Importance of lineage

Hello, my dear friends, hope you’re doing well.

Now in India, the Pitru Paksha is happening. That’s a time to remember the ancestors and offer them our gratitude. How do we do that? How do we express gratitude to the departed? We usually do it through certain rituals, through specific mantras and rituals together, conducted by priests who know the methods. We also serve food to all the beings around us, starting with ants and insects, to people and all the species of the animal/bird kingdom as much as we can.

Pitru Paksh Ritual

There’s nothing better than feeding the hungry. You know that, and we do that. Now, let’s think about the Science behind, Science, as in S-c-i-e-n-c-e, and not s-i-g-n, behind this thought process. It’s important to know. We are inheritors, all of us. What have we inherited? First of all, we have inherited ourselves. Where did we come from? From two people, father and mother. So, we have inherited ourselves from them. So, if you think backwards, who is our father and mother? They are the representation of the lineage that we came from. As we have inherited ourselves from the lineage, we have inherited our parents as a living representation of our lineage. This is very important to understand. So, when you take care of your father and mother, you are taking care of the lineage. Suppose you look after your father and mother with love, care, genuine devotion and genuine love, that automatically transmits or transfers your gratitude to the lineage, because most of the people in the lineage probably are not existing now. Many people, like your grandparents or grandparents of your grandparents, they would have all gone. How can you express gratitude to them?
How can you express kindness, love, compassion, respect? You can’t because they are not there. The right thing to do is to consider your father and mother as the living representation of your lineage and respect them. Express gratitude, express love and kindness. Do whatever you can for them.

Many of us are working outside our houses; we are not even in our hometown. We may not even be in our neighborhood where we can go and meet them. They’re probably far away, flights away. So how can you make sure your father and mother are happy, and they’re taken care of? You need to hire support. You got to hire support; use a part of your resources to ensure that your parents are happy.

So, it is our responsibility to look after our father and mother because they represent our lineage. When you look after them, and they are pleased, the lineage is pleased. That’s the only thing you can do about your lineage, at any given point in time.

If your grandparents are existing, take care of them as well. Look out for them, make them happy, provide as best as you can within your given capacity for them. As I said earlier, we are inheritors. We did not happen by ourselves. So, when you inherit, you’re also responsible. Inheritance comes with responsibility. People are doing all sorts of things, just for the sake of wealth; sometimes things which are totally inappropriate for the sake of wealth. That’s very harmful to the lineage, not only for the person.
Remember, your children are going to inherit from you. What are you going to pass on to your children? If you do not clean up your lineage as best as you could, you would be passing on contamination to your children. They will have a heavy burden of bad karma, i.e., bad actions. Bad representation of anything is a heavy burden on ourselves. We need to clean it up; we need to clean our thoughts; we need to clean our actions. We need to clean up everything like we clean up our house every day. This is not just this one time; as long as you are alive, as long as you are active, as long as you have the capacity, you must take care of our lineage.

Same with children. Children are also a continuation of our lineage. We must take care of them. So, our responsibility is not just to take care of ourselves. As a refined species, with the capacity to understand and assimilate the subtle, even the capacity to experience the supreme consciousness, we must behave accordingly.

We have inherited two major things from our lineage. One is the subtle, and one is the gross. We all know the gross. Gross consists of wealth, property, name, fame, and whatever we have inherited from our lineage. What is subtle? Subtle are the aspirations, desires, good and bad things they did in society, that residual effect – they all come in the lineage. Everything is inheritance. You cannot just say I will only have property and wealth, but I don’t need anything else from anybody. That’s not true. It’s like a huge treasury where whatever actions each person has done has left a residue or a kind of bank balance, which all the lineage members inherit. It especially goes to the people who are leaders of the clan, the eldest people or the decision-makers and those kinds of people will probably get a larger share. But as a principle, it goes to everybody. The good and the bad that you do definitely go to your children in essence form along with the gross inheritance that you transfer. So, the subtle is also transferring or getting transferred, as is gross. Both are getting transferred.

Pitru Paksha is the right time, considered as per the astrological calculations, to express gratitude and respect to the lineage, so that it lightens the inherited subtle aspects. It makes the residue of the good and bad actions of our ancestors slightly lighter, which will, in fact, reflect in your own life as a lightness of existence. So, what can we do? There are rituals, as I said in the beginning, conducted by priests, all the rituals are expressions of gratitude and expressions of respect. And that automatically makes things lighter. It’s not about one person. Don’t think that I’m doing it for my ancestor. Of course, you are doing it for your ancestor because there should be a point of contact; some representation, which you can connect to and do something. For that purpose, you are doing it for the departed, the known departed. But there are many unknown departed in your own lineage; probably you don’t even know them, but they are all getting benefitted.

