Sunshine Coast, Queensland, Australia
Final program October 2006
Today is the last public program in Queensland for this year and we appreciate your interest in coming to sit with me to listen and practice the amazing, great and wondrous technique of meditation. Before I would begin to talk anything, I would offer my prostrations with deep love and reverence at the Lotus Feet of my beloved Guru and seek refuge. Also we would greet you all with my love and blessings this evening.
In yoga marga, the path of spirituality, it is essential that when you sit for meditation and you practise meditation either you shall not have any intention at all – simply practise the method that the Guru says then also the mind can become quiet; automatically it will go towards God, to its origin, to its home, its abode. As always I emphasize the mind has no third place, no third way. Either it is in the world with imaginations and distractions or when it becomes quiet it will go towards God, its origin. There is no other such thing that the mind might go somewhere else if we do not direct it properly. So that is one assurance I can give you. Otherwise you can have a good intention, a noble intention of achieving a Supreme Peace, of going to God, obtaining the Divine’s Grace. You should have the highest intention. You want God because you want God, that should be the highest thing. Not that you want God to come in front of you to give any smaller things.
In the general stories we read about such people who did great sadhanas – amazing, ferocious and vigorous Tapas. Unfortunately sometimes their intentions were not proper, good or on the right direction. So such bad intentions, such wrong intentions can be dangerous and disastrous or at least may not lead you to anywhere. So that is important.
As we read in the stories of people like Ramana Sukra the demon king, or before that Hiranyakashipu a demon king in the nether world, who was the father of Lord Prahlada. Prahlada became a self Realized soul ultimately, was a great devotee of the Divine. He always adored and worshiped the great God as Narayana, a form of Vishnu. Though his father himself was a wicked person, was a demonic personality, he did such a great Tapas. When Ramana Sukra did Tapas he wanted to achieve victory over death for his physical body, his imagination of ‘I’ as the physical body. So then he wanted Brahma and the Divine and then he was guided to do Tapas in working the darshan manifestation of the Divine as Lord Shiva. So when Shiva first came he wanted his physical body to be immortal. The Divine said that is not possible he can take any other boon except that the body can never be immortal, it can never go on forever and end will always be there. You see that demonic foolish temperament – when people try to become too clever even with God, they ultimately cheat themselves. In spite of that, God told that the physical body cannot be immortal and cannot go forever – still he thought, “Let me try to be clever and remember all such things that can bring death to this physical body and then God will have to give me such a boon.”
So he went on asking for boons, “Let no Gods be able to kill,” that was his first thought in his wisdom – it is a God that was going to kill me. “God in any form should not be able to kill me in any such form,” he thought. In his own incarnations and also he said no animal, no angel, nothing should be able to kill me. But he had that ego; he did not consider human beings as worthy of fighting with him or that they would kill him. So when that thought came he thought it is nonsense, “If I have this boon ‘I should not be killed by human beings’, it is below my dignity, I’m not going to ask.” So his ego worked there also. That is what the story said. So he did not ask any boon that I should not be killed by human beings. So that is why in Ramayana it is said the Divine incarnated as a human being, as Shri Rama on this earth and ultimately Ramana got killed by Shri Rama. So that was how the end came disastrously for him and like Hiranyakashipu, who also did vigorous Tapas, which made Lord Shiva to manifest in front of him. So when you invoke Lord Shiva, Shiva will come or Vishnu will come. The Divine will manifest in any such form if you have such a resolution, but if you still have that ego or the wickedness so that you go only for such things, if you have any desires.
As always I tell people that you ask only for a small chocolate, you forget that the Divine wants to give the Divine itself; we should not compromise on that one. Hiranyakashipu asked and he thought he was going to be a little cleverer he said that,
“No creature should be able to kill me – either human being or angel or God. No weapons should be able to kill me and I should not be killed in the daytime, in the night”. He thought suddenly, “Someone is going to come and kill me.” He thought he was going to be very clever he asked for this boon and he asked he should not be killed on the ground or in air, like that he asked. He thought that some such angel or power might come. That fear was in him and ego worked and some God might come and cheat me, take me up into the air and kill me. In fact he asked for all such boons that he could obtain but finally in that story the Divine manifested as Narasimha – means that his body was of a human and his head was of a lion. He should not have been born or he should not have existed, so he manifested from a pillar. His son Prahlada was a very great devotee of the Lord Vishnu because when he was in the womb of his mother Saint Narada had visited their palace and he was talking about Vishnu’s name Narayana. He gave a discourse to his mother so in the womb it is said that the child listened to the discourse and his brain was so well developed, his mind was so sharp because of previous lives sadhana so he absorbed it. By birth, as a very young child he became a great devotee of Lord Krishna.
