Category: philosophical counseling

• January 25, 2025

  ‘Regard Everything As The Self Only’

  “Regard everything as the Self only, until all thought of things ‘other’ than the Self is lost.” —Ribhu Gita 1. Only the Self is. 2. If this statement is not experientially clear, then the teaching “kicks in” by saying: Regard everything as the Self only. 3. What is one to regard as the Self? “Everything”…
• January 24, 2025

  How Can You Get To IT When You can’t Get Away From IT?

  Question: During the most recent Zen retreat, I kept asking ‘Who am I’? I was relentless. In the first few hours I probably used this noting method 100 times until it felt like I dropped into this neutral space of awareness. But then after the retreat ended, the understanding slowly faded. How can you possibly get to IT…
• January 23, 2025

  A Person Cannot Surrender

  A person cannot surrender. A person can only be surrendered. The story is told of an overweight man who went to a spiritual teacher with the hope of receiving guidance on how he could lose weight. The teacher is supposed to have said: “Can you accept the fact that you are overweight? Can you surrender?”…
• January 13, 2025

  Suffering, More Than Apparently, Isn’t Real

  1. Suffering seems like the most obviously real thing. Who hasn’t said or felt, “I am suffering?” And don’t we see suffering so plainly on the news every day? 2. Here, we are investigating metaphysics, not conventional reality. “What, then, is ultimately real or true?” This is our principal question. 3. We can divide our…
• January 10, 2025

  Are You Real?

  Suppose you dreamed last night about being a newborn infant. In the dream, you grew up. Later on, you saw your aunt get old, fall into sickness, and die. In this dream, you came to believe and feel that your life was unfolding within the temporal domain bounded by birth and death. You felt, above…