27 July 2001, 11:44pm IST
Andrew Cohen.
while most of us want to be free, there is a part of us that is terrified at the prospect. is there anything that we can do to make the part of us that wants to be free stronger than the part that is afraid? you have to be willing to make a choice. so many seekers are only waiting for all of their fear and resistance to go away. if you're serious about this, you don't have the time to wait. you have to come to the point where you don't care how difficult it is. don't you see, you have to stop making any demands upon god. so many seekers say they want to be one with the truth, one with god. but at the same time they have a long list of demands: "i never want to experience fear, i never want to experience doubt, confusion, or frustration. then i'll be yours forever." you have to understand that the demons of fear, doubt, confusion and frustration are not god's problem. they're your problem. in order to find the kind of confidence that you are looking for, you have to be willing to make sacrifices and you have to be willing to suffer. to find true confidence, you must be able to bear more doubt and confusion than you ever have in the past. too many people only want the kind of confidence that they don't have to struggle for, that they don't have to make any sacrifice for. the kind of confidence we're speaking about is never free. in fact it's very expensive. you see, you have to get to the point where you're no longer weighing and measuring what you're willing to give, where you have no doubt whatsoever that absolute love and perfect freedom are more important to you than any experience of discomfort. then you will no longer be waiting. you'll be ready. ready for what? ready to abandon the future. that's what true renunciation is. the individual is willing to abandon the future literally. and when we are willing to abandon the future, it is then that we have finally stopped waiting. that means that we realise that a better moment will never come. we are always waiting for the perfect moment to let go. we are always waiting for the perfect moment to be ready to respond completely, wholeheartedly and without any hesitation. it is because of this, the fact that we're waiting, that when that moment actually does come, we are not able to let go. when we ultimately find the depth of courage and the strength of conviction to abandon the future once and for all, we will discover a context, a vast and infinite context where we will know beyond any doubt that we are free. and in that freedom we will be detached. but that doesn't mean that we won't care. it means that we will care even more. why? because we are not worried about ourselves anymore. and because of this we discover the freedom to care far more than most people ever do. as long as we are waiting, we will never be able to truly love. never. our relationship to love will always be selfish because we will only be wanting for ourselves. when we cease to wait there is no time for that. i'm speaking about a way of living that is radically different. when i say abandon the future, i'm not referring to coming back to the present moment. i'm speaking about giving up everything. that is something very different. you see, it is in abandoning the future that we are released from the hell of a morbidly self-centered existence where we only want for ourselves and where we always need more - where everywhere we look, a materialistic relationship to our experience says, "what's in it for me?" imagine that you are orbiting the earth in a spaceship. sometimes you leave the ship to walk outside. while outside you are attached to the ship by a cord. out in space it is the greatest thrill. you experience extraordinary, unspeakable freedom. but you always know that you will return back to the safety of the ship. when i speak about abandoning the future, i'm speaking about being out there and cutting that cord. the instant that occurs you will experience the thrill of existence. you will experience the overwhelming implications of the fact that you are alive. the magnitude of that is more than most people want to bear. most want only to taste it and then go back. i'm speaking about never going back, about going all the way in this life. and that can't happen unless you are willing to cut that cord.
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