His father was a great demon; he thought his son is going to be like him. He wanted his son to be a cruel, wicked person like him. He would torture all his subjects put them to death, whoever wouldn’t listen to all such things. His son became a very noble boy; he always recited Lord Narayana’s name. But Hiranyakashipu wanted that everybody in this world, whoever was under his rule, would accept Hiranyakashipu as God. “I am that God,” he declared. So here we see that same ego again. When he declared “I am God” in his imagination his physical body, a narrow and small thing, he thought “I am that God”. He forgot that God is everywhere. He wanted to be called as God. Many of his subjects who where under his rule and out of fear of his powers as he had obtained a lot of such powers from God, they all accepted that nobody could kill him.
But his son was totally fearless that is important on the path of spirituality. Those who have that faith in the Divine Lord will always be fearless. That is the first important thing they act upon – not to please somebody else, they will worship God, not out of fear but for their own sake, out of love and attachment to God. He always recited, “Narayana, Narayana.”
Hiranyakashipu was disgusted about his son. In the story several times he tried to put him to death. He was so frustrated. “I don’t want this kind of son who is against me, who does not want to accept me as God. What is this ‘Narayana’ – it is total nonsense. There is no such deity called ‘Narayana’ – let him come in front of me.” He tried to put Prahlada into boiling oil, so God always protected him. He asked his servants and soldiers to take him to the mountain top and then push him down, so then God comes and holds him. So at all times he gets protected. In the end when he was summoned to the court where the Emperor Hiranyakashipu was sitting at the time and he challenges, “Today is the last moment! Either you show your Narayana or you accept that there is no such Narayana. Where is your Narayana?” Prahlada said, “Narayana is everywhere, he can come from anywhere.” “What is his form?”
“He can come in any form – there is no such restriction for him, he can manifest in any form at any moment.”
“Does he also exist in this pillar?”
“If he exists everywhere my Father, then he exists in this pillar also.”
“Let him come out of the pillar and invoke his blessings.”
So he went on reciting at all times, ‘Narayana, Narayana.’
Then the pillar broke into two pieces and the Divine manifested as Narasimha, half human and half as a lion-faced one, with his nails very strong. So he takes Hiranyakashipu onto his lap and sitting at the door step so that it was neither inside nor outside or on the ground or in the air – it was on his lap. There were no weapons and so he pieced his chest with his nail and killed that demon king.
The story goes that the ultimate spiritual truth is that the demons were actually Divine servants who had been cursed by a Yogi. Hiranyakashipu and his brother Hiranyaksha were two who had been cursed and told that, “You have to go and be born in the world as human beings.”
Then they prayed to the Lord, “How can this happen to us?”
He said, “Because it is a Yogi’s curse. You will have to go down – but I can modify the curse in such a way. If you want to go to earth and become my devotees, if you want to be worshiping me you will take more than 16 or 17 types of births. But if you become my enemies still you will be remembering me at all times out of fear but you can come back to me after 3 births on this earth. So legend says they then chose, “Let us be your enemies, my Lord, because we want to come back to you earlier.”
This story is told to help you to understand the spiritual significance of what can happen with bad intentions, when we try to cheat, to become too clever and too cunning in this world – we always cheat ourselves. Also if there is a bad intention such Tapas can go to waste and become dangerous and disastrous. So even though these demons could do long time of vigorous Tapas, they had such a desire – they wanted to keep their physical body intact and immortal at all times. They wanted power in this world; they wanted to torture with the power; they became egoistic because they had enormous ego in spite of the Tapas. They failed to get enlightened with the Divinity.
Finally the story said that because they had remembered God out of fear, there was a fear within them, there was a hatred. But they were remembering God alone so that’s why they got liberated when they got killed by God himself.
