Only This Vivid Reality: Radiance Sutras Verse 71

During this session, we discuss Verse 71 of the Yukti Verses from the 'Radiance Sutras', a translation of the Vijanana Bhairava Tantra by Lorin Loche. A meditation follows our discussion.

These sessions are recorded on a weekly basis and all are welcome.

Transcript

So today we are reading from the Radiant Sutras,

Which is a beautiful book written by Lauren Roche,

And this is an interpretation of the Vijnana Bharava Tantra,

Which is an ancient tantric text believed to come out of Kashmir Shaivism,

And the intention of tantra,

Specifically this text,

Is to help us experience reality.

And reality is a combination of essentially two things.

One part is this physical world that we live in.

So that this physical world,

In tantra we're not meant to not live here.

We're not meant to transcend duality,

We're not meant to escape our physical life.

This is reality.

This is real.

And the second aspect is that we are also everything.

We are also divine.

We are also everything in the universe,

All at the same time.

And what's interesting is it's almost like we live in multi-dimensions.

We live in the oneness of God,

Or in this language of Bhairava,

Of the real nature of the universe.

The sound of Aum,

The original vibration that creates reality.

That that is also us.

Where that vibration comes from,

That creates all of maya,

All of this quote illusion,

This world of duality,

We are also that.

But I am also Katrina Boss.

And I am 54 years here on earth.

Like I am also that.

And I am all that there is.

So in a very practical way,

These are not easy concepts to bring together.

It's easy to say,

Maybe hard to believe.

And kind of impossible to explain.

This is the goal of Tantra,

Is to remember.

To remember our divinity.

And because we remember our divinity,

We actually embrace our physical lives more.

It's not about experiencing divinity so I no longer feel here on earth.

The problem is when we don't remember that we are also divine,

Our emotions rule us.

Our fears rule us.

And we actually become almost slaves to the physical world.

And we become depressed,

And we become anxious,

And we become stuck.

And we're actually unable to fully live.

We're unable to expand and enjoy this earthly experience.

So the path of Tantra is this very interesting dance between experiencing the divine aspect of who we are,

And the more we can experience it,

Not understand it,

The more we can experience the divine aspect of ourselves.

It's almost like it puts our physical experience in proper context.

So then suddenly,

When we really deeply understand,

Like just as an example before we do the reading,

Imagine yourself sitting beside the ocean.

And you're sitting there,

Or maybe it might be something different for you.

Maybe not everyone's connected to water.

Maybe you're sitting beside an ocean,

Or maybe you're sitting gazing at a mountain.

Or maybe you're on top of a mountain,

Looking out over the world.

But whatever it is,

It takes you to a place of magic,

Of expansiveness.

And as you're gazing at this scene,

You can feel infinity,

Right?

Or what you can feel,

You can't really explain.

Let's say you sit there for quite a while,

And you actually allow this infinity into yourselves.

And it's almost like by sitting there and gazing upon the world,

You remember something about yourself.

You remember that this also is you.

And it really becomes a part of you.

And then at some point,

You turn away,

And you return to your regular life.

And then somebody in your life,

Who normally would trigger you says something.

And for the first time in your life,

You look at them and you say,

Wow,

You must be having such a bad day.

And you know,

Because you have this context of the wholeness,

It's very easy to see that this thing that this person said had nothing to do with you.

That was just them having an experience.

And then all of a sudden,

Your life here in the world becomes richer.

And this is the path of Tantra.

And this is the intention behind every sutra we read out of the Radiant Sutras.

Each one of them is a tiny opening to our actual reality.

So today we are reading verse 71 because I know some of you guys have the book.

And if you're new,

What we're going to do is we're going to read a sutra.

Then we're going to have a discussion about it.

And then we're going to do a little meditation.

So even if you have the book,

Let's close our eyes for a moment.

And let's just breathe deeply,

Expanding the belly as we inhale,

Contracting as we exhale.

Feeling into maybe your heart center,

That eternal place within you.

Here we go.

People talk about mind and ego.

Let's just drop this whole conversation.

Consider instead,

There is no mind.

There is no ego.

There is only the vivid reality of this surprising moment at play,

Beckoning.

How does that make you feel?

Or what thoughts come up or feelings come up when you hear that?

Weightless,

Floating,

Acceptance,

Present,

In control.

Having no mind,

No ego would be so good.

Point my focus toward joy.

Be playful.

Let go of working to understand self through the mind and ego.

Clarity,

Freedom.

All right,

Here it is again.

People talk about mind and ego.

Let's just drop this whole conversation.

Consider instead,

There is no mind.

There is no ego.

There is only the vivid reality of this surprising moment at play,

Beckoning.

