Video 8

Vedic Christianity, Class 8 · Practice of the Presence of God · Swami Chidbrahmananda

[Music] where is this [Music] foreign [Music] oh [Music] this is [Music] oh [Music] my dreams [Music] be kind of [Music] who have taken shelter [Music] at once [Laughter] are we having technical difficulties tonight or i'm seeing mike's come and go [Laughter] so this letter tonight is brother lawrence writing to a friend or to a person and you'll see not fully willingly [Laughter] but uh trying to answer their questions and share with with them the secret people wanted to know the secret because he had accumulated such a joy of being such a bliss in just everyday work in his monastery as the cook that people were curious how did you do this what's going on how is it that you're so happy that you're having to hide this happiness that you're actually having to control yourself from from ecstatic moods which would be a nice problem to have at least i'd trade a few of mine for it anyway so the first letter he says since you desire so earnestly that i should communicate to you the method by which i arrived at the habitual sense of god's presence which our lord of his mercy has been pleased to vouch safe to me i must tell you it is with great difficulty that i am prevailed on by your importunities and now i do it only upon the terms that you show my letter to nobody well i don't think that that happened here we are studying that letter but greatly happy or very happy and appreciative of this person for sharing it and for not throwing the letter away but the beautiful thing that he introduces here it's interesting that the same thing motivated him to share this insight as motivates god to move us forward in our spiritual quest and that is earnestness you know sri ramakrishna said that that he said three things are the most important thing and i used to always start my lectures with these three things so i'll wander in that direction tonight the three most important things according to the world's religions that i've stumbled upon so far anyway is of course the first one is love right from that we know from jesus to love the lord your god with all of your heart with all of your soul and with all of your strength and for the christian that there's a second one that says to love your neighbor as yourself in vedanta we are quite happy to have those as one that the highest worship we can offer to the beloved is to worship him or her in each one of us and to recognize that divinity that's there so that's the first the other the the other first of what is most important is sincerity and earnestness remember sri ramakrishna says if you're looking for the market you just need to walk out of your door with an earnest and sincere attempt to find the market and you're going to get there you'll just ask one person and they say oh go down that way to the right and ask the next person they said oh yes you're almost there a little bit farther it's down on the other side of the street you know eventually you get there and what got you there your brilliance your abilities no your earnest desire to find the market and so takor says that in this life if you are earnest and sincere in your prayer to know your nature and your prayer to know the truth of what this is be sincere and mother herself will take responsibility for getting you there she will come and take your hand and deliver you to the to the freedom that you're looking for and of course the third one the third first is truth it's it's a commitment to truth now uh what is what is truth well the truth they're talking about or one of the aspects of truth that they're talking about there is that inner alignment remember we've talked about that that three things should always be in alignment anybody remember what they are that's it your words your thoughts and your actions should always be the same if you're into hypocrisy or or into image you spruce up your image while the inside rots you know that's kind of like what jesus talked about that he says your whitewashed tombs outside you're painted so nicely white and decorated but inside you're full of dead men's bones you know you've you're going barking up the wrong tree so this truth is presenting yourself as you are being courageous about what you are being honest and straightforward about it and saying thinking and doing things that are in alignment so you don't have different behaviors for different people and different truths for different friends you're a single person because the most important thing to you is honesty straightforwardness so those three are the most important things so this earnestness that this person is making this request is being answered with this letter even though he's not really into it you can see this method by which i arrived at the habitual sense of god's presence which our lord of his mercy has been pleased to vouch safe to me so it's interesting we're asking brother lawrence how did you do it and he's saying well you're asking me to tell you something that god did i i didn't do it it's not like i figured out the pieces you know i was just earnest and sincere in my effort and this is what came of it i must tell you that it is with great difficulty that i am prevailed on by your opportunities and now i do it only upon the terms that you show my letter to nobody and so in this sense he's protecting his ego trying to trying to prevent his ego from growing you know he from from worldly appearance he has accomplished something great and people are coming to him show us how you did it because we all believe ourselves to be the doers we all believe ourselves to be the ones running this action we haven't quite come to the understanding or to the accuracy of seeing the subtlety of knowing to recognize that this life is going on we're passengers we're observers of it the body and mind have their karma their wheel of samsara they roll on the body of mind know when they need to be fed they know how to cook the food they know they need to get money they know they have to work at the job to do it all of that's going to happen of its own accord of its own rhythm you are the observer of it all and watching it happen and when we come to that level of of perception that subtlety of perception when we've when we've begun paying a very close attention to how the mind works and how the body