July 12, 2000 Wednesday Evening with Aaron, At the Cabin at Friends Lake
Truth and Empowerment;Empowerment: Teachers, Truth, Views, and Authority
Aaron: Good evening and my love to you all. I am Aaron. We usually don’t have the opportunity to spend time together over the summer. It’s a joy to feel all of your energy and I thank your for bringing yourselves out here to this tree house and woods.
It’s such a lovely environment I’m tempted not to say anything, just to give you the privilege to sit here in silence and hear the birds, the wind rustling the tree branches, the natural sounds. But I know you have come here to hear me, so although I don’t think I can offer anything better than this rich silence I will share my thoughts with you.
An interesting question came to me this week. I’d like to share it with you. You know that when newcomers are present I usually precede my talk with the statement that what I offer is simply my own perception, what I perceive to be true, and that I do not claim it to be ultimate truth. A friend came to me and said, “When the Buddha taught, he said that what he taught was Truth with a capital T. Why do I (Aaron) not offer this as truth?” If it’s not truth, what is it?
Good question. I do not say it is not Truth, I only say that I do not tell you it is ultimate truth. That’s for you to decide. I offer you what I perceive and of course if I did not consider it to be truth I would not offer it. The Buddha said, “Be a lamp unto yourselves.” That means that you must light the way with your own wisdom and your own presence. You must discern for yourselves what rings true. I would not deny you that process.
There are relative truths. We may call them “views”. Two people can go to the lake and one can say, “The water feels warm today.” That’s her experience of the water, her view, her truth. The other can say, “The water feels very cold to me today.” And that is his truth. Neither one is wrong nor right. One experiences it as warm, one as cold. Each expresses their own truth as they experience it. In the ultimate sense, the water simply is as it is. That is ultimate Truth. The water has a certain temperature relative to the body and relative to the air.
When I say that I speak from my own perception, and then offer that perception, I am not merely saying the water feels warm to me. When I speak of suffering and the causes of suffering, for example, I speak with a certainly born of my own experience, that suffering does exist and that that suffering has certain causes. And finally, that there is a cessation to it. I do not experience this merely as a view, but as Truth. But if I then were to say to you, “This is how it is. Don’t argue with me. This is ultimate Truth.”, two things could happen. I would disempower you. If you have a lot of faith in me, you’ll believe me and you’ll become lazy and not investigate for yourself. Your own lamp flickers low or goes out. If you don’t have much faith in me or have never met me before, you might quarrel with me. But the quarrel might be an intellectual quarrel. Again, it does not well serve the lamp. I don’t want you to believe or disbelieve me. I do not claim to be an authority on anything but my own experience. Use my words as a map and find out for yourself.
If I state that experience simply as, “Well, I think it’s this way but I don’t know”, then I’m being irresponsible in not stating, “This is my experience”; I’m being vague and imprecise. “Maybe it’s this way, I don’t know.” But I do know. So I must state it, “This is my experience.” But if I say, “This is the ultimate Truth”, I don’t leave you any space to do your work. My statement “this is my own perception” then is not an expression of doubt either about my own experience or about what I consider to be ultimate truth, but it is an invitation to you to look deeply and see if what you experience as truth resonates with my experience of truth. If it doesn’t then one of us has some confusion.
When someone whom I respect says something that contradicts what I experience, I like to look at that to see if there’s something I’m misunderstanding. I would hope that my statements invite you to the same exploration.
When the resonance is there, that is a sign that we do experience this in the same way. When the resonance is not there, it doesn’t mean that one of us is wrong so much as that something is not yet fully understood. Sometimes it’s just the particular articulation or language which creates misunderstanding. After all, we cannot share our experience but only the labels of language which we put on that experience. Sometimes it’s a surface level contradiction. Sometimes one does not want to look as deeply as is needed because it feels frightening. Sometimes we cling to old and erroneous perceptions. Then view gets in the way of Truth. The voice that offers its own experience with the authority of practice, but without ego which says “only this,” is a voice from which you can learn. Thus I am very careful how I articulate when I teach.
In some traditions the teacher is looked upon as the authority. Whatever the teacher says is law; nobody would dare to contradict him or her. I have been a teacher in those traditions. I understand the responsibility of that role of authority. When people are accustomed to it, it can work to a degree. But both sides have a great responsibility. The teacher, not to betray that authority, and the student, to do his or her own work and not simply take the teacher’s word for it. Like any way of being in the world, the authority model has its strengths and its weaknesses.
In the Theravadin tradition, the tradition within Buddhism with which I am most at home, the teacher is looked upon as a spiritual friend. That also has its strengths and weaknesses. The difficulty here is that the teacher who is not comfortable, let me say this very clearly. The teacher who still has an active ego and at some level seeks to be an authority over others and is uncomfortable with that ego and its grasping for authority, may then back down and refuse to take any responsibility at all for what he teaches. The teaching becomes, indecisive. The teacher may say, “Well it could be this way, it could be that way.” Certainly, this leaves the student to work it out for himself. In that way it may empower the student. But the student has come to the teacher because the teacher has certain experience which can serve as guidance. If the teacher is unwilling to be the authority on his or her own experience, it doesn’t serve the student well at all.
