I, Parabrahman. An Easter Egg.

Asking who is Atman is like asking who am I. The only difference in the questions is a grammatical one.

The upanishadic rishis answer both questions in their highest revelations, the mahavakyas. Atman is Brahman. I am Brahman.

And Brahman is that which is talked about in two ways. Nirguna Brahman is the unconditional godhead. Saguna Brahman is the conditional God of Maya.

And we are Brahman but due to original ignorance do not know it. Thankfully, sage revelations point the way. It’s up to us to clear away the personal clutter: what am I not?

In the analysis of seer and seen, what I’m able to know, I am not. Thus I’m not the body, breath, mind, intellect, or karma.

Neither am I the waking state of the world nor the dreaming state of the mind. Most provocative, I’m not even the absence of duality witnessed in deep sleep.

Not only am I not the known I'm not the unknown. I am the knower, the seer, pure consciousness!

Along with pure existence and holistic bliss infinity, I am satcitananda, another name for Brahman.

Have faith, for the revelation of the mahavakyas is not to be believed but confirmed. Beyond the individual is the universal. And beyond the I-am is I, Parabrahman.

a. april come she will

April is the month of reincarnation. It's not as much a cruel month as a karmic one. For in the perennial world, you reap what you sow.

April 1st is April Fool's Day. For only fools reincarnate. Nirvana is not for the foolish.

April is the month of Cynthia Forsythia wow! My pseudonym was born on April 27th and wrote about that goddess on the very next day.

b. on vidya

Original beginningless ignorance (avidya) is like original sin but without the sinner.

Beginningless ignorance begins with the big bang of wave-particle duality.

Wave-particle duality, enlightenment, and this devolutional-evolutional universe in-between are all appearing in the light of atman.

c. in the very merry month of may

One day in May I saw a dive-bombing osprey pull a striper from the middle of the river. Far across the high tide fullness of that Merrimack, an eagle saw and wanted.

Less than sixty seconds later, after a high-wire dance of conflicting desires, they collided in a winged battle less than thirty feet above from where I stood and watched in wicked awesome awe.

In the end, the hawk escaped with its treasure, the eagle returned to its pirate ship, and I continued on my merry way.

d. that sweet taste of nonduality

The moon in June doesn't just reflect the sun but smells like spirit too.

Its reflection of a midsummer light is nothing but light minus the vig.

Eye is seer. Ear is witness. Nose is the knowing. Tongue is that sweet taste of nonduality and skin is the holy ghost.

e. i am standing

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on I.

Assumptions are not to be trusted. Test each rock ten thousand times before standing on it.

I am standing on pure existence, absolute awareness (pure consciousness), and holistic bliss infinity (ananda). Anything but satcitananda is an assumption making samsara out of me and you.

Mithya Snake, Satya Rope

Ontologically speaking, there’s that which is self-existent, like a godhead, and this which depends upon something greater for its existence. In sanskrit, that is satya, and this is mithya.

In the classic advaitin examples, pots are mithya and the clay comprising each pot is satya, as gold is satya and the jewelry made from that gold is mithya. Of course these examples are not meant to be taken at face value. In the little lower layer, even gold is mithya.

For in the final analysis, the universe itself is mithya, and only parabrahman is satya. And satya is the sat in satcitananda, existence - consciousness - bliss, the real Self or atman, the real I or aham, as in atman is brahman or aham brahmasmi.

a.

Atman simply put is self-existent, self-luminous, and self-happy.

While a person of beginningless ignorance believes oneself to be mortal (this is the only mortal sin, my brothers and sisters).

And a person of beginningless ignorance believes oneself to be subordinate like an insignificant part of an infinite universe encapsulated in a life of constant sorrow.

b.

They say the tides on the Bay of Fundy are the greatest in the world. In some places the difference between high and low tides is more than forty feet. I've seen boats in harbors lie in the drying sea bottom thirty feet below the dock at low tide. No regrets coyote.

In the Santa Lucia Mountains of Big Sur is New Camoldi Hermitage. On the way up to its 1300 ft. altitude from Highway 1, there's a bench overlooking a scopious blue Pacific straight below. On the way down, I sat there and read the Thomas Merton I had purchased in their bookstore.