So, it’s like a conduit, a pipe. When you do it, do the proper stuff, it goes to everybody. Just like the good and the bad which your lineage did has come to you. And what you do or what they did, along with what you do, goes to your children. So, this is the approximate picture. Then through feeding the poor, feeding the hungry, you dilute yourself, that’s basically sharing your wealth, with the underprivileged. Even all the species around, they all deserve to be happy, contented. So, we help them to be happy and contented, which makes us lighter and brighter.

As I said earlier, parents are the living representation of our lineage. They are the living representatives. So, when you take care of your parents, automatically, the people who left, and the people who are going to be-both will be benefited, because they are an important link with the lineage just like we are an important link to our lineage. So, respect them and look after them as best as you can. Serve them with gratitude.

Now, gratitude is a very, very powerful thing. Probably the word gratitude is so much used, it’s become a cliché, but gratitude has huge power, just like respect. Respect is immediate. You can see the reflection of that in the society almost immediately; when you respect somebody, you automatically get more respect, it’s more tangible. But gratitude is an attitude.

If you have the attitude of gratitude, it kind of cleanses the air; it’s like a purifier. It purifies, not only inside; it removes all the negativities from the environment. So, gratitude can never be underestimated. Gratitude is very powerful. This activity is on this ancestral time of Pitru Paksha is actually an expression of your gratitude to all those who lived in your lineage and departed plus all the people who are going to come and take birth in your lineage in the future. So, gratitude is extremely important. This is a clear sign of expression of gratitude; when we give food to all the beings, we are extremely grateful that they are receiving it. There are beings whom we can serve. When they become contented, we become contented. And when you keep giving, you keep growing; when you share, you become bright, you become light.

So, this is a time for extreme purification, where you express extreme gratitude to your lineage, and in a year, this period should be considered as one of the most important periods to make yourself light and bright, where you are deeply integrating yourself into the lineage, expressing respect, expressing love and compassion, expressing every positive aspect of you, in association with your lineage. And as much as possible, pass this on to your next generation. If your children ask you, “Why do we have to do this, they are already gone, we can’t see them?” You have to say, “You can see them. Where? In yourself.” You are the representation of your lineage, living representation. There is nothing invisible. People have come and gone, but you have not gone. If you are alive today, if your heart is beating today, you are representing the lineage whether you like it or not. There is no other way.

Some people do not know their parents, orphans; people are born into difficulties. They also must do it, because this is their opportunity to cleanse up their path. Instead of hatred or instead of remorse or disrespect to the lineage, if they choose to respect and gratitude and do whatever they can and for whoever they can, I always tell people that all the old people should be considered as your own parents. All the elderly should be respected as your own father and mother. So, all the people can be considered as your own. And that changes you. That changes the frequency of your lineage, that changes your own frequency. That makes you lighter and more effective in the world. Gratitude is a very powerful tool to make you graceful. Gratitude brings grace. Gratitude makes you grateful. So, gratitude can never be underestimated.

Mata, mother, with whom you have a relationship, more than the society, at least for nine months; father, the protector and the provider, who helped you to stabilize yourself on your feet, and Guru who guided you to the inner truth, which is sitting inside you. And finally, God, the energy aspect of you. So, Mata, Pita, Guru, Devo- Mother, father, Guru, God are four integral parts of your life, especially for your stability. If you connect to these four aspects, with respect, with gratitude, with extreme love and compassion, with kindness, with selflessness, you will have a great life; you will have a very stable life. If you just look at them as individuals, (f course they are individuals), but then you have something to do with them, and they had something to do with you. So, lineage had something to do with you. Without lineage, you are not here. You have to do something for the lineage. It is said that the karmic combination of every individual is a mixture. One is the unfulfilled desires that you came here to fulfill, that means what you wanted to do with a new life, with a new body. Second is the representation of the lineage, the aspirations of the lineage, the residue of the good and the bad which people of the lineage performed at their times; that residue. So, karma becomes more complex, when you think about these two main strains which have made you. Your unfulfilled desires, as well as the inherited desires of the lineage, they come and mix together like milk and water.

