THE ORIGIN OF THOUGHTS Psychologists say that the origin of thought originates in the subconscious mind. Through various layers of the subconscious mind, it comes to the conscious mind, where the conscious mind recognises the current the thought produces. Through multiple processes with different combinations of certain kinds of chemistry, the conscious mind receives those currents and translates them into thought form, and then we think that we are feeling. I would say that the origin of thought is not necessarily from the subconscious mind, although specific thoughts of a lower level can come from the subconscious mind. Yet, behind the subconscious mind, there is a mind that we could call a memory box. Every thought that we think is never new whatsoever. We have thought those thoughts before. However, the combination of two thoughts could be regarded as new, and synthesising those two thoughts could produce a third thought if we go beyond the levels of the subconscious mind and come to the area where there is a subtle conjunction between the superconscious and the subconscious, where the subconscious just ends as the day would end, fading away into the night imperceptibly. At that level, we can cognise things, or thoughts could arise from that level, which we can term the finest relative level. At this finest relative level, we are not only in communion with our mind, but our mind has expanded to the universal mind. So, no distinction would remain between the limitations of the mind as we know it and the universal mind because our mind has become one with the universal mind. Once we have dove within and contacted or been one with the universal mind, and a thought arises from that level, at the finest end of the subconscious mind, then we are capable of the most significant amount of creativity, as we call it. Because then we would have at our fingertips, so to say, all the knowledge that has ever existed. Existed not only on this planet but all the knowledge that has existed throughout existence itself, and that is what we mean by direct perception. You would find people trained, or people that have trained themselves, in such a manner that they could cognise things directly. As a typical example, you might find a genius in mathematics. A problem could be asked of that person, which generally would require a computer for several days to answer. Yet, this person with the ability of direct conception would come to the answer immediately. CONTACTING THE FINEST LEVEL OF THE MIND OPERATES UNDER A VERY NATURAL LAW All of these things function under natural law, and all laws we do not understand are considered supernatural. A hundred years ago, when we would tell someone that you could take a two-hundred-ton machinery to fly through the air, they would say we were mad. Nowadays, we have hundreds and hundreds of planes flying over our heads every day. If you told a person a hundred or so years ago that you could speak from San Francisco to New York, three thousand miles, and have a person-to-person conversation, they would regard that as supernatural, which would be unbelievable. Contacting the finest level of the mind operates under a very natural law. We call it supernatural because we do not understand the law that serves it. But there are people, very few perhaps, that could have the direct conception of all knowledge that could ever be. Knowledge can only be known to ourselves when formulated in thought form. When we say thought form, we add a form to thought. The next time you think or try to think, see that you are thinking in pictures or words. You are thinking in pictures or words because the word forms a picture. So, in this case, we could say there is no difference between words and pictures. Or we could say that they are two aspects of the same thing. In direct cognition, the picture presented to us in thought form never works linearly. By linear fashion, I mean proceeding chronologically from a, b, c, d to z. In direct conception or cognition, the entire picture is conceived. I think it was Mozart who said, “I might be wrong with the name,” that he could conceive the whole composition entirely within a moment and its parts simultaneously. The entirety and its parts simultaneously. This comes from the subtlest level of the mind. There is a Sanskrit term for it, “Ritam bhara pragya.” That term is applied to that area of the mind where direct cognition occurs. When you find an artist, poet, or composer composing great works, everlasting works, then be sure to know that he has contacted intense levels of his mind, and the deeper the level, the greater the composition of whatever it is, music or poetry or painting. And the immortality of such work is in the fact that when you read the poem or listen to a talk by a person who has direct cognition, you not only understand the words, but it immediately touches the deeper level of yourself. This can be seen in the form of painting. It could be heard through words, hearing, and, of course, through sight; one reads and then hears those words in one’s mind. CREATIVITY HAS VARYING DEGREES To develop maximum creativity in daily life, which I always bring to every question I answer, we must meditate. When we meditate, we reach the deeper levels of the mind. In my experience, we have artists, such as Rhodesia’s most well-known artist, J. Trevor Wood; in his famous paintings, the ideas, conceptions, and colours have come to him in the meditation process. Creativity also has varying degrees. Like for example, one poet is a more excellent poet than another poet. Both of them go to the deeper levels of the mind. They are doing a form of meditation without knowing it. The poem that is not of such high
Everything Is Perfect: Seeing Through the Illusion of Imperfection
Belief, Christ, Compassion, Consciousness, Devotion, Divine, Divinity, Ego, Eternal, Evolution, Free Will, God, I and my Father are one, Integration, Kindness, Kingdom of Heaven within, Law of opposites, Laws, Love, Love thy neighbour as thyself, Manifestation, Manifestor, Meditation, Mind, Omnipresent, Path, Separation, Spiritual Practices, Superconscious, Surrender, Universal, Universe