One of the canonical Three Views of Japan is the Matsushima Islands, 260 small pine islands situated in the confines of Matsushima Bay. The poet Basho visited in late spring 1689 while on a pilgrimage to sites written about by the 12th century poet Saigyo.

It's famously said Basho was so stunned by its beauty he couldn't write a single word about it in his masterpiece Oku no Hosomichi. There's another legend that says he wrote an unpublished haiku with only the words Matsushima & Ah! I visited in 2007 on a pilgrimage to Basho. Print the legend!

c.

You are not what you appear to be.

Neither material body, breath of energy, mind with memory, intellect, nor ego, you are that nondual trinity of satcitananda in which this mithya is now playing.

Things exist. Being knows. Self-awareness is ananda.

Tvam & Tat

1 tvam & tat

The one identifying with the body-mind complex is the individual consciousness. Neither is real but neither is unreal either. There’s the rub.

Beyond benightedness, yet within full light of maya, I’m not a part of universal consciousness. I am universal consciousness.

In nonduality, there’s neither separation nor division, inequality nor equality. In tattvamasi, I and That are the same.

2. who?

Not body-mind but individual consciousness. Not individual consciousness but universal consciousness. Not universal consciousness but consciousness period.

If transmigration begins in beginningless avidya but ends in maya, who is being reincarnated?

Individual consciousness is a super imposition.

3. lawrence

Where salt water of the Gulf of St Lawrence meets fresh waters of the St Lawrence River, this boy was mostly born.

But there’s that unborn spirit of ancestral fire-breathers swimming in volcanic York.

Seeing Mount St Helens from the Columbia River Valley was wicked cool though.

4. rabbit

beginningless avidya

fucks you up—

this is the verse.

nothing gold can stay—

this is the new england chapter.

what you could call my life on the way began when first i met the beatles.

5. recipe

The recipe for individual consciousness is organic chemicals, functional compounds, and the resultant amplification (reflection) of pure consciousness—

double bubble instant karma dancing with myself.

True science is deconstructing big belief. Big science isn't.

6. big

Both big religion and big science are trying to buy your big belief.

Is the new god the same as the old god?

Self-inquiry is the meaning of true love.

7. jivanmukta

all things exist.

some beings know.

one realizes.

Sunlight Earthshine

1. sunlight earthshine

In the Wonderland of Maya, the subtle body of organic chemicals and functional compounds is reflecting pure consciousness tonight like a red hot iron ball.

Consciousness is spreading to the far extremities of this body. Listen, light is light and reflected light is light, and I am that light and not the body-mind I am currently burning through and through.

It’s like the sun is original fire. And this wildfire on earth may be its reflection technically speaking, but the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Even earthshine can light up the dark side of the moon.

2. maya of things

If Saguna Brahman is the reflection of Nirguna Brahman, Maya is the mirror.

Or Isvara is the great magician and Maya is its scepter of power veiling the truth and projecting the false.

And Vishnu pervades, preserves, and protects this great projection. To paraphrase Julian of Norwich, all maya of things shall be well.

3. For James Leo Leon Mellon

Fifty-one years ago tonight, a man called Leo, whom I knew as Dad, died from a massive heart attack while working the night shift at Western Electric.

A psychotherapist once famously said to me that my mother was afraid of the world and my father never introduced me.

It was the greatest karma he could give me. It made me deconstruct things on my own. Love!

4. strange lands

From the south rim of Grand Canyon, one can see 10,000 sunrises in 15 minutes.

It's enough to make you think the sun never ascends, that atman is unborn and infinitely shining, and only the mind rises in a dream and sets in deep sleep.

Grok this: that witness of deep sleep is the witness of the waking state and I am that.

5. on unconsciousness

There are states of mind but there are no states of consciousness.

Identifying with any state of mind is unconsciousness.

Unconsciousness appears in consciousness. Paradox alert.

