Rupert Spira responds to a practitioner who has lost interest in formal meditation — suggesting that when one has "arrived on the Caribbean beach," the map (spiritual practice) has done its job and no longer needs to be consulted.
Transcript
I've had this experience over the last several months where I just I just don't what do I say practice anymore. I don't meditate anymore. I don't contemplate these things anymore. I don't I used to love like I mean there were like I remember four or five years ago I would just love reading and listening to these wisdom texts Raman Maharshi and Nisaradata and Meister Echard and all of your videos and I would just like drown myself in it and that was all I wanted to do anytime that I had any free time and I'm sure many people in this room can resonate with that. Um, but I just like now if I if I try to listen to something or read something, it's it feels like it actually feels artificial. And I just feel like, well, I'm just going to live live my life. I get up, you know, make coffee or tea and play one of my instruments. I go teach. I, you know, I just like I do my I'm working on a this project or that project and and I'm just living and I'm and it it almost feels like this is what I felt like before I had what I would call this deep interest in truth and this awakening experience. It's kind of like, oh, I'm just now I'm just I've just gone back to living life. Except the difference now is like I don't suffer as much. >> Yes. But when you've when you've arrived on the Caribbean beach, you stop reading the map. >> Yeah. [laughter] >> The map's done its job. You you you pass it on. >> Except when >> you're not supposed to sit on your deck chair reading the map. [laughter] >> And actually what what you were saying I said how I left yesterday and I was chatting with Ben outside. We were actually talking about this and I and I told him, but now what happens is it's not that I never feel sad or I never feel anxious. So it it doesn't happen that often. Maybe every 3 or 4 weeks. I don't know. It's hard to say, but I'll notice it, but I'm so quick. Like I'm like, "Oh, there it is." And then that day for a couple hours, I'll be doing netty disentangle. You notice it, you you you find your own way back very quickly. It doesn't >> you don't go into a depression for 2 weeks. It doesn't cause a drama in your relationship or with your friends. You just take care of it. It might take you a few minutes or a few hours, but then you go back to yourself. In other words, the map's available when you need it, but you don't keep reading it when you don't need [clears throat] it. No, that that that's how life's supposed to be. >> So, you don't think that's an emergency approach? cuz I was like, "Oh, am I just reacting that that's I should be more preemptive and I'm just >> if if there is this deep satisfaction in you uh this this this imperturbable peace and causeless joy most of the time, then the the map has done its work, but you you have it there on your on your shelf, you know, when something happens and you you lose yourself in the content of experience. So you find your way back quickly. And that that's that's how life's supposed to be. >> Okay. >> I'm going to confess something to you which I I fear will disappoint you, but [laughter] um I hope I don't lose too much credibility with with too many of you. What do you think I'm reading at the moment? >> You think I'm reading Ballayani or Meister or I I'm reading I'm reading um the the Bitcoin standard. [laughter] Why? Because my son's fascinated by finance and I want to understand his world >> and I love him and I want to have a language that I share with him. So, I'm just learning the language of of finance. It's absolutely riveting. It's [laughter] so interesting. I'm loving it. I'm learning all sorts of things that I had no idea about about finance and the gold standard and and how economies work and and I've never been remotely interested in such matters and I'm not inherently interested in them now but I but I love my son and I'm very close to him and I want I want a shared language. I want to be interested in his world. I want to understand his world and the way so I'm reading it and and so I I don't go home in the evening and sit down as I used to for for 40 or so years and read >> Krishna Menon and Ramano Mahashi and Roomie and I I you know I I I did that for a long long time >> but I don't do that now. Occasionally I might take one of my books off the bookshelf and just read um a sentence or a paragraph at most and I just I appreciate it. I I read I read the those sacred texts in the same way that I I enjoy listening to a Bach prelude. It's the same. I just love hearing this understanding formulated in the Sufi tradition, in the Vantic tradition, in the mystical Christian tradition or um but I but I I I read very little actually I think very little about these matters now. You know, when Kira and I are alone at at home, we we talk about what we're going to cook for dinner and where we're going to go for a walk or or we we're not discussing these m again for for 45 50 years I this was I was thinking and talking about nothing else. But it but a time comes when you've when you've thought about everything. you don't you don't know what else to think but until you know I have a conversation with someone or one of you asked me a question in fact there have