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The Advaita Show #014 – The Guru Gets Ripped Off
The Advaita Show #013 – You've heard the podcast, now buy the t-shirt
November 29, 2005Eliot takes the helm
December 11, 2005The Advaita Show #014 (MP3 – 18MB – 50min)
Elliott joins us again today, which is a good thing, because I had to make fun of him for letting Bob get ripped off. Bob wanted a little device for recording his thoughts (because he can’t type fast enough) and ended up paying $720! But that’s okay, E & B got their own back on me when my iPod died in the middle of the show!! F#*%#$(*@ iPods.
Anyway… fear not, I went back and re-recorded the stuff we lost due to hardware failure.
So here it is… all of your questions answered by the laughing guru. From memory we talked about (in no particular order):
And NO – I didn’t have a second mic for him today but we did realize AFTER we recorded the show that he has a spare mic there himself so… the next time it’ll be better. BUT… I’m on holidays for a couple of weeks so, unless I can convince Elliott to stand in for me, this is the last show until the end of December folks!
Lucky for you we have 14 episodes that you can listen to over and over while I’m sunning my illusory self in Queensland.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
20 Comments
π
thank you Cameron for doing great show. I just enjoyed thirteenth one and 14th is still here to be heard when its time comes. So, what a nice december before us.. do you like christmas? Does Bob likes christmas? Do you make some nice sweet smelling cakes or potato salad, what will you do on CHristmas eve?
Tell me, tell us..
Michal
cam,
PLEASE tell me that you got Bob his $720 back!
holy cows don’t even cost that much
elliot what were u thinking? LOL
A nice Sanyo Digital Voice & MP3 Recorder is abvout 150 $US
that has to be closer to reality!!
love u anyway elliot
still offering Bob reverence?
has he let you touch his feet yet??
Hello Bob and Cameron…
I’m writing to you from Rochester, NY…America.
Thanks for the great show!
Now, a few questions that have arisen in my listening.
First a quick disclaimer about me. I’ve been reading and practicing
everything I can find on enlightenment for about 10 years now. I Am
That is one of my favorites, but I would definitely not say I’ve acheived
enlightenment or even the cessation of thought.
Cameron, do you really belived this stuff? I definitely feel you belief in
the lack of free will, and see the connection between your thoughts and
advaita, but…Are you living in a non-dual reality? Although I appreciate
these ideas and I want them to be my reality, they aren’t my experience.
Bob & Cameron, I have great respect for Nisargadatta and his teachings, I’ve
also read Bob’s website, but let me ask a naive questions and hopefully
receive a STRAIGHT answer. Are you enlightened, are you living in bliss?
From your conversations, I get the feeling that you believe in what you say
and you understand it, but I don’t get the feeling that it’s given you any
more freedom or comfort than the rest of us?
I hear you saying, there is no you or me, or the checkered shirt, but it seems
a bit clinical. I don’t get the feeling that this is your EXPERIENCED reality. I guess I’m saying it seems it’s your belief, but not your reality. Can you expand on this?
I mean no disrespect, all I ask for is clarification. I love the show and thank you
for providing it.
thanks,
corey vance
Corey.
you ask if I really believe this stuff? All I can tell you is that for the last 16 years it’s been plainly obvious to me that there is no such thing as a separate entity called “Cameron”. That’s the only truth I’m aware of and I’m not sure what else I should be believing in. Am I living in a non-dual reality? I’m not sure what a “non-dual reality” means. Is there another kind? Am I living in enlightenment or bliss? I’m not sure what those terms means to you, but I can tell you that life appears to me as spontaneous and effortless, even when there is planning and effort. Freedom? Comfort? Yes it’s both of those things. I’ll get Bob to answer those things from his perspective the next time I see him, but my experience has been that once I realized that the separate entity concept had no validity, life just seemed to flow. “Good” and “Bad” things still happen but they are all experienced equally and effortlessly.
You have to understand that when I do the show with Bob I’m trying to provoke, stimulate, challenge. Wouldn’t be much of a show if I just agreed with him all of the time now, would it? π I’m playing the part of the new seeker for those people who don’t have the privilege to sit in front of him each week. I’m trying to cut through the accepted advaita terminology to discover better examples, better analogies, the clearest representation of his teaching.
