ReSources...
31 January 2011
30 January 2011
Seeing Is NOW
Seeing is NOW. ONLY NOW can there be Seeing, Knowing, BEING. This NOW is what-we-ARE. Space-like, NOW looks to the mind like nothing. Empty. Like a sky with no content. That can disturb the mind, the sense of being a "me", in large measure! Because once the idea of a "me" has arisen (around the age of 2-1/2, usually) then two things happen: There is NOT me or other, which engenders fears, a sense of insecurity and vulnerability, and a sense of being "located" i.e. being separated by space and time from other objects which may bring pleasure or pain. Then the seeking to attain pleasure and avoid pain begins and continues until there is (in rare cases) a questioning, such as, "is this all there is?"
The search for pleasure is then seen as bringing it's inevitable opposite, pain! In this dualism there appears to be enormous suffering until it is clearly pointed out that no matter what appears, it all appears to an Unchanging Seeing and Knowing, which Seeing and Knowing is Open and Obvious and always only NOW. As the seeing is clear the clouds of self doubt, insecurity and vulnerability clear away and the open One-Source, the Singularity that embraces and loves BOTH duality AND Non-duality, is made clear by no one for no one. Simple and plain, ordinary Being is that what IS. Call it by any name, knowing that no name is IT. That Eternal Isness is Seeing NOW, Looking NOW, Knowing NOW. This is what YOU ARE. That which is beyond both dualism and oneness; outside and inside, beyond BOTH Nothing AND Everything.
Confused? Good. Paradoxical? Hell YES! Stay put IN and AS that. As the ancient Zen Masters repeated, Confusion and Paradox are the fierce guardians at the Gateless Gate to Paradise. Let them BE and they will let YOU be, as You are, open, clear and awake ... just NOW. The Seeing is Now. And YOU ARE this Seeing. KISS. (Keep it simple seekers!)
This is a love letter from You to You written by You!
28 January 2011
A Potent Pointer from JD Hazlewood
The Light of Pure
Awareness is all that you see. If you are searching, seeking, longing to
find a peace that is not currently known, it is right before you, right
before your eyes. It is so close that you are blinded by its purity. It
seems very ordinary, so common place that you miss it because you are
looking in the wrong direction.
Just because it is ordinary doesn't mean that it's not an absolute wonder. Look at the sunrise everyday. Is that not something wondrous? But because we are so used to it it seems mundane. What you are seeking is already present, and fully available to each and everyone. It's just overlooked because it's not something new and different, something exciting.
The mind with all of its stimulus seeking tendencies doesn't see this wondrous beauty that is all around, ever present, and totally free of concepts. It is prior to any seeking, and always on. Turn the attention away from the seeking and there it is, shining in plain view, never absent and always full of Love.
See this and the game is over! ... JD Hazlewood
Just because it is ordinary doesn't mean that it's not an absolute wonder. Look at the sunrise everyday. Is that not something wondrous? But because we are so used to it it seems mundane. What you are seeking is already present, and fully available to each and everyone. It's just overlooked because it's not something new and different, something exciting.
The mind with all of its stimulus seeking tendencies doesn't see this wondrous beauty that is all around, ever present, and totally free of concepts. It is prior to any seeking, and always on. Turn the attention away from the seeking and there it is, shining in plain view, never absent and always full of Love.
See this and the game is over! ... JD Hazlewood
A Q and A -There is Intellectual knowing, but Still Suffering
Q: I have read lots of really great books, by yourself, Ramesh Balsekar, John Wheeler, John Greven, Wayne Liquorman, and many others and I still feel that while the concepts are crystal clear for me, I am still suffering. Mostly I get upset with things that happen to me, like my lousy health status, getting a nail in a tire on my car, having an escalating spat with my spouse, and having my kids be so bratty I want to just get away and move to the Himalayas or a monastery! This life has so few peaceful moments ... and mostly I just want to get out of Dodge. How in heaven's name do I get beyond this? I KNOW "I am No Thing" as Randall Friend says; I KNOW that "nothing is wrong with right now unless I think about it" as your pal 'Sailor' Bob Adamson says, I KNOW I am non-conceptual awareness as all of you guys who write and talk about this keep saying. I know all the stuff, and I feel like I should have it, whatever "it" is, by now, after 23 years of searching and not finding. Can you help me? I am desperate. Thanks in advance. D. J.
C: Let is start with that "I" that is claiming the knowing. What IS that "I"? Is it really a separate entity standing apart from totality, and standing as a solitary object somehow OUTSIDE of the obvious inescapable Awareness that is fully ON wherever that body goes, whatever that mind thinks? If "you" are outside of Awareness, then exact;ly where does that "you" stand? Can you ACTUALLY find a self apart from your very Being, which just flat IS, inescapable and unavoidable??
Look and see! WHO or WHAT is this that claims to "understand intellectually"? Who is it that is "desperate? I am not being cavalier; it is a powerful question, looking BACK behind the "I" notion at what is it that makes these assertions and claims and are they really TRUE?!
Is that claiming thought "I" real? Meaning, is it solid, unchanging, always present, and eternally so? LOOK. Rather than try to use the intellect to "get it right" or "figure it out" just look into the space of the "mind" and see for yourself if "yourself'" is a permanent unchanging entity? Or is it a thing, ever changing, coming and going, happy or sad, emotionally wrought sometimes and peaceful other times? In other words can you ACTUALLY identify an entity outside of Presence, apart from Awareness, that never changes? And could what is always changing be ultimately real and forever what IS?
Let us bring it down to the brass tacks: Here is an excerpt from "Being - Awake and Alive", Chapter 42, "Back To Basics":
"R" Writes, Q: You kindly answered my questions when I still thought there was an “I” who had to improve and get somewhere else. I’m deeply grateful for that.
C: My pleasure.
Q: Now, 2 or 3 years later, I’m already free of that illusory and huge burden, and I’m writing to you to see whether you share my recent thoughts. They relate to the “waking state spirituality” vs. deep sleep, and they’re so simple that I’m afraid that I could have missed the point somewhere. I think that having gotten to a point of complete mental exhaustion regarding "spirituality" has triggered all this.
C: Now this is bringing a subtle self-identity, “I”, back in. This indicates that perhaps the “I” sense has still got some energy of belief in it.
Q: Right now, objects (thoughts, sensations and, even more important, the sense of a personal “I” with all its notions and convictions, even the sense of being the subtle witness), they all had started looking like floating ghosts to me (to nobody!), like empty shells that owe me their existence, shells that could not affect my nature. So far so good...
C: Okay…
Q: But one of those days I woke up and stayed in bed for a few minutes, and examined this gap between being deeply slept and being awake and suddenly I realized something as obvious (but usually overlooked in the spiritual teachings) as the fact that something that is present during the waking state, but not during deep sleep or dream state, cannot be completely real, cannot be my nature. I mean, no way something "real" could have waked up with me if it had not been already present during deep sleep. A more humble version of Ramana’s “discover what you were before your parents were born”, I suppose.
C: Fair enough! As we say here, you are the knowing of ALL: “states”, dream, sleep, and waking. And “birth, death, appearance, disappearance, and your face before your parents were born” all appear in That. That is the NON conceptual awareness which is always on. No concept of being, consciousness, whatever label affixed, can actually describe or corral that! That which you are is always awake, even in sleep; that awake awareness reports on the state of deep sleep: “The sleep was good, or not so good”.
Q: So I compared the three states and realized that the only thing that resists the fire of the deep sleep state is simply Being, untouched by experience. There’s Being in the three states, but since there are no objects or subjects whatsoever during deep sleep, we can discard them all as [not] absolutely real… yes, these subjects or objects are the shape Awareness takes during the waking state or dream state, but they can only be real as Being, that is, they are real inasmuch as they are made of Awareness, but not as objects or subjects on their own. A tree is real as a form Awareness has taken in the waking state, but not as a tree, which is a relative form that only appears when the mind is functioning) And, considering that Being did not need a mind to know Itself during deep sleep , we could say that It is aware of Itself without an object. That is, it’s not tied to space and time. It has no beginning, no end and no form.
C: While nice poetry, this is all ultimately just a lot of ultimately useless concepts! Drop it all! The truth is wordless.
