Robert Adams
 

I'm dedicating this thread to Robert Adams (neo-Advaita teacher).

Will share some of the core teachings of Sri Robert Adams here :hug3:

Change no one.
Change nothing.
React to no one, react to nothing.
Do not live in the past and do not worry about the future.
Stay in the eternal now, where all is well.

After all you are me and I am you.
There's no difference.
Do not react to the world.
Do not even react to your own body.
Do not even react to your own thoughts.
Learn to become the witness.
Learn to be quiet. :toothy4:

Robert Adams

It's in the silence that your problems just dissolve. Try it. It really works. :love2:

Robert Adams

These are not (his) mere thoughts, these are the teachings of Advaita Vedanta propagated by Sri Shankara and Sri Ramana Maharshi.

Non-reaction means - not acting automatically....and becoming a watcher of your mind, emotions and actions.. :icon_sunny:

And as Ramana Maharshi says, the mind is just one thought at a time. Prevent thoughts from arising, stop giving energy to your thoughts and they will fade away. Knowledge of the Self arises when the mind is absent.

Peace.

So true :wav:

The direct and simple nature of Sri Ramana's words has stood the test of time and continue to change lives on a daily basis.

This teaching of Ramana is close to my heart:-

The wave said to the sea: "Could I be like you?
The sea replied: It's easy...
just settle down. :icon_flower:

Realize the place that you're in right now, whether you think it’s good or bad, whether you think you're happy or sad, whether you think you're rich, or poor, or sick, or healthy, the place where you're in right now is your right place. That's the beginning. You stop trying to be someone else. You stop trying to change your life. You're in your right place, right now, just the way you are. If you can become happy and peaceful in the place where you are right now, all of a sudden you will find circumstances will change in your favor, and then again you will be in your right place. Whatever change comes along as far as your body-mind is concerned, you are in your right place. The more you can see that, the more you can look at what I just said intellectually, intelligently, the more peaceful you become, the more the karmic patterns begin to break away and you begin to awaken.

It may be gradual at first. You notice that things that used to annoy you, no longer annoy you. You notice that people that you live with, the conflicts you've had, they stop because you've stopped. There's no more trying to get even. There's no more trying to win your point. There's no more trying to find the right book, or the right teacher, or the right anything. You remain centered. You remain free. :hug3:

Robert Adams

All I am pointing out is that in order to practice the teachings of others one would have to react to the thought of others .
In these instances it is not an automatic response to one's thoughts arising .
One is purposefully reacting to thoughts in a specific way .
When there are teachings to not react to your thoughts, the actual opposite is occurring isn't it when one complies with another's ways / teachings / practices / thoughts .
Do you see the irony and the contradiction in it all?

x daz x

So funny Shankara is on my list to look up...he and Ramana
(who I am VERY familiar with) were mentioned in a 2 hour youtube I have watched many times...
'Buddha at the Gas Pump' is an interview series I listen to a lot...
love having my laptop on my night stand ...click and listen to teachers for hours, ahhhh, heaven.

Daz, don't give the young lady a hard time!!!:tongue:

Keep up the good work,Tara. :icon_thumleft:

Lol, Miss H, not so much a hard time but rather to just clarify what constitutes a non reactive thought based upon a thought that one should pay no attention to a thought ..

It might seem like I am picking holes into something for the sake of it, but all one has to do is look at what is suggested and then look at how one REACTS to that suggestion .

If peeps want to pay no attention to their thoughts then they pay attention to the thought of something else lol .. A one pointed focus for instance is to hold your thought upon something else in order for 'other worldly thoughts' to dissipate for use of a better word .

If you relate to what Robert adams suggests in regards to ''Do not even react to your own thoughts'' then surely one should not react to your thoughts in such a way where you focus on something else in order to make them go away lol ..

Don't shoot the messenger :tongue: .. I am just pointing out the irony / contradiction ..

Do you see them? Some peeps don't because they are soooo fixated on the thoughts of other's they get a little lost within them ..



x dazzle x

Gosh, Robert's words seemed so simple and sweet...I was getting lost in his thoughts...
just like you said...a little wonderland of such simplicity and wisdom. :icon_cool:

I live from my heart space and his teachings touch my heart deeply.....so, i can't find any contradictions in his words..:hug3:
Thanks for sharing your valuable insights with us. I greatly appreciate it. :love10:

What an amazing and profoundly beautiful experience :hug3: Master's grace :love2:
I had a vision of Ramana in my dream and since then everything changed. :icon_sunny:

:happy7:
[IMG][/IMG]

***

Feeling presence of innocence
In fragmented thoughts absence
The flowing rippleless stillness
Of divine entwined being-ness
Transmutation by magnetism
Bridging all illusionary chasms
In being becoming & blossoming
In tandem with divine love pulsating

Within

***

The song of silence! These kinda songs come from the Unknown :hug3:

You wrote it, right? :wav:

***

I did indeed write it even though it was not written by me :smile:

***

This happens a lot, but it serves it's purpose, just like any teachings really . It doesn't matter if it's biblical teachings or non duality teachings because at some point most will question them when they have specific realizations and then they will see through them for what they are .

