Webcast Transcript 24 June 2004

> I have a question about your recent Advaita newsletter. There’s something I’ve wondered about related to the nature of the way that we understand. You said that it doesn’t come about gradually, it’s not like you get a little bit at a time. If God or Totality put the pebble in the shoe in the first place and then removes it, why is it that the pebble could not be put back in the shoe again? How is there a certainty that when it happens, it happens for the rest of the life for the organism that we call the sage? Why couldn’t that also flip-flop?

Wayne> Because the Understanding is not a thing. You’re thinking in terms of the flip-flop, which is experiential. As long as we’re talking about something that is existent, experiential, it can flip and flop. But the pointer we keep getting back to regarding this ultimate understanding is that it’s not phenomenal. It’s transcendent. You ask, “Why can’t it change?” It can’t change because it has always been. So, as long as you are conceptualizing enlightenment as a state, as some thing, then that question is inevitable.

> So, there’s no point in us getting hung up on these concepts? I think about this divine hypnosis as something that has happened, and then presumably “it” can be removed. With that assumption, the question came up of why can it not be put back.

Wayne> The limitation of this pointer is that it is intellectual and so it must be dualistic; it must have a subject/object relationship. It’s the only way it makes any sense. We use these tools, but they are pointers, not scriptures.

> It’s like one of those things where you have to be there to . . .

Wayne> Yeah, and once you’re “there,” the whole thing becomes nonsensical, and those pointers are seen as tools. They are not descriptors.

What is your name?

> Margo.

Wayne> Hello, Margo. How is that you find yourself here tonight?

> A friend told me about you a few days ago and suggested I should check it out.

Wayne> Do you consider yourself a spiritual seeker?

> Yes.

Wayne> If I put you on the spot and asked what it is you are seeking, what would you say?

> I had a collapse about a year ago.

Wayne> Was it emotional or physical?

> Everything. I realized I no longer want to be the doer any more in my life. For half a year, the whole process evolved.

Wayne> Have you read Ramesh’s books?

> I came to pick up some.

Wayne> I asked because when you talked about being a doer, that is one of the terms Ramesh uses. My “language” is slightly different. Here is the distinction I make. These body/mind organisms are constructed and programmed to do things. When they stop doing things, people come and cart them off before they start to stink, because that’s what we call death: the meat – the body/mind apparatus – stops doing. Doing is intrinsic. Doing is inevitable as long as there is life in the organism. What we really mean when we say, “I don’t want to be the doer. I don’t want to have the sense of being the doer,” is that we don’t want to feel that we are the author of these actions. It is this profound sense of authorship, of personal responsibility that arises in the organism, that is the source of suffering.

> No kidding!

Wayne> So that became painfully clear to you at some point and, thus, this desire arose to be free of that guilt, free of that burden of the sense of being the author. This teaching - through the examination of the nature of one’s being - sometimes has the effect of diminishing the sense of authorship and increasing the awareness of being an instrument through which doing happens, rather than being the author of the doing, of the actions.

> It helped a lot. It was a huge relief, a burden lifting.

Wayne> That is what we will call the blessing and the grace of the teaching: that incredibly weighty burden is often eased.

> I find myself extremely sensitive. My body picks up stuff. I’m totally fine one moment, and then the next moment something hits me like a truck and down I go. How do you handle that? I have no problems with letting go the belief, all of that; for me it’s exactly where I want to be. But how do I handle the onslaught of the energy that my body picks up? I didn’t read anything about how to handle that part.

Wayne> The reason you didn’t read anything about how to handle anything is that the presumption is you would be authoring the handling: how do “I” do that? You’re either coming from a standpoint of authorship – how do I make that happen? – or you are simply looking at a purely mechanical process – what can be done to … etcetera. If that’s what you’re looking for, then there are countless workshops and processes available. LA Weekly magazine probably has a listing of fifty of them. You may have to work your way through the fifty to see if any of them are effective for you.

> There isn’t anything to hold inside?

Wayne> There may be, but this teaching is not about any kind of technique. This teaching is constantly pointing to the nature of that which is functioning. If you are looking for mechanical processes to handle things, fix this or that, there are places where you can go to study and practice that might help you. That is not what we do here.

What is happening here is much more fundamental, much more central than that. We look at the fact that the very nature of this organism is to be sensitive. So, it reacts to certain energies in accordance with the conditioning of the organism. That conditioning can be changed and does change.

What is your name, sir?

> My name is Basil.

Wayne> Have we met before?

> I’m from Toronto, Canada, actually.

Wayne> Oh! What brings you to Los Angeles?

> I’m here on a tour. I’m aware of Ramesh’s teachings. I looked you up and realized that you were only a stone’s throw from where I’m staying on Grant’s avenue, just around the corner. I was pleasantly surprised.

