Look Within
You are the teacher you seek.
All the wisdom you are looking for is inside you.
This is great news! If you can really hear this, it is the end of searching, seeking and looking outside of yourself. That game must eventually end.
All spiritual practices must eventually come to an end.
There is a saying I love:
“When the student is ready, the teacher appears. When the student is really ready, both disappear.”
Papaji used to say - no teacher, no teaching, no student.
Katie often says - just be the student! Be the listener. I love this. Isn’t it so simple, profoundly honest and humbling?
I’ve come to unterstand that my “teacher” is that which triggers me - whether that be a person, situation or life itself! It is always kind and alerting me to a belief I haven’t yet questioned. This is true for everyone.
Listening
The Work is a way to help you access your own wisdom by listening to yourself! How can we ever listen to others if we’ve never stopped to listen to what’s inside of us?
By being still and listening patiently to the voice inside you, it reveals precisely what you need to see or hear, just in this moment. Remember that this moment is all we ever have. Forget the past. Don’t dream into an imagined future. Just be Here and Now fully with a humble willingness to know the Truth.
The Truth sets us free.
As you listen deeply, The Work also reveals very clearly where you have motives, may be distorting the Truth, jumping to pre-conceived conclusions or intent on a preferred, ideal outcome. It shows you everything you need to see about yourself.
You can’t “work The Work” or make it fit a preconceived agenda or motive you may be holding, however subtle or tricky the ego may be! When this happens, know that you’ve moved away from Self Inquiry and into something else (therapy, talking about your story, defending/justifying, strategising, coaching techniques, intellectualising the Truth, control, manipulation and so on). Usually, this resistance has the flavour of wanting to be right rather than wanting to be free/true.
It’s not right or wrong; it’s just not the Truth.
As soon as you have an agenda or motive, The Work stops working, only every time!!!
The Work liberales you from all of your illusions, false ideas, precious concepts, tactics, strategies and motives.
“Everyone has equal wisdom. It is absolutely equally distributed. No one is wiser than anyone else.”
“Do you want to be right or do you want to be free?”