Video 13

Vedic Christianity, Class 13 · Practice of the Presence of God · Swami Chidbrahmananda

heart may be cleansed of its dust and that mighty forest fire of desire may be quenched chant unceasingly the name of the lord and his glory oh lord mine is no prayer for pleasure wealth or fame i want only steadfast devotion to thee for thou white my hearts beloved with me whatever thou wilt for thou art my heart [Music] [Applause] [Applause] um [Applause] [Music] as i stumbled here on this [Music] won't you cut these [Music] when these hazy thoughts spread like [Music] this you draw a silent breath and raise this blinding fog and raise this mother left me free me take me and echo me on your shoulder please hold my hand wake me up when i am falling from your life [Music] breaking [Music] turning mother i'm weary [Music] feel lost so lift me free me take me [Music] pick me up i am [Music] i am drawn to your glowing face [Music] you shine upon this lonely heart [Music] on an icy mountain like golden rays on an icy mountain [Music] me free me take me and take me [Music] please [Music] mother lift me breathe take me and anchor me [Music] let's do a prayer this is a prayer [Music] may all those whispers my silent aspirations reach your ears sweet lord reach your ears mystery may they respond at once to your call and may all the sorrows on the way vanish sweet lord vanish [Music] begging bowl of my life it's filled with arms from may that be completely emptied and may my heart with gifts from the o lord with sacred gifts from thee may all the intensity of my love go [Music] may all the whispers reach your ears [Music] lord go to thee [Music] uh can we turn more light on yeah okay all right okay well here we are by grace once again thank you ma thank you takur on krishna's special day to study the lives of a saint brother lawrence who continually was aware of and lived in accordance in response to and in accordance with the presence of the beloved of god having taken a vow to never do anything in the moment that wasn't pleasing to the divine and if there was something that he wasn't doing that he should be doing to instantly begin doing it without question and if he made a mistake to not be bothered by it but to apologize put himself back in the presence of the lord and carry on just just like that living in the moment living sweetly in the presence of the beloved and just by having him in mind having her in mind to be able to see the world properly to see the world without a hunger for the world to see the world without a discontent and a delusive need for something external for something outside of this beautiful temple that we carry within where god is properly worshiped so we stopped last week uh just after the third paragraph of the fourth letter the the paragraph was so beautiful uh actually that i would love to read it again it's it's similar to the one that we finished with the week before that but he says that i am now so accustomed to that divine presence that i receive from it a continual suckers upon all occasion for about 30 years my soul has been filled with joys so continual and sometimes so great that i am forced to use means to moderate them to hinder their appearing outwardly so this long work that he's been a part of we know that he managed to establish himself first in the constant present what after 15 years of practice and now he's 30 years into it and is experiencing such a bliss of being that he has to cover it up which is a problem i long for [Laughter] if you have to have a problem this is a good one to have so he carries on this week by saying and he's talking in third person now i read that one that previous paragraph in first person but it's actually written in third person because he's writing to somebody and doesn't want to betray his accomplishments so i'll return to the third person but know that the he he's talking about is his own self brother lawrence if sometimes he is a little too much absent from that divine presence god presently makes himself to be felt in his soul to recall him which often happens when he is most engaged in his outward business this is a beautiful piece of hope and and really a correction to a perspective on religion or or on god that we often have that that we're in a one-way conversation with god you know we're always talking to god why is why doesn't she talk to me you know i have all these problems and all these questions why don't i get an answer and not that i have an answer for that from this text but we see here a person has devoted themselves to think of god at every moment has devoted themselves to not make any move that was contrary to the love of god has taken a vow to renounce everything in the world but the love of god and to never have another motive for anything and so this relationship now 30 years in is deep and well established and there's an inner silence that has occurred in brother lawrence so that that inner stirring of that divine nature is felt and heard you know most of us in our day-to-day life and he also is is confessing to it here we get pulled out of that center we get pulled what does that mean we get pulled into mind we get pulled into the world of our thinking and we start analyzing and running up well what about this and what about that oh i've got to do this no i forgot to do that and the worries and the stresses that mind creates that exist only as thought in the mind is a noise loud enough and a disturbance big enough to pull us out of the awareness of our inner self to prevent us from being authentic we start living according to thought rather than according to our nature which is love bliss and wisdom or knowledge so he's saying here that when he