IMPERFECTION IS JUST A CONCEPT The imperfection that is seen around us is but just a conception of our own minds. On this path to Divinity, as one progresses into that range of the Divine, one sees nothing else but perfection. There are no untruths in this world. Everything is truth and truth is God. But there are degrees of truth, so the path to Divinity is the path of progressing from a lower truth on towards the higher truth. Therefore, if Divinity is omnipresent, if It is present everywhere and regarded to be perfect, why do we conceive of anything as imperfection. The very moment we have the idea of imperfection within us, the very moment that idea strikes our limited consciousness, our vision becomes blurred, for there is nothing imperfect in this world. There is no imperfection whatsoever. If you can realise this truth that everything is perfect, everything is within the plan of Divinity, and within this process of evolution, this process that makes this universe exist, and when we realise that all that which exists is perfect, then only will we be able to realise the injunctions of theology that would say, “Love thy neighbour as thyself.” If you keep on seeing imperfections, how can you love thy neighbour as thyself. So certain theological beliefs are these, that be kind to the neighbour. But who is being kind? Is that kindness or compassion that is being expressed not ego made? Is it perhaps to inflate your own personal ego to say to yourself, “I am so kind, I am so compassionate”. As soon as you use the word “I” then your ego self is set into motion. I AND MY FATHER ARE ONE Perfection can only be perceived by perfection. And that perfection is reached through meditation and various forms of spiritual practices whereby the ego self is cleansed. The ego can never be annihilated, for whichever is manifested from the Manifestor also has to be eternal. For once manifestation disappears, the Manifestor also vanishes. God exists because you exist, and you exist because God exists. You are an integral part of each other, and all problems that exist in this world are because we feel so separate from Divinity. We do not realize the truth which Jesus spoke, that “I and my Father are one.” It was not the man that was speaking; it was the Christ that was speaking, and that Christ is the universal consciousness that has the cognition of perfection. PERSONAL GOD – IMPERSONAL GOD Reaching this universal consciousness is not the totality of things. Theologies might have perceptions of a grand old man with long beard sitting on a throne and looking around at all his children. These injunctions are necessary too. They serve a certain purpose, and the purpose it serves is for you to develop devotion. For you can only be devoted to an object. An object that is somewhat concrete in your mind, or a symbol which could be concretized in your mind. And that becomes the object of love and devotion, so that too is a path to reach the superconscious area of your own mind. But as soon as you give Divinity any attributes you put limitations on Him. As soon as you call Divinity kind you put limits on Him. As soon as you call Him compassionate you limit Him, because every quality must have its opposite. That is an eternal law; the law of polarity will always exist. With kindness there will be unkindness, with compassion there will be that which is opposite of compassion. How do we get out of this dilemma? That is the question. How do we get out of this dilemma that we are so involved in? The totality of consciousness, which is none else but the vibratory emanations of this universe, form the personal God. And most theologies teach of the personal God that has attributes. But then beyond that stage that real God is the impersonal one, that impersonal energy that has no discrimination and neither distinction, that does not interfere at all in your life, it only energizes your life and gives you life, gives you that breath. That is the impersonal energy which energizes the personal god, which in turn is the God which people of theology worship. So, the impersonal god manifests itself; the unmanifest becomes manifested in the personal conception of God. Now how many has really seen God? How many have heard Him? How many have tasted Him? Your senses are not required because they are limited and incapable of even perceiving that personal god that perhaps is sitting on some throne. So how far would the impersonal God not be from you? To have the idea of the personal god serves its purposes in taking you on the path of devotion. Who created that God? Did God create man or did man create God? Is it just a conception of yours, and where does that conception come from but from your limited ego? So that is why in different theologies there are different conceptions of God. The Hindus, for example, would believe that God has four hands, four arms. It is very symbolic, and there are great amounts of truth in symbolism, too. But it has to be interpreted in its true value and not to be taken literally. Like that, other religions have other conceptions. But the real God is beyond all conception, all perception. The real God is only experiential. You can experience that Divine energy flow within you. And through meditation and spiritual practices you can draw upon that Kingdom of Heaven within, draw from that storehouse of energy and allow it to permeate every cell of your body. Every thought in your mind can be permeated by that energy, and then when you act in life, any action you perform in your waking state or sleep state or dream state would be in accordance with Divine will.
Cleansing the Soul: The Journey to the Spirit Within
THE SOUL IS MADE OF IMPRESSIONS/SAMSKARAS The soul is a repository of all the experiences that you might have had in this lifetime from childhood, or perhaps from previous lifetimes if you believe in them. Your soul is a reflection of your mind. We could even term the soul to be the mind, which is entirely different from the spirit. The spirit is a neutral force that contains no impressions. While the soul, or in Sanskrit the Jivatman, is that which includes all the samskaras which we might call impressions. And those impressions are precisely what you are made of. The soul resides nowhere. You are the soul, and the physical body you see around you is but the grossification of the subtle soul, of the subtle mind. And yet, the soul is composed of very fine matter. This very fine matter, which we could call memory cells, are forever acting and interacting with each other. It is this very motion that is produced in action and interaction that governs your actions, your daily way of life, your behaviours and your concepts. It also governs your ability to perceive according to the limitations which have been set upon the soul through the sheaths of samskaras or impressions. To reach the real spirit within man, that neutral force, which is attributeless, one has to clarify or cleanse the soul. You might call it unfoldment or development, or you could use any term you wish, but the soul has to be clarified in order to reach the spirit within. THE EVOLUTIONARY PROGRESS Biblical scriptures were not wrong at all when they said that this universe was created within seven days. Science has proven that in the “Big Bang”, in this vast explosion, be it seven seconds or seven days, when all these minute particles of subatomic matter shot forth, it gathered unto itself various other particles. The very atom there had the ability to duplicate itself and replicate itself. In its evolutionary progress – for evolution could never be regressive, it is always