Urban Guru Cafe
Discovering what you truly are
85. Isaac Shapiro – Beloved Life
Posted on 06.07.10 1:51AM under Isaac Shapiro
Many will already be familiar with him and others may not have even heard of Isaac. He lives in Australia for some of the year, near Byron Bay. He travels all over the Globe holding meetings. Website HERE. Papaji was Isaac’s pointer.
Oneness is all inclusive. Every expression, in any place or time, is the Singular Essence expressing and appearing as THAT.
Who gets stuck on what? Enjoy the program. Relax and listen.
and….Welcome to all the new listeners to the Urban Guru Cafe. We have 85 programs, all about the same ‘Thing’…..No Thing.
Music includes: Ray Charles, Iron and Wine, Sirocco, Sheryl Crow, Matt Walters, Annour Brahem and Vassilis Tsabropoulos.
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Posted by gilbert on 06.07.10 12:51 pm
Anyone who downloaded the file in the first 170 downloads may want to download it again because some technical adjustments were made, to brighten up the voice in certain parts.
Exports from South Africa include, Tony Greg, diamonds and Isaac Shapiro. We have tamed Isaac quite well, here in Australia. He is a loving fellow, in love with Life. We must have quite a few listeners who have met Isaac and a few who have visited Byron Bay as well.
The Urban Guru Cafe should open up a Cafe there one day.
Paul Hedderman, another ‘urban guru’ live at Byron for a few years.
The ehadland at Byron is the most eastern point on the Australian Coast.
Posted by confused on 06.07.10 3:21 pm
Gilbert, thanks so much for all the time and energy you invest into this message. I was just reading through some of your old posts, and they all bring me to what is clear and obvious, just this. What I am is NO THING! A THING is objective to awareness, be it a thought, feeling, emotion, idea, or otherwise. All these apparent forms are just momentary blips on the radar of awareness. These blips include any and all ideas that arise about “me”. Their nature is to “come” and their nature is also to “go”. They only appear to be stuck in awareness because of a fixation or holding onto as “mine”. Like you say, negate every appearance as mine and relax. You ARE awareness and thats all. No “thing” will ever change this…
Posted by Tim on 06.07.10 5:50 pm
I’m very grateful for this.
Posted by Cat on 06.08.10 1:21 am
It’s so true, that always subtle feeling of not wanting what is. Thinking there is a ‘solution’ to what is. It’s like the ultimate symptom of a separate self. It seems like sorting out the unconscious habit from who you really are is illusive mostly. How can you trust anything the mind comes up with? It seems like tricky business.
Posted by gilbert on 06.08.10 2:04 am
When anyone expresses something, it implies that there is someone there. It all appears as a dance of energy appearing as ‘matter’ whatever the form it may appear to be, it is nothing other than the zero appearing as one or two, three or more.
A scriptural text appears spontaneously without ‘reason’.
“When two or more are gathered in my name I AM there also”.
The usual meaning of this text is the common misunderstanding, that has apparently kept many in bondage.
Whatever state you may believe you are in, no matter how fragmented it seems, the naked ‘I am-ness’ is present.
What holds the molecules of a crystal together? What quality of life is it that moves and permeates every cell and orchestrates the magnificent architecture of a living body?
It is not the feeble reasoning of a ‘me’ that does these things.
It is not an isolated doing in any way shape or form.
It permeated the universe in this very instant.
Posted by suki on 06.08.10 4:20 am
There is no beyond this! whatever is encountered as beyond, is still this, whatever this IS.
Mind gives context to experience, patterns and configurations, imaginary points of reference on the surface(changing waves) of the Unchanging infinite ocean of Being(Awareness). Identifying with the waves can lead to suffering, unnecessary when your true identity is with the Whole ocean.
Posted by anatta on 06.08.10 12:50 pm
My knowledge is dancing. Where is it dancing to? I don’t know – it just dance.
Posted by Fred on 06.08.10 7:34 pm
Really nice podcast. I never really got the ‘love affair with life’ explanation, but Isaac’s invitation to see if there is even just a hint of enjoying this moment reveals that strangely enough there is.
Posted by fernando on 06.09.10 1:05 am
If there is love, it must be here and now, in what you are.
If there is peace, it must be here and now, in what you are.
If there is enlightenment, it must be here and now, in what you are.
Because there is NO elsewhere. Because there is NO elsewhen.
Posted by mark on 06.09.10 9:45 am
This was great. Thank you. I have really loved listening to Isaac. Lots of excellent videos on his website, If relationship with others appears to be a sticking point, he’s very good at undoing all the apparent difficulties.
