Oneness

My dear friend!

Have you noticed that in life most of us wants to be happy and enjoy life, but maybe you also have noticed that happiness and enjoyment comes and goes? This is because we look for it externally. And why doesn't it give eternal happiness? Because everything external is temporary, it is not ever-lasting, so of course we won't be able to be fully satisfied with the external world. Never! I'm sorry to say, but if you think you will find eternal happiness and enjoyment solely in the outside world, you are gravely mistaken!

So what if I would tell you that there is something inside of you that is always happy and enjoying, no matter what happens, and that you could stay in this state no matter what happens in your life? What if I would tell you that it is possible and even easy to go beyond all your fears and bondages that you might think that you have? And most importantly, what if I could point you to this, would you take the opportunity to get it?

This book is for you whom are open and ready for that, it is for your very own Self-realization and merging into One!

There are other important books that explain that you are thinking, and that you can take control over your thoughts. Those books are also an attempt to help you lead a more happy and healthy life through various practices for your mind, some with the help of yoga and meditation, but there are other techniques as well. If you were lucky you had the chance to read one of these books that also were explaining this in a very simple way so you actually got the message. If you read and understood these books, or if you have been blessed to be aware of your own thoughts through other means, then this understanding will help you a great deal for what will be explained in this book. But if you didn't read any book about how thoughts work, I have tried to explain it the best I can in a short and simple form in this book. You don't need to have any prior knowledge about the mind or yoga or whatever. If I succeed with this or not, will be up to you as the reader to see for yourself, the only thing I ask from you is to keep an open mind as you read along!

I have structured this book into parts, or “degrees of awareness”, in an attempt to make it easy for you to follow. I think many of us goes through these “states” of awareness in life, but of course not necessarily in exactly the same order as I have structured it. Anyhow, here is the structure at a glance:

To reach the Self, which is called Self-realization, there is a need for you to first understand that you are thinking. Then, you can start to watch your thoughts. Then you will be able to realize that your thoughts are actually objects in front of you and not really you, and that your “I-feeling” always stay as the subject no matter what thoughts that comes and goes. This realization enables you to stop identifying with the objects in front of you (for instance your thoughts). This is the part where a simple technique for Self-realization enters the scene, called Self-enquiry. Simply by asking yourself who is seeing these objects, and thereby go from one observer to another deeper and deeper inside of yourself, you finally reach your Self as being the subject, and you will notice that you are awareness even of awareness! When you have attained awareness over awareness, you will also have attained Self-realization, and you will have freed yourself from any concepts that you thought you had to believe in.

Sounds quite easy, no?! Yes?!

Well, both yes and no I guess, it all depends on how much we are willing to let go of what we think of ourselves, and how fast we are ready to let go of any ideas of ourselves, and so on. Sometimes it can be quite easy, and sometimes it can be quite a struggle. I know this, because I have been struggling quite a lot myself in this process!

But I dare to say that it is easier than you possibly can imagine, because you will eventually see beyond your own mind and beyond all your concepts, that you were and are nothing else BUT the Self already! It is our mind and its concepts that make us think otherwise. Amazing, isn't it?!

This first part of the book might be a bit hard on your ego in a way, because the book will make you aware that you are not your ego, and the ego generally doesn’t like that. The book is probably also going to tear down the world as you know it, and then I mean completely dismantle it, piece by piece, until there is nothing left for you to hold on to. Your imagined world is going bye bye, and this can be a bit scary perhaps.

But when we reach the Self it is very sweet indeed! You will get a taste of the Totality. And every taste of the Totality seems complete, so you will probably think that there is nothing more to accomplish after this! But I am here to tell you that there actually are. You have now had a realization of your mind, but there still awaits the realization of the heart! And the blending of the two makes you and everything around you One! The blending of the awakened mind and heart makes us One, and it made me finally relax completely in my search for God, as God is in the Oneness of everything.

So that was the basic structure of this book. There will be some simple practices to do from time to time as well, and I recommend you to do these practices sincerely in order to fully understand what I am talking about, and to avoid the potential risk that this book stays as mere intellectual mumbo-jumbo. My intention is for you to fully experience permanent happiness, peace and Oneness!

So then, shall we start?!

Okay, I want to get to the point as quick as possible:
What you need to learn first, is to understand that you are thinking, and then learn how to watch your thoughts when you are thinking!

The easiest way to do that, and for that matter to understand and go deep with anything in this book, is to keep quiet and just watch and observe. An ideal situation would be if you would have some time off and only could focus on the practices in this book, until the book has finished. But if you are working or if you are busy with something else right now, then you don't have so much time, I understand that. Then maybe you can use your evenings or weekends to be more silent and read this book for yourself. Make some extra space and time for you in the external world so you can look at yourself in a peaceful way and see what is inside of you.

If you are not aware that you are thinking, I suggest that you think(!) a little about it and then come back here again when you are more aware of that you are thinking (it is important)!

Maybe you can notice that you are almost always thinking?!

Now we can move on to the next step, which is to watch your thoughts. We can compare our thoughts to the clouds in the sky. The clouds (just like the thoughts) are simply coming and going, coming and going, coming and going. Now recognize that even if the thoughts (like the clouds) come and go, you are still here, present and observing.

Recognize that your awareness of being or existing is not coming and going, it is only your attention that, when it follows different thoughts, comes and goes. If you decide to follow a thought, that thought can be as short or as long as you want. But sooner or later, you will come back to your awareness of yourself and your presence, and to your existence. And after that, you would probably start to think another thought. This is normally how our relationship with our thoughts are in our lives; sometimes we are aware of our thoughts, and other times not.