. And you said, no, I don't think so. No matter what I do, sometimes I will be obligated. And so that means, does it not, is this not irrefutable, that we are believing then that peace itself cannot be a permanent, everlasting condition. And so no wonder someone who believes that peace is fragile, that peace is a changing thing, that peace is an ephemeral coming and going. No wonder is that person not at peace. How could you be? And if this is the truth about peace, then let us know this truth. Has truth ever harmed you?

SPEAKER_03 1:01:48

No, um truth I was able to step back and kind of as I think you said in a previous answer, you have the I which you present to the world, and you have the real you, which is very distinct. And I think truth allows me to see that distinction.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:15

Exactly. So if if peace is a fragile thing, if peace is a coming and going, if peace is something that can perhaps even be earned or satisfied, and that's how we can have peace, and every time we do not satisfy our obligations, we cannot have peace. If peace is such a thing, then I want to know that, because then it is truth, and I want to know truth. I don't want to be ignorant, I don't want to be uh in uh disalignment with truth, right? I want to be aligned with truth as much as I possibly can. So if this is peace, I want to know about it, I want to know more about it, right? And truth cannot hurt me, so this exploration cannot hurt me. And so if peace is this fragile thing, then that means that peace is not peace. Because every time I am at peace, I will know that this is a changing state, that the very fact that I am at peace now means that soon I shall not be at peace. And so when I'm not at peace, I'm not at peace, and now when I am at peace, I'm not at peace either, because I know what's coming, and I know what I'm about to lose. And so that is not peace, even when I have it, that is anxiety, and peace is not anxiety. So I want to tell you the good news. You have no idea what peace is. Because what if you had the exact right idea of peace, you know what peace is, you have it, and you still feel like this. You still feel like you are regressing, relapsing, um, failing, whatever, whatever, all these things that uh you are thinking and you are being told by something. You do not know what pieces. And so if you do not know what peace is, you cannot have the vision of it because you're looking for something else. You are looking for bliss. What you call peace is bliss. Bliss is a changing thing, bliss is coming and going. Bliss is a reward to fulfilling obligations. Bliss is something that you can enjoy, and then knowing that you're going to lose it, that you cannot always have bliss. And you call bliss peace. Peace is not bliss. Because bliss is an emotion. Emotions come and go. Emotions are up and down. Emotions are here now, gone then. Or vice versa. Peace is not an emotion. Peace is not a mood. Peace is not a feeling. Peace is rock solid, ever present. It is your nature. Every single time you are disturbed, you can only recognize the disturbance because your nature is peace. If all there was in your life was disturbance. You would not call it a disturbance. And even when you are disturbed, you recognize another disturbance. You are not blind to it. Every single disturbance proves its opposite. Because recognize this. When you have a disturbance come in saying you thought you were all safe and calm and everything was fine, but actually, this that's what we call a disturbance, right? And what do you do to deal with the disturbance? You get up, you start doing. Either you're fighting or you're fixing, you're putting out a five. All of this is doing, it's an activity. So when a disturbance calls you and you get up, you get up from what? What were you engaged in? What were you effortlessly resting in? It was peace. Right? Otherwise, you cannot see a disturbance. Otherwise, everything would be a disturbance and there would be no differentiation. There would only be this one thing, and there would be nothing else. But you never forget what a disturbance is. Don't you wish sometimes that you would forget what a disturbance is, that you could not recognize disturbances? Yet every single time there's a disturbance, you recognize it for what it is. You cannot ignore it. This is proof that you are operating out of nature, out of your nature of peace. This is proof that your nature is peace. This is proof that peace is effortless to you. Because you never strain to have peace. Peace is effortless. Just like it is effortless, the most effortless thing for a fish to swim rather than to walk or to fly, that's because swimming is the nature of the fish. And flying, most other animals can't even fly for any amount of time. A bird, some birds fly for months straight. And that's still a physical example. There's some effort involved in that. But relatively speaking, it is effortless to the bird to fly. And to the human being, it is effortless to be at peace. Peace is the ceasing of effort. Peace is stillness. Now, okay, you're gonna say, okay, my nature is peace, but I'm constantly disturbed out of it. I cannot always have peace. I want to tell you this that which you were sitting peacefully in before you were disturbed was peace. True. And when you got out of peace, when you got up to do something about your disturbance, you stepped onto the ground of being. That too is peace. Without peace, you have no ground to stand on. Everything is on top of peace. Disturbance is on