John David interviews Rupert Spira in 2009 • Wisdom of the European Masters

All [Music]. So, it's January the 20th, and I'm sitting in the middle of Paris with Rupert Spira. We're going to talk together for Blueprints for Awakening. Rupert, these questions are designed to unfold and explain your teachings and are asked in the context of the teachings of Ramana Maharshi, which reflects the ancient wisdom. There is the fundamental question: Who am I? Who are you? When we ask ourselves the question, "What am I?" or "Who am I?" or when we just speak the word or think "I," we refer to something. "I" is the name that we give to that which is most intimately known. It is what we—it's the word we use to refer to that which is most intimate in our experience. We normally think that this "I" is a body and a mind. So, when we say "I," we refer to this body here, plus all the thoughts, the memories, the hopes, the desires, the fears that are considered to reside inside this body. So, when we first ask ourselves the question "Who am I?" the obvious place to look is at this, here, at this body or this collection of ideas that I have about myself, for instance, that I am a man, I am of a particular age, of a particular height, of a particular nationality. So, as we turn our attention towards this "I" that we know ourselves to be, a strange thing happens because we look at the experience, for instance, of the body, and we see straight away that the body is, in fact, known in the same way that the world is known. The body appears to us as a sensation in just the same way that this room, the world, appears to us as a perception. For instance, if I were to go now into the experience of the body, it is a cluster of sensations. Those sensations are known. They are known by me. And in fact, even ordinary language betrays this understanding. We say, "I feel my body. I feel my leg." We refer to something actually which knows the body, which feels the leg, in the same way that we say, "I see the wall" or "the tree." We refer to something, something again which knows or experiences the wall or the tree or the world. So, it becomes obvious very early on that when we turn our attention towards what we consider ourselves to be, that whatever it is that we refer to as "I" is that which knows or experiences the body, for instance. In this moment, it is what experiences this current cluster of bodily sensations. Likewise, all the thoughts that we may have about ourselves, for instance, the thought that I am of such an age or that I'm a man or that I'm British, these are all ideas that are known, and we know that they are known by me. It is "I" that knows my thoughts. It is "I" that knows these bodily sensations in exactly the same way that it is "I" that knows the perceptions that we call the world. So, that's a very simple but very profound realization to come to because previously we thought that "I," the body-mind, is the subject of our experience, and you and others and the world is the object of experience. But when we look closely at the experience of the body and the mind, we see that the body and the mind are objects of our experience in exactly the same way that the world is. So, we now arrive at a new formulation of our experience. It's not a new experience, but it's a new formulation of our experience where we see no, it is not "I," the body-mind, that is the subject of experience, and the world including all others that is the object. It is "I," whatever "I" is, that is the subject of experience, and it is the body-mind-world that is the object. So, if we keep looking towards this "I," we've now seen, and when I say seen, I don't mean understood intellectually, we've seen in an experiential way by looking directly at our experience of ourselves that what we refer to as "I" is not a sensation or a thought or an image. So, we keep facing this "I," which is the most intimate thing we know. It is the best known thing, if we can call it a thing. We turn our attention towards it, and a very strange thing happens when we do this. We try, we try to look in the direction of this "I," this subject of experience, and we don't even know in which direction to look because any direction is a direction within the mind. So, we want to turn our direction towards this "I" that we intimately know ourselves to be, but it is always, as it were, behind us. It is always in the opposite direction. Wherever we seem to be looking, it is not there because we can only look towards a direction, a known direction. So, it is always, as it were, behind us, always in an unknown direction. So, what can we say about this "I"? We know for certain that it is present. Whatever this "I" is, it is present, and whatever it is is knowing or experiencing. Whatever it is that is hearing these words, that is sensing the current sensation of the so-called body, whatever it is that is perceiving the so-called world is knowing, experiencing. So, these two elements are inherent in our experience of ourselves. It is both present and knowing. So, it could be called knowing presence, or it's often referred to as awareness, which simply means the presence of that which is aware. So, if we continue to look in this directionless direction, in other words, in the direction of ourselves, and ask ourselves, "What else can we say about it? What else can we know from experience, from this current experience? What can we be sure of? What is this 'I'?" We know that it is knowing and present. We know that it is this knowing presence, this knowing presence. What else can we say about it? If we look, for instance, as to where it is located, we find that it has no known location because in order to be located somewhere, it must have some objective quality. In the same way that at a relative level, we can say this chair is located in a room. We know that it's there because the chair has qualities that we can observe in this room. This knowing presence has no objective qualities, so there is nothing in our experience to suggest that it is located anywhere. Likewise, if we look to see where it ends, where its limits are, again, we have already ascertained from our experience that it has no objective qualities, and a limit would have to be some kind of an object, some kind of known object, and this apparent limit would appear to this knowing presence. So, in this way, if we explore anything we might say about this "I," about ourselves, other than that it is simply present and aware, we find that we cannot make any assertion about it from our direct experience. So, this completely challenges our concepted belief, our accepted belief, and more important than our belief, our feeling that what I am is an entity that is located inside here somewhere, looking out, seeing. I, the seer, or I, the hearer, located in here, or I, the thinker, or I, the feeler. It completely destroys the apparent evidence that we have for thinking, and more importantly for feeling, that what we are is located and limited. Now, it is one thing to come to the intellectual understanding that our beliefs of being a limited separate entity have no valid experiential foundation, but it is quite another thing to explore not just the belief but the feeling that what I am is limited and located and separate. In other words, to explore not the belief that I am here, located here, but that I am here as a body sitting on a chair inside this room. That's a much deeper—it takes the investigation into what we are much deeper than simply intellectual understanding. It takes it deeply into the level of the body, into the level of what it is that makes me feel that I am this here and not that there. Many seekers are looking for enlightenment as if it is an experience. What is enlightenment, for example? Would it be this moment of realization that you've just been speaking? We could say that enlightenment is the experiential understanding that what we are is unlimited, unlocated presence or consciousness. What is it that knows? That unlimited, unlocated presence is the only thing there to know that. So, it is a self-recognition that takes place prior to the mind that what we are is this unlimited awareness, unlocated awareness.

the teachings of ram mahashi which reflects the ancient wisdom there is the fundamental question Who Am I who are you when we ask ourselves the question what am I or who am I or when we just speak the word or think I we

refer to something I is the name that we give to that which is most intimately known it is what we it's is the word we use to refer to that which is most intimate in our experience we normally think that this I

is a body and a mind so when we say I we refer to to this body here plus all the thoughts the memories the hopes the desires the fears that are considered to reside inside this body so when we first ask ourselves the

question Who Am I the obvious place to look is at this here at this body or this collection of ideas that I have about myself for instance that I am a man I am of a particular age of a

particular height of of of a particular nationality so as we turn our attention towards this eye that we know ourselves to be a strange thing happens because we look at the experience for instance of the body and we see straight away that the

body is in fact known in the same way that the world is known the body appears to us as a sensation in just the same way that this room the world appears to us as a perception for instance if I were

to go now into the experience of the body it is it is a a cluster of Sensations those Sensations are known they are known by me and in fact even ordinary language betrays this understanding um we say I feel my body I feel my leg

that we refer to something actually which knows the body which feels the leg in the same way that we say I see the wall or the tree we refer to something something again which knows or experiences the wall or the tree or the

world so it becomes obvious very early on that when we turn our ATT attention towards what we consider ourselves to be that whatever it is that we refer to as I is that which knows or experiences the body for instance in this moment it is

