Experiencing True Freedom by MSI

There is only one true independence and that is enlightenment. There is only one true freedom… People die fighting for relative freedom. It’s very silly because there is only one freedom. There is only one independence. There is only one – and that comes from the inside out. You can have it on the inside, and it matters not what is going on with the outside, in the environment or even in your body. It makes no difference. Those that worship bodies might think it’s important but it is not.

There is no freedom apart from the Ascendant One. Either you know it – or you don’t. If you don’t, you are a slave. You are bound. You are caught by the boundaries, which is ignorance. You are not aware of the Unbounded. Not being aware of the Unbounded, not living the Ascendant, you suffer when the boundaries collide with you, one after the other. There is no freedom in the field of boundaries.

How could there be? You get free from one boundary and you impose another one. You throw off one government and then immediately build another one over your head. It’s ever been so… particularly when the one you build today is worse than the one you had yesterday. Freedom is real. It’s not to be had by anything on the outside. There is no external impulse of life that can give freedom. There is nothing, nothing on the outside that can give freedom.

Freedom comes from the inside. If you have that, you have everything. If you don’t have that, you have nothing. All the wealth of the world won’t give you freedom. It might make your movement through the boundaries easier, but that is not the same as freedom. Freedom lies exclusively in the dominion of consciousness. Consciousness knows no boundaries in its pure state. The boundaries of life are on the outside. They are, without exception, illusions. There is no reality in them. There is no reality to them. The boundaries of life are fantasies, are dreams with no truth. For one who knows the Ascendant One, there are no limits, there are no restrictions. There is nothing one cannot do. You can stay alone a mountain or move to a far off place or never move.

If you know the Ascendant One, there are no limits. There are no restrictions to the fully enlightened. That is where freedom lies. I remember the story that Yogananda used to tell about a sage in India who was so free from boundaries that he never saw a point in wearing clothes. So the police decided they had better lock him up because, after all, he was never wearing any clothes. So they locked him up every day and the next morning, he’d be found floating above the top of the prison. It’s hard to lock up the Ascendant and hard to make it obey the rules of the waking state. Finally, they decided they couldn’t do anything about it, so they let him wander off stark naked.

A truly enlightened being make no noise about it. Doesn’t make a big show, doesn’t perform a lot of second-hand miracles. Such is for the incredulous. Such is for those who are influenced by such things. There are many such people in the world today; but without exception, they are following the Path of the Gods, not the Path of the Sages. The Path of the Sages is ruthless. It accepts no boundaries. It’s not interested in flashy little miracles here and there. It’s very interested in the Truth, in the relentless pursuit of the Truth on the inside which is the only place that Truth can be found. It astounds me how people travel half-way around the world to pursue somebody that manifests pictures or watches out of the air. What a silly thing. You can watch their act but they can’t do anything for you. The principal is basically the same. There might be some manipulation of subtle law for such people but that doesn’t mean they are enlightened.

Enlightenment is awareness of the Ascendant – permanent awareness of the One. It has nothing to do with flashy little things on the outside. You could say that George is fully enlightened because he could pull good cards out of the air and George would attract quite a following if he could do that regularly and consistently but he might be more ignorant than your dog. Freedom is something internal, not external.

Evening Discourse during Teacher Training Course
given by Maharishi Sadashiva Isham (MSI)