(Photo caption: Avatar – Gururaj Ananda Yogi giving Satsang – a coming together for truth)
THE NATURE OF THOUGHTS
No one could ever create a thought. Like the old saying, there is nothing new under the sun. For example, when a poet composes a poem, he attains a higher level of consciousness, where others have thought these thoughts. Then, the poet synthesizes thoughts that have been considered over millions of years and creates a poem. The impulse of an idea does not come from when you are born. It precedes it by millions of lifetimes. They are always there, and the more one dives deeper into oneself, the subtler the thoughts one will capture.
The sensory inputs control the grosser mind, which is the conscious mind. That would combine itself with what we call memory, and with the combination of the input and the memory, we think we are feeling. But, really speaking, we are not thinking. You say, “I have grown this flower.” You have not grown the flower. You have only planted the seed and the input. That is all! The flower’s seed drew the minerals, water, air, and sunshine towards itself. Then only did the flower grow. But what happened to the seed? That is the question. The seed has to die. For the seed to be able to sprout, it has to explode in the ground. That explosion occurs in your mind, and as a bubble from a pond rises to the surface level, you consciously recognize it to be a thought.
Meanwhile, that thought could also be distorted. It might arise at a very pure level, but going through the various sublayers of the subconscious mind, the Chitta might assume a different form altogether. The subconscious mind does not create the impulse, for the subconscious mind, with all its samskaras, has all the impulses of the whole universe in its memory box.
To connect itself to all of the thoughts floating around in the universe, this memory box has to go through the same channel from the subconscious to the superconscious level, which is connected to everything in the universe because the universe is nothing else but a thought. If there is anything solid in the universe, it is created by an idea because a thought has form.
A person with deep insight can see a thought, which is the principle on which telepathy works. You are thinking of a friend, and then a minute or so later, you hear a knock on the door, and the friend is there. Or, you think of a friend, and here the phone rings and that person says, “Oh, I was just thinking about you.” Therefore, there is a connection, and this connection is there because there is only one mind. It is connected. You are connected to the furthest star in the heavens. You are connected to everything because this universe is nothing but matter, at places existing in a grosser form and in a subtler form. Yet, whether slight or gross, it is filled with life force, and life is all-pervading.
LIFE KNOWS OF NO DEATH
Life knows of no death. Even a stone has life in it. It has a form of consciousness. A certain consciousness, not in the sense of the human consciousness, but it has the potentiality of the entirety of consciousness. Keep a stone outside for a while or even inside, and you will find it changing. It is not only the outer atmosphere that makes the stone change, but the more significant change comes to it because of its molecular construction. You will have millions and billions of molecules swirling around in that stone. It is a universe on its own, and wherever there is motion, there is life, and all life, to repeat, is connected.
THE MANIFESTATION IS NOTHING BUT AN IMPULSE
To get one’s mind to higher thoughts, one naturally goes to the deeper layers of one’s mind to pick up finer thoughts. All the symphonies of Bach or Beethoven, Mozart, you name them, they never created the symphonies. All the most outstanding poetry of Shakespeare, Shelley, Keats, and Byron depends on which poet you like the best; they never made those poems. You cannot create with your mind. The creation is forever there, all the time.
To recap, you are only synthesizing, bringing a few parts together, to make it seem like a new creation. We are talking about a bowl of soup. I don’t remember you creating the carrots. I don’t know why you are creating the peas. I don’t remember you creating the spices. You never create whatever you throw in. Five women can be given the same ingredients to make the same kind of soup, and each soup will taste different! I am sure the ladies know it. The same ingredients, the exact quantities, the same thing. However, they will taste different because of the personality of the person who makes the soup. For example, I get wind in my stomach if I eat a meal that is not cooked with great love. I get gaseous. I do not get those gases in the stomach if the food is created with love. This shows you how connected you are with everything, even with the soup you make, which gives it a different flavour and taste. Likewise, everything is connected in the universe, which is in impulse form. It is an impulse, one single impulse with various facets! And man can tap into any facet he likes.
Todd is a technician of computers. His tendency, his mind, is built that way. The deeper he can go into his mind, the more he will pick up and capture the thoughts of other people who might have similar thoughts. Those who might have thought those thoughts might not have brought it to completion, but through Todd’s determination, he can take those thoughts and get them to completion. Then we say Sir John Todd has created the most excellent computer in the world, the most advanced, like that. Thought has no impulse, and thought creates no impulse. The impulse of everything is always there. In lovemaking, the impulse of sex is there within you. It would be best if you were in the right circumstances, with the right frame of mind, the right person, perhaps, or whatever, and the impulse is brought into its physical action. But the impulse was there already. I don’t remember you creating the impulse. You have only brought it to its natural climax. The impulse is there, and the universe is nothing but an impulse.
