Pareen (Host): Good morning! Good evening to you if you are joining us from across the world! Welcoming you all to 10 on 10 on 10, where we all come together on the 10th of every month at 10 O’clock to meditate for 10 minutes; to merge with our collective consciousness!
Today our guest, who is guiding us, is none other than the world-renowned humanitarian, Mohanji, who believes that Humanity is our religion and Ahimsa is the way to practice it. He has devoted his life to making people aware of the higher goals such as kindness, love, and compassion and continues to strive to do this, each day.
I am very grateful to him for agreeing to guide us through this meditation today. So without much ado, Mohanji, please take it away!
Mohanji: Thank you, Pareen. Good day to all you who are listening. Without much description, I will start with the meditation.
Mohanji starts the meditation process (3min-13.08)
Pareen: I can feel a wave of calm gushing through me. We have one or two questions which we would like to ask if it is allowed.
The first question is a lot of times; people are not in touch with the compassion that resides within them. Is there a way that we can assist people in looking within and finding that compassion within, especially when it comes to expressing it towards animals?
Mohanji: The best message you can give to the world is your life if you live it. Like we talk about Mahatma Gandhi, we talk about various great leaders or legends of the past, because they lived what they believed in. The preaching and talking about it to people may have very little effect. But when you live it, it has a great effect. The biggest lesson, we can give to the world is ourselves.
We have to invest in, what we believe in; that will become a message to the world.
Mohanji
So, if we really want the world to be compassionate, we should exercise it, and we should do it, and deliver it to the world, consistently. And also, sometimes when we express compassion and kindness, unconditionally, the society may not accept it. But society will remember it. Initially, people may ridicule; people may not appreciate it; people may not accept it. But eventually, people will honour it, saying that this man or this woman was consistent in his or her conviction.
Our biggest message, the greatest message is ourselves; how we live; what we believe in, and how much determination we have, in expressing our conviction.
Mohanji
Pareen: Yes. That’s indeed a powerful message! Be the change you want to see.
Mohanji: Yes
Pareen: This will be our final question. Today being the World mental health day, it’s really important that, as activists, we take care of our mental health. Our activism comes from a place of caring, a place of love. How can we give back to ourselves and keep reminding ourselves that we need to sometimes, maybe hit reset ourselves, as well?
Mohanji: Mental health has become a question in the world because we have become unnatural, most of the time. The society or the education system has created people who are conducive or compliant, to the social, religious or other structure we have. But we are not like that.
We are a flow; we are like a river. We are natural, like a child!
A small child, is always natural, always happy, being itself. The moment we started growing up, we decided that we are adults and hence have to behave in a certain way. We have to present ourselves in a certain way, maybe even in a hypocritical way; we can see the hypocrisy also. We are projecting what we are not in various situations. All this has made us unnatural. So, we have to get back to our natural state; being ourselves, being totally ourselves.
How do we measure that state? It’s very simple. When you are natural, you’re effortless. When you are unnatural, when you have to wear a mask, you have to make an effort for it. Like for example, anger is not natural. Anger is something that violates the inside, right? But love is natural; it doesn’t violate anything inside; Kindness is natural! Compassion is natural!
So, we have to go natural, and what expands you, what makes you happy, liberated, and free, that is exactly what we should perform.
And as I said earlier, not everybody may accept you as naturally as you are, because people bring expectations. This is their problem. We are not here to cater to the expectations of other people. We are here to demonstrate what we believe in; that is our expression. Our natural expression, or what we are, as we express it, that’s the most authentic thing. But if you try to be somebody else, if you try to pretend, if you try to adapt to some requirement of the society, which we are not; then it will all go crazy.
The basic reason for the mental or emotional fluctuations is because of these unnatural things; because of compulsions. We are compulsively doing things, or are compelled to follow certain principles or methods, which is not suitable for us. I always believe that mental health is a serious affair; we have to start from the school days.
When we put a lot of pressure on a child to study that which a child doesn’t have a taste for, a child is never natural. And we bring up a child to study for the sake of a job or career or money. The child has no time to be himself or herself. This is a fundamental issue. That is why we have to discuss mental health. Such a problem leads to depression and various complexes. It also leads to a feeling that life is not good; that life can never be justified, and so on. People commit suicide, right? All these extreme situations are happening because we have not identified the imbalances happening due to social pressure.
At the same time, in our old system, we had the balance. We know that children were taught what they are suitable for. They were not taught something as per the social needs. And such people lived well; a person likes to make clothes will make clothes; some person likes to do cobbler work, they will do that; someone will become a doctor. A person’s inclinations will take the person forward. So, this is important. We need to understand; everybody is unique. Nobody’s higher; nobody’s lower; nobody is equal. All of us are unique, and that uniqueness is exactly what makes our minds stable. Understanding that uniqueness, accepting that uniqueness, expressing that uniqueness, makes us stable. We deserve it; we have the right for it.
It is our responsibility as adults to take care of children, and also the society as every child is the property of society. Society has the responsibility; society has to bring up children to be as unique as possible so that the world will be brilliant. Whenever there is inequality, whenever there is mental imbalance; there is violence. We can cut down on all the violence and also set aside the religions and look at Humanity as the most important thing in the world. You know, it’s not about religious dogmas, it’s about Humanity.
And what we can do as human beings in the world, how we can take care of the world, how can we deliver a better world to the next generation. This should be our only objective in this world.
Pareen: Yes. Indeed, being true to ourselves and following that path and letting everyone else be on their journey as well.
Mohanji: Lead by example.
Pareen: Thank you. Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom with us today.
Mohanji: Thank you for inviting me. And thanks to all of you for being here with us.
Speaker: Thank you so much Mohanji for being here with us. I’m so excited that I have a big smile, thank you again for being with us.
Mohanji: My pleasure, I am happy.
Connection with a spiritual family
Speaker: People are really very excited about being with you again. I tell them to connect to your heart, to connect to your eyes and then just to open themselves to your energy. Okay, so can we start with the questions?
Mohanji: I’m ready.
Speaker: Mohanji, as you know, Peru is one of the countries that is most hit in the world with the Covid-19 virus. We are still in a very strict lockdown with a curfew, and there are a lot of people who asked me questions about death because they have relatives, they have parents who died of Covid-19, and they have people around them who are suffering from it.
Actually, there were times when this country was number one in the world for the number of people dying on a day. Apparently, a lot of people have issues with the immune system, especially people from the jungle or from the mountains. The question is when people are dying from this or diseases like cancer, what can we say to the relatives, how can we ease their pain, especially when they are not spiritually oriented, or when they don’t have a deep connection with God?
Mohanji: I fully understand this. This situation is all over the world now. What makes or what brings pain is our connection to our parents, to our relatives, or other people? We feel a deep connection. We feel a kind of real bonding, and when they are not there, we feel devastated. This is irreplaceable. You cannot change it.
Let us take a scenario. If we have somebody unwell in our house, what will that person see? What they are suffering or what they are going through, you cannot change, because it’s already happening. But what would that person need from us, usually? They would need understanding, love, empathy, or companionship and support; these four things.
Expressing fear and sympathy may not work, because that will aggravate the situation. Expressing indifference also will not work, meaning ‘I don’t care’ that will not work. Just from your heart if you say and act accordingly, “I am with you, I love you, let’s fight it together” that will bring more power and energy to that person to fight; basically, survival is connected to a decision; to win the war.
Sometimes in such occasions, if you say God is helping you, etc., it may not work because the question they will ask is, then why did God give this to me first of all? So, let’s not talk about God too much. Let’s talk about us, as human beings, what we can do. We can make a big difference in society, and in people’s lives, with our attitude.
I get many messages from people not because they connect to me spiritually; because they say Mohanji, you are somebody whom we can trust. You are there like a rock, solid; you never change your mind. So, we love to see you; we love to connect with you because you are stable. Our stability is a very, very good gift we can give to our relationship, any relationship. Stability has a lot of value when everything else in the world is unstable. Many things in life now, in the world now we have no control, but we can choose to have an attitude of stability.
Moreover, in situations like Covid-19, most people you see are depressed; they’re not happy. If you meet ten people, and nine people are depressed, automatically you will feel depressed; because most of the energy exchange happening is taking you to a state of depression. This is to be very clearly understood – with whom you are interacting. It is important for you to connect to something stable, strong; you should make such friendships or connection to a person who’s very stable and strong; because you need somebody to hold on to so that you can give strength to other people.
This cannot be a picture on the wall; it should be a connection to a live person. I am not talking about God as such, but you need a person who is stable, so you can also be stable by connecting to that person; because this is important in today’s time. This is why I have been really working on connecting people globally as Mohanji family so that people can help each other to stabilise themselves. This has worked very well. So many of our people, whom Mirella you know already, are very stable despite things around not being stable. Bring a community together, not for activity; but for love.
The activity makes them come together easily, but the basis should be love. It is just simply staying together; just for the sake of love – togetherness and family. We all have our family; we were born in a particular family, and when we probably get married, it becomes a different family. In our life, different aspects of the family happen. But when you look back, you may see discontinuity many times and in many cases, but it is a family, which is connected unconditionally; it will never change; it’s always the same.
A spiritual family is very, very important. That is your immunity, and it’s your immunity in calamity. Here, the love is not conditional; if you are giving me something, I love you; it’s not like that, its love is unconditional. Whatever you are, whoever you are, it’s love that united us. And love will maintain us; love is our oxygen. Whatever you are, whoever you are, wherever you are from, whether you are rich or poor, whether you are educated or not educated, nothing matters. Just love, love brings everybody together.
During this time, we should know how to behave, because people will look at us. You are a spiritual person, and how will you be interacting with the world. Very simple – stability. Spirituality should be stability. When people look at you, and they see you being extremely stable; they may ask you, how can you be so stable, when everything is in calamities. That time you can say, “I have a family; that family is stable. I’m stable. This family needs nothing from me.” This is very important to understand, “My family needs nothing from me; I am everything to my family; my family is everything to me.” To have that connection, what do you need? Very simple, yesterday, today, tomorrow, day after, you should be connected the same way.
It’s very simple because all you need is consistency. Don’t keep changing your mind. Then you will be nowhere. In a time of calamity, stability and consistency have a lot of value. That tells you who you are and what you are. This is not to gain anything from anywhere. It is just to be immune to all the problems and calamities of the world.
And you should have deep conviction and faith. Conviction in what you believe in. You should believe in something, and you should have a firm conviction in what you believe, and you should have faith in that. What is the easiest and the most important thing in your life that you must believe in or you must have consistent conviction and faith in?
Maria: We have to trust in ourselves; some people say unconditional love; some people say love; some people say, love and family.
Mohanji: Good! Thank you for participating. The most authentic, the most original and the most reliable person you will ever find in your life is you. So, you should believe in yourself. You should have faith in yourself. You should have a deep conviction in yourself. This is very, very important. What is your investment in the family? Yourself, as you are.
What is your investment in society? In all your relationships, take anything. What is your investment? It’s you. Not something that you have, because that’s temporary; permanent investment is only you. So this is very simple, right? Not complicated spirituality, we don’t need complicated spirituality; it’s too much of noise. We need to know what the truth is. The truth is only you, only one thing; you.
When you were born, you realise there is a world around you, and when you die, the world is still around you, but you do not know there is a world. When you wake up in the morning, you know there is a world around you, and when you sleep, where is that world? So it’s all about you and your life. This is the secret. The secret is to find you and accept you and love you; self-acceptance, self-love, self-respect and then it goes into society. This is the only thing you can give to society.
What can I give you? Only myself. I cannot give another person; I cannot give any other thing which you may accept or reject. Society has only two faces, either they accept, or they reject. This is how the world works. So, what best can I give you is myself. When you see yourself in me, you will accept me. When you see me as a different person, you may reject me, but if you see yourself in me, then you may accept me.
This is very important; this is the time to make the real family. The Covid situation has given you clarity. This is the real time to make a real family, stable family, together. It does not matter where you are living, but we can all be connected in energy; energetic connection. So there is something positive during Corona time.
Speaker: Just reading some of the comments… People who have never seen you, they say that they feel so much joy and happiness in their hearts.
Mohanji: It’s not seeing, we are connected, energy-wise we are related, and some people who are sensitive will feel it right away; immediately.
Spirituality and selfless service
Speaker:Mohanji, I would like if you could tell what is the relationship between spirituality and selfless service? Because there are a lot of people that just like sit and meditate, and that’s it. Then they tell me, but I’m meditating, and nothing is happening, what would you tell them?
Mohanji: Beautiful. We all have our orientation. We have a particular nature. We like some things, and we don’t like other things. What is that connected to? What is that based on? Our orientation, our being natural – naturality. So, that tells us that we have our original state or our originality; our naturality. We are original; we are natural; so we can only interact with the world, as we are. There’s no other way.
Likewise, we like certain subjects. Some people like science, some people like arts, some people like math, some people like to draw or paint. Some people like music. This is all connected to our orientation. The same applies to spirituality. Some people are very intelligent; they look at life through their brain; they need answers. Some people are very emotional; they see the world through their heart. And some people look at the outside world in the context of, what I can do for this world; and these people like to serve the world unconditionally. All these three people are spiritual.
In Sanskrit, for the intellectual or knowledge type people, it’s called Jnana Yoga. Jnana Yogis will want answers for every question; they will never be satisfied. Now, the other set is called Bhakti Yogis; they like the path of devotion. They like to pray and to have devotion as their path. Then the other group is called Karma Yogis. Karma Yoga means they like to serve, and they have happiness because of service.
This is all purification, and everything helps purification; inner purification. Which is better? Which is not so good? Everything is good. So, what you are, that is how you will do, you will connect, nobody can change it.
PC: Google Images
Karma Yoga is selfless service, and when you do not have any desire with your activity, that means you don’t desire name, fame or money from this activity, it is called karma sanyaasa. That means renunciation; it’s like a person who has already given himself for it.
All of these are good. But, how you are, that’s the way you interact. Sometimes you are a mixture, you would like a little bit of chanting, you like to serve the society around you, and you may like to have some knowledge; so people have different mixtures. We are all different things.
This is the approximate picture. Let it be you, connect to yourself and what makes you peaceful, what makes you happy, what makes you contented, you can take that; you should follow that.
Don’t think what I’m doing is not right and what another person doing is right; it’s not so. What is good for you is good for you. This is a very simple benchmark. No comparison, no competition, because you are the truth. What you want to experience from the world is the reason for your birth.
Hanuman – The Disciple
Speaker:Alvaro, you remember Alvaro, who translated last time when we had a session; he’s organising an online yoga retreat, and he has a meeting with his team. He asked me how he can be like Hanuman?
Mohanji: Hanuman’s strength was his unshakable connection to Ram. It is not a vague idea; it is not to some invisible God. There was a man, whom Hanuman identified as an Avatar. He understood Ram is an Avatar and he dedicated his life to Ram completely; body, mind, intellect, and ego, everything to Ram.
First and foremost, we should know who we are connected to and why we are connected. Hanuman only concentrated on Ram. If you concentrate on one thing, continuously, consistently, you will become so powerful. Hanuman had full awareness. He told Ram, “I prefer to be your servant; so I can serve you. But please remember, inside, you and I are one; no separation.”
What happens today, the mind gets distracted; the mind is on many things – many people, many teachings, many books; so this concentration is not happening. That is why the result is not happening. When you concentrate on one Master, with all your heart, all your mind, body, everything connected, then you become the Master’s responsibility. Then you don’t have a responsibility, because you have already delivered yourself, which is what Hanuman did.
That kind of strength of being a disciple is missing in today’s world. It’s not easy. Because of the internet world, you see so many things, your mind is everywhere, and then the concentration is not happening, that’s why we are not progressing.
Hanuman had full clarity. This is very important for a clear disciple; full clarity. He knows this is Ram; this is an Avatar. I will not leave him, whatever happens. One point of contact is very important.
Focus on one thing! If that happens, and you are very clear, then you should avoid all doubts. Doubt is very dangerous because if you’re not sure, your mind is distracted. No doubt, no criticism, no comparison, just acceptance, this is my Master, I connect deeply.
Hanuman never asked Ram anything. He never asked Ram, “Please give me something.” He never asked, instead he served. Go ahead. You ask nothing from the Master, and you get the whole Master. When you have the whole Master, you have everything. When you ask something, it becomes too small. But Hanuman asked nothing, and he got Ram himself. Ram himself was his property. This is the strength of the relationship. When you want nothing from the other person, that relationship is so pure and innocent. Hanuman was fully aware of who Ram was. He had full clarity and awareness; clarity and surrender.
I keep always repeating, do not look at the Master as a human or a person. Look at the teachings, look at what he’s delivering, and then you will not be distracted. If you look at a Master, “Oh! He’s eating, drinking, sleeping; he’s just an ordinary man”, then we lose the track. This is a very big trap that we must understand when the Master is in the form of a person. If the Master is in the form of a person, you have to totally ignore the form and the related needs. You should look at the teachings and connect to the consciousness through the teachings; then you are stable. But if you’re looking at the person, you may be unstable. You understood this point.
Many people that time, connected to Ram as a king, as a warrior, as a husband of Sita, in various forms, various levels, people connected. But Hanuman connected to Ram as the Supreme Consciousness; this is the difference. He was not distracted by Ram eating, drinking, sleeping, talking and fighting. He was not distracted by anything. He was only connecting to him as consciousness. Just imagine, if you connect to a Master as only consciousness, you will become that. Where you park your mind, you become that.
Who is a Master? There is a Master inside all of us. Understand this very clearly. There is a Master inside all of us. The true education or true teaching is to bring that Master out. This Master is simply quiet, silent inside us. We all have a Master inside, our true Master.
In Sanskrit, it’s called Atma tattva, which means soul factor. We have a soul inside, that is the energy, which is stable and running just like electricity, which is going through all the gadgets. When the electricity goes to a washing machine, it performs as a washing machine. When the electricity goes to a refrigerator, it performs as a refrigerator. When the electricity goes to light, it behaves like light. But electricity is the same. Like that, inside us, inside all of us, we have this energy particle; energy factor. This energy factor is not visible. You cannot feel it with your gross mind. It activates our mind; it activates our senses; it activates our brain; it activates the whole body, just like electricity. But we can’t find it; we cannot see electricity, right? Just like that, we cannot find it.
So, how can you find it? How can you find the soul factor? Through silence. When you become silent; when you start accepting yourself, respecting yourself, loving yourself, connecting with yourself continuously for a period of time, then you start feeling the energy moving inside you. You can use Kriya, you can use meditation, you can use anything, you have so many methods. But the main thing is you are consistent. It’s about you. Catch one technique to come inside you. Go inside.
What is the aim of all these techniques? Why do we have meditation? Why do we have Kriya Yoga? It’s all to find the Master inside. Who’s the Master? Who’s the real Master inside us? You can use the knowledge path; you can use the devotion path; you can use the service path; it is all to find who our true Master is. When you really, really concentrate on yourself; going within, finally, you’ll find the Master – the soul factor, the energy factor, which is running your show.
Speaker: I’m sorry I was reading the question, and I didn’t hear. Could you repeat, please?
Mohanji: When you consistently concentrate on going inside, eventually you will find the Master inside; the soul factor which is running the show, which is making you function. If the soul goes from the body, we call it a dead body. Correct?
So, we are essentially this Master. We are the Master inside, but not the mind, or the ego Master. Ego tells us, “Oh! I’m better than other people; I’m a Master”, not like that. The real Master, the electricity inside, is making this whole thing function and experience the world. We find that person, and then you understood the Master. When you have actually understood your Master, you have become a Master. Very simple.
That means when you have understood the source inside you; the source which is activating you, making you function, making you experience the world, once you see that person, or see that energy, you have understood the real Master inside you, then you become the Master. So, somebody who has understood the Master, the real Master inside, He is a Master. The answer to the question, who is a Master – somebody who has recognised, understood, experienced the Master inside, is a Master.
Ram was an avatar. He came with full awareness. He knew why he was born, what was his job, what he was supposed to do, he knew the purpose of life. He knew who he was, so he was a Master. Since Ram knew his purpose of existence, he lived only that. Since Ram had full clarity about his existence, and about his life; in every twist and turn, in every level, he understood. And he was cool about it. He was not affected.
When you have clarity, you become cool. When you have confusion, you become angry, you become upset, you start hating and all those things. Whenever you have confusion, think about somebody sitting inside you, who has no confusion. The Master sitting inside is cool always.
