Dharma and Inventory

Dharma and Inventory

Live Meet Transcript 24.04.2016
Speaker: Rohan
www.rohan.life

When we live in a small apartment or small space,

as we go through life, ​we accumulate more and more objects, and more, and more things. We get to a point of asking ourselves: Do we move into a bigger house? Or, do we claim more storage? Put more cupboards up? Fill the spaces with more and more storage devices, and keep expanding the space, or building spaces within space, to make it look more efficient & cleaner? Or, the alternative is, we start removing the inventory that’s not being used, that’s not of service, that's cluttering the space.

There are two main choices. We learn to accommodate or make a bigger space by moving.

But, with moving and the bigger space comes a bigger burden. We have to raise more finances now. We have to look after a bigger space, clean up a bigger space, fill up bigger space. And so, our inventory grows, and grows, and grows, and grows. Then, at some point in our life, we are getting to a certain age where we realise- “Oh we don’t need all these spaces.” We start getting older and we are not doing the activities we used to do, we start going small again.

The point being is that it's much like our internal existence. As we get older, more, and more worldly things are presented to us, more, and more worldly ideas come to us, more, and more experiences come to us, and we start collecting inventory.

An inventory of knowledge. Much like we collect furniture, and items within our home, we collect knowledge within the psyche of our being, which we store within our nervous system.

Our nervous system becomes like a library, for the storage of knowledge, which the mind can pull from at any time, any point, and the brain is like the switchboard.

The front of the brain is the switchboard for all of this collected knowledge, this knowledge stored within us. Almost like a computer. It takes energy to maintain. We've got a very small current containing all this knowledge and information. Our traumas, our fears, our misbelieves, our misunderstandings, are also in this category and may be stored in slightly different parts of our nervous system library. But, it takes energy. So now we have dozens, to hundreds, to thousands, to millions of ideas, and concepts, and fears, and beliefs, clogging up our living space, our nervous system. Our living space becomes clogged up like a hoarder.

And, we are quite often in a society where knowledge is considered king.

Filling ourselves up, or filling our home full of objects, and books, and knowledge, and things, is considered the winning way. But, somebody that thinks a bit deeper, perhaps through having this experience, might realise that it doesn’t work. They are not happier; they feel compressed, or they feel overwhelmed. Some people may have experienced this, and have started decluttering; Others may go see a doctor, and take a pill; Others may find some self-help new age crutches, to help them navigate through the clutter.

The true way, the way of freedom and ongoing happiness, evolution or de-evolution back to a simpler way of being, is actually to start decluttering the home, decluttering the house, decluttering the unit. Instead of expanding into a bigger space with your clutter and your inventory, which all takes energy to maintain. It takes energy to move it; it takes energy to unpack it, box it, unpack it again into a new space or build shelves, and all these different things. It takes a large amount of energy. The simplest, purest way that leads to an opening within, is to remove the inventory, to declutter the home, the nervous system.

This space starts to appear, and this space appearing can actually cause fear in some people.

I remember personally when I was younger at various times being afraid of silence and space.

It was a fear that used to arise. I used to avoid it, and go do something; hit the fridge, go to the beach, go surfing, call my friends. You know, we didn’t have Facebook back then, so we had other activities we'd do. So, it is important to recognize the potential fear of this space too, and be with that. This space is important for us to make friends with, this space appears when we start decluttering.

Instead of building more storage space, and clogging ourselves up, and our life gets smaller, and smaller, and smaller, until where old people with very narrow bandwidth (I’m sure we all know some older people that have an extremely narrow band of reality now), what’s acceptable to them is a very small slither which is basically a prison. We can see them. Surely we see older people that narrow themselves down into just very small reality, and everything outside that is not okay. They’re going to teach from that space, and that’s a closure. This is where we end up when we collect inventory, upon inventory, upon inventory. There is a very small passageway left for us to operate in. There's no width, there's no breadth, there's no depth. It's deepening ignorance, it is not an expansion, it’s a contraction. It's a self-imposed, self-created prison. We surely all have experiences of people we know like this. And, I’m not degrading them, I feel for these people, it's not pleasurable to see. I want to help, but I know I can’t help in these circumstances.

