The Natural State is effortless

We are together for you to realize what means to be in Satsang. I am trying to show you the importance of the Consciousness, of the mind disidentification. I am constantly saying there is nothing you afford to control, achieve or acquire. The only thing that matters in these meetings is this Consciousness, the disidentification with the mind.

You are identified with the mind. The only thing you need to figure out is how to perceive this mind's movement, and that is the key for the disidentification. "Perceiving" means "watching" yourself, but not by means of "someone watching" what happens, what goes on inside. In this very "watching", there is no "one" watching; it is a "watching" that demolishes the illusion of a "someone" within the mind.

In general, you believe you are thinking. So, there are you and the thought – this is the belief. What I am saying is that in this "watching" you discover "Stillness", the absence of the "thinker". Realize how truly fascinating this is. There is neither the thinker, nor the thought, but only the thought happening. Through this "watching", the thought´s movement loses its bolstering energy, its energy to move forward. Therefore, this "watching" or "perceiving" demolishes this thought movement, when this Stillness assumes, the Natural State of Meditation. In this "watching", there is neither the watcher nor anything to be watched; but only Stillness. This is Real Meditation, and there is no method to lead you to it. There is no system to quiet yourself; it happens naturally.

What people have been practicing out there, the so called "meditation", is no Real Meditation. To those searching for a mere meditation practice, there are plenty of them available in the market, but none of them can reveal this Natural State, nor provide Real Awakening. The reason behind is that a meditation technic or mind quieting system, will still lead you to a mere "state" and such "state" cannot be the Natural State.

Your Natural State, the Real State, is not a "state", and this such an important thing you got to understand – if you do not realize this, you will spend your next sixty years engaging in some technique or practice, but this won't reveal your Natural State. I repeat it: the Real State is not a "state", it is the Total Presence, the complete absence of this "me", of "someone". When the Real Meditation is present, "you" are not there! In this Natural State, there is no longer body mind identification; the concept "I am the body", "I am a person" is no longer embedded into yourself. All this burden and strain disappear.

The Natural State is effortless. Right now, at this very moment, there is only the "watching" without interpretations, comparisons, judgments, without any idea. In this "watching", the Natural State is revealed, the Meditation, pure Intelligence, Consciousness. Thus, there is no "one" watching and speaking, neither anybody understanding nor misunderstanding.

There is the Natural State, when you are not identified neither with the body-mind, nor with the external environment, with the world around you. This happens because the external world, the world around you, is only a perception of the five senses. That is, once disidentified with the body, you will also not identify with the external environment, that is nothing more than senses perception.

Therefore, What You are in your Natural State, cannot be found in the outside world, in any object. This cannot be caught, just like Freedom, or like Love, that you are also unable to catch; It is like Peace, that cannot be hold. You cannot fit THAT into concepts nor into thoughts or mind descriptions.

The first and foremost thing here is solely Being, is your Natural State, is Meditation. Consciousness, this body mind disidentification, is Real Meditation. No effort is required from the "person", because effort always entails accomplishments and here the matter is to relax in your Being; it is not a matter of doing something, but of giving up to do anything. This is effortless because you are THAT fundamentally and essentially! In fact, you just have to give up striving to do something in order to be "someone", in order to have something. This is very simple somehow, but it gets very difficult because you are addicted to doing and to looking for something.

Therefore, there cannot be any intention to such attention. Self-inquiry requires full attention, but not implied by a personal intention, frequently founded on desire, on fear, on the pursuit of being something, of being "someone". The matter here is this "watching", this "perceiving" that means simply to give up!

*Online meeting transcription originally held on June 27th, 2018. First published in Portuguese on August 27th, 2018. For further information about our meetings, please click here.

Self-realization is a remembrance

It is important that everybody here recognizes this subject is not something to be learned about. Self-realization is a remembrance, but the fact is that you are not able to remember What you are without allowing yourself time to accomplish this.

Satsang basically means the joy of being "free" from "yourself", from this "me", this false "me". The problem lies in the fact that people never have time to be idle, since they are always busy and in the puisuit of further occupations; they don't free up neither time nor space for that, because their own things make them too busy. The more things they accomplish in the outside, the more they have to strive to keep them. This way, people do not free themselves time up to investigate the nature of Reality, because they avail themselves of time to service this "oneself", to maintain what the "person" has built and preferably to build further, and all this means fear, suffering, and worries.