works and how this world unfolds we come to start to understand that we're responsible in the direct sense for very little that you know that very little now the danger in that is we would like to come to that realization fully right away and say i'm not responsible god i'm not the doer god's doing all this stuff well it's true but if you don't do the practice and you don't do the purifying of mind and the discernment of your your subtle self god may be doing it but you're going to be hurting for it you're you're going to pay be paying the karmic prices why because you haven't separated out your identity from the things that are doing from the body and from the mind you have not found yet or established yourself in that refuge of knowing the self as soul as spirit that the spirit is the container of all that happens that the spirit is not in what happens the soul is the stage with when which this entire world exists when swamiji says i'm not in alameda but alameda is in me these things are apparent to someone paying attention these things are apparent to someone who's who's who's hearing properly who's not constantly distracted whose mind isn't wandering in 12 14 maybe a thousand different directions at one time but who's able to take their mind observe something and keep the attention there until they understand its nature or to have that thought of god to be able in yourself to put your thoughts squarely in your center of divine love and hold it there and not be distracted by all the marvelous things that are going to begin to reveal themselves from that space you know that that warm flush feeling that generosity that wells up from within that that elation at just the miracle of being of uh not being distracted by the unknowing nature of everything you know how how things i mean this is god everything that you're seeing and hearing and experiencing is god and when that becomes starts to become apparent there's lots of things that are tempted to come up fear for one you're like whoa even vivicananda when when god when sri ramakrishna gave him that direct experience remember by touching his chest when they started to wrestle in the in his room and vivekananda himself says the room began to swirl i watched the walls fall away you know and i became i saw i just this infinite ocean of consciousness and as he was beginning to fall into that loss of ego his ego cries out he cries out because he's identified with that ego wait i have parents at home you know don't you know i've got friends and family there that want me to be here that don't want me to don't want me to merge you know don't let this happen so this there this is the reason that we have to do such work in order to establish ourselves in grace so that we're not hit by fear when that ego begins to diminish when that self when that idea of me as the doer begins to shake begins to wobble a little bit when when our real nature begins to undo some of our wrong observations some of our inaccurate assumptions to be able to let go and to let this new knowledge arise within is a very challenging uh situation and so uh he's he's protecting himself here from the sense of ego from the sense of doer you know he doesn't want the ego to come in and start getting the idea hey yeah i have done something pretty spectacular here you know and for the right price i might share it with you so he says i must tell you it's with great difficulty that i'm prevailed upon by your opportunities and i do it only upon the terms that you show my letter to nobody if i knew that you should let it be seen all the desire that i have for your advancement would not be able to determine me to it so he's pretty determined to protect to protect to not have that egoistic perception or idea of himself and so this secrecy and this is the reason also we've mentioned this before that within our tradition it's not customary to tell people about your holy dreams or to tell people about your visions or to tell people about your spiritual experience it's not that it's illegal it's not like you're not allowed to do that but you run a great risk at doing it the way swami prabhupada shared it with me he said when you have one of these experiences whether it's you know whatever it is let's pick a grand one you see you see shining letters of a mantra appearing in fire in front of you in the world you know as you're going on that's one of his visions so you have one of these what happens he says is that that energy that ojas said that that prana that divine energy that becomes everything that that manifests as you that energy is completely free and undefined inside and it can be used to and focused to bring your to bring your awareness to bring you up up into a higher consciousness into a higher understanding that energy can also be used you know to for your vices as well and that energy can become crystallized into ego also so if you have one of these wonderful experiences and you run outside and share it with the motive of wanting people to know that you've had an amazing experience you want people to know that you're of a certain accomplishment in spiritual life well you've taken one of the most beautiful gifts that you've been given and you've used it to build ego you've used it to increase your delusion about what you are and so that's why someone as spiritual and as established as our brother lawrence is would be so adamant about not having that happen he does not want this beautiful thing that has happened to him this gift from the divine that has been given to him he does not want it to become the thing that builds his delusion that that that exacerbates his ability to see not to his how am i going to say that exacerbate exacerbates his inability to see god maybe i think that parses out right anyway if i knew that you should let it be seen there's no way that this i could not motivate myself to write this down the account that i can give you is having found in many books different methods of going to god and diverse practices of the spiritual life i thought this would serve rather to puzzle me than to facilitate what i sought after which was nothing but how to become holy gods you know this this so he's saying there's lots of options out there he doesn't list the ford vedantic ideas that gyana yoga raja yoga karma yoga bhakti yoga but it's the same idea there's lots of