Dear Cynthia,

Thanks for the email. Yes, I am fine. I enjoyed your letter, read it carefully and made a few comments below. I hope they are helpful.

Cynthia: Through a dream I became aware that in the momentary state of my life I need to carry in me both life-concepts: a personal way of unfolding by clearing up lots of suppressed feelings and dissolving insufficient patterns of behavior on one hand. On the other hand the perspective on human beings as you were describing it by the Vedantic point of view. I´ve got the feeling your teachings had the effect of watering some seeds in me which were spread by reading Sri Nisargadattas book "I am that".

While the past twelve years I've read them again and again and to me it's like understanding this concept in a cognitive way but not being ready to live what I understand, means "to be that ". There's a saying : You can't let go what you've never held in your hands. That's what I feel with me in some areas of my personality. But although I wish to develop those parts of my personality my wish of transcending personality is as strong as well.

Ram: There is nothing really ‘wrong' with the limited human point of view except that, because it is dualistic, it continually presents conflicts. Should I do this or that? Should I see it this way or that way? Usually conflicts are resolved by one's values. If I want money and there is an unethical but easy way to get money I will have a conflict. So I have to decide whether my value for money or my value for integrity is more important to me. This means that human values are also subject to conflict. So when I have a conflict of values I need a ‘meta' value that will resolve it. Values belong to the ego, the human being.

When there is a conflict Vedanta asks, ‘What is the ultimate value? What is it that will always serve me in every situation? And the answer is always ‘a conflict free mind.' Why is this the most important value? Because a mind free of conflict is a happy fulfilled mind. And it is for the sake of happiness that I do everything. Happiness is the nature of the Self. It is not object related happiness but uncaused happiness, i.e. peace. And from this platform of a healthy, happy mind one can make the final step into complete freedom.

The saying ‘that you can't let go of what you've never held in your hands' points to one of the big problems that one always has to deal with in Maya, this relative world. It is not at all unusual that you should feel this way about ‘some areas of your personality.' Why? Because there is nothing solid and substantial about the personality. It does not stand alone and nothing in it stands alone or remains the same long enough for you to get a clear idea of what it is, what caused it and how to deal with it. Everything is affected by everything else; the whole big psychological soup is in continuous flux.

In Vedanta this level of reality is called ‘mithya,' apparent reality. It is not totally unreal because it is experienced but it is not totally real either because it is never the same. In psychology they speak of ‘complexes' which I understand to mean that certain similar individual traits (vasanas) group together to make a megavasana , a ‘complex' or a powerful tendency to behave a certain way. These things are always in flux and are not easily affected by conscious action, therapy or sadhana, for example.

On top of the problem of the insubstantiality of the personality is the problem of how I see my personality. This again is a question of values. What values cause me to see my personality, my ego, in a certain way? If I think it is a solid real thing and I don't like it then I may set out to change it into something that is more appealing to me. If I don't understand that nothing is every resolved in Maya I may work for years and years and still not achieve the result I want. And even if I do achieve the result I want I am still subject to conflict because this result is in time and I need to worry about how to keep it.

Every situation, objective and subjective, generates a conflict: how should I act or react to it? And if you look at any situation objectively, both sides of the issue seem to be logical and consistent. In relationships, for example, two people come to completely opposite conclusions about a certain situation. Both have come to their conclusions honestly and because of that both are ‘right.' Yet a big conflict is generated. I see it this way, you see it that way. What is the court of higher appeals? Where can I take this conflict to resolve it?

This is where the Self is useful. The Self, the non-dual vision of reality, solves conflicts because it sees that all things are fundamentally equal, no matter how different they seem. This is the ‘transcendental' approach. The way out is not by taking Maya to be real and therefore trying to resolve a conflict ‘in Maya' but by looking at Maya from the Self's point of view which immediately reveals Maya for what it is…a joke.