top of peace. When you put the disturbance on your workbench and you start working on the disturbance, trying to fix it, the bench you put it on is peace. Without peace, you cannot operate. Without peace, you cannot exist. Your nature, your being is peace. When you do not have peace, you do not exist. Your existence and peace is one thing. It's your nature. The bird can be prevented from flying, often is, in a cage. But that flying is its nature, that will never change. This is a vision, this is a seeing, this needs to expand. This is not just oh, okay, and then you know it. This this needs to be allowed in. All we need to do is pay attention to this. I want to ask this if this is peace and a disturbance comes in front of it. Is peace gone now? Alright. I can see peace. Oh, I'm at peace. Here we go. I I I can see peace. It's right here. Oh no, a disturbance is coming in. And it's completely covering up peace. Is peace gone? Or is peace only the vision of peace? Is it only obstructed? I cannot see peace, but is peace gone? A traditional example to this is you can see the sun in the sky. A thumb, just a thumb, it can cover up the whole sun. But is the sun gone? The sun is never gone. Rather, you know, just because a thumb is in front of it, the sun is still there. And so I want you to see you could put ten thumbs in front of the sun, you could put skyscrapers in front of the sun, you could put a whole planet in between the sun and you. The sun is still there. The peace is right here. Disturbance can come in front of it, and then the disturbance goes away, it comes back again, goes away again, it comes back, and this time it brings ten of its friends. The peace is still there. It's still there. Always will be, always has been. Disturbance, um setbacks, relapses, unawareness, ignorance, violence, hunger, failure, all of these things can come in front of peace and obstruct our vision of it, but that they can never touch peace and that peace is always there. If we can see this what enemy is left, what are we worrying about? What problem is there? Because it is not a problem to peace itself to be covered up by disturbance. It is not a problem to the sun when you cover it up with the thumb. So why do you think that the thumb is a problem to you? Peace is always there. You are clearly here. Because if you're not here anymore, you're not experiencing disturbance or peace. Nothing. You're not here. So clearly, you are here. And peace is of the sun is always there. So why do you call the thumb a problem? This is the question I want to suggest to you to sit with. Um, this is not an answer that's required now or ever, because they're in this highest, truest sense. Uh there are no requirements, there are no obligations. That, what you in reality are, truthfully are, whatever that is, we might we need not define it. Perhaps we cannot define it. Whatever you are, you are there. And whatever peace is, peace is there. And the disturbances get in between. And peace cannot see you, and you cannot see peace. But you are there still, and peace is there still. There are many things that you cannot see that you still know are there. When I end this meeting and I go away, you do not think that I stop existing. Maybe I stopped existing right at that moment somehow. Quite a coincidence, but it could have, sure. But it's more likely that it's just that my image disappeared. And I will be back here again in a week. You do not count me as lost or as destroyed. So why do you count pieces destroyed when you cannot see it? When you leave your cat or your dog in the other room, why do you assume that the cat or dog has died, has vanished, never to be seen again? Is it not enough for you to know that the cat or the dog is completely fine? Everything is alright. You just cannot see it right now. Logistically. It is not permitted to you for however long to not see it. But imagine your cat and dog is uh well taken care of by another loving person that it identifies as its guardian and it loves. Imagine for the rest of its life, um, it will always have this perfect care and happiness. Do you really need to see your pet to be completely at ease with its condition? Whatever it is is happening, whatever it's going through, whatever the situation is in that room, I know that it is well taken care of. Is that knowledge not enough? Do you need to see it too? Because truth is more powerful than this physical vision. Just because you cannot see it doesn't mean there's isn't something much more powerful still there. So your setbacks, everything you do in unawareness, everything you do in ignorance, every mistake that you thought you were done with, but you just did it again, is merely a temporary, as you called it, I did not say that. You said it is temporary, a temporary thumb in front of the sun. That's all it is, and the thumb will move again because while peace is immortal and everlasting and timeless, disturbances are not, failures are not, events in the world are not, and so the thumb will move. But the most amazing thing about all of this is even if it never ever moves again, and you never see the sun in your entire life ever again, the sun is still there. And you know this because even though you can't see the sun, you can see that everything is lit up. The valleys, the mountains, the clouds, you can still see all of that. And it is much like the same with the with the self. We cannot see the self itself, we can only see all its effects. What are its effects? I am aware, I perceive. I am not the things I see, I'm not the couch, I'm