Introducing my Self (& not-self) simultaneously.

Hi 👋😀

I am new here to Steemit, in case that’s not obvious, but it has come to my attention that it’s suggested to follow with the custom of introducing yourself to the community with your first post. So here I am! 

Although an introduction, for me, gets a bit tricky. The nature of my writing has to do with nontraditonal Self-realization, meaning I have never had a physical guru, and so I have never followed any one particular tradition. However, with that said I resonate mostly with Advaita Vedanta and Neo-Advaita, just to give you an idea, but even these I am not attached to. I will reject any implications that suggest I am to be personallyidentified with these traditional teachings or that what I write is inherent to these teachings, traditions, or sadhana (practices). Indeed, what I write is quite similar. I do often refer to the teachings and those gurus associated with them. The practices I recommend are the practices that I direct experiences with so I know they can be effective, but are not necessarily suited for everyone. They can be effective for anyone, but not everyone is ready for these practices. They are an over-the-counter to be prescribed to those who are clearly not ready for them. In the online "spiritual community" there is a lot of generic suggestions being made from those who have no idea about anything of the one they are talking to and giving advice to from a place of ignorance. They may or may not have applied the suggestions they give to one and all who will listen to them and believe them to have valid knowledge of what they are talking about and promoting to others. I once did this myself, and so I have been down that path and seen the confusion and lack of "positive" results. The results tend to be the exact opposite of what they are hoped to be, opposite of the goal as what they are promoted to achieve. From this experience I learned a great deal about myself and the practices. I found that I was fooling myself through own my beliefs and unintentionally I was interfering in way that I had I been aware of this I wouldn’t have taken those actions to begin. In my excitement in believing that I had achieved my goals and gotten tremendous results I wanted to share what I thought I knew with others. It came from a place of wanting to help others who were seeking after similar results that I thought I had achieved. So I wasn’t intentionally interfering with others hoping to confound them. I wanted the exact opposite for them. 

It was in my path of self-inquiry that my ignorance eventually became clear to me. When the ignorance is clearly seen it ceases being ignorance and is known for the "wrong-thinking," or better said, the "mental conditioning" that it really is that simply is presumed to be true. It’s not known, as in directly experienced, to be true, but is only presumed to be true without any direct experience. That is the nature of beliefs. I began inquiring about the beliefs themselves that I had never objectively questioned before. In my inquiry of these beliefs I wasn’t even aware that I was actually practicing self-inquiry (atma vichara) not being very familiar Advaita Vedanta or the gurus associated with the teachings. It was this turning inward that I began to become more interested and familiar with the teachings and teachers. They served as confirmation in my discoveries where there was still a great deal of doubt for me as I knew of no one else who was experiencing what I seemed to be discovering on my own. At that time, I referred to my teacher as my "Higher Self" as I was still identifying with the mind-body, although it was becoming quite clear that my self-image was not who I really was. All identifying made no sense to me whatsoever anymore. I could see through the mind’s concepts. A "tree" was an actually object. I could see it was just a word and concept with a mental story all about this object and how it was separate and had a unique cause-and-effect for being an independent reality. All of this came into question for me. All that I thought I knew I realized I didn’t really know to be true and I had to surrender it as it had me in bondage to the mental conditioning of the mind. I began to get to the root of where all thoughts arise, the I-thought. Who was this "I" that always only ever appeared as a thought to me? Why did I identify with it as if I was the one who was thinking this thought? Who was this thinker? Was there a thinker at all? Wasn’t this thinker just a thought itself? I became very diligent in my practice of self-inquiry without any traditional teachings to rely nor the terminology to really describe what was happening. I did find my own words to describe it my experiences which I shared online regularly as well as with those who I knew offline that shared similar interests in their spirituality. Those who were more familiar with the Advaitic teachings could see a similarity between my words describing my experiences and what they understood of the teachings. They would often quote the teachings or the teachers associated with the teachings. They often did this in an attempt to correct me to seeing it their way because what I shared was eerily familiar to them, but not accurate because it didn’t meld with those whom they leaned it from, but they admittedly didn’t have the direct experiences yet. They assumed I was getting my information secondhand and merely parroting what I got somewhere else in attempt to appease the "spiritual ego" was portraying myself as being a self-realized guru. 