In your case you seem to be saying that there is some doubt about whether or not you can live as ‘That' i.e. the Self. So how does one resolve this apparent conflict? In the first place there is nothing wrong with trying to change the relative Cynthia as long as you realize that you are trying to change something that is mithya. When you try to change an apparent reality you will never be completely satisfied. There is always something that is unacceptable. And the only way to make what it unacceptable acceptable is to accept it. Complete acceptance of things good and bad is non-dual vision in action.

Usually one is dissatisfied with one's personality because one is small-self-centered, one has an unnatural, not to say narcissistic, fascination with one's self/personality/ego. One feels very ‘responsible' and feels a ‘duty' to make oneself better. This is one of the more unfortunate legacies of Christianity's view that we are all sinners.

You perhaps know the story of the princess and the pea. She can feel the pea under her mattress and does not sleep well. So she gets a second mattress but by this time she is so sensitive that she can feel the pea beneath two mattresses. Twenty mattresses later she can still feel the pea.

So when you do psychological work your mind gets very subtle and things that did not bother you about yourself and others before, things that you did not even notice, become a problem and you feel that you have more work to do. When does it end? There is nothing in the program of human beings that says that they all have to be saints. So at some point you should become tired of trying to make yourself better if you are going to be happy. You should say, “Hey, I'm not a child molester or an ax murderer or a bank robber. I'm good enough as I am.”

This is what Vedanta calls freedom. It is freedom from Cynthia, the person. You look at the person through which you are shining and you see it as an imperfect but loveable object, like a child. One doesn't stop loving his or her child because the child is selfish, petty and vain. Yet people will withhold love from themselves because they have some unpleasant personality traits. Love for the child is unconditional. If you take the Self's point of view, the personality is a child. It is unformed and incomplete and no matter how good it is it will never be perfect. Unconditional love is just an emotional word for non-dual vision.

So at some point the person has to become fed up with this small self concern. And then it is possible for the mind to focus on something greater. When you get absorbed in something other than the personality, personality problems work out automatically because they are sublimated into a greater point of view. Vedanta tries to make that point of view the Self and to help you cultivate non-dual way of seeing since this view is so effective at solving existential problems. You can do this profitably because there is actually only one self and it is non-dual. You may only believe it at first but as you start to make your choices from that point of view and see the results you become more and more confident that the non-dual view is correct.

Cynthia: In my dream the solution was given in the following picture: both are walking side by side towards a quiet lake. And the dream ended up by the words: By saying good bye new mails were coming in. I do not understand yet what these mails definitely mean. I've only got the feeling that our meeting will have an important effect on my future life and it's already having the effect of heart-opening, a large inner space and a deepening of trust in life and love for people and life.

So I'd like to keep contact with you and learning more about what you are living already.

Ram: I'm very happy to develop a friendship with you, Cynthia. I liked you immediately and I get the feeling that I can be of service to you. So let's email and when I come in March perhaps we can meet and see what happens. The best situation is where I can be with the person in their life for a couple of weeks and see them every day and we can apply the non-dual vision to everyday life.

As far as the dream is concerned perhaps it means that when you let go of something (say goodbye) ‘new mails' i.e. new messages come in. The non-dual vision is like new message in the post.

Cynthia: I'd like to talk to you about some thoughts. I understand that I'm awareness and being that means being complete. This is the absolute layer of what you are talking in your teachings. This absolute layer includes the relative one, having a personality, having history, and this means changing again and again, means borders in thinking, feeling, living etc. So I'm both, complete and limited, just different points of view as you have when you stand on top of a hill and look in different directions. To stay with this picture: You are the top but the limited mind only enables you to recognize one direction after the other and then you can resume being on top which is actually a panoramic view. The point is a development of the mind which enables one getting to a meta-level. So personal life seems to be necessary to unfold the ability to recognize that I am the awareness, I am the universe and I am all I am aware of. So regarding it this way borders are important and helpful states within the completeness that have to be passed through for developing strength to reach the top: the knowledge that I'm awareness.

