Until there is Hearing, Until the Argument Makes its Point in You, Practice Cannot Begin Adi Da Samraj
The following is an ‘essay’ composed from a collection of notes and excerpts taken from the writings and teachings of Adi Da Samraj on the nature of ‘hearing’. ‘Hearing’ is a technical term used by Avatar Adi Da to indicate most fundamental understanding of the act of egoity (or self-contraction) and in so doing (by Grace) transcend the self-contraction. In ‘hearing’ or Understanding and transcendence simultaneous there is the permanent intuitive to one’s own true nature, Divine Condition (Reality or Truth).
The collection is not made to read as if it’s one seemly conversation or essay. It it a ‘choppy’ patchwork of writings and teaching put together to give the reader of what one would ‘look like’ or what the ‘signs’ would be if one actually were to demonstrate a ‘hearing’ disposition.
In some of the writing below I have taken a paragraph and broken it up into sentences. I’ve done this because I believe one way to read (study) Adi Da’s Wisdom Teaching should be read as if you were ‘biting’ into a meal and needed to chew it. And so I’ve broken up paragraphs, included sentences and paragraphs from other essays and talks which do not read as a seemless essay. I beleive this a good way to read, study and digest the Wisdom Word of the Great Sage Adi Da Samraj.
One more item that may need some clarification. The term hearing, as Adi Da uses it, is also used in conjunction with other terms such as ‘self-understanding’ ‘self-observation’ ‘hearing the teaching argument’, Satsang and a variety of other terms which all have to do with transcending the act of ego or self-contraction.
All the words below are primarily those of Adi Da except those italicized. I’ve done my best to remain true to Adi Da’s teaching word as best I am able and any errors are only my responsibility and if alerted will address them immediately.
The Way begins only when you have thoroughly understood the disease of egoity, not as a symptom external to you, but as a process with which you are thoroughly involved in this moment and which you are capable of observing, understanding, and transcending. You have the capability in my company, by entering most fully into the prior presumption of Being. It is only then will you have the capacity to practice this Way, and not until then.
The first thing you must do is to hear me, combine yourself with the Argument relative to Narcissus to the point of relieving yourself of the arbitrary notion that things are just happening to you and that you are succumbing to limitation. You must realize that these limitations have no force at all. Rather than just respond or react to them, you must see the mechanism of contraction or reactivity and know it utterly. The sense of self-contraction is just like clenching your hand or getting a knot in your stomach or tightening your eyebrows. You must see it as something that you do in reaction to conditions of existence.
You cannot receive me until you understand your resistance to me. Understanding is the first gesture of spiritual life.
You must know the self-contraction and you must see it. You must observe it to the point of realizing that it is not happening to you. You are doing it, just as you are moving your mouth and blinking your eyeballs. Like the movements of your intestines, it is a rhythm to which you have become habituated. It is really very simple, but you must observe it, and you must understand it. This is the first office of spiritual life.
When you awaken to this understanding through ‘hearing‘ and are awakened to the Condition of this moment without concepts and contractions of energy and feeling you will quickly achieve humor and responsibility relative to the conventions of self. You will see through the strategy of Narcissus and awaken beyond all appearances and delight in the Awakened Company of the Adept. You will then have the ability to quickly transcend all false evidence and all conditional distractions relative to conditional arising.
A sign of those whose “hearing” is most profound is one who is stably founded in psycho-physical equanimity, and their energy and attention are completely free for the direct or unmediated Intuition of Transcendental Being. One Awaken to the ultimate Condition of things and their participation is one of constant Brightness.
Another sign of one who awakens through hearing is they are full of humor and delight. There is no aggressively opposition to the world, nor clinging to it. All the tension in the heart has been re-leased. To speak of Enlightenment without that sign is nonsense. There is no Enlightenment without the release of the heart from all of its seriousness, all of its clinging to phenomena, high and low.
True devotees (one who has ‘heard’) realizes Humor, Freedom, or Distance from all the seriousness of his or her interests and occupations from day to day. They see the ordinariness of it, even the absurdity of it, without becoming ironic. They are free of the world in itself and rest naturally in the mood of the heart, the Intuition of the Radiant Transcendental Consciousness.
If you rest in God, then you have received Grace. Then Grace has entered into your daily life and only serves its ultimate transcendence. If you do not come to rest in God, the heart is like a stone or a clenched fist. It has not entered into the Infinite Radiance of Consciousness. It is fixed upon itself. It is Narcissus, self-meditative, self-protective, threatened by everything to Infinity, obsessed with possibilities and the repetition of experience in order to acquire a sense of survival, consolation, and pleasure.
