ATTENTION
The Ultimate Antidote for Tension
PREFACE
Attention Is Not Just What You Focus On—It’s Who You Become
Attention is not a passive state—it’s an active choice. Every time you check your phone, scroll through social media, or let your mind wander to worry, you’re making a choice about what you value and who you’re becoming.
Your attention determines your experience of reality.
Modern life is designed to fracture your attention. From notifications to infinite scroll, every digital interface is engineered to hijack your focus. Your brain physically changes based on where you place your attention. By consciously directing your focus, you actively sculpt your neural pathways and build the person you want to become.
Where your attention goes, your life flows.
External forces are constantly competing for your attention. In a world where billions of dollars are spent engineering systems to capture and monetize your attention, the ability to deliberately direct your pure focus is not just a skill—it’s a superpower.
You have far more control over your attention than you believe. Learning to protect your attention is an act of self-awareness & preservation.
Those who master their attention master their lives. Those who lose control of their attention lose everything that matters.
Attention is the Divine Door
All throughout life, people search for happiness outside them – in particular person, position, place, possession, progression etc.
Look around and you will certainly observe that most people are stuck in this materialistic mess. They really do not know what is the way out of this mess. So helplessly and hopelessly, with a heavy heart, most individuals drag their life like a heavy burden.
They live their life but have forgotten what it feels to be alive anymore.
Let me tell you today that the way out of this situation is the way in.
Peace is not outside you; it is your very nature. It springs from the core of your being; by knowing yourself as you are in the light of absolute attention.
So, go within and tap into your natural grace through the power of your own amazing attention. Everybody is alert of his existence all the time and one can always use this attention to return to the source.
Attention is a divine door which connects you back to your natural Source; the same door which takes you out also lets you in. You do not need any special kind of attention; the same attention which you divert outside need to be diverted inside.
Attention is Timeless
The Source is timeless existence and it can only be reached by the timeless. In this moment, our body and mind are both subject to time; only Attention is Timeless.
Attention is not a new experience. It is the timeless factor in every experience. It makes all experiences possible; yet it is not an experience in itself.
Attention is the core vital force of your body-mind structure. It remains untouched by all your conscious and unconscious mental activity.
Attention enables you to see, but you cannot see it. Attention enables you to listen, but you cannot hear it. Attention enables you to smell, but you cannot smell it. Attention enables you to taste, but you cannot taste its flavor. Attention enables you to touch, but you cannot touch its texture.
Attention enables you to think, but you cannot conceptualize it.
The key reason which makes Attention a divine door to reality is that it brings you back to this moment, here and now. Attention is always pulsating in the present moment and it has the direct ability to interact with the life force without any interference of thoughts.
In this moment to be , you do not need to think; rather, to think, you need to be.
Attention right here, right now stands alone and is beyond the play of memory and imagination. To exist in totality right here, right now, you do not need thoughts, as attention is enough in itself.
This book explores the power of attention as a tool to reconnect with one’s inner self.
I have lived my entire life in a bubble of control, as if I always knew what the meaning of life is. But, recently, I have been diagnosed with blood cancer and, as per my doctor; I have only few months left to live. This is eye opening news for me, and in the face of death, lost and lonely, I have realized that I had explored almost everything in life except my own real self. Externally, I shone like a bright star in my field of work; but internally, my heart remained in darkness towards my own source. Soon, death will end my story; I will die and disappear like a bubble on the surface of water – as if I had never existed. This fact is really scary! The problem is that out of all my complicated social masks, I really do not know which one is my real authentic face…my real source. So, at this point in time, I desperately want to find my ultimate source. Please, could you explain it in detail?
Yes – I can.
Whether you are aware or unaware about your true self, you are always the supreme source of life. Your body and mind are both subject to birth and death. But as a supreme source, you are always beyond the cycle of birth and death.
Supreme Source is your original identity which is complete in itself and is always available to you. However, you are rarely attentive towards its existence. It is primarily the feeling of being present. Wherever you go or whatever you do, this sense of pure presence is always within you all the time. It is the ever-present supreme reality beyond space and time.
Supreme Source is the nameless and formless eternal emptiness in which everything has its start and end. This eternal emptiness makes everything alert and alive. It is always present in each moment in an invisible manner and is full and empty at the same time. It is a deep and dark changeless centre of existence which is used by all beings but is never used up. All opposites are contained in it, but it is not in the play of duality.
What is the best way to feel it?
To feel the Supreme Source, you do not need the senses.
To know the Supreme Source, you do not need the thoughts.
The only way to know the source is to be the source!
What kind of practices do I need to embrace in order to reach this high level of mental state beyond death which you refer as supreme source?
Supreme Source is your natural state of being. You don’t need time and effort to achieve it as it is the primary source of all that is. It cannot be brought about through some special practices and prayers; you are eligible because you are.
Supreme Source is always now and here and at no point of time can it become a remembered or imagined mental state. It is not a state of mind. It is not a thought in the mind; rather; it is the very source of all thoughts. It cannot be experienced by mind as it is the very foundation force of all experiences.