There’s a very fine line. It is not the teacher who has authority, it is the dharma that is the authority. It is sati, mindful presence, which is the authority. It is awareness which is the authority. It is the deeply loving and open heart which is the authority. It is the Ground of Being, the divine essence of each, which is the authority. The teacher who has done his or her work, understands the practice and has developed a depth of realization of how things are, has no need to be the authority to another, but is willing to offer what he or she knows with a certainty, offering it for the guidance of others, but with no need to say, “This is it!” If it really is it, others will discover that through their own practice.
None of you would have any trouble if I handed you a bowl of plastic fruit with a delicious and ripe orange in the bowl, if I pointed to that ripe orange and said, “That one, this is it!”, you wouldn’t need me to say that, you’d look at the bowl and you’d pick out the ripe orange if you were hungry. Who would go for the plastic fruit? Who would be so easily deceived? But if the ripe orange is buried among the frauds and not so easily seen, it will help if I say, “The ripe one is there; the true fruit is there. Look and you will find it.”
So to convey what I know, I must take responsibility, I must say to you, “This is my experience. This is what I find to be true.” I don’t have to say, “This is it!” with an absolute authority, only, “This is what I experience as true.” Here I am being a responsible spiritual friend. I’m offering you my experience. If it’s useful, I will offer you ways to deepen your own practice so that you may enter a similar kind of experience and see if the fruit is really as sweet as I experience it to be.. Is this the sweet fruit or is this one plastic? I offer you the whole bowl. I point to the ripe one, the real one. If you’re still going to bite into the plastic fruit, you’re going to have to do that for as long as you need to. Eventually when you come around to the ripe sweet fruit, I have no doubt but you’ll know it.
What happens here is that dharma empowers us both. We each have a responsibility: the teacher, to say what he finds to be true without any hesitancy, for if it is the result of his experience, he knows it with certainty. But pride and ego do not speak this Truth; compassion speaks it. Out of compassion I must give whatever I can to aid in the resolution of suffering. The student, not to take the teacher’s word for it but to use the teacher’s words as a guide, to find out for him or herself, is this really Truth? And then, both can know Truth as Truth.
Nobody is really empowered or disempowered. How can one be empowered when each has limitless power? How can one lose that which is inherent to its being? But each finds within himself his own inherent authority which is not a personal authority but is the voice of dharma, the voice of Truth, the voice of love. This is why I teach the way I do.
The way I see it the teacher does not empower the student so much as the student empowers himself. You empower yourself by doing your own work, looking into things as they are and finding the truth for yourself. The teacher may invite in the student the faith in his/ her ability to do that work, and may introduce the needed skills. You disempower yourself if you take the teacher’s word for it and don’t look. And it doesn’t matter here whether the teacher claims himself to be the ultimate authority or simply a spiritual friend. In either stance from the teacher, the teacher does not disempower you, you disempower yourself because of how you relate to the teacher’s words. And in the same way, regardless of the teacher’s stance, you empower yourself. If the teacher claims him or herself to be the ultimate authority, you still don’t have to take him or her as that authority. Check it out for yourself.
In your lives, everything is a teacher. Some teachers come to you with a soft whisper, some with a shout. Some are pleasant in their demeanor and some very unpleasant, even very painful. When life is shouting at you, when people you work with are blaming you, for example, telling you everything you did wrong, or when a relationship is falling apart, and the other person in that relationship is angry and blaming, you are the authority, or more precisely, your innate wisdom and compassion are the authority.. No matter how much another blames you, even many others, you have the responsibility to check it out for yourself. If what they say is appropriate then you can apologize and change your behavior. If what they say is inappropriate, no matter how many of them there are swearing that you are wrong, then you have the responsibility to uphold your own truth. But you must be very honest to make sure it’s truth and not ego. Each of you does have the ability to discern that.
And if the other praises you and paces you on a pedestal, that also you must check out. Remember that the praise is not ‘yours’, but returns to the dharma.
When the voice comes as a whisper, just a small nagging doubt that was raised, again you have the responsibility to look deeply into it. Maybe you have helped somebody with a project and at the end they raise their eyebrows a bit and say, “This is not quite what I expected.” Maybe they were grossly disappointed but still all they said was, “Not quite what I expected.” Again, you are the authority. What was the mission here? Was it done as clearly as was possible? What was wholesome and skillful about the results? What was unwholesome and unskillful? What can be learned from this situation? Here is where you begin to cut through views and uncover truth. Some truths are painful. Perhaps a truth that there was anger that led you not to do the work as carefully as you might have. That’s a valuable insight. A truth of resentment or jealousy or pride; again, valuable insights. These mental states arise and one can be led astray by them. The next time when such an emotion is present, perhaps it will be possible to be aware of it, to work with it in a more skillful way so it doesn’t taint the final result.
These are small truths; that is, they are clearer than views but are not ultimate truth. The ultimate Truth here might be that when there are opposing views and people hold on to them, there will be suffering.
