Embracing Emptiness: Overcoming Fear and Finding Self

Mooji emphasizes that true peace comes from embracing emptiness and detaching from the mind's distractions.

### Embracing Emptiness: The Path to Self-Discovery and Detachment
* 🧘 Many individuals find themselves in a continuous cycle of trying to fix their lives, yet this pursuit often leads to an **endless quest for more fixing** rather than **true contentment**.
* 💭 Mooji encourages self-reflection, urging individuals to **observe their feelings of unhappiness, anxiety, and fear of death**, recognizing that this awareness is the **first step toward personal transformation**.
* 🌌 The essence of being lies in the recognition that one is the **witness to thoughts and emotions**, which come and go, rather than being defined by them.
* 💡 Mooji shares a poignant story about a sister who, even in her final moments, remained **aware and detached**, illustrating the power of **being present and accepting the transient nature of life**.
* 🌱 He emphasizes that true understanding does not require numerous techniques; instead, it involves a **commitment to self-discovery** and the practice of **detachment from the mind's incessant chatter**.
* ⚖ The journey towards emptiness and clarity is challenging but essential, as it allows one to **transcend personal identity** and **embrace a deeper sense of being**.
* 💫 Mooji reassures that the mind is **not stronger than one's true self**, and through persistence in recognizing this, individuals can **gradually diminish the mind's influence** over their lives.
* 🌈 Ultimately, he invites everyone to experience the **simplicity of being empty and aware**, which leads to a **natural flow of life**, free from the **burdens of ego and identity**.

[Mooji] Many people try to fix their life, then you get to a point, there's more fixing. There's no end to fixing. See when you become empty, if you are unhappy. See if you are anxious, see if you're worried about life or death, see. 

Because you will have the capacity to see. And if it feels really, really good to you, invest in this commitment to keep doing it. Just for yourself. What is more simple than this? Overcome the Fear of Death...
and Life!

14 April 2024
(with subtitles) [Questioner 1] Is it OK? 
[Mooji] Take your time. [M.] And you may sit also, if you want. 
How do you feel? [Q.1] It's good to stand.
[M.] OK.

[Q.1] Thank you. [Q.1] And I'm asking you, because I want you to test me 
about something, that comes up for me daily. It didn't when I was younger, OK. Every day I live with the reality
that it could be my last day.

[Mooji] Yes, it's a good thing.
[Q.1] OK. [Q.1] And I have this desire in me to die consciously. And what I mean by that is, to not hold on to my physical reality, 

when it's time for me to leave. And I don't know if I'm able to do that. And what I want to know, is this just my mind, or is this really a sincere place? 
In other words ... [Mooji] Thank you, thank you.
[Q.1] To feel the fruition of my life, 

seems to me to be able to accept it 
at that moment. [Mooji] Yes. [Q.1] And I know I need your help. 
[M.] Yes. [Q.1] I know if I could be with you 
I'd have no problem.

If I could be with you, 
I would be able to trust. [Mooji] There is a way, of being in that way. It need not be that we are physically together. That's a very important thing. There are many people 
who fell in love with Jesus Christ,

or with the many great saints and sadhus, 
and realized beings, and they never met them physically. And you asked a question before. One person, one of our very dear sisters who departed from this plane maybe a couple of years ago,

and I spoke with her the very night also, 
that she left the form. And ... Actually, she is very close with Lakshmi. And actually, even after dropping the body, she asked her, Lakshmi asked her, in heart,
[Mooji touches heart]

'How did you leave?' So, what did you ask? 
'How did you leave so ...' [Lakshmi] How did you leave so well?
[Mooji] How did you depart so well? She was also in very serious pain with cancer.

I spoke with her. Even we have a small book 
of the conversation I had with her, like last words I share with her. And she said to her, 
'I stayed only as awareness'. The very same thing. We didn't have an end of the life 
special teaching.

It is the same. You have been pointed to that
and it is clear enough to see that all things come through the mind
or the senses; they come and they go,
they come and they go. They come and they go.
Nothing has ever come and stayed.

Once you can be clear about that, you will know that you must be here, because you are the witness of the things
that come, play, and then go. Because if you were any of those things, when they go, you would also be gone.
You say, 'OK, now it's gone'.

