Perth Talk – 13th May 2012

Part One

It’s the eleventh year that we’ve been coming here since 2001. We would like to convey, appreciate the group of devotees who have formed groups like committee and volunteers and others – so many others helping and organizing these events – so that I am able to fly in, stay comfortably, travel here, come, convey my message and also help you all to practice this meditation.

I would advocate that the practice of this silent meditation is like the strongest detergent to cleanse the mind. When you practice this meditation the mind is trying to watch itself. It is cleansing all its unwanted habits of holding unnecessarily to its own imaginations. These imaginations are in the form of thought processes or visual effects, which could be affecting the very peace or happiness, or the pleasurable, enjoyable things of that consciousness which forms your own personality.

The consciousness itself
becomes so small in front
of its own imaginations

In my observations of deeper meditations I firmly would like to assert that when I talk of consciousness or mind it is nothing but ‘You’. In spiritual languages we have always addressed this thing ‘You’ as the Immortal Soul also. When your mind imagines one thought, that same mind called ‘consciousness’ can get involved into the thought so deeply, so strongly, that one thought could be troubling you so much, stirring all your emotions, disturbing your peace and composure, all such things. Imagine if this thought multiplies into tens, thousands, millions and billions, how much it can be troubling. Just like one thousand elephants try to stumble and step on an ant, the consciousness itself becomes so small in front of its own imaginations which would have grown as huge trees and mountains of unpleasantness, troubles, tensions, stress – all these things that happen.

And when this consciousness gets attracted to this world, this world is much more powerful compared to those thoughts that are in the mind, because this world is probably the creation of a thought process of a much higher potency, much bigger units of consciousness. In front of this world a human mind called consciousness can appear just like an ant in front of a big mountain. So how much this world could be troubling! Stirring the emotions, disturbing the peace, giving so much stress, keeping a person confused. But in spite of all this, as human beings, we have an edge over other creatures. From time to time I have always emphasized that we are able to talk about these things, understand, diagnose the problems. When we are able to diagnose and understand then we search for a solution, for a path which can take us out of this problem, sort out and give us that peace, keep us back into our pleasurable condition of existence. This would be possible. That is why we have always told that human life is the rarest of rare gems, that we have obtained this body in which we have this beautiful brain which enables us to apply wisdom, to think and understand, have the serenity and also to be able to appreciate the difference of good and bad, right and wrong, of evil and of noble, of Divinity, of peace and the loss of peace, of trouble, of stress. All these things we are able to make out. It is necessary that we need to ponder over these things. When we have a problem, how can we overcome it?

When you pay attention
then you become peaceful,
you cannot be thinking

In meditation we teach, first important point, when keeping the eyes closed, silently to watch. So this point needs to be understood. When the mind is watching, it is not thinking. If it is still thinking, it is not watching one hundred per cent. So your effort should be just to watch. That’s what the Teacher, the Master teaches always, “Just keep watching by focusing the attention.” Meditation is that you start paying attention. When you pay attention then you become peaceful, you cannot be thinking. If you are thinking, all your attention is on that thinking. But because the mind does not stop into one type of thinking, that attention gets diverted, keeps jumping from one thought to another, to another, into a million times, a thousand times and a billion times. That’s what becomes troublesome. But through the meditation, when you practice this silent watching, it means mind is trying to watch itself. When it watches itself it is unable to think, it is unable to imagine.

So when I advocate all these things, I do not mean that you should not be imagining or should give up once for all − no. Just by practicing meditation all the previous acquired habits of the mind can be cleansed and you take care of the mind that it does not become habitual to one particular type of thinking always, but it will still be able to imagine, think and live in this world.

All these years that I have been travelling, often many people, the majority of the people say, “It is very difficult to believe that this mind can be stopped, this thinking process can be stopped.” When I talk of stopping and recommending such methods it is based on my own experiences, that this mind has stopped and has become purified. It is not habitual to any one type of particular thinking. Still I am able to imagine and teach you all, try to find such words and sentences so that I can give you a clue of what this meditation means, what its benefits are, what you can be achieving, why am I recommending, why I am trying to teach this to you, why it is that you have to take out your precious time, come to these classes and practice, why it can be beneficial to you.

If you all ask yourself again the same thing, you are looking for that peace and happiness. You want happiness, nobody would lift their hand to tell, “I want unpleasantness.” Well there are some stories that the mother of the Pandavas was supposed to have asked Lord Krishna for the boon, “Worldly to remain, worldly unpleasant,” because at all such times when there was unpleasantness in this world she felt it so pleasurable to remember the Divinity, the Divine Lord Krishna. She wanted to enjoy that peace, that pleasure in the mind. That is why she asked for this boon, “Oh Lord, please grant me that all my surroundings, all this world, everywhere, may be unpleasant and troublesome all the time so that I can more and more keep remembering You and enjoy that pleasure of remembering You, my Lord.” So that was also asked for sake of peace and happiness.

When we see conflict in the world surrounding us, in many places, this is what we have also felt. Maybe we would have asked for a boon, “Let everything remain in conflict so that we can always remember and go introvert and be with the Divinity.” But that does not mean that we want the world to be unhappy.

At least now I would not ask God to give me any such boon that, “Let the world be into conflicts, all my surroundings giving me trouble and making me feel unpleasantness all the time,” because I don’t want others also to feel unpleasantness, others to go into conflict. Just for the sake that I have to remember my God and go introvert, it is not needed. If all of you can achieve peace and happiness, still then I can remain in God totally. I don’t have to get attracted to this world. In the entire universe, all worlds everywhere, let there be peace and happiness. May people end the conflicts within their minds.