When you believe you are suffering because of some offense, words from another, or an injury from an object, look deeply into that suffering. In the suffering is wisdom if you will but look, for then you will discern the true causes of suffering, and with the causes you will see the cause/ effect relationships, impermanence of it and its cessation. Here again, you become the authority on your own experience, which reveals reality if you will but look. The Truth of Dharma empowers you to open to the freedom which is there for the taking.
No matter how a person approaches truth, carefully or not, skillfully or not, with their own huge or negligible ego, with their own anger or kindness, whatever they present to you, take it into yourself and look at it and find out if it rings true to you. And if so, what does that truth mean? What does it lead you to? What new ways of being in the world might it open to you, if you allow yourself deeply to experience that truth? Never be afraid of truth. It may be uncomfortable at times, may lead you to feel grief or shame, resentment or confusion. That’s not a problem. If a certain truth leads you to feel shame, just be there with the shame. Anger, confusion – be present with it. Allow it to open your heart, allow it to teach you.
Sometimes what one experiences as one’s truth seems to differ from the truth of those around one. For example, one might being might feel strongly that beings of all races, all ages , body builds, religious beliefs and cultural and national backgrounds, have an equal right to various kinds of opportunities. Others might say that their own truth teaches them that people of this or that color or religious or national background are wiser or better. This is like the water is warm, the water is cold. Two different views. Do not confuse views and Truth. Beyond the views there is a Truth and one can discern that Truth if one releases all views.
How do we know the difference? Views may change. Views are the result of conditions. The small truths which grow out of views are also subject to conditions. Truths do not change. For example to say that one person is superior to another is a view based on the observation of those persons, based on conditions. A truth with a small t may emerge from that view. But when one transcends conditions and sees how things really are, then one arrives at Truth.
If your own truth resonates deeply for you, and you find itisTruth and not a view, you must honor that truth. It dishonors Truth to get into a shouting match with another. “Mine’s better.” “Mine’s better.” “Mine’s better.” “Mine’s better.” Not useful.
If there’s real wisdom there, you will be able to understand how the other arrived at what seems to you to be a distortion of the truth, what is in reality a conditioned view. You’ll understand certain conditions such as fear or misinformation which led to those erroneous conclusions. You cannot force your view upon another. What you can do is lovingly to offer that view and to stand firm knowing that your statement may provoke a lot of anger in the other.
Let’s use a very simple example. One partner in a relationship drinks too much. The other partner is aware that each time the first drinks, he or she becomes angry and loses control, becomes unskillful in relationships to the first and to others. So the one who has ceased drinking or does not drink says to the other, “My experience is that when you drink it causes harm.” The other says, “No. I’m always in control.” This can get into a does/does not kind of argument. But you have the responsibility to state your view clearly, not “This is absolute truth”, but “This is how I experience it. What I experience is, when I see you drink then negative behavior erupts and causes harm. Therefore, each time I see you begin to drink, I am going to leave this place where you are. I will not stay with you and therefore support this behavior.” The other may become very angry. Of course, if they become physically abusive, you must put a stop to it by leaving the spot. If they become angry, that’s just a statement of how afraid they are, how defended they are of their position, which they may thoroughly believe to be true.
One’s view is “in control; drinking’s no problem.” The other’s view is “drinking’s not in control; causing suffering.” These are views. The Truth is that all behavior which is not grounded on presence, kindness, wisdom, may cause suffering. The Truth is that mindlessness creates suffering. These are not views, not changeable facts, but Truth. Then you add your personal truth, “I cannot participate in this creation of suffering, so if you drink, I must leave.”
You can’t round up friends and vote on it. The one who is drinking will say, “Well, you’re all wrong.” You just note that this is a view. Don’t argue the view; find the Truth that transcends views, such as that mindlessness enhances suffering. But state it with compassion, not self-righteousness! You have the responsibility to stand by what you experience as true, but, not to force your opinion on the other. Simply make the statement, “I will not participate in this behavior.” The other may catch on. He may not.
Another example. This is a hard one. The boss at work who is constantly abusive, constantly berates your work. At a time when you know you have done good work, and the boss looks at it and scowls, picks out one or two very minor flaws, perhaps even points that he had urged you to include although you felt they were not appropriate. Says, “Why did you include this information?” “Well, you told me to.” He’s angry. This is habitual with him.
What does it mean to state your view there? You might say, in your own words, “I hear that you are dissatisfied with this. Our opinions on our work are our views, and subject to change. It feels to me like you are always dissatisfied with whatever I do. This is also a view. We both want my work to be useful to you. If you will give me more specific instructions in the beginning, and will write it out, I will try to meet those instructions. When you simply berate my work at the end, when I feel I have done what you asked, I cannot accept that.” Here you are stating a personal truth. Again, he may be angry. You’re taking some risks. There’s always a risk to state your own truth to those who see it differently.
Remember, beyond the views, there’s a Truth. The Truth here may be that people will have different views. If they cannot agree to hear one another’s views, there will be suffering. if they wish to avoid suffering, they must work to hear one another. Here is letting go and cessation of suffering!