Wayne> What kind of work do you do in Toronto?

> I teach accounting in a community college. I’m of Chinese ancestry, born in Calcutta, India. I came here very early on with my relatives.

Wayne> When did this interest in non-dual philosophy start?

> Quite early, I’d say when I was nineteen; I’m now forty. It started when I first heard about Ramana Maharshi’s teachings. I went to workshop after workshop. I don’t know how I would categorize myself right now. Tired. That’s the only word that comes to mind. My wife’s Indian, and it so happened that her family is in Bombay. I decided if I visited Bombay, I had to see Balsekar. My first contact with him was three years ago.

Wayne> How was that? What did you experience?

> I think it was very welcome. I told him if Ramana Maharshi had spoken in English, he would have sounded like Ramesh. I think seeing him was one of the most important things I did. If I had to categorize myself, it would be as a tired, miserable seeker. I remember my in-laws took me to Rishikesh and I saw more Westerners. My first thought was, “Here we are all gathered, tired and miserable seekers.” That’s just how I judge my own place. Another way of looking at it would be – for lack of better words – that God has been teasing me. Here it is - you started at such an early age; you’ve been digging around, digging around, digging around, learning a little bit about this.

I can really get what he’s actually saying. There are moments where it’s so obvious. It is here. And the next moment . . . I don’t know. I’m just in that kind of a place. Before the spiritual trip was very sexy, but not any more. There’s no thrill there any more. It’s like sex: after a while, it’s boring; it’s the same trip. I’m on the trip, but I can’t stop.

Wayne> I liken it to having sex with a six-hundred pound gorilla: you’re not finished until the gorilla is finished. It seems to me you’re at the point where you’re saying, “Enough already!” But the gorilla’s not finished. So, whether you’re interested or excited is not really relevant to the process. If it were, you could stop. Obviously, that is not in your power to do today.

> In a way, my hands are just in the air.

Wayne> Not completely. If your hands were completely in the air then that kind of total surrender is peace. I understand the frustration you’re experiencing and describing, I see it with some frequency. The people who come here generally are not novices. Occasionally someone gets dragged in unexpectedly, but for the most part, they have been at it for a while. This is the point at which all of those things have been tried - self-inquiry, meditation, tai chi, breathing - you name it, it’s been done.

> I’m with my main course, you know.

Wayne> If you are still believing there is a main course, then you’re going to continue to look for it. We’re pointing to the nature of that main course. What do you want? What are you truly looking for in the main course? What does it represent for you (assuming for the moment that I morphed into a real spiritual teacher like Ramana Maharshi, and I had the capacity to give you what you want)?

> I think it would be peace. What that means is that I wouldn’t worry what others think of me, I could let go of it. Forget about the labels of enlightenment and all that stuff. When I look at my modus operandi, it is all about protecting that. I just don’t want others to laugh at me or look down on me. I can go on and on, citing examples. So, I’m very much driven by that. If that entire mechanism could collapse . . .

Wayne> What about what you think of you? If you’re anything like most people, you’re your own worst critic.

> What I think about me is “not good enough.”

Wayne> Even if everybody else lined up to tell you how good you were, when the line finished you would still be left with yourself. There would still be that voice saying, “You’re still not good enough. Those people don’t really know. You have fooled them. If they really knew you they wouldn’t be saying that.” You know all your dirty little secrets that the other people don’t even know.

What you’re describing is exactly what Ramesh encountered with a Swedish lawyer who came to him. This man was at the pinnacle of his profession. He had big houses, yachts, all the money he could want, yet he was still seeking. Ramesh asked him, “What is it you’re looking for?” His answer was the same as yours, and it is the same thing most people are seeking in enlightenment. Ramesh summed it up in the phrase, “peace with oneself and with others.” His book Peace and Harmony in Daily Living came out of that essential quest that people share.

This peace with oneself and with others comes with the diminishing of the sense that “I” am the author. It comes with the understanding that it is Consciousness or Totality that is what I am and what I do, rather than the separate egoic entity being what I am or what I do. As Margo would say, as that is glimpsed and then as that deepens, the relief and the peace with oneself is palpable. The pointer to this peace is through the understanding of one’s nature.

[Pause]

> Your statement the other day about 12-step AA had quite an impact. I’m interested in it, but I’ve had an aversion to it for some reason that I can’t really put my finger on. What is it about it that you see as the ultimate blueprint for human life? I think you said something like that.

Wayne> I said it was a blueprint for living. It’s an incredible structure for recognizing one’s true nature, one’s powerlessness; that is the fundamental precept to the steps. The process is one of clearing up the wreckage. First is getting the sense of one’s nature and then taking a full and complete inventory of one’s characteristics, seeing which are positive, which are negative, and how they impact life and living. The thrust of this program is a recognition that a power greater than your egoic being is going to change it or not, not that you are going to perfect techniques for improving yourself. Take an inventory and become willing for a power greater than yourself to change it.