Q: But that also implies a quite shocking truth: it means that all (I mean ALL) of the spiritual notions, practices, explanations, enlightenment, unenlightenment, (such as Suzanne Segal's), traditions, paths, Gods, mysticism, visions, yogas, religions, etc., not only imply the existence of a separate “I” that in fact does not exist, but all of them belong to the waking state only!! They cannot be absolutely real. They are only real as relative expressions of the Unmanifest Absolute. It is the mind, not present when there’s no space and time, the one that superimposes spiritual ideas onto the Unmanifest, where by definition there’s no mind at all, that is, no spiritual object or subject.
C: Again, all irrelevant! Just stories arising and setting IN the aware presence that you are.
Q: I felt relieved, but also cheated in some way, because, why don’t those traditions start with the obvious truth that our true nature must be present in the three states and also transcend them? That immediately would free the pupils of the expectation of trying to get somewhere, of the need of practice, of the idea of an “I” who has to evolve, of drama, etc.
Where are the out of body experiences, the NDE´s, the bardo lights, the Kundalini energies, the gurus, etc. during deep sleep? Who meditates? Where to go?
C: Again, this is the subtle ego-I again. WHO felt relieved? WHO cares about whatever appears in the waking dream of life living itself? Who wants “answers?” WHO?
As always, there are two aspects or angles of pointing to the natural seeing: You are already That; the seeing-awareness is always on 24/7, at all times in all spaces, and that, you are. Full Stop.
If there is any trace of self-concept or identity left, that subtle I-sense needs to be completely dismantled, so to speak; so long as any vestige of identity appears then the job is not complete!
Q: Realizing that just effortless Being is, realizing that it is enough with Being, that there’s not anything to do or think, and also remarking that any experience, no matter how profound, is a play of Awareness (even the most beautiful angelic visions during near death experiences or deep meditation states), that would lead by itself to the suicide of the world of name and form. That’d lead them to the Unmanifest.
C: “Lead” WHO? There are no “persons” who are NOT That! You are projecting the “I” sense onto “others”. This indicates you still have a little looking and deconstructing of the self center to do. It’s fairly normal; there comes a time when you recognize that even an idea that “you are done” is another movement back into subtle ignorance!
Q: Does this make any sense?
C: No.
Q: Can it be so easy or am I going too far, too soon? I mean, I’m not denying the manifest, since it’s the shape Awareness takes from time to time. I’m just implying that not being present during the three states, I should focus in that which pervades them all. In fact, even this situation (R writing an email to M right now) feels somehow like a dream. It is losing its solidity rapidly.
C: "I. I. I". WHO!?? Who asks this? Who are you? Asking that mind who am I? might deconstruct these last vestiges of false self-identity. Try it and see.
Q: Thanks in advance, Charlie. As always, any opinion or advice would be really appreciated.
C: No problems. All is imagination, and No Thing. That, No Thing, YOU ARE.
Q: (Follow-up) Sharp as a knife, and clear as always. That’s what I needed. I loved that “there comes a time when you recognize that even and idea that ‘you are done’ is another movement onto subtle ignorance!”
Thank you so much, Charlie. You’ve always been a great help.
C: De Nada!
25 January 2011
New Review of "Thy Will Be Done" from Randall Friend
Many books in today's age of Internet Spirituality can be found - the "self-realized guru" is more available today than at any time in history, writing books, holding satsang, and offering tidbits for those "fortunate enough" to be in their presence. Yet when reading "Thy Will Be Done: Awakening to The Eternal State" by Charlie Hayes, the overwhelming feeling is that this Charlie Hayes character is genuine. Charlie doesn't care to travel the world gathering seekers as followers. Charlie doesn't make a fortune selling books. Charlie is simply a portal through which this clear, direct and tough-as-nails message expresses.
Charlie's latest book is simply a brickbat to the forehead. There is a sense in this book that it is likely the last book which will come - the earnestness of expression is breathtaking. Charlie has always expressed in a take-no-prisoners way, yet this book transcends even that. It is reminiscent of Nisargadatta in his last days, in his last book, where all possible fat has been trimmed and only the pure heart of the message remains. Charlie wastes absolutely no space or time in getting to the point...
"There is no separate controller in “you” or in “anyone else” INCLUDING the conceptual believed-in God! In the rediscovering of this, there is the complete and utterly natural realization that there is no individual doer anywhere, not in you, not in anyone or anything else. There is ONLY WHAT IS." - Introduction To The Living Gift Of Eternal Unknowing
This direct and piercing message holds no sympathy, no pity and no compromise for the seeker wafting on the edges of spirituality. It is either jump in head-first or stay clear of the carnage. If that seeker is truly earnest and desires to know what he is, Charlie's message goes for the throat quickly like a pissed-off Navy Seal.
"Look right now! Seeing with naked Awareness, where is any person … unless you (as a mind-identity) think about it? Thoughts come and go. What you ARE NEVER comes and goes anywhere. It is (You Are) fully Here Now and Eternally Free and Clear, Eternally Presence, Shining before the mind.
YOU are not a thought, not a concept, not a feeling, not a time bound entity. The Sages say: "You are Awakeness, Aliveness, Presence-Awareness". But the YOU they are talking about is not the you that you are trained to believe you are. NO! And these are all just synonyms for God (which is NO word!) Just THAT and NOTHING else. The story of “me” … ANY “me” … is irrelevant. Let's cut through that crap right now! Okay?" - 14. It Is So Very Simple!
Charlie's book, "Thy Will Be Done: Awakening To The Eternal State
" is a book which should be read by any spiritual seeker. The book is a hammer, chapter after chapter after chapter of relentless attack upon that idea of individual existence, an existence which began, an existence which by definition is separate. Charlie dissects this idea with the skill of a master surgeon yet leaves the reader with the overwhelming feeling that this message is born of deep compassion, a compassion which arises when all conditions have fallen away. Charlie leaves the reader, possibly for the very last time, with these words...
"I love you."
- Randall Friend, author of "You Are No Thing" (HIGHLY Recommended!
Charlie's latest book is simply a brickbat to the forehead. There is a sense in this book that it is likely the last book which will come - the earnestness of expression is breathtaking. Charlie has always expressed in a take-no-prisoners way, yet this book transcends even that. It is reminiscent of Nisargadatta in his last days, in his last book, where all possible fat has been trimmed and only the pure heart of the message remains. Charlie wastes absolutely no space or time in getting to the point...
"There is no separate controller in “you” or in “anyone else” INCLUDING the conceptual believed-in God! In the rediscovering of this, there is the complete and utterly natural realization that there is no individual doer anywhere, not in you, not in anyone or anything else. There is ONLY WHAT IS." - Introduction To The Living Gift Of Eternal Unknowing
This direct and piercing message holds no sympathy, no pity and no compromise for the seeker wafting on the edges of spirituality. It is either jump in head-first or stay clear of the carnage. If that seeker is truly earnest and desires to know what he is, Charlie's message goes for the throat quickly like a pissed-off Navy Seal.
"Look right now! Seeing with naked Awareness, where is any person … unless you (as a mind-identity) think about it? Thoughts come and go. What you ARE NEVER comes and goes anywhere. It is (You Are) fully Here Now and Eternally Free and Clear, Eternally Presence, Shining before the mind.
YOU are not a thought, not a concept, not a feeling, not a time bound entity. The Sages say: "You are Awakeness, Aliveness, Presence-Awareness". But the YOU they are talking about is not the you that you are trained to believe you are. NO! And these are all just synonyms for God (which is NO word!) Just THAT and NOTHING else. The story of “me” … ANY “me” … is irrelevant. Let's cut through that crap right now! Okay?" - 14. It Is So Very Simple!
Charlie's book, "Thy Will Be Done: Awakening To The Eternal State
" is a book which should be read by any spiritual seeker. The book is a hammer, chapter after chapter after chapter of relentless attack upon that idea of individual existence, an existence which began, an existence which by definition is separate. Charlie dissects this idea with the skill of a master surgeon yet leaves the reader with the overwhelming feeling that this message is born of deep compassion, a compassion which arises when all conditions have fallen away. Charlie leaves the reader, possibly for the very last time, with these words..."I love you."
- Randall Friend, author of "You Are No Thing" (HIGHLY Recommended!
(See Charlie's Store for Downloads and Print Versions of all of the available books).
Also you can view Charlie's Page on Amazon.com HERE.
Also you can view Charlie's Page on Amazon.com HERE.
There are MANY MORE Reviews and Comments HERE.
24 January 2011
22 January 2011
Has Your Being Ever Changed?