I am not guru. 

I am not a student. 

I am nothing, as in no thing. I do not have an identity. You May be identifying "me" as a person, a human being, a writer, an individual that is regarded as "other than" you, separate from you. I don’t have that mental conditioning anymore, in fact, I realize it never was myconditioning. The word itself, mental conditioning points back to its source. Mental being a process of the mind. The conditioning of the mind are thought patterns, or beliefs, the mind becomes attached to through our ignorance. We presume them to be true but have never truly investigated them unconditionally. What I mean by this is that we tend look to find information that supports a belief to seemingly prove it to be valid and true, this we call a "fact." Rather than admitting that we don’t know it to be true we seek out information to support it as true. Or we go to the other extreme to prove it as being untrue by simply finding information that seems to be more credible an valid giving us the impression that what we, or others, once thought was true can’t possibly be true as the other information that seems more valid suffices to prove the other belief as being untrue, in error, fictional, fantasy, or fallacious. We simply adopt and adapt to yet another belief and are right back in the same boat again but think we are in a completely different boat that seems more comfortable, more stable, and superior without realizing this pattern we keep repeating over and over again because we are constantly seeking the truth and when it becomes apparent that what we thought was true isn’t true at all we naturally let it go but we seek to replace it with another belief that we only presume to be true using information we find outside of ourselves because we also believe the truth is not in us, but is somewhere outside of our "self" which is actually just a self-image in the mind that we are identifying with. 

In my realization that all identity was contributing to constructing one false self-image after another it made no sense to me to say I am "this" or I am "that." Clearly I was the "I am" who was ultimately the one speaking except when merging it with the self-image it becomes unclear who is really speaking. Are there are two of me? Am I a multiplicity? Of course not. So then who am I? It’s clear that I know myself only in negative terms from the level of the mind as per my experience. So how wonderful it was to come across the teachings of Nisargadatta Maharaj when I felt so alone in this understanding that I can only know what I am not. The only thing that I couldn’t possibly negate, and that I could say with an absolute certainty was that I am. I am, as in, I know that I exist. That’s all I know without a doubt. I don’t even have to think about it, in fact, I knew I wasn’t thinking or controlling thoughts. They just spontaneously happen to me. In other words, it was clear that thoughts were appearing to me and I was only identifying with them because of how they appear to have a personal nature, in the form of "I, me, my, mine, them, we, us, they, them," and all the polar opposite negatives in the form of "not me" or "other than me, we, us," etc. etc. I was still identifying but disassociating with those identities the mind was constructing and prescribing the identity as belonging to other than me, outside of me, projecting self-images belonging to them, but were not my images of myself. Well, until having detached from the mind as being me, realizing I was not the thinker, and being interested in who was the thinker since it was clear to me that I wasn’t the thinker. I started watching the thoughts as I learned to do in meditation even by those who regarded themselves as being people that weren’t self-realized they still taught that you are not the mind and that mind can be watched by watching the thoughts like passing clouds. If there is any analyzing of the thoughts, any judging of the thoughts, or any stories being told about the thoughts, those too are just more thoughts that almost seem subtle and will confound you again to identifying with being the thinker. This teaching was very clearly understood by me because I already knew the thoughts weren’t being thought up by me. I wasn’t generating, creating, or calling thoughts to me from some place outside of my mind. They just appeared and would suddenly disappear just as suddenly as they appeared and it would be another thought that would appear after them that was so subtle it was always unnoticed until I began watching the thoughts come and go which this thought would follow and say it was the thinker. "I thought this or I thought that" or in the negative reference, "I didn’t think, or I never thought of it that way before." I noticed how I had been entangling my sense of self with these thoughts because of identifying with the thoughts through the identity of the thinker. There was no thinker, the thinker itself was a thought of "I" but that I wasn’t me, it was appearing to me the true I. What I mean by the "true I" is that I am the subject which these thoughts are appearing to, whatever it is that I am which I couldn’t seem to know it but I was being it whatever "IT" was that I am. This knowingness that I exist or beingness that I am but can’t seem to grasp with the mind as that would just be more thoughts. 