If supreme source cannot be experienced, then what is the point of talking about it?
The more you talk about it, the less you will understand. Supreme Source is beyond all definitions and descriptions of mind as thoughts are incapable to reach it and words are incompetent to preach it. When all thoughts and words disappear in the absolute attention of this moment, then what remains is the Supreme Source.
Remember, you can only describe what you are not. What you are, you can only be in silence.
What will I get by knowing the source?
Peace!
All creation toils to return to its source. Till the time you do not realize and return to your source, you are bound to suffer and get lost in the madness of mind, no matter how intelligent, creative, powerful, rich or famous you are.
To be what you really are and to reside in your natural state is the greatest bliss in life and the only way to be at peace with your own self.
Am I connected to the supreme source right now?
Yes. You are always connected to the Supreme Source. Right understanding of this connection leads to peace and freedom, while wrong understanding leads to suffering and bondage.
What is the reality of death?
Reality of death entirely depends on your level of attention towards your own self.
As a Universal Perceiver, nobody ever dies and as a private person, everybody is dying each moment.
Death is similar to the state of deep sleep – like in sleep; the person disappears temporarily and appears back in the morning with the return of attention. Similarly, in death, the person disappears permanently and returns back in a new body as per his past unfulfilled deep desires.
However, the Supreme Source takes no part in it, but enables this transition through the light of amazing attention.
If thoughts and words are not capable to reach the source, then what is the best way to connect to it?
Supreme Source is timeless existence and it can only be reached by the timeless. In this moment, your body and mind are both subject to time; only Attention is Timeless.
Attention is not a new experience. It is the timeless factor in every experience. It makes all experiences possible; yet it is not an experience in itself.
Attention is the core vital force of your body-mind structure. You feel and think, beat and breathe, listen and speak, smell, taste and touch through it, but it remains untouched by all your conscious and unconscious mental activity and physical sensory experience.
So, the best way to connect back to the source is your own amazing Attention.
Do I need some special kind of attention to connect to the source?
Everybody is alert of his existence all the time and one can always use his/her normal attention to return to the source.
You do not need any special kind of attention; the same attention which you divert outside needs to be diverted inside.
Attention is a door between the Known and the Unknown; the same door which takes you out also lets you in.
This alert attention is the simplest path to return to the source.
What is it that makes attention a door between the known and the unknown?
The key reason which makes Attention a divine door to reality is that it brings you back to this moment, here and now.
Attention is always pulsating in the present moment and it has the direct ability to interact with the life force without any interference of thoughts. With the direct focus of your attention, you become the very thing you look at, as your life energy enters it and its life energy enters your very being.
What do you mean when you say that attention has the direct ability to interact with the life force without any interference of thoughts?
In this moment to be, you do not need to think; rather, to think, you need to be.
Thoughts need past and future to exist; and past and future need thoughts to exist. It is a vicious circle of mind.
Attention right here…right now stands alone and is beyond the play of memory and imagination. To exist in totality right here…right now, you do not need thoughts, as attention is enough in itself.
Attention right here…right now is not at all empowered by your thoughts; on the contrary, constant thinking disturbs the flow of attention and disconnects you from this moment. Your mind channelizes your attention in all kinds of thoughts and takes you away from this moment into the jungle of past memories and future desires.
Attention is neutral towards all kinds of thoughts, and you may always use it to fulfil any desire as per your choice. However, thoughts in themselves are impotent without the flow of attention in them.
I strongly feel that without my thoughts, I am nothing. Why do such thoughts dominate me?
Specific thoughts dominate you because you nourish them with your attention every now and then. Your own interest in particular thoughts helps them to invade your peace of mind.
If you want to get rid of certain thoughts, just stop giving them nourishment of your own attention; they will die and disappear on their own.
Why is it that I have paid attention to everything in life except attention itself?
It is very natural because of the invisible nature of attention. Attention enables you to see everything, but you cannot see it. It enables you to listen to everything, but you cannot hear it. It enables you to smell everything, but you cannot smell its fragrance. It enables you to taste everything, but you cannot taste its flavour. It enables you to touch everything, but you cannot touch its texture. It enables you to think, but you can never conceptualize it.
How does attention work in a human being?
You can say that Attention gives human existence three levels, one as a Private Person which you can see, second, as a Universal Perceiver which you cannot see and third as a Peaceful Pure Presence beyond all conceptualization.
In your waking state, Divided Attention moving in your thoughts, feelings & sensations makes you a private person which is partial and ever-changing.
In your sleeping state, Undivided Attention at rest makes you a universal perceiver which is complete and changeless.
However, the Private Person and Universal Perceiver appear to be distinct and opposite; but it is the same attention in movement and at rest.
In your deep sleep state, Absolute Attention simply returns to its source and makes you the Peaceful Pure Presence.
This “Peaceful Pure Presence” is not a state of mind; it is the supreme reality beyond all mental states.
