Solve The Puzzle Of Pleasure And Pain And Be Set Free

So let's get started.

Kate,

If you will,

Will you bring up the first key lesson,

Please?

Read along with me,

Everyone.

It says,

We will have to repeat whatever we fail to complete in this life until that work is done.

We will have to repeat what we fail to complete in this life until that work is done.

Now let's put that idea into context.

How many of us realize that we have these repeated experiences with others,

With ourselves,

With conditions,

Conditions where it's almost endless how it is that we just seem to come back to that same place,

Maybe not the same people,

Maybe not the exact same circumstances,

But we seem to be brought back and back and back to what one day we kind of realize is life is trying to reach us with some lesson of some kind that we've failed to recognize and because we've failed to learn the lesson,

We have to keep repeating it.

This is a fairly familiar idea in higher spiritual work.

The question is,

What is it exactly that we repeat because we have failed to complete in this life?

That's what I want to look at with you.

If you and I were to take a scale,

You know what a scale is,

And on one side of it,

We were to put what we could call our contentment in life,

Our satisfaction,

And on the other side of the scale,

We were to put the stuff of our discontentment,

This sense that something is always missing and that we have to add something to ourselves,

Which way do you think that that scale would tilt?

Indeed,

It would tilt to the side of that discontentment,

To that side of always feeling like something is missing,

Which is why,

By the way,

Whenever we're anxious or rushing,

Why do we rush?

Why am I anxious or afraid of anything?

Psychologically speaking,

It's because there is some sense in myself that there is a pivotal thing that I haven't acquired yet,

It's still missing,

And so my life then,

As that formulates itself,

Drives me from pillar to post looking for whatever that next new thing might be that is going to bring an end or at least get this pleasure-pain scale at least balanced.

And we've lived,

You and I,

For so long with this sense of wanting something more from life than we have found or been given,

That this endless need that we have and the constant search behind it to bring an end to that disturbance,

It feels natural to us.

We don't really know who we are unless we're headed someplace,

Unless we're hatching a plan or trying to figure out some new promise to ourselves that's going to bring about this,

Finally,

What we seek,

This unending sense of self and its pleasure.

And I want to just break into my own notes here for a moment.

First,

The problem with this approach to satisfying ourselves is that no matter what we put on the pleasure side of this invisible scale that we might make this discontentment be outweighed by pleasure or whatever,

Surely we have seen that there is no way in which the passage of time isn't going to change those conditions that had moved this scale for us so that as the conditions change,

I wish I had a little scale,

So the conditions change over here is the contentment of this new relationship,

The happiness that I found in some new pursuit of happiness.

A pursuit or pleasure that as the conditions change,

We sit and watch the scale tilt again so that we're always trying to add something to this pleasure side,

To this power side,

To this possession side in order to balance out what we see a life that gives and takes without consulting us so that we're always in conflict with any condition that challenges what we finally get put on the side of this pleasure.

And if we can see that the fact of our present condition that I'm describing is inseparable from this unconscious nature that continues to reincarnate,

Now listen,

This unconscious nature that continues to reincarnate itself through the conditions that it promises will change this sense of something missing from our life,

Then we can reach a point which is pivotal to our study this morning that brings us to a key question and I'll ask Kate to bring it up so that we can read it together.

Is there a contentment and abiding security that we may know that doesn't come with some form that it may be lost at the drop of a hat?

Is there such thing as a pleasure of a peace that can't be turned upside down by some contrarian condition?

One more time.

Is there a contentment and abiding security that we can know that somehow isn't connected to a condition that change as it will doesn't change our sudden sense of well-being into oh no now something's missing I've got to go back.

