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Wie ervaart gelukzaligheid? |
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Dit artikel werd voor het eerst gepubliceerd in The Messenger op 2003. In de traditie van Ramana, om het even hoe die wordt genoemd, is sprake van de zogenoemde omhulsels van Atman. Het laatste omhulsel, het laatste obstakel, de laatste sluier wordt ook wel aangeduid met de Anandamaya kosha — het zaligheid omhulsel. Dit is de laatste sluier, en voor velen vaak een knelpunt. Die zegenrijke gelukzaligheid is een ervaring, maar voor wie? De gelukservaring die je kent van het onderzoek, maakt plaats voor verwarring op het moment dat je wordt geconfronteerd met iets dat niet zo goed past in wat je er, misschien heimelijk en onbewust, van had voorgesteld. Als het zalige gevoel daardoor verdwijnt en plaatsmaakt voor verwarring, is dat misschien toch niet precies waarnaar je op zoek was. Wanneer iets verdwijnt, is het niet wat je zoekt. Wat je zoekt is je zelf, dat is nog nooit veranderd en zal ook nooit veranderen. Dat weet je, binnen in jezelf tref je niets aan dat vergankelijk is. Geboorte en dood zul je daar ook niet vinden. Houd er dus niet mee op. Dat is de schoonheid van vichara, het onderzoek. Dat is de grootsheid ervan. Alles is jouw leraar. Alles, elke gedachte, ieder gevoel, ieder moment van verrukking, elk ogenblik van verwarring, wijst nu regelrecht terug naar je zelf, als je de richting van jouw aandacht tenminste omdraait en terugvolgt. Alles is de goeroe van de buitenkant die je terugduwt naar de innerlijke goeroe die je naarbinnen trekt. Iedere gedachte, elke vorm van verwarring, iedere vergissing, elk ongelijk, elk gelijk, alles wijst en zegt je: "Dáár, dáár moet je zijn, daarbinnen!" We zijn hier niet voor het ervaren van gelukzaligheid. Dat gevoel is weliswaar groots, maar het komt op en gaat weer weg. De gelukzaligheid die jij bent is blijvend, zegen en kwelling zijn daar in gelijke mate aanwezig. Het ligt allemaal besloten in je intenties, weet je, het hangt allemaal af van wat je wilt. Als je gelukzalig wilt zijn, dat gevoel van gezegend zijn wilt ervaren, dan is dat makkelijk, er lopen genoeg goeroes rond die je dat kunnen geven. Als je er geen kunt vinden, dan is er misschien altijd nog de weg van de halucigene middelen, maar permanente gelukzaligheid zul je echter nooit krijgen. Je moet er dus ook niet naar op zoek gaan. We zijn gedurende ons hele leven allemaal op zoek naar het antwoord op de vraag: "Wie ben ik?" Dat is het enige waar we mee bezig zijn. Dat is het enige wat we in dit leven doen, in deze lichamen: proberen uit te vissen wie we zijn. Door de kennismaking met Ramana Maharshi worden we ons nu ook van deze queeste bewust. Nu dient zich in je leven eindelijk de mogelijkheid aan die zoektocht, waarmee je al sinds je geboorte onbewust bezig bent, volledig bewust te vervolgen. Nu doet zich eindelijk de kans voor heel bewust, heel direct en heel spontaan antwoord te vinden op vragen als: "Wie ben ik? Voor wie is de gelukzaligheid en voor wie is de verwarring? Wie ben ik? Vind je zelf.
Vertaling uit het Amerikaans door Jan P. Smith, Zoetermeer, Nederland.
© 2008 John Sherman. Enkele rechten voorbehouden.
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As of July 21: |
| Worldwide Online Meeting | Saturday, September 11 at 4 pm PDT (UTC/GMT -7) People all over the world gather together with John for a couple of hours. John is available to listen to your questions, and to help you sort out any difficulties you might experience in your own practice of looking at yourself. This is very much like a call-in radio show. If you simply want to listen to the meetings, all you need to do is to install the software and have speakers attached to your computer. If you wish to speak with John, then you will need a headset with microphone. You can also use earbuds and a microphone. |
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A Worldwide Meeting - July 10, 2010 My role in this adventure of trying to bring the simplicity of this work to every human being is not to concoct teachings, ways of looking at things, instructions and practices that are my creation, and then pass them on to you for you to receive gratefully, and try to make sense of. My role here is actually to distill and articulate the product of an ongoing conversation among all of us, over a period of more than ten years now, about the discovery that bringing an end to misery in a human life is actually not only possible but easy and simple, and can be done by anyone. It requires nothing at all to accomplish this except the determination to do one simple, solitary, radical act, and that is to turn the beam of your attention onto the feeling of being you. That's it. In the end, and against all odds and all expectation, this repeated act will bring sanity into your life. It will eliminate the underlying sense that life is treacherous and not to be trusted, and that something desperately needs to be done about it. Complete, live recording of a Worldwide Online Meeting with John Sherman broadcast live from Ojai, California on July 10, 2010. |
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Our Work First, last, and always, my advice is only to look at the feeling of being you, without the mediation of understanding, the need to resolve paradox, or the requirement that this looking lead to any conclusion. Simply make every effort just to look, and persist in that effort as often as you can. In this effort, understanding is irrelevant, belief is irrelevant, even duration is irrelevant — the briefest look, repeated over time, does all the work. A Message from John Sherman, videotaped in Ojai, California on May 15, 2009. |
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Our work is to bring the practice of looking at oneself to all who are interested. The only problem anywhere to be found is the false belief that you are at the mercy of your life, and the only solution is the truth, which is everywhere and always present and self-evident. Ridding oneself of the false is as easy as repeatedly tasting the truth of being here, unmovingly, unchangingly here. This repeated looking directly at oneself is the infallible method of the vichara. Although our meetings are free of charge, they are certainly not free of cost. The money needed for this work must come entirely from the generosity and compassion of those who, like us, have seen for themselves the immense worth of spreading this good news to all humanity. Please help provide financial support for the work of making this method more widely available in the world by making a donation or a monthly pledge in any amount now. All gifts to the RiverGanga Foundation are fully tax-deductible as charitable donations. |
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RiverGanga Foundation RiverGanga Foundation is a not-for-profit, 509(a)(2) public charitable organization under Section 501(c)(3) of the United States Internal Revenue Code. Our Internal Revenue Service Employer ID Number is 77-0561647. All donations are tax deductible for US residents as charitable contributions. Click to view our letter of determination from the IRS. IRS Tips for Year-End Donations
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All text, audio and video content offered free of charge on this website, unless otherwise indicated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Updated daily since July 12, 2009 Click here to see the archived map showing where more than 43,000 visitors came from last year. © 2001-2010 RiverGanga Foundation.All rights reserved. |
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