III LEVELS OF ATTENTION
| LEVEL 1 | LEVEL 2 | LEVEL 3 |
| PERSON | PERCEIVER | PRESENCE |
| Waking State | Dream State | Deep Sleep State |
| Doer Identity (Somebody) (I Am This & That) | Witness Identity (Nobody) (I Am) | No Identity (Source) (No Sense of “I”) |
| Divided Attention in Movement | Undivided Attention at Rest | Absolute Attention |
| Focus on Experiences | Focus on Experiencer | Focus on Experiencing |
| Exist in Past & Future (Memory & Imagination) | Exist in Present (Here & Now) | Timeless Existence |
| Trapped in Duality | Free from Duality | Complete Oneness |
| Egoic Existence | Subtle Ego Existence | Eternal Existence |
I only know myself as the private person which is my current identity. Why is it that I have never known this universal perceiver in me?
Unfortunately, man is attentive to everything outside him, but he is not attentive towards his own inner centre. So, most of the people exist at the periphery of life and their centre remains in darkness. This ignorance towards your own centre is the fundamental cause of all human sufferings and pain.
In reality, all external and internal search of man to find happiness and peace in life is an attempt to return to his own inner centre.
Can you please explain it in detail? How does attention give birth to private person and universal perceiver?
First, you need to understand that Private Person and Universal Perceiver are the two sides of the same coin.
The Private Person and Universal Perceiver appear to be distinct and opposite; however, it is the same attention in movement and at rest.
At any point in time, it is the state of your attention that defines your level of existence as human beings.
In your waking state, Flowing Attention trapped in thoughts makes you a private person.
In your sleeping state, Still Attention free from thoughts makes you a universal perceiver.
In your natural state, Absolute Attention naturally returns to its source and makes you the peaceful pure presence.
However, in reality, only the Supreme Source exists in all the above-mentioned states.
What is the relation of attention with the supreme source?
Supreme Source is like a deep and dark black hole and Attention is the light surrounding the source. In the invisible light of attention, the world appears and disappears.
Whether you acknowledge attention or not, it is universally available to all life forms at all times and flows through opposite extremes of life in a continuous circle to maintain the balance of life.
Supreme Source is the birthplace of attention, but it is not attention itself. The source of attention cannot be an object in the field of attention. Supreme Source is absolute and self-dependent; however, attention is partial and dependent on its content.
Can you please give some simple example to understand the relationship between attention and the supreme source?
An easy example to understand this relation is: Let us imagine a dark room.
The window in this dark room is a medium for sunlight to come in. But it is not the source of light; the sun is the real source.
In the same manner, consider your body as a dark room. Attention is the window in your mind through which enters the life force of source which gives birth to thoughts and sensations. Now Attention is the medium for life force to enter your body and mind, but it is not the real source of it.
The real source is nameless and formless eternal emptiness which we address as the Supreme Source. The sun of Supreme Source shines all the time irrespective of the fact that the window of attention is open or closed.
As a Private Person, you exist as a closed window, and as a Universal Perceiver, you exist as an open window.
Whatever the case may be – open or closed – it makes all the difference to the body and mind but none to the sun of the Supreme Source.
What is that I should keep in mind while experimenting with attention to return to my source?
Always remember, if you want to reach the Supreme Source through the path of attention, go beyond whatever you will encounter in the field of attention.
Whatever appears and disappears in the field of attention is neither you nor yours; it is the purposeless play of the source. So, enjoy the play, but never get identified with it. You are the untouched and unlimited Supreme Source itself.
What is wrong in living like a person – it is the basic practical requirement of social life?
There is nothing wrong in living as a Private Person, in playing a particular role based on purpose, rules and responsibilities. However, if you only live life at the level of a Private Person, sooner or later, your life will become a drag, a burden, a compromise and a struggle of separate survival.
Nothing is wrong in living an ordinary life as a person, but limiting oneself only to the level of person is a huge blunder. It is like looking at the cloudy sky and completely forgetting the infinite blue sky behind the surface of clouds.
All that I am saying is that you are not just the person you take yourself to be; you are more than that. This idea of just being a limited person actually keeps you in bondage.
Person is a mind-made private prison which limits your existence within the walls of perception, like clouds cover the sun without in any way impacting it. Similarly, person covers your natural existence without in any way impacting it.
I am not able to understand this so-called mind-made private person. Can you explain its root?
In order to understand this prison which you have built around your natural self, let us trace the face of this person from its very source.
At the time of the birth of your body, you were not born as a person with a particular name and sense of personal identity. There was just a simple sense of being without any trace of self-consciousness. In your very early years of childhood, you existed as a super satisfied being completely connected with the whole. Before the birth of this person in you, complete peace and joy existed in you. You existed as an innocent being in a state of pure perfection without any trace of personal identity.
