GC: Hello everyone! We are here for another videocast. Once again, we would like to thank Master Gualberto for his presence, who are here for the videocast so that we can bring some excerpts from Joel's books and the Master can provide a deepening. We also read the questions that you ask on the channel and the Master can provide the answers. Much gratitude, Master, for this videocast.
Master, today I'm going to read an excerpt from Joel's book called: “Practicing the Presence,” and, in an excerpt from the book, Joel says the following: “Only I am God. Not the concept you have of me, only I, the invisible one, am God. I alone am God. We have to stop creating mental images, stop imagining what God is like, and trust the formless invisible One that penetrates and permeates all beings.” Master, can you give us some comments on this excerpt?
MG: Here, it is what is very common on our part, which is creating an image, formatting God within an idea, creating a mental formulation of this Reality that is beyond the mind. I have called that the Nameless, the Indescribable, because the word “God,” we use that word… we are talking about something that is outside of the intellect, outside of our intellectual reason, outside of these measures of reasoning, of understanding. Divine Truth is outside the mind, it is outside any formula, any formulation, any imagination, any idea, any concept. So, this is something that we, really, Gilson, need to get rid of.
It sounds a little strange, for some of you, when we say here that the belief in God, the idea, the formulation of the belief in God, is just a mental concept that we form, and we form this belief, this concept, this image, due to the cultural conditioning where we were raised. If you are raised where you hear the word “God” since you were a child, you end up creating an image of what it represents and you carry that image until the end of your days. And it is just an image, a belief, it does not alter in any way the Awareness of the Truth of what God is and the Revelation of What You actually are.
We do not need to believe. What we actually need is to become aware of the Reality of God, but we cannot become aware of the Reality of God by studying this idea called “God.” In the holy books, we have the idea, and the intellect forms an image and studies it, and that is not the Reality of God.
The Reality of God needs to be verified, and It is only verified when we discover It in ourselves, when we become aware of the Reality of That which we essentially are, because our nature is the Nature of God. Not the God that we imagine, the God that we believe in and the God that, intellectually, we can study about, but, rather, the God that we can see present here and now when this sense of “I,” of the ego, of this person that we believe to be is no longer present. So, we indeed have the Awareness of the Reality of God.
In this sense, Gilson, we don't need to trust this, because who would have this trust, if not this molded intellect? This shaped intellect, in this principle of belief, image, and imagination, is still part of illusion. So, it's not about trusting, it's about being internally “burning” for the Realization of this Truth, and that requires an understanding of this illusion, which is this false identity that we bring, that we express in our relationship with others, with life.
This sense of an “I” in us is what needs to be investigated, and it is enough to have this deep interest in It, to be “burning” for It – and this, in fact, is already an action of the Presence itself of this Real Consciousness, which is God, in us… It is about the Consciousness of this surrender to the Truth, going beyond this limitation of this “I,” this false consciousness, which is the ego present.
So, this happens in a very natural way when Grace itself takes charge of carrying out this work, of making this work possible here for this organism, for this mechanism. The Truth of God is revealed by God himself!
So, here it is really about unlearning everything we have ever heard and believed about God, about studying ourselves and understanding this movement of the “I.” This will occur through an action, of course, of the Divine Presence itself here, which is already taking care of this, so the Truth of God reveals itself. It's not about believing, trusting, it's about learning the art of self-observation, which brings you closer to that Self-awareness, which naturally carries out this surrender, the surrender of illusion. Through True Meditation, this happens.
So, Gilson, this is our emphasis here in these meetings: learning the art of self-observation and discovering this false center, this false “I.” This very realization is the end of this illusion. This naturally brings about this Revelation that God is the present Reality. Not the idea, the concept, the image, the belief, but this nameless Reality, indescribable and unreachable by thought. This is the Divine Reality; it is the Reality of God.
GC: Within this context that Master is talking about, on how useless it is having a belief in God, and about the word that is used a lot within spirituality as well, which is “faith,” “have faith in God”.. Master, could you talk a little about it?