That is another thing but our spiritual lesson is this – that when you practice meditation either you shall not have any intention at all or you should have the highest intention – just like if you want peace, go for the Supreme Peace. Let that peace be at all times, all 24 hours 12 months. Ask to God, give me such peace. “May it happen according to your wishes My Lord. May you protect my wisdom, that my wisdom shall not give up your devotion. Let me be surrendering to you, take me to your lotus abode in the end. That is what we want. Whatever condition that you keep me in this world is no problem – may it happen according to your wishes my Lord.” That is how great devotees have prayed to the Divine. That is the basic principle of bhakti marga – the devotional practice of surrender, total surrender.
I keep talking in my talks that surrender means that the mind shall not go into any type of agitation or analyzing. Accept the things as they come. Yet again one should not misunderstand “let everything happen according to the Divine’s wishes”. This does not mean that we are going to sit in a corner quietly not doing anything. We have to do whatever we want in this world – whatever way of life that you have accepted, you need to do all such action. Repeatedly we try to explain about this because very often in this world people misunderstand this type of teaching – like destiny or the Divine’s wishes, due to the Divine, all such things. It is important that you act upon your own free choice and free will. Pray to God to guide you on the right path always. When you sometimes see human beings to be so helpless in this world, whatever instincts come, whatever things come to their mind they go on doing it. Whatever they come across they go on learning such things. Some also are fortunate to become noble and good people in this world. Some are not fortunate, some take a wrong path. Either they are born in such an atmosphere or in childhood they get into bad company or their own basic nature is such that in spite of proper good company some people can absorb negative things. If their observation power, understanding capability, are wrong, they might misunderstand a good thing also. A child can misunderstand a father or mother if the mother is pulling up the child, if the child is doing something wrong. The child might consider the parent as an enemy unknown to it. So that is the ability of the mind – if one is carrying since so many lives of the nobilities. That is why Adi Shankara talks that, “Satsanga is the greatest Tapas.” ‘Satsang‘ means the company of the noble and the right temperament people – Saints and Yogi’s. One should be the chosen one, the luckiest one in this world to have the company of a Yogi, to have the company of a Saint, to be able to sit even for a couple of hours at the feet of a Yogi – as Shri Krishna talks in his dhyana yoga and also Adi Shankara talks about the Guru. Though such a satsanga, such a company of the nobility, can keep you away from wrong company automatically, from the bad desires of this world. It will tune in your temperament to the nobility if you are constantly in the company of the Guru.
I keep telling that if you go in the midst of alcoholics they will also force you to drink the alcohol. If you go in between the drug addicts they will force you to have the drugs according to them. That is the right path for them, though it is such a wrong and dangerous path. If you are going in the midst of such people who worship God, who practice meditation, who talk about God, so they will try and tune in your temperament also to such a thing only. So that is the importance and effect of the company. If you come into my company I will always talk about God, meditation – all these only. I cannot talk anything else I don’t know anything else in the world; that is the important thing. When you are away from the bad company your mind shall remain detached from all wrong things automatically. There should not be any more attachment to the wrong desires and things. The moment the mind becomes detached from all wrong things, all such desires, when it gives up all such imaginations it is automatically in the Tatva.
In ancient times, very, very ancient times called the Rig Vedic era, before people knew God in the forms of Brahma, Vishnu, Maheshwara and all such, they called God as ‘Tatva’. ‘Tatva’ means ‘tat‘, simply that. When they realized those Great sages as Vishwamitra who composed the Gayatri Mantra, as he talks ‘Tat Savitur Varenyam’ that is what it means. ‘Tatva‘ is not an inert thing; it is as powerful as sun itself. ‘Savita‘ is ‘sun’; ‘Varenyam‘ – ‘equivalently powerful’.
‘Bhargo Devasya Dhimahi’ – they called that Tatva is Divine in nature. That is how the name of God and Divinity came. Why it is Divine? If we adopt in our mind’s consciousness, the God consciousness; remembering God, all our sins and unhappiness will be washed away once for all. So that is the basic requirement of every human being, every mind, every soul in this world, every creature perhaps – Happiness, if the unhappiness can be washed away. So if we remember God, ‘Bhargo Devasya Demahi’ that’s what they said. Here also in this small mantra the meaning comes that they simply pray to God to inspire the wisdom.