Gradually, with time and through others, you started identifying with your name and physical self. Your body and mind are limited and vulnerable by nature; so they needed immediate protection and sense of direction to grow. This fundamentally gave rise to the centre of Personal Identity in you which you refer as I-Me-Myself.
Eventually, with time, you firmly started identifying yourself with your physical form and mental baggage given to you by others like name, gender, race, religion, tradition, culture, caste, creed, country, values, morals, ambition and purpose etc. All these layers of conditioning within your body-mind structure made your existence personal and limited.
You forgot your natural connection with your own unlimited self and started struggling and suffering as a separate entity disconnected from the whole.
This mind-made sense of separate self has limited your natural infinite existence and turned you hard and stiff from your original soft and supple state. Rigid attachments with your form, name and thoughts made you completely self-centred and selfish.
Selfishness deepened separation which, in turn, deepened selfishness. The more you paid attention to your personal selfish identity, the stronger it became; and the stronger it became, the more attention it demanded. It is like a never-ending vicious circle of mind.
This is how from a selfless pure being, you got transformed into a selfish practical mind-made private person.
For better understanding, let me tell you the story of a wild wave in the ocean.
At the time of the birth of this wave, it was totally connected with the ocean and was completely at peace because it was one with the ocean.
No mental separation existed at all.
With time, the wave started to grow bigger and asked other waves about its existence and purpose.
All other big waves informed this young wave that you are this and that – a small little entity separate from the vast ocean and your purpose is to find the ocean and merge in it as it is your real source.
So, this wild wave believed other big waves and started searching everywhere outside to find the ocean. The more it searched, the more it suffered.
Finally, this wild wave created its own story like other waves centred on mind-made personal self and wasted its entire life in search of ocean which was all the time beneath and around it of which the wave itself was the part!
Most of the human beings are like this wild wave. All these layers of conditioning within your body-mind structure make your existence isolated and limited. You forgot your natural connection with your unlimited supreme self and started struggling and suffering as a separate egoic entity disconnected from the whole.
So, don’t disturb your mind with seeking. There is nothing to seek and find, for there is nothing lost. There is nothing to practice. We just need to stop running and rest in our own peace and live integrally, in oneness with all life, as pure being.
“Peace is our natural state of being” and in order to deserve it, we don’t have to disturb it.
We disturb our natural peace by our own thoughts, by constantly channelizing our attention in past memories and future desires. In this present moment, nothing is lacking and nothing is needed. In the depth of our being there is perfect peace.
For the time being, I assume that your wave theory sounds right. But how can I ignore the fact that millions of human beings, who have lived life centred on being a person since ages, were all quite mistaken about their real existence?
I understand your situation and can completely empathize with your point of view as I know from where it is coming.
Right now, all you know is your personal identity and you firmly believe that it is your real identity, your real foundation, your real face, because it has been given to you by your own family and it is very difficult to doubt your loved ones and your own self.
And this process of passing the personal identity from one generation to another has been going on for centuries; naturally, the law of majority makes unreal appear as real. When everybody adopts and follows the same lifestyle centred on personal identity, obviously, it becomes very difficult to doubt its authenticity.
Since you do not know your own inner centre, from childhood, you constantly depend on the opinion of others to define yourself. You value what others value and avoid what others avoid. As a person, currently your happiness is dependent on others, outside you.
However, let me assure you that you are not just the person you take yourself to be; you are something more than that. No matter what you think, right behind the prison of Private Person lies the path of Universal Perceiver.
And remember, as a Private Person, you can never reach the source, and as a Universal Perceiver, you are the source.
Private person and universal perceiver – it all sound very complicated to me. I am an ordinary person and all I am seeking is happiness and peace in my normal day to day materialistic life. I am really tired now from moving from one country to another, from one guru to another in search of real peace. Can you tell me where I am going wrong or what I am doing wrong?
Seeking peace and happiness is not wrong; what is wrong is to seek it in the wrong direction.
Happiness and peace are not outside you; they are your very nature. It springs from the core of your being; by knowing yourself as you are in the light of absolute attention.
All throughout life, most of the people search for happiness and peace outside them in particular – people, positions, places, possessions, progressions etc. After not getting the desired level of satisfaction, they keep on moving from one place to another, one possession to another, one position to another, one person to another, one pleasure to another in order to satisfy their very being.
Look around and you will certainly observe that most of the people are stuck in this materialistic mess. They really do not know what the way out is. So helplessly and hopelessly, with a heavy heart, most individuals drag their life like a heavy burden. They live their life but have forgotten what it feels to be alive anymore.
Let me tell you today that the way out of this situation is the way in. Go within and tap into your natural greatness and grace.
I feel something stops me from looking within my own self. I exactly do not know what it is. Can you help me pinpoint this barrier within me?
Yes, with pleasure.
As a private person, you become the prisoner of your own perception. You cling to your rigid convictions and regularly crave for more experiences, the memory of which you consider as knowledge. You take remembering as knowledge and gather more experience with time to enrich your memory.
Your own memory and imagination based on it becomes a wall between you and the reality.