MG: Yeah... We don't know what Faith in God is. We know what it is to have faith in God, and this “belief in God” is something that we were taught, and it is an act of goodwill of the intellect itself to accept this as being real, as God being a Truth, but this is just an action and a movement of the intellect itself creating an image and trusting it. This is what we call “faith.” We do not know what Faith is. Faith is the Awareness of the Reality of God. Faith shows itself when the Truth of That which is unknown reveals itself. It is not a belief.
This movement of surrender to the Truth, of working on oneself so that this sense of “I” dissolves, so that this sense of “I” disappears, this movement is a movement of Divine Intelligence itself, of Divine Grace itself, of Faith, of the very Reality of God in us. This Faith is a Gift from God. It is not this “I” that accomplishes This, it is not this “I” in its will, in its belief, that exercises Faith. The “I” would never do that; the ego would never do that. The Truth about Faith is that Faith is an action of the Presence of Grace itself, therefore Faith is a Divine Gift. The sacred scriptures say that Faith is a Gift from God. The Bible says: “Faith is a gift from God. This does not come from you; it is a gift from God. It does not come from work, so that the man, so that no one can boast.”
Therefore, Gilson, we don't know what Faith is. Faith is an action that comes from God to God. It is not from man to God. It is something that comes from Grace itself. Divine Grace is the presence of Faith. In our speeches, I don't use the expression “Faith” so much, precisely because there is this confusion. We would have to clarify that “Faith” is not someone who can have it. The person cannot have, the human being cannot exercise Faith. It is the very Presence of Divine Consciousness in him carrying out this process.
In general, in religious life, people use this expression “faith” in the sense of an exercise of will, of volition, of wanting of the own “I,” the own person, which is false, which is completely illusory, because it is the Divine Presence itself that places this impulse towards God in the heart of man. It is God in search of Himself, it is God becoming aware of Himself here, in this instant.
This sense of ego, Gilson, is not real, and this entire movement around this false identity revolves around the known, the movement of thought, which is part of this illusory dream. So, it is very simple to understand that human beings cannot exercise Faith, because the psychological condition of conditioning in us, in this false center, in this “I,” in this ego, is exactly the absence of Truth, the absence of Grace, of absence of Faith.
It's a delicate subject, because, in general, we say we have Faith, but who has that? The “I,” the ego? It cannot have that, but we use religious expressions, taken from the scriptures, that we are unaware of their real, deep meaning. We use the expression “God,” “love,” “faith” … We do not know the meaning of these expressions, but we use them in this religious sense, within this aspect of Theology, which we intellectually approach and believe we have understood, but this is only at the verbal level, at the level of words, and we don't get out of that.
The Truth of That which we are, which is the Truth of your Being, which is the Truth of God, brings, within Itself, this Truth, What is the Reality of Consciousness, of Being, of God Himself. So, Love is This, Faith is This, Truth is This, Happiness is This. Not the happiness we know, the love we know, the faith we know, the God we believe we also know, nor the God we know. Reality is beyond the mind, beyond the “I,” beyond the ego.
GC: Master, there is a question from Wilson Barducci. He asks the following: “Master Gualberto, are you enlightened?”
MG: What we call Enlightenment… Everyone gives a meaning to It. Lately, I've even been using this expression, because it's an expression that people, in general, use, but they don't know what the real meaning of this expression is. The expression “Enlightenment,” as a synonym for the Awakening of Consciousness, you see, is not something that one can achieve. This Awakening of Consciousness is the very Reality of this Real Consciousness taking Its place in this body-mind. So, Enlightenment is the Truth of this Light itself taking Its place in this body-mind. It is not someone becoming enlightened. It is the end of this illusion of someone present in this experience of living, of life, carrying this sense of separation, of duality, and, therefore, of fear, suffering, and all the confusion that thought can create.
People live in an internal state of confusion, suffering, fear, anxiety, unhappiness, and absence of Real Love, the Real Truth of Faith, the Real Truth of God. The Truth of What Grace does is to bring this Awakening of Consciousness, which is the end of this “me,” this “I,” this ego. So, the Truth of Enlightenment, the Truth of Awakening, is that the sense of an “I” that separates itself – and therefore carries all this weight of an identity separate from life and therefore in suffering… The end to all that, yes, is the Awakening of Consciousness.