Is there the pleasure of a peace of mind of heart that can't be turned upside down by someone simply looking at me saying something some news that shakes my world and now I'm all back to trying to put it back together again and the answer is yes there is and I've been working at trying to flesh out as it were the understanding about this new kind of a new kind of peace a peace that is pleasure not a pleasure that brings peace a peace that is itself the pleasure as opposed to the pleasure that we believe will bring us peace a substantial difference in that one idea so that before we can begin to find this world that I'm alluding to here we're going to have to learn something about the nature our present nature with its constant set sense of something gained something lost something won something taken something given something again lost so that this discontentment that recurs can be made evident enough to us that we start to understand something about that relationship that we have with our own unconscious nature where our nature is determined by something we don't see and if we we're going to do that we're going to have to ask ourselves a fairly obvious question that will if we can ask it and be honest will take us more than halfway to this peace of mind that is pleasure take a nice deep breath we have to ask a question go along with me when it comes to seeking power pleasure love security by any other name whatever it is sorry that we're running to or running from why is it that when we look for these things including our ideas about what we believe God might be including that pleasure of a time to come when everyone and everything is finally put away why is it that the only place we look is believed to be somewhere outside of us please don't discount the question examine yourself with me i'm rushing someplace why because my mind has told me that when i get there and there is always outside of me whatever the torment is that's making me anxious and driving me on it'll be put away i imagine a social power i imagine some financial gain every last thing that i imagine that i imagine to bring an end to this sense of discontentment this sense that something is still missing from my life every last one of those things i believe i will find outside of myself physical pleasure psychological stimulation all of these things that we seek are outside of who and what we are outside of who we are and understood these pleasures that we seek outside of us if you can see it with me every last one of them is tied to conditions over which we have no control so this this temporary sense of self of self that is inseparable from the the situation that that same unconscious nature imagines the whole thing rests on a on a a mountain of sand that drips and drips and drips away that falls away and as it does as conditions change lo and behold the contentment i had a moment ago the sense of being complete it it disappears like that sand through an hourglass and we know that it's true that it's always going on and we don't seem to be able to finally find something in quotes in this world and by the way when i pause it's because i'm returning as i would ask you to do into that place within oneself where nothing is missing and i'll explain this unconscious level of ourself and the ever changing exterior world that it wanders through that they mirror one another so that my sense of self is a derivative of what i see in the world did i get it did i lose it i get it did i lose it makes no difference it still gives me a definitive sense of myself and as one changes so goes the other change in the conditions of the world change in the way i'm conscious of myself whether i've lost something or gained something they mirror one another and if we can see the truth of that that i wake up for instance in the morning and the first thing that my mind does is it evaluates whatever it's looking for and through in that moment it looks for what have i got to do it looks for how do i feel and in the mirror of that moment my identity my sense of self that by the way will then determine what i go on to do and how i feel for the rest of the next set of activities is already built into that consciousness it's a kind of a trap a box really but we don't recognize it as being a box as the content of our conditioned thoughts and feelings being that which we turn to in order to change our relationship with the past content of our thoughts and feelings so what can be done that's what we're looking for where are we to look for this sense of of life in which nothing is missing where there is a peace that passes understanding and it is that that and it is that understanding that is the true pleasure where are we to find it so i have a story make this a little simpler i hope as you know those of you who've studied with me i often use a certain uh instrument a certain set of tools storylines that help forward certain ideas because in this instance when we send our our warrior queen christine to the good doctor in search of what's going on what hasn't she understood we understand that this this this part of us that wants to persist with understanding the true purpose of life that wants to complete the purpose of its existence it's all in us she represents you and i and the good doctor represents this higher knowledge this wisdom this understanding that we need to gain and then work with so off she goes to see the good doctor and as always he asked her what's happening with you and she says you know what i've reached this point where it's obvious to me i can pretty much give myself whatever pleasures i want i'm not wealthy but i can make ways to give myself even the smallest things i can give myself the things that i want that i feel are missing from my life and when it comes to my contentment if i can't find it in the things that i'm giving myself i'm skilled enough i'm worldly enough i can create new conditions for myself i know all this but it doesn't matter she said because no matter what it is that i give myself supply myself eventually i feel like i've come up short again and i feel like something is missing and i'm wondering to myself at this point because i've reached the age where i don't know how much time i have left to go after seeking these things that will make me whole so i'm i'm i guess i'm a little concerned i'm a little afraid i know something is missing and i've named it a thousand million times from the smallest thing just if i could just get through this moment and i always do but whatever it is that i get through delivers me to another moment like the one that i was in i don't know what's missing can you help me is it do i need other vitamins do i need new doctors do i need to live someplace else do i need to gain something that i i haven't given myself please instruct me he said listen first you have to understand that what you're looking for to bring an end to this sense of discontent you're looking for in the world that you've explored probably as fully as it can be explored the problem he said is that i understand there's always one more thing one more thing to get through one more thing to do one more place to go one more experiment i get it he said but that's not the issue she said so you can help me he said i know that i can well do we have to run tests she said no no tests well how will you know he said because first i've treated many other people like yourself and i can tell you that the treatment is a true treatment because it began with began with discovering the same thing about myself because i too was driven by this sense of myself that