Hermosa Beach, 16 November 2009

What I can't quite get used to, is that it's so peaceful being here with you. And I know I'm going to leave here after tomorrow, and it doesn't seem like a problem. And that's kind of a, well you know me, if I look histoerically, I can't quite see how that's happening.

Wayne: Um hmm. That's really a blessing.

It is, yeah, absolutely. Do you get many people reporting back to you, that they find themselves walking around with the guilty grin you get when you're a bit stoned? You're walking around with this permanent grin on your face? I found myself doing that. And it is quite fun to see the reactions of people as I'm walking by. Some ignore, and some look and smile back. Sometimes I find myself walking around, and I'm trying really hard not to grin, just like being stoned. Not the, just this grin I mean.It's quite a pleasant experience.

Wayne: I am sure it is.

It's like to trying to look normal, because you see everybody else, and they look either nothing or they look miserable. I'm self-consciously trying to fit in. It always seems to happen when I am around you. It finally goes away when I get back home.

Wayne: I'll be in Madrid in February.

Will you? Brilliant. You're also visiting London?

Wayne: We will, I don't know. There are no talks set up yet for London in the middle of February. We'll see how that all goes.

Haven't bought the tickets yet?

Wayne: But not booked. But we will definitely be there during that period. Jackie's book is coming out on the 18th of February, so we'll be there for that.

[silence]

I'm just watching, it just seems like there is contentment there, like there's just contentment. And I'm sure if I think about it long enough, I can come up with some things that are wrong, but they don't seem to be chasing after me or anything. You know, there is just like this contentment, despite circumstances, it's just not... It is great. It's almost like there is a preference for the contentment, is how it feels.

Wayne: That's fairly understandable, that there would be a preference for the contentment.

It doesn't always seem that way. When there is heavy duty focusing on the circumstances that are unacceptable, then it seems like, there is the focusing on that. It almost feels like that's the preference, you know?

Wayne: Well I guess, it's a matter of languaging also. If we say that the preference is indicative of what you're doing, that's a way of speaking. Generally, when we talk about preferences, it's not necessarily aligned with what is happening. You can prefer to have pleasure rather than pain, but you may have pain. The suggestion that you have the pain you have, is because you actually subconsciously or secretly or in some way, have a preference for the pain - because obviously, you must have or the pain wouldn't be there - what that suggests, always comes back to, is that you are the source of what's happening, through your preference. That's, I mean that's the implication. Now in this teaching we ask: Is that true? And you can examine for yourself to see if your preferences, in fact, do produce what's happening. If so, why on earth would you ever have pain? Or what would make you prefer pain?

Yeah, it seems like when there's this intense focus on what's wrong, and what's unacceptable, and all this suffering going on, it almost seems like the volume is so loud, with that, it's unavoidable. And in this precise moment, it seems like it is also there, but it is really low, it is like a one and it's way off in the distance. And what is really loud is like: Oh my God, what a beautiful day! Oh my God, everything is so beautiful! Oh my God, I get to go to Satsang tonight! You know what I mean? All this is just like, everything is fantastic. And way out there at volume one, it's like: Oh it would be nice if I had some money. It wouldn't it be nice if blah-blah-blah-blah-blah. But that is not the focus. And the loud part is the gratitude, the appreciation, and just like the awe, it's so great!

Wayne: Someone I once heard speak years ago, made the observation that your attention is like a magnifying glass. So whatever your attention is on is magnified. If your attention is on gratitude and the good things, then they are bigger. If your attention is focused on the negative and the unpleasant and the painful, the negative is bigger. And I went, "Yeah, that's true." Now, the implication at that time, and the one we tend to supply in general, is that what that means is: We must then focus on the positive, because now that we've seen that it is the focusing that creates the awareness, and it magnifies whatever it is we are looking at, then obviously it is better to focus on the positive rather than the negative, because you want the positive to be bigger and not the negative to be bigger. This is where we have to, like step back a step, and look at the whole thing one more time and say, “Okay, yes, we observe the mechanism that what you focus on gets bigger. But can you, are you in fact the controller of your focus?" If you are, by all means, only focus on the positive. I don't have to tell you that. You already know that. So even if you say, "I am focusing, I am capable of focusing on the positive," the question then is: Well, why don't you? If you are in control of this ability to focus on the positive rather than the negative, why don't you do that all the time? What is it that diminishes or pulls away the control. If there is something that pulls the control away, do you in fact have control? That's the question. So if your control is given to you by something else, is it in fact your control?

