by Jean Klein
I feel hemmed in by mediocrity; life seems very dreary to me.
Something that is happening at the present moment, or something you remember, both appear within awareness. When you think of the present moment it is already part of the past. So all your qualifications and feelings about life are already past. Problems, weariness, boredom, depression stem only from the mistaken notion of taking ourselves for a certain person with certain ideas, a particular background, etc. Our difficulties come when our projections into the future in the hope of attaining some result are thwarted. We choose the results and goals we think best but it is a choice entirely dependent on our likes and dislikes, our personal conditioning, our attitudes. Thus, no matter how many objects we collect, how much accumulated learning or experience, we are inevitably locked into the round of pleasure and suffering. Only when we live in our wholeness, free from the person, free from all goals, preference and choice, can there be a full expression of life. When we live without qualifying we live in the moment, the eternal present “now.” Here, in the absence of thoughts of the past and longings for the future, we are in our fullness. From fullness flows love and all actions come out of love.
Unthinkable Presence is your real nature in which all appears. Because you identify with your thoughts instead of presence, you feel limited, restricted. In freeing yourself from this restriction you come to live your limitlessness. Then everything that happens in your life will have new meaning.
In his life a man can ask himself many questions but they all revolve around one question: “Who am I?” All questions stem from this one. So that the answer to “Who am I?” is the answer to all questions, the ultimate answer. But we must be quite clear about certain things, so that we don’t appropriate this question as just another idea among many.
A man always speaks of himself as an I and gives this I many roles: I run, I eat, I’m hungry, I’m sitting, sleeping. All these activities refer to the body he firmly believes himself to be. He also says: I remember, I think, I’m surprised, worried, etc., etc. Thus he also takes himself to be his thoughts. Here the I-image identifies with the body and the mind. But if we observe things more closely, we soon come to realize that it is the body that is doing the acting and the mind the thinking. These are the tools of consciousness which function without an I-image.
Our mental and physical activities constantly change throughout the four stages of life. These experiences prove that there is an experiencer who recalls the experiences when stimulated. But what must be clearly seen is that the recalling, like the event itself, is a present happening. The thought of a past is a present thought. This continual presentness is what we mean by saying consciousness is one with its object. Memory and change are thus fundamentally illusions which dissolve in presence. All recalling takes place in this timeless, unchanging background. The experiencer is one with this background.
We can only know and remember what we have already experienced, something that happened to us, a thought we had, or something we did. When actually thinking or doing, there is only thinking or doing, nothing else. In the moment of doing something there is no doer. The mind and the object of its perception are not two. The world and the mind are not different. They are discontinuous but appear in the present continuum which is silent awareness, so that in the end we could say that everything is awareness.
In the state of deep sleep, the ego is not involved and the body and brain continue to function. There is only the pure awareness that is present when the I-image is absent, when we are free from all thought constructs.
It is from this awareness that statements arise such as “I slept well.” Consciousness is its own light, it does not need a vehicle. Objects, on the contrary, depend entirely on consciousness. They could not otherwise be perceived. Consciousness knows itself by itself. Once we clearly recognize this truth we are freed from our mental framework and the true I knowingly reveals itself.
The question “Who am I?” springs from the “I am.” The reply is already present before we even ask the question, the question in fact originates in the answer.
The question itself, on the level on which it is asked, the level of conflict, cannot give rise to a reply, for when we look at it more closely, we cannot possibly put the answer into words, even less think of it. However, the driving force pushing us on to find an answer by means of thought finally dies away, and is reabsorbed into the eternal, all-answering presence, I am.
But when wake up and say “I have slept well” am I not only referring to a feeling of relaxation?
That is true but there is something more in saying this than just feeling the body is relaxed. There is a delicious sensation of wellbeing that comes from being bathed in sweetness itself.
Look, when someone asks you, “Are you alive? Are you conscious?” you immediately say “Yes” without having to think. You don’t refer to any feeling or representation first. This spontaneous “Yes” comes from the deep conviction that you are consciousness.
If we cannot proceed towards understanding, how does it just happen?
Any form of exercise is bound to a goal, to a result. But this is an obstacle when there is no goal to be reached since what you are looking for is here now and always has been. When the mind is free from all desire to become, it is at peace and attention spontaneously shifts from the object to the ultimate “subject,” a foretaste of your real Self. Be vigilant, clear-sighted, aware of your constant desire to be this or that and don’t make any effort. What you are is without direction so all direction takes you away from knowingly being what you are. In this letting go of all trying, time no longer exists, there is no more expectation. In the absence of name and form what room is there for fear and insecurity? When there is no projection there is the forefeeling of wholeness.
Does maturity come from inquiry or does inquiry come out of maturity?
