In NTI Romans 2, we learned that a curiosity arose:

What if nothing was as it is?
What if I could make something completely different?

When this original idea was infused with believing-attention, two options arose. The first option was a reminder of truth—the reminder that reality is reality, and it cannot change. The second option was the belief that something different had been made.

“What if nothing was as it is?” is the first sense of ‘I.’ It was the sense of an ‘I’ that can cause an effect. Out of that idea, two thoughts arose. One was a correction to the original thought; it pointed directly to truth. The other option was more thought, which led into a dream.

Today’s reading opens by saying:

The truth is that all thought rises out of the sense of “I” or because of the sense of “I,” as a correction to this thought.

Without the original error of an ‘I’ presence that can cause an effect, thought would not be. That includes right-minded thought, because right-minded thought is a correction to error-thought.

If we consider that our sense of self, our sense of others, our values, our ethics and our world are all thought, we may realize that we do not know who we are or what anything is without thought. Thought is our form of understanding; it is our form of knowing. And yet, if thought blocks reality, our form of knowing is entirely wrong. It is ignorance masquerading as knowing.

Thought is story. It is an ongoing storyline that creates fantasy. When the story comes into our mind as thought, and we believe it, we believe a story, a falsehood. Some things may be true in the storyline, but “true” in a made-up fantasy is not truth. When we search the story for what’s true in the story, we are simply engaging untruth more.

The story is in motion, and the storyline does come into your mind as thought. However, you are not the story character. You are life-awareness. You can  abide as life-awareness and see the entire story as nothing but story. You have the ability to be the detached observer, regardless of what occurs in the story.

Detached observation leads to freedom from the story.

As pointed out on Day 314, the body-mind will continue to play its part in the story even when you pull attention out of the story and abide fully in the Heart. Nothing that is to be done by the body-mind will go undone. As Ramana Maharshi said, “A yogi who is in this state is inactive even while engaged in activity.” The script continues, and the body acts according to its vibrational level in the script, but you  live beyond the script and have no part in it.

For one who is not completely detached from the script, the best way to “be in the world but not of the world” is to abide in a constant state of devotion. Devotion is living from within, instead of from thought. When you live from within, you return attention within. Through devotion, attention learns to stay at home in the Heart. It learns to abide there, until a natural transition occurs and it no longer goes out. It stays in.

Devotion is retraining attention to stay in.

With that said, please listen to this song very carefully now:

 
Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link

As part of yesterday’s tip, we contemplated this scripture:

Again, the kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and hid; and for joy over it he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field. ~ Matthew 13:44

Today’s reading tells you exactly how to sell all that you have and buy the field that contains the treasure. Today’s reading provides very specific instructions.

The reading says that Self-realization is the “highest spiritual state.” In this context, a “state” is a particular condition that you are in for a period of time. In other words, it is another milestone on the journey, but it is not the destination. The destination is the absolute, the First Principle of God.

You can see the field as Self-realization. The treasure is the absolute.

Sell everything you have now, and buy the field.

Today’s reading tells you how.

Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link

Please read and contemplate today’s commentary in the same way that you read and contemplate the Thoughts of Awakening.

~Commentary on Attachment~

 Precious is an idea that may speak of “fondness” to you. It may speak of “treasure.” But I say to you, some of what you treasure most you do not think of fondly. Some of what you treasure most you seem to hate, dislike, resist or deny.

Do not be afraid to admit that an idea is precious, whether it seems to be an idea you are fond of or an idea you dislike. If it is an idea you cannot easily let go of, it is an idea that is precious to you. Accepting that the idea is precious to you will help you question its value. In questioning its value, you open to awareness that knows how to judge the precious as precious and the seeming precious as having no value at all.

~From our Holy Spirit

Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link

You are not the mind. You are that which you know now as the inner teacher.

The inner teacher is your Self. When you sit and commune with the inner teacher, you are temporarily disengaging from the mind and communing with your own true wisdom. When you are able to stay with your Self, and your attention no longer drifts back to the mind as ‘me’, you won’t need an inner teacher anymore. Until then, the apparent relationship with the inner teacher is the most important relationship  you have. Please treasure it as such. It will awaken you to the degree that you value it as the most important thing in your life.