Directly or indirectly in your life, you accumulate so much of information in your memory that it almost becomes impossible for a learned individual to relax back and see things again as they really are.
As a private person, you are so full of your own memory-based knowledge that you never respond to reality; on the contrary, you react to it in a very absurd selective way.
Irrespective of the truth in any given situation, you see what you want to look, you hear what you want to listen and you understand what you want to believe. This selective approach is the real barrier due to which you completely overlook reality in each moment of life.
Unfortunately, as a private person, you are so filled with your own memory-based knowledge that no space is left in you for the real wisdom of life to enter you.
Your cup is always full of yourself.
As a private person, you identify your present with your past and project it on your future. The more you define yourself as this or that, the more you divide and limit yourself.
What is the major difference between wisdom and memory-based knowledge?
Memory-based knowledge adds layers of information to your mind and limits your vision. Particular thoughts dominate your mind, definite desires distort your heart and specific senses divide your very being.
This kind of knowledge can help you survive and succeed in the contemporary materialistic world, but can never help you return to your own Supreme Source, whereas freedom from all layers of information is wisdom.
It is the child-like ability to reflect life as it is. In order to gain wisdom, you must unlearn everything first. To gain pure innocence of an infant, you need to give up all your thoughts. All backgrounds and identifications limit your identity. To be full, you need to be empty.
In wisdom, your mind is like a crystal-clear mirror free from the dust of memories and desires which reflects reality as it is.
In memory-based knowledge, your mind is like a dirty mirror full of dust of memories and desires which distorts the reality of life.
At this point in time, I do not desire wisdom as I am happy with my memory-based knowledge. All I want to do is to help the millions of suffering people across the globe through my international NGO. According to me, a helping hand is thousand times better than any words of wisdom to a hungry tortured human being. What do you think? Am I right?
My dear friend, I appreciate your good intentions and actions. But you need to understand that if you really want to bring peace and harmony in the world, you need to have it in yourself first.
You can only truly help others when you yourself have gone beyond all need for help. The real act of charity comes from the clarity of your own self.
Real help is neither done for others nor for your own self. It is it done for the act of help itself. And only as a selfless universal perceiver can you truly help anybody.
Selfishness is the source of all evil. As a selfish person, most of the people enjoy the pain and sufferings of other fellow human beings; it is a source of entertainment for them. Even majority of people involved in charitable causes are doing it primarily for their own personal selfish motives – like social respect, to compensate their past evil deeds, personal fame, free funding, mode of business, etc.
Very few rare individuals are involved in charity for the sake of charity itself.
Have you noticed that across the globe in every culture, the game of exploitation and torture is laid on the foundation of human selfishness?
Selfishness is a device of mass destruction which is used by egoist entities to dominate and degrade human life. History affords several examples of mass destruction based on selfish interests of politicians and priests in the name of nation and religion.
As a selfish person, the more you interfere with nature and natural way of life, the more you ruin it. Look around and you are bound to notice that for achieving person selfish agendas, how man is killing man and destroying Mother Nature. Whatever comes in the way of selfishness gets destroyed.
So first get rid of the selfish person in you. Then whatever you do will naturally bring immense peace to you and to others around you.
I think humanity has taken a giant leap in terms of technology and growth in the last century, and in the coming years, we will be the most evolved species of humans that has ever existed on this planet – may be on other planets as well. How do you look at the modern man of this golden era of science and technology?
I am all in favour of new-age scientific growth and development as long as modern man is aware about his own inner centre of existence. However, unfortunately, that is not the case now. Without knowing yourself, whatever you do will end up in a more complicated mess.
Even your so-called solutions to life will end up creating more problems which had never existed in the first place.
Do you see the joke?
The modern man is searching for the signs of life on other planets to relocate there someday, while destroying life on its own planet earth which is the only known place in the universe so far with so much of diverse beauty and life.
As a materialistic modern man, this moment is just a means to an end. Modern man is attracted to the fake outer materialism and repelled by real inner mystery of life.
He has made his life a constant process of accumulation of materialistic possessions which are considered signs of success in the modern capitalistic system and society. Fulfilment of desires and self-gratification is the top most priority of the contemporary modern man; for that, he can go to any extent.
Modern man works hard to live a meaningful happy life. However, excessive workaholic lifestyle destroys even his present peace and happiness. In reality, excessive workaholic lifestyle is an escape route for majority of busy individuals to avoid his/her own unbearable story which naturally weighs upon them when they are not doing anything in particular.
Even after knowing the fact that nothing lasts forever, the modern man madly clings to everything. He prefers a secure and safe lifestyle and firmly believes that his beloved possessions will protect him. In reality, your possessions make you more vulnerable and trapped. Your so-called safety and security kill the very spark of your own life.
In this modern so-called civilized society, unfortunately, everyone is a copy of everybody else. Everyone has made their life a fast-paced serious affair in which they are always on the run to reach somewhere else, to be somebody else.
