Attaining Fulfillment of our Human Potential: The Soul’s Journey to Redemption
Welcome to the be-dead-while-alive-stream, brought to you from the misty mountains of Costa Rica, from the Sat Yoga Ashram. Welcome to all of those who are attending the satsang online.
We’re in the midst of our annual rainy season retreat here at the ashram, and we’ve been in relative silence for the last couple of weeks and with intense classes and meditations. So, I’m sure that those who are here in this local space as well as those listening online will have interesting questions—no doubt profound questions about your own journey to Self-Realization. But, actually, the whole process and the whole understanding is extremely simple, and really does not need to give rise to any questions—it should actually put all questions to an end.
I think the ancient metaphor that’s most useful is simply that of the drop of rainwater that returns to the ocean. Perhaps a little more accurate would be a bubble of foam on a wave on the ocean, and when that ego-bubble pops, there is only the ocean. And there was never anything but the ocean. And so, if we understand consciousness to be an infinite ocean—an infinite field that is beyond time and space, in which the universe appears, but that appearance is nothing more than the foam on a wave within that ocean—then we understand that we have never left the original, true Consciousness that has no boundaries, no separate units. And all we need to do is let the bubble pop, and we will realize that.
The only illusion of separation came from our own invention of a membrane of a bubble that was made of nothing other than the H2O of the ocean. And in that popping of the ego bubble, there is immediate, instantaneous release, without struggle, without resistance, without difficulty. And the popping of the bubble is simply a matter of stopping the process of inner chatter. That’s all the bubble is made up of—subvocal talk—talk that tries to convince itself that it is just a bubble, an ego, a separate being, different from the universal consciousness. But a time comes when that illusion can no longer be maintained, and in the last moments, or the last stage of the process before the bubble decides to pop, it will go through a tremendous chaotic up and down struggle with itself, because of the fear of its illusory death, the fear of the unknown, the fear of the infinite, the fear of love, the fear of joy, the fear of overwhelming power.
But a moment will come when the bubble will pop, and that is known as grace. And the more that the ego yearns for that grace, the sooner that it comes because the love for that infinite consciousness from which we derive our being—and is our being—the love for that is also the love of that, the love that is that. And the love, and the wisdom, and the light, and the power, all come together as the membrane of the ego’s self-talk dissolves in silence. The freedom and the peace that comes with letting go all of the tension, the anxieties, the negative patterns of self-talk that include self-hatred and disgust, anger, insecurity, fantasies of lust that cannot be fulfilled, or lead always to disappointment and karma, that brings ever more suffering. Once the soul has been through all of its possibilities of self-expression, and self-discovery, and self-exploration of reality at the level of ego, it discovers that all of it leads only to a dead end of exhaustion and of despair.
And a moment comes when one wants only release, only liberation, only freedom, from one’s own mind. And when that yearning is single-minded and whole-hearted, then grace is given and the ego disappears. But what emerges is that power of Presence that is not empty of Being, but that is filled—filled with the power of eternal Truth, eternal Light, eternal Presence, and a power of goodness, a power of moral strength, a power of understanding and compassion. But beyond all of that, comes the power to redream the world, that is realized all along to have been one’s dream and not a reality that opposes one, and that one needs to conquer or flee from, or have a paranoid relationship with, or a feeling of disappointment—but that one is free to redream the world in its most perfect form, its most loving, its most beautiful form, because consciousness is the source of beauty, of goodness, of love, of light—and because there is no otherness, there are no divisions and separations in consciousness in its real nature—the dream that is created from that field that has itself been liberated from egos and their fantasies, becomes a world of peace, and a world of the perfection of the potentiality of consciousness in manifestation. And we gain the gift to realize that we are that.
And so the attainment of liberation from the illusion of ego is the attainment of a kind of joy that the ego can never know, because it is also the ending of all the karma, all the suffering, all the weakness, all the inability to change the patterns of self-destructive behavior and the ability to live free and to share the absolute bliss of that freedom with all, because all are recognized as manifestations of the one Self, the one Light.