what experiences this current cluster of bodily Sensations likewise all the thoughts that we may have about oursel for instance the thought that I am of such an a such in such an age or that I'm a man or that I'm British

or these are all ideas that are known and we know that they are known by me it is I that knows my thoughts it is I that knows these bodily Sensations in exactly the same way that it is I that knows the

perceptions that we call the world so that's a very simple but very profound realization to come to because previously we thought that I the body mind is the subject of our experience and you and others and the world is the

object of experience but when we look closely at the experience of the body and the mind we see that the body and the mind are objects of our experience in exactly the same way that the world is so we

now arrive at a a new formulation of our experience it's not a new experience but it's a new formulation of our experience where we see no it is not I the body mind that is the subject of experience

and the world including all others that is the object it is I whatever I is that is the subject of experience and it is the body mind world that is the object so if we keep looking towards this eye

we've now seen and when I say seen I don't mean understood intellectually we've seen in an experiential Way by looking directly at our experience of ourself that what we refer to as I is not a sensation or a thought or an image so we

keep facing this I which is the most intimate thing we know it is the best known thing if we can call it a thing we turn our attention towards it and a very strange thing happens when we do this we try we try to look in the

direction of this eye this subject of experience and we don't even know in which direction to look because any direction is a direction within the mind so we want to turn our direction towards this eye that we intimately know

ourselves to be but it is always as it were behind us it is always in the the opposite direction wherever we seem to be looking it is it is not there because we we can only look towards a direction a known

Direction so it is always as it were behind us always in an unknown Direction so what what can we say about this eye we know for certain that it is present whatever this I is it is present and whatever it is is knowing or

experiencing whatever it is that is hearing these words that is sensing the current sensation of the of the so-called body whatever it is that is perceiving the so-called world is is knowing experiencing so these two elements are inherent in our experience

of our self it is both present and knowing so it could be called knowing presence or it's often referred to as awareness which simply means the presence of that which is aware so if we continue to look in this

D directionless Direction in other words in the direction of ourself and ask ourselves what else can we say about it what else can we know from experience from this current experience what can we be sure of what is this eye we know that it is

knowing and present we know that it is this knowing present this knowing presence what else can we say about it if we look for instance as to where it is located we find that it has no known location because in order to be located

somewhere it must have some objective quality in the same way that at a relative level we can say this chair is located in a room we know that it's there because the chair has qualities that we can observe in this

room this knowing presence has no objective qualities so there is nothing in our experience to suggest that it is located anywhere likewise if we look to see where it ends where its limits are again we have already ascertained from our

experience that it has no objective qualities and a limit would have to to be some kind of an object some kind of known object and this apparent limit would appear to this knowing presence so in this way if we explore

anything we might say about this ey about ourself other than that it is simply present and aware we find that we can not make any assertion about it from our from our direct experience so this completely challenges our concepted Bel our

accepted belief and more important than our belief our feeling that what I am is an entity that is is is located inside here somewhere looking out seeing I The Seer or I the hearer located in here or I the

thinker or I the feeler it completely destroys the apparent evidence that we have for thinking and more importantly for feeling that what we are is located and limited now it is one thing to come to the intellectual understanding that our

beliefs of being a limited separate entity have no valid experiential Foundation but it is quite another thing to explore not just just the belief but the feeling that what I am is limited and located and separate in other words to explore not the the

belief that I am here located here but that I am here as a body sitting on a chair inside this room that's um a much deeper it takes the investigation into what what we are much deeper than simply intellectual understanding it

takes it deeply into the level of the body into the level of what it is that makes me feel that I am this here and not that there many Seekers are looking for enlightenment as if it is an experience

what is enlighten for example would it be this moment of realization that you've just been speaking we could say that Enlightenment is the experiential understanding that what we are is unlimited unlocated presence or consciousness what is it that knows

that unlimited unlocated presence is the only thing there to know that so it is a self-recognition that takes place prior to the mind that what we are is this un unlimited awareness unlocated awareness but that's not the end of the

story because it's one thing for this recognition this self-recognition to take place for presence as it were to recognize itself to to taste itself for the for the dualizing mind which conceptualizes a separate entity in here and a separate world out

there to collapse leaving presence knowing its own being but it's another thing there's another we could call it another stage and that is when the mind and the body and the world reappear within presence what is this what is their

relationship to the presence in which they appear so the there is um in a way it could be called a a further stage um of self- inquiry it could be called in which as it were the world is is gathered back into

presence having been projected out by the dualizing mind having been projected outside as other made out of something other than Consciousness that it is as it were gathered back so there's a further exploration where the mind and the body

and the world are explored reexamined in the light of our understanding of ourself as unlimited presence and they are seen and when I say seen I meant I mean they are understood experientially to be made out of the substance that knows

them so when we recognize that what we are is unlimited presence we take our stand as it were as the witnessing consciousness behind and prior to all appearances of the Mind the body in the world but then when the mind the body in the world

reappear we explore them again in the light of this experiential understanding and we discover that they they are not just witnessed by Consciousness they are made out of Consciousness that Consciousness is not just the witness it is the substance it is not just

Transcendent it is imminent and that that's further Explorations could be called it's just a way of using words not everybody uses them in this way but it could be called self-realization or the self-realization process which is the reabsorption of the

Mind the body and the world in this knowing presence actually it's not reabsorbed they've always been there they've always only been made out of that but it's in in our actual experience we understand in an experiential way that they are made out

of they the mind the body in the world are made out of nothing other than what we intimately know ourselves to be are there any qualifications for enlightenment is practice that necessary and if it's necess if you feel it's

necessary what what form do you advise uh can you repeat the second part if it's necessary uh if if if you feel practice is necessary um what form do you advise what what form would you teach people from from the absolute point of

view the only qualification if we can call it a qualification is the presence of Consciousness because Enlightenment is consciousness is recognition of itself there is nothing else there in that recognition other than presence all alone with itself so truly nothing other than

Consciousness then the presence of Consciousness is needed and as that is always present the qualification is always available always present to everyone at every moment having said that if the dualizing mind has appeared within Consciousness and ultimately made out of nothing other

than Consciousness and has imagined that this knowing presence resides in here somewhere or or in here that it is glued as it were to one part of the to totality of its experience just this body and nothing else at that

moment the all pervading Consciousness seems to be shrunk into a body and at that moment the world jumps outside so the separate entity and the separate world are born simultaneously they are two sides of the same coin they

always come and go together once that has taken place The Knowing of our own being is veiled The Knowing of our own being as unlimited unlocated presence is is veiled now there's another word a very common word that we use for the

knowing of our own being and it is simply called Happiness so when the dualizing Mind Rises and Consciousness seems to be exclusively associated with a body and as a result the separate world seems to to be born the happiness that is

inherent in The Knowing of our own being seems to be veiled at that moment th this apparent entity it's not that the apparent entity starts searching for this apparently lost happiness in the world it's that this apparent entity

is the search for happiness it doesn't have a choice they're synonymous the sense that I am a separate person and the sense that I am looking for peace happiness love however we conceive it in the world is in inevitable so we

set out as this apparent entity into the apparent world of objects relationships looking for the happiness that was lost when we seemed to cease to know our own being and um most of us try all the conventional means in the world sooner or later our

search in the world ends and it Dawns on us who who is this one that is in search maybe I should question this one that I have considered myself to be and that has been out in the world searching for 10 20 30 40 50

