Home CHAPTER 12 Contents
Are You Ready
To
Give Up
Ignorance
For
Knowledge?
"God
knows everything, and pretends to know nothing.
Man knows nothing and pretends to know everything."
Sai Baba
Who are you?
A teacher and his student were crossing a bridge. The student asked the master how he could most quickly attain self-knowledge. The master threw him off the bridge and pushed his head under water for what seemed like forever. When the teacher finally let go, the student came up gasping for air. The master said, “When you want to know who you are as much as you wanted a breath of air just a moment ago, you will progress quickly toward self-knowledge.”
Do you know who you are? If your answer is ‘No,' don't you find that rather strange? How can you exist and yet not know yourself? Your existence tells you who you are. In the Bible Jesus said, “You are verily Gods.” He also declared, “I and my Father are one.” Genesis, the first book of the Bible says that God created man in His image and likeness. Sai Baba says, “You are God. You are no different from God. There is no one more powerful than you.” Isn't that empowering?
Uncertainty about who you are is self-deception on a grand scale. What is life but to be yourself? To be restored to true knowledge we have to want it more than all the other knowledge with which we distract ourselves.
In the mid -1900's, an erudite scholar was being ferried across the river by a simple boatman. After some time passed, he casually asked the boatman for the time. The boatman confessed that he didn't have a watch and didn't know how to tell time anyway. The scholar rather derisively exclaimed, “What! Without knowledge of time one quarter of your life is wasted.”
After some more time the scholar asked the boatman for the news. The boatman admitted that he could not read. The scholar derided the poor man, “You don't pay attention to what happens in the world? At least one half of your life is wasted.”
After some more time, the scholar asked the boatman to entertain him with some radio tunes. The boatman humbly apologized that he had no radio. “No radio mean you miss out on the wonderful world of entertainment - thus three quarters of your life is wasted,” mocked the pompous scholar.
When a storm came up the boatman asked the scholar, “Can you swim?” The scholar admitted that he could not. The boatman sadly informed him, “Then your whole life is wasted.” Your whole life will be wasted when used only to gain secular knowledge. Only with the pursuit of self-knowledge do our lives become worthwhile.
The difference between an awakened master and the rest of humanity is that the awakened one knows who he is. We adulate anyone who knows himself. We should stop adulating and get on with finding out who we are. We are love and light, created by God to be and have everything, no different from God or any of God's creation. We are life eternal, all-knowing, one with everyone and everything, whole and perfect. When you know that, you know something precious.
Being is lost in becoming
It is thought by many that waking up is an evolutionary process whereby we start from below and over time learn and progress and eventually ascend. Suffering is a great teacher it is said. Having things go wrong is full of opportunities for growth. As long as we hold this philosophy, we will continue to draw hardships to ourselves so we can grow. We will continue to suffer so we can mature and learn. Certainly when hardships come they can be used. We can use our pain, see the gift in everything, and yet, ultimately we must come to the realization that enough is enough. That is the only true lesson worth learning from any pain. It is the idea that pain is a good teacher that calls forth that teacher into our experience. We did not start from below. There is no evolutionary process. We do not have to become who we are. We are whole and perfect right now as that is how we were created.
If you were already everything that you aspire to become through suffering, tough times, challenges and trials, would any of them have any purpose? Without a purpose, our difficulties would cease to be our experience. As long as we believe we are not who we are, we can justify all kinds of hoops to jump through to become ourselves. If we simply allow ourselves to be who we are right now, none of those austerities or sacrifices will make any sense. They will cease to be what motivates us and our circumstances will change to reflect our shift in consciousness. If we were created to know everything forever, then it must be that we know now. It has taken much time to be who you are not. It takes no time to be who you are.
Perfection is your truth
Sai Baba says, “My life is my message.” He leads a life of purity and perfection. Acting with the utmost purity and holiness will reconnect us with our true self. When our every thought, word and deed is in alignment with our perfection we will realize that we know and our experience will reflect that knowing. We block our knowing when we choose to be less than the perfection God created us to be.
We do not have to learn how to be the perfection we already are. We do not have to become good in order to attain knowledge or become worthy. Behavior modification deals with the problem of imperfection at the level of symptoms. We need merely stop denying our shortcomings or feeling guilty for them, and then ask God to correct our thinking that we could be other than how we were created. Perfection is immediately available, no learning is necessary. We demonstrate our desire for perfection by striving to our maximum capacity for excellence and purity with every thought, words and deed.
Imperfection is a symptom of alliance with ego. Ego is the cause of all imperfection. When we root out the cause of imperfection, it vanishes instantly, without a struggle. It is ego that tells us that we are not and cannot be perfect. It is ego that depends on us to be imperfect. When we remove ego, our perfection, which is always in tact, reemerges effortlessly.