Who are you? Are you also a thing? Even your own state of personal identity, sometimes very strong,
but it also comes and goes. Its emotions come and go;
its feelings come and go. Some beliefs come and go. There is something earlier
than even strong personal identity,

that is aware of personal identity also,
isn't it? [Q.1] Yes.
[Mooji] That, that, what is its form? [Q.1] There is no form. [M.] Therefore, if you have come
to that recognition, stay with that,

and don't get it mixed up
with the experiences in the mind. The mind is always coming. And if it comes,
it comes and goes, and if it's witnessed to come and go, there must be something
deeper and purer than the mind

that sees the mind coming and going. This I call your Self.
Not your ego. Not the person. [M.] Do you see?
[Q.1] Yes. [M.] And we persist with that,
because sometimes mind is strong.

When we do the exercise, for some people it's impossible
to stay detached, because the mind force seems so strong.
It pulls your attention, pulls the senses, in the beginning. But look how quickly that begins to change. If you keep it up, you persist with it, 

at some point, you realise that,
wait, 'This cannot change!' And This is not stagnant. It's not like it's dead.
It gives life to life. But it is not fickle like the mind. This is the place we have reached
in this sangha field, 

now to say, you are crossing over from the state of person and mind
into this place of being. Keep clarifying, keep clarifying. And the force of the mind is going to get weaker and weaker and weaker. [M.] But in the beginning
it will be very strong. 

[Q.1] So then, the fear that comes up is,
if there's a lot of pain, [Q.1] that the intensity of that experience ... [Mooji] Yes, waking up more and more
to the real Self, 

you realise how much pain you live in
as a person. [Q.1] Yes, I have more and ...
Yes. [Mooji] All our life the state of personhood
is a state of anxiety, [Mooji] unstable, restless.
[Q.1] Yes. 

[M.] So when you're able ...
I don't say destroy. Don't destroy. But look with detachment
and come to recognise that there is a space
between the mind and its play, and the place which sees it. And just keep just this, just this. 

You don't need to be doing
10, 15 techniques. You don't need anything.
Follow just this. It is enough! The mind will give you other things,
'Try this as well'. Because when something works, be sure your mind is going to try
to get you to try something else.

That's the play. It's not a surprise to anyone
who comes to know that this is a play
that you must transcend. And you can, because the mind
is not stronger than who you are, but it's stronger than
your present state of personal identity.

[Q.1] Say that again. [M.] The mind is not stronger
than who you truly are, but it is much more influential to the person you take yourself to be, which is a mind-created identity. Most people in the world probably
won't be able to hear me say this.

They're not...
They're already so captured, that it's not even appealing.
This kind of talk is not appealing. It's not appealing.
You must have been, somehow, been prepared by some Grace
to even be here. [Mooji] It must take some maturity

to be in a place where the ego is challenged. [M.] Not challenged to a fight,
[Q.1] No. [M.] but challenged by a higher wisdom.
And still, you are here. I'm waiting to see who will come out next,
who will come.

But you are here. [Q.1] I'm very grateful to be here.
[M.] Something is with you, that a higher thing
than the mind can offer you is with you. [Q.1] Thank you.
[Mooji] Yes, yes, very good.

[Q.1] Thank you.
[Mooji] Thank you, thank you. [Mooji] Let's just take a moment now. If I was giving 7 or 8 powerful techniques
about how to do things, the mind will be much more interested probably.

But when things have boiled down
to the quintessence of understanding, then you start to feel the twitching
and the wriggling, because something that is not yet stable, starts to feel challenged. You must bear that challenge
and go beyond that seeming challenge.

Actually, the thing is nothing at all, but to the one who believes it, it becomes something really important. We have been throwing away
many wonderful opportunities, because the ego didn't like it. It's like that. You, either this or that one.

[Questioner 2] Thank you Mooji. [Q.2] I feel a really strong urge [Q.2] to lay this out before you
and the sangha that, when I attended the retreat last week and subsequently, here,
in lots of conversations,

I came to the realization that
this is what I am committing my life to, and I've made that, I've said that,
starting now. And tomorrow I go home, and I know I'll be going into a maelstrom
of issues and problems,

and I want to place them at your feet. Because what they are,
is what's held me back for 50 years and that's a preoccupation
with the sort of success outcome that our society conditions us to. And I'm still ...
I have been caught up in that,

and I'm in a few tricky situations, and I want to put them at your feet. And proclaim that from now, I'm seeking to live in my heart and not to give priority to all of these work-life situations. [Mooji] Yes, yes.
Just little by little you persist.

