The Most Direct Path: Instant Conviction in the Attributeless Self I Bentinho Massaro

00:31 - To feel that what one is is attributeless. Therefore it’s not this or that. It’s nothing perceptible.

00:43 - It’s no sensation. It’s no feeling. It’s no idea.

00:50 - So try to stay devoid of attributes, and be. Be alert, be aware, be mindful, but without latching on to any attribute.

01:02 - Any quality. Any object. Just staying empty, staying unidentified… with anything that has the power to appear.

01:20 - And that is wisdom, that’s discernment. And we can always practice that, that we are not what appears, that this is not the Self.

01:33 - This is of the nature of the Self, but it is not the Self.

01:39 - It appears because of the power of illusion, but we are without attributes.

01:49 - And it’s like you don’t lend anywhere. No idea affects you.

01:57 - You’re not graspable by any concept or feeling. No sensation can grasp you. Just stay without attributes.

02:09 - That’s the combination of ‘not this not that’ or Neti Neti. And if that knowledge is strong, the knowledge that you are not what appears, then it can be maintained and practised even in appearance, in activity and sensations. If that knowledge remains strong, the remembrance, the discernment, the wisdom remains firm, that I’m attributeless.

02:36 - Then whatever sensations or attributes or ideas or relationships arise, it doesn’t grasp you. And it’s revealed to be empty, to be imaginary, to not have real existence, apart from the nature of the power of the Self, which is illusion. So just to stay, just to remain without quality, makes the mind subtler and subtler and more and more able to recognise Its Absoluteness.

03:16 - It’s freedom. Freedom is a good word for the true Self.

03:22 - It’s not this, it’s not that, it’s not the self. It’s not awareness, it’s not being it’s not da, da, da…

03:27 - Freedom cannot be defined. If it is defined, it is no longer free.

03:33 - It’s a thing, which is bound. It has limitation, it compares.

03:40 - So you are freedom itself. Freedom is one of the best terms to point to what you are.

03:49 - Because if you are freedom, then that means you’re not anything else.

03:54 - But try to find freedom. You know? You can’t locate it.

03:59 - You can’t identify it through a quality. It is attributelessness.

04:05 - Qualitylessness. And yet it mysteriously is.

04:16 - So freedom is similar to the Absolute? Yeah it is the Absolute. Yeah.

04:23 - I mean, it’s just the word, but it points to the same as the word absolute. Yeah.

04:29 - I’m just saying how it’s good to practice being without attributes and knowing yourself without any attributes. Removing the attributes or the attachment to attributes, qualities.

04:48 - Because it’s self evident that you are. It doesn’t have to be proven.

04:51 - It’s evident. We wouldn’t have this conversation if you were not.

04:57 - So that’s already confirmed. It is obvious.

05:01 - But then to not mingle it with any attribute.

05:06 - To remain… strong in your knowledge that you are free of all qualities and attributes, sensations and forms and colours and feelings and and ideas and memories and projections, states of mind, states of body.

05:25 - And just to remain aware of the contrast between attributes and yourself.

05:32 - It’s cuts through that illusion even while it’s appears. Now it can be very effective sometimes to enter a meditative state where you remove all these attributes from view, where you kind of enter into a state of concentration or Samadhi, or…

05:48 - expensiveness, where it’s more like space. So you more directly confirm to yourself that you still exist, without body, without mind, without thoughts, without experience in that way.

06:00 - But it’s equally, and maybe even more powerful, and for most people more practical, to practice it in contrast to attributes. Of the daily life, of the different bodies, the physical, mental, even the causal body, even God, even the I am being, even the knowledge I am, is still an attribute.

06:22 - So to remain strong conviction and awareness, attentiveness that you are nothing that is perceivable.

06:29 - Perceivable is made of the nature of you, but you are not that which you perceive.

06:34 - You’re not limited to. You’re not confined by. This is very simple practice, but it requires a…

06:42 - certain strength of determination and clarity, which is a practice and you’ll become subtler and subtler. The less you identify with attributes, you naturally become subtler, which is another way of saying: The mind becomes purer, or the essence of the mind becomes purer in its transparency to the truth that is beyond at all, even beyond itself.

07:11 - It’s a combination of purifying the mind, to the point where it recognises that even its own purified Self is transcended.

07:20 - It is still an attribute. The pure essence of mind or the Citta, purified Citta, or that pure I-Am without form or identification is stil an attribute. It’s the primordial attribute. It’s that ‘Moola Maya, Mool Prakriti. ’ That original essential nature of all appearances.

07:42 - But that two appears. That too is known. That too is a quality.

07:47 - It’s just a very formless pure quality that’s hard to describe in conventional terms.

07:52 - So the Self as the I-Am already transcends conventional reality.

07:57 - But then even that divine reality can also be known as an appearance.