‘Dhiyo Yonah Prachodayat’ – to put in efforts to obtain your grace and to reach your Lotus Feet. They did not say, “Let me simply be eating and sleeping, and you please give me blessings so I can reach you easily by short cut method.” They prayed to put in efforts, “Inspire my wisdom.” Inspiration is such an important thing for every human being. If there is no inspiration you would not like to move on this path or any path. Wherever you feel inspired – the bad people are inspired by bad things so they move on the bad path swiftly. The good people are always inspired by good things, so that is why you have to draw inspiration from the elders, from parents, from the Guru’s and from Yogi’s, from God. ‘Dhiyo Yonah Prachodayat’ – means, “Please inspire my wisdom, my Lord.”
That is meaning of the prayer of the Gayatri Mantra. Anybody can pray this directly to God. So that is how they prayed.
When the mental consciousness gets tuned into the Divine, automatically without confusion all such consciousness is tuned into the Divine, so then you are automatically that Liberated one. Means that your mind gets Liberated in every way from all confusion, from all fear, all unhappiness, all tension, everything gets liberated. Ultimately from the bondage of this body also. It does not have to be born, it does not have to die. It is always immortal as one eternal soul. That is how it gets Enlightened.
In ancient scriptures they have spoken of two stages of the Yogi. Jivanmukti and Videhamukti. Jivanmukti means while alive in physical body, the one who has Liberated himself. The Enlightened one he is called the Jivanmukti – means the Liberated one. Videhamukti when the physical body gets dropped then he is not reborn again because he has not got desires or imagination, he becomes one with the Divine. That is why when a Yogi drops his physical body it is normally said that such a Saint, such a Yogi obtained Mahasamadhi. ‘Obtaining Mahasamadhi‘ means his mind is always into Sahaja Samadhi – means natural stand-stillness without effort. That is what one has to achieve in Tapas. Until one’s mind does not stop into the Self totally, does not remain contented into this total stand-stillness. Finally and effortlessly it stays there. You don’t have to put in your effort to keep your mind tuned into God. Once it has become one with God it’s automatically there. As a Yogi when he talks he will be bringing up his mental consciousness. As you all keep asking these questions to me, “What is your mind?”, “What are your experiences?”, How do you live?”, “How do you do this, that, everything?” … a Yogi has to bring the mind upwards to the consciousness so that he can use the brain a little bit. So you see to talk this much for half an hour or so, and have to use these terminologies, I have to use a certain amount of imagination, because the experience of the Ultimate Truth is beyond all imaginations. Impossible to give it as it is. It is just like nobody can define the space as it is, the more we try to define the space we are going to limit the space. “How long it is?”, “How wide it is?”, “What are its habits?” You never know. ‘Ananta‘ the sages called it – means ‘boundless one’. That’s how God is. Galaxy after galaxy – you keep going and the space continues and continues.
So even Purandara Dasa – the story that we learned yesterday. In one of his songs he talks, “It is such a great magic, great wonder of wonders, that you have done. It is so difficult to understand whether this illusion is in you, or you are in this illusion.” Sometimes it appears so when you see this physical body it appears that the soul is inside, but if one becomes realized, this body is inside the soul. That ‘I’ is all-pervading; this body is inside. Just like you hold an oven pot or a glass that is empty. If you look inside space, it seems to be inside that glass. But the truth is, that the glass exists in the space. So that is how one day when I was trying to contemplate on the Divine, suddenly we realized the Ultimate Truth is this space. Space is our ‘real’ form, space is what is God. If we are thinking space as a void, then that is because of our imagination, a long time feeling of such terminology. All these things have been spoken in the Vedas and Upanishads – it said the Divine is holding the entire creation in its womb. Let me call the Divine as ‘It’, otherwise some people will say why should God always be addressed as him, why not her? Let there be no such confusion – it is beyond all such genders. The Divine is holding the entire creation in its womb – that is amazing. You see the space is holding this entire creation, nothing can go beyond space. Whatever is, it has to be in the space only – it cannot go beyond the space. Even if you can remove all of the object matter, remove the earth, remove the sun, everything – still the space will be. In Yoga Vasistha talking about the Divinity Vasistha gives a beautiful clue he tells, “Apart from that, it is all pervading, omnipotent and omnipresent.” These are the terminologies. Those who were familiar with the yogic scriptures would definitely have heard these things. He talks that it exists in itself. This is an amazing clue. If you look into it, suppose in front of us all the object matters are there and space. Only the space has such a quality to exist in itself. It does not require anything else for its existence. If you remove everything – even oxygen – simply the space exists. It does not even require oxygen for its existence. Everything else requires space, without space nothing can exist. Today in this world there is so much of competition, so much of struggle, so much of fight, so much of conflict for this space. “This is mine, this is not mine. This is yours, this is mine,” we draw a line – everything we try to divide in this world. It makes me to laugh at the way people are into conflicts “My Lord, everything is yours. It is you. Just in one moment of shock you can finish everything – the earth can come to an end, and sun can come to an end. Kabir Das, a great Saint talks, “This entire world is a village of dead bodies”, he says. “Who is alive? Even the emperor dies, subjects die, sun dies, the stars will also die, and earth will also die. The one who dies if he goes back to you is the alive one all the time. Even the 14 worlds created, like Brahma, Vishnu, and Maheshwara they will also die, if they are holding any physical body they will have to drop it.”
