Video 2
Vedic Christianity · Class 2 · Practice of the Presence of God · Swami Chidbrahmananda
[Music] is [Music] this [Music] maybe [Music] with gifts from you [Music] of my life [Music] so like that so all right so this is our what third week of class second week of brother lawrence and uh going along with an experiment of living called vedic christianity which we talked a little bit about what that was i don't really know what it is really it's an experiment after all but this notion that all that all truth is one right i think it's the rig veda that says that the truth is one though the sages have called it by many names and i've chosen to interpret that as meaning that religion is not plural that there's one religion and all of us practice it in different ways but the goal remains the same it's just the details of practice that have worked out differently for different experimenters and for those who stumbled on that relationship with the divine and found the nature of things and so uh having grown up in christianity and around the christian scriptures i just took it upon myself as a vedantist to look at them from that light not really make that distinction you know it's interesting to me in the book of hebrews there's this uh statement that all scripture is inspired by god and is worthy for teaching reproof and instruction in spiritual life and of course raised as a christian i was always taught that all scripture meant the bible the the one problem with that is that hebrews wasn't written until uh well after uh well i mean it was written well before there was any compilation of the bible so it couldn't have meant that in particular so i choose to take the broader stance and see all the world scriptures as being available to us as vedantists to know the beloved and to purify our minds and our hearts from this idea of me and mine to grow in unselfishness and to bring that down i guess to street level to where we can walk away changed and moved i decided to take up the very simple and beautiful teachings of brother lawrence a very humble monk who joined the monastery because he thought he needed discipline he thought he needed god to kind of straighten him out a little bit and he joined expecting to be brutalized he says he he thought the other monks were going to beat him for you know being such a clumsy nut and that god of course would never draw him into the inner circle because he was so impure and so unaccomplished and uneducated and they assigned him to the kitchen so he worked as the cook in the monastery and uh he tells the story of his life and his beautiful devotion his beautiful encounter with the divine in very simple ways these are some conversations that were taken down many of you probably have read these before they're very simple there's not any high religion in them but there's very meaningful statements meaningful to the heart meaningful for someone who wants to be changed to be free so we're going to go over the second conversation tonight it's got kind of a strange writing style to it which i haven't gotten used to it causes me to stumble through it a little bit but he starts off saying in this area called second conversation that he meaning brother lawrence that he had always and he wrote this he's talking about himself in third person here that he had always been governed by love now there's a statement you know and it's one of those things that brings home to me the real essence of practice is not so much learning new things and creating new philosophical connections in our mind and becoming more educated in that sense but it's about taking what we already know and opening it up to say to see and poke at what we think we already understand and yet probably have not even begun to understand and so this notion that he had always been governed by love is a great place to start in spiritual life that simple practice i think would take you all the way to the feet to the divine mother quite easily that he had always been governed by love without selfish views and that having resolved to make the love of god the end of all of his actions he had found reasons to be well satisfied with his method that he was pleased when he could take up a straw from the ground for the love of god seeking him only and nothing else not even his gifts so we see here this amazing dedication of karma yoga going on where everything that he does is done for the love of god everything that he does is done in the presence of god and using that word immediately opens up me myself to this to my favorite thing to talk about and this is the i am-ness of the beloved that the christians uh you know did me a great favor in recording the old testament i guess with jews actually that recorded the old testament where when when uh when um god is asked for his name uh i guess the exact story is is a moses in egypt is going to ask the pharaoh to release three million slaves with no authority and no no reason that that he should even be able to get in to see the pharaoh let alone convince him to let three to three million slaves go for free and so as god is telling him what he needs him to do moses says well who should i say sent me and god says tell him the i am has sent you so his own name and i've loved uh the times that i've had in my spiritual life to contemplate that notion of what that means uh what's opened for the uh is this idea that this moment the i am is the present it's being uh in our even in vedanta we are that satchitananda that existence absolute and that's the one that we seem to have the least amount to say about and yet it's the one to me that seems to be the most profound this idea of being our existence there's a wonderful scientific conversation going on on youtube right now on uh why is there anything you know when when with this world being from their position purely material and just here it is why is there anything at all it seems that the most effective outcome of chance is nothingness emptiness that would be the easiest thing accomplished why is there something and so this is-ness of god is quite profound when you think about your own being like what am i what is this experience we have words i'm a human being and we find that somewhat satisfying but what's that well it's a human being and how does that explain what i actually am that i'm able to think that i'm able to to cognate that