practices out there that can bring us to god and he thought you know getting involved in all that and having to learn all of that just seemed like it was too much for me i didn't want to get caught up in that i didn't want to i didn't want to become religious i didn't want to become highly educated in in religiosity or philosophy i just wanted to know how can how can i just make myself completely god's how can i just give myself completely over how can i possibly do that he said this made me resolve to give the all for the all a very simple way of receive perceiving it if i want everything which is to be holy gods to be entirely given to the develo to the beloved then i should give everything i should give my all for all so after having given myself holy to god that he might take away my ignorance take away my sin take away my wrongdoing take away my my wrong thinking the things that i've held on to that's gotten me into this predicament of living a life that somehow doesn't seem to be fulfilling of living a life where everything that i want always seems to be one more step away from where i am you know it's like i get a raise and it's not two days before i'm thinking about the next one you know i come back from my vacation and the second i sit down in my cubicle i'm ready to go for the next one next you know the year the year is is too long for that two weeks and so i'm living this life and you have two options you either have to face this beast head on you know to find that honesty to do the work that needs to be done in order to to fix that situation or you need a string of distractions you need powerful distractions you need lots of friends you need lots of money you need lots of activities you need lots of clubs you need lots of all kinds of things to hide from the truth that there's nothing in this world that you're going to find fulfilling it's a tall order and it takes a courageous person to accept that and to keep going to keep looking until you find that thing that is being implicated by this world for you i renounced for the love of him everything that was not he and i began to live as if there was none but he and i in the world so he sets himself up here a little bit of a of an imagination as at first so first of all my motive is love i'm dealing with god on the level of love i'm going to do this because i love the divine i love love i love love itself my highest ideal is to live for love you know there was a time when after i'd been in the monastery for like six years where i went through a little bit of a crisis of faith and i was sitting there trying to think are you sure like you know i was i was sitting in that shine and i was like wow dude you've done a pretty extreme thing here are you sure you know that and i sat there thinking okay well what am i doing you know what what exactly am i going up for what if what if i've thrown my entire life into this practice and it turns out that there's nothing what if i just die and it's over i said okay well let's let's say that that's true what am i doing i'm living for love i'm on a quest to be the most loving caring compassionate person that i can possibly be does that not sound like a good enough endeavor even if there are no bells and whistles even if i assume all these things that i own in faith don't exist does that make a difference because i have to live this life it's here in front of me it's an opportunity for something and what better thing to spend it on than love than on intelligence than on mining or indulging in the very sense of being which is one of my favorite things these days just that being uh you can find so much bliss in a moment if you're having a really difficult day if if things get really dark for you if you just shut down for a minute close your eyes and just become aware don't think about anything in particular don't use the mind shut the mind down and try to just become aware of all the signs that you are feel your whole body feel the air going in and out watch the mind toy with it a bit see how it can do and and be whatever you want it to do and be in its moment you know sit there and lift a finger and ask yourself how is that possible how is that happening i don't know any of the mechanics i have no awareness of any of the possibilities and all i i don't even have to be aware of the thought lift my finger and it happens just start paying attention shut down and become aware don't project don't don't analyze just shut up and become aware of how little you know and instead of freezing up around that embrace it and find it to be wonderful find it to be truly exhilarating that you can do this without having any idea how it happens that this that that this life can be lived with almost no knowledge whatsoever and that if you can open to that and embrace that chances are something authentic is going to find itself something authentic is going to brighten your day and it's a very simple way of of of dealing with a lot of the trials that go on in a day a lot of the meaninglessness you know i used to work in an accounting office at one time 23 of us together in a cubicle farm and at that time i had no no interest in spiritual life it was it was that that weary task of a cubicle farm that eventually moved me in that direction because how do you at 45 run around a cubicle maze and find a meaningful life how does that happen this is how that happens becoming aware of the presence of the divine and living for love so that you're not running around cubicle farm trying to get anything from it you're there to love that's your job incidentally you're an accountant right we've talked about that incidentally you're an engineer incidentally you're a bus boy incidentally you're a waitress in reality you're the lord you are love itself and your job is not what your badge says your job is deeper and richer than that it's to love and that's how you make working in an accounting office important that's how you make working in a cubicle farm inspiring that's how it becomes a fulfilling life when you generate love and relationship between every single person in that office when people start depending on you and sharing with you and coming to you and encouraging you and asking you for encouragement when you become [Music] the mitigator of love freely giving freely handing it out because why because you've come to know