I was thinking earlier today, sort of following on a conversation we had a couple of weeks ago about time, how time doesn't really exist. Past present and future, the past doesn't exist, the future isn't here yet, and the present is, well it has to be so narrow, in fact it has no dimension in a horizontal dimension, otherwise it wouldn't be the present. So if something has a dimension of zero, it doesn't exist, so there is no time. That was my conclusion anyway. Just to take that a step further. Then if there is no time then there can't be any cause-effect. Which relatex a little bit to what you were just saying. It also makes one think about the theories of the big bang theory, and the continuous creation theories. Most of those must be incorrect. Because both of those depend upon time. The big bang theory is sort of postulating a start to all of this. A start means there's time. Continuous creation means there is time. So both of those theories must be incorrect on that line, from that concept. It must be just is, well, the is-ness without a time factor.

Wayne: That's good as far it goes. So what is happening here?

Exactly. This pesky stuff gets in the way.

Well forget the stuff, what about YOU? What are you?

There's two of me. There are two mes I think. Well there is a body-mind mechanism.

Wayne: Oh, is there?

Which you call Brian.

Wayne: If there is a body -mind mechanism then it exists in space, and if there is space there is time.

Yeah. Exactly.

Wayne: So there must be time if there is a body-mind mechanism.

Well, it seems to be how we look at this thing.

Wayne: It certainly does!

In this space-time thing, if we look at it from outside of this space-time thing, that's duality. So we're back to a duality instead of a non-duality. And this is a non-dual teaching. So how do the two tie together?

Wayne: That's a very good question. How does duality function or fit into a non-dual teaching? And, you see what we do with our minds is we create an either-or situation. It is either non-dual or it's dual. So what is it, dual or non-dual? And what this teaching, this one here in this room, is pointing to, is it is both. It is both dual and non-dual. Meaning that within the non-dual Total is the dual. So the dual exists within the non-dual, and so there is both.

One tends to think of like the material universe as being a projection of consciousness. But there can't be so either. So it implies that there is something outside of conscious open space, beyond consciousness that consciousness can project into.

Wayne: That's right.

So there can't be a projection of consciousness.

Wayne: That's right.

So it must be within consciousness.

Wayne: That's right.

You can talk about within consciousness, that sort of implies a limit to space thing too.

Wayne: It is a much better concept in talking about this, because it's inclusive. It is within. And inevitably, if we're going to talk, we have to conceptualize, which means objectivize. So that which is within is conceived as an object. So that non-dual Total, no matter how sophisticated your thinking gets, it's still objectified. If you conceive it, you can think about it, it is an object.

Yeah yeah. So you've got to get beyond thinking about it somehow or other.

Wayne: I think that's a good thing to try to do. [laughter] Report back, let us know how that goes.

Now about this concept that when the body-mind mechanism is created, all the events of the lifetime of that body-mind mechanism are sort of decided at the point of creation of it.

Wayne: That's a very coarse image. I mean, it may be potentially useful as a pointer of some kind, but it's a crude one.

: It's sort of the big bang theory applied to the individual body-mind mechanism.

Wayne: Yes, but the problem in that example, is that this organism exists in context. So you say, "Everything that will happen to it is written," but what about everything around it?

It's all written too.

Wayne: It's all written too. Okay, so what you are saying is that everything is written, so it all is. And that is-ness is a Totality.

Yeah.

Wayne: No problem. So where's the point of picking out one organism, one part of that, and saying, "Oh, well that is all written." As if everything else isn't. If it's all written, what significance does it have that it's written for that organism? Everything's written.

