Category: philosophical counseling
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Getting To The Trailhead: The Beginning Of The Nondual Path
The point is to get to the trailhead. Everything else is beside the point. The trailhead does not begin, per se, with addiction, or with the loss of an elder sister (as was so for me), or with the end of a relationship, and with a shocking disappointment. For the longest time, it can seem as if we simply want to…
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The Perennial Nondual Teaching: Is Pain Real?
Question I have a question about responding to back pain during seated meditation. I currently bear with it and try to give attention to it and relax it into a good position, but I eventually shuffle around or use a pillow until I need to shuffle again. How should I deal with back pain? Answer…
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Nisargadatta On The Acuteness Of Suffering & On The Longing For Liberation
An Argument in 4 Parts from I Am That Part 1: The Acuteness of Suffering Nisargadatta replies: “Suffering has made you dull, unable to see its enormity. Your first task is to see the sorrow in you and around you; your next to long intensely for liberation.” 1. You must begin with herculean earnestness: if…
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Does The Nondual Teaching Amount To ‘Fake It Till You Make It’?
I’ve sometimes heard spiritual practitioners say that they must “fake it till you make it.” By which they mean that they don’t really believe in Waking Up or that they don’t believe that they can really Wake Up, but they need to act as if they did. It could be shown, however, that such an…
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‘Knowledge Can Remain Unshaken Only After All The Vasanas Are Rooted Out’
Question Andrew: In Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi, Ramana Maharishi, replying to a disciple, states the following: D[isciple]: Will the knowledge gained by direct experience be lost afterwards? [Ramana] M[aharshi]: Kaivalya Navanita says it may be lost. Experience gained without rooting out all the vasanas cannot remain steady. Efforts must be made to eradicate the…
Andrew Taggart, Ph.D. 