that's what you are that's who you are and when you know who you are when you manifest that authentically your life is automatically fulfilling your life is automatically enriched and your sense of purpose is deepened so i renounced everything for the love of him everything that was not him and i began to live as if there was none but he and i in the world think about that one that seems like a very simple statement i began to live as if there was no one but he and i in the world what does that imply that implies that if he's if he were me sitting in this room he would assume that there was no one in this room but he and god so i assume that this would play the role of he and you and you and you would play the role of his beloved and so how does he act toward his beloved he's deeply respectful right he's deeply adoring he wants only the best he would give only the best because he's doing all of this why he said for the love of god so he's going to treat you in every way for the love of god he's going to see his beloved in your eyes and his action with you is going to be his prayer to his beloved to the divine there's a beautiful richness being set up here a beautiful depth just from this little setup that i'm going to get up today and know there is no one in this world but me and god god's nature i know as love intelligence and existence itself my own nature doesn't matter i'm going to live for the love of love i'm going to live for the sake of being sometimes i considered myself before him as a poor criminal at the feet of his judge at other times i beheld him in my heart as my father as my god i worshiped him the oftenest that i could keeping my mind in his holy presence and recalling it as often as i found it wandered from him so he's talking here about something that takes a certain amount of awareness that's what we're working on that's why we meditate we meditate to build up that awareness we meditate to increase that sensitivity toward being we meditate to be able to hold the mind on a single thought until that thought reveals its nature to sit and look at the idea of god long enough with steady enough vision that it manifests it reveals itself to us so he's saying i sometimes considered myself before him as a poor criminal at the feet of his judge at other times in my heart as a father you know so this relationship takes on different forms based on the ex the situation at hand whether whether you are a judge or whether you're my father or whether you're my lover all of the relationships that you have with what you think are other people in your life are actually relationships with god to become aware of that will change the nature of them to become aware of that will deepen them to become aware of that will open the floodgates within you and release you from the fear that makes you mitigate your love or to hand out your love in little pieces based on reward you know based on time space and causation it will allow you to just open the floodgate because you are infinite there is no end to that love everybody can be your favorite and you will not exhaust yourself in showing it you know because it's not necessary i held him in my heart as my father as my god i worshiped him the oftenest that i could so in everything everything that you do becomes an act of worship right from karma yoga he's he's he's doing karma yoga here where everything is worship every interaction with every person when done with the awareness of god of the presence of the divinity in that person anything that you do with that awareness is going to automatically be worship on your part so worshipping doesn't happen in a shrine worshiping doesn't happen just during a puja or a formal ritual worship worship happens any time you recognize god in something anything around you and let the authentic reaction happen that's worship to be in the presence of god is worship because you will respond no other way than with that motiveless reaction to love that pure and unadulterated reaction to is-ness when it's recognized as being motivated and rooted in love in god so he did it as often as he could he would worship keeping my mind in his holy presence and recalling it as often as i found that it wandered from him so just constantly bringing it back to an awareness of the presence of god to be aware of the presence of god doesn't take your whole mind that doesn't mean you can't go to work it doesn't mean that you can't ride your bicycle that oh my gosh my mind's off god i have to stop riding the bike get it back okay now i'm thinking of god i hope i can ride the bike at the same time the awareness of god frames everything and enables you to be deeply involved in everything without being deeply attached to everything because things lose their individual nature and become manifestations of that one to you so you know that the love that you're enjoying with this person in front of you right at this moment does not have anything to do with that person as a particular it's because that same divinity that is everywhere is in that person and so when that person goes away you don't have to miss that person because that which you love in that person is in the chair is in the next person is in your own heart is in everything that you're tasting touching smelling seeing or hearing that is the nature of being that's how attachment is removed that is how we stop clutching uh things of this world trying to make temporary things permanent trying to make things that pass away stay and that's when the misery ends because our misery all of our misery comes from our attachment our desire to have temporary things become permanent because we haven't understood their nature i found no small pain in this exercise he's just as frustrated as you are with his mind you know when you sit down to meditate you've got great hopes and dreams i'm gonna see god today and you sit there and you find yourself snoring and then you wake up and you're drooling and then you realize that your head you only woke up because your head hit the pew in front of you you know these things so it's no small amount of pain and certainly when you practice the presence of god this divine love this divine perfection what happens you become acutely aware of your shortcomings when you have god in your mind all the time you become acutely aware of the rats that are running