Transcript:

This transcript was created automatically from the audio recording and has not been proofread yet. It may contain errors, especially with Sanskrit terms and with questions from the audience. Please get in touch if you would like to help improve it! https://robert-adams.de/contact/

Greetings and salutations. Happy New Year. God bless America. Thank you. I welcome you with all my heart. I love every one of you unconditionally. Unconditionally. It means whatever you’ve done in the past doesn’t matter. What you’re doing now doesn’t matter. Always be aware that you’re not a doer. It is pure awareness that it is a doer. It is Brahman that it is a doer, not you. You have absolutely nothing to do with your affairs. nothing you didn’t ask to be born so to speak or to be here now you didn’t ask to go through the life that you’ve been going through good or bad in between you find yourself engrossed in life without you to say so without you doing it there’s a power that knows how to take care of you knows how to love you if you give it a chance you give it a chance by not being judgmental by leaving things and people alone we’re not coming to any conclusions we’re getting rid of your dogmas your preconceived ideas then the power that knows the way will take hold of you and lead you on a straight and narrow path and we’ll all be well with you everything we do in set thing is important everything some of you think that only if we chant it’s good some of you hate chanting you don’t want it at all some of you think if I talk for two hours it’s good some of you don’t want me to talk at all some of you think we should sit in the silence for two hours some of you think we shouldn’t sit in the silence at all what am I to do if I listen to you all everything we do here is important when I come here I have no preconceived idea of what I’m going to say or what I’m going to do everything is extemporaneous I feel where you’re coming from as I come into this room and I say what’s important for you to hear so everything we do is very important everything

When you come Thursday, everything is important. When you come Sunday, everything is important. When you come to set thanks, surrender yourself to it. Leave your ego outside the door.

Come in here with humility, with love, with peace in your heart, and you’ll find what you’re looking for. Jnana without bhakti is dry intellectualism.

Bhakti without Jnana is emotional apathy. Both are important. All of the great stages throughout history are told you the same thing. From Ramana Maharshi, to Ramakrishna, to Nuskatata Maharaj, Shankara, onward and onward. They’ve all told you the same thing. There’s no new teaching.

If you read a book that has a brand new teaching that a person just invented, be careful. The revelations that sages have had have been the same revelation that all sages have had.

There are no special revelations, strange happenings. the teaching is you have to lose yourself to find yourself as long as you want to hold on to yourself you’ll never find your real self your real who you are the reality you’ll never find as long as you’re holding on to what you are you must let go let go struggling completely of everything that you’ve been holding on to it isn’t easy for some people yet this is what you must do as a matter of fact it’s the only thing you have to do nothing else is necessary everything else will take care of itself once you let go of everything once you decide to drop your ego your beliefs your brainwashing that you’ve had all these years once you decide to drop all these things wonderful things will begin to instill in your life but as long as you come in here happy and you go all miserable and you think you have to straighten people out you have to straighten conditions out you’ll never go any further than where you are now in order to go further in the spiritual path something has to give on your part there is such a thing as enlightenment self-realization this only means that you return to a natural state that’s all a natural state before you believed you were an ego or a separate person your separateness has to be given up you belong to the universe the universal is your home that’s where you came from somebody has taken on to believe that you’re a body you’ve taken on to believe that you’re a mind and so you appear to be going through life struggling fighting for survival trying to make things happen looking for results looking for enlightenment looking for peace of mind looking for all kinds of things because you can never find these things because they’re already dead it’s like the sun looking for light you are the light but you don’t believe it, you don’t know it and you refuse to accept it instead you accept the problems that happen to you the problems that come to you you believe they’re real and you worship them you become your god how do you worship them?

By fearing them by becoming angry over them by becoming upset over them this means you’re worshiping your problems but if you only learn to laugh at your so-called problems really laugh at them pay them no mind whatsoever you don’t enlarge them by thinking about them or trying to think of ways to get rid of them this only enhances them, makes them bigger and bigger there are no problems and there’s no one living who has a problem.

A problem simply means to you that things are not going the way you want them to go, that’s all. Isn’t that what the problem is? We also, we as human beings have set up the society a certain way and in this society that we’ve made up we say this is right and this is wrong, this is good and this is bad.

But it’s only one that agrees with society that it’s good and one disagrees with society that it’s bad. Where were you before society came into the picture?

Did you have to do anything or be anything? You were totally free before you came into this picture. Now you appear to be stuck.

Stuck in time. Stuck in karma. Stuck in samskaras. Stuck in samsara. And you’re not doing anything about it that’s going to be free yourself.

And as long as you allow the world to dictate to you, you’re going to suffer accordingly. The world has no power over you if you realize who you are. And if you understand your true nature, then you’re free already.