There are those who justify a lack of perfection on the premise that it is not possible to be imperfect no matter how imperfect one's actions may be. If your actions do not reflect your truth, you are exposing to yourself that you don't really believe you were created perfect. Actions reflect one's state of consciousness.
There are others who say, “I'm perfect just the way I am.” They mean their imperfections are perfect. When you know you are perfection, your every thought, word, and deed will reflect goodness, integrity, nobility and loving kindness. Ego is determined to employ all kinds of cunning arguments to keep you from your perfection, so be bright and alert.
You already know everything
Love cannot be taught. It is who we are. Ego alliance blocks the awareness of love's presence. When we want to be who we are, the blocks fall away because they were never real. We do not have to learn how to remove the blocks. We need simply be willing to have them removed. Our desire is all that is ever needed, as our minds are all-powerful. We just have to recognize that the problem is ego and the solution is its nothingness.
There is nothing you can learn from anyone that you do not already know. There is nothing you can teach anyone that they do not already know. Your worth is not established by teaching or learning. Your worth is established by God and He created you to know everything forever. He also created everyone else to know everything forever. Why would God create you and yet keep secrets from you? Why would He create you ignorant? Nothing is hidden from you that you have not hidden from yourself. There are no mysteries. There is nothing that is beyond your ability to know right now.
To know takes no time at all. As we were created with all knowledge we have no need to learn anything. Our minds were not created for learning. We were not born to learn something only to end in death. We taught ourselves how to learn.
There are those who think God gave us an unreal experience in order that He become enlightened about unreality. Is God really deprived by not being able to experience suffering, lack, separation, fear, death, ignorance...? God is all-knowing, meaning He has nothing to learn. Learning serves to fill a lack. Can you imagine God studying, learning, evolving or progressing? Can there be any lack in God? Or in you, who were created in His image? Can knowledge of unreality add to total knowledge? We can concoct all kinds of justifications for our ignorance or we can simply drop our ignorance and be all-knowing. We are the deciders of our destiny, be it a slow learning process or a quantum leap into limitless knowledge. It is alliance with ego that allows us to distort our God nature.
Knowledge is different from everything we teach ourselves and returns when we want it. As long as you think you need to learn something, you are giving yourself an unreal purpose and keeping knowledge at bay. We do have tremendous capacity to learn if we so choose, as our minds are all-powerful. If you want to use your mind to learn, then learn you will. We have used all our God-given power to teach ourselves to believe the unreal real and the real unreal. This is quite a learning feat. Now we need merely unlearn what we have taught ourselves, for we have been poorly taught.
Ignorance disappears in the light of true knowledge
We have convinced ourselves that we are ignorant, that we do not know who we are, that we do not know who God is and that we do not have a purpose. All these untruths have been acquired while truth has been forgotten. It was our decision to make everything that is natural and easy impossible.
Once in an interview Baba manifested a diamond ring for an older devotee with the injunction, “Die-mind.” He gave the diamond as a reminder to still the mind. The endlessly, useless chatter needs to die. However, a diamond is clear, brilliant and dazzling. So should our minds be. It is up to us how we use our minds. And how we use our minds will be reflected in our lives. We are grandeur and to think it humility to be small, limited, or lacking is to deny that we are as we were created.
God's children, who were created with the brilliant luster of dazzling diamonds have become dull, lifeless and ignorant. This is a great travesty on God's creation and fortunately never really happened, for truth is unaffectable forever. We can throw off our ignorance whenever we choose. It has taken much time to become who we are not. It takes no time to be who we are.
We have merely fooled ourselves into believing that we are ignorant and convinced ourselves that ignorance is humility. Ignorance is not humility but rather the height of arrogance. It is arrogant to want to be different from who we are. Only grandiosity would have you be other than yourself. We can convince ourselves that we are small if we wish. We can as easily convince ourselves that we are grandeur.
When we stop teaching ourselves that we do not know everything, we open the door to the remembrance that we were never ignorant. The veils of illusion that obscure our truth are but the weight of a feather. Maya (illusion) obscures only as long as we fool ourselves that it can fool us. All sickness, suffering and disasters unto death are due to the belief that we do not know who we are, while all along it is impossible not to know ourselves. Just to exist, you have to know who you are. We do know who we are and also who God is for we are God.
While you ask questions about God, you are clearly implying that you do not know Him. It is ego that hopes we will not know our true identity or true source, for then it has not further purpose in our lives and withers and dies. When you know who you are you can never act unkindly toward anyone. When you know who you are, you will be certain about everyone's Divinity and you will naturally express only love and joy toward all of creation. To experience this truth we must unlearn what we have taught ourselves.
Learning has a function now – that of unlearning
Due to erroneous learning it has become necessary to use our learning ability to change our understanding. This is a remedial necessity. The ability to learn has no value when change of understanding is no longer necessary. The eternally creative have nothing to learn. God does not teach. To teach is to imply a lack which God knows is not there. God is not conflicted. Teaching aims at change, but God created only the changeless.