For contemplation:

Again, the kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and hid; and for joy over it he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field. ~ Matthew 13:44

Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link

Today’s message cannot be understood by the mind, so if you are identified with mind when you read today’s message, you will not be able to follow its clarity. It might be helpful to practice awareness-watching-awareness before reading today’s message in order to break the attachment to mind and read from a place of Self-realization.

The Self does not experience pain. It does not experience mental pain, emotional pain or physical pain. It is completely beyond pain. The only thing that experiences pain is the mind (attention on thought).

When you believe that you experience pain, you are identified with the mind. Awareness as attention has projected itself into thought and imagines itself to be thought. It is like watching virtual reality from what appears to be within  virtual reality; therefore, appearing to experience virtual reality, although virtual reality can never be actually experienced, and you can’t actually be in a virtual reality.

When Ramana Maharshi’s body was being eaten up by sarcoma prior to his death, the body was filled with pain. Ramana asked his devotees to move his body carefully, because of the pain. When asked about his experience of pain, he explained that the jnani (enlightened one) experiences pain as if it is a dream.

Today’s reading explains the same phenomenon this way:

You are the true Self, who is constant and changeless and sees the passing of all experience from a deep abidance within itself.

In other words, Ramana saw  the pain in the body and asked his devotees to move it carefully in the same way that you may be aware of the pain in a hurt kitten’s body and ask a person who is moving the kitten to move it carefully. You do not experience the kitten’s pain, but you have compassion for it. Ramama did not experience the body’s pain, but he had compassion for it.

Ramana’s compassion for the body wasn’t any different than his compassion for the world. He saw the pain and understood that it was experienced as real, but he did not experience pain from his place of abidance.

Just as the Self does not experience pain, the Self does not require purification. It has never been anything but pure, so the idea of purifying the Self is ridiculous. Also, the mind cannot  be purified. The mind is the illusion that it is. All one can do is see that the mind does not exist and that s/he is not the mind.

So, what is the purpose of purification?

Purification is not the process of changing or improving the mind, which is what many people mistake it for. Purification is the process of seeing that the mind is not real and the mind is not what I am. When one awakens from the delusion that the mind is me, purification is no longer necessary, because one has awakened to purity (pure truth). The false isn’t believed anymore.

In the apparent process of awakening, one may feel like s/he is changing or improving the mind. However, what is really happening is this:

One is starting to see, “I am not the mind.” Therefore, one is starting to disregard the mind’s chatter and act based on wisdom instead of mind. That is not changing or improving the mind. The mind remains the same. That is disengaging from  the mind.

Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link

Today you will read another conversation between a student and her awake teacher. In today’s message, the teacher asks the student for a commitment. The teacher asks:

Do you agree to follow me and to do as I ask?

At some point, every student must make this commitment to his/her teacher. Without this commitment, the ego will never allow the student to awaken; the student will continue to listen to the mind that thinks it knows best, and the mind that thinks it knows best will keep the student’s attention firmly attached to it.

It’s interesting to note that in today’s message, the teacher points out that he isn’t asking the student to put the mind aside. He’s asking her “to see that it is nothing.”

What’s the difference between putting something aside and seeing that it’s nothing?

I can decide to put a cup of coffee aside. I can’t decide to put Santa Claus aside, because there is nothing there to put aside. If I think I have a relationship with Santa Claus, I am deluded. A counselor wouldn’t help me heal from that delusion if he said, “Put Santa aside. Stop talking to him. He’s not good for you,” because the idea of putting Santa aside reemphasizes that there is a Santa. A counselor would be most helpful to me by helping me to see that Santa doesn’t exist.

Our teachings have been teaching us that the mind doesn’t exist. What we experience as mind is consciousness appearing as thought and world, but it isn’t thought or world. It is consciousness. It appears as thought and world through our believing-attention and the loop of experience. In other words, delusion breeds more delusion.