Therefore, is the wealthiest person the one who possesses things or that one free from worries about pursuing possessions? Who has time to investigate the illusory nature of oneself? The one worried about keeping accomplishments of this "me" or that one willing to give up this "me" and all its possessions or believed possessions? I am going to reformulate the question: who is ready for Happiness? Is it the one who has possessions or that one who is investigating the nature of this illusory possessor of things? Who is truly a Sage? Is it the one searching externally for fulfillment – in things, people and goods, or that one engaging solely in the investigation of this "oneself" illusion and of how foolish is to attain things in the outside? Then, what is real ignorance and Real Wisdom?

When people come here and say this is not easy, I look at them and ask: "Is your life easy?" People say this is quite difficult, but I say I consider quite hard the way they are living their lives. I consider very painful to live in suffering, with attachments, frustrations and full of desires that are never achieved – because they end up turning into new desires. To live in the ego is trully hard! To live thinking, to live worried is an overburden...

So, as I've said in the beginning, it is just a matter of remembering THIS, and not of learning about IT. You believe you are a person, you were born and you will die, and I say: You are God! You are Consciousness! Your Nature is undying, timeless, spaceless, pure Presence, pure Reality. Your Presence, the Presence of all, is the Presence of Happiness! I am saying your Presence IS Happiness, and not that Happiness will once reach you. Happiness will neither be found nor acquired – IT is You! That is why Happiness, Love, Peace, and Freedom are unattainable in the outside world; there is only frustration in the outside world.

Basically, what I mean is: abandon everything! You got to abandon everything in the outside world psychologically! You can do that! This is my invitation to you in Satsang. This time dedicated to this is tremendously necessary to Awakening. Stay with the beauty of this Awakening, of this Truth blossoming, of this supreme Freedom. Remembering THIS means you end the suffering, the illusion, the ignorance about yourself.

*Online meeting transcription originally held on February 23rd, 2018. First published in Portuguese on August 30th, 2018. For further information about our meetings, please click here.

What is Reality?

Hello everyone! Welcome to Paltalk! It is great to be together with you to investigate the Nature of the Self. What is your reality? The thought, likewise the feeling, has created a reality: the experience of this moment through thought and feeling ... The mind manages to provide a reality to this – the reality created and imagined by the mind.

The question to you is: What is Reality? There is the Reality and the "reality" created by the mind. The essence here is to realize this inquiry opportunity and to assume it as something real to your life ... It is to put all your heart into it, to avail all your energy to this great discovery of the Truth about yourself, of the Reality.

Today, I live days of Reality. I notice how distressed people are in the mind, trying to make up ways of fulfillment and of "peace and freedom", "love and happiness" provision. However, they are falling into this trap over and over, posed by the "reality" created by the mind, thereby "drying up ice" ... You can try this as far as you want, as long as you want, but the ice will never dry out. Nobody, until present time, had never been able neither to dry up ice, nor to be happy being "someone" making choices, decisions, working in their projects.

You have already attended college, gotten a fiancée or a fiancé, married, rented or bought a house, had two children or half a dozen. You have already become a businessman, you have already had a Rock band (or discovered that you have a good voice to sing and then you became the lead singer of a band), you have already become popular and now you have many fans, you travel around the world, but you are still trying to stifle this unhappiness availing yourself of drugs and other stuff.

It is not possible to dry up ice. It is not possible to be happy. Happiness is not something you achieve, you work for, work for and accomplish it. The more you look for it, the further you get away from it indeed. The "ice" is always in the outside and there is no way you can realize the Truth outside – what I meant as mind "reality". You got to go beyond the mind, beyond your personal experience.

The sense of person poses a great boundary. It is the only self-limitation. Your dreams are based on this, they are part of the mind, of this illusion of being "someone". When you move yourself, you move away from yourself, because every movement goes outwardly, to the outside. There is no movement at this moment. Therefore this is not something you achieve or attain, but that you witness at this moment as the only Reality here and now.

This is not the mind reality, because its reality lies in the space and time concept. The things created and searched by the mind lie within space. The feeling of having attained as well as the process to get there lies within time. This is the mind reality, the reality of the "me" , of this person you believe you are.