In this sense, everything that we are sharing here, that Gualberto is sharing, is based on what he is living. We are sharing the Reality of this Being that we are, this Real Consciousness that we bring. So, we are sharing this from an experience, not from an idea, a belief, a concept.
When this Natural State settles, your living is no longer the living of a person in the sense that we have given to that word. One lives in confusion, one lives in this sense of separation, one lives in this ignorance about one's Divine Nature, and the Awakening of Consciousness is the end of that. To put it very simply: this Truth of Being of this Consciousness, of this Enlightenment, is the Truth of everyone. The difference is that some have already assumed this and others have not. Some are already aware of this Reality and living this Reality, and others are still identifying with the illusion of a sense of an “I” that separates itself from experience in living, from the present moment and therefore suffer.
Here, our proposal is for you to assume This. This “you assuming” is the end of this “me,” this “I,” this “you” as you see yourself. This is Awakening, This is Spiritual Awakening, This is God Realization, whatever name we want to give It. The name does not matter, the Natural State free from confusion, disorder, suffering, fear, and this sense of ignorance about life, about oneself, in this context of living – that is what matters.
Enlightenment, Gilson, is the Awakening of the Sage, it is the Awakening of that Natural State of Pure Wisdom, of Pure Intelligence, something beyond everything that the mind knows, even beyond all mystical experience and all mystical life, like the mystic also knows. That’s it!
GC: Master, it is impressive how, in this idea of being someone – I am talking about myself – it is completely unknown what “someone enlightened” would be, because, really, as I have this feeling of being someone, looking at the Master only with this human vision: “Ah! It’s someone: Marcos Gualberto.” And then, living with the Master in recent times, a vision opens up of what the life that the Master has today is, this life without this sense of being someone, but it is something that is completely unknown, popularly unknown, especially because it is rare Realized, Enlightened Beings working like the Master does.
And then, the idea we have, very common in spirituality – I'm talking about myself – is exactly of someone, a being of light, someone enlightened, or someone with many powers... and, knowing the Master, by Grace, and being in the atmosphere of the Master, I can perceive what the Master… yes, there is this body-mind, but he no longer has this whole idea of being someone, which perpetuates suffering. And it is really a complete Freedom, right, Master?
MG: Still talking about this Enlightenment or this Awakening, because there is a lot of curiosity about It, Realization, Awakening, or Enlightenment, whatever name we have for This... The name never represents the thing itself. This State, which is the State of Being-Consciousness-Bliss, which is described in the Indian scriptures in this way, in the Vedas, as Being-Consciousness-Bliss, is simply the State of the Sage, of one who is free from the confusion of the egoic mind, this egoic consciousness, this sense of an “I” that separates itself from this present moment. It is the State free from the illusion of this “me,” this identity that comes from the past, is here in the present and heading towards the future.
Notice, Gilson, that, in this sense of ego-identity, the notion we have is of “someone” today, here, who came from the past and is going to the future. This disappears into that Natural State of Being, which is your Natural State, which is your State free from the illusion of this sense of separation, then there is nothing more to achieve, nor is there anything to get rid of. So, it is, in truth, your Natural Divine State, where That which is present is beyond birth and death, is beyond this past, this present, and this future that thought idealizes, that self-image, which is the image that the ego makes, has of itself. This disappears in this Natural State.
So, the Natural State of Awakening, which is the Awakening of this Consciousness or Enlightenment, is not an imaginary state, it is not a state that the mind can reach, imagine, speculate about, as the mind generally does about everything. The mind has ideas about everything and it also projects, within what it knows, this State, which is completely unknown to it. It is possible, Gilson, to live in this Natural State, but never explain or clarify what it is, in terms of language, speech, expressions. It is outside of language; It is outside of the mind; It is outside of the known.
So, here, we investigate the nature of illusion, and not the Truth about Reality. The Truth about Reality or Reality reveals itself in its Truth when illusion ends, and that is what we are interested in investigating here: not having that imagination, not forming that image, not sustaining that image, because we are going to be dealing with an illusion too.