When you serve the lineage, when you pay respects to the lineage, when you devote yourself to the welfare of the lineage, and not only your family; (as I said earlier, looking at every species as your responsibility), then the lineage gets cleaner, lighter, and that will enhance your existence on Earth. You can see that in your stability, in your thought process. If you fill your heart with gratitude, you can weather any storms.

I leave this thought in your plate. Ponder over it. Think about it; discuss it. I wish you happiness, always.

This is Mohanji, for you.

Listen to an excerpt of this podcast here.

Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt

Proofread by Vidya Mohite and Rekha Murali

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Personal Effectiveness

Welcome to Mohanji speaks.

Hello, my dear friends,

Today, let us think about certain aspects of our life, which are taking away a lot of our energy; the aspects that consume our energy more, are the wasted matters of our life, not the necessary aspects. I will talk about a few of these. Look at three C’s of our life and I mean the alphabet ‘C ‘- Criticism, Comparison, Competition.

Let us begin with the last one, competition. We have been trained to compete with somebody or something. But have we ever thought, at any point in time, whether it is necessary, or not? And usually, more often than not, it is not necessary. We don’t need it. But competition is not a negative word. You can definitely compete with yourself. That will help you to improve yourself.

 

The second C is Criticism. Who is our most bitter critic? We ourselves are. We criticize ourselves more than the whole world criticizes us. We judge ourselves more than the entire world. We are our most beloved friend, as well as the most hated enemy. It’s all us. Everything is us. Criticism takes away a lot of time. It even affects our self-esteem. We compromise our experiences for the sake of critical view, comparisons. What are the comparisons with?

Imagine you are an orange, and you are comparing yourself with an apple. Definitely, you’re not the apple. You are an orange and be proud of it.

You are who you are. You are inevitably yourself. You are unique. You are original. You are authentic. 

If you clearly understand this, you realize that you can’t compare with anybody else. Comparison is stupidity. In fact, that time can be used for actualization; that means coming closer to yourself, exploring your authenticity, your original state, your originality. That time is worth it. This is the alternative to comparing ourselves with others, creating a type of competition within and in the bargain, exhausting us too! Is it worth it? Absolutely not! It’s a waste of time.

Along with it, we see that children, (because we have groomed them or we have tuned them like that) are always in the mode of competition or comparison. We compare them with other children. “Hey, look at that boy, or that girl, how well they are doing, how good they are!” etc. This, in fact, creates more divisions in our children, more confusion in them. Instead, if we gently help them to come to terms with their own uniqueness, originality, that would be the biggest gift that we can give to our children. 

We have a great life, but only if we understand it with clarity. Our life is great; it is an amazing life. We don’t experience its greatness, first and foremost because we resist a lot; we resist too much; we cling on to certain bad things of the past. And we don’t let them go. A thing of the past stays on, only if the mind holds that experience or the mind analyzes it and enjoys it in a way, to be in its presence or having a presence in our life. But that’s unnecessary junk. The past is finished; we have nothing to do with it.

Today is our reality. How our authentic are you today? How effective are you today? How much are you able to experience life today?

We are only experiencing our authenticity, our uniqueness. We are not experiencing anything else; we are experiencing the world, as we are. This connection with ourselves will help us much with the contentment factor. 

If we stop criticizing, comparing and competing, look at our world; how will the world be with all unique people, all authentic and all original, walking this earth, expressing their originality and authenticity? The world will be brighter. However, at present, 80% of the people in the world are busy competing, comparing, criticizing, judging and analyzing each other. And what do you get at the end of the day? Disappointments, sheer frustrations, anxieties, fears, jealousy, guilt and regrets are the effects. We can avoid these. We can indeed avoid all these emotions, easily, if we were to connect to our authenticity; if we could connect to our originality, accept it totally, against all odds, and if we could ignore the opinions of others about us unless it is creative criticism. If the criticism is from somebody who’s guiding us to actualize ourselves, it is creative criticism. Someone who is guiding us to explore our own authenticity is creative and that is a good suggestion or criticism. That’s fine. Apart from that, nothing else is important.

Our own connection with ourselves is the most authentic connection you can ever make in a lifetime. Anything else, any opinions, any criticisms, is not important.

Anything that helps you to connect with yourself is good. Anything which explores your authenticity is good. Anything which reminds you of your originality is good. And those are the good things of life, not the materials you get, not the positions, or the possessions; they are all temporary. But your own exploration of your authenticity is permanent. And that makes you an effective person and a compelling personality.

You are your own ally. Don’t be your own enemy.

I’ll leave you with this thought today; think about it. We’ll talk about something else, next time. Have a good day.