Coming back to Alvaro’s question, you want to be like Hanumanji. First, create one point of contact. Remove all your doubts, confusions, jealousy, all those things connected to that and focus on that contact. Imagine Hanuman is your mind; when the mind is connected to the source, the mind becomes the source.
When the mind is connected to an addiction, then the mind becomes an addiction. The mind nurtures and holds addictions. If your addiction is your Master, 100% sure, you will become the Master. But you should not doubt; you should not blame. You should not compare, criticise, judge. Take your time to find the Master; you can take any number of years to find the Master. But once you find him, stay connected; make the Master your addiction. That means your heart, your soul, your body is given to the Master, and then you become the Master. That is why Hanuman became so powerful. In Hanuman’s case, it is said that even the hair on his body was chanting Ram, every cell had Ram inside. Ram, Ram all the time; that is addiction. Totally addicted to the Master!
Many people like to connect to a Master who is not in a physical body. What is the problem with connecting to somebody who is not in the body? Somebody who is not in the body, who has died and gone, but we know his teachings, we hear his teachings through books. When we connect to that kind of Master, what is the main problem? It is okay, it is not a problem for the sake of living, but for transformation, for connection, what is the problem?
The teachings that we know of a great Master today are usually interpretations. That means 30% is teaching, 70% is interpretation, imagination. It may not be the same what the Master said. The original teachings, nobody knows. Interpretations are what we listen to. Based on interpretations, people who are talking, or people who are interpreting may not have the same frequency as the Master. As I said earlier, in every generation, there are Masters who have mastered or who have understood ‘who is the Master’, experienced the real Master inside us. The Masters of the past are definitely authentic. Rama, Krishna, Buddha, Jesus, they are all authentic. And the Masters who have found themselves in this life also, are authentic. So it is your choice, preferably connect to somebody in the body, so that they can tell you where you’re going wrong easily. And it is the toughest to connect to a living Master. Mirella, can vouch for it.
Speaker: Yes.
Mohanji: What happens when you connect to a real Master directly? Your identifications, which is maintained by the ego, starts breaking. So, the fastest track is always through a living Master, but I’m not saying that a non-living Master is inferior. Not at all. They are good but follow your own heart, not the interpretations.
If you really like to be Hanumanji, you should be steadfast, clear in connection. Nothing else matters; nothing else. Only Ram matters, only the Master, your own connected Master, and that Master should be Ram for you. If you’re Hanumanji, who you are connected to should be Ram. Not that he is Ram, but the same way, and focus. And then you become that, become the Master, then you become very powerful, and you will know that; all your ego is lost. You have become completely free; you will experience tremendous power and freedom.
Now the question. What’s your question?
Speaker: Javier and Krishna have asked these two questions. It is about ego. If the ego is there, it is not helping us to find the Master that is within us, and what to do with a mind that is jumping all around and it’s very difficult to concentrate on one Master?
Mohanji: That’s a habit; pattern. We talk about not being able to concentrate, mind running after something; these are patterns which we have created. You need to tame your mind. You need to concentrate on one person, one method, one practice, one teaching, one path based on your orientation, what suits you.
Ego is there for everybody. You cannot run away from the ego. Ego is part of our system. Surrender your ego to the Master. “I leave it to you.” That is why a living Master has value. Master will squeeze your ego, and make you free. You can only follow what suits you; otherwise, it will not work.
If you are in the path of knowledge, you can only follow a Guru in the path of knowledge. Some people can only follow devotion, bhakti, that is their path. Some people can follow service, that is their path. We are all a mixture. What is predominant in you, that’s your right path. Understand what you are, what is your orientation; this is very important. Then you walk the path. And where you have parked your mind, that’s what you will become.
Understand this clearly. All our life, we are making prison cells for ourselves, our activity, our relationship, our possessions, our positions; they have made prison cells for us, they have bound us. Every relationship has restricted or made our boundaries, restricted our walking space. Every possession and position has restricted us. Can you see that? If you look at all our lives, whether you’re working, whether you are a family person, whether you are in a society, whatever you are, all these name and fame, and the possessions and positions, they all made us cages, prison cells. So, it is our job to be free. This is your spirituality.
Being free is spirituality. It doesn’t mean that we are not in the society, we do not have possessions, and we do not have positions; but having the awareness that this is not what we are. We are free in silence, and the only thing that is free inside, which is enjoying the freedom, is the soul factor.
A true Master will never bind you. The real relationship, which gives you freedom is your relationship with a true Master. Don’t compare a cult with the true path. This is a different path. One is towards brightness; one is binding. A cult is binding; they bind people with fear. We have to be free from all fears. A true spiritual path is a path of freedom. A true spiritual path brings you to yourself. A true Master brings you to yourself. That is the true path. So it’s easy to understand what is a true path and what is a cult. A cult binds you with fear. Here, there is no fear. You don’t have to be afraid of yourself, and you are the path.
So, to be Hanuman, very easy, is to be connected, permanently. If you want to be a Master; there are two ways. One is to connect to somebody, who has found the Master inside and settled in that awareness, or you have to find it yourself inside. Both are okay.
Speaker: I’m receiving messages that we should finish. We are 35 minutes over your time.
Mohanji: Is there a burning question? Is there a very important question? I would like to answer and then go.
Self-acceptance
Speaker: Yes, there is a burning question. She wrote to me several times here, and it is about how to accept myself 100%.
Mohanji: The simple answer is, you have no choice. You are the only person whom you cannot avoid. You are the only person whom you cannot escape from. If you understand that real freedom is freedom from the senses and not freedom of the senses and the mind, you will start accepting yourself better.
Real freedom is freedom from the senses and the mind; that means you’re not tempted by too many things outside. You are happy with what is inside, your Atma Tatwa, or principles.
The second level is gratitude, very, very powerful. When you start appreciating electricity, water, food, and everything like oxygen, start having gratitude for everything in your life, then you start appreciating yourself also. Take one decision. You will not take anything for granted.
Maria Rosa has a question.
Duality
Speaker: How to overcome duality that we have in those moments when we lose the connection with our Master?
Mohanji: Well, it’s always like that. We have to come back consistently. There will be times when you are detached, again, you come back. Again, you detach automatically, and again you come back. This journey is like that. It cannot be a hundred per cent consistent in the beginning. After a while, your top priority becomes the Master. Your only connection will be to the Master, or your only interest is the Master, then you become the Master, then you don’t have duality.
Mohanji: Clear? Is Maria Rosa happy?
Speaker: Perfect. Oh yes.
Speaker: Thank you so much Mohanji. It’s been an enormous pleasure. I think this conversation is going to help a lot of people. Thank you so much.
Mohanji: Love you all. At the end of the day, only love remains.
A very warm welcome to all of you. It gives me immense joy to be with all of you today. Today is the third part of My conversations with Mohanji.
Absorb His wisdom, absorb His vibrations.
Time
Host: Please explain to us about the time. As average humans, we linearly understand time, but I guess that is not the way it is. Could you please share your insight on this?
Mohanji: Well, time is always multi-dimensional. For a woman who is going to deliver a child, every moment is like 10 hours. But for a person who is experiencing ecstasy, even an hour vanishes in no time. So the concept of time itself is relative; especially for us, existing in linear time, and that means yesterday, today, tomorrow, the day after, and so on, it has different values at each time. We experience different values for time. Time is not static. Time is variable, and time has its effect as per our situation, condition, orientation. It changes as per our mood. A situation changes the effect of time.
But there is one period of time, every day, in 24 hours, where we nullify everything –the deep sleep time. When we are in a deep sleep, all the dimensions end. We do not see anything. We do not have any idea about time; rather, time doesn’t matter. Even in our own life, what values time the most, is the mind-matter – mind, intellect, and ego because it is operating on linear time. The body is being carried by time, from birth till death. But the soul is not affected by time. In our system, there are multiple faculties, with different orientations about time. So you can’t define time in one sentence. It’s a relative term.
Then there are parallel realities. Parallel realities mean simultaneous happenings; only at the soul level, you can connect to them. At the Physical level and the mind level, we can’t connect to those realities, because this is the reality we are occupied with. We believe we are this reality.
Just now you said it’s your birthday. Birthday of what? Birthday for this incarnation, this body; so it’s a relative thing. For the soul – what birthday? It is another day in its existence as a unit. The soul is not affected by birthdays, but the body and mind are affected. The mind is happy that there is a celebration. The body has no idea that this is its birthday. It goes through it. At the time of death, that body is left behind. The body is just a cage we use for an expression or experience.
Time has multiple levels of existence. Time is the same, but what we perceive has multiplicity, dimensional differences. When you are completely occupied in silence, where sound itself is alien for you, then, time doesn’t matter. You became eternal. What you connect to becomes you. So when you deeply connect to the eternal aspect of your own existence, then time doesn’t matter. You become a time rider, like a wave rider. You’ll be riding time because you’re already eternal.
Great masters like Babaji, Sai Baba, Akkalkot Maharaj, Bhagavan Nithyananda, and numerous other masters are examples of this existence. They have become eternal because of their connection or identification with the eternal aspect in you, which is your soul; thus, they became eternal. For them, leaving a body doesn’t mean leaving any story; the story exists; leaving a body doesn’t mean anything. Inside a body or outside the body, they work alike. Consider, for example, Babaji. Babaji is a different dimension; but I’m merely giving an example, to explain that with the body or without, He is very active. Hanumanji is very active; Shirdi Sai Baba is very active. The body could not bind them. The body will not bind you if your identification is with the eternal aspect of you.
If your identification is with your body, your personality, or ego, it’s perishable. Whatever rises will also fall. The ego arises; the ego falls. Everything rises and falls each day; in 24 hours you see the rise and fall; you arise in the morning, you fall in the night. Birth and death are happening every day. Death is the total annihilation of your existence, deep sleep. When you wake up, you rise again. Rise and fall are happening; like sunrise and sunset; every day. Identify this, that this is exactly the existence. Then you start detaching from what seems to be you, to what is you. What seems to be you is what people perceive you to be, as you are or what you project to the world, as you are. What are you, in reality, is beyond your third dimension, to the level of who or what is the source that moves you. The Source is eternal. No change happens to the Source. The Source is permanent. When you connect to the permanent aspect, you become eternal.
Other Dimensions
Q: Baba, would you like to shed some light on the other dimensions that exist? Is Earth going through an ascension cycle?
Mohanji: Earth is not going through anything. We are going through. We blame it on Earth. Evolution is for the human mind, not for the Earth. Earth is a reflection of what we are. What we project is what you see. We are constantly projecting things to this world, all the time, 7.5 billion people are projecting various things to the world. They can only project what they are. You can’t project what you don’t have. So you are projecting what you are. Another person is projecting what he or she is, and the conglomeration of all these put together, we call life.
So the Earth is a platform. Earth has all that is needed to give flavours to life. It’s like a huge hypermarket. You can go, pick up things from there, and you can make your curry. And that’s what you’re doing. So the Earth is not on ascension or decline; human minds are.
When we talk about yugas, ascension means entering into Satya yuga or the golden age. The golden age is a state of eternity, where you choose the time of your death, you choose when to stay, how long to stay, and when to leave. However, karmic birth is not the same. Karmic birth is a bundle of desires; fulfilment is needed; take a body, fulfil it; and then you carry forward more desires and come back again. This is karmic birth.
When you are in the Satya yuga mode, it means that firstly, you have no desires. You have no connection with the world outside, except that you exist in the world, like an Avadhoota; you are fully in the world, but you are not of the world, or not with the world. That state; a state of detachment is the first aspect. The second aspect is the perfect awareness of who you are. You only exist, revelling in the inside story, your inside story, in your soul, with that aspect. It’s not the denial of existence. It is a full awareness of existence. It is not an intellectual or emotional feeling that you are not what you are; that is an illusion.
What I am saying is that you are fully occupied with your own soul material, and you realize this is your truth. You stay there, totally stabilized, totally still. Then you are in Satya yuga. So, Satya yuga is existing right now, for some people. All people have that ability. This is what Babaji and other great masters are doing. This is what they are giving you, or this is what they are guiding you towards but through practices. However, what happens is that people get stuck with practices. They think that these practices will help you. Practices are only like a bridge to help one go across. Each step, each practice should take you deeper and deeper inside.
More than a practice, sometimes, integration to the Master’s Consciousness helps. Imagine a master who’s well established in Himself, is with you and you connect to that Master. That is what Baba meant when he said, “I just sat and looked at my Guru. I did nothing. I looked at Him; He gave me everything.” He gave it, does not mean that the Master takes (something), and gives it to you. You become the Master because what you are connected to him, constantly, consistently, without doubts, without prejudices, without comparisons, without competition; you become that. You become the Master’s Consciousness. You become the Master.
So true masters make others masters, not disciples. No true Master is interested in disciples. What will they do? What will you do with a lot of people? Instead, true Masters makes others masters. But then, it’s the equation and the orientation and the disposition of the disciple that makes them masters. If there is a disciple who’s constantly doubting, criticizing, competing, or comparing and discussing intellectually, he will only see an object or another personality called the Master. They can’t connect. There’s no connection happening. More than the visual aspect, it is the deeper connection that brings transformation. So what is spirituality? Transformation. So when you talk about multiple levels of existence, it is all simultaneous. That means, definitely we are aware of multiple levels of existence each day-waking state, dream state, deep sleep state.
Beyond that, there are multiple possibilities, depending on the level of illusion that you hold. If you are completely deluded that you are this physical form and this personality, you have only this life. But when you start connecting to your soul deeper and deeper and deeper, then you start realizing that whatever I seem to be, is only one aspect of me. But I can have many more aspects. Then automatically your dimension changes. This is a very broad subject, very big, very deep.
First of all, the time as we see, linear time is only one aspect of time. This is number one. There is a possibility of past, present, and future together, simultaneously. Like Lord Krishna explained to Arjuna in the 11th chapter (of the Bhagavad Gita), when he showed his Vishwaroopa. “All the people who are supposed to die are already dead and gone.” He told
Arjuna, “Look here! You are only an instrument. What has to happen has happened already, in real-time.”
So Lord Krishna showed this to get the idea to the people; showed this because the people understand that past, present, and future are simultaneously existing. But we do not perceive it because we are oriented with this identification, this body, this life, these identifications, these orientations, character, and constitution so that we only see linear time: yesterday, today, tomorrow, the day after. We cannot catch the possibility of vertical time. Again linear, horizontal, and vertical times are just expressions. Don’t think that the time is standing up now. It’s not like that. They are all just to explain the possibilities, so they are all existing simultaneously.
I explained this earlier in another program – When one person asked Ramana Maharshi, “If I die now”, usually they say that it takes about 700 days before you take another birth. It’s a general statement. Don’t take it seriously, because there’s no rule like that. So he asked Ramana Maharishi, “If I die now, will I take another body in two years?”
So Ramana Maharshi said, “Possible, definitely possible. But in that life, you would be already 70 years. That means there is a parallel existence already happening!” So when you leave this body, you merge another body of yours, and you continue. In linear time, you never understand this; it is very difficult.
But that is why through meditations, through connection, contemplation of “Who am I? What am I? Why am I?” and through deep penetration or even easier through a deep connection to a very powerful Master, a better understanding is possible. By Master I mean, not those that you usually see in the world outside, those that talk. They are mostly acharyas, and they are practitioners. That’s not what I mean. I mean somebody who’s really established in Consciousness or has established himself completely within. That’s a true master. So if you are able to connect to somebody like that, then you may connect to this aspect faster.
Again, it’s a big trap. When you connect to somebody who’s already established, that person will look very ordinary; this is the problem. He will have no paraphernalia. He will know, he will not show or state, “Hey, look here! See, I’m a big master.” Once they are fully settled inside, you will not show; they lose all interest in the world outside: nothing to prove, nothing to approve. Then what happens- they’re fully themselves. When they’re fully themselves when they are not showing off, people will think, “What type of a man is he?! I’m wasting my time with him.”
People expect miracles. People expect certain paraphernalia, a certain amount of show. If you don’t get it, then you think this is not the right guy. That is why I said there’s a big trap here, trap or a problem here. You’ve got to see through all these ordinary things and look within to see the brightness inside. It takes time. You should have keen observation and consistency. Most people don’t have consistency. They come with an expectation. “A master will do a miracle tomorrow. I will be enlightened.” You can’t be enlightened when you are a bundle of desires because your desires are all to the external world. You want a job, you want money, you want relationships, family, girlfriend, boyfriend, all sorts of things, everything from the world outside. Then where do you have time for the world inside? When all your processors are focused on the world outside, you have only time to process what is visual, what we can perceive. That is why the Bhagavad Gita said, “Millions of sense objects in the world; to experience them – five senses, one mind. “Mind means – mind, intellect, and ego together; mind-matter.”
At one point in time, you can only experience one thing properly. That has only two results possible: happiness or sorrow. That is it! This is life. So millions become five, five becomes one, and one becomes two, and one you can experience. So basically it becomes one. This is our existence.
Host: Thank You very much, Baba!
Mohanji: Thank you for interviewing me. My love to all those who are listening to us or seeing us.
Question: Is suffering so important to the soul, to undergo change, even if it harms? Another person, has a powerful Guru, can’t he remove all the suffering?
Mohanji: Suffering is connected to your waking state mind. Pain is connected to various factors such as injury, body, going through certain processes. Pain can happen, but suffering is your choice. Suffering happens when resistance happens to the pain. When we resist situations, when we resist emotions, when we resist people, places, time, we have suffered. But suffering is not a permanent thing. When you are experiencing pleasure, necessarily, you may not suffer. But sometimes even during pleasure, at the time of pleasure, we may suffer because we worry that this time also may end. So, we may fail to experience a situation because we are afraid of something finite, connected to that situation. In the time of sorrows, some people have great pleasure. They say sorrows are good because they remind them of their life. In the time of pleasures, they fear sorrows may come after the pleasure, like a pendulum, like two sides of the coin. So they fail to experience a pleasure. This is human nature. This is one of the patterns that we constantly entertain.
So there is no need to suffer. When you go beyond your mind-matter, there is no suffering. Your soul has no suffering. It’s witnessing your happiness and sorrows, and all the games of your life. Your consciousness which operates in three levels – waking state, dream state and deep sleep state is not suffering. It’s happy to witness what the mind-matter produces, churns out called experiences. We categorise these experiences as good or bad. Consciousness is just watching it. At any point in time, consciousness does not tell you “Don’t do it. Don’t experience it.” It never tells. It just witnesses. It just allows you to experience anything you like on Earth. Nothing is good; nothing is bad. You experience whatever you want. Who categorises situations as good and bad, who categorises high and low, who categorises do’s and don’ts? Mind – Mind-matter.
I always tell one thing, do not enter into the realms of violence. Do not entertain violence in thoughts, words and action, because it breeds more violence. It contracts you; it shrinks you. That’s not our original state. Our original state, as I explained earlier, is expansion, inner richness. This is our actual state, but we fail to see it because our mind entertains itself with anger, hatred, jealousy, revenge, kind of silly things. And then it suffers because it’s like a person who smokes a lot and then suffers from lung issues. This is exactly similar to that. The person gets addicted to something spurious, and then health is affected. Who caused it? They themselves caused it. So we don’t have to suffer.
There is no suffering in life, except in our mind. Our mind has decided that there is suffering and then we suffer. The mind has decided, “This is okay; this is not okay.” And we suffer. The mind has decided. “This is right, this is wrong”, then we suffer. So, this is all minds’ game. I always believe that there are zero sufferings, even when people betray you or cheat you, etc., you don’t have to suffer because for doing that, they are paying a huge price. For them, it’s an experience. You have an experience of getting cheated, getting betrayed; like that the people who betray you, have an experience of betraying somebody. And when you ask for such an experience, you got a price to pay, a very high price to pay. Sometimes that price takes you to a level of debt, which lasts lifetimes.
That is why Mirabai says, “When you betray a guru, you carry the debt of that act of betrayal for about 80,000 lifetimes,” such a big, huge debt. So if somebody really wants to do that, they’re paying for it. You need not worry. They chose it. If I decide that I want to have a Rolls Royce car and choose to go ahead and buy it by taking a bank loan, I have to pay the bank until it’s over, as long as it takes. I cannot say that I will not pay any more, because they will catch me and will take the car away from me. So this debt is chosen. Our own anger, hatred, jealousy, selfishness puts us in debts.