So, if you can hear my words, what I’m saying to you is choose your direction carefully. Look ahead at people that have chosen a direction, and see where they’ve ended up. Use others mistakes for your own wisdom. To learn from all your mistakes is a fool's passage, because with the modern era, and technology, we have an endless capacity to learn from other people’s mistakes. It is accessible by hitting a keyboard or touching a phone, we can see all the mistakes that people are making, and we can adjust ourselves, and our way in the world to avoid making these mistakes, rather than making them all one at the time; wasting years, and years, and years of our lives that could be used for clearing out our inventory.

A lot of the inventories are hidden in cupboards that have a mirror. For example; in front of it, you may not see that there’s all this stuff behind it. That’s the unconscious. So, we have to start looking and exploring the unit in great detail; looking under the furniture for bits and pieces that are hiding from us. Slowly but surely, we empty, and empty, and empty our nervous system. Suddenly, the light starts to appear again. The light can come out from all our pores, it's not covered up by the stuff anymore. Suddenly, we get brighter and brighter; or gradually, I should say, and occasionally suddenly. But, usually, we slowly get brighter, and brighter, and brighter; and our way in the world shifts, and shifts, and shifts, and then this… this beautiful thing occurs, where there is no other way to be, except to keep doing this, and keep removing, and just enjoy the experience. Occasionally it's a very uncomfortable experience too, because we find a dark corner of the house, full of things we don’t want to see.

But, you may be at this stage now where you know what it's going to be like when that dark corner has left; there's going to be more brightness, there's going to be more light, there's going to be more joy to share.

So the little obstacle that’s quite painful in the moment, or uncomfortable in the nervous system in that moment, it is also understood that behind that is light, behind that dark corner is light waiting to come out.

With this knowing the obstacle becomes very small. At the beginning of these practices, it can be very uncomfortable, because we're not feeling the result, we are not experiencing the result, and we can lose heart. So it's important to understand with on-going practice this will start to dissipate. As we start getting more comfortable with uncomfortableness, of the dark corners of ourselves, as that practice continues, it gets easier, and easier, your feathers are not as ruffled each time. Eventually, you can be doing day to day duties with this occurring within you and not even bat an eyelid, because you know it's going to pass. You know it just a wave going past in the ocean, and when it’s gone it’s flat again, but the ocean is brighter and becomes more obvious. It will take some time and repetition of this occurring, and some gentle courage to end up in the space of almost desiring to find the darkness within. You become the true you. You're not adding stuff anymore, you're removing inventory, an awakening is never, ever, ever adding things.

Some might say you add the watcher, if you are into these terminologies; which is an impartial observer of the world. That impartial observer of the world that people think they're adding, is actually the actual deeper you, coming into play. It’s not an addition, it's just recognition. The old you dissolves, the false you dissolves, and that’s what’s going to be left. It's a deepening, and you can deepen further back, but we don’t need to go there now. All of our boundaries are imagined. All of our boundaries are the inventory we’ve collected consciously and subconsciously and have stored within our nervous systems from stuff we can’t even remember in the unconscious. So, my point is, don’t keep building new cupboards to store everything. This is my perspective, what you do is your business, it’s your choice. From my perspective, from someone that has found the light within, this has been the process; it’s been a continual removal of the inventory. When the house is clean, when the nervous system is clean, none of the books are necessary, because what you need is here. Moment to moment. You are IT, itself. There is a recognition that moment to moment with everything is as it is, and how it is supposed to be, the information is actually unnecessary. It may be necessary to get to this point, but at some point, it all has to be put aside.

So, start now. If you are going to remove your inventory, remove everything you know you’re not using, and not going to use If you have stuff that you think may be of service, some information that’s being really helpful for you, etc, that might be okay to hold on to. But, refine, clean, clean, clean. However, my suggestion would be everything has to go. Or, just put that in a not sure yet column. You know, you have your no, definitely not; Yeah, yes for sure, that you understand from your own experience, that’s definitely a yes; and have a massive not sure yet column for everything else. maybe is best just to get rid off everything within,, all the inventory in my home.

Have a house of Zen with pure, crystal clear lines. If something changes in the room, in the house, you would see it, because it's not cluttered. It will be obvious that something is out of place. You will notice. So, when you’re nervous you will notice a movement within your nervous system because it’s so uncluttered now. Any movement is obvious. It can be seen for what it is, and it doesn’t accumulate a little bit at a time, and sneak up on you like a child growing.