This is Mohanji for you.

Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt

Proofread by Vidya Rajagopal

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Q&A – How do we best raise our children in these difficult times?

Mohanji: Welcome to Mohanji Speaks. These are answers to questions from listeners. Thank you for sending them, keep sending them. I will try to answer them as best as I can.

Speaker: This question is about parenting small children, especially in the current times. The question really centers around, how do we keep spirits alive and help them realize the beauty and goodness in the world, despite having to constantly remind them not to hug others, not to touch articles outside, not to meet friends? And for this person, it’s breaking the heart to see the child indoors, alone at home.

Mohanji: The question is about how to bring the children up the way you expect them to be. First and foremost, every child born in the world is the responsibility of society, not only the parents. First of all, try to get your ownership away from children. When you do not have ownership, then you have a better connection. When you have ownership, you have flavored connection. You own the person. This is my child. I want this child to be like this, etc.

You have to gently bring them to this awareness of how they should be in the world, and you have to lead by example. You cannot avoid the pressure or the presence of the society from the lives of your children. Not even you. That presence and pressure will affect everybody; in a good way or a bad way. Do we have any control over our children? They came through us; that’s okay. But they don’t belong to us. Every child belongs to only themselves. They don’t even belong to the society; but it’s the responsibility of the society, which is a conglomeration to take care of each child. And what we have in the society, what is the mental structure, collective consciousness; that’s reflected in each child of the society – every child.

Parents, teachers, society, if you take all these three, the highest and the most important in the society; then comes parents and then come teachers. All these aspects have to be equally understood. A child is a complete character. A child comes to this world with a character, a constitution, a particular inclination, tendency, and a set of desires. It’s obviously not the same for everyone; each person has their inclinations, tendencies, likes and dislikes, desires, all distinct, even in the same family. What contaminates a relationship is the ownership and what enriches a relationship is freedom.

Freedom is the best message you can actually deliver to a child with your own life. Freedom is not freedom of the senses and mind; it’s freedom from the senses and mind. If you live that in your own household, and if you demonstrate that on an everyday basis, not as a teaching, but as a lifestyle, children will pick it up. If we demonstrate the power of compassion, kindness, unconditional love, selflessness, caring, sharing, every day; and bring your children along with you while you demonstrate it in your own life; not to teach them but to show them that this makes heaven on Earth. Then the child will start connecting to it at some point in time, even if they get influenced by the bad effects of the society for some time, they will have this in the back of their mind that there is a possibility of heaven on Earth. This is within us. We have that power; we have that means and stability to bring forth. So, this is the thing, when we talk to a child, don’t try to give them lessons, instead, try to give them awareness. The best way to give them awareness is through the life stories of great Masters. When I say Masters, do not think they are saints or spiritual people; Masters is somebody who has exercised their purpose against all odds and found success.

Again, as I say, according to me, success means the contentment factor; satisfaction over life. Every moment satisfaction, not like a satisfaction at the time of death, or to the latest stage of life, not like that. For me, contentment is much more important than possessions and positions. For me, richness means contented life. This is real richness; having a contented life is real richness for me. It’s not about what I have. It’s about how I perceive life, how I accept life, how I live my life. Even if you have billions, you can only have one breakfast, one lunch and one dinner; you can only sleep in one bed. You can have any amount of luxury but how would you use it? So, contentment factor is not connected to materials; it’s not connected to relationships. We change relationships quite often to find the right relationship; but mostly we are not contented. It is not about changing relationships; it’s not searching outside, it’s searching inside. You search inside and find yourself. You are contented, and that gives contentment to everything outside.

These are fundamental things which we can guide children into with our own life, not through teachings, not through messages, not through punishments. I hate punishing children; there’s no need to do that. Instead, you can live a great life and show this to children. For a small child, the father and the mother are great personalities. They admire them, they should admire them with their own lifestyle. And don’t ridicule or gossip or talk bad about any spouse in front of the children. When you say that “Your father is not good”, or when the father says “The mother is not good”, the child develops conflict within. The child doesn’t understand; he feels that there is a betrayal going on here. (Not exactly in those words but that’s the effect) A child looks at a relationship, in terms of love, (a small child) hug, love, feeling, kissing, very much understood; but disparities, enmities, revenge, not understood. And if a child grows up seeing that; how can you expect a better society? So, it’s important!