Why should we worry? If we are instrumental in creating it, we should worry. Otherwise, we need not worry. If somebody is cheating you, if somebody is betraying you, you are only at the receiving end. You are not spending on it. So if you develop that level of maturity and you start seeing the reality all the time, you will see this drama at work. You will see this whole drama of life. And this drama is very interesting. People play roles, and we enjoy those roles. They keep experiencing them time and again. Sometimes they come in different costumes, and they play the same role. You get surprised that this is the same guy who was doing this before. When in another costume, sometimes we don’t recognise them. But this is the reality.
Everything that is connected to our life has a reason. If we chase the reason, if we try to understand the why’s, we do not move forward. Just experience it as it comes and leave it, unhook from it, and let it go. Time changes everything. Time changes situations. Change is the only thing which is unchangeable. Change is the only thing which cannot be changed. Change happens in life. Everything changes, everything evolves, everything has to evolve into various forms and dimensions. So, if we flow with those changes, you will be experiencing a breeze like life. Life would be like a breeze. But all these factors have value. Some of them are lessons. Some of them are warnings. Some of them are experiences, good and bad, whatever you wish to call it. But when we boil it all down, we call it life. Life has everything. It’s important to understand that.
Question: How to recognise my future partner? Also, I want to open a vegetarian restaurant, but how to conquer the fear of failure and how to succeed?
Mohanji: Three questions – your future partner, vegetarian restaurant and fear of failure. I think all are interconnected. If your future partner is a disaster, you will experience failure. And if you open a vegetarian restaurant, maybe you will get food to eat. (laughter)
I do not understand the correlation between these two. But, understand that fear of failure has its root in inertia (Tamas) and most of us entertain it because we all have inertia. We always say that we must be appreciated, we must be accepted, and for all that we do, we should be rewarded or recognised. This is our wish, our desire. But life is not like that. There are failures in life. If you look at my life, I have failed enough and more times. At one point in time, I was an eternal failure. In everything I do, I was failing. What I understood from that is, all that gave me experiences. If you do not resist it, do not reject it, do not fight it, do not put it under the carpet, then that means it becomes lessons for you. Everything in life will not be successful.
We cannot rehearse in life. We cannot rehearse something and do life. So, we have to just do it as it comes. We have to live it; we have to do things as it flows. I would say if you are fearless, you will have tremendous success because we do not know what is around the corner. So if you don’t take a walk, we will never see it. If there is a failure, you slip and fall, or you fell down, what do you do? Get up and walk. In fact, if you take your whole life, you are born alone, you will die alone. You neither took the permission of the society to take birth nor will you take the permission of the society to die. So what is the bottom line? Your EXISTENCE is the bottom line. You are YOURSELF. You are the EXPERIENCE.
You are here to experience; you are here to express. EXPRESS. Don’t worry about failure. If it fails, you start again. Look at people who have succeeded in life. They have failed tremendously. I think Walt Disney; he went to about 20 or 25 banks for financing his project called the Disney cartoons. But nobody believed in him. They said, “You are making some cartoons, and you want money?” They were ridiculing him. And finally, one banker decided to give him a soft loan. Rest is history. He created Disney World, and it became a huge success. Likewise, this Spider-Man character – Stan Lee, I think; he offered Spider-Man story for print, and the publisher said, “Ridiculous, this story will not sell.” Look at how famous this Spider-Man character became. Now, all the countries, all the children know Spider-Man.
The ability to believe in your work, ability to believe in yourself, the conviction that you have on yourself, ability to invest (the investment) in yourself, is basically the faith and that will take you forward. So, if you focus on failure, like the options of failure, the possibilities of failure, what will four people think, society will think, you will never move forward. Instead, we take the step forward, let us fail. No problem. Let there be failure, and that failure will give us a lesson. The failure will guide us to success because we know if you walk this path, there will be a failure. So you might as well change the path, deviate, take a detour and achieve success.
Whether it is a vegetarian restaurant or a husband, it’s the same thing. You got to kiss a lot of frogs before you find a prince, right? So you can never say that this is going to be the right man because we are talking about karmic beings. We are talking about bundles of patterns. We are talking about bundles of concepts. We are all baggage, huge baggage. So, how can you say that this is the right compatible person? If you are extremely tamasic, another extremely tamasic person might be compatible because you both can sleep all the time. If you are extremely tamasic and you get a person who is extremely saatvic, then you will have struggles at home as one person will sleep, and the other person cannot sleep. So this is how the combination works.
Don’t look at life too seriously. Flow with life just like water, like a river, keep flowing. Whenever you are looking at small things like relationships, (I’m not saying relationships are small, it means when you are occupied by relationships, etc.), you become short-sighted. Instead, you look for the larger life. Try to look at life in a much larger perspective. What are you trying to achieve from this life? What do you want out of this life? You should always dream big, think big, or have a larger vision. If you have a larger vision and take one step at a time each day, you will reach there. All the other things will fall in place. But if you do not have a larger picture, and if you are searching in a linear level in the market, to find a right man, like this guy looks okay, or that guy looks okay, this or that etc., this will always be confusing. That’s not the way. Instead, you walk your vision, and the right things will come to you. They join you because your frequency is set for something larger, something huge.
I have created this Mohanji platform with that context, that all the people who are associated have the possibility to have great expressions in this platform. I created it in that mode because everybody has a need for actualisation, a need to be fully themselves and completely blossom. So, this ground has to be set in that way. I cannot set a ground where nobody gets actualisation, and all are like robots, not possible. So, this is created in that way which is why so many countries, so many dimensions, a variety of activities are happening. All this is created because of actualisation. Look at how many people are blossoming with this platform.
The point is, we should not think in a tubular way or within a frame. We are not bound by frames. We are not to be put in frames. We are like a flowing river, flowing as per time, as per various desires and our karmic patterns. But when we have a higher vision, when we are walking towards it and when we are bound by purpose, not people, (clear purpose, a purpose with clarity), it will open up the doors for you. Nothing can stop you, and everything will come together.
When you are talking about a restaurant, you look at the chain of restaurants; you have the vision for that. What do you really want to express in the world? You should have that picture in mind, and you should dream it, you should feel it every day. And you should feel it is alive, means you should actually see it in the world, in your mind, in your inner eye. Then it will happen eventually because you are energising that positive thought, a great image, a great plan inside you. That is how it will happen.
Question:How do I seek blessings and stay connected to Guru and the Guru Mandala?
Mohanji: Guru and Guru Mandala are the same. Guru is the representation of Guru Mandala, that means the world of elevated masters. There is no world of elevated masters apart from your master. It’s like a small transformer in your house that gives electricity to your house. Outside there is a huge transformer which is much more powerful. If you decide that my house needs the power from that transformer and you connect directly to that, your house will burn. So, what you need is a regulated energy flow where you can actually come in contact with it, and it can help in your transformation.
In the Datta tradition, the whole nature is your guru. If you are considering a person as a guru, in the tradition of Datta, everything is guru, life is guru, your SELF is the guru, and your INNERSELF is the real guru, personal guru. But if there is an external guru who has lived the freedom, walked freedom, expressed freedom, given freedom even from themselves (means no binding), that is the path. There is no binding on rituals, no binding on people, places, time, FREEDOM. That is the Datta tradition. So when we walk that path, how do you get connected? You have to connect to YOURSELF. You have to go within and connect to yourself, assimilate yourself and then through YOU; you can reach the whole world. After that, when you look outside, everything will become a reminder of who you are. And that’s how it should be. All the things happening in you, around you, they are all reminders of who you are. When you are deeply connected to that feeling of oneness or experiencing that feeling of oneness (It’s all experiences end of the day. If you cannot experience it is not real), you are unmistakably connected, unchangeably connected, permanently connected.
So, your connection with yourself is extremely important in our path and the path of liberation. Your connection with yourself is the truth. And that connection will take you to similar frequencies. As you raise your frequencies, you will come in contact with people of the same frequency. That is how you can actually grow and evolve. This is very important to understand. You are the final thing you need to connect. That is what we were talking earlier. You are the thing, you are the matter, you are the being, you are the person, and you are the personality. This is your connection. And this is exactly what we are trying to tell all the time. But then you look at somebody as stable as a rock, established in themselves, who’s not bound by the emotions of the world, not bound by time or space, not bound by any philosophies, totally free, then that becomes a reminder to you on how to walk the path, what will be the situation, how it can be. That is a reminder to you.
Now, you have a benchmark, you have a point of contact, or you have a destination which you can put into your GPS, so you know where you are going. And that’s exactly the whole point of the tradition. The tradition gives you these locations, these benchmarks, these pointers, the destination so that your journey is effortless. Also, you know where you are going, and that’s easy. So on this day of Guru Poornima, we must understand that connection is extremely important. When you stay connected, remember one thing very clearly, doubts are the detrimental factors. Doubting yourself always alienates you, separates you. Doubting the master separates you. Doubting the time, doubting the practice, doubting the environment; doubting separates you. Don’t take doubts lightly. Take doubts seriously. And don’t ask why this is happening? It is. So when you stop asking WHY all the time, you save a lot of time because acceptance takes ‘why’ away from our system. “Okay, this is happening. There must be a reason for it. Whatever the reasons are, if I’m supposed to know, I will know. Otherwise, I don’t have to know.” Every time you think like this, you are free. Each time you stop asking why, and you start connecting deeper and deeper into yourself and assimilating the experience that has come out of that situation; it means you are actually experiencing that situation fully within, each time. That experience becomes a validation of your life. That itself is your final and gives you stability, gives you freedom, complete freedom. So this is exactly what you should do.
Stop doubting; stop asking ‘why?’ and stop asking, ‘Am I progressing? Am I regressing?’ All these are unnecessary questions. Keep doing the same thing. Keep repeating, keep assimilating and keep investing into yourself. Then what comes out will be something brilliant. It may take time because you have no idea how many baggages of patterns you are carrying, how much is removed, how much has to be removed. So, when we don’t know the whole drama of life and when we can only see two dimensions, we are completely controlled and bound by mind-matter (mind, ego and intellect). Hence stop asking why, stop doubting and just keep practising. And whatever you practice, you should believe in, otherwise don’t practice. Whether it is Kriya, Meditation, Contemplation, if you do not believe in it, there is no point in practising. It is a waste of time. And don’t practice for the sake of a Master. Master has nothing to do with you. A master’s job is to show a clear mirror to you so that you can look at the mirror and you can see yourself, where you stand. That’s the job of the master. Master’s job is NOT to TAKE you to yourself. His job is to show you that you are everything or tell you that you are everything or GUIDE you to yourself. But you have to walk. You have to find yourself and go within. If you doubt yourself, if you doubt the master, if you doubt the practice, if you doubt the time and space if you have excuses all through, where will you go? That brings a waste of time. That takes a lot of our time away, and it is a waste of life. This is the problem. It wastes lifetimes. We have wasted lifetimes already. Now let us use this lifetime to find ourselves and settle down.
The inner space is the only space which is yours. All the outer spaces are not yours; they are temporary. End of the day, all you need is only six foot of ground. If you are very tall, maybe eight foot of ground. That’s about it. You don’t need any more ground to keep your body, that’s it. We are chasing so many things of life, and finally, we are tired. We are still unhappy because we want more. And that is a waste of time. You should have something which gives you a good shelter, food to eat, peaceful life so that you can spread your energy and light into this world outside. When you assimilate yourself into yourself, you become brightness, and that brightness will reach the society and make the society brighter. That is your biggest contribution to society, not your teachings, not your noises.
The society has plenty of noises. It does not need any more noises. What the society needs is silence – a pregnant and deep silence, where silence talks much more than words. This is what society needs today. And what you need to give to this society is yourself. This is the only thing you can give. The only authentic thing you can deliver to this society is yourself, nothing else. You give your flavour. That’s the only thing which is expected. You cannot give any other flavour because you are already yourself. You cannot do anything else about it. So you give the society, your own flavour and that’s good enough. That means you are giving the society your unique flavour. And when you do that, don’t expect anything back. Don’t compare, don’t criticize, don’t judge, don’t character assassinate. Don’t betray, don’t cheat. So your conscience will be clean and bright. When your conscience is clean and bright, you are only giving pure stuff. You cannot give contaminated stuff. So this is important. What you need to give to this world is yourself and that you give as clean as possible, conscience clean, and deliver it with your full conviction without expectation.
On this day of Guru Poornima, this is the message I wanted to give you. Please remember – you are unique, you are important, you are significant, and nobody else is like you. Don’t underestimate yourself. Don’t criticize and judge yourself. Don’t compare yourself with anybody. And please don’t blame others because whatever you do, will have an effect on you. Your own activity, whether it’s done now or done in the past, it will create its own effect. Any action and every action will have a result. So do not blame others saying that because of him, I am suffering. That is not true. It’s all because of our own actions.
We must understand that whatever we do, whatever we perform, whatever we say, speak, think, everything creates vibrations, frequencies, and that will create results. So, understand this clearly, and assimilate and be together, support each other, help each other. We got to have a whole world – one world, one family. One world and one family is the truth – Vasudeva Kudumbakam – that is the truth. We are all together; no caste, creed, country, culture, colour, language, religion, nothing, just people, one species FOR ALL species. This is what we should be. Then we are living purity. We are walking, talking, eating purity, everything pure. That is the highest you can give to this world. And it’s not a small thing.
I hope I have given you the message. Thank you for coming together, and we will stay in touch. Wish you a great Guru Poornima and wish you a great life ahead. I’m always with you, and I love you.
Question: What is the real purpose of a disciple to do worship of a guru on this auspicious day?
Mohanji: Where does the Guru sit? This is the first question we must ask ourselves. Look at our whole life. We are only looking at a life which has happened from our birth so far, until our death in this life. This is what we consider as life.
All the masters, all the great traditions have said time and again that you are the thing you are looking for. I have mentioned that in my Guru Purnima message also, that you are the very thing or the very subject you are looking for. That means you have got to find yourself inside you. That means you got to do manana (contemplation). When you contemplate more and more, you will start finding your dimensions first. Eventually, you will come to a level where you will see yourself as a beacon of light and the rays spreading as dimensions; that means you have become one with your source, the one that is inside you. When you start connecting to the source that is inside you, you will start feeling the various possibilities beyond birth, beyond death. It means the possibility of the atma tatwa or the soul factor, which has no birth or death.
Once you understand that, you will see all your lives of the past and all the lives that are going to be in one spectrum, in one canvas. What happens then? That means you can see the whole role-play; various lifetimes you have played certain roles, and there is a continuation in between, like a stage in the drama. You go out, you change your dress, and you come back. It’s almost like that, very simple. That means you are almost going out and coming back. There is no birth, no death; just changing over, transitioning. So, once you understand that, the principle of Guru and the principle called YOU become very clear to you.
So, where is this Guru sitting? Inside! Then why do we worship a guru outside? That Guru is a reminder of what is sitting inside: just a reminder, nothing else.
So, when you respect (not only the Guru), the Guru in everything, which is the soul factor of all things, of all beings of nature, you will keep seeing the Guru. This is the main factor, the unchangeable factor. One who has actually recognised that soul factor and decided to settle into the soul factor; one who has found that soul factor from the physical factor, an emotional factor, consciousness factor and still further the witness factor, ( once you have settled down in the witness factor), you will see everything in the form of witness hood. You see everything as a witness. In that state, there is no caste, country, culture, colour, religion, language, nothing, just witnessing the whole thing.
When you start witnessing the whole thing, then you realise what exactly is awakening. That awakening only simply means you are a total witness of everything. You see the whole tapestry, not just the scenes of the drama, not the emotions, not the situations, not even the people acting; you see the whole picture. This is the journey that can only be achieved through our inner journey; you got to go within. You got to go inside, within.
When you are worshipping a master or when you are coming in contact with a master, who has already settled down within and he is fully established, your worship, (forget about physical worship), even thinking, even remembering, even your meeting, connecting, all that amounts to one thing. What is it? This is the state I’m looking for. Give me that state of yours. The state makes a master. The state where the Master rests makes that person a master. If the person is resting on emotions of life, that’s not mastery. The mind is dragging us like a slave.
When our awareness rests in the body, we are in waking state. When our awareness rests in our mind matter, we are in dream state. When our awareness rests in deep sleep state, we are in a state like death; we are detached. We are only in consciousness. When our awareness merges with consciousness, we start witnessing the state of the soul. That’s the only time we really witness what the soul is experiencing. That is the journey.
So, if you worship a guru, do you think the Guru needs worship? Guru needs nothing. Why does the guru need worship? Guru is not dependent on things outside of him, because he’s fully established in the witness hood, peaceful, stable and happy. He or she doesn’t matter. When you go within, and you start connecting to your own soul as I explained just now, you don’t need any worship. You are happy; you are settled. You are not dependent on the world outside for your pleasures of senses. Instead, senses are existing, but the senses are not demanding. Senses are relaxed, the mind is relaxed; there is no thrust of desires, no push of desires; tranquillity, peace. This is the real state.
If somebody is resting in that state, what would he feel and what would he say? Just be. JUST BE. The highest is achieved through that state of being YOU, being YOURSELF. BEING; only being. That’s the beauty.
When somebody says you have to worship me, that person only displays insecurity. That person is insecure. Why is he insecure? It is because he’s still dependent on the world outside. For a person who is stable within, whether somebody respects, somebody worships or not, it doesn’t make a difference. But if you want to experience that feeling of connecting in your way, as you are, you can do that. You can do whatever and for the Master, it doesn’t matter.
Sai Baba displayed that all the time. As the disciple came, Baba allowed them to perform their chosen ritual. Baba just allowed it to happen. He never said, “I don’t like it”, because there’s no like or dislike; just being.
Question: I want to know, for somebody like me when I’ve not met you in person, how could I understand that you are helping me and uplifting in spirituality? How do I know that I am growing in spirituality?
Mohanji: Do we actually need any help? This is the fundamental question. What help do we need?
In fact, a true master always remains as a mirror, undistorted image. That’s what he gives us. So, he always remains like a mirror, stable and still, and when you look into the mirror, you see your own true reflection. You see yourself in your true form, as you are. And that itself is a big deal because, in the outside world, you are only getting opinions of people. Some opinions are good, some opinions are bad, some are criticism, and some are praises. But between this, there is a reality. You never get that reality from the world outside. When you come to a master, the mirror is so fresh, perfect and clean; you get the real picture. That’s the biggest thing a master gives us your true picture.
So how does a master help? It is by giving your true picture; you realise this is where I stand; this is what I am. The moment you understand what you are, correction is easy. Diagnosis is difficult; the cure is easier. Similarly, when you come in contact with a pure mirror, an undistorted image happens. You automatically know where you stand and where you should be. The Master becomes a road sign with his own life.
What is the main thing happening here? Amidst all the varied dimensions of existence, emotions, changes; HE remains unchangeable, still. So, when you look at that Master, and you see a zero change, unchangeable, steady, then you realise this is the state of happiness; not pleasures, which are changing every now and then. Pleasures keep changing. For some time they remain, then again, you need more. But here, happiness is a state where you are always happy, stable and happy. And that state is what you are looking for. That’s when you realise, this is the state. So a true master’s life itself is the lesson, message and path. And when you come in contact, how do you know that you are being helped? Are you attaining silence in the mind? Or are you continuing to be restless and affected by things around us around you?
If you are always affected by things around you; that means you are only expressing your inherent patterns. It means, patterns or habits have formed, and it’s like a cycle going on and on and on. But a master shows you, that there is a possibility of being still, being out of the patterns, overcoming them by accepting those patterns and not resisting them. By holding the hands of the Master, (as long as it takes, maybe it takes lifetimes we never know), you come out of your patterns of life, including habits, likes, dislikes, opinions, prejudices, etc. and you become free. When you become free; fewer thoughts, less desire, less wear and tear from life will be the result. If this is happening, that means this relationship is working.
Relationship with a master does not have boundaries when I say boundaries, not bound by time. It is a continuous process. What brings you to a master is eligibility, YOUR WILL to experience the higher aspects of existence such as happiness; this brings you to a master. (And again as I said, it is not pleasures of life. We have many pleasures in life. It keeps coming and going, and we are not happy. Because one time it comes and goes, you crave for more, desire for more, and this is a continuous process.)Then you are in a tranquil state, and you are happy by nature and contented. So the contentment factor is the connection factor; you can actually assess your connection with your level of contentment.
Question: If people take advantage of unconditional love, how do you handle such situations? Is there a boundary to draw when you give unconditional love?
