Hello guys! Welcome to another meeting here on our channel.
After all, what is the purpose of these meetings that we have here? Is it seeing again what we have already seen in a book, in a lecture, learning what we already know?
We can sit here and listen again to something that we tend to agree with, because, in a certain way, we already know and appreciate the subject, and we admire it, because we've read it, we've heard about it, we have already learned about it from someone, from some book.
So, we come here and end up having this agreement; we listen to a speech like this in order to have an intellectual agreement, to have a verbal agreement. Is this our purpose?
Exactly… Today, I want to tell you, I want to put to you, as I have always tried to put in these meetings, that here we are not dealing with ideas, dealing with conclusions, dealing with teachings, in the sense that books communicate this to us, in the sense that lectures communicate this to us.
We need to discover something different than simply learning something from someone, learning from a book, learning from a speaker, learning from someone who has something to communicate to us, like a teaching.
I want to talk to you about the importance of learning from ourselves; this is what we need! We need to discover the Truth about who we are, and no one can give us that, a speaker cannot give us that, a book cannot give us that. After all, what does it mean to learn from ourselves? What does this imply? Why is this learning so important? I want to talk to you today about this – how important this Self-discovery is.
This Self-discovery is possible when there is the Self-knowledge. Self-knowledge is the Recognition of the Truth about who You are. Another person won't give you that.
You can read hundreds of books, listen to hundreds of lectures on Philosophy, Psychology, Spirituality, and nothing, absolutely nothing, will communicate to you the Truth that you may easily, or as challenge, discover for yourself, in yourself; and this is only possible when you observe yourself. This is very important, to discover the beauty of Self-knowledge through self-observation.
We need a change, a deep psychological change. When I refer to this psychological change, as I have done here in our meetings, I mean a change of the mind itself, and here “mind” includes thoughts, feelings, emotions, sensations, perceptions; it includes the brain itself undergoing a change, a transformation.
This is the real form for a change in the mind. If there is a change in this structure of the mind, there will be a change in this very view of Life.
The vision that we have had of Life, until today, until that moment, is a view, all of it, based on what we learn, we learn from our culture, from our civilization, from our parents, from our grandparents, from our great-grandparents, our educators, with the whole model around us; and that model has placed us within a condition of mind trapped in a pattern of deep psychological conditioning.
We need a deep change within each one of us.
This change is necessary, because we live, like our whole culture, like our whole society, like this whole world around us, trapped in an internal, inner psychological condition of unhappiness. Envy is unhappiness, jealousy is unhappiness, desire and fear, all of it, is unhappiness, and this has been the model of our lives.
We lack a change, an internal transformation. This transformation is only possible when there is Self-knowledge, and the Self-knowledge is born from this learning, from this learning about ourselves. And I want to tell you here that this is possible, and we just need to find out how it becomes possible.
So, if there is a teaching here, this teaching is the teaching of the need to self-discovery, to find out ourselves, who we are, who we truly are.
We need to discover the Truth, the Divine Truth we bring, the Truth of our Being, or else we will continue as human creatures trapped in this egocentric, limited, narrow pattern, in reality, unhappy. We can cover it all up, mask it – that's how we've done it.
We mask all this, we cover it all with external achievements, professional achievements, family achievements, financial achievements, affective achievements... We have in our lives several areas of achievements, that we work for them, we seek them all, and unfortunately, we are superficially fulfilled by them, and everything, in fact, remains – that ancient and old condition of ego identity, of egocentrism. I want to invite you to a Recognition of the Truth about who You are and therefore to the Discovery of something within you beyond this condition.
That something is the Truth of your Being, it is your Divine Truth. So, our meetings have the purpose of communicating something that is not in the speech, that is not in an exchange of ideas. If you stop here, sit down to listen to this speech and enter into this condition of just agreeing with what you are hearing, nothing new will come of it.
The mere verbal agreement, the mere intellectual agreement, constitutes another form of psychological conditioning, another form of adjustment of this old condition of opinions, conclusions and beliefs to something that will repeat itself. You will only have a reinforcement of these old opinions, conclusions and beliefs. We need to discover the Truth about who we are, and that is only possible when there is this Self-discovery, this self-observation. Ramana Maharshi called this self-enquiry. The question “who am I?” is not a question you should simply ask yourself theoretically, intellectually, verbally.