i've got to add something do something go somewhere but that's not the case that is not what's missing from your life christine please tell me what's missing and he looked at her he said i don't know how much you'll understand of this at first but i will help explain it if you wish go on she said what you're missing is half of yourself christine you're missing half of yourself and the most important half at that that's why it doesn't matter what you get in the world it can't give you what it is that your soul seeks it can't place you into any kind of power that won't be challenged by a change in circumstance the work that needs to be done as you know those of you who have been working with me for these years or just joining me it's an interior work and as we are now we've come to feel and believe that our sense of self is inseparable from the conditions that we find ourselves in whether created or not our sense of self is inseparable from the conditions that we find ourselves in i can wake up feeling good my husband my wife my children the news some text an irs notification the doctor's letter any last one thing can come and whatever it is that was suddenly that felt like it was solid out the door it goes why because the condition is in charge of my consciousness or more accurately my sense of self is a derivative of the condition that it is identified with attached to and dependent upon change the conditions out the door goes my sense of being whole and happy and the truth is if you're following me we don't know any other sense of self other than the one that is generated by being identified with passing conditions i know this is hard there's an old story about a fish swims through the oceans looking for a school that will finally be able to tell it what it needs to do and where to go to find what it believes is missing from its life and it searches and then one day it finds a school and it goes up to the the big fish it says all my life i've been looking for something that i know is missing can you please tell me where to find it and the teacher says well i believe that i can help what is it that you're looking for and the old story goes and closes with this idea the little fish says i'm looking for water how in the name of god does one explain to any other human being who is so sure so confident in the sense of someone who knows what they have to do where they have to go how other people have to be how do you how do you help someone understand that what they are looking for they are in already that there's nowhere to go there's nothing to do there's just something new to understand and see the truth of it and the truth begins with this understanding that we really don't know any other sense of self other than the one that is generated by whatever that particular condition may be and when the condition flies away that false sense of self evaporates and then we're right back one more time trying to figure out what do we have to do to bring an end to this incessant sense of self that something's missing what's the other half the one that's missing that's what we're working to solve here or to understand i'm going to ask kat kate to post something please be patient and read with me this is what we're looking to understand as best we can the missing half of ourselves is the silent awareness of the passage of thoughts and feelings that along with their associated sensations create a sense of self born of being temporarily identified with their ceaseless appearance and disappearance the missing half of ourselves is the silent awareness of the passage of thoughts and feelings that along with their associated sensations creates a familiar sense of self born of being temporarily identified with their appearance and disappearance if you could see it and one day you will god willing or perhaps you've had a glimpse of it my identity rises appears with whatever the thought is that's generated by some impression and suddenly that thought and that feeling familiar as it is deeply conditioned as all of these things are as it appears so comes the one who knows it so comes the guy the you the person that now knows exactly what that particular thought or feeling means what it implies what has to be done to reconcile whatever the problem it is pointed out and it rises and i appear and it disappears as the do the conditions that generated it and as it disappears i disappear but i don't know that i disappear because just as a wave on the ocean rises and falls as one falls another rises and out of the the murky dark waters of this unconscious nature suddenly i rise again believing that i know what's right i know what's missing because these conditions have stimulated the condition thoughts and feelings that are telling me what's true and as i rise ah i know who i am i know where to go i make commitments i make promises and then as that wave falls because the conditions that generated it disappear suddenly i'm left there having to pay for something i don't even know why i did it having made a promise i can't keep having lied and never recognized that all of that was resting in an unconscious relationship that i have that i have with the world that generates and that i'm allowing to that i i agree to the identity it generates because i don't know any other sense of myself other than that sudden strong surge that depression that that that despair that endless hunger mammon as christ called it it these waves that i'm describing of sensation driven as they are by thoughts and feelings along with whatever that her corresponding experience of self may be these waves are not separate from the consciousness that gives rise to them these waves are not separate from the consciousness that gives rise to them but this unconscious nature that gives rise to these thoughts and feelings names these thoughts and feelings and believes the conditions it names is other than the content of the consciousness that was triggered into that thought and feeling and then it then subsequently gave a name to and obviously a task to be accomplished try to see this with me i think i even spoke about this last week these waves are not separate from the consciousness that gives rise to them any more than the ocean exists apart from whatever forms it may generate given the conditions acting on it we understand the ocean itself doesn't generate the waves the currents that that that that that how do i say that give it its its identity to us it's the conditions that act on that massive body of water that produce the conditions in that water so the movement of the earth the sun the winds the the shift all all of this the seasons the tilt the axis every last one of these things generates out of that ocean the temporary conditions that the ocean is capable of of manifesting and all of that by the way is so that the ocean is refreshed by all of that change in itself i'm saying to you that we don't see yet that all of this sense of something missing can't be separated from the thoughts and feelings in this unconscious nature that suddenly here comes this wave i see a car i see somebody has something i don't want i look at my past it's not right here comes this wave of thoughts and feelings and the identity that's built into it it rises ah i know who i am and then it disappears and now i have to go through another iteration because i don't understand yet that this sense of myself that comes and goes that appears and disappears that's forever missing something that it is inseparable from this unconscious nature that generates it and that they are a singularity and to understand