Posted by gilbert on 06.09.10 3:45 pm
Someone sent me this email: I heard the Isaac Shapiro interview. His take is quite good, existential approach, so to speak. His observation that the majority of punters are run by and in the grip of unconscious and unexamined habit patterns. Quite amusing when we say and point out that reality, or non duality if you like, is that which never changes and is the same under all circumstances – there is no one now or ever who is not aware – yet, as Issac says, if there are 15 people in a room, how many realities are there? Hilariously, the answer is 15. Ha. It is just a habit of seeing oneself as separate, apart, special and different from the reality of “what is” or THAT, as we refer to reality or awareness.
Posted by fernando on 06.11.10 2:11 am
Everything of what you call ‘reality’ is APPEARANCE, except ONE single ‘thing’: the space-like awareness you ARE.
Awareness is the only ‘thing’ that is NOT a thing.
Awareness is the only ‘thing’ that can’t be thinked, sensed, perceived or described, because is that which makes thinking, sensing, perceiving or describing possible.
Posted by suki on 06.11.10 11:38 pm
This awareness that is everywhere is already here, but when it gets tied to experience, in other words, when we measure it by experience, we are confused. All experience appears in awareness. Once you know that, then every experience is free to come and go and no experience can trouble you. ~ Isaac Shapiro
Posted by Tim on 06.12.10 9:14 am
I’ve been tripping on what I heard pointed to here a lot the last few days. It’s the damndest thing, this love, this enjoyment of what is. First, it’s kinda weird to me that I never noticed it before. Second, it just doesn’t really fit into my little mental “equation” of what this non-duality thing is all about. “Love implies two!”, as UG was so fond of snarling. The cool thing is upon noticing this my mind finally quit trying to understand.
Posted by Will on 06.13.10 2:59 am
get why it can’t be got.
that’s it.
got.
Posted by admin on 06.13.10 3:34 am
If you haven’t checked out Bob’s new site, please do – it’s http://www.sailorbobadamson.com. There is new audio posted there and also a guestbook you can sign or comment on.
There are also links to books including the newest from Kalyani Lawry – “Only That – The Life and Teaching of Sailor Bob Adamson”.
Posted by fernando on 06.13.10 12:51 pm
Everything is PERFECT just as it IS.
It could not be any other way.
ONE ESSENCE displaying itself as EVERYTHING… every apparent thing, including every thought, concept and notion. You think that they are your thoughts and that is where the apparent trouble ‘starts’ – but that is also PERFECT – and nothing ever starts or finishes.
The CLEAR view ‘appears’ to be most accessible when thought is paused. Why not try it? And SEE for yourself.
Everything is PERFECT just as it IS.
It truly could not be any other way.
Knowing that is simple and easy.
The polarity of positive and negative is actually EQUAL.
(Gilbert Schultz – January 2, 2010 at 10:11 am)
Posted by mark on 06.14.10 9:53 am
please, Fernando, stop it. You are no clearer by copying others, just a litle dumber. see how it is. Dont bother copying words.
‘Thr appearance of one is in the multitude’
Okay, keep a fire burning.
Posted by fernando on 06.14.10 11:04 am
I’m not ‘copying’, mark. I’m just ‘quoting’.
If you don’t like ‘quotes’, it’s YOUR problem, not mine.
Anyway, mark ‘thumb down’, mark, if you don’t like it.
And finally, WTF means ‘the appearance of one is in the multitude’?… I’m a little dumb!
Posted by fernando on 06.15.10 12:17 am
There is NO ‘multitude’ anywhere.
‘Multitude’ is a concept that appears in YOU.
Posted by claudia on 06.15.10 8:56 am
There is no perception without a perceiver. They are inseparble. In this very instant the whole universe arises in awareness out of nothing, ceaselessly dissolving and giving birth to the new, creating itself ad infinitum and by its own unfatomable law. Where do you begin and where do you end? Coud there be anything apart from you knowing it? If it is resistance that is perceived, could it be without you being aware? Could the thought “I feel resistance” arise without you knowing it? Absolotly nothing could exist without your aknowledgement. How could one describe this? This intimacy, this fullness, this absolut vividness right here and know?The imaginary me shivers and trembles. It is unbearable for it, because it is boundless. No boundery, that means absolute love: ‘I am everything’. No ultimate formula – so elegant it may be – will ever ever grasp this, There is no way out for the believed in individual. So it may as well shut up and be quiet.
Posted by Tim on 06.15.10 9:22 am
Sometimes I think it would be helpful if all these podcasts ended with Gilbert saying, “The UGC is produced in Australia. None of the words you just heard contain any truth whatsoever.”
Posted by mark on 06.15.10 9:32 am
ok fernando. since you like quotes, heres one from J. Krishnamurti : ‘If you try to study yourself according to another you will always remain a secondhand human being.’ or ‘if we learn about ourselves according to someone else, we learn about THEM, not ourselves.’ can you hear the drums? (btw the words about multitudes and appearances were just bullshit and yet they seemed to have a sort of ring about them, a sort of authority. Funny that, isnt it?)