years so it is it is the interest in finding out who this one is that is the prerequisite what is the what is the moot the fuel behind that it is the search for happiness instead of searching for happiness in the objects

of the world sooner or later they fail us and the search as it were turns around we face this one this apparent one who is in search for exactly the same reason that we were previously searching in the world we want happiness

because the person is we one way of defining the person could be simply as the veiling of happiness happiness is inherent but seemingly veiled in the person so this desire for happiness um or desire for love is a

prerequisite um as we search in the world we search within the realm of Multiplicity and diversity always looking for new objects for new people for new situations for new events for new places so there seems to be a a huge range of

options as to what will provide this happiness as we turn around to face this seeking self our our search becomes very narrow the there is no longer any multiplicity or diversity there we are simply looking towards the eye towards

the self so all these disperate energies that were previously focused towards the world get focused towards ourself um so and this um as we become more and more focused there this this surge it gains more and more intensity so it is this intensity of our

love for happiness or the intensity of our love for truth or or love which is the really the sole prerequisite and that itself comes from the very happiness that seems to be veiled so then there isn't really any PR

practice well the the yes the practice is if we are a person if we consider ourselves to be a person the practice is to the practice starts the moment we turn around and we ask ourselves who is this

one that is unhappy who is this one around whom my life revolves that is always well nearly always dissatisfied nearly always seeking fulfillment in the realm of objects so the the the the practice or the investigation is to

explore this apparent one not just the belief in what we consider ourselves to be but the feeling of what we consider ourselves to be so the the investigation is an investigation at the level of the mind and at the level of the body and it

leads it leads back and back and back as it were as we look towards this eye that the the eye loses all of its accretions we see as we said earlier that it is not a mind it is not a

thought it is not a sensation it is not located it is not limited so with this investigation we we go back and back and back and back until we arrive until we can't go back any further and we arrive just at

knowing and being but not knowing and being as two things knowing being knowing presence so the in the the practice could be called this return to the to ourself but then there's an as I said earlier there's another in a way another

stage of the investigation which is no longer carried out by an apparent person we have still discovered that what we are we have rather we have discovered by this stage that what we are is presence knowing presence and

that this knowing presence is not limited or located but there is then for most of us a further stage of exploration of exploring the substance of the mind the body in the world but this it's not it's not a practice that is

undertaken by an entity it's it's an expiration at this stage many of the body the sense of me in the body and the sense of not me in the world but it's not an investigation that is under taken as a person it is a a

reabsorption as it were of the whole realm of experience including the world back into ourselves and that is a very experiential exploration not just an exploration of ideas about what we consider ourselves or the well to be it's an expiration

about of the actual Sensations that comprise the body and the perceptions that comprise the world and what it is that seems to make a distinction between them so you haven't you haven't actually used the word self-inquiry I haven't

used the word self-inquiry but I've been talking Non-Stop about it but you actually are actually telling us a lot about self- inquiry yes and it's an inquiry into I'm not by the way I'm not avoiding using that term in any way I

have no problem with it it's it's but I I would be I would be very specific about the use of that term I would say that it was an in that self- inquiry was an investigation at the level of the Mind

into the belief that what we are is personal unlimited and that it is in some ways more importantly an exploration at the level of the body of what it is that makes us feel that we are limited and separate

because it's not so difficult to come to explore our ideas and to see there is no justification for the belief that Consciousness is located and limited but long after that belief is no longer present we still feel that we are

located as a body sitting on a chair in a room so both these two aspects are uh Incorporated in what is called self- inquiry it's not just a mental process C what am I what am I what am I it's not

it's a deep investigation of of what we intimately know ourselves to be all right well that's that's very nice because I was going on to say that that ramai had said self- inquiry is the most direct route to realizing the self

and then I was going to ask you about that but actually without specifically um Direct your your words to that you've actually talked a lot about self- inquiry so um yes it may be slightly differently emphasized I would

say perhaps what you've spoken yes I I I've been speaking almost entirely about this this expiration yeah of of of um the eye which to begin with seems to be a body or a mind but that as we look

towards it it loses its the accretions that we have the layers that we have surrounded with the beliefs the belief upon belief upon belief one sensation supported by another sensation this dense network of beliefs and Sensations that seem to comprise the

separate entity as we look for it we find no entity there what is our experience of the body in this moment if we close our eyes the body is just a cluster of Sensations do we find whatever it is that is hearing

these words inside that cluster of Sensations no we don't what what is our experience of the head it's like a tingling cluster of vibrating sensation we look there do we find something an entity hearing seeing thinking no we

don't so all all this as as we explore our experience in this way that the eye loses all these accretions and it stands in the end at a certain stage it stands revealed as it were naked without all its clothes on

without all the beliefs and the sensations which we have with which we have surrounded it and and yes I I think it's [Music] true to say that it's the most direct because any other means that this separate entity might

engage in in order to find its true nature involve this parent entity doing something at some stage that doing as it were has to turn around and face the one who is doing and that is that moment of turning

round is the moment when self- inquiry begins it's the return home the return Journey it's not a progression of this separate eye through various practices towards a goal the separate eye itself the appar ently separate eye itself comes under scrutiny and as we look at

it or as we look for it all its accretions dissolve and that results in this taste of its own self this knowing of its own self as it is not as a mind or a body as unlimited unlocated presence

when RNA was asked when will the realization of the self begin he replied when the world which is what is seen has been removed there will be realization of the self which is the Seer what is the true understanding of

the world and how to remove the world the world is normally conceived to be separate from independent of and at a distance from the sea and moreover made out of something other than the sea so there is something which is considered to be

located in here which is which knows or which is consider to know or see and then the world is made out of something else a different substance called matter we give it a name it is what Consciousness is

not that is basically what we consider the what I am not is is what we consider the world to be it is actually a concept no one has ever experienced such a world indeed nobody has ever experienced a

world in the way that it is normally conceived of that is as an object that is independent of that which knows it so I don't remember the quote exactly but when it is said that that when the world is is destroyed or dissolved or

got what's the well the way it's a little old quote but it's what is seen has been removed yes when the world has been removed that when the when the independent the Apparently independent existence of the world has been

removed right when its see its own seeming reality which seemed to exist independent of and separate from that which knows it has been removed it's other than it's not meanness when that has been removed it will experience to be one with that

which knows it in fact even more intimate than that because even in the formulation it is one the world is one with that which knows it it still there is the admission of two possible things a knowah and the

known orbe it very intimately joined together but it's even closer than that it is it is this knowing presence that we intimately know ourselves to be that takes the shape as it were of perceiving the substance of perceiving is made out of

knowing or experiencing it is only the dualizing mind that then Rises and says that the knowing part of experience resides here and the existence part resides there in the world so with this dualizing thought the seamless totality of experiencing or

presence is is apparently divided into two things a Noah located here and a known located there that separation never actually happens it just seems to happen happen when we explore deeply and this is what is meant by self-inquiry when we deeply explore the

nature of our experience we find that knowing and being never for a single moment separate it is not even possible for them to separate because there are there are not two substance is there there's one homogeneous substance that cannot be

separated into two things when that becomes obvious the exper the world is experienced as an expression of ourself that is as an expression as a as it were closer than expression as a modulation of ourself as the shape that our very own

self takes from time to time as it were but as long as the world has some otherness about about it then I am equally going to have some otherness the world is going to reside over there and I am going to reside in