So you need time and space. That is why the mind is very ambitious – it loves having things, trying to fullfill itself with objects, friendships, relationships ... living surrounded by a large crowd. The mind behavior always turns toward this direction: huge amounts of things, people and information. It is always escaping in its limitation, always seeking to fullfill this limitation with infinite things. This movement only creates confusion, because the more things it has, the more afflicted and limited it feels.

One curious thing about the mind is that everything it touches, it gets old, thereby providing no more fullfillment and entailing the mind to replace it. Any new thing you find, like a car, a house, a boyfriend or a husband gets old a few weeks, days, hours or even minutes later. Everything the mind touches gets old outright implying on the replacement desire. At first, the mind feels excited and fulfilled, valued and complete, attempting to "dry up ice", that is, to find happiness in its things.

Whithout the mind, nothing is old nor new. Listen to this: whithout the mind, there is no place for things, no time for projects, desires or dreams. Whithout the mind, there is only the Unique, True Reality and not the mind reality (time, space, objects, accomplishments, dreams, desires). When the mind reality is not present, the Reality of this moment is this Consciousness, this Presence, this Love, this Peace, this Happiness, the Reality of Being, the Reality of God.

Is this simple or complex? You are here to find out you are Here. What I mean is the following: being here is the only Reality. Being Here Is To Be! Now is Here, beyond time and space. Beyond the mind is Here, and there is nothing beyond That. So, this is God's Realization, the Realization of Happiness.

When you are in Satsang, something happens causing the perception of time and space to vanish. It happens because you are Here. It can last maybe three clock seconds, but you do not need three seconds to realize the unique place is Here and the only Real thing is Here, where there is no sense of a "me" making choices, having desires, full of small or big stuff, and so on.

This message has this purpose: to make you realize the only Reality is here. "Here" is the place where your Being loses track of time and space... Here! We can apply any word to replace that expression, yet we are pointing out to What is spaceless and timeless... Here!

OK! See you next meeting! Namaste!

*Online meeting transcription originally held on July 21st, 2017. First published in Portuguese on September 07, 2017. For further information about our meetings, please click here.

The greatest and most outstanding challenge of your life

This is another opportunity to turn to the ever present Reality. Satsang is the opportunity to an encounter with the Grace. The word "Satsang" represents the encounter with God, the encounter with the "Sat" (Being).

Everyone is connected to the illusion, because everyone considers him/herself "someone", and he or she is paying a huge price for that. People relationships are on the basis of desire, fear, anxiety, pursuit of fulfillment in others, pursuit of recognition, of feeling loved, of being accepted, resulting in all forms of requirements and misery. This has been the price of illusion based relations – what I have called as "relationship".

Relationships have no Peace, no Freedom, no Love, no Truth. They are relations where something will always be demanded or searched, and such demanding behavior entails conflict, suffering, quite miserable things. One part always demands something of the counterpart, being this "counterpart" indeed his/her own self-insufficiency, his/her own neediness, his/her own unhappiness, his/her own misery in pursuit of something placed apparently in the outside.

The mind cannot reflect on this because it is unable to recognize its self-limitation. From the moment you get up in the morning on, you carry the sense of "person", demanding, desiring. It is essential to notice this self-limitation, to observe the mind insufficiency, to see all the distressing and conflicting movement where the mind is confined to. This is strictly required, since without it, you cannot take the leap beyond these boundaries, this suffering, this personality.

I am just portraying the movement of the "person", of the personality. The mind cannot think beyond the limitation of the personality. It is "successful" in this identification with this false "me". So when you come to Satsang, you face the greatest and most outstanding challenge of your life: to go beyond this fake life, the life of the "person", the life of this false "me", and thus to discover what means living in your true Divine Nature, in your true Self.

When you live in your Being, in your True Nature, there are no more requirements, no more desires nor fears. Thus, there is no more "requiring", but "offering". Love is this Freedom to provide, to donate. Love is wealth! Love does not beg, does not require, does not seek, does not wish. It has no longer any sign of this old egoic mind movement. You are Consciousness itself in your Being, you are Truth itself... You are God! There is no more "requiring" because there is this Totality, this Completeness. So you are completely sensitive, open... You are Free!

