“Stand up from where you are sitting now.
Now take a step towards yourself.”
Seems moronic, isn’t it?
I will explain in a bit. But first, a little bit of context.
Last time I wrote a lengthy post on Facebook was 15 years ago. ( sheesh, i am old ). Back then I wrote almost everyday. Then life came in between and here I am after 15 years, sharing my thoughts on Facebook on something that is very dear to me.
On a side note, I have no intension of posting regularly, just 3 posts spread accross the next couple of months.
So, what is this about?
Well, if you know me, you already guessed it.
Spirituality.
If you are an Atheist, I recommend you just skip this. I have nothing against you, my best friend is an Atheist and we have these wonderful conversations from time to time. Why I ask you to skip is, you have a certain world view and this definitely will not fit your world view, that I can promise. So why waste time. This is for the ones who have a religious inclination.
The problem with this kind of post is that it is hard to write without coming off as egotistical. But as I always say to people with whom I share my experiences, its hard to share personal experiences without mentioning the ‘person’, ergo ‘me’. So, be warned.
15 years ago I thought I knew everything about ‘my’ religion. I thought “I” was doing great practice. ( Who ever the hell this “I” is. ). Then I got busy with life and spirituality became kind of a distant memory. Until about few years ago.
Things rapidly started changing. Spent almost one year studying and more importantly practicing many religions with people from these ‘other’ religions.
Buddhism, I always practice, its part of me for decades now. I practiced prayers in Churches, I chanted in Hindu Temples, I meditated using different teachings from different religions and philosophies for months and months. Hindu, Sikh, Zen, Christianity, Dual methods, Non-Dual methods, and so on, I practiced and practiced.
And it helped.
The problem “I” had was, I was too attached to the concept of “My” religion being the best. I was too invested in the idea of “My” religion is the only path.
I do not know who is right or who is wrong. What I realized was that I was approaching spirituality from the wrong end.
The questions I should have been asking were not “Is this going to work?” or “Is this the best religion?”.
No, these were not the right questions. There is only one question that mattered.
And that is “Who is this ‘I’ ?”
Now, I know, if you are like 15 years ago me, you will have answers locked and loaded, ready fire. Answers you learned from your religious books. Answers you learned from sermons. Answers you picked up, from someone or somewhere.
Just take a moment. Think through it.
Do you actually know what is what when it comes to religion and spirituality? Or are you just smartly organising all the knowledge you gathered over the years and logically explaining it, because you want to ‘believe’ that what you know and hold dear is right.
Do you know the answer by Experience?
Let’s take ‘our’ religion. You probably will be able to explain every step from being normal to becoming Enlightened. You will be able to explain all the names of different stages through which your mind goes when you meditate. Because you learned them, from books, from teachers.
But you don’t actually know, do you?
This is the problem. If you actually felt it, you will not keep your religion as your identity, you will not wave it around to show the world how good of a person you are. Because you will gain a deep reverence for it.
It doesn’t matter what religion you belong to. If you are playing with the Knowledge, you are invested in it, you have the incentive to think of other spiritual paths as ‘lesser’ paths. Because you have invested in ‘your’ religion
But when you experience your religion, truly, as it was meant to be, then you will not have these dichotomy of ‘your’ and ‘my’ religion.
I hear a lot of people saying that ‘my religion’ is the correct path, others are ‘delusional’.
But how do you know?
I am asking seriously. How do you know that ‘your’ religion works?
Let’s say you are a Buddhist. You are proud of it. Which itself negates the core principle of being a Buddhist. I will come to that in the next post. You know all the steps to Enlightenment. You know what is ‘pin, pav, kusal, akusal’, you know all the hells and heavens, you know all the gods and deities, you know everything about meditations
But have you felt it?
Have you experienced it?
Have you touched the ‘Non-You’?
Without it, you are just spitting out something you read or learned. Aren’t you?
On the flip side of that, you also say that ‘other’ religions are wrong. They are ‘wasting’ their time by praying, by doing all this and that.
But then again, how do you know that those things doesn’t work?
I am asking seriously. How do you know ‘their’ religion doesn’t work?
I have prayed in Church, and I did it with absolute heart, and I felt ‘it’. Whatever ‘it’ is.
I have chanted Hindu mantras for hours with all my heart, and I felt ‘it’ there also. Whatever ‘it’ is.
I have meditated in Buddhist temples, and I felt ‘it’ there too. Whatever ‘it’ is.
How do you feel ‘it’? Well, that is not hard.
Prerequisite for ‘it’ is dropping all your knowledge and expectation.
The moment you think you know how it ‘Should’ work, it won’t work.