They grow, but you don’t see them, because you see them every day. The clutter can sneak up on you, so it's always removal process. Empty the house, empty your nervous system.

Your nervous system was never supposed to be a library. At some point, humans behaved like Adam and Eve’s story. The humans left Eden... paradise, and chewed on the fruit of the tree of knowledge. The tree of knowledge is the mind, the analytical thinking dualistic mind. This cannot be lived in while the garden of Eden is being experienced, paradise experienced; it's not possible they’re two different dimensions altogether. Eden is the heart which is the doorway to the true self. The mind is an abstract connotation or contortion of reality; a labelling system, like a labeller, through which we communicate through little printed labels.

With this, we only get a shallow version of reality, a conceptual version, an interaction of reality.

Quite often that can be distorted into very, very deep imaginational constructs, that lead to all sorts of problems; wars, misunderstandings, and just endless, endless issues...

So, emptying your inventory is emptying the false, which exposes the heart, because the heart cannot be false, it is the core of our being. It is a gateway to immortality and joy, and bliss and love. The mind, the mind although it can be used as a tool to find this also, like by your hearing these words you’re processing it, you think if it is true or not, it can be used as a tool, but anything beyond that is an illusion.

Technically, even the mind operating is a resistance, which a subtle form of suffering. It is possible to be in the world with absolutely minimum thoughts & function extremely well.

This is something that took me a long time to understand and believe when I heard it from a teacher, and from different teachers, it was definitely deep in the dark side of the not sure yet column (laughs). As time went on and my experience deepened, I removed my inventory, and removed, and removed, and removed, and hunted, I went looking for these books of inventory, in these hidden cupboards, these dark corners, it became more and more of my reality, the mind was not working much anymore. It was getting less, and less, and less; while my happiness was going up, my clarity was going up, my understanding was going up, my relationships were improving, some of them were disappearing... untenable. It became my experience. As I’ve been speaking to you now, this whole dialog has been done without a thought. This may be difficult to understand, I heard this being said from somebody myself at some point, and I thought: "Well, I’m not sure about this," and that’s okay. It’s best to have a big not sure yet column if it's not your experience, that’s the way to be in my opinion.

I suggest to be a happy skeptic. not one of those shrivelled, dry, negative sceptics… a happy sceptic, be happy that it may not be true, it’s okay. There’s no point in lowering your frequency, your energy, your being because you don’t agree with something, or you are not sure of something. Be a happy sceptic, there is nothing wrong with that. It’s the right way to go. Because you are leaving doorways open. You are not locking doors, and closing them, and suddenly at the end of your life, you are locked in a hallway, where all the doors of existence been closed to you, having lived in a slither of reality that's quite often not pretty. This is not a nice place to be.

So there is your challenge if you choose to accept it. You have free will, what do you will? Do you will an opening? An expansion in happiness, and for the light that you are to be able to permeate the densities of this world, the illusion of this world? Or, would you like to just plod along in the world collecting inventory and knowledge, sharing that with people, so people can see what you know, and you can create a better ‘I’, a bigger shinier ‘I’? You can polish the apple and have the shiniest apple in the veggie store, but guess what, all of the apples are going to rot. It’s just how it is. That’s the nature of reality here, they’re all going to end up back as dust.

So, what are we going to do before we're dust?

What existence are we going to have?

These are the questions that are important to ask, not to be avoided.

It’s up to you...

it’s always up to you.

Now that you've heard these words, there's a choice.

And the choice is up to you.

It’s nobody else’s business at all, nobody else can help you on the level of free will.

You choose to start examining this course, examining to see, you know if this may be in your not sure yet column. You start examining if this is true; “Will collecting knowledge truly help me into the future, or just help me materialistically and socially? Maybe I’ll be able to have deeper conversations with more intelligent people…” And on, and on, and on we go.

Until I’m too old to speak, or all my friends at work aren’t listening to my great wisdom, or I should say or great knowledge because wisdom and knowledge are two very different things.

Until all my friends have passed away, no one is listening anymore, and all the young people

just think I’m just a silly old man or silly old woman. They’re not interested, they’ve got their own thing going on, I’m just sitting there with this head full of knowledge that I can’t share with anyone anymore.

