The Soul Flies the Bird’s Way
A visit to India set in motion a chain of events toward liberation
‘A time comes in a person’s life, in a particular incarnation, when he begins to lose interest in the affairs of the world, knowingly or unknowingly. He may feel that he does not belong to the world, and the objects of the world no longer give him satisfaction. Though not clearly perceived, somehow, he intuitively senses that the objects of sense gratification which he has sought over and over again, perhaps in several incarnations, have brought him nowhere. A faint idea begins to haunt his thoughts that he belongs to some other order of existence and that his home is somewhere else. This is the beginning of the search for that permanent element we now call “soul”.’ Ravindra Kumar
I was battling heat & flies as I wandered into Rishikesh, sometime in early June 2006, trading the jungle’s edge (where I kept seeing imaginary tigers) for gold & silver braid, the coloured pennants announcing town.
In Delhi, I had been persuaded to visit a tailor in preparation for the Navaratri Festival, celebrated further north, & emerged somewhat poorer but with a rack of sumptuous silks & shirts.
This led to the usual critics, the hair-shirt brigade, spikily suggesting the festival was not in fact a modelling competition, evidence — as if I needed any more — that ‘spiritual’ types are just as envious as their mainstream brothers.
Preferring people-watching to shops, I had never known what to do in any town other than find somewhere to sit & observe the passing parade.
In Toronto, aged 16, I discovered the Eaton Centre with its vast food halls & giant nectarines, both unavailable in England, & the precise mechanics of how beautiful women can easily turn a man’s head.
The casual observer would have seen a human windscreen wiper responding to a sudden storm. Flik-flak! & a head overstimulated by sheer waves of pulchritude.
How many men cannot relate to this simple paragraph from Diogenes, the Greek philosopher of Cynicism?: ‘I have seen the victor Dioxippos subdue all contenders at Olympia and be thrown on his back by the glance of a girl.’
Almost 30 years on, a little maturation had seen my interests diversify, migrating to the printed word, the smell of books & the keepers of wisdom.
And so, I returned to Phool Chatti ashram on the banks of the Ganges that day armed with a book (which, regrettably; I have since given away) & realized Mr. Kumar was speaking my name.
This was the ambrosial gift I was seeking, what I had wanted all along & the main reason I wasn’t caught by the shopping bug, despite my lapse in Delhi to the delight of the wiry Indian shopkeeper.
Even to this day, when my partner asks, Is there anything you want? my first response can be a dismissive wave. (I’m working on it. The fruits of this world are here to enjoy.)
A year later, I found myself in a small conference auditorium in London attending a satsang with the Canadian spiritual teacher John de Ruiter.
At one point, we spoke directly and he looked me in the eye. ‘You are not what you take yourself to be,’ he said, firmly.
My mind immediately filled with questions. Was he speaking to me personally or was this statement for everyone? It was hard to know, but it got me thinking some more, 18 years after beginning my quest.
Whatever the answer, the statement was both intentional and deliberate and I had to know where it led.
Below the level of consciousness something was going on & those 11 years in England’s capital had their purpose, other than work.
Often, I would take the short train ride into town, again hitting the bookshops, notably Watkins near Charing Cross where occasionally I would buy something.
One book stood out with its distinctive black & orange sleeve although I don’t think I ever picked it up. I was simply aware of it. It was another half dozen years or so until it found its way into my hands. Perhaps I wasn’t ready for its complexity but it wasn’t long before it penetrated my deepest longing and answered the key questions of life.
What stunned most of all was the short passage in I Am That, a series of collated talks, when Nisargadatta, its author, describes the meeting with his spiritual master, Siddharameshwar from the Inchagiri lineage, otherwise known as the Bird’s Way.
‘’You are not what you take yourself to be,’ the master said. ‘Just focus on the sense I Am.’
I was, of course, amazed yet somehow not surprised. These are the signs leading the ardent seeker, if he or she is sincere.
Kabir, the poet, was one of several Sant Mat teachers who had inspired the lineage and saw the bird as the soul, looking down on Earth. It was surely no coincidence that I had been initiated on the Path of Light and Sound otherwise known as Sant Mat in 2010, neither I suspect that my family hailed from India.
The practice is sometimes called awareness watching awareness. Unlike the usual meditations, it does not advise focusing on thoughts or objects. In other words, it is designed to take the seeker beyond duality and out of this world. The mind is left behind.
What needs discovering sits directly in front of us but is so simple, we fail to see it as we mistakenly conflate our being with the body-mind. When we are exhorted to love ourselves, as we so often are, we focus on the animal body when true Self love is simply giving time & attention to consciousness itself.
Another teacher who practiced with Nisargadatta’s contemporary Ramana Maharshi, says this: ‘You were looking for an object that finally turned out to be the subject that was doing the seeing.’
And even more clearly: ‘You are the Self not some make believe person having thoughts.’
In my own life, the moment came almost like a pop! or a train switching tracks when I knew that I was not a person but consciousness itself.
That conviction then has to grow & bed down within until one knows without doubt that one is not the body and in fact can never die.
All is illusory and the expected trajectory of birth, experience and death can indeed be outshone.
It is both sacred destiny and duty of all and is the true meaning of being one with the Father.
I recommend the slender volume best consumed via audiobook, I Am Not The Body, again by Nisargadatta Maharaj, for those who want to explore these ideas further.
Although my quest included pilgrimage across Spain and India & the pursuance of many differing paths, there is truly no need to go anywhere.
Just simply be as you are before the arising of ideas and events and remain there continually refusing the mind’s invitation until at last, it lies down and lets go.
I Am That & so are you. What else is there?
Copyright Simon Heathcote