progressive – it passes through various phases: the mineral, plant, animal, and then finally to man. From the very start, from the very particle of subatomic matter, there the soul existed. And, in that very subatomic matter, coming from that vast explosion, it contained a significant amount of purity. It was pure, for it reflected the pure consciousness that was contained within itself. But through the gradual evolutionary process, through all these various kingdoms of existences, it could not help but gain experiences. In the beginning up to the stage of the animal, it progressed with the laws of nature. It never contradicted nature, or never went against nature – it was pulled along in that momentum, that force. But when it reached the stage of man, with the ability to think, all the troubles began, because, with the thinking process of the mind, which is the soul, man started realising his individuality. When that very particle could not think, there was no realisation of individuality. It was an instinctive process. For example, in the animal kingdom just to survive, there was no acquisition, there was no greed, there was no lust, and everything functioned within the framework of the laws of nature. As you would know, animals have their mating seasons, so, in the animal world, although it is on a lower rung of the spiral, it functioned naturally. THE THINKING ABILITY But when man started thinking, the unnaturalness came about because, with his thought, he formulated that individuality. With his thought processes, he separated the mind from the spirit and the body from the mind; the total vision was lost. He created a division in the vision! In order to have the individuality, he had to preserve that individuality, and for the sake of self- preservation, he had to start fighting nature. Therefore, the deeds that men do are not always in the flow of nature, but they are swimming upstream, not with the flow of the waters, but upstream in the river. When one swims upstream, conflicts begin to arise. So here the very mind of man, the soul of man, is now involved in conflicts by his own actions. INDIVIDUALITY Assuming this individuality, many challenges were brought forth to him, and the more he resisted these challenges, the more he fought them, the problems became greater and greater. Therefore, the scriptures would say, “Resist not evil.” And this is what it means: do not get into these conflicts. When man from primitive times, with his own thoughts started progressing, he became more and more aware, he also became more and more aware of the troubles and the challenges that faced him. Because everyone wants to get away from misery and suffering, man started searching outwardly in secular, mundane things to try to find an answer, and in getting involved in mundane things, and to ease himself of the sufferings, his mind started expanding. But, with that expansion in an outward search, his troubles also multiplied. With a sophisticated mind or soul, it is the same thing, he started inventing various things to ease the burdens he has, but searching outward has not eased the burdens at all. This does not only apply to the sophisticated man. This has also applied to the primitive man, where he created river gods and rain gods and all kinds of gods to appease his mind. Today we have also created gods: the motorcar god, the aeroplane god, the money god. Have we not done that? So how much has the soul progressed? Yet, there has come a time, especially more so in this century, where man is becoming tired of the outward search to ease his problems and replace it with pleasures. Then again, wherever there is pleasure, there has to be pain, wherever there is sun, there has to be rain. So, he got himself involved in the law of opposites. You cannot accept a coin without
In the Clarity of Being: I Am That I Am
HOW CAN I GET THE CLARITY WITHIN MYSELF TO KNOW MYSELF? When you ask yourself, “Who am I, and what should I be?” there is one phrase you must delete, and that is, “what should I be?” It would be a projection trying to reach somewhere, but how can you get somewhere when you are already there? That is why I always say that you are divine. You have nowhere to go at all. You come from nowhere and you go nowhere, for how can eternity, immortality, and infinity come from anywhere or go anywhere. The better way to put it would be, “How can I gain clarity within myself to know myself?” When you ask the question, “Who am I?” there is not a single person who would answer you. An outside source cannot answer it, but it can be answered by your inner self after gaining that clarity, after getting rid of the stumbling blocks. And you start slowly. YOU ARE A MIXTURE OF YOUR INDIVIDUAL SELF AND YOUR UNIVERSAL SELF In that wall that prevents you from seeing the other side, you just need to knock out one brick, and that force itself will knock away all the other bricks. It is like this boy in Holland, there was a hole in the dike, and he plugged it with his finger, or else the whole of Amsterdam would have been underwater. But here you do not need to plug the hole; you need to open that little hole, that one brick, so that the flood, the waters of Divinity, could cover your entirety. And then the bricks are of no value, the wall is gone. And that is what you want. When the wall has collapsed, all the little samskaras that constitute the wall will be submerged in the water of Divinity. Then what would you say who you are? Will you say that I am the bricks lying under the water, or will you say that I am the water, the ocean? For what is the difference between the water, the ocean, and the bricks? There is no difference at all. It is just moving it around, breaking down the barrier so that the mud of the walls will mix in the water of Divinity, and they become one. And you cannot separate that mud from the water, or else it would not be mud. It would either be water or mud if you separate them. So, this mud is a mixture of your individual self with your Universal Self. WHEN YOU START REALISING “I AM BRAHMA,” THEN THE QUESTION “WHO AM I?” DISAPPEARS Therefore, everything is divine, and never ask the question, “Who am I?” For the answer is already there, I am that Divinity. I exist in that Divinity if any existence there be. For it is only the small I that thinks of existence, but the big I does not think of existence at all, because the big I cannot think. It just is. So, when we ask the question “who am I?” the answer is straightforward: “I am I. Yahweh. I Am That I Am,” without any qualifications at all: I am This, I am That. The Vedas usually talk about “Thou art That,” and of course, it means that thou art Divinity. But why the Thou and the That? Do you see how mistaken it is? Because you are creating a separation between thou and that, where no thou and that exist. That is the grand illusion, and it is supposed to be one of