i'm able to feel that i'm able to create i'm able to destroy uh you know that that in this rather short time on on on the planet i've got an immense amount of power given to me and yet there's no knowing exactly what to do with it where to go with it so here we dwell in god this present moment being the divine herself that we're surrounded in this moment and that if you close your eyes and you forget the names forget the particulars and enjoy the ability to love and know love enjoy the mystery of what beauty is and that it surrounds us wonder at who you are and what this life is and find some some depth in relationship with life as god the very fact that this moment is that divinity that this interaction is not something for tomorrow or later in life that this dance with the beloved is not something abstract and far away that it's the way you are interacting with your being right now it's the way you're reacting to beauty and to love and to togetherness and all of the things that life is presenting to you and so we see here that from brother lawrence his his simple commitment to be fully engaged with that idea of love at all times and in this dance of living that even a straw picked off of the ground was done so in relationship to the divine to the beloved to the mystery whatever you want to call god for yourself that he had long been troubled in mind from a certain belief that he should be damned that all the men in the world could not have persuaded him to the contrary but that he had thus reasoned with himself about it he thought i engaged in a religious life only for the love of god and i have endeavored to act only for him whatever becomes of me whether i be lost or saved i will always continue to act purely for the love of god i shall have this good at least that till death i shall have done all that is in me to love him you know to go from the idea of being damned to go from the idea of being wicked and broken and unworthy to making your commitment that it doesn't matter okay so i'm damned i still just for the beauty of it just for the depth of it consign my life to the very act of love in every way and i think that that's a beautiful ideal i remember after i had been uh in the in the monastery for for i guess it was six years or so and i was sitting in the shrine and i was thinking along these lines i was like god you know i've given up everything you know i got rid of all of my stuff and my job and all of that and i'm sitting in this monastery i was like what if what if this isn't true you know i mean what what if i made a bet here and i've lost what if what if i've dedicated my life to something that's not real and i thought this is something i'm going to have to sort through especially being a monk you know i can't pretend that that question doesn't exist and i can't pretend that i have a satisfying answer to it you know i've got to really work this through and i sat there and i thought about it i was like okay i've got x number of years here on this planet suppose it's all material suppose that when i go there is nothing well then it doesn't matter what i spend my life on i can do anything with it i can throw it away if i want to so given that that suppose there's no meaning to life there's nothing to figure out there's nothing to know there's nothing to find what do we do with it and you know brother lawrence wasn't totally unfamiliar to me at the time but i it really affected me to think well kind of as an art project i'm gonna i'm living for love i want to know what love is i want to understand love and i thought what better way to spend a life than to choose the highest ideal you can think of the most beautiful thing you can imagine and live for it have it not matter whether there's a forever or not have it not matter whether there's magic or not have it not matter if there's a purpose or not simply dedicate yourself to the most beautiful thing you can imagine and live your life for that regardless of the rest and this is exactly what our brother here is is suggesting throw yourself into love love for that for that alone assume you're damned assume there's no victory for you assume there's no gift there's no there's no prize for you suppose this is it what's the most beautiful thing you can do with this moment than to act in love is there anything more satisfying to those around you or to your own heart and then to learn that the sages have found the reason for that is because part of our nature is love this idea of being able to recognize it and being able to give it two very beautiful gifts that came with the image of god you know the christians talked about having been made in that image of the beloved and i heard all kinds of stories about what that meant growing up most of them very physical and material but to hear from the sages from the practitioners of old that that means you're composed of love that's how you recognize it that's how you know it that you're composed of being and that you're composed of intelligence that all these things that are thrown against the wall of the body you're able to make sense of you're able to figure things out you're able to understand and because of that you're able to develop and grow this is what it is to be in the image of god this is what it is to live in god and to have that awareness about how you live your life it can make the most dull accounting cubicle you can imagine a gold mine of experience of profundity and depth and meaning i always reminded myself in the days before i joined the monastery and was still still working in one of these cubicle farms uh reminding myself that i'm only incidentally a systems analyst what i really am is a lover and my job today is to love and so i would go there and i would make my rounds in the morning stopping at all the little cubicles to check in i worked with 23 women in the human resources department so i just went around my first hour of the day just checking in just saying hi seeing what's going on of course i always masked it with concern for their computer equipment but it was really just to kind of do this be love be true to my nature be true to this image of the beloved that i carried and to never get fooled into thinking that i'm anything else i'm not a systems engineer i'm not an american i'm not a man i'm love itself designed to express it and to build it and to encourage it and