Posted by gilbert on 06.15.10 10:07 am
Thanks Tim, none of the words you wrote contain any truth whatsoever.
I may use it, or not.
Posted by gilbert on 06.15.10 10:31 am
There is nothing perceived and no perceiver without seeing (perceiv-ing).
The word ‘Perceiving’ is not the same as the word ‘seeing’.
Whatever the functioning, walking, seeing, hearing, breathing, thinking, it is just plain functioning without a ‘doer’. The walker, seer, the hearer, the breather or the thinker are conceptual add ons.
Trying to grasp it with the mind is truly frustrating, simply because it just can’t be ‘done’ – and the ‘doer’ is just another thought.
Intellectuals find this ‘subject’ exceedingly challenging and frustrating. Usually ‘in life’ they can ‘stay on top’ via their honed ‘strategy’ mind game but with this, it just doesn’t work.
‘People’ get offended. The ‘person’ is not reality.
Intellectuals complain the loudest. Words appear to convey something.
Often they feel empty? That can be very significant, so it seems.
Why are ‘we’ so afraid of empty words?
All words are empty.
It may seem that ‘we’ navigate our way through ‘feeling’ our way.
All of our preconceived notions are upside down and back to front.
The value system of society is biased towards keeping the dream alive.
Who is asleep and who is awake? Who needs to awaken?
The question “Are you awake?” is a cutting question in the immediacy.
The response must be “Yes, I am awake”. In the instant of checking to see if I am awake there is a ‘silent gap’.
Upon that silence and stillness the whole universe moves.
Naked Wakefulness is clearly obvious. ‘You’ will not be able to define it or label it with any words that will stick to it.
All we can do is point to THAT.
I am THAT – you are THAT.
Posted by Tim on 06.15.10 12:44 pm
Cool.
Posted by fernando on 06.15.10 8:30 pm
1. BEING is happening.
2. SEEING is happening.
3. There is NO one (no BEer, no SEEer) ANYWHERE.
Is THIS ‘second hand’, mark?
What more do you need?
(Investigation doesn’t imply EFFORT)
Posted by fernando on 06.16.10 2:34 am
Why should we insist in considering that Non Duality is such a difficult ‘matter’, one that can only be ‘grasped’ by a few extremely bright people or hardworking seekers (among whom, I presume, you, mark, include yourself)?
The message is quite simple: You are THAT which you are seeking… You NEVER left home!!
I wonder if Non Duality might not continue to be a ‘matter’ of very ‘few people’, solely because of OUR insisting in the need that it MUST be a difficult one. And, as a result of such BELIEF, we overlook Non Duality’s evident SIMPLICITY:
‘To BE that which you are and to stop PRETENDING to be that which you are NOT.’
Posted by suki on 06.16.10 4:56 am
This realization happens by itself. No new knowledge is acquired, but old assumptions fall away. No effort in the world can make you what you already and actually are. The truth behind ego is a no-thing-ness too close for investigation, since it is the very source from which the attempt to investigate arises. Seeing this makes it clear that the activating agent in all your actions is not a fictional “me,” but the universal energy, or one’s true Self. The belief in a “me,” as well as the seeking for enlightenment, is seen through by no-one as nothing but the playful activity of this primal activating energy. The cosmic joke in the journey of the seeker is that the energy that fuels the seeking is precisely what is being sought. In Zen this is called “riding an ox in search of an ox.” Wei Wu Wei compared it to looking for your spectacles, not realizing that they are on your nose and, were you not looking through them, you wouldn’t be able to see what you are looking for.
IT awakens to itself or, more to the point, IT is Awakeness itself. It is the light in which all apparent opposites reveal their interdependence and ultimate One-ness; it is the clarity in which the illusion of separation dissolves. The witness and that which is witnessed merge into witnessing, while the illusion of past and future dissolves into the clarity of timeless presence. As It Is, life has no meaning beyond itself. It is always at the point of completion and, simultaneously, as fresh as the morning dew at the dawn of creation.
~Leo Hartong
Posted by confused on 06.16.10 8:07 am
The thought “I am bored” appears.
I take the thought to be reality and now I experience what my conditioning tells me is boredom.
The thought “I just don’t fucking get it” appears.
Now I experience not fucking getting it.
I listen to an “enlightened guru” and the thought appears “I FUCKING GOT IT!”
And I experience fucking getting it.
Then the thought appears “Fuck, I lost it.”
And I experience fucking losing it.