A child is the responsibility of everybody, the society, as well as the parents as well as the teachers, in a different order. When we consistently show compassion, kindness, love, the child will be stabilized in that. By the time the child is five or six, he would have established himself in love. And he will not choose any other option because there’s no better option than love. So, this is the point, when a child comes up in love, basking in love, swimming in love, filled in love; he will not express anger, hatred and jealousy, in the world outside. Even he would probably transform the world with love. And this possibility is always there.

So how do you groom your children? Very simple, you have to lead by example. You have to be love, you should never pretend, no hypocrisy because children catch it very fast. You got to live it yesterday, today, tomorrow, day after; that means, every day, live the same thing; love, compassion, kindness. And always understand that discrimination of any kind, including racism, speciesism, and all kinds of ‘isms’ which discriminates people and beings and every creation; is not understood by a small child. They don’t see the life that way. But as we grow up with our conditionings, we start looking at things in that way. So, don’t bring this to children. You should live a life beyond every ‘isms’; beyond man-made barriers that will give stability to a child.

We need a society rooted in absolute compassion. We need a society away from corruption, selfishness. We need a society rooted in selflessness. “How can I help you?”, should be the question. “Can I help you? How else can I help you? How else can I serve you?” This should be the question, and let the child see you performing this all the time. And the child will transform itself into a powerful personality, filled with compassion, with kindness and love. This is the best thing you can give to the world – great child, a great son or daughter rooted in compassion, kindness and love, with the ability to transform the society with it. There is nothing more powerful than love. And here, you are creating legends, great personalities. You have the capacity, every parent has the capacity. Do not restrict the children, do not bind them. Instead, give them freedom; as I said, again, freedom is not freedom of senses; it’s freedom from senses, and give contentment, with what you have. Love as you are, and leave the world better, much higher than you got the world from the past.

Thank you for listening to this podcast. Do contemplate on it, do discuss with your friends, and let me know what you feel. If you have further questions, do send them to me.

Thank you. This is Mohanji for you.

 

Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt

Proofread by Padmini Ravikumar

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How do I motivate my children?

Welcome to Mohanji Speaks. These are answers to questions from listeners. Thank you for sending them. Keep sending them. I will try to answer them as best as I can.

This question comes with the title motivation of children.
Q: How to motivate my children to get over tamasic tendencies and put their minds to useful productive work like doing chores, study time, being responsible people within the society? Smartphones, gadgets distract them completely. And even taking them away doesn’t do much to help. So, what can I do to help them so that they do not waste their time and their lives? Or is it that the predestined behave in such a manner?

Mohanji: We should not consider anything as destiny and procrastinate over it. I believe that if we have the right attitude, we can change anything to something positive. How do you bring up your children to powerful personalities? We have spoken about this earlier, but I will give you another dimension. The world has the highest possibilities of human existence and the lowest possibilities of human existence. The highest is existence in compassion, kindness, selflessness, unconditional love; the highest of human qualities. The lowest is just being sense oriented, chasing pleasures, comparing, criticizing, judging, revenging; these kinds of things.

We have this huge variety. Now, where do we position ourselves? This is very important. And that’s exactly where the children will position, looking at us. If we are always insecure, if we are complaining, if we are criticizing judging, if we are positioning ourselves as completely confused in society; children will do the same because they are looking at us as role models at least in the initial days. What do we need to do? We need to bring the stories of powerful personalities who survived all sorts of tribulations, all sorts of tests and express themselves in the most successful way as trendsetters, game-changers. This is in everybody. You got to believe in yourself to do that.

First and foremost, bring awareness of the child in such a way that they believe in themselves. First and foremost is self-respect, belief, faith in themselves, towards themselves, for which we have to respect ourselves. We have to respect other people. We have to respect people, we have to respect ourselves. We have to cultivate respect for everything we do. We have to accept our self; self-acceptance. Respect our self, self-respect.

And we should not ever position ourselves in a position of insecurity or low self-esteem, or things like that. When we have a situation where we are a bit low, we should be able to address it positively. We can go high or we can go low. That’s how human life works, but we should address it positively. Yes, I have a situation where I’m feeling a bit low, that’s fine. That’s okay. And then, the child will learn that everything is okay. If we accept it, it doesn’t hurt too much. If you resist it, it hurts.