Mohanji: We are unconditional love by nature. That is our nature. We are love by nature, and we expand with love. We contract with hatred, revenge, anger; it makes us shrink. But with love, we expand, and that’s our nature; our nature is to expand. So love is our natural process. Love is our nature. But the world outside, of seven billion-plus people, is of every dimension. They are of different dimensions. It is not easy to say or categorise them at all.
Everybody is a mixture of various types of people. So, in this whole mixture, how people respond is completely based on time, space, their moods or the fluctuations of mind as per that time, because of various reasons. So, we cannot predict. We can only generalise a person based on the most predominant attitude. We can never say, “This person is always like this”. Each day could be different, moods could be changing, and everything could be changing. So, we must never judge anybody and say that he/ she is always like this. So, we have to understand that the world operates in such a way where the gunas; the Sattva, Rajas, Tamas gunas are fluctuating, flowing.
That changes time and again based on various aspects of existence, and that causes swings in moods. Sometimes Sattva is very high; people are tranquil and peaceful, then Rajas becomes high, they become very active, very explicit, and when Tamas becomes high, they procrastinate. So, this keeps going up and down, and according to that, a person will respond. Sometimes when the person is filled with Tamas, they may respond illogically, procrastinate. Procrastination brings forth anger, hatred, various types of feelings: feeling of separation, feeling of lack of love, etc. When that happens, maybe a disconnection happens between the person who loves them fully and the person who takes advantage of them.
Sometimes people think that the people who take advantage are good people because they fail to see the truth. At the same time, a thought may come that the people who love them unconditionally, but pretty rigid in their attitude are bad guys. In such cases, they hate the people who are truthful, and they follow the people who are manipulative. We have seen that in life. Sometimes people go after people who are manipulative, and they realise it much later. By the time too much of water would have flown under the bridge. That means time would have changed, and it would have probably become irreversible. Then betrayals happen, revenge happens, so much of bad blood happens. At the same time, the estrangement takes root; it means separation takes root, so this might become a trauma. But a master you are connected to, the Master will remain unconditional.
In the story of Victor Hugo, the Bishop gave food and accommodation to an ex-convict. When nobody wanted him, the society rejected him and did not want anything to do with him; at that time, the Bishop invited him to the church, gave him warm food and accommodation. But the convict in him could not accept it. The convict in him accepted himself as a bad guy, and decided, “This is not possible. Nobody can love me”. Because the inherent feeling or the concept or the state that he was in, rejected the kindness which the Bishop showed unconditionally.
What did he do? He stole the silver candle holders and ran away in the night. The police caught him, brought him back to the church because he had those candle holders which had the mark of the church on it. The police asked the Bishop, “Did this man steal something from the church?” and showed him the candleholders and few other things. The Bishop said, “No, I gave it to him”. Thus, he saved him again. That transformed the man.
So I always believe CONSISTENT KINDNESS transforms minds. So all you have to do is, not to have any expectation if you are brimming with unconditional love. If you expect people to appreciate, people to accept you as unconditional etc., there could be disappointments. Whenever there is an expectation, there is a potential for disappointment. So, express unconditional love consistently and be kind again and again and again, and you raise yourself in stature, not status. Stature is your ability to be unconditional love all the time. Then what happens in society? Society cannot ignore you anymore. Society will come around you, respect you and glorify you and make you a legend or legend hood comes to you because you have been consistent.
Consistency is a big deal. Many people do not have it. It is because they pitch expectation into an activity, and suffer sorrows and disappointment. So, this is something which we must remember. Be unconditional, but have the maturity to have no expectations. So you keep giving. Examples are Mother Teresa, Mahatma Gandhi; we can find so many examples. They did not do things for the sake of earning glory, and because of that, glory came to them. Nelson Mandela, for example, He was behind bars in one cell for about 30 + years, that is, for most of his life. But when he came out, he was not affected. He created the platform for a peaceful society.
How can that happen? There was no revenge in his mind. Likewise, various great masters whom we have respected over time, they have been kind consistently, been compassionate, and been selfless consistently, and expecting nothing and that made them legends. Being unconditional is a beautiful thing. But it should have one more ingredient added into it. That is, zero expectation, and that will give you glory.
Question: How can we be sure that we are doing Consciousness Kriya correctly? And how do we know we’re making progress?
Mohanji: Well, any practice for that matter, say a normal physical practice, how do you know whether you are making progress? In simple terms, your proficiency increases. But in spiritual practice, the idea of spiritual practice is to give you a certain level of stability. So one of the criteria if you are doing a thing right, with the full application, full commitment, with conviction, faith, and consistency; if you are doing it properly, the result would be stability. Automatically, you will be very stable, and you will not be affected by the things around you too much. Things will be happening around you as it would, but it will not affect you as much as it usually would. So that’s the real sign that you are actually in the right track; we can extend it to say with fewer thoughts, less desires, etc.
End of the day, when you are practising it right, when you are consistent about it, and you believe in it, (if you don’t believe in it, if you are testing it, it may not work that much.) then you will realise that there is a kind of stability happening inside you. You are not fluctuated by the fluctuations of the outside world. The outside world will remain outside; the inside world will strengthen. When the inside world strengthens, the outside world cannot affect you anymore.
This phenomenon, you can see if you are getting more and more stable inside that means the external world will not affect you as much as it normally would. So, this is a clear sign of knowing you are doing it right. Sometimes, you know the method very well, but the effect is not happening because you do not trust it. Secondly, when we go to a guru with expectations and the guru gives you certain guidelines, but then we neither trust the guru nor the guidelines, we fail in the whole thing. It is because of one reason; we have not connected, we have not accepted. So, it’s important to accept wholeheartedly, experiment it, keep trying it, and after a while, it will start working. Maybe initially it may not work, it starts working as you go further and further.
There should be some kind of consistency in your practice; this is very important. If that’s not happening, the results may not happen. We become busy with our thought processes, so we do not have consistency sometimes. Then, that affects us, and we feel dejected, depressed because we are not progressing. Progress means less thoughts. Less thoughts means less desires. Less desires mean more detachment and more freedom.
Less thought = Less desires =Less needs = More detachment = More freedom.
That’s a benchmark which you can actually look for. But for that, you need to connect to your inside world more than the outside world. When we are running behind the pleasures of existence, entertaining the senses, entertaining the mind, etc., it may not work easily. On one side we are chasing things outside, but on the other side, we are trying to come inside, this struggle will continue.
So you must spend enough time with yourself. And I have always done that between 3 am to 8 am, early morning. That is because that time, the world is relatively free from you or you are free from the world. After that, you got to give yourself to the world. Maybe you are working, you are doing things, and then you are probably busy with your life outside. And that will take its toll. It’s okay, that’s part of life. But we got to spend time with ourselves, a personal time. That’s the time you should practise consistently with faith, faith in yourself, faith in the activity and also be clear that you are not keeping expectations ahead of you.
What are you doing? – Just practising. Just doing what it takes. And it doesn’t matter whether it’s good or bad. Just by focusing on the activity with full surrender, the results will start happening because you are starting to connect with yourself. End of the day, whether you are a Bhakti Yogi, following the path of devotion, or Jnyana Yogi, following the path of knowledge, or Karma yogi, following the path of service, or Raja Yogi, following the path of consciousness, it doesn’t matter. Everything leads you to yourself. Eventually, you will have to come back to yourself, and that’s the whole path. That’s the whole tradition. So this will happen anyway. This has to happen. So it doesn’t matter whether this practice is right or wrong, etc. I would say wrong practice means you need to put pressure to do it. Right practice is a pleasure. You are happy to do it. This is very simple.
Question: What would strengthen and help the awakening of consciousness?
Mohanji: Consistency strengthens our purpose. When we are consistent, what is our priority? We must ask this question some point in time. Imagine you came in contact with a very powerful master. But you contacted him for some personal gain or personal benefits, such as a job or a marriage or a relationship or some money or a position in the world, something like that. That’s very shallow. It may happen anyway.
But why did you associate with a very powerful Master? What brought you to him? It is your eligibility. What kind of eligibility brought you to a master of that kind? It is the eligibility for liberating yourself from the mundane existence of likes and dislikes, happiness and sorrow; this kind of duality. It was time for you to come out of it. That is how you came in contact with the master. Now, imagine you are still expressing your patterns, expectations leading to disappointments, ownerships, anger, hatred, jealousy, etc. What happens? You stand still! Your patterns are more powerful than your association with something really powerful (the master). That means your patterns become a wall in front of you, which disconnects you from that master.
Then that connection is wasted. You cannot use it because there is a wall in front of you. Your own patterns, concepts, prejudices make a wall, and the wall grows, because your ego enters. Ego sometimes manipulates you. Ego tells you, “Hey, look here! This is not how it should be; he should come forward to you, not you go to him” etc., all those things and it takes you away from reality and detaches you from reality and what happens is that the whole connection is wasted. So, when you come in contact with a master, you should have the priorities set right. And you should have extreme flexibility, flow like a river, and flow like water. Extreme flexibility helps you to progress in drastic speed.
As I told in the beginning, imagine you have a lot of lifetimes, let’s say 200 lifetimes. As you come closer to your soul, you can see these 200 lifetimes in one frame, like in the zoom, we can see all the people on one frame, all the people who are connected to us are all in one frame, and they are all in these frames. Like that, we can see our various lifetimes in one frame and then we will know that we have been expressing almost similar patterns. Maybe, we have been a man or a woman or a child or anything in each life, that doesn’t matter. But in every life, we have been expressing similar patterns, insecurities, prejudices, all the things which you are experiencing now have been the same in all those lives and the coming lives as well.
So what you are really doing is that with each death, you are just going out, changing clothes and coming back into a new life. So it’s like a new scene in the drama. We are acting scene by scene by scene. If you take a drama, in that kind of boundary/frame, you are enacting a role. And you keep coming back in a new costume, and you play the role. In between, you are coming in contact with a master who says, “I will take you out of this. You had enough of roles in life, you have played a lot of roles, and I’ll take you out of it”. But then again, you have been used to certain patterns all these lifetimes, similar patterns. So what will you say? “Okay, I would like you to take me out of it. But you know what, I have something more to settle because I have left some things on another screen, another time so that I want to go back to complete that. That man cheated me. So I must go back and cheat him. He betrayed me. So I must betray him.” Like that, we have scores to settle.
We have things to complete, which provokes further lives. So in this whole bargain, in various lifetimes we have come in contact with people who have come out of this drama; they have finished their acting, they have already settled within themselves, they’ve understood there’s no need for this drama. They’ve experienced everything connected to this whole life, and they don’t want it anymore. They know it very well, and they have come out of it. These people still hang on to guide others to come out of it. But then our patterns are so strong, that we may even blame the people who are already detached from it, saying, “No, no, this guy doesn’t understand, I have to take care of this thing. This is more important for me.” ‘I’ am important. I factor. ‘I’ is the association with the role not with the actor. This is the problem. We associate ourselves with the role.
If Mohanji associates himself as a guru, then Mohanji has a problem. I’m not a guru all the time. When I play with Mila, I’m not a guru. I’m her father. Like that in every scene, I play a different role. And the sum total of it is what is called this incarnation. So, that acceptance should happen. With extreme flexibility, when you play the role, you play it well, good enough for an Oscar. You play it supremely well, and when you come out of it, you have nothing to do with it. That is the detachment we talk about. We have that experience every day.
Remember, when we go to bed, we shut off from this external world. We are completely detached. We shut the screen; there is nothing on the screen, no world outside. Then we connect to the internal world, and we see the drama of life as dreams. We get tired; we shut that also. Then we go into a deep sleep where you shut off everything, body, mind-matter, everything is shut off. You are totally sitting in consciousness with consciousness. You are sleeping with consciousness. Then you come back again to the waking state, where you and the world come alive. Again you wear the costume of this incarnation as per your projection, and the world recognises you as you are known in this incarnation. But is that you? Ask this question – Am I this? This role play is important in this act for sure, because you play that role, but is that you?
Why do you set boundaries? Why do we have boundaries? This question will happen, and that time we will start understanding the role play. So, everybody’s life is just acting, or role plays and patterns are guiding. The inclinations, tendencies push them to express what they are into this world. That means we are projecting what we are into this world. That means we are seeing or experiencing this world as WE are; we cannot experience the world as it is. We are not experiencing the world as the world is. Instead, we are experiencing the world as we are. What do you see around? What do you get from this world? – Opinions, concepts, prejudices, and so many factors of that kind. Think about it.
The world is full of opinions; it may not be the truth. Somebody says, “This person is not good.” That is his perspective. That person thinks that the other person is not as good as per his criterion. But another person may say, “This guy is very good.” So who’s telling the truth? Nobody is good. Nobody is bad. It’s our perspective; it is the way we see it. We see a person, and if our frequency is not matching with something, we call it not good – For whom? – For us. So, when we tell another person, “That person is not good, stay away”, are we missing heavily here? Definitely. We are missing a lot because we fail to see the truth. Our opportunity to see the truth or our opportunity to be neutral and have clarity is taken away because we see the world through our ears, not through our eyes. Eyes are given to see the world, to see the truth, but eyes cannot see the truth because ears work more.
We experience that in life. So this has to be clearly understood. The world is as it is, but we see the world as we are. And then if you see this whole 100, 200 lifetimes of our existence, you can see the same pattern at work. But because we are getting involved in the drama, we cannot really come out, because each person changes the costume and comes back and we must be there. We are addicted to this play, and we keep coming back: the same people, different costumes, and different order. They all come back, and they all provide similar emotions because they’re all coming with patterns; similar emotions. We enter into the drama, and we really suffer from that drama, sometimes happy sometimes sorrow, but do we see this drama? We must. The moment you start seeing the drama, and then you realise, “Oh, this is the story.”
Do you know why we have assassinated most of the people who spoke the truth? The people, whom we assassinated like Jesus and Socrates, were great masters who saw the truth and told the truth – undistorted truth, but we killed them. We character assassinated them. Why did we do that? Because we do not see, we can’t see. We are blind to reality. We only see what WE are, what is our pattern through the eyes of the pattern. We only see through the eyes of the pattern, through the eyes of our prejudices and concepts. Through the spectacles of what we have carried forward and what we have collected, we are watching this world. We are witnessing this world, and we don’t see the truth. We do not even accept the truth. All these people are like that. That is why racism, speciesism is all because we are eating concepts right from our breakfast till we sleep.
Somebody says, “It’s okay to kill an animal and eat” and we eat. We do not think that they have a life. They have a right to live as much as we have. The right is the same for every species which we don’t see. Likewise RACE. Each person is born in a certain community, and that’s about it. Nobody is higher or lower. Nobody can be higher or lower. Experience wise, everybody has the same right; the same kind of experience. If you touch fire, your hand will burn. The same happens with every race, everybody.
If we start seeing beyond all these seeming boundaries that we have created for ourselves and we fail to see the truth, then we realise, ”Oh, so there is a pattern”, but when do we get to see it? Even when somebody who has seen it tells you, we may not accept it. We may ask mundane questions. What will happen to me in the future? Does that mean you are asking what is the script? Or ask what will happen after my death? You will come back in the same way. It doesn’t matter. What you can do right now is your only reality. Try to connect yourself and try to see the truth now. That can change your future. Not that the future can change by sitting doing nothing, or entertaining the patterns now. Future will not change like that. Future will be future, patterns will continue, and patterns are ruling us. Our inclinations and tendencies are ruling us, which we don’t know. Even if it is told, we do not accept, nor do we understand. We do not allow changes because we are too bound by the patterns. We don’t even see. I have to sleep; I have to eat; I have to do this. I have to do that. You are completely preoccupied and bound by patterns, where your freedom is lost. As I have explained in today’s message, freedom is freedom from the senses and mind, not of the senses and mind. But unfortunately, what we have always been told and what we tell others is that I have freedom because I can go out and do whatever I like. That means being a slave is freedom. When you say, “I have the freedom to go out and do things that I like”, you are saying, “I can exercise my patterns and I call that my freedom”.
That is not freedom. Freedom is a state where you are free from your own senses and mind. Senses are pretty much sensors; they cannot operate on their own, the mind provokes them. So when you are free from your mind-matter such as intellect, ego and mind, then the senses are in control. If they are not bothering you, if the mind is not bothering you and if you are detached from your mind, and in the state of witness hood and mind is not really provoking the senses to go out, that’s the only time you experience freedom. Otherwise, you don’t. Whatever we say as freedom: freedom of choices, freedom of doing things; that is not freedom. That is just another word for living your own patterns.
Freedom is when you need nothing from Earth. Freedom is when you are free from your mind. If you understand that clearly, you have understood the whole tapestry. You have understood the whole thing. So when you are coming in contact, or when you are fully in contact with your own soul factor, then you see life in the whole picture, the whole frame, every life, and all the lifetimes together. That time you realise, if I miss the chance to get out of this drama, I’m stuck again. That’s the time when we realise this connection which you have received in the path of spirituality is worth millions, or it’s totally priceless. That’s the only real thing in Life.
Forget about the patterns and other things. You want to get married; you want to have children, a house, etc., all these are patterns. But look at the reality now. Look at the truth which you have come in contact with. The truth of being you, the truth to be you, connect to you, accept you, understand you, assimilate you, align you, be you and realise you. We call it self-realisation, and that is priceless. You cannot put a frame or a price to it. And the role of a master is to bring you to this awareness, not to force you into this awareness. No master will force you, why should they force you?
A true master will show you a mirror, “Look here, this is where you stand”. “Then where should I go?” – Into yourself. Which way? You connect to yourself through contemplation, understand yourself, and accept yourself. Acceptance is very important. You have to accept yourself with all your weaknesses and strengths. You have to feel yourself as you are and be yourself. This life is a golden chance. Do not chase the rainbows now because we have been chasing it always, in all the lifetimes. Now, we have got an opportunity to be aware that reality is at hands reach. We have come in contact with reality. And this is worth anything. That should be the first priority.
Destruction of patterns should be your first priority. But you can’t destroy something and stay empty. You got to catch something higher. How do you catch it? What will you catch? TRUTH. The Truth inside you; the truth is what you are catching. That truth is inside you. That’s the real you; the witness who needs nothing from Earth, nothing from anywhere. Beyond relationships, beyond time, space, beyond matters, materials, possessions, positions, this is you. You start connecting to that; you will see immense power happening inside you, overwhelming power.
Because you are free, you feel the power of freedom. It is great freedom to feel that power. That power is not to display to somebody, not to show off. The power is big, the power of beingness, the power of being you, you have nothing to prove on Earth. There’s nothing to prove; there is nothing to ask for or nothing to gain from Earth. Instead, you are giving the Earth all your brightness. Imagine, this is the truth of liberation. This is a liberated existence. If we understand that, we have understood everything. This is within you; it is not something which is kind of unreachable. It’s not a tall order. It’s within you. It’s you, connecting to you, assimilating you, aligning you and being you.
The connection with the master is to bring that spark, to light that fire. Then the fire catches, burns you and reduces you to yourself. All other things go away; all the patterns, concepts, everything burns into ashes. Then you become you. If this is really understood, you have understood everything. This opportunity is right at hand, and you have it. This Guru Poornima is the right day to think about it. Sage Vyasa, Vashishta, Saptarishis; everybody came to tell you this story, that human birth is extremely important. And in human birth, you have this opportunity to recognise, understand and assimilate your true self, the truth.
It’s not a linear existence. Life goes linear from birth till death, but that is only for the sake of experience. However, truth does not go linear. The truth remains vertical, always vertical. All the time, the truth remains the same. When you are a child, the truth is the same. When you are an adult, the truth is the same. In your old age, the truth is the same. Truth never changes. But in linear time, experiences changes, perception changes, body changes, mind changes, intellect changes, everything changes. And we confuse ourselves by thinking, “I am changing.” However, nothing is changing. You are the same, you cannot change, and truth cannot change.
So, if you’ve really understood this, you will start recognising the truth every moment. What you get out of it? – Immense stability, peace, tranquility, freedom. You will experience the real meaning of freedom only when you reach that state, where you are connected to the truth yesterday, today, tomorrow, and the day after. It doesn’t matter what your moods are, what your surroundings are, what your emotions are. Not a problem. Nothing matters. You could be anger, hatred, jealousy, lust, anything. Not a problem. It is a state of freedom. That’s exactly how great masters existed -consistent, stable, integrity, unchangeable because you are connecting to the unchangeable.
Question: We have multiple tasks being done at the same time; managing the home, children, etc and there is no time for spiritual practice. This is causing irritation. I would like to understand how I can make it more efficient.