the four great injunctions of the Vedas. “Thou art That” is for the wayfarer who is on the path that slowly, slowly, slowly starts realising that you are divine. Which is a necessary step, but it is not the total answer. But when you say and start realising Brahmasmi – I am Brahma – then the question of “who am I” disappears entirely. Because to ask a question, there has to be a questioner. And who asks the question? The little mind wants to know who I am. IN SELF-REALISATION NO QUESTION REMAINS So, when there is no question, there needs to be no answer. You just are. Isness. Beingness in totality. When you are total, who is there outside to ask, “Who am I?” In that totality, there is no question left because there has to be someone outside to ask the question. And if there is no one outside in totality, then no question is asked and no answer is necessary, and that is what we call the realisation of self. That I realise myself means that I am myself, for the question disappears again. Who is the realiser? Realisation is self-existent. Like this one philosopher said, if I could stand outside the universe with a barge pole, I could turn it around. I cannot remember the guy’s name. He was perhaps poetic or perhaps just dwelling in his imagination. Because he can never be outside the universe, he can become the universe, ah, yes. You see, these philosophers have led us up the garden path. You can take all your Hegel and Kant and Spinoza and Nietzsche and whoever. One day, the question “who am I?” will disappear from your mind because the basis of that question, “who am I?” stems from insecurity and inadequacy. It is only when you feel insecure that you want to know who you are or what you are. It is a stepping stone. Nothing is useless; everything has its own purpose. But reach the stage of purposeless purpose. Ahh! That is the stage. Purposeless purpose means non-motivation, non-questioning, non-inquiring. These are necessary. The child goes to school, form two, three, four, five, six… ten, eleven, twelve. He needs to inquire. But when he has gone through all his studies, he does not need to ask any more. When the teacher gives a child in form one a maths lesson, and the child is made to write
How Does the Mind Work? About the Human Mind and Consciousness
Attachment, Attitude, Awareness, Brahman, Conscious Mind, Consciousness, Divine, Divinity, Ego, Force, God, Happiness, Heart, Impressions, Karma, Love thy neighbour as thyself, Manifestation, Meditation, Mind, Non-Attachment, Philosophy, Purity, Religion, Scriptures, Self, Self-Realization, Spirit, Spiritual Master, Spiritual Practices, Subconscious, Universal, Universe
VERY LITTLE IS KNOWN ABOUT THE HUMAN MIND AND CONSCIOUSNESS So little is known about the human mind and consciousness by psychiatrists and psychologists, and who has you. They have barely dipped their big toes in this vast ocean of the mind, and most of the analysis, like Freudian or Jungian analysis, is more hit and run, and they call it psychoanalysis. Did you know that one of the highest suicide rates in the world is among psychiatrists? So, if they are in such a muddled state themselves, how are they going to help others? I do not know if I ever told you this before, but when I was about eight years old, a very holy man who was called a Sufi passed through my village. I went to see him and chatted with him because, since I was about four, I have been interested in who or what I am, where I come from, and where I am going. After long chats, I asked this Saddhu, as they are called, “Give me a spiritual practice,” and the spiritual practice he gave me was this. “Draw rings. Just circles.” And I drew so many circles that we could plaster this whole High Leigh with the paper on which I drew circles. I thought this was absolute madness, drawing circles. How was it going to help me? But only later, in retrospect, did I realize it was a very valuable practice. Because if you, as a boy, can draw a perfect circle with your free hand, then your mind becomes more and more concentrated. I cannot do that anymore. I am getting too old. THERE ARE VARIOUS SECTIONS OF THE MIND THAT ALL FUNCTION TOGETHER There are four sections of the human mind; we will call them sections for the sake of explanation. They do not operate independently, but they operate together. Manas is the lower mind that is subject to sensory inputs and could be called the conscious mind. The lower mind is subjected to sensory input. Seeing, touching, smelling, tasting, and hearing. Man is governed mainly by these five senses: seeing, touching, smelling, tasting, and listening. Manas, which is the lower mind, is influenced by the sensory inputs. These five senses influence everything you do. Seeing will influence your thoughts. Hearing, touching, tasting, and smelling all influence your thoughts, but those thoughts are the sensory input into the lower mind. The lower mind cannot function on its own. These impressions you get are sent to what we call the Chitta, which is the memory box —or, we can call it, the subconscious mind. Because of all the sensory inputs you have, they create impressions in the subconscious mind, which activate and motivate actions performed through the conscious mind. Yet the subconscious mind requires identification because this is only a memory box from which the conscious mind draws impressions. The subconscious mind is like a box of pigeonholes, where specific files are put. So, if you see a dog, that very act of seeing will transmit the impulses to the subconscious mind, where that impulse will be compared to a dog that you have seen before, and then only the recognition occurs that that is a dog. Otherwise, you will not know if it is a dog, a cat, or a mouse. But this is still not enough. The subconscious mind transmits itself to the ego or the individual “I”. These sensory inputs of the conscious mind are transmitted to the subconscious for comparison; once compared, they must be identified with the ego sense. For without the ego sense, no one could really live. Even the most perfected Master must have two percent imperfection in him, otherwise he would lose all sense of individuality. He would not be able to eat. He would not be able to sleep. He would not be able to go to the toilet or perform any biological function. So, a tiny percentage of that sense of individuality remains. When a highly realised man, a Spiritual Master, leaves the body, the little 2% of the ego self dissolves, and the person merges into Divinity. That is still not enough. The ego sense will still require specific guidance, and that comes from Buddhi, which is intellect. The function of the intellect is to weigh the pros and cons. And when the Buddhi or intellect weighs the pros and cons, it transmits it back to the ‘I’, the ego, and how it will fit in with your personal individual ego. You might like lamb, you might like chicken, you