to see it in everything and everyone to recognize god as he looks at me through multiple eyes and multiple experiences to learn from god as he teaches me through every event of the day to be mindful of god as i dance through every single event of my life to know and understand this beautiful ideal this beautiful opportunity of being i shall have this good at least that till death i shall have done all that is in me to love him that this trouble of mind had lasted four years during which time he had suffered much so this idea of being lost this idea of going to hell that he felt that he was yeah you know growing up as a christian it's not hard to feel that way you're you're told quite regularly that you're going straight to hell uh you know that you're a horrible and wicked person and that that only by the grace of god do you have any hope at all so it's not too much of a wonder that he struggled with this for four years even after joining the monastery and that he suffered for it it hurts to think that way it hurts to to imagine yourself that way and it's a terrible catch 22 because swamiji swami vivekananda tells us what you think is what you become so if you beat yourself down like that you know like he's doing and has done for these four years that's ultimately what comes of it and so really this notion of love that he developed really saved him from that when he just said so what i'm damned i'm a horrible person what do horrible people do and they try to not be so horrible you know they try to love but that at least he had seen this trouble arose from want of faith now this is an interesting point and that since then he had passed his life in perfect liberty and continual joy all right who can ask for more than that so he went from this suffering from this idea of being lost from this this pain of of being separate from god by by focusing on love and by focusing on the nature and company of god at all times he says that his life passed to perfect liberty that's freedom absolute freedom that's according to swamiji our highest ideal to be free you know and what does that mean it means free from desire so that we're not you know it's funny because i i had that experience a while back i was taking a shower and as i was washing my body i was focusing on the body part and thinking okay i'm not that all right i tried to turn it into just a mechanical feeling without identifying it as my hand and my hair you know in my shoulders and i was going along and going along and getting down to where there was not much more to exclude from myself and thinking oh wow what what am i then and after i just sat there kind of eliminating it all i felt this wonderful sense of freedom and so i said it out loud what swamiji said you know always declare yourself to be free i'm ever pure ever free ever blissful so i'm standing there dripping on the bathmat you know i'm ever free i'm ever pure i'm ever blissful and i thought well what now you know here i am i'm not any of this and i'm ever free and ever blissful what now and so i asked myself i said well you can do whatever you want and that hit me up the side of the head i was like no that's what we normally understand freedom to be but if i'm doing what i want i'm beholden to a desire something is telling me what to do i'm free not to have any desires it doesn't mean that i'm doing anything it means that i'm enjoying standing here dripping on the bathmat in my relationship with the beloved that is everything around me that i touch and think and feel and experience at this moment and the nature of that is pure love the nature of that is divine intelligence the nature of that is eternity that he had placed his sins between him and god as it were to tell them that he did not deserve his favors but that god still continued to bestow them in abundance so even though he felt these this this terrible pain which isn't so hard to understand at least for me you know you sit in the shrine and it's always you know when you if you're not having a good time in your life if you're kind of giving in to that other side of yourself you know i've had two good fights today with two people and you know you sit there before god and you're just like sorry yeah you know you're not quite sure what to do with that right and that's why he says right here this this year that at last he had seen that his troubles arose from a want of faith what is faith faith is that knowing things that are true that sometimes may not seem so evident that god is love that i am love that i'm composed of love that i'm composed of intelligence that i'm worthwhile i'm worthwhile because i carry a divine spark the image of the beloved the highest ideal imaginable to humankind i am that that's where my value comes from as a human being not by what i do not by what i accomplish not by how good i am how young i am how rich i am how handsome or ugly i may be none of that is what makes me me what makes me me is my faith in love my faith that my nature is pure that my nature is divine that my nature is unselfish and living like that he says that god continues to bestow his abundance on him even though he was always still insecure and still unsure of himself that in order to form a habit of conversing with god continually and referring everything that we do to him we must first apply to him with some diligence but that after a little care we should find his love inwardly excite us to it without any difficulty that with just a little bit of effort to be in constant communion with the beloved which is the goal of our practice the goal of our repeating the name of god over and over and over again is that to remember and not become calloused and forgetful that we are in the presence of god that this is not a future thing religion i think modern religion has has done a great disservice in presenting this idea that we're working for something tomorrow that we're trying to reach an idealized day in the future where i will realize god or where i will die and then have eternal life like somehow i have to go through death before i'm eternal you know before i live forever and i think what what our brother here is trying to really bring out and allow us to enjoy is the fact that your eternity with the beloved has already begun that your relationship with the divine already is and when swamiji says stop seeking god that's what he's