One who has heard must emerge into the True Condition of existence, which is relationship. To live in constant, heart-felt relationship to the Spiritual Master. It obliges the being to a Way of sacrifice, which is at once Truth and Love.
One who understands and becomes free of the necessity of his own life of Narcissus begins to live among men in an entirely new way. What he requires is the communication of love, of presence, because he knows that we are the food source, the life source, for one another. The force of his presence begins to become a demand for that life, that love, that Truth, the lightness, that happiness. This alone is the proper condition of a human society. The more he experiences of himself, the more he also sees in the world. The more he becomes responsible for all of his own activities, the more that responsibility begins to extend to the activities of others-his intimates, his household, devotees in the Ashram, and in varying degrees all those whom he contacts.
In the ‘Hearing Condition’ one suddenly Shines forth, free of the limitations of the left and right sides and the mechanics of experience. It is pure Feeling or Blissfulness, pure Consciousness or Happiness, without knowledge, without any definition.
It is free of all of the limitations of experiential knowledge and conception. It no longer has any such problems. Its fundamental Condition is obvious, but not really speakable.
All the aspects of one’s life becomes observable, and you can presume responsibility for them and act whole bodily in our relations in every moment, as God-Communion. In such practice of Real Life, th(e) body-mind becomes purified, balanced, and clarified. It becomes healthy in the truest sense.
When the ego (or self-contraction) is understood and transcended, then Nature is seen from the point of view of Wisdom. And, in that case, the egoic struggle in Nature or against Nature is also understood and transcended. Then the Way of life ceases to be founded on the need to destroy the dynamic of Nature via conventional knowledge, power, immortality, or mystical escape. The world is no longer conceived as a drama of warfare between Good and Evil. The righteousness of the search for the Good as a means of self-preservation disappears along with the self-indulgent and self-destructive negativity of possession by Evil. In place of this dilemma of opposites, a self-transcending and world-transcending (or Nature-transcending) equanimity appears. And in that equanimity there is an inherent Radiance that transcends the egoic dualities of Good and Evil (or the conventional polarities of the self in Nature). It is the Radiance of Love. And in that Free Radiance, energy and attention are inherently free from the ego-bond, self-contraction, or the “gravitational effect” of phenomenal self-awareness. Therefore, dynamic equanimity, or the free disposition of Love (rather than the egoic disposition in the modes of Good or Evil), is the “window” through which God may be “seen” (or intuited)-not in the conventional mode of Creator, Good, Other, or Heavenly Place, but as the Real, or the tacitly obvious Condition of all existence.
The Argument and the self-Contraction
Once the argument has been considered, felt, and lived, the devotee is convicted. He is convicted of his love for the Teacher and he is convicted of the necessity of the Teaching and of right action for the rest of his life. Then he has heard the Teaching, he is prepared, and he approaches the Divine Master in Divine Communion.
When that contraction is seen in the moment of self-observation – not in the moment of self-watching, because then there is a self and all you do feel is the contraction – but when the contraction is seen, when it is really observed, then you not only see the whole life contracting through all of its mechanisms, but you see what precedes it. You see contraction relative to the whole pattern of existence. You do not just feel contracted. You see this contraction, you see the great space in which it is occurring, you see it as an event, and thus you realize what is prior to that event. You become responsible for it when you know it as an event, and you cannot do it anymore. In consciousness you live as what precedes that contraction, and thus through the Siddhi that is Consciousness you may in every moment undo the limitation of your tendency.
The sign of true hearing in the devotee is an ease in life – the disciplines become natural and clear, his life becomes unclouded and responsive, he is capable of functioning, speaking, thinking, acting, and loving, he is a disciplined and religious person. He is not merely disciplined in the traditional way of living according to a conventional law – don’t do this, don’t do that, like the traditional yamas and niyamas that we talked about earlier – but he is disciplined as a natural response to ordinary life. He enjoys a natural asceticism or easeful economy in the midst of ordinary activities. He neither exploits life nor limits it. The signs of preparation or hearing are a natural approach to the Teaching and clarity.
Everyone who hears the Teaching enters into this Enlightened disposition in some fundamental sense.
Those who hear me are not self-concerned anymore. They already possess the arms of wisdom. They already enjoy the Siddhi of the Divine and deal with whatever may arise in the apparent individual experience. They do that creatively and responsibly, but they do not stand as fear. So, where is their attention? Their attention is free. It deals freely with personal circumstance and is not troubled. It is to be thrown out of the sphere of the body into the environment of all relations and all possibilities, the environment of total existence, not merely of self-existence.
Until there is hearing, until the Argument “makes its point in you,” practice cannot begin. In hearing you transcend the self-contraction and are restored to Satsang.