Maturity comes out of inquiring. Inquiring is natural to us, look at babies and young children. Unfortunately society and the educational system do not foster this inherent exploration and the child often becomes bored. We are taught to superimpose the past on the present and future and so we lose the excitement, the newness of the moment. It takes alertness to see this mechanical functioning.
You may have a glimpse that every moment is unique and you will spontaneously be brought back to the background of real inquiry: attention, openness. This inquiry is not localized as a concept or a percept. It is free from anticipation, expectation and becoming. When you clearly see things around you as they are in relation with the whole of your being, there is ripening. You see the false as simply false without wasting time and energy analyzing why it is false, defending or explaining it. It just no longer belongs to you. You are out of it. You feel yourself in an atmosphere of clarity. Here, the inquiry of the truth-seeker transcends that of the child. While the child still focuses on the object of inquiry, the mature seeker focuses on the inquiring itself, and one day discovers himself to be the inquiring.
Even if one becomes independent from one’s social conditioning— family, education, etc.—is there not a fundamental “condition” that belongs to being human, that has to do with biological survival through the ages?
I agree there is always a certain amount of cultural and biological conditioning. This belongs to our existence. Being free does not mean you negate, eliminate by will or refuse this conditioning. It means you are not identified with it, stuck in it. You don’t try to free yourself because you know yourself to be free. So there is no reaction against the past, against the society. To a certain extent your functions are within the conditioning. You don’t spend energy trying to accept it because it doesn’t concern your real self. To know that you are not you know what you are not. So you know your mechanism, you are familiar with your conditioning, but because you are not bound to it it presents no restriction.
Humanity has inhabited the globe for millions of years but freedom and love have never changed nor been conditioned. Freed
om and love are beyond thinking and representation, time and space.
When we live in waiting, in openness, what is the stimulation for action to occur? How could any action at all come about? In other words how can the arrow shoot itself and find its target without a shooter?
First we must see that we cannot will ourselves to be open because openness is our very nature. Any tiny residue of willing, of wanting to be open takes us away from what we are. Willing never goes beyond willing. So the only way to be free from this circle is to glimpse the truth that openness is the egoless state, that it is here and now.
This openness is free from all center and periphery; it is without a controller, an observer, one who chooses or decides. All functioning takes place spontaneously. In observation free from an observer, the observed appears and disappears without memory interfering. To take your example of archery, this means that the target and the position and state of the body and arrow are all witnessed without goal or intention. At a certain moment the right elements come together and the arrow is spontaneously released, but there is no one who lets it go. When there is no shooter it is the non-state of the man of Tao whose perfect relaxation in the midst of action lets in the flow of Tao.
Does this mean that unless we have experienced our openness we cannot act correctly?
Yes, because until then only the mind acts. We cannot act rightly or accurately from memory because no situation ever repeats. Every shooting, every meeting is new. Right acting comes out of the moment itself.
What about codes of behavior, legal, social and moral or religious which teach us a way to behave and say we can learn how to apply this behavior appropriately in all situations?
Codified action is never moral.
But our society is not ready for spontaneous living...
It is true. For the moment we need crutches but one day we will be free from crutches. Right social behavior calls for sensitivity but when there is no sensitivity we need rules, but what you use as a crutch must become obvious to you.
You mean we must know our crutches?
Exactly. Don’t lose yourself in them, in patterns. Inquiry will bring you to know what is a crutch, what is memory and what belongs to the creative moment.
Doesn’t codified behavior often appear as good and wise as spontaneous right acting?
Maybe. But when you see learned action there are moments of wrong emphasis which do not come from the flow of spontaneity. Only someone in the light can see this clearly.
You have said that we must transpose our understanding into daily life. What is the difference between doing this and practicing a learned social behavior?
First we have to see that in daily life we don’t act according to our understanding. When you see the false as false, what remains is truth.
I need to be clearer about this. Once there is a glimpse of truth, once the principle has been seen: that we are not what we think and what we are appears in clarity, then certain elements of our life shift spontaneously, rearrange, drop away, what you call a reorchestration of our energies, is this so?
Yes.
But still are there not other areas, more dense and complicated, that need more time to become integrated? Don’t we need some effort here in transposing understanding into life?
It is not effort, it is intelligence which functions. This intelligence belongs to your effortless openness. A single glimpse of truth can stimulate this intelligence. Transposition occurs through analogy, transposing understanding on one plane to another plane. What the archer learns in his art can be transposed to all areas of his life. The art of archery is only a tool for analogy.
A key to the art of living?
Yes. The way we do body-work is also a key. The approach to your body on the physical plane, being completely open to the perception, must be transposed to all areas of life.
Taoism seems to be going with the flow of life, Yoga seems to master the flow of life. Perhaps they are ultimately not different but as far as the traditions go, what would you say are the differences? Can the way of mastery, the way of power, ever bring one to freedom? It seems that our present society is founded on this belief, that control can bring harmony.
