ADI DA SAMRAJS DIVINE WORK AT QUANDRAMAMA
SHIKHARA:
Klik-Klak: The Pattern Patterning
A Gathering “Consideration” with Beloved Adi Da Samraj
at Free Standing Man, Quandramama Shikhara, January 31,
1996
The gatherings that began at the Mountain Of Attention
Sanctuary continued when Adi Da Samraj arrived at
Quandramama Shikhara. He gathered with those devotees who
had travelled with Him from California, and a small group of
devotees from Hawaii. The gatherings were held at Free
Standing Man, His Residence at Quandramama. Beloved sat on a
futon couch, surrounded by the Quandra Mai.
Night blended into day, and hour after hour the Divine
Lord Granted His direct and spontaneous Word to those
gathered with Him. He sat cross-legged, His Body sometimes
rocking slightly as He Spoke, drawing all present into the
Sphere of His Samyama.
Though He had begun to develop the “consideration” of
klik-klak and the pattern patterning on previous nights, it
was on the night of January 31st that He elaborated it
fully. This gathering is printed here almost in its
entirety. In His Masterful unravelling, Adi Da conveys the
nature of conditional existence and the Truth of His Divine
Revelation, entirely beyond the realm of all appearances.
SECTION III – Don’t Fool
Yourself
A few minutes ago I said, well, maybe, having gotten some
basic notions down, we can now approach this whole
“consideration” from any number of different angles. And
what you would like to have happen as a result of that is, I
was jokingly saying, a new religion in which you, after a
few brief preliminaries, take up the “Perfect Practice”.
Well, in other words, through some kind of “consideration”
process, we’d come around to an understanding of how it may
be possible for an individual who chooses to do so to
directly take up this Way in the form of the “Perfect
Practice” after some basics of some kind as a foundation-but
not necessarily have to think of it in terms of all those
hearing and seeing and everything else kind of phases.
Well, in fact, I did propose to you all a way to take up
the “Perfect Practice” directly after a relative few
preliminaries – in 1986. But those preliminaries amount to
assuming a way of life that is not bound to conditional
existence by act or orientation. So, at that time, one of
those simple preliminaries for the “Perfect Practice” was
celibate renunciation. Yes, just that. That was
straightforward there.
In the Advaitic tradition, in fact, in some of its
principal books, like Vivekachudamani (I believe it appears
there and in some of the other books in the Advaitic
tradition), there’s an indication of the preliminaries
required to be given up to be instructed in this Advaitic
sadhana. However they proposed it in the particular
tradition I’m talking about now – sometimes in the form of
six parts, or whateve r- basically what it comes down to is
it’s, as I’ve said, that your’e not bound to the
disposition, purposes, obligations, and all the rest of the
first five stages of life. You are detached from all of
that, disciplined (including celibacy), have no other
obligations, are one-pointed, are here just for the sake of
liberation (in other words, sixth stage of life purposes,
rather than karma, fulfillment of the potentialities of
attention).
So, as soon as you go through a very few preliminaries,
you can take up the “Perfect Practice”. And basically that’s
what I’ve told you. But first of all, you are not readily of
that disposition, even as described in the Advaitic
tradition. That’s not your position. You are attached to and
bound up in matters of the first five stages of life. Now if
you can, with a glance, see it’s bullshit and drop it like a
hot potato and make that clear to Me, you can take up the
“Perfect Practice” – if all the other things are there, too.
If that asana, that disposition, free of the search relative
to the first five stages of life – not only affirming
yourself free of it, not bound to it, your attention clear
-is there, then you can take up the “Perfect Practice”. So,
yes, its just a matter of if you meet the qualifications you
can take up the “Perfect Practice”. It is as simple as that
because the “Perfect Practice” is the Way I’m Giving
you.