Mohanji: We have a feeling that we have many tasks. We do have various responsibilities; home, office and a variety of responsibilities. Why don’t you take these as Sadhana or practice? It is possible. Do everything as an offering. Your work itself is worship! Everything can be worship. Breath is worship, thoughts are worship, actions are worship; everything can be an offering. Imagine like that – then it is perpetual meditation; all the time you are meditating. Don’t try to compartmentalise your life. It is one life, in which you are playing various roles; you are playing the role of a wife or a mother or a child or a father or uncle or any other role. You are playing these roles every day and it is part of your responsibility. YOU MUST! But there is a YOU in the middle. There is YOU who is playing these roles; connect to that you, who is no role, but the actor. Not the role you play, but the actor. Connect to this actor, the real you and meditate on that actor. Not the role; roles will change, even in a day it changes many times; let it change, play all the roles. But at the same time, connect to yourself, the actor. And you feel how it is. You will start feeling very peaceful and meditative. The actor is not changing, roles are changing. You are everything. But you are NOT anything. You will understand that experientially. You will understand and experience that.
That will make a difference in your life.
Question: What is the significance of special occasions, like certain times for deities?
Mohanji: Every time has its significance, just like day or night. Similarly, there is significance to seasons, certain planetary configurations which shift the energy frequency, and we perform certain rituals at that time, all of them have significance. Each of these, as you connect to it, is transformative, even if temporarily. When you participate in a festival, you feel excited. You forget your sorrows, wear new clothes, eat good food, and you feel great! The purpose is to rejuvenate you, to press the restart button! So what happens is you look forward to these holidays, those experiences. Whether it is spiritually significant or not, what happens inside is the real story. Are you happy? If you are happy, it is worth it! What is life for? Happiness. We want to experience what is happiness on earth. We want to experience ecstasy, bliss, love, great things in life which makes us feel good. All these festivals that society has created are for that purpose. If you really understand that you will start appreciating all these things.
If you look at festivals connected to Lord Krishna, all joy and dance and singing, etc. Why is it so? Because life should be a celebration ! Life means celebration. Janmashtami happened a few days back. Everybody celebrated the birth of Lord Krishna. Krishna was born about 5000 years ago. But we celebrated as if He was born now! What happened in the minds of people?
A rebirth happened! Reborn, Rejuvenated, in a way, Reinvented!
This is the beauty of festivals. We must celebrate, Datta Jayanthi , Sai Baba’s Samadhi day, and so on. We celebrate everything and it is worth it. We sing, we chant, we connect, we rejuvenate and then we reinvent and we restart ourselves.
Question: A person who has always helped others, and never harm others still suffers greatly. How can this happen, is it karma?
Mohanji: Life is a flow. We must flow with life. Two things life is a flow through bodies life flows. That means through rebirths life flows. So, we do not understand the flow completely. What has happened in the past lives? What did we do in the past lives, what is happening in this life, is a reflection of what happened, or what we did in our past lives. And so, we only experience this life right now. You will not understand the cause. That is why this question, why is something like this happening?
In fact, imagine somebody did all sorts of atrocities in another life; anger, hatred, jealousy, revenge, betrayal. He did everything possible in that lifetime. Then he produced a new lifetime based on the karmic wealth, he accumulated in that lifetime.
He took another birth. So he came in this life but he can’t remember what happened in the previous births, which caused this life.
Probably in his previous life, at the end of his life, he regretted doing all those things. He died with regret and he took a wow, “ I will never do these bad things anymore.” And he took a new life, a good life. This life is good, doing all the good things, but the karmic bank balance keeps following him.
In a Mirabai bhajan it says, if you betray a master, a spiritual master, it takes you about 80,000 lifetimes to come back to where you have been before. That means betrayal, criticizing, scandalizing, gossiping all these have a price to pay. Don’t think that,” Oh I can gossip about somebody and it doesn’t matter”. It matters.
Appreciation and honoring, expressing gratitude – these are good, because then you have reward. But if you gossip, talk bad, character assassinate, betray, all these things have huge price; you may end up paying that over lifetimes, many lives. Because it’s as if you took a huge bank loan, gambled and lost everything. So you end up paying your entire life. It’s almost like that but in the case of betrayals and character assassination, and such issues, the price goes through many, many lifetimes. I always tell people do not engage in any gossip. If you don’t know, just forget it. Don’t talk bad about anybody; even if somebody has done something bad to you, leave that person to his karma; karma will take care of it. Don’t worry. You should not keep thinking about it and creating your own future.
There are people who will come to you as problems, because you might have been a problem for them in another life. As I said, life is a flow, it is a continuous flow. Bodies are temporary and to each body. They have experienced something, then this body is gone, another body, they experience many different things. This goes away, then, another body; like this, we have taken many bodies.
We will take more if you don’t dissolve into the Supreme Consciousness in this life, we will take further bodies.
This is why you need a very powerful master to connect to, where you dissolve into him, and you don’t have to take any more bodies, unless you want to.
That’s the difference, birth by choice. Birth for the sake of Dharma is different from birth for the sake of karma. They are two different things. So we may not understand why we are experiencing certain things but we can assume that if we are experiencing bad things in this life, we might have committed something bad in another life. So it’s come back to us. This life, if you’re done good things, the merits of it will go to another life. Probably you’ll be born in such a family in the next life where you get only the merits of it. This happens. So, what you do today will have its payment later. Means you do your work now and you get paid later. Like that whatever you are doing now, you will have the results later.
But please remember, there is no escape from karma.
If you have done something, if you’re committed something you must pay for it, especially death, destruction, betrayal, character assassination, gossip, the negative aspects. Also, please remember we watch these programs in the television and movies and different forms of entertainment; the soap operas where it’s about bad relationships, criticism, judgment, betrayal, and such in the stories and we occupy ourselves with these; we imbibe those emotions within; we can probably have a similar future, or a similar experience in the future. This is possible. So please be aware! That this is why all the great Masters insisted on satsang – good company, good company.
satsangatve nisangatva
nissangtve nirmohatva
nirmohatve nischallatatva
nischalatatve jivanmukti
That is exactly what great masters have said. That means with good company you learn to detach from the wears and tears of life, from the fluctuations of life. When you are in a kind of detached state your desires are reduce, desires becomes fewer. When desires become lesser, mind becomes still. What is causing the mind to be restless? Numerous desires.
That is why I always say let’s get it fulfilled, let’s do it and finish it off, so that the mind is still. The mind must be still. When the mind is consistently still, liberation happens to you. Moksha happens; mukti happens. We must understand that we are the source of our own destiny. We are creating it every moment; every day; every moment, whatever we are doing there is a reason, result.
So there’s a past for everything; there’s a present for everything and there’s a future for everything. You should understand this. And when you’re very involved and have a clutter of thoughts; you can’t see the truth. And we start looking at the world through our ears; through other people’s words. That’s the worst thing. We should not see through our ears. Ears are to hear but then other people’s opinion, should not be our spectacles to see the world; which means, we should look at the world ourselves as we are and experience it; and detach from criticizing, blaming, and talking bad about anything, including yourself. Do not criticize others; do not criticize yourself. Do not judge others; do not judge yourself. Like that if you respect everything, life will be better, for sure.
Question: This question came in relating to acceptance. Yeah. So how can we accept, even the bad aspects of ourselves? Why is self-acceptance so difficult?
Mohanji: Why is self-acceptance so difficult? It’s because we always worry about the bad aspects in ours ourselves. We all have it, 7.5 billion people, have good and bad in them; positive and negative in them. Don’t think that you are the only one who has all the negatives in you; it’s not true. All people have it, so we must understand that this is how creation works. In every human being, there is positive and negative; and we must really understand that we have to focus, on only positive and ignore the negative. We have to ignore the negative. We have to focus on the positive, and that’s the way we can accept ourselves better. Let the negative be there with us, and don’t look at anybody in the world as only positive; it’s not possible. It is just not possible. There will be some negative in everybody, and don’t focus on the negative; because then we are missing the whole thing. Focus on the positive; let’s strengthen the positive; we unite together; work together; be together like one family, and then it will be glory for everybody. We have that power!
Question: Is there a way to dissolve past karma, and also what’s the consequences of any parent’s actions on the child destiny?
Mohanji: Past karma – We’ve taken this life to exhaust past karma; it means pending desires and our, our driving force, or our inclinations are our vasanas. Vasanas are our driving force, tendencies, and inclinations. And we are going ahead with experiencing our pending desires at each point in time in life, right from childhood till death. This is what we are doing. Part of it is lineage karma, that’s coming from the lineage, from our father and mothers’ side, coming together; that merges with us. Each individual has personal karma, pending desires of personal nature, and also pending desires of the lineage nature; they are coming together. They come together, and we are experiencing that in life.
So, how do you exhaust them? Automatically, without your knowledge you’re exhausting it. Whatever you’re experiencing each day that’s exhaustion; every experience amounts to that karma. If you block it, it stays postponed. If you experience it and move on, then it’s done. So the best way to come out of all these karmas are, by being good and doing good; so that when you express your best in everything, whatever you can, as per your capacity ; and be kind; be compassionate; be generous, and then this karma gets dissipated. So the more good things you do; by good things I mean because of your existence, you help all the beings of the nature; then automatically your karmic configuration starts changing; and improvement happens, and you reach a level where there is no ownership of action.
When you have ownership of action, you have karma. If you, if you surrender everything to the Almighty, then there is no karmic binding. When you get up in the morning itself have the right attitude towards life; surrender attitude and connect to one master; seriously and consistently, whatever happens let it not change. Again as I said before, the Master and the man should be different, considered different; a person has his needs and requirements, but a Master is the settled aspect of that person; so connect to the Master aspect. You don’t have to connect to the person, so that you can avoid an illusion. That is why I said so. So, connect to the Master in that way, as settled consciousness; after you have sufficient proof for yourself for that sake. Don’t just look at the picture or somebody words and follow somebody; it won’t work, because if you look at just the picture and the words of opinions of somebody it may not be suitable to you, but you need to know whether this person is stable within. If it is not, don’t follow.
Once you start following; don’t leave. This is your integrity. This is how it should be. Then somebody else says at some point in time;” Oh! He’s not good or this is that. Don’t change your mind!” Your experience is true to you; your experience is most important for you and you follow that whatever happens in the world; then you will have progress. So this is an individualistic journey; it’s an individual journey.You are the traveler; you are the journey; you are the destination. You are the experience of the journey; everything is you.
So if you understand that clearly, you will not have lot of distractions, or distortions. This is the truth.
Question: How can we be liberated in this life, is it possible, with nothing pending that needs to be taken forward?
Liberation is possible right now, right here! How it is possible? It is possible firstly, by keeping that as your priority. Your top priority should be liberation. And then second is increase your awareness; increasing awareness is very simple. It means just be aware of your thoughts, words, actions; be aware and slowly start detaching from them, by just being aware. I am not the thought; thoughts are happening through me. I am not the doer; actions are happening correspondingly through me, so there’s no ownership. I’m not the action; actions are also happening through me. I’m not the doer, but it doesn’t mean that you go and kill somebody and say, “I didn’t kill, it happened through me.” Not like that. You should be responsible as well. You have to have responsibility. So, everything you do, you’re responsible; so only good actions, good thoughts, good words, and then no, no negative feelings or expressions or any of those kind of things. And then you have clarity that everything that is born will die. Everything has a duration. Whatever is born, will die. And all things are interconnected, you cannot exist alone. Everything is connected in the world; the plants, the trees, the birds, the animals, human beings; we are all interconnected; we all have something to give and take; so that kind of a total acceptance is essential. And liberation is a state which you experience right now, where you do not have binding on something, or something does not bind you.We do not have binding out of place, a person or situation or emotion or experience. We are not bound by anything. Our desire level is very low, very less.
Once you understand that and accept that and when you are in that kind of a mode; automatically you will start feeling detachment from the world outside. That doesn’t mean that you hate anything; there’s no hatred here, it’s just that, you don’t want it. You don’t want it; which means you have no need for it. When you have no need for something; you are free from it. When you have such freedom, you are liberated while living; and that means you’re not collecting more and more desires anymore. So, what happens? No desires, no reincarnations! Simple, so liberation is possible, just by investing in awareness. Investing in awareness – that is the secret. Invest in your awareness; be aware of who you are, what you are, where you are, why you are; of all those be aware. Also understand all the things around you during waking state do not exist when you’re sleeping or it doesn’t exist for you when you’re sleeping. When you wake up, they are there. So, what is there? That your experience is connected to you! You can have experience or no experience based on your moods, your situations, your emotion at that time. Everything is like that. So, this is very simple, it’s easy to understand. When you really know that you are everything; and you don’t need much, then you are liberated. So liberation is a state of mind; it’s an attitude, which you can easily cultivate, just by awareness. Awareness is the fire.
Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt and Padmini Ravi Kumar Proofread by Vidya Rajagopalan
Question: How to dissolve the barriers of physical identity and see all gurus and masters as one?
Mohanji: The usual mind is filled with so many factors, so many different flavours of life; which means that we have been living all these years and we have had various lifetimes. What we have collected over a period of time has made the whole mind murky; our mind is filled with so many things, especially things connected to likes and dislikes, prejudices, concepts and knowledge of various kinds. All these things are mixed in our mind. Our awareness is very much like muddy river water. So, unless that mud settles down in the mind and the water becomes clear, we cannot see the truth.
That is why masters have insisted that we must spend enough time, to give clarity to our own mind through stillness; by practicing stillness – through contemplation, meditation, etc. When we do contemplation, when we do meditation consistently and consciously, it means we do nothing, that is, be still or keep the mind still. Mind by habit keeps moving. It has many prejudices, likes and dislikes, flavours, and emotions like anger, hatred and jealousy are also a part of our existence. We must understand that to have clarity, you need to settle down; be still. Else, you may connect to one master, who you have recognized through your own experience. Do not go with others’ words, it won’t work. People can give you opinions; it will not work. But through your own experience, if you have understood that this person has stabilized his mind, he has settled down properly in himself and he’s just like a mirror, then you connect to that person.
Where you park your mind, where you are connected to and what you are connected to, you start becoming that. That becomes you or you become that. This is very important to understand. You need to connect to masters who are stabilized. (You connect to) One master or one person, but not many masters. Many masters are all illusory. Only in a confused state of mind, you connect to various people; otherwise it’s just one connection, steady connection, stable connection which gives you stability. Those who keep wandering, they do not stabilize anywhere and it is not easy to stabilize too. This is important to understand.
Confusions arise in the mind, because mind is murky, mind is not able to see. Once you are very settled inside, then you are fully into yourself. The right place to settle down is inside you. We are settling down inside us every night. Do you know during deep sleep state, we are fully settled inside? We are settling down inside fully. So, we do have that experience every night, when we are in deep sleep, where we are fully settled inside. When we wake up in the morning, we get scattered, the mind is scattered. Then we bring that mind back into ourselves and sleep. When you do this with awareness in the morning – meaning your mind is completely inside you, in that state, you will fully be stabilized. This is very important. But I would tell you one thing – you can do it yourself; you have that ability, because you have that example of the night, the sleep time, where you are fully into you.
The mind which is going out normally comes inside and settles down inside and then you are fully into yourself. From that point, if you understand and shift with awareness; in other words, you are aware that you are inside, that is a state of meditation. You can come inside and you can settle down. None of the external factors will make much difference to you. The emotions, the places, the people or the situations will not make any difference in your mind because you are stable and still. This is your birth right. This is what you are essentially.
If you look at a master like Shirdi Sai Baba, he used to be just like a mirror. During much of our life, we are projecting what we are to the world outside. Whatever is inside us, we are projecting it to the world outside and we get the reflection of our projection, or the reciprocal/ reflection of our projection. So, if you are projecting anger into the world, you also get anger from other people. People become angry with you for no reason. If you are projecting hatred to the world, you do get hatred back. If you are projecting love into the world, you get love back. So, when you do selfless service and altruistic activities in the world, you get that back as well. When you dedicate yourself to the world, the world gives itself to you. That is how life works. So, what you are is very important. That is exactly how you will experience life – AS YOU ARE. You can’t experience life as something else. You cannot experience life even as how things are. It’s not easy.
Hence we must understand that we are the cause for all our experiences. There is nothing right or wrong with whatever is happening. Don’t try to categorize them into, “This is okay”, “This is not okay”, “This is right”, “This is wrong”. There’s nothing like it. Everything is good for you. Because you are asking for whatever you are missing. Otherwise you won’t miss it. If you are not missing it, you won’t ask for it. So, whatever you are missing, you are asking and that is a potential for another existence. You may need another body, you may need another time; you may need another situation to experience that thing. Nothing is right or wrong that way.
Everything that you are missing, you are asking for it and you must have it because that calls for or asks for fulfilment. This understanding is very crucial, as to why certain things are happening. First of all, there is no ‘WHY’. Everything IS – AS IT IS.
Because there is a deficiency in you and you are asking for that reality. Sometimes we may feel that we never asked for anger, but do you have anger suppressed inside you? Do you have rejection suppressed inside you? Do you have feelings of injustice inside you? All these things will definitely create that asking and will ask for fulfilment. So, when you have consistent rejection, you will ask for appreciation and acceptance. So, when the world is not accepting you, you will feel unhappy, you feel angry. This is how life works. In a broad spectrum, life is all about – whatever you are missing, you are asking for and chasing. And that’s exactly what gives happiness also. If you get it, you are happy. If you don’t get it, you are sad.
Question: In times of trials and tribulations like we’re in now, what is the best way to calm our restless mind?
Mohanji: Currently we are in a particular time situation where none of our plans are working. Everything has changed. We made plans last year for this year but because of the Corona situation, everything has changed. It is not in our control. The best method to manoeuvre in such a situation is flexibility. Be very flexible, absolutely flexible. That means you flow like a river. Be like water and keep moving and be very flexible.
If you really flexible, then you do not have that feeling of loss and feeling, “Oh! Everything is lost and all my projects are finished”. That kind of pessimism comes from not being able to execute your desires or your plans. It happens to people, right? Sometimes we make great plans and we can’t execute it and we feel that everything is lost. But that’s normal. That’s natural, because we are human beings and as human beings, we tend to have expectations. So, the right method to handle such situation is absolute flexibility.
Keep flowing like water. Just flow like water. Be like water. Be flexible. Tell yourself, “Okay, this is not happening then there will be another thing” and be happy with what you have. Have Gratefulness. Have Gratitude. That’s very important at this time. You should really be grateful for all that you have; even your connection to your father, mother, Guru and God. In that process, all those people are adding value to your life. We must remember this and be grateful because this a good time, because you have time with yourself.
You can remember what built you up? What made you what you are today? First and foremost is mother – you have a relationship with your mother, nine months more than the society. So, the first and foremost is mother. Then father, the protector and the guide, the guiding factor who helped us to be ourselves. Next is the guru who gave you clarity about existence. One guru – whichever guru you connect to, be consistent with one, otherwise, nobody can give you anything. You can appreciate, accept, respect all masters and you must. But remember your guru, your tutor, your teacher; your guru should be one; because inconsistent connection means no receptivity. You can’t receive. So, be very constant with that connection. You can you take your time to be connected to the guru. But you should not get fascinated. It should not be out of hallucinations or imagination or expectations. It should be with reality. You should know that this man whom you are connected to is stabilized in himself. If you are not sure, do not connect. If you connect to any master with expectations you will have disappointment because the master and the person are different.
The aspect of mastery is different from the man or the woman. Let me tell you a real story. One man took a lot of pain and struggle and finally he reached his guru. When he came close to his guru and started living with him, he understood that the guru also eats food, drinks water, sleeps, goes to toilet etc. Then this guy got disillusioned. He had all the wrong thoughts in his mind. He said, “Oh, no! This Guru is an ordinary man just like me. I do the same”. So, these kinds of illusions can come in. Doubts can come in when you know that this person in the body is just another human being. So, you must segregate the human aspect and the spiritual aspect and just go with the teachings.
In Sai Baba’s case, Baba used to smoke chillum and somebody thinks, “Oh, Sai Baba is smoking so I also can smoke”. That means you will only become a smoker you will not become Sai Baba. So, we must understand that what Sai Baba said, we must follow– Shraddha (Faith) and Saburi (Patience). Saburi is extremely important. Very clearly, COVID is teaching us Saburi now. It’s a very important lesson that the COVID has given us – Saburi.
So, to come to the point, we must respect all beings. We should take time and respect. When it comes to God, you have to respect the god inside you. The God Particle inside you is the most stable particle inside you – which is your soul.
