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    You're Trying Too Hard
    You're Trying Too Hard
    You're Trying Too Hard
    Ebook83 pages1 hour

    You're Trying Too Hard

    By Joey Lott

    4.5/5

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    About this ebook

    Working Hard to Become Spiritually Elite?

    Have you ever wondered why enlightenment is just out of reach? Have you struggled with expensive meditation techniques, special diets, elite teachers, and all manner of other crazy things trying to one day reach spiritual liberation?

    Do you dream of that day in the future when all your problems will disappear? You'll finally be invited to the spiritual enlightenment club? Then perhaps you too will be able to hold satsang and retreats and have hundreds or perhaps even thousands of doe-eyes devotees hanging on your every word, waiting for your powerful shakti transmission...

    Stop!

    In You're Trying Too Hard, Joey Lott explains exactly that--you are trying too hard, and you will never achieve your goals. In fact, the harder you try, the worse things seem to get.

    Why? Because you've been looking at it all wrong.

    It's not your fault, of course. All your great, wise, spiritual guides and gurus and teachers have deceived you. You've been hoodwinked.

    The good news is: this is already it.

    The bad news is: this is already it.

    But when you test out what Lott proposes, you just might find that it's more good news than bad.

    If You're Worrying about the Right Technique, the Right Lineage, the Right Practice, the Right Path...Worry No More

    "Look to direct experience right now. This is absolutely effortless. There is no trying required. Why? Because direct experience is unavoidable. It is what is happening."

    Forget about the spiritually elite. Let them try and one up one another in their misery to be happy.

    Let them fight over whether the One True Way(tm) is advaita or nonduality or Zen or Buddhism or this teaching or that teaching. Don't worry if you're doing your mindfulness and meditation correctly.

    Instead, discover that you are already all that is. Not in some esoteric sense. But in a very simple, direct, and obvious sense.

    Are you ready? Read this book now, and set foot on the only path to so-called "enlightenment" you will ever need.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherJoey Lott
    Release dateOct 1, 2013
    ISBN9781533774453
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      Book preview

      You're Trying Too Hard - Joey Lott

      Preface

      back to top

      I tried so hard for years and years to attain something that is utterly impossible to attain. And since you’re reading this book, I’m guessing that you too have been trying too hard.

      There’s an amazing thing that happens when you actually remain with what is immediate and direct - what I call direct experience. What happens is that clarity shows itself.

      Clarity is always what is. There is only clarity. Yet somehow clarity can seem to be absent. This is only because of a misunderstanding of clarity.

      All so-called understanding is actually misunderstanding. That is because clarity is all that is, and all so-called understanding seemingly obscures what is.

      So the purpose of this book is simply to examine and dismantle all (mis)understanding. The aim of which is to reveal ever-present clarity.

      Clarity is not a state. It is not something other than this. Clarity is the simplicity of being. Clarity is simply seeing what is as it is.

      Clarity is not an attainment. It is merely seeing through what is not true. This is possible in an instant. This is possible right now.

      The Direct Path Is Simpler Than You Think

      back to top

      Just as the title says, you’re trying too hard. Any amount of trying is too much. No effort is necessary. In fact, no effort is possible.

      If you can truly hear that, then you’ve already arrived.

      If you are still trying, then what follows is an attempt to address some of the major obstacles to recognizing the simplicity of being.

      In what follows I address some of the obstacles that I see that keep people stuck in the vicious cycle of identification with a false self. These are drawn from my own experiences with seeking, as well as the questions I receive from others.

      I’d also like to offer you this important tip to keep in mind as you read: don’t get hung up on the words or trying to understand. If you get hung up on words then you’ll just get frustrated. I make no effort to try and present a teaching or use consistent language. That’s because in my experience when teachers use language in a consistent way then seekers tend to give meanings to the words.

      I know that I used to do that.

      And it’s not helpful. Because none of this means anything. All of it is merely to point to what is unavoidable. All of it is an invitation to remain with direct experience, by which I simply mean non-conceptual sensory perception.

      That’s all.

      Grand Ideas

      back to top

      Years ago I used to attend a meditation group led by a self-proclaimed spiritually-enlightened teacher. He claimed to transmit Shaktipat as we sat with our eyes closed in meditation. Afterward there would be a talk and we could ask our questions.

      There was a guy named Joe who frequented the meetings. There was something different about Joe. I’m guessing he could get an easy autism diagnosis.

      Joe carried a street map that he consulted often. This was an interesting metaphor because Joe seemed to be constantly trying to get everything to fit with his internal map of reality.

      The teacher, a guy who called himself Aham Brahmasmi, would speak of Brahman or spiritual enlightenment and Joe would frequently interrupt to ask if Aham was referring to cosmic consciousness.

      Joe had evidently learned about cosmic consciousness at some point. This was his point of reference. He had cosmic consciousness clearly marked on his map.

      Joe was a special case. But only in that he was so overt in his attempts to make everything fit his ideas.

      I was doing the same. I didn’t feel the need to interrupt Aham and clarify terms. But that was only because I was able to translate on my own.

      Brahman = my idea of what that means.

      Spiritual enlightenment = my idea of what that means.

      See how you do this too.

      When you read these words, see how you think you know what they mean. See how you translate them to your own ideas of what things mean.

      The only trouble with this is that none of it means anything.

      Your ideas are merely that: ideas. They don’t mean anything. There is no Brahman. There is no spiritual enlightenment. The ideas of what you think any

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