You make a list of the people that you have harmed in your life, and then set about clearing up the wreckage so what you end up with is a clean slate. It may take a while, but you can then walk comfortably. You are not avoiding people because you have screwed them over. There is a sense of being clean. Out of that cleanliness, the channel becomes more open. The more open you are, the more blessings flow in. It’s fundamental. That’s why I say it’s an extraordinary blueprint for living. But the admission price is high.

> You said something earlier about Totality is what you are and what you do, something like that. I understand about Totality is what you are, but that Totality is what you do . . .

Wayne> What it means is even the actions, even the thoughts – good, bad, whatever – are Totality.

> Right. I just hadn’t brought that all through to physical actions.

Wayne> It does come right through to the manifest universe. What I appreciated so much about this teaching is that it brought it through to this by saying this that is manifest is, in fact, God or Source. A common pointer in scriptures is that this is an illusion, and it is often taken and used as doctrine: this is illusory; it has no substance and doesn’t exist. It’s crazy making, when you get right down to it. How can one stand there and say that there is nothing? That which is making the assertion IS something. We can argue endlessly about what it is, but it is something.

I understand the essence of that pointer to mean that what is illusory is that it appears separate – you appear separate from the table. That is only an appearance. Essentially, you and the table are Consciousness.

> That I can easily follow. But I just can’t follow it to my actions.

Wayne> Ramesh’s thrust is on action because that is where the sense of authorship connects. “I act.” The authorship claims the action: “It’s mine. I did it.” That is the point at which the divine hypnosis is the strongest – in the action – because it is claimed by the ego as “my” egoic doing.

> So, I can say actions happen.

Wayne> I can say that, too. They do happen. Once there is understanding, you can even say, “I act. I, Joan, went to the store.” You don’t have to say, “going to the store happened.” In some Advaita circles there are people walking around talking that way to show that they understand; personal pronouns are not used. That would be “unspiritual.” If you say “I,” everyone knows there’s no “I.” The understanding is that there is a functional “I” – there is a Joan. Joan has properties, qualities and characteristics that we call Joan-ness. Joan, as this body/mind apparatus, does things. We can talk about it that way as long as there is the underlying understanding of what Joan is.

> Even the action?

Wayne> Of course, “even the action” – even EVERYTHING. You’re not alone on this, by the way.

> I can think that’s very cool, but it’s going to take a while to really sink in.

Wayne> It’s very cool, indeed. You know how I had the “aha” seeing of that? I was going up to see Ramesh regularly. I felt I had it: Consciousness is everything, etcetera. I got that. Then I went home and my son, who was then five, was sitting there doing something that I had told him fifteen times not to do. I yelled, “God damn it! I told you fifteen times not to do that and here you are doing it again. What the hell is the matter with you? Go to your room!” He went off to his room and I felt horrible; I was the world’s worst Advaita student. Clearly, his actions were the actions of Consciousness, and here I was punishing him as if he were the doer. I forgot completely it was Consciousness doing the actions through him. I was an idiot! The next day I confessed to Ramesh about my horrible Advaitic lapse. He looked at me with deep compassion (I’m maintaining to this day it was compassion and not pity) and he said, “Wayne, your yelling at Justin was also the functioning of Totality. You leave yourself out.” When he said that, I saw it. Even MY action is the functioning of Totality.

> It really screws with the controller.

Wayne> Yes, it does. Because it is that fundamental presumption by the ego that “I’m doing it” – that it is independent.

> Then it feels like there’s a void. I’m wondering what happens when you go through the void.

Wayne> Well, we’ll see.

> Why in the 12-step program would there be a need for amends if you recognize that it really was part of Totality?

Wayne> It’s mechanical. There are karmic laws, cause and effect laws. If you put a bunch of crap out there, you’re going to get crap back; the crap is going to keep flowing. So, it’s a mechanical identification. You clean up the crap and things are clean. It has nothing to do with you becoming better. Do this: clean it up. The underlying understanding, however, is that you can only do it if it is the will of the source. The basic tenet of the 12-steps is, Number One: you are powerless.

> Powerless over your addiction. But I don’t think it says that you are powerless over your behavior, because it makes you take responsibility for your behavior.

Wayne> I don’t want to argue about the AA program. Increasingly you look and see what you can and can’t control. It’s suggested that you make a list of the things you can control and those you can’t control. What you’ll find over time is that things move from the list of the things that you can control to the list of the things that you can’t control. Nothing ever goes the other way!