With zero interests in your likes and dislikes, your life, your death- it has no interests. It is just accompanying you as totally neutral. Just like electricity comes and gives light in your house. It helps washing machine, it helps refrigerator to function. Electricity has no needs, it has no requirement. The electricity board needs money, but the electricity does not need money. Those who produce electricity may need money, but the electricity itself does not need anything. But electricity is essential for the lights to happen, the fan, the air conditioner, the refrigerator, the washing machine. Electricity is always neutral. If it goes into washing machine it operates in that way. If it goes into air conditioner, it operates in that way. If it comes into a light bulb, it operates in a different way. Just like that, the soul is the same. It operates through different machines. In the body of an elephant it operates like an elephant. In the body of a human being, it operates as a human being. So as simple as that. All are same. Once we connect to that aspect inside you, you have found God. That is how you find God. We call it the self -realization. Realization of something which is already sitting in you and operating you. It is giving multiple dimensions, such as waking state, dream state, deep sleep state. Each dimension we have different experiences. This is what we are. This is how we are. This is something which we have to always remember.
We are universal. We are the soul, not the body. Body has duration, it has some time on earth, birth till death. And also we are changing with age. What we liked with the age of 20, we may not like it at the age of 40. Like that, every time the flavour changes, everything changes. This we should always remember. During covid time we can connect to ourselves , be ourselves completely. Its worth it. I hope I clarified this point.
Q:Why we are facing so many disasters and natural calamities? Including suicides this year.
Mohanji: Why we are facing so many calamities is becasue of our insensitive lifestyle. Earth has its rhythm, its balance. All the beings of the earth are supposed to live within the boundaries and balance of earth. But human beings are different. All being are controlled or run by instinct. What is instinct? The basic instinct is survival -to be alive, to stay alive. That is a basic instinct. If you look at all the beings in the nature, they are all struggling to stay alive. They are always looking forward to being alive. Human beings also have the same thing. But then because we are highly intelligent,we have intelligence separated from the instinct. We created lot of things on earth for our comfort, for our protection, but basically survival instinct; extended survival instinct. That is the reason.
We created a lot of of things on earth. But we have become slaves to that. Now, even if we don’t get food, we are ok, but when you wake up in the morning , if the internet is not working, some people might commit suicide. They can’t think of a world without internet, without communication. Imagine, something hapens and the internet goes away. What will happen to the world? But, that’s the reality!
We have changed our taste for gadgets and various things. We even lost eye contact, as a species; we don’t even see eye to eye; we don’t have eye contact. We suppress so many desires. And what happens? We have perversions; we have aberrations in life. This is because of suppression. Many explosive behaviours; anger, hatred, jelaousy; these are all connected to suppression. But we never had that problem earlier. Animals do not have a problem with suppression. They are spontaeous. They express and they finish; they forget, so that they are at the moment all the time. We also should be in the moment all the time.
So what has happened? We, as one species, behaved like viruses and destroyed most of the species on earth. Including flora and fauna. That means ecology. So we made a disaster on earth. We created disaster on earth, so earth is giving us back. If our previous generations had thought,“ We got a world with us, we should give a better world to the next generation“, things would be different. But they never thought like that. Even we are not thinking like that. We are talking about religion, caste, country, culture, color, and we are dividing people more and more, based on religion, culture, language..all those things. What is happening in the bargain? We are getting isolated; we all became like islands, separated from each other.
We don’t love, we only expect. We do not give, but we expect. We do not share, we expect more from others. So we have become greedy, selfish and a little insensitive. That is why all these disasters are coming forth.
Imagine a Unified Consciousness, where everybody, we are all one family.
Our slogan in Mohanji Universe is,“ One World, One Family – one family, beyond species“. We are all here to experience earth. We are not here to accumulate anything.
See, you came empty handed, when you were born. Nothing was in your hands. You will go empty handed when you die. You carry nothing, not even a pebble. So what is life? Experiences of each moment and we must experience. That is why we are born. We have to experience. Every flavour of life we must experience. That, we deny. We say, “Oh, this is not ok, that is not ok“. Mind divided things and we separated them. Then what happens? All those desires are suppressed. Then we ask for more births. We need another birth to fulfill them. Like that, we have become unaware. If you live with awareness, you understand that we must coexist with all the beings of the world; every being that has taken a body on earth must have it’s set of experiences and we cannot deny it.
If we consider ourselves as more refined than other species, we must behave so.
We must be considerate.
We cannot conquire, capture and kill.
We cannot do that. We should support all forms of life.
We should coexist.
There should be forests; there should be every aspect of the Existence of nature shoudl exist as is. Then, we will have balance. The we can have better health, better life. Otherwise, all these disasters are signs of human insensitivity over time, over a period of time.
How much of pollution we have made in the world? How much destruction have we created in the world? World wars, religious wars, based on religion, killing based on religion, the pollution in the air, in the water, on earth..Look at everything! No being is safe on earth. This is a human world. In the human world, no other being is safe on earth. I have seen a picture of one man. He has killed 5,000 elephants in Africa, a hunter- he hunted 5000 elephants! Just imagine the number of beings being he killed?! We are paying for all this. Humankind is paying for all these kinds of aberrations and perversions.
We have no right to kill any being. We have no right.
Instead, if we call ourselves refined, we have the responsibility to provide for other beings. We should make sure they are all fine.
Sarve bhavantu sukhinaha – Let all the beings be peaceful!
That is exactly how it should be. Everybody should be peaceful and happy. Everybody should be blissful. This is our path. This is how it should be.
Q: How can I know my purpose in life?
Mohanji: Your purpose in life is what you are experiencing every moment. Because your birth is connected to the bundle of desires you have carried. From birth till death you have a duration of time. Within this time, you are supposed to experience whatever you came to experience. It doesn’t matter. As I said earlier, no right or wrong here. Whatever you are supposed to experience, you will experience within this time. That is the real purpose of each birth. Each birth is the fulfillment of the pending desires. This is exactly what you are born for.
Now, what is the possibility of a higher purpose? A human existence has this great possibility. From total unawareness to Supreme Consciousness. You can connect to Shiva. Be Shiva, which means Supreme Consciousness, stillness. You have that possibility. Shiva or Vishnu, its all same – Supreme Consciousness. You have that capacity in one lifetime. If your focus is on something larger, higher, you will reach there. It doesn’t matter whether you are a man or a women, it doesn’t matter which caste, country, culture, color- you can reach there. Everybody are same in the eyes of the Supreme .
So we have all these great potentials. You need to sit down and decide. What do you really want to achieve with this life? And work towards it. Then nature will configure itself for that purpose. But most people do not have that kind of a purpose. What they do is, they just want to make some money, or get some positions, or some possessions, and then they think,“Now, I will be happy“. And eventually, what happens ?No happiness. Because, they want more. When you get 100 you want 1000. When you get 1000 you want 10, 000. When you get 10,000 you need 100,000. Like that, desires multiply. There is no point in saying that if I get this, I will be happy. If you can’t be happy right now, you can’t be happy ever. It is not connected to something outside. It is not connected to your relationships; it is not connected to your possessions; it is not connected to your position. It is connected to YOU. You can be satisfied as much as you are connected to yourself. You can have contentment.
If you deeply appreciate yourself, if you really really love yourself, if you really respect yourself, Life will change its flavour.
Instead, we are busy loving somebody outside. We are busy looking for something outside. We are looking for situations, places, and time outside. In the bargain, we are not happy.
Instead, spend some time with yourself. What a beautiful creation YOU are! Have you ever thought about it? Feel yourself. Feel, see and experience how beautiful you are! How handsome you are! And what a kind of miracle you are!
All the organs inside are functioning like a great orchestra and giving you what is called life. Isn’t it great? We must think like that. We must remember that.
We are wonderful beings, but we forget it. Instead of that, we are looking outside, we see and think that there is something outside that we must appreciate. It’s not true.
First you appreciate inside. You. This whole package called you.
Appreciate it! How beautiful! What a wonderful creation! Then you start connecting to yourself, appreciating yourself. Accept yourself with all your weaknesses. Everybody has weaknesses. Nobody is only strength in the world. Don’t worry about your weaknesses. Instead, invest in your strenghts. Let the weaknesses stay with you. It’s ok. No problem. Why should we be perfect? We don’t have to be perfect. Let us have those weaknesses. We are born with this, or they have come to us. But we focus on our strengths. So what happens? There is no energy wastage. We don’t waste energy fighting weaknesses. Instead, when you strenghten your strenghts, when you invest in your strengths, when your strengths become stronger, the weaknesses become eclipsed. They become ignorable. You can ingnore them. That is the right way. Don’t waste your energy fighting something, resisting something. Instead, use your energy promoting something good in you; the best in you. That will make you very powerful.
And then you see a big difference in the world around you because people will start liking your aura, liking your presence, and say,“Hey, I love you! I love to be with you“ and you will know that it is worth it. The secret is accepting yourself, connecting to yourself, respecting yourself. If you don’t respect yourself, nobody will respect you. The secret why society cannot respect a person is because the person does not have self-repect. Why the scoiety cannot accept a person is becaue the person does not have self acceptance, self love. It is not selfishness, it is admiring and appreciating your existence. Selfishness is very bad. Our relevance in the world will depend on these two boundaries, selfishness and selflessness. The extent to which you are towards selflessness, that is how much you are appreciated by the world. Glory is connected to this aspect. The more selfless you are, the more glory you will get. This has to be clearly understood. That way you can transform the world by your own existence. You have that power! You have that in you! And this must be very clearly understood. Don’t think that somebody has to come and give it to you. Nobody has to give anything. You already have it. And you are immensely powerful. Why don’t you feel it? Because mind doesn’t allow you to feel. Mind gives you boundaries; “Hey, you are only this much! You are not great.“ And then you compare with other people – „ Hey look! This person is more beautiful than me, is smarter than me; is more talented than me.“ But remember one thing – he cannot be you or she cannot be you! Neither can you be that person! That person is already taken. But you are available to you. You are not taken. You have yourself. And that is your strength; your own strength is being you. ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IN THIS LIFE IS BE YOU 100%! Don’t try to be somebody else. And respect yourself, respect the world, respect the society.
Transcribed by Rakshitha Ananth and Nada Rakovic Proofread by Vidya Rajagopalan
Kailash, Sanatana Dharma, Naag Devas, Family deity
Namaste everyone!
A very warm welcome to all of you.
It gives me immense joy to be with all of you today.
Today you get to see the second part of my conversation with Mohanji. Go ahead, soak in the wisdom.
Kailash
Q: Father, I would like you to talk to us about the glory of Kailash Mansarovar, and what happens to humans who undertake this holy pilgrimage? If you could elaborate on this?
Mohanji: All these great locations, power centers of the world have transformative effect. We go to such locations for the sake of transformation. Transformation simply means more silence inside, fewer thoughts, less desires. So a place like Kailash is about stillness. In fact, Kailash is stillness. Kailash means stillness. Stillness means, it is the state of the Supreme Consciousness. Still, yet fully active, fully intelligent, and fully vibrant. When you have such a power center, many beings get attracted to that center, for their own transformation, personal transformation. Through personal transformation, when a lot of people are personally transformed, when they are not greedy anymore, when they have shed all their lower vasanas, gravitational vasanas, inclinations and tendencies, they become lighter, and then they start becoming brighter. So, a place like Kailash is a symbol or is symbolic of your own inner possibility; the possibility of inner stillness. Inner stillness means when there are no thoughts inside; you’re absolutely still then. When there are thoughts inside, you are always vibrating. You are changing, you are shifting. But that changeless state is Kailash. When you go to a place of that nature, you should go with full awareness; awareness that this is what you’re coming here for. This means you realize that you are coming here to transform. Once you transform internally, your life changes, and that reflects in the society outside. But not everybody goes to any place with full awareness. We go to samadhis of great masters, expecting something, praying, “Let me get married or let me have a child”, or things like that. This is the level of operation of the human mind. But Kailash Mansarovar has the effect of transforming you. There you don’t need to take any more births; forget about desires, you don’t need any more births! So that level is possible with Kailash.
Not only Kailash Mansarovar, there are many power centers. These are places which have high energy conglomeration. There are many centers like that, and that can transform people. See, the main thing you can see in the transformation is overwhelming compassion, kindness. You can’t hurt anybody, you can’t even think about shedding blood, no murder of any kind. People have shifted to become vegan, because of the inner shift within. The inner shift. This can happen, the big inner shift. People have reduced the quantity of consumption; sometimes they eat only one time a day; not because somebody told them; it won’t work that way. It should come from within. So less consumption means you are not utilizing more resources from earth, and you are giving back more to the earth. That shift happens. Otherwise, we are asking for more and more from earth. We have a voracious appetite. We need more. We take more and we consume more. And we don’t care about how the earth will be after our death. That will change to compassion, where we will receive less; we will take less from earth; but we would want to give more to earth. With different people the shift differs. We cannot say this would be it; but some shift will happen when inner stability settles within.
Yes, I have always felt this Baba. Twice that I went to Kailash, I felt that I have been twice reborn. It’s a new birth, after coming back.
Mohanji: We are reborn every day. When we get out of the deep sleep, we are reborn. The only difference between death and deep sleep is that, with the deep sleep we come back to the same body. With death, we come back in another body. That’s the only difference. So we are reborn every day.
Power Centres on the Earth
Q:Baba would you like to name a few more other powerful spiritual energy centers on earth?
Mohanji: There are many. Char Dhaams, they are all energy centers in India. Then there are the Jyotirlingas; they’re all energy centers. All the Shakthipeeths are energy centers. There are many outside: Machu Picchu is a very good energy center. We have Sedona, in Arizona, USA, it is an energy center, beautiful energy center. There are so many. But, see, it’s not essential to go to all these places. If you go to a place with awareness, it makes a difference. We go to these places so that it accents our evolution to levitation. It accents, provided you spend sufficient time to feel it. I always tell people, ”Go to a place to feel the place, not to see the place.” Many people go to those places, to take a picture against the backdrop, and post it on Instagram. I mean that’s okay. That’s one more wish list item checked. But that’s not the real reason for going to such places, right? It is to transform oneself.
Naag Devas
Interviewer: Yes Baba. Kindly tell us the role of Naag Devas on Earth? Are they still actively guiding humans? How does it work?
Mohanji: In the Sanatana Dharma principle, Sanatana Dharma is the essence of co-existence; essence of creation, essence of maintenance, essence of dissolution and an essence of co-existence – this is Sanatana Dharma in nutshell. According to Sanatana dharma principles – all the beings of the earth, all the beings of nature have frequency, vibration, relevance and interaction. Look at all the animals which are associated with our deities: lion, rat, swan, peacock, snake… all these beings are given respect. We respect them, because they are associated with the deities. Indirectly we are respecting those aspects of nature; we see it in the Dasha avatars of Lord Vishnu – Matsya, Kurma, Varaha, Narasimha; all of them have their respect, their relevance; we respect them; we revere them, because ecology should be maintained. According to astrology, various trees are connected to various stars, birds connected to stars and animals connected to stars. They say, if you protect the animal, the bird and the tree connected to your star, it will stabilize you. Indirectly what are they saying is – you’re interconnected, you’re connected to one another. So when you protect them, when you worship them and you respect them, your life is enhanced. You will strike a balance inside. We are not just individuals walking in a concrete jungle. We are spiritual beings; we have taken birth in an environment which has spirituality. This awareness should be given to people all the time. This awareness is essential. So, that is why we have in our system, where we respect every being which is living, walking, crawling, swimming, inanimate, animate, everything is respected.
For example, consider the Shiva linga – Why that particular form? That is the form which can contain, store and maintain energy for a long duration of time. That is why all the atomic reservoirs of the world are in the shape of the Shiva Linga. Why it is not square, circle, triangle or rectangle? It is not because this is the only form which can store and maintain energy of a certain nature – a powerful energy for a period of time. We understood this centuries ago.
Thousands of years ago we understood and said, “Everybody should exist, coexist. Everybody should be happy and peaceful” Sarva Bhavantu Sukhinah –May all the beings be happy, may all the beings be peaceful. This is exactly the reason why we do not harm any being. We do not kill any being. We should not kill any being, because they all are connected to us. When you kill a being, it’s like chopping a hand because they are connected to us. So why we propagate Ahimsa as Parmodharma (paramo means topmost, ultimate, or supreme, and dharma means duty) . We say this because it is essential for our well-being. For well- being to happen, we should co-exist, we should connect to every being, we should love every being, respect every being. That is why we worship. When you respect, you don’t kill.
Sanatana dharma created a structure where we respect all beings. Regarding snakes , there is a world of snakes. It’s not snakes actually. There are so many lokas. There are planets which are visible to eyes right? There are various frequencies in this world in this universe. In the created universe -created universe means manifested universe. There are various frequencies. Some are visible with naked eyes, human eyes, some are invisible, but they exist. There are numerous frequencies, numerous beings operating in numerous frequencies in the universe.
One such world we call as the Naga loka. Naga loka does not mean that they are snakes in the form. Why we call Naga loka, is because they when they appear in earth, they look like snakes. When they appear on earth, they look like snakes, huge snakes. Why are they here as snakes, you may ask; it is just for protection; people will not go and touch snakes. They take that form so that they are protected. They are highly evolved beings; you can call them aliens, in our terrestrial term. Various beings have come to earth, because earth is a plane where life can happen, as we see.
Many beings are curious. Then we have a type of animal which we call human beings, who can actually attain the highest possibility of human existence; that means Realization of God. This (the earth) is a very interesting location for all these experiences. So, many of these beings do come, they do interact and they do guide people. But we have one good quality – thanklessness, ingratitude. So what did we do? We attacked them, killed them and we made a lot of mess for them. And what is the result? If you destroy the environment, what is the result? Sickness is the main result. We become sick.
If you destroy the connection to the Source, what happens? Confusion, alienation, depression. This is what happens when we disconnected from those people. The whole structure of Brahma-Vishnu- Shiva that means Creation – Maintenance – Dissolution was explained to us in that detail, by these people, who appear as snakes. Around the neck of Shiva, you can see snakes. Maha Vishnu is lying on a serpent. That serpent is a symbolic representation of infinity, which cannot be defined. Ananta is infinity. Maha Vishnu is lying on Ananta. Maha Vishnu is lying on Ananta, means He is lying on Infinity, which means He is fathomless. He can’t be measured. He is existing in Cosmic Consciousness, in the Ridhambara buddhi and beyond, the intellect, which is vast and all encompassing.
Then Lakshmi is at His feet; that means the material aspect is at the feet of the Supreme Consciousness. When you enter Maha Vishnu, the stature of Maha Vishnu, when you enter into that frequency, wealth comes to you. That is also an antidote for poverty. Poverty is coming to you because you are disconnected. When you are deeply connected to Supreme Consciousness, wealth is coming to you; wealth will come to you. Lakshmi has to reach you. When you are completely disconnected, you are your ego material, your mind, then, no Lakshmi can come to you because your frequency is so low. That is the secret of poverty or richness. Everything is within our system. Naaga loka does exist. Naagas do exist. They are not snakes, but they appear as snakes here, so that they can stay away from people.
Photo from the installation of the Nagaraja murthi at Skanda Vale
Family Deity
Interviewer: Baba, what is the significance of family deity? How important in today’s times, you know in modern days, how important it is for people to acknowledge and revere the family deity?
Mohanji: There is no modern day or past day. Relevance remains the same. Our awareness is the difference. In modern day, we have more materialistic awareness, less metaphysical awareness. But earlier there was more metaphysical awareness, probably that’s the difference. But family deity is just like the guest who you are invited to your home. Some of your ancestors decided to bring a deity; which means they brought a frequency and an energy into your house, for the sake of worshiping, with one contract, “I worship you, I revere you, I take care of you, please take care of us.“ That’s the deal. So they brought this deity home. In the Western countries, there are Patron saints. Patron saints are similar; they bring the energy of a saint into the house and they honor them; the saint takes care of them. Like that, we have family deities, Kul Devetas in our house. Then they made temples, they had worship and the family was flourishing at that time. As I said in the beginning, everything that rises will also fall. The family deities were really happy when they were taken care of. It’s like the guest of the house. You bring the guest to the house and you ‘re all eating food, but the guest is starving. What will the guests say? They will run away.
Interviewer: So bad.
Mohanji: Similarly, the coming generations did not feel the importance of the family deity and did not take proper care. There are two ways you can take care. Either, you worship as it used to be before; second possibility is that you bring this deity to a temple, where there is already a worship practice set up and merge the deity with that temple. Both are okay.