sometimes gets a little much a little too much absent you know he's getting sidetracked by his work in the kitchen he says god presently makes him to feel in his soul a call hey come back here and he says he goes on to talk about how it happens he says which often happens when he is most engaged in his outward business he answers with exact fidelity to these inward drawings either by an elevation of his heart toward god or by a meek and fond regard to him or by such words as love forms upon these occasions as for instance my god here i am all devoted to you lord make me according to your heart so he hears this call of the beloved and this call is going to be i would imagine very subtle it's more of the recognition of an absence when you get drawn into mind when you get drawn into the world of the senses which is the same thing you leave behind the stillness that that peace that passes understanding that's established in the heart in the shrine where where the divine dwells in each one of us where god can be found in each one of us we get pulled out of that silence and we get pulled out of that stillness and that that space and uh it's very difficult to find your way back to silence to find your way back to that well what the buddhist would call the void or that emptiness but which is a profound emptiness you know i was reading this morning in the power of now eckhart tolle where he was instructing us to be as aware of the silence between words as we are of the words and to be as aware of the space between objects as we are of the objects and he said the reason for that is that that space and that silence is not in fact nothing that it is uh now this now we're going to play with some words here because th this is illegal in advaita but we're going to we're going to try and put a handle on invite to here for a second he says that that space and that silence are the the nearest things to the manifestation of the unmanifest remember we talked a little bit on sunday a week ago or two about the fact that the the universe that we live in we've reduced to a mind-sized universe we have we have we are only aware of a universe that can be absorbed by five senses that part of the universe that can't fit into one of our five categories fit into through the passages of one of our five senses we're unaware of we have no knowledge of we have no instrumentation to know of its existence and so he's saying that this inner silence this this well not just inner silence actually he brings it to that but that silence itself is what allows for words or music or expression that the emptiness of space itself is what allows for manifestation allows for objects to give rise if there was no space there would be no objects if there was no silence there could be no words and so uh he's saying by becoming aware of that it will help us to realize and come to the understanding that we are walking in god that we are present in god like fish are present in water we are present in the divine we exist in the divine one of eckhart tolle's first realizations on that night when he had his enlightenment experience he said the next morning when the sun was shining in the windows and his room was filled with that daylight that he saw for the first time in his life that light and love are the same thing not not that light is a good symbol of love or that light reminds him of love he said his realization was that light and love are the same and so in that this room the emptiness of this room is filled with light the night sky even in its darkness is pregnant with the light of a billion trillion stars shining suns not stars suns shining so the darkness of night is not dark at all we only perceive it that way because there is nothing blocking the light to reflect it it's simply passing freely through the unmanifest through the unmanifest divine and you can play with this idea a little bit think about when you dream when you dream a dream at night say you're standing here and you're looking out over this vast ocean at a mountain that's 125 miles away in your dream you've got 125 miles of empty space but what is it that you're actually looking through you're looking through your own mind stuff right and that 150 miles where does it exist it exists between your two ears it's it's it's illusory so all that you're walking through in a dream all that you're touching in a dream everything that you're seeing in your dream is your own mind stuff taking all of these forms in response to your presence to your being there assuming that you're being there so this this idea of of being forgetful and being called away from silence being pulled out of that peace inside he gets a call from god to come back that that sense when you've walked away when you remember eating your favorite food right one of mine is uh the way i really experience this what i'm talking about is at christmas time when they have eggnog that one time a year that you can buy eggnog in the stores that that milky delicious it's one of my favorite flavors ever it's the only thing that makes me realize that my tongue is too short because i can only taste it from here to there and then it's gone and it's one of those things it's one of the clearest lessons to me on the fact that the senses cannot enjoy god as the soul can enjoy god because you know your fingers are such a limited surface for an entire universe to be sensed your nose two little tiny holes to smell a rose what is that you smell a rose you want to be completely absorbed in roseness you know i remember when i was 13 i was standing out on a big hill and there was this beautiful breeze blowing across the alfalfa fields and you know when that those waves start happening in