We aren’t being asked to put some thing aside. We are asked to see that a delusion isn’t true. It isn’t real. It’s false. It doesn’t exist.

We are being asked to stop giving attention to the false and to give attention to the true.

Today, consider if you are ready and willing to make a contract of awakening with your inner teacher. Consider this decision with heartfelt seriousness.

As we go into Gentle Healing Year 3, you will have more opportunity to commune with your inner teacher than you’ve had in Year 1 and Year 2. I will step away from the teaching role, which I temporarily accepted during Year 1 and Year 2. I will step into a supportive role in Year 3. I won’t provide daily tips anymore. Instead, you will contemplate four quotes from The Seven Steps to Awakening  each day, and through contemplation, you will commune with your inner teacher daily. The awake inner teacher will guide you as clearly and as consistently as the tips have guided for the last two years.

The last year of consistent gentle healing will come from your relationship with your inner teacher.

What you receive from your relationship with your inner teacher will be extremely helpful. However, if you receive it, and then walk away and forget what you have received, it will not awaken you. In order to awaken, you must be fully committed to your inner teacher. You must give yourself to the inner teacher with complete trust and devotion.

As Nisargadatta Maharaj said:

Your own Self is your ultimate teacher. The outer teacher is merely a milestone.* It is only your inner teacher that will walk with you to the goal, for [it] is the goal.

* A milestone is a significant point on a journey, but it is not the destination.

Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link

Please contemplate today’s commentary in the same way you contemplate the Thoughts of Awakening.

~Commentary on False Perception~

 The closed-box is false perception. False perception is a way of seeing what is as if it is something it isn’t. False perception can also be called blindness, because it hides the truth from the mind that has chosen to be deceived.

The good news, however, is simply this: “It hides the truth from the mind that has chosen  to be deceived.” And if the mind has chosen to be deceived, it can also choose again by choosing not to re-believe its own deception.

Ask, “What am I believing that is not in alignment with what I am?” And as you ask this question, remember that you do not know what you are. If you can ask this question with the realization you know not what you are, the thinking mind will not be able to figure out an answer. Any answer that is given is given by true awareness. Therefore, it is a truly helpful answer.

You need not know what you are doing to be helped by God, for God does know. God can show you and enlighten you if only you will surrender with a desire to be shown.

~From our Holy Spirit

Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link

When you read today’s message, please surrender to it. It is a message about surrender, but in order to fully realize the lesson in the message, you will have to surrender to the message.

When today’s message asks you to do something, surrender to it, and do it right then. If there are thoughts in your mind that say you don’t need to do it, or you don’t have time to do it, or you can do it later, practice self-inquiry to notice how the mind is trying to stop you from surrendering.

Why would the mind try to stop you from surrendering?

Is the mind trying to control you?

Is the mind in control of you, or is your Heart in the lead in your daily life?

In the Bible at John 15:4, Jesus said:

Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me.

“Abide in me as I abide in you,” is a call to surrender. The “fruit” that Jesus spoke of is awakening. Just as he told the disciples previously that salvation (awakening) is not possible for man, but only for God, this scripture points out that awakening is not possible if the mind remains in the lead. Surrender is necessary.

When I was the scribe of Inner Ramana, I received guidance to add, “Abide in me as I abide in you,” to my mantra practice. In other words, just as I said, “I am that I am” to myself whenever the reminder came to do so, I also said, “Abide in me as I abide in you,” to myself whenever the reminder came to do so. As I used this mantra, I felt my inner desire to surrender. Through using the mantra, my resistance to surrender weakened, because I noticed that I (the true ‘I’) wanted to surrender. As I became more aware of my desire to surrender, surrender came more easily to me.

If you feel guidance to journal about anything you read as you read today’s message, surrender to that inner prompt, and journal with inner wisdom as guided.

Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link

Today’s reading addresses three common ideas that people have about ego death:

1. It will take a long time.
2. It will be difficult.
3. When the ego dies, I will cease to exist.

Do not read today’s message too quickly. Pay attention, and notice that none of the statements above are true.

Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link