‘The Parabrahma‘ is how they address the Divine – ‘the One beyond all imaginations’, ‘Paramatma‘ – Supreme Being. So these are some the points of the Yoga and what you can achieve apart from the normal things of life like peace, happiness, overcome the fear, stress of the life, overcoming all the confusions. That you can achieve and lead such a wonderful and better life on this earth, if you simply practice even half to one hour per day. Intention is important, either you shall not have any intention at all, quietly practice as we say or try to have the best intention to achieve the supreme peace, the highest thing.
Life on this earth can always go on for all of us. Sometimes it is happy, sometimes it is unhappy – it is like that only. It is the attitude of the mind that can give us happiness or unhappiness. Otherwise the mind has to be at peace; if there is no peace, there is no peace in the mind. If there is no peace in the mind, there is no peace for you. The mind has to be peaceful that is all. That is why we tell in this world, so many of us keep giving big talks, long talks and so on about peace but we do not have peace in the world because we do not practice peace. Practice is very important – practice is the thing that can make you perfect and bring you out of all such wrong habits that the mind would have picked up from time immemorial. Practice, practice, practice this is what all Gurus have spoken. Shri Krishna has spoken, the Lord has spoken, and everyone has spoken. By practice only the mind has gone out of control, by practice only you can bring it back.
Questions & Answers
Question:
Could you please talk more about the ego and action and non-action? Like it seems as though in everyday life even though we may be questing for a spiritual path the ego can be involved in non-action as much as in action and sometimes if we decide not to do anything but to just be, then there is that risk of lethargy. There seems to be as much ego in action or non-action.
Babaji:
Whereas spiritually every imagination is considered as an ego ultimately, however while we have to live in this world it cannot be classified like that. There can be good and bad, right and wrong so whatever comes to the imagination, whatever we think that this might be right, this might be correct – based on that only we have to act. When there are imaginations only then we will act upon. If the brain and mind becomes dull then sometimes it might become very difficult to take a judgement or decide whether to act or not. However what you have to do is whatever you think right. Whatever you want to achieve you can live in this world a way of life that you would have adopted. You have a right to defend yourself; you have a right to think for yourself what is right. So one thing is that if you practice this meditation regularly an ability to do this will come into your mind. Ultimately it all depends on the ability to think, to judge, to understand what is right and what is wrong. Based on these things only ego and right and wrong things are always decided. Sometimes when ego means one simple understanding that if there is ego, we do not want to learn things. Ignorance itself is not a curse, it is not a sin, and it is natural for everyone. Everyone will be in ignorance – then only they come to knowledge and understand. As long as one is able to learn, learn from the history, from the mythical stories, learn from our own past. The past is meant so that we can learn lessons not to repeat the same mistakes. No need to be brooding about the past. Future is meant that we can always plan. But we need not be anxious – so that is how one can avoid ego. So if we do not act, if we try to remain quiet and expect results that also is an ego. So that is why we always tell that you need to act upon – you cannot afford to keep quiet – whatever you feel right. So this will be according to your ability. Ultimately, the mind, if it is more purified and if it is more concentrated, then you will be able to consider a larger cause always and try to act accordingly sacrificing the personal narrow-mindedness. Just like when we think that we need to have happiness and peace, if we think of the whole home, think of the whole society, if we are able to think of the world and country, as much as possible. Like even while praying to God, we should pray ‘Loka Samasta Sukhino Bhavantu’ we don’t know how many worlds the Divine would have created but let there be peace and happiness prevailing everywhere for all creatures. Like that gradually our vision, mind and consciousness expand into broadness. So the more the mind becomes broad its ego decreases, less and less ego happens so we are able to consider a larger cause. So then you would be able to avoid ego as much as possible if you always try to look for a larger cause and better education and better learning for yourself. These types of things can always help you to avoid ego in a better way.