tall grass they were going and at the same time the sky was that dark purple before a big storm and so you had this this the white seeds of the of the grass fluttering and waving as it goes along and i remember seeing that and feeling distinctly how small my eyes were how fragile my eyes were and how i depend on these fragile tiny little things to perceive something so amazingly beautiful and the fact that i stood there knowing i could not appreciate it to the extent that i knew it existed that i could not know what it was for that breeze to touch all of those blades of grass and to wave all of those seeds and to feel the tumult of the clouds and the upcoming of the storm that there was no way that i could fit all of that through these tiny eyes through these tiny senses and i felt such a deep frustration so this is a hint of what it is to live in the presence of god when that silence is pregnant with love with presence with meaning with depth and when your senses pull you out of it when your distraction pulls you out of it that voice of god is that voice of the silence that voice of the contentment that voice of pure fulfillment that voice of of absolute gentleness you know it is that the the sound of silence as they were and when he heard that call that subtle reminder in there the heart immediately was lifted he said that it would lift either through an elevation of his heart toward god where he just opened his heart to god became mindful of the presence of the beloved again in that moment or by a meek and fond regard to him just by giving birth to a feeling of love toward god a fond regard nothing overwhelming we're not talking about an ecstatic love here we're just talking about the love between dear friends friends who spend all of their time together who have shared all of their sufferings together who've walked through every step of life together this is what what he's experienced with the beloved so me can fond regard to him or by such words as love forms upon these occasions you know just little thought of love oh hey sweetie how's my beloved oh yes my beloved you're here these kinds of things were my god here i am all devoted to you lord make me according to your heart which is one of his things that he repeated so he says and then it seems to him as in the effect he feels it that god that this god of love satisfied with such a few words reposes again and rests in the fund and center of his soul so this god that that that felt that separation when he reached out in that silence to call him back when he gets what he was looking for when he was gets the attention of his devotee of his beloved when he gets that attention then he returns to reposing in the center of the heart that peace returns that knowledge of of no need the divorce from hunger the divorce from fear the divorce from smallness happens and that that return to relationship that return to oneness is established the experience of these things gives him such an assurance that god is always in the fund or bottom of his soul that it renders him incapable of doubting it upon any account whatever well that's beautiful so there is nothing that he can conceivably do where he would feel like god would not be at the center of his soul that god would not be present and always fully available and fully welcoming to him that it's an unconditioned presence of god that doesn't require anything of you but to turn your attention toward it to not be distracted from it to not run after anything else instead of it but to know that it is there as sure as you exist that it is there as sure as you know love that it is there as sure as you know beauty and that it rendered him incapable of doubt what a marvelous thing to arrive at so just 30 years of practice and he's arrived at a state where he's incapable of doubt toward the presence of god and to where the heart is stirred to such a rapture of joy and returns so easily and so meekly to the thought of god in the moment judge by this what content and satisfaction he enjoys while he continually finds in himself so great a treasure he is no longer in an anxious search after it but has it open before him and may take it whenever he pleases to know to have that that security in god that knowledge and experiential presence of the divine to know what it is to have the mind quiet you know for for many of us we've been practicing so many years and we still haven't even experienced a moment of silence in the mind the mind is constantly doing constantly saying constantly chattering constantly analyzing constantly raising up this memory or this idea or this piece of knowledge or understanding this or explaining that but to go before mind which is to transcend mind transcend mind weans to set it down because it's unnecessary you don't need the noise you sit there and it becomes the stage upon which god appears it becomes the stage upon which god plays and you are in your awareness sit in that place undistracted so that you are no longer looking for god you've just decided to see god to obey what vivicananda said stop seeking him stop seeking him and see him and that's what it is to sit in here so love is light and god is love so here you are right now completely surrounded by light completely illumined by light and it is god herself that is using that light to show you everything else to make you aware of everything else it is the light of god so you close your eyes but it's still light it's still there you know open your eyes ah it's still light it's still there and even in your own mind light exists god exists even though light has even though no light in this physical form has ever made it into your mind somehow in your dream at night how do you