While someone has made an attachment to the teachings it's possible to be so entrenched in them they fail to see beyond them .

I am often seen to be the bad guy when I point things out that don't make sense or only make sense from one perspective like when adams speaks about the world being a dream and that I am is not the body and such likes . I could break down the flaws in all of these statements but most don't want to hear what I have to say because it will cause a reaction within them that will result in them questioning their devotion to their teachers .

That is their lesson either way, to be attached to something not yet realized, to blindly believe in another and perhaps live life in denial or try and emulate another's point of view by trying to walk in their shoes .

In one respect it is a very dangerous game holding onto another's perspective and try and make it their own .. I have seen that in effect and it mainly ends in disappointment, but again, that is in part, the lesson .

I was having a chat with someone the other day where niz came up and niz said that there is only how you see things, it is neither right or wrong, it is just a favoured perspective .. So perhaps one should bear that in mind when one believes in the words of another and live their life in reflection of those words ..

Then one will see that their devotion is perhaps misplaced .

I had this the other month where Tolle followers were blinded by his actions and words .. it is common for there are those that are born to follow and those that are born to lead .. Each to their own on that score ..


x daz x

Robert's universal message is -Immerse in "Love, Compassion & Humility" for all. For true seeking to happen "Let life flow" with gay abandon. Absorb the Universe in total Silence.
Namaskar

But, I'm not attached to him or any other master. I have got a great thirst for TRUTH. I have walked down many paths....I began reading Osho (when i was a young girl) then went through J.Krishnamurti, Thich Nhat Hanh, Eckhart Tolle and don't know how many others, attended silent Vipassana meditation retreats...and got more and more disillusioned.. but self-inquiry(atma-vichara) allowed me to go deep inside myself...allowed me to see the Truth..:smile:


His actions and words?
There is no ownership of Truth.
Truth is one, paths/teachers are many.. What is Tolle's is everybody's....

Once there was a Zen monk who got angry every now and again. He would argue with his fellow monks and was always looking for something wrong to complain and whine about, and always telling others his troubles. A fellow monk told him to go see the roshi and ask for help. The roshi lived two miles down the road. He explained his problem to the roshi, who said, “Take my staff, and hold on to it. Whenever you get angry my staff will remind you to come to me and that will get rid of your anger for you.”

The monk returned to his quarters and soon became very angry at another monk. He looked at the staff, and remembered the roshi, and he jogged the two miles all the way. The roshi asked, “What is wrong?” The monk replied, “I got angry.” The roshi said, “Show me your anger.” But in the jogging the anger went away. He had nothing to show, and said, “I am not angry right now.” The roshi said, “Go back to your quarters, and when you get angry again come and tell me about it.” The next day he got angry again. He ran to the roshi and the same thing happened, his anger disappeared. This went on about twenty-five times.

Finally, the roshi said, “I'll tell you what to do now. When you get back to your quarters take my staff. When you get angry beat the living hell out of your anger with it.” This was so funny to the monk that he became realized. He became enlightened. He realized he would be using the staff to beat himself, and that his real self could never get angry. It was his body that appeared to be angry. He had run back and forth twenty-five times and the answer the roshi gave him made him open his eyes and become enlightened.

So it is with us. Do not look at your problem as a problem. Look at it as a no-thing. It does not exist. If your ego does not exist, if your body does not exist, if your mind does not exist, how can you be angry? Where would it come from? Who gave it birth? This is true of any other problem you believe you have. Just watch it. It will disappear, and you will awaken to your true self.

Robert Adams

I can understand that certain people at a certain stage have a thirst for TRUTH as you put it . I certainly did and I turned within and spent many years understanding myself, the mind and such likes and realizing the sameness and the differences that relate to them and their absence .

I am glad you have entertained self enquiry and not relied solely on the teachings of others ..
So what truth have you seen? Does this truth mirror what all teachers say or just a few?
Have you realized both sides of the coin for instance?
I mean it is easy to say I am not the body like Adams suggests but another teacher will say you are the body and you are also not the body .
Some teachers, teach one side of the coin because they have only realized one side ..

What then happens is there is resonation had with certain teachers because there is similar realizations had, but it's not the whole story .
What is misleading is when a student / seeker has had no experience for themselves they then believe in a one sided story to be the whole truth .