not my house, I'm not my carpet. But I can see those things. Aha. That is direct evidence that I exist. Because I am the perceiver, I am not the things I perceive, but I am the perceiver. I am the perceiving, rather. And so what a beautiful thing. Even your setbacks are proof of your existence as well as of peace. Because every setback, by seeing that it is a setback, so-called, or a disturbance, let's say, you are seeing two things. One, I exist, I am. Two, peace is my nature. Because if it wasn't, this effortless recognition of a disturbance would not be possible. I would have to work for it because I don't know what peace is, right? I'm not constantly reminded. I it is not of my nature. I need to go remind myself what peace is in order to recognize a disturbance. Because if I don't know peace, I don't know disturbance. I cannot recognize disturbance if I did not know peace. And so, let me go study peace. Oh, now I see this is a disturbance. This is not how it is. It is immediate, effortless, and completely natural by every disturbance to rem to be reminded of one, I exist, otherwise I could not perceive this. Two, my nature is peace, otherwise I could not perceive this as a disturbance. The whole world serves you. The whole world serves you. Every beautiful bird that you hear singing and that you take delight in proves these two things that you exist and that your nature is peace. Otherwise, you could not delight in that. And even every disturbance is the proof of the exact same thing that you exist and that your nature is peace. Otherwise, you could not recognize this as a disturbance. A disturbance from what? What is being disturbed? So every single thing that happens to you in your life or does not happen to you in your life is proof of these two things forever and always, and can never be any different. And if this ever did change, if you ever forgot what peace was, well, then even better, then you could not recognize disturbances anyway. And that somehow is peace as well. So either way you're going to have peace. But you cannot change that. You will always know what a disturbance is, and you will always know the beauty of kinship, of another human being, of ideas, of truth. You will see justice, you will, you will rejoice in that sight. This is all possible only because you know what peace is, because peace is justice. Peace is not injustice. Justice is aligned with peace, awareness is aligned with peace, beauty is aligned with peace. And badness, ugliness, and injustice are the absence of justice, beauty and awareness. It's the absence of them. And so the one who recognizes this can only do so by existing and by knowing peace. And also we are seeing that this knowing of peace is effortless, it is instantaneous, it is natural, meaning peace is our nature. You and the sun are one nature. You cannot survive without the sun. The sun, you are made for the sun. You take literally, literally, you take life from the sun. Directly and indirectly, everything you eat takes life from the sun as well. So let things come in front of the sun. It does not bother the sun, it need not bother you. These are clouds. The clouds are not an enemy to the sun, the clouds are not an enemy to you. They're just what they are, clouds. And even they can be beautiful. Because again, in every suffering, in every so-called failure, in every so-called ignorance, we see the evidence of its opposite. Irrefutable evidence. And we say, thank you, unawareness. Thank you, ignorance, thank you, disturbance, for once again making it more obvious to me what you are and what you are the opposite of. And so just like how it is when we sometimes take a walk in the park and a cloud comes in front of the sun, and we say, Whoa, it just got darker. This is yet another point pointer. This is yet another reminder, irrefutable evidence that the sun exists. What a beautiful thing. And yeah, I would have liked to have some more sunshine, but what a beautiful thing. I was just walking, not even aware of the sun, not even aware of the sunshine that I'm delighting in right now. And so this cloud has pointed that out to me. And I will delight a little bit in shade. For as long as I need to, for what it proves to me, for what it shows to me. I will delight in it. And when the cloud passes, I will once again have this direct delight in what I am made for, in my nature. And so literally, the whole world serves you. Every single thing that happens to you is proof of the same thing. It is never proof of, oh, you're doing worse now. Worse than what? And is that even really true? Because this to say that sometimes I can be at peace, sometimes I cannot, is to believe that the thumb can extinguish the sun. Because I'm saying, ah, now that the my my thumb is in front of it, the sun is not, the sun is gone, the sun is prevented from doing what it does. No, it's not. That would be a foolish belief. We would call someone foolish for saying that. Yet when it comes to peace, we say exactly that. We say, sometimes I can be at peace. Peace is a precious thing. It's a beautiful thing. It's an amazing thing. And all my fighting, all my doing, all my activity, all my achieving, all my ambitions are so that I can have peace. So I'm very well aware of its value. You might be aware of its value, but you are not aware of its nature. You think it's a passing thing. You think it's an ephemeral thing. You think it is a changing thing? You think it is a fragile thing. You think it can be touched. Go try to touch the sun if you can. Does that make some sense?