have daylight in your dream from a brain that has never seen light has no idea what light is how does god get in there how does god become the very substance of your dream without your awareness without you knowing so anytime you see how god is always available to him it's not a special thing for brother lawrence he's writing this and telling us this because this is the reality for us as well even though we haven't done the 30 years of work and even though we don't experience the joy and the bliss of it because we're wandering in our mind everywhere that we wander god is equally present everywhere that we look god is equally present so in those thoughts that have taken you away from god with proper seeing those same thoughts are in god so it's not necessarily a big change in what you're doing it's an enormous change in how you're doing it to do it with the awareness of being bathed in love to do it with the notion and knowledge that this universe is a manifestation of pure love despite the evening news that this world is in fact an unfolding of a story of love that all of the things in the news even the heinous things can be seen as being motivated by a love of something by something he complains much of our blindness and cries often that we are to be pitied who content ourselves with so little god saith he has infinite treasures to bestow and we take up with a little sensible devotion which passes in a moment blind as we are we hinder god and stop the current of his graces but when he finds a soul penetrated with a lively faith he pours into it his graces and his favors plentifully there they flow like a torrent which after being forcibly stopped against its ordinary course when it has found a passage spreads itself with impetuosity and abundance you can't use more words to talk about fullness than that little paragraph a torrent you know plentifully penetrated lively faith he pours into it graces and favors you know that that he finds god will take the smallest opening that you give her and fill it forcefully with a torrent of grace a torrent of bliss so much so that i guarantee you will look away out of fear you'll look away out of out of a wanting to preserve your ego because it will come in with such a force and such a clarity and such a purity that this ego will be in danger of being dissolved will be in danger of disappearing and because you're deeply attached to it because you like your personality you like your body you like your mind you you fascinated with all the things that it does when that when that possible dissolution is real before you when that dissolution can happen before you this is a moment where we're faced with the reality of our condition when we choose to grab ego when we choose to take refuge in ourself and in what we think we know for the sake of comfort or for the sake of familiarity when we won't let go and be taken to our deepest and most beautiful essence the experience of oneness with god so this is why we practice because you know one of the ideas that i have about death i got it from these near-death experiences actually i didn't get it directly i got it from my brothers here that are that some of them have read many many many of them and have given me lots of information about them but imagine that that at the point of death your body falls off imagine this imagine you're laying there in your death bed and finally the heart stops and the body is gone and you realize that you're not just think of how that is going to be what an interesting experience that's going to be when the body and everything familiar drops off and you still exist as a point of reference as an eye and then you go and you see this light this pure light this pure divinity you see god and it's shining bright as a torrent of grace and it's shining right through you which means everything in you is visible everything about you is instantly visible everything that you said did hoped for longed for thought about lusted after experienced and tried in this life is suddenly plain and open and seen by anyone looking what will you do what will you do will you have had enough practice to trust the grace that is that light to keep walking directly at it unashamed unafraid unhindered to accept that grace that that that pure love in such a beautiful form will you be able to keep walking or will the ego call you to protect it will you be ashamed will you be afraid will you be sad will you long to go back to it will you find a body because what you do at that moment determines what happens embrace the lord fearlessly not because you're great not because you're awesome though you are in your real sense in your authentic sense not for any reason of your accomplishment but purely for the reason of the love of god you go forward and you open yourself to that without fear not owning it because all of this vedanta is to teach you that you are not those things you were never that mind that's now left behind you were never that body that is now no more you were always the ever free ever pure blissful self in your practice as you sit with the divine practice this familiarize yourself with this surrender yourself to this so when it's your moment to stand before god in that light when it's your moment to walk directly into that light without fear without shame you can because apparently if you turn to the left or right whatever you take refuge in is your new birth possibly i'm not saying that as a fact whatever you take refuge in whatever you long for whatever you reach for for comfort or relief from your embarrassment or your shame or your fear whatever you reach for that's your new lesson you're going to have to find out how to let go of that so that you