Burnt Out Nothing - X: Put Down the Nondual Phone
This post is a diversion from the 'main' posts of this series, and yet still fits amidst the whole. It just isn't deserving of a number, for some reason.
When people get something like 'burnt out', they'll more often than not find their way to one of many (...many) contemporary nonduality teachers or gurus, who state with various styles of certainty that there is nothing, no one, and never was anyone.
These teachers and gurus will, usually at the start of any talk, make it clear that they're not a teacher or guru, but merely talking about nonduality. This is all very well, but they are still sitting on a chair, in front of many people who have come specifically to see them, delivering answers in the form of authority. If it walks like a duck, etc.
The message of these talks is something like...there is no individual "you" who makes choices or experiences life - what appears as personal experience is simply "this" or "what is" happening without any doer or experiencer. Enlightenment isn't something that can be achieved because there's no one to achieve it; seeking itself is just more of the illusion. Everything that appears to happen - including the search for meaning, spiritual practice, or understanding - is simply phenomenal appearance with no one behind it. The recognition of this "hopeless" situation (that there's nothing you can do because there's no "you") is itself just another occurrence, not an attainment. His teaching strips away all consolation, purpose, and the possibility of progress, leaving only the bare assertion that "this is all there is" - no separation, no individual, no journey.
As far as I'm concerned, that's all fine.
Now, the conclusions that follow from that list are, and are not limited to:
- There is no free will or choice - everything simply happens
- Spiritual practices and self-improvement efforts are meaningless
- Morality and personal responsibility are illusory constructs
- Suffering and seeking are just appearances with no one suffering or seeking
- Death is meaningless since there was never a separate person to die
- Relationships occur, but there are no separate individuals relating
- Cause and effect are a conceptual overlay on what simply is
- Time, past, and future are illusions of the apparent separate self
- Awakening or enlightenment cannot be achieved because there's no one to awaken
- Helping others is pointless since there are no others and no helper
- Knowledge and understanding are just more content appearing in consciousness
- Nothing has inherent meaning or purpose
- Guilt, regret, and pride are based on the fiction of personal agency
- The apparent world continues, but without anyone experiencing it
- This message itself changes nothing because there's no one to change
Again, that's all fine. Except...
...if those are the conclusions of nonduality, why do people keep returning to the most stiflingly monotonous rooms out of hope? The nondual rooms that include: the aforementioned 'non-teacher', a vase of flowers on a small table, a jug of water and a glass, a crisp microphone, and a medicinal quiet, like that of a hospital or art gallery.
Everything simply happens, which itself entails people going to the no-happening place to listen to no-happening from the no-happener.
Week-in, week-out, meeting after meeting of explicitly listening to the non-message which we all know isn't really a message and we can all coyly laugh about, pull your head out of your ass. Go bake a cake or something.
"Hey, buddy, is this still all there is?" "Yes." "Still all meaningless?" "Yes." "Alright, cya next week."
Cha-ching, baby! That's the sound of the non-dual message pullin' in another sucker!
Put down the phone, that is another story.
Go live, or don't.
Or give up.