But some people, because of lack of awareness, do nothing. They neither worship nor do they bring the deity to a temple, where there is worship. You can pay some money for maintenance. However, both are not done. Then what do you see in the household: energy shifts, mental disorders, various problems connected to being a family. When a family has taken a vow to take care of something, the family is responsible. Everybody in the family is responsible. This is the important.
For this, you have suggested Baba (which I do almost with every meal, from the time that I learned it from you) wherein you said that before we eat, we can offer the food to Ganesha, to our family deity….. Would you like to share that ?
Mohanji: No, you say what you do.
Interviewer: So what I do is what I’ve learnt from you. You suggested it to us. You said that it would be wise if before every the meal we offer the meal mentally from our heart. We offer the meal first to Ganesha. Then we can offer it to our family deity; we can offer it to the form of God with whom we feel really connected to. We can offer it to our gurus. We can offer it to our Pitra Devas and to the final absolute stillness.
Mohanji: It’s a good idea, because many of us do not know our family, original family location, family diet etc. That’s when I suggested this and it’s really having a remarkable effect in people’s lives. I always say -start with Lord Ganesha, because Ganesha is the Supreme Unmanifested form of Lord Shiva, son of Shiva. There are two aspects to Shiva: one is the manifested aspect and the other is the Supreme Unmanifested aspect. The Unmanifested aspect is much larger. That is why Ganesha has a huge body. The Unmanifested aspect has huge consciousness, huge intellect, big brain. That is why it has the elephant head. So first we give it to the Unmanifested aspect, which is our original aspect. So we offer to Lord Ganesha, then to the family deities, our guests whom our ancestors have invited home, then the ancestors themselves, then favorite deities whom you like in this life, next to gurus, personal deities and so on. Also to snake deities – the Naag Devatas. Naag Devatas represent wisdom, as well continuity of existence, continuity of good fortune, family, children, continuity, all those things.
108 Chants
Interviewer: Baba would you tell us the significance of mantras and why do we chant them 108 times?
Mohanji: Well, 108 times is like scratching the surface. You should chant much more; for mantra siddhi, you need to chant much more; 108 is simply like a smelling or tasting. Instead of not chanting at all, 108 is okay. Mantras are frequencies. They are vibrations, frequencies. When you constantly chant a mantra inside, it’s 80 percent inside and 20 percent outside; that’s what is said, or 90 percent inside and 10 percent outside; it helps your alignment. You are aligned when you chant mantra. So when you constantly chant, when you are aligned, your energy and aura is powerful. It’s as if you increase your immunity from the wears and tears of life. When you are constantly chanting a mantra or connecting to a Master and chanting a mantra, your focus is on the Master. You chant a mantra like Hanumanji did. He focused on Ram and chanted ,”Ram, Ram, Ram”; so He became so powerful; Ashta siddhis and Nava niddhis happened in Him.
These are all potential from Lord Ram. But Ram never used them. Ram lived an ordinary life. But connecting to Ram, Hanumanji used them. This is what happens when you are fully aligned or focused on the Supreme Consciousness, like Ram and you are chanting the mantra, automatically you become very powerful. Powerful means your immunity increases and your aura becomes stronger. This is possible with mantras. Mantras are frequencies and if you connect to it and chant it continuously and consistently, it stabilizes you; you get mantra siddhis.
Would you also please shed some light on rituals like havans and specific pujas to certain deities, and actions like annandan? How does it help a human being ? What is the significance ?
Mohanji: How many hours do we have this interview? It’s such a vast question. It will take at least four hours to complete.
Interviewer: Okay, fine. Then Baba I’ll take another day from you then for this specific topic.
Mohanji: Well I’ll tell you one thing. Rituals are for yourself. Everything is for yourself. What is the purpose of all these activities is to connect yourself with yourself. All the deities, 330 million deities are inside us; 330 million deities of the Sanatana dharma tradition are dimensions which are possible of the Supreme Consciousness. They are all inside us. Because inside us we have various frequencies, and which frequency is predominant in you -that is you. That is what people conceive or perceive as you. This is exactly how we work. So a person who of very sattvic nature will worship in the sattvic way. A person of rajasic nature will have that kind of worship. A person of tamasic nature will worship in that way.
This is how all these worship methods are configured. Now, all the rituals connected to these worships are for the sake of activating that aspect within you. So if you broadly specify the havans and pujas and all the things which you just now said, they all have their distinct effect in that particular mode. One cannot be swapped onto another. A temple has a particular idol, idol representing an ideal and a particular method of worship to create and keep the energy in the idol , which will transmit to the worshipper, the energy. Means there’s an energy exchange happening when you go to the temple. Each deity has a potential. The deity is installed in the temple, prana is infused into it, so that the energy exchange can take place, and puja vidhis or the methods followed are to maintain it. Usually saying, broadly speaking, the energy exchange is between 8 seconds to 40 seconds, depending on the intensity created in the idol deity. Our temples are definitely not places of prayers, they are places of transformation. We have created temples in that way . That is why it’s very, very relevant. We must preserve our temples, because they are all places of positive transformation. This is why we must take interest in our temples, take care of our temples, maintain them so that so many people will get cleansed from within. What do you get cleansed from ? It is from the base emotions like just such as kaama, krodha, lobha, moha, madha, matsarya and such emotions to compassion, kindness, unconditional love, selflessness. They are daya, karuna, bhakti, and all those things. They come because from there by through purification. All the rituals are connected to inner purification. All the temples are for inner purification, rejuvenation, transformation, regeneration and all the activities are individualistic. That is why we have such a big variety. It is needed, because all of us are individuals. If we do not connect to a suitable deity, we can’t transform ourselves. We can’t get transformed. That is why.
If you connect to a deity, because there is no other possibility, stagnation is the result. Like for example, a rajasic person connects to a taamasic method, he will not have transformation. As you are, you should connect. What you are, that’s exactly how it should be. So the aspect within you, which is like some people worship Shiva, some people worship Vishnu, some people worship Shakti, some people worship Hanumanji, some people worship Sai Baba.. Various people worship various deities, because of their orientation, their disposition, how they are, because we are unique creations. It is as simple as that.
Interviewer: Baba, what is the importance of rudraksha beads? Why we do wear that, and why it is that generally saints and sages always wear rudraksha beads?
Mohanji: Rudraksha is a stabilizer. The energy, the frequency is more stable nature. Like tulsi plant. Tulsi plant has a great aura. We consider the tulsi plant as connected to Lord Krishna, who had great aura. When you bring tulsi plant and you consume, it really enhances your aura. When you wear the mala, when you when offer this to the deities, it enhances the aura. Likewise, rudraksha has a stabilizing stillness energy connected to Shiva . But we should know about all this. Otherwise, lot of people wear rudraksha and go to toilet, and you know various things. You should be refraining from eating meat, taking it to toilet and when we need to wear only is only during Sadhana, meditations, prayers etc… If that happens, it stabilizes, it enhances our efforts. That’s why. These materials enhance our efforts for higher elevation.
Interviewer: Okay
Mohanji: I wish great success to your video YouTube channel. I wish you great success!
Interviewer: Thank you very much Baba!
Mohanji: Thank you for interviewing me.
My love to all those who are listening to us or seeing us.
Thank you very much.
Interviewer: Anjali Kanwar Transcribed by Nada Rakovic Proofread by Vidya Rajagopalan
Questioner: Who is a Guru? I’ve heard a guru is like a GPS. Can we progress without a Guru?
Mohanji: Thank you very much for inviting me and thank you very much for this opportunity. My gratitude to the Healing Our Earth team and all of you.
About the question about guru – I follow the tradition of Lord Dattatreya who had 24 gurus. When somebody asked Dattatreya, “Who are you?”, he said, “I am just a worshipper of nature”. So, the fundamental is that anything and everything around us is teaching us something. And the greatest and the highest Guru is life itself – life gives you lessons.
And if you consider 24 hours, we have three distinct dimensions that we go through without any choice:
1) One is the waking state where we interact with the world outside. We gather experiences and we project ourselves into the world (and as per our projection we get experiences).
2) Then we enter into a state of the dreams, the dream state where we completely shut off the world outside, close the eyes and then go within the world inside. Then what we process here is from what we have collected and stored.
3) Then that is also shut down when we enter into a deep sleep state where we completely nullify all the experiences.
So when awareness is connected to the physical level, we have the waking state.
When awareness is connected to mind-matter (which is mind, intellect, and ego where mind processes emotions, intellect processes information and ego processes things connected to ownership), when we connect to that mind-matter and become fully immersed in that, then what comes alive is what is stored by these faculties inside.
And then we connect to the consciousness aspect when we have deep sleep, and we don’t know whether we are a man or a woman. We don’t know the time or space, we are completely not accessible to this world, and we don’t have the world to access.
We take a rebirth again every morning – we come back. So we go through this process, almost like a pattern. And then we decide that we are this personality that we have projected in the world. We are also trying to figure out what we are in this world, based on our positions and possessions.
So at some point in time, we realize that this is not really giving us the whole satisfaction – we are actually roaming around for pleasures.
At some point in time we realize there is something permanent and perpetual. That’s a time when we start associating – that the first level of physical, second level of mind-matter and then the third level of consciousness : that it has got these three states, we start thinking about it. It is called manana, not dhyana (meditation), it’s contemplation. That is why various masters have time and again repeated that it is important to contemplate, not meditate. Meditation will happen spontaneously but contemplation is very, very important. The more you contemplate, the more you realize that there is somebody witnessing the whole show. And then it is a quest for knowing who is the permanent, unshakable witnessing this whole show and is always unattached. So this question happens inside. And then we start going within. And it’s an inner journey, it’s definitely not an outside journey.
So as far as the tradition that I follow is concerned, you’ve got to find yourself, and that’s the whole thing. When the student asked the teacher, “I can’t really understand all these scriptures – Vedas, Upanishads, Puranas, Shrutis, Smritis, and 33 crore Gods! I can’t really go through all this. I can’t understand. Tell me in one word what this whole story is”.
The teacher said, “YOU! You are the whole story. Tat Tvam Asi”. (You are that)
Then the quest is to find this You, who is actually making all this experience possible. That’s the way the connection happens.
So the Dattatreya tradition has great masters like Sai Baba who everybody knows. He lived as a fakir and a Sufi saint. And though he was living in one place, his energy and power radiated in several places. As a perfect avadhoota, he had fully turned inward the faculties like mind, intellect and ego, and started finding himself. And then he finally found the soul aspect, the atma tattva, stabilized there and settled down. Then what you see outside is your own reflection everywhere. So all the leaves, plants, trees, people, animals, birds, everything gives you a lesson. Because you see yourself in everything. And then you become one with the whole universe. So this is the guru principle that we are talking about.
Guru is definitely not just a human being. Of course we talk about Lord Krishna, as jagath (world) guru. Definitely because he lived the detachment. What he lived for is valid even now, because he was in everything and he was in nothing. Perfect detachment. So like that, there have been masters who time and again came and displayed the possibility of existing without boundaries and full freedom.
Freedom means freedomfromthe senses and mind, not freedom of the senses. We have misunderstood this concept too much. When we talk about freedom, we talk about freedom to do anything we like to do or to say whatever we like, that in society we can be ourselves as we are. That is not freedom. That is just an expression of patterns. What freedom is, is the freedom from senses and mind where we do not have any kind of binding to anything around. So this is exactly the freedom which the masters have lived, and expressed.
Now when you talk about guru principle, the job of the guru was to live it and the job of the disciple was to connect to that principle of freedom and walk towards it, inside. Go within and find yourself. So this takes time. In my earlier days, I used to go to the Himalayas quite often when I was working in a company as well. And I was trying to find out this me and it took a long time. I did not have a personal guru at that time, but I connected to my spine – being aware of the spine when I’m walking, when I’m doing things, I’m still aware of the spine. And then automatically things started shifting, awareness started shifting, it took me many years. But the point I’m trying to tell is that if you really want to find your guru, you have to find yourself. If you have found yourself, you found the guru. Then everything around is your guru. All the gurus brighten up when you brighten up. So this is already sitting inside. So that is why Tat Tvam Asi has a lot of value. That means, this is the fundamental principle of all the scriptures. If everything were put together and crushed and a juice made out of it all, you get one thing called You. That is the final thing you can get.
When we walk this path, don’t think it will be easy – because our patterns have become too strong. We have been used to so many things, we have been literally entertaining ourselves and our patterns for a long period of time. And we have forgotten that we are bound by patterns, bound by concepts, bound by prejudices. When we look at a person we decide that we don’t like him, or we like him. This is all connected to how we see the world. Basically, there are no enemies, there are no friends, it’s just as it is, and the world is as it is. We all have our space, we all have our relevance, our activity, we have to do something here and all that we are doing is projecting ourselves to the world and getting it back. That is what we are doing. But once you start assimilating yourself, once you find yourself, then you stop projecting, as there’s nothing to project. Instead you start reflecting like a mirror, you will be like a mirror. When somebody comes in front, you reflect that without prejudices, without expectations, without any kind of flavors – as it is. So that makes you a perfect master, total reflection. That is why great masters like Haidakhan Baba said, “When you come to me with anger, I become anger. When you come to me with love, I become love”. That means that you do not have flavors to project, instead you are being a reflection of the whole world, and that is a very sincere reflection, there’s no flavor. And that is consistent, no change. So when you become like that, you become like a huge magnet because you have no flavors. You become every flavor, you are everybody, you’re everything! There is no discrimination, you see the atma tattva in everything, the soul particle, the soul aspect factor which is in all things, and you connect to that – no barrier. So this is exactly what the soul principle is. And that is exactly what the guru principle is.
On Guru Purnima day, all I would like to tell you that whatever you are searching for is already within. And when you realize that, it is called self-realization. The realization is only of what you already have and what you realize at some point in time is that you have it. So that’s very simple, and all you need to do to achieve that is to spend time with yourself, not in books, not in rituals, not in activities, not with people. You’ve got to find time for yourself, assimilate yourself. For all that you need to accept yourself. Most of us have a big problem accepting ourselves. We judge ourselves, criticize ourselves, we doubt ourselves. And that creates the distance between ourselves and us. We find it difficult to come within because our acceptance is conditional for ourselves. And then the same thing gets reflected in society – you don’t accept everybody, then we don’t accept situations either. And then we sometimes have a lot of opinions. The world is full of opinions, but we have to go beyond opinions and realize the truth. Opinions are flavored because they are situational, and they are a play of duality. But reality is totally detached from opinions. So we got to really cut out all this, these kind of fringes. And then you come inside. And then you feel okay : ‘I’m complete as it is, I’m unique. I’m neither higher, nor lower or equal to anybody. I’m unique, and this is exactly what I’m supposed to express in this world, nothing more’. And then you start connecting to yourself.
So total acceptance is the first step, and complete liberation is the result. Thank you very much.
Questioner: My god, that was so enlightening. My eyes were glued on your eyes, trying to focus on this message. My question for others. Freedom from senses and mind is one of the most difficult things to go through. How would you recommend this for individuals to go through?
Mohanji: Thanks very much. The first step is always acceptance, self-acceptance, self-respect, self-love. See, the most criticized person in our life is ourselves by ourselves! We judge ourselves, we compare ourselves, and we criticize ourselves when we try to compete with other people, and then we dilute our uniqueness in that way, and that’s the detrimental factor. We say – I am not good enough because of X number of reasons – this is not true.
We are good enough, we are unique. Nobody is like us. Our thumb impression is unique to ourselves and our retina is unique to ourselves, and we are unique creations. This has to be accepted, the first and primary step. And that is the moment we start accepting ourselves, we stop competing and stop comparing. Then we start connecting with ourselves with wonder, like a child. Like you know, when a small child is given a toy. The child will be playing, touching the toy and feeling the toy and literally enjoying the toy for a long time. And then it really is fully occupied, full concentration Like that, we have to accept ourselves as a unique creation and start experiencing ourselves with wonder, not as somebody in the society (that is only when we are awake).
There are two things to understand: one is pratheethi and the other is anubhoothi.
Pratheethi means we open our eyes and we see things outside and we connect to those things, and we have an experience.
Anubhoothi means even if you close your eyes, you have that experience inside, you don’t need an object. For example, when you wake up in the morning and you say, ‘Oh, I’m happy, I slept well’, there was no material, there was no person, there was no interaction, but still you’re happy. So we realize that for happiness, you don’t really have to interact with the world. So that kind of awareness takes you to yourself and you start exploring that aspect of yourself. This is all simple awareness that we should have. Awareness. Bodh!
Awareness is the key, when you are aware of yourself and you accept : the 2 A’s (acceptance, awareness.) You do that all the time – when you’re working, when you’re traveling, when you’re sitting in one place, when you’re interacting, just be aware of how you are, what you are, and be fascinated by yourself. So then after a while, you will be fully connected to yourself, and you will be very much linked and happy with yourself. See, all our frustrations, anxieties, insecurities everything is connected to the world outside – all of them will have no value anymore, because we have a lot to see and a lot to feel inside.
And that’s the way we come inside. There are techniques defined by various traditions such as concentrating on the heartbeat, concentrating on the breath, and also assimilating, you are controlling, the pranayama kind of stuff. All those things are there. Anything which is suitable for you is good for you. That’s no problem. But fundamentally, everything should start with acceptance. And there you go, and then be aware. When you’re angry, be aware of the anger, when you’re jealous, be aware of the jealousy. Always be aware but do nothing about it. When you’re constantly being aware, already your witness. You’re taking a step backwards and seeing it. When you are seeing it, that thing loses its intensity. When you are experiencing anger and you’re witnessing the anger, the anger will happen, but you are not angry. This is the difference. So when you take one step backwards and start looking at it, you know that you are actually powerful, you’re not a victim of all these emotions. Instead, you are experiencing all these emotions and you’re still the same, you are completely a witness. This is possible. It takes time, but the first foremost step is acceptance. That is why I keep insisting on acceptance because if we don’t accept yourself; society will not accept us. So this is as simple as that. When you look at the whole society, so many people love you so many people hate you – so you have an element of non-acceptance, which is getting reflected. Whatever you get from society is your own projections. And when that projection ends, then you become a reflection, then the society loves you because they only see themselves in you, they don’t see you. So, there you become lovable. You’re one with the world. You’re part of the world, part of the universe in fact. Everybody enjoys your presence because you are Brightness. You’re like a mirror!!
Questioner: That was a very strong answer! Something I picked up from there was self-recognition, self-appreciation, self-approval. It is so vital to do that, to actually recognize yourself that you are the person you are. That’s awesome. Now it’s interesting, this philosophy, this concept is amazing. I will read the message. I will take home this message. However, to live this message on a day-to-day basis : how strongly do you feel the power of association is? Because if you engage with like-minded people who think this philosophy, live this philosophy, breathe this philosophy, it’s that much easier to be with them in order to think that. Now, can you reflect your message on a day-to-day basis? What to do, how can we make this a part of our life, our breath?
Mohanji: There are two parts to this question; one I feel that we should not detach from anything that comes our way, we must accept. Because when we detach, there are two things happening: one is suppression, other is escapism, and these two are equal to postponement. We should not postpone – we are postponing to some other time. When fears happen, we look into the eyes of fears. When situations happen, accept them. Some situations may not be very easy to accept. If you don’t accept, they hang on, they stay, they persist. So whatever we resist, persists. So I always recommend acceptance in everything: ‘Come, come, we look into the eyes. Bring it on.’ And that makes you free, liberated, because you’re not hiding from anything. You’re not avoiding things, you’re not escaping nor are you trying to manipulate things. It is as it is. We are taking it, as it is.
And secondly, often we can’t avoid many situations in life. For example, workplace situations – one can’t change them. So, being yourself there is the right answer. And always one thing in every situation, we do not have to respond. There are two ways you can interact with a situation. One is to react emotionally, which we usually do – egotistically, emotionally. And the result is usually regret or guilt. Or the other way is to respond using the intellect and just take it easy, take a foot back and look at it and then respond with awareness, and with intellect so that it will not create emotions. These are the two major ways we can interact with society. I always recommend responding, not reacting. Reacting always leaves some bad residue, which is not good. So if you constantly respond, and you have your time, your space and you respond, then you are always light and free. And then you do not have to handle so much of the hangover of regrets or guilt. So that itself saves a lot of time, because we have to handle a lot of all these kinds of things.
