June 2004

Wayne will be in Boston in July giving a series of Talks. For more details, see below.

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MESSAGE FROM WAYNE
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Hello my loves,

There is a prevalent notion that there can be Awakening or Realization that comes and goes and finally stabilizes after some time. I do not believe that there is such a thing as "partial realization." I recognize there is seeking. I recognize there is intellectual understanding and there is spiritual experience, both of which are progressive and cumulative. And I recognize there is the final understanding, which is sudden, irrevocable, and after which there can be no further process, in the same way that you cannot be 'more dead'. You can only be dead; you can't be dead plus. Once dead, there is no question of stabilizing into your deadness. And realization, or the final understanding, is exactly like that.

In my definition of this final understanding, gradual or evolutionary enlightenment is not possible. What that refers to is this unveiling process of seeking in which you have spiritual insights. In that stage, there are often very real spiritual experiences in which you know the oneness of things. Such experiences ebb, and then they often come back again. That's what I call the process of spiritual seeking. This process has increasingly been redefined as enlightenment or awakening. In fact, much of the modern satsang movement is based on that model of spiritual experience being called enlightenment. So after your spiritual experience has been officially declared enlightenment by someone who had their spiritual experience declared to be enlightenment by someone else who once flew over Lucknow, you are then urged to teach that to others as being awakening or enlightenment.

Part of the appeal of such a model is that the goal of virtually every seeker is to gain this enlightenment. Therefore, if you tell them that they gained it, everybody's happy because they're getting what they wanted, and they are happy with the teacher for giving it to them. If they're honest and they say, "Well, this enlightenment, this experience that was so profound and important seems to have gone or ebbed," then the teacher says, "Well, it isn't really gone, you're just settling into it. You're just learning your new spiritual body. Your physical being is learning how to accept it" or some similar explanation often accompanied by a supporting quote from a sage who has been dead long enough to no longer be controversial. Implicit in the notion that enlightenment is progressive is that enlightenment is a state - an experiential state. The pointer in this teaching is that it is not an experiential state; an experiential state is by its nature transitory. If you're experiencing something, it will change. The very basis of duality is change. Change is integral to experience. In fact, what we call life is movement and change. In the absence of this movement, when it's localized in an organism, that state is what we call death.

So in terms of the experience of life, the states of life are always alternating, but this is not what is pointed to in this teaching as enlightenment. It is why sages like Nisargadatta Maharaj would speak from the standpoint of Totality and make statements such as, "I'm awake even when I'm asleep. I will live even after I am dead." They are linguistically pointing to that which is not conditional. That which is the source and substance of everything - what we "truly are" - is not experiential except in its aspect. It's experiential only as what we can know and touch and taste and live. But enlightenment is beyond that kind of knowing because it is beyond the limit of experiential knowledge.

With love,
Wayne

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UPCOMING EVENTS
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WITH RAMESH BALSEKAR

Daily Talks in His Home: 9AM Sindhula, N. Gamadia Rd. #10, Bombay, India (Helpful info for people planning to visit Ramesh can be found in the Ramesh Balsekar section of the advaita.org website)

Seminar in Kovalam, South India Dec. 5 - 16, 2004 See: http://advaita.org/aftalks.html#Kovalam
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EVENTS WITH WAYNE LIQUORMAN

Boston Talks.....July 23-25 Contact Francois tel.781-925-3893 Cell 781-405-6167
email: fm@space.mit.edu

San Diego Talks........Aug. 6-8 Contact Chetna Phone: 858-481-5359 (evenings) Email: chetna1@yahoo.com

Ross, CA (San Francisco Area) Talks... Aug. 20-22 Contact: Joanne Phone: 415-457-6686 Email: jfm1@comcast.net

Sedona Residential Retreat ....Sept. 10-15 Contact Kate: kfree77@peoplepc.com

Northern England (Sedbergh, Cumbria) Residential Retreat... Oct. 1-6 Contact June (44) 15396 20972 jmp55@tutor.open.ac.uk

Amsterdam Talks.....October 15-17 Contact Ronald 31-020-646-2160 Email: ronald.valk@wanadoo.nl

NYC Talks..... Nov. 12-14 Contact: Daniel djhnd@earthlink.net or Jim# 718-543-4189

Talks in Wayne's Home

927B Sixth St., Hermosa Beach, CA (check website for times or call 310-376-9636)

These talks are broadcast LIVE over the Internet. Live broadcasts can be accessed free from the advaita.org website thanks to the continuing support of the members.

