When we set out to listen, we are not really willing for that – and I hope we can come closer to a comprehension about this. This comprehension is needed, it is fundamental, and it occurs when you learn not only to hear, but to listen. I started talking about this with you the other day: becoming aware of things requires listening directly to them. We need to discover the importance of this listening. This listening is something directly linked to the subject we are going to talk about here; if you don’t listen, you will not understand the subject we are going to talk about. You will hear, but you will not comprehend.
Right now, at this moment, life is happening to each one of us. When I say that it is happening, I am saying that it happens, but your model of looking at experience, in general, is a model of interference, of intervention, of doing something, of seeking something, of wanting something from that experience. Our contact with each other is always a contact of approaching – because this is a principle of the ego in us, of the “I,” of this person who is this model of being someone that we have brought with us since childhood… and it is the history of humanity, human beings have lived like this for millennia – this way of approaching each other is a self-interested way. We approach each other to obtain something, to achieve something.
So, our contact with experience, with life, with people, is always a self-centered movement present within us. This self-centeredness that makes us want, desire, seek and expect something from others, from the world or from life is egocentric. So, it is important that we learn here, together, to listen to this speech, because I want to address the importance of a new relationship with experience, which is the relationship disinterested of the “I.” We don’t know how to do this! We always come into contact with an experience hoping to extract something from it. This is the nature of the ego, “what so-and-so will give me,” “what this can give me,” “what will this bring me.”
Right now, when you hear a speech like this, don’t put that here. Don’t have a purpose, don’t internalize the illusion that you’re going to acquire something by listening to this speech, because it asks exactly the opposite of that. This is not about acquiring something, but about having a comprehension of just listening, not accumulating what you’re hearing, to have it as something that you keep inside you, like a deposit. So, what is the way we need to approach life to truly discover the Beauty of life as it is? It is without the “I” element, the ego! This becomes possible when you learn to listen to life. This listening to life is paying Attention to the instant; it is paying Attention to the present moment… when you talk to someone, when you gesture, when words are being used…
Bringing this Attention to this moment, where life will be revealed in it without the intervention of someone who is the “I,” self-centered, this is the art of Attention. Having Mindfulness to this moment, full Attention to this instant, means only listening to what this here represents, without having an internal, personal posture of involvement in the experience. This is the approach to life without the ego, this is the approach to experience without the “I,” this is the approach to thought without the thinker, this is the approach to feeling without someone getting involved with it, this is the approach to a challenge, to a problem that we need to deal with, without someone having to deal with it.
It may seem strange to hear this; we want to deal with problems, but we don’t get closer to see their meaning. The approach to see the meaning, without someone to deal with it, generally, brings about the comprehension – when this happens, it becomes very clear, this will happen all the time, an approach like this will show you – that the so-called “problem” is a problem linked to this situation of someone who is not clear about the meaning of it. Problem is only a problem when you don’t have a solution, and a problem is only a problem when you are involved in solving it. When there is clarity in this approach, you don’t get involved in solving it, so it is no longer a problem; it is a situation, a challenge. We don’t know how to do this! And why? Because we lack this Attention, this way of approaching the experience.
Just now one of you here said to me: “It seems that we enjoy sustaining conflict.” It doesn’t seem that way, it is certainly that way! And why do we do this? Because conflict gives existence to problems, and without problems we cannot live! We love suffering! You might say: “What are you saying?” I am saying exactly this: without suffering you are not a person, all people suffer! We seem to always want pleasure; in reality we only want pleasure when we know that, deep down, there is an effort to achieve it. I have to have a purpose, an objective to achieve it, I have to fulfill myself with desire to reach it, that is why I want the pleasure, which actually implies the presence of conflict, because if there is effort, if there is desire, if there is self-discipline to achieve pleasure, it is not pleasure! It is effort, it is self-discipline, it is conflict, it is suffering, so that later the ego says: “I achieved it!”
The ego’s behavior within us is very subtle. We are not aware of how the “I” within us moves, how the ego within us moves. So, we are not willing to give up suffering, at all! Because suffering makes us someone, makes us important in the experience of the sensation of being special because you are feeling something. I know it sounds strange to hear this, but, in fact, it is like this. We are living, in the ego, always in search of sensations, and there is no better sensation in life than the experience of being someone specialized in complaining, in lamenting, in having problems! Someone who has no problems is not important, they hardly speak, they hardly even appear, they do not attract attention, they are not special.