What is wrong in living a modern materialistic lifestyle, in which we crave for the pleasure and avoid the pain?
First of all, let me inform you that life is an eternal river which flows between the two shores of pain and pleasure.
Duality of life may appear to be opposite and distinct to each other; but, in reality, opposite extremes of life are completely interdependent and interconnected. They are not contradictory but complimentary in nature. They are the two sides of the same coin. Each side follows the other to maintain the balance of life.
However, as a person, you are always in conflict with the flow of life. You crave for one side and avoid the other. Due to this biased personal approach, the more you seek, the more you suffer. This selective one-sided attitude keeps you always off-balance and you keep on going back and forth in your memory and imagination looking for a perfect life where only beautiful side of life exists.
Sadly, my friend, this is Mission Impossible!
When you accept both the sides of the coin as part of life, suddenly, you are free from both of them. Then you start flowing with both darkness and light; day and night – all become a play of the Supreme Source in the light of attention.
You say, go beyond the private person. But as a human being, I definitely need my personal identity to exist and evolve. What is wrong in this process?
There is nothing wrong in living as a Private Person, in playing a particular role based on purpose, rules and responsibilities. However, if you live life only at the level of a Private Person, sooner or later, your life will become a drag, a burden, a compromise and a struggle of separate survival. All that I am saying is that you are not just the person you take yourself to be; you are more than that.
In the very early years of your life, you surely needed this personal identity to relate and exist, for protection and direction.
However, in order to grow completely, sooner or later, you need to go beyond your personal identity. Remember, a chick needs a shell to grow. But a time comes when the chick needs to break the shell and go beyond it; otherwise, the chick will suffer and die.
So now it is time for you to break your shell and go beyond.
What do I need to do to break my shell and discover my reality beyond the mind made person?
To break the shell of the person, all you need to do is to stop paying attention to all your thoughts; do not fight with your thoughts; do not flow with them either; simply leave them alone.
Deprived of attention, your thoughts will slow down and will eventually lose their grip on you completely.
When you watch your thoughts with a silent mind and a quiet heart, that is all what is needed to break the shell.
Reality will naturally emerge and embrace you on its own. You do not need to look for reality as it is never lost. A still mind and a silent heart spontaneously help you recover your natural purity and grace.
You cannot go beyond the mind when it is running. Fast stream of thoughts makes it impossible to go beyond the mind. Constant flow of thoughts and keeping your mind busy all the time disrupt and destroy the natural peace and purity of mind.
What is revealed in a still mind?
As a person, you are always in a constant mental mess. You suffer an intense identity crisis as you really do not know that out of all your complicated ever changing social masks, which one is your changeless authentic face.
In a still mind the reality of life is revealed.
You see that beyond the moving Private Person, there is a centre of unmoving Universal Perceiver which never changes. You discover that the Perceiver is a constant reality which has never changed in you, right from the time of your birth till date; however, as a Person, you are continuously changing all the time.
I want to really trust you that I am something more than this miserable old person. But I am really afraid to let go my personal identity at this age. All my life, I have lived with this person, and now when my death is near, you are telling me that I am not this private person, that I am the universal perceiver about which I know nothing. I am scared if I give up my personal identity, what I will become. Will I exist at all?
I understand your restlessness at this age, but I want you to relax and recognize your natural self before death destroys your body and mind – not you. You are the Supreme Source of life and death itself. Don’t worry. You are something beyond birth and death.
As a private person, all throughout life, you have only paid attention to your experiences, but completely ignored the experiencer. So, I want you to shift your attention to the experiencer from the experiences.
Have you observed that every night in sleep, your personal identity disappears, but you still exist.
And every morning, with the thought of I-ME-MYSELF, it appears back and the whole trouble starts again.
It means that the Universal Perceiver unites your life force and connects you back to your source, while the Private Person divides your life force and disconnects you from your source.
I know that as a person, you cannot give up the life-long habit of control; but you can surely give up this person itself.
And when you are free from all your thoughts, from all your backgrounds and identifications, then the Private Person merges in the Universal Perceiver. The Universal Perceiver merges in the peaceful pure presence; yet the identity is not lost.
Only its limitations disappear and you return to your natural supreme state where you are one with the whole.
You always say that universal perceiver is the way. But what is this universal perceiver? I have no idea about it.
Perceiver is the pathless path which takes you out from the prison of Private Person in the free land of peaceful pure presence.
The Perceiver is the end of all patterns of thoughts and all backgrounds of self-identification.
Perceiver is the inner path which naturally appears in you, when you completely disappear as a person. When your mind is empty of memories and desires, the very absence of thoughts allows the power of perceiver to arise and awake in you.
Do not you think that the perceiver is just another mind made thought within the realm of mind?
Thoughts cannot witness thoughts; it is the perceiver within you which is the centre of perception. Thoughts cannot help you go beyond thoughts. Perceiver is the only point which is relevant and revealing and can help you return to your source.