The only certainty is that You ARE; that sense of or knowing of your Being, which is always clear and open, has never changed one iota ... test this, really get this in your gut: You Are and that is absolutely known prior to anything, any thought, emotion, or other temporary condition of the body or mind. Those are things that change while the true Essence of Being, Self-Aware and always Present Here-Now, is simple and unencumbered ... and nothing can appear unless Being here first. So see that YOU ARE that Being that has never moved or changed in any way, and that all that appears is simply Being manifest as what we call "I" and "world". These things are objects, Being is the endless beginningless Subject "made manifest" as all that there appears to be Here-Now. This is a major key to freedom from suffering; to "know Thyself" as Being, awareness, always Present regardless of whether "you" appear to be awake, asleep pr dreaming. That,Being, is both "prior to" and "includes" time, space and all objects.
What you are, Being, Awareness, just THAT, could be called "Isness" or simply What IS without no separation whatsoever. To know THAT as your True Identity (call it "identyless Identity" is so simple we tend to overlook it BECAUSE it is absolutely Ever-Present. But to say that "it is an 'it'" is inaccurate because in actual fact That Isness is No Thing and yet That is appearing presently as Every thing. In any case wherever You are is Here, whatever the timepiece might assert it is Now. Knowing this beyond the mental noises of "doubts' or "yeah, but's" is Freedom. And you already know that You Are, Being. So that's IT! Home. The space you never left. This is the deepest possible fullness of who You Are. Inescapable and so obvious! Simply notice it and know NOW, that yes, "I am That!" This pulls the plug on all suffering. You have never stood apart from Being, from Awareness. That is the simple "truth that sets you free".
What you are, Being, Awareness, just THAT, could be called "Isness" or simply What IS without no separation whatsoever. To know THAT as your True Identity (call it "identyless Identity" is so simple we tend to overlook it BECAUSE it is absolutely Ever-Present. But to say that "it is an 'it'" is inaccurate because in actual fact That Isness is No Thing and yet That is appearing presently as Every thing. In any case wherever You are is Here, whatever the timepiece might assert it is Now. Knowing this beyond the mental noises of "doubts' or "yeah, but's" is Freedom. And you already know that You Are, Being. So that's IT! Home. The space you never left. This is the deepest possible fullness of who You Are. Inescapable and so obvious! Simply notice it and know NOW, that yes, "I am That!" This pulls the plug on all suffering. You have never stood apart from Being, from Awareness. That is the simple "truth that sets you free".
A Review of "Thy Will Be Done ...
J.S. writes,
In this thing(dream) we call "life" as a human in this world, there are stories about "me"(the central character to my experiences) and other than me(you and the world which includes everything). What's possible when hearing the message delivered in Charlie's book, "Thy Will Be Done: Awakening to the Eternal State" is this dream we call our life can truly be seen to be what they REALLY are, just stories ACTUALLY made of NOTHING. What is pointed to by Charlie is what you TRULY are, boundless existence that silently shines, exposing all thoughts, labels, concepts, beliefs, stories... all seen to be made of NOTHING; ALL completely transparent, leaving NO ONE present and aware as pure peace beyond belief. These stories and this dream, before investigating their true nature, are believed to be completely real, solid, made of substance and believed to be who I am. And when believed to be real, they can cause what is referred to as psychological suffering.If there is an interest into the true nature of experience, AS IT IS, then read this book. It can guide you to see through beliefs that aren't true, that seem to obscure freedom if truly examined. As a result, recognition of peace beyond any and everything. It is what you ALREADY ARE. Have a read, and SEE for yourself. And if interested, call Charlie to discuss further. He helped end my search... Love, J.
In this thing(dream) we call "life" as a human in this world, there are stories about "me"(the central character to my experiences) and other than me(you and the world which includes everything). What's possible when hearing the message delivered in Charlie's book, "Thy Will Be Done: Awakening to the Eternal State" is this dream we call our life can truly be seen to be what they REALLY are, just stories ACTUALLY made of NOTHING. What is pointed to by Charlie is what you TRULY are, boundless existence that silently shines, exposing all thoughts, labels, concepts, beliefs, stories... all seen to be made of NOTHING; ALL completely transparent, leaving NO ONE present and aware as pure peace beyond belief. These stories and this dream, before investigating their true nature, are believed to be completely real, solid, made of substance and believed to be who I am. And when believed to be real, they can cause what is referred to as psychological suffering.If there is an interest into the true nature of experience, AS IT IS, then read this book. It can guide you to see through beliefs that aren't true, that seem to obscure freedom if truly examined. As a result, recognition of peace beyond any and everything. It is what you ALREADY ARE. Have a read, and SEE for yourself. And if interested, call Charlie to discuss further. He helped end my search... Love, J.
(See Charlie's Store for Downloads and Print Versions of all of the available books).
Also you can view Charlie's Page on Amazon.com HERE.
More Reviews and Comments are HERE
Also you can view Charlie's Page on Amazon.com HERE.
More Reviews and Comments are HERE
21 January 2011
A Review Of The Essential Pointers
The Infinite IS, Is That Which YOU ARE
Being Is The World. It is You, - Awareness, Being - arising as Consciousness - is all there is.
The One who Knows that this text is being read, registering within your own awake Presence, IS the One we have been seeking since about the age of two or three.
You are Here, talking to You, the Love that You are. Not the you that thinks I am this and that. This is you sharing with yourself. The speaker and listener are YOU as you are. SEE this by Looking.
Perhaps you have sought that joy, like this body-mind organ-ism called Charlie, in drink or drugs, in sex, or fast cars, or work. In fame and danger. In the approval and acceptance of other people. In Churches, Temples, Meditation, and endless Satsangs, Gurus and Teachers and so-called sages, in seminars and workshops... and on and on. Ad Infinitum. And all the while That Timeless Love watches us, so to speak, seek It “out there,” hoping to “someday” find It, and never again lose It.
Someday.
It leaves you exhausted, all that looking for Love when and where it doesn’t actually exist, doesn’t it?
That awareness that is registering these very words is it. These words and images and spaces on the page are IT. The one who understands is it. The one who does NOT understand is it. The separation and dualism of that separateness is it. The unity of all things is it.
There is nothing that is NOT it.
EVERYTHING is IT. This is the Mystery. This text is all simply pointing you back to your Eternal Essence. You are that impersonal empty awareness that sees and hears, AND all that appears within That. You have never not been That!
Look. Right Now. Are YOU thinking? Or do thoughts simply arise in the awareness?
Do the eyes see? Do the ears hear? Or is there a seeing happening THROUGH the eyes, hearing THROUGH the ears. Thoughts are arising in the Space. Notice this. Just stop and look. The One you have been looking for is the One who is LOOKING right now, this very instant-before-time.
You are that. And that is an ocean of awareness-love-freedom. Pure naked possibility arising as Unbounded LOVE.
What If?
All there is, is the Presence, Awareness, BEING, IN WHICH the thought “I am” APPEARS like a cloud in the clear sky?
And then some mechanism in the program grabs that thought “I am” and unconsciously turns a thought into an IDENTITY, a ME?
In some circles this BEING or AWARENESS is described as “Non-Conceptual Awareness, before time, just Cognizing Emptiness.”
Can any of us say “I am NOT?” There must be AWARENESS to even be able to recognize the thought “I am” OR “I am Not.”
Now look: Can any thought appear if there is NO awareness FIRST? Possibly, that a priori awareness OF thought and experience and all the rest of it IS the True-Nature the sages point to.
Maybe the CONCEPT or THOUGHT “I Am” is NOT That I AM-ness that PRECEDES thought.
If so, herein lies the source of all problems, the source of all suffering: I think that I am the thinker, not the Awareness IN WHICH the thought arises from NOTHING.
What if we MISTAKE the CONCEPT “I am” for the Space-Like Awareness of pure a priori “I am Ness?”
What if that I Am IS NO Thing (nothing)... a nothing that is the pure potential for everything?
Maybe, if we have no DISTINCTION between Concept or Representation (Re-Presentation) and the thing itself then we are deluded and ignorant, and we don’t even KNOW that we are ignorant.
I suggest here that we mistake the Menu (Concept “I am”) for the Meal... the actual SPACE... Pure Pre-Cognitive a priori I Am-Ness, the Oneness from which all that is arises, as its own Self Expression.
When One is Nothing That is Known by No One.
The pointer is, “The CONCEPT I am is NOT the true I AM.”
When this is seen there IS no one and nothing. THAT is the “I AM That” or “That Thou Art” that the sages are pointing to.