After having spent some years in religion and having a bad taste left over from the overall experience realizing I couldn’t find God in religion it left me bitter toward anything remotely similar to religion. I couldn’t find the truth to my being and understanding my existence or purpose for existing for in the first place in religion. I tried many religions but mostly I was exploring through Christianity as that is what my mind was primarily mentally conditioned with but I also looked into Islam and Judaism, and eventually let all those go and dove deeply into New Age spirituality and Law Of Attraction which really fooled me but it also was very much an intricate part of my path that helped in getting me to be more open to questioning things without being so dismissive as I had been in religion in fear of being mislead by heretics or Satan which among Christians is a common conditioning of fear based beliefs that not all Christians share. I have met enlightened Christians who don’t identify with anything, not even as Christians but they go to Church and serve their Church in some sort of ministry and while there are many who identify them as being an individual who they regard as a good and loving person who represents their Lord and Savior as a great example of how Christians should behave they themselves don’t even see themselves like those who talk about as being an individual they happen to know that is unique and separate from themselves. 

Even writing all of this and sharing this in an introduction post which honestly, I wouldn’t even read it myself, because it creates an illusion of individuality, or personhood, which I know am not. I am not that story the mind tells and says is the person’s unique marker that makes her/him an individual with an independent reality. And for those reading this who haven’t ever questioned who they really are and believe themselves to be the self-image that is constructed in the mind and appears only in the mind as an object to the true Self would read the story about being a Christian and may relate to me as a person but upon reading up to this part they wouldn’t relate to me anymore and would likely believe that I am only fooling myself with having new beliefs that I am not classifying as being beliefs and only playing a mind game with myself. That’s because they still take themselves to be an individual. 

I’m not here to change anyone, or to get you to restructure your mind to achieve some goal. That’s not why I write. I am not here to "awaken" you and save you from the mind, or to save the world. I write for the Consciousness that you really are. I don’t write to people even if you are identifying with the mind-body and you are reading anything I write from identifying with that self-image you have of yourself, that’s not who I am writing for and you are likely to have many disagreements or misunderstandings about what I touch on. That’s ok, you’re going to take it however you are going to take it as that isn’t up to me how it is perceived but I am just making it clear who I am really writing for. Everyone who reads it will take as they are supposed to. The earnest aspirant seekers of self-realization will ask the questions to clarify what I mean in whatever I am saying and there appears to be a clear lack of understanding on their end of what is I am intending to convey to all readers (the same exact indivisible consciousness). Those who are destined to misunderstand, whether they agree or disagree in their misunderstanding, is supposed to happen that way. How do I know this? Because that’s exactly what happens and the ideas that should be any different is only the mind resisting what is and desiring to have what isn’t and imagining something to be better than what is. I am not here to argue with anyone and if I engage readers who are argumentative it’s only because I can see what it is their mind is misconstruing but they have to be receptive in order to see it clearly. I can only point it out to them but they have to be interested in seeing it or they won’t see it and will continue to identify with the mind which the mind will always defend its conditioning which it takes anything pointing out the conditioning as a dangerous or even deadly threat. Feel free to ask me questions. I’ll know who to answer and how to answer them as it comes. Even if they don’t understand my answers I’ll know when to just let it go. The seeking out of making an argument of something I’ve written and the defensive posturing to reinforce the image in their mind that they are right and I am wrong makes it quite clear that they don’t want to understand what they’ve read as I intended it to be understood. That’s fine, as far as I am concerned, but I am not interested in joining in such arguments. When it’s clear one has made up their mind and are imagining I mean something other than what I am pointing out to them is in error and they refuse to accept my explanation that’s when I will disengage from the discussion which is likely to be abrupt rather than to continue going back and forth to no end. 