But to actually fulfill those requirements is itself a
sadhana. Its not just status or an attitude. It is equipment
altogether. In other words, what you would have to be
altogether in order to fulfill those requirements, in the
general case requires you to do sadhana first, or as a basis
for that. You can’t just affirm those qualities. You can’t
simply affirm that you’re free of the searches associated
with the first five stages of life. To be in a position
where that is true, unless you have extraordinary
characteristics, sadhana is required.
I view all that as preliminaries. You like to look at it
as a way of life, or you like to even look at points along
the line as a way of life, or even the goal, somehow. That’s
why you have no business “guruing” yourselves – its one of
the reasons. That’s a big reason. Total incompetence is the
reason, in summary. [laughter]
If you want to entertain “guruing” yourself, you should
submit this application to Me . And, if I approve, then you
can go and “guru” yourself. [laughter] I am the
Chairman and the Board Itself, but if you make your
application to Me – you’d like to function as guru, you’re
very humble, you only have one disciple, one devotee you
have in mind, and you’ll keep it to just that one. You’re
willing to make all kinds of agreements with Me: You’ll just
guru yourself . Thats it. Nobody else.
[laughter]
Okay, so far it doesnt sound like its going to wreak
havoc. But, okay, “Let Me see the qualifications.” [Adi
Da laughs.]
Well, this might be amusing for you to “consider”,
sometime, relative to any tendency you have along these
lines – of telling your guru what you’re going to do rather
than submitting and asking. Or just guru yourself altogether
using some kind of source-books, or using your guru as some
kind of a source-book, perhaps. But, in other words, doing
the ego-based, motivated, self-manipulative, and so on,
self-“guruing” game rather than practicing Ishta-Guru-Bhakti
Yoga.
Of course, this is the tendency in anyone – in everyone,
in some sense, because everyone is functioning on the egoic
basis in the pattern. So you must simply be responsible for
this. But it might be interesting for you to do it something
like an application for yourself. At least think of it this
way. Yes, first of all think of how modest you are: You’re
only planning to do it with yourself. But just “consider”
this. You really do do this sometimes and do have this
orientation sometimes, as your egoic nature. And so, in
effect, then, at those times you have accepted the
application of someone to be your guru. You see?
Effectively, its someone else. Look at the qualifications,
in other words, that you have as a guru.
DEVOTEE: Just read the
confession written for the Feast of Water and Fire.
ADI DA SAMRAJ: Youre “guruing” yourself, thinking you’re
a guru – but why are you “guruing” yourself? You have found
yourself to be unsatisfactory in
the Realization department. [laughter] And yet
totally satisfactory in the “guruing” department. [Adi
Da laughs.]
One of the first things I asked Rudi when I met him, not
in any offensive way at al l-the exact language is in The
Knee of Listening , you can check what it is there – but
something to the effect, “Are you a Realizer of this
Kundalini Yoga?” And He said, “You dont teach it if you cant
do it.”
Well, that was a good answer for Me. Because thats what
it was always about from My point of view. I wasn’t going
there just looking for somebody to give Me some words I know
I could get from the local bookstore – some kind of words
about that kind of a thing. I wanted to make sure that He
knew what He was talking about, that this was something He
was actually involved in for real.
DEVOTEE: You asked him if he
was proficient at it. I think that is what You said.
DEVOTEE: And he probably
realized right then and there that this was no ordinary
devotee!
ADI DA SAMRAJ: Mm-hm.
I’m often amused when I hear a devotee, one devotee or
another, telling Me about what they often refer to as their
“Spiritual search”, or something like that, before they came
into My Company. (One devotee)
was just telling Me a while ago, about some meditation
practice – some organized, self-help, somehow religious kind
of group. No great revelation or anything like that, just
some therapeutically oriented, at the same time religiously
oriented, somebody – reading, thinking, trying this and
that, and make some sort of a church out of it. And people –
wandering wherever toward finding whatever – come in, get
involved in that, fall into that pattern there for a while.
It frequently amazes Me why you would have done such a
thing. [Adi Da laughs.]