that they are a singularity is the beginning of what an awareness that i never had before of how this false sense of myself is ceaselessly generated and that i am dragged into an identification with it because i don't know where else to look i don't know who else to be i don't know what else to be because as i am now every wave every set of conditions is either a danger to avoid a potential threat or that wave looks like it's on the rise and therefore there's a temporary sense of power and creativity and yes i'm on top of things now but you're not on top of anything something is on top of you and as difficult as it may be but i would add a caveat here to what i'm about to say in my over gosh 75 almost 50 years of speaking teaching i've never not found i've never not found that if one will persist with their wish to understand their circumstances instead of allowing their circumstances to determine for them an understanding generated from their own conditioned thoughts and feelings i've never seen that that understanding doesn't grow i've never seen that a new order of awareness doesn't flower doesn't open i've never i've never not seen that and to even grasp the possibility that you and i are true nature that you and i are true nature as sure as we are and mistakenly so that somehow that that which we seek will be found outside of us the disappointment in the sense of missing out on life the pain of it isn't a punishment it is the slowly developing revelation of another level of understanding that from the awareness inherent in these gradual discoveries produces in us an unthinkable and it is an unthinkable awareness and it is the unthinkable awareness that which is not in thought that's what cannot be quantified or qualified with words it is that awareness that this sense of myself that i'm seeking is fictitious is fictitious it's a lie so that not only is the sense of self fictitious but everything that it imagines that will free it from its sense of missing life it too is fictitious it doesn't matter how long it takes to to gradually discover that my identity is in a ceaseless state of dependency on conditions outside of myself that i was led to believe would bring an end to my dependency on conditions outside of myself that i would finally gain enough gather enough be whole enough that nothing would rock my reality that i would be safe at last i wouldn't have to feel anxious i wouldn't get depressed because everything would coalesce and then you begin to awaken to realize that what you're looking to coalesce is a dream something imagined by an unconscious nature that has to constantly imagine something coalescing so that when it comes together then that sense of self can be real and whole and your new awareness if you're allowing it is saying no no how can you ever be free when you're dependent on something that changes how will you ever know who and what you are as long as your identity is a derivative of what people think or of what political party or what religious ideology you happen to be attracted to in that moment the old analogy of looking for your reflection in a stream it's there oh it's gone it's there oh it's gone and then one day god willing you recognize that you're not going to find your reflection in that particular spot in the stream but that who and what you are is actually the stream of this life that brings everything with it and takes everything away with it at the same time so that there's always something complete but the only way you will know what is always complete is in your complete awareness of that consciousness we're addicted as human beings to a mind that wants to grab onto something that says that's true never suspecting that the very attempt to grab something by which i can know who i am is the same as the fear of losing that sense of myself when the condition changes that's what makes your spiritual work on one hand so difficult but on the other hand ultimately so rewarding if you persist because if you're following me the missing half is the silent awareness of this endless thought endless feeling endless associations because it in the awareness of that is the recognition that nothing that the mind generates from its consideration of those thoughts and feelings those conditions nothing the mind generates from that is real nothing the mind generates from that is real and to take a sense of reality of myself from that is to have this endless sense that something is missing because no sooner does the cup of self get filled with the stuff it believes makes it real then the cup is emptied in truth the illusion is the cup is it half full is it half empty the real cup of life is always full of an awareness that reveals as one enters into it that there is an endless coming and an endless going and endless birth and endless death and in that new awareness that is the new relationship with the moment it can see the false for being false imagine for a split second here i am i'm home and i get out of bed and uh what am i gonna do what if in that moment instead of being identified with this the usual thoughts and feelings that lead to the depression or oh my god i've got so much to do the endless identification with that sense of importance and brushing what if in that moment because you had begun to understand that the missing half of yourself is the awareness that reveals the movement of these things what if you understood ah look at that there's a wave look at that that there it is again any one of a thousand different ways it can be described and you would see the false as being false maybe you do have things to do maybe yesterday didn't go so good so what what does that got to do with another identity that has to prove itself and protect itself and then be reinvented again and again and again what if you understood you never have to invent yourself meaning you never have to be identified with thoughts and feelings that from which is derived this sense of self once we see the false is false once we understand the dual nature of this consciousness that we have mistakenly called our life that awareness is what begins to place us as i started this talk that awareness is what begins to place us as i started this talk not in a peace to come as imagined by a pleasure or a pain to be gained or escaped but rather it places us in the pleasure of a peace that can't be taken from us a peace that it doesn't matter what comes and goes what appears and disappears because as you understand what i'm describing you'll just deal with what you have to deal with you have a physical life there's a certain karma attached to the body and all that it is acquired to what the personality is manifested over time all that has to come and go it's necessary it's part of the great reconciliation but you can watch all of that and as you learn to observe all of that then you enter into a peace that passes understanding because now you understand you don't need power or possessions or any of the things the mind imagines is going to bring about an end of the sense of something's missing you realize you know what all i need to do in this moment where it start to feel like something's missing here's a fear is anxiety what i have to do is bring myself back into what i've already been given what i am already made in the image of and that is this quiet awareness and you bring you bring yourself back into that world and in that world in its light you see everything that is not true everything that is passing through and what you need to do or not do but no longer deriving an identity from it that will appear and disappear