What’s Love Got to Do with It?

"Except from Sundari's new book...

"The idea that there is only one Self is radical because the information we get though our senses does not confirm it.  However, if you carefully follow this experience based logic, you will understand.  Everyone knows that they exist and that they are conscious.  No one ever informed you of this fact because it is self-evident.  You cannot say you exist unless you know you exist and you cannot know you exist unless you are conscious, nor can you know you exist unless you exist.  So, your Existence and your Consciousness are non-different.  Everyone exists and is conscious.  

The next question: is your Existence/Consciousness a property of your body or does your body borrow its Existence/Consciousness?  When you say, “I am” you probably think that your Existence/Consciousness belongs to the body.  To say you ‘probably do’ is not true.  You definitely believe it because you don’t want to die.  But ask yourself, “Does Existence die?”  If it dies, it would have to be born.  But when was Existence born?  There is no evidence that Existence was born.  There is plenty of evidence that the body was born, so if you are the body, your fear of death is justified.

But am I the body?  I am not the body because the body is an object known to me.  This ‘me’ is my existent conscious ever-present Self.  Now ask yourself, “What am I doing right now to exist and be conscious?”  The answer is “nothing.”  Existing is not something you do.  It is what you are.  Being conscious is not something you do.  It is what you are.  If your body was creating Existence/Consciousness, it would disappear when your body dies.  But it doesn’t. 

Now ask, “Is the Existence and Consciousness that I enjoy different from the Existence and Consciousness that everyone else enjoys?”  The answer is no.  If the answer was yes, nobody would understand me when I say, “I am.”  But everyone knows what “I am” means because we all share the same “I am,”—Existence/Consciousness.”  If you add attributes to “I am” then you differentiate the Self into many.  But, differences belong to the body and mind, not to the “I am.”

Now tell me when you are not experiencing “I am.”  You will say, I was not experiencing it before I was born, nor will I experience it when I die.  Why is this not true?  Because there is no evidence whatsoever that you, Existence/Consciousness, were not present before the body appeared as an object in your consciousness.  And if you contend that it is true, then it would only be true if you were there to witness the birth of the body, which you couldn’t have if you were the body.  The body is inert, a food tube; it doesn’t witness anything.  It doesn’t know me just like my reflection in a mirror doesn’t see me.  I see it. It is the Self, the witness of the body, that is always present in every conscious being as the universal ever-experienced “I.”  

What’s Love Got to Do with It?
Everything it turns out, because your “I am” is love.  How does that work?   You may desire a new car, house or a new lover.  I may desire a new boat, a trip to Indonesia and a divorce from my husband.  Yes, the objects we desire or fear are different, but is my feeling of desire itself, different from yours?  No, it isn’t.  Just as when I say, “I exist” you know what it means to exist.  When I say, “I want” you immediately know what I am talking about because you experience exactly the same feeling I do because desire is one.  Similarly, when you say, “I am” or “I want” you also say, “I love.”  When you say, “I love” I don’t interrupt you and ask what does “I love” mean because I too love certain things.  I only have a doubt about the object that the love centers on - my husband/lover, my body, job, house, what have you. 

What Does It Mean to Say I am Love?
What does it mean to say that the Existence/Consciousness I am is love?  It means that you are a partless whole.  Nothing substantial can be added to Existence.  If it could, we would have names for the other Existences from which existence could borrow things or for existences that could subtract things from Existence.  But I don’t shrink or grow.  I am always the same.  If Consciousness changed, I wouldn’t know what it means to say, “I know.”  Everyone knows what knowing is because knowing is the essence of the Self.  If I am a partless whole, I can’t gain or lose anything, which means I am free of fear and desire.  When I am free of fear and desire, as mentioned above in the Cupid example, I experience love.  The nature of the Self is love, which is non-different from Existence/Consciousness...

"Passion is not all upside, contrary to popular opinion.  Duality being what it is, passion’s downside is equal to its upside.  The downside is bondage to sex objects and the corrective upside is dispassion, a foreign word in the world of sexuality.  Dispassion, however, need not imply an absence of passion, only knowledge of the global factors involved sexual situations.  Because sex involves two people with different conditioning, dispassion is an acute appreciation of differences.  When you are focused on getting rid of the pain of your desire, you have little interest in the big picture, but the the little picture—your momentary needs—is controlled by the situation.  Getting what you want only works with the blessing of all the factors in the field.    Even one small thought can instantly turn pleasure into pain...

When you fall in love with someone, you are on your best behavior because your worst instincts are suppressed, at least until you feel secure in the relationship.  Once the suppression mechanism is unnecessary, you revert to type and discover you are the same person you were in the last relationship, the person who wanted a new relationship to get back his or her lovable old self.

Relationships are one of the best ways to circumvent dealing with the parts of ourselves that need work because you end up dealing with somebody else’s stuff too.  Even if you are a lovable person and your stuff doesn’t bother you, someone else’s will.

In any case, I need to know that the ostensible reason for my relationship is never the actual reason.  I don’t ultimately care about the object.  I care about removing my sense of dissatisfaction with myself."

-- Sundari

"On Septemper 29, 2011 I (James Swartz) married Isabella Viglietti whose spiritual name is Sundari. Sundari is a Sanskrit word the means "the Beauty that make beauty beautiful." It is a name for the Self because the beauty that we see with our eyes and appreciate with our minds is a pale reflection of the light of Awareness, the Self."