SPEAKER_03 1:25:57

Absolutely. And I think that was really profound. And thank you for opening my eyes up in that way. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:07

But again, your eyes are not opened. They already were open. Otherwise, you cannot see this. Right? This is again the beautiful thing that we have inside of us. Because you also started with the um statement that, yeah, knowing things, the knowledge of things immediately works in many ways, but sometimes knowledge is not enough, you said. And I agree, if we're talking about like information, that's not knowledge. Knowledge is just the knowledge of truth, not information. So when we see the knowledge of what peace really is, what the sun really is, and that it cannot be prevented, that statement still is true. Knowing is all that is required for vision for peace. You cannot be at peace. You can think that you are something that you are not, but it doesn't change what peace is. It doesn't change what you really are. There are so many people out there who think they're in a bad way, that they are worth less or worthless because a certain group of people thinks not what they want them to be thinking about them. And we want to tell them excuse me, you are not other people's opinions about you. But they cannot see. They don't have the ears to hear yet at this point. But that doesn't change who they are. That doesn't change the fact that they are, in fact, not other people's opinions. They can believe that as much as they want, they can identify with that as much as they want. It does not change what who they really are. And so when we think of people. Peace as bliss, as merely another fleeting emotion, then we too are free to believe that, but it does not make it so. And so you're gonna want to probe in your own existence not believe this because uh someone says it, but to look in your own experience. Is this true? Is peace something like an emotion? Can peace be prevented? Or is it actually always there? This is something we're all gonna have to see uh for ourselves and by ourselves. This is only a pointer, this is only a suggestion, as this is all that we can do anyway. This is this pointer has been given, this suggestion has been given, and now we can test it. We can experiment with it to see if it shows up in our experience. If it does, perhaps we'll adopt it, and we won't be able to help to adopt it because we think, well, I am seeing this. Am I gonna refute what I'm seeing? To what end? Or we're gonna say, no, I'm not, I'm I'm just not seeing that. It's a neat idea, it's interesting, and if it helps other people, great. I wish them well, but I simply can't see it, at least not yet. Okay, so then don't allow it into your life, don't believe it. Right? And so uh this is all there is to it. As we always say, uh truth is simple. It might be difficult, it might be difficult to these to do these things. Um, they might not be easy, rather, but they are simple. This is simple stuff. We did not get uh a master's in this, right? We did not have to read a book about what we just said, to understand it rather. Maybe we got this idea from a book, but to communicate it, to talk about it right as we did right now. Do we reference any books? Did we go to a course for eight months and come back and now we can talk about it? No. We are right here right now. We already did it, it's already over, it's already been done. And so this is my suggestion to this very, very valuable question, to this very, very valuable insights and experience that you shared with us of seeing these things and then sometimes engaging in behavior that is not conducive to the knowledge, to the realization of this at all. It is not in agreement with it at all. And so we wonder why am I doing this? Why am I having these setbacks, these uh relapses? This is a universal thing that everyone wonders about. And I always say, we are all dealing with the same things, each one of us, and the solutions are the same too. And um, just a little more logistical, tiny little suggestion as well, just to end this, uh, as an addition to what we talked about so far. I want you to notice that there was a time in your life where you were acting completely out of identity, completely out of unawareness, right? And there was no problem. You never said, Oh, I'm being unaware right now. I want to be more unaware, but I'm keeping unaware. I promised myself, I know how amazing awareness is, and and I want to be like that more. I don't want to be unaware. There was a time where you never even said that you were so unaware that you were unaware of being unaware. And so as you're becoming more aware of unawareness or more aware of awareness and the implications of each of this, you are now seeing things that were always there, but all of a sudden now you think of them as existing because before you didn't know of them, you didn't know about acting out of ignorance and unawareness and what that does and what kind of a way of life that is, and how there's now a different way. You didn't know about this.

unknown 1:32:00

Right?

