Meetings with John Sherman

The end of the effort to settle the issue of identity is the realization that your life, just as it is, as it is unfolding, as it is displaying itself, is precisely your realization. Your life is yourself made real. Not real in the philosophical sense, but real in the sense of a manifested object.nnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting with John Sherman on July 5, 2008.nnLength: 1 h 39 min. File size: 23.8 MB

This work is entirely about identity. There is nothing else that is of any use for us in fulfilling the natural desire to be alive, and free, and in love with life. There is nothing else that matters apart from identity. There is nothing else that gets in the way; there is no other problem, no other cause of suffering than the issue of identity. When the issue of identity is settled, all else follows.nnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting on June 21, 2008.nnLength: 1 h 35 min. File size: 22.8 MB

Seek the sense of self. That is what the self-inquiry of Ramana Maharshi is. "Self-inquiry" is really not a good translation for what he advises. There is no inquiry to it. There is no question to it; there is no answer to it. "Who am I?" is not a question, it is a quest. It is an exploration, an adventure, it is an investigation into the bedrock reality of identity. It is the movement that will resolve the issue of identity once and for all. It is the action that will remove from you the fearfulness and anxiety that arise solely because there is operating within you the unseen, unseeable, inferential conviction that there is nothing to you but this life.nnComplete, live recording of a Worldwide Meeting with John Sherman on June 7, 2008.nnLength: 1h 33 min. File size: 22.39 Mb

How are metaphysical and philosophical questions of any use to you? How does understanding or not understanding the spiritual assertions that "you are inexistent," "there is nobody home," or "there is just being" help you bring an end to the undercurrent of fearfulness and anxiety that arises from the conviction that you are at stake in this life?n nAll that is ever really needed is to taste this sense of self, the feeling of being me whenever it occurs to you to do so. See if you can feel what it feels like to be here, to be you. Feel what self feels like.nnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting on May 24, 2008.nnLength: 1 h 57 min. File size: 28.13 MB

Spiritual ideas such as "resist nothing," "stop," or "call off the search" and the like are not instructions, they are simply attempts to speak of the outcome of our seeking.nnWhat we seek is the direct taste of the sense of self, and this brings us, again and again, face-to-face with the light of reality. It is that light that does all the work. nnIt is that light that snuffs out the deep, unseen conviction that we are these lives, these minds, these bodies and nothing more, and that we are at stake in these lives. Then we see what is meant by all spiritual ideas.nnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting on May 3, 2008.nnLength: 2 h 8 min. File size: 30.76 MB

Once you embark upon the real effort to rid yourself of all beliefs about what you are, that effort makes the mind transparent to reality.nnnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting on April 5, 2008.nnLength: 1 h 33 min. File size: 23 Mb

One of the things I want to talk about today is the role of words, of understanding and speech in the consideration of reality. I want to speak about the role of words, ideas and understanding in the arena that we call self-realization.nnI remember that, when I first heard the term self-realization, I thought that was a lot better than enlightenment. It seemed to have a more esoteric and highfalutin sound to it, there seemed to be an aura of special knowledge to it. So, I invested that word with a magical component, which is what we do with words anyway. We have this inclination to think of words as the gateway to understanding, and clarity and, in the spiritual arena, as the gateway to self-realization--a state that we imagine to be outside of, apart from normal experience. nnThat love affair with the idea of realization did me no good. If it had any effect at all, it was to delay the day when I was done with suffering and misery once and for all.nnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting on March 15, 2008.nnLength: 1 h 27 min. File size: 20.96 MB

The idea that there is only one question is a kind of a cliché in the spiritual community. It started out as an articulation of a momentary insight that was clear, startling, and useful to people. But my sense of it is more that there are many, many questions. nnThere are infinite questions, but really there is only one answer. And that is the truth of it. So, for the one who is harboring a burning question about reality, or the relationship to it, or what can be done to realize freedom, and so forth, that question is unique and particular to the experience of the person who is uttering it. It is not the same question. But it is going to be the same answer.nnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting on March 1st, 2008.nnLength: 1 h 11 min. File size: 17 Mb

When I say "you," I am talking to you. And you know who you are. You know what you are. I am not speaking to "ego," and I am not speaking to the "true self." I am speaking to you, to this reality of presence that hears my words; this reality of presence that is the source and the destination of all things whatsoever -- thoughts, confusions, ideas, understandings, and everything. I am speaking to you. And it is on you to know what you are. nnI can't tell you what you are. It is of no use for me to tell you that there are two you's, a little you and a big you, one of which has to go, and the other of which has to be woken up. That doesn't help you at all. That is just an interpretation of the reality of which all are already constantly aware; just an interpretation of the reality that is endlessly giving rise to its own interpretations, and its own versions of a narrative about itself. That's what this whole universe is: the arising of reality's attempt to say something about itself, to see itself, to explore the infinite range of expression that is its story about itself.nnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting on February 16, 2008.nnLength: 1 h 25 min. File size: 20.3 Mb

