Advaita Post - Volume 14, No. 15 - For the self-being...

August 30, 2012
An advaita talk with Douwe Tiemersma in Gouda, April 25, 2012
For the self-being a limitation is always painful
I often use thoughts to protect myself from what's happening around me.
It's good when you can recognize that. So then that's the understanding of: I am engaged as an 'I think', with all kinds of things connected to it such as self-interest and so on. You recognize that and then you can say: in themselves these thoughts aren't bad, it's just my identification with that 'I think' which causes the problems. Take a look at what that thinking actually means biologically. It just means that something happens internally in the brain, or from a psychological perspective something in imagination. Sometimes it's necessary to do this because there are certain things you can't approach directly. So then you have to make a detour. How do you make this detour? You need thinking for that. So ladders have been invented, and so on. Then it's a practical tool for living. Thinking is just a part of life. But see that your identification with thinking, with something limited, with whatever - a certain feeling or a certain form - that's what creates problems. How is it with yourself ? Aren't you completely spacious? So then just let everything go, that's life. You're not situated somewhere in a limited way. Even with a thought like: I live wonderfully free, I live divinely, and so on. If you still have that idea then it's self-referential, because when you experience life like that sooner or later you'll get a bump on the nose. Why? Because you've identified yourself with that piece of energy. All energies change and at some point disappear, they dissolve. Even with divine identifications you get the same exact problems as you do with all other problems existing in duality.
What would you be able to identify with?
As soon as you identify yourself with something, you're already in duality. Identification is when you give your identity to something else. This is my identity, so I am identical with it. When this is something limited, then you also get to know it's limitations. A limitation is always painful to the self-being, because the self-being always has the feeling: I am infinite. So then you get this conflict.
Sometimes when there is an attraction towards something limited, I notice that it's very easy to identify with something more spacious. Mostly I just let that happen.
Great. Then just let it proceed infinitely. When you are just a little more spacious you always find that it's beautiful. Being a little more spacious, more open, experiencing more freedom, everyone finds that wonderful. Doesn't it seem obvious then to look at the essence of that freedom? If you find it wonderful to tear down a road in a car, then you say: I want to go even faster, experience more freedom. Because it's never enough. But if you look at the essence of what you experience in that car you'll see that the essence of that feeling of freedom goes much further than fast driving. When you go toward that essence you become freer from the conditions of driving fast. If you don't make this transition then you get the left overs. It's the same with power. People in politics want to have power. They feel better the more power they get. Why? Because then they experience a more expansive realm of self-being and can exercise power over that realm. There's a piece of freedom in that: in my realm, in my territory, I can do what I want. It brings a good feeling when that territory expands. When it gets put into action you can see that it's that infinite essence of freedom which is sought but it doesn't work on that level. That's the tragedy of every dictator. It's the same with all the people who think they can do more than other people. Then they cross over boundaries which makes it go all wrong. That absoluteness of freedom can't be achieved at the level of "I want freedom, I want power, I want space, I want everything". If you do then you set up the absolute on a relative level and then you get an incredible amount of misery. Traditionally there was always a warning against blasphemy: you are not God! And that's quite right. Because if you think so there will always be mishaps. You shouldn't get those levels mixed up. See how it is.
****


Er is geen tweeheid

als je ontspannen bent
in zelf-bewustzijn
is dat duidelijk.


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