here so the separate ey and the separate World they both arise together in presence and they both subside together in presence they're two sides of the same thing it has been suggested that the Mind must be destroyed for Liberation to

occur do you have a mind and how to destroy the mind I don't have a mind and um so I can only speak from experience there is a concept of a mind and that concept of a mind is like a vast container

that is housed inside each head and inside that container called Mind resides all the memories the hopes the fears the desires the anxieties the everything all the images and thoughts are considered to reside inside this container called mind has anybody ever seen that

mind have have you ever experienced the mind that the thought mind refers to there is a current thought certainly there is a thought which is being expressed now or there may be an image appearing but does it appear in a

mind does anyone have the experience of the container called Mind within which the current thought is taking place so we were talking about um this idea that the mind has to be destroyed so yes in in order to destroy the mind

we first have to find it so the mind is is considered to be like a poisonous snake that is ruining everything and that we want to kill it so we go looking for this poisonous snake but nobody has

ever seen the poisonous snake sooner or later we realize that this idea this image or this concept of a vast container called mind which resides somewhere in here called the body inside this sensation nobody has ever seen a for instance

nobody has ever seen a thought inside a body we go now to The Sensation that we call my head it's this tingling amorphous mass of sensation and then we take a thought any thought where should we go for dinner

tonight is it our experience that that thought appears inside this cluster of Sensations that we call the head the cluster of Sensations called the head appears the thought appears they actually appear in the same place out of the same stuff but one doesn't

appear in inside another they both appear in and made out of presence Consciousness so no one has ever experienced a thought or a mind inside the head or a thought Inside the Mind the mind is simply a thought the thought

what should we have for dinner doesn't appear inside another thought called Mind One thought cannot appear inside another thought in the same way that one thought cannot appear inside a sensation called the head so it's about seeing clearly experiential understanding not

intellectual understanding experiential understanding that is what is referred to as the destruction of the mind seeing clearly that it is absolutely non-existent in the in the first place that it has no reality of its own that that that that the mind is is a concept but

that that concept itself is made only out of the thought that thinks it made only out of thinking and thinking itself is made out of the substance of our own being it is our own being that takes the

shape of thinking and appears as this idea called the mind and the world but just because it appears as that idea doesn't mean that it is so we could we could go perhaps more specifically to one part of thinking one part of the so-called

mind which is the dualizing mind the thought that specifically identifies Consciousness with this body and seems to locate Consciousness as a result inside this body and as a natural coroller to that belief seems to locate a world outside so

that particular thought is as it were the Rogue thought that thought never truly separates the seamless totality of experience but it seems to but again even that thought which we could call the dualizing thought or the dualizing mind and I call it that to

distinguish it from all other from many many other thoughts that we have in which Duality is not inherent just this particular category of thoughts in which apparent Duality is inherent even those thoughts don't need to be destroyed because they are

fed on the belief that what they refer to is real they are fed on the belief that it is true that I am located in here and that the world is located separate distant out there once that is seen to

be untrue then the dualizing mind just slowly dies it dies of understanding it is no longer fueled by the belief that what it says is true it is seemed to be so obviously not true it's just we've explored our experience and

the the ideas that the dualizing Mind presents are just SE not to marry up with not to cor corroborate our experience and they simply become redundant and that doesn't mean that we can't use everyday language where apparent Duality is

implied in order to negoti negotiate everyday life these old concepts are still used in which time and space and separate entities and objects seem to be given credibility so we can still use them but it's they're no longer

beliefs they're just ideas they're just Concepts that are used when necessary they're no longer beliefs and more importantly because we no longer believe in them we don't feel that they are true we just use them it's a kind of

language so no nothing needs to be destroyed what about the Tendencies of the mind they can be called vastness in Hindi must these be removed before self-realization can become permanent and if so how to remove these tendencies there's a very nice image that I would

like to use in this respect and that is of a very deep well in which many creepy cwes live and normally only the creepy cwes that live at the surface of the well are alive and active the ones that live in the depth

of the well are in hibernation fast asleep most of the time but every day for a short period of time the sun is directly above the well and its light shines straight down to the bottom at that moment all

the deep dark creepy crawlies wake up and they start coming towards the surface and the sun continues to move over and they quietly go back to sleep again so these Tendencies veners of the of the Mind are like these creepy crawlies that live in

the well they they live at all different levels there are some on the surface with which we're very familiar the places where our buttons get pressed they're pretty obvious and they're unique in each of our c cases and they

they die away very quick Fall Away very quickly when it becomes obvious that what we what we are is not limited or located these immediate expressions of of Separation all the defense mechanisms the strategies the they they very quickly drop

away but the deeper ones are less obvious they take time this is the as it were the tap route of Separation the deepest darkest places where the sense of Separation resides and it resides right deep down in the body not in our thoughts not in

our feelings so what is it that allows these deep dark difficult feelings to rise to the surface it is the presence of of the sun above the well so what is the presence of the Sun the presence of

the sun is the presence of Consciousness so it is turning and facing this presence all the time when I say facing this presence that's a metaphor what I me mean is taking one's stand knowingly as this presence as this open Infinite

all pervasive loving presence and allowing or we could say offering everything in the body mind to this presence so it's like we allow the sun of our presence to to pervade the body we open ourselves completely to it allow

everything to come up there is no we have absolutely no agenda with it there is no need anymore to keep all these deep dark difficult feelings suppressed because the one who is afraid of them is no longer present the one or rather the one who is

afraid of them is has already been seen to be non-existent so there is no longer any agenda with the character so the character to sometimes it may begin to display itself a little bit more colorfully and it's very common some

people say I thought I was going to get more peaceful as a result of doing this actually I feel more Disturbed now more agitated than before and that's it's not really a sign of more agitation truly it's a sign of more peace but it's

because we are taking us stand more and more as this welcoming presence that all these feelings that see that were previously suppressed through fear they seem to be too dark and too difficult to deal with now it's they're just

like just like the weather we we we we allow them to come up so it's this um taking our stand as this openness as this completely loving unjudged indifferent disinterested presence that allows everything to appear nothing can appear without

presence first saying yes to it as it were nothing can appear outside Consciousness so we know that what we are presence cannot be touched by any appearance of the Mind the body or the world in just the same way that the space in this room

however agitated the activity in this room might become whatever anybody said or did would leave the space completely untouched and yet the space would have to be there to allow it in the first place presence is the same presence is

this loving open space in which all possible shapes of the mind and the body can appear but we know that what we are ultimately is untouched by and therefore we don't need to have an agenda and it's that lack of agenda that

lack of resistance to these Tendencies these characteristics that allows them to come out of hiding to show their face they're not going to be crushed anymore they're not going to be judged they're not going to be disapproved of they're just a

little Ripple of energy passing through presence and there's a finite number of them if we can call say there's a number there's that they're they're finite why because they're objects so they they come up and that's different in every

case so that's a a process that takes time and it's as these Tendencies come up and are offered exposed to the light and are as it were dissolved by the Light of the awareness through no effort through no attempt to get rid of them just to

allow them just to love them as as that happens we we become more and more established in in the in the Peace of of presence it becomes clearer and clearer at an experiential level that what we are is untouch

touchable and yet gives itself utterly and intimately to every appearance so this process of allowing everything loving everything welcoming everything is the process of as it were becoming stable in this experiential understanding and it's a process that happens naturally