See, if you really want to touch a different dimension of life, you can do it with your religion. Whatever your religion is. But you cannot half-ass your effort. You can’t use your religion as your identity. You have to be all-in. Because once you go through that door, there is no turning back.
Now, the reason many of you might not want to take a step in your religious or spiritual journey is because you are scared of ‘How it will affect my daily life?’.
I started by spiritual journey close to 17 years now. All I did was gather knowledge. I would read all the books listen to everything, try to live a noble life. But all of that time, I was just running away from doing what I actually needed to do.
I was focused on the ‘Good’ part of being a ‘Good Person’, when I should have been focusing on what the ‘Person’ part is.
When I dug deep, I realised, all these thing I was doing was just fluff. It looks good. It helps me to be a better human being. But it was not solving the core problem. And I realized that I was afraid to take the big step.
I was afraid if I truly become a seeker, I would lose my drive for life.
I was afraid that I will lose all my interest in everything.
I was afraid of what will happen to my love life and sex life.
I was afraid of what will happen to my dreams and desires.
Well, the answer is, nothing happens.
That I can tell you, nothing happens. All the feelings will still be there for you, only difference is that they will not control you. You will not control them either. They just are.
You might expect someone on the ‘journey’ ( i use the word journey loosely here ) will just change, things will start to magically change that is noticeable from outside. That is the general expectation.
Well no. Nothing noticeable from outside will happen. You will still be the same to the people around you. But internally, your whole world will turn upside down, so many things will break. You will be reborn almost every day. But from outside, it will just be a normal Tuesday, so to speak.
The two of the most important people who guided me in my ‘journey’ were ‘normal’ people. They were not living in a jungle.
One was an Engineer with a family and a kid and the other one was a Musician. Normal looking people from every aspect.
So, if you are worried, don’t waste a decade like I did, just take the jump. You will not fall down. It is actually called ‘jump and fall upwards’.
Life, Karma, Dharma, God, Universe, what ever you believe in, will catch you.
When you take the jump, you will experience life in a much more different way.
People around you will still be the same, the problems you have will still be there, you will still get sick, you will still have ups and downs and challenges of life. But something magical will happen too, everything will start opening up to you in ways you never thought possible.
Even a leaf of grass would open up wonders to you.
Of course, you are not doing it for the wonders, but its just a bonus.
You will start to truly experience being ‘alive’ ( and no, I cant explain it, because there is nothing to which I can compare ‘it’ to.)
At the very end i will give you the exact same pointer that my spiritual teachers gave me. You do that and you can experience it for yourself and that way we don’t have to go to this whole discussion about whether I am telling the truth or not.
You will thank yourself for it ( Atleast for a while, then you will realize there is no ‘you’ to thank to 🙂 )
Before we end, I want to explain where you might go wrong and what is the significance of the teaching ‘Standup from where you are sitting, and take one step towards yourself’.
What you mistake for is that you have heard this ‘spiritual journey’, so in your mind its a journey.
You think, you need to do this, do that, then that other thing, then you have to do some more things, years and years of practice, meditations and then someday you will get ‘it’.
All of that because you are thinking its a journey. So you go on searching.
But the thing is, its not a journey. It is right here.
Why can’t you stand up and take a step towards yourself?
Because you are already there.
Read that again.
You can’t take a step towards yourself because you are already there.
It is the same with your spiritual ‘journey’.
You are already there.
But you are trying to go somewhere.
You are trying to find something.
When there is nothing to be found.
Because ‘this is it’.
I don’t wish for you to understand this intellectually, because then it will just be one piece of information in your memory for or against your beliefs.
What is the point of that?
What I wish for you is not to go on defending or attacking or trying to logically prove or disprove these things. You will gain nothing but a fleeting sense of triumph. There is no need for that.
But if you do want to feel it, experience it, I will tell you what my spiritual teachers made me do for weeks.
Here it goes.
– Find a place in your bedroom or somewhere you will not get disturbed.
– Pick a time where you will not be disturbed. ( better early morning or late at night )
– Have a shower.
– Make the room dark
– Sit down at the specific place
– Close your eyes.
– Look at your thoughts. Do you see/hear your thoughts popping up and running through your head?
– Now ask yourself this single question the entire time
– ‘Who is it that is witnessing these thoughts?’
This will open doors for you in ways you never thought was possible.
You must do this Every Day, At the Same Exact Place, At the Same Exact time ( yes there is significance )
And one more very important thing.
Everytime you sit down, you will do it as if you are sitting down for the very first time. No expectations.
This pointer will open up the flood gates which will take you to places and experiences you never thought existed.
Then it happens. “The Great Reversal”.
Instead of “You going through life”, “Life will begin to go through you.”
Bye.
Till next time. Whenever that might be 🙂