SPEAKER_01 1:32:00

If you live in a house that has a bunch of plumbing issues and you finally find out, that doesn't mean the plumbing issues started then. They were always there. And so, as they sometimes say, you know, what when you finally start cleaning your glass, you realize you see the dirt actually that was in it. It was dry dirt before, so it seemed kind of clean. Uh, but now that you're putting water into it, you're seeing like how muddy it is, and you you see this dirty water, and you say, Oh no, it's getting dirtier. It's not getting dirtier, it's getting cleaner. This is the process of this. Does that make sense too?

SPEAKER_03 1:32:48

Yes, it does. And um thank you for um all of that. And I definitely will try and take a new approach with everything going forward, with with in lieu of what you said and kind of how I can kind of practice this now.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:10

I appreciate it once again, you know, you being here bringing this up, because if you don't come here and bring it, we can't talk about it. We will not have the opportunity to unfold uh something, anything. Right? So this is entirely your doing, if you think about it, because you brought it here and it could not not have happened otherwise. And I again I can only hope that there are a few suggestions in there that can be tried and experimented with and then seen. But um maybe you'll uh come back and say, hey, this yeah, this worked, this was amazing, great, and I want to share it, or it didn't, you know, uh, or some part of it did, some other part didn't, and so I want to talk about that part, or I just want to share that this worked, this didn't. Uh you can do that as well if you so wish. Uh, no requirement, no obligation, no expectations, of course. Uh it would just be great if you did, great if you didn't. That's totally up to you. But um I am grateful already beyond measure to for what has already happened, for what you brought here and what we were able to discuss because of your bringing here. And uh so thank you very much for that. And um uh I want to ask you the question of the Fortnite if you would like to answer it. You don't have to, but uh just to just I'll ask it, and if you don't want to answer it, you'll just say, I haven't thought about it. I really don't want to give my opinion on it. But uh the question of the Fortnite for this week, it ends this week, is do you still pity the ignorant?

SPEAKER_03 1:34:49

Um I think I with that question, I remember what you said about pity being uh more progressive than anger or violence, but it still isn't a great reaction or response or idea to even hold. And I think that sometimes I can come out and be honest and say I'm complicit with pity, and sometimes I use it as a crutch because um perhaps selfishly, I do not want to feel offended or angry or consumed by someone else's actions which I can't control. So pity can be a useful crutch, but I ultimately recognize that it's um not useful, and it is partially egotistical to think that perhaps I'm better than someone else. I the the way that I think is more um thought out or kind of the better way. Um but I try and think about misguidedness a lot and how the things which I've experienced have guided my life this way, and it's exactly the same for other people. The way that they react or um approach the world is very much influenced by the way they think tr the world is true, but um when you show them universal truth or ideas which kind of hold on, and I've seen this for myself. People have these very um misconstrued ideas about like ambition, for example, or kind of being offended, and I put it in a certain way and they immediately drop it. And I know that works for myself, but um I see it within other people, and I can only assume that perhaps it's working the same way, but again, um I think pity isn't the end goal, but I I think for when it comes to myself, um I only tend to use pity as a crutch, and I'll be honest.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:22

Meaning you you pity uh people as a crutch? How do you do that?

