Where is the Silence?

Question: I came to satsang for the first time last month and fell immediately into silence. I was amazed and thankful and so surprised. Then this feeling of silence and peace went away, and I cannot seem to find it again.

Hanuman: Where have you been looking?

Question: It’s so noisy in my head. I can’t seem to find the volume switch.

Hanuman: You know right away then where not to look for that very silence and peace!

Question: Right. In my head.

Hanuman: Right. So that is a great clue.

Question: It happened so naturally before.

Hanuman: You have to return to your own natural state. Everything that is spoken of in satsang is in behalf of coming back home to rest in the very Heart of peace itself.

You have noticed that sometimes you can misplace your keys, and you will start looking in this place and that place, and you don’t find the keys. And then you start looking in those very same places all over again. Now you have confirmed for your own self that these are the very places where the keys are not going to be found. So maybe by Grace alone, a thought comes: ‘Okay, I need to look someplace else.’

So, this someplace else that I am speaking of here is that which my Master referred to as the Substratum, or the Source, the Heart. Silence is found when one follows thought back. You simply follow thought back from whence it arises. Then you come immediately face to face with Silence itself. Thinking has dissolved into Silence now. Just simply rest in this ever-present Silence that is recognized as your own true nature.

The Silence is ever present despite what may be appearing in Consciousness or what sensations are happening in this body, or what thoughts may be arising and displaying and disappearing, or what emotional state may be flashing.

The Silence is ever present.

So, follow thought back to its Source to find that which you are seeking, or simply return back to Witness-Consciousness. Imagine that you are simply leaning back in that easy chair, in front of an open window, a soft, gentle warm breeze coming through, gazing out at the sky, seeing the clouds go by, and then simply recognize: ‘I am the simple, natural seeing; the natural being; the Stillness; and all is manifesting in me, manifesting before me. I am relaxed in my own natural state. And thoughts are coming, maybe very quickly, maybe very slowly, and maybe not at all. It does not matter.’

Know yourself to be this very seeing. Ask yourself: ‘To whom are these thoughts displaying?’ And see for your own Self that you are that silent screen of Awareness upon which those thoughts are projected. Cease identifying with the projection, and recognize yourself as that very screen: empty, immaculate, pristine, pure. And come to rest as That. Let go of any effort, any tension, in behalf of ease.

You see, otherwise it becomes dependent on being in the presence of somebody. It appears that way. And it is not dependent on being in the presence of anybody but your own true Self. Then you recognize that the true guru is within. Within. So, someone appears without and is pointing: ‘Go within to find That which you are seeking.’ So, ‘within’ is what I’m speaking of when I say follow thought back to its Source.