A Second talk given by Babaji in London, June 2005

Spirituality alerts us to the fact that happiness and peace are elusive in this world and should not be sought there. It does not impose on anyone that you don’t do this or that. You can do anything – if you want to earn a billion dollars you can, no problem. It simply alerts us to the fact that you cannot depend for your happiness on this universe – including your own physical body – because everything is transitory; it ends, it is not permanent. When you go back to the Self, which is permanent, only then will you be able to have that Peace permanently, that is what is recommended. So whatever you want to do, do it. Even if you want to gain material worth – but if you can do that work sincerely then by the time you reach it you will have lost all interests and desires. That is what happens.

My Guru, as a child, He understood that there were poor people; because His mother was working, His father had passed away when He was only 6 months old. So at the age of five He realised they were poor and that His mother was working very hard. So He thought, “My mother is not going to work, I will look after and give comfort to my mother. I will not go to the school, I will work.” So He dropped out of school. He was born into a weaver’s family so He started working the next day. His uncle had taught Him that poverty is not a sin to be ashamed of; it is only a circumstance of status. Through hard work and honesty one can overcome. So He thought that He would become a good businessman and look after His family and mother. He was so hardworking and honest. In the time it would take one person to make one sari and one dhoti He would do two in the same time. After four or five years He had opened a small shop. At the age of twelve or thirteen, when others of His age would be playing and gossiping, He was earning. But the Divine had other plans. Not only one family but the entire world family was waiting for Him. So He was ordained to sit for Tapas. Suddenly the Divine appeared from the fruit as He was trying to squeeze out the juice. His idea was to take the juice – He did not think of God. But because of His previous lives, His samskaras, so the Divine appeared before Him in the form of a sannyasi with matted hair and made Him sit for tapas.

Swami used to recollect, “Tapas is such a tough thing.” Even for such a mighty soul. One day, two or three months after He had started Tapas, He began crying. When He was sitting in the village, the village urchins troubled Him by throwing stones and mud and they even put kerosene oil on His legs and set it alight so His legs were all burnt. His mother was looking after Him when He was in Tapas. Then He moved to the graveyard thinking the urchins would be afraid to go there. But He had to face other types of problems. It was the rainy season in August 1949 so it was mud all over; He was sitting in the mud. His skin began to decay and a lot of scorpions and rodents used to bite Him, thus it became difficult for Him to keep the mind in Samadhi. Then one night He thought, “Why should I be sitting here like a dead person? I must go back and do business and earn something and look after my family. I didn’t expect anyone or call anyone, I don’t know who that gentleman sannyasi who made me sit in Tapas like this.” Thinking like this He got up and started walking. He came to the graveyard gates. The same sannyasi was standing there and said to Him, “You have to do this Tapas for twelve years. You were born for this purpose – until then I’m not going to allow you to go anywhere. After this twelve years you can do anything you want. You can still do business. You can do whatever you want to do.” With that Swamiji, the little boy, came back determined, “OK, if that is the case now I will finish this twelve years of Tapas. Either I will die in this process or come out successful and then let me be.” Like that it went on for twelve long years. So many tests came; it was a very vigorous exercise. In the end Lord Shiva and Parvati appeared and told Him, “Your Tapas is over. Your mind has reached the Nirvikalpa Samadhi. Now you can go anywhere you want. Whatever you want to do, you can do.”

Swamiji said, “I don’t have any desires left at all. I don’t feel like doing anything. I don’t have anything in my mind’s imagination. So whatever you want me to do, I shall do that.”

So Lord Shiva ordained, “You teach this meditation to the people of the world who have forgotten about themselves. That is why they are miserable. They have forgotten the words of the Divine and they need to know who they are and their problems will be solved. So teach this mind control on which you have achieved mastery.”

This is how my Guru used to talk. So once you reach there all desires are fulfilled, there’s nothing else left. So when you’re Realised it means you become a Jnani. You come to know of this thing, after knowing you need not know anything. If I say, “I am the knower of the Truth,” It doesn’t mean I must know all the street names in London. I may not know anything, but I know about God. After that there is no need to know anything. That’s what it means to be Realised.

Questions and Answers

Question: Babaji, You speak about God being connected to the space, is this correct?