Ram: Yes. In the beginning it may seem like the two points of view are in conflict but in fact the Self's point of view includes the ego's point of view. So you don't lose the ego, you gain the Self. But yes, you need a healthy ego with a good sense of its limits to make a successful inquiry into the Self and to assimilate the non-dual vision. The important point as I mentioned above, however, is that you like yourself enough and are reasonably pleased with the life you are living so that you can take a vacation from yourself and put the energy you would put into making yourself and your life more/better/different into a dispassionate exploration of the Self.

Cynthia: What do I want with this example? I wish to become clear about this force in me that partly feels imprisoned and want be free . What I understand from enlightened people is, realizing that I am awareness means freedom. But this doesn't make any sense to me.

Ram: It doesn't make sense because you are free as awareness, not as Cynthia. There is no real thing that can be called Cynthia. Cynthia is insubstantial. It is an idea, a name that is given to identify a body so that it can function in Maya. Think about who Cynthia is. Can you put your finger on her? Can you hold her in your hands? If you try to explain her to yourself you will only be able to talk about experiences that you have had or things that are going on in your mind… things that do not add up to a person.

The ‘transcendental' point of view, the Self's point of view, insists that you stop identifying yourself as Cynthia exclusively. Freedom is not freedom for Cynthia because there is no Cynthia. It is freedom from Cynthia. You, awareness, are aware of Cynthia. She is an object to you. She is you, but you are not her. You know her. So she cannot be you. In your next statement you seem to understand this.

Cynthia: I understand that I'm awareness but Cynthia isn't free. The personality never can be complete or free for the personality is changing the whole life. It is a lovely facet of Brahma that makes life full of colors.

Ram: Yes.

Cynthia: But change includes borders and always remains within the walls of relative life. And as long as I live within these walls I will feel the wish to unfold, become free, gain more space to spread my wings.

Ram: That's right. The feeling that you referred to above “this force in me that partly feels imprisoned and wants be free” is due to your identification with the Cynthia concept. Freedom is knowing that the I is the Self and not the Cynthia concept.

Cynthia: Isn't that a fact also beside the fact of being awareness?

Ram: It isn't a fact ‘beside' if by ‘beside' you mean that it has equal value. It is a fact but it is a fact with considerable less reality than the fact of your non-dual nature.

Cynthia: Isn't human life a platform that enables one to realize the amazing complexity of the universe of Consciousness and at the same time developing a quite enlightened way of behavior to handle this universe?

Ram: Well, it might be a platform, but what one sees from that platform depends on one's values. And one's values depend on who one is. How valuable is life apart from the Self? It is only valuable for the sake of the Self. And what use is the realization of life's ‘amazing complexity' if one does not know the Self? Or, to put it another way, ‘life's amazing' complexity' is only amazing because the Self is amazing. So isn't knowing the Self the reason we have been given this life?

The last part of your statement bears looking into: “at the same time developing a quite enlightened way of behavior to handle this universe.” I think I'll argue with you a little bit about this idea, although in general it is a reasonable statement.

Vedanta says that all behavior is ‘enlightened': that is to say that it takes place ‘in the light' of Awareness. And if this is a non-dual reality then unenlightened behavior has as much value as enlightened behavior. It is a problem to think of enlightenment too much in terms of behavior because all behavior ultimately serves the Self. If I hadn't made such a mess of my life by living in an unenlightened way I probably would have never suffered enough to have got on the path to Self realization. And it is quite possible for people who are good and behave in an enlightened way to create a lot of misery for themselves and others…the history of religion can supply infinite examples of this truth.

So ‘developing a quite enlightened way of behavior to handle this universe' is a very tricky proposition. In fact ‘the enlightened way of behavior' is already built in…because this is a non-dual reality. It is programmed at the deepest level of every living being, including plants and animals. It is called dharma. If a person is too much under the spell of rajas and tamas it is possible that he or she is cut off from dharma and will not behave in a dharmic way.

Cynthia: If enlightenment could people set free…

Ram: It doesn't set people free. It sets people free from the idea that they are ‘people.' If I'm not a ‘people' I won't have the problem of bondage and freedom. Behavior will not be a problem. I will not interfere with the working of dharma in my body and mind and I will be a blessing to others.