What if our starting from the assumption “I am a separate person (me) that thinks and feels and experiences and does all sorts of things” IS the root cause of suffering? This may be nothing more than a BELIEF in a thought-form that is only a representation, NOT that which is being represented.
What if we start from “I am that Awareness IN WHICH all thoughts, feelings, experiences, etc. arise?” Then perhaps the effort to “become” that pure I Am falls away in the realization that we al-ready always ARE That. Then (actually NOW) what is left is the No Thing that we are eternally. The ACTUAL NON-thought NON-feeling, I AM. Simplicity itSelf.
Have a look. Really, take a good long look. Do you exist? Can you claim you do NOT exist? Who KNOWS that existence IS? Simple awareness, knowing without an entity that “knows,” might then be seen.
Your Psychological Suffering Ends Here
In the final analysis (of nothing by no one) it is seen clearly that “one” cannot “access” what has never NOT been so. THAT is Always Already shining... it is the Light that illumines the mind. Like the Prism and the Sun... the Mind is like the Prism (notice how much that sounds like PRISON?) that apparently splits the Sunlight into a magnificent display of Color that has NO independent reality without the Light of the Sun. Without the Pure Unconditioned Light of the Space-Presence-Awareness of the One-without-a-second, the mind cannot BE. IT has NO independent existence: IT is a REFRACTING dividing mechanism – an OBJECT – like the prism is an object.
Without the Prism there is only Light. Without that Light there is Not One Single Thing. Period! End. Stop.
The Light IS all there IS. Form or Formless, it’s all That.
It Always Is
What we call a human being is NOT a “Subject” that “Ob-serves” “OBJECTS.”
The human thing is a body-mind object – a “perceiving object.”
This perceiver-object perceives perceived objects! That is all there is in manifestation: objects. Time? A thing. Space? A thing. Body? Obviously a thing. Mind? A thing. Self? A thing. Others? Things.
No thing can exist without that Source, the Light of Presence Awareness. Any more than a hologram could “exist” without the Laser. As if the Shadow could exist without the tree that casts the shadow AND the Light that shines and “causes” the shadow of the tree.
You Are That Light of Presence Awareness, shining before and through the mind. Beyond doubt, you exist and are aware. That simplicity, the simple ordinary wakefulness that is always wherever and whenever you are, is IT.
That Is That.
Got it?
If YES, welcome to Being – The Home you never left.
If NO, reread this, slower, and do the investigation as though your life depends on it. Because, for a life free of suffering... IT DOES.
Being Is The World. It is You, - Awareness, Being - arising as Consciousness - is all there is.
The One who Knows that this text is being read, registering within your own awake Presence, IS the One we have been seeking since about the age of two or three.
You are Here, talking to You, the Love that You are. Not the you that thinks I am this and that. This is you sharing with yourself. The speaker and listener are YOU as you are. SEE this by Looking.
Perhaps you have sought that joy, like this body-mind organ-ism called Charlie, in drink or drugs, in sex, or fast cars, or work. In fame and danger. In the approval and acceptance of other people. In Churches, Temples, Meditation, and endless Satsangs, Gurus and Teachers and so-called sages, in seminars and workshops... and on and on. Ad Infinitum. And all the while That Timeless Love watches us, so to speak, seek It “out there,” hoping to “someday” find It, and never again lose It.
Someday.
It leaves you exhausted, all that looking for Love when and where it doesn’t actually exist, doesn’t it?
That awareness that is registering these very words is it. These words and images and spaces on the page are IT. The one who understands is it. The one who does NOT understand is it. The separation and dualism of that separateness is it. The unity of all things is it.
There is nothing that is NOT it.
EVERYTHING is IT. This is the Mystery. This text is all simply pointing you back to your Eternal Essence. You are that impersonal empty awareness that sees and hears, AND all that appears within That. You have never not been That!
Look. Right Now. Are YOU thinking? Or do thoughts simply arise in the awareness?
Do the eyes see? Do the ears hear? Or is there a seeing happening THROUGH the eyes, hearing THROUGH the ears. Thoughts are arising in the Space. Notice this. Just stop and look. The One you have been looking for is the One who is LOOKING right now, this very instant-before-time.
You are that. And that is an ocean of awareness-love-freedom. Pure naked possibility arising as Unbounded LOVE.
What If?
All there is, is the Presence, Awareness, BEING, IN WHICH the thought “I am” APPEARS like a cloud in the clear sky?
And then some mechanism in the program grabs that thought “I am” and unconsciously turns a thought into an IDENTITY, a ME?
In some circles this BEING or AWARENESS is described as “Non-Conceptual Awareness, before time, just Cognizing Emptiness.”
Can any of us say “I am NOT?” There must be AWARENESS to even be able to recognize the thought “I am” OR “I am Not.”
Now look: Can any thought appear if there is NO awareness FIRST? Possibly, that a priori awareness OF thought and experience and all the rest of it IS the True-Nature the sages point to.
Maybe the CONCEPT or THOUGHT “I Am” is NOT That I AM-ness that PRECEDES thought.
If so, herein lies the source of all problems, the source of all suffering: I think that I am the thinker, not the Awareness IN WHICH the thought arises from NOTHING.
What if we MISTAKE the CONCEPT “I am” for the Space-Like Awareness of pure a priori “I am Ness?”
What if that I Am IS NO Thing (nothing)... a nothing that is the pure potential for everything?
Maybe, if we have no DISTINCTION between Concept or Representation (Re-Presentation) and the thing itself then we are deluded and ignorant, and we don’t even KNOW that we are ignorant.
I suggest here that we mistake the Menu (Concept “I am”) for the Meal... the actual SPACE... Pure Pre-Cognitive a priori I Am-Ness, the Oneness from which all that is arises, as its own Self Expression.
When One is Nothing That is Known by No One.
The pointer is, “The CONCEPT I am is NOT the true I AM.”
When this is seen there IS no one and nothing. THAT is the “I AM That” or “That Thou Art” that the sages are pointing to.
What if our starting from the assumption “I am a separate person (me) that thinks and feels and experiences and does all sorts of things” IS the root cause of suffering? This may be nothing more than a BELIEF in a thought-form that is only a representation, NOT that which is being represented.
What if we start from “I am that Awareness IN WHICH all thoughts, feelings, experiences, etc. arise?” Then perhaps the effort to “become” that pure I Am falls away in the realization that we al-ready always ARE That. Then (actually NOW) what is left is the No Thing that we are eternally. The ACTUAL NON-thought NON-feeling, I AM. Simplicity itSelf.
Have a look. Really, take a good long look. Do you exist? Can you claim you do NOT exist? Who KNOWS that existence IS? Simple awareness, knowing without an entity that “knows,” might then be seen.
Your Psychological Suffering Ends Here
In the final analysis (of nothing by no one) it is seen clearly that “one” cannot “access” what has never NOT been so. THAT is Always Already shining... it is the Light that illumines the mind. Like the Prism and the Sun... the Mind is like the Prism (notice how much that sounds like PRISON?) that apparently splits the Sunlight into a magnificent display of Color that has NO independent reality without the Light of the Sun. Without the Pure Unconditioned Light of the Space-Presence-Awareness of the One-without-a-second, the mind cannot BE. IT has NO independent existence: IT is a REFRACTING dividing mechanism – an OBJECT – like the prism is an object.
Without the Prism there is only Light. Without that Light there is Not One Single Thing. Period! End. Stop.
The Light IS all there IS. Form or Formless, it’s all That.
It Always Is
What we call a human being is NOT a “Subject” that “Ob-serves” “OBJECTS.”
The human thing is a body-mind object – a “perceiving object.”
This perceiver-object perceives perceived objects! That is all there is in manifestation: objects. Time? A thing. Space? A thing. Body? Obviously a thing. Mind? A thing. Self? A thing. Others? Things.
No thing can exist without that Source, the Light of Presence Awareness. Any more than a hologram could “exist” without the Laser. As if the Shadow could exist without the tree that casts the shadow AND the Light that shines and “causes” the shadow of the tree.
You Are That Light of Presence Awareness, shining before and through the mind. Beyond doubt, you exist and are aware. That simplicity, the simple ordinary wakefulness that is always wherever and whenever you are, is IT.
That Is That.
Got it?
If YES, welcome to Being – The Home you never left.
If NO, reread this, slower, and do the investigation as though your life depends on it. Because, for a life free of suffering... IT DOES.