SPEAKER_03 1:37:29

So, like immediately if um I feel that there's an injustice, um I can feel the anger and I can feel um Oh, I see. And being able to rationalize everything instantly is not sometimes feasible, and sometimes it's best to allow emotions to drain. Um and I've I've I've tried to do that where I've tried to rationalize something in the moment, and it's extremely difficult because I because you're so clouded by it and you're so affected by it. And I think emotions are sometimes a function a bit like I see it like when you're really tired and you can't concentrate and you're you're grumpy and you're irritable, and then you take a nap, and then suddenly you're fine. I think in sometimes the same way when you're really caught up or you're overwhelmed or you're anxious or you're angry, sometimes just being able to pity makes sense, and it's kind of like a quick fix and a quick explanation, which doesn't really need much thought, and you're able to move past it, and you're able to kind of operate better. But then in hindsight, if you're still impacted by it, you can think about misguidedness and how um you know it's not right to pity, or not better than anyone else, but um you can also have compassion for why someone might think that, and in a way, then the whole issue is dropped because I don't think pity is enough, because you still carry that, you still think I feel bad for you, and that's still my problem, but then um it becomes no longer your problem when you can kind of find, as you say, kinship with the other person, and that's just what I've experienced.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:39

Do do you realize that every time you call acting out of unawareness and ignorance yourself a relapse, that you are doing the same thing to yourself, that you are judging yourself worse than what you should be, could be, would be if you didn't do it, and that in that sense you also pity yourself.

SPEAKER_03 1:40:06

Um I do, and in fact, that's something which I've come to terms with very recently. I do have experienced that a lot of myself, and I do see the irony in that, and you've reminded me of that.

SPEAKER_01 1:40:21

But look again, the one that calls it an irony is the same mode of thinking. It's not an irony. You know why it's not an irony? Because everything you do to yourself, you do to others. Everything you do to others, you do to yourself. This is not a paradox, this makes complete sense. Because why do we think that we would apply a certain set of standards, certain set of different standards to other people, and a certain set of standards to ourselves? We cannot have a different standard. There's only one standard. And this is why we pity other people, because we pity ourselves. This is why we hate other people, because we hate ourselves. This is why we are disappointed in other people, because we're disappointed in ourselves, and vice versa. It's the same standard. So it is not ironic to um pity others and then to realize, well, I pity myself too. I judge myself too. That makes perfect sense. And so if you finally see that peace is your nature and that you can peace cannot be destroyed no matter what happens, it's just it's a cloud in the sky. The cloud does not harm the sky, that the sky does not even think about the cloud, it does not know it. Then you will also stop judging other people as now they're at peace, now they're not at peace. Because they're at peace, they're doing well. Because they're not at peace, oh poor them. You will say, whether they know it or not, just like I used to know it or not, they in fact always have peace. They are always what they are, and peace is always what it is. Neither one of these two things are changing or ephemeral or fragile. And so, obviously, I wish them well. I wish that they one day do realize that, and in fact, that they realize that as soon as possible. In fact, I'm gonna go talk to them. But if they nevertheless don't see it, there is nothing to pity. Because their true self is changeless, it is awareness, is it is uh existent, as it's their bedrock. They wake up every day with it, they do not turn it on, they do not decide to exist another day, to be aware right now. They do not decide that. They have that. It's their birthright, it's their very nature, it is their very core, their essence of being is being. So that cannot change, and peace cannot change. Peace is strong, peace is immortal, peace is untouchable. So what are they losing? What are they gaining? Due to what? Their life situation is better, so they are better. That's not true. I see that now. Their life situation is better, so peace itself is better. No, that's not true either. So when their life situation is not so good, is peace affected? Is they them are they themselves affected? They're not. So what is there to pity? Oh, I while I pity that they don't know this. I wish they knew this, then they could be at ease more. But that again is believing that ignorance can harm the self or peace itself. This too is the thing that we let go of. So we would not say that either. And so, truly, what is there left to pity? And if you know this about yourself, this is one thing to say about uh other people, but you if you can see this in yourself clearly, and you cannot pity yourself anymore. All you're gonna do is just use the very distraction, the very obstruction to peace, to the vision of peace, as a reminder of the true nature of peace and as a reminder of the true nature of the self. What role does pity play? What use, what room do we have left for it? The knowledge of the true nature of peace and the knowledge of the true nature of the self has completely taken over the space that pity could live in. Or anger or disappointment or ambition, as you say. It's gone. It has no room left. And it has if it has no room left in you about you, then it also has no room left in your judgments of others. And again, it is not a failure if now and then you feel the emotion of pity, because like we discussed this whole time, the emotion of pity also is no harm to peace. So whenever you say, I fall into the emotion of pity, and I know it's wrong, and I know it's better than anger, but it's still not great, see that too as no problem. As a passing thing in front of something that is not passing. That too. This applies to everything. This is what I want us to see. This applies to pity, to anger, to disappointment, to every single thing. It is a cloud in the sky, it is not the sky, and the cloud cannot make better or harm the the sky. Sometimes a sunset is particularly beautiful because the sky is full of clouds, and the clouds are catching all kinds of light. Now, is the sky better?

