A beautiful game

Life is a beautiful game! If you see it clearly, that is how life looks like: a great play, a great game, where Consciousness performs all the roles. Here, the point is that “you” perform roles and are in this game without knowing your True Identity, and then the game remains hidden. Sometimes, as part of this great play, there is the Acknowledgment of your True Nature, and being in Satsang is a great opportunity for That.

Right now, we are experiencing a global problem, as we are in a real war, in our “Third World War,” against an invisible army of a virus. This is a health problem on the planet, but we cannot see that as a game, a play, a divine performance. In the mind, you see that as a terrible drama, however, when you see the Show, this is not what you perceive. When you do not see the Show, you see all this as a drama, and why? Because you are used to performing roles without knowing your True Nature, your Real identity.

When you mistake yourself for the role and you do not know it is a Show, all this is taken very seriously, so there comes the drama, the huge drama of life. Your involvement as a character in this play or Show, without Acknowledging the Truth, is taken too seriously. All dramas of life seem to appear from the lack of this Acknowledgement, that is, all your problems belong only to the “person.” In other words, the idea of “person” is the unawareness of the Show.

The character does not disappear when you became aware of it, but it is rather recognized as such; the character does not disappear in a flashlight. Some people imagine Enlightenment as something like that – a flashlight, and that is why “enlightenment” is happening at large scale around the planet. I am certainly being ironic here, since this is only part of the ego-identity drama, provided that the ego does not enlighten itself, but it can see or imagine itself “enlightened.” For example, some people dress themselves in orange-colored clothes or in some kind of special clothes, carry a “japamala” in their hands – a sort of rosary beads – let their beard grow or shave their head completely and reach “enlightenment.” As this is happening around the world, these people also start to achieve some disciples and to teach them the “spiritual truths” they know. This is also part of a role the character may act, completely unaware of the representation of Him or Herself.

However, there is another aspect of this Show, through the clear Acknowledgement of the Truth about Yourself, and this supposed character will likely keep on living an apparent "ordinary life.” This apparent character does not need to tell others there is neither real character nor real Show, but only a theatrical performance, a great divine joke. However, there is also a probability for this apparent character to start sharing that. Now, we are talking about the Sage, the Realized Being, and not about those who are deceiving themselves and, consequently, deceiving others, totally unaware of that unconsciousness.

Are you all with me? Is it clear? So, Freedom is unique, is the Acknowledgement of the Show. Consciousness recognizes Itself as part of the Show and as the producer of the entire Show, in this or that human mechanism – this is the Real Awakening. The Awakened, the Realized Being, the Sage, can share That to others, or not, and if they are open to that communication, they can also reach that Acknowledgement, that same Awakening.

Another point here about the play, this game, is that all of this is happening without a spiritual or evolutionary purpose, as the mind likes to frame. To the mind, everything must happen in line with an evolving, spiritual or some sort of purpose it may create. However, this play has no purpose; it is just cosmic entertainment, sacred, divine celebration! The Supreme Consciousness, the Divine Truth, God or whatever name you may give to the Author of all this, is a cosmic, phenomenal, self-produced entertainment.

Some days ago, I called this as "a cosmic joke God is telling Himself," but I only didn’t mention how funny God considers that... God finds it funny when you can laugh at that! So, it is a laughing entertainment, but you can only laugh at that if you Awake and see the game, the play; that is, when you are able to see the divine entertainment happening. If you cannot see it, you see drama instead. It is difficult for you to accept the reality of all this since you do not have Consciousness´ eyes to see what happens. The mind sees what we have just called as “Third World War” as a horror, whereas the eyes of the Truth see it not like that.

There is only God doing everything, whether your mind understands and accepts it or not. There is nothing outside that Consciousness; in other words, nothing is happening outside that Divine Will – that is the Sage's, the Realized Being viewpoint. The fact is that all of this is a great divine game, where You are that game and there is no existence apart from What You Are, from your True, Real Nature. The beauty of this encounter called Satsang, that means an encounter with Reality, with the Truth, is the possibility of being able to perceive the game, what is behind it and the beauty of this all. It is a fascinating game! Being born and dying are part of it, but it is difficult to see it that way.

In Satsang, we are dealing with Life as It is, not as you, in your mind, believe it should be. Life happens without all that thinking content. It is beyond all concepts, beliefs, ideas, judgments, opinions, this whole notion of justice and injustice, of truth or illusion. Sages name as Liberation the Blossoming of the Truth about Yourself, the Acknowledgement of the Reality, of the Show, of the game, Sages call That as Liberation. This is the end of the illusion of that sense of duality "me and the world," "me and others," "me and life," "me and the Divine," since there is no room for that within Reality, it is just a space of acting, of theater, of Show, that, ultimately, is not real.

It is difficult to accept that as real since your perspective of reality comes from the mind’s experience. However, Life is beyond thought, imagination and all the concepts the mind can produce. To identify with an illusory character is to mistake yourself for a belief, since this "me" is an imaginary psychological sense, just an appearance, an apparition in Consciousness. Your illusory life is based on these false fundamentals, in the belief of this psychological “me,” this psychological identity, this fantasy. To identify with this "me," with this psychological sense of an identity, is to mistake yourself for an imagination.

I want to invite you to allow Life to be What It is. So, instead of striving yourself to abandon this drama – and here this means the idea you can die from coronavirus – I want to invite you to give up this effort, to abandon the illusion you are “someone” with power to control something, such as life and death. When you are completely free from the sense of “me,” from the illusion of that identity present in the experience of living, You are a Realized Being, Awakened, free from the sense of separateness.

Notice I am not talking about an experience. I have just told you that some characters can imagine themselves free from the idea of being "characters," yet feeling themselves like a character. You may even catch a glimpse there is no character, no identity present in that experience, but every experience of this kind comes and goes. When that experience, the glimpse, is present, the imagination of being free arises, but later that old “me” comes back and, at that moment, it becomes clear this was also just a belief, one more experience, and that’s not what I am talking about.

I am talking about Something Real that becomes steady internally as your Natural State of Being, here and now, and not about the “sensation of enlightenment,” the “experience of enlightenment,” not about the temporary perception that all this is a great Show without anyone present here and now. I am not talking about an experience, but rather about an irreversible plunge, without return, where the diver vanishes into the Ocean of Reality.