Just persist and it grows. Don't try to conquer everything at once. Just stay. Look and see.
You come. If you don't identify with anything at all,
just for a short time. Don't say, all day. You can't.
You're not asked to do it all day.

But in the morning I'd recommend,
you give a little time, before you go out into the world, 
so to speak, and learn to empty yourself.
Everybody should know this. It's the most healthy thing 
for a human being and nobody is teaching it.

Just empty everything. Don't fight. Don't curse.
Don't throw. Don't destroy. But empty. Be detached. Let things come, but give more energy to just being detached 
and yet conscious. Don't hold a shape to yourself.

Just be aware and detached. Don't hide. Don't hide. Don't fight. Learn to do it, 
because nobody is empty. We are all carrying something.
Nobody tastes what is empty. And yet, it's the one thing 
that is universal in you.

So don't try and take on the world. It's only here. [points to head]
Your world is only in here. Learn to be detached. And you'll see that quickly, quickly 
you feel the change inside more. Just stay with it 
and don't worry for anything else.

Gradually, a lot of the troubles you have in life will begin to come more right. Just keep staying. And something wants to say, 'It cannot be this. It cannot be simple like this.' Just do.

And then when you say, 'I've done this, I looked at this', see when you become empty, if you are unhappy. See if you are suffering. See if you are anxious. See if there is any fear lingering in you.

See if you are worried about life or death, see. Because you will have the capacity to see. And if it feels really, really good to you, invest in this commitment to keep doing it. Just for yourself. What is more simple than this?

It's just the mind is not having it. It's trying to find another way to fix the world, which it doesn't want to. Many people try to fix their life, then they get to a point, there's still more fixing.

There's no end to fixing. All that needs to happen is that you are in the place of Self-discovery, that you are resting inside your heart. All the great beings, the teachers, those transcended, that's all that happened. They came back to their original nature,

earlier than the mind and conditioning. They didn't fight. When you realize who you are, life goes on. Action, reaction, interaction, people, life flows, and you find that your own life is flowing also. Rather than fencing and defending and trying to arrange life,

You find that, in some way, you are life. And at the same time, 
the witnessing of life occurs to you. Simple. [Q.2] Thank you. 
[M.] Thank you. [Q.2] I'd also like to thank the beings here,
who I've encountered,

who said that exact thing to me
and I appreciate that. [M.] Very good. 
[Q.2] Thank you so much. [M.] Thanks to you, thank you.
Should we sit a little bit? We won't break up the sitting 
with too many.

Just one sitting we will do,
for 15 or 17 minutes. I think you can handle it. 
I'm here with you, OK. Om
[Mooji rings the bell] Now, leave everything alone. Don't carry any identity with anything

that may appear in the mind. Be apart and alone and conscious. Mind will take some shape. 
It will come, it's OK. You are not this shape or any shape. But resist the habit 
to get pulled into the mind's movement.

Very simple. Be very determined to stay uninvolved. Doesn't matter what comes. Just be alone. Let go of all identity. It is possible. Do it. Remain empty, and inwardly very spacious. You are not a room.

You have no boundaries here. Do not hold on to any identity. When you hear this sound, 
[Mooji clacks the sticks] it means Emptiness. Stay empty. For sometime, it might seem very easy 
to become distracted,

because of the habit
to play with the mind. But here, now, be only alone. You don't need any identity for this. Do not fall asleep. [Mooji clacks the sticks] [Mooji clacks the sticks]

Don't create. Stay empty. Detached. You are being aware
of the strength of the mind, that has been the main influence
in your functioning. You are doing well. Stay empty and conscious. Mind will try to put you to sleep

to avoid the power of being awake
and empty. [Mooji clacks the sticks] Do not be deceived. You do not need anything from the mind. Discover this. Here, the mind's trick
is always to distract you from God within your own Self,

from truth, and from your eternal nature. [Mooji clacks the sticks] [Mooji clacks the sticks] Stay empty, even if it feels difficult
to not engage with the mind, but Grace is with you. This is perhaps
one of the most important exercises

to break free from ego. [Mooji clacks the sticks] [Mooji clacks the sticks] Discover pure consciousness
unmixed with mind. This is very rare. But you will never regret it. Choose to remain empty. [Mooji clacks the sticks]

[Mooji clacks the sticks] Don't identify with the person.
This is weakness. Very good. Stay empty. There is nothing of value
that the mind can give you here. You are choosing and have chosen,
by God's grace,

to awaken in this life form. Something is trying to distract you from this. Stay only aware. Awareness is your Self, True. Beyond names and forms. Don't let your head fall. Stay up. [Mooji clacks the sticks]

[Mooji clacks the sticks] Do not touch any image, any thought. Even the sense of your own personal identity,
be detached. It's only appearing in the mind. Awareness is not a state 
you have come to enjoy.