around in there you know you become acutely aware that you didn't clean the kitchen of the mind before you invited god in and so you know that discomfort is there you have to face what you are you have to face the beast when you're selfish you're going to have to recognize it you're going to have to see it and own it and then you're going to have to let go of it you know even though your pride wants the other person to apologize first you're not going to wait for that you've got the presence of god within you and that's going to make everything brutally important to resolve so i'm saying this and mother's there laughing even in my own mind right now putting her list together oh okay monk how about this what about this situation you've ignored so far for weeks at a time you know indeed it can be painful but it's grace and faith in love that is everything in that situation that's what gives you to know that with the divine presence being such a pure love there's no recoil or punishment on the part of god for the condition of your mind that disadvantage is built into the restless mind itself the suffering isn't because of god making you suffer the suffering is because you who are that divine are having to be separated from it because the light is too bright because the demand for truth is too high because because uh any number of things and so we tend to we tend toward uh distraction we tend toward not seeing not paying attention we tend toward delusion because in this world the only comfort that it has ever offered us is that distraction a moment's peace from our pain that's the reason people get get get sidetracked into drinking it's not their love of the alcohol it's for a moment they find peace from their suffering find peace from this separation from god find peace from not knowing from not having any idea what's going on in this world you know this this is why people do the things that they do in this world not because they're horrible people but because they don't know what else to do they're clutching at anything they can clutch to find that simulate that semblance of god that semblance of peace that semblance of of tranquility inside you know this is why taquer says why god says why jesus says why buddha says take refuge in the divine alone take refuge and truth alone take refuge in love alone you know take the name of god and that is your refuge that's where you go it's going to be hard you'll see a lot of things that you don't like you'll see a lot of things that need to be changed you'll see so many things you'll feel discouraged it'll feel impossible but mother will teach you that none of these things have anything to do with your success because your success is from grace your success is the fruit of love and the recognition of the divinity within you and everything i found no small of pain in this exercise and yet i continued it notwithstanding all the difficulties that occurred without troubling or disquieting myself when my mind had wandered involuntarily i made this my business as much all the day long as at the appointed times of prayer so he recognized and he he says a lot of these things over and over and why does he say these things over and over the same reason that ramakrishna said things over and over the same thing that jesus the same reason jesus said things over and over because we've heard all of this before and we're still sitting here tonight in as much ignorance almost as the first time we heard these things right we have to hear them again and again and again because the mind is going to wander again and again and again and we have to find the patience to just keep bringing it back keep bringing it back and not let that become the point not let the bringing it back become the practice but the enjoyment of the presence of god is where we keep our attention the the the enjoyment of the presence of god the security the inspiration of the presence of god that's where we keep our mind as we keep bringing it back keep bringing it back we don't let the struggle become the experience it's always off to the side yes i struggle but my attention is on the presence of god on the presence of pure love on the nature of love without condition and he makes this his business as intensely all day long as during the hour of prayer so when you were doing your meditation this evening in rit you saw how carefully you were watching you were mine maybe you saw for that hour you were caught you were really trying to bring it back he's saying don't stop that at the end of the hour don't stop that when you walk out of this room keep that practice alive keep all day long using the same intensity of practice as you do during your set times of prayer always be as aware of your mind as you are during meditation as you are during worship as you are during prayer i made it my business as much all the day long as at the appointed times of prayer for at all times every hour every minute even in the height of my business i drove away from my mind everything that was capable of interrupting my thought of god wow wow can you take for at all times every hour every minute even in the height of my business i drove from my mind everything that was capable of interrupting my thought of god not everything that was interrupting my thought of god he didn't let it get to that point he drove out everything that was capable of drawing his mind away from god if you wonder what it means when jesus says love the lord your god with all of your heart all of your mind and all of your strength this is what that means that at all times every hour every minute at the height of your busiest part of the day you are driving from your mind everything that even has the capability of distracting you from the presence of your beloved from the presence of pure love and from that being your own nature from the inspiration of life so to have that commitment that dedication is what it means to love the lord your god with all of your heart soul mind and strength it's also what it means to love your neighbor as you love yourself that you look around at people and never once do you forget your love and union with them every single person all day long you never look at them and get distracted by how dirty they are you never look at them and get distracted by how fat they are how rich they are how ugly they are or how mean