That divine energy, which we call the impersonal God, condensed itself or instead manifested its energy, not in totality, into what we call the personal God. And within that energy of the personal God lies all the impulses possible; therefore, we call God almighty! Consequently, we call Him omnipresent or omniscient. Everywhere existent. To repeat, all the impulses are there.
Why can one person create something great, some in the same field create something mediocre, and some create something poorly? It depends not upon your intellectual capacity, and that is the greatest fallacy of modern psychotherapists and psychiatrists. The intellect, or the buddhi as we would call it, is only a vehicle that evaluates things. It is still coming from the personal God, the Atman or the Brahman, as you would like to call it. So, the intellect starts weighing.
Here lies the creation, or instead manifestation, of that impulse. You know that the Bible says the world was created in seven days, but I disagree with it. It was created in that one impulse in a flash of a moment. Then, it took millions of years to formulate itself. Like this earth breaking off from the sun and taking millions of years, vegetation grew after it cooled down sufficiently.
MANIFESTING THE IMPULSE
When the superconscious level of the mind finds clarity, clarity means connecting the conscious level to the superconscious level. The conscious level of the mind, the functioning, worldly functioning mind, forms that connection, so there is a direct line from that superconscious level to the conscious level, bypassing all the dirt and the rubbish in the subconscious. That impulse is picked up by the superconscious level of the mind and taken through Buddhi or intellect; however much it is developed, it transmits itself to the conscious mind, which we call the brain.
These impulses that are always there and non-created transmit themselves through the various brain cells, and I believe that according to scientists, there are twelve billion cells. I do not know which scientist counted them individually, but they say that. The more the brain cells are opened, the more the mind can filter through in thought formation. Impulses are eternal. They are there. They are never created, but they are manifested from the impersonal energy. For that, impersonal energy itself is an impulse, and by grossification, it becomes the personal God which is connected or is at one with the superconscious level of the mind. Then, it transmits it to the conscious mind through the intellect, depending on its development and capacity, IQ, or whatever you want to call it.
Then, the conscious mind feels it again but sends it back to the subconscious level of the mind to make comparisons. You take a teaspoon of sugar, and you say it is sweet. How do you know it is sweet? You think it is sweet. Because you are comparing it with other sweetness you have had, if a hypnotist puts you under hypnosis, in other words, he blocks out your conscious level, the analytical side of your mind, the left hemisphere. He will give you suggestions, provide you with a potato, and say, “You are eating a most delicious, beautiful apple.” The hypnotist puts that suggestion in your mind and makes you taste that potato as a lovely apple without using your consciousness because if you were using your consciousness, it would taste like a potato. The contact is made by suggestion to the subconscious mind where all the patterns are, and the subconscious mind knows these patterns because it has some knowledge of an apple.
Anyone can learn to hypnotize. It is something straightforward, but It is rubbish.
When a thought comes to the conscious level, your subconscious mind can convert it into something different because of its patterns. Like the very, very favourite saying of mine, which I have repeated a million times over but I love so much:
“Two men behind prison bars; one saw mud, the other saw stars.” Both are in the same circumstances, but one sees gloom because of his mental patterning, and the other sees glory because of his mental patterning.
By practising meditation, we can eliminate the samskaras, or unwanted patterns, significantly hindering our ability to think clearly.
BEING IN CONTROL OF THE IMPULSE
Impulses can be converted through the various layers I have mentioned into emotions, feelings, compulsions, obsessions, etc. Yet the source of the impulse is one. None different. How do you want to channel it? You have no choice. The more you choose to control that impulse that comes through in thought form, the stronger that thought form will be. If it is something obsessive, you have an obsession, then that obsession becomes deeper and deeper until you become either a psychotic or a neurotic or – but not exotic. So, that is how impulses work.
Man, with the tools in hand and his little thinking mind, can traverse this vast field and capture the universe in the palm of his hand. The poet William Blake says, “Capture infinity in an hour.” I say no, nonsense, capture infinity in a second. That is how you hold the entirety of the universe in the palm of your hand! Because you are in control of the impulses.
By control, I mean that the various channels that impulses have to go through have been clarified. Samskaras have been eradicated. The mind’s mental thinking and brain patterns have been repatterned. More than 90% of the ways of life are just habits. From habit, we go to the opposite. We become unhabitual.