but at the same time we can also cooperate with it life presents situations where all these deep dark difficult feelings are provoked but there are also ways in which we can cooperate with the process for instance we normally feel very strongly

that what we are is located in here behind the eyes thinking or in here in the chest feeling so we can we can imagine that what we are is not located in here we can we can imagine that we're located in the space behind

our body a very strange thing happens when we when we do that because that if if it's true that we are unlocated then we should feel ourselves we should feel ourselves in that way to be unlocated not just to

think that we are unlimited Consciousness but to feel that we are unlocated so if we try to do that a very interesting thing happens we we we feel a resistance to begin with because we're so accustomed to identifying ourselves with a

body so if we make the effort for instance to to reside in the space for instance behind us or or or above us it's like a spring there is a habit to begin with that pulls us back to feeling

located in the body so the attempt to do this reveals old habits of feeling on behalf of a separate entity of feeling limited and located and as these habits in other words this is a way of of of these creepy crawlies at the

bottom of the well waking up thinking no no I I'm I'm dense I'm located in the body I'm made out of matter it's so these these this is one very loving Cooperative way of of as it were inviting these Tendencies to

appear to say please come come I I I want to discuss what you are made of come and come up come and show yourself so it's again it's not ieat it's not in any way an attempt to do

anything to them but just to say it's just a a way in which these old habits of feeling on behalf of a separate entity can be revealed life will reveal them anyway but these are are just beautiful ways in which these frightened

Little Creatures at the bottom of that well can be encouraged to to show up and to be loved for what they are and to be let go of yeah that's ni what about Destiny do you expect things to Simply happen or are you

expressing your free will and choosing it depends what you mean by you or it depends what you mean by your free will who whose Free Will are we referring to if we understand that the separate entity that we believe and feel

ourselves to be is simply made out of the thought that thinks it and the feeling that feels it then it doesn't make sense to think that this thought creates something or Wills something or choose a thought is just is

just a that that that that entity is is just made out of that thought it it's non-existent as an entity so it doesn't make sense to to think that this non-existent entity has free will or indeed any kind of will or that

chooses anything it's like saying does the pink elephant sitting under your chair have free will choose decide think or feel both the answer yes and the answer no presupposes the existence of the Pink Elephant but the Pink Elephant doesn't

exist the separate entity we have already we have already seen that it's non-existent so it's not there's no question question of a of a separate entity choosing anything or or willing anything um our experience is that thoughts appear not just in us but they are made

out of us so the substance of a thought or the substance of thinking is made out of Consciousness it is consciousness has the freedom to take any shape all possible shapes William Blake the the the poet said all things possible to be believed

are an image of Truth All Things possible to be believed or he could have said imagined sensed or perceived are an image of Truth and in that sense everything that takes place is an expression of this unlimited possibility of Consciousness

to take all possible shapes so yes at that level there is complete freedom in fact when we talk about Freedom we refer to this quality that Consciousness has to take all possible to take the shape of all possible

appearances that is why it is called Freedom so it is freedom for Consciousness it is not freedom for for a non-existent entity so freedom is is one of the words that is used sometimes to qualify Consciousness because it is

inherent in its nature it is it is by definition it is freedom itself because it can take the shape of all possible appearances it has many other names such as peace because at the same time as at the at the same

time as it takes the shape of all possible appearances it is not touched by any of those appearances in the same way that a television screen can take the shape of any image however wonderful or awful but the screen itself

is never touched by the image Consciousness is never touched by any of the appearances although it gives birth to every appearance and for that reason it is no as peace it is it is often known called love and it is the same reason it is

because everything that appears it is because Consciousness gives birth to everything that appears that it everything that appears comes out of presence it's not that it comes out of it and and remains somewhere else it is always only presence it's the

relationship of any object any apparent object to Consciousness is so utterly intimately one that the very substance of every object is only Consciousness Consciousness gives its own substance like a mother giving birth to a child to every appearance and for

that reason it is known as love it is this absolute utter intimacy with all things so I'm developing your question a bit but but yes so Freedom peace love and names that are given to qualities that that are

inherent in Consciousness and just in the same way that it is never a person that has freedom in this in just the same way it is never a person that is peaceful and is never a person that loves or is

loved which is always love is always peace freedom is always as it were presence tasting its own being knowing its own self as it is not through the veil of the Apparently dualizing mind you you're using this word love

right now I I think this is a word that um causes a lot of trouble for people like this thing about the mind the Mind should go could you say something about mind in the con in the about love yeah about love in the

in the situation of um as as you would feel actually I don't want to pin it down to particular if you could just unfold a bit more about this word love if if we were to stop anyone on the

street that had never heard about non-duality or ran mahashi or and and ask them what what do you mean by love most people would describe it in one way or another as a dissolution of whatever it is that keeps

us apart or separate from the so-called other so just in common parents when we talk about falling in love we refer to this experience where we we kind of lose our boundaries we lose ourselves in this whatever it is that we refer to as

love so even even in in the normal understanding of the word love there is this deep intuition that love is a dissolution of the boundaries with which we normally surround ourselves with which we normally imprison ourselves so love

is one word that is given to this non-objective experience of Consciousness tasting its own being knowing its own self when it ceases to create a dualizing thought with which with which it seems to become located as an entity here and

which all others and objects seem to be located out there it is the collapse of this dualizing thought which seems to separate the totality the seamless totality of experience into two things I and the world me and you it is the

collapse of this dualizing thought which is itself only made out of Consciousness so there is never any true separation but it is with the collapse of this separating line that is made only out of thinking and feeling that the seamless totality of

experience as it were recognizes itself and it is that self-recognition that is called love so of course when the Mind reappears out of this non-objective experience the mind as usual or as as nearly always misinterprets the experience the

dualizing Mind reappears it immediately creates a person in here and another person out there and it says I in here love you over there that is just a complete misinterpretation of the experience of Love by the mind which was not

there during the experience it knows nothing of the experience of love because it is Love Is defined by the absence of mind the absence of those qualities that seemed to separate us that that that that we imagined separated us that that we

imagine separate the the totality of experience when that collapses experience goes back it doesn't go back because it's always only ever been this seamless totality but it knows itself as that it recognizes itself as that and that recognition is what we call love now

when we meet when we as an apparent other meet a friend and something about this meeting seems to precipitate this recognition of our own being we call it love when exactly the same thing happens in relation say to an object or a work

of art the apparent seer in here and the apparent object seen out there collapse in this experience and then we refer to exactly the same nonex non-objective experience as Beauty so normally when we see it in relation when it seems to be

triggered by a meeting with a person we call it love when it seems to be triggered by an object we call it Beauty when it seems to be triggered by the acquisition of an object we call it happiness but these are all different

words that refer to exactly the same non-experience non-objective experience the the tasting of our own being The Knowing of our own being that was an attempt to say something about love which I should really not do no I think you I think you

should do it because it's something that causes people a lot of trouble and I think what you said is very good and I actually would like to encourage you now to talk a bit more about beauty because um that's also something which people

maybe don't always bring together with this subject of truth that that's very true um the two Paths of of um knowledge and love are well documented in the spiritual Traditions the path of Jana and the path of bakti are well known but

there is a third path the path of beauty which is very rarely spoken of so the path of of knowledge which culminates in understanding and by understanding I don't mean understanding in the Mind by understanding I mean the dissolution of