As I’ve stated I don’t identify as anything although some are likely to view me as a sort of guru, teacher, mentor, or what have you. I have no control over how any mind is creating images for an individual "me" that is being projected as a person and interacted with as that image. I may remind them here and there that I, as well as they, cannot be what is being perceived. I have no awakening story to be asked about and if you ask me to tell you about my awakening and should I tell you anything at all I’ll have to make it clear that it’s the mind’s story not mine and to tell you such a story I’ll have to believe it’s my story so I will remind you not to take it as the truth, it’s a story, a dream illusion but if it appears that divulging such information to you is of value then I will carefully indulge in it but for the most part I don’t bother with such information as it’s only part of the illusion anyway and is ultimately untrue. 

Take into account that the most celebrated gurus we know of didn’t have the internet. People from all around the world traveled to India to seek out answers from the likes of Adi Shankaracharya, Siddharameshwar Maharaj, Nisargadatta Maharaj, Ramana Maharshi, Papaji, Annamalai Swami, Robert Adams, Burt Harding, Osho, and so on. They didn’t go out into the world looking to preach their message to the seekers as most religious people do. The seekers came in search for them. They wanted to be in their presence and to hear what they had to say in regards to their questions they had for them. They didn’t travel from distant lands to demand explanations for something they disagreed with having read or heard the guru to have said to some other seeker or disciple. They weren’t just killing time out of boredom or just dabbling in what others seem to believe which is unlike their beliefs. Yet this is what is often experienced on the internet. People act as if they are sincere seekers but have a secret personal motive in mind to engage others on matters they are passionate about or at the very least have a strong affinity for or an aversion against which they can be addicted to. Today’s spiritual teachers who have an online presence limited their engagement to participants online but may field questions and they do include their talks to those who are not in their physical presence as those who attend their Satsangs or retreats giving more attention to those who have gone out of their way to be in their presence showing they have genuine interest of being there. They are not going to be there with an agenda to call them out on something they disagree with or wanting to argue that their belief is right and the guru/teacher needs to stop teaching others what they perceive as being false. Yet this attitude and subsequent behavior is rampant online because they have to be heavily invested and interested to establish a connection with others when it’s as close in range as their fingertips to raise a dispute over what someone has said and published in a post, blog, vlog, podcast, or video. They most likely wouldn’t travel from Spokane, Washington to deep into some unknown and unheard of part of India to them to argue with some quote they say of theirs posted online. It wouldn’t be that serious or interesting for them to be that invested. However, they can say and put up a front of being very serious and interested that even if one questions their level of interest in the matter they are raising or that their motives are perceived as being disingenuous they will use that to portray themselves as being unfairly judged and why others should regard that as their questions showing to be valid and the teachings they are challenging to be regarded as a credible sign of being invalid because the teacher is refusing to prove themselves against the accusations the one who wishes to expose them as being wrong in order to prove themselves as being right. If one truly feels they are on the right path they don’t seek out arguments with those who don’t share their path. Those who have doubts do seek out arguments in order to use that information or the experiences as "proof" that their beliefs must be the truth after all despite they have no direct experience to know they are true. They can only presume them to be true and go looking for things outside of themselves to shore up a false foundation of making their beliefs seem strong to themselves even if they need others to agree with them that they suspect doesn’t quite understand it correctly but that’s better than someone who has a very valid point that forces them to either ignore the point or they have to dive in to either consider their belief isn’t as true as they think it is or they will seek out other information that others have used to argue against similar points brought up to someone else who they don’t anything about other than they have similar beliefs and have had similar challenges in their interactions with those who do question their beliefs where they themselves haven’t. It’s pointless to bother trying to convince people that don’t want to be convinced otherwise. Their argument isn’t necessarily to investigate their beliefs or to seek a clearer understanding of what the author has presented. Their argument is more with themselves and their own mind’s mental conditioning which feels threatened by having become aware of something that has shook their weak foundation and the argument is a way of seeking temporary relief for the mind’s cognitive dissonance. With that said, and it had to be said, because everywhere I have shared my insights online there have been those who are very gung-ho about wanting to argue just about anything they disagree with and seek out those who will agree with them then attack anyone who will engage them or defends the one who published the content they have a problem with. I am well aware of the workings of the mind. I understand this way of thinking having experienced myself when I was thoroughly convinced that I was my mind and believed myself to be the "thinker" of "my" thoughts. I was constantly getting caught up in arguments and was suspicious of nearly everyone, not just those who I disagreed with but also those who agreed with me but they seemed to only agree with me to a degree, but didn’t quite understand it as I did which the mind does a great job in making your beliefs seem factual and true because the mind can completely filter out stimuli you really don’t want to see that could devastate "you" mentally and emotionally. So I may engage you to a point even after it’s clear you’re not seeking to understand what I am sharing here with you, but I am likely to abruptly disengage from the conversation without any explanation because what it matter if it seems clear to me that it’s not about wanting to understand and so anything I say will only continue to be used in to support a false notion for the self-image that really isn’t you anyhow? With that said, the door is open to all who wish to truly understand anything I may present here in my writings as I know there will be a lot to take in that your mind may seem to have never been exposed to before. It’s actually not new information, as it’s more of a deconstruction of beliefs systems that keeps one from seeing what’s been within you all along. 

