iRealization: So where is the question of free will?
Sia: Only in the imagined mind.
iRealization: Right, all there is is imagination. In imagination you want realization.
Sia: I’m interested in knowing your journey.
iRealization: I spent my whole life trying to be this imagination of Silicon Valley entrepreneur, selling a company, moving from India to here… all that happened and it was a disaster in many ways and I completely lost touch with my sense of reality and wanted to go deep into the question of what is it that we are all basing our actions on if nothing works out in the end… and nobody is happy, which is evident. And so I just went into it and I was a scientist in the past, you know… an engineer, still am, but I didn’t have a spiritual background, just an intense rational look at the world and wanted to find out. It was one of these really dark periods of life, 2014 and 2015. And then I discovered all the things we are discussing. At 2016 I met my guru and then it was instant.
Sia: May I ask who the guru was?
iRealization: He’s a person in India from a couple of different lineages but just an ordinary man. He just lives his own life; he is a farmer. He is from the Ramana [Maharshi] times. He is in his early 80s now. A lot of people know him and he has traveled the world, not known in the sense of belonging to an organization or anything because these people don’t even have names. I mean, he’ll tell you but the name is unimportant, you see? These are the sages, they are there. The sages exist. You have to be lucky enough to find them – when the desire becomes so intense, the dream manifests. Other than desire there is nothing, so whatever is on top of mind only you will be able to accomplish. If you want something and don’t think about it will you ever get it?
Sia: No.
iRealization: Effort is required to find the effortlessness.
Sia: But then you contradict your earlier statement that no matter what you do in the illusory dream, that will not lead you to realization.
iRealization: Yes, I contradict because right now you are not in that state of freedom. So the effort is required in the sense of what you call meditation. It’s a practice, but don’t get attached to the very meditation. When you start driving a car, if you keep looking at the instruction manual you’ll never move and then at some points it happens that you don’t even realize you are driving the car. In that sense it’s a practice, but once the raft is used to cross the river, you can let the raft go. These are all just words, they have no meaning. Sounds! This point should become clear, that this is only sound, isn’t it? So how is sound able to do anything?
Sia: Because we are building meaning around it.
iRealization: That is afterwards. At first the very sound is happening, you know? And that sound is itself triggering everything. Where is the control of meaning? That is the imagination part of it. If there is a bus about to hit you, you’ll just jump out of the way. Before you knew it, you had already jumped. So to see this immediacy of reality requires nothing. What is the effort in seeing that? If you start seeing the specific then you’ll call it “thoughts”, otherwise thoughts will not happen. So the meditation that I talk about has to be done all the time, not sitting somewhere and doing it, it is called being aware of reality. It’s known as jnana yoga, meaning being aware. Awareness is of the nature of consciousness and knowledge, otherwise you can’t say “I am aware”, however if you say “I am aware”, that becomes knowledge, so… don’t say it! Simply be. Don’t do anything… relax! Become effortless. That is itself the effort. Is this clear?
Rishi: I feel like sometimes when people come to this meeting or read spiritual books, they are not looking for such a simple answer, they expect a transcendence, they look for something someone is saying expecting for something to come out of that but nothing really changes… but the dots might connect better.
iRealization: That’s how it starts. You have to understand that dots connecting, of this and that… that’s all in the realm of illusion. Same as thinking that awakening is happening… please understand the reality here – none of these things are happening – never lose sight of reality. So don’t get excited, and don’t get depressed as there’s nothing to react to. As you know what you are, what reaction can there be?
Rishi: Nothing.
iRealization: So what happens is that you are just there, which is reality. You happen to be here, isn’t it? This meeting is not possible to have been premeditated, nothing could have planned it. Everything is just happening. Where is the question of free will? We keep inserting our own limited “I-did-something” but who can have done anything when everything else is happening all at once.
Rishi: How is it that there is more than me? Why am I not the only thing there?
iRealization: You are the only thing there.
Rishi: There’s this meeting.
iRealization: Which is also You. Everything in the dream is a single thing, there’s absolutely nothing else ever at any time. No time itself, that’s why we’ve touched upon what eternity points to. The experience of it, the bliss portion, is hidden because we keep thinking there are other things. So the mind is bifurcated, split, imagining multiplicity when there is not even the question of unity. Even one thing doesn’t exist. This is why advaita is called not-two.
Clarissa: For one thing to exist you have to stand outside and point to that thing.
iRealization: Ah! So it’s not even one. There is nothing apart from oneself. And everything is of the nature of knowledge, isn’t it? You say that this meeting is happening, how do you know? Because it’s happening in my consciousness. The I is bringing in the light, it’s not seeing it. What is it that sees?!
Clarissa: What is the distinction between “I” and seeing?
iRealization: The I is the light! The Light is ever the Light. It is the shadow that sees anything, the limited consciousness, else the Light is Awareness, and is not conscious of anything.
Clarissa: The Light sees the Light in this analogy because to be conscious of anything implies separation.
iRealization: Yes, there is nothing to be conscious of otherwise. No object and no seer of the object. Only Seeing.
Clarissa: Very important to be seen, otherwise one's chasing one's own tail always seeking for something.
iRealization: Always. Like chasing one's own shadow or a reflection in the mirror… a mirage.
Clarissa: Yeah…
iRealization: What you have to take away is just to relax and not really think about these things. Just relax, nothing to be discussed, nothing to be cognized, nothing to be analyzed. This is only for real listening. The knowledge is the only thing operating, you are not operating. Whatever knowledge you have operates. You are not operating it, it is operating you. So once you see that the knowledge is operating you, where is the question of illusion? Of free will?
Clarissa: I just want to submit and live…
iRealization: Nobody to submit and live. Take back your right of being aware instead of being subjugated to knowledge. This means instant freedom from thought because only Awareness is real. One has to remain focused, this is what we call effort. You may call it focus or attention, as in paying attention. What does it mean when somebody says “Hey, pay attention?” You put your focus where they’re pointing to. Practically that is to become aware of something and stay aware of it at all times. That is called meditation. The minute you are unaware of it there is a situation called “thoughts”. Only without Awareness can there be thoughts. And without Awareness nothing can be there. Can there be something without you being aware or the fact that there is Awareness of it?
Clarissa: No.
iRealization: So why not remain as what is always there? Which is Awareness. Everything is changing. What is it that is unchanging?
Clarissa: The awareness part.
iRealization: So we already isolated immediately what you have come to realize. You have come to realize Awareness, and what is there to realize about Awareness? All realization is conceptual. It cannot be realized, because Awareness is the very source of every thing, of all concepts. First you have to be aware then concepts can be created. So what came first? Awareness or the object?
Clarissa: Awareness.
iRealization: Right, because the object was only created after You created it. Before it there was only Awareness. What we call Awareness, right? But don’t make it something. It is the very thing, the actual.
Clarissa: I think I should meditate on this, on me…
iRealization: That is the most difficult thing to meditate on, the Self. But with this knowledge meditation will happen.
Photography - Courtesy of Bailey Zindel