Only after the separation was it necessary to direct our creative force to learning, because behavior had become mandatory. We needed to learn to survive, to grow crops and to build shelters. Behavior became part of our experience, though it was never the purpose for which we were created. Behavior is learned. Behaving perfectly is the portal back to our true state where behavior is no longer relevant. Poor behavior attracts unreality, as it is unreal, while good behavior attracts God as God is goodness.
To be restored to sanity, we can learn to improve our behavior and to become better and better learners, bringing us in closer and closer accord with truth. The truth is we are perfect creations, and perfection is not a matter of degree. Only while there are different degrees of understanding is learning meaningful. Now we must want to learn. Until complete understanding is restored, until all doubts are dissolved, learning is indispensable. Turn to the teacher within. All knowledge is within.
No kind of knowledge is acquired by anyone unless he wants it or believes in some way he needs it. We have learned poorly, so now must learn anew what is true. We will do this when we are motivated to learn.
Knowledge will be restored when we meet its conditions, not because God bargains with us, but merely because we misused His laws on behalf of a will that was not His. Knowledge is His will. If we are opposing His will, how can we have knowledge? The happy learner meets the conditions of learning here, as he also meets the conditions of knowledge in the kingdom.
Be willing to be wrong about everything you taught yourself
The only thing we really need to learn is that it is possible to be wrong. When we insist we are right, we put up blocks to the truth that is always present. A mind that is willing to be wrong is free and open, and that willingness removes the blocks to the awareness of true knowledge.
We have to be willing to be wrong about everything we have erroneously taught ourselves. When we let go of all our ideas of what knowledge is, knowledge can dawn once again upon our most holy minds. When we want the truth above all else, then only will we be able to recognize the truth that we do know everything for all eternity.
Truth dawns on a mind that is willing to be wrong, that is open and does not need to defend its position. When we think we know something, we close the door to truth. In letting go of any need to be right we make room for truth. We must be willing to be wrong about our religious beliefs, our philosophies and our ideas of who God is and who we are. Before the separation we did know everything. We have not lost that knowing, but after the separation we chose to forget and knowledge will be restored when we give up our desire for autonomy. In desiring autonomy, we traded in true knowledge, as that desire gave birth to ego.
Ego is the only obstacle to knowledge
Ego does not know anything and has no being, as knowledge and being are one. The ingenuity it employs toward self-preservation however is enormous. Ironically, it gets its cleverness from the power of your mind and then denies you its power. Ego attacks what is preserving it. It draws on your mind, which is totally inimical to it, for its existence. It then depreciates the power of your mind in your mind to avoid being found out. It convinces us that we are not all-powerful, but instead powerless, and that not only do we not know everything as we were created, but that we don't know anything.
The major obstacle to any true and valuable knowledge is ego. It will distract you and try to convince you that you are not capable of learning the truth. Ego tries to prevent you from attaining self-knowledge because once you know who you are, you recognize ego's nothingness. Though its distractions seem to interfere with your learning, remember that it has no power to distract you unless you give it that power.
Ego's voice is an hallucination. Hallucinations are inaccurate perceptions of reality. To be free, illusions must be dispelled, but you need not dispel them alone. All that is needed is that you evaluate them in terms of their results to you. If you do not want them on the basis of loss of peace, they will be removed from your mind. Knowledge cannot dawn on a mind that harbors illusions, because truth and illusions are irreconcilable. Truth is whole and cannot be known by part of a mind.
True teachers know that you know
A true teacher always wants to join with his students by bringing forth their own inner knowing, rather than encouraging dependence. The only true teaching is perfect equality and a teacher who does not lead the student to that understanding is an ego oriented teacher. A true teacher can only help you remove the blocks to the awareness of the knowledge that is always within.
Those who teach with words without bridging the gap between student and teacher are keeping separation alive. This is always due to fear of oneness. A true teacher knows his students were created by God to be and have everything, no less than he. He does not see himself as greater than his students. A true teacher wants his students to surpass him. Jesus said in the Bible, “Greater works than I have done, shall you do.”
It is not uncommon to experience fear associated with teaching or learning of ultimate truth. That is because true learning leads to the relinquishment of the ego to the light of the soul. It is ego that tells us that learning about who we are is fearful. We must change our minds and help others change theirs.
Perhaps you wistfully see that your family, environment, religion, education or culture is the cause of your faulty learning of inequality and separation. Every situation that you find yourself in you made for yourself because it is exactly what you wanted to learn. The world cannot teach you anything you do not want to know.
Once Arjuna asked Krishna, “What if a yogi is close but does not achieve enlightenment in this lifetime?” Krishna assured him that the yogi would be born into a family who would support and strengthen his spiritual aspirations so that he would be able to pick up where he left off in his previous incarnation. Learning of the truth will serve your eternal life. Whatever efforts you make in that regard cannot be lost.
