Let's do a self-exploration meditation on memory.
Nisargadatta Maharaj says that we are living by the thread of memory.
Let's attempt to understand experientially.
Let's attempt to recognize this experientially.
What does he mean by living by the thread of memory?
Let's look at our current experience.
You are experiencing the sound of these words.
The sound is happening in the now.
Again,
This sound is also happening in the now.
Every experience happens only in the now.
It is not possible for you to have an experience other than the now.
Moment to moment to moment,
There is only experience in the now.
You cannot step out of the now.
Can you?
Can you step out of the now and go back to my first sentence and hear it again?
You cannot step out of the now and go into the past.
You cannot step out of the now and go into the future either.
There is only a single possibility for you.
The single and only possibility is the now.
It is only memory that joins these different individual nows together and creates a story out of it.
The story is always created after the now has passed.
In reality,
We experience only the present moment.
We experience only the now.
The past is simply a story.
It is simply an idea.
There is no realm called the past.
There is no place called the past.
You cannot go to the past.
Past does not exist in reality.
If it existed,
You could have stepped out of the now.
And gone into the past.
Phrases like dwelling in the past,
Living in the past are simply ideas.
You can never ever dwell in the past.
Then what is memory?
Memory is nothing but a repetitive thought.
A thought that has already occurred when it repeats itself.
It is called memory.
Where is the repetitive thought happening?
The repetitive thought also happens only in the now.
When the repetitive thought starts happening in the now,
You forget the truth of the now.
You get consumed by the thought.
You get enchanted by it and you get lost in the chain of thoughts.
It is a chain of repetitive thought happening in the now.
It only is labelled as memory because it is repetitive.
When you get enchanted like this and forget the truth of the now,
It is called living by the thread of memory.
Always recognise the now.
There is only the now.
If you get caught up in memory,
Take a step beyond and check.
Isn't this a repetitive thought happening in the now?
Haven't I simply labelled this repetitive thought as memory?
Only the present moment is the truth.
There is only the now.
You are the now.
You are not in the now.
You are the now itself.
Let's dive deeper into why do we get lost in repetitive thought or memory.
Bring to your mind a time when you hugged your beloved,
Your family member,
Your child,
Parent,
Sibling,
Spouse.
Remember when you first went to them and hugged them.
The experience of the warmth of the love,
The soft,
Secure feeling,
Lasts but a moment.
Then the experience vanishes.
The mind notices the missing feeling of warmth and security and it hugs even tighter.
It yearns for that feeling to return.
The feeling returns,
Stays for a moment and vanishes again.
The mind notices that it is missing again and hugs even tighter.
Notice that this continues for a while until the mind gives up.
Recognize that the mind yearns for a continuous,
Permanent,
Everlasting feeling of warmth and security.
But the truth is that every experience lasts only for a moment.
The mind creates a false story by joining these moments of warmth and security.
And it discards the intermittent moments when the feeling had disappeared.
It likes to create a continuous story.
But it is false.
The story is missing the truth that every moment,
Everything changes.
Everything changes.
Everything changes.
The mind fills up the gaps with a false sense of continuity.
This is called enchantment.
This is called living by the thread of memory.
The only cause for this is that the mind does not want to accept the truth of transitoriness.
It does not want to accept the truth that everything is momentary.
It does not want to accept the truth that there is no continuity.
There is just the now.
Now.
Now.
Now.
Now.
Now.
Now.
Now.
I do not have the experience of a continuity called time.
Time does not exist.
The past and the future are mere ideas of the mind.
The only truth is the now.
I am the now.
I am not in the now.
I am the now itself.