And now, in this moment—in this moment of the death of a civilization that has formed its way of consciousness into the most degraded form of egos, with the most corrupt ways of treating one another, the most lustful and perverse and the most conflicted and violent. We have fallen to the lowest level of the ego’s possibilities—and therefore it is urgent that we release ourselves from the curse of our own egoic desire, that have brought about suffering for every being on the planet. And we have that obligation, as well the yearning from within, to be free, and to transmit the truth of consciousness, of oneness, of freedom, to all beings, by becoming living models and avatars of the supreme Presence.
This is the function of an ashram—to help to accelerate the maturation of consciousness, so that it can make that choice deliberately, determinedly, consciously, and finally, decisively—to pop the bubble of its own private life and become one with the life of the cosmos, the life of the Godhead, the life, the love, the light, of the one Self.
Not everyone is ready for such a path and such a metamorphosis, from ego to Self—very few in fact are willing to make that sacrifice—a sacrifice that is all gain and no loss—but still from the ego’s point of view, it cannot reconcile itself to its own disappearance. And so, it is only those mature souls, old souls, souls who feel that need for liberation, and that moral calling to be of service to the world, during this time of suffering and degradation and destructiveness—before that world dies of its own destructive impulses—to bring the seeds of a new world, a new age, a new consciousness, into being.
And those who are called to such a task—the great work of alchemy—those who are called to such a transformation should know that this community is here at the service of all who seek to live in that highest Truth, and to offer a refuge from the hellish world of Kali Yuga—for those who have the wisdom to understand that a different world is not only possible, but is the will of that supreme Intelligence that is bringing us to the singularity—the omega point that will be the end of one world and the beginning of another.
And those whose consciousness is able to reach the level of the world that is to be born, now, will be those who are able to usher others in, through that stargate into the next cycle of time, and to be reborn with new forms, in that beautiful kingdom that all religions have postulated and prophesized, and make it a reality.
But to do that, we must make our own nature real, authentic, true—and abide in that truth, in that strength, in that wisdom, without falling back into the illusory and defiling attitudes and behavior patterns of an ego—so that the vibrational frequency of this new consciousness becomes manifest in such a way that a morphogenetic field, in which this energy of divine love and Self-realization is transmitted to all beings, so that everyone has the opportunity to link to that level of consciousness and find their way to the ultimate goal of human existence.
May we have the generosity of spirit to attain this goal and to share it with all, through the opening of our hearts in total and unconditional love, that is free of fear and free of desire, and that offers that power, that luminous shining strength that can enable others to follow, through the popping of the quantum wave function that brought egos into existence, and effortlessly and painlessly enable consciousness again to be free, of that illusory shell that has prevented us from knowing who we are.
May we gain that freedom now, through recognizing that we are already That, and have never been anything but that infinite Source and Field of consciousness that is the one supreme Being, that authentically can dream, sustain, and govern a world in peace and harmony, and bring the current chaos to an end, with the greatest blessings that can be imagined.
The more free we are of the ego illusion, the more we shall be tapped in to that knowledge, that intelligence, that strength, that love, to function in the service of the One, and bring this transformation about in the quickest way that brings the suffering of all to an end, and the redemption to full attainment.
This is not only our destiny, but it is the deepest yearning of the heart of every being, if we will only have the courage to dive into our heart, we will know this truth, and in our surrender to the truth and the Source of the truth, we shall be free from all those negative thoughts, that have enchained us to the wheel of birth and death and rebirth, and enable us to know the bliss of liberation.
May we recognize that this truth is eternal, it is here and now, we are under the jurisdiction of the Supreme Lord, who has commanded this transformation to be underway, and who guides and directs it from the subtlety of the innermost Self, and whose amnesty for all who suffer from the burden of guilt or shame or sin of any kind, is granted through that selfless action of surrender to the will of God.
May we be wise enough to take advantage of this beautiful offering, and open the prison gates in which we have dwelt, and live as free manifestation of the divine Self.
Namaste, Shunyamurti