This is how it is, and then failures. We do not allow a child to fail because we think failures means the end of life. Absolutely not. Failures lead to success. When you accept failures gracefully, we have found success. Success is in acceptance and non-resistance. This we can lead by example, we should lead by example. Another aspect is that we should not push a child to be perfect. Perfection is a relative thing and it’s a constant thing. Perfection means you got to keep improving. What was perfect yesterday may not be perfect today. We have seen systems, people, situations, materials, constantly getting upgraded. So, a new thing totally eclipses a thing of the past, because it gets upgraded. We must understand that perfection is a relative thing. We should not push the child to be really, really perfect, and some of the backbenchers become very successful because they did not have peer pressure. Just for the sake of perfection, if we put the child into pressure, they collapse completely, eventually.

Many people who are probably successful in life, in terms of money, are not successful in life in terms of contentment. Many people have many diseases, because of this mad rush for something materialistic and thinking that is what is a success. It’s very, very important that we must understand that a child is a unique creation like we are a unique creation. We are all unique. We must leave the child free to be themselves with gentle guidance; with great stories of people who could have had anything, they could have had anything in life but wanted nothing. That means that they were contented inside, and they performed very well and then transformed the society with their existence. Bring the stories of that kind, so that the mind as the child grows will orient to activities which are good to create legends. Don’t try to say the society is not good or things are not good, a sign of times and stuff like that. Society is as it is; it will keep changing. There’ll be differences each day, let’s not worry about that. Let’s see what we can do in this society at this time, in this situation. We must accept ourselves, then the child will accept themselves.

Do discuss this with your friends, contemplate on it, and increase your awareness, step by step. Wish you great success in life.

Lots of love. This is Mohanji.

Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt

Proofread by Rekha Murali

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Children

Dear friends, this is Mohanji.

Today I would like to speak about a subject, which is very close to my heart, children. Children of all species are the same for me, they are children. They are just children. And I like to take care of all these children because they are the future. So, the point I would like to make here is this; when you walk through the streets especially in India, you can see many children, selling things and some children trying to beg, trying to get some money from you, etc. I do not really like to give money to children. Instead, I would like to give them food; I’d like to give them clothes, etc. Why I don’t like to give money is, there probably is someone else behind them, trying to extract money through these children. If we give them money because of sympathy, and there are people behind them, or owning them, who were probably trying to make use of them to get money.

So, I would like to help the children as best as we can. How can we help them? First of all, when they are selling something, do not bargain. You give them maybe 5 or 10 rupees more, that’s fine. Don’t bargain. Secondly, ask the question, “Are you hungry?” If they’re hungry give them something to eat, give them water, and show some love and nurturing. And if we can, we should take care of them in a more involved manner; maybe we can take care of their education, or get them admission in a school, buy them books, clothes, and such things. We’re trying to do that through Mohanji Ka Aangan. We’re trying to help as many children as possible through that, but that’s not enough, we should really, really take care of them. It’s not enough to just meet them. We should nurture them, take care of them and make them powerful citizens of the country, and of the world.

Please understand all children are the same, in all species, I’d really like to look at all children as the same, not that human children are special. All children are the same, and they are very precious for their mothers. So, we must make sure, whenever possible that the mothers and children are together. This is very important.

Recently, we have read, heard or seen in television about mothers killing children. These are connected to mental disturbances, you know psychological disorders. They need treatment. But what happens is when somebody does something like that, we immediately victimize them, convict them and jail them. Instead, we should understand them; in hospitals, doctors should be trained to understand the mental states of the mothers. We should also keep an eye on such people who are abusing children, who are tending to abuse children, to beat them to starve them etc. And we must do something about it. We have to gently guide the children away from them or alert the authorities to take care of the children; do something like that so that we prevent various crimes of that nature. Hence children should be really, really taken care of.

I do not like to bargain with small vendors, because that’s silly. Don’t bargain with these daily wagers, such as the people who sell vegetables from their garden. Give them something extra because they are doing a good job, and they are not making a fortune out of it. So, when I see children on the road selling small things, I buy them even if I don’t need them, just to give them some money. Sometimes I try to give them extra money and almost always I have seen that these children are very honest. If you give them money without buying anything, they won’t take your money; they are not here to beg. They don’t want to take money as alms, they would like to sell and earn money. We can at least avoid bargaining, that would help. Pay a little bit extra to encourage them, and when you see them, ask the question, ‘Are you hungry?’ Make it a point to ask this question to anybody in the street, who you think is hungry. Food and water – these are important. You know, we can actually make a difference in their life this way.

I would like to leave this thought with you now. When you’re going out on the street, you can try to make a difference in their lives; not only the children, the street vendors, the old people or others who are selling their wares. Don’t bargain with the rickshaw pullers, the very old and the seemingly sick rickshaw pullers; instead, give them slightly more money than what they ask for. And that’s how you can display your inner richness.