Your son wants the car. The last time he had the car he came home 2 hours beyond his curfew. Your own truth says no. He’s furious. What you are speaking from is your own deepest clarity and wisdom possible at the moment, your view. . You might later discover that you did not understand the whole issue. This is how we learn. If it’s clear that you don’t understand, then of course you don’t say, “This is my truth”, just “This is what I experience so far but I don’t really see the whole issue. This is my view” Maybe your son was late because he had a flat tire. Maybe the flat tire was your fault because you ran over a nail earlier in the evening. Maybe he had not had the chance to explain that to you.
We must differentiate between views, relative truths and ultimate Truth. Views about who is at fault, relative truth about the flat tire and the out-beyond-curfew situation, and ultimate truth about treating people as if the divine in each being was apparent to all, treating people with respect, kindness, care, treating yourself in the same way. An ultimate truth may be about the power of love and kindness. An ultimate truth may be about the nature of suffering and the fact that there is freedom from suffering. An ultimate truth may be about responsibility and the karmic formations which are the fruits of both responsibility and irresponsibility, kindness and lack of kindness.
If you state your truth from your own experience, that’s all you can do. If others present information which you had not previously considered, then you must take that into the experience and seek to understand it further and see if your insights change. But ultimate Truths will not change: the truths of goodness, of non-harm, of presence.
Never be afraid of the truth. It can lead to painful situations but in the long run, it is your strongest ally. Ego may want to present the stories, how he or she did this or that to me. Let go of that, that’s not truth, that’s ego’s stories. But truth is truth. It’s not so hard to get to know it.
I’ve touched on a wide range of subjects tonight all revolving around empowerment and what it means to be the authority of your own experience. I’d be happy to speak further about any of these issues, none of which we went into in any depth. I thank you very much for your attention. I will let you get yourself something cool to drink and then we will continue. That is all.
Barbara:I’m reading an e-mail question: “I have some questions about some things you told me about, Aaron. Am I correct that he was a Buddhist monk in Thailand? When was that? Did you say that he was an arahant? I believe you indicated that he does not follow the currently believed Buddhist cosmology regarding an arahant disappearing into the void, like a fire that is extinguished when its fuel is exhausted, that he does not believe this happens when an arahant dies. (An arahant in Buddhist terminology is a being that has reached complete extinction, enlightenment.) Do all arahants maintain some form of identity in the spirit world? Is the person known as Siddhartha Gautama, the last Buddhist, still available in some form? Does Aaron has access to him? If my impression is correct, the dhamma world would open its arms to the teaching of an arahant in whatever form he or she takes, if it is presented in a form others can relate to.”
Aaron:I am Aaron. I appreciate the opportunity to speak to these questions. There are many ways of articulating experience. Different religions use their own specific phrasing They are all articulations of the same experience, but because of the subtle differences in terminology, people may understand things differently.
When I spoke to this question briefly by email, I pointed out the old story of the blind men and the elephant. Each one holds a different part of the elephant. Somebody says, “What is an elephant? Ah, it’s like a tree trunk”, says the one holding the leg. “No, it’s like a whip”, says the one holding the tail. “You’re both wrong, it’s like a wall”, says the one with his hands on the elephant’s side. “Ah, no, it’s like a giant snake”, says the one holding the trunk. One elephant, different experiences of it. Furthermore, if one has never seen or felt elephant, tree trunk, whip, wall, snake, all of these explanations are conceptual.
In defining enlightenment, the Buddha emphasized the aspect of extinction. The questioner says: “the currently believed Buddhist cosmology regarding an arahant disappearing into the void, like a fire that is extinguished when its fuel is exhausted “ Thus, the conditioned moves to extinction. But the Buddha nature remains. How could that be extinguished? If the unconditioned exists, and is the Deathless, then what is extinguished? So we see that there is, and is not, extinction.
There is a quote from Vimalakirti,The Holy Teachings of Vimalakirti.“That which has no intrinsic substance and no other sort of substance does not burn, and what does not burn is not extinguished; such lack of extinction is the meaning of “peace.” So here we are talking both about extinction and lack of extinction. Something is extinguished but we come to see that where there is no substance, where there is nothing that burned, there is nothing that can be extinguished.
When the Buddha speaks about extinction, part of what he is speaking about is that which is seen as a separate self. As humans you experience this separate self and also may have occasional glimpses of that which is not separate. The being with some realization of the true nature of being, realizes that there is nothing separate. And yet there is a collection of aggregates which lives the incarnation.
With such realization, and when the heart is open, uncontracted and full of kindness toward all that arises and dissolves, and knowing the true nature of the conditioned realm, identification with sensations, emotions and thoughts will cease. When such identification ceases, and there is no longer energy to support these emotions and thoughts, then gradually the emotions and thoughts die out, or at least the emotions die out. The kilesas die away. The various energy contractions which supported the kilesas are extinguished.
Thought of a different nature may persist. Articulation is not necessary for thought. Thought can appear as a non-articulated insight into how things are, but there still is some level of thought. And as long as there is a physical body, sensations will continue.