Midnight and Maya Again

1. midnight and maya again

Midnight and the sun is like pure consciousness and the moon is like the mind lit by self-luminous awareness and reflecting that light upon the darkness of the earth.

Midnight and the sun is nowhere in the sky like pure consciousness is the unseen seer. And midnight and the moon is insentient rock brought to life by the self-shining atman.

Midnight and the mind is but reflected consciousness although some people on earth mistake it for the real thing. Yes it’s midnight and the earth is on quicksilver sentient fire.

2. electric satcitananda

The mind is both seer and the seen. The mind sees the world and the mind is seen by consciousness. It’s the function of the mind to mind the world. It's the nature of awareness to witness the mind.

The world turns and the mind as a functioning mind is a singular tool. But the mind as an ego is always changing. This changing mind is seen by an unchanging consciousness, the only constant.

Disidentifying with the world is the science of psychotherapy. Disidentifying with the mind is the art of nonduality. The nature of mind is division; the nurturing of mind is ego. 

Consciousness is neither nature nor nurture. I am not the reflection of light in this filament of a light bulb but that electricity of satcitananda.

3. from out of bondage, james bondage

It was eighteen years ago today that Canyon del Muerto taught the mind to deconstruct.

In the middle of a timeless desert canyon facing the ancient one’s Mummy Cave Ruins etched in bronzed sandstone, I sit as this adjacent babbling brook takes away my vital breath to original Arizona.

I am not some DNA. Neither am I karma. I am that in which deoxyribonucleic acid and/or instant karma is appearing. That is pure consciousness. Pure consciousness is absolute existence. Absolute existence is ananda, satcitananda.

Consciousness Is Not a State of Mind

1. superimpositions and the substrate

The same awareness witnessing deep sleep is witnessing the waking state, and this waking world is appearing in awareness but that awareness is untouched, unmoved, and immaculate.

They say consciousness is smaller than a mustard seed yet all space-time is appearing within consciousness. Such is the nature of illusion and the indescribable ineffability of pure consciousness.

Without consciousness shining on the world, there is no world. Without the world minding the world, there’s deep sleep. And without awareness, there’s no deep sleep. That's the way of superimpositions and the substrate.

2. the cosmic consciousness

The world is in the mind and of the mind. Self-awareness is in the mind but not of the mind. Absolute awareness is neither in the mind nor of the mind.

As the mind hears the revelations of nonduality, the mind is seeing through the mind, and self-awareness is being known.

Some say there's a cosmic consciousness and I say this so-called individual consciousness is the cosmic consciousness.

3. common knowledge

It's not what you know, it's what you think you know, says Steve Martin on SNL. It's distinguishing between what you think you know and what you really know, says I.

What you think you know is an assumption. What I know is I am, I know, and ananda, satcitananda.

Like Bond, James Bond; Christ, Jesus Christ; Viveka, Vivekananda.

This is Dedicated to the One

0. the one

It’s not that there’s no personal god, there’s no person. But as long as one is acting like an individual, there’s a universal god to be reckoned with.

Forgive me Isa for I have sinned and missed the mark. Although in Maya I am you the universal consciousness, I’m thinking I’m an individual consciousness instead.

Moreover due to this original ignorance, I’m alienated from holistic bliss infinity and stuck inside samsara with the dreamstate blues.

And that almighty satguru is always whispering this ignorance is only cured by knowing what I’m not while being the pure knowledge that I am.

1. oppenheimer redux

As long as one is acting like an ego there's a superego to be heard.

Newtonian physics is to the universal body-mind as quantum physics is to universal consciousness.

From the point of view of materialism, quantum physics is a paradox. From the point of view of consciousness, a paradox is an effect appearing in the cause.

2. satcitananda!

Life is but a reflection of existence. Consciousness is but a reflection of pure consciousness. And happiness is but a reflection of ananda. Let's go satcitananda!

Satcitananda is not a quality of the absolute noumenal godhead. Satcitananda is the nature of the absolute noumenal godhead. Like fire is hot, parabrahman is existence itself and consciousness itself and holistic bliss infinity itself, that power of three!  And that's not nothing.