The question “who am I?” points to that Silence – “who am I after all?” –, discarding all these opinions, conclusions and beliefs, all this conditioning of culture, of civilization, of the world, this heritage of parents, educators, of those who surround us since childhood, giving up all that, letting go of all that, looking at within ourselves – “after all, who am I?”
Here, the work constitutes the Art of Meditation, and Meditation is this approach to yourself, it is this approach to yourself, this learning with yourself, and learning means looking at what is here, looking exactly at this model, that makes us ambitious, makes us jealous, makes us possessive, makes us attached, creatures with fear, stuck to patterns of anxiety, desires, stuck to conclusions, opinions, evaluations, basically, prejudiced criteria.
We need to discard that, we need to discover something beyond this egocentrism, this condition of illusion, of mistaken identification with who we are.
Our work, our meeting, is to offer you the possibility of Realizing the Truth, the Truth about your own Being, the Truth about your Divine Nature, about your Real Identity.
So, this meeting intends to show you that it is possible through self-observation… Self-observation is the beginning, it is the foundation of Meditation. And note: Meditation is not simply closing your eyes, sitting in a certain position, listening to smooth music, in a silent environment, trying to control the breath and put the mind under control. All this can be a great support, a great help, for that internal health, for that psychological health. So, it soothes, it calms down, it relaxes, it brings emotional and physical well-being, for sure, but that's not what I consider the True Meditation.
The True Meditation is the awareness of the Truth about who You are, here and now, in your life, in your daily life. Self-observation puts you in this new condition. If you can watch yourself walking, talking to someone, driving your car; if you can watch yourself when you feel a word being addressed to you, creating some form of conflict in you, like sadness, nuisance, annoyance, making you tense, making you nervous, that direct observation, just this observation of that reaction arising at that given moment, in this instant...
This will only happen when you are in touch with Life as It is, as It appears, here and now, around you; not when you are sitting in a certain place, relaxing, breathing, simply watching the thoughts arising.
This is not the exclusion of this practice, but it is to tell you that there is a much more efficient, much more powerful practice of Meditation, actually the only Meditation for this real process of psychological deconditioning, which is this Meditation - in your living, in your day to day, becoming aware of yourself by watching the mind, watching your reactions, watching the words you say, watching the thoughts that arise, watching the words you hear, watching the images before your eyes causing some form of pleasant or unpleasant sensation.
This observation made without choice, without judgment, without comparison, just this direct observation, this observation is the Real Observation, when there is not this separation within you, this duality within you.
What duality is this? It is that which appears within you when what is seen within is interpreted as being seen by you and rejected; being seen by you and accepted. What you hear... it comes this misinterpretation: “I like It,” “I don't like it.”
What you see, what you hear, what you feel... You see, that feeling is something in the body, it's something in that structure of the brain, it's something within that structure of the mind... that feeling. But at that moment, a thought arises and creates this illusory division, this artificial division, this internal duality, and it says "I don't like this" or "I like this." So, we are all the time, internally, agreeing and disagreeing with thoughts, feelings, sensations, perceptions, and we are always putting this element, which is this element of psychological conditioning, this “me,” this “I,” agreeing, disagreeing, judging, evaluating, rejecting… This pattern of behavior is the pattern of behavior of this ego identity, this “person” that we believe we are.
So, Meditation is the art of self-observation and not being confused with what arises, with what appears. So, what is present is what is. Any idea, any suggestion, any evaluation, judgment, condemnation, puts you back on the ground of the conditioned mind, that mind in the ancient and old pattern, that identity that you believe yourself to be; and in that moment you are outside of what I have called the True Meditation, because Meditation is the art of simply Being, becoming aware of yourself here and now. This self-observation is all that is needed for this art of Meditation. This is learning from yourself. The beauty of it is that it puts an end to that illusory inner sense of division. This inner sense of illusion is the sense of separation, of duality, between you and this experience. The human being lives within this context of envy, jealousy, fear, worries, judgments, evaluations. This happens inside because of this conditioning, this illusory division - this sense of "I and the other," this sense of "I" in this liking, this disliking, this "I want," this "I don't want."
