IAT Self-Exploration - Ch 25.1 Happenings!

Listen to Ektaji guide us through a self-exploration meditation, “Happenings!” from Chapter 25 of Nisargadatta Maharaj’s book I Am That. What is happening NOW? Without senses, body, or thought, does the NOW disappear? The NOW is pure Nothingness – silent, beyond thought, feeling, sensation, and perception. Like a rainbow, the “I” is imagined, and people, situations, and their stories are all illusory.

One imagination cannot cause another imagination. Let’s rest as untouched Nothingness, where nothing ever truly happens.

Transcript

Let's do a self-exploration meditation on happenings. Keeping your eyes open, Attempt to see the reality of the now. Ask yourself the question, What is happening now? Do you notice that the eyes are searching for the now? The eyes are seeking for the now in the objects of the room. You are seeking the contents of the now through the eyes on the body. What if there was no visual field? Would there not be a now? Let's close the eyes. Let's remove the visual field. Now ask yourself the question again. What is happening now? Do you realize that the ears are searching for the now? The ears are seeking for the contents of the now in the sounds of the environment around you. You are looking for the now through the ears on the body. What if there was no auditory field? Would there not be a now? Turn within, Attempt to close yourself away from all sounds in your environment. Again ask yourself the question, What is happening now? Notice that there is a seeking happening within the border of the skin. Are you able to notice that inner seeking in the form of an inner movement inside the border of the skin? You are looking for the now through the sensations and feelings inside the body. What if there was no sensory field? Would there not be a now? Sensory field is equal to the body. The sensory field, The body, They are not consistently present moment to moment. If something is not present continuously, Consistently, It means that is not permanent. That which is not permanent is illusory, Imaginary. It appears and disappears. Quit seeking inside the imaginary border of the body. What if there was no physical body? Would there not be a now? Notice that you have been kicked into an infinite field of nothingness. The borders have dropped, The limitations have vanished. There is an infinite field of nothingness. The seeking has stopped. What is happening now? Notice that there is nothing happening in the now. There is merely the no-thingness. The now is equal to no-thingness. This is the only reality. Be with the silence of the reality of no-thingness. The reality is that nothing is happening in the now. There is no perception of sight. There is no perception of sound. There is no perception of smell. There is no perception of taste. There is no perception of touch. There is no sensation. There is no feeling. There is not even a thought in the reality of no-thingness. There is nothing happening in reality. Shunyata. No-thingness. Emptiness. That is the supreme truth. Just like there appears a mirage in a desert and suddenly disappears. Similarly, Only the ideas of perception, Sensation, Feeling and thought appear and disappear. They do not exist in reality. If they existed, They would be permanent. They would not appear and disappear. Their appearance lasts but a while. Their disappearance is inevitable. Memory threads the appearances together and creates stories. This gives birth to the idea of a world consisting of people, Situations and objects. This is how the idea of perception, Sensation, Thought and feeling is assumed to be people, Situations or objects. And a further categorization is done as waking objects and dream objects. Their absence is categorized as the deep sleep darkness. But in reality, All of this is imagined. The supreme truth is what you are seeing right now. There is no-thingness in the now. There is nobodiness in the now. Nothing is really happening in the now. The world of perception, Sensation, Thought, Feeling put together by memory is merely imagined. Merely illusory. Does not exist in reality. Just like a rainbow does not exist permanently. It appears and disappears. Similarly, The world does not exist permanently. It appears at the beginning of the waking and disappears at the end of it. The nothingness wipes away the reality of the waking. Therefore, The nothingness is the reality. Nobody-ness, Nothingness, No happening. This is the supreme truth. There is no I here. There is no you here. I and you are simply ideas. Nobody-ness is the truth. If there is an I, It is a universal I. And that universal I is the universal no-thingness. The world is imagined. Perceptions, Sensations, Thought, Feeling are merely imaginary ideas. Situations are imagined. People are imagined. Things are imagined. Story is created by connecting these imaginary people, Situations and things. Imaginary things happen to imaginary things. I is an imaginary thought. You is another imaginary thought. The false I is imagined along with the false you. Imaginary things happen to imagined things. One imagination cannot make another imagination happen. Thus, There is no cause of the happenings. The false I or the I-thought cannot be the cause of any happening. Things happen as they happen, Not because the false I makes them happen. These imaginations are simply appearing and disappearing without being controlled by anything or anybody. They appear from the real I of no-thingness and disappear back into it. I, The no-thingness, Am imagining it all. I, The no-thingness, Am perceiving my own imaginary ideas. And I, The no-thingness, Choose to forget about myself and get lost in these imaginary ideas. That is how things happen to things while I, The no-thingness, Remain ever untouched. In reality, Nothing ever happens. All is imagination. Nothing ever happens. Nothing. Nothing ever happens. Nothing. Nothing ever happens. Nothing.