08:03 - It can also be recognised. And then one can stay truly without attributes even without the attribute of God or Isness or beingness.

08:12 - And yet you still exist, you still are. Even without being.

08:17 - But that Are, that I-Am beyond the I-Am cannot be described, because it literally is prior to any concept, any atribbutes.

08:31 - So just remain ferm in your conviction that you are attributesness, while the attributes all appear and engage with each other. It is only attributes that are engaging with attributes. Attributes have never engaged with you. With the true Self.

08:48 - The mind connects with the body. The bodily sensations connect with the knowledge of the intellect of the mind, and are all kind of based in this void of nothingness or the causal body, which is all enabled by the light of awareness, of being or knowledge. Without knowledge you wouldn’t know nothing.

09:08 - Without knowledge you wouldn’t know intellect.

09:10 - Without knowledge you wouldn’t know sensory input.

09:12 - Without knowledge you wouldn’t know body or world.

09:15 - So all the attributes relate to each other and they make love to each other all the time. It’s just a mingling of ingredients like a big stew or soup.

09:24 - Different ingredients that are intermingled, but…

09:28 - the soup never intermingles with you. So just maintain that clarity of conviction.

09:37 - Strengthen it. Strengthen the conviction that you are without attributes of any kind.

09:44 - Even without qualities I-Am is the first and final and only quality that permeates every other quality.

09:51 - Every attribute is intermingled. Just like every ingredient in the soup consists of the water element or the liquid element. That’s the final attribute to disidentify from.

10:04 - But when you know the attribute or the pure quality of the water, you know the whole soup. It’s the wholeness, it’s the oneness, the everythingness, the I-Am-Brahman, I am all that there is.

10:16 - I’m everythingness. But then you realise the soup is apart from you.

10:20 - It’s a thing. It’s wat? A thing.

10:23 - It’s still a thing. Yeah. All be it the subject, but the subject is still an object.

10:29 - The pure subject of which all objects are made, is itself still an object to the absolute attributeless, unexplainable, mysterious existence beyond I-Am.

10:41 - So it’s not that hard, it’s not that difficult, we just need…

10:44 - consistency in our practice. It’s Just this knowledge.

10:52 - So that’s the path of understanding as opposed to the typical path of meditation. That doesn’t mean meditation cannot be an expression or extension of this knowledge. But it’s an extension of this knowledge rather than a means to it.

11:06 - If you understand it, it’s not that hard. You can even logically get it.

11:11 - And then that logic will become transparent to that intuitive knowing of it. And then meditation is kind of a natural expression of knowledge being maintained in the moment.

11:23 - When you maintain awareness of the attributelessness of Self, then that is meditation naturally.

11:32 - And it can be more or less pure, more or less quiet or more or less concentrated.

11:37 - But… those are just different degrees of meditation that follow ferm knowledge or understanding.

11:45 - And the distinction between Self and not self is ever present. It is ever clear.

11:49 - Because you’re always experiencing with one of the bodies, you’re always experiencing some quality or attribute that intermingles with the other attribute, a body is just an attribute too, to means to know other attributes that are really produced by that body.

12:05 - So the soup interacts with itself, but it never grasps what’s not the soup, which is you.

12:12 - The real you. So I like this tradition. It is good.

12:20 - It’s very simple, everyone can understand it.

12:23 - With a little bit of exposure to these teaching.

12:26 - And everybody can quote-on-quote practice it by just applying that discrimination on a day to day basis.

12:34 - Then nothing needs to be done. It’s just a matter of discriminating.

12:38 - Which is very appealing to us mind- based creatures.

12:42 - Because we can use the mind to discriminate.

12:46 - And it will connect to that deeper level of truth…

12:49 - or pure discrimination. Pure understanding.

12:58 - And then all the 10 qualities to describe, become naturally, they’ll naturally flower as expressions, but like you said, those are outward signs…

13:07 - of realisation. They still are attributes.

13:10 - Changing your quality from impure to pure or from angry to detached, are still outer expressions of realisation.

13:21 - So they don’t actually define it, but they are…

13:24 - natural emanations. That’s how the soup changes.

13:29 - When it realises it’s just soup, and it’s not the Self.

13:35 - And the flavour of the ingredients change. And everyone can do that.

13:41 - That’s what’s so nice about it, so compassionate about this path.

13:46 - So everyone already has that discrimination within them. It’s innate wisdom, it’s innate discrimination. It’s innate clarity, it’s innate knowledge, innate seeing.

13:57 - It is intrinsic to ourself, our very nature in each moment, it’s available.

14:02 - We just have to not be fooled by what appears.

14:05 - Maintain mindfulness of what appears with the wisdom that we’re not what appears. That’s the golden combination.

14:13 - Attentiveness of what is, what appears, what is known, with the wisdom in the background, the discernment, the knowledge, the understanding, that that which we’re holding within our mindfulness can never reach us, can never affect us.

