Karl Renz - AM I - I AM

Q: Do you ever meditate?

K: I never stop. What am I doing here? I am presenting you a talking meditation. Talking the living words and dont expect anything to come out of it. Thats talking meditation, the living words, there is no intention, no expectation in that what is living word. There is no need of any result or any goal. Its like there is no teaching, nothing to learn, this intentionlessness is just living words. This what we are doing here is meditation.

Q: You dont sit with your eyes closed for a few minutes every day?

K: Its just another escape. Buddha says meditation is moment by moment facing what you are. Zen Buddhism is the next sip of coffee you know that, the next is the next is the next. Never ending Zen. Even after death experience, there comes the next experience. There is never beginning, never ending That what you are. There is nothing to reach by all this action. Action will happen but there is no intention in it and no goal.

So if you ask me meditation yes. Was there any moment when you didnt meditate? There is only a personal meditation with expectation and there is impersonal meditation without expectation. But both are meditation, in personal way and in impersonal way.

But if you ask me, the impersonal way is maybe more relaxed and the personal is more tensed. So tense and no tense, but meditation is both. Lying down is meditation. In Germany I have 15-20 people putting their feet in front of me, snoring [laughter] especially girls, you cannot imagine how they snore.

Q: You get away from yourself

K: In Germany they call it wood cutter, cutting away the forest of sorrows.

Q: Self-enquiry is a meditation?

K: Yeah, moment by moment you inquire into your nature. Thats meditation, its not a form you enquire all the time. The moment you are awake you enquire into that what is awake, no moment without it. You are the seeker the seeking and that what is sought.

Q: What is the difference between what you are saying is going on all the time and what this form[pointing to herself] is thinking who am I?

K: Who am I is wrong. You know that. Its not who am I, how often do I have to tell you that? [laughter]. You see Im blowing in the wind, thats a proof that Im always meditating without expectations, talking without anyone listening [laughter]. After so many years telling her there is only Am I-I Am in the presence there is no who Am I.

Its Am I, I Am. With who am I, you always become the background, the answer. Then you take it personal that you are different from what is the question. No, it is : Am I-I Am. That is not a game, it is Ramana in action. The question is already the answer. The nature of the question is the nature of the answer Am I, I Am. Thats all. Its not like Who Am I and then being that silence which is a fake one in the background. Its a fake silence and answer.

Q: Its more fun Who Am I

K: Yeah for YOU [laughter]. You are funny enough, you dont need more fun [laughter]. Its strange there are so many books on who am I and every one repeats this technique. Its a wrong technique.

Ramana in Tamil never said Who Am I? It was translation of someone who wrote down what he may have said. It was always Am I and the answer is I Am, it becomes a stream of presence of Am I-I Am. Its not like Who am I becomes the silent answer and then you are the Reality and whatever is in front of you is not. Write it down [laughter]. Maybe you write it up, why always writing it down? Am I is just natural.

Q: All one knows is really a shadow because you are constantly playing in the shadow. You cannot not play in the shadow either

K: No, you experience yourself as a shadow.

Q: In the experiencing of the shadow, all is coming and going. You cannot not play it.

K: But even the shadow is coming and going.

Q: Yes but the shadow thinks that he is That which is

K: No, You fall in love with that shadow and then you identify yourself with the shadow and you believe that you are the shadow beyond shadows. But it never happened. You never left What you are. You fall in love with this very first idea of I. That already is a false idea. Then starts the whole shadow boxing, you are boxing against yourself, one shadow against another shadow. Even awareness is a shadow of What you are. Shadows! Shadows! Beyond, prior, with and without! Wherever you land is a false landing. Its all false! false! false!

Q: And yet landing will continue happening

K: Obviously. Every morning you wake up landing in this body. Then its too late. And every night you depart again.

Q: When we spoke last time about Dwaita , the shadow part and all that is happening to yourself and whatever you do to get away from pain and suffering is all in the Shadow Dwaita ?

K: The shadow feels sick and the shadow needs to be healthy. Its a shadow disease. Thats how it works. Being between healthy and sick. Then you always try to be healthy for sure. You like to be more in comfort than in discomfort. Your intention is always comfort, always good. And because you want to be in comfort, you make yourself uncomfortable. One comes with the other. As much comfort, as much discomfort. You will never be comfortable enough. No place, not even awareness is comfortable enough for what you are. The beauty of it is, what you are never needs any comfort. What you are doesnt need any place or has no place. There is no between something. It doesnt even know itself.

Q: So what you are is playing with itself?

K: It is experiencing itself as a player, playing and what is played with. But its not the player and not the play. It is that which is realizing itself as a player, playing what can be played with. Its not playing with itself. It cannot play with itself, so it plays with ideas.

Q: So all the seeking in the world, all the different paths are a..?

K: Play

Q: And it is not necessary anyways and yet it is there?

K: It is a realization of Reality. There is no question of need or no need. That is the way Reality is realizing itself. As the realizer-realizing what can be realized. But only the realizer is a lie. Real-lie-zer.

Q: But the shadow realizes the lie in the seeking