Being is Awareness Seeing
There is never NOT Awareness. Can you doubt for any instant your presence, and can you deny that this presence is silently and delightedly AWARE? This simple Awareness never changes, never judges right or wrong, good or bad, winning or losing. There are NO "Upsets" or "Ill health" or any other "human problem" for this Awareness which YOU ARE. Knowing this and BEING this in-the-world is the end of seeking pleasure and avoiding pain. As the Sages from time immemorial have told us over and over, yet "do we have ears to hear?" The seeing IS Awareness-Active, Silence sounding, Stillness moving. Here and Now You Are. That. This is NOT to deny that "stuff happens". Only to point out that there is no "owner" of either Awareness as Space or Awareness as content of that space. The "owner" is a false mental overlay, purely imaginary, a phantom.
As the ancient Sages put it, all we can say about who we are is not this, not this. What's left after full negation. Only Awareness, always Here, always Now, always Present and Aware. THAT is the TRUE Identity, the Timeless Space;like "I" itself. The One in All and the All in One. Know this NOW! (When else is there?) Know this HERE (where else is there?)
So dear One, return your Self to the moment Here, the instant Now, what "A Course In Miracles" calls the Holy Instant" wherein we return to that Home we never left ... this Simple Awareness, always NEW and always only NOW.
Are there "issues" of health, poverty, depression and such "things" that trouble you"? KNOW NOW that all such "issues" are but Mental-Images, i.e. Imaginary. What is imagination? A play of language. In what does this play of language appear, to come to pass and never to stay? The Awake Aware Presence that You ARE. That which is impossible to escape. That which is Eternally Unchanging.
Simple Awareness. Like the space in the room where this appears on a computer screen which is overlooked as the focus is on objects IN the space, this Awareness is only overlooked UNTIL it is pointed to as who and what we really are. Then as we notice, by god YES, I AM, and that I AM is the open, silent, shining Presence od Awareness, and we refuse the mental lies any further credence. Here, we stand, outside all appearance, all imagination, standing alone (All One) as what we have never not been in Truth.
The Truth that the natural knowing "I AM Awareness" and as THAT "I AM" invincible, eternal, and fully FREE is a profound tautology: "a statement that is necessarily true". Undeniably YOU ARE, and THAT cannot be disputed by anyone. Ergo. This Simple Awareness IS and as it is, it's Self-knowing Awareness. True-Nature, Beingness, Isness, Life and Livingness etc are all synonymous with Awareness. And realize HERE, NOW, dear One, that the Awareness that is "named" is NOT the ever-obvious clear witnessing-empty-screen which is PRIOR to all languaging.
You are Non-conceptual Awareness. To paraphrase Sri Nisargadatta, do not refuse that, because THAT is your True Identity, unmoved yet moving, silent yet sounding, all one Not-Two-Ness that excludes nothing. It is ALL Awareness in form and formless. And THAT is a vast Love that language cannot get within ten million miles or ten millions light-years of.
Wherever you go HERE, you are. Present and Aware. BE that! Nothing else is needed; let the search for Peace end HERE, NOW.
As the ancient Sages put it, all we can say about who we are is not this, not this. What's left after full negation. Only Awareness, always Here, always Now, always Present and Aware. THAT is the TRUE Identity, the Timeless Space;like "I" itself. The One in All and the All in One. Know this NOW! (When else is there?) Know this HERE (where else is there?)
So dear One, return your Self to the moment Here, the instant Now, what "A Course In Miracles" calls the Holy Instant" wherein we return to that Home we never left ... this Simple Awareness, always NEW and always only NOW.
Are there "issues" of health, poverty, depression and such "things" that trouble you"? KNOW NOW that all such "issues" are but Mental-Images, i.e. Imaginary. What is imagination? A play of language. In what does this play of language appear, to come to pass and never to stay? The Awake Aware Presence that You ARE. That which is impossible to escape. That which is Eternally Unchanging.
Simple Awareness. Like the space in the room where this appears on a computer screen which is overlooked as the focus is on objects IN the space, this Awareness is only overlooked UNTIL it is pointed to as who and what we really are. Then as we notice, by god YES, I AM, and that I AM is the open, silent, shining Presence od Awareness, and we refuse the mental lies any further credence. Here, we stand, outside all appearance, all imagination, standing alone (All One) as what we have never not been in Truth.
The Truth that the natural knowing "I AM Awareness" and as THAT "I AM" invincible, eternal, and fully FREE is a profound tautology: "a statement that is necessarily true". Undeniably YOU ARE, and THAT cannot be disputed by anyone. Ergo. This Simple Awareness IS and as it is, it's Self-knowing Awareness. True-Nature, Beingness, Isness, Life and Livingness etc are all synonymous with Awareness. And realize HERE, NOW, dear One, that the Awareness that is "named" is NOT the ever-obvious clear witnessing-empty-screen which is PRIOR to all languaging.
You are Non-conceptual Awareness. To paraphrase Sri Nisargadatta, do not refuse that, because THAT is your True Identity, unmoved yet moving, silent yet sounding, all one Not-Two-Ness that excludes nothing. It is ALL Awareness in form and formless. And THAT is a vast Love that language cannot get within ten million miles or ten millions light-years of.
Wherever you go HERE, you are. Present and Aware. BE that! Nothing else is needed; let the search for Peace end HERE, NOW.
Natural Effortless Meditation
There IS Presence, an undeniable knowingness we call forth with the words, "I AM", wherever you are, whatever the clocks read. Yes? That Presence is both inescapable and infinite, beginningless and endless. Simply NOTICING that Presence IS, that there is always This Presence whatever the mind may say, and that for This Presence there is no such actuality as yesterday, tomorrow or even 'Now", is "Sahaj Samadhi", i.e. Natural Effortless Meditation.
And the beauty of this is it is always "ON", as the Light that illumines both the light and the dark. Like the fullness of the light of the moon is always backed by the absolute darkness of the other side of the moon, while the Space in which that moon appears as both light and dark is always Present. And You are that Space, that Eternal Light. Simply notice that indeed, "I Am That!" The Tao symbol is the most potent image I know of to illustrate this: The light contains a dot of dark and vice versa. All is One appearing as two, light and dark or both separate AND together.
So simple: In this Light-Space that You are nothing can ever be excluded. Anything is possible; everything is possible.
As Sri Nisargadatta said when asked about meditation, "The only thing anyone has is the conviction is the conviction that one exists, the conscious Presence." And, "It is not necessary for you to concentrate on it; it is always there ... you stick to one conviction, that you are that sense of Presence, and not the body-mind. That which you are has no shape or color." (There is more on this in Jean Dunn's excellent book, "Prior To Consciousness".)
The nature of this Presence is an all-accepting and all-encompassing Love, the One Love that has manifest as war and peace, love and hate, all the "pairs of opposites". It is the gentle Essence that is the only incontrovertible concept: I AM. You are That. And I Love You ... as my Self.
No One Owns Awareness
Awareness is not an object any other object can "own". Awareness is the One Subject IN (and as) which all objects appear to come and go, like the images that come and go on a TV screen while the TV SET remains unchanged. The ever-changing "theater of the absurd" which comprises the incomprehensible dream of separation is but a relative appearance in the Absolute Subjectivity, the One with no otherness which is the sole Reality. As Reality nothing is ever "wrong". As the misidentified pseudo subject, the delusion of a programmed human-object that considers itself the subject, there is "always something" because its programming is to claim awareness as some thing within it, rather than simply noticing that the Reality is that the "pseudo-subject human" is a happening IN Non-objective Awareness.
To claim that one "owns" awareness as a possession is suffering. to BE Awareness (your true state) is the being-released from the dream-without-substance of existing as a being standing apart from True Infinite Being, i.e. from Awareness. God, Being, Ultimate Subjectivity are all labels for That Timeless Oneness and no more real that the word table is a flat surface you can put your dinner plates on.
Investigate this: Can you find yourself EVER standing outside of Awareness? No Awareness, no "you". See this now: You ARE Awareness. You do NOT "contain" Awareness! Because in Reality Awareness is not an own-able object.
Investigate this: Can you find yourself EVER standing outside of Awareness? No Awareness, no "you". See this now: You ARE Awareness. You do NOT "contain" Awareness! Because in Reality Awareness is not an own-able object.
To ask the final question, "WHO AM I" or "WHAT AM I?" is to find the final answer: Silence. The "individual dreamer" simply cannot find a separate entity outside of the ever present Awareness-Which-Always-IS. Prove this to yourself NOW.