It is often very much a process of seeing one’s powerlessness. This begins with ones addiction and then expands until one talks about having had a spiritual awakening as a result of these steps. It happens.

> I don’t see how that and what Joan was asking can fit into the same teaching. Where I go in my practice is watching: watching when I take responsibility, watching the fluctuations of the mind and what it does and wants to do with those thoughts. The realization of this is just a movement of thought, and then the movement is action. So I can rest in that and watch that and know that I’m not the source of that. But then when something takes place that . . . it feels like I would be totally passive. That’s where I get confused, because in the 12-step program you’re supposed to take the inventory and make the amends. But it seems that it’s not really me, it’s just part of the Totality expressing itself.

Wayne> But that really doesn’t follow. Everything is part of the Totality expressing itself. Everything that happens, everything that is said, everything that is done is part of the Totality. It’s all-inclusive. It does not exclude teaching. It does not exclude practices. It does not exclude any of that.

> To me that is an example of a moral practice or a moral code.

Wayne> No. It is not a moral code. It’s a practical application, such as “Change your oil every five thousand miles and your engine is going last longer.” Whether you do it or not, or can do it, or whether you have a good mechanic, all of that is up in the air. But if you change your oil every five thousand miles, your engine is going to last longer – in general. Your particular engine – well, anything can happen. But that is something we can point to as the mechanical properties of things.

I called the 12-step program a blueprint for living because it describes how Advaita can work. Whether you can do it, whether it’s going to be your life, who knows. That was the gist of my comment. It is, as far as I’ve found in my investigations, the most complete blueprint for a workable life. And when there’s grace, you have the power to do what is suggested, to get things cleaned up and to get a life that works better.

> With grace, I guess you really wouldn’t have to think about what that is.

Wayne> Grace would be that you think about it and you do it.

> Without all the identification, the body/mind just functions really well.

Wayne> Without involvement by the ego, the organism functions more smoothly. Even the pain runs more smoothly and perhaps more easily because it’s not restricted by other things. There’s total pain in the moment – be it emotional or physical. Ramesh tells the story of the cartoon characters, Mutt & Jeff. They are driving to San Francisco and the car quits. Jeff gets out and starts pushing the car. They come to a hill and Jeff’s trying to push the car up. It’s getting steeper and steeper, and he barely makes it to the top of the hill. He gets to the top of the hill, climbs into the car, coasts down the other side, and says to Mutt, “I didn’t think we were going to make it. I thought the car was going to roll right back over me and into the Bay.” Mutt answers, “Jeff, you didn’t have to worry. I had the emergency brake on all the time!” This ego or sense of personal authorship is that emergency brake.

> Are all actions of the Source, including the rape of a child?

Wayne> Yes. The pointer in this teaching is that everything is the manifestation of Source. Even the bad stuff, the most horrific, is part of this dualistic manifestation. For there to be unparalleled beauty there must be unparalleled ugliness. It is the very structure of the manifest universe.

The acceptance of the fact that the rape of a child is the manifestation of source does not mean that you approve of it. The acceptance that it is what it is does not mean that you like it. Your response of horror, your response of disgust, is also part of the same functioning of Totality.

> Then all governing of actions are part of the conditioned Totality as well?

Wayne> Absolutely.

> Ramesh said that Basil exists because Basil acts. I’m paraphrasing him. I was a little confused by what he meant. If I understood correctly, what he meant was that by virtue of the fact that I act, my existence can begin.

Wayne> It’s essentially a pointer to the nature of this manifest universe, which is that it is a subject/object relationship. There is a point of sentience – we call it action or perception – and in that, there concurrently arises something to be experienced, to be perceived. That’s the model that he uses.

[Pause]

> When it is my turn, or the preprogrammed destiny for the ego in me to no longer exist in my experience, will it have an affect on continuing to seek?

Wayne> It may. There are different ways of talking about this. One of them is cause and effect relationship – the way that we talk about what is manifest. But the more essential understanding is that everything is. Totality has arisen and it is all part of what is. Then it is revealed and experienced in space and time.

> Even understanding is being a part of manifestation.

Wayne> It is an event in the totality of manifestation that has happened through an organism. It is given tremendous significance by seekers because that’s what they want, so it’s “the event.” Lifting a glass is an event. It’s merely a matter of the weight we give to various events; the significance of an event is applied afterwards. So we understand the event is part of the totality. All events are part of the Totality, including the preceding event. We can say that those events that came before had to come before in order for the subsequent event to happen. We could say they expedited it; they made it happen. But we can only say that in retrospect.

> From your experience and from what I’ve read of others when they are on the “other side,” the way they talk about it is that there wasn’t a singular thing. It was just that it wasn’t there any more - the separation idea. They don’t know specifically when that was.

Wayne> The point is that we tell a story about it.