telling you stop looking for something later and see god see him now recognize her now recognize that beauty now have faith that it's true and that it's real that he expected after the pleasant days god had given him that he should have his turn of pain and suffering that's not that's not the way it is i remember when i first started lecturing the first lecture went really great i was really happy and excited about it the second lecture went really good and i was like wow this is a lot of fun i enjoy this then it was time for the third lecture and i remember i was hit with this panic attack of like oh my god the third one is always you know that shoe is going to drop i'm going to get up there i'm going to forget my old forget my lecture it's going to be terrible and i was having such a panic attack i went into this little back room in the in the temple in dc and i sat there at the table and tried to kind of just all right ma i'm really i'm really messed up here and i just have to surrender this to you you know i just these are your people they're here to see you they're not to here to see me they've got to learn from you i don't have much to tell them so let's make a deal i'll do this if you give me the things to say and so i warn you if it comes into my mind i'm saying it so so you'd better keep it on the up and up you know because because this is our deal and so i i went out there with that attitude and just delivered the lecture and it went fine it went beautifully and afterward i was thinking about oh wow that went pretty good and i was kind of thinking about what went well what went well and i just all of a sudden you know got that punch again i was like what are you doing that was my job mother saying to me you told me that was my job to give you the words and to to do the lecture what are you doing judging it and taking responsibility for whether it went right or not and patting yourself on the back when you give things to the divine you set them down they're not yours anymore and this is part of that ongoing conversation with the divine that he's talking about and that want of faith we keep asking for something we'll pray for somebody we pray for them again and again and again why are you doing that you mentioned it you gave it to the lord you asked him to take care of this now it's your job to accept what comes in the faith that he did she did that did in whatever way the divine felt like answering it with the one promise that it would be for the best that it would come to to to to the best for you maybe not the best for your body maybe not the best for your mind but the best for you that you that's behind the mind behind the eyes behind the senses and that eye we barely know we've barely come to recognize that he expected this that after the pleasant days god had given them that he would have his turn of pain that this would collapse on his head you know but he was not uneasy about it knowing very well that as he could do nothing of himself god would not fail to give him the strength to bear it hmm there you go there's a promise for you i love it when the scriptures accidentally give you a promise the divine will never put you in a situation that you cannot handle he will never she will never give you more than what you can digest it will never get that bad it may get close you may you may think that line has been crossed i'm like i can't believe you're doing this to me but that's the point to bring you to that to that precipice and say i can't i can't do this i can't do it you've got to take the wheel from here you've got to let me hold on you've got to let me just surrender and that's when things get good in spiritual life so when the divine gives you the strength to bear it take it assume this as a fundamental truth assume this in your life that whatever is going on you can manage the divine has said so i won't pile it on heavier than you can carry that when an occasion of practicing some virtue offered he addressed himself to god saying lord i can't do this unless you enable me to do it and that then he received the strength more than sufficient to do it so this is what a surrendered life looks like you know it's there's not a lot of trying to it it's doing it it's living a life of faith it's living what you believe or what you know or what you suspect however you want to word it you know that you do it if you want if you want to know god assume you know god assume that you've been forgiven assume that your purity is managed that god's got you covered assume that things are taken care of that you're welcome in his presence or her presence assume that you're pure assume that you're that that you're loving because god is outside of time he's not waiting for you to reach your enlightenment before he loves you he's not waiting for you to clean up your mess before he forgives you god has in every sage and in every avatar made the biggest effort to say that one thing to us as human beings i will do anything to reach you i will suffer anything to touch you i will do anything required to build your faith in that love to show you a love you cannot find in this material world to show you a love that's transcendent to the notion of this this uh what market love that we have in the world you know i'll call you as long as you call me i'll invite you to my party as long as you invite me to yours you know that we can finally give up that notion and get all the love that we need because it's ego ego is like this nozzle on a hose you know that only lets your infinite love you have as much love to express as you're willing to express an ego is the one that clamps it you know and just meters it out in little tiny pieces it's it's it's poverty living for no reason you have all the love you ever need why not give it to somebody because you're angry at them why not give it to somebody because they said something mean to you so what does that have to do with anything you're an infinite well of love use it dig deep into it and enjoy being that go around being super nice super friendly in the world and just see how life changes see how life changes i can't help but tell the stories when i first got transferred here eight years ago when i first got to la i thought gosh everybody is so unfriendly here that was my first impression i would take walks you know and in san francisco i was kind of in the habit