Seeing That Awareness IS and "I" Am THAT and ONLY That is Reality, empty and full, allowing all that is to be the perfect Isness that all IS, is the Natural State of Eternal Being-Knowing.
The end of suffering is just this simple. Stop "trying". Just BE.
(For more, visit http://www.lulu.com/charliehayes36.)
(For more, visit http://www.lulu.com/charliehayes36.)
Done!
A reader of our recent Newsletter writes:
Hi Charlie,
Huh - a light went on (or perhaps off) somewhere (no idea who for though).
The "I AM" is not about the character "D.C". The I AM is that which is prior to D.C. that is enjoying being part of the D.C. character play and that D.C. appears on and as that which never changes.
Huh - a light went on (or perhaps off) somewhere (no idea who for though).
The "I AM" is not about the character "D.C". The I AM is that which is prior to D.C. that is enjoying being part of the D.C. character play and that D.C. appears on and as that which never changes.
Even the I AM isn't it either as there is no "I".
It does feel like being the movie screen to which "\D.C." and life are happening on. The story is great fun to watch and play in. It is now clear that the mind can never understand it because it is not a thing or object that can be packaged up and labeled.
It does feel like being the movie screen to which "\D.C." and life are happening on. The story is great fun to watch and play in. It is now clear that the mind can never understand it because it is not a thing or object that can be packaged up and labeled.
Nothing can ever be wrong - who is it going to be right or wrong for?
Wow. Speechless.
Much love,
Hi D.C.
Wow. Speechless.
Much love,
Hi D.C.
That's a Bingo! Bodhi Svaha!
Welcome to the Home You never left!
Much Love to You (not) too!!
What Is Eternal?
Seeking for some security and stability in the appearance, the Maya of Manifestation, is doomed to fail. The nature of what appears IS to constant;y change. It is a truism that "change is conserved"; that the ONLY constant IS change. So what in the changing universal appearance could possibly BE "eternal"?
Nothing.
I could be said (but only as a pointer!) that nothing is Eternal; ONLY nothing is Eternal. And all authentic Sages, living or passed on, have reiterated that YOU ARE that nothing, that No Thing.
Call That, No Thing, Awareness, or Beingness, or Emptiness, call That Beyond the Beyond, call That TAO, call That by any name your like, but understand deeply that the name is NOT the Named! As the Tao Te Ching avers in the very first (and arguably THE most important) line: "The Tao that can be named is NOT the Eternal Tao."
All the same there is this appearing Manifest Maya, isn't there? So we are left in a mystery. A deep honest sense of the only true answer to the query "what IS Eternal?" being a simply heartfelt "I Don't Know". And in this empty space of "I-don't know" there is an always shining Presence which illuminates all the false knowing AND the self-evident Not-Knowing with a Light beyond comprehension, beyond representation or description, beyond language or no-language, beyond sleep-dream-waking... and That is what we are. THAT is the absolute Pure Subject; that is what is aware of all relative states of being/non-being, and that is immutable, invincible, and never-born.
Consider deeply the words of the great Sage Jnaneshwar Maharaj: In his "Amritnubhava", Jnanadev writes,
"Knowledge and ignorance [both] being conceptual, the one who knows may think he does not know, and the one who thinks he knows may know not." (8.18)... and to resolve this not-knowing or No Thing back into the Final Seeing-Knowing, the same Sage writes, "Just as the noumenon is is unicity without the slightest room to point out even its existence, this supreme identity is everything." (9.30)
Nothing. Everything. The word is not the actual. This "word", everythingnothing, POINTS to what we are. And that is the entire realization; wordless timeless suchness. THAT arises as I AM, from it's own sourceless source. And LOVES to BE all there is. Here and now, That is what WE ARE.
So have a Happy Now! This Thusness-Suchness of NOW is the Eternal... arising, manifesting, With great Love and appreciation for all that is. Why not!?
This Is The Heart Of The Matter
Q: First I want to say that I'm aware that you can not reply to all emails, or write very lengthy replies, so that would be perfectly OK! I have seen your videos on YouTube and I just want to THANK YOU for those :-)
C: You are very welcome!
Q: I do hope your health turns to the better!
C: We shall just have to see how Totality unfolds, regarding that and everything else manifesting.
Q: After a talk with my brother, who had emailed with you, the phrase "I do not exist" and "nothing really happens" became real. The experience itself was like there was just a black hole of nothing were I used to believe I was. For some reason it felt like this hole was in my whole chest. When "I" walked there was no one walking, just walking, and I couldn't stop smiling.
C: THAT is a sort of ‘holy grail’ experience for the "phantom-individual-seeker" (the believed-in “ME”.) Nothing wrong with that at all; it is one of billions of possible happenings. The thing to understand is it does not mean anything! The test is, IS IT PERMANENT? It is NOT, that along with every other aspect of experiencing is a passing show. In WHAT does the show APPEAR? Awareness. Awareness is what You are.
The initial Seeing must be that the content of Awareness is NOT what You are. Yet in the Final Understanding it is obvious that nothing can appear apart from Awareness, ergo what appears must BE MADE OF this elf-Same Awareness: Not Two, NON dual, what IS as IT IS... This is the Understanding that we begin with: I AM Awareness, just That and nothing else. You are Aware that walking is happening and no one does it. You are Aware that walking happens and there is a sense “I am walking”. Neither experience is significant!
To clarify one crucial point regarding the pointer-concept “I do not exist”: This must be understood as only a pointer to the absence of a real, separate “identity-called I (or me”). The FACT is you (and everything else) DOES “exist” as Existence-Awareness-Consciousness, AKA The One Self of All; the definition of the TRUE "I" is Infinite Reality, always fully exist-ING, as this Isness of obviously present Awareness! It is a matter of correctly identifying what "the I" actually IS. To know beyond doubt "I AM AWARENESS". And there is Only That, Awareness appearing as nothing AND everything! THAT IS Eternal, unchanging forever. That is What-You-Are,
Q: A couple of years before this I one night had an anxiety attack in which I was sure I was a moment from dying and I said to myself that "OK, I don't want to wait, lets die now". My brother suggested that my acceptance of "my" own death in that moment sowed the seed to the death of "me"!
C: Possibly. Yet also the moment your great grandmother met your great grandfather is every bit as much “to blame!” ;-) !Moreover there is, in your litany, a claim of “being someone who can die”. That claim happened IN AWARENESS, right? So that occurred, and then your mind-training, the habitual wrong identity of a separate “me”, CLAIMED that happening and, made it “MINE”. This is the heart of the matter: The false claim of a "me" that owns (or creates or experiences) the functioning of the Seamless Whole, dividing into this vs. that, me vs. other, and “me and mine. This notion of being the owner of what happens is the false identity at work. Defining oneself as a changing experience or a changing “subject” in a sea of “objects” IS the infamous yet all too common “case of mistaken identity” that the Sages have pointed out and attempted to correct, like asking you to take off the tinted glasses so as to see, YES! What I AM simply IS, and that Is-ness IS Open, Empty Awareness, Full as Everything that appears in and to It; Just That. And I Indeed AM That.
And THAT is ALL, All-One, and to know thyself as That is to know thyself as Nothing AND Everything, with no separation in REALITY. IE, The True HEART beyond the intellect. Truth is Timeless Reality and it is always absolutely Present and Aware, every where, every when, Now Now Now. Here Here Here. FULL STOP. And the intellect must be subverted or surrendered to the Heart for the Peace that IS to be realized.
Speak it aloud: “I AM Awareness”. How does that resonate? Where? Notice the vibe in the Heart. Never mind the mind, know this Truth in the Heart. This, “I AM Awareness, Only THAT”, is the true Heart of the matter. Being as you are is simplicity itself. You are and you know that wherever you go, Awareness IS. Unavoidable and invincible! Bodies are born and die. Thoughts are born and die. All “things” have a beginning, middle and end. What has NO beginning, NO end? The Eternal Awareness. IE YOU As-You-Are.
Know that simple Awareness-I-Am to be your true identity. Right now! (When else IS there??)
Q: Anyhow: All experiences pass and I guess the ego/mind is strongly back, reminding itself that there is some sort of realization of "nothing".
C: What “ego”? Show me one! Tale a picture of this “ego” and e-mail it to me! Search for the ego and you find …. what? Emptiness-Fullness …. and a few thoughts swirling around in that Aware Beingness that You Are. Like a few snowflakes flurrying, appearing and disappearing in a clear empty winter sky. You see??