So the object of this is to learn who we are, to know who we are, and to abide in who we are. This is all we’re asked to do. Abide in the self,

The self which is bright and shining, all-pervading consciousness. Abide in that. How do you abide in that? By observing yourself, becoming the witness of your thoughts,

Practicing self-inquiry, continuously asking yourself, Who feels this? Who feels hurt? Who feels bad? Who feels good? Who’s feeling all these things? Well, where’s the source of this I am? What’s this I am? Who is this I am? Where did this I am come from? Ask yourself these questions, continuously, over and over again. Never just accept the condition and become depressed over it, Just spun it over it, upset over it, that’s for the average person in the street. But you know better. You know that the only way that it can hurt you is if you allow it to. You have swords of truth to protect yourself. Hold on to the truth. Don’t let go. Hold on. As you hold on, you’ll notice everything will disappear and you become yourself again. True self. The real self. But if you allow your anger to take hold of you. If you allow your depression to take hold of you, if you allow the world’s feelings to take hold of you, then you have a battle to fight, and you can’t possibly win. I’m going to look at this world and laugh, say you have no power over me, only if I give you the chance will you have power over me, only if I allow you to do so will you have power over me, but you have no power over me, so I am that which has always existed, never born, never died. I am that, which is all-pervading, absolute reality, bliss consciousness. This is my true self. This is what I really am. The separateness from me is gone. The detachments are gone. I am free, just the way I am, by this moment, right now. I don’t have to do anything special to be free, except to know that I am free, and live in this moment in time forever. This moment, by this moment right now. Feel this moment. This moment is love. There’s peace in this moment. There’s harmony. There’s joy. But once you allow your mind to take over and begin to think again, all these beautiful things take place in the Back with the head.

Go away. For you cannot keep your mind on two things. You cannot keep your mind on the self, the perfection, and the world with some perfection.

You can only keep your mind on one thing at a time. And it’s your choice which you will keep your mind on. You have a choice.

Remember these things when you’re by yourself at home. When you watch the television, when you read the newspaper. When someone calls you on the cell phone with bad news.

Do not feel it. Do not accept it. Look at it and leave it alone. Hit it and drop it. You are totally free right now.

You’re not bound by anything. Feel this. Feel what I’m saying to you. You are a wonderful person. Just the way you are right now.

You are a free person right now. Absolutely, totally free. Nothing wants to hurt you. Nothing can hurt you. For you are the power of yourself. All of the power that exists in the universe, you are that.

All of the gods that you believe in, the saints, the sages, always in you. You are that. Feel this. You are never alone. Never.

Be happy. Always be happy under all conditions. People often ask me, this all sounds so selfish. There are people starving in the world, people dying from malnutrition, from disease. What can I do to make this a better world in which to live? What can I do to help others? Instead saying it with myself all the time.

Well, it’s a very interesting question. I’m glad you asked. You see, when you try to make this world a better world and wants to live, what are you really doing? You’re putting your beliefs in this world, aren’t you? That’s what you’re doing.

You want to change people. You want to change conditions. You want to change governments. Because you believe you’ve got the answer when you try to help others. What are you really doing to them? You’re giving them your opinion, aren’t you?

That’s what you’re doing. You’re giving them what you believe is right. People have been doing this since the beginning of time and look at the shape of the world in which we live. So unless the truth is you cannot help others, it’s impossible. Sometimes it may appear to work but it doesn’t last. It’s the way to really help others, the way to really help the world. It’s to become self-realized. Why? Because when you become self-realized you become the world. you are the world a being that awakens an awakened being is the entire universe and when you self-realize you’re in total bliss all the time so if you’re all pervading you’re no longer bound by your dimensions you no longer have a circumference you emerge in the infinite then you become the bliss of the infinite and you have so many people that can awaken because of you you see what I’m saying it’s only when you realize that you can make other people realize also without trying to do anything to help people and realize being doesn’t go out of the way to help people but people are helped by just being in the proximity of the person and even people who are not in the proximity of the being or the sage are also helped to pull upward so the highest way to help anybody is to help yourself become a nightmare first then you become an asset in the universe but if you’re running around the way you are right now protesting doing all sorts of things to make this world a better world you’re fooling yourself because you’re imposing your beliefs upon them that’s what you’re doing you’re saying I know best listen to me or I’ll kill you I know the way to make this world a better world again people have been doing this in the beginning of time and the world is becoming worse and worse so the first thing you have to realize is I know nothing I know absolutely zero zilch that’s humility and you have to continue by saying yet there’s something in me that knows the way there’s something within my heart that’s never been blemished that’s so beautiful that I can’t even comprehend it I will abide in thee our heart and become totally free and liberated as you work on yourself this way and become a kinder person a sweeter person you’ll develop loving kindness with everybody and people just by hearing your name will become free and liberated people hearing about you will drop all their problems and become totally happy and free these people may be living in Japan on Mars it makes a difference where they are but when you’re free and liberated people will feel it certain people who are attuned to you will feel it they’ll say help others so right now drop everything close your eyes focus your attention on your breath listen to yourself breathing watch all the sensations in your body without reacting to them ask yourself the question, who breathes?

I do and who am I? keep still, as other thoughts come into your mind inquire to whom do these thoughts come? who fills them?

I do again, keep still after that the point of this meditation is if you become still when you say I do and then the stillness and quietness to question on the horizon who am I and just listen