Well yeah, but it is interesting thing from the individual's point of view when you are talking about whether or not you're the cause of things, which we were just talking about a few minutes ago.

Wayne: Yes. So if you are concerned with cause and effect then you come back to, we go back to that whole question of time, which brings you back to the question of the nature of existence, of the non-dual, because it is all non-dual. And then you come right back to: what the hell is the dual? We can keep running around that track as long as you like. You build up some muscle running around it.

Then you say it's all Consciousness, which sort of covers it, but it doesn't.

Wayne: Yeah, it's kind of a nice advertising sort of phrase. “It's all Consciousness.” It's catchy, gets your attention. Points you to what we're wanting you to buy, but it's not representative of what it is that we are selling.

It's something more?

Wayne: No, there's nothing more to tell. That is the point, what we're pointing at it is beyond the concept. And as long as we are telling you about it, as long as it's conceptualized, it ain't it. Which is not to stop conceptualizing, I'm not suggesting we stop conceptualizing.

Couldn't anyway. As far as my interest goes, I do it. But at some point, and presumably the conceptual will cease or something, one will have a more intuitive understanding.

Wayne: We talk about it as a transcendence. Like the bottom just drops out of the whole paradigm, of me knowing something else. And then there is a transcendence of that whole process.

That'll be nice.There's be a lot to think about meanwhile.

[silence]

It's a funny statement you made, that the dual and the non-dual exist at the same time. You used the word time in there. Which, since we're talking about the non-dual...

Wayne: But whenever we're talking, it's time. Wherever there is existence as something knowable, as something that is experiential in terms of existence, there's time.

You know, we just proved that time doesn't exist.

Wayne: Time doesn't exist as an object, time is relative. Which is what Einstein pointed out.

Of course, you could use the same logic on objects and things, you know, we're talking about a line having no, well it has length, but no breadth by definition. And a plane is a line that is extended in one direction but has no depth. So it is still at a zero dimension, but you know the walls of this room are made up of planes which don't exist, at the zero dimension. Indeed so it would be impossible to determine where the actual plane of the wall is by that logic, by that thinking anyway, because there's a zero dimension in there. Is it same as the time thing that we were talking about.

Wayne: That's right. So there is no absolute quality that you can identify.

Because it is relative?

Wayne: Because everything is relative that is experienced.

And so that's what you mean when you say it is not real, cause it's not absolute.

Wayne: It is not - and this is where it gets really tricky because we come back to both the dual or non-dual - it is both absolute and it is not. It is absolute in its relativity, because it is the absolute expressed as the relative. And so we can never ever get away from the absolute, even when we have the relative as an experience. Now you've heard through your spiritual studies over the years, I mean it is said that this is all an illusion. And the question then really is: Whose illusion is it? It is your illusion. That means you exist. How come you're not an illusion?

Well, because there's a you, talking about it again.

Wayne: That is the point. So we come back to: What are you? And what is anything? If you say, "I don't exist," fine. What does? Something, there is existence. And that quality of existence is what we point at, when we talk about the absence.

Can I get the last part? The quality of existence is?

Wayne: That quality we experience of existence, of being alive, of being something, not even being alive, it is something here. It is that quality which points to the Absolute. We give it that name, but it is like sort of the doorway, into which you may, there may be a glimpse of what it is we are talking about.

So we just go around in circles when we use words of course, because of the limitations.

So how does that relate to the absence? Like, so there's this noticing of certain times when there's, like I said the volume is on 10, there's this intense suffering, and it feels very very, it's very me-focused, all consuming. And then there's right now, which is a lot of contentment, gratitude. So then there is a question that arises like, is that me-focused, or is the contentment just there when there is no me-focus? There's just contentment, there's just appreciation. And maybe you know, and then I'm coming back to what we talked about last time, we heard about the absence.

Wayne: Okay, we say there is contentment.

There is contentment.

Wayne: Fine, there is contentment but it's localized. The contentment is there. That contentment may not be there. So we can say that the contentment is not me-centered, but it is centered there. So now, we are into linguistics again, language, what do you mean by me? It's related.