Please do not mistake pure existence for nothing. Just because absolute existence is indescribable and therefore hasn't a name doesn't mean it's name is nothing.

3.

In this Valley of the Tao

Cynthia Forsythia shall be appearing

if the Creek don't rise

The Little Lower Layers of Causality

0. on satkaryavada, vivartavada, and ajativada

First, the effect is same as the cause. Moreover, the effect is merely an appearance in an immutable cause.

Actually, cause itself is an appearance. Nothing is ever born. There is existence and existence only.

As maya is the power of saguna brahman, causality is the potency of maya. Samsara is the effect of ignorance. 

Destroying ignorance is the effect of knowledge. Knowledge is the effect of the all-knowing. Non-origination is beyond original sin.

1. on the force (of prajnanam)

It's the mind divides and the intellect decides. And not the mind divides and decides, and the heart of intelligence covers the mind's ass in reams of rationalization.

Consciousness is, so to speak, the single cell which has never divided.

Addition nor subtraction, there is neither. To be fruitful and multiply is maya's directive. In division but not of division, consciousness talking to consciousness, that is.

footbotes

a 

It's the mind divides and the intellect decides. And not the mind divides and decides, and the intellect covers the mind's ass in reams of rationalization.

The intellect is the reflection of pure intelligence as knowledge is the reflection of pure consciousness.

As the 'I Am' is the reflection of pure existence and happiness is the reflection of ananda.

b.

Consciousness is, so to speak, the single cell which has never divided.

Am I the filament or electricity? Am I the manifestation of light or light? Outside of the mind, there is no question.

The opposite of pure existence, the sat of satcitananda, is life and death.

The opposite of pure consciousness, the cit of satcitananda, is ignorance and wisdom.

And the opposite of pure bliss, the ananda of satcitananda, is sad and sadder.

c.

"By criticizing worse views one arrives by stages at better ones. 

For example, the view that effects are different from their causes (asatkaryavada) is worse than the view that the effect is essentially identical with its cause (satkaryavada);

within the latter, the view that the cause transforms itself into its effect (parinamavada) is worse than the view that it manifests its appearance as effect without itself changing in so doing (vivartavada);

still, all views that take causation seriously are inferior to nonorigination (ajativada), since causal relations, as any relations, involve differences and are thus tinged with ignorance."

~Karl Potter

The Assumption of Maya

0.

To assume doesn’t make an ass out of you and me. It makes you and me.

The first assumption is I’m not the universe, but an individual entity surrounded by an infinity of others.

Here’s the wrinkle though. Not only am I not an individual consciousness, I’m not universal consciousness either.

The former assumption is made out of ignorance, but the latter one is the wizardry of gods and maya.

Tattvamasi is where the rubber meets the way. No person but atman. No god but brahman. No truth but atman is brahman.

1. the nondual turning

If consciousness is brahman, and atman is brahman, as the mahavakyas testify, then consciousness is atman by the transitive maya of nonduality.

Not the body-mind complex, I am consciousness and consciousness is my true self. And the true self is the inner self and the outer self, our nondual self.

From a materialist metaparadigm to one of consciousness, there is a great turning. It's like that of molecular rock becoming functional compounds and organic chemicals.

2. rest in presence

Another name for profound meditation is resting. Like Jiva Be Goode and still.

Resting in existence is resting in consciousness. I Am is its mantra.

I am, therefore I know. I know, therefore infinity and so on, like a cat's cradle.

3. dropping hyphens

I am therefore I know.

I know therefore infinity and a cat's cradle.

Supercalifragilistictattvamasi.

4. mary mother of god

I am, therefore I think I am.

All thoughts appear in one consciousness, do they not?

Maya whispers yes.

5.

The sea knows the island.

The island doesn't know the sea.

As consciousness knows the mind

But the mind cannot know consciousness.

Symphony of Epistle Me and Prophecy You

You usurp the I and call it me. As if that consciousness is a creation of the body-mind,

you pray at the feet of science who’s yet to prove it.

Praying to the Christ is not a superstition but just giving a name to the godhead

of consciousness, like Krishna, in which the world is appearing like a powerful dream.