can be yourself so that you can be ever free that ever pure blissful self so he's talking that that god has this infinite grace available that if you make yourself just even slightly available to it he will push it through you with a torrent of delight and wonder yes he says we often stop this torrent by the little value that we set upon it but let us stop it no more let us enter into ourselves and break down the bank which hinders it let us make way for grace let us redeem the lost time for perhaps we have but little left death follows us close let us be well prepared for it for we die but once and a miscarriage there is irretrievable of course that's within that christian context where you have just one life to get it right and if you don't do it well that's a that's a huge misfortune you know fortunately tacor says that we get many chances and that god's infinite mercy will bring us all home but it's a matter of time talk course says that some people are going to get to enjoy the party starting at 8 am some of us are gonna have to wait till noon and some of us won't get till the party until you know seven or eight or nine at night when there might you know so but he'll he guarantees you that after you get to the party you'll be like oh my god why didn't i get here this morning why did i wait for tonight so he's saying when you sit for your practice please be sincere please be authentic in it please be earnest in it take it very seriously is the most important thing that you're doing all day long more important than the doctor's meeting more important than the job interview more important than the new car is this moment that you're setting yourself in the presence of god not as a a a not as a deposit that you'll draw on later not to achieve something that you'll enjoy somewhere in the future on that day of enlightenment wherever it might be no to sit in that in light to sit in that enlightened moment to sit in your meditation so that the here and now becomes your favorite place so that the here and now becomes your most secure place so that here and now is the safest place for you that's what we're working on because you'll never get out of the here and now ever the here and now is if you're not happy in this moment it's not a matter of conditions that have to change it's a matter of understanding you don't pay attention to the divine love flowing at you from all of these chandeliers [Laughter] you're not aware of the divine love that you're swimming through like a fish the presence of god which is everywhere around you it's only becoming aware it's only opening your eyes too and to constantly remind yourself at every moment in the day for 30 years until you reach a place where you cannot forget where doubt is impossible for you and when you're living in that here and now the here and now that happens when the body drops of course we're breaking all kinds of rules talking about it like that but in the here and now when the body drops that here and now won't be any different for you than this here and now sitting in this room tonight you will have surrounded yourself with the presence of god by the knowledge that he is everywhere present and always perfect and you will have learned to see the body as something other than self and the mind and its noises as belonging to something else you were ever only the witness of it your nature has always been equivalent to the divine has always been of god so this is the practice that we do so that we don't get lost so that we don't get pulled away so that at that moment when we can walk toward god we don't shrink in fear we don't shrink in shame because we think that we're lustful we think that we're hungry we think that we're this that or the other we are not we're ever free ever pure i say this again let us enter into ourselves do you know what that means how does one enter into oneself you can't turn around and go into yourself right because because you get you you can't turn you around to see you it's like your face so what do you do you shut out everything else and you relax into that noiseless piece of the heart put your attention here know that the love of god flows out of a small spring the size of your thumb it flows out unconditioned and into your mind and into your world and it's your ego that puts a nozzle on it and says so much goes here and so much goes there when you could if you remove that nozzle fill the entire world up with it it's not a rare substance it's for everyone equally for everything equally so in that silence you sit there you quiet the mind you think of nothing you just set it in a fond regard for love and then you just sit there and let love become apparent to you let love become obvious to you and then as you sit in that place of love and you look out through these windows on your face at the world around you you are bathed in love so when that angry person honks their horn you're not moved so in that when that boss comes in in a panic you're not afraid so that when you realize that you missed a deadline you're not overcome you're bathed and established in this love and everything that you do will be filled with it you'll become the best employee the best mom the best friend the best customer in line at the cashier you'll become that which everyone longs for not because there's something special about you but because you finally have become authentic you have finally become real you finally become human i say it again let us enter into ourselves so let us shut down all of this noise all of the senses all of this outgoing longing the time presses there is no room for delay our souls are at stake so even in this moment right now this doesn't mean tomorrow's practice