Look beyond others' errors - don't ignore them
To know that everyone was created equal is knowledge. To see everyone as they were created we need but recognize that every act without exception is love or a call for love. Only appreciation is an appropriate response to anyone. His loving thoughts as well as his appeals for help should elicit only gratitude, as both are capable of bringing love into your awareness when perceived truly. When we do not feel the deepest gratitude and appreciation for everyone, we have decided wrongly and can choose again.
Once Peace Pilgrim, an American saint, went for a walk with a rather tough teen. En route he started beating on her. She responded by wrapping her arms around him with all her love and compassion. She knew his Divinity and felt his call for love. The surprised child responded by melting in her arms. All he wanted was to feel loved.
Overlook errors in others by looking to their perfection undimmed by any error. We must stop judging error as sin and thus condemning others and wishing them punished. At the same time, when I know I'm mistaken, I want to make it right, but I cannot correct an error when I'm oblivious to the fact that I'm in error. In truth we do always know when we are off, but we tend to fool ourselves. When others support us in fooling ourselves they are not really serving us. Those who are willing to point out error without judgment reflect back to us where we are off if we allow them to serve us in that way.
To turn a deaf ear and blind eye to others' errors would be to have no interest in their salvation. Everyone is yourself and their salvation is your own. Do everything within your power to support the truth for all in every way possible. How do you feel when you avoid dealing with or deny others' errors? If you find yourself feeling guilty, if your peace is disturbed in any way, or if you feel desensitized, be sure that something is telling you to get more involved. It may feel scary, but the peace you will experience will make the risk worthwhile. Sometimes your acts of kindness in the face of error will be the remedy. Sometimes it will be avoiding company with your ‘brother' while he is choosing erroneous ways.
Let God direct you in what to do in relation to others' errors. And be sure to see that you are not projecting your errors onto others and seeing in them what you are not willing to look at in yourself. If your response comes from irritability you have work to do on yourself. Be pure and then you will see others with clarity, charity and compassion, recognizing their error as the call for love that it is. Then you will be shown what to do to truly serve their enlightenment.
There are those who teach that it doesn't matter what you do as a defense against correction of error. What doesn't matter is the past. It doesn't matter what you've done, but it matters very much what you do now. It doesn't matter your position in life, whether you are a street sweeper or the CEO of the largest corporation in America, but it matters very much what you do with that station – purity, integrity and nobility matter.
Only when we want everyone to be whole and perfect and to stop being fooled by ego are we in right relationship with others' errors. To heal is to correct perception in ourselves and others by sharing God's love. Three women were named women of the year in 2002, for being whistle blowers for corruption in corporate America. That took courage and clarity. Correction of others is a delicate matter. It requires purity and integrity within your own life first before you can act in any capacity in others' affairs. You will just know when it is appropriate to act.
When I was raped, I did have the man sent to jail. I did this out of a sense of duty to society. I could not bare the thought of someone else having to experience what I had gone through. I would have felt responsible. I did not put him away out of a sense of justice, retribution, retaliation or revenge. I have the deepest compassion for this man and pray for him even today. My wish is that he correct his ways, not that he be punished for his mistakes.
If we truly inspired all criminals to be transformed, we would have true correctional facilities and rehabilitation centers and people would reenter the world as upright citizens who choose to lead noble lives because they have learned that is in their very best interest. That will be accomplished when they step into personal responsibility for their past actions and are willing to correct their ways. Their detention ought to be determined by their transformation and should be based on willingness rather than on a time related sentence meted out as punishment, which makes time and guilt real.
When my rapist said he was sorry, he was acknowledging that he was in error. He also needs to know that though he was wrong he is not guilty and that error is correctable. As long as he feels guilty for his error, he has made it a sin and will not be able to avoid punishment or to stop his hurtful ways. Once he is willing to let God correct his mind, he will not feel guilty. Then his error will be undone automatically and he will be able to reenter society and live a life of decency and trustworthiness.
Once you know who you are you cannot hurt anyone. It will be enough for me to know that my rapist will never rape another woman. It would be enough for me that Hitler not hate Jews and gypsies. At every moment anyone can choose to be transformed into a noble citizen, as that is their truth. I do not wish Hitler punished for the monstrous atrocities he perpetrated against humanity. I would be happy to see all criminals transformed. I do not need anyone punished. That gives me no satisfaction. My satisfaction comes in their discovery of who they are as wholly innocent.
I am overjoyed when anyone discovers the truth that they deserve the best because they are precious souls, created by God as God, worthy to walk the earth like masters with their heads held high. You know you deserve the best when you treat others with the utmost dignity and kindness. Everyone has the capacity to change their minds and transform their lives. Every saint has a past and every sinner has a future. You can choose again. Each moment is a clean untarnished birth.