Therefore, it is not about making an effort to get rid of the thought, the imagination “I am someone,” nor to become “someone enlightened.” Actually, the effort to get “enlightened” is quite dangerous, since you do end up “enlightening yourself” when you strive for it. That is, you fall into another trap, since previously you were a “person without enlightenment” and now you are an “enlightened person”, still unaware of the Show, of the game, as you still mistake yourself for an experiencer, for “someone” present internally. Enlightenment is the end of the illusion of “someone” present; it is Consciousness in Consciousness by Consciousness, within Its divine entertainment, Its play, Its game, where there is nobody.

So, Enlightenment is to allow Life as It is, without “someone” inside the Show, the play, without all this effort to abandon the “me” or to achieve something, without this state people name as “enlightenment.” That is what we are dealing with in Satsang. Currently, this period of reclusion, when people are living their own quarantine experience, is an opportunity to observe this.

This rest or surrender, this surrender to Life as It is, does not end the body’s life. Life goes on, but no longer overburdened by the intricacy of imagination, of thought. I call This as Natural State of Happiness – Life, here and now, without all that imaginary acting thought produces, creating a huge overburden of a false, illusory identity called “me.”

In this Natural State, you no longer search for something like peace, love, happiness, since Peace, Love, Happiness and Consciousness are already here and now as Life Itself! I am talking about You and your True Nature. You are That, you are Consciousness, whatever you look like. You may be fat, thin, tall, short, it does not matter at all. Here, I am not talking about what is apparent, but about What is beyond appearances. You are Consciousness.

Appearances can grow, reduce, change, transform, appear and disappear. For example, they appear when children are born and disappear when people die, but they are only appearances. The forms are disappearing in what we call as "death," in what we call as "war against the virus," but everything unfolds within this Consciousness, this Supreme Reality, and all of this is simply the story of the play, of the Show. I will end by saying this: everything you see, everything that happens, is just part of the story of the Show, of the game.

*Online meeting transcription originally held on March 27th, 2020 – First published in Portuguese on November 24th, 2020. For further information about our meetings, please click here.

This is your work

Free will is just a belief, a thought. In general, you believe you solve things, you do things, but everything just happens. From the day you were born until today, things happened by Divine determination and this will continue like that. This will not change; things will continue to happen.

For example, you believe you decided to come to this room today; you found an ad or somehow you heard about this work. You believe you found it, but in reality, it only happened. You are breathing... Is it right to say that? You think, but is it right to say that? If you think, why don’t you stop thinking? If you are the one who thinks, you could say: "I will stop thinking for five minutes.” Who here can stop thinking for five minutes? Is there anyone who says: "I will look at the clock and for two minutes I will not have any thoughts?” Try to do this out. Try this out for a minute or thirty seconds. Can you do it?

So, you are not the one who thinks; thought happens. You are not breathing; breathing is happening. You have not decided to come to this room; this is also only happening. Give me another example of freedom you believe you have... When you lie down to sleep, do you sleep or does the sleep happen? Have you noticed you do not sleep when you want to, but rather when sleep happens? What else do you think you do? There is no "you" doing anything! Are you with me? What about feelings, like sadness and joy? You say: "I am going to be sad" and so you are sad... Is it so? You say: "I am going to be happy" and then, are you happy? Do you decide on your emotions and feelings? Anger, for example, do you choose to feel anger or not?

So, where are you? Do you choose when you will be thirsty and hungry? I want to know what you do, what you decide on to do! How many times during the day do the eyes open and close? Do you choose this? Do you choose to make your heart beat? What is the pressure of your heartbeat, the speed of the blood flow into the veins, into the arteries? So, do you decide to feel happiness? You listen to a self-help speaker and he or she teaches you how to be happy, how to keep in control, how to not fall into depression, anxiety, that is, how to control "your present" to achieve "your future." People pay fortunes to listen to self-help speakers and do everything they are taught to be happy, since it is just a matter of choosing that. Is it so?

Are you sure the speakers also do what they recommend you? Can they do that? You simply decide "I will not fall into depression, sadness, anguish." Is it so? Or "I will not feel pain, be it physical, emotional or psychological." Does it work like that?

Participant: But, when we are more alert, we decide not to react in a certain way before a provocative word, for example. The state of Consciousness allows one to not act blindly. It is a choice, isn't it?

Marcos Gualberto: Consciousness is Intelligence! Consciousness does not choose! Consciousness does not have flights of fancy about a character. It is simple, and it is not a choice. Intelligence, Love, Freedom and Peace do not make choices. Peace is the absence of choice. Freedom is the absence of choice. Everything you have learned is false! You are not at liberty to have peace when you have Peace, and that is Freedom. You do not have the freedom to make choices, because when there is Freedom there is no choice. So, when there is Consciousness (and that is not a choice), there is no way to act blindly.

You said that "the state of Consciousness allows us to not act blindly," but I am contesting that. I am saying, when there is Consciousness, there is no action, no illusion, no author of the action doing anything, so there is no choice. In the ego, you make choices and decisions, and all of this is false. There is no naturalness in the egoic mind, since there is no Freedom, Intelligence, Truth, exactly because "choices are made." Actually, these choices do not exist; they are ego’s imaginations.

Participant: Do I decide if I want to dedicate an activity to God or not? Do I decide for God?

Marcos Gualberto: No! Consciousness does not decide that; Consciousness assumes that, the Truth there is only God. Do you get it? Wherever your decision is, there will be confusion, duality, liking or disliking; there will be no Intelligence! When you say “I decided,” who is this “I”? This “I” is obsession, imagination. Consciousness does not decide, does not do anything. I repeat: Consciousness does not choose, does not do anything, does not decide. Consciousness is Absolute Intelligence!

These decisions are on your moods, and you are inattentive of it, being in a good or a bad mood, and there is always an interest behind these actions. You treat someone very well and you do not realize you are falling into a trap. This is not a natural action, since it is not this never-acting Consciousness unfolding. Consciousness does everything, but without acting and without expecting results. In the ego, you are always stuck to results, as you start from the wrong principle of choosing.