So, it's not so much me, it is more like conditional. Does it have to do, am I happy because I like my circumstances, or am I happy because there's just this contentment here? Is it being conditional or it's just now contentment has arrived? Without any certain set of circumstances, it's just what's happening and therefore it's all good?

Wayne: Yes. I'm hearing what you are saying. If it has the positive quality of contentment, then it is the conditional opposite of the quality of involvement in misery. So that's where I would make the distinction. There is something, there's a positive feeling, you say this feels good, I like this. That positiveness is the conditional opposite of the involvement, of that which you don't want. Now they're both, of course, expressions of the same energy. The same source is manifesting in both experiences through you. So when you look at it from that angle, then the whole question of you is simply one of a mechanism through which things happen. And that's you, meaning this body, this mind, this set of emotions, this capacity for experience, for feeling pleasure and pain, joy and sorrow, this particular capacity which is different from this one. This organism has a different capacity for those things. So, that collection of capacities we call Joanne, we call you.

In this teaching what we focus on, and we make a distinction and try and get connected to, and what often people talk about as the me, is the 'sense of authorship'. This very subtle me, this quality that attaches to me, that's been with me since I was two and a half years old, and so it's been there so long it's just thought of as part of me, a part that I probably couldn't be without, but in fact is disposable. It can go and there is still a you. I can't tell you how many times people come to this teaching in the beginning, and they listen and they start to absorb the teaching, and they say, I'm really afraid that if I go further in this, this me will be gone. And that I will just have to dissolve into this oneness, and there won't be any me left. Because of all we're talking about. So: what do you mean by there'd be no me left? "There'd be no personality, I wouldn't have any character. I wouldn't have these qualities (generally the good ones that people cop to), the ones I like." And you've got memories, "I like my relationships with my loved ones, my feelings for my children, for my parents, those kinds of things - I don't want to lose those things and just be this, you know, everything-nothing-thing, you know 'neutral everything-ness'. Because the quality of 'me as the author' is so, has so absorbed and claimed the 'functional me', that when it seems that this 'claiming me' is threatened, is being revealed and exposed in a way that it can't survive, then the threat is that, if that is actually what I am, this 'authoring me', if that's gone, then there won't be anything left. So that's why I come back to this distinction all the time, between the 'functional me' and the 'authoring me' or the 'claiming me'.

Yeah, I'm getting like a felt sense about how, I don't know what the feeling is when that arises, this idea that there's something wrong I need to do something about it. It seems like the opposite of that, is this contentment, it's perfect, it's really good, fine.

Wayne: Yeah. And it gets even subtler as you go deeper into it, you may find that what really is there, is a 'quality of shouldness'. And when that 'quality of shouldness' goes, then what remains is peace or contentment, regardless of the situation. So that you can have anger or agitation or even anger, and still have peace. Because the peace that you are finding is not conditional on what is happening in the moment, in terms of the human response.

So the shouldness precedes the authorship?

Wayne: No. It is the product of the authorship. So the should is the 'sense of authorship' itself. "I should be other than I am, I should behave differently, he should behave in such a way."

Right. So I had this experience. Like I go to this church sometimes, and the minister talks about, he's giving his message whatever, but it's like this infinite being that you are, wants to express through you. And so, often I listen and what starts to arise is the idea that it's not expressing enough right now, and it should be expressing more, right? And then, that sense of, "I should be doing that, I am not doing enough, whatever I'm doing it is not enough, it needs to be more." And it is like that's the birth of the snowball that starts rolling down the hill and getting bigger and bigger and bigger. And then you know, stress and agitation and the sense of wrongness is born.

Wayne: Yes, absolutely. Of course it is.

Right. And I don't know if that is actually what he's saying, or that's what arises as I'm listening to whatever he's saying.

Wayne: Yes, and no way of knowing, either. The message is, that it is the Source, the Universal Energy, that is expressing through us. That's clear. Where it gets funky, often in churches, is that it has a positive spin to it. So the positive energy that is manifesting through you, is thought to be this cosmic force. The crap, the ugliness is...