I feel so down.

This is so beautiful.

Yeah.

Release,

Surrender.

Outside pressure keeps this from me.

Relaxed.

Then what do we want to fix all the time?

Wholeness.

So I'm going to read a literal translation of it.

Lauren does a beautiful job painting us a picture,

Creating a poem out of Sanskrit,

Which can be a little hard to understand sometimes.

So this is the literal translation.

This comes out of the book,

Sri Vijnana Bhairava Tantra,

The Ascent,

By Swami Satya Sagananda Saraswati.

And this is a little heavy,

But we're going to dissect it.

By contemplating thus,

The antahkarana,

Or inner instrument of mind,

And so on,

Is non-existent within me.

Then,

In the absence of vikalpas,

Thought constructs,

One becomes free from the vikalpas.

This is why we're so thankful for Lauren Roche.

Okay.

And this is really interesting to dissect.

By contemplating thus,

The antahkarana.

Now the antahkarana is essentially everything that we perceive with our mind.

And so there's three aspects of the antahkarana.

They call it manas,

Which is the mind,

Buddhi,

And ego.

Manas,

The mind.

In this context,

Manas is the part of our brain or the part of us that interprets the senses,

The sensory world.

Light comes into my eye,

And my manas interprets it as red,

Tree,

Old.

That's manas.

Manas is when someone touches my hand,

And that touch sensation goes through my nervous system,

Up into my manas,

And the manas says,

Soft touch,

Hot touch,

Painful touch.

Part of our mental facility or mental faculty interprets the sensory world around us.

This is manas.

Buddhi is our intellect.

It's the part that understands,

Comprehends,

Has reason,

Creates thought constructs,

Creates ideas,

Understands time and space,

Imagination,

Fantasy,

All that kind of thing.

This is the buddhi.

And then ego is,

They call it the ahamkara.

This is our sense of self.

And to understand none of these things are bad.

These three things are foundational for our experience here on earth,

Here in maya.

So the ego is really important,

Because the ego gives each one of us a sense of individual identity here on earth.

And so in the tantric worldview,

You begin with shiva shakti,

Oneness.

Shiva shakti splits into duality.

How does it do that?

Well,

They map it out,

And they map it out.

And there's a level here that we're not going to talk about.

But then below that,

This is where we begin to enter maya.

And the creation of the self requires shakti,

Because shiva stays as consciousness,

To require shakti to develop manas,

So that we can experience the world around us.

Buddhi,

So that we can navigate through the world.

And ego,

So we have a sense of who we are here on earth.

So these are constructs that create maya.

They're very important.

And all together,

They call this antahkarana.

And the words aren't important,

Except for just the reading of the sanskrit.

And so the other word that's in there is vikalpa.

And vikalpa is essentially,

Simplest,

It's a thought construct.

What's interesting about a thought construct is vikalpas always exist,

Either in the past,

Or the future,

Or it actually is something that doesn't exist at all.

So imagine you are thinking about something that happened in the past.

Because the thing is,

Everything that's in the past,

And everything that's in the future,

Is imagination.

It's not real.

And this is a very difficult concept to take in,

In the tantric world.

The only reality is right here.

Right here.

Exactly what we're doing right now,

Is the only reality.

So when we are thinking about the past,

It is an imagination.

There's tiny little pieces that we are stringing together.

And we are creating a story that we either enjoy,

Or we are angry about,

Or we're sad about,

Or whatever.

But we are actually creating that story and telling it to ourselves in this moment.

But it is a fantasy.

It is not real.

It is a vikalpa.

And the more we stay in the past,

We are not actually in reality at all.

This is reality.

This moment,

Only this moment,

Is reality.

If we are imagining a future event,

A future situation,

It's all imagination.

It may come to pass,

It may not come to pass.

But no matter what,

It is a thought construct.

We're taking little thoughts,

Putting them all together,

And creating something with them that does not exist.

These are vikalpas.

And sometimes in this very moment,

We create things that do not exist.

These are all the what-if statements.

But what if this happens?

And what about this?

And what if this is the truth?

And what if I,

What,

All thought constructs.

All vikalpa.

So what this sutra is asking us to do,

It's asking us to say,

What if there is no mind?

What if there is no ego?

What does that feel like?

Like right now,

What does it feel like to say,

What does it feel like to say,

There is no mind,

There is no ego?

Notice how all thought constructs disappear.

Do you guys experience that?

Like suddenly you can't think.

You can't,

Freedom.

But you can't think.

It's like,

I have no mind and I have no ego.

And suddenly you're just in the stillness,

In the silence.

What is left without mind and ego?

This is the question.

What is left is all that there is.

