Éric Baret: Interview #1

[Guest guest]

INTERVIEWER: Having experienced moments of clarity, people then look

for a way to remain permanently established in the state of

awareness, only to find that it is impossible. In their search, they

read sacred texts, go to meet wise men, study for many years with a

great guru, meditate, do pranayama, yoga, change their diet, their

habits, etc. But my experience and that of my friends has clearly

shown that despite all this, one quickly reaches a point of

saturation and seems to stagnate for years, even decades. It seems

as

if the thirst has not been quenched. As if something essential has

been overlooked: could it be what is known as " grace " ? What is

grace,

where does it come from and how does it operate?

 

A: There are many parts to this question. Let's first answer the

last

part. If we can talk about it, if we can understand it, and if it

comes from somewhere, we cannot call it grace. Grace, according to

the traditional approach, cannot be observed objectively. It arises

of itself, from itself and it cannot come from anywhere but the

heart. It is not dependent on activity nor can it be comprehended by

the limited human mind. Nothing more can be said about it than that.

 

To come back to the beginning of the question, it is a good

observation that first there is an insight and then there is a

sadhana. The insight does not consist of seeing our true nature, for

this is impossible, " being " can never be experienced; the insight is

of what we are not. We see our mechanisms, our arrogance, our fears,

our limitations, very clearly without experiencing any desire to

change them. Facing these facts is an act of humility. Seeing

clearly — what we are not — is what, in the East, is referred to as

insight of what we are. It is important this be clear, because most

people fantasize, think or visualize an insight of what they are,

rather than an insight of what they are not.

 

 

Sadhana was never intended, at least according to the Kashmir Shaiva

Tradition, to bring you back anywhere, because what has come without

any cause, without any sadhana, is without cause. The first insight

came unwanted or unasked for and nothing can make it come back.

 

The whole process is determined by life. Sadhana is seen in the

Kashmir

Tradition as an expression of this insight, not as a way to come

back

to it. Otherwise it is yoga, in the dynamic sense, which is the core

of a senseless idea that more can be created from less, a democratic

fantasy. Sadhana is the art of expressing silence in everyday

activities, that is to say expressing this evidence on the level of

body and mind. That is why all the arts in the East are seen as

sadhana: dancing, poetry, the art of war, the art of love. In India,

music is sadhana for a musician; for a servant activity is sadhana;

for a widow life without her husband is sadhana. All expressions of

life can be seen as sadhana, can be seen to express this conviction

that life is not about doing, acquiring or getting something.

 

There was a moment of availability in which this was clearly

evident.

The awakening of energy and such things are an expression of

consciousness on the mind and body level. The phenomenal plane

cannot attain consciousness, but it can be enlightened by it: you

can

realize that your body and mind don't exist on the same level as

your

understanding, as your convictions. You see how much aggression,

fear

and desire fill the whole body structure and the mind with

strategies. Then you knowingly tune your body-mind to reflecting

this

insight, this openness, to discovering the space within you.

 

Again, the technical part is not to create this openness — but to

realize that we are not open. You can only feel how tense your body

is, and silently observe it. In this silence, the body tensions are

released and return to stillness. You realize how much you use the

mind to express your will, and how much it is engaged in fears and

strategies. You quietly observe it. Nobody asks you to like it or

dislike it, to think that you should be different. You live with the

facts: I am arrogant, pretentious, all this resonates within me now.

I no longer aim at being different tomorrow. I lucidly recognize my

limitations. In that very moment, when you see your limitations

clearly, they can slowly dissolve into openness.

 

You cannot deliberately progress towards an open state, you can only

see clearly that you are in a blocked state. So, you let your body-

mind slowly become more open to your conviction that you can attain

nothing. That you are going to die in total stupidity. You may die

in

the very next moment, so there is no time to reach anything, to

achieve anything. In sadhana you live with the feeling that you are

going to die the very next minute; thus, you no longer make

strategies and you just do things for the sake of doing them. If you

think that you will die within two minutes, what do you do? Nothing.

You don't call anybody, you don't think of anything, you just

totally

enjoy seeing, feeling, smelling, listening to the last seconds of

your life, the beauty of life.

 

Sadhana is this feeling. You sit for the joy of sitting, you do yoga

for the joy of doing yoga, you sing for the joy of singing. There is

no time and life is too beautiful and goes too fast to have time to

achieve anything. The slightest intention, like doing yoga because

tomorrow you are going to get better, will not work: you may die

before tomorrow. You go to satsang because it resonates in you now.

You do yoga because grace calls you to do it; you take aim with your

bow, you sing, but never with the feeling that you can reach

anything. You do everything for the shear beauty of it. Your life

becomes your sadhana. Situations are only what we project them to

be.

Each possesses its own beauty when we don't ask it to be anything

other than what it is. You become imminently practical, without any

goal, or intention.

 

That is the message of the Gita, when Krishna asked Arjuna to do

what

needed to be done and to put aside his likes and dislikes. It is of

no psychological consequence that his master and parents are to be

fought on the battlefield of Kurukshetra. So Arjuna does it because

it has to be done. There is no future, no intention; he is just

acting functionally. That is the meaning of sadhana from the

traditional, non-dual point of view.