Hearing liberates energy and attention from the egoic body-mind and to the Process that is the Way. Thus, those who hear also begin to hear more and more. Understanding arises when there is true hearing and self-observation in relationship.
Hearing is continuous insight into the self-contraction, allowing us to abide in the disposition which is radically free of the self-knot.
Understanding is insight into the very mechanism of your existence that is duplicated in all your actions and experiences. Through such insight you inherently transcend the lie or the binding power of that mechanism (The lie is that its psychic aspect represents an independent being-that is, an elusive…specific soul that is separate and independent). This insight into the mechanism of Narcissus, or awakening into the attitude of Ignorance, is the fundamental Teaching, and the fundamental practice is the “conscious process,” whereby insight is expressed moment to moment. You must enjoy insight into the mechanism, the action, the presumption that makes existence into a torment. You must remember That which you are always denying.
To hear the Teaching means that you hear Me, because the Teaching did not fall out of the sky. Then you can live with Me in Spiritual terms. To hear the Teaching means to be established in a relationship with Me.
Having heard, you must see Me, you must live with Me, you must practice in my Company. That is the secret of this Way of Life – not to be self-involved, not just to have a mental understanding, but to live with Me directly.
True “hearing” occurs when the soul flashes forward, when it is Awakened. When devotee is not at odds with Teaching, his intimates, and Teacher. When the devotee is no longer at odds with the Teaching, when he is no longer at odds with his intimates, when he is no longer at odds with the Teacher, then hearing is beginning.
Understanding prepares us for Spirit-Baptism (Seeing). Without Spirit-Baptism there is no spiritual life. Therefore, you who deny me and are so self-possessed must understand that the essence of my Teaching is the Transmission of Spirit. This Transmission Intoxicates you, but if you have not understood yourself, you cannot use my Spirit-Blessing. You will shut It down. Therefore, you are only prepared to practice in Truth when you have used my Teaching to the point of understanding.
The only thing that prevents the sublimity of Spirit-Communion in every moment of existence is the simple mechanism of self-contraction. You must hear me, therefore. You must observe the self-contraction and understand it so thoroughly that it is not happening to you anymore, so that you recognize it as your own action, so that you can enquire of it or meditate beyond it or feel into the Life-Current, the Divine that is beyond it, in your daily life. That is the capability you must regenerate in yourself. It does not exist in you now because you have habituated yourself to shutting out the Force of God.
You discover that you are already free, and Happy. Life is enjoyed from the point of view of understanding. There are difficulties – as always – and practice remains your test as well as your obligation. But in your hearing, the “problem” orientation is undone and instead, understanding is brought to the events of life.
When you are living the disciplines of practice that the Spiritual Master has given you, when you are living them in the spirit of Satsang, in the spirit of the Teaching, simply practicing in ordinary terms. Thus, when you are seated in the dimension of consciousness itself, not in the seat of the brain as a strategic position, you suddenly grasp the entire play that is your humanity. When you are free of all manipulative exercise, you are like a mirror to your own event, and the process of your life shows itself to you in instant comprehension.
From the point of view of the true disciple, there is no significance to the patterns. There is no significance. “Significance” is your dilemma. It is the pattern of your own mind-forms.
Hearing is knowing, we are always already “there.” This is it. There is no dilemma. There is only one Reality, presently. It is not somewhere else. It is not hidden within us, nor behind the world. It is obvious. Satsang is the condition of Reality, consciously lived. It is lived to you, within you, as you, along with you. It is that real condition lived as life, as a pressure upon the disciple. The Guru lives it to him, until it begins to become obvious, until it begins to become intelligent in him. But all he will have realized, after all, is the obvious. The nature of the rising event, the apparent condition, becomes clear. It becomes obvious to him that his dilemma is his own activity. He sees that in fact there is no dilemma. There is nothing about the present that is not Truth.
Observation, or insight, which is fundamentally the same thing, lasts only when it is perfect, because only when is is perfect does it include all other possibilities that maybe observed, and therefore it goes on and on and on.
Any moment of self-observation cannot last, because something else arises, and you must be present in the next moment. It is only when the whole affair of self-observation and insight becomes summary, conclusive, total comprehension of fundamentally what you are as an activity, only then can it appear as a real responsibility in consciousness. The whole affair of self-observation ultimately becomes summary and conclusive. It becomes comprehension.
Find the Company of Truth. Hear the Teaching of Truth. Become intimate altogether with the One that is Truth.