SPEAKER_02 1:46:28

No.

SPEAKER_01 1:46:31

It's full of clouds. It's all there's gray. I cannot see the sunset at all until it is dark. Is the sky worse now? Both are cloudy skies. It is all about interpretation. It is all about what we're identifying with, what perspective we're looking from, what beliefs we're holding. If we believe that the sky is fragile, if the cloud formations determine the condition good or bad of the sky, then of course we are going to judge one good and judge one bad. Of course we're going to pity the other and congratulate the other, or be proud of the other. But what is our pride and our pity based on? What belief is it based on? Is it based on the belief that uh peace is fragile, peace is bliss, and that we cannot always be blissful, we cannot always be free of obligations, so we cannot always be at peace? Is this our belief? If then that, of course. If then pity, of course. But if we let go of this belief, if we truly see it in our lives that this is not so. Maybe it is not this way either, maybe it is some other third way. Okay, but it is not what we believed in this whole time. If we can just see that much, what the basis of our pitying falls away. Maybe it's replaced with something else, maybe with a third, or maybe with a tenth thing, maybe with nothing. I don't know, right? We'll see. We'll see. But the bottom has fallen out either way. Whether it's going to be replaced or whether it's going to be replaced with this or that, or not at all replaced. The bottom has fallen out. So I wonder if pity is going to be possible, even. And even if it does come up in certain situations where we're just unaware, where we are not reminding ourselves of the true nature of peace, even though everything is a reminder to it. We can feel pity. Look, even pity, like I said before, everything is a reminder to the true nature of peace. Pity is as well. Go out of your way if you'd like to, if you test this. Go and meet a pitiful situation that you would normally deem as pitiful. And feel the pity. The arrival and the feeling, the emotion of pity arising inside of you, that is not a failure. That is not a relapse. You are not in control of what emotion, what thought comes. You are in control of what you do with it after. So see a dog that has been mistreated and is now uh, you know, we're gonna see if it can recover, maybe it can't. Look at a dog like that. And uh if pity comes, fine. If it doesn't come, fine. If it comes, you say there's pity. I see it, I observe it. Now should I pity myself that I've once again fallen into the emotion of pity? This is your choice. Pity is here, pity has come. It is a cloud in front of the sky, the cloud cannot hurt the sky. So okay. So that's pity. And what now? Oh, what a terrible thing. This this pitiful little dog. I feel so bad for it. Or once again I've fallen into pity. Oh no, I'm terrible. I don't want to do this anymore. I don't want to live like this. I've seen the effects of living like this. I really, really don't want to. Why do I keep falling into? This is you now. This is you doing it. That part was not necessary. The first feeling, arisal of pity, is completely necessary. You have no control over that. If it happens, it happens. What you do afterwards is what determines your participation in the experience of peace or its opposite in disturbance. If you can feel pity and see it for what it is, and in fact turn it all the way around and use it to your advantage in rem reminding yourself of the true nature of peace, then what have you made of pity? Aren't you now thankful, in fact, that you've come across the emotion of pity? So there's nothing, there's no harm in that, there's no disgrace in that, there's no disappointment in that. It's beautiful. Pity is there, beautiful. Pity is not there, beautiful. What is our enemy? This is another question for all of us. I'm always open to learn about an enemy that I have that I did not know. Because then I finally know I have an enemy and I can go fight them and I can just do maybe something about that. So I want any one of us to tell who is left, who is our enemy. Pity is not our enemy, disturbance is not our enemy, anger is not our enemy, other people's actions are not our enemy, other people's opinions, our own thoughts, our own emotions, our own past, our own regrets, our own wishes, our own expectations, our own disappointments, shame, guilt, regret. None of these are our enemies anymore. So what's left? Who is our enemy? No more enemies. No more problems. So once again, I can only uh thank you for bringing this here. Because this is this is the most, most, most uh direct core thing in our experience, how we view things. Because we never look at the source of our beliefs, we only see our beliefs. And if we can take that next step with examination, with being aware simply of identities and how identity operates, how the ego operates, then we can go to the bottom of these things and we can have the bottom fall out. You do not need to go fight pity, you do not need to go fight your problems, you only need to have the bottom fall out of them, which is completely up to you. You are in control of this. This is the beautiful thing. Instead of going changing the world so that this problem does not occur again, you can simply go change yourself. And change only based on truth, based on experience, not on, oh, I would like it to be like this, so I'm gonna do everything I can to brainwash myself. No. I want to go to the depth of this and see what it's really like. Whatever I'm gonna find there is gonna be truth. And since truth has never harmed me, I'm gonna accept whatever it is. So if I am now seeing that the thumb cannot harm the sun, is this something that I can deny? Is this something that I brainwash myself to believe? Or can the thumb really not hurt harm the sky, the sun? This is what we all have to individually for ourselves um find out and see, and then accept or not. This is up to us. But the pointer has been given. Uh what is now seen cannot be unseen. And uh we'll see what develops. And once again, you can if you so care, you can maybe one day come back at any point and uh uh let us know how it how it's been, what's going on, how where that went to, um, or not do that. Like I said, that's totally either way, totally fine. But this is all for us to do for ourselves, by ourselves. We don't need anyone else on this. We don't depend anyone on anyone else for this. We do not need permission. We do not need to go purchase this. This is available to us. It always was. It was only the vision, we were only not seeing it. That's all. So thank you very much. Uh, this is really so valuable, so much so. In fact, that you know, we got two so valuable questions. We only talked two people this whole time. And uh now we are out of time in the best way possible. This is beautiful. Because it doesn't matter whether we talk to 10 people or to one person. Uh, if we want to talk for that long, then there's a good reason for that. And that's that. So that's beautiful. So thank you very much for that. I'm gonna um move you back to the audience for now, since we're at the end of our meeting here.