Let us first make clear what is meant by “going with the flow of life.” When you are identified with a person, an idea, a body which you believe you are, then there is object/object relation. In this relation you can never see how the ocean of life solicits you. You cannot be adequate to the coming and going of the waves. Your action and non-action is inevitable reaction because you live in images, in the mind. You act or don’t act according to certain motives, certain morality, certain ideologies or spiritual ideas. You don’t really accept life, but rather submit to it. Then there is fatalism. Fatalism only exists on the level of living as an individual, a personal entity.
Really going with the flow of life is “passive-active,” passive in that the ego, the personality is completely absent, there is no intention, will, goal or motive. But active in that in the absence of the ego you live in your presence, your awareness and all your energies and talents are liberated. You are alert, adequate to every situation, always vigilant, ready for anything. It is a state without choice, where action appears out of the situation and non-action also appears as action. In awareness there is no thought of action or not, you simply function in the moment itself.
Regarding Yoga, Yoga is an Indian system, a discipline completely founded on duality. This dual system can never bring you to the non-dual non-state. It can, however, bring you to see that you are in a dual system and in seeing it you are out of it. But I was introduced to another, unorthodox, way of seeing yoga when I met a swami in India in the 1950’s and asked him what he understood by “yoga.” He gave an answer that astonished me; he said, “It means sitting right.” Then he added “walking right and right doing.” For him, yoga was not about asanas and kundalini, it meant sitting according to the chair and acting according to the situation! So we can say that from the ultimate point of view, letting life flow in your alertness and being adequate in all circumstances are exactly the same.
Our society today emphasizes the fractional personality which is the origin of competition, achieving, aggression, war. We are encouraged to be more and more specialized. It takes us away from our real global nature. But domination, assertion and manipulation can never bring wisdom and a healthy society. On the contrary, the light of wisdom, love and harmony is concealed by the personality and its qualifications. Our society is living in the dark. But love and wisdom are infinitely patient, unchanged, ever there since before time.
Is there any difference between the mystical state of unity in which subject and object dissolve, and the non-state in which subject and object dissolve?
In the mystical approach the devotee receives from God the movement towards God. In the direct approach the inquiry into what we are not comes from what we are. In both there is a coming back to where we originally belong. In both, on the phenomenal plane, there is gratitude and thanking.
But for the mystic isn’t there always a feeling of gratitude to God?
In this case the mystic has remained in relation, adorer to adored. In a certain way there is still somebody. In the highest unity this adorer, this somebody, is no longer present. There is only God. As Meister Eckhart said, “God is when you are not.”
The inquirer lives in the openness of the inquiring that comes from the answer itself. This openness can never be an object, a perception, a state. It is free from all assertion.
What is the last object to dissolve?
The last and the first is the idea of being somebody. The blank state and all subtle states stem from this idea.
What do you mean by “blank state”?
In the blank state the object has dissolved but the subject/object relation remains, so the object is potentially still there. In other words the absence of the object is still an object. This is the inevitable result of progressive elimination by will.
The content of the meeting on the phenomenal plane comes to its integration when there is no me and therefore no other. There may be rare occasions when this integration occurs during the meeting but since events on the physical plane occur in succession and are bound to time and space, the totality of the meeting appears only in the absence of these restrictions. It lives in its fullness in your timeless awareness.
How do you distinguish between pure perception and direct perception?
In a direct perception you are one with the seen. In a pure perception, the perception empties itself in the homeground, seeing, so you are one with the seeing.
When the disciple becomes autonomous what is his relation with his guru? Does he always feel gratitude? What state is the disciple in when he feels independent but no real gratitude?
In the practical (as opposed to the theoretical) approach, there is no disciple and no teacher. If there were there could be no transmission of being, of oneness. There would only be teaching on the mental level.
The disciple hears from his guru that he is not the body, senses and mind so he temporarily stops emphasizing these and focuses on what he is. After he is established in his real nature, body, senses and mind are integrated in the completeness of being and they carry with them the “stamp” of the guru. There remains a current of love and friendship and gratitude for the transmission of the flame, the primordial gift.
Someone who feels independent from anything lives in reaction. At this moment he is not a disciple. To forget the guru is to forget himself.
Who is the knower of my true nature?
Your real nature is knowing. It cannot be known. All that the mind can know is not you. Your “I” becomes a living reality once the idea that society has given you of being a separate entity has entirely left you—together with its desires, fears and imagination, its belief that it is this or that. One reminder, one foretaste of your unrestricted being will immediately make it clear that these are not reality but its expressions. You will be instantaneously convinced of what you are. The truth of the nature of existence will be spontaneously revealed to you: that you give birth to all that exists. Without awareness nothing would be. What is experienced on a phenomenal plane is not you but an extension of you. Experience is in you but you are not experience.