do this tomorrow it means right now become aware of this love let this let this presence of god become your awareness now and it becomes even more infinitely uh intimate than that because the awareness that you're using to be aware of god's love is the love that you're becoming aware of it is the thing itself so you see that it keeps getting closer and closer and closer and more bizarrely fuller and fuller fuller you know as as it moves into your center and you start to realize at some point perhaps this one without a second which is the intimacy that you have searched for in every relationship you've ever had broken or unbroken lost or not lost but have never been able to get you've never been able to get close enough to your lover because there's always a body between you you know you haven't been able to enter their mind because there's always a world of senses between you and if you're if you're built on a on a mountain of constantly changing conditions that relationship itself is a constant torrent of experiences how easily love becomes hate when it's not love for its own sake how how how quickly the heart closes and defends itself fiercely when it loses trust you know when it when it realizes it's not getting as much as it thinks it's giving how perilous is a life of the mob of the ego of the mind this is why it's important to put it away and learn to be i say again let us enter into ourselves the time presses there is no room for delay our souls are at stake i believe you have taken such effectual measures that you will not be surprised i commend you for it it is the one thing necessary we must nevertheless always work at it because not to advance in spiritual life is to go back but those who have the gale of the holy spirit go forward even in sleep if the vessel of our soul is still tossed with winds and storms let us awake the lord who reposes in it and he will quickly calm the sea do you guys know that story there's a story in the in the the gospels in the new testament where you know they were fishermen or many of them were fishermen and they were on a boat in the sea of galilee and jesus was sound asleep down in the hold wherever that is on a boat and there's this huge storm going and the fishermen are all up there trying to to bring down the sails so that the boat doesn't capsize and to keep the water out and whatnot they're panicking and someone screams john says to peter go wake up the lord go go wake up jesus get him up here we need him we need him so he goes down and no there's several lessons there one in this huge giant storm where they're all thinking they're about to die jesus is asleep completely unconcerned why because he knows that this conditioned world is not real you know that that that self that it's a dream within the mind of the beloved it is not real they are that he's safe so he's down there sleeping well he comes up and they're all in a panic help us look this boat's going to sink we're going to capsize do something we've got to do them and he turns to them and he smiles and he just says oh you have little faith and then he demonstrates it he raises his hand and stills the water all the storm stops the wind stops the waves stop and he turns to them and says have you such little faith that god will take care of you you know this notion of knowing so that's how that's the power of this presence of god if you stay aware of it it will become you know it starts right now when we think about it it's probably you know for every one of us different but probably more than half of it is imagination right we think about god it's like okay he's cool i like it that's nice but as you become more sensitive inside as the noise begins to recede and as the distractions begin to recede you begin to see things that you had not been aware of within yourself that will change your experience of being that will change your understanding of what it is to exist and will change your notion of god change you in that relationship as you come closer and closer as it were or become less and less guarded against love absolute love without condition and you'll know that you're getting close when you're not afraid to love anymore when you're not afraid to help somebody without wondering oh is it going to be worth it are they going to what are they going to do with that or are they going to lash back at me how are they going to respond all these reasons that we stay closed and protected is because we think we're small we think we're a body we think we're a mind we think we're we think we have emotions all these things that can get hurt and that are tender and and and uh you know fragile we have forgotten that we're a soul that the gita says cannot be burned cannot be wedded cannot be cut cannot be injured that you are the essence of all things what can hurt you is a marvelous story about the king there's a king walking with his soldiers and uh i don't remember why they have to disturb him but they pass this sawdu and they i guess they want the sadhu to carry something or help out with something or something but they go up and they're trying to get the say something with a sadhu and he's just sitting there it's deep meditation and stillness and the king finally goes up to him you know hits him in the arm with his sword and says do you not know who i am i'm the king do you not know that i can run this sword through you right now without blinking my eye and the the the sadhu responds yes i know who you are but more importantly i know who i am and i could let you run that sword through this body without blinking an eye a marvelous marvelous scene you know that that that is what it is to know god that is what it is to know your true nature