I’m also testing him for senility. He’s an old bloke, after all. :0)
cheers
Cameron
Hey Charlie,
I touched the gurus feet and you know what he said.
“Don’t put any of that F@#+ing Guru crap on me”
You gotta respect a man that can be as direct as that ain’t ya!
Love Ya Bob π
I’m now free of the guru illusion!
I’m surprised Cameron hasn’t got a black eye for calling Bob a guru.
Go for it Cam and post the photo’s if he hits Ya! π
He tried Bob but he’s too slow! I fly like a butterfly…
Since it’s the season,
What would you give a seeker for Christmas? and (ducking in advance), what would you give a guru?
Have yourselves a great break Cam and Bob,
Stan
Thanks. Bob and Cameron.
Great service to us all here and now. Thanks Cameron and Bob. I am only up to prog 4 but they are both greatly instructive and bloody funny.
If possible there are two questions from a bastard that wants to know. I have to set them up because some of my Advaita reading seems to ask them but not follow through with a meaningful answer ( if there is one ).
Here’s one about death
There is awareness without a someone who is aware. OK. Cant deny my own being. OK.
Dying, drifting in and out of consciousness, body/mind breaking down. Where is the awareness ? Body now Dead …. is there still perception, hearing, noticing. states or even thoughts arising as they do for Bob now ? If not, is the beingness that can’t be denied no longer present.
The other question actually concerns Dementia :))
The alzheimer patient or the brain damaged. What’s going on there ? Can that expression of the intelligence energy realise the non dual state or are they royally buggered.
Thanks guys !
Glenn ( west australian non entity ! )
hey Stan,
* what to give the “seeker?” NUTHIN!
clearly that is what “bob” gave “elliott”
great stuff elliot … love ya
when is your website going up????
* what to give the guru? what do you give to The One …
who IS everything???
have a nice holiday and x-mas days π
Dear Laughing Gurus,
How exactly did Bob become ‘aware’? Did it happen gradually over time and through some sort of practice? or did he wake up enlightened one morning like Eckharte Tolle and Byron Katie claim they did? (Byron Katie’s website, and her fascinating process called “The Work” is: http://www.thework.org) Those teachers make it sound like they went from daily mental suffering to complete enlightenment literally overnight. Can you discuss Bob’s process because while I can intellectually understand his teachings, I have yet to become the laughing guru myself. Any advice?
Hi guys,
Thanks for answering my questions and thanks to you Cameron for trying to get the seekers perspective across to Bob. Because it’s easy to say see, but when you don’t know where to look or what to look for it’s hard to see.
I actually did try looking at myself and start from the fact that I am. When I did that I felt I was actually setting up separation. ‘I’, whatever I might be (awareness, person, self,…) over here trying to look or find some other ‘I’ overthere. When this daunded on me I actually stopped looking, for a second or so, for some other ‘I’ so I could then see what (that) ‘I’ is. Suddenly I recognized myself, well that’s the best i can describe it. I realised I am myself, saying this now it sounds sorta obvious, but it felt like this was all the while overlooked while trying to look for ‘the I’.
I still don’t know what this ‘I’ or self is and how it related to awareness. I only know (that) “I am myself”, although now this seems like some dead thing, it’s just some thought while at the moment of recognition it seemed alive and this recognition had enough on its own, I didn’t feel like I needed to know anymore who I am because it was staring me right in the face sorta speak. Of course like everything it comes and goes and all that seems that’s left is just this dead thought/memory “I am myself” which really doesn’t mean anything. I seem to be overlooking this obvious recognition again.
I didn’t do anything to recognize myself, it just happened when I stopped looking for some imagined ‘I’ that I was supposed to investigate. No, I’m back in the races again, not trying to look for some ‘i’ but for myself, although I realise I’m again looking for some other ‘I’ or self (i.e. the one i recognized earlier) the stopping doesn’t happen, nor does the new and fresh recognition that I am myself.
Any comments?
Kevin
(From the UK)
Omnipotence?
First let me tell you that I discovered Bob through this first episode and subsequently bought his 2 books – so thanks for the show.