they are that you always bring your mind back to the god that dwells there and you use what you know of your own nature that that inner self that you've touched when you be when you start to get the suspicion that really there is the image of the beloved within me that there really is this endless well of love within me at that time when you begin to know it in yourself at that time you will begin to assume it in others because in this world one of the interesting things that you'll come to know as you're trying to become aware of not being the doer will become the fact of how little that you know about anything out there and all i ever know of you is what i know of myself that i project on you right i have zero access to your mind i have zero access to your experience to your history to to all of the things that are in your mind at this very moment i will never know them i could have that conversation my whole life with you and still still not know everything that's there so what do i do when i say that i know somebody what do i do when i say i know who this person is i take what i know of myself and i project it i project it on them when they do this they mean that because when i do this i mean that here we come to this alignment those people that we like are the people most like us why because we can know them the deepest because they seem to be like we are and so we can assume an intimacy but it's a it's it's fake it's foe you will never know what you will know is the nature of divinity and that divinity in them is the same as the divinity in you and experientially you'll know that oneness one day that intimacy can come with everybody equally only through the recognition of the presence of god everywhere all the time it's the only way to do it you won't be able to love everyone equally for any other reason it won't happen but someday this will happen you'll recognize your beloved everywhere and the love that you will feel will be unstoppable such has been my common practice ever since i entered in religion and though i have done it very imperfectly yet i have found great advantages by it so this is that this is that tenacious insistence on his part i did it imperfectly it took him we know from the up from other places in the writing that it took him 15 years to perfect this ability to think of god at all times it took him 15 years of mistakes 15 years of watching his failures 15 years of becoming aware of his shortcomings 15 years of practice failed and he didn't give up he didn't get a complex about being a lousy person he didn't get small because he called himself weak as a matter of fact he tells us again and again i just didn't pay attention if i found myself that had wandered my mind had wandered i just lifted it up and put it back on god and kept going made my apology oops sorry about that and just kept on going such has been my common practice ever since i entered religion and though i've done it imperfectly yet i have found great advantages by it these i well know are to be imputed to the mere mercy and goodness of god why did he grow because i worked really hard no because god is kind because god is loving i i this happened because god's love is great and and i've i found my way here because god showed me the way here you see all of that thinking sets him free from ego ego creates anxiety oh i did it once i hope i can do it again oh i had such a great meditation yesterday i hope i can make it happen again so that kind of thinking creates anxiety and that anxiety creates discouragement and that discouragement breaks down practice and that breaking down practice encourages distraction and distraction makes you forget your nature makes you forget who you are unnecessarily these i well know are to be imputed to be the mere mercy and goodness of god because we can do nothing without him how do you know that because of satchitananda god is your existence you know i'm going to say this every time we get together because it's fundamentally beautiful your very existence the very the very fact that you know what you mean when you say i is god's presence it god you know i make this distinction simone weil that great sage from from france is where i learned this idea from that that god isn't god doesn't exist god is existence he's the noun of these things he's the absolute the unchanging reality the perfection that has no imbalance no movement no adjustment solid he's not loving she is love itself she is not intelligent she is intelligence itself all of us are the verb we are the manifestation of that absolute you are loving you are intelligent you exist but god is that existence that you're manifesting god is that love that you are manifesting god is the intelligence that allows you to understand what you fling against your mind as the senses pour in their information to the mind the fact that you know is because of god the fact that you are is because of god the fact that you can recognize love having never been taught it is because of god god is your very life in an absolute real experience experienceable way know that dance in that fill yourself up to intoxication with that because this cannot be taken from you it cannot be lost it cannot be forgotten it is the one permanent immortal thing that is yours forever these i well know are to be imputed to the mere mercy and goodness of god because we can do nothing without him and still less than any and i s and i still less than any but when we are faithful to keep ourselves in his holy presence and set him always before us this not only hinders our offending him why because those things things don't get to come to fruition you know your your tendencies to selfishness your tendencies to delusion if you live in the presence of god they can't get past the start right they can't get past the start they can't actually become something to create a state of mind you need us several thoughts purchased in succession in ignorance to put your mind into a mood to put your mind into a state if you are in the presence of god and aware of that divinity you can't get past that first thought your mind doesn't go into states your mind doesn't go into moods you know you reserve your sense of being separate and independent free of the mind the mind can have its its conniptions you're just looking through them so when you hear yourself say i know