It can be a form of brainwashing, what is to be taken into consideration also is that many well known teachers have spent many years studying the scriptures and other material which is fine to a degree, but where would they be without them .
What one needs to ask themselves is what is actually realized and what is not .
You will find that there is plenty that is written by teachers that is not realized ..

x daz x

That I am more than my physical body, my thoughts and my emotions.....I'm absolute freedom beneath the confinement...(not bookish knowledge, but my Truth)
When he says, i'm not the body, it means don't Identify with your body...remain a watcher...
don't know about other teachers but i'm one hundred percent sure that Robert Adams and Sri Ramana Maharshi are gyani (realized beings) :smile:

When Adams say's I am not the body, nor this world, nor have I got anything to do with this world or this body is saying I am not the body lol .

Sure we can all try and watch our thoughts and such likes and have an awareness from that perspective, but what does that prove?

All it proves is that our awareness can entertain many vantage points so to speak, it doesn't mean that we are not the body or our thoughts .

Whose body is it? Whose thoughts are whose thoughts?

How can you watch your thoughts and distance oneself from one's thoughts when they are your thoughts .. lol

There are many teachers that try and distance what they are from the mind-body and this is the one sided coin realization I have spoken about .

In regards to spiritual teachers, i am sure there are many that are Self realized . What I said however is that there is plenty that is written by teachers that is not realized ..

This means that a teacher that writes about Consciousness being this and not that, life is but a dream, I am not the body and such likes is not realized . It is a favoured perspective had that mind conjures up in order to make sense of their reality, their truth/s .

Do you understand this?

Do you understand that Self realization does not reveal the inner workings of the universe? Do you understand that Self realization doesn't reveal that life is but a dream .

If you disagree with what I propose then please explain how 'being what you are' beyond the mind reveals anything about self and this world reality ..

This is what I mean when I say that the material in all these books and scriptures were not 'actually' realized .

You could perhaps for arguments sake write about Self realization on a postage stamp .




x daz x

something in you- observes your thoughts (and obviously that something is not your thoughts), otherwise, how can you report it ?

Thoughts come, stay and go but it isn't YOU that comes and goes with your thoughts....Something is aware of COMING staying and Going.... Who is he? Because of Self/Consciousness/Awareness thinking is known to be happening. And that Awareness is like empty space or screen upon which everything is seen...coming going everything...Go inwards

Mooji says - 'You want to taste the honey, you don't want to be the honey'. What is this honey? It is the satchidananda state—the perfume of the Self experienced as existence, consciousness and bliss.

Peace

Yup.
Mooji stole that from Ramakrishna ....:biggrin:...except he said sugar...and was speaking in the first person...some may want to be the honey, see?

Like daz, he probably wants to be the honey...why, he might even think he IS the honey already..:tongue: You know I love ya...


Tata, eh? You know that darn t is right next to the r...you should see the other tipos I make!
But, there is no Tara, no Tata and no me...now...if we could get rid of that daz...something inside is having
too much fun on this thread...but Who is That? :biggrin:

There are no problems. They're just experiences. And if you look at the experience in the right way you will transcend that experience and become free of it totally and completely. But if you react in the wrong way to the problem so-called, you may win or find a solution but you will have to go through another problem of a similar state sooner or later. You will have to go through it again and again and again until you transcend it completely by not reacting to it. This is an important point to remember.

Your problem is at a certain level. A certain level of mind. If you believe in your problem, if you're fearful of your problem, if you react to your problem you have not broken out of that level. Even though you may appear to come up with some kind of solution, you are still at that level of consciousness where the problem exists. Therefore you will have to go through it again and again and again. The idea in other words is to rise higher than the problem. To rise higher than the problem. For the problem is below you, beneath you and you are free of it completely.

Robert Adams

The same something in you that observes your thoughts is the same something in you that creates the thoughts .

You can't divide one from the other because there is only what you are .

Try observing your thoughts when what you are is absent from the mind-body .

You won't be able to because what you are of the mind-body is a package deal .

There requires self to witness and observe .

As Ramana put it across Pure awareness becomes self-awareness. When there is a Self, self-awareness is the witness. When there is no self to witness, there is no witnessing either.

Now what you are suggesting here is that you can observe your thoughts in a way where you are not your thoughts .. It is incorrect because like said without self being present there would be no thoughts to watch .. and self is what you are . There is only what you are .. There is no divide .. There is nothing that what you are isn't .

This is two sides of the coin . Saying I am not the world, I have nothing to do with the body is a one sided perspective and it isn't the whole story .

Whose thoughts are they that you are watching?

What else is there present that is not what you are that can conjure up a thought about the weather?