of saying hello to people or smiling you know nodding and i would always get some sort of exchange on that there and when i got here people kept looking at me like they're like i was trying to take their purse or something you know i was like just like what and so i was really struggling with it and thinking god this is crazy and so i thought all right when god says that that that he has become all of this that the one has become the many i thought all right well let's try this let's pretend that my life is a prayer like what brother lawrence is talking about here and when i go down to yucca market i'm going to look at the cashier as as if god is about to talk to me through her ear as if god has taken this job as the cashier i'm going to talk to her like i would talk to the divine without any fear without any resignation or without any uh resid without any resignation yeah just just was that right reservation there it is without any reservation just just be natural and open and free and assume that we're cool you know that we're we're cool with each other we're great and i tell you i did that for two weeks as a practice each time that i took a walk and i always take the same walk i decided that i would look at people and consciously identify them as god and that i would use all that i had grown in that relationship all that i had understood of that love that i would give it to them because that's who they were and i'd been doing this for about well i will say 10 days just shy of two weeks when the first fruit happened a permanent change the world i lived in became different there was a time the first time it happened i was standing at the stoplight at the corner of franklin and gower down there and this guy comes up and i just looked at him i didn't say anything to him i just looked at him you know completely open just completely unguarded just looked at him and smiled and he started talking to me the first person in la to start talking to me for no reason and i was like whoa whoa that's different he's talking to me that's cool do you know that became a rather regular thing that that people began that i guess that defensiveness that was my own that kind of standoffish fear that people weren't going to be nice to me or not respond to my hello or whatever didn't want my all those assumptions had slowly after 10 days of trying to do this had somehow passed and people were meeting somebody who was open and someone who wasn't guarded all because of the beloved and life changed la became a different place did la change no no the energy in this place changed because god was present god was being honored and recognized and that's our task that's what we do right as spiritual people being spiritual means being unguarded being open being loving being compassionate being honest and the world will respond be the change that you want to see in the world gandhi says or as attributed of saying that when he had failed in his duty he only confessed his thought saying to god i'll never do it otherwise if you leave me to myself it is you who must hinder my falling and mend what is amiss that after this he gave himself no further uneasiness about it this is a beautiful teaching because you're going to have those mistakes there's times when that when you're when you're not going to be the ideal you want to be and what do you do do you kick yourself around the block for it i'm a horrible person oh god i always messed up i'm never gonna get it right blah blah blah blah you know get depressed skip your meditations because you're ashamed and don't want to go into the shrine or you can't calm your mind because that self-accusing voice is there going on and on and on brother lawrence learned how to deal with that mention it to god i blew it and if you leave me to myself without your thought to my mind i'm going to do it again and over and over and over again because of my own accord i can do nothing vivid canada said that vivican at the end of his life he writes this gives us lecture read says everything that i've done was impure at some level you know that there was selfishness in my love that there was ego in my in my teaching you know it's knowing that this ego self this personality self that we love so much that we dress up so much that we bathe so tenderly every day is never going to do anything good it's never going to accomplish anything look around what's being accomplished in this world the ego is in charge of the whole world and look what it's doing look what it's done so how do we deal with that we set it down we said yes the ego self is losing this game ma i can't do if you if you leave me for a moment on my own this is what happens i'm sorry you know please mend what is amiss and then don't give it a second thought you don't think about it again you don't kick yourself around the block you don't tell yourself that you're failed and that you're not going to make it you don't remember that you're weak and that you're poor and that you're impure you give it to the lord and you forget and you get up and you walk in that divine love again without a second thought can we say that enough without a second thought that is faith that's faith that works to go on that is after this he gave himself no further uneasy about it that we ought to act with god in the greatest simplicity yeah there's not much to the moment you know things get complex when you start tripping into the mind if you get more than two thoughts away from god you enter into a state of mind and that state of mind can be a mood that state of god mind can be you know a a crotchety selfish self who's tired and whatnot you know so you don't let yourself get more than two thoughts from god you don't let it get too complex you don't let the mind build a little castle to tell you what you are to tell you how you feel you know that's one of the interesting things an advice you know god alone is and all this changing stuff is unreal in its core and so you know to to to to [Music] stay simple in that and not not to get caught up in the story that when somebody asks you who you are normally we query two places right first thing if you answer with oh i'm uh you know a little moody today that means you asked your mind first oh my and so your mind will tell you how the mind is and you because you don't know any better will start describing your state of mind you know