Devotion is the first step in turning away from all your scientific hocus pocus.

And devotion to consciousness itself is the middle way

as identifying with consciousness is the direct way.

Toward jivanmukta, all three ways are legit. In whatever combination applied,

their earnest deconstruction beats your unsubstantiated and frantic belief, friend.

I bow to Sri Dakshināmūrti in the form of my guru:

I bow to Him by whose grace the whole of the world

Is found to exist entirely in the mind, like a city's image mirrored in a glass,

Though, like a dream, through maya’s power it appears outside;

And by whose grace, again, on the dawn of Knowledge,

It is perceived as the everlasting and non-dual Self.

~Shankara in Hymn to Sri Dakshināmūrti (tr-Nikhilananda)

Drive My Fast Car

Mindfulness is like paying the same attention to the actions of a body-mind as one would in driving a fast car. Consciousness is talking to consciousness. Consciousness is not a backseat driver.

First, there is devotion to the representative of consciousness. Next there is allegiance to consciousness itself. And finally there is identification with consciousness. No belief. Oneself.

Fact-checking

In devotion, consciousness is sometimes called spirit.

In pledging one's allegiance to consciousness, one is dedicated to that spirit of existence and holistic bliss infinity too.

Identification with consciousness is not identification with any belief. Identification with consciousness is, in fact, disidentifying with all belief.

The Last Belief

Nonduality is, in fact, the last belief. Letting go of nonduality is your personal apocalypse.

That's why letting go takes a lifetime—ba dum tss! Seriously though, you can't let go. It lets you go.

And It doesn't let you go until It knows you're ready to let go. So get ready already.

Getting Ready

There's no one way of getting ready. Basically, for the purposes of this paraverse, there's devotion, a middle way, and direct.

And all the weird combinations of that power of three per your singular conditioning.

I am hereby devoted to the raw intelligence of Maya. I now pledge allegiance to the universal consciousness of Isvara. I Atman Am That Brahman,

Beyond, Be Yonder, The Great Beyond

0. beyond, be yonder, the great beyond.

Like the movie screen pervading the movie, consciousness pervades the world.

Like a mirage is in and of the desert, the mind is not just an appearance in consciousness, the mind is of consciousness.

Like the illusory snake is in and of the rope, there is no mind. There’s only consciousness.

Like if consciousness is all there is, then I am consciousness. And as consciousness, I am, I shine, and Beloving.

1. gate 

Consciousness projects the mind upon the screen.

Maya is the movie.

The screen is pure consciousness.

2. paragate.

Clouds appear in the sky

but aren't of the sky—

the sky appears in space 

and is of space.

3. parasamgate.

Like a dream is in and of the mind, 

spacetime is in and of consciousness.

There is no spacetime.

4. isvara and maya.

Cities are just projections of the past. Nature is happening now.

The city is Maya. Intelligence is Saguna Brahman.

5. lakshmidhara and basho.

In a dragon boat on Matsushima Bay

the ghost of Basho is appearing

like 260 infinitesimal pine islands.

6. gaudapada and the mahavakya.

Like the sleeping dream, the waking world is in and of the mind.

And the mind, body sleeping or body waking, is in and of consciousness.

And consciousness is existence is holistic bliss infinity—prajnanam brahma.

7. call me satcitananda

Please allow me to introduce myself. The satcitananda that can be named is not the real satcitananda.

I am existence itself—as in not non-existence. I am awareness itself—as in not unaware. And I am holistic bliss infinity as in ananda.

In other words, I am, I know I am, and ananda!

I Am Breaking Maya (symphony 1)

breaking maya

Do not agonize over maya but understand avidya. If the body-mind appears in consciousness, as is obvious (at first disturbing) to the witnessing of deep sleep,

I’m not the body-mind—I am consciousness, beyond any doubt the mind may have. In other words, I am that ‘I am’.

The metaphysics of nonduality isn’t rocket science. Existence, consciousness, and holistic bliss infinity is all there is. And I am that.