Can you answer me this?


x daz x

Now looking through my closet for my wrestling costume :icon_eek: :biggrin:



x daz x

Yes, there is only ONE, the consciousness. But consciousness creates duality coz consciousness only experience creations in nonduality..that's why it is called Leela, Maya, divine-play, a dream of the Brahman.

And, Consciousness created duality because NOTHING wants to taste SoMETHING, immaterial want to be the material...

A painter paints a painting, is Painter and painting same?

Of course, thoughts originate from the Consciousness but are the thoughts and consciousness the same?

Maybe you are right and maybe i am wrong...and, it's Okay! To each his own!

But you already are a warrior...see, you are wearing a warbonnet of Native Americans :tongue: :tongue: and it's beautiful...suits you :tongue:

If you believe in 'oneness' then the thoughts cannot be associated with anything but the 'one' .

How can the thoughts belong to something other than what you are?

How can there be truth in saying that I have nothing to do with the world or this body .

This actual statement is build upon separation and illusion ..

Can you see that?


x daz x

It's so funny... you have Consciousness and then you have Awareness.
Oh boy...that has been talked about here before.
And I was impressed, Tara, you said Consciousness creates duality.
You don't hear that everyday.
Ya gotta have 'another...something' to be conscious OF! Yes.
Lol!

I have been in the Void....and OH my....there IS NO Other!
I mean when they say Nothing or Nothingness....or a Vacuum...
They aren't a' kiddin' ! There is no up, there is no down....
There is nothing but The One.....and that means you...there is
just One....only....completely....just Awareness...that's It...
and that's you. Whew.

I came outta that place understanding exactly why The Absolute One
created 'Creation' !
Why be alone? One Mind...only One...in a place of no time or space..
oh if everyone could exp this...

There is Nothing but Pure Awareness, period...black...there's no light...
and Mind...that is aware....but there's nothing.

This Awareness....just is....not too hard to talk about. Ha!

As you can see I'm like tripping over myself :tongue:...it's quite ...well, shocking,
a shocking... eye-opening experience.

***

The vibrant void of fullness
Not emptiness
Of Absoluteness
Of singular pure awareness

Breathing
Pulsating
With exalted Love of purity
Which here & now too is our divinity

***

Hmm...not my exp.
No breathing, no pulsating, empty so totally, not vibrant.
Yes, singular Pure Awareness...of nothing, no fullness.

We will have to disagree to disagree on this one...get it... One!:tongue:

***

First time the void of nothingness
wherein one with the That Oneness
we are as (but not The) Absoluteness

Second time the veil lifts to reveal
The Supreme being

Thereafter the void of seeming nothingness
Is known as charged with purity of Love in fullness
Be it beyond form or within form, no coming, no going
There is yet in perfection, being, becoming & blossoming

In a flow unending

***

I think we are going around in circles - but going nowhere....Let's agree to disagree :love10: :icon_flower:

Oh, that reminds me of a story....

The Play of Energy

Before the Universe was created, it is believed that there was just darkness. That darkness pervaded everywhere. It was the raw energy, an energy with its own consciousness, hence, it is called the cosmic intelligence. The culture named it as ‘Shakti’. Though the Shakti was all-pervading, but it was uncontrolled. Thus, nothing formed out of it and the energy remained raw throughout.

Within that play of Shakti, a point came when there was a super-saturation of the energy leading to a massive explosion — which science identifies as the ‘Big Bang’. What happened at that time?

The Controlled Manifestations
The Yogis explained — at the very moment of the massive bang the Shakti (the single conscious energy) manifested into two. One part is the consciousness and the other is the matter. Yes, even the matter, the non-living elements, all came out from the same energy. In this way the uncontrolled Shakti manifested into different creations due to the presence of that control, which the Yogis named as ‘Shiva’. This is why, in the Indian culture, they are revered as a couple. Because, without Shakti, the control (Shiva) is of no significance; and without the Shiva the uncontrolled Shakti cannot be manifested into anything.

This could be understood with an example. Today, we see a thousand electric appliances that are useful to us. They all use the same electricity. But, is the raw electricity of any use to us? No. Only when the raw electric energy (Shakti) is controlled (Shiva), we get the amazing creations that we can use. This concept of Shiva and Shakti is applicable to every aspect of this Universe:hug3: .

Different people use different terms to describe this. So we could say that the Absolute is beyond even Light and Dark, energy and consciousness. The Absolute manifests as Purusha (Spirit) and Mulaprakriti (primordial Matter). Spirit is considered as the Father principle (Shiva) and Matter is considered as the Mother principle (Shakti). The Father principle provides Purpose, the Mother principle provides Intelligence, and the combination of Spirit and Matter produces Consciousness.

We are all trying to explain the unexplainable.

Peace.