Question:
What if through our practice, our practice or empowerment we are disorientated or we find disorientation from an outside force? We try to empower our beliefs but we are disorientated by forces that we don’t understand. We believe in ourselves, we believe in universal law but we find in our energy or we find something new in the picture, something new to us.
Babaji:
This is actually the Divine energy it is working throughout the universe and the entire creation – you will be able to realize by practicing this meditation. By practicing this meditation you are not going to be become selfish or doing something for yourself only. First you are gaining the best education, the best understanding about yourself; you will be able to face the challenges of these energies that are outside that you do not understand. Just like for example, you would be putting in your efforts to the best of your ability. Sometimes the results do not happen according to your expectations. Sometimes it might happen according to your expectations, sometimes it may not happen according to your expectations. But you have done your duty whatever is in your hands the rest if it is beyond your control you will have to simply accept such a thing that comes. That is when the mind becomes peaceful otherwise there is no peace at all. Always there can be confusion to tackle this outside energy. The same energy that is inside is outside also. Once you’ve become more energetic and more composed and more peaceful in the mind you will be able to understand this energy that is outside also and at all times you will be able to have that peace and tranquility.
Question:
What happens when there is indecision?
Babaji:
So that is when the confusion occurs. We do understand it can happen to anyone very often in the life. That is what I was trying to tell when you practice meditation, when the mind becomes more concentrated, more purified there is less confusion. You will be able to take such a decision coming out of the confusion and you would not regret. Based on a larger cause as much as possible you would be able to have a longer vision for yourself also. You would be able to exercise a lot of patience, you shall not take any decision in a rush or a hurry. You see always when you get into a strong annoyance or a hatred or a jealousy or any such excitement, nervousness, that when most of the time the mind is confused. You are unable to take a decision – “What is happening to me? What should I be doing?” Everywhere a doubt might occur, mistrust might occur. So ultimately if you can keep your mind composed and cool and think. That is why we tell that this meditation can help you to face the challenges of life in a better way. You would be able to coolly think for yourself and others and be able to arrive at a better decision. You would come out of the confusion.
Question:
Could you explain the kundalini?
Babaji:
Kundalini, very often I have spoken about this. You might have heard this word from scriptures and talks. Kundalini is made up of the same substance as the mind; pure consciousness is its substance. It is beyond form and formlessness, infinite like the mind itself is so infinite. You cannot show it to somebody – ‘This is my mind, and this is the color and this is the shape.’ Simply based on the thoughts that have gone into the universe you recognize that portion as the mind. Another portion of the same consciousness has gone into the body and is coiled as the energetic force which has given you body consciousness You are so much conscious of the body, the potency is so strong you simply cannot remove it. The mind is sucked, consciousness and the body consciousness is also so strong. So when you practice sadhana, the sadhak – meaning the one who has to practice meditation – is advised not to bother or think about kundalini; you just have to bother about the mind. Because compared to kundalini, mind is more powerful. It is widely spread in the universe, in billions of pieces. When it becomes concentrated, it automatically lifts this body consciousness called kundalini, coiled energy. It is coiled in a smaller space like the body. So they both become one single piece and then are de-linked from the brain’s reflections and go towards Samadhi to get absorbed into the Self. This is what happens actually, but kundalini itself cannot bring this mind back. Mind, if it does not become detached from the universe, will never come back. It will always be attracted to the illusions. People keep talking supernatural powers and all such things. They are all really useless compared to the Divine itself, compared to supreme peace and Self Realization. So even if by some means one tries to raise this kundalini, the mind does not come back – it will fall back down and enormous lust and greed can get created with excitement. So that is when during meditation also one can feel that energy movement – that consciousness itself is an enormously energetic thing. That is why the enormous energy is there in the Divine also. In the mind also so much of energy is there. So in the same way the kundalini is also very energetic. If both can become one piece then it becomes easy to go to Samadhi.