When the mechanics of egoity are transcended in our understanding, then it becomes obvious that life (or manifest phenomenal existence) is simply a play of opposites. Neither “Good” (or creation and preservation) nor “Evil” (or destruction) finally wins. Nature, in all its planes, is inherently a dynamic. The play of Nature, in all its forms and beings and processes, is not merely (or exclusively and finally) seeking the apparent “Good” of self-preservation (or the preservation and fulfillment of any particular form, world, or being), nor is it merely (or exclusively and finally) seeking the apparent “Evil” of self-destruction (or the dissolution of any particular form, world, or being). Rather, the play in Nature is always in the direction of perpetuating the dynamics of the play itself-and, therefore, polarity, opposition, struggle, alternation, death, and cyclic repetition tend to be perpetuated in the characteristics of phenomenal existence. Therefore, the play of Nature is always alternating between the appearance of dominance by one or the other of its two basic extremes. And the sign of this is the inherent struggle that involves every form, being, and process. The struggle is this dynamic play of opposites, but the import of it is not the absolute triumph of either half. Things and beings and processes arise, they move, they are transformed, and they disappear. No thing or being or process is ultimately preserved. But neither is there any absolute destruction. Nature is a transformer, not merely a creator or a destroyer.
Ignorance.
Understanding cannot be understood. There either is understanding or there is not.
Mere observation is not a condition in itself. It does not turn toward or in on itself. It is tacitly disposed to whatever arises, if anything arises, subjective or objective. It is not a method that can be taken up in order to control or watch arising events. It is not a strategy. It is not itself identified with any problem. It is simply our natural, present disposition when we are “hearing,” that is, when we are simply at rest in the intuitive presumption of Ignorance, rather than any subjective form, any experience, any condition, any kind of knowledge.
True observation is present in random (not strategic) self-observation. Observation is true only in the effortless, native moment, in which Divine Ignorance is the obvious Condition of self and all conditions. True observation does not merely confront or perceive a condition-rather, it is priorly free of that condition, and, therefore, intuitively recognizes it, feels it without obstruction, and dissolves (through non-reinforcement) its limiting and binding force. True observation is identical to Divine Ignorance, and, therefore, it acquires no knowledge by association with conditions, but abides as no mind, no experience, formless, pristine, and void. Thus, from observation, or free attention, which is identical to Divine Ignorance, springs the force of love, or unobstructed feeling, which is identical to Divine Radiance.
True or intuitive observation cannot itself be intended. It is itself native to us at every moment. It is mere or free attention, or natural awareness of all events, within and without. It is always already true of us and as us, but we are free to be present as such mere awareness or mere presence only when we are intuitively free of identification with all forms of subjective motion, distraction or knowledge.
In every moment of active understanding, the independent “I” dissolves – by becoming identical to the body. When the self-contraction is transcended on the bases of understanding, the knowing “I” is replaced by Ignorance, or the consciousness. Consciousness is Ignorance, or That which is intuited prior to all knowing.
The fundamental life of understanding does not begin until there is insight from the point of view of the fundamental activity and proposition of your life, which has you seeking always, but never fundamentally being transformed, because that sensation, that quality, is the principle of your seeking. No magic from without works that transformation. The Guru serves that transformation, but if you don’t become intelligent in Satsang, the genius of the Guru makes no difference whatsoever. Understanding must take place in your case. No shaktis, no philosophy, no marvelous influence is greater than that, nothing transcends that. All those experiences and occupations are just consolations, distractions from falling in upon that fundamental activity. When God becomes your condition, nothing you’re doing makes any sense whatsoever. You become a happy person. You don’t have any more seeking to do. You don’t have anything more to accomplish. You just become already happy. You know that nothing is going to make you happy, and you know very well then that nothing is going to make anybody else happy either. Either they are fundamentally and unreasonably happy, or they are simply unhappy. Perhaps consoled, occupied, distracted, but basically unhappy.
Until the devotee begins to grasp some basic understanding of his ultimate Condition, he is exploitable by individuals who arbitrarily assume a creative power and authority beyond his own. So most men and women, who work in an organization or ashram who don’t understand are constantly exploited by all kinds of shrewd, honest and also deluded people who are really in charge of his or her political, social, and intimate life.
Adi Da – edited and adapted by Beezone
We are at the dead end of the ancient ways, and we are suffering from the inability to move fully into our right human, and immortal destiny. Only an enlightened and liberated understanding of our old cultural and subhuman presumptions will permit us to yield to Life bodily, in love, and so move on in the Way of God.
If you had half a wit, reading The Knee of Listening would have changed your life! But you do not like the implications of The Knee of Listening because it indicates that you must change.
I attest to this with every cell of my body. I affirm it with all my heart. I plead with you to consider it fully and resort to a new Way of Life.