Babaji: Due to what we have been taught some feelings have been given about space, void, emptiness and such. That is why, if I say that this space is nothing but God, people may laugh. That is why you have to experience that this is not an inert voidness – it is Supreme Consciousness. Just like inside an earthenware pot the space is a Soul, but in reality the same Soul or Self is everywhere. The same Soul is within and outside also. That is what is meant when people talk about ‘all-pervading’. You also think, “If it is all pervading, it has to be at every place.” According to physics no two things can occupy the same space, so it has to be God. ‘Space’ and ‘God’ cannot be together in one place. Either it has to be the space and not God, or it has to be God. So that is how the Divine is all-pervading. That is what it means. Simply because we do not know how to recognise or communicate, to communicate with this space called God means through the mind. That is the clue, your own mind. When it’s concentrated without resolutions then your mind can go back and experience Self, as the consciousness expands.

As long as you proceed you want to imagine God. When you experience God that imagination also will have gone. A single Self exists. That is why so many terminologies have been used by different people, Self-Realised souls. Some have used the term as ‘God’, some have used the term ‘Self Realisation’. They are all the same – the Real Self or God – it’s all the same. Whether you imagine it or don’t imagine it, it’s all the same. You can experience only when you go beyond imagination. As long as there is imagination you are likely to get confused.

A Guru trying to teach for the sake of understanding has to imagine and use these terminologies; otherwise it’s impossible to teach. That is how the Advaita was also taught by imaginations only. The skill part the Guru has to imagine and teach. When you imagine only, you can invent some terminologies and teach. Ultimately the Guru advises you to experience. Don’t pick anything else, it will confuse you. In the Yoga Vasishta discourse to Shri Rama, after Shri Rama and Laksmana had come back from a pilgrimage, Sri Rama was quite depressed. The sage Vishwamitra came to take Shri Rama and Laksmana to ask them to protect his fire sacrifice. At first Dasaratha, the king and their father, refuses. He says that he and his army can come and protect the fire sacrifice instead. But Vishwamitra demands, “If you send only Rama and Laksmana that is OK. Otherwise I shall go then.” The sage Vasishta says, “Please send Rama and Laksmana with them. You don’t know the powers of Rama.” Then the chamberlain adds, “Ever since he came back from the pilgrimage Shri Rama does not talk to anyone, he does not smile at all, he has stopped eating properly. Quietly he is absorbed into some unknown path.” So then Vasishta tells the court, “Let me talk to him.” When Shri Rama comes to the court, Vasishta asks, “What has happened to you? Please explain it to me.”

Then he talks of his detachment. “What is this world? What am I? What is life? What is the purpose of life? Even when I am eating, one day I have to die. If I don’t eat, also I have die. If I like it or not, I have to sleep, I have to eat, where is the liberation then? When I am forced to do everything?” So, like this he talks, whilst all are listening. Then Vasishta teaches him the Yoga – what the Self is, the mind and its imagination and space.
That’s basically what he teaches him. All the mind and its imaginations can be a problem. As long as the mind imagines, it doesn’t reveal the Truth. Once you are able to control the mind and lose all its imaginations, then you will know who you are.

At the end of those discourses on the seventh day, Shri Rama became Realised as at the end Vasishha tells him, “All these days that I was discoursing are also not true. All thoughts. There are no conclusive answers, so do not imagine anything. Just become still and Realised and then go about in this world.”

Question: Is it possible to practice this meditation and also manage to live in this world, to manage a family and work?

Babaji: This is a good question. It can come to any household that a person can remain in that way of life, it will definitely not harm. After Realisation, the mission is like a family for me. Though I don’t have a wife and children, I have hundreds of children all over the world that I have to look after. Their mental turmoil, their questions, their stress and agonies. So we are able to fulfil all the duties, we keep working. So it will not be a detriment even if you practice one hour of meditation every day. You will not lose your mind or memory or any such thing. You will simply be taking control of the mind.

Whenever you want to think, you can think in this world and live; when you don’t want to think you can keep it under control at peace. Just like when you want to drive a car you can take it out of the garage, you can drive all over London. When you want to stop it, stop it, and bring it into the garage, that is all. If you are not using it to think from morning to evening you will be working very hard and you will be tired, you will want to take rest, you come back. It’s easy to bring the physical body home. You can make it sit on the sofa comfortably or even better lie down on the sofa, but it’s not easy to bring back the mind. If the mind is worried it will be always wondering, wondering. You want peace, you want to lie down, you can lie down physically but not mentally. But with the practice of meditation it is possible.