You! [laughter] Or it has to be big, or bigger or like that's kind of the feeling, is that bigger is better. More is better, is the feeling that I get when I listen. Cause it's almost like, "Isn't it already expressing like, yes?" But it needs to be expanding all the time, or it needs to be…

Wayne: Well, if it is the Infinite Source, and it needs something, presumably it has the resources to do it. I mean what possible limitation could it have? Now the thing is, often - you've got to really understand that large gatherings require a message that can communicate to large gatherings - and what're are talking about here doesn't play in big audiences. Because people just like, "Huh-unh." This is a very selective approach. So understand the context that you're in. And the pointers may be, you know, fine. But the way that they're expressed, in order for people to understand them are crude, if you will. They just have to be at a level of general and easy-to-understand, rather than sophisticated and... That being the case, there is often quite difficult-to-understand messages. When you look at it, it just doesn't make any sense.

I guess the guide for me is like, that's not a new experience, thinking it should be more, it should be better. It triggers whatever the conditioning is that's here. So I guess what happens is, then inquiry starts.

Wayne: Well, if the inquiry does start, that's wonderful. If you really start to question and look into whatever it is that is being stated by whoever. And I would certainly hope that the same level of inquiry and curiosity about what is being said or proposed, would happen here for you as well as there. And that you not simply take and swallow like a pill, that which I am putting forth here. Because that's not really what I'm about in what I'm talking. I'm not dispensing pearls for you to take in to a nice belly full, to then you know, at some point spew back up to the waiting masses. [laughter] A bizarre image, isn't it? [more laughter]

In the end it just feels like, there's just a daily whatever, prayer or something' that's just, wherever you want me to go, whatever you want me to do, show me guide me direct me. And then, oh look at that beautiful sunset again, just like, back to trusting that it is unfolding the way it's supposed to.

Wayne: Um huh. That is the easy part, however, the sunsets, and the whales spouting, saying that's unfolding exactly the way...

No no no. You know, with the more difficult things, the ones not being my preferences, the things if I were to say what my preference is, it wouldn't be my preference.

Wayne: Correct.

Apparently there's supposed to not be any money in the checking account, and whatever it is, is how it is supposed to be. It seems like there is just acceptance I guess. And even it is like some curiosity like, "Hmm, wonder what that's about," or something like that, which is much better than, you know, freaking out and screaming and stuff. So how does that relate to the absence? Because that feels like where the next… Can you say more about the comment you made a minute ago, that there is this peace even in midst of the reactivity, or it's like you talked about the final realization, it's like, that's where all the curiosity is.

Wayne: Yeah I understand. And in fact, it is unfair even to characterize it that way. Because it dangles a carrot of sorts, you say, "Aah that there will be this peace, even amidst the chaos, when you attain to the final understanding." And it isn't even that present, I mean, to give it the name 'peace' seems to suggest that there is something there, and that is where we come to the absence. It is in fact an absence, which is without quality. So that it's the absence of suffering, so the suffering never attaches to the pain. The pleasure and the pain come and go in the moment, the experience of the moment with the whole measure of: I don't like it, or I like it. The reactivity of, "Hey, this sucks, this is not how I would like things to be!" That kind of reactivity can still arise, but there is an absence of involvement, of the 'should' and that things should be other than they are, that is what I characterize as 'the peace that surpasses all understanding'. Now of course the phrase itself ‘surpasses all understanding' is I really mean it, if you understand it, it ain't it. Because it surpasses anything that you could know or understand as peace.

Okay. So did you find it at some stage, that there was this like burning curiosity about the 'absence of involvement'?

Wayne: Of course, I was a seeker. I mean I know what that's about. I mean that's why I was up, well part of the reason, you know, I was up every day twice a day sitting with Ramesh when I could, and being as involved in this teaching as I could, aside from the heart-opening aspect of just, of the sheer love and joy of being in the presence. There was also that curiosity that drives, wanting to know what it was that he had, and what was this quality that was clearly there. And how could I get it. "I want it. Gimme. Gimmie, gimme, gimme." So I mean, I know what that's about.