Question:
Baba earlier today you spoke about when our mission here is completed we will leave our body, we will die. Baba – A Yogi’s? What I was going to ask – is there some higher significance to the timing of our death or is it completely random as it seems?
Babaji:
It is very difficult to give a conclusive answer. This is based on the symptoms as is widely always assumed. That the Divine’s ordainment is that a Yogi is always working and when the end happens to the physical body so that Yogi’s mission is complete. The Mission will be carried on by the disciples – the next generations. So that’s why the body gets dropped. This is a common thing. The body has to get dropped at some time – that is the important and true thing. It might happen tomorrow, it might happen 10 years later, nobody knows. The Yogi also does not assume any such thing. It is something like remaining in a deep sleep – suddenly one day the body falls, that is all. The Yogi also does not think or try to visualize, “When will God want to take away this body? Is there any such work, any ordainment as long as the body is there?” The Yogi is absorbed in the Divinity and it goes on working and one day the body gets dropped. So we will have to assume that the mission is over and as many people who were supposed to come and receive blessings came. They have received as much as they are supposed to see the Yogi in a physical body they see and then finish. You can consider that it happens at random.
Question:
Are humans superior to animals?
Babaji;
At least as long as this brain is concerned. You see you become superior to the animals because it is the humans who have the well-developed brain. You are able to think, right, wrong, real and unreal, able to discriminate. All other creatures, the animals, their mind works only on instincts. Generation after generation they pick up instincts to earn their livelihood, hunt and find the food. Once their belly is filled they won’t bother about anything else. Happiness or unhappiness they will simply be there. Once they are hungry at that time they don’t think anything else. Humans have an edge over all other creatures because of their brain, their thinking capacity. Such a big elephant and such a big tiger enormously powerful – even with their size they can hit the human and break the skull. Physically human strength is nothing; but using their brain with a small bullet they are able to kill such a big elephant or tiger. They are ruling the world. So in that way the human life is more superior definitely. So that is why human life is the very rarest of rare gems that one has obtained, one must utilize to feel more responsible to other creatures, to fellow beings on this earth, utilize this opportunity to realize our own selves, how we exist as the immortal soul and try to be tuned into God as much as possible.
Question:
Baba, when some people meditate they have jerky movements and their face contorts and jump around, why does that happen?
Babaji:
Because of some energy movement some people might get excited and might do that one, but that must be avoided during meditation. Body needs to be totally composed and unmoved, practice as much as possible. Only then the mind can become totally concentrated and go introverted otherwise when there is so much of jerk to the physical body, the mind will get more excited in a blissful state and get more excited and jump back and get distracted again with enormous lust and greed – this can happen. So one must take care to remain unmoved throughout the meditation. The highest thing is to achieve the peace.
Question:
When I go to meditation I almost get to the stage when I’m not breathing. Should I be more conscious of the breath?
Babaji:
Yes, breathe little bit that should not totally stop. Gradually in due course of time by automatic practice you will be able to do the breathing, inhale and exhale and you will be able to concentrate. Until then you become conscious of the breathing. You try to practice a couple of these breathing exercises that we teach before going to meditation that will be helpful for you.
Question:
So when I go into a deep meditation I just cease to breath?
Babaji:
It should not cease actually – practice, that is not proper.
Question:
Sorry to ask again, but say another being comes into life, another form, we pray to our higher power, we pray to our higher being like a Yogi of wisdom and of knowledge. We believe in life and believe in cherishing life of humanity and the strength of humanity is the well being, is the peace of humanity in human life that we strengthen and that we empower. If another being questioned this, if another being challenged this, another being threatened this. Why would we respect that being, how would we not empower that being?