Now, if possible, I’d like to ask some questions that have been troubling me for some time since I enquired into who I am. My thought process gets so far then it runs into confusion which goes round in circles. This is the first one:
What I get confused with is is it possible for me to ask a question? Is it the mind or is it me? By mind I mean the thought machine (Bob says in your last show that the mind is a very mechanical thing running itself). So if a thought occurs such as “who is asking this question” the usual Advaita answer is that no-one is, it’s not me, it’s just happening. So I can’t ever really ask a question. And similarly you can’t answer any questions. Although the asking and answering are taking place. This feels like powerlessness not omnipotence.
“We” talk about asking questions and answering questions. It’s very confusing, questioning happens as if it is coming from this being.
Or are there 2 “me”s : one the mind machine and one the real me? The mind works as if it is an entity called “me” and the real me gets confused that the 2 are the one. Maybe there should be 2 names for “me” i.e. mind-me (ego?) and real-me (presence-awareness or intelligence energy). So to come full circle with this maybe the question should have started with any of the 4 possibilities:
1. “What ego gets confused with is is it possible for ego to ask a question?”
2. “What ego gets confused with is is it possible for intelligence-energy to ask a question?”
3. “What intelligence-energy gets confused with is is it possible for ego to ask a question?”.
4. “What intelligence-energy gets confused with is is it possible for intelligence-energy to ask a question?”.
Which is it? My own guess is that the question which makes sense according to Advaita is number 4, because ego can’t think as it’s just a thought itself. And it’s intelligence-energy which wants to know what it’s own power is, although the mind has to do the asking.
Hi Bob and Cameron,
Great show guys!
Question: If there is no such thing as FREE WILL, can there be such a thing as CREATIVITY? Without free will, the situation must be pre-determined, which means there is no such thing as creativity. Is this true?
Keep it real!
Hi, Cameron and Bob,
You boys are the best. As a seasoned vet of the search for me, I can tell you that in spite of my picture on the milk carton, I have not recognized myself. The cosmic joke is sheer delight as played out by the two of you.
Who knew advaita could be so funny.
Love, Vicki
Garry and Sham… depends on your definition of ‘creativity’. My reductionist brain sees the universe as operating under a set of laws. The expression of those laws can be unpredictable if we don’t understand them. Arthur C Clarke’s third law: “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” Also read Stephan Wolfram’s book “A New Kind Of Science”, where he demonstrates how extremely simple cellular automata can produce extremely creative (and unpredictable) results. Raymond Kurzweil has also demonstrated (see “The Singularlity Is Near”) that computers have the ability to compose music, poetry and art. Do they have free will?
Russell Says:
4. Γ’β¬ΕWhat intelligence-energy gets confused with is — is it possible for intelligence-energy to ask a question?Γ’β¬Β.
Which is it? My own guess is that the question which makes sense according to Advaita is number 4
Can i jump in here? My question would be, are you “(Russell”) asking with a false premise in the background? That being the assumption or belief that Energy-Intelligence is a THING that can BE confused or clear?
Bob, my take after sitting with the teachings is simply, there is no separate thingness to That I which is pointed to when there is the thought I Am … but what we ARE is that pure “I” (purno’ham vimarsha, pure I Consciousness it Self, or as you pointed the seeing here, “One-without-a-second?)
“From the beginning not a thing is”
(Just some mental noise from the son of an unborn woman π )
Charlie – there is confusion here. It can’t be in my mind since there isn’t one, there are only thoughts, but for the sake of talking about the thoughts it seems people (including Bob) refer to a mind. What I don’t understand is whether the mind and those thoughts necessarily reflect the understanding within me. It certainly feels like the thoughts are coming from me. They seem to mostly follow a logical sequence and relate to what is in focus, although sometimes they go off at random.
I’m trying to get a hold on how the mind works and how do thoughts relate to what I am. In ordinary parlance we talk about using the mind, as if we have some control over it. Bob even says in his book (What’s wrong with right now unless you think about it) that “we have got to use the mind. The only instrument we have is the mind. That is why the mind needs to be understood. Understood thoroughly! Then it is there as a very useful instrument.”
It confuses me to be told that it is my instrument and then that I have no control over the mind. I don’t generate the thoughts and don’t make the decisions. The only explanation left to me is that the mind somehow automatically links to my understanding and it attempts to create thoughts to aid this understanding, and I just see those thoughts. Maybe Bob could address this one for me.
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