The sense of duality, the sense of separateness, creates the illusion of separation between you and the other, between you and life, between you and this complete experience happening here and now. Therefore, what we're dealing with here is not something that you agree or disagree with, because it's something you can observe, it's something you need to observe in yourself. How? Again, again and again, in your life, in your daily life.
This pattern of egoic isolationism, of personal positioning… how is this interfering in these relations? Life is made up of relations. We are in a relation in everything around us. Life is pure relation. We transform this relation with Life into this relationship, in this sense of an identity present within this relation, accepting, rejecting, agreeing... So, there is this agreeing, disagreeing, this liking, not liking... So, there is always this position of an identity being personal, assuming this personality. Life happens as It is, but this idea of being someone present, within this context, has been the cause of a lot of unhappiness, a lot of misery, a lot of suffering.
The Self-knowledge, which has this self-observation as the beginning of everything, is only possible when there is True Meditation. When there is the True Meditation, you have contact with something in you beyond that duality, beyond that illusory principle of separation, beyond that particular and personal view of wanting, not wanting, liking, disliking, desire and fear. So, you have contact with something in you, because of the presence of Meditation… You have contact in you with something that is beyond the egoic mind, beyond the conditioned mind. So, a transformation in this whole psychological structure becomes possible, because there is a change in the mind - and mind represents thoughts, sensations, perceptions, feelings, as I said just now -, and the brain itself undergoing a change for something entirely to arise, for an entirely new state unknown to the vast majority to arise: the Truth of That which is present here and now, the Truth of your Being, That which is nameless, That which is beyond time, That which is beyond the body and beyond the mind.
Then, something new arises, and that something new is this Transformation, this Recognition of the Divine Reality. Notice what we are saying here for you. We never come into direct contact with experience, we are always protecting ourselves through this position of duality, of separation. There is always this self-defense mechanism, this “me,” this “I,” and it is always ready – and this is a pattern of conditioning from childhood that we all have – it is always ready to defend itself, to protect itself. And it does it exactly as I said just now: wanting, not wanting, liking, disliking, preferring, having opinions, assuming conclusions, believing in control...
This makes us, human beings, fall short of the Reality of our own Being; it makes us possessive, aggressive, tense, anxious, jealous and controlling. And, over the years, as the body ages and the need for this Understanding does not appear, does not arise... This body ages, this entire structure of the body and mind goes through a change of decrepitude, and we are becoming, over the years, creatures even more attached to these old models. We become old women and men, older people, sullen, we become aggressive, possessive, jealous, violent creatures…
We need this change, this transformation, we need this Awareness of the Truth about who we are.
Therefore, our meetings are intended to show us the importance of Self-Realization – some call it Spiritual Enlightenment; it is the Consciousness of the Truth of our own Being, a state free from this ego identity, from this egoic identity, a condition of Fullness, of Inner Completeness, of Love, of Peace, of Happiness.
So, you, in your Being, are a Joy, you are a Blessing of your circle of relationship, because these relationships are no longer at the service of an identity that isolates itself, that separates itself and that demands something from this relationship. So, I would say that this is the real way of relating to the world, life, others, to what is around us, because at that moment there is no longer this sense of “I,” this sense of duality, that sense of separateness, and when that is no longer present, there is no longer this egocentrism, there is no longer this sense of “I” as the center of this experience.
Realize the beauty of it, realize the beauty of it, the importance of it. The relationship with the husband, with the wife, with the children, with the employees, with the boss at work, with life as it is, with the other as he is, without this element of contradiction and disorder, of confusion; this element that is the “I,” this “I” that creates the illusion of the other, separates itself to request, to demand, to control, to possess. That egoic condition, that condition of separation of illusion, is unhappiness.
Living within this condition, because there is no Self-knowledge, because there is no self-observation, because there is no Meditation, this inclination of this false center, this false "I," is to isolating itself more and more into states of unhappiness, such as anxiety, depression, loneliness, boredom, fear. So, I want to invite you to understand yourself, to see yourself, to look inside yourself, to go beyond this condition, this pattern, in this Self-recognition of the Truth about who You are. OK? This is our subject; it is the subject of our interest here within this channel. If this makes sense to you, leave your "like," subscribe to the channel and let's work on it together. OK? Thanks for the meeting.
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