I don't even feel like, "Give me, give me, give me," or "I want it, I want it."

Wayne: Oh, stop.

It's almost like, well I talk to people, and they're like, "I want to make a million dollars," or, "I want to build this business," or, "I want to do this," and I'm like, "Who cares about all that, there's this 'absence of involvement', you know about this? It's is all I really care about. [laughter] And it seems to be the song that is in my mind all the time. It's not even like an attainment, it is just like this burning curiosity, just like this, it is like you just find yourself driving by it everyday, this is just like this, "Aah, aah." It feels like home, it feels.

Wayne: Yup, you've got it bad girl.

Fortunately I live in Hermosa Beach, so...

[9-1/2 minue silence]

So I keep hearing this, the 'absence of involvement', so it feels like expanded. Like it feels really good to be here, because there's this awareness of that 'absence of involvement'. And it, the feeling is like expanded, and in that expandedness there is this awareness of 'expansion has contraction', of course. So, getting this sense of the non-dual that contains the dual, but there's this awareness of the non-dual. And so when there's the awareness of the non-dual, at the same time of the awareness of the duality, it's fine, it's totally fine. But when there's this seeming 'forgetting about the non-dual' and there's this absorption in the dual, then there is, then it is like a perpetual contraction and that is when the volume is 10. And then walk in here, suddenly there's this awareness again of the non-dual, and then it is all fine again. Yes, so if there's like any desire, it's that desire, that is the desire.

Wayne: That's why they build ashrams.

It is not too, see and when you were talking about that tricky bit, like that whole Abraham-Hicks [producers of The Law of Attraction] feels better, co-creation, all that stuff? That's the part that says well in the realm of duality, I only want to have these ones, and I don't want to have any of those ones, it's like that feels like bullshit. You get it all, you don't get to pick and choose, right?

Wayne: Yes and no. It is not bullshit to want one, and not want the other. The wanting the good and not wanting the bad is natural, it's built in. It's the fantasy that, "You can have only the good without the bad," it's just that, it's a fantasy. And if you're living in that fantasy, then you're cruisin' for a bruisin'.

It feels like suppression, because when you have the stuff you don't like, you lie to yourself, or you suppress it, or you pretend, or something like that. To keep the fantasy going.

Wayne: Because, I mean, nobody can sustain that for very long, you just become more of a secret, you become more imploded, as you try and pretend to the world that you've got it all under control.

So that seems where the non-involvement comes in, like when there's the absence of involvement, it is like duality is fine. Yes, there is still a preference, but there isn't this contriving. Maybe that's the authorship you're talking about, where there isn't this sense of, "I need to get all this stuff, and not keep away all that other stuff over there." It's just this awareness that everything comes and goes.

Wayne: This too shall pass, yes. [reading from the chatroom] Sam says, “I'm asking this question with the utmost respect to you and Ramesh. Besides his memories that remain with us, besides the memories of him that remain with us in our minds, is there anything of Ramesh that remains in this universe now? I don't want to use the word ‘soul' as though it were something within us, that still remains after death. I hope you understand where I am coming from in asking the question in reference to Ramesh.” I'm not sensitive to that, so that's not a problem. I will go back to my basic metaphor of 'the ocean and the wave'. If we understand that Ramesh, like every other object in the universe, is like a wave that arises in the ocean. And so that arising has a name, it has a form, it does things, it feels things, it makes things, that is the nature of that wave. And when the wave crashes, that wave is no more. That particular wave is no more. And you say, "Is anything left of that wave?" Well, yes inasmuch as that wave was the ocean, and everything that that wave was, remains.

Except the identity. There's no longer that identity.

Wayne: That particular shape and structure is no more. But what it was, was and is, is eternal.

[silence]

Thank you for the talk that you put on the internet about him.

Wayne: You're most welcome.

[silence]

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