Only in Satsang it is possible to clearly see and perceive all this game play the ego has been getting into against itself, by means of supposed relations with others – actually, it happens to be always a relation between the ego and itself, in its incompleteness, loneliness and ignorance. You need to figure out how to go beyond this personality, beyond this false "me", dissolving that root. The oddest thing in all this is to speak of personality as if it were something real, and yet it is not.

You must undergo full and absolute Truth experience in order to trully find out this personality does not exist. This "me" is only a conditioning, a belief, a cultural and social model, a false movement of what we call "egoic mind". That personality you take for real, that "person" you believe you are is only a collection of experiences, memories, remembrances and beliefs. When you are offered this opportunity to investigate, being then able to realize this illusion, you cannot be caught anymore; this "sleep", this hypnotic state, this belief vanishes.

Some call It as Self-Realization, Awakening, Enlightenment... It is the end of illusion, of the sense of self-identity. Thus, life is present, but in its Totality, in this sensitivity and openness. There is no more that "you"!

This Silence, this Presence, this Grace, this Reality, this Natural State is called in India as "Sat-Chit-Ananda", that means, Being-Consciousness-Happiness. There are no more requirements, no more searches, no need from external things... You are Free and nothing and nobody can drag you back into unconsciousness, into the limitation.

*Online meeting transcription originally held on July 4th, 2018. First published in Portuguese on August 22nd, 2018. For further information about our meetings, please click here.

You got to go beyond the thought

Everything we know outlines what thought has been creating. So, throughout life, every contact you have is a contact with some mind creation, which is part of the mind itself. The contact with Reality or with the Truth is the contact with the Unknown.

Everything the mind can explore is a part of itself and you are too involved in this "thinking" stuff. The Unknown is this Reality presented moment by moment, but unable to be caught by the thought. Therefore, you have no means to access That through the habit of thinking, of making conclusions, of deducing, of imagining, and that is why Meditation is the foremost factor. Meditation is this break, this breach of mental representation of current happenings.

Therefore, you got to go beyond the thought. This sense of "person" you carry with you, this personality, is entirely settled in the thought, in the known and in the experiences you keep in your memory. Personality means thought! The mind cannot think beyond the personality, that embraces all your knowledge about yourself and the world around you. Here is the prison!

The mind cannot succeed without the personality, which can only exist on the basis of the thought. Therefore, thoughts ultimately represent memory. Notice how things work: thought itself is memory, and memory lays the groundwork for your personality. The mind cannot succeed without this personality, thereby resulting you are in a vicious circle, where you have the thought, that ultimately is memory, personality, mind. So, you spend your entire life within this cycle, referred by Indian Sages as "maya," the illusion. This creates this false center, this false identity, which you believe you are.

Any and all relationships you have in your life are bolstered this way: by the illusion of the known, by the illusion of memory, by the experience of this so-called "someone." Everyone around you is part of that movement. There are no "strangers," because they lay within that "knowned" boundaries, there are no "others," because "others" are embeded by that sense of the "me."

The situation may worsen when this personality projects and looks for assurance in its relationships, thereby envisioning the perfect world to live in! You got to understand this personality is delusion! "Your world" is delusion! Whenever you identify with the personality, memory, experience, knowledge, identity, these relationships, you will engage in delusion. So, now you understand that when we apply the term "ego," we mean delusion. I have been reinforcing this by saying, "You are a fraud!" Realize the value of what you call as "person": this has zero value! It has not even a negative value, but zero value!

When you give up the personality, no more pain or effort remains. When you realize how delusive this personality is, you are then working on this abandonment and you have no more reason to fight (you are constantly fighting, striving all the time to be "someone," to attain, to reach, to accomplish, to do something). I know how demotivating these words seem to you. Everybody wants to reach something, that's why people are working: they aim to change the world, to save themselves, to protect themselves, to defend themselves; they want to go somewhere ... you want to go somewhere! The mind ignores its boundaries. The ego resists its ignorance, frivolity, uselessness, confusion ... Ego only brings confusion with it! You have never done anything right because you have always been there, messing with God's business and affairs, always striving to do on your own will, as if you were a skillful present entity!