Freedom is the reason we could err
How is it possible to err if we were created perfect? It is possible for you to make wrong decisions because God's kingdom is freedom. It is possible for us to err in thought, reflected in our words and deeds. Error cannot however really threaten truth, as truth can withstand its assaults. Errors are but illusions that remain unrecognized for what they are. Where truth has entered, errors disappear. They merely vanish, leaving not a trace by which to be remembered. They are gone because without belief, they have no life. There is only one error, the idea that we could be different from how we were created. History would not exist if the same errors were not repeated in the present. Errors are of ego.
Before ego, there was only one error possible, the making of ego, or one's own God. That error could only be motivated by a desire for autonomy from God. Once we wished to be free of our Source, to start a mutiny, we had the power to make that our experience, though we never had the power to make it a reality. God is our Source. We are inseparable from God forever. Ego is an idea of separation from God. It is an erroneous idea, however we have the power to convince ourselves that we succeeded in becoming autonomous.
Into eternity where all is one, there crept a tiny mad idea and we forgot to laugh. That tiny idea was that we could make our own source. It was a silly idea, a mistake. We took it seriously. It was not an idea that entered our minds inexplicably; it was our idea. We are all-powerful and if we entertained a tiny mad idea, we did so open eyed. We are responsible for everything that happens to us and for every thought that enters our minds. Our will is free. We can make a mistake and when we do, it is our error. When we so choose, error is corrected. Truth overcomes all error. True perception cancels out misperception in ourselves and others. When we see everyone as they were created and can really create, we offer them our own validation of their truth.
Once ego was made, we opened ourselves to all kinds of errors, as ego thrives on error. In fact all those errors are only one, namely that we could become different from who we are. We thought we could be guilty instead of innocent, powerless instead of all-powerful, vulnerable instead of invulnerable, mortal instead of immortal, imperfect instead of perfect, ignorant instead of all-knowing, autonomous instead of one with God and each other forever.
Ego convinces us that error is more than error, it is fact, and that we indeed succeeded in becoming autonomous. If error is seen as a lack, it will simply be corrected. What keeps it from being corrected is an unwillingness to see it for what it is. When seen as sin, irrevocable, wreaking permanent damage, it will have to be punished to balance the scales. If admitting error is seen as weakness it will also remain uncorrected. It is strength to admit error and to allow it to be corrected. Then we can again enter the experience of our wholeness.
Ego wants you to believe error is sin. Sin is insanity for it suggests that you actually succeeded in being different from how you were created - perfect. It entails an arrogance that the idea of error lacks. To sin would be to violate reality and to succeed. Sin is the proclamation that attack is real and guilt justified. It assumes that you, who were created innocent forever, are guilty and have thus succeeded in losing your innocence and making yourself what God did not create. Sin is the grand illusion underlying all ego's grandiosity. To admit that you are a sinner is arrogance and not humility. In that admission you are stating that you are more powerful than God. You are equal with God. God created you perfect and you do not have the power to become different from how you were created.
We can pretend we have become bodies, prey to evil and to guilt, with but a little life that ends in death, but all the while our Creator shines on us and loves us with an everlasting love, which our pretenses cannot change at all. It is ego that hopes we will err and then think we deserve punishment unto death. That is its guarantee of survival at our expense. We suffer and die so it can live. It is possible to make mistakes, but those mistakes can have no real effects.
Mistakes warrant correction, not punishment
All suffering ends in a willingness to correct our errors instead of punish ourselves for them. Sai Baba says of sin: “Do not condemn yourselves as sinners. Sin is a misnomer for what are really errors. I shall pardon all your errors, provided you repent sincerely and resolve not to follow evil again.” Repenting of errors collapses time. God can see errors, but He does not use them to see you as different from how He created you.
When we correct our errors by owning that we were mistaken and by being willing to make life changing commitments, we are repenting of our ‘sins,' and then we do not have to pay back any debts, for they have been undone. That shift in consciousness assures that we only choose to act in ways that are pure, holy and in harmony with how we were created. God never punishes, but ego does. If we don't give our errors to God for correction, we have given them to ego and we will punish ourselves, even though in truth sin is not real and never happened.
No one warrants punishment for ‘sins,' and God's children are not sinners. We do not deserve to be punished because we have never done anything sinful. Any concept of punishment involves projection of blame and reinforces the idea that blame is justified. Errors are of ego and correction of errors of any kind lies solely in the relinquishment of ego.
Reason cannot see sin, but can see errors and leads to their correction. It does not value the errors themselves, but only their correction. You will know that you are in error if you see a sinful world. Can you see a sinful world and look upon yourself apart from it? It is reasonable to see a world that needs healing and in your wish for the healing of the world, you contribute to its healing and to the healing of your mind.