i'm feeling a little lonely and that was making me kind of crotchety and you know or you query the body i'm tired uh you know i'm just really feeling like i want some time off you know and so you start describing the body well according to the scriptures you've described your mind you've described your body but how are you well isn't it a funny thing that we would think that we would have to query ourselves to know how we are swami prabhu nanda in san francisco he's had he was dying of cancer in his last days and so of course all the devotees would constantly ask the poor man how are you maharaj and so finally he started just saying oh like this and i found that to be the most satisfying answer i could think of oh like this i don't have to ask anyone i don't have to go inside and query a part of me i am what i am i am this i'm i'm going on things are as they are you know they don't involve me much because i'm this ever perfect ever pure unchanging absolute self who's just manifesting you know just this world is wafting off of me like a good perfume maybe a bad perfume who knows but it's wafting off of you you just are so be that don't get complicated about it don't dive into the conditions of body and mind know that you are ever free and ever perfect there is nothing to be concerned about stay simple god is love you are loving god is existence you exist god is intelligence you are intelligent and go forward there's no more to it that we ought to act with god in the greatest simplicity speaking to him frankly and plainly about everything you know one of my favorite stories about girish gosh is the fact that ramakrishna never told him to stop drinking girish was a drunkard by the way or you know would even retrieve girish's bottle of wine from the cab you know if girish forgot it in the cab you know which you think about that his spiritual guru you know someone that we attribute to being a manifestation a direct manifestation of the divine never told an alcoholic to stop drinking why because what alcoholic doesn't know he should stop drinking that's utterly not the point what did he tell girish to do he said garish every time you pour yourself that glass of wine hold it up and thank mother for the bliss you think you're going to find in it invite god into the center of your vice the center of your dark take god with you where you dare not take him or her and as you're engaged in that darkness even in the midst of that frankly and openly just like he says here frankly and plainly converse with the divine i know i shouldn't be doing this but look how i look how it makes me feel and with the divine begin unpacking what you think you're getting because you don't really want those things they are not feeding you otherwise you wouldn't have to constantly go back to get them they would have already given you what you needed but the fact that you're constantly having to go into a repeat cycle you know it's like it's like that used to trouble me as a kid my my father used to have head and shoulders in the shower and the instructions on the back were you know rinse lather repeat and i was like well how how many times am i supposed to do this i never did it more than once that's not a repetition it says to repeat but how long do i repeat you know how long do i keep going with this you know so i don't know where i'm going with that now i'm lost so but this notion this notion you know of of being there uh in the presence of the beloved and and speaking with him frankly and openly about all of these things that you wonder and think even in the midst of your vice to take the lord with you and don't sit there and just feel guilty and block him out because it hurts to think of god while you're in the middle of your vice that's the whole point that's why it's vice it's because you're pushing you're pushing god away right what does ignorance mean ignore ends right you're ignoring the presence of your highest ideal you're ignoring god the divine by working really hard at being engaged in this thing this this nasty little business of vice over here that you think is so wonderful for yourself it's like well if it's so wonderful tell god if it's wonderful god would enjoy it he'd like to hear about it she would like to hear about it so bring him bring bring mother in and talk about what you're doing become aware of what you're doing become aware of how your body really feels in that environment begin to pay attention to what real thoughts are there and slowly slowly swami prabhupada always taught in the light of awareness maya will untie her own knots the knots of maya will come undone it's that awareness that will heal you it's the presence of the beloved which is awareness itself again not some third-party magical thing the awareness that you have the presence of being that you have is divine that is god bring that into every area of your life do not let any place be ignorant ignorant where you push away that awareness so that you can become distracted which is the only power that maya has to keep you deluded distraction is the only thing this world can give you anything of the senses anything of the mind its best gift possible to you is distraction it can't help anything it can't fix anything that can only be done with a pure awareness in the light of who you are in the light of what you are let it be expressed that we ought to act to gut with god in the greatest simplicity speaking to him frankly and plainly and imploring his assistance in our affairs just as they happen this is again that practice of the presence being mindful from the from the buddhist perspective as it's happening pray to god and talk about it don't make your prayers about the future don't make your prayers about the past make your prayers and interaction about now about is-ness come to know this moment right we talk about it all the time your past is your attachments they're the things that you wanted to last forever the they are the mortal things you wanted to be immortal so you grabbed them and you tried to share your immortality with them by putting them into your memory so that's your past your past is all of your attachments and those those attachments from the past carrying them around prevents you from seeing the moment purely that's why we can't see god because we have all of these attachments that we're looking through at this pure