I leave this thought on your plate. Digest it and let’s see some difference in your attitude. Or probably you can share this, you can discuss with people and make a difference in the society this way.

Lots of love. This is Mohanji.

 

Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt

Proofread by Vidya Rajagopalan

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Cultivate Change, part 1

Mohanji Speaks Zoom satsang
on 09th June 2019

Q:  What is more important in spirituality – faith or being objective?

Mohanji: Being practical. This is very important in spirituality. Spirituality is not apart from you. Spirituality is your connection with the spirit aspect of you, which is the consciousness aspect. It has three dimensions, the waking state, the deep sleep state and the dream state. In these three states, you are experiencing this incarnation, your life on earth, through three states, every day, 24 hours. So while you are awake, it is very important to be practical. For example, many have come to me and asked, what is the right path? You can’t generalize the right path, because it is individualistic;  because it is as you are. Some people love to experience devotion, bhakti, because their orientation is bhakti. Some people like the path of knowledge, the questions and the answers, because they operate from their intellect. You cannot deny that. That is the way they are, so when somebody is operating from their intellect, they need answers and that is the gyana marg –  the path of knowledge. Then there is path of service. They are very kind at heart. They want to serve the world. They love everybody. They have lot of compassion. The kindness overwhelms them. All these are signs of a Karma yogi, somebody who is there for the world. So it is very important to recognize our orientation and based on our orientation, we should choose our path.  Hence, no generalization is possible.  That is why I said practicality is very important. Objectivity is not as important as practicality. Even if a guru or spiritual master gives you something that you can’t use, guides you to a method that is not suitable to you, you should be very practical about it. You should say that this doesn’t suit me and instead choose something which suits you, because the entire spiritual journey is about you. This is similar to a situation where someone gives you an outfit that you can’t wear; you don’t try to somehow fit into the outfit. You can have a million questions, but the answer is you. Everything starts with you and everything ends with you. When you wake up, your world wakes up. When you sleep, your world sleeps. The world exists, but the existing world has no value for you, unless and until you wake up. If you don’t wake up, you don’t see the world. It is as simple as that. So we have to be practical. If you are not practical, you miss life because we are based on concepts – concepts and opinions of others. They are others. They are as per what they are, not as per what you are. You need to have a life as per what you are. This is very important. Only then, it becomes realistic. If a life time goes without full conformation, to your nature, to yourself, then it is a wasted life. You were trying to become something, you were trying to compare or you were trying to position yourselves your whole life. It does not work that way.

We are born with a particular frequency and that frequency can be changed only with change in awareness.

Change in awareness is completely dependent on how much you accept yourself.

Awareness will not shift, if you don’t accept yourself.

So accepting yourself has a big value here.

Accepting yourself – this is very important. It does not matter whether you accept the many things around you; because when you sleep they don’t exist for you. You exist as a dreamer, as a person who is in deep sleep. You exist as a person who is awake. So “You” have a lot of value.

You should definitely attend to yourself. If you don’t attend to yourself, you miss a lifetime.

So my opinion is that being practical should be first, before trying to be spiritual. You are spiritual anyway, whether you like it or not. Because being spiritual means your connection with this awareness or connection with the awareness that the spirit in you is running the show. This whole show is run by the consciousness, the energy behind it.

Consciousness operates and it has three distinct bhaavs (forms), which are waking, deep sleep and dream.

Once your awareness is above these three states of existence, it shifts to the fourth. It’s called Turiya – the fourth state.

Turiya is like witness hood. It is objective witnesshood of these three states. So this is all part of you. And everything starts with you.

If you do not recognize and don’t conform to what you are, then the journey is affected. Please understand this very clearly – spirituality is not activity. It is not about activity. It is not about doing so many things. It is not about meeting many masters or going to places. They all help you, but everything is you.  Spirituality is about transforming you to higher awareness, to the level of awareness where you only see consciousness in operation, nothing else. Nothing else matters. It is consciousness at work, through plants, trees, animals, birds, everything – consciousness is working. And that becomes your experience. Your experience becomes consciousness at work.

Then you start understanding yourself, “Oh this is the show! This is the drama, which is being played out. I am an actor; I am playing various roles, just like any actor who would play different roles in a feature film.” We play various roles – role of a father, a child, a husband, a wife, maybe the role of a pedestrian, a shopper or a shopkeeper, whatever you are. You are playing all these multiple roles and you play them well.