might like cabbage, or this or that. It is because of the various impressions that are there and the Buddhi that is analysing it and transmitting it to your individual self with its likes and dislikes. Then it gets back to the memory box, pulls out the file, and says, “Ah, this is okay, chicken is fine, curried chicken or roast or whatever.” And that is submitted to the conscious mind, where your five senses will start enjoying it. WE PAY SO MUCH ATTENTION TO SENSORY INPUTS TO THE LOWER MIND The lesser the ego, the lesser the value of sensory inputs would be, and by lessening the value of the sensory inputs, you do not become attached. You reach the stage of non-attachment. I might have said to you sometimes that if there is a King’s feast on a table and there is a dry piece of bread, of course, I will choose the best. But if there were only a dry piece of bread there, I would not have any regrets whatsoever, because I would know that the molecular structure of that piece of bread is the same as the molecular structure of a King’s feast. After all, when it comes to, for instance, tasting, what happens is only four inches from there to there, four inches, and people die and kill themselves for those four inches. For once, it goes down the gullet, and
The Path of Love: Integrating Heart, Mind, and Spirit Through Meditation
Acceptance, Attitude, Divine, Divinity, Eternal, Evolution, Force, Grace, Heart, I am That I am, Integration, Joy, Kingdom of Heaven within, Laws, Light, Love, Meditation, Mind, Oneness, Path, Purity, Scriptures, Self, Spirit, Spiritual Master, Spiritual Path, Spiritual Practices, Spiritual Teacher, Surrender, Universal, Universe, Yoga
THE HEART IS THAT WHICH IS CLOSEST TO DIVINITY AND IS FOREVER RADIATING AN ENERGY The core of the human personality is what is called the heart, the sum-totality of all your feelings, your emotions, and not only those that you feel with the mind. All the feelings and emotions that we experience are not necessarily of the heart. A lot of it is mixed up with the mind. The heart is a quality or a form of existence that could exist without the mind and without feeling, without emotion, without the thinking process. It could exist independently, yet the various mechanisms of the mind are necessary to be able to appreciate what is happening in the heart. The heart is forever radiating an energy, a force. When I said that the heart is the core of the human personality, it means that the heart is that which is closest to Divinity. Divinity is encompassed, trapped, so to speak, in the heart. The heart has a universal quality. Therefore, we call a good man a big-hearted man. Little do we realise how big that bigness is. Its extent is the entire universe, but because humans have minds, they persist in limiting the heart. By limiting the heart to its individual self and its individuality, they close the heart. Therefore, the question arises: “How can we open the heart?” THE RADIATION OF THE HEART IS FOREVER PURE How do we begin by opening the heart? If a man says, “Oh, I must be kinder, I must be more generous, I must be more loving.” Does the heart say that? The heart does not say that. The mind says that it feels the closeness of the heart. Yet the heart is pulsating so powerfully all the time that the mind starts to feel those pulses or impulses, and it begins to wonder. Why is my heart closed? Why can I not feel? Feeling is thought to be measured in terms of one’s emotions, because emotions could be good or bad, could be positive or negative, but the radiation of the heart is forever pure. When we study the Scriptures and where it is said that “Jesus’ heart bled for us.” What bled? What shot forth the pulsating flow of blood? When we talk of blood, we mean lifeblood, lifeblood coming from the heart, empowered, generated by the force of the heart that is universal. THE HEART DOES NOT REQUIRE OPENING, BUT THE MIND DOES Here, we have to be very careful in understanding this principle. Opening the heart is not necessary in opening the mind. We start with the mind in trying to open the heart. We gather to ourselves or affirm to ourselves positive qualities that affect the opening process. But the proper way to open the heart, and here is the secret, is to go beyond the mind and not let the mind interfere. Man says to woman, woman to man, “I love you.” The love that is spoken there is not the love of the heart, although it is generated by the heart. It is empowered by the heart, but it is the mind that is speaking. The mind appreciates the shape of her nose, her ears, or her toes and says, “I love you.” The heart has no eyes. It has no ears. It has no feeling. Yet we say the heart feels. The mind feels, not the heart. The heart is a pulsating, radiating power, and when the heart is opened, that means that the mind is opened. The heart does not require opening. Like our usual old analogy, the heart can be likened to the petrol in the tank of the car, and the carburetor is the mind. So, when the mind is expanded, the heart, the petrol automatically flows through. WHEN YOU STIMULATE THE HEART, THE MIND AUTOMATICALLY OPENS UP In our practices, we leave the mind aside and we are in touch with the source that could override the discrepancies of the mind. It is tough to start with the mind in opening up the mind, so that the heart could shine through. But it is so much easier for the heart to shine through in its own “isness” through the mind and all the crevices of the mind. All the dirt in the mind is automatically washed away in this force, this torrent of heart energy. People who follow Jnana Yoga would start by trying to expand the mind, which is a challenging path. People who would want to start with the heart would find it much, much easier, because they do not take the mind into account, because when they stimulate the heart, the mind automatically opens up, and the power flows through. IT IS THE NATURE OF THE HEART TO LOVE AND TO SEND FORTH THAT LOVE The question is, how does one stimulate the heart? How does one reach the core of one’s personality? How does one take the individual feeling that is within oneself and infuse it into that universal oneness which is the heart? The process is facilitated through our meditational practices, where we systematically delve deeper into levels beyond the mind, and there, in the realm of the heart, lies the Kingdom of Heaven. You see how the heart has been so misinterpreted, because the core of human personality is the spirit, and the spirit is the heart. What loves, really loves? The heart loves. Not because the heart wants to love, but because it is the nature of the heart to love and send forth that love. LOVE FOR THE SAKE OF LOVE So, we bluff ourselves into thinking that we love, because the moment you believe that you love, you have stopped loving. Take this to mind very carefully. The moment you think I love, I have stopped loving, because the mind interprets it, and the mind is too imperfect to analyze that which is so infinite, so forceful, so powerful. How could it