Only if it is amusing to yourselves. But the kind of
things that at one time or another you found interesting,
got involved in – it was, in other words, what you were all
about.
If I had walked into Rudis store – and, of course, that
would’nt have been the place I walked into anyway, but if I
had gone that far – and spoke to Him and when I asked Him
that question, which was really trying to find out the
position to which He was making Himself available as a
teacher, if He had told Me He was really just an antique
store man and He and His friends study the I Ching , throw
the coins and then they all meditate on the passage and
sometimes discuss it afterwards and they do this every
Tuesday and Friday nights – and would I like to come and
join them? [chuckling] Absolutely not! [Adi Da
laughs.] I wouldnt have gone there.
Of course, I didn’t find Him at random. You know what led
to that – so that was not the case there at all. I didn’t
bother, generally speaking at any rate – sometimes I
investigated things intentionally, but I didn’t find the
kind of things that you all often have found satisfying to
be satisfying at all.
So it is revealing – what you did that had anything do
with religion, including your childhood upbringing. But
everything else, even some preoccupations devotees get into
once they’ve already come into My Company – all of it is a
pattern that should be useful to you, very revealing to you,
especially revealing to you relative to other things that
are similar to what you can observe that way.
What’s interesting and useful about noticing a pattern
early in your life is to see that the pattern is right now .
It’s not that you have to struggle with something that
happened early in your life, but if you see it there then
you can see something about the pattern which you are
enacting right now. And that’s what you can change.
This can be of interest to you, then, because its
revealing about “you”. When you talk about these things,
often you’re feeling, you know, “that was just years ago”
and you’re sort of in a position of dismissing it.
Like(one of my devotees) was the
other day, relative to Christianity – “never seemed
interesting to him” kind of thing, something like that. But,
rather than feel that way about that, look at it as a
pattern that is revealing about what you are tending to be
right now. Just look at it as a pattern and what it says
about you, how you are being characterized relative to
anything you’ve done, or anything you decide, or anything
you’ve “considered”, or anything youve believed in.
What you tended to be satisfied with to any degree at all
– for any period, in some previous kind of religious
association, even though you may dismiss it now – you are
very likely, somehow or other, demonstrating that same
predilection, tendency, or fixation now, in the context of
the Way of the Heart. Sort of a picking-and-choosing kind of
participation in this Way, or stronger in some respects,
weaker in others, or sort of applying the total Teaching at
random to your present moment
kind of self-“guruing” – or whatever it may be. You see?
Whatever would seem satisfactory to you, at least for some
significant period or reason in the past, its about
something that you’re probably up to now as well.
In other words, very likely its still satisfactory to
you. Something was satisfactory to you then, but you didn’t
find everything that was satisfactory, so maybe you kept on
going. But what was satisfactory about it, at least for a
moment, is still something you tend to find satisfactory.
And you are just sort of perpetuating the pattern by
dismissing the past. Whereas if you look at it as a
representation of your own design, then you can feel it in
the present moment more sensitively, perhaps, and grant
yourself better clarity about what it is you’re examining,
and also create a clarity in your feeling beyond it in
moment to moment practice.
The more fully you are aware of the pattern in which you
are apparently in motion, certainly the more intelligent,
perhaps the more effective, your transcendence of it in
every moment will be. One of the reasons is because you take
into account more aspects of the binding characteristics of
the moment. The more you know about the pattern altogether,
the less you dismiss about it or fail to notice about it.
The more total the awareness of the pattern is, the more
comprehensive the practice is in any moment.
In any case, all of that kind of “consideration” does not
have the purpose of accumulating a massive verbal
construction that you have to continue to reintroduce. No,
its a way of becoming sensitized more and more profoundly to
the conditions in which you are doing this Yoga from moment
to moment. It gives you greater and greater clarity to
examine My Word and My Instruction altogether and apply it.