The progression of experience is that one first moves from identification with thoughts and sensations as self into a spaciousness which sees their nature as conditioned – objects arising and dissolving because of conditions, impermanent and not self. But one may still contract around such arising, and preference may still be present.
Gradually those contractions cease. One rests in spaciousness, but body still gives rise to sensations and mind still gives rise to thoughts. One acts skillfully on the input from such sensation and thought, moving the hand away from the fire, remembering to close the window so the bed will not get wet from the rain. There is nothing to feed further karma with such arising. There is no contraction, no energy based on delusion of self, given to these arisings . Thus, we can say these contractions, in fact, ignorance itself, is extinguished. But a being still exists.
We need to examine the terms, stream entry, once-returner, non-returner, arahant. We must understand that these are passages, not abrupt steps. The one in Buddhist cosmology referred to as the stream-enterer may understand that everything that arises in the conditioned realm arises because of conditions and is not self, and yet has not been able to bring that understanding fully into his life. So the understanding is there but it is not fully integrated and there is still contraction around what arises. For the once-returner there may also still be contraction but it’s not as strong a contraction. The difference I think is that there is no contraction around the contraction. Certain emotions may arise. There may be a contraction around those emotions and then the spaciousness which sees, “Ah, this is just another piece of flow of conditioned experience”. Slowly that one has trained him- or herself away from taking the experience personally. The body/mind energy fields no longer contract around it. There is no longer an idea that it has to be fixed. There is a willingness to attend to what has arisen for the good of all beings. But that’s very different than fixing it, which is a contracted fear-based state.
For the non-returner, the emotions may still arise but they have no power whatsoever, they are simply seen as a cloud floating through. Between non-returner and arahant there is a huge breadth, a huge distance. Ten thousand steps of growth.
There is a place, (place is a rather inelegant word; can we rephrase that please?) There is a level of insight experienced where one sees so clearly the whole progression of the arising and dissolution of a certain emotion, and has so deeply trained oneself not to get hooked into that emotion, not to fear it, not to smother it and disown it, but to bring loving attention to it, to attend to it, – there is a level when one has persisted in that work where there is no “self” left to feel these emotions. All conditions have been brought in balance, and ceased, and the conditions and their results do cease to arise. And yet, as I said, this is a progression. For this hypothetical non-returner, in 999 cases out of 1000, sensation and thought may no longer give rise to anything beyond that immediate experience, but something very strong might still catch him. So he’s still not yet-forgive me, those of you who are female, I do not mean to exclude you when I use the pronoun “he”. She may not have yet reached the arahant phase where there is no such possibility of these emotions arising.
In Buddhist cosmology – as an aside I want to state that I have rarely been a scholar dedicated to the study of the precise articulation of these teachings, I have studied the sutras but my primary work as a Buddhist was in meditation areas. Certainly from where I stand now I’m capable of looking into it but it doesn’t seem necessary to do so. This then is simply my own perception – there are precise terms but the Buddha did not feel it necessary to delineate each part of each stage of this growth process, this transition process. I think he chose not to do that because he didn’t want people to hold it up as a chart and measure themselves. That leads to a lot of grasping, a lot of suffering. It certainly is not a helpful path. So he simply said, there is the once-returner, there is the non-returner, there is the fully enlightened arahant.
You don’t need to pin labels on your experience, all you need to do is to observe when certain kinds of sensations and emotions arise, how do you relate to them. Is there an increasing spaciousness and kindness with them? Are you caught less and less? Has wisdom developed into the truth of the relationship of the conditioned and the Unconditioned so that the arising of these conditioned sensations and emotions and thoughts leads you directly into an experience of the Unconditioned? It is here that even anger, fear, or pain can become teachers. As you progress in that way, the conditions that gave rise to these emotions will truly die away and full realization will develop. But you can grasp after these phases of experience, and perpetuate suffering..
What I experience is that most beings who reach the non-returner stage still may experience heavy emotion at times. Very rarely but it’s still possible. But there is no identification with it as self, there is no contraction around it. At this point one is ready to leave 3rd density, human experience, but there is still much to be learned.
I’ve defined 4th and 5th density. In 4th density you enter into a group experience. Because you do not take your own or another’s emotions personally but simply understand compassionately that they arose because of conditions, you can fully hear each other without feeling threatened. You’re fully open to each other. Fourth density then is a density of learning compassion and wisdom. You finally can learn from another’s experience. You’re telepathic in 4th density. Everything is shared within your group. Of course you have free will within that group, and you can always withdraw from it.
In 5th density, the being begins to withdraw from the group experience, not out of fear but because what needed to be learned has been learned. There is increasingly less possibility of the arising of any of the kilesas. Again, wisdom deepens, compassion deepens, and there is a willingness to take more responsibility. For such a being there is still a mental body. It will remain through 6th density. Sixth density is a density of immense deepening. There is nothing seen as self by the middle of 6th density, and yet the mental body is retained as a tool. Without this mental body I couldn’t teach you. It’s notmymental body, it’s just a tool.