moment and we can't see it as it is and what does that do that creates in us a desire for a perfect moment that we can no longer experience is perfect that gives us our sense of the future because we have to go and make a plan for how to bring perfection into the moment and most of us spend all of our time bouncing back and forth between our attachments in the past and our desires of the future and very rarely being with god very rarely having a moment of authentic being where none of that is coloring anything you know eckhart tolle makes that great point i share all these things over and over but eckhart tolle makes a great point he says if you're living a life where you feel down about yourself where there's depression where there's anger where there's where there's these kinds of inertia he says you're living in the past that's what causes that he says if you're living full of anxiety and full of worry and constant concern and need to to fix or do or get or you know accomplish is you're living in the future come to the present there are no problems in the present there are only obstacles and they come one at a time deal with them keep that conversation with the beloved alive and be present that god never failed to grant it as he had often experienced it that he had been lately sent to burgundy to buy the provisions of wine for the society which was a very unwelcome task for him because he had no turn for business and because he was lame and could not go about the boat but by rolling himself over the casks right there's an image so he's having you can't he he's lame so he can't walk very well so he has to literally lay down on the boat and roll you know around the boat to get from one place to the next and he didn't know anything about business you know so he's always probably not getting the right amount of change and whatnot so he was you had to go do this he didn't want to do it he wasn't set up for it but he went that however he gave himself no unease that however he gave that sorry that's the strange writing here that however he gave himself no uneasiness about it nor about the purchase of the wine that he said to god it was his business that he was going about and that he afterward found it very well performed that he had been sent to albert alvarez auvern alvernay it's in france that he had that he had been sent in to alvaren the year before upon the same account and then he could not tell how the matter passed but that approved very well so this is that surrender you know if if you're praying to god to take care of things let god take care of them you know let god take care of it so if god is going to have you i don't know go to over and to pick up wine just say help me get the best wine and just walk in there be like that one clearly that's the best one i prayed for it here it is and we go on our way always full of faith that god is present everywhere present and always perfect the scriptures say god is everywhere present always perfect so learn to see the moment like that everywhere present always perfect so likewise in his business in the kitchen to which he had naturally a great aversion having accustomed himself to do everything there for the love of god and with prayer upon all occasions for his grace to do his work well he had found everything easy during the 15 years that he had been employed there so you see how the the secrets of of karma yoga coming to us here through brother lawrence that whatever your task is whether you like it or not you know of course he says he says working in the kitchen he hated it i had a natural aversion to being there so what do you sit and think about that the whole time you're cutting vegetables no you cut the vegetables as a love letter to god like come here everything done in that consciousness everything done in your absolute absorption and in that moment given to the beloved here have some i'm doing this for you doing this with you as a part of you it becomes an expression of your ideal it becomes important something very mundane takes on an importance takes on a depth of profundity that it normally would have not been recognized normally would not have been seen that with him the set times of prayer were not different from the other times that he retired to pray according to the directions of his superior but that he did not want such retirement nor ask for it because his greatest business did not divert him from god what's that saying he understood that life is practice not the hour that you spend in the shrine in the morning or in the shrine in the evening that's not your practice life is your practice being your true self is your practice opening up that that ego nozzle to let this love that's infinite come out of you in an even open spread to everyone around you that's your practice not forgetting to to to be in conversation at this very moment with your sweet beloved that is practice you know riding the bus with the divine that's that's practice taking a walk and greeting the divine at the stoplight that's practice stopping and chatting with the homeless person you keep passing every single day you know stopping and saying hello asking hey what's up what's going on with you you know not making the assumption he needs or she needs something from you you're a human being they're a human being they are the divine sitting there talk to him her that they as it were be there with them if you have nothing to give them give them your humanity give them a human being that sees them that recognizes them that honors them you know this this is the call for us that for us the set times of prayer are not different from any other time that as he knew his obligation to love god in all things and as he endeavored to do so he had no need of a director to advise him but that he needed much a confessor to absolve him that he was very sensible of his thoughts but not discouraged by them all right so we are aware we're aware of our shortcomings but we're not troubled by them we don't get caught up in them not discouraged by them he confessed them to god but did not plead against him to excuse them when he had done so he peaceably resumed his usual practice of love and adoration so you make your mistakes you're aware of them you mention them to the beloved and you get on with it you just get on with it i was told a very beautiful thing by my very first guru