If you have a massive mind full of calculated argumentation
to justify feeling good, then you’ve got to go through the
whole rehearsal of all that in order to “get in” those few
rare moments where it might feel some kind of good. You
see?
So those are just like My yellow pages years ago, before
I burned them. They are all the leftovers of a
“consideration” that sets you straight. It’s the being set
straight that’s the important part, and then functioning in
that straightness, directly, moment to moment, rather than
with a lot of verbal instructions which you have to organize
and rehearse every other moment. The sadhana must become
straightforward. So its not about building up a massive
structure of mental calculations. More importantly its a
matter of freeing up the intelligence from confusion and
bondage and uninspected entanglement.
So because the process of being qualified for the
“Perfect Practice” in general requires sadhana, and you
cannot meet the qualification simply as an act of will in
the present moment – generally speaking, or speaking of
devotees generally – the offering I made in 1986 couldn’t be
accepted. It was done as a “consideration”. Everyone was
allowed the opportunity to actually approach it in this
manner. And so everyone “considered it”, or at least thought
about it, talked about it, and a significant number of
people actually – as real “consideration” must be – took it
on as an actual condition of existence. Simply established,
flat out, the requirements that would be met in the Advaitic
tradition, as I described earlier, if somebody came to be
instructed. If you meet these qualifications, then you can
enter into this kind of a sixth stage practice, in that
tradition. So we entered into it together, as a
“consideration” in just that manner. Conditions like
celibacy and such, then, were part of it; dietary
disciplines, and so forth; a range of things, but very
straightforward, simple renunciate.
And the first communication of the now Lion Sutra was
associated with this kind of “consideration”. It occurred in
the midst of that very “consideration”, so it directed
everybody in that “consideration”. But, one by one, several
at a time, gradually, people showed the signs that they
couldn’t maintain the asana of those qualifications. Or they
didn’t have the will to do so, but came up with arguments
against it, or they weakened in their disposition or
whatever, on and on. Everybody with their this’s and that’s.
And how much of Feeling-Enquiry were they doing?
Anyway, it was like the smaller gathering at Charlie’s
Place, with the “Ordeal of Being” retreats and so forth. A
“consideration”, a very direct, immediate – by immediate I
mean in a very short term – entrance into the seventh stage
Disposition, first sixth and then seventh. And it involved
an intensive period in solitude, until (at some point)
individuals began to come forward indicating that this
Disposition that we had “considered” – this seventh stage
Disposition – was true of them. Of course, just as if I ask
you now, “Isn’t it true, no matter what is arising, you are
the Witness?”, in the midst of such an intensive, in
“consideration” with Me, something which was the direct
“consideration” matter of their pondering seemed to be
clearly so. There was no way they could deny it, somehow, in
that samyama.
So some felt, well, it must be so, then. They felt
something about it was so. So then they would come back, and
however many times it occurred there was a “consideration”
that followed that. Again, very much the same thing, though.
They couldn’t hold to the Position. Just as any of you could
say at any moment, if I directed you to “consider” it – yes,
this is so, you are the Witness, no matter what arises. But,
a few moments later, you reorganize with psycho-physical
attention in some other specific way, and it’s no longer so
from your point of view – you’re not established in the
Realization that you are not that but the Witness in that
moment. You could recollect that it is so, but you don’t
exist as such. You become the fruit-eating bird,
instantaneously. You can be one or the other but you can’t
hop as the Witness-bird into the fruit-bird position, or
vice versa.
So you dont hold to the Position. The Mudra isn’t true.
You haven’t Realized It. You’re still clinging to something
else that puts you out of phase with this Realization of
What is Always Already the Case.
(One of my devotees) was pointing out how we had spoken
to one another in Hermitage one time about how much he likes
pondering the Ignorance “consideration” in one way or
another. And we’ve talked about that, of course, but if you
discovered that you don’t know what even a single thing is
(and this applies to every thing) – in other words, you
don’t know What Is – if you really pondered that, you’d come
up with some profound motivations to practice! [Adi Da
laughs.]