that there are only three things that you can say i love i think i'm intelligent i am those are the only three things that belong to you those are the only three unchangeable immortal things that identify you if you say i'm angry you've lied your mind is angry and you might be looking through an angry mind but it is impossible for you to be angry you are unconditioned love if you say i'm depressed you've lied you are bliss itself your mind may be depressed you may be looking through a depressed mind but you are ever free and that choice is yours know that separation insist on that separation and remind yourself of the three things that are always true i am love i exist i'm intelligent and don't let go of them hold on to them all the time but when we are faithful to keep ourselves in his holy presence and set him always before us this not only hinders our offending him and doing anything that may displease him at least willfully but it also begets in us a holy freedom and if i may so speak a familiarity with god wherewith we ask and that successfully the graces we stand in need of this isn't that lovely just this beautiful fondness for god that is born of thinking about her him it that this wonderful freedom that becomes yours why because you're not driven by the body and mind anymore you're not driven by the sense of lack you see when we come to this idea if i tell you this moment you're absolutely free you're absolutely free what's the first thought in your mind going to be no okay that's that's not the one i had in mind but it's not a bad one all right not yet or what do i do what do i want to do i'm absolutely free obviously i should do something right we immediately give into obligation why because that's the only thing we've known of freedom identified with body mind freedom means i get to obey a desire obedience is not freedom freedom is to have no desire because desire is born of need and need is born of slavery know your identity as the immortal ever free ever pure self hold on to that ideal and don't subject yourself to the idea of body the idea of mind which is just a limitation and a restriction that cuts you off from the rest of your nature that limits your expression of love that defines your dance to be free is to have no desire because it's to know god to know the self as soul and that soul is not broken into pieces it's not hungry it's not lonely it's not old it's present it's here it's dynamic it cannot be defined it cannot be captured in any thought or concept it cannot be named even it's always more than what you think and that's the beauty of this relationship with god it will never be mastered you know swami brahmananda right my favorite thing about swami brahmananda he said that spiritual life begins at nervy culpa samati you know that once you see god once you know that union with the beloved you've just begun and what have you just begun you've just begun to fall in love because you will fall in love forever because god is infinite you will never fully know the love that god has for you never because it cannot be measured you cannot find its end you cannot find its limit spiritual life is about falling in love forever with god with love itself but it also begets in us a holy freedom not driven by body mind and if i may speak a familiarity with god wherewith we ask and successfully for the graces that we stand in need of in fine by often repeating these acts they become habitual and the presence of god rendered as it were natural to us give him thanks if you please with me for this great goodness towards me which i can never sufficiently admire and in that lies the secret to holy life to becoming a saint that's how you become a saint right there when you when you are faced with grace when you are faced with with the abundance of mercy that the divine has toward you and all of your failings when you come to know that when you come to believe that when you come to trust in that and that becomes the inspiration for your day that becomes the inspiration for you getting up and starting that's how you become a saint that's how saints are born it's a reaction to the reality of an infinite grace what's that famous that's saying i like to repeat that infinite grace requires an infinite humility to accept it which i can never sufficiently admire for the many favors he has done to so miserable a sinner as myself may everything praise him may everything praise him amen i am in our lord yours and that's the first letter beautiful any questions concerns arguments yeah i'm glad the fact that you're willing to say that out loud begets a great hope uh it is true because we keep those things in our mind because we like them you know that's that's the hard thing to accept in spiritual life the reason you haven't realized god is because you don't want to it's not because you've got something to do or that you have something to fix it's because you don't want to you you enjoy your life as it is for the most part you make a few adjustments here and there but you're contented you know yes there's some suffering yes there's a little that but by and large i'm comfortable with my life i know who i am i know how to ride the bus i know how to get to work things are working i don't want any of this unknown you know i i don't want i don't want to let go and drop into infinite love i don't care how good it is i don't want to let go i'm not going to do it yes that's it and so we have to battle that that's what that's why discernment has is so important we have to we have to come to understand how much suffering we're actually going through by insisting on our ignorance we're not aware of it because we we very conveniently stopped being aware of it you know because we've accepted as accepted it as reality how this is the way life is not really it can be so much more but will you take the risk you know that's the question will you take the risk yes when i was like four years old i knew clearly this lifetime is for premium yes i've worked until now i feel like i've arrived there i feel totally free but it's scary as hell yes so you were talking about the freedom so we should not want anything now or when we're told where is he going now i have to let go and paul yes yes well it's a matter this moment is divine this moment is the only reality right so the first thing you have to let go of is