Really, just don’t buy into it. In our laziness to LOOK and SEE that Awareness ALWAYS IS and we are That Alone, we get caught back up in the net of thoughts, including the me-thought. If that occurs, STOP. LOOK, LISTEN. Listen to “the still small voice: that tells you “I AM, Awareness, that simple, the clean, that loving-Self that allows all to appear. War and peace arise in Peaceful-Clear Awareness. Don’t sell THAT diamond for the price of a bit of spinach!
Q: Today I listened to some Guru talking. At the same time, I felt very uninterested and tired of all the Guru talk and all the seeking stuff. I am even tired of all "experiences" that comes during/after meditation. It feels like it doesn't really matter.
C: Right!
Q: The feeling is that if I would die right now it would be fine because there is no one who can die. I feel so done somehow! (29 years of age). Still, I am happy about life! I used to go to spiritual events and such but I just don't care anymore (even if I some times still go).
C: Whatever happens HAPPENS with no “you” or “other” in charge. ALL happens completely by itself as the spontaneous and natural functioning of That Awareness, the Seamless Whole. Understand that. Drop ALL the rest. Then do as you like!
Q: There is no need to find anything because there is no one who can find anything. Yet in this moment with this seeing there is no experience of love, freedom etc like there was initially.
C: just make sure that is a deep natural Knowing and NOT just another dogmatic spiritual conceptual belief!
Q: Many say that love is all there is, but love seems like a concept, truth converted in the brain to an experience. So even if the experience of love is not there, that is fine, too. I think many seekers fear that "what if there is no love?". Could the seekers accept even that if that was truth?
C: All there is IS Awareness-Love, embracing dualistic war and peace, relative love and hate, ALL the “pairs of opposites” in the appearing show. Love is knowing YOU ARE. And You Love to BE! Period.
Q: It is like I both care and don't care about anything/everything at the same time.
Everything is fine even if it externally OR "internally" is not! I express myself like normally, get happy, angry or whatever. It doesn't matter to "me". Expressions are a natural wave of events. STILL - there is something wanting something, or I wouldn't write this email! How can all this detachment be here but still a the urge of asking you what is happening here?
C: Detachment is a stage, not “enlightenment”. ROCKS are detached from the whole in the appearance yet rocks are also The Whole. There is ONLY the whole. Nothing is split but thought makes it SEEM as though there are two, three, many, billions of “parts”. It is a mighty yet utterly impotent delusion of mind. Come back to the ONE SIMPLE FACT that YOU ARE, Present and Aware, and KNOW (do not merely believe) that YOU ARE THAT Aware Presence forever, unborn deathless. The death of the idea of being separate results in a Love so complete and so vast that nothing can get near it to disturb it, and you are already THAT even (and always NOW. Stop lying about it, that’s all!
Thanks for writing. Now go DEEP, recognize, “I AM AWARENESS, just That. And that is the All and the Everything I have sought whilst it has always been right here now and never actually missing at all.”
This is the Heart of The Matter!
Please feel free to stay in touch as is natural and Heart felt. Love to you, my friend, and to our brother as well.
C: You are very welcome!
Q: I do hope your health turns to the better!
C: We shall just have to see how Totality unfolds, regarding that and everything else manifesting.
Q: After a talk with my brother, who had emailed with you, the phrase "I do not exist" and "nothing really happens" became real. The experience itself was like there was just a black hole of nothing were I used to believe I was. For some reason it felt like this hole was in my whole chest. When "I" walked there was no one walking, just walking, and I couldn't stop smiling.
C: THAT is a sort of ‘holy grail’ experience for the "phantom-individual-seeker" (the believed-in “ME”.) Nothing wrong with that at all; it is one of billions of possible happenings. The thing to understand is it does not mean anything! The test is, IS IT PERMANENT? It is NOT, that along with every other aspect of experiencing is a passing show. In WHAT does the show APPEAR? Awareness. Awareness is what You are.
The initial Seeing must be that the content of Awareness is NOT what You are. Yet in the Final Understanding it is obvious that nothing can appear apart from Awareness, ergo what appears must BE MADE OF this elf-Same Awareness: Not Two, NON dual, what IS as IT IS... This is the Understanding that we begin with: I AM Awareness, just That and nothing else. You are Aware that walking is happening and no one does it. You are Aware that walking happens and there is a sense “I am walking”. Neither experience is significant!
To clarify one crucial point regarding the pointer-concept “I do not exist”: This must be understood as only a pointer to the absence of a real, separate “identity-called I (or me”). The FACT is you (and everything else) DOES “exist” as Existence-Awareness-Consciousness, AKA The One Self of All; the definition of the TRUE "I" is Infinite Reality, always fully exist-ING, as this Isness of obviously present Awareness! It is a matter of correctly identifying what "the I" actually IS. To know beyond doubt "I AM AWARENESS". And there is Only That, Awareness appearing as nothing AND everything! THAT IS Eternal, unchanging forever. That is What-You-Are,
Q: A couple of years before this I one night had an anxiety attack in which I was sure I was a moment from dying and I said to myself that "OK, I don't want to wait, lets die now". My brother suggested that my acceptance of "my" own death in that moment sowed the seed to the death of "me"!
C: Possibly. Yet also the moment your great grandmother met your great grandfather is every bit as much “to blame!” ;-) !Moreover there is, in your litany, a claim of “being someone who can die”. That claim happened IN AWARENESS, right? So that occurred, and then your mind-training, the habitual wrong identity of a separate “me”, CLAIMED that happening and, made it “MINE”. This is the heart of the matter: The false claim of a "me" that owns (or creates or experiences) the functioning of the Seamless Whole, dividing into this vs. that, me vs. other, and “me and mine. This notion of being the owner of what happens is the false identity at work. Defining oneself as a changing experience or a changing “subject” in a sea of “objects” IS the infamous yet all too common “case of mistaken identity” that the Sages have pointed out and attempted to correct, like asking you to take off the tinted glasses so as to see, YES! What I AM simply IS, and that Is-ness IS Open, Empty Awareness, Full as Everything that appears in and to It; Just That. And I Indeed AM That.
And THAT is ALL, All-One, and to know thyself as That is to know thyself as Nothing AND Everything, with no separation in REALITY. IE, The True HEART beyond the intellect. Truth is Timeless Reality and it is always absolutely Present and Aware, every where, every when, Now Now Now. Here Here Here. FULL STOP. And the intellect must be subverted or surrendered to the Heart for the Peace that IS to be realized.
Speak it aloud: “I AM Awareness”. How does that resonate? Where? Notice the vibe in the Heart. Never mind the mind, know this Truth in the Heart. This, “I AM Awareness, Only THAT”, is the true Heart of the matter. Being as you are is simplicity itself. You are and you know that wherever you go, Awareness IS. Unavoidable and invincible! Bodies are born and die. Thoughts are born and die. All “things” have a beginning, middle and end. What has NO beginning, NO end? The Eternal Awareness. IE YOU As-You-Are.
Know that simple Awareness-I-Am to be your true identity. Right now! (When else IS there??)
Q: Anyhow: All experiences pass and I guess the ego/mind is strongly back, reminding itself that there is some sort of realization of "nothing".
C: What “ego”? Show me one! Tale a picture of this “ego” and e-mail it to me! Search for the ego and you find …. what? Emptiness-Fullness …. and a few thoughts swirling around in that Aware Beingness that You Are. Like a few snowflakes flurrying, appearing and disappearing in a clear empty winter sky. You see??
Really, just don’t buy into it. In our laziness to LOOK and SEE that Awareness ALWAYS IS and we are That Alone, we get caught back up in the net of thoughts, including the me-thought. If that occurs, STOP. LOOK, LISTEN. Listen to “the still small voice: that tells you “I AM, Awareness, that simple, the clean, that loving-Self that allows all to appear. War and peace arise in Peaceful-Clear Awareness. Don’t sell THAT diamond for the price of a bit of spinach!
Q: Today I listened to some Guru talking. At the same time, I felt very uninterested and tired of all the Guru talk and all the seeking stuff. I am even tired of all "experiences" that comes during/after meditation. It feels like it doesn't really matter.
C: Right!
Q: The feeling is that if I would die right now it would be fine because there is no one who can die. I feel so done somehow! (29 years of age). Still, I am happy about life! I used to go to spiritual events and such but I just don't care anymore (even if I some times still go).