One of the characteristics of that “consideration” is it
has got a humorous dimension to it – the absurdity that this
is so. For such a thing to be so of everyone – and it has to
be pointed out to everyone – seems absurd. Yes.
So, yes, you’re pondering, but you don’t even notice,
really, the import of what it is that you’re noticing here.
You’ve got all kinds of pattern and no knowledge, no grasp
of Reality, no answers. Just a lot of questions. Its all
question.
This is not just true in this moment, wherein you enter
into some sort of open disposition, rather meditative. But
its true this moment and this moment and relative to
everything altogether. Therefore, you don’t even know What
Is . You want to go to the office?! [Adi Da laughs.]
You want to get laid? That sounds like a very leisurely life
to Me. Smiling on TV and you don’t even know what any thing
is? That ought to tell you which bags to pack. Not your
attaché case. Travel light and keep on moving until
you straighten this matter out. [Adi Da laughs.]
So that’s what I did. I mean, how could I consent to live
an ordinary life without knowing this fundamental Truth? The
fundamental Truth! Or anything fundamental-how could anybody
do this? That’s not the order of business.
So unless the foundation was clear, how could you build a
house? Maybe you’re building it on a swamp. So, surely, you
must find out. That doesn’t mean you necessarily have to
disregard all responsibilities. You cannot disregard all.
But you can maintain them either simply or otherwise in such
a way that you can really engage the process of finding out
What Is . And What every thing Is . What the Truth Is. Why
consent to just be pattern-robots?
So, generally speaking, handle your responsibilities,
those that pertain to such a serious disposition, and
intensively engage the sadhana of this Realization. Well,
that’s what the non-humans “decide” immediately, so to
speak. That’s what they all do. They’re convinced
immediately of that course. They’re not wound into klik-klak
exactly like you humans. You have a wide variety of
involvements, extensions, elaborations of the content
associated with functions far beyond that of the
non-humans.
Look how much psyche you need to eat lunch. How much
psyche you need to do anything. How much language, how much
mind you require to put on a shirt.
“Consider” everything about it – including the
weather, the decorativeness, appropriateness for where
you’re going – everything about a shirt or about the body
altogether, clothing. Look at all, everything that comes
together, the complexity. Look what complexity it takes to
get a passport, or a bank account, or whatever it takes to
get anything these days – to get connected up these days,
for your own mobility, or whatever, things you need to do to
function. How complex everything is.
And look with what ease the chameleons walk about –
without so much as a knife and fork . . . or the first hat.
[laughter]
So complexly wound in such complex patterns, and the
collective associated with it and all the rest, your simple
bondage with the body, “Narcissus”, is more like being the
emperor of a kingdom than a guy with a knapsack leaning over
a pool of fresh water. [pause]
Actually, its not quite like being the emperor of a
kingdom. The emperor is in the ultimate position in that
structure – could, perhaps, have some kind of view or
leisure in which to find out something great. Its probably
more like being the sarvadhikari of the entire kingdom or
empire of the emperor. [laughter] And the emperor
insists on a life of total leisure given to Contemplation –
not ever disturbed, therefore, by anything in the total
domain of your ordinary life, your egoic life. Never disturb
the emperor. That’s all the destiny you’ve got. [Adi Da
laughs.] You had all the destiny you were going to
get.
So the “consideration” I put to you when I first began to
speak with you earlier this evening is, of course, in
summary, a sufficient Argument for the “Perfect Practice”.
But in order to do the “Perfect Practice”, you must be
established (by Grace and Yogic disposition) Prior to the
body-mind. The Yogic asana of the Witness must actually be
true, not something fallen from, argued toward. And if,
therefore, you followed that argument of “consideration” –
from earlier this evening, when we first began – such that
you got up from that “consideration” qualified for the
“Perfect Practice” (in principle this is possible), all the
qualifications that I’ve said apply to the “Perfect
Practice” would have had to been Realized by you in that
“consideration”.