When there is Intelligence, as no choice is present, there is no other place to be, except with God. If Divine Grace is available, there is nowhere else for you to be, except before that Grace. This is not a choice! This is Intelligence!

“Oh! I decided not to create any more confusion,” you say, but soon you decide something else. The same one, who decides not to create more confusion, soon decides to create it – it is always the ego! When there is Intelligence, there is no confusion, but that is not a choice. You say: "I decided to be happy"... Happiness is not a choice; Happiness is Intelligence! You say: "I decided to live in peace," but that is not a decision; living in Peace is Absolute Intelligence, because the Nature of Consciousness is Peace. Live in Intelligence, do not live making choices, decisions. Making a decision means assuming an illusion, and that complicates things.

Participant: How to differentiate what is illusory from what is real?

Marcos Gualberto: By being real, not thinking. Once thinking, planning and choosing, you will always decide for illusion. In order to differentiate what is illusory from what is real, just be real, and this requires investigating what is not real, and not distinguishing the illusory and the real, what is false or true – it is not a matter of differentiation, but rather of investigation. You need to investigate what the mind produces internally.

Investigation will show you how the egoic mind constantly deceives you by assuming a mistaken attitude, posture or movement. That investigation awakens Intelligence, and this is love for the Truth, it is devotion.

My job with you is to show what is false, not what is real, and your job is to abandon what is false, and that is devotion. There is no devotion without giving up on the false things. There is only a romantic thing for the Master, for the Guru, for Jesus, for God, for Krishna, for Buddha... This romanticism is not real devotion. Real devotion is to abandon what is false when Christ shows you, when God shows you, when the Guru shows you, when Life shows you. When you encounter an Awakened Being, a Realized Being, this One will show you what is false, only that. This One will say, "Look, this is false." This One will give you the Grace, the “eyes” to see what is false and the power to abandon that. But to really abandon that is up to you. This is your job.

*Online meeting transcription originally held on October 3rd, 2020 – on Zoom app. First published in Portuguese on November 17th, 2020. For further information, please click here.

It is all a great game

Everything is a great game to me. If you are able to see Life clearly, you can see this great and wonderful divine game, and then every representation, every role is part of it. If you know and realize That, all suffering ends.

However, if you do not have the straightforward Understanding of your own Being, of your Real Nature, this game becomes too serious – when there is the involvement of the character you believe to be. All the dramas you have in your life are connected to this ignorance, to the unawareness of your Real Being. So, if the game is not seen as it is, you see yourself as a separate entity, living the drama of life, of this complex existence. That is how the mind sees life – a great drama.

The Sages call this as "illusion of ignorance." That is, it is not a lack of Understanding, but rather an illusion of ignoring That. If you ignore Knowledge, the Truth, that is pure Understanding, you are living under the illusion of ignorance, under the illusion of this unawareness, of this non-recognition. That is why we can call this as the “illusion of ignorance,” as there is no ignorance indeed.

The sense of separation lives its self-produced dramas under this illusion of ignorance, and it is all imagination, fantasy, false. This is not real because your Essential Nature is Wisdom, Comprehension, Consciousness; and this is the wonderful Divine game -Consciousness "unaware of Itself." Consciousness cannot be unaware of Itself, however, it seems to be like that. That is why I call this as a "wonderful game." This is the Sage's viewpoint about it all.

So, you ended up in Satsang to find out Satsang is already your Real Nature, but you go around, you wander around a lot, until you stop, and here is the joke, the game. That is why Truth sounds paradoxical: there is nothing to be found, nothing to look for; however, you should not start from such belief, because believing in it is still part of the illusion of ignorance. It is useless to believe in what the Sages say, since this means just another belief in this illusion of ignorance. You need to investigate it; you need a careful, patient and dedicated examination of all that.

This investigation is more than an intellectual inquiry, it means unveiling all this trick, all this internal game. When you discover the game and know that all of this is part of it, there is no more drama. However, if you do not discover it, this is not just a game, and then everything ends up being only a drama, since for the egoic mind, everything is a great drama, everything is contradictory, difficult and painful. So, when your True Nature becomes obvious and clear, this character you believe to be disappears.

Some people around the world put on those orange-colored clothes, practice various forms of exercises, that I call as spiritual practices, but this is just an orange-dressed character doing something now. That is, a character is still present. It is not possible to abandon the illusion of ignorance through esoteric, mystical, spiritualistic practices, nor through a lot of reading or hard study, since that way the character is still present. If this character is not seen, the game is not recognized, so the character does not disappear, but rather only changes the way of working, of operating. This way, the character had previously a common, ordinary, mundane life, having then currently a spiritual, holy life, connected to practices, virtues and spirituality.

This speech aims not to attack the practices of spirituality; I am just saying they are not enough. By the way, they can become a major impediment, since one thing is the "addicted ego," but the "virtuous ego" is quite another. So, just as there is an "addicted ego" and a "virtuous ego," so also there is a "worldly ego" and a "spiritualized ego," and the game goes on. That is, you are your game! This whole “story of your life” ends up happening within that game, or the game itself is this “story of life.” In this way, Life cannot be What It Is, since there is always resistance and an illusion present, trying to change, shape, alter, modify, reject Life and what is being presented. So, there is never a rest. You never rest in Life as It is.

You are Consciousness, and whatever is present, appearing in that Consciousness, is just the Divine game, and That is What it is, and it is perfect. However, the ego does not see it that way, the mind does not see it that way. So, how can that be seen? It is not possible to recognize that straightforwardly without disidentifying from this internal movement of the mind, from these illusions thought creates. Without this disidentification, you cannot recognize your Real Being.

So, mundane life or the so-called "spiritual life" are worthless to this Clarity, to this Awakening, since they are still part of the game. If the presumption of a present individuality is ever present, even if this present individuality is improving, getting better, becoming more peaceful, humble and virtuous, the illusion will still be there. So, to become spiritual is pointless, although I know that deep down some of you had the dream of becoming a spiritual person.