I am inviting you to engage in a new perception, a new dimension, to the Consciousness of Reality! In this new dimension, you give up this fight, this pursuit, this search for something outside yourself in worldly relations. You are pursuing peace, freedom and happiness in the world, and you want to attain it in relationships with other egos. Ego is the problem, "your ego" is the problem; others are only an expression, an extension of yourself.

When you discover the beauty of living this openness, in this new dimension, surrender and abandonment follow as a consequence. Likewise two fighters in the arena, when one of the opponents resigns, gives up the fight. When by an action of Grace, the mind realizes how unproductive, vain and stupid this fight is, naturally its functions and its desire to dream vanish! So, you can Awake!

Within this new dimension, the mind, the "person" is no longer appreciated. You have been valuing the "person" too much, but that becomes different now. So, the mind weakens and go to the "grave." It dies of hunger, because it is no longer provided for, fed by this ignorance. Then there is a chance to go beyond the personality, beyond the egoic mind. In this new dimension, there is no one, no ego, no "person".

Whenever you believe you are a person, you will feel unsafe, seeking reassurance in relationships. When you give up the illusion of the desire to be a person, you stop seeking reassurance in relationships, thus, you welcome the fact existence is complete without "you" and assurance poses no issue at all. You are beyond reassurance and the lack of it; you are beyond duality!

We are here to walk you through all the directions, all the paths and trails you have been building, everything the mind has been crafting over the course of time. So, the question is, "Who am I?" Only when you explore all these directions and when you thoroughly abandon the memory, the personality, the mind with its relationships in the pursuit of assurance, only by doing so, the mind is able to acknowledge its boundaries and to give up, allowing this new dimension to arise.

*Online meeting transcription originally held on June 8th, 2018. First published in Portuguese on July 11th, 2018. For further information about our meetings, please click here.

Real Meditation happens when attention flourishes

To not observe the mechanics of the mind is unconsciousness. Being caught by torpor, by ecstasy, by bliss is still a barrier. Self Realization is the Natural State of Mindfulness, without any effort or impediment to the activities, such as speaking, eating, walking... In the ego, you experience temporary silence, peace and ecstasy, and you can mistake this for Realization; this has been happening frequently. You can mistake these states for Realization and believe you have achieved the goal.

If during meditation practice, you do not get upset with anything, and out of the meditation practice, something still annoys you, so this is not Real Meditation. Body relaxing and quietness of mind do not represent Real Meditation. The practice quiets the mind for a while, but later the mind gets annoyed again. If something annoys you and you say: “I am not meditating at this moment,” it is an evidence that your practice is not the Real Meditation. This is very usual presently. Meditation practice is spreading out, since it relaxes the muscles, it restarts the nervous system, it regulates blood pressure and it entails great physical wellness. This is what people known as meditation.

I apply the word “meditation” in a different way. I apply it as the Natural State of not being identified with the sense of the “me” and this can only happen naturally. Meditation, in the way I mean, happens without effort, practice, physical posture or guidance. If you can be led to the state of meditation, you achieve the state aimed by the one leading you. Nevertheless, a state achieved through guidance cannot be natural, and therefore it vanishes.

This is like being guided by the sunlight. While the light is shining, you see the path, but if a lunar eclipse gets in and the sunlight does not appear anymore, you've got to stop, because there will be no more light. Meditation is the awakening of this internal light. No external movement, as an external light, can provide you Meditation. The practice is something like that – the external light may be the music, the breath, someone with a soft voice guiding you... The Real Meditation is your Natural State, a Light independent from any external situation, practice, exercise or guidance. It is the blooming of effortless Attention, naturally born when the movement of the false “me” is observed and disappears.

Therefore, Meditation is here and now; no matter if you are eating, walking, lying down, relaxing or sleeping. Nothing prevents or facilitates your Natural State. If you believe you have achieved the Natural State after ten, fifteen minutes, or half an hour of meditation practice, just because you are relaxed and in peace, without any conflict, you are wrong.

Your Natural State is present when your wife is complaining about something; when your child is crying, asking for something and screaming insistently; when the soccer team you are for is getting thrashed; when you have just gotten a traffic fine; or when there is a traffic jam and you have an appointment to arrive on time. Your Natural State is there! If you get internally annoyed at such circumstances, even after having meditated so much, then it is a sign that you do not need the practice. If when you are practicing you are different from when you face unpleasant situations, what you call “meditation practice” is just really a practice, but it has nothing to do with Real Meditation.