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THE ADVAITA PRESS STORE
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NEW BOOKS------------

VOICES by Antonio Porchia
The non-dual Teaching comes through many channels. This is a book of insightful and concise aphorisms written by an Italian who moved to Argentina and ran a print shop. He may never have thought in terms of Enlightenment or Ultimate Understanding, yet his writings are as beautiful and as clear as the most celebrated of Sages. The book contains both the Spanish originals and the English translations.
A few excerpts:
Set out from any point. They are all alike. They all lead to a point of departure.

If those who owe us nothing, gave us nothing, how poor we would be.

Following straight lines, shortens distances, and also life.

I would ask something more of this world, if it had something more.

When you and the truth speak to me, I do not listen to the truth. I listen to you.

Softcover, 129 pages $14
BKS-VOICES

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NEW ON CD

FROM THE ARCHIVES - Disc 1
Ramesh in Hollywood, CA -- Fall 1988

The first in a series of never before released Audio discs capture Ramesh's early Teachings at Henry Dennison's home in Hollywood, California. The Talks included in this disc are presented here for the first time and provide a fascinating look at the seeds of many of Ramesh's later Teachings. The disc starts with Ramesh talking about how he was first brought to the US to teach. Sound quality of these recordings in generally excellent.

CD, Running time: 80 min. $15

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Click here http://advaita.org/store/index.htm or go to the www.advaita.org website, click on Advaita Press Store and then Latest Releases and you will find this item as well as a new video about Ramana Maharshi, another video about Nisargadatta Maharaj as well as a new Maharaj pictorial book and DVD's of both Wayne and Ramesh.

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BECOME A MEMBER
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If you have not yet joined the Advaita Fellowship but would like to become a member... click on the link

http://216.86.195.102/members/register.asp

or visit the advaita.org website and click on BECOME A MEMBER

Members, via their TAX DEDUCTIBLE monthly donations, help to make the Fellowship financially viable and ensure the continued free presentations of the Teaching via the web site, webcasts, newsletters and free Talks in Wayne's home.

In thanks to the members for their support they receive unlimited access to the Fellowships online video archives. These archives contain hundreds of streaming videos of Ramesh and Wayne. New ones are being added constantly.

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A LIVING GEM FROM RAMESH (previously unpublished)
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'Motivation' means personal involvement due to frustration, leading to a waste of energy. 'Acceptance' means spontaneously doing what needs to be done in the moment, which means a great saving in energy, not 'fatalism'.

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POEM
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The Well

Rumor has it that this well is unreliable
That people have drunk here and been poisoned
Or that drunk on rumors of its life-giving waters,
They've wandered for years
Following a bad map
Unable to find it in plain sight.
I've heard some have come to the well
And seeing the wild, bearded fellow watching over it
(he looks more like a wine drinker than a water drinker they say)
Leave without even lowering the bucket
Thinking surely their thirst couldn't be quenched here, of all places.
I have come many times to this well and
Strange as it may seem, I can't always find it
Though I too know it must be in plain sight.
Wandering in circles, thinking I recognize this tree or that stone -
I'm certain it was in this precise place just yesterday!
And gone on looking, and given up, throat parched;
Or I come all the way
And my thirst inexplicably disappears
Though it was there a moment before
And returns when I leave.
I have come and found the bucket missing,
The pulley rusted stuck,
The rope frayed and broken
And have left as thirsty as when I came.
I have gotten lost looking for it,
And finding it, cursed it until the bitterness in my mouth
Turned my stomach, and I've left
Still thirsty.
I have at times been so distracted by the hypnotic wild rantings of the well watcher
That I've forgotten why I came
And returned to town in a daze.
I keep coming back to the well
Because sometimes
The well is easy to find
The bucket is clean, the rope is strong, the pulley works fine
The well watcher mutely stands by
And at those times
The water is as sweet as any I've ever had
As sweet as anything could be
And I wonder how I could ever have been thirsty.

Daniel