The Loving Will of God: Evolution is the Journey Back Home
Awareness, Brahman, Conscious Mind, Devotion, Ego, Eternal, Evolution, Force, God, Incarnation, Light, Love, Meditation, Mind, Path, Peace, Self, Soul, Spiritual Practices, Superconscious, Universal, Universe, Wisdom
THE PERSONAL GOD IS ALL LOVE AND EXPRESSES ITS NATURE IN THE EVOLUTION When we say, “God is love,” we are not talking about that all-pervading, eternal essence or energy called the Impersonal God, for that remains just an energy. But that which expresses love is the totality of this universe. So, when we say God is love, we are talking of the Personal God. We are not talking about that Brahman or that always existent fine energy that does not have to go through cycles, that knows of no love. But the Personal God is the one who is all love. What do we mean by this love? The Personal God has the universal mind because He is the sum totality of the universe, and therefore, it is love. Through that universal mind, the love that He is or gives is not conditional, nor is it by volition. It is its nature, and it expresses its nature in the evolution, the development of the cycle. That is why right from the primal self, one progresses to the human stage through various kingdoms, and that very process is the love of God. That very process is the love of God, because it is forever taking you back home from where you have originated. And that is why we say, “God is love.” It is not a figure with a long beard sitting up there on a throne in Heaven, and says, “I love you, my son, I love you. Come unto me.” No. The process is love. THE PROCESS OF EVOLUTION IS THE LOVE AND THE WILL OF GOD The more we become aware of the process, the more aware we become of love, and then we, in turn, express that love because we are aware of the process. So, the entire existence is nothing else but a process and, in the process, we are forever proceeding to greater and greater awareness of what is going on in this motion. But we understand more of commotion than of motion. Motion is peaceful. Commotion is not. But we use motion to create commotion, and the small mind does that, and that is why we want to meditate to reach the highest superconscious level of the mind, where even the motion, though being motion, would be so still, like a highly spinning top, spinning so fast that it would seem very still to us. So, these are the things to understand; otherwise, it would just be a saying. Everybody says that “Love is God and God is love.” Just verbal words, words, words, and nothing understood. The love of God is the process, and the very process is God. Do you see how they tie up with each other? For even in this process, there is a system. No process can come about haphazardly, and because it cannot, we call it God’s will. That is the rule. We are involved in this process, which is God’s will. Therefore, we say that we are governed by God’s will, which is very accurate. It is very precise that we are involved in this process—we engaged in his love. ONLY THE EGO-SELF CAN HATE, AND THE HATRED STEMS FROM THE SUBJECT When there is love, it has to have its opposites, hate. Where does hate come from? In reality, there is no hate. There is no hate at all. It is the misinterpretation of love that is termed hate. As we all know, there is a very thin dividing line between love and hate. You can love someone very much now and later; it can turn to hate only due to misinterpretations by the little mind. So, hate is an idea. If God is love and God is the universe, where is there a place for hate? There is no hate. Hate is an idea because we only use the conscious mind, which is only a fraction of the mind, and the conscious mind, with its ego self, wants everything conducive to itself and says that “I am the center of the universe.” When it says I, I, I, it does not mean the real “I” but the ego “I” and the ego “I” is forever grasping, is forever trying to preserve itself in whatever way. By hook or by crook, it wants to maintain itself, and when things do not go its way, it changes the energy of love into hate and projects it onto others. And that is what the ego thinks: “I hate someone.” The ego self finds an object of hatred. But where does the hatred really stem from? It stems from the subject. EGO-SELF IS THE STUMBLING BLOCK, WHICH YOU CANNOT ANNIHILATE, BUT CLARIFY So, then I am the hate. The ego self is the hate, and that is why we lose sight of the true meaning of the will of God, and God is love. So, what do we do with the ego self, the stumbling block? People say annihilate it! I say do not, keep it. It is good. For without self-identity, which the ego self brings about, how can you know the universal identity, which is God, without knowing yourself? So, preserve the ego self, but refine the ego self. It would be foolish for a person to say, “I was Jack, I am not Jack anymore. Now I am the universe,” and then he runs around like a madman. Therefore, we have had mad men coming into this world and saying, “I am God.” You really are, but have you realised that yet? Have you realised that universal self? Have you encapsulated that universal God within yourself to say, “I am He.” No, and that is why people like Hitler are born to boost their ego. That which we must refine is made much, much grosser. So, we become stagnant. We actually go back, instead of going forward. WHEN THE SMALL SELF IS CLEANSED, THE HIGHER SELF COMES AUTOMATICALLY So, we, in our sense, preserving
Through the Intercessor: Not to Him, But Through Him
TO KNOW THE WILL OF GOD, WE NEED AN INTERCESSOR We say that God’s will is always done, but how many of us can truly appreciate and understand God’s will? In the lives of the great Masters, like Jesus, Buddha, and Krishna, we have found that intercession is necessary. An interceder does not go and appeal on your behalf. The true meaning of this would be that he, having seen the knowledge of Divinity, conveys that knowledge to you; therefore, he who knows God’s will interprets that will to you. But your approach to him is always direct. There are certain theologies in the world, certain religions, for example, in the Bhagavad Gita, that would say that “No one goes to the Father except through me,” and Jesus said the same thing. This really means that he is not there as an advocate or a Barrister, going to appeal for you to Divinity. No. It means that you have to reach the stage of Christhood. You first have to become one, that is, a very high mortal being, an embodied being; you have to reach that stage of consciousness before you can get the stage of Divine consciousness. That is the greatest duty that all true Teachers of Divinity have performed. They lead you, and they have to be authoritative. You come to