Inquiry Into Awakeness

You wake up now or never,

You wake up here or nowhere.

So I'm gonna recommend that you just go ahead and wake up during this video,

You can do it.

You think you can't,

But you can,

I promise you.

I have people write me all the time about my videos and most of them are not nearly so clear and plain and out front as this one is gonna be.

So the problem is number one,

Who's teaching?

And I'm not saying the problem is the teacher,

I'm saying it's our projection of who's teaching.

We think there's someone over there teaching us over here and that's not true.

Within relativity,

That's true,

But we're not talking about relativity right now.

We're not blowing off relativity either.

We're just noticing that relativity is not gonna be the most skillful method,

Going through relativity is not the most skillful method of waking up.

If it was,

Millions of people would be awake who are not.

So the first problem is who's teaching and understand that when I'm teaching you this,

This is not a Fred Davis.

There is no Fred Davis inside this unit.

There is nobody inside this unit.

This is a completely uninhabited teaching unit.

It's a teaching puppet.

It is,

It's a teaching meat puppet.

Right?

Just I don't know what to do,

Right?

It's just moved along.

It doesn't move along,

It is moved along.

It doesn't change its mind.

Change occurs.

It doesn't make up its mind.

Decisions happen,

But nobody makes them.

That's from over here or over there.

But over there,

You may think you make some decision.

That's all right.

You can believe that just as long as you're willing to suffer for it.

I have no problem with that.

But I personally have given up on that.

The second problem,

And this is even more critical than the first misunderstanding,

More important even than who is teaching is understand that it's awakeness is teaching you.

That's who's teaching you here.

There,

I can't say it's not colored by some Fredness because there's Fredness conditioning here.

This is a sack of conditioning.

And what the truth that's coming through this thing is gonna get a little warped.

Hello,

Nothing I can do.

I'm using the language.

That's the only tool I've really got with you.

But it's a ridiculously insufficient means of carrying,

Of telling the truth.

So the second most important thing is not understanding who's teaching,

Not just understanding who's teaching,

But it's understanding who's being taught.

For 24 years,

I was a seeker.

For 24 years,

I thought I was a Fred Davis.

And for 24 years,

I was sure that this is what a Fred Davis looks like.

And I was wrong.

Now,

You can be wrong for 24 years if you'd like to.

I have no problem.

Some of you have already been through 24 years.

And if some of you have been through 30 or 40,

I know,

I talked to you,

50.

And two people over 60 years on the path.

The only problem,

They were very successful on the path.

The only problem is they didn't know who the hell they were.

They were missing just that one little part.

And that one little part is the only part that really counts.

So who's being taught?

I thought this unit was supposed to wake up.

I thought Fred Davis was supposed to,

Whatever the hell that was,

I thought it was this.

But I thought Fred Davis was supposed to wake up.

I thought this unit was supposed to wake up.

I thought this guy over here,

So-and-so's husband,

So-and-so's employee,

Whatever,

I thought that was the one that should wake up.

And damn it,

It was the one I couldn't understand why it couldn't wake up.

Well,

The chief reason it couldn't wake up is that there was no one there to wake up.

See,

Awakening is coming to see that there is no character here.

That there's a body here,

At least within relativity.

There is a body here.

I mean,

It's an object in relativity.

But it's not inhabited by a person or a soul or a spirit or any,

I use the word spirit sometimes.

Harmless,

Unless you believe it.

So if you hear me say that,

Just go,

Oh,

I see,

That's just a skillful lie that Fred's telling us.

Because that's what I do is I tell you skillful lies.

That's what this is,

It's a skillful lie.

Because I can't actually tell you the truth.

But I can tell you the truth much,

Much more easily if you quit trying to wake up that unit,

You quit trying to wake up that character.

Leave that character alone.

It's not there,

So it's easy to leave alone.

This unit cannot wake up.

And it has the same capacity to wake up as this glass.

The difference being,

See the water in this glass?

This glass is inhabited.

This is not.

There's Hurricane Fred,

Which you know,

All these patterns of thunder and lightning and flood and all that.

And these patterns,

They sort of cooperate symbiotically.

Just,

I mean,

It's not like they make a decision any more than you or I do.

See,

It just happens.

The difference is,

Is that with a hurricane pattern,

No one's saying,

Well,

I'm gonna be Hurricane Bob and I'm gonna be the biggest hurricane ever.

You know,

It's just,

That's not the way nature works,

But it's the way our minds work.

So we think this seeker is supposed to wake up and it's just gonna be great when he does.

Because what we're gonna do is we're gonna add something.

We're gonna add something to the insufficient unit,

To the unit that has been less than all of its life,

Even if it didn't notice it,

But most of us notice it.