SURPRISE!!! There is no boredom, there is no not getting, getting it or fucking losing it. THERE IS NO SUCH THING! apart from the movement of mind, and the belief in these ideas as REAL. When I believe in an idea as REAL, I experience it as reality. When there is no belief in any idea as real, or more real, or closer to reality…when all ideas are SEEN to be equally false, what remains? PURE BEING. And YOU ARE THAT! Let the ideas, whether they be “good” or “bad” or “spiritual” or whatever, come and go. That is their nature. None of them are real. You know what you are. Chill.
Posted by Joe Cap on 06.16.10 8:40 am
My wife has been substituting with the word “Flippin” lately.
I know it doesn’t pack as much ‘punch’ but at least the kids are now saying “Go flip yourself” to their friends.
Posted by gilbert on 06.16.10 5:57 pm
I agree. One should be able to get across what one needs to say without resorting to bad language. I have heard this ‘Flipping’ recently for the first time. My Mother used to say at the appropriate time, “Muddy Basket”, which always brought a smile to my face.
Coming soon, a series of woodcuts, hand printed and signed, to be sent to those who donate, above a certain amount, to the UGC. We may add other artists to the list but to begin with they will be my own artwork. We will have samples to view in the near future. This is necessary to keep this site going. There is a substantial amount of time and work that goes into this site and the programs. Not that many take the trouble to donate a few dollars. There are over a 1,000 downloads on each program usually and sometimes a lot more.
There is a good possibility of doing Video Podcasts but that is a way off at the moment. – Gilbert
Posted by Tim on 06.16.10 6:50 pm
Bah, there’s not substitute for the original F-word. Most beautiful word in the English language, IMO.
Posted by Cat on 06.16.10 10:13 pm
I suppose non duality could be called the ultimate freedom from psychological suffering. My mind keeps going but but but…but what? Duality doesn’t work, never has and never will why keep going back to it for answers. The truth of the matter is the problem and subsequent suffering is only a perception from the perspective of an I. There is no I. It’s not that we don’t exist, it’s that we simply do not exist as a concept. The only way to get there is to step off the cliff of self…freedom is here always. (Editor: No step, no cliff – you are already THAT)
Posted by mark on 06.17.10 7:39 am
If, like me, you get disheartened at all the non dual mumbo jumbo, always remember the word OSTRANENIE. It has been my favourite word for a while now and sums up what is needed, at the brain level, for getting close to this essence, which is of course, beyond or before any words at all! Good luck. For the that is essentially what this appears to boil down to. Luck. Fortune Grace as to whether an energetic shift will cause a radical change in your perception or not. Meanwhile, remember things are good……even when they’re bad. Whoops, i may be paraphrasing Gilbert now.
Posted by gilbert on 06.17.10 9:17 am
It is the concept that ‘I am separate’ that causes all the trouble. Investing energy into that ‘idea’ will just keep pumping up the self-image and then draining you of energy over and over. Neurotic behavior is common because ‘we’ oscillate between hope and despair. There is NO answer in the mind. Recognizing our true nature is not via the conditioned memory.
A concept cannot see. Seeing is happening. Drop the idea that there is an ‘I’ that is seeing, pause all thought and see that you are already complete just as you are. BEING IS.
The mind is ‘becoming’ and it never arrives. It will go on dividing THAT-NESS into ever-more and more postulations of ‘time’.
The simplicity of direct pointing is of no interest to the ‘me’. This is why very few ‘appear’ to be genuinely interested in the direct pointing. The appearance is merely the appearance of multiplicity. The heart essence is ONE.
You are THAT.
(The rest of this comment is on my website – Gilbert)
Posted by fernando on 06.19.10 2:33 pm
SEEING is the Essence of everything that APPEARS, and yet it’s INVISIBLE.
The REAL you does NOT appear. It’s INVISIBLE.
You are THAT.
Posted by confused on 06.20.10 11:31 am
What is unconditional love? It certainly isn’t the love we are accustomed to, which is love versus hate. Love and hate are concepts contained within awareness, where every thing is seen equally. No bias, no preference. And even if a preference for or against some thing were to arise, what would this be seen by? This seeing goes so deep. It penetrates and permeates every apparent thing. Seeing is all that is truly happening and seeing is what you are. Amazing.
Posted by gilbert on 06.20.10 1:36 pm
Yes, it is true – I recognize (that you have) seen through it all.
We can call it insight or in-seeing. This in-seeing does not come and go. Prior to a clear insight it appears that this in-seeing is rarely present and ‘after’ the clear insight it is known that in-seeing is all that there IS. What ever the mind does with the ‘seeing’ is of no consequence and nothing sticks, except in the appearance of things.
Do not expect many, if any, to understand what you say about this.
You may find your own unique way to speak about it, one that resonates with others. It is truly amazing and the fact that ‘the world’ misses it is also amazing.