You would say, “But what you’re saying is strange.” It’s not strange. We cultivate pain; you’re suffering in a given situation, but you don’t see that it’s suffering because there’s pleasure involved in it. Since you find great importance in this pleasure, it’s very clear to everyone that there’s suffering involved. For you, the valuing of self-importance in being someone in the experience of pleasure blinds you to the condition of suffering involved there. All suffering present in us always has pleasure involved and vice versa. A little attention and you’ll discover this. There’s only one way to live free from suffering. We don’t know what that is; life free from the pursuit of pleasure is a life of Joy. We live within this duality: pleasure and pain, pleasure and suffering. This is the life of the “I.” It gives us self-importance and we don’t want to get rid of it. You might tell me that you only want pleasure – in fact, you want pleasure because there’s something that implies some level of conflict in this encounter with pleasure.
So, we live in this duality: pleasure and pain, pleasure and pain, pleasure and pain, that’s what we know. That’s why we have mental states like this: pleasurable memories and painful memories, and all of this happens because we are not paying Attention to the experience, to thought, to the feeling, to what arises. We are not paying Attention to this moment, to what is happening here at this instant, at the level of experience, at the level of thought, at the level of feeling, at the level of relationship with him, her, with this or that thing. Being in this instant, just in this instant, in this experiencing of the moment, without valuing the “I” in the experience, is Attention.
Right now, you are here, without getting psychologically, sentimentally, emotionally involved, seeking something from this speech, some level of satisfaction, pleasure… or suffering, because “I want him to tell me something that will make me feel guilty.” We appreciate that too! “I need confirmation that I’ve been doing wrong things.” So, we live in this quality of life, always wanting something from an experience. At this moment, it is the experience of hearing this speech, but being here without that, just listening, will reveal the Beauty of an Attention where the “I” does not enter to interpret, to translate, to extract pleasure or pain from this speech. Are you with me?
Our contact with others is to suffering. As long as our egoic identity is present, everything is fine! As long as “I” am someone, as long as “I” become someone sadder or happier, everything is fine! So, our condition in the ego, which is the absence of the awareness of simply Being – which is Mindfulness – is this: we cultivate pleasure and pain in this inattention. I will repeat: this inattention, as entering this moment, or rather, as this moment arrives, is the sense of an “I” present that wants to do something with it. You are not just simply being what you are, you want to be happier with the experience or less happy with the experience. And you can do it because the sense of an “I” is present in doing, in “being someone.” This is the ego.
What is the importance of this Attention at this moment? It is because this Mindfulness opens the door to the comprehension of the movement of the “I,” and this comprehension of the movement of the “I” is Self-Awareness, and this reveals the art of Being Consciousness, which is Meditation. And when there is Meditation, there is no longer the “I.” So, these images that the ego creates of itself in relation to the world, to others, to life, to existence, do not enter. These states of psychological fluctuation: pleasure and pain, depression, anxiety, anguish, liking, disliking… none of this is part of this Mindfulness, this Awareness of simply Being!
This Natural State reveals the presence of Joy. Notice, it is not a state of absence. It is a state of absence of the ego, but it is not a state of absence of Love, of absence of Truth, of absence of Joy. We do not know what Joy is, we know what pleasure is, we know what it is to desire, we know what it is to want, we know what it is to not want, we know what it is “I must get rid of it,” we know what it is to suffer. We do not know what Joy is, we do not know what Silence is, we do not know what the stillness of simply enjoying the moment is, where there is a gaze free from the ego, free from this sense of separation between you and the other, between you and life, between you and this moment. We do not know what this is because we are lost in this inattention. Are you with me?
Looking at this movement here and now, becoming aware of the investment we are making to suffer in the search for pleasure, this is part of working on ourselves. Listen to this carefully: you are in life to do something, to study. It is not to study books, it is not to study novels, you are in life to live life as it is, and this requires studying yourself, comprehending how you function, what this “me,” this “I” is, how it functions in this context of life. I see people studying everything, learning everything, knowing everything, but nothing, absolutely nothing, regarding this feeling, thinking and acting in them, of themselves. They do not know themselves!