When you want to think you can think and when you don’t want to think you can keep quiet. In the same way a Yogi applies a little bit of consciousness to use the brain and be alive in this body and live in this world and work. This is why I keep saying, unknown to you, you are using your mental consciousness much, much more than is really required to live in this world. You can live with one pound of consciousness but you are spending thousands of pounds unnecessarily. That is what creates the mental turmoils, tension, fear, anxiousness, all these things. So by practicing meditation you can be a very normal person and can overcome all types of tension, anxiousness and you can put your mind at peace.

You can enhance your memory power also. What I like to say is concentration is required in studies, in a job, on the sports field, everywhere concentration is required. If you practice this meditation, all of you can live like a genius. A genius technically means the one who can apply the brains. But if you can apply one hundred percent concentration while trying to achieve something then you are able to observe the truth of anything you are trying to achieve. If you are trying to study then you can absorb the right meaning of the studies that you undertake, and in the everyday life if you want to achieve something in your life you can obtain the maximum, the best results. Your efforts should be to the best of your ability and concentration. Concentration really matters much in this world. Just like if your mind and concentration is here, you will understand what Babaji is saying, otherwise if your mind is roaming in some sports field or in a shopping complex while you’re sitting here then your concentration will get distracted.

This is the basic aim of meditation, to teach concentration; because this mind belongs to God, just like the Sun’s rays belong to the Sun. The mind’s ultimate truth is God. So if you worship God and remember God you can achieve total Peace and Happiness always in your life, you will be more successful in this world, you will lead an effective life. So you must understand how important it is for you all, your mind and its concentration. If you achieve concentration you should be master of your mind, otherwise the mind can disintegrate and go into craziness and unhappiness and all these things.

This is why our forefathers in this world gave us a religion, why we should be religious people. We all might wonder, “Why do we need God?” We need to keep our physical health, mental health and moral health also. We all want the physical health to be best. Only then we can be happy. Even if there is some slight pain somewhere in the body we run to the doctor. In the same way one needs to understand the pain of the mind. When the mind goes into tension and turmoil one will not notice it quickly, but yet, if you have been experiencing any tension in the time of examinations, or facing any tests, or any desires in this world then you will definitely understand. But if you practice this meditation from this very day then you will be able to concentrate and achieve the mind control best and God will always listen to your prayer. Whatever you want He will do it for you, but you have to have the faith and concentration of the mind.

Question: Does the meditation have any affect on the surroundings or the people around you?

Babaji: Yes, definitely. It will make the atmosphere more sanctified. The Divine’s manifestations and the Divine’s vibrations can be felt in a much better way. If there are ten people, twenty people all trying to meditate together then that atmosphere will be charged with energy, that is ‘the company of the good’.


Question: Will meditation help us to make decisions about our lives and what we should do, the choices we make?

Babaji: When you meditate and practice you gain control over your mind and you will not be confused in trying to make a choice. What happens when we try and make a choice we are always afraid of the results that come. This makes us confused about whether one is making the right choice or wrong choice. You won’t regret once you make a choice. Before making that choice you will be able to think well, monitor your own mind, what your mind really wants and go for that option and achieve it. With the last breathe of life you put in your efforts. Achieving itself is not that important, more important is your efforts, concentration with devotion. The mind will tell you the right thing always; you won’t be doing the wrong thing.


Question: Where does this world come from?

BABA: Ultimately it’s the projection of the mind, the illusion. Even as we sit here, everybody’s mind will be constantly picturising and visualising something. It cannot keep quiet even for a moment. Even when I am talking, you will be daydreaming. Whatever it pictures, the same thing appears to you in the mind, so if its strength increases with more concentration then try to imagine that same picture more and more, the same picture will appear to you more solidly. Just like in dreams also sometimes the dreams are very strong and solid pictures. You won’t be able to forget such dreams for days or months. Sometimes the dreams may be a blurred picture, you will have forgotten it by the time you get up in the morning. It all depends on the concentration of the mind as it projects. So imagine the energy of the Divine Consciousness with all its concentration is able to project a solid picture like how this world appears. The world appears to be real and yet it is another projection. If your mental attitude is right then you will have a right projection always.

Copyright © 2005 SRBY, All rights reserved.