I am reminded often, in my own mind, of the story of how Nisargadatta found his teacher, the guy said to him something to the effect of, "Just stay with the feeling 'I am' and it will take you home," then he promptly dropped dead, without providing Nisargadatta with any follow-up instruction, correction, discussion or anything else. nnI don't say it quite as poetically, but I don't have not much more to say than that. What I have to say in this realm is, Look at yourself. Look at yourself as often as it occurs to you to do so. As often as you can, look at yourself. So far, I haven't dropped dead on you and left you hanging, wondering what in the world can I possibly be talking about with this look at yourself business, but really, that is all there is to what I have to offer. All the rest of it is discussion, and elaboration, and explanation, and perhaps some guidance and encouragement and reassurance... The truth is that, if you take just this one thing that I say and try with all your heart to see what it is that I am talking about, it is enough. Look at yourself as often as you can, because it is the seeing that does all the work.nnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting on February 10, 2008.nnLength: 1 h 36 min. File size: 22.9 Mb

Ramana Maharshi gave no one any encouragement to follow him in any way whatsoever. He only instructed us, consistently, and again and again, to find out for ourselves what is real, what is here, what we are. He did encourage us, and the encouragement he provided was by his own example, and by his own experience that the effort to find out for ourselves what is real would give us everything we have ever wanted. So far as I know, in all of the time that I spent reading Ramana and thinking about Ramana, he never told anybody to go out and teach in his name or in the name of his teaching either. Nor did he ever suggest that he was part of or the beginning of any lineage.nnThe whole essence of Ramana's offering is that there is only one thing worth doing in life, only one thing that has to be done in order that life can be seen as the wonder and the gift that it is. And that is to cut through all of the conditioning, the mental chatter and the mind's insanity and look with all your heart, trying only to see yourself.nnnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting on January 19, 2008.nnLength: 1 h 31 min. File size: 21.8 Mb

Determination is a good thing. What is really required is intention. Not so much determination, but the intention, when you turn your attention looking for this ever-present reality, that it is your intention to see reality. That's all. In other words, it is not something that comes to you as a side effect of some other thing that you are doing or not doing. It is your intention in that moment, even if that moment is vanishingly small, and even if those moments are few in number over time. What is required is that, in those moments when it occurs to you to look at yourself, that you see that that is what you are doing: you are, with full intention, trying to see the reality of what you are.nnComplete recording of a Worldwide Meeting on January 5, 2008nnLength: 64 min. File size: 15.3 Mb

This activity that we call self-inquiry should be so easy to speak about, and so easy to offer clearly and understandably, that just having heard it once should produce in the mind that hears it at least a curiosity about whether there is any possibility that something so simple, so easy, so direct and uncomplicated could have such profound effects on the life. It should be simple. I should be able to say something that, when you hear it, you will say, Oh right, "I want to try that. I want to see whether there is anything to this." Without it triggering in you spiritual associations, and religious understandings, and all of that. Those things are all fine, but they are 100% beside the point in self-inquiry. nnnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting on December 22, 2007.nnLength: 67 min. File size: 16.8 Mb

It seems to me that one of the great problems with this practice that we got from Ramana Maharshi is its simplicity. And I mean simple, not easy. By "simple" I mean stripped of all the adornments, decorations, explanations, rationalizations, and understandings that normally come part and parcel with a spiritual practice. nnUsually we engage in a spiritual practice not for the sake of the practice itself, but in order that we can transform or transcend our lives, or think more clearly, or think less, or have a better idea of what we want or what we want to be, or how we want to get there, or have a better idea that we are nothing, or feel better, have a deeper understanding, have more clarity about the world, and my life and the things around me. nnMost of us, for the most part, when we engage in a spiritual practice, we do so from the stand point of a life that has absolutely revealed itself to be wholly unsatisfactory, and from the experience of which we desperately want to escape. So, when are engaging in these practices, what we are looking for is some change in our lives.nnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting on December 1, 2007.nnLength: 58 min. File size: 14 Mb

