Self is not liberated. It was never bound. What gets liberated are the demons as well as gods of your mind. Set them free. You are sick of playing with the game. Be willing to not play the game. This takes huge resolve.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of freeing oneself from mental constraints and embracing a deeper understanding of one's own mind.
Gangaji's quote highlights the idea that the true self is inherently free and unbound, while the challenges and conflicts we face come from our mental constructs. By releasing both the positive and negative aspects of our thoughts, we can transcend the 'game' of life that often traps us, revealing a deeper sense of freedom that requires significant inner strength and commitment to achieve.
In practice
This quote can inspire a workshop on personal development and mental freedom.
The most sublime truth of all has never been stated or written or sung. Not because it is far away and can not be reached, but because it is so intimately close, closer than anything that can be spoken. It is alive as the stillness in the core of your being, too close to be described, too close to be objectified, too close to be known in the usual way of knowledge. The truth of who you are is yours already. It is already present.
If you are willing to take an instant to withdraw attention from whatever your internal dialogue is, to withdraw energy from whatever the latest point of view about your suffering is, it is immediately obvious what is here: the fullness, the richness and the love of oneself as conscious life.
When you are willing to stop looking for something in thought, you find everything in silence.
Be still. it takes no effort to be still; it is utterly simple. When your mind is still, you have no name, you have no past, you have no relationships, you have no country, you have no spiritual attainment, you have no lack of spiritual attainment. There is just the presence of beingness with itself.
I think that's one of the maybe under-discussed aspects of process - the difference between a good writing day and a bad one is the quality of the split-second decisions you made.
Our bodies are perishable, wealth is not at all permanent and death is always nearby. Therefore we must immediately engage in acts of merit.
Be not ashamed of mistakes and thus make them crimes.
Humility has nothing to do with depreciating ourselves and our gifts in ways we know to be untrue. Even "humble" attitudes can be masks of pride. Humility is that freedom from our self which enables us to be in positions in which we have neither recognition nor importance, neither power nor visibility, and even experience deprivation, and yet have joy and delight. It is the freedom of knowing that we are not in the center of the universe, not even in the center of our own private universe.
One of the things I had to learn as a writer was to trust the act of writing. To put myself in the position of writing to find out what I was writing.
When you hate, the only person that suffers is you because most of the people you hate don't know it and the rest don't care.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.