any notion of a past because that prevents you from being free that determines how you act that determines what you're going to do from this forward this time forward if you own the story of who you are so you have to let go of the past by letting go of the past you become aware of the perfection of the moment there's no longer these attachments which are making the moment seem like it's missing something and because the moment doesn't seem like it's missing anything that's the dismissal of desire the future the future lays out all of your desires because you have to come up with plans to get them right so if you let go of your attachments let go of your past that automatically will show you the perfection of the moment the perfection of the moment will unhinge all of the chains of future that was necessary for chasing after desire and in letting go of those two concepts they're not real there's nothing actually that you're letting go of because you can't show them to me now anyway you know say show me a piece of the past no you can't show me show me something from the future you can't there's only now and coming to understand that allows you to see that it's divine allows you to recognize god as the moment the i am the is-ness of the present and so doing those two things is the big task letting go of your story letting go of this identity of what you are the story of who i am and uh being in in in direct relationship with the moment so that you are manifesting not doing manifesting you're not calculating out the next move you're not taking in ideas and coming up with some plan of action you are simply fully present which means that your nature is fully engaged with existence you cannot take a wrong step you will always act from a place of selfless love if you can be fully present if you can let go of the past let go of the idea of future and just be here now yeah post the pandemic i am bankrupt kept afloat by kindness of friends i must push myself to earn money however i don't see myself as the doer as i practice living in the presence of god okay can you can you read it again yes after the pandemic he kept off by the kindness of friends but he must push himself to make money but he doesn't see himself as the doer because he's practicing the presence of god okay well uh that's a unique situation to not be the doer and to ask what needs to be done um so in that i mean it's it's really going to mother you know go if if you're going to do what brother lawrence is doing you do what's in front of you whatever it is you keep the presence of god actively aware in front of you and you go forward you go forward your karma is going to unfold the body and mind are going to carry their story forward no matter what it's your understanding that it's not your story and what comes will come you know don't don't form an idea around it but uh allow it i mean respond to the fact that your friends have done so much for you what does that make you want to do for your friends go do it you know whatever is motivated by the grace you've received is going to be a beautiful inspiration for action let it what comes of it who knows you know what what what manifests out of this time who knows you never did know you never will know you know the the that which is unfolding is god you will never understand it make yourself available to it and act out of what you know of yourself you know that you're that you're loving that you're intelligent and that you exist put it together allow it to work allow it to be or be homeless you know be a monk [Laughter] be completely unconcerned if you can and if you can't ask mother which restaurant you should work in [Laughter] and fill out the application yeah no this idea of not being the doer don't be deluded if you got up and took a shower this morning you consider yourself to be the doer you know it's this not being the doer is is one of the final realizations uh you can have the idea you can have an intellectual understanding of it but to actually know it is your your moments from realization it all that would have to happen is to have your guru whisper in your ear thou art that and you'd be free so uh know that that that you don't have an accurate picture of your reality which is what's causing the confusion be more move into a place where of more awareness as to what's really happening in your mind what's really happening in in your experience of being um and and be be in that place and i think mother will answer your question yeah okay yeah that's one of the giants uh you know saints saint simon of the mountain st simon of saint gregory of sinai i think that's it saint gregory of sinai great names for these monks but one of the things he says there's three beasts i named them in my blog the day two days ago three beasts are hunting you the first beast is the beast of forgetfulness forgetting your nature forgetting that your soul forgetting that you are content and fulfilled and need nothing he says the second beast is the beast of laziness not to be engaged to be to be idle and he says that gives birth to fantasy where you'll get wrong ideas about yourself ideas of pleasures of the past will play in your mind and then your mind will decorate them and make them look irresistibly beautiful and you'll be caught up in desire and lust and then the last one was oh goodness gracious there was the beast of forget from this uh the beast of ignorance the beast of uh what i can't remember the word but he uh talks about it in the sense that when you identify with body mind because of the first one the forgetfulness and then the laziness that that incurs because the body and the mind or the cause of laziness of that idleness the fantasies that are born of that give you a wrong idea of yourself and then you begin to take on issues that belong to things that are not you and you start to take on identities that cause you to act in ways that are contrary to your nature you know and so don't don't let that happen to say that i am not the doer that i understand that i'm not the doer and yet i have to get a job i understand that but chances are one of those beasts has gotten hold of something a fantasy about our own or actual position in life our actual state of being so just more more introspection more quiet sit more quietly for a while all right offer this to mother jaime swamiji you