Beyond enjoyment or suffering. Absolutely pure being. That which perceives experiencing even. Stay empty. Be determined to stay empty. Do not give in to the mind. You will soon see why. You are not your head. You are not your thoughts.

Om 
[Mooji rings the bell] Empty. Empty. Notice the unbound nature of this Emptiness, without boundary. This exercise is most important 
for you to recognize that thoughts, sensations can come, but they cannot affect the Emptiness.

You are very present. Also, that there is no need to sit all day, but to clarify your being, be here, and life flows on within the awareness, 
as it has always done. It's very important 
to experience the separation

from personal feelings and identity 
and mind. Clarity and peace. True happiness. Also be aware that Awareness itself 
does not change. Awareness is not an exercise. It is the ground of being. You need not believe this. You ought to be able to verify 
you are awake.

If you don't touch identity, 
everything is flowing fine. Actions, reactions, interactions
become natural. But don't speak about it. Simply Be. Sometimes you may experience a sensation, like the urge to yawn, meaning like, 
[Mooji demonstrates yawning]

it's a very natural thing, very good, freeing up the space. 
It can happen also, and is also a sign of grace. It's OK. Don't work for that. 
Everything spontaneous. You begin to experience everything as a play of spontaneity.

You'll be very present and undisturbable. But if disturbance plays, 
also be aware of this. You may go and sit, 
just again clarify, and move. Clarify. Flow. All is good. Do not endure being in the company 
that disturbs your peace.

You can step away. You do not have that obligation,
unless it is forced upon you, in which case, 
you will turn it into an exercise in detachment. And do not look for trouble 
to test yourself. Let it come spontaneously.
[laughter]

OK. I say, don't look for things to test, because it's the ego that wants to be tested. Very good. Om. Thank you. 
[Mooji rings the bell] Ignorance will manifest through the mind, but if and when, ignorance gets 
combined with arrogance,

much trouble will come. Observe them with detachment. Free yourself from such entanglements and remain happy and peaceful. Thank you. Copyright 2024 Mooji Media Ltd.
All Rights Reserved. No part of this recording may be reproduced without Mooji Media Ltd.'s express consent.

Overcome the Fear of Death…and Life!

Moojiji

Overcoming the Fear of Life and Death Through Self-Discovery

Many people try to fix their lives, but there's no end to fixing.

If emptiness feels good, invest in maintaining it.

A questioner shares their daily contemplation of mortality.

The questioner desires to die consciously, without clinging to physical reality.

The questioner seeks to understand if this desire is genuine or merely a mental construct.

Mooji explains that physical presence isn't necessary for deep connection.

Mooji recounts a story about a deceased sister who departed peacefully.

The sister's last words were, 'I stayed only as awareness.'

Mooji emphasizes that this state of awareness is achievable through self-discovery.

Witnessing the Impermanence of Thoughts and Sensations

The witness remains when thoughts and sensations disappear.

There's something deeper than personal identity that witnesses it.

Mooji advises staying with this recognition and not getting caught up in mental experiences.

The Strength of the Mind and the Persistence of Self

Initially, the mind's pull might be strong, but it changes with persistence.

The goal is to transition from the state of person and mind to a state of being.

The initial intensity of pain during self-discovery is addressed.

Waking up to the true Self reveals the pain of personhood.

The mind's tendency to offer distractions is highlighted.

The mind is not stronger than the true self, but more influential on the mind-created identity.

Many are too captured by the mind to find this appealing.

A certain level of maturity and grace is needed to accept this challenge.

Commitment to Self-Discovery and Letting Go of Societal Expectations

A questioner shares their commitment to living in their heart.

They anticipate challenges upon returning home.

The questioner acknowledges 50 years of preoccupation with societal success.

Mooji advises persistence and gradual progress.

The importance of daily emptying and detachment is emphasized.