that fearlessness that utter lack of concern for the things of body mind you live for love and love alone i have taken the liberty to impart to you these good sentiments that you may compare them with your own it will serve again to kindle and inflame them if by misfortune which god forbid for it would be indeed a great misfortune they should be though never so little cooled let us both recall our first fervors let us profit by the example and the sentiments of this brother who is so little known of the world but known of god and extremely caressed by him i will pray for you do you pray instantly for me who am in our lord so wow look at that way he describes god that he knows so little that that brother lawrence knows so little of the world that he doesn't say but knows god he says who knows so little of the world but is known by god so he sees there's no center of ego as of himself being the lover of god he is it is god loving him and that he says that that god and extremely caressed by him that's that's just lovely i mean that's just beautiful how how how could could i ever describe my relationship with god like that as being you know what is that extremely caressed by him just you know you can imagine that god can cover your whole body with a hand at once and stroke it with an unending hand that would be an extreme caress you know a caress that it wasn't just hands with all the way down it was like body length all the way with no stomping as soon as that hand moves there's there's another one just coming along that this is the nature of god that is how it's possible for every one of us to be his favorite to be her favorite because there is not a quantity it's an infinity and god can love you so much that you know absolutely without the possibility of doubt that you are her favorite that she loves you more than anyone else that is the nature of god that's the nature of that love and so he's saying to this man don't don't let this become cool within you don't don't let this fire die out remember this love remember this presence of god and stay with it continually and constantly remember your first day your first fervor when you first approached spiritual life or you first had that insight you know i remember i remember when i first took my initiation in india back in the 90s and i had this you know i was reading the gospel at that time and the gospel of sri ramakrisha you read that and like there's people experiencing ecstasy all over the place you know somebody's seeing god here somebody's seeing kali there someone's seeing shiva and then takur is constantly going off into you know samadhi and you know people are touching him and looking at his eyes and his face is glowing and you read this all over the place and so i was reading that and i was thinking oh wow this is this is cool this is the way it is right and so i thought when i had my initiation i was like i sat down i remember the first time i got home that afternoon or got back to the hotel actually i sat down to do my meditation and how wonderful it was to believe naively that it could happen at any second this could be the time and you know i i sat for hours back then not because i was doing discipline and austerities but because i truly truly thought any moment this could happen any moment my delusion could fall away and i could see god i remember sitting in this in this restaurant called the choti wala in rishikesh and i was sitting there with my friend philip across the table from me and i don't know what happened and maybe nothing you know you just get a little dizzy feeling for a second it was like like that there was nothing really that happened i just got like some some some deja vu for a second or something and i was like phillip phillip i think it's happening i'm not kidding i was like phillips i think it's happening and he's looking at me like what's happening i said i think i think enlightenment's gonna happen and you know it's so funny that i think about that now and how absurdly naive that seems and how ridiculous that was i had no idea that i still had at least 25 years to go you know we're still not there we're still going but remember that fervor remember that faith because it is true no matter how much many times or how many years time has passed between you and that belief it is still true that at some moment you are going to realize god you are going to know the truth and it's not because of your effort it's not because of your accomplishment it's not because you finally meditated one thousand three hundred and twenty two and a half seconds which was what was required it's not like that it will just be because god touches you for the first time you're aware of it and that will be enough so sit with that anticipation and approach god with that faith and with that knowledge i am your own this life is lived because of you through me i know that my ego is unreal i know that my dreams and hopes are delusional but they teach me something about you they originate in your name all of my desires are because i think that you lay out here somewhere ramakrishna says to to to get peaked with god where are you for crying out loud i'm sitting here and i've been sitting here a long time where are you you know come to me i want you i want nothing else but you make that true want nothing else but the lord understand that it is true that it is the lord you're looking for in partners in sweets in money in fame in talent all of the things your ego is trying to hold on to they're just all symbols trinkets that remind your soul of its nature but you've confused the symbol with thing itself and you keep running keep trying to grab it and you can't because it's a reflection of what's