Perceiver is always untouched and unaffected by the play of perception. Whatever you may encounter, the purity and peace of the Perceiver remains the same in all circumstances.
It is the changeless centre of reality in you which has no name and form; it is the reflection of real in the still mind.
Is the perceiver part of my inherent personality?
Not at all.
Perceiver is the unlimited universal freedom beyond personality.
It is the power of pure presence without any trace of personal identity in it. As a Perceiver, you go beyond your personality and the process of personal judgement and continuous planning ends forever. You go beyond the whole mental pattern of fear and hope.
By giving up all ideas about yourself, you suddenly stumble upon yourself.
By not defining yourself through your thoughts and by not identifying yourself with your limited body and mind, the whole universe becomes the body of the Perceiver.
Why is there no trace of personal identity in the perceiver?
As a Perceiver, you are no more attached to your name and form and completely lose all self-concern. It is a state of being alive and alert like an infant without the trace of personal identity.
Perceiver is complete in itself, fully integrated within and without. As a Perceiver, you go beyond safe and secure mental projection and always abide in the unknown. As a Perceiver, the illusion of separation disappears and you become one with the whole.
As a matter of fact, you can only talk about the Private Person because the Perceiver can only be realized in deep silence and stillness.
Can we control and manage our practical life as a perceiver?
Direction of perceiver comes from within, from the silent spring of the source.
Perceiver responds to each event through his inner wisdom rather than outer memory-based knowledge.
Perceiver makes you soft and supple from the hard rigid private person, and you start flowing with total harmony in the duality of life.
You embrace each moment as it comes with absolute acceptance. You reflect reality in each moment as a crystal-clear mirror; the routine practical thoughts, words and actions spontaneously appear and disappear in you, but your memory stays clear and empty all the time.
In the light of wisdom, you don’t feel any compulsion to follow anybody or to identify with any particular background. You naturally go beyond all the divisions of system, beyond all discriminations of the society and beyond all concepts and convictions of mind.
As a perceiver, instead of paying attention to your experiences, you pay all attention to the experiencer, and you realize that whatever you perceive is neither you nor yours.
So, you watch the play of perception without being affected by it. You feel no urge to interfere or control the flow of reality nor are you affected by the play of images nor do the images get affected by you.
Is the perceiver beyond space and time?
In a way, Yes.
The Perceiver always pulsates in the present moment immersed in deep silence. It is the timeless existence beyond space and time.
As a perceiver, you are undivided by your thoughts, unadulterated by your words and untouched by your actions. You are beyond all attributes of body and mind.
You simply accept this moment as the best and allow nature to take care of the rest.
As a perceiver, you stand fearless and free even in the midst of death as you are fully in tune with your unlimited universal existence. It is the door between the Known and the Unknown.
It is the real Guru within you which will take you back to your supreme source.
I have completely let go my existence as a private person. But I am not yet completely established in the state of universal perceiver.
Right now at this unknown stage, I feel extremely empty and bored which also scares me at times. To escape this blankness, sometimes I strongly feel like going back to my old familiar state of private person since it is known and comfortable. What do you think I should do?
Do Nothing.
Perceiver is the land of eternal emptiness; it is the middle state, where old is gone and new has not arrived yet – similar to the state of dawn where night of the person is gone but the light of pure presence is yet to emerge.
Do not become afraid of this state of no identity and do not get bored with this empty space. Instead, stay silent and still and delve deep into this emptiness as this is as far as any human can walk on the path of truth.
Keep your cup of life empty.
At this last point, the purity of perceiver is tested by the peaceful pure presence and if your whole being is ready, the Supreme Source suddenly enters your heart unexpected and uninvited.
Beyond this point lies the land of serene silence.
You say that the perceiver is the path, but now it has become my final destination. Thank you for showing me my real existence beyond mind-made person. Now, I am in love with the peace and power of the perceiver as this is what I always wanted in life.
Remember, the Perceiver is the path, not the destination.
No matter how peaceful and powerful you feel as a Perceiver, sooner or later, you have to cross the door and leave it behind. Clinging to the door of Perceiver can become your last attachment and illusion which is equivalent to the prison of person.
I understand that through the door of Perceiver, you can clearly see the glimpse of your real home; but the door itself is not your home.
Once you go beyond the limited person and embrace your existence as an unlimited Perceiver, do not cling to it and make it your identity.
Remember – clinging to any form of identity is a play of mind.
First you asked me to go beyond the private person and now you are asking me to even go beyond the universal perceiver. I am totally confused now. What is it that you really want me to be?
I can understand your state of confusion, but you need to clearly recognize that the Perceiver rises with the person and disappears with it.
Prison of person and path of Perceiver are both states of attention in movement and at rest.
However, your natural state is the peaceful pure presence in which both the Person and the Perceiver appear and disappear.
This peaceful pure presence is not a state of mind; it is the supreme reality beyond all states.
To clear the confusion, let us look at this process like this. The person vanishes in the light of the Perceiver and the Perceiver vanishes in the light of peaceful pure presence.