Once when this instrument was going on a holiday I said to her, “I’m going to take a vacation.” She said, “You? A vacation? Where are you going?” I said, “It’s okay. If you need me just call out and I’ll be there instantly. But please do me the service not to call upon me if you don’t need me.” “Where are you going?” she said. “On retreat”, I replied. My vacation was literally to put aside the tool of mental body and rest in that spaciousness and immense peace, free of the tool of mental body. Even though there’s no identification of it as self, it’s still a tool that I must carry around.
So this is where I go on holiday. I could not call it an immersion into 7th density because to enter into 7th density is to fully let go of the mental body. But it’s a move in that direction. I am not afraid to let go of the mental body, but compassion leads me to stay connected to it as the teaching tool that I need.
Seventh density fulfills the quote offered by the questioner, the arahant as the one in whom all is extinguished. Am I then not an arahant? But self is extinguished. There is nothing here. There is no Aaron. There are only these tools with which I communicate to you. Is one more an arahant because he is taken that step into 7th density? I don’t think so. Each must do what he must do. It is not me doing it. It is simply the dhamma, ground of being acting through me, through this willing energy field which carries the intention to alleviate suffering. Whose intention? you might ask. Awareness’s intention. Love’s intention. And yet the intention was begun by the beings that I was through so many lifetimes including the final one. The intention to dwell in non-harm to all things and to alleviate suffering.
So there’s nobody doing it, it’s just awareness, goodness, love itself, carrying on this intention. I don’t know if this explains it any better. I hope so.
The one who was known as the most recent Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama, has not fully released the mental body but released it to the degree that clear articulation of it through such as this instrument is not directly possible. The vibrational frequency of that energy is too high.
But beings of 6th density like myself can communicate with this being, do communicate with this being. The questioner asks, can this being’s teachings be brought out directly into the world? They are being brought out directly into the world. He does not claim them as his teachings, they are simply the dhamma. He did not create the dhamma, he revealed the dhamma. It continues to be revealed not only through him, not only through 6th density beings who are fully realized beings like myself, it is revealed in a drop of dew. It is revealed in the grass, in a leaf falling from a tree and revealing its impermanence, in the smile and cry of a baby.
I would say here that I do take him as my teacher. I do revere him and attempt to pass forth that which he realized. Teaching through an instrument this way is new to me, so I carefully regarded how I would bring the teachings from that highest level onto the human plane.
He is not my only teacher; I also regard the one who was known as Jesus as my teacher. He remains more accessible. The one known as the Buddha is not more advanced because he has begun the move to 7th density, it’s just a difference in the way they will use their energy. If you leave honey in the jar, it may be spooned out at need. This is like the more available, upper sixth density being. If you pour it into an enormous pot of tea, then it sweetens all the tea. Each has a purpose. When one allows that move into complete extinction, as it was phrased, this is like the honey in the pot, touching everything. It is like the drop of water, purifies, returning to the sea. Like one more brilliant candle brought into the vast array of candles that light an infinite space. Just one drop, just one candle, but it has a tremendous impact when it is as pure a drop of water, as radiant a light, as the one of which we speak. One drop of honey sweetens everything!
There is darkness in the universe. There are beings of great negativity. They are not dual with the light. We’ve discussed this at length and I will not go into it here. But nevertheless, with that negativity they can do tremendous harm. There is a need for the power of light and love in the universe. To add this radiant energy into that sea of light is very powerful. And so this being who was known as Siddhartha Gautama moves in that way. That is his present form of service. And yet out of compassion to beings he does not go all the way but remains available.
The one known as Jesus finds that it is of greater service for him to remain more directly available. And so he does that, and can be more accessible to humans. Each does what they can do best in service to all beings.
There is much more that could be said about these questions, but I think this is sufficient and I will end here. That is all. I will welcome your questions about this or other topics. I pause.
Q:I would like to ask Aaron about devotion and longing. They often come together in my experience. Sometimes they feel very heart-opening and important, and an important part of me. Sometimes I worry that it reinforces a kind of duality.
Barbara:Aaron asks, how do you define longing?
Q:It’s a yearning for something ultimate. I could say it’s like wanting to know God. Kind of like homesickness.
Aaron:I am Aaron. We have to consider the relative and the ultimate in human experience. On the ultimate level, there’s no place to go. You’re already home, but the human does experience a longing for the divine, since it does not yet realize its true state.
You agreed to this veil of forgetting. Your entire incarnate experience has a purpose of growth and integrated realization. Realization is of the ultimate truth of your being. By “integrated realization” I mean the ability to live this deepest truth in the mundane world. Growth is to move past the old negative tendencies which arose because you did not understand the divinity of your being and lived in fear. But this concept of separation form the divine, and the resultant fear, provides the learning situation, the opportunity replace the dialogue with fear with compassion , kindness, faith, love and an open heart.
On one level there’s no place to go and on another level, there is a path, or seems to be. If you’re going to go somewhere, there’s got to be an intention to go there, otherwise you won’t travel anywhere. Where you are going is not into perfection, as that already exists, but to abandon this dialogue with fear and grow into the enactment of the compassionate heart.