As I was growing up I believed that when I did something like lie, steal or cheat I was bad and deserved punishment. The truth is I was wrong and needed correction. My teachers taught me I deserved punishment. I must have wanted to learn that or I would not have given myself that learning situation. We set up circumstances to teach ourselves only what we want to learn. I wanted to learn I was bad because I had chosen ego as my guide instead of God. Ego wanted me to think myself bad so I could be punished and thereby assure its continuance. Ego was then happy. Ego is really only ever interested in its survival at our expense.
Have you ever used punishment to discipline a child or student? If so, you probably felt guilty. You will feel guilty when you hurt another for that is never an act of love and you are love. It is not that you are bad when you punish error. It is just that you are listening to ego and being told that is in the best interest of your child or student. You only want what is best for those in your care. Ego likes your guilt too. Let everyone feel guilty and thereby ego is assured survival at everyone's expense. All suffering ends in a willingness to correct errors instead of punish ourselves or others for mistakes.
See error as unreal rather than bad
When a man came to Baba asking for help to stop drinking, Baba said, “Don't stop. Drink to Me!” The man followed Baba's instructions and soon he stopped drinking. Why was that? Baba guided him to let God take care of the problem by telling him to think of God when he drank. He was not judged or condemned because of his error. When it was given to God he didn't feel guilty. When error is not given to God, it is given to ego and ego wants you to feel bad. Without guilt, ego cannot survive. Ego is the source of all bad habits. Once ego is gone, the bad habit can no longer be sustained.
Bad is never truly what is happening. Bad is really unreality which has been given reality. There is only real or unreal. Good is real. Bad is unreal, therefore does not exist at all in truth. Once you stop giving energy to unreality, it disappears. When you think someone or some action is bad, you are judging and giving reality to what is unreal. If it is not an expression of goodness, it is simply unreal. It will be healed when given to God to heal. You act nobly when you love yourself and you love yourself when you act nobly. One who acts impurely simply does not love himself because he has forgotten who he is. His is a call for love, and a loving response would include wanting him to be holy for his sake.
There are no sins, but only mistakes. When you view a mistake as a sin, you are looking with ego and ego will make sure you are punished. Hardships, sickness and suffering come because we misperceive mistakes as sins. All we need do is be willing to see our mistakes as just that, and ask to be shown how to correct them. Every unkind thought, word or deed is a mistake. If it goes uncorrected, that is if it is not given to God, it has been given to ego for punishment. There are only ever two possibilities in relation to all errors - correction or punishment.
Sai Baba says, “Give me your garbage.” He doesn't want us to suffer. When you offer imperfections to God, you are not giving them to ego and they are corrected and you are not punished. When you give error to ego, you repeat the error again and again due to the guilt associated with it. When you think of God constantly, you are keeping ego away. Suffering comes from ego. If you are not thinking of God, you are thinking with ego and sabotaging your and others' joy. Lead a life of holiness and turn any errors over to God immediately, then you are collapsing time.
Striving for perfection is exhilarating
An unwillingness to admit a mistake means you see it as irrevocable. Many alcoholics are closet drinkers. Violent husbands remain unexposed. Rapes go unrecorded. As long as error is denied, it will not be corrected and will remain unhealed. When you deny an error, you have made it a sin in your mind. When error goes unrecognized for what it is, it is given reality. The fact is we all make mistakes or we simply wouldn't be here. To let a mistake go unrecognized is to make it real. Ego is very cunning in preventing us from recognizing error for what it is. Be bright, be vigilant. You do know when you are in error, as the truth is you know everything. You cannot plead ignorance. It won't work and it won't help.
Watch a tendency to justify or defend error. If you do not recognize error as error, will you be open to correcting it? Error must be seen for what it is in order that it willingly be corrected. The catch is that if error is not corrected, it is automatically given to ego and ego takes every opportunity to mercilessly judge you sinful because it wishes to remain alive now that it has been given life. It is like that science fiction movie where robot turns on its maker. Without your guilt, ego will simply disappear. Ego wants you to feel guilty for everything. God created us to be innocent forever, but that would not be in ego's best interest, so it convinces us that we are sinful, that our errors are irreversible and uncorrectable, and that we must be punished for our mistakes. In fact, some religions are based on that very premise.
Christianity teaches that you are sinful no matter how pure or perfect your behavior and that Jesus died for your errors, whether you committed them or not. This is the teaching of others who came after Jesus and is not what Jesus taught. This teaching does not inspire perfection, which is what Jesus taught. Your sins or mistakes can be forgiven. Forgiveness merely means seeing that the truth was not affected, then correcting your error through self-responsibility so that you come back into alignment with your truth. Then past is wiped away without guilt or punishment. We are eternally sinless. As long as you are convinced that you are helpless and powerless to control your actions you are under ego's spell. You are all-powerful, therefore you are always acting on your choice and are not impelled by forces outside of you or beyond your control.