I don’t have any desire to become anyone’s personal spiritual teacher. How you perceive has nothing at all to do with me. It’s not that I don’t care how I am being perceived by a mind but I am just indifferent to such distortions of perception that the mind is basing on the memory of past interactions. I do care and I am very interested in who you really are and I don’t need a personal introduction and a run down of some personal history because as I have already explained my story isn’t really mine, but the mind’s story it imagines is true about an individual separate self that has no reality. It’s a dream, and I am not interested in the dreams anymore. I am interested in the reality that is you, that reality I am, which that reality isn’t different, distinct, or unique. It’s an indivisible reality. There’s but one Consciousness experiencing itself, not a diversity of individuated Consciousnesses. There appears to be a diversity of unique finite minds all projected and accessed by the same Consciousness. That "I" I say I am is the very same I you say you are. The mind reflects an "I" as a thought of the true I but attaches it to all that the true I is not. 

If you don’t agree with this that’s fine, then don’t bother wasting your time reading any of my material unless you want argue with yourself. Or you’ll have to try to get any readers who seem to agree and understand my material to argue with you. I can’t stop them from arguing with you nor can I say that’s not part of their path. I wouldn’t advise anyone to argue anything but my advice is to turn inward and find out what it is you are defending and why do you feel the need to defend a point of view. Who even has a point of view? The ego has endless changing points of view but the real you doesn’t have a single point of view and yet it sees all of the points of view and isn’t bothered nor does it show any favor to any single point of view. I’ll stop there as this is supposed to be introduction but with how that is customarily done this was the best I could come close to doing that without losing any integrity to the Self. 

With all that I will be writing and publishing on this site along with some of the other platforms I already make use of, I’ll be introducing the Self in each post. 

So there’s that! 

Yeah very wordy indeed. Perhaps most will see the length of it and decide screw that I am not interested any stranger that I am not interested in reading a book on them. I get that, I wouldn’t read all this either if I hadn’t written it. I can see how this may be of value to others who just can’t let go of the curiosity of getting to know "others" or when they come across someone that seems to strike a nerve in them whether that’s a positive or negative nerve. The curiosity is bound to arise unless you’ve already realized the Self then that curiosity won’t even arise in you at all. 

In any case, let me say none of the above is ultimately true of me, but on relative level it is true and as all relative truth it’s subject to change, but get to know what is changeless in you and then you’ll know me as I truly am because I am you. 

I’d say it’s a real pleasure to meet you, but then I would be bullshitting our Self, because I’ve always known you as I know myself. 

I exist. I am. That’s all I know for an absolute certainty. 

😜

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