been several it's been very beautiful this week I've noticed that several of you have asked me questions that I've never been asked before I never thought about before so then my mind loves that and I I formulated things here this week that I've never formulated before and never even thought of before so so when a new question comes or when I have a new podcast conversation with with someone then and someone brings a new perspective or a new idea then my mind will engage immediately and I enjoy that but left to my left to my own devices I'm not thinking and reading about these things I'm just leading a very ordinary simple beautiful loving >> life >> creative >> yes in the same way I I mean, all I want to do is play my instruments and and work on my projects. And before I go to bed, I like watching or listening to comedy. I just like laughing, you know? I laugh a lot. And [snorts] I just like I love music and I love laughter. And >> comedy, comedy is one of the >> one of the great pathways to the recognition of our true nature. >> Not not many comedians know this. Most comedians think that um comedy is they're there to entertain people. This is not true. Comedy is not about entertainment. >> Commentary is one of the direct paths to the to a glimpse of our true nature. Pete Pete knows this, but but not most comedians think that comedy is entertainment. It's not. It's a beautiful vehicle um for giving people a a glimpse, a taste of of their true nature. And it's very direct and and very powerful. So I I I understand why you like listening to watching comedy. >> And one last thing, it it actually made me wonder of like why am I still coming to retreat? >> Yeah. Uh for no reason. >> Yeah. >> And that that's the best reason for coming to a retreat. You you come for no reason. Not not not um you know there's that story somebody reminded me of it in the lunch queue the other day the the the monk who was traveling from monastery to monastery and and he comes to one one monastery and and one of the resident monks says to him oh I I presume you've come to to um hear the the the teachers marvelous teaching and then the monk says no no no I haven't and oh the the resident monk says oh I suppose you've come to sit in the teacher's presence and the monk says no no no I haven't and then the the resident monk says why why have you come and in the traditional story the monk answers I've come to see how the teacher ties his shoelaces but there's a higher reason in my version of the story the the the resident monk says this is new version of the story. The resident monk says, "Oh, I suppose you've come to see how the teacher teaches his sho ties his shoelaces." And he said, "No, I haven't come for that reason." So the resident monk says, "Oh, well, why have you come then?" And he says, "For no reason. That's the highest reason. >> You don't come for a reason. You just come to just um to to be in in this beautiful community of friends and uh it's the best reason for doing for doing anything is for no reason. You you don't need to get anything from being here. Nor do you need to give anything. You you do give something but we all give something but not because we want to. Not because we have a mission, not because we're trying to change anybody or in light. We don't we don't why do you know flowers don't bloom for a reason. They don't bloom in order to en enlighten anybody or or or change anybody or transmit any they just bloom. They they So that's the best reason for coming here. just just just to be with this beautiful amazing group of people and just just to be and to to give and receive whatever it is in the moment. Um that's that's a good reason for coming. Some people come to this understanding and they realize there's no reason to go to a retreat anymore and they stop coming to retreats and that that's also perfectly fine. that would be another possibility that you feel a very dear friend of many of us here came to me I think it was the end of the retreat this time last year and she be she's been coming for many many years and she said came out to me at the end she said Rupert I'm not going to see you again >> this is my last retreat I'm not coming back anymore she just came to say goodbye and thank you and we'd known each other for years and we just had this beautiful poignant parting. So for her she came to this understanding and she said I don't need to come anymore and therefore I'm not going to come anymore. Somebody else might come to the same recognition. I don't need I I'm complete. I don't need to come. But I'm going to keep coming. And I know this is true for many of you. Many of you who have been coming for many years. I know that you don't you don't need to come and you've recognized your true nature. You do so just because you love to do so for no reason. There are many of you here that are here for that reason. So, but both both are possible. >> Mhm. >> Yeah. >> So, don't don't feel don't feel badly if you if you feel there's no reason to be here. Uh if you if you don't feel like coming back, don't come back. We we'll we'll miss you. But it's okay. It's we're all supposed to graduate. [laughter] We're And then we should only stay if if it's just what we love to do, but for no reason. >> So just keep playing your instruments and watching your comedies, [laughter] and I hope we'll see you from time to time. Thank you, Rupert. [snorts]