A Real Dialogue

What is a REAL dialogue?

A real dialogue is what happens when a Realised person meets with someone who WANTS to 'get it'. We can call the Realised person the Guru (if we want to - it is just a word) and the one who wants to get it can be called a disciple. The danger in doing this is that it can create all kinds of concepts about what the Guru should be and the disciple should be, which are more barriers to overcome.

However, the essential ingredient is this: The Guru must be realized - in the sense that he must not be speaking from theory or books or concepts alone. Otherwise it is the blind leading the blind.

The disciple must be SINCERE in that he does not just want to debate. This means he has to drop his desire to be RIGHT. He must forget all about 'being right'. He must be open to dropping his previous ideas that he may have collected over a whole lifetime.

Then - something might just happen, because the disciple is receptive and open. He may 'get it' and one insight leads on to another and soon awakening happens.

An intellectual debate is not the same at all because the essentials are missing.

An example of a Real Dialogue is Krishna and Arjuna. Arjuna questions but only in the spirit of trying to 'get it' and to get clarity. Arjuna is not argumentative - but at the same time he is vocalising his real concerns. When Krishna says "I WAS even before the sun was" - Arjuna is taken aback and questions this.

There is something unique about the dialogue that happens when Guru and disciple meet in this way. This is the real sant mat journey, and history shows that this is what happened to just about every enlightened person - he or she met someone who changed their whole life.

Guru is not a formal title - not a position - like a pope. If it becomes so - then truth has long departed. Guru is also something that cannot be bestowed or passed on. There is nothing to bestow or pass on. It is one's own inner realization.

This is a far cry from what happens in organised religions like sant mat. I call it an organised religion because that is what it is now. The truth has long departed. All that remains is an empty shell. Politics and power plays are in abundance. There are rules and more rules. Satsang is nothing more than a formal gathering. It is the blind leading the blind because often these are conducted by disciples who themsevles have no first-hand experience of the truth.

I was a speaker for quite some time in RSSB and I have seen first hand the ego games that are played by the disciples. Nothing significant happens in RSSB satsang because they are simply giving out theory and telling to you to meditate. In a real satsang - the disciples would get breakthroughs and insights just by being in the satsang. They would begin to awaken and drop their minds.

Comments

[George]

"A real dialogue is what happens when a Realised person meets with someone who WANTS to get it."
-- I wholly and strongly disagree, what you are describing is a lecture or a sermon. A REAL dialogue is the exchange of information between two parties giving equal respect to the other's views. Your definition requires someone to have 'got it' and another to want to 'get it'. I don't believe there is anything to 'get' and these are false prophets.

What is there to get? There is nothing only oneness. So what? Great, end of story. No dialogue is necessary for that. It says nothing and means nothing.

"However, the essential ingredient is this: The Guru must be realized"
--- How do we know whether a guru is REALIZED or not?
How can we spot the deluded false prophet from the realized guru?
Is there in fact any diffeence?

"The disciple must be SINCERE in that he does not just want to debate."
--- I think the word you are looking for is 'question' rather than debate. Every single religious traditions appears to have this in common, no questioning, just blind faith, so that you can open your mind and get swallowed up and taken in by all of it. Every single one of them has exactly this in common, you would have thought by now there would be some variations on the theme, but ultimately at root, they require mindless unquestioning undebating devotion.

What is it with intelligent human beings that they can con themselves so totally?

[George]

What most religious folk have never quite 'got' is the concept of debate.

These ppl have been raised and weened on spiritual humility and devotion, and have totally lost the ability to truly think for themselves or to have faith in the experiences and wisdom that can be imparted by their normal 'unrealized' fellow man.

[George]

There is a massive industry for new age evangelists and self-help REALIZERS.

Its all alot of absolute claptrap and if ppl are prepared to swallow nonsense wholesale they only have themselves when 30 years down the line they feel totally and utterly dissillusioned.

That is fine, ppl want answers and this world can appear a cruel uncaring place at time - however what really gets my goat is ppl that claim to have REALIZED the TRUTH, and there is not a single shred of evidence to support it. All they do is use attractive wording and rhetoric, which has been dripfed and programmed into their subconsciousness over a long period, until such time they decide to disseminate these false memes.

[Osho Robbins]

George,
"A real dialogue is what happens when a Realised person meets with someone who WANTS to get it."

I do not mean a lecture at all. A lecture is not a meeting - it is a one way communication. A meeting requires BOTH to be present.

George Wrote: What is there to get? There is nothing only oneness. So what? Great, end of story. No dialogue is necessary for that. It says nothing and means nothing.

When you say "There is nothing - only oneness" - you are making an intellectual statement only. It is just a theory to you. It is not truth for you - it is a belief or you can doubt it. It has no meaning for you because you have not REALIZED it - you are merely repeating the words - like a parrot can repeat yet have no understanding.
To REALIZE nothing - is to BE nothing. To say "There is nothing" is just a concept. It is the difference between SAYING "Water" and drinking the water. One is a word - the other is an experience. Realization of truth is NOT EVEN an experience - because even to experience two are needed. The experiencer and the experienced.