I remember that, over forty years ago, I had also this idea. When I was seventeen or eighteen, there was a present belief connected to a “me”. I believed I was lacking spirituality or spiritualization. My Guru appeared five or six years later, and it became clear it was not a matter of spiritualizing myself, of being more spiritual, since I was already quite spiritual at that time. Being spiritual is not complicated; some years of practice are enough.

When you are born in a religious family, you are raised leaning, since birth, how to become a better person, a good person, who does not smoke, does not drink, has no addictions, so you escape or separate yourself from the world, but that is not the point. Spiritual life ends up imposing many conditions, starting by showing what is pure and what is impure, but still to that separate entity. So, it appropriates procedures, some diets, ceremonies, non-reprehensible sexual conduct, in an effort to achieve silence and surrender to the Divine, to God. In this case, God can be very good, but this is not the solution.

Then, you go on to “more advanced” spirituality: vegetarian diet; celibacy, tantric sexuality, meditation practices (meditation in blue light, violet flame, and so on), contact with higher beings, from other spheres ... Some people like astrology, others like tarot, other types of things, and all of this seems to be of high spiritual level. Some people dedicate themselves to the spiritual world through astral projection or contact with other planes, third, fourth or fifth-degree contacts, and so on.

All of this is still part of that game and some people spend their entire lives connected to it, delighted with it. Do you see it? Does that make any sense to you? None of this solves the matter! What you really need is a plunge into yourself to give up on the illusion of this "me," either worldly or spiritual, addicted or virtuous, profane, sinful or a holy one with a soft voice and religious appearance.

Look at this, ok? Let's stop here!

*Online meeting transcription originally held on June 25th, 2020 – on Zoom app – First published in Portuguese on November 19th, 2020. For further information about our meetings, please click here.

My whole focus is to show you what Real Meditation is

In Satsang, we are working together on this matter of Realization. Realization is the encounter with the Truth in ourselves. What we call as human mind has proved to be an extraordinary mechanism, but in its movement it carries an aspect that has been producing the state of separateness – Reality and you, God and you, Truth and you.

The mind has this chaotic movement of thoughts, of feelings, of emotions, of perceptions, settled in this false basis, this false “me” that is not you but passing as so. The mind can´t be stopped. You perceive its whole confusion, but you simply can´t stop it, you can´t turn it off nor interrupt the confusion the mind creates in your life. What you name as “your life” is confusion. This way, you can´t stop the thought. This is curious, since the thought can cease, but you can´t stop it. This confusion can be interrupted, but only for Something greater than your desire to do so. All this suffering, all this internal confusion can be interrupted, but not by you.

Putting it in a better way: there can be an interruption, but not caused by you. Thought can cease, but you cannot stop it. Suffering may end, but you cannot put an end to it. Fear can end, but you cannot put an end to it. You are the fear, the confusion, the inner talking, this inner chaotic state, and this "you" is the illusion of the false "me." You are too attached to this movement to be able to interrupt it. You are entangled with that. You are too identified with the thought to be able to interrupt it. You are too identified with the internal confusion to be able to get rid of it, too identified with imagination to be able to interrupt fear.

Your work is to Awake, because all of this is the "sleeping state," but you do not know you are sleeping. This is similar to the moment you are dreaming without realizing you are dreaming. All you seek is Love, Peace, Freedom, Happiness, Truth, but since you have been mistaking yourself for the mind for such a long time, you try to find That inside the mind itself. You must awaken, so Love, Truth, Freedom, Happiness and God can be real there. Since you are "sleeping," "dreaming," you are seeking Peace, Love, Happiness, Freedom, God externally, that is, you are seeking That inside your "dream," in the "sleeping state."

You are pursuing Peace and, simultaneously, producing confusion through the relationships, warding off the very own Peace you are seeking. You want peace, but you do not want Peace. You do not know what Peace is, so you are not able to find It and therefore you keep searching for It externally. That also applies to Freedom, to Happiness, to Love. You do not know what Love is; you know what pleasure is, what fulfillment by affective, emotional and sentimental pleasure is, but this is not Love. That´s why you seek this through relationships and then you want to get married, to have children...

You search for happiness in objects. You believe the more objects you get, the happier you are (in order to have the objects, you need more money; the more money you have, the more objects you have; the more objects, the more comfort; the more comfort, the happier you are). However, comfort is not Happiness and objects do not provide Happiness... Nothing on the outside, absolutely nothing, can provide you That!

Everything on the outside produces pleasure and pain. Love, Peace, Freedom, Happiness, God is inside, not outside. My job is to show you what You Are to yourself, because all you need is only to be alone. Everything you need is already present in What You Are. It is not outside!

So, my whole focus is to show you what Real Meditation is. You need to find out What is present, What is already there... Just find That out! You will not produce That, nor bring That from the outside, but rather will only find That out. My job is to help you to remember how to access this discovery.

As long as there is any form of dependence – and dependence means being attached to the external world the mind produces in its dream, in its fantasy, in its desire to express – you will remain away from yourself, away from your Essential Nature, and there will be no Love, no Peace, no Freedom, no Happiness... There will be no God! All that you were born for is to realize What is already there, but That is not this body, this mind, these objects, places, people, things, nor images; that is, That is absolutely nothing from the outside!

When your Being, your Real Nature, blossoms, everything remains in the same place, but now everything is in a new place. What I am saying is the external world does not need to disappear, but rather the mind’s illusion concerning the external world and its projections towards these externalities, be it people, things, places, objects, sensations, perceptions.

It is like a cake with a topping. Nobody knows what that cake was made of, what kind of cake is underneath that topping, whether it is an orange, carrot or chocolate cake. Actually, we do not even know if it is a cake, because with that topping it could be an unreal cake, something with a very beautiful and quite convincing cover. The mind has been producing this cover over your Real Nature. You do not know what "cake" is there, because you are caught by the topping. Your entire experience called "life" concerns the “topping,” and not the "cake."

So, when you come to me, I say, "This is not real." People get angry at first, it is true. They get furious when I say, "You are a fraud!" I am not saying He or She is not Real, I am saying “he” or "she" is not real; everything one knows about oneself is not real. People live a permanent internal turmoil, an internal noise, a complete internal confrontation – and “internal” means the "topping," the surface.