I mean,

Everybody that's here that has had a moment of,

Or maybe lots and lots and lots of moments like I have,

Where,

You know,

I'm just not good enough.

I'm not smart enough.

I'm not attractive enough.

I'm not rich enough.

My parents aren't rich enough.

We don't drive the right car.

I don't live in the right house.

Don't even live in the right neighborhood.

I don't have the right job.

And,

You know,

I'm just less than.

I'm just less than.

Everybody else here apparently got an owner's manual and they forgot to mail me one.

So I don't know what the hell is going on here.

It looks like everybody else does,

But they don't either.

It's just the way it looks.

That's when you're comparing your insides to their outsides and think you're coming up a lizard,

But it's not true.

Compare your insides with their insides and hell,

You could be a step above.

Who knows?

Because there's,

There are really frighteningly few confident units in the world.

And somebody who's tremendously confident is probably trying to overcome a lack of confidence.

Someone who's tremendously confident,

Is what I meant to say,

Is probably covering up for the belief that there's not enough here to be confident amid all of you guys with your splendid ways.

And all I got is this?

I mean,

I'm just,

This is what,

I'm supposed to get along with this?

Are you kidding me?

Right?

I mean,

I can't,

I can't,

I can't accept this.

But I have to.

But I'm not this.

But I'm not this.

However,

And there is no Fred Davis,

But let me give you a good piece of advice.

There's no character there.

Be easy on them anyway.

This is not non-dual philosophy where we got hard lines.

We know what we can do.

We know what we can't do.

We know what's possible.

We know what's impossible.

Plenty of people out there that know all that.

I don't know all that.

All I know is what works.

I'm really a very simple man with a very simple teaching.

And,

But the good news is,

Is that it is,

It is incredibly effective.

And it's not because it's my teaching.

There's no one here.

It's because awakeness is utilizing this unit in the same way that a carpenter uses a hammer.

And the difference between this and a hammer is that a hammer never thinks that the house is all about him.

And this one sometimes does.

See,

I should be telling you that there's never any hint of arrogance over here.

Jesus,

There's arrogance all over the place here.

And it is,

There is,

I mean,

That's just what,

That's the way the unit's made.

I'm sorry.

Because you had to have somebody arrogant to even,

I mean,

You had to have an arrogant unit to even run this teaching through them.

They were gonna have to be arrogant because everybody else was gonna tell them they were wrong and they were gonna continue to do it anyway.

You gotta have arrogance.

So they got an arrogant unit.

The good news is,

Is that most of the time,

I recognize what's really going on and there is not too much,

Hopefully,

Of an example of arrogance here.

But there's no one here to be arrogant.

There's just no one here to be arrogant.

That's the thing to see.

No one here.

So whoever it is that,

When I was going through it as a seeker,

I thought they were all trying to teach Fred to wake up.

But there's no Fred.

So how in the hell are they going to wake up something that isn't here?

Listen to this.

Listen to this.

Accept this for just a minute.

Would you?

I mean,

You don't have to.

You can suffer if you want,

But I'm just saying,

I'd like to offer an alternative to that.

But you don't have to take it.

You don't have to do anything.

Matter of fact,

You never do anything.

So what I'm talking over there,

It's I'm addressing nonetheless flesh and blood.

I get that.

But within the construct of relativity.

So I'm mindful of that.

But flesh and blood is all an illusion.

We don't need to go into that here.

It's not,

Here we're just talking about the basics,

Man.

What's the fastest way that I can wake up?

What's the fastest way?

Well,

Recognize who it is,

That awakeness over there through the guise of some enlightened teacher or friend or neighbor,

Enlightened guy on the street,

Whatever,

They don't have to be enlightened.

They could just,

From the mouths of babes,

Right?

So what are they trying?

What is awakeness over there?

Because that's when I sit down in the meeting,

I notice that I'm always speaking to awakeness.

Awakeness has always got the other chair,

Always.

So I can only talk to awakeness.

And guess what is talking back?

Awakeness.

So we got to understand that an attempt to wake up is an attempt for awakeness to come to recognize awakeness in that chair.

I don't care if it looks like a Bob or a Susan,

I don't care.

It can't be a Bob or a Susan.

How do I know?

Well,

The fundamental teaching of all non-duality,

All of it,

From the fight of the Zen and beyond,

Is that there's just one thing going on.

So if there's just one thing going on,

Can there be a Bob,

A Susan and a Fred and whoever the hell is watching this?

No,

There's just one thing.

See,

And what the one thing,

The only thing that can teach is the one thing,

Awakeness itself.

And the only thing awakeness itself can teach is awakeness itself,

The one thing.