14:29 - And it’s very simple. Very direct. It’s very here now always available.

14:35 - Nothing obstructs it, because you can with whatever comes your way you can be mindful of that, with the knowledge that too is not you.

14:46 - Whether it’s struggle or pleasure. Be mindfull of the struggle and the pleasure equally, like you’re being aware of the whole soup of sensation.

14:55 - With the knowledge, with the firm strength…

14:59 - of clear recognition that it’s not I. Not what I am.

15:04 - It’s happening on me. That’s not me. Every thing appears on top of me but it’s not me.

15:14 - That can be maintained through everyday action and speech even.

15:18 - You can speak while recognising being mindful of your speaking as an appearance, as a quality, and therefore, how can it be you? You endure! The speech begins and ends! The thoughts about the speech begins and end, the identification of the personality with what it says and how it’s received begins and ends.

15:37 - It’s not there when you sleep. It’s not there when you’re not talking. It’s not there, when you’re by yourself walking in the woods.

15:42 - How could it be you? How could the walking in the woods be you? How could the sleeping be you? They all come and go.

15:51 - Discernment is obvious, it’s so clear. It doesn’t require any special gifts or talents or…

15:58 - It even doesn’t require concentration. It requires some mindfulness, because otherwise you’re in the soup. You’re just swimming around is one of the ingredients. But that’s an assumption.

16:07 - And even that’s transcended more and more…

16:10 - when you realise in your moments of clarity, that even when you were unclear, that wasn’t you either.

16:16 - So that’s when you transcend knowledge and ignorance or dependence on it. Or liberation and bondage.

16:23 - Because, even while you felt like you were swimming around the soup, in retrospect with mindfulness in that moment you can still cut all the association, all believe that you were lost in the soup! It was the body that was lost in the soup.

16:37 - You were just asleep to your true self.

16:40 - You where asleep to that discernment. therefore, it felt like you were swimming into soup is one of the ingredients, among many other separate outward ingredients that you were reacting to, grasped by and affected by.

16:53 - But in retrospect, you can see very clearly that you were in that moment already, in essence in truth, ungrasped even by being grasped.

17:03 - Unaffected even by the feeling of being affected.

17:06 - You’re just not mindful of it in the moment.

17:08 - And that’s all right. Just practice mindfulness combined with the wisdom of discernment.

17:13 - Mindfulness combined with not this not that.

17:16 - Not this not that without mindfulness can be kind of sloppy or conceptual. But if you maintain an attentiveness of sort of the wholeness of the field, the wholeness of all the sensations and feelings and senses that are all appearing co-mingled in the soup of presence.

17:32 - If you’re mindful of the whole presence, with the knowledge of Neti, Neti, or I’m not that, that’s really when it becomes very effortless and very obvious. And that realisation is obvious. It’s not a obscure thing.

17:47 - It’s obvious. Waking up to what’s already the case.

17:54 - You know, the goal that we seek is, again, it’s what we already are. So it’s so close, there’s no way to it.

18:02 - It can only discern that it’s the case or forget.

18:06 - But even that kind of just happens on its own.

18:12 - Freedom from al that is. Yeah. Yeah, ‘all that is’ is the only illusion.

18:19 - Because it comprehends everything. You can say: Okay, well, the cinnamon or the garlic, or the chicken, or the water or the this or the that is the bondage.

18:32 - But they’re all the same soup. Right? They’re all that is.

18:38 - If we’re free from all that is we simultaneously are free from all the individual components that appear separate, but they’re not.

18:46 - So first, there’s oneness. And then there is discernment between the oneness and the truth.

18:53 - Duality is liberation. (Laughs) But some degree of mindfulness is definitely helpful.

19:01 - Attentiveness. The duality between all that is and myself.

19:08 - Right? Separation is liberation. Oneness is total bondage with everything.

19:14 - Like instead of being just the, just the garlic chunk, you’re now the whole fucking soup. I mean, what could be more bonding than that? You’re one with everything. You’re in love with everything.

19:26 - All at once. Jesus Christ! That is a heavy burden.

19:30 - And not only are you identified with the body, now you’re identified with everything! So separation is liberation.

19:37 - And it doesn’t mean that it is metaphysically understood at that stage that all that is is not… It doesn’t have a nature apart from the Absolute, but the separation is in the quality between quality and freedom of all quality.

19:53 - That’s just a fun way to kind of go against all the common scriptures.

19:58 - Actually, unity is bondage. It’s absolute bondage.

20:03 - And absolute separation is absolute liberation.

20:09 - We have to report you to the non-duality police.

20:12 - Oh yeah. The non duality police. Yeah.

20:17 - We will confuse some of them and will aggravate the others.

20:21 - But confusion is a good gateway into understanding.

20:28 - Good talk!.