Meditation is you in your Natural State, when the sense of the experiencer is not present being personal. It is just like this when the toddler cries, screams, calling you; when you are watching a soccer game where one team is winning and the other one losing; when you are stuck in the traffic jam, all cars are also stuck and you cannot fly away in a helicopter hovering over all the other cars ahead; when the wife is yelling and so on. When you are not present as an experiencer in the experience, it does not matter what is happening, what the body is doing or not, what is happening outside or inside this “body-mind” mechanism, no changes take place, because there is no more the sense of winning and losing, of self-importance, there is no desire and fear. When That, timeless and nameless, is present, then you do have Meditation.

"Meditation is you in your Natural State, when the sense of the experiencer is not present being personal."

Meditation is Self-realization, the Realization of God. States that come in and go away, like silence, peace, joy and ecstasy are only experiences. Therefore, it is essential you discover Meditation in your daily life, when you speak with your wife or child, while watching a movie on TV or at the cinema, or when watching a soccer game. That is, you need to observe how personal you are in your daily life, what kind of requirements you have inside there when things happen or do not happen, and how this “me” has desires. It is necessary to observe this movement of the “me” to “catch it” at the moment it arises.

This "me" requires enormous efficiency to be "caught" when it wants to be sad, when it intends to show anger, when it feels depressed, euphoric or when it moves up from joy down to sadness in less than thirty seconds. You got to observe how fickle, how “bipolar” this “me” is, and how it lives in duality. You got to observe it! You got to “catch it” at that very moment, without letting it escape! You got to just observe it and let it go – give up this “me,” abandon it. This is Meditation!

This is absolutely effortless! Since you have been living your entire life “sleeping,” a huge amount of energy is required; devotion to the Truth is required. It may seem like the greatest effort in the world! The ego has always been acting inside you automatically and in an unconscious way. So, to avail of this energy to this Attention may seem the greatest effort in the world for an addicted ego, for a present false “me”, reacting, feeling, suffering, experiencing.

Even so, I keep saying: no effort! Just Consciousness, Attention... no choices, decisions and beliefs. It does not matter if the soccer team you are for is getting trashed; there is no “someone” there. This is Meditation. This can be started observing the thoughts and the beliefs it brings with, telling you that you have a soccer team, that you are part of this or that ideological movement, that you are someone for or against something. Then, thought starts being watched moment by moment, at every moment. Notice this has nothing to do with a specific moment within a specific practice.

At first you may feel you need a huge effort, but this is the unique Real Practice, which is actually not a practice, since it is not a mechanical thing and therefore you cannot get used to it. Consciousness is the presence of the end of the automatism, while every practice leads you to the automatism. Once the automatism puts down its roots in "practicing meditation," then it is easy for you to access that "state." Remember this is not the Natural State, but now, you have the practice, the automatism, so it is easy for you. You ended up being hypnotized by the automatism, by the unconsciousness, and therefore you will live in this practice for a thousand and two hundred years; your ego will not be moved away, because you will remain unconscious.

The Real Meditation happens when the Attention flourishes, and not as a result of mechanical practice. The Attention is a result of the natural flourishing of your Being, which is never sat, walking, awake or asleep. That is why Meditation is natural, just like Awakening, Enlightening. Now you understand why all the Sages say you are already This and, therefore, no effort or practice is required. However, notice what I am saying: the real effort is to find out that no effort is needed; that is, this is the right effort. Otherwise, you will remain in this hypnotic state for a thousand and two hundred years; you will become an expert, a great specialist in the practice of meditation.

Here is the Meditation, independent from your body posture and your psyche. If there is no identification with the internal movement of the mind nor with the body, and you are full “Consciousness”, we do not talk about This anymore, we do not need to talk about Meditation anymore – You are Meditation! You are Consciousness, Peace, Freedom, Happiness! You are Christ, Buddha! Remain there, in you Natural State, eating, sleeping, speaking, working, doing business. Remain free from the experiencer, who has his or her demands, beliefs and states. Remain there each moment, night and day, awake or sleeping, because they are moments of Consciousness, they are not “your moments.” This is Meditation.