me. There is nothing wishy-washy about a great soul, a great being, He that has become one with God. He tells you with authority because he has experienced that. So when He says, “No one goes to the Father except through me,” it is very accurate. There have been many interpretations, and I can only offer you mine: that you must reach the consciousness of Christ to attain Divinity. So, we could call him the middleman. In daily life, if you go directly from the street to a wholesaler, they will not sell you their wares, their goods. He will tell you, “No, we supply the retailer, and you buy my goods through the retailer.” This has happened all along the ages. When we talk of God’s will, is it also His will to bring into being such an entity? It is his will. LET ME PUT YOU ON THE PATH TOWARDS DIVINITY, AND YOU WALK WITH YOUR OWN FEET What God are we talking about? Who knows God? How many have experienced God? It is said that out of ten million people on the path towards Divinity, perhaps ten might reach. I always say that I do not want to show you God, because that is a false promise, but I would say, “Let me put you on the path towards Divinity, and you walk with your own feet.” And if you are put on the right path, you will definitely reach your destination. We have some religions that would say, “Okay, you come to me and pay your dues, and I will take you to God.” Please shun them. For the faithful messenger of God or the true Incarnation that in physical form represents that which is Divine, is worth going to. You can call him the middleman, the interceder, or whatever title, but when a man has become one with God, then he truly could be the most outstanding representative or God incarnate walking on earth. These theories or theologies are not wrong. They are all true. They have a deep meaning. But most people, ninety-nine-point nine percent of the people, misinterpret these things. It is not to him but through him that you realise your own personal Divinity. You come from nowhere, and you are going nowhere. If that which we call Divinity is omnipresent, all-existent, eternal, and infinite, then you are that too. For the eternity of that which is Divine can never exist without you being eternal. THE REAL SELF IS BEYOND TIME, SPACE, AND CAUSATION AND THEREFORE ETERNAL We keep on saying “I get born and I die.” What gets born? What decays? And what dies? This little bubble. This little physical body. How important is it in the eternity of things? When we talk of eternity, time is measureless, which means in turn timeless, while man is bound by time because his emphasis is on the little body, the little mind, which is here today and not there tomorrow. And not there tomorrow, meaning, it is not here as well. For where is the difference between here and there? What is here, and what is there? We only say here and there because we know only of time and space. Time and space, and the causation of them, are, in reality, from the absolute viewpoint, non-existent. If I were to say “You are non-existent”, it would seem blasphemy. You say, “Look, I can feel and touch myself, and I can feel pain and pleasure, and I can walk, and I can communicate.” But who is saying that? The unreal you, which is transitory, is saying that, and anything transitory could be termed non-existent. But is the authentic Self, that is you, saying that? No, for the authentic Self is beyond time, beyond space, and nothing causes it. And that is why it is eternal. THE PERSONAL GOD IS THE TOTALITY OF THE UNIVERSE When we talk of God’s will, what will are we talking about? Because the supreme Divine, the supreme Divinity, has no will. But the Divinity man is talking about, or in other words, the Personal God, is the force which makes up the whole universe. That we call the Personal God. The Personal God exists. He is the total of the emanations of this universe, and when an Incarnation comes, that sum “l” of the universe takes on a body. But that sum “l” of the universe that takes on a body is still totally aware, experientially aware of that which is beyond the sum totality of the universe. So, we have the Personal God, which man needs. Because when you enter the realms of
A Journey Within: Awakening the Peace We Truly Are
Attitude, Awareness, Belief, Christ, Consciousness, Divine, Divinity, Ego, Eternity, Freedom, God, Guru, Heart, I am That I am, I and my Father are one, Impressions, Integration, Joy, Kingdom of Heaven within, Law of opposites, Light, Love, Love thy neighbour as thyself, Mental Patternings, Mind, Path, Peace, Purity, Religion, Scriptures, Self-Realization, Spirit, Spiritual Master, Spiritual Practices, Universal, Wisdom, Yahweh
GET AWAY FROM DIS-EASE AND BE AT EASE WITHIN THE PEACE THAT WE REALLY ARE If you cannot find the Kingdom that is within yourself, then that means that you are not functioning in totality. You are functioning fragmentedly. Through spiritual practices, we transition from fragmentation to integration. We integrate the body, the mind, and the spirit. For they are not things apart from each other. It is a wholeness; it is a continuum, and only by knowing the continuum can you see the peace that is your inherent birthright. We are looking for the peace that is within ourselves. Dis-ease is the opposite of peace. So, let us get away from dis-ease and be at ease within the peace that we really are. It is so simple to lead the mind to that area, the Kingdom of Heaven within, where peace resides, and draw it out so that it can be infused into all our daily actions, thoughts, and way of life. MAN, KNOW THYSELF To find that peace, we have to penetrate ourselves, and by going there, by using the direct hotline, we can find that peace. But the trouble is, we do not want to dial the number, although the line is open. Through a methodical approach, individually prescribed spiritual practices, we reach that area, and then we start knowing ourselves in an integrated state, rather than a fragmented one. And when you know yourself in the integrated state, you will be living that beautiful injunction in the scriptures, which in every religion says, “Man, know thyself.” No religion says, “Man, know God.” It says Man, know thyself, and automatically you will know God. For it is said, “I and my Father are one,” and who said those words? Jesus, the man did not say those words. But Christ said those words, and Christ is that universal consciousness that is within you, too. He talked from the level of that consciousness. He did speak of that little frame of a body which was named Jesus. Consciousness is always present – just waiting for you to lead your limitedness to that which is unlimited. Why be like a fish swimming in the water and yet dying of thirst. That is? What we are doing. Do you think you are alive? You are dead. You think you are awake. No, you are asleep. WHEN YOU REACH THE GOAL, YOU WILL FIND THAT THE PATH AND THE