So, I say there is no way for you to stop that. The mind is that: the confusion, the "topping." This is discouraging... There is no way to stop the mind. But now, there come not so bad news, but good ones: there is no need to stop the mind; it stops! It is possible to break this model, this pattern, to get rid of it, but no action is required from your side. Look how interesting this is! There is an element in yourself able to break with this pattern, but it is not "your effort" in the sense you take this matter about effort. So, you do not need to try to destroy, to stop the mind.

Now we approached the matter of Real Meditation. The problem with traditional meditation, that people know, is how it attempts to make you stop the mind, and you do not have to do that. The mind may even hide itself, but it will not stop; it will return again. You do not need to try to stop the mind, it stops, but you are not the one who makes it to stop. The mind stops by itself when there is room for Consciousness. Give room for Consciousness and the confusion of the mind disappears!

How do you give room for the mind to stop by itself? Attention! Only that. Just be aware of its craziness. Is it crazy or not? You look at its movement and then the dream ends. And this is because you are naturally not identified with its madness, with its inner chatter. It is not about the mind trying to stop the mind, but rather a patient, careful, unhurried observation ... a deep interest in observing. So, confusion ends, and so does the identification with that whole crazy thought you have, because the dream is over, the sleep is over – You awake! When you awake, there is no more mind. Mind is unconsciousness, the dream that happens during sleep because you do not observe the craziness. The crazy one goes together with the craziness, the madness drags the madman, but if there is attention, disidentification, there is no madman, there is no craziness.

What does to be Awaken mean? To be disidentified from the body and the mind. So, there are no beliefs or conditioning patterns about family, culture, politics, religion. You are in your Being, in your Real Nature, that is Intelligence, Love, Truth, Peace, Happiness! You do not seek That; It is revealed to you as your ever-present Nature.

You do not try to control the mind, the desires, the fear, the anxiety and the crazy ego identity, and so all this goes away. Do not try to stop thinking, feeling, desiring, being afraid. Do not try anything of this. Just bring consciousness, observe it. When you observe it, you realize this is not you, but rather a crazy, addictive, repetitive, mechanical, unconscious impulse that comes and drags you. But now you got it, you see it, and, as I use to say, you are weaning yourself off being a wretch. You are turning back to God! In a religious language, you are becoming a saint, ceasing to be a problem.

Your work is to Awake! It is totally your job, but it is not "your" job. It is a Work of the Grace, of the divine Love, of that inner Consciousness, that is the Guru.

*Presential meeting transcription originally held on April 2018 – First published in Portuguese on June 4, 2018. For further information please click here.

Your Heart is God

The speech is not what matters in Satsang. The speech is just a way to approach What really matters in this meeting – this Presence, this Consciousness, that does not speak Portuguese, English or any other language; but rather the from the Heart, from Silence.

There is something present in all of you that needs to be in touch with the Reality, and this “present thing” is the Heart.

When this contact is not present in the Heart, there is pain. All of you are at this meeting due to this present pain, this yearning for this contact with Reality. Your True Nature is Happiness, and This is what everybody yearns for. Nothing can put an end to this pain except for the contact with Reality, the contact with Happiness.

The sense of separateness is the cause for this pain. The absence of this contact with What You are is the cause of the present pain, the pain of separateness, the pain of ignorance. The egoic mind carries this pain and cannot get rid of it. As long as you maintain this sense of separation from God, from the Truth you bring in your own Heart, that pain persists.

You have done everything to conceal this pain, to make it vanish, but this will never work. Getting married, getting a husband, a wife, children or a beautiful house is useless since no external accomplishment can put an end to this “pain in the Heart.” Only God can do that! That is why some call this Realization as “your True Nature,” which is the Consciousness of God’s Realization.

To Realize What You are – this Consciousness, this Presence… – only This Appeases, brings Quietude and Love to the Heart, since This is the end of duality. All the pain lies in the sense of separateness. As long as there is a sense of separation, there will be some form of fear – fear of losing what you have gained, fear of losing the life you think is yours, and that is suffering.

This imaginary “me” is constantly looking for Peace, Happiness and Love externally, in objects, people, situations, trips; however, That will never be found in this sense of a separate existence. The very own search for Peace, Happiness and Love is suffering.

There is not any Wisdom in living in the mind. Living in the mind is quite stupid! Not to assume the Truth of your Real Nature is nonsense! You are here, at this moment, to be Wise, to live Love, Freedom and Happiness, and that is a sign of Wisdom. Stress, anxiety, security based on objects, on people, on external achievements, none of this is a sign of Wisdom, since there is no real security outside. Life is this movement of great beauty, but in Life, there is no security. The stupid mind, the egoic mind, is pursuing that security and, therefore, it keeps that outwardly movement. That is all the egoic mind knows.

In this “sense of separateness,” this search is endless, and so is suffering. Therefore, you need to cease that search, and when that happens, the mind returns to the Source, which is the Heart. Then, this Presence, this Consciousness presents Itself as Real Intelligence and there is no more foolishness. Now, there is no more fear, ignorance and pain. This search for Peace, Happiness and Love outside, in objects, in people, in the world, is no longer present. The only place where you repose, rest, where you are real, is in Yourself, in the Heart. The only space where you recognize yourself as pure Reality, pure Freedom, as What is Eternal, is in the Heart.

When there is no more belief, when the sense of separateness dissolves, when that sense of separation vanishes, Love is present, Truth is present, Beauty is present. You are here to Realize This! You are here to go beyond that sense of separateness, that belief, that fictional separation, that illusory separation between “you and God.” Your Heart is God, God is not in heaven! You were born for Happiness, for Freedom, to know God –, and to know God is to recognize yourself in Him! The Revelation or the Comprehension of this Truth causes this illusion of suffering to collapse. All your internal conflicts are projected outwardly, into a thought-created world. All conflicts between individuals, nations, communities, people, all this is based on this illusion of the sense of "someone" present, that "me." There is no such thing! All conflicts are within this dream called "sense of separation." The suffering of this supposed present entity is reflected in an apparent external world – this is the dream, the whole nightmare of this ego-identity, this “pain in the Heart.”

*Online meeting transcription originally held on May 15th, 2017 – First published in Portuguese on November 21st, 2020. For further information about our meetings please, click here.