You cannot know if the guru is realized any more than you can know if I have just had a drink of water. There are some signs - for example if he is teaching duality - obviously he has not realized the ONE.

"The disciple must be SINCERE in that he does not just want to debate."
George, Questioning and/or debating IS REQUIRED. I said JUST want to debate or question. I definately do NOT advovate BLIND faith. In fact FAITH is NOT required at all, neither is Devotion required. Nor is it necessary to accept any teachings or follow any rituals. I am saying the direct opposite is required.

[Peter]

Hi Osho,

I'm getting a mental image (nothing fancy) of all these posts on Sant Mat and I'd like to share.
What triggered me was this sentence in your initial post of 09/20/2009:
"Nothing significant happens in RSSB satsang because they are simply giving out theory and telling you to meditate."

That's probably the best, shortest, most accurate description, that I've ever read about this spiritual science (online or anywhere else)!

Of course you said a lot more. And the image I wanted to share doesn't just apply to that one brilliant line.
It is this: Pictue a room or a very big hall even, yeah, the size of the Mand Pandal at Dera, filled with solitary people playing chess against themselves. Every now and again one player comments on what the other should do and turns back to his own game.

Cheers,
Peter

[Osho Robbins]

Peter,
Nice comment. Please elaborate on the image of chess players playing chess against themselves. Are you relating this to meditation?
By the way - I am not AGAINST sant mat as such - I am simply saying that it is clearly a duality path and if you understand what that means - it cannot take you to the state of ONENESS - since that is not even the goal. A dulaity path will give you dreams and future goals and will keep you the treadmill towards your spiritual goal. You will never reach because you are in the rat race. Instead of material possessions - you are after spiritual wealth. Nothing has really chnaged at all. It is the same race - the same mind and the same greed is still present within the seeker. So what if the goal has changed - the seeker is still the same.

Enlightenment is very different - there is no goal - no destination - and no future. You are not trying to attain anything.

[Peter]

With the chess game I meant to refer to our mental gymnastics in trying to grasp most everything ourselves, by ourselves.
I guess it's part of being human, but IMHO it does have a certain pointlessness to it. That of playing chess against oneself.
I'm very partial towards practice or at the very least trying to put (Sant Mat) into practice.

As far as what Sant Mat really is or isn't is concerned, I wouldn't know so I can't argue about that.

[Osho Robbins]

Peter,
are you initiated into sant mat? Sant mat is very enticing as it offers a lot - except when it comes to delivery time. It delivery very little. All the promises are empty.

All practice - no matter what type - meditation, prayer, reading scriptures, etc, it ALL re-inforces the EGO - the sense of I. If I am doing a practise - I am putting in the effort - there is a ME doing it. However, sant mat says that the 'I' is the barrier between you and truth/God. So you want to go beyond the 'I' and that cannot happen through PRACTISE.

The way sant mat gets around this is: is says the ONLY way to eliminate the 'I' is for your SOUL to merge with the OVERSOUL (GOD) and this happens through the inner journey of the soul towards Sach Khand.

However, this is a metaphor - as in reality there cannot be separate entities - like Sach Khand, Soul, God etc. It is ALL ONE. Sant mat gives the illusion that they HAVE TO BECOME ONE through your meditation.

So the disciple spends his entire life trying to merge and it cannot happen because merging is impossible. Why? because there is ONLY ONE in first place. WHO is going to merge into WHAT? The real goal is REALIZATION of the ONE. There is no MERGING - there is only REALIZATION that there ALWAYS WAS ONE.
This is what Nanak says in JapJi Sahib. He says - "The ONE - His Name is True - He does everything - He is BEYOND TIME. He WAS, IS and ALWAYS WILL BE." This is just a way of saying that HE is ALL there IS and always will be. There is nothing else. Merging can only happen if there are TWO in the first place. TWO exist only in Illusion - only in MAYA - that which appears to BE - but is NOT.
Everything that is MAYA will END because it is within TIME and SPACE. That which is NOT within TIME and SPACE will remain forever. You can call that the ONE. It is all there IS.

[Peter]

Osho,

I must say, the waiting feeling is fine:)

I am an initiate of Hazur and would have loved to be one of BabaJi's.

I appreciate your thoughts regarding sant mat.

Maybe Spinoza's "Ethica" is interesting reading for you. I think I hear some similarities in his views to what you just wrote.

[Osho Robbins]

Peter,

You might find this interesting:
http://elearn.mtsac.edu/dlane/babafaqir.htm

Faqir Chand was one of the rare RS Gurus who examines the search for truth and honestly tells you his truth. At the time he was 87 years old and had traversed the regions of sant mat - yet still he questioned and came to a new conclusion.

I will write a separate post about Faqir Chand because he stands alone among sant mat gurus.

thank you for you recommeded reading - I will look into it.