Reality is present. We need to investigate the nature of illusion and thus it ends and this Reality shows itself. And, when It shows itself, we don't talk about It, there is nothing to say about It. You live It, you are aware of what It is in living, but you don't have this “me,” this “I,” to say anything about It. This is Realization.
GC: Master, the word “Sage” that the Master commented on: “become a Sage” ... It is very common, within the known or spirituality, the wise as someone who knows a lot, someone who has studied a lot, someone who has an intellect who knows a lot. Can the Master clarify a little about what this true Sage is?
MG: The Wise is the one who does not suffer. You can meet people who have a lot of knowledge. People, in some specific areas, acquire knowledge, but all knowledge, Gilson, is limited. No matter how much you learn something and become an expert in it, no matter how much you know something, you will always have more to know about it. This shows us that all knowledge is limited. So, knowledge does not give you Wisdom, because, no matter how much you know about things, you still have a lot to know about that, because knowledge is limited.
The truth is that no knowledge gives you Wisdom. Knowledge, in fact, is an element of research, it is something that is researchable, and, because it is limited, it can always be added. So, Wisdom has nothing to do with knowledge. With knowledge, you become an expert in a given area, but no matter how expert you are in that area, you still have a lot to discover and learn, because this knowledge is limited, while Wisdom is the end of knowledge. It's the opposite! The Sage is not the one who knows everything, the Sage is the one who does not suffer, because he is not within the limitation of the known and therefore is not bound by the limitation of knowledge.
So, the Sage lives in his Natural State of Being-Consciousness-Bliss. This State is the State of Wisdom, it is not the state of limited knowledge, of that “knowing” to know more, and know more, and know more. Note that you can be a scientist and, at the same time, be afraid of your wife, afraid of death, afraid of spiders, afraid of the past, afraid of getting sick, and afraid of old age.
So, if you are a man of great knowledge, cultured, illustrated, and who is always learning more and more about your area, about your expertise, but you still carry this sense of an identity present in experience, separating yourself from this moment, this present moment, and still seeing yourself as a person who was born and who can die, and carries some form of fear, because of this sense of separation between you and life, between you and Reality, between you and God – because it is like that things occur… as long as there is this sense of separation, there will be some form of fear, there will be this primordial ignorance, which is ignorance about your own Being.
The Sage is one who knows the Truth of his own Being. He is beyond the illusion of an identity present in experience. This is the Sage! He is free from suffering, he is free from desire, he is free from fear, he is free from primordial ignorance, he is free from this illusion, this sense of separation between God and him. This is the Sage!
So, let's not confuse this anymore. The educated person, the illustrated person, the person who has knowledge, can be intelligent, but within a specific area. This intelligence is not what we are dealing with here. The Intelligence we are dealing with here is the Intelligence of the Sage.
I will repeat: the Sage is not the one who knows, he is the one who is aware of his own Nature, his Real Nature, his Divine Nature and the Essential Nature of everything. He doesn't live in the research field. He is free from this movement of searching for the known. It's the Sage! I would say that the Sage is the scientist who discovered the Truth about Himself and kept quiet. Everything is here and now revealing itself as Your Real Nature. So, it is the One who is within a dimension outside of the known, outside of knowledge, outside of time, outside of this sense of a “I,” outside of limitation, who is simply in his Natural State, which is something unspeakable, indescribable, and unnamable.
The Truth about You is God's Truth, and That is outside of time, That is Wisdom. This is the Natural State, it is not about someone wise, it is just the Natural State of the Sage.
GC: Master, gratitude, gratitude. Our time is already over, so gratitude for this Satsang, this encounter with this Truth that is beyond all knowledge. And, for those who are watching, leave a “like” and leave a comment. By bringing the questions here in the comments, we can bring them to the next videocasts. And remember: whoever feels something different, beyond the words of Master Gualberto, and who feel a yearning to go deeper into this, there is the link in the first comment, the link of the WhatsApp group with information about these intensive meetings on weekends, which are Satsangs, online and face-to-face. So, here's the invitation. Gratitude, Master, for this videocast.
MG: Okay, guys! Thanks for the meeting! See you!
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