Worldwide Meeting - October 27, 2007nnI am here to get you to stop for one moment and look at what you are. I am here to to convince you to engage yourself in a devoted investigation of what you are. The point of looking at yourself is not to learn or understand what you are, or to confirm that you are eternal love. The point is only to see the truth of what you are and, eventually, all false belief about what you are will be destroyed. nnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting on October 27, 2007.nnLength: 1 h 26 min. File size: 20 Mb

Here I am again, seeking to find some way to communicate not just to you, but to the world, how easy it is to be finished with misery and suffering in this life, right now. And, in the finishing of misery and suffering, how all the problems of the human race disappear -- really. nnMy goal is not to find a way to impress upon you how wonderful life is (or how sweet it is, or beautiful or how loving it is). Because that is easy. There are poets who have done that; there are musicians, and singers and songwriters that have done that; there are preachers that have done that -- and done it well. There are sutras, and shastras, and Upanishads, all kinds of spiritual utterances that have been devoted to persuading us, or describing to us, how wonderful life is; how wonderful existence is; how ubiquitous and universal is the bliss of being. nnSo, I don't even bother with that too much. I guess sometimes I slip into it, but that is not my purpose; that is not my work here. My purpose, and my work, is to find a way to communicate to you (and to everybody who can hear) how easy it is to be finished with the experience of misery and suffering that is really the only thing that prevents us from seeing for ourselves what a wonder existence is. And it is the easiness of it that is so difficult to convey.nnnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting on September 29, 2007.nnLength: 1 h 25 min. File size: 20 Mb

If I had my way, and if I knew a way to do so, I would take a scrub brush and hot soapy water and scrub away from our minds every vestige of the "spiritual," every bit of gunk caught in the cracks that is "spiritual." We are enthralled by the magnificent and beautiful spiritual utterances that we have uttered over the ages. We are hypnotized by them, and in love with them, and we think they mean something apart from what they describe, which is just this: just us, just life. They are simply our attempts to say something true and real about life, about consciousness, about what we are all absolutely intimate with already. nnWe know that the attempt to try to say something true about it must fail, but somehow we have lost our way. We have fallen in love with these expressions, concepts and ideas, these non-dual sermons about the oneness of all being, about infinite consciousness, love without condition and grace, as if they were something apart from these lives, just as they are. As if they were something separate from us that we need to strive for and attain.nnComplete live recording of A Meeting in Satsang in Santa Monica, California on September 16, 2007.nnLength: 1 h 28 min. File Size: 21 MB

In actual fact, it matters not whether I am effective or ineffective in communicating to you, as this mind, as this thinking entity, the essence and the purpose of self-inquiry. This is the good news. It is perfectly possible for the mind to continue in its confusion and its misunderstanding of the purpose of self-inquiry. It has no effect if the mind continues to believe that there must be something done about the life; that there must be something done about the nature of the cravings and the aversions that come and go within it. That doesn't matter. It is not true, but it doesn't matter if the mind continue to believe it is true. Because the ultimate practicality resides in the fact that all that is required is that you look at yourself, as often as you can. No matter what you think you are doing; no matter what you think you should be doing. nnAll that is required is that you taste the actual presence of this presence as often as you can. And it is the looking, the tasting that does the work and not anything having to do with the understanding or the confusion of the mind about why it is working, or why it is not working, or why you are doing it, or what you should be doing, or how you should be fixing yourself, or anything else. It is the looking that does the job; nothing needs to be done about the mind.nnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting in Satsang on September 15, 2007.nnLength: 1 h 42 min. File size: 24.4 Mb

Self-inquiry is a radically simple means whereby we can rid ourselves of misery and suffering in our lives. Not pain and hardship, but misery and suffering in our lives. I have found that the most difficult task that I have in speaking about self-inquiry is trying to distinguish self-inquiry from all the other spiritual stuff that goes on in the world. nnThe idea of investigating to find out the reality of what I am is very old. Maybe 2,500 years, maybe even longer. It may have been a practice of the Aryan tribes before they even got into India. But until very recently, before the advent of Ramana Maharshi, self-inquiry was a part of the whole business of spiritual aspiration and attainment. It was one means among many for attaining spiritual fulfillment. nnEven with Ramana, it is sometimes difficult to hear from him the simplicity of the method of self-inquiry, because Ramana was willing to speak with everybody about everything. But one thread that ran through all of Ramana's teaching was a radically, fundamentally different view of self-inquiry as a means of ridding ourselves of misery and suffering in our lives.nnComplete recording of a Meeting in Satsang in Ojai, California on September 8, 2007nnLength: 49 min. File Size: 12 MB