Let’s use a metaphor here to clarify. Picture somebody resting on a small raft tied to a tree branch which overhangs a river. All they know is that there is river which flows before it reaches them and flows beyond. They have no concept that it goes anywhere. Maybe there’s a waterfall just above them and a waterfall just below and they think the entire river is from the base of one fall to the top of the next. Then somebody comes along and says, “Have you ever been to the sea?” “The sea? What is the sea?” And slowly the desire, the yearning, arises. “I want to get to the sea. I’ve heard it’s so vast, so beautiful.”
Now, if they don’t have any concept that there is a sea, they can’t intend to go there. I suppose they could just untie their raft and drift along, but as soon as they come to the waterfall and it looks like an unsurmountable obstacle, they’ll stop. But when they hear there’s something beyond, then it brings up this longing. There’s also a sense of devotion, in this case a faith, that there really is a sea and that it’s a worthy object of intention. So they untie the raft, float and battle and struggle their way downstream over many different kinds of obstacles and finally the raft flows out through the mouth of the river into the sea. And it’s just as vast, radiant, and magnificent as they had believed it was.
After a bit of time floating on the sea, they stop and question, “What is the nature of the sea? Water. What was the nature of my river? Water. The sea is no different than my river, it is simply the place where the river comes.” And suddenly they understand, “I’ve always been in the sea, only I was in a different aspect of the sea. But I’ve never been separate from the sea.”
In order to understand this, they had to reach the sea. In order to understand there was no place to go, they had to go there, to learn that it was where they had always been.
But within the journey is the growth, the opening heart which makes space for the obstacles, the developed faith and lovingkindness which made the journey possible.
This is a progression, then. Once you understand the nature of the journey, the longing ceases. There’s no place to go. Earlier the longing served a purpose.
The work that you must do with such longing is to make sure that intention comes from a place of love and not fear, from a place of moving to, not running from. You must attend to grasping and know it is the root of suffering, so that in the place of grasping comes aspiration, a very openhearted movement toward that which is inherently beautiful and pure and good.
As you experience the innate goodness, faith and devotion arise naturally. These support the journey, and at the culmination of the journey, the longing is gone and the devotion is transformed into pure love, truth. Does this sufficiently answer your question? I pause.
Barbara:Others?
Q:I have 2 questions. The first is, I’ve had the experience where someone has told my future very, very specifically and it has come to pass. I’m wondering how it can be that I had free will but they could see anyway. I know they have deep insight into dependent origination. Is that how they see it?
Aaron:I am Aaron. If somebody is very angry and greedy, has no qualms about harming another person to take what they want, one might with some degree of certainty predict that this person is going to suffer loneliness, the anger of others. One reaps what one sows. If somebody is very kind, generous, deeply concerned for the welfare of others, one might with some certainty predict that this person will be loved by others, will experience deep connection with others and not feel lonely; will be happy. One reaps what one sows.
But the one who is greedy and angry, at any point he may see what fruits he is reaping through his greed and his anger, and change, and then the prediction will be wrong. It is less likely but possible that the one who is kind and generous will suddenly find a place of enormous fear where he becomes greedy and angry and reaps different fruits.
So, somebody has predicted the future for you and it came true. What they did was very simple. They looked at what seeds you were planting and came to a hypothesis that if you did not make changes or if you only made certain changes which were already indicated as to their possibility, then this is what would be the result. That’s all.
It’s not much different than a game this instrument’s children used to play, putting a ball on top of a mound of sand and guessing which way it would roll. They would look at the sand and see where the subtle inclinations or the steepest slope was. Which way was the prevailing wind. Usually they were right.
What I find difficult about such predictions are, one, that it creates a false authority in the one who predicts, and second, that it creates a limit for the one who hears the prediction. It wrongly influences the outcome. If 2 people are playing chess and I’m an expert at chess, and I watch the game flow back and forth for a moment and then say, “Ah, you’re going to win and you’re going to lose”, if people know I am an expert, the one who I said would win is more likely to play to win; the one who I said will lose is more likely to play to lose. It’s like the role of the observer looking through the microscope who in some way influences that which he observes by observing it. So he is a participant with what he sees. The one who predicts influences the outcome and this corrupts free will.
This is about human responsibility and free will. You will always reap what you sow. It may seem to another that you are planting certain seeds, and to make a prediction based on that seeming sowing. But it is to my way of thinking of great harm to beings to predict the future which is a statement of belief that one will continue to plant the same seeds. It categorizes a being and denies the free will possibility of changing course into a more positive or sometimes to a negative track.
It doesn’t strike me as at all unusual that somebody could predict what might be the outcome. And you cannot prevent people from saying, “I know what’s going to happen.” But you can know within yourself, “This is just his opinion. It doesn’t have to happen that way. It depends on my choices.” This is part of the whole issue of empowerment at the beginning of tonight’s session. Does this adequately answer your question? I pause.
