The Truth is Already Here - 10th November 2016

Actually, all the trouble seems to come from just this attraction to a story, you see? There is attraction to the story because when we find this stillness, when you find this peace which is here now, this emptiness which is here now, something still is attracted to the idea of 'But what about my story? Where is it going? Can I write the chapter on enlightenment now? Okay, is this what is happening to me?' The freedom—it wants some glorious ending to the story about nothing. Because peace, freedom, awareness, the Self, all of it is just here now already. Undeniably, for some of you who have been in Satsang, it is so clear that what I am must be here. The reality of who I am is not coming and going. So what are then... what must we be chasing? Whatever the identity is—seeker identity, the one who wants freedom—what is that chasing? Something that is presumably going to come in the future? That next bowl of milk for the pretend cat that we presume ourselves to be?

Really, it is just now. The truth is here now. That is why it is invaluable. If it came later, then it would be another appearance which, by definition, just comes and goes. If for the truth to be true, it must already be here. I know I make this point often, but many times we don't hear it, you see? Many times we don't hear it, that the truth that we are looking for is before we start even looking. It has always been here. Before we can decide our next step, our next move, our next words, our next thoughts, there is the truth. It is what we are. It is never something that we will become. There is no such thing as an enlightened person. What do we... we use the term to signify that which is beyond the person idea, that who is not believing themselves to be this non-existent person. So sometimes conversationally we can say these things, but what does it really mean?

Like yesterday I was saying, it means that that which we believed ourselves to be is dead. Actually, it is seen that... because 'dead' can seem like a morose term, it is just seen that it was never alive. It was never real in the first place. So whatever your name is, know that that one was never alive. It was just a label for nothing. At least for the body you can say, 'Okay, these set of atoms and molecules appearing energetically, this is the body.' Okay, so is this the name for the body? No. Also, it is the name for the mind, and the mind is so frivolous. When there is a thought, there is mind; there is no thought, there is no mind. So we've made a conceptual entity where no real entity exists. Then we call it the body-mind complex, the body-mind entity. There is no such entity. There is nobody which is the body-mind.

So once we see this, we see that that one which never existed could... can never be me. In reality, that's all that is being pointed to, actually: that the false never existed and the true has always, always been here. That which witnesses all of this play is not coming and going. That which... that which witnesses the states coming and going, that one is not coming and going because it is not a state. And you are that, you see? So the story... now, the problem is what? That one which is not coming and going, which is the witness of all of these states, that has no story, you see? So then the mind comes and says—because this is the story engine, like the gaming engine, we have this story engine which is saying—'But so what? How does it help me if I'm just this solitary witness which has no attributes?' And so what happened? And the asking of that 'so what happened' means 'so what is next on the next page of the story' as well.

When I say that if this moment could be the end of your story, your novel finishes now, the story of 'me' comes to an end now, would you truly be okay with that? Many of you, I know, are okay with that. There is some prior magnetism that the story held for you which is still playing out. Maybe that is what is played out even after the truth is seen—just some remnants of prior magnetism to the prior story. Now what happens is that many times we want to include the Master as part of our story. 'I have a spiritual life, I have a work life, I have a parenting life, I have this, and in my one aspect of my story is this spiritual life, and in which I want to have the best Master as part of my story because I'm so special, I must have, you know, the best there is out there,' isn't it? So, 'Okay, this one I didn't like, this one I like.' So then we have this... the Master becomes part of our seeming story.