the Mind so on the way of knowledge the Mind investigates and it dissolves into its source that is called understanding in in the path of back te we go more with our feelings than with our mind we don't

find the Beloved we dissolve in the Beloved and that is called love but there is a third mode of experiencing we don't just think and sense we also perceive so there is a third path that corresponds to this third mode of

experiencing which is arrived at through the process of perceiving seeing in the case of a painting or a sculpture tasting in the um in the case of food um Hearing in The Taste in the case of of music so these are so whichever

path as it were we set out on whether it is through thinking through feeling or perceiving at the end of that apparent process the thinking feeling or perceiving dissolves into that which is its source its substance and that

experience is called understanding or love or in the case of perceiving beauty so beauty is is again another name for the taste of our own being The Knowing of our own being and it's the particular name we give it when it has

been as it were accessed through perceiving so in the same way that we may listen [Music] to a dialogue or a conversation that expounds the teaching and this will dissolve the mind in understanding on the way of beauty it's just done through

the senses just through perceiving it's not it's not a a mental process [Music] um the best example I can think of in this respect is is the painter Paul sesan who was a pure non-dist and he said and I'll quote it

because it's it's a most beautiful succinct clear expression of of um the way of art the way of beauty he said everything vanishes falls apart doesn't it nature is always the same and yet nothing in her that appears

to us lasts our art must render the thrill of her permanence along with her elements that is the appearance of all her changes it must give us the taste of her eternity so he he's saying everything van he's talking to the world he's

standing in front of mon VI the most solid permanent enduring structure in nature and he's saying everything vanishes the world vanishes the World falls apart what did he mean he means that we have a belief that the outside

world world is solid tangible real independent of Consciousness but actually when we go to our experience which is what he was and this is what he was trying to portray in his painting when we go to the experience we find

that the world is only made out of perceptions that's our only knowledge of the world is perception we have no other knowledge we don't even know if there is a world outside our perception so he was saying everything vanishes the world

every time a perception vanishes the world vanish ises every time a perception vanishes the apparent solidity of the World falls apart everything vanishes falls apart doesn't it and then he says nature is always the same and yet nothing in her that appears

to us lasts and these seem to be contradictory in one moment he says nature is always the same there is something which lasts all the way through always the same and and then he says but nothing in her that appears to

us lasts so what can this always the same be made out of he's already said it's not made out of perceptions it's not made out of intermittent perceptions because by definition they don't last then he says our art must give us

the thrill of her permanence our art what we make as artists must give us the joy it must give us the thr of her pance the the The Thrill The Joy of that whatever that is that is ever present

that runs throughout our perception of the world and then he says along with her elements the appearance of all her changes in other words it must take the appearance of all her changes in his case colors in a musician case

sounds so it must take all these appearances and must arrange them in such a way that it gives us a thrill of her permanence the thrill of that which lies behind her appearances it must arrange the appearances the colors in such a way

that it indicates the permanent what you got that which is always the same the permanent background and then he finishes it must give us a taste of her eternity not the taste of that which is always present in time but a taste of

that which is ever present timelessly ever presentent so here he he's he's observing the world he's seeing that the world as such doesn't exist in the way we conceive it to be it only consists of perceptions those perceptions are

falling apart but there is a reality that pervades them they appear against the background of course he's referring to Consciousness to or to whatever we call it that's what we call it but he didn't use that word and then he's saying that a work of

art is so arranged all these appearances are so arranged by the Artist as to somehow give a taste not to give the concept of nonduality not to give the concept of Eternity but to give it taste our art must give us it heart must give

the thrill of her permanence to to it's not just um it's not just a a neutral background he indicates that this background that which is ever present in the experience of nature or the experience of the world is not just this Bland background he

calls it thrilling William Blake described exactly the same thing every bird that cuts the air way every bird that flies through the sky is an immense world of delight in close osed by the five senses an immense world of delight what cesan

calls a thrill it's delightful it's made out of love it's not just a neutral background it's what's in the Indian tradition they mean by namarupa satand when that which when name and form are removed from the background upon which they

appear the apparent knowing of exist of of of reality and the apparent existence these two apparent things knowing in here and existence out there they collapse the separate rather the separation between them collapses and Ananda is the result what suzan referred to as the

thrill what Blake called the Delight what we could just call love or joy and this third path is is made available through the senses through sensing through hearing through seeing through touching so that's that's where through through through tasting a a really

Exquisite cook is doing the same thing just dissolving Us in being gives us the taste not not just the idea how intimate is a taste it goes straight this way of beauty it goes straight in it doesn't go through the mind like

these words have to go through the Mind before they before we dissolve in understanding it goes straight straight to the heart straight unmediated by thinking that's the power of art of a true work of art that's because a true work of art

like suzan's paintings come from this experience so I wanted to ask you if you look back at some of the great artists whether it's musicians like Beethoven or painters like Michelangelo do you have any sense if in fact these people were also awakened

even though apparently it's it wouldn't be talked about they were talked about always as great artists creative genius geniuses it it's never a person that is awakened there's never a there's never anybody there who is awakened [Music] so in their case the the their body

minds or the Body Mind of an artist or a poet is is is a body mind that is that that that is refined and sensitive and that has in the case of an artist um a skill that has leared the A

to Z of his or her art form so has the means available in the body to put into to express something in form but it's in the moment of creation it is the absence of this sense of Separation that

allows the the experience the momentary experience of beauty the tasting of our own being to take the shape through the particular qualities of the body mind that in that in in in the case of an artist have become very

refined and have learned a skill that have a skill that have ability in in music or painting on for example Michelangelo produced the pior in the Vatican I think when he was 20 years old something like that whether or not when

his mind returned after the experience after the the moment of painting whether when he go went home the eye thought then arose again and said I this body mind was the creator and the doer of that painting the answer

is I have no idea I suspect in many cases the ey thought returned with the ey thought is just a it's like a filler thought that appears after the event and fills the gap between Perceptions in the Natural State when

thinking comes to an end when feeling comes to an end when perceiving comes to an end we just remain as we are open empty available ready to take the shape of the next appearance but this this in in this

Timeless Gap in order to as it were avoid the emptiness the apparent emptiness of this G we recreate the I thought which says I thought it I created it I did it I chose it I saw it I loved it in the work case for work of

I did it I thought so maybe that did happen maybe it didn't I have no idea but in the moment of creating there was this transparency the reality of experience and this is just a metaph now the reality of experience here recognized

itself out there in the in the Mount San what in San's case there was this recognition that was then translated into the medium of the Mind colors form but it was this self-recognition that was being modulated by the mind given form

but in that moment there was just pure seeing pure experiencing given the shape of perceiving maybe thinking came back later and claimed it I don't know but it doesn't matter because what was left from this in this case this moment of

painting or what what is Left To Us of B's music still shines with that same power it still shines with the place the experience from which it came and therefore it still has the power within it to to transmit to give

us a taste to deliver that experience when I say deliver that experience that that's a metaphor I mean to reawaken to inspire this recognition some some artists not only did they have were they able to express this not only did they

experience it and had the ability ability to express it they also knew what was going on in a sense the I thought didn't come back someone like roomie was not only an artist he was also a Mystic not just a poet but also a Mystic

some it seems wored but I'm speculating now because at that level I I I don't know about what thoughts appeared to Michelangelo but it doesn't matter it doesn't matter because what they truly were is left for subsequent generations and and