It seems that I have, from time to time, complained about the fact that I only talk about one thing, and about having so little to say and so little to talk about. I received a message this morning from a dear friend reassuring me that the only thing worth talking about is what we actually do talk about, which is self-inquiry or the repeated and continued practice of having the experience of the reality of what we are. But still, it seems that there are a lot of very powerful spiritual concepts, ideas, utterances and practices that have captured the attention of most of us, at one time or another: philosophies, explanations, descriptions, mantras, meditations...nnI don't talk about any of that. I don't talk about the sweetness of enlightenment; I don't talk about eternal love... Love is a big one. It seems like it is almost a requirement of spiritual people to speak about the primacy of love, the ever-presentness of love, the beauty of it. The reason I don't speak about these things has very little to do with any judgment that I might have about their value or their beauty, or the authenticity of the expression that goes into them. The reason that I don't speak about these things and pretty much stick to speaking about the practice of self-inquiry, of looking at reality, of looking at myself has mostly to do with my own experiences with these things.nnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting in Satsang on August 25, 2007.nnLength: 1 h 6 min. File size: 15.68 Mb

We come to these meetings carrying with us an underlying sense of what it is we are here to discuss -- things having to do with the oneness of being, or eternal love, or emptiness, or liberation, or enlightenment, or self-realization. What I am trying to do is to shake that context, and set a new context that does not depend upon or require any spiritual component, any particular state of mind or frame of reference. The context in which I meet with you has very little to do with any of that. It has much more to do with an wide open, open-eyed, open-hearted investigation into reality. Not spiritual reality, just reality -- what is real. nnAnd the more particular context in which I come to meet with you is the context that encourages our willingness to rid ourselves of all the false ideas about what we are. Not in order that we can become spiritual, or that we can confirm or deny any spiritual concept or idea, but just so that we can see what is real, the simple reality of what I am. Not so that I can be transformed or set free, or so that I can attain some new state of grace, but just to see the truth of it, the actual fact of it.nnnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting in Satsang on August 12, 2007.nnLength: 1 h 56 min. File size: 28 Mb

The meditation that I speak of is the very simple meditation practice that I received from the Buddhists, I think it is called Shamata meditation. And it is just a matter of watching your breath. You sit comfortably, close your eyes, (...) and you watch your breath as it comes in and out of your nostrils. What you are after is to get a one-pointed, attentive experience of this physical sensation. (...) nnThe only purpose of this exercise is to strengthen the mind. There is no purpose to it whatsoever apart from strengthening the mind. You will find that it makes you feel good, and that is okay too. But that is not the point, that is just a side effect. What you are after is to be able to strengthen the mind. And the reason that it is useful in the inquiry is because the whole of the inquiry is to bring your attention to bear on an experience that is not really an experience. The whole of the inquiry is to bring your attention to try to see yourself face to face. And this is not an experience that is really an experience, but you see it immediately. So, the purpose of this meditation is to prepare yourself; it is like pumping iron. You get good at moving your attention, keeping your attention focused one-pointedly on an object that has no meaning. But then, when you really feel like you are doing it, look at yourself. Look at yourself. nnComplete recording of A Meeting in Satsang in Ojai, California on July 14, 2007nnLength: 1 hour, 22 min. File Size: 19.72 MB

Many of you may know that today is in traditional Indian spiritual ideas, a day called Guru Purnima, which takes place always on the full moon of July-August. Guru Purnima has come to be seen as a day in which disciples and devotees of a guru can bring offerings of gratitude and support to their gurus. Initially, it was not called Guru Purnima; it was called Vyasa Purnima, in honor of the man who is said to have compiled the Vedas, to have given structure to the Vedas. He divided it into their four parts, and added organization throughout. This is also the person who is thought to be the author of the Brahma Sutras, which are the heart of Vedanta and of the Mahabharata. It used to be called Vyasa Purnima, and it was a day that was spent honoring the memory of this great man, who did work of great value to us all. As it happens, gurus of later times changed the name themselves, so it could be seen as an occasion to receive offerings to them from their disciples.nnI don't have any problem with that. I am happy for any arising of gratitude within any human minds, toward anything whatsoever. The experience of gratitude is a gift of God. But it is my experience, and the experience of many of us, that the whole principle of guru worship, along with the worship of spiritual utterance and spiritual understanding, have never been of much use to us, except maybe as entertainment, as experiences and states that are delightful and feel good. So, rather than speak about devotion to the guru, I thought that today I might tell you a little story about how this whole practice of spiritual utterance and spiritual ideation came to be, in the beginning of the period from which the Vedas, the Upanishads and all the other gorgeous Indian spiritual ideation arose.nnnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting in Satsang on July 29, 2007.nnLength: 1 h 26 min. File size: 20.58 Mb

