THE SIGNIFICANCE OF AWARENESS

I would like to express my appreciation and joy in being asked to be with you all on this very special occasion — the eleventh Sahavas at Pilgrim Pines here in California.

There is little left for me to share with you of the earlier years with Meher Baba, whilst He was with us in His physical form, that I have not already shared in the book, Love Alone Prevails.

However, Baba stressed that we should try to live in the present, in the Now, and not be concerned so much with the past or the future. So, bearing this in mind, I have chosen to concentrate on the years since Baba left us physically to remain internally within, and to find new meaning in these latter experiences in relation to Meher Baba's messages of Love and Truth.

Two concepts seem to contain the substance of this later period's experiences for me. One is the concept of Consciousness, followed a few years later by the concept of Awareness.

And yes, along with these two concepts has been an intense and continually increasing longing to fathom God Himself. This latter theme must be left for another occasion, for Baba puts the cap on it, as it were, by telling us in His book, God Speaks:

"God cannot be explained. He cannot be argued about. He cannot be theorized, nor can He be discussed and understood. God can only be lived."

"We are all each one of us meant to be happy. God who is within us is to be experienced as Infinite happiness, and it can be done only through love for Him through the heart, and not the intellect."

"The only important thing is to see God everywhere and in everyone, and to become One with Him. The goal of life is to know God, the Infinite One, in every-day life, and all this existence is to gain that goal."

"Spiritual progress is not a process of accumulation from without, it is an unfoldment from within."

Perhaps living for so many years, 18 in all, with Meher Baba in India, and later from 1952 in Myrtle Beach but with the privilege of corresponding with India, there seemed no need to be concerned with concepts such as this. Baba's Form and Presence were all-encompassing.

Can you imagine anyone reading the Discourses or God Speaks and the eye not registering on this word, Consciousness — proving the truth of the saying that until the mind is ready to grasp what the eye sees, the words carry little or no impact.

It was not until after Meher Baba dropped His physical form that two profound statements of His continually focused my attention, and led ultimately to a deep search and effort to understand Consciousness, and later Awareness.

Quoting Meher Baba:

"In Myself I am free but in you I am bound. But the binding is of My own doing so that I might realize Myself consciously in each one of you".

"I am ever conscious that I am in you, but you are never conscious that I am in you. Daily I support you and share your consciousness. Now I want you to uphold Me and share My consciousness, and share it one day with all with whom you work."

Going back to the 1930s and '40s for a moment: To give one example of how Baba worked on this theme — any time of the day — during mealtime, playtime, worktime, or perhaps whilst we were walking in the compound — suddenly Baba would gesture toward one of us with a slight raise of His hand indicating, "What are you thinking?" Why? He was working to bring our consciousness away from self, away from the many objects of illusion and duality with its wants and desires, to the one object of Himself, or God.

Apparently, to do this, He needed us to be with Him and His physical presence. I recall a statement of Baba's at the time:

"Love Me and obey Me and I will look after your spiritual life."

I also recall another remark Baba made during this period (paraphrasing)

"What I am doing now with you all will affect everyone in the whole world later. In their time, they will be sharing in the work I am doing now."

Baba tells us:

"I have come not to teach but to awaken."

"I have come to awaken Myself in all."

"The journey of the spiritual path from beginning to end is a journey from unconscious God to conscious God, the highest consciousness being Infinite Consciousness — Divine Love.

"When misdirected it is illusion. When directed to Reality it is Infinite, but whether from having Reality for its object or bound to the objects of illusion, consciousness is One. All consciousness becomes infinite when it takes Reality as the object of its consciousness. All apparent differences are different states of Consciousness. Nothing comes, nothing goes. There is only the shifting of Consciousness."