the reason why now when we hear certain pieces of music or see certain paintings and and it just dissolves us it just melts us is because they they come pregnant with the experience from which they they they they they they are

permeated they are pregnant with them with their origin okay slightly now on a different tack it it appears essential to meet a master and surrender to that Master who is the master what is the Master's role and how to recognize a

true master once we have believed and more importantly come to feel that we are separate entity that belief and that feeling veils The Knowing of our own being and as a result happiness or love seems to be lost and everything and

everyone else is projected outside now what is it that initiates the return to ourself so to speak because we have already seemed to contract into this separate entity this Awakening or Reawakening or recognition comes in most cases in the

form of an appearance that seems to be outside and other and just the same way that when we fall in love when we are young we think we fall in love with a person later on it becomes more obvious

that actually in the experience of love I and the other dissolv there was no ey there and there was no person there but in just the same way when we when we have been out searching in the world for for long enough and that takes

a different period of time for each of us it is as if as if this presence takes the shape of a very special appearance in the world just like it took a shape of a person that we fell fell in love with it

takes the shape of of what we call the teacher or a friend or the master and just like our lover seems to be someone outside so the teacher seems at first to be outside seems to be a person seems to

be an object seems to be other and it is this apparent other that facilitates this turn towards ourself that's how it seems to be But as time goes on if we stay if we develop a friendship with this apparent other all

the qualities with which we distinguish ourselves and separate ourselves both from the teacher but in fact from everyone and everything they slowly start falling away and it becomes apparent that actually they were never truly there in the first place

so our idea of what the master is of Who the Master is who the teacher is becomes refined in exactly the same proportion and at the same time that our ideas about what we are become refined so as the eye loses its

accretions so the teacher loses his or her accretions and those accretions with which we dress the teacher are exactly the same accretions with which we dress ourself thoughts images perceptions Sensations as we go more and more deeply with the help of our friend to turn

towards what we truly are what we seem to be and what he or she seems to be loses their apparent objectness and there as a result there seems to be this merging of the two and this is very well

documented in the traditions this merging of the teacher and the student it's not really a merging it's it's a recognition that you were always in fat one but and of course this can be quite shocking yeah because maybe you're

projecting onto the master that he's kind of bit higher or specialer than you are and then suddenly one day you recognize that you're the same as the master it's it can be shocking and it depends on the um different

qualities of the the style of the particular so-called master in my case it wasn't at all shocking because the whole thing happened so so sweetly and just saturated with friendliness there were no there was no rejection of my

projection every time I tried to grab this person I was just grabbing the wind I mean there was nothing there there was no rejection of my attempt to to make my teacher a person there was just nothing to get hold of and I was

left hanging and and all the energies that went towards this they just they collapsed and and I learned as a result of this as it were to withdraw the projection it was never there was no resistance no denial no rejection of this on the part

of my teacher of of this projection was just this understanding that it's natural it's a natural stage and that if not played with in any way and when I say played with I mean both if it's not rejected

or equally common if it's not played with then it just simply it's got nowhere to go the energies of the Mind keep on going in that direction C for a certain time but because they're not giving anything to hold on to the energies kind

of collapse and the relationship then begins to change from being one of a a student teacher relationship to being one of friendship for the teacher it was always one of friendship but the Stu for the student it seemed to

be a student teacher relationship for a short period of time or for however long it takes in each individual case but sooner or later we realize that it's a a relationship of of friendship it's love it's called love and it's very inspiring if

one's spent a long period of time with a with a teacher who who has this impersonal quality of Love without knowing it we learn how to have impersonal friendships we we learn that love is something at the same time most

intimate but at the same time truly impersonal so to begin with very often this quality of impersonal friendship that you have with your teacher seems to be exclusive to this particular friendship but after a while as as it becomes more more natural

we we notice the same quality of impersonal intimacy is not just given is not just shared between these apparent two it begins to pervade all our friendships and it has a profound effect on our relationships whether those relationships are Intimate Relationships

or relationships with our colleagues or we we live this impersonal intimacy this impersonal quality of love with everyone in whatever way is appropriate and it transforms friendship friendships truly Thrive they they they become so sweet so so so

tender really I I discovered true friendship when I met my teacher and I don't mean by that that I didn't know what true friendship was I did of course like everyone I loved friendship love but I was I

was as it were shown the direction and and when I say show none of this happened through words it was all just through spending time together that it became more and more obvious and that I noticed it began

to that my other relationships seemed to have this same quality of of impersonal intimacy I mean you mentioned earlier about back te which is devotion I mean in a way what you're describing is is this back te devotional quality I think

yes to begin with it may seem that it's devotion for a person for a teacher but if the teacher is is um truly impersonal then the teacher gives you nothing there's nothing there objective for your for your Devotion to hook itself

onto and slow slowly and and in some cases um as you referred to earlier it can be a little bit abrasive but in my case it was very slow and gentle and sweet the our love which seems to be love for

a person is very slowly turned around reorientated towards the true object of devotion which is the self so all devotion is in the end only devotion for one thing and if the if the if the teacher doesn't need your devotion for

his or her own self-image something about the the relationship the Friendship enables our devotion to find its true home to find its true place which is presentence and you don't even know it's happening you don't feel that you're

being turned around or again in in in my case it's not there's no violence it was effortless I didn't even know it was happening I just noticed afterwards that it had happened I looked back and I thought those old projections those old

ideas about my teacher that they're just not there there's just this friendliness this tenderness and that the my devotion has found its home found that for which it was always longing but it was never in the direction of a an object or a person it

was it turned in on itself it found its own heart as it were very poetic actually very beautiful how you describe these things this is going this is a rather strange question now to to more or less finish um Seekers often have curious

ideas about the enlightened State please describe your typical day and how you perceive the world in my typical day um I won't go into too much detail but I'll just give you a um a broad sketch I wake up in the

morning my English conditioning is is still very prevalent so I can't do anything without a cup of tea and of course it has to be lapsang so make a cup of tea and and um if there's time go back to bed and

sit in bed chatting with my wife Ellen or we sit by the window and look out of the window but sometimes there isn't time for that so when I get up still make a cup of tea and get on with

whatever business the day has in hand I won't go into too much diff detail but it's it's a balance as we were talking earlier between um my work as an artist in my studio and um answering a great deal of

correspondence from people who have read my book or so these these two aspects of of My Life um which are really two different aspects of the same thing involve activity thinking doing making organizing speaking relating telephone emails and and and I

enjoy and and I I should say also um I have a child a 10-year-old boy um he doesn't live with me so I don't look after him on a daily basis but I'm very closely connected with him and spend a lot of time with him and he

with us so it's a very let's put it like this it's a very full-blown fully very expansive very full life in the world of um relationship um work um interaction with all kinds of people and objects and and it's it's I

find it all very enjoyable it's it's uh in in all these different ways I I I find love and beauty and intelligence is is expressed and expressed in uniquely in each way with my son in one way with

my wife in another way with my assistant in my studio in another way but it's all it it's writing in a particular way making another way but it it comes it comes from the same the same place it's

um it's like a it's like a sort of outpouring I can't remember the second part of the question well I think that's that's okay I mean if you wanted to say something about how you perceive the world I

perceive the world I I experience that that what I am takes the shape of thinking it takes the shape of imagining it takes the shape of sensing and it takes the shape of perceiving so I feel the it's myself and by myself I mean this