So in this society, whatever happens, let it happen. We are not trying to change it. We can’t change it. So we interact in our social life, in our family life, in business life – it’s all one life, but in all the situations we are playing different roles. And in those roles, just be ourselves, keep responding. And our equilibrium, our inner stability, our peace quotient is very vital for us. The peace quotient, and that’s inside us, we already have it. Peace is a state of the soul. Soul is always peaceful whatever emotions we go through. In turbulences, and similar situations, the soul is not affected. So we are coming in contact with our inner core all the time. Or just be reminded that there is a situation inside, which is completely unaffected and try to imitate it. And then we respond and not react. And this is also connected to ownership a lot. Means we own our actions that” I do this , I do this” , this I factor is sometimes very painful. So instead, like what Krishna said, in the Gita,
That is what He said: “I happen”. He did not say, “I take birth”. “I happen”, He says.
Life is about happening. Happening means you are actually happening, or life is as it takes place; not that we have created it. There is of course a history for everything, something has produced a situation and something will happen to the situation; there will be a result, but at the same time everything is sprouting. So we understand that. And we assimilate that, and we accept that. We are not the owner of the action. Ownership of action creates pain, disappointments and also karma. If there’s no ownership, the karmic structure is different. When you do not own it and you are surrendered, (like kaayena vaaccha manasendriyairvaa). And there you are detached from your action, and you’re flowing through. When you are flowing through, you are always free.
And that is what Vyasa said when he ate all the sweets, which the Brajvaasis (residents of Braja) had brought. The Yamuna River was overflowing and Krishna was on the other side. The Brajvaasis said, “We want to cross to the other side but can’t go as no boatman will take us, because the river is overflowing”. Vyasa asked, “What did you bring for Krishna?” They showed him all the sweets and he started eating them. They were embarrassed to tell him not to eat because he was Vyasa. And then Vyasa said, ”Come with me”, and when they reached the shore, he said, “If I have not eaten anything, let the river part”. And the river parted. The Brajwasis went to the other side but were surprised as they knew Vyasa had eaten all the sweets in front of them. Finally they found Krishna sleeping on a bench in the garden, and they waited. And Krishna got up and asked them, “What did you bring?” So they said all these things. Krishna said, “Sorry I can’t eat them because my stomach is full after eating the same things a little while ago”. That means when Vyasa was consuming it, he was offering it to Krishna, and though it was going into the mouth of Vyasa, it was going into the stomach of Krishna. So this is exactly the point.
The point is that if you are absolutely, completely surrendered to existence, then karma cannot take place. The other side I’m saying is that, when we know that everything is happening in life, and you are completely floating through it, like you’re cruising, there will be turbulences, but it doesn’t matter – the ownership and the pain connected will not be present.
Questioner: This was an amazing tip that you’ve given, and this is why they say that we need a guru who can guide us properly so these are some amazing tips that you should share, thank you very much for sharing !!
A true teacher is simply a mirror and if he or she is also a leader, you have hit a jackpot. India is a land of such powerful leaders and today, I’m going to be speaking to one of them.
I am your host Palak and I welcome you to the very first episode of the Palak Mehta Show. Presenting our first guest- Sri Mohanji.
WHO IS MOHANJI?
A Philanthropist, humanitarian, teacher, friend, a man next door and a globally renowned Spiritual Master – Sri Mohanji.
For some, he’s been a top shipping professional in the Middle East. For others – a dear friend in need. For many – he’s been a powerful Guru. A source of positivity and inspiration for karma yogis. Mohanji has founded several charity organizations and platforms worldwide such as the Mohanji Foundation – a platform for the building of healthier societies, registered in 15+ countries. ACT Foundation, a global charity platform. Mohanji Youth Club – a platform to empower and inspire teenagers. EBC -The early birds club, encouraging one to start their day at 4 am, and the World Consciousness Alliance – a unified platform for raising the vibration of humanity. The base of his approach is purity in thoughts, words, and actions, which lead to a liberated existence. Ahimsa, unconditional love, kindness, selflessness, compassion, righteousness, and the power of gratitude are key values that he wants to see with every person. Coexistence with and selfless service towards other species and Mother Earth should be our number one priority.
Palak:Namaste, Mohanji! Thank you so much for coming on this show. We are truly blessed.
Mohanji : Thank You.
Palak: Mohanji, my first question to you is: Who is a Hindu? Can anyone be a Hindu?
Mohanji: To answer it directly, Hinduism is not a religion. It’s a way of life. Anybody can be a Hindu, provided they are natural, they are themselves, they accept themselves totally, they are totally balanced in their outlook. They look at every being as part of themselves; they belong to the world and the world belongs to them. There is no greed, there is no anxiety, fear, there is no confusion, and there is total balance. If somebody has total balance, he can be called a Hindu. I do not think that this word ‘Hindu’ existed beyond a few hundred years. I believe that the name or the word Hindu or Hinduism is coined just to denote or just to talk about a few people who live on the south side of river Sindhu and are practicing various aspects of existence as they are. My firm belief is this. Hinduism is like an ocean. It’s not a religion; it is a way of life. And it is deeply rooted in how Nature operates the balance that Nature keeps. Nature has its own balance. Every being in Nature is fully rooted by the balance of Nature.
Like that, human beings as part of Nature should also be rooted in the aspects of Nature. A true Hindu will be totally peaceful. We will not be aggressive at all. Aggressive in a sense – not that we are not self-defensive, we will defend ourselves, that’s a different story. But, a true Hindu is somebody who nourishes and nurtures. A person who would contribute to the growth of everything around him and who will not contradict. Who will not be against things. But instead, through deep acceptance and deep nurturing, you will develop yourself and you will nurture the whole life around you. This is how a true Hindu can live.
So, it does not matter which segment you are born in. But internally, you can be a Hindu when you are balanced. ‘H’ which is the Sun and ‘Indu’, the Moon, the Sun and the Moon, the heat and the cold, the male and the female in us unite perfectly – it gives us a balance. That balance makes you a Hindu.
Palak:What is so special about this land called Bharat?
Mohanji: This land has the Bharat; Bha-ra-ta; Bha – has that bhav, feeling, the various feelings, and various aspects, dimensions. Ra– is the music, the Om, the vibration, the frequency. Ta is the rhythm. All this merges here in this land. And this merging of the Bha-Ra-Ta together makes the person connect to himself. In your own body, there is Bhav: there are various feelings, various expressions, and various experiences, the room for tackling and experiencing various aspects of life. Then the rhythm, the movement of the rhythm. It’s like music. Like a medley. Each organ functions in a synchronized way, the synchronicity of functioning. And the Ta – the rhythm – basic rhythm, heartbeat. When this is all combined, we have a good healthy life. So, Bharat is the space where this aspect of existence, when everything is harmonious when all things are united – you have a good life.
Palak:Thank you so much. In that sense, isn’t Hinduism less of a religion and more of spiritual ideology?
Mohanji: There have been great Masters who totally connected to themselves and they became the Universe by focusing on themselves, finding themselves inside, and settling themselves inside. This is the place where we have seen tremendous great Masters, consistently – over every period of time, over every generation. This has helped this country, unique country, and unique space on Earth.
Palak:What is Purushartha, can you explain it in a little bit more in detail?
Mohanji: The key aspect of human existence is called Purushartha. Purushartha has four aspects: dharma, artha, kama, and moksha. Dharma is righteous living, the right way to live, righteousness. Artha is material support, including your bed, your clothes, your space or your house, or your food. Artha is a very broad thing, every material that supports your existence. Kama is the desire, the hope, the inspiration, and the tendencies. This is Kama; and Moksha – liberation. That means, while you are experiencing anything, you already know inside, that these are all temporary. Nothing stays forever. We are here on Earth like a tourist, with a duration of space of existence from birth to death.
Then we have to leave, at some point in time. So, with that full awareness, that we are existing in liberation, while we are experiencing everything, that is the right way to experience. Not through ownership and a false illusory feeling that we own these things. We cannot own land, we cannot own relationships, and we cannot own wealth forever. For some time you can be custodians of all this, but you cannot own them forever. The Earth owns us. We go away at the time of our death, which means we need to shed the body. So, this Purushartha is well dissected, well defined, and well-practiced here. This is very important. Every other place had Dharma: laws, rules, social laws, social rules and guidelines, and all those things. Artha – materials, welfare, material support, that was there. Kama – of course inclination, and desires which caused all developments. But, Moksha – the detachment aspect is defined only here. And that makes us unique, and that brings all the people to India. In search of this, how can you live detached amidst everything?
Palak: I always wondered Mohanji, is there a spiritual significance to the whole Indian attire?
Mohanji: The spiritual significance is basically what is comfortable for you in the space you exist. In a tropical climate, in a tropical place where there is humidity, much more humidity, like 90% humidity, if you have to wear a shirt and jacket, it does not suit you, because that is not suitable for the environment. So, our attires are all connected, like each segment. India has great diverse locations. Every place has its flavor, its own cuisine, its own food habits, its own climate, and attire. Everything is different. That is all based on the conditions of these places. And I think that is the right way to do it.
Palak: How about the spiritual significance of the beard? A lot of men, back in the day, in ancient India, would grow their beards and even their hair. Especially a lot of people who follow spirituality. Is there a proper scientific or spiritual reason for this?
Mohanji: In ancient times, the idea of being natural also meant that they have long hair etc. And if you are talking about the Saints and the people living in the Himalayas etc., there is no way they could go to see a barber quite easily. There were no barbers to attend to them. But most importantly, now it is scientifically proved also, when you allow your body and hair to be natural, you are more connected to your awareness. You are more aware of yourself. Awareness is fundamental that you should have. And in the practice of awareness, you should be fully aware of yourself. When you are unnatural, then slightly, in a subtle way, it disturbs that energy flow.
Palak:Mohanji, what do you think about traditional Indian art forms? Do they hold any spiritual significance?
Mohanji: I love it. I love the Indian art forms and numerous varieties. Every state has its own. And they are all rooted in Sanatana dharma, the eternal ground rules, or perpetual ground rules of Existence, means – how Nature is. We have picked them up from Nature and we have practiced them over time. Everything is harmonious. Something which creates harmony inside and outside, this is the beauty of most of our art forms. Our various deities and our various festivals, they all have this aspect, the harmony aspect. Whether people know about it or not, over a period of time everything changes. Evolution happens in everything. We may not know the real philosophy behind everything. For example, why do we worship the basil plant – Tulsi, people may not know. Tulsi plant is one of the plants which has an aura eighteen times its size, which people have said. This is in the scriptures. That is why something which has a great aura is respected. Means, a person who has great aura is a saint. He is respected. Like that, the plant is respected because of the size of its aura. Every philosophy has a deep root. There is a meaning and a method; there is a reason, proper reason. Everything is coming towards or aligning to alignment, personal alignment, harmony. So, all these festivals, all these art forms, everything are expressions of, spontaneous expressions of personal harmony. That is why I love them.
They are not just something that will break up your emotions and just make you unconscious, or to just follow something without knowing. Not that it takes you to a level of unconsciousness. Instead, it takes you to a level of full consciousness. That is liberating, right? When something you can connect to, or something connects to you, it evokes in you a level of consciousness, higher consciousness, and that is beautiful. That is why I love it. I think that there should be a lot more explanations and kind of details to be given to people so that they can start experiencing them.
Palak:India is known to gift the world with a sattvic lifestyle. How is that related to animal cruelty?
Mohanji: If your aim is for higher awareness, if your aim is liberation, if you aim to meet and merge with higher consciousness, then consumption should be disciplined. Discipline is very necessary for elevation to a higher level, not that we are not all going to be saints or going to be liberated, so any food is fine. I always say – avoid violence in thoughts, words, and actions. So that you will be feeling good, feeling peaceful. Violence breeds guilt, regrets. These are non-essential things, they just imbalance you. Avoid imbalance and be harmonious. That is your birthright. That gives you peace of mind. You can sleep peacefully.
If you cheat, steal, betray, talk bad, take revenge, character assassinate, you won’t be able to sleep peacefully, because your mind will be contaminated. Just like that, food which has violence behind it, if you consume unconsciously, the body becomes numb. And the essence of that violence enters your system. That you realize, when all faculties are focused inside. Then you realize that every small thing counts.
Palak: Mohanji, in your opinion, what do you feel, is yoga being misunderstood globally?
Mohanji: I do not think that yoga is misunderstood. Yoga has been understood now more, and the value has been understood now. I think overall the awareness of yoga is much more than before. This is what I feel whenever I travel. Not only yoga, but also vastu, and ayurveda, our great wealth. Wealth is really the wealth of knowledge, which is being accepted and appreciated in the world outside. Our understanding of the plants, Nature has a part in our existence. Then the contribution of the birds, the animals, the harmony of humans with other species. I think there is a lot more awareness of all these things in the world. Some people have come and discussed these things with me. In case if there is a misunderstanding, I think this is very temporary or in a small segment. But on a large level, I think the understanding is much more. This is what I feel.
Palak: Mohanji, has the Indian system of schooling evolved over the years?
Mohanji: The Indian concept of schooling has not grown over the years. This is my feeling. The Gurukul system was completely connected to a person’s inclinations – vasanas. A person who has a tendency, vasana towards let’s say science is taught scientific things. A person who has inclinations toward spirituality is taught that subject. If a person who has an inclination towards let’s say – martial arts or archery, or war techniques, that is what he is taught. If you look at the epics of the past, you will know how the education system happened.
The Master looked at the level of awareness of each individual, each student, and delivered accordingly. That means it was individualistic. No denial. This individualistic approach is very important. In a massive, in a kind of systematized educational system, we are creating just bricks on the wall, mediocrity. But in the Gurukul system, there cannot be mediocrity, the student learns based on what he is capable of. What his inclinations are. So, he will be happy to learn it. Learning should be a pleasure, not pressure. In the modern educational system, the main disharmony I find is that students are learning things to make money, to make a living. So, what do they learn? Most of them learn what provides them a job, which will give them a lot of money instantaneously. Meaning, as early as possible. People are only going for safe subjects. But their inclination or their attitude may be different. But, in the Gurukul system, attitude is counted very deeply. And the Master knows. Like for example, if you see how Drona used to teach his students. He decided that each one of them was taught according to his attitude, his disposition, and his caliber, what he was capable of. And it is important that he will not use it for selfish pleasures. For the sake of dharma, not adharma, that was decided. There should be a total balance inside before a martial art is taught. That means it should be only used for self-defense. Not for attacking. Not for abuse. It should not be abuse. When a person decides to use it, to show his pride or for egoistic purposes, it’s taken away because nothing is taught for egoistic display. Instead, it is taught for self-defense. This is how our system worked earlier.
It was beautiful, harmonious. A person who likes carpentry is taught carpentry; a person who likes cobbler work is taught cobbler work. Things like that. Based on what his disposition is, he is taught that. That system should come back. We should educate people based on their disposition, attitude, and also their capacity and caliber. So that everybody will be peaceful. When you have people performing life or performing their duties in life, if they are taught things that are suitable for them, they will have a balanced existence. They’ll be happy to do it. Work will be a pleasure. Now work is usually a pressure, for the sake of money. The internal harmony is missing. We must get this back. Life has to be harmonious. I believe so. If you do not like something in life and you are pressured to do it, the whole life is disturbed. And that is displayed as aberrations. People go for intoxications, strange behaviors, sometimes abnormalities in behavior, sometimes perversions. All these things are connected to disharmony.
When a person is totally harmonious, they will not display anything disharmonious in life, which means they will not display any aberrations in life. I think that we have to bring back the old system of education; where we are teaching children based on their attitude. I think some schools are doing it, but not all schools. So instead of churning out like a machine, more and more bricks on the wall, we should instead concentrate on bringing out the best of every student. That will make every student competent, confident. They will not have to compete with anybody.
Why do you have to compete with anybody? Because you are trying to find your footing somewhere. If you are satisfied and stable with your skills, then what are you competing with? You are unique. And what you are displaying with your right skills, right mechanism, or the right education? What you are displaying is the right product, the right attitude in society. When you display the right attitude in society, you are rewarded the right way.
Glory happens when you are harmonious with your tendencies, your inclinations, and you are doing things which suit you. When you do things which suit you, you are happy with it. If your activity is a pleasure for you, you will be successful; you will have glory because you love to do it. You really love to do it. When more people do things which they love to do, the world is better. This should come back. India should get this back.
Palak: How to bring peaceful societies around the globe? Do you think a Gurukul system could help?
Mohanji: I would always say, let there be harmony in every aspect of existence, and then there will be harmony in the society. Now you can see a lot of aberrations, so much of heartache. We see disturbances. The root cause of these disturbances is that people are not happy. They are doing things for a living. But they are not happy. If they are happy, they will not disturb any other soul, any other being. They will be peaceful. To bring this peacefulness we must bring harmony. And that has to go in every aspect of existence. I always believe that there should be counseling in every level, from the small class to all the way to the highest class. Whichever class people go into for education, there should be counseling. People should be able to talk, “This subject is not suitable for me, and I can’t do this.” So that you never ask a fish to climb a tree and call it a failure, because fish can’t climb trees, fish is not supposed to do that, it is supposed to swim well. So, we will give that aid and ability for people based on their disposition, their inclinations, tendencies, attitude. Then there will be a great life.
Palak:Mohanji, I follow you on twitter. And in a recent post, you mentioned that Nikola Tesla, Bob Marley and Bruce Lee are saints on their own right. That is a very unique perspective. Please shed some light on that.
Mohanji: I respect all these people, like Bob Marley and Nikola Tesla because there are certain aspects which makes you a saint. One of the key aspects is that you can have anything you like because you are resourceful, but you want nothing. Means total detachment. You can have plenty, but if you don’t need anything, you are not connected to any aspect of your existence outside of you. Instead, you are fully connected to every aspect of existence inside you, you are a saint.
You can be a musician, you can be a pilot, you can be a scientist, it does not matter, but how detached you are makes you a saint. We had a great president A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, he was a saint – walking, talking saint. He was living the life of a saint. When he left his body, he just left behind the dress he used and a few pennies. That is it. He was the president of the country but he never amassed wealth. This greed for things from Earth and the greed for positions and possessions, they all make you terrestrial. But here, you can have anything you like in the world, because you are resourceful, you have talents, but you are not affected by anything, means – you don’t want anything.
When Karl Marx introduced the concept of haves and have nots, it really inspired the world. And that is how communism took birth. But there was one category of people at that time, and even now, and before that time, who could have had anything they want but they needed nothing, the great Masters. They were fully occupied with the bliss inside. They were really floating in that place, fully occupied, enjoying the bliss. They wanted nothing from this Earth. This class is the real class, totally detached from everything. Detached from everything, but enjoying everything. If something comes to them, they enjoy it.
If it does not come to them, fine. So there is no regret, there is no guilt, there is no desire, there is no ambition on that level. Just living their life, free as a bird. Complete freedom. So, a person living in total freedom without any materials, like intoxications, etc., on their own – can be considered a saint. This is real sainthood. Real sainthood is total detachment, while you have everything. Not that you don’t have it and you say, “I don’t need it”, that is different. But while you have everything, while you can have everything, but you don’t need anything, that is sainthood. That is a real saint.
Palak: Describe India in three words?
Mohanji: Bha- ra- ta.
Palak: Who is your favorite Bollywood actor?
Mohanji: Amitabh Bachchan.
Palak: You started speaking a little bit of Hindi, what is your current favourite Hindi dialogue?
Mohanji: Speaks in Hindi
Palak: Mohanji, what is your vision for India in the next 20 years?
Mohanji: Total love. Total coexistence with harmony.
Palak: What is that one thing which this pandemic has given birth to?
Mohanji: Yourself.
Palak: Alright, this is an easy one. Most of us know the answer, but we still want to hear it from you -Mountains or beaches?
Mohanji: Mountains.
Palak:If a feature film is made on the life of a saint, who would it be?
Mohanji: Swami Vivekananda.
Palak:Thank you so much, dear Mohanji, from the bottom of our hearts for taking this time. And I’m sure that our viewers have not had enough of you. We will be calling you again next time, and we were truly honored to have you.
Mohanji: Thank you so much. I wish you great success. This is your first show. I’m sure you will do very well. And there will be a great, great presence of you and your shows in the world. And the world needs it. You have the caliber, you have the talent, and you will be visible. Shine bright, the world needs light!
Palak: Thank you so much.
Mohanji: Thank you.
Palak: Thank you so much for watching. If you like this show, subscribe and share. I’ll see you next time with another very special guest.
Thus Spake Mohanji 