The whole Beauty is already present!

Realization is not something new to be added to you. It is like an abandoned palace, without dwellers for hundreds of years. It is forgotten, lost, like a hidden treasure in some corner of the world. This palace is housing cockroaches, rats, bats and spiders. The floor, the walls, the mirrors and all the furniture in this palace are covered with dust. Rats and cockroaches are multiplying there.

This palace has been there for thousands of years and, under all that dust, there is furniture made of the strongest and most beautiful wood that can be found on Earth. The mirror frames – which are many – are of the finest, most refined, most delicate material. There are large halls, large bedrooms, and the floor – like everything there – was placed very carefully. There are many details of great charm for the eyes, of great beauty, but everything is covered with dust. The number of insects is huge! Unless this palace is found, discovered, and all that dust covering the furniture, the dirt and the insects are removed, its beauty will remain hidden. Realization is like that: it is already there, but there is a lot of things covering It!

The palace was not built for the dwelling of rats, cockroaches and spiders. The purpose for building this palace was much more noble. Kings, princes and monarchs are those who live in palaces.

The purpose of these lines is always the same. They are not meant to teach you something new, but to make you find out the old, to perceive What is already present. You are a palace, but you are busy with too much dust, too many rats, cockroaches, spiders and several other insects. You are a palace with large and beautiful rooms, beautiful furniture, but too occupied.

You are like a huge ocean mistaking yourself for a small wave, a small ripple, living in a narrow piece of the sea, crashing against the rocks all the time. With small variations, the same wave repeats itself. Time after time, it hits the rock, vanishes, comes back and vanishes again. It gets "born" at a certain point and "dies" when it hits the rock and then comes back with a small difference in shape. Thus, months, years, centuries, millennia go by, and you, who are all this immensity of the ocean, inexplicable, indescribable, keep mistaking yourself for a small ripple, a small wave.

* Presential meeting transcription, originally held in Campos do Jordão city, Brazil, on February 2018. First published in Portuguese on May 30, 2018. For further information about our meetings, please click here.

A Great Misconception

People live in a constant search for pleasure, mistaking the fulfillment it provides for real Happiness. You are in Satsang to investigate that, not only verbally but also existentially.

The whole point is that pleasure never comes alone. It is like something you want to buy, but you must pay a huge amount of money – the price for pleasure is pain. Therefore, you will never be able to dissociate pleasure from pain, since in order to get one, you must also have the other. So, mistaking Happiness for pleasure, and this is what human beings do, is a huge misconception. In a totally different way, the Sage considers Contentment as Happiness, that is different from pleasure.

In the Ego, there is never contentment! When things go bad, there is a pain there, and when they go well, even in the presence of pleasure, pain is also there, in hiding, waiting for the next opportunity to show up. So, you are permanently confronted with this matter of duality, and this is how the egoic mind basically works. I want to show you the beauty and the importance of the Natural State, which is Contentment.

Notice the difference: the Natural State is free from worries, from desire’s fulfillments, from the burden of duality, from this matter of pleasure and pain, ever present in the manifestation. Human body is biologically prepared to pleasure and pain, but since in the Natural State you are internally and psychologically free from the egoic sense, you are also free from duality. That means you are free from the need of searching for pleasure or escaping from pain, and that’s the beauty of the Natural State.

In the state of duality you live in, there is this permanent search for something, in the attempt to escape from something else. In other words, in the ego you label what you like versus what you don’t like, what you want versus what you don’t want. This way, there is never contentment and therefore there is no Happiness. The topic here is the basic and natural matter of Happiness.

It is interesting when you observe nature: living beings have no problem with the issue of handling pain, because pleasure and pain are inherent to manifestation. We see this in nature, in animals, and currently studies have observed that in plants too.

However, when you look at human beings, you see this confusion in identifying with the mind, and this way in frequently translating the experience of pleasure and pain on the basis of a personal viewpoint of this false “me.” Thus, there is no Happiness, no Contentment. To the Sage, the acceptance of Life as It shows, as It is, is Contentment. So, there can be Happiness, because there is no search for pleasure by escaping from pain.

Human beings carry a very strong sense of doer, which is pure vanity, suffering and frustration. Have you ever found yourselves complaining about the lack of some pleasure fulfillment in your lives, saying: “How miserable I am! Everything goes wrong in my life!”? Just because you missed or you were denied some pleasure, you got frustrated and angry, too angry, and that means being stuck to this wrong view of life.

I have something to tell you: you will always feel pleasure and pain physically. However, you are not doomed to live forever in this duality of frustration, desire and fear. You just have to awake! When you are free from this inner feeling of duality, from the search for fulfillment through pleasure and from fighting against pain, you are free. This way, it is possible to recognize your Real Nature, which is Contentment, Happiness; and This is Peace, Freedom!

From birth to death, you will always have situations of pleasure and pain, always determined by external things. Physically, you will always experience this, but internally, you can live free from the presence of this personal sense in pleasure and pain experiences

From an external point of view, the Sages live their lives just like any other person. However, from an internal perspective, the Sage is in Contentment, in Happiness, in Freedom, because the Sage knows God determines everything that happens. As the Sages no longer mistake themselves for the body, they have no problems anymore since they are not in favor of pleasure nor against pain. This means all your problems only exist because you see yourself as a "person," as a separate identity, as "someone" able to control something by abandoning another thing.

If your true goal is Happiness, forget about the search for happiness and realize your Natural State of non-duality. Stop mistaking yourself for external experiences, let them on God’s hands. I will be practical now with you: if someone does not like you, this is not your business. You are getting involved in completely wrong situations! Your business is to give up this “someone” you believe to be, and not to care if someone likes or dislikes you. I am giving you an example of how you care about what is going on externally, ignoring the Reality of who you Are internally.

This sense of “me” is frequently paying attention on what seems to be happening outside. This way, you will always be unhappy, since you will always be trying to protect yourself, to defend yourself, to justify, to improve this self-image. The search for pleasure is, in itself, pain, egoic interest. Let things outside there where they belong to. Do not search for pleasure nor escape from pain, and when the one or the other appears, don’t mistake yourself for the experience, because it comes and goes.