knowing presence that takes the shape of perceiving for instance this perception that it is made out of that which knows it that it is made out of myself so I perceive the world that I take the shape of the The Taste the delicious Taste of

lapang tea in the morning and then I take the shape of this nice conversation that I have with Ellen then I take the shape of the light coming in through the window and I take the shape of the sound

of the telephone as it goes I take the shape of the email that comes in I take the shape of the subsequent thought it's it's this presence taking the shape of thinking imagining sensing and perceiving of as like a kind of

flow always being itself always remaining itself but always taking the shape of of new forms always the same as itself but always different as the shape of thinking imagining sensing and perceiving that it's that it takes you've given us a profound discourse on

awakening I would add very poetically when you would meet someone with a passion for awakening what would your short advice be when I people that come to my meetings and when I when I I feel this passion it it every time without

exception it completely melts my heart that that's all I can say I I don't have any I don't have any standard response to give them because it depends where their where their particular question comes from so I I'm I I feel their love their passion

their interest their devot devotion and so I listen very but I listen with my whole body not just with my mind but I listen my my whole body to to them I I take them in I I take them into myself I feel

like I'm them I know where they are I know and I feel I I go to where that question comes from and I go there with them and then from there we go together we hold hands and and we we

walk so it depends it depends completely where they're coming from of course deeply they're coming for this love of Truth This Love Of Love of intelligence and I share that with them but then this love is is tailored uniquely and

specifically to each case and there's absolutely [Music] no sense of what that's going to be beforehand it's it's it's this just this deep listening that's as much as I can say thank you it was it was very interesting for me of

course um I think you have a very um I don't know how to explain it but it's anyway poetic or creative even may be the right word way to express a lot of things it's it's very um unusual I

think so it's very interesting when you have this history of many years of pottery making and I don't know yeah something very very lovely very lovely I me I didn't I didn't even realize it at the time but what I was doing what I was

exploring in my work as an artist was it was an aspect of self-inquiry right it was it was exploring the nature of experience it was only later that I came to to realize that to formulate it and I

was brought up in the kind of classical advit school where it was all the path of janana and the path of bakti and my my love of perceiving my love of art my love of beauty I always felt a little bit

apologetic about it in the traditional advit and it wasn't until I met my teacher that my love of I realized that my love of Truth and my love of beauty yeah were the same thing and that for me

was I mean that was an explosion yeah it it just liberated my my my love of beauty all right right and I realized yes that that's what it was about all along it it was kind of brought in line with my deep love of

Truth yeah I realized it was the same thing and that expressing it that making things was exactly the same as one would express love with a friend or that one would Express intelligence through through words or writing that was so exciting for me to

realize that right no I can understand that completely yeah it's not much I don't know if it's right to say not much recognized but I think um Francis is sort of unique a bit unique about that I think Francis is is very

unusual um in that respect and and his teacher Jean Klein was an artist oh was he a very good musician an artist and had this deep sensitivity not just for perceiving par he loved painting and music but he had this deep sensitivity

towards the body so he had explored the body not just the sense of Separation at the level of the mind he had explored the sense of me at the level of feelings what is it that makes me feel that I'm

separed what is it that makes me feel that this is me and that not that this is not me so um both Francis and Jean kleim had this very this deep love of of beauty and and their teaching is is

um equally given to the realm of the body and and the world not just the realm of the of the mind and in that respect I think I agree with you I I was you know I was blown away when I

met him yeah because and it's a very nice addition to traditional advit I think because addition of advit or anyway the way it apparently has been taught was a bit dry it's a bit um yes dry I guess I think there was a

certain stage where in the early stages of self- inquiry where where we're discovering that what we are is not a body or a mind where we have as it were to put the world put the body and the

mind and the world at a bit of a distance we say no I am not this I am not this I am not this we come to the understanding I am nothing that is I am nothing objective and this is the traditional

position of the witness but then we we have to go on right from that and discover that I'm yes I'm nothing objective but this presence that I am is also the substance of everything so I'm not just nothing

I'm also everything and I think some schools some traditional schools got as it were stuck at the witness stage and they kept the body the mind and the world at Bay as as this as this rather dangerous Abode right this dangerous

realm that that obscures Consciousness and therefore it's a bit dangerous and I grew up with that I grew up with 20 years is that the world don't get lost in the world it's dangerous right it's it'll it it veils Consciousness it's a

and there was a it's slightly true also in this early stage when you're really true absolutely it's a for many of us and for me it was absolutely necessary it I was able to put all that at Bay and

give attention to presence and and that's that's so important because it establishes the presence of consciousness and the Primacy of Consciousness but if we stay there and I stayed here for a long time we remain in this slightly

aloof position of of the witness just behind experience slightly removed from experience the world was kept at at Bay and it wasn't until I met Francis that these that that the exploration continued more deeply into m experience and that the two came back together

again but what then became clear is that this eye doesn't just pervade this body as it had seemed to previously it pervades the world as well I I I'm interested in your response to the film we've just made about R

mahashi you probably know about him yes and he's kind of an icon of somebody who sits on a couch and doesn't speak and in a way doesn't do anything and in this film we've tried to give him a more rounded

uh image because actually it's not true that image is not true about him at all he for 15 years he was the cook for the ashram and for 20 years he was the architect and Builder designer of the of

the ashram you see so he's constantly doing stuff actually that this is one of the reasons why it's so valuable to have a friend to have a teacher and to spend time not just sitting in s and asking questions

right that's one aspect of that's the preliminary that's that's just the but but spending time together because because you see this love and this intelligence in action in response to every all the minute details of life it doesn't mean to say

that you want to respond like that not at all at the level of the body mind you're a totally different body mind sure sure but nevertheless you you just through being around through hanging around you you see how this love and

intelligence is tailored minutely to every single situation and just by being in that Alon you learn your own ways that are unique to your own body mind of expressing the Same Love and Understanding in relation to the unique situations that you're

going to find yourself in and I had I had 25 years of classical advit vanta I mean I had ideas up to here about what I thought you know for 20 years my teacher had had an orange robe and a beard and

and I had so many ideas and I was I tried to fit myself and it of course it didn't work there was some sense of a mismatch it wasn't until after you know that I spent many years who was close who was that teacher

shant sarasti the the Shankar of the north of India okay so it was a very classical ADV advisor teaching and please don't misunderstand me I loved it it's a beautiful teaching I loved it but there was a limit for

me it was it was there was something missing which was that more it was the more the tantric approach where absolutely everything was included um so I think it's yes all kinds of ideas were projected onto Raman mahashi

but only those who truly lived with him knew what he was like and and and saw him cooking and looking after his animals yeah and getting angry and screaming at people and doing all kind of stuff that spiritual people

don't do you see yes it's very very important I think it's it's why it's it's a a beautiful thing and a valuable thing to have a friend to be with someone who is established in this love and understanding and just by being

together you you catch it like we catch flu from each other you don't know where it when it happened where it happened why it happened how it happened and you don't mind the important thing is to to catch to catch

what he or she has sure nice yeah I was interested when you said lap song because I used to really like that tea and one day in our community I told people I really like o gray and I

just realized now I've been drinking o gray now for three or four years and I never have a lap song I Really used to like it you please make a note about that come come and visit me in

England very nice cup of L in a very nice cup and saucer oh yeah yeah well you're dropping with tiredness we should have something to well I'm I'm not so tired now you know it came and went a

bit but probably some food would be good you still filming or you asleep I so thank you very much Del