C: Whatever happens HAPPENS with no “you” or “other” in charge. ALL happens completely by itself as the spontaneous and natural functioning of That Awareness, the Seamless Whole. Understand that. Drop ALL the rest. Then do as you like!
Q: There is no need to find anything because there is no one who can find anything. Yet in this moment with this seeing there is no experience of love, freedom etc like there was initially.
C: just make sure that is a deep natural Knowing and NOT just another dogmatic spiritual conceptual belief!
Q: Many say that love is all there is, but love seems like a concept, truth converted in the brain to an experience. So even if the experience of love is not there, that is fine, too. I think many seekers fear that "what if there is no love?". Could the seekers accept even that if that was truth?
C: All there is IS Awareness-Love, embracing dualistic war and peace, relative love and hate, ALL the “pairs of opposites” in the appearing show. Love is knowing YOU ARE. And You Love to BE! Period.
Q: It is like I both care and don't care about anything/everything at the same time.
Everything is fine even if it externally OR "internally" is not! I express myself like normally, get happy, angry or whatever. It doesn't matter to "me". Expressions are a natural wave of events. STILL - there is something wanting something, or I wouldn't write this email! How can all this detachment be here but still a the urge of asking you what is happening here?
C: Detachment is a stage, not “enlightenment”. ROCKS are detached from the whole in the appearance yet rocks are also The Whole. There is ONLY the whole. Nothing is split but thought makes it SEEM as though there are two, three, many, billions of “parts”. It is a mighty yet utterly impotent delusion of mind. Come back to the ONE SIMPLE FACT that YOU ARE, Present and Aware, and KNOW (do not merely believe) that YOU ARE THAT Aware Presence forever, unborn deathless. The death of the idea of being separate results in a Love so complete and so vast that nothing can get near it to disturb it, and you are already THAT even (and always NOW. Stop lying about it, that’s all!
Thanks for writing. Now go DEEP, recognize, “I AM AWARENESS, just That. And that is the All and the Everything I have sought whilst it has always been right here now and never actually missing at all.”
This is the Heart of The Matter!
Please feel free to stay in touch as is natural and Heart felt. Love to you, my friend, and to our brother as well.
17 January 2011
What Others Are Saying about Charlie's Books and Talks
Charlie Hayes has the one most precise way of pointing to the Truth that I've read. The words take hold and lead you through to your True Being. He definitely ranks with "Sailor" Bob Adamson and John Wheeler, among others.
There is only so much words can say about non-duality, and words have a tendency to confuse the subject; but when reading the words that Charlie has expressed in this book, “From I Am to I Am, With Love”, it is definitely as though the he is bypassing the mind and speaking directly to the Essence that I Am.
Make no mistake, Charlie shoots straight, and if someone wants to turn this into something that it's not, he tells them flat out. This is what is needed to present this teaching; you don't need someone telling you what the "mind" wants to hear in order to make "you" happy. The writings contained in this book brought some real understanding here; when all is seen for what it is, that the Reality that I Am, is eternal, and lacking nothing.
This book comes across more as a personal talk than something that's being read. Many of the questions that I had were answered within these pages. Through the help of Charlie Hayes, there is now unimpeded view of who I Am, and who I am NOT, end of story!
~ JD Hazlewood, author of “I Am Therefore I Am” and other books on Nonduality
(See Charlie's Store for Downloads and Print Versions of all of the available books).
Also you can view Charlie's Page on Amazon.com HERE.
Also you can view Charlie's Page on Amazon.com HERE.
There are MANY MORE Reviews and Comments HERE.
16 January 2011
A Meeting in Non-Separation - Jan. 2011
Laughter, Tears, Insights and Completions
It was my privilege to offer a Talk on Advaita Nonduality and "Effortless Self Realization" on Saturday, 8 January 2011. I was touched, deeply moved and inspired by the openness, innate wisdom, and sincerity of all who attended. We have produced a Video of some excerpts from this wonderful event, which contains their essence, and also three MP3 Audios which comprise nearly all of the time we shared.
The video is posted below:
For the Audio MP3 downloads, click THIS LINK which will take you to a special download page. The downloads are made available for a suggested donation (by Honor System; the links are LIVE without payment being required first) of $10 each or $25 for all three. We offer the MP3s for download free to those with financial challenges.
Much love to ALL!
It was my privilege to offer a Talk on Advaita Nonduality and "Effortless Self Realization" on Saturday, 8 January 2011. I was touched, deeply moved and inspired by the openness, innate wisdom, and sincerity of all who attended. We have produced a Video of some excerpts from this wonderful event, which contains their essence, and also three MP3 Audios which comprise nearly all of the time we shared.
The video is posted below:
For the Audio MP3 downloads, click THIS LINK which will take you to a special download page. The downloads are made available for a suggested donation (by Honor System; the links are LIVE without payment being required first) of $10 each or $25 for all three. We offer the MP3s for download free to those with financial challenges.
Much love to ALL!
01 January 2011
Awakening to the Eternal State
When the natural or intuitive realization dawns that there is no "individual I" and that everything that happens in this manifestation is completely perfect exactly as it is (and is not), the search for happiness, peace and wholeness just stops by itself. If you are still seeking something more or better than What Is, take a good honest look:
Did you start that seeking? Did you as the "meat", that body with an apparent mind, cause whatever events led to seeking? Isn't it true that forces from "outside" i.e. a complaint about what is being "not good enough" and what is having to "improve' for you to be happy came into the life you claim is your life? Something happened and the search began, didn't it? And for most seekers, the seeking itself is a bigger problem than whatever life issue you were trying to improve, isn’t it? Truthfully?
So now you are not only, perhaps, broke, out of a job, poor, and maybe also in lousy health, and still striving for some self-improvement technique that will finally work ... despite having tried such self-improvement programs and having failed to "get satisfaction" for 10 or 20 or 30 years or more!?
What is the answer to this dilemma? In short, as a pointer to the Truth, I say this: All there is, is God's Will happening. Wat we call "my" life is not ours at all. You did not invent Life! Where were "you" the moment the sperm joined the egg and began to form what you now CALL "you" i.e. the body-form with a nutty voice in its head telling it what s real and who it is?
So how can "you" awaken to the eternal? How can a voice in your head awaken to the Reality that is the "author" of that voice? Can you silence that voice permanently? Yes but it will take something like a .357 Magnum bullet to the brain. YOU can no more stop that voice in your head than you can move a mountain from Colorado to Oklahoma. try it. Stop the voice. Don't think for the next hour.
How’s that going!?
So you see in your own experience now, that "thinking happens". Who is thinking? Who is awake and talking to you in your head telling you what to do and who to be? WHO? Inquire within!
The possibility of awakening to the eternal is absolutely real and available. What is takes is an earnest willingness to interrupt the voice and ask it to identify itself: "Who are you? What are you?"
Consider the possibility that YOU do not "think". God or Source "thinks" and you HAVE God's thoughts and then claim them as "mine". But thoughts are Life, Happening. God's Will is just one way to point out that you are not the creator of Life; there a a vast and omnipotent force that is manifesting as everything that appears in the Space around you and within you. It has been said, "God dwells within you as you", and "The kingdom of heaven is within".
Sages from the beginning of the illusion of time have pointed at this fact from their own experience. Let the Message that there is ONLY God, or Source, or tao operating and the person you think you are is a mirage. And you know there is no water in a mirage. So realize right now that there is no REAL separate entity in you; there is only God, in drag, appearing as you and everyone else; God is not hiding, He or She if you like is EVERYWHERE.
God is The Eternal Is, and that is what YOU are. Realizing this at the deepest possible level, in both "mind" and "heart", is "Awakening To The Eternal State".
God is The Eternal Is, and that is what YOU are. Realizing this at the deepest possible level, in both "mind" and "heart", is "Awakening To The Eternal State".
All there is is THIS, call it God, call it Nothing-Everything, call it Consciousness or Awareness, no matter what you call it, the name is NOT it. IT IS, all there is. Being. And That's a fact.
You are That which you seek. Period. Meanwhile, if there is seeking, fine, let it be and ask the questions, look into the mind and demand an answer to the question "Who Am I?" While there is no one to ask that question and no one telling you to ask that question, the questioning still happens. Then as God's Will arises there can be the instant seeing that all there is is Being, and indeed, I AM THAT!
Just Here, Just Now. That is That.
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