Babaji:
There is one important thing as we told – as human being we have the ability to think. Suppose there is an animal, it might be remaining with kids or cubs, whatever it is, if you are going towards the animal, the animal is unable to think whether you are a friend or a foe – it doesn’t have the discrimination capacity. Based on the instinct of fear it will instantly attack you so that’s what happens. But it is human beings who can plan, who can think. You see even in this human world also, in jurisdiction a planned murder is totally different to when a person tries to defend himself – it is totally different. When you are faced with such danger when you have to defend yourself that is alright, that is no problem. But just out of our own greed or madness we should not be destroying other creatures. That is what responsibility we need to exercise. Suppose amongst human beings also if one person is more sane and another person behaving insanely, in a foolish way, in a less dignified way, the more dignified person would try to cool that person, try to make him understand. Only when everything else fails one will have to take the action of defending one’s own. If you are physically in danger, you always have a right to defend yourself at that time. But even whether you are not out of greed, it is we human beings – we try to attack other things, other creatures. We try to destroy indiscriminately, we do not think. For a simple example based on this question you will all understand. In ancient times in India saints and Yogi’s used to wear tiger skin and sit on a tiger skin and practice meditation. This has been a traditional practice so many people have asked me this question – “Why is it that you are not using a tiger skin? Why is it that a Saint, a Yogi has to use a tiger skin?”
In my opinion, in my answer long, long ago human beings perhaps were not as greedy as they are today. Hunting used to be done by a royal clan or the hunting clan and they knew to maintain the ecological balance. Gradually as the time has passed human beings have become totally greedy, they have gone into total destruction. So today if we think of sitting on a tiger skin it may be unacceptable to human values. It is not proper to kill an animal so that I have to sit on a tiger skin. Because to meditation what is needed is to control the mind – we can sit on a gunny bag and do the meditation. So I am trying to give an example of human greed and human responsibility, so we can all understand.
Question:
I was just thinking about the earlier question. It almost sounds like a trance. Is there a difference between trance like when you are in hypnosis, when your breathing slows down so much you are in a trance? Meditation is different.
Babaji:
Yes, meditation is totally different, trance is totally different. I will try to give a few words about this. In India this trance is known as ‘bhava samadhi’. English word ‘trance’ is the nearest word – that is why it is used probably. I don’t know exactly the meaning of ‘trance’ in English. Perhaps, what I have heard that ‘trance’ would give the meaning as if you are being possessed by another soul, this type of thing. This is not correct actually – spiritually this has no significance, and this has no truth also. Bhava samadhi means; ‘bhava‘ means your mind’s feelings, emotional feelings, ‘samadhi‘ is total stand-stillness.
‘Meditation’ is you rise above all type of bhava, go into a true Samadhi. But if one person is emotional, is trying to go on a bhakti marga so such a person, if long time devotional practice has happened, such a person can go into a bhava samadhi. This means his mind can go into stand-stillness into one type of imagination. Just like for example if you become suddenly devoted to Baba on your own, unknown to you, you have developed a devotion, you are highly emotional out of devotion; so when a song is sung in front of Baba or when you come in front of Baba, so you are likely to become more excited but yet you might be having a vision of Baba within your mind – all these things might be happening. At that time a person might be having a jerk and excitement and the body might move with so much blissfulness. This is like a preliminary round before going to the actual meditation. In meditation you have to achieve total composure of the mind, beyond all these emotions. The body movements also have to become totally composed. So through meditation you achieve the highest thing. In simple words – ‘bhava samadhi’ is like giving chocolate to a child to make it to go to school – to give you a lollipop to make you to go to the spiritual school and eventually practice meditation. So one has to understand that is what it is. Very often people might get stuck with lollipops only and not go to the spiritual school – so such people cannot reach the spiritual heights. Meditation is the thing that can help you to achieve the right things.
Question:
Sometimes when you get the concentration, the focus, and your mind is absolutely concentrated and mind is not connected to the brain also. Not connected means it has the awareness but again its concentration is quite powerful and the body gets jerked, like a feeling that you are falling but again it comes back
Babaji:
Occasionally this type of experience might happen during advanced meditation. Some currents pass when the jerk happens, at that time the body might quietly jerk and it will come back into that position. That is why perhaps in ancient times those sages tried to adopt some postures that the body shall not fall; even in the state of Samadhi the body can simply fall sometimes. But it will not be a sleepy state, it will not be a trance type of excitement state – it is simply currents passing. Such a person would not be claiming anything, would not be behaving in any such manner, would not be dancing or giving such jerks. It would be simply a quick jerk and come back, that type of thing. You can tell that when the energy movement is there the mind is becoming totally concentrated; the body consciousness is also getting lifted upward, so this type of currents might pass through.
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