Barbara:Time for one or two more questions…
Q:I have a hard time with the idea of free will. For me, I only have free will when I’m at a point where I can make a certain kind of decision based on my experience. And what was my free will 10 years ago may be very different from my free will now. And I’m just wondering how free I was ten years ago. In other words, I could say I had free will ten years ago, but really it was based on a more contracted state than it is now. So the whole idea of freedom is, I’m just questioning and wondering about that.
Aaron:I am Aaron. Thank you, R, you raise a very useful point. We must distinguish between various levels of free will and understand what we mean by free will. Only the one who has realized the nature of things to the point that he or she is not at all influenced by conditions, but sees with perfect clarity can make choices with what we would call ultimate free will. That is, totally free of conditions. Even there, the choices are made based on an ultimate condition, which is the final realization of how things are.
If I ultimately understand that if I swing my fist through the glass window there, I’m going to break the glass and cut myself, if I understand the implications of my act and if my aspiration is to do no harm, if my intent is to do no harm to myself or any being, then I will not swing through it. Is that a limitation of free will?
On another level, one has the free will to experiment and even to make what you term “mistakes.” Have you ever watched a toddler repeatedly attempt to place the wrong piece in a puzzle. She is learning about form and shape, learning as much by this “wrong” placement as by a “right” placement. Free will is an interesting term and maybe the difficulty lies in the word itself. You say the decisions you made 10 years ago are different than you would make now. But you had the choice to make those decisions, skillful or unskillful, as you have the choice today. That is what I mean by free will. But if somebody comes to you and says ether “you must swing your fist through the window whether you want to or not “ or “you may not even consider it”, then you don’t have free will.
There are always going to be conditions that influence the choice. Within free will you control the conditions. That is, in this example you control the decision to do harm to yourself and others or not to. You may say, “Well I don’t have any choice about that, I’ve been so conditioned to defend myself. So conditioned to be reactive to my feelings, my emotions, that if I’m angry I have no choice but to strike my fist through the glass.” If you’ll pardon my language, bullshit. You always have a choice. And you always have the responsibility to investigate what seems to be the limits to your experience so that you may act with increasing love, care and responsibility. To act in such a way is to exhibit the ultimate in free will, which is the free will decision to live one’s life in love.
Shall I speak further on this my sister, or is this sufficient? It’s an interesting subject and I would like to talk further on it on a future night. But I think it could use a lengthy rather than a short talk. I pause.
Barbara:Is that sufficient for now? (Yes.) One last question?
Q:Aaron has a very loving and liberated way of teaching the relationship between the student and the teacher. In Tibetan Buddhism, for example, lineage, initiations, transmissions, still seem in very strict fashion to be followed to the letter. Is this perhaps one of the transforming areas of Buddhism, the attitude of teachers and students? Is Buddhism still changing?
Aaron:I am Aaron. I do not think this is a transforming area so much as that each tradition is based on a different process of realizing enlightened mind. However, I do pray that the distortions in each tradition are being dissolved so there is less suffering along the path.
There are many kinds of personalities and so there are ways of learning for different personalities. In a tradition in which you offer allegiance to one teacher and regard that teacher really as Buddha, as infallible, there’s a certain demand placed on each side. The teacher must be even more impeccable than the aforementioned spiritual friend in order to do this well. Their personality must not get in the way, so there’s no ego demanding authority. There is a willingness to be the authority for others.
The process for the student is that acceptance of that authority, if it’s to be successful, must come from a place of love and not fear. With that love, the heart opens. The teacher is truly seen as the Buddha. Within the teacher’s Buddha nature, one sees one’s own Buddha nature reflected. The specific details of what is taught are far less important than the process of devotion to the teacher. So the tradition is grounded very much in devotion and the transformation that devotion may create when one sees one’s own divinity as a reflection of the teacher’s divinity. The human teacher will undoubtedly, if you’ll excuse my language, fart and shit and belch, stink when he sweats. He’s got the same body that any of us have. He must have enough spaciousness for this body and also for the mind and emotions, if they’re not fully resolved. Then what he transmits to the students is this vast spaciousness and love. And within that spaciousness and love, the divinity which is reflected and picked up by the student.
However, the student will still need to do his or her own training with the discomforting eruptions of his or her own body and mind. I think what makes it easier is when there is this deep perception into the non-duality of conditioned and Unconditioned, into the divine nature of being, and some stabilization in that experience as foundation. In this way guru yoga parallels the pure awareness practices except in pure awareness practice one finds that divinity in one’s self and one’s own experience rather than through the teacher.
Does this answer your question, A? I pause.
Barbara:He says he’s not sure he got it all.
Q:I am unclear. In the future, will the teacher/student relationship transform because of teachers like Aaron?
Aaron:I am Aaron. Forgive me, dear one, but I will not predict the future!(Laughter)There is a probability that as beings more deeply realize their own nature and strive to enact their inherent goodness and clarity in the world, there will be transformation. It depends on each of you. You all have free will. I think this is a good place to end. Thank you for your attention. My blessings to each of you and may you enjoy these weeks of summer. That is all.