GOAL ARE BUT ONE AND THE SAME Through spiritual practices, we find wakefulness, and by seeing that awakening, that wakefulness, you will say that the conceptions I had of bondage were but a dream. I was dreaming. I have been free all the time. I was free all the time, and now I know that that bondage was but a dream which is not the nature of myself. I am by nature free, and not by nature bound. It also means that by feeling yourself to be in bondage, you are not using your total potential, and that is why you are asleep. That is why you are dreaming and not fully awake to the beauty of life. How many times do you walk through your beautiful parks here or through the lovely trees in your city? How many times do you pass there and notice and listen to the beautiful symphony of the wind blowing through it? How many times do you see the blades of grass swaying there in a divine dance? How many times are you with your beloved and feel the very throbbing of her heart or his heart melting away into your heart and finding the rhythm of oneness? You do not. Because of fragmentation. An integrated person would see that, for there is nothing ugly in this world. Everything is filled with beauty. Therefore, we say, “Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder.” We want to become the beholders of beauty, and all ugliness and all bondages to disappear. So, arise, awake, as Vivekananda would say. “Arise, awake, and stop not till the goal is reached.” Oh, lead thou me on, kindly light, even if it is one step at a time. But you have to start – you have to start, and if you are in Sioux City, you cannot begin from Chicago. You start from Sioux City on that beautiful, joyous journey, and when you go along this path and reach the goal, you will find that the path and the goal are but one.You have come from nowhere and you are going nowhere, and then you experience that which I experience, the isness of life. Blake said something like “Eternity in an hour.” I say eternity is now here, in this very moment. It is just turning your attention. GOING BEYOND THE LAW OF OPPOSITES, ONLY THE JOY OF EXISTENCE IS LEFTJOY REQUIRES NO ANALYSES, JOY IS IN THE AREA OF EXPERIENCING The search in modern technology and in the world’s mind today is to go out, to find things outside themselves. It is to go outside themselves; the search is forever outside. You want to see some pleasure, so you go to the movies, you go to the nightclub, you go to the dances, you go to whatever entertainment there is. Why? To find pleasure. In other words, you are trying to escape from yourself into some kind of pleasure. But know this for sure, that if you have pleasure today, tomorrow there will be pain because you are fluctuating within the law of opposites. If there is a day, there must be a night. If there is heat, there must be cold. But there is this other area which goes beyond the law of opposites, which goes beyond the pain and pleasure, and that area is joy, absolute joy. Indefinable by the left hemisphere of your brain, which is analytical, but experienceable. So, joy requires no analysis; joy is a matter of experiencing. Analysis is the root of all problems.
Living Beyond Sin: Finding Purity Through Meditation
WE COME HERE TO BETTER OURSELVES There is a law of nature which strives and strives for perfection. We have said earlier that the nature of man is bliss, and he wants to return home to bliss. Whatever the physical body feels, the mind feels more intensely. There is no way out for the mind but to follow the law of nature, and man has a choiceless choice. Man is forced, compelled, and coerced by his doings to return to live out those experiences. We come here to learn. We come here to evolve. We come here to better ourselves, and every experience is valid. Even a wrong experience, even a bad experience, in its finality, will bring one to certain realisations. I have done something wrong. That wrongness will produce in me one day the sense of what is right. I can only enjoy the sunshine if I experience rain. So, no experience is to be discarded. Even the experience of the sinner is not to be discarded. We say condemn the sin but not the sinner. The sinner, too, is on an onward march towards perfection to achieve his inherent right to become one with his Maker. So, it is a natural coercion, a natural force within the laws of nature that the person wants to experience so that he can better himself, always, constantly. THE SIN IS IDENTIFIED ONLY WITH THE BODY AND THE MIND As we have discussed before, man has three aspects: the body, the mind, and the Spirit. Having the eternal divine value, the Spirit will be untouched by that which we call sin. So, what we have left is the body and the mind, and only the body and the mind would be capable of doing an anti-social deed that could be termed sinful according to the interpretation and morality laid down by creeds. With our method of meditation, we are going beyond the limitations of body and mind and finding that unstained Spirit within us. By living in the Spirit, we become incapable of sinning. Meditation involves experiencing joy and living a good, Godly life. The sin is identified only with the body and mind. What could be sinful in one situation or culture might not be immoral in another. For example, monogamy is accepted in our culture, and polygamy would sound sinful to us, but there might be other countries where polygamy is a rule and not called sinful. These are superficial definitions of sin, but the more authentic meaning of misdeed would be the infringement of what we feel, not think, within ourselves to be correct. When we feel within ourselves that our actions are not accurate, that is sinful. The quality of sinfulness would be devolutionary and not evolutionary. It would be flowing against the current of nature and not with the current of nature. So, any action that is stagnating or blocks us from flowing with the current of nature can be regarded as sinful. In contrast, an action that is natural and within natural laws and can be substantiated, appreciated, and felt suitable will be evolutionary. EVERY ACTION WE DO MUST NECESSARILY BE DONE WITH SOME KIND OF THOUGHT So, the difference between the sinner and sin is nil because when we talk of sinners, we naturally speak of two aspects only: body and mind, and the forever pure Spirit has been excluded. I would say again that the purpose of meditation would be to find that Spirit within us that would regenerate, rejuvenate, repattern, and reorganise our thinking processes because outward action is the grosser interpretation of thought. Thought, too, is action, and every action we take must necessarily be done with some thought. So, action exists in the mind in a subtle form, and when that subtle form is expressed, it assumes a grosser form whereby the good deed or the lousy deed is known. … Gururaj Ananda Yogi: Satsang UK 1976 – 08