Then, remember this: “you” are not present, and if this is true, there is no desire, no fear, no conflict and no problem. Remain there! Work toward this direction; do not wait for Enlightenment to happen one day. Get out of here and do not create more problems for yourself by believing in thoughts, in sensations and in experiences in your favor or against you. There is not this "you," but the Life with its mysterious movement. This is Meditation, the Natural State. Do not wait for Enlightenment for the next 20, 30, 40, 50 years. Assume now an attitude of an Enlightened; not the belief of being "enlightened" because they are different things. You may believe you are enlightened, you may even announce your name as the "latest enlightened" in human history, like automobile companies launching a new car each year, there is also the newest "enlightened" in Brazil, or in Americas, or in Europe. Do not fall into it!

It is one thing to be in the Natural Enlightenment State; but to believe you are enlightened willing to tell everyone, calling this "made-up story" as Satsang, is quite another. Therefore assume you are not the person you believe to be, work to this disidentification here and now. If this Natural State is really awakening there, you become natural; preferably silent... You turn to be more silent. Becoming more talkative is a clear sign you are still not seeing anything at all, and the blinder you are, the more talkative you become. You change this inner attitude here and now, and not for the next 40 or 50 years! You leave the "sleep" state, you stop relying on thoughts and feelings, you stop attaching to these things and you stop affirming yourself as a "person" all the time. You do it here and now! This is the right effort, the right Meditation, the right attitude. This is how you discover What You Are!

Presencial meeting transcription, originally held in João Pessoa city, Brazil, on May, 2018.
First published in Portuguese on August 6, 2018
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The Presence of Grace in the form of the Guru

In Satsang, you are meeting Yourself, the Truth. The presence of God, of Grace is a mysterious, unknown movement. There is a very clear difference between the written word and the one coming out from the Guru's lips. In the Western world, we plod along to accept the importance and the value of the Presence, of Grace, in the form of the Guru.

We should never underestimate the Presence of God, which is this Presence of Grace, when it takes the form of a Master. The Guru does not need to have exactly a human form. This Guru, who is Grace, God, can assume any form. Realize that the Guru is this Presence within you, but you are not aware of That. It is the Presence of God, but the Presence of God "sleeping." Then, there comes a time when a prayer gets into your heart making this God's Presence to truly awaken. It is when the external Guru assumes a human or non-human form entailing the awakening of the inner Guru.

God is always present, but His presence does not necessarily means He "awakened;" It does not mean He is "awaken." Therefore, you are Christ, you are Buddha, but a "sleeping" Christ, a "sleeping" Buddha. So God assumes a form – human or otherwise – and in His Grace implies the awakening of the inner Guru; God comes to awaken God, Christ comes to awaken Christ, Buddha comes to awaken Buddha! This is the Mystery, something very paradoxical, because God does not sleep! He is never unaware of Himself! Never try to get these words into a precise model, as something perfectly logical, because it is not. Truth is not logical; it is only the Truth!

Therefore, when the Guru comes, it is God coming in His Grace, in the form of the Guru. When the Guru talks to you about the Truth, you certainly hear these words, but they disappear; no reference about this talking remains, but only the Guru himself, and here lies the Mystery.

The Guru is beyond words, so the Guru remains and the words disappear. The Guru is important, but the words are not. So, if you are unsure, you approach the Guru one more time, a certain number of times, and each time the Guru speaks, the same Truth is pointed out through different words. Thus, you understand it and it results profoundly evident that THAT does not comes out from words, but from the Presence of the Guru, from the Presence of Grace.

I got to tell you this, because you can read an entire library about it, thousands and thousands of books, discuss it, talk about it, and even write about it, but that is of no use, because there is no Truth in words. The Truth is in the Presence of Grace! The Wise One is this Realized Self, which is Grace, which is the Guru. It is clear there is something else connected to the Guru's words, something above a teacher's speech, or the words of a book, there is something that gets more deeply into the heart of the disciple.

So, That makes the Miracle, the transformation, which we can call Real Experience, because That is the Truth viking out from the lips of the Sage – Krishnamurti awakening Krishnamurti, Ramana awakening Ramana, Jesus awakening Jesus ... It is the same simple and natural Truth of the Unique Self, of the Unique Consciousness.

It is different than when you read it in a book or when you listen to teachers, no matter how spiritual they are and how deeper their experiences were. They are not the Truth yet. That is, a "person" cannot provide you THIS.