Jesus taught us to be perfect as our Father in heaven is perfect. If perfection were not attainable, why would he bother to teach it? When the prostitute was about to be stoned to death, Jesus saved her by exposing to her accusers their own guilty conscience. After they left, he said to her, “Go your way and sin no more.” He did not condone her behavior. He told her to stop doing it, to correct her error, to come into her purity, for he knew that only her holiness could content her. He did not tell her to believe he was about to die for her sins and that she ought to see that as the purpose of the crucifixion. He knew the truth that we not only have the capacity to be perfect, but that perfection is our nature and sin is simply a mistake.
Jesus often spoke of ‘sin' when he taught his disciples as well as the masses. He spoke in Aramaic and the word for sin is ‘Katha,' which means ‘off the mark.' It was used as an archery term which Jesus applied to any misalignment with one's true nature. When you shoot an arrow and miss the target you will simply correct your aim and shoot again. You will not feel guilty for missing the mark.
That is all that is needed when you make any mistake. When you admit your error God can show you how to correct it. Then you will again be on the mark. It is really very simple and not a big deal at all. There is never a need to feel guilty for a mistake and there is never an error that is more than a mistake. Uncorrected error leads to needless self-inflicted punishment, which serves no purpose whatsoever. When a mistake is brought to correction, you are restored to wholeness and that feels good, just as hitting the bull's eye feels good. There is something very satisfying about striving for perfection in everything you think and say and do.
Nothing you do can alter the truth of who you are
Rama Krishna, an East Indian saint of the 20th century, said that the only sin possible is the idea that you could be sinful. It is impossible to sin for sin is an action that causes irreparable damage and that would prove that you are more powerful than God, as God created you sinless forever. Your actions cannot affect how God created you. He created you perfect and if you really sinned you would be imperfect. To admit to being sinful is not humility, but rather the height of arrogance. To those who believe sin possible, purity is seen as arrogance and acceptance of yourself as sinful is perceived as holiness. It is ego that cannot support true virtue, purity or holiness for they threaten ego's existence.
Can you see mistakes in others? Yes, and at the same time you can give them the charity of knowing their perfection. Then their mistakes can be corrected. If you see them as acting perfectly when they are in error, you are making the imperfect perfect, the unreal real. This is not what the teaching to see only perfection means. See them as perfect, but do not excuse their error or you are an accomplice. In your complacency, you are responsible for their error. We are all one.
Correction of error of another is not of you, however. Ask Spirit to direct your actions in relation to others' shortcomings. Only then can error be resolved without conflict. And remember if his error is attended with any irritation on your part at all, it is you who are in error and projecting that out onto others. Generally speaking, it is safest to work on correcting our own errors and not to feel inclined to look for errors in others. Look for that which is laudable in others and support and encourage that. Listen within and you will know what to do in every situation. Find ways to inspire perfection both in yourself and in others. When I was a Montessori teacher I discovered that if I looked for goodness and pointed that out to my students, every child was inspired toward goodness. A willingness to be holy brings you into holiness. Inspire others to want to be holy because in that they will be at happy. Be holy happy.
‘Original sin'
When we made ego to be our source, we made a mistake. It was the first and only mistake really. The Bible refers to ‘original sin' as the eating of the apple from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. After we made ego to be our source we became aware of both good and evil. In choosing the knowledge of evil we lost the knowledge of God as our Source and thus lost all knowledge, as God is the source of all knowledge. In choosing ego to be our source we traded in everything we had with God as our Source. Ego was never our source. Making ego to replace God was a mistake. It was the first mistake and really the only mistake that ever happened. Once you accept God as your Source, ego disappears and you regain the awareness that you know all things.
You can be mistaken. You can deceive yourself and even turn the power of your mind against yourself, but you cannot sin. There is nothing you can do that will really change your reality in any way, nor make you really guilty. That is what sin would do as that is its purpose. The attraction of guilt is found in sin, not error, and guilt is attractive as long as you ally with ego. Sin will be repeated because of this attraction. A major tenant in the ego's insane religion is that sin is not error, but truth.
When you think you sin, you think you have lost your innocence. You can never lose your innocence. You can never lose anything. There is no loss. To think there is, is a mistake. When you are willing to be wrong about everything you taught yourself and to see that you cannot be different from how you were created, your mind is open. This openness permits knowledge to dawn once again and you will see that you could never sin or become less than God created you to be, and you will see that you do truly know who you are.
Always think of God
Baba tells the story of a king who was warned that his servant must stay busy all the time doing constructive acts of service or he would destroy the king. Whenever the king had no pressing assignment, he instructed the servant to climb up and down a tower. In that way he was safe, for he always kept the servant occupied. The servant is the mind. The tower is remembrance of God's name. When we are not otherwise occupied, we will be wise to repeat God's name. Then we will be allied with God and not with ego and will not be causing ourselves or others harm with our thoughts. Your mind is all-powerful. Never underestimate the power of your every thought.