he said to me the difference between a spiritual man and a worldly man is that when the spiritual man falls off the horse he will get immediately back on the worldly man will fall off the horse and realize he can't ride a horse you know don't let life defeat you always get up and try again a beautiful verse about love in corinthians that i read as often as i can love is patient love is kind love always helps you know love always believes always trusts see love keeps no record of wrongs so if god is love he's not keeping a record of wrongs he's not interested in that you know god always believes you may have fallen to the same fight six six billion times you may be the biggest fool in the world to get up and try again how who could ever think that you would ever accomplish any victory over that after this many years so what get up and try again because at least one is believing in you at least one has not given up hope in you at least one is dedicated to you and that is your beloved that is this present moment that is your existence your love and your intelligence be there be here now any questions or concerns or arguments all right be well sure are there questions yeah how do us like advice reconcile this concept of lawrence's god whom he clearly conceived as others yes well that's exactly it i'm going to go to my my spiel on advaita advice is not a practice you know all of the four paths are the practices to reach advaita so there's not a divided practice but the important thing to recognize in advaita is that it is not god that disappears it's you and so god has gone nowhere in advaita god is the one only real thing you are the one unreal thing in the room and so this notion of other anything that you don't think of as yourself is the divine you know anything anything on the other side of the wall of ego unless you've managed to become egoless which let's talk about that you know if you've managed to become egoless then you're right you know there's only one without a second who are you praying to if you're not egoless god is the one that lives on the other side of your white picket fence you know as perfect love the love that your ego is preventing you from expressing god is perfect action he's on the side you know that that your ego has prevented you from accomplishing uh you know god god is that so that for the advice it's to know that that you are still in the midst of that one without a second whose nature is satchit ananda and your relationship with this is-ness is the same you may not call it god you may not have a name for it but you are still soaking in the same syrup of love that the rest of us are you're still inundated with the presence of divinity because of your own nature because of what it is that wakes you up in the morning because of what it is that grows your awareness and lets you listen to your ear and lets you look through your eye and let you feel the skin you live in this is that relationship and it's rich and full for everyone all the time and to open to that it doesn't matter what path you're on it doesn't matter what what yoga you are practicing they are they are all being pointed all pointing at that one same truth that satchitananda another question as the observer do we have voice is it different from the voice of the mind or is the voice just a part of the delusion uh yes yes and yes initially uh yes it's imagination initially it's just a voice in your own mind as you grow in your purity things will begin to occur to you that will make you wonder if it's just a voice in your mind anymore uh or not uh god you know god will inhabit the space that you give to her to inhabit in your life and it may take some time for the mind to purify down and the reason i say this is that you will actually learn from that voice in your mind and if it was just your own voice in your own mind you would not learn from it because it can only it can only say what you already know if it's your own voice but i will tell you that there will come a time in your practice where that voice will say something that you had not thought of that that voice will betray you a truth that you did not know and that you will be different for it so it is a matter of relationship it is a matter of reality now uh this idea of imagination in western culture we kind of poo poo that idea you know imagination is unreal and yet here we are in this building what built this building some architect imagined it and he manifested it and it became real what you imagine becomes real what you imagine you will manifest it is the nature of imagination to manifest itself so imagine yourself ever free ever pure ever blissful ever loving and you will be that imagine yourself bound and depressed and defeated you will be that so imagination shouldn't be so lightly taken it shouldn't be considered just the toy of of children with trucks in the sandbox imagination has built everything we see everything we experience so last question having a christian background yourself what message and graduated what message do you wish to convey to christians every denomination wow that's not my job from from what i from what it is be a christian look very closely at the life of jesus and be that that's you know you you don't you don't need to be a vedantist you don't need to be anything you need to be what you are at your very core and uh jesus can take you there buddha can take you there rama can take you there krishna can take you there your own self if you're dedicated to to eliminating me and mine from your mind that inner guru will wake up and take you there but it takes quite a bit of practice to be able to hear that guru above the voices of your body mind and the pleasures that they're looking for so you have to quiet the body and quiet the mind enough to hear the guru for that to be a viable path for you don't take it too early it will be disastrous so for christians do what you're doing just just know that it's bigger than that you know there was a time in this world where people knew god before any of the avatars had come before any of the scriptures had been written before any of the songs had been sung there was god and there was you and god was found and experienced so all of these writings and teachings are a great boon for us but they are not the thing itself the thing itself is this moment free and pure all right china you