SPEAKER_03 1:55:24

But thank you again, and that was extremely interesting and insightful. Um, thank you for your time. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 1:55:31

Thank you for your time, and thank you for uh, as some other people have commented in the chat as well, thank you for your honesty, your openness. Um and as you know, I think you know this very well just from uh talking to you. I can absolutely tell that you are have opened yourself up. You have emptied yourself, and um you know that openness is not vulnerability, that you cannot be vulnerable by being open, quite the opposite, that you are strengthened by this, or that strength comes through vulnerability, however we want to say it, it doesn't matter, it's all the same thing. You have the way, you have the way, and everything that you want is already yours because you have opened yourself, you have given yourself, you have um dedicated yourself, and as you know, truth requires neither wealth nor intelligence. Some of the poorest people have done this, and some of the least intelligent people have done this. And all that truth, if you want truth, all that you want to do is to be dedicated to it. You say, I'm gonna go down this road, I'm gonna explore this, and whatever comes my way is truth, and truth has never harmed me, so there's nothing, absolutely nothing to be afraid of. Even though there is fear, there's nothing to be afraid of. Fear can come. Fear cannot harm me. I'm gonna let fear dance and play as much as it wants. It cannot harm anything. The cloud cannot harm the sky. And so I'm gonna, even though I'm shaking, I'm gonna keep going. This is all that's needed. Oh, and I still owe you a new question of the fortnight. The new question of the fortnight is are you perfect? Are you perfect? And so I'm putting you in an impossible situation here. If you say that you are imperfect, I will ask you why. What makes you so imperfect? What can harm you, what can hurt you? And if you say, I am perfect, you will immediately think that you are being egotistical and narcissistic and all those terrible things, you will judge yourself. And you will you will think that others will judge you, saying, How can this person say that they're perfect? No one's perfect. Truth has never harmed you. So whatever come what whatever comes out of this challenge, if this of this impossible situation, uh, it will be for our furtherance, it will be to our advantage. So I want you to think of the question are you perfect?