For you, generally speaking, the “consideration” is
everything from student-novice to the “Perfect Practice”. In
other words, that “consideration” is accompanied by all of
that practice, it’s still, nonetheless, constant
“consideration” of the Argument relative to the “Perfect
Practice”.
So you can do that sadhana most intensively. Or you can
do it but not all that intensively, and with a lot of
vacations and complaints and whatnot, only minimal
directness or quickness. Or you can just sort of be
peripheral with it and so forth and not do it all. In any
case – what does it say?
DEVOTEE: Laughing Mama? The
Laughing Mama says: “Your objections to any thing dont mean
shit! “
ADI DA SAMRAJ: So, whatever you choose, Arjuna, just
remember this. Klik-klak doesn’t give a shit. Play it as you
like. But this is the secret. You want to play it, that’s
your business. But you have nothing to complain about if you
choose the fruit that’s on that tree there. You’ve given up
all right to complain as soon as you step through the
attention doorway to the conditional domain. After that it’s
the throw of the dice in some respects, you could say. But
its not about Realizing Happiness, anyway. Happiness is not
there. You superimpose it by your glance, alone. You
superimpose the expectation of Happiness but never Realize
it because you identify Happiness with this plastic you’re
animating by attention. And it is all changes,
shifts-replication, shift, change. So it is utterly
indifferent to your expectation of Happiness, in the realm
of klik-klak.
I mean, since the earliest moment of physical
self-awareness you’ve been afraid of death. If the klik klak
God were concerned about you – zip! – you know, a little
magic, sort of whitish-colored, smiling ghosty boy says
[in a really high-pitched enthusiastic voice] “Hi!
Saw you’re worried about death there. Don’t you worry for
one minute! Take a look at these ten rules here of Reality.
You’re taken care of, don’t you worry. And I’m always by
your side, buddy. You can always call on me.” If klik-klak
were the care for your interest in living forever and being
happy, well, that would be built in. Klik-klak could make a
sign of ghosty boy like that anytime. So if this was all
built for your amusement and fulfillment because “love is
here”, then there would be those kinds of things all over
the place. Yes, love is here, but it’s not here . You know
what I mean?
So the Call to the Divine is a Call Beyond . Not a
justification for klik-klak-land. But that’s how religion
gets used in the common form. Ultimately all it is a
justification for klik-klak-land. You’re all wound up in it.
You say, “Is there a God?” If you get any notion there is,
right away you start bringing in the requests. You can, by
being responsible for the movements of mind, yes, do the
Devotional Prayer of Changes, you can participate
responsibly in the domain of changes. But that doesn’t mean
you’re in paradise, and you just say the magic word and
Uncle Carbuncle comes and gives you a kiss and a box full of
everything you want. You see? That’s not how it is. There is
no Santa Claus. And there’s no Santa-Claus God, either.
There is the Divine, but Santa Claus is your own invention,
and the Santa Claus God ideas are your own invention.
Even if the disposition is positive and hopeful, and has
all kinds of religious justifications for fullness of life
and on and on, in some other klik-klak conjunction, all of a
sudden you’re garbage. You see? It doesn’t mean there’s no
God. It means its not about that somehow. You depend on
klik-klak, then no matter how hopeful you are, sooner or
later you’re going to get klakked. Because that’s how the
machine works. It’s not even that that amounts to being
punished for something. Its just that nobody, they or
anybody else, knows what the hell is happening and is doing
“all right”.
All this pattern patterning and patterning within and
among human beings – inevitably they’re going to be spirals
rotating separate from one another. And patterns start
intruding upon one another and creating disturbances. That’s
the nature of patterning existence. It never looks like
unity in the world, between individuals or between groups of
individuals or so-called nations – all these different
spirals and patterns. Theres no unity in that.
Discourse – Klik-Klak: The Pattern Patterning
***