*Online meeting transcription originally held May 25, 2018 – First published in Portuguese on June 08, 2018. For further information about our meetings, please click here.

What is the secret of Meditation?

My question to you is: what is the secret of Meditation? Why do we talk so much about Meditation here? You are busy with thoughts all the time, and this is constantly producing different states to yourself. You are involved with countless thoughts! When you are engaged in some state internally, you are not in your Being. So, Meditation is a very important thing, since it is the science of how to remain in your Being, free from any state.

You have uncountable thoughts, so you are continually in search of objects. You consider a state as an object to be achieved, and when you reach it, it is not real. Thus, you attain “happiness” and “peace,” but they are not real. You need to notice when you are away from your Real Being, you need to be aware of it, and you are always away from That when you are in a state you have aimed, searched for and found. That is why Meditation is very important – it is the presence of your Being free of states and objectifications.

Notice you are biased to think in order to accomplish something, and thinking really wards you off from your Natural Being, your Natural State. That’s why I say this Natural State is Meditation, is Consciousness!

Then, what secret could I share with you today, in this encounter here, about Happiness? What is the secret of Happiness? Happiness is to be here, without pursuing objects and results, that is, not focusing on the thoughts to find states. The thought creates these states of “peace,” “joy,” “freedom,” “happiness” – and even the state of “divine realization” – and then strives to reach that. So, when a single thought occurs inside your head, you are prone to create an object, and therefore it turns out to be the search for a state.

So, Meditation is a very simple thing to put into words but a very complex thing to be recognized, once the thought does not allow for it. Meditation is the absence of this movement of objectification, the absence of thought in the search of something externally. When you are in your Being, there is no search! It is simple to verify when you are absent from your Being: you are under some state.

Then, I am sharing you a secret here. What is the secret of Realized Beings, of the Sages? They do not engage themselves in pursuing objects. That is why desire, which is the motivation of a state, disappears. The mind is addicted to searching for states. Since you have not discovered the beauty of being in your Self, what do you do? You listen to music, watch a movie, go for a ride, you eat and so on, since there are countless ways for the mind to find these states. The mind will even meditate, since the practice of meditation, taught and prescribed, leads the practitioner to reach states of relaxation and well-being.

Meditation is not a state! Whenever you say “I am happy,” you are not in Happiness, or when you say “I am very glad,” it means that you do not know the Real Joy since It is not a state. “I am very happy” means you are objectifying an emotional experience; you are present in the objectification of that experience. It is the same as saying “I am in a meditation moment” or “I am in a consciousness moment,” since Meditation is not a passing state. Thus, Meditation, Consciousness cannot be pursued as an object!

Every time you enjoy something, it is not Happiness. “Ah… this song is so beautiful!” “That movie is so good!” It is an experience of a state; it is still an objectification; that is, the ego is present there, so there is no Consciousness, Meditation, Being. Can you see that? “I enjoy music,” “I enjoy cinema,” “I enjoy dating” is the same as saying: “I enjoy meditating, since in meditation I am in peace” – that is a peace turned into an object. When someone says: “I like meditation because it brings me silence,” but this is a silence you have achieved, you have reached.

Your Being is not a silence you achieve! Meditation, Happiness and Consciousness are not states you reach, since when This is present, “you,” the “person,” are not present. Can you see the trick? People become spiritual; in other words, they find states to live in. It means these people are spiritualized egos. Meditation is Consciousness, Consciousness is Being, Being is God, and one should not objectify This; one should not experience such objectification. To objectify is to separate yourself – “the experience and you,” “the state and you.”

These states are changeable, so they cannot be Meditation. I do not use the word “meditation” with the same meaning people use, as a practice, because to me Meditation is Consciousness, Samadhi, that is, it has nothing to do with a state, since you cannot objectify that. God cannot be objectified!

The “person” uses to look for states to live in. Be aware of when you are away from your Being, when you are in a state. People sometimes write to me: “I am very happy, Master. I woke up in deep silence,” “I am very well,” and I say: “it will pass.” You say, "I feel the silence," but you are objectifying the experience; there "you" are! “I feel such joy when I listen to this song” – this is an egoic, pleasant, romantic experience, such a deep feeling that can even provide you full inspiration, but you are in the ego. That has nothing to do with your Being, for your Being is not touched.

Another one wrote: “When I am with a boyfriend, I feel such a deep peace! It is the same as Tantra's contact with the Divine when I have sex. I have a cosmic experience of ecstasy in Tantra.” That is an objectification involving the senses, emotion and sensation, with the “experiencer” present. It has nothing to do with Consciousness, with the absence of the sense of "me," but rather just an ecstasy experience. Someone has the same or similar experience in a concert hall or listening to classical music.

For example, when your team wins a championship, you almost disappear in joy, and this is an experience, a state. When your child is born, you are in ecstasy, the world ends, the joy is so deep, the feeling is so fulfilling, but it is an objectified state and you need to be alert, aware of it. The moment you are aware, you know there is no "someone" to know. When there is Real Happiness, you do not say: "I am in joy," "I am happy," and you do not think: "I am at peace, in joy." When there is Real Joy, there is no thought, no objectification of the experience.

If "you" go through the experience, it is not real. What is Real is not an experience "you" go through, so That cannot be objectified. You cannot go in and out of Real Meditation; of consciousness, of Peace or of Happiness.

Be aware of what is happening to you. When you say: "I like this so much," it is a pleading, a request for more, that is, this is already going or has already gone away. That is how the egoic mind shows itself. So, stay tuned and see that within yourself. See how much the mind is objectifying the experience, constantly searching for sensations. That wards you completely off from your Self, from your Being.

The egoic mind is like a little monkey, jumping from branch to branch in the pursuit of a new sensation, a new experience. Now on a higher branch, then on a lower one but it does not calm down on a branch. It stops for a little while, enjoys the landscape and then jumps to another branch, then to another one, then it goes down to later jump up again. The egoic mind is like this little restless monkey jumping from branch to branch, never resting, and this wards you off from your Being. Your Being does not need branches, new landscapes, distractions, having fun; Your Being does not have to fulfill Itself with any distraction, does not need to find something called as "happiness," "peace," "pleasure," "satisfaction."