The comprehension of the Truth about who we are requires this Attention on the movement of the “I,” being aware here and now, of every thought – see how delicate this is – every thought! It may sound very strange for you to hear this: not to miss one single thought. It may seem like an extraordinary challenge not to miss one single feeling, one single perception… not to miss it, to become aware of it. It is not doing something with the thought that arises, I said to become aware that it has arrived. It is not doing something with the feeling that arises, it is becoming aware! It is not doing something with an intention that has arisen, it is becoming aware, just becoming aware!
If you want to do something, you are already involved in it, you are already involved in an emotion, in a feeling, in an experience being the experiencer, being the one who is feeling, being the one who is emotional… I am saying to just become aware. A thought arises and you look; a feeling, and you look; a sensation, and you look; a perception, and you look. These mental states do not carry you in these fluctuations, because the “I” does not enter when there is this Attention. Does it make any sense here?
Cut out from yourself – I will repeat – cut out from yourself this egoic, vain, capricious, addicted movement of imagination, for example. Look at your head, you are nothing but imagination! The ego is imagination – she laughed – you are imagination! Every time you are in the past or in the future, this does not proceed in this Intelligence, in this Real Consciousness. To become aware of the movement of the mind here and now is to break with this addicted, vicious, repetitive, mechanical, unconscious pattern of being someone. This is someone! “I feel very sad.” No, you have a lot of imagination. “I get upset many times a day.” No, you imagine many times a day. Thoughts of annoyance upset you, thoughts of sadness sadden you. “I feel like crying many times a day.” No, you have imagination many times a day, and this gives you a feeling of existence, of specialness, of being someone who cries, sensitive, emotional, and so on.
Becoming aware of how you function, of how we function, moment by moment, requires this attention so that we can leave behind this addictive, repetitive model of being like this. This is an addiction! This mental chatter that we carry is due to this model of the ego loving the future or loving the past, and, through thought, being fulfilled by being someone far from this moment, because this takes you away from the present moment, takes you away from life without the ego. Abandon that, it's an addiction! I see people addicted to this model of imagination and of seeking sensation through imagination that thought brings. This addictive model of unconsciousness, of always being in the future, of always being in the past, is inattention!
Listen to the thought; when it arises, look! Don't put a thinker in it; observe and you will break this pattern, you will break this addiction, you will break this habit, this model of unconsciousness. Are you with me? Here and now, at this moment, just listen, without trying to take anything from it. A thought arises and you look, don't attach to it, don't cling to it, just look. And you will soon discover that it becomes detached from this psychological system of being someone that you have.
Notice that repetitive thoughts work like this. People complain, they say: “How to get rid of obsessive thoughts?” You can’t get rid of obsessive thoughts, you cultivate them like we cultivate a plant, you cultivate thoughts. You cultivate emotions, you cultivate feelings. “How can I get rid of this?” You can’t, because you are not willing to die to this, because this gives you life – the life of the “I,” the egoic life. This is cultivation of the future, which is suffering. This is how, in psychological time – psychological time, which is the time created by thought – the “I” perpetuates itself in its constant dissatisfaction with life as it is.
Find a successful person, someone you look up to as an example, and ask them if they are happy with this instant, with the present moment. If they are honest, they will say, “No, I still have to accomplish this, that and the other thing.” Because you think they are happy with what they have, they are unhappy with who they are. Your unhappiness is not for what you lack, it is because of the excess of being someone that you bring, that imagines this “coming to be,” this “achieving,” this “becoming,” this “obtaining.” You are Wealth, you are Beauty, you are Joy, you are Happiness when you are not present. It does not matter how much wealth and luxury surrounds you externally, if internally you are living in the ego.
Ramana Maharshi said that both a king and a beggar in deep sleep both enjoy the same Happiness: neither feels rich and neither feels poor. When the ego is not present, you are Happiness, it has nothing to do with what is outside! It has to do with someone in the sense of the illusion of dissatisfaction of becoming, which is how the ego always feels: either it wants to cease to be or it wants to achieve being. That is where misery lies, that is where unhappiness lies. Bringing Attention to this moment, becoming aware of the movement of the “I,” is to abandon that. If that makes sense to you, work on it, okay? Work on it now – and it is always now. Okay? Let’s stop here.
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