already in you so sit with the lord pray constantly to the lord and pray constantly for each other remembering that initial fervor all right that's the end of the fourth letter anybody have any is there any questions on in the online world or here we have one in the room i've been suffering for two weeks ah looking forward to stumping you that's easy to do to my days of doing a little sculpture and the last two weeks ago brother lawrence was advising us to let let the lord chip away at us to refine our shape oh yes that's right so he's a deductive sculptor how about an additive sculptor like clay is that in another chapter well it's just a different practice just a different practice i i don't know because what he's taking away is an unreal is his unreality he's taking away the dream so it's not that he's actually removing anything so maybe man is always adding to the dream oh yes sculpture oh most definitely you're yes most definitely you're always we've packed on layers and layers and layers of unreality you know and uh that's what uh swami uh tattoo my nanda said he says that there's nothing in the scriptures to tell you what god is the scriptures are there to tell you what god is not so that that which is obvious can become apparent this presence of god the person seeking god yes sure it's a matter of discernment that's what discrimination is about uh the one that takur it gets rather graphic about um and i always hesitate but you know i remember walking down the street and seeing this very beautiful person on the other side of the street and it erased it aroused that desire in me and i remember stopping and trying to practice what i had read in the gospel of saying okay mind what is it that you want you know is it a body part here take a knife you can go cut out any body part that you want and you're instantly recoil you're like ooh and so i said well what is that mine do you want the whole body is that what you want you know kill that person and go take their body you can have their body and immediately that recoil happens again like oh no well i and i was like well you've got the whole body and you've got the parts of the body that's all you're seeing and you're arising with this flame of desire inside what is it that you're looking for and it becomes clear you're looking for the life that's in that person that presents the body you know you want you want the life the living thing you want the intimacy you want one without a second you know so you can see that your lust for that person is not about a body part it's not about the body as a whole that it's about a connection with the spirit of god which dwells in it that you've associated with a body that you've associated with preferences and aversions same thing with with money what are you looking for in money you're looking for absolute security you're looking for absolute power you're looking for absolute pleasure every one of those is a name of god that you've confused with money because money can give them to you for a very short time and when the money is given to you it comes what comes with it is a deep responsibility towards all the people that gave the money to you right and then a fear a deep fear that's as big as the money the fear of losing it of having it disappear or be taken away and so everything that gives you bliss in the material world always comes with its opposite you can't have one without the other this divine experience within you is the only thing that cannot have an expiration that does not change because it itself is unchanging it itself is outside of time it's transcendent it itself cannot be destroyed it is one without a second what is there that can destroy it it's like coming to realize that you're dreaming while you're dreaming it changes the whole nature of it if you were running from some gang of thieves through the streets of new york in your dream and suddenly it occurs to you hey wait wait i'm dreaming i'm actually asleep in the bed what happens you stop running you turn around and you you look at these guys and you're like you can't do anything to me i'm not here you're not here we're in my own mind you are me i am you and i can change the dream in a woman you know just like that and we say oh that's a little bit far-fetched but you know one of the most far-fetched things you'll ever read is in the bible when jesus says to you if you have faith the size of a mustard seed and you go to the kitchen and find out how small that is it's like a period little tiny seed it says if you have that much faith you can say to this mountain that mountain out there with hollywood written on it you can say hey throw yourself into the sea and jesus says i verily i tell you the truth okay that means i'm going to tell you something that's super duper true i'm not making this stuff up he says i tell you the truth that see that mountain will pick itself up and throw itself in the sea so you see this world has the same nature as a dream if you can stop seeing it as real and forcing yourself to obey its rules through identity you can say to the mount and throw yourself in the sea so there you go be free don't let your past actions determine your current actions don't let your future hopes determine your current actions let what you are and what flows through you determine what manifests from you without a will without a hunger without a need but simply because of what you are and exist in the world like that deathless and ever free knowing the dream to be a dream a manifestation of beauty and wonder of profundity and wisdom of love with no depth no end no limit and that's brother lawrence jaime all right so two weeks we'll be back here by the grace of mother you