It is easy to see if you are in or away from your Being. When away from your Being, you are restless, very “hungry”: hunger for drinking, for drugs, for food, for sex, for spiritual knowledge... Your Being needs nothing! Your Being is not concerned with family, children, dog, cat. So, when you say: "Bless my children," "Bless my pet and my business," it is your ego asking. Your ego will feel blessed if good things happen to your business, to your cat, to your children... That is the ego's old trick.

*Online meeting transcription originally held on June 7th, 2020 – on Zoom app – First published in Portuguese on November 10th, 2020. To access our agenda, pleaseclick here.

The fear of the Natural State

Do you know how to ride a bicycle? In order to learn, you start by using two little supporting wheels attached to the back wheel or with the support of someone holding you, otherwise you fall. Isn’t it so? Those two training wheels are there to support you, since you are neither able to keep the balance nor able to keep the pedal pace. Riding a bike is like that: on zero speed, you fall, and speed requires you to keep the pace on the pedals.

The difficulty is to pedal without balance. Without pedaling, you have no speed, and without speed, you have no balance; but if you pedal without balance, you fall. As the brain still does not have a record of the required speed and the correct way to pedal, you have to learn to ride a bike, and therefore you have the support of someone holding it or of those two training wheels. It may take half an hour, two hours or two days, but you will ride your bike effortlessly, without training wheels or anyone holding it. What does this have to do with God's Realization? It is possible to no longer fall into that egoic mind, without effort, without anyone or anything holding you, without any support.

You cannot learn to “ride the bicycle” of this full and non-dual Consciousness without training wheels. In general, people just cannot, since not everyone is born like Ramana Maharshi. After being born, the vast majority of the people is not so endowed with internal freedom, detached from desires and fears and close enough to touch this Dimension. People are not prone to that, they have not that nostalgia, that thirst, that yearning for Freedom. Even if you have some glimpses of something out of the egoic mind, your predisposition will continually push you to this “autopilot,” and your “little plane” will keep flying low over the world of names, forms, desires, imaginations, anxiety, depression and illusion.

So, you need training wheels on your bicycle, a hand to support you while you learn to give the first pedal strokes until you are brave enough to accelerate. In general, despite all this security, there is fear of riding the bike. Then the courage comes, but the training wheels are still there or there is someone behind to support us. Putting this in a simpler way: to assume this non-dual Consciousness, to enjoy this non-suffering Freedom – because you are no longer deluded by the creations of that ego-identity – is not an easy, simple and natural thing for the major part of the people, as soon the “autopilot” takes over the “little plane.”

The viewpoint of the Sage, of the Saint is extremely rare, clear and inspires us to the Truth. The Saint is the one who has the taste for impersonality, for non-dual Consciousness, for living without stories and able to move forward without “letting the bike fall.” Since it is extremely rare to recognize the Saints, they become invisible. The Saint is the one who has the taste for the Natural State, free from the “person,” and it is extremely rare to recognize the beauty of this State in such one, for they become invisible. Do you understand the difficulty? You can live for 30, 40, 50, 60 years with a Saint inside your house, with the One who has already experienced the impersonality, and even so, you may not be able to recognize or to appreciate him or her.

Generally, people’s tendencies concern the world, so they care a lot about the car manufacturer, the size of the house, the pool, the social position they assume, the status they reach, the “person” they are. So, the Saint, who has the taste for Consciousness, is extremely rare. The major part of the people is not so gifted with such Intelligence, so they need “training wheels,” and it seems that their “little bicycle” has to “move a lot” before removing those “training wheels.”

However, this is not really necessary, since according to the Sages, the entire path or each round you ride with the bike, means getting into, plunging into or establishing yourself in this Perception of Pure Consciousness. This is not about driving an imported car, about living in a huge house, nor about being an illustrious and important figure within society, but rather about establishing yourself There, in that Pure Consciousness, where what is being seen and the one who sees have both vanished.

In this Unique Consciousness, there is not a center with a circumference, there is no subject in relationship with things. If there is no center, there is no border, there is nothing to see, nor "someone" to see. There is no ego with such an organized, prepared, frightened, complex and difficult structure. Ego is an airplane on autopilot, permanently flying the same flight of dissatisfaction, conflicts, dilemmas, problems, demands and eternal dissatisfactions.

Back to the bicycle, when the training wheels, this support on the back part of the bike – that is the ego as an organized structure – is no longer needed, it reveals itself as a false, empty and illusory structure, and therefore it is dismantled. You are too afraid of this Natural State, since you believe this “structure” is the basis of sanity, and it is very typical of the ego-identity to consider itself in sanity. The ego is afraid this structure may collapse. In other words, the “child is afraid of losing the training wheels.” That is why you have so much resistance, because not only is there no risk of you going insane when that structure collapses, but also you find out that insanity means exactly that standing structure. However, when this egoic structure collapses, the Real Consciousness arises in an authentic and true way, without any distraction, dilemma or problem. Insanity is how you live inside this old and ancient structure when you do not know how to "ride a bike," when you are afraid of "pedaling."

I know some of you say you have already understood this. No! You are seeing someone “riding a bicycle without the training wheels,” but that does not mean you have understood that. It is like seeing someone playing an instrument or performing a scenic performance and, when looking at that, you say "I can do it," "I already know it," "I will do it," "I understand how to do it." You all know what I am talking about, how quickly the mind drives conclusions growing out of superficial considerations. When the mind sees something being done, it says "I know how to do it too," but when you ask the person to do it, to put it into practice, the person finds out his or her inability and how compelled he or she was by the enthusiasm, by the desire, by the simplification.

Yes, it is simple! Riding a bike is simple, but only after you know how to do it. Before, your brain cannot do this, it has neither motor coordination, technique nor skill. The ego is full of imagination, so it simplifies what is not so simple and says, "I know," but the ego does not know, because it is not enough to see someone doing it and immediately suppose you could do that just because you desire so.

Here, with me, you hear that and say: “It is so simple what he says, it is so real. I have already understood." Isn't that true?

*Online intensive meeting transcription originally held on September 26th, 2020 – on Zoom app – First published in Portuguese on November 12th, 2020. Access our agenda, please click here.