Yes, I am the sky of pure consciousness. Neither earth, water, wind, nor fire offer any real concern. Maya can’t touch me.

deconstructing ordinary awareness

Ordinary awareness witnesses the waking state but true awareness witnesses deep sleep.

In the ordinary world, ordinary awareness is attention, which is consciousness and thought combined.

If you think you know what true awareness is, deep sleep is there to deconstruct you.

devotional #1

The mind is a tool the mind does not know how to use.

Devotion to a god is not to be believed but practiced.

To help the mind not abuse itself by using itself, let consciousness be Krishna.

in the name of satcitananda

Satcitananda is the god of gods.

And life is but the reflection of Existence; attention, the reflection of Consciousness; and happiness, Ananda.

That is that existence which can't be named; that consciousness which can't be believed, and that ananda which can't be defined.

devotional #2 (methuen #1)

Beyond spacetime is the space of consciousness and the time of timelessness.

Marrying the matrices of life, attention, and ananda is oneself, nonduality.

Dedicated to that christ consciousness i so mysteriously loved

While skipping catholic sunday school behind the anglican stone walls of the east street cemetery.

~My First Methuen Devotional~

Beyond spacetime is the space of consciousness and the time of timelessness.

Marrying the matrices of life, attention, and ananda is oneself, nonduality.

Dedicated to that Christ consciousness I so mysteriously loved

While skipping catholic sunday school behind the anglican walls of the east street cemetery.

nonduality comics 240302

1. unconsciousness

a.

unconsciousness is a misnomer. it's more like unmind.

b.

the mind is either on or off. 

consciousness is neither on nor off 

but is is is.

c.

consciousness is that immutable nonduality

witnessing either the presence of duality or the absence of duality—

whether it's dream or deep sleep doesn't really matter to 'me'.

2. personalizing

a.

yes the mind personalizing consciousness is the original sin

and the source of all suffering

but give the me a break.

any one-year-old would have made the same mistake.

b. 

and don't go blaming god the parent for the work of god the child.

c.

forget it jake the snake, it's maya town.

3. epistle to my dakini

belief is like a rock in the middle of a stream. in other words, belief is the root of all duality. in nonduality club, no identification is required.

the only difference between dreaming and waking is the body being on or off. otherwise, dreaming is dreaming.

if mind-on is dreaming whether the body is on or off, and mind-off and body-off is deep sleep, what is mind-off and body-on, my inner dakini?

Symphony Number One: Me, Myself, and Atman (for Agi)

1. paraverse.

Consciousness is where the buck stops. The dream state is lit by the mind. The mind is lit by consciousness. Consciousness is self-luminous.

Strange, the mind borrows its sentience from consciousness but in some material hallucination has come to believe that consciousness owes the mind its life.

Look, in deep sleep, the mind is nowhere to be seen, yet consciousness is present witnessing this absence of duality. Further, consciousness is all there is. In fact, I am that.

And all those castles in the clouds are appearing in ‘me’. For the mind usurps the noumenal subject and mistakes its false sense of self for ‘me’, I, the true Self.

2. advaitaverse

Vidyaranya says you have to draw the line somewhere not in the ad infinitum metaphysical but that which is actually intuitive most importantly.

Ashtavakra says to Janaka, when the mind usurps consciousness, it makes its body its sole identity, and this stream of consciousness its natural by-product.

Gaudapada divides the ordinary states of mind in two: deep sleep and dreaming, whereas most suppose three. But in his karika, the waking state is

just a subset of dreaming—highlighting both deep sleeps’s absence of duality and the dreamlike quality of the waking state. Genius!

The poet Laksmidhara in Advaita Makaranda (Nectar of Nonduality) is taking one’s stand in Brahman. It’s up to you to prove that truth otherwise.

3. tantrikaverse

belief is like a rock in the middle of a stream. in other words, belief is the root of all duality. in nonduality club, no identification is required.

the only difference between dreaming and waking is the body being on or off. otherwise, dreaming is dreaming.

if this mind-on is dreaming whether the body is on or off, and mind-off and body-off is deep sleep, what is mind-off and body-on, my sweet dakini?