I want to begin by trying to make a clear and straightforward statement about what I have to offer (and the only thing that I really have much interest in), which is the self-inquiry that destroys the false belief that you are your life. nnThe self-inquiry that I speak of (which came to me as a consequence of trying with all my heart to understand, to hear, to get what Ramana was offering) has very little to do with anything that we are accustomed to hearing in the spiritual realm. It has nothing to do with enlightenment, or realization, awakening or the gaining of any siddhis or powers. It has nothing to do with any of that. nnIt has to do with the recognition (which is accessible to us all if we reflect upon it) that the only problem anywhere to be found in all of humanity is a false belief about what we are. And that false belief is the false belief that we are our lives. What I mean by "our lives" is everything whatsoever that you see, do, think, remember, experience, suspect, think about, and so forth.nnLive recording of a Worldwide Meeting in Satsang on July 15, 2007.nnLength: 81 min. File size: 19.44 Mb

I don't see that there is any such thing as "spiritual." The practices that we undertake to get rich, or to get famous, or to get love, or to get rid of what I don't like about me, and hold on to what I do like about me, or get experiences of spiritual ecstasy, or get enlightened, or quiet the mind, or sweeten the body, all of those things are in the same kind of boat. They are all things that I do to try to make myself acceptable to myself. They are okay, there isn't anything wrong with any of them. There is nothing wrong with spiritual meditative practices, there is nothing wrong with yoga, there is nothing wrong with trying to get rich, there is nothing wrong with any of it. It just doesn't solve the only real problem.nnBecause there really is a problem, a shortcoming, a sense of a false promise that afflicts us as human beings, and no matter what practices we engage in, this sense of life as a false promise, of things falling short, remains in the background. Sometimes it is very big, and I am filled with longing, and yearning, heartache, and heartbreak for the horror of being born human and not being able to break free of human limitation. Sometimes it is quiet, and just a little nagging hum in the background. But it is always here, and we know by now -- we have been trying this for thousand of years -- that nothing that we do to try to fix our lives has any effect whatsoever on that underlying problem.nnLive recording of a Meeting in Satsang in Boulder, Colorado on June 28, 2007.nnLength: 89 min. File size: 21.38 Mb

I come to you, as always, to speak about self-inquiry and I don't think that I could have assigned myself a more impossible job in life than to speak about self-inquiry. I try, Lord knows I try. But what I am speaking about is something that seems to be an effort to discover something that has never been lost; seems to be an effort to find the reality that is ever-present and obvious to all. So that, when I try to speak of it, I fail -- always. It doesn't matter whether I seem to succeed, I always fail. Sometimes I have conversations with people or receive emails from people in which what they have to say to me seems to indicate that somehow they have heard really clearly the heart of what I am trying to say.nnLive recording of a World Meeting in Satsang on June 3, 2007.nnLength: 50 min. File size: 12 Mb

I come here to speak about self-inquiry. I come here with the hope of communicating to all of you the preciousness of self-inquiry; the power of it, the uniqueness of it. It is not like anything else. It is not like any other spiritual endeavor that you've been involved in. Self-inquiry is the last step, really. Everything else we have been doing for all our lives is a postponement of that last step. nnLive recording of a Meeting in Satsang in Santa Monica, California on May 20, 2007.nnLength: 74 min. File size: 17.7 Mb

The solution to the problem, which is the belief that I am my life, is the truth of what I am. This is what solves the lie: the truth solves the lie. nnWhat self-inquiry accomplishes is to rid ourselves of the belief that we are our life and it is infallible in doing so. To find the truth of what I am is the only thing that can do that.nnLive recording of a World Meeting in Satsang on May 27, 2007.nnLength: 56 min. File size: 13.5 Mb

It is not the technique whereby you do self-inquiry and it is not the quality or nature of the experiences that come to you as an outcome of doing it. It is just the doing of it, the actual, momentary, conscious realizations of the reality of you, that do the actual work. And the promise is that, overtime, as you do this, this false belief that you are your life (which is the source of all misery, hatred and suffering whatsoever) will erode and vanish finally, before you even know it. And, before you even know it, you will see that life is sweet, and beautiful. nContrary to the spiritual expectations about these things, to be free of the idea that you are your life does not in any way distance you from your life or the events in your life, but in fact, quite the contrary happens. In some way, as a result of being finished with the idea that you are at stake in your life, it turns out that it is easy and totally possible to just relax fully into your life. nnLive recording of a World Meeting in Satsang on May 13, 2007.nnDuration: 1 h File size: 14.4 Mb