Self-Medicating with Alcohol from the media The True Source of Peace and Happiness

The awareness of being is not a new experience. It is the most intimate and familiar experience that we know, although it’s usually overlooked in favour of the content of experience. Being seems to recede into the background of experience, such that we feel cut off from it, so we do not feel its innate peace and joy. Here we soften the focus of attention from thoughts, feelings, sensations, and so on, and allow the simple fact of our being to emerge from the background of experience. Sooner or later, when the world fails to provide happiness, we return to our being, the true source of peace and happiness. This return to our being is the essence of meditation or prayer, a direct path to peace and happiness. We learn to remain in touch with being and feel its innate peace continually in the background, sometimes overflowing into the foreground as quiet joy and happiness.

A man asks about finding our true purpose on a practical level. Rupert suggests that with this understanding our activities come to reflect those qualities inherent to our true nature. He suggests following what you love, and then the peace and joy felt on the inside is then shared in the world. Rupert and the man engage in a conversation about the role of this understanding in the sports world, particularly in golf, as it relates to ego.

A man asks if the understanding that God's nature is love is not dualistic because it excludes hatred and evil. Rupert suggests that there are no parts in the infinite, no finite entities, therefore hatred is unknown

A woman comments that she struggles to feel unity in difficult situations. Rupert suggests that when we encounter unpleasant circumstances, we separate ourself through resistance, and so we cannot merge in shared being. Using the example of her practice of sitting in a slave market in southern US, Rupert guides her in the practice of going to shared being.

A man says he still feels a physical sense of separation even after a state of expansion and understanding. Rupert responds that the understanding behind this expansion often comes first, but the body lags. This integration is the purpose of yoga meditations, which facilitate bringing this understanding into the way we feel the body.

A man asks if there are gifts that can be expressed effortlessly, simply by showing up, such as language or creative activity? Rupert responds that there are some gifts, such as in art and music, that simply shine in the absence of the ego, an effect that is noticed by others.

A man asks about how the law of attraction relates to non-duality. Rupert suggests that the law of attractions is based on the idea of abundance and the unlimited nature of reality. It is we who impose limits on reality and then act as though those limitations are real. We are then surprised when the universe reflects this limitation back to us. We do it to the universe, the universe doesn’t do it to us.

Rupert responds that life is God’s being knowing itself, in response to a woman who says she lives the understanding that life is a game or a movie, and that it is a state of pure being. Rupert suggests that one way to look at these two understandings is that life is pure being only knowing itself, or God's being knowing itself, and its activity is what appears to us as the universe from our localised point of view. If we forget that this is an appearance, we credit the world with an existence of its own.

A man asks about a recommendation for how to deal with pain and our resistance to it. Rupert suggests yoga mediations, which provide a deep felt sense of the body that may cause or contribute to the pain. Yoga meditations allow us to feel the body in a way that is consistent with feeling ourself and our body as open and transparent.

A man asks about what exactly perception is. Rupert responds that the way in which we experience the world is through the five senses: sensations are how we experience the body and perception is how we experience the world.

A man asks about how to experience unconditional love. Rupert suggests that it can feel like a great wave of love, and, at other times, it is a more neutral feeling of shared being. Not feeling an overwhelming sense of love is not a failure of understanding because it can happen with someone you don't like, but there is still an understanding of our shared being.

Rupert recommends Brother Lawrence's Practice of the Presence of God, when a man asks for a Sufi book recommendation. It is written in Christian language but is essentially the non-dual message.

A woman who is translating Being Myself asks about a passage that references the infinite becoming finite and aks, ‘Does God create our suffering?’ Rupert says that the infinite freely assumes the finite self in order to perceive its own activity in form, to make manifest its infinite potential. But God leaves a trace of itself in each of us, as a longing for happiness or the knowledge 'I am'. If we follow that thread, it takes us out of the maze of suffering.

A man describes the experience where everything shines as consciousness. Rupert elaborates that yes, the world doesn't impose the reality of separation on us, but we impose the sense of separation on the world. The world reflects whichever perspective we hold, and that consciousness and love are the same thing.

A woman asks, once there is a longing for awakening, is prolonged suffering necessary. Rupert suggests that it’s not, but if there is a long habit of suffering, this habit will have a momentum in us and may take time to wind down. He suggests being interested in our true nature, not in our suffering.  

Rupert suggests that there is nothing to any experience but the knowing of it in response to a question by a man who says his mind cannot comprehend this. He further explains that objects have a reality beyond, and prior to, the content of the finite mind.