Or, do we pursue wisdom? Which is emptying in my perspective, from my experience,

whether is yours or not is another story. Wisdom is emptying. The only knowledge you need to find out, is the best techniques of emptying. Now, emptying can be a threatening word.

“By emptying, what do you mean?”

The identified "I" is the problem. The I appears to be your friend, but that’s the veneer of the mind overlaying reality. It keeps us compressed into a little space, a bit like a twenty-foot being compressed into a one cubic inch box. And all the boxes are created from the veneer of our mind. Once the inventory starts to be removed, these words can be seen for yourself. There’s nothing I’m saying that you cannot find out for yourself if you commit with diligence, and correct effort, and correct attitude. It may be conceptual right now, but it’s with practice, you will see!

And it will be your own version of it. If you arrived at the space I’ve arrived at, and you were expressing this concept, your words would be completely different in how you express it. You are, as Nisargadatta would say, ‘A ray of the absolute’. We are all rays of the absolute. We’re all mirage brothers & sisters. But this is a different subject. It’s the same subject, but it’s a different one.

The fear of the “I” disappearing into the deepest space; Please be aware of this fear, and be aware of this fear being false. Face this fear head-on, as gently as possible. Ultimately, the identity can never take you home; Home to happiness; the peace you; to what you truly are. It is the core of what’s holding you separate. Also understand: The ego is not one subject. The ego is thousands, and hundreds of thousands of strands, strung together to look like one object.

Another angle of looking at this actually is: Just think of thousand of small pieces of string, and each piece string is an idea or thought that comes into the brain that drives us forward as an identity.

When you are removing your inventory, you are removing a string at the time, and the ball gets smaller, and smaller, and smaller. This ball is hiding light. Behind the ball, is incredibly light. Even words are going to fail me here.

So, we are pulling the strings, from this ball of short pieces of string called the ego, one string at a time. Quite often we pull on one string, and fifty, or a hundred, maybe a thousand, will just drop out in one chunk. These are beautiful times. But they don’t feel good when they coming through our system, we have to acknowledge that too. It's not all sunshine and rainbows, this process. It’s for warriors. Courageous, hearty people, that desire authenticity at the highest level, that’s a rare breed. This may not be for you, and that’s okay too. Sometime, it will be.

It's this way because you haven’t suffered enough yet; the world hasn’t knocked you down enough yet to see that there is no other way, to see that we have to start cleaning out the inventory. It is the only way,

Some of you reading this have suffered incredibly, and that’s why you’re even reading this. You are looking for ways to dismantle that ball of string that is blocking the light that you are. The light we all are; it’s all the same light. It’s only one. It’s not that everyone’s got a different light to find; we are this one giant light, just one. Even the word ‘one’ doesn’t work. It’s before that.

Because one can beget two. But it’s a simple way of explaining it without over complicating things. When trying to describe the indescribable, we have to start somewhere. So, start pulling on these strings. I challenge you. If you are reading this, and you have read this far, you are probably interested in doing so. That’s beautiful. You have to have the courage to want to do that. But, in order too, you need to start opening up. The inventory needs to be cleaned out.

Don’t buy a bigger house. Don’t build more cupboards. Don’t collect new spiritual ideas (please). Spiritual ideas are the hardest inventory to remove. Once you start getting a spiritual identity, your heading into deep water. And it’s not the ocean...it’s mud. Okay? Nobody wakes up from spiritual ideas; spiritual identities. Nobody wakes up period, but that’s another story once again.

Waking up is enough strings being pulled apart that the light burns the rest of them away, and then, the hidden strings of the subconscious are getting pulled out too; they start to expose themselves, and they are getting burnt in the light of reality. The gorgeous light of reality.

I wish you well, you have my heart, if these words inspire you, even if they don’t inspire you, my heart is with you. My heart is you, yours is mine. It’s not a separate heart; it’s one heart that links us all. One heart, one mind, if we are going to use words. If your thoughts are yours, please, tell me, what is your next thought going to be? What is mine going to be? I don’t know what my next thought is going to be, or when it’s going to occur. If you know what your next thought is going to be, please send me a message, let me know because that’s a miracle.

So, therefore, if you don’t know what your next thought is going to be, can you be sure they’re your thoughts?

Or can we put that into the "not sure yet" column too? Or start work on removing inventory?

Again… it’s all up to you.