This, my friend, is the ultimate journey of life force from bondage to freedom, from limited to unlimited and from the Known to the Unknown
I still cannot comprehend my existence as pure presence. Can you describe it in detail? How is peaceful pure presence different from the states of perceiver and person?
At the level of Person, you identify with the projected pattern of memories and desires; at the level of Perceiver, you give up all mind-made patterns, but you still identify with the witnessing centre.
However, at the level of peaceful pure presence, you go beyond all attachments and identifications. You pulsate in each moment as an empty space which is no longer self-conscious. You lose all capacity to identify with anything in particular and detach from all backgrounds; you become one with the source.
You exist like an infinite sky, totally absent yet fully present.
Why is peaceful pure presence not conscious of itself?
When the body is healthy and whole, you do not feel it. When some physical pain or mental suffering draws your attention, only then you feel your body.
In the same manner, when human mind is healthy and whole, you no longer feel yourself. Personal identity is a sign of sick and unhealthy mind.
Self-identification is a disease of the duality of a wandering mind. In reality, to know – is not to know; to be – is not to be.
This is so unrealistic! What do you exactly mean by this statement: to be is not to be?
To be is not to be, by this, I mean is that the doer in you disappears in the deed itself. No matter what life offers you, joy or pain, loss or gain, you always abide in a state of absolute acceptance.
You flow with everything with perfect harmony and respond to all events in a most efficient manner. Nothing is done by you; yet nothing is left undone. Your whole being responds to reality in the form of inner reflection instead of mental reaction.
As peaceful pure presence, you pulsate in deep silence and allow the source to express itself in action.
You just flow with circumstances and simply stay in touch with reality in every situation.
Staying in silence is not an act or effort from your end as it becomes your very nature. Every event and experience happens against the background of stillness and silence.
So, are you saying that as peaceful pure presence, you have no desires and expectation left and you just go with the flow like a moving cloud?
As far as I am concerned, this moment is my eternal home; stillness is my only act; silence is my real language; and simplicity is my only style.
As a pure presence, I have no desire for myself and I am utterly content with my ordinary life.
The only thing that matters is this magical moment -right now…right here in which by dying now to now, I keep my memory fresh and free from all thoughts. This art of death naturally empowers my being, and simple thoughts, significant words and spontaneous actions naturally arise from the source itself.
I act without expectations and once the act is over, I completely forget about it and do not wait for any personal claim or credit.
Everything happens on its own around me without any sense of control and purpose in a playful childlike spirit.
You definitely have a specific name and form. Looking at your lifestyle, I am certain of your existence as a normal person. Then how can you say that you don’t exist as a person and that you are this so-called superior peaceful pure presence?
Like the empty space inside the cup appears to be limited by the shape and design of the cup, but in reality, it is free and one with the whole.
Similarly, to you I still appear to be limited by the shape of my body, but in reality, I am totally free and one with the whole. I exist not as a private person attached to a particular name/story but as a Universal Perceiver within the mind and as an unlimited peaceful pure presence beyond the mind.
My existence as Perceiver within the realm of mind and pure presence beyond the mind does not make me superior over others; the only advantage I have is the freedom from the false.
Instead of trying to be this or that, I am just happy to be my natural self – nameless and formless infinite being. I enjoy complete contentment in each moment without any trace of comparison and competition with others.
I am like a simple lotus flower in the midst of the mess of life; my physical roots are deeply ingrained in the mud, but my natural fragrance is free and formless.
I am in the world but the world is not in me.
I am completely untouched and untainted by my own thoughts, words and actions now.
How can you show me the real way to the supreme source, when you do not exist at the first place?
For me, this moment is not a means to an end but it is an end in itself – a timeless state of silence and stillness.
In this moment, I see things as they are and show reality as it is. My whole being remind others who they really are.
By giving up all thoughts and a sense of personal identity, I have gained all. Now source itself handles everything.
I speak without words and show a way by giving no way.
When I see others around me returning to their own natural source, my heart rejoices and my whole being dances in deep silence.
How do you look at humanity?
I am fully aware of the fact that what people take themselves to be – a limited person is nothing but a wrong identification with the memory-based projected pattern of thoughts.
However, real existence of all human beings is beyond their limited thoughts, concepts and convictions.
No thought is your natural state of being.
So, I do not judge people based on their pseudo-personalities as I see them as they are – Unlimited Universal Peaceful Pure Presence.
Do you believe in love at first sight, as I guess I am in love with you?
Thank you for your love.
Yes, I do believe in love; but first and last sight is something irrelevant to me.
Personal love – no matter howsoever pure – is still based on feelings and thoughts, and it limits your existence with the realm of mind.
However, real love is beyond the mind and it is without any personal judgments and expectations. It is limitless and is available to everybody at all times.
In real love, the more you give, the more you get. It is an inexhaustible silent grace of supreme source which creatively transforms everything it touches in an invisible way.
ShunYo 