Cynthia… there wouldn't exist such a disaster on personal level caused by so called “enlightened persons”.

Ram: You answered your own question here with the world ‘so-called.' This kind of person has a different definition of enlightenment. They always see it as an experience of some sort or other that is quite distinct from them. They are not enlightened if by enlightenment we mean the hard and fast knowledge that I am non-dual limitless awareness and not this body mind complex.

Cynthia: I believe that those people realize or understand that they are awareness but lots of them don't seem to have a solid psychic structure to handle their knowledge in an “enlightened way”. You mentioned Da Free John, I heard and read about Chögyam Trungpa , Sogyal Rinpoche , and other Indian masters…alcohol, drugs, sexual abuse, rapacitiy , exploitation...

Ram: Yes, this is true. Dogzen said, “Next to dharma, enlightenment is the most important thing in the world.' You need an ego that follows dharma. It is possible, however, to realize the Self when there are still adharmic tendencies in the personality and to convert them to dharmic tendencies as a result of your Self knowledge.

Cynthia: To me it seems that being conscious that I am awareness is only half of the knowledge. The other half has to be developed more or less, depends, and is concerning the personal layer, the way of behavior in the world and against people.

Ram: Who is being aware of being awareness? Is it awareness or is it someone other than awareness? When what it means to be awareness is understood, behavior takes care of itself because you have understood that you are the ultimate value and that the apparent ‘others' are non-different from you. How can you treat others badly then?

Cynthia: It sounds and looks like a trap if being aware that I'm awareness leads to the conclusion that there's nothing more to do, everything is fulfilled. There seem to be a short circuit in this way of understanding the completeness of Brahma. I ask myself why did consciousness give me two hands, two eyes, two legs and so on and last but not least two layers of reality, the limitless plus the limited one?

The idea I've got to is that one side has to cross the other in a quite netting way so finally a wonderful individual texture like an artful garment can appear and become alive.

Ram: You say ‘one side has to cross (to) the other so finally…an artful garment can appear and become alive….' Vedanta says that there is no need to get one side to cross over to the other because awareness and the body/mind entity are already one. They are alive because the ‘crossing' has already happened. It is not something that one can achieve, something that will take place one day when circumstances are right. It is something that needs to be appreciated here and now.

Cynthia: It feels like we need both layers to wake up….

Ram: Vedanta says that you are already as awake as you are ever going to be . You, awareness, was never asleep. Just as there is no actual Cynthia, there is not someone who is asleep. There is only one self and it is eternal unborn undying awareness. Nothing is required for it to be awake. In fact you have to be awake to know that you are asleep. If you define awakening as shedding ignorance of your real nature then it is a reasonable but imperfect metaphor.

Cynthia:…to understand life as a chance to become a highly developed human being radiating love, dignity, a deep and hole understanding of life and people and thus illumining the dark and sleeping and suffering spaces of people among us so that they can get alive glimpses of what everybody is seeking for.

Ram: One of the first things I thought when I met you was that you were a highly developed human being. In fact Vedanta is made for ‘highly developed human beings.' It does not make highly developed human beings. This is left to people as they struggle through life. But once a person is highly developed there are still a few questions that being highly developed will not answer. And when they are developed they come in contact with Vedanta in one form or another. As I mentioned above the princess and the pea syndrome comes into operation when you are speaking of ‘development.' You can't find an end to it in Maya and it can easily become the goal itself.

Cynthia: So much for my “concept” of enlightenment and the two layers of reality! I'm looking forward to discussing this topic with you that it can become more clear to me.

Love, Cynthia

Ram: Well, you did a good job articulating your views and I tried to shed some light on them in light of the non-dual teachings of Vedanta. I hope this is useful. It will work best if it becomes an ongoing discussion. It takes time to work though these things and refine one's understanding. Thank you for writing. I was getting lonely for some satsang. I've been involved in getting over jet lag, nursing an aching back getting my apartment set up, seeing friends, etc. And all that is pretty much over now so your letter was timely and most welcome.

Love,

Ram