God knows the past, present and future of everyone. He has a plan for the salvation of the world. All we need to know is that we each have an indispensable role to play and that He is showing us every step as long as we are aligned with Him and not with ego. You do not need to know more than the next step or you will get in the way. Be fully in the present and you will know that you know. You are an instrument in His mission when you have turned away from ego.
We are Gods, because that is how we were created, and it is our birthright to walk the earth with our heads held high, like masters, full of self-confidence, holiness, perfection, serenity and knowledge. You were created to know who you are and there is nothing you can do to be other than yourself. We have beclouded our minds with all kinds of ideas and concepts of what truth is and when we empty ourselves of all those notions truth will reveal itself for it was always available. May you walk the earth in the certainty that you do know all as endowed by God, and may your certainty be a beacon of light to those who still think they are trapped in ignorance and cannot change their minds. May the light of true knowledge reemerge in your awareness in the service of all humanity.
Heavenly Father, Thank You that You made each one of us to know everything forever. How beautiful to know that everyone does know deep within. Lord, let us teach that and that alone. What an uplifting message of joy. Lord, grant us the courage to look at our errors and turn them over to You for correction. Inspire us to want to be the perfection that You created us to be and depend on us to live always. Help us to think of You constantly. May all beings know the truth that they know everything and are sinless forever.
May all beings in all the worlds be happy and blest, Amen.
Where is true knowledge to be found?
(Questions for on-line course - all are welcome to particiapte. Please feel free to share your answers at www.groups.yahoo.com/group/joiningintruth)
- Did God create us to know everything forever? Do we know now? Why or why not? What stands in the way of true knowing?
- Is evolution true or is creation true? If God created you whole and perfect, where is the need for evolving? Why do we see evidence of an evolutionary process?
- Is waking up an evolutionary process? Are spiritual practices necessary? What is their purpose?
- Who are you? Does it make any sense to strive to become who we are? Did we become ignorant? What is the purpose of ignorance?
- How do we close the gap between who we are and our experience? What keeps us from experiencing who we are? How do we remove the blocks to our true inner knowing?
- Were we created to learn? What purpose does learning serve now? Is it important how you use your mind? Should you use it to learn? How do you reconcile being a happy learner with the arrogance of ignorance?
- What justifications have we given ourselves for learning? Is suffering a good teacher? Did God put us to sleep so we could learn to wake up? Are we in the experience of illusion as a gift to God, because God cannot ever experience illusion? How do we implement these ideas in the academic setting?
- Does perfection need to be learned? Is it difficult to be perfect? Do you want to be perfect?
- Is behavior learned? Is it important? How do we move from behavior back to creation?
- If you were created to know, what can you hope to learn from a teacher? What will a true teacher teach his students? Is the student rightfully indebted to the teacher?
- What is the cause of misperceptions or faulty learning, even from true teachers and true teachings? Who is responsible for your misperceptions? How do you know when you are listening to ego and when to God?
- If you are all-powerful, is it possible to make the untrue true? What are the obstacles to true knowledge? What is true knowledge?
- If God created us perfect, how do we find ourselves susceptible to errors? How is error corrected? Why is this the only error that needs correction?
- How does God view error? Ego? Why? Does God punish error? Ego? What is God's solution to error? Ego's?
- What is your responsibility when you make a mistake? When others make mistakes? Is it possible that your brother be seen as making a mistake when he is not in error? How can you tell?
- What does it mean to see the imperfect as perfect? What happens when you see the imperfect as perfect? Is it correct to find perfection in the imperfect? Will God punish imperfection?
- What happens when we make mistakes? How do we correct error? Are some errors worse than others? Are some more amenable to correct?
- Why is it so difficult to admit a mistake? What's the big deal about correcting a mistake? Can past mistakes be corrected now? Do past mistakes matter now? Does what you do now matter?
- What is the only real error from which all other errors spring? Why does ego teach us that error is more than error?
- What is sin? Is sin possible? Why or why not? What is the difference between a mistake and a sin?
- What is original sin? How is it corrected? Is sex a sin? Is it the original sin? Where does the idea that sex is a sin come from? Is sex outside of a sacred commitment a sin? Is abstinence a surer path to God?
- Is it good to discipline a child? Is it ever appropriate to punish a child?
- What's the difference between being responsible and being guilty? What is your responsibility toward criminals? What's the cause of crime?
- Is punishment ever appropriate? Should criminals admit their crimes? Can a hardened criminal be transformed? How can a criminal not reap the consequences of his actions? If an error is unreal, how do we give it reality?
- What are the teachings in this chapter? The pitfalls to guard against? The life applications?
For answers please return to Home page, then link to Workbook, then to chapter 12.