When we remove the construct that creates us here on earth,

We experience our true reality that I was talking about earlier.

We experience Atman.

We experience the true self.

We experience the divine self.

We experience us as oneness.

But the crazy thing is,

It's not something we can think about.

It's not something we can understand,

Because understanding comes from buddhi.

And it's not something I can see,

Hear,

Touch,

Smell,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah.

So it doesn't come from menace.

And it has nothing to do with who I am.

So I can't experience it with ego.

So we go beyond that.

And that moment when I said,

Imagine you have no mind and no ego.

And all of a sudden,

Even if it was only for a moment,

You went and suddenly you're floating in space.

That is the feeling of the true self.

That is who we truly are.

That feeling,

We can't explain it.

It's that feeling of sitting by the ocean.

That feeling of standing on the mountaintop.

You can't explain it to someone who's never experienced it.

True knowledge comes from the experience of things.

You cannot explain,

You can read about what chocolate tastes like,

But until you taste it,

You'll never know.

And then you still can't explain it.

You know what I'm saying?

Like the true experience is beyond the mind.

But of course,

The true experience of our nature of Bhairava is beyond the mind.

So the only way to get there is to kick the mind out for a little while.

Is to kick the mind out for a little while.

I'm going to reread the literal translation.

Okay.

By contemplating thus,

The antahkarana,

Or inner instrument of mind,

And so on.

So by contemplating that all of this is non-existent within me,

Then in the absence of the vikalpas,

One becomes free of the vikalpas.

I'm going to read from this other one also.

This is called the Vijnana Bhairava,

Or divine consciousness.

So again,

This is another literal translation.

One should contemplate thus,

Within me,

The inner psychic apparatus,

Just so you guys know,

If English isn't your first language,

This is hard to understand when English is your first language.

Just so you know.

This is very confusing English.

This is very confusing English.

Hence all the discussion.

Okay.

One should think about this.

Within me,

The inner psychic apparatus consisting of citta,

Etc.

Does not exist.

In the absence of thought constructs,

We will be completely rid of all vikalpas,

And will abide as pure consciousness,

Which is our essential self.

In that moment,

When we imagined that there was no mind,

We were experiencing pure consciousness.

I'm going to read you one more little piece here.

This is in the notes in this book.

Because there's something very interesting about this to me.

The first line says,

When one becomes fully convinced by bhavana,

Which is contemplation,

That he is not his psychic apparatus,

Consisting of manas,

Buddhi,

And ahamkara,

With which he has always identified,

Then his mind ceases to form vikalpas,

And his essential nature,

Which transcends all vikalpas,

Is revealed.

Again,

This is super wordy,

But there's something about it that I really love.

So bhavana,

Contemplation.

So just what we're doing,

By the act of imagining there is no mind and no ego.

When one becomes fully convinced that he is not his psychic apparatus,

Just that line is so important.

Can I be convinced that I am not my mind and my ego?

This is an important question.

Am I willing to imagine that I am not my mind and my ego?

That the mind and the ego are constructs so that I can experience this world.

They are not who I am.

This is such a big deal.

I love this.

I love the idea.

When one becomes fully convinced that he is not his psychic apparatus,

With which he has always identified.

So once we are convinced that we're like,

Oh,

So that's not all who I am,

Then his mind ceases to form vikalpas,

Ceases to form the constructs.

Ceases to form the constructs.

We stop creating thought constructs of the past.

We stop creating thought constructs of the future.

We stop imagining things that aren't real.

So then what happens?

Like without even rereading the rest of this,

What happens?

If we stop creating vikalpas,

We stop thinking about the past,

We stop thinking about the future,

We stop imagining things that aren't there.

Where are we left?

Living in the here and now.

Right here.

Right here.

That's it.

That's all we have.

Imagine.

And here in this present moment is where we have all the power,

All the creativity.

Exactly.

Everything is created in this moment.

Every new choice,

Every new understanding,

Everything.

And then suddenly we can bring back the manas,

The buddhi,

And the ego.

The manas,

The buddhi,

And the ego.

Because then suddenly manas says,

Hmm,

I can smell fresh bread cooking.

And the buddhi can say,

Oh,

I know what I'm going to do today.

And the ego says,

Wow,

I love doing this,

Or I don't like doing this,

But I'm all right here.

So it's by understanding.

And the final line of that is,

So when one becomes fully convinced by contemplation that he is not his psychic apparatus,

Then our mind stops forming thought constructs in the past,

In the future,

And the present,

And his essential nature,

Which transcends all thought constructs,

Is revealed.

And we realize that we are infinite,

Amazing beings living in this moment,

Capable of anything.

That's what we realize.

I've experienced flow state or some such like a few times.