The awareness of being is not a new experience. It is the most intimate and familiar experience that we know, although it’s usually overlooked in favour of the content of experience. Being seems to recede into the background of experience, such that we feel cut off from it, so we do not feel its innate peace and joy. Here we soften the focus of attention from thoughts, feelings, sensations, and so on, and allow the simple fact of our being to emerge from the background of experience. Sooner or later, when the world fails to provide happiness, we return to our being, the true source of peace and happiness. This return to our being is the essence of meditation or prayer, a direct path to peace and happiness. We learn to remain in touch with being and feel its innate peace continually in the background, sometimes overflowing into the foreground as quiet joy and happiness.

A man asks about finding our true purpose on a practical level. Rupert suggests that with this understanding our activities come to reflect those qualities inherent to our true nature. He suggests following what you love, and then the peace and joy felt on the inside is then shared in the world. Rupert and the man engage in a conversation about the role of this understanding in the sports world, particularly in golf, as it relates to ego.

A man asks if the understanding that God's nature is love is not dualistic because it excludes hatred and evil. Rupert suggests that there are no parts in the infinite, no finite entities, therefore hatred is unknown

A woman comments that she struggles to feel unity in difficult situations. Rupert suggests that when we encounter unpleasant circumstances, we separate ourself through resistance, and so we cannot merge in shared being. Using the example of her practice of sitting in a slave market in southern US, Rupert guides her in the practice of going to shared being.

A man says he still feels a physical sense of separation even after a state of expansion and understanding. Rupert responds that the understanding behind this expansion often comes first, but the body lags. This integration is the purpose of yoga meditations, which facilitate bringing this understanding into the way we feel the body.

A man asks if there are gifts that can be expressed effortlessly, simply by showing up, such as language or creative activity? Rupert responds that there are some gifts, such as in art and music, that simply shine in the absence of the ego, an effect that is noticed by others.

A man asks about how the law of attraction relates to non-duality. Rupert suggests that the law of attractions is based on the idea of abundance and the unlimited nature of reality. It is we who impose limits on reality and then act as though those limitations are real. We are then surprised when the universe reflects this limitation back to us. We do it to the universe, the universe doesn’t do it to us.

Rupert responds that life is God’s being knowing itself, in response to a woman who says she lives the understanding that life is a game or a movie, and that it is a state of pure being. Rupert suggests that one way to look at these two understandings is that life is pure being only knowing itself, or God's being knowing itself, and its activity is what appears to us as the universe from our localised point of view. If we forget that this is an appearance, we credit the world with an existence of its own.

A man asks about a recommendation for how to deal with pain and our resistance to it. Rupert suggests yoga mediations, which provide a deep felt sense of the body that may cause or contribute to the pain. Yoga meditations allow us to feel the body in a way that is consistent with feeling ourself and our body as open and transparent.

A man asks about what exactly perception is. Rupert responds that the way in which we experience the world is through the five senses: sensations are how we experience the body and perception is how we experience the world.

A man asks about how to experience unconditional love. Rupert suggests that it can feel like a great wave of love, and, at other times, it is a more neutral feeling of shared being. Not feeling an overwhelming sense of love is not a failure of understanding because it can happen with someone you don't like, but there is still an understanding of our shared being.

Rupert recommends Brother Lawrence's Practice of the Presence of God, when a man asks for a Sufi book recommendation. It is written in Christian language but is essentially the non-dual message.

A woman who is translating Being Myself asks about a passage that references the infinite becoming finite and aks, ‘Does God create our suffering?’ Rupert says that the infinite freely assumes the finite self in order to perceive its own activity in form, to make manifest its infinite potential. But God leaves a trace of itself in each of us, as a longing for happiness or the knowledge 'I am'. If we follow that thread, it takes us out of the maze of suffering.

A man describes the experience where everything shines as consciousness. Rupert elaborates that yes, the world doesn't impose the reality of separation on us, but we impose the sense of separation on the world. The world reflects whichever perspective we hold, and that consciousness and love are the same thing.

A woman asks, once there is a longing for awakening, is prolonged suffering necessary. Rupert suggests that it’s not, but if there is a long habit of suffering, this habit will have a momentum in us and may take time to wind down. He suggests being interested in our true nature, not in our suffering.  

Rupert suggests that there is nothing to any experience but the knowing of it in response to a question by a man who says his mind cannot comprehend this. He further explains that objects have a reality beyond, and prior to, the content of the finite mind.