Impulse is always there. There is one universal impulse you can realize and experience within yourself, but you can never verbalize it. Like electricity, for example. The light is burning here, giving light to this lovely room, but can you explain what electricity is? No one can. No scientist has, up until now, succeeded in describing it. You can explain it if you touch two open wires and get shocked. You would say, “Hey, I was shocked by electricity!” But yet, you do not know what the impulse behind the wires created the shock.
We live through life in a shocked state. We are neither going nor coming and do not know where we are. And that causes all the frustrations in life, all the miseries, all the anxieties, all these tensions, all the stresses, and all the strains.
There are two ways of tackling this problem. You can clarify the various levels of your mind through spiritual practices that are simple and easy. Spiritual practices bring that clarity to the conscious and subconscious mind until you reach the superconscious level of the mind. Or otherwise, you say all this can go to hell! And surrender. If I am in trouble or have difficulties, I would say to myself, or everyone else should say to themselves, that I created these difficulties and things. Seeing that I cannot overcome them, I put them at your feet, my Lord. You look after them because you were the primal impulse. You were the primal energy that created me or manifested me, that gave me this superconscious level of the mind and this subconscious mind and the conscious mind and this ugly face and all that! You are responsible, damn it! So, I surrender it to you! I wash my hands!” And you see that feeling of comfort that comes to you.
THE TRUE GURU
That is why a true guru always attracts sincere people to himself. Always. Because Divinity is abstract, they cannot conceive of it because it is abstract, and we can only think in concrete terms. Therefore, the chelas we have worldwide are sincere, symbolizing this little frail body and understanding, knowing, feeling and realizing that that divine force is flowing through the Guru to me. That does not mean worshipping, but it does imply love and devotion. It works both ways. If a guru does not love his chela, he cannot expect the chela to love him. If he has no devotion for the chela, he cannot expect devotion from the chela; otherwise, he is just nothing but a fake! His teachings symbolize us, what he has to say, and what power he imparts through the grace of God because, as I said, I am just like a piece of reed, a hollow piece of wood. He blows the music, and the world enjoys it. Do you think I am speaking to you here now? I am not; I am not saying to you. I, that little I, that little ego, I that has to do all the biological functions you have to do, eat, dress, go to the bathroom, all that? That little I? No. It is He who is speaking, not me.
Anything I say, I always talk from personal experience and never from books. For example, I do not know what question you will ask. You can ask questions because I do not speak from the conscious mind. Immediately, in that one minute of meditation, I connect myself to that superconscious layer where all knowledge is, all the impulses for thoughts, thoughts are expressions, perhaps not verbal, maybe not in symbol, but in a form, expressions. That is why any question can be answered. Because you are connected to the source of impulses, and that source cannot be explained in words.
When I talk to you, two things happen. I explain specific facts of life to you, show you different aspects and new perspectives of any given idea, and connect myself to the superconscious layer, pouring out that spiritual energy to you.
Two things are happening, and most of you who have taken various courses will bear me out: after the course, you feel that you are floating in the air.
Everyone within themselves is divine. But all these veils that we have built upon that Divinity is causing the darkness is not allowing the whole light of that bulb to shine through. Spiritual practices are the easiest way, and of course, the Guru, because of his total oneness with divinity, helps to give a push. Not the Guru. But that big Guru up there. That Granddaddy. He provides the push through His channels. To bring the impulse into reality would be like electricity in water. You call it hydroelectric power. You cannot bring it directly from the water to the bulb burning here. You need a generator that captures that hydroelectric power and sends it off to this town’s millions of lights.
That is all a guru does. He does not generate the power, although he is called a generator! He only captures the power and sends it off, sends off the impulse in the form of spiritual force and in the form of thought, which, in its final analysis, is nothing else but that one impulse!
What is speaking through me is that one impulse that is many-faceted. That impulse is like a diamond, which could never sparkle if all its facets are poorly polished. Then, it sparkles in its proper glory.
BE YOURSELF
People say, be like Christ, be like Buddha, be like Gururaj, be like anything. I say, be yourself; to be yourself, you have to know how to be here and now. Here and now! And here and now means that if the entire universe is just one impulse, one flash, then my sixty or seventy years or however long I am going to live is also but one flash. But, having captured that universal force or having some cognition of it in your conscious mind, you live for the moment. When I sit and eat, I become one with the food. The food and I are one. There is no difference.
… Gururaj Ananda Yogi: Satsang US 1984 – 45