It was a feeling of bliss and my whole body and consciousness felt like I was in slow motion in that moment.

And I felt physically like cotton wool,

Or as I usually describe it,

I felt like a marshmallow.

Who does the realizing?

That is the important question.

Who is that?

And again,

There's no answer.

It's like there is an answer,

But you know the answer.

The answer is the question you're asking.

As soon as we say who is doing the realizing,

It's like our mind goes all the way back to the source of who is realizing.

And we feel the essence of who is realizing.

We feel it.

Yet last week we did a talk about pain,

Piercing the skin,

And how the idea of piercing the skin,

If you actually feel the pain,

And you go all the way back to who is experiencing this,

Where is the sensation coming from?

And you realize it's not the ego.

It's beyond that.

But something,

Someone,

Some essence is experiencing this,

But it's not answerable.

Who is an ego question?

Exactly.

Maybe it's not a who,

But we know.

And it's so important.

Like Osho used to say that if you have never had an experience that you couldn't explain,

Then you have never had a real experience.

This is really important.

It's really important to be okay with not putting words to certain ideas.

It's fun.

Don't get me wrong.

I'm a wordsmith.

I love the act of.

.

.

I write books.

I dig words.

I like trying to explain things.

And exactly.

Maybe it's higher consciousness.

Maybe it's our soul.

Maybe it's our inner Atman.

However we understand it,

Maybe this language takes us a little closer.

Like Norma does with painting.

That's just it.

Like you're sitting there and you're looking at it,

And it takes you somewhere you cannot explain.

But imagine walking through your life always having this knowing.

It's almost like,

It's like it becomes the wallpaper inside of you.

Or some sacred painting inside of you.

That every time you imagine it or think about it,

You remember that you are all things.

And then that becomes the context of every experience we have.

You know,

And we can still fully engage in life.

But we'll always have this consciousness.

And the coolest thing is,

The fewer words we give it,

The better.

This is the true use of an altar.

Is to place things on an altar that wordlessly remind you of this.

That on the days that you forget,

That you look on that altar and the very vision of whatever you've placed there instantly lets you remember that wordless reality.

The one that watches the mind and its activities exactly.

This depth of spirituality feels like home in so many cultures.

Current socialization is what we're breaking out of jailbreak.

I found it very interesting that in a weird strange way I experienced differently that involved my old interpretations being let go to experience a new mystery that I accepted instead of being afraid of.

That's wonderful.

It's an awesome thought wallpaper painting inside of us.

I imagine scenes of the whole world's nature like tattoos and all my limbs.

Hmm.

All right,

Let's close our eyes for a moment.

And let's just breathe deeply.

And in your mind's eye,

Let's find yourself sitting on a bench in the country and you're overlooking a beautiful scene,

Whatever it is.

It's a magic bench that appears exactly gazing upon the scene that you would love to look at.

And in your mind's eye,

Your eyes are open.

And as you gaze at this beautiful scene,

Your breath becomes deeper.

And you're taking in the world around you.

You can hear birds singing.

You can feel a light breeze on your face.

You feel the air going into your lungs and being released as you exhale.

And you feel completely at peace,

Kind of with a,

An inner smile happening.

And then these words float up from your consciousness.

There is no mind.

There is no intellect.

There is no ego.

I am pure consciousness.

I am pure being.

There is no mind.

There is no intellect.

There is no ego.

I am pure consciousness.

I am pure being.

And just breathe in that space,

Allowing that feeling to imprint on the walls within you.

This feeling,

This knowing,

This deep wisdom.

Chitta Adi Antakrita Na Asti Mama Anta Bhavayat Iti Vikalpanam Abhavane Vikalpa Ujjita Bhavet People talk about mind and ego.

They talk about the mind and ego.

They talk about the mind and ego.

They talk about the mind and ego.

They talk about the mind and ego.

They talk about the mind and ego.

They talk about the mind and ego.

They talk about the mind and ego.

Let's just drop this whole conversation.

Consider instead,

There is no mind.

There is no ego.

There is only the vivid reality of this surprising moment at play,

Beckoning.

There is only the vivid reality of this surprising moment at play,

Beckoning.

Let's take a deep breath in together.

Exhale.

I would love to know how you feel I would love to know how you're feeling.

Thoughts.

It felt like sound.

Do you know that the heart chakra Sanskrit name is Anahat which means unstruck chord.

What that means is from the heart we feel the sound that the universe makes before we strike something to create sound.

There is the sound that our ears pick up but then there was the sound of the original vibration.

When you believe in things you don't understand,

You suffer,

By Stevie Wonder.

Sound that you hear in the moment,

Then gone.

Thank you so much for being here.

I hope you have a wonderful day.