Andrew Cohen - N° 25 - LAST TEACHINGS - Dec. 24 _ Feb. 25

Being happy is a big part of the main goal. Don't you think? Don't you want to be happy? [snorts] Doesn't everybody want to be happy? We all want to be happy. We don't want to suffer. What's part of the, you know, the postmodern predicament? Have you heard of the postmodern predicament? This particular time in history, there's many very well educated, reasonably wealthy people like all of us here who have been given more freedom and more opportunity for travel and for education and for experience than any generation in human history. And most of us are very unhappy. All this abundance we've been given because of the time in history we've been born is not making us happy. There's so many so many lucky people, the luckiest people that have ever been born. So many of us are unhappy. It's a tragedy. It's a crisis. So if we're talking about seeking for spiritual liberation or enlightenment and we're not happy, something's not adding up. We want to be happy. Enlightenment is joy and lightness of being. Lightness of being. So we want to be happy. Experience spontaneous joy. spontaneous happiness. It's a it's a sign of liberated state, right? When you renounce the mind, you'll you'll experience spontaneous happiness. Yeah. I'm repeating it because it's so ridiculously simple. When you renounce the mind, we experience spontaneous happiness. It's very simple. If you renounce the mind, we experience spontaneous happiness. If you renounce the mind, you experience spontaneous happiness. What more do we need to know than that? If it's true, and it is true. If you do, you'll find out what I'm saying is true. Renounce the mind, you'll start feeling happy. The mind makes us this the conditioned mind makes us feel unhappy, miserable, lost, stuck, confused and angry, victimized and bitter. [laughter] So in the enlightenment context is about transcending the mind. So if we transcend the mind, we renounce the mind, spontaneous happiness starts bubbling up. Just because the mind is quiet, it's very very very simple. Well, we've got to do it. That's what yoga is, right? Not complicated. It's just very easy. But we have to do it. Me, too. Why am I happy? Why am I unhappy? Usually unhappiness comes because we're dwelling upon something that's causing us to suffer. So, we stop. The suffering stops and we start feeling better. Very simple. So with the enlightenment dharma, it's very different than therapy because we don't need to understand the problem. We just need to renounce the problem. A lot of people think they have to understand the problem in order to experience happy. I'm saying you don't have to understand it. In the enlightenment context, you just have to drop the problem or renounce it and then changes everything in the present moment. And then the joy becomes self intoxicating. The joy of having no problem becomes intoxicating. self-fulfilling. You have no problem with a state of ecstasy and im immense happiness and you have nothing to work out, nothing to nothing to figure out because you're free. You're not attached to the problem anymore and therefore you're not attached to working out the problem anymore. So it feels like a relief. I've dropped the burden of having a problem. I've dropped the burden of having a problem. Isn't that wonderful? I've dropped the burden of having an enormous problem. I've been struggling with this problem my whole life. Then I stopped and I felt so much better. I didn't figure anything out. I just dropped the whole problem. Most people don't believe it's possible to do what I'm suggesting, but it is possible. That's that's what the good news is. We don't have to work it out. I just have to let it go. And the ego wants to understand it before I can draw. I need to understand this first and then I let it go. No, you don't need to understand it. You just need to let it go. Ego says, "I do have to understand it." True self says, "No, you don't." Ego says, "I do have to understand." True self says, "No, you don't." Who who usually wins the battle? The ego. But this this point I'm making and I always make it. The ego doesn't want to let go of the problem. I've got a project. I' got to understand it. I got to figure it out. I have to come to terms with it. I have to process it. I say, "No, you don't. We're going to be free." Like, "Oh, the whole the whole thing, the whole story." Then I won't know who I am. Say, "Well, that sounds interesting. We're all We're all the same in this. We're all in the same boat." So, the ego keeps insisting on the same old story and being the one who has the problem. And we we believe that we end up being trapped inside a whirlpool for days, weeks, months, years, eons, countless lifetimes. You You all already know all this. The small self believes it has problems and big self knows has never had any. Take your pick. But you all already know that the true self has feels it has problems. The big self never had any. Take your pick. Who do you want to be? Well, if I pick the big stuff, I won't know how to be, who to be, or what to think. So what? Why do we have to know everything before it happens? It's much more spiritually liberating, spiritually exciting, spiritually compelling to be in a situation where we're finding out who we are without already always knowing it. I'm finding out a fresh and new every day who I am without always already knowing it. Who I am is a new friend. It's a new experience every day. It's not always already known this old painy ass person who's always complaining, feel victimized and angry. Huh? That's very familiar, right? Old, wretched. But the true self of the authentic what I call the authentic self is fresh. He's uncreated, unborn and uh inherently liberated. So we don't always know who we don't know who we are. We go through the process of finding out. I knew who I am every day. That's very thrilling. The ego already knows everything. I already know that. I already know that. I've heard this a thousand times. I already know. I don't already know. True self doesn't already know a damn thing. But if asked, it's open, innocent, alive, fresh. innocent, uncorrupted and free. So it's that already knowing peace that's very suffocating. It's visually suffocating. Already knowing is like being like an old man. >> [laughter] >> It's how old men feel old. People go, "Ah, I already know that, grandma." They tell you story. I already know it. But if we don't always already know, there's room for growth and development, right? So the whole point of spiritual practice is to throw out the garbage every throw out the garbage every day. You don't throw out the garbage, what happens to the house? It's going to get smelly. So the already knowing is the garbage again. What's in it? Follow. So the not already knowing is what opens up the infinite space and room for growth, verticality and growth. Can you do that? Yes. Anybody can take out the garbage. I'm feeling tired today. I don't have the energy to take out the garbage. Are you sure? And if we don't take out the [laughter] take out the garbage today, then tomorrow they're going to have two garbage cans to take out. Then it's going to get even harder. Maybe maybe I'll postpone it. I have to go call somebody to take care of it. And then it starts accumulating, >> right? Very to the point, not too esoteric, not too complicated, not too obscure, very simple. No plan B, baby.