There is a quotation of a Realized Being, a Wise One, called Sri Anandamayi Ma: "Once the Guru has accepted a disciple, He or She will never leave the disciple until the goal is attained." When you hear the word of the Guru, the word of the Grace, of the Truth, even the first time you are before Him or Her, your ego moves away temporarily and you envise the Truth – this is the Mystery, a powerful action of Grace! You should never forget there is no difference between You and the Guru. So, for the first time, you can undergo the Real Experience.

*Online meeting transcription originally held on July 4, 2018. First published in Portuguese on August 19, 2018. For further information about our meetings, please click here.

In your Natural State, you are Reality itself!

Getting in touch with a speech like this is more than approaching to words. Words are symbols. Thus, everything you perceive through the senses can be communicated through a word. Talkings, therefore, describe perceptions, what the eyes, the ears, the sense of smell, the touch, and the sense of taste perceive.

Our interest in this meeting is to discover That which is beyond words, beyond perceptions, beyond the senses. Satsang means to investigate the nature of Reality. Reality is where everything arises, where everything appears, where everything is perceived. Identified with the mind and body, you can spend a lifetime mistaking yourself for the illusion of the existence of "someone" present in the experience of perception. To the mind, perception is Reality, but I want to tell you that Reality is beyond perception.

You need to understand the difference between perception and Reality. When you are identified with body and mind, experiences happen to a supposed "identity" present, to this "me", to this "I". Without identification with the body and the mind, you may be in touch with the direct Reality, which is the Truth about yourself. This means living free from the sense of the ego, the "me", the "I". Realize the importance, the beauty, the grace existing behind it!

You, in your Natural State, are not a person, not an ego identity. In your Natural State you are Reality itself! What is the implication of this? The implication of this is to live without conflict, without fear, without suffering, in this indescribable state of Freedom, Happiness. Some call it Enlightenment. I prefer to call it as Natural State because you are not a special being, someone who has a light bulb lit over the head. You do not shoot lightning through your fingertips; neither have super-powers like the superman or the wonder woman.

Therefore, in your Natural State, you are not special, you are not superior to anyone, you are not greater than anyone else. You no longer mistake yourself for the sense of separation, no longer identify with the sense of duality. There is no "you" anymore, no more God and the world, as the mind made you believe before. This is the end of confusion, of all emotional, psychological disorder, because it is the end of illusion.

This Natural State is the Reality of God! You were born to realize This, only This, uniquely This, and nothing more! It is when you are at "home", in Peace... You are Wise! You are healed! You had been stung by the serpent of ignorance and now you are healed, there is no more poison in the body!

You cannot find the Truth of God, this Truth about You, at the marketplace, pay a bargain for it and take it home. It is not like this! The price of Reality, Truth, Awakening, is your life, your history, your world ... You will have to surrender it all! If you still have desires, dreams and still want to do a lot of things in this world, it is a sign that you still like it very much. Forget this world or forget God! To remember this world is to forget Yourself; to forget this world is to remember YourSelf. I refer to this world your mind has built with your desires and fears, with your dreams and hopes. This is the only world you need to get rid of – the imaginary world created by this presumed present identity.

All this is pure conditioning! You were conditioned to believe Happiness is for "someone" – that "someone" you believe you are. A "someone" who will find this Happiness in the outside, in the imaginary world created by the thought itself. So, you believe that a marriage will provide you Happiness; success in a professional career will provide you Happiness; having a family, a dozen children, will provide you Happiness; driving an imported car – a Lamborghini or a Ferrari – will make you attain supreme Happiness...

Happiness lies here and now! It is your Being! Your Being is Love, Peace, Freedom, Intelligence, Sanity, Completeness, and This is here and now! It has nothing to do with the experience of the senses, with the sensations, perceptions ... When I talk about perceptions, I mean physical and non-physical perceptions (called spiritual perceptions). All this is within the mind. The most sublime of all the spiritual perceptions is still a mental experience; the ego is still present there. I am sorry I have to tell you that. If you are still attached to these things, I am very sad for you, because they are worthless, whether in this world or the "other world."

*Online meeting transcription originally held on May 12th, 2017. First published in Portuguese on August 8th, 2017. For further information about our meetings, please click here.