Even situations, such as a situation of confusion, where your clarity is very low, be that situation of confusion 100% at that point in time. Because that is your reality at that time. Otherwise in some situations you are excited and happy, very happy. Be happiness at that time. Be happiness. Not the situation, the essence of the situation is happiness. A situation has provided that state, or the opportunity to be there, become that. Sometime we are in deep despair and sorrow, be sorrow at that time. Be the essence of that. Each point in time as per what is provided to you, be that. That is the height of fulfillment you can have in a life time. Each moment fulfillment. No resistance. No comparisons. No criticism. Don’t judge. In the path of liberation, judging yourself and judging another are equal. Because when you start looking at yourself as a karmic being, when you take a step backwards and look at yourself, you will see that you are also another actor in this whole world, another player, another object, with duration; we have a certain time on earth. So you don’t see much difference between other people and you. All are actors. All are going around in this world doing their act, and in that point in time you will know that criticizing yourself, judging yourself, blaming yourself, having guilt, all these things are same, as if you have it for other people. There are no other people. It’s all expressions. Numerous expressions. It’s all time bound. 100 years later, we will not be here. So everyone is just a player and an actor. There should be complete harmony in this operation, the entire place, all its people should be in harmony. A person includes other species too. All beings  in all species are people, because they have personalities. Whatever has a personality is a person. So that way we will see this whole Maya – the role play. When I say Maya, it is something that gets transformed, which changes. When I say Mata, it is something truthful and unchangeable. “Maya” – we see the operation in this world, with complete Maya, beautiful drama being played out each moment and you will know that you are witnessing. This is the objectivity. It happens to you. You are not creating it.

When you create it, you are involving your mind. When you involve your mind, you have ownership. When you have ownership, you have Karma. Ownership is the main ingredient for Karma. When you have ownership, possessiveness over the possessions or positions, that creates Karma. That creates emotions. Emotion is the glue which attaches the thought or word or an action to your subconscious which eventually becomes your habit or need, desire or pattern. This has to be very clear. So being objective is important, but being practical is ultimately important and also please understand, don’t connect to a master or a path or an exercise thinking, “Oh this is now going to change me.” You are changing, not the thing. Anything outside of you is but a guide, a mirror, a road map. How you benefit from it depends on how well you use it. If you don’t use it, it remains as it is, not a problem. But if you use it well, it will transform you. So your transformation is the ultimate aim. Nothing else. Nothing else can be the aim. Your transformation is your sign of spiritual stability. Being spiritual should be transformative.

­­­Q: Anything bad that happens in the world is attributed to Karma. This includes the atrocities that happen like raping young children, killing people in holy places etc. Are we using the excuse of Karma as a way of escapism from our Dharma towards the society?  Why weren’t the souls protected by the Supreme?

Mohanji: I think it is an incorrect way of looking at the issue. I do not think our judiciary system ever talks about Karma, at least I haven’t heard of it. It is we who are talking. Judiciary is taking care of various things of the society with law and I think that’s the way it should go. There are certain reasons for creating certain effects, one of them is collective consciousness. Collective Consciousness is the awareness of a group of people. Again it boils down to each individual. Your world is how you are; your world is a reflection of yourself. Now to answer why some people have certain perversions, certain psychological disorders, usually in a generic manner you can say it’s suppression – suppression of something. Human beings and all other species are driven by instincts.

Instinct is the basic driving force of creation. What is the major instinct? Survival instinct. Survival instinct has major two aspects, the first is our need for food to sustain the body and the second aspect is the need for sexuality to sustain the species. These are two important aspects. Besides these,  there are numerous other aspects. If you are able to look at the larger picture, you see that every animal, every bird, every reptile, in fact, every being has the survival instinct and they also hunt for food. The survival instinct depends on their orientation and species. They have clans and boundaries. They keep all these for the sake of survival; human beings too. But with human beings, there is a difference. They operate also on intelligence and imagination. This is the difference between human beings and other species. All the developments you see in this world are connected to intelligence and imagination where instinct is sometimes considered inferior. It is considered lack of refinement. Then what happens is suppression. Suppression causes disorder. You can see that young children do not have such problems. That is because they are very natural. As you become more natural, you also become more relaxed and in tune with nature.

Dharmic law– what is the Dharmic law? Dharmic law is based on naturality. Everything is natural. Being natural. Being one with the nature. One frequency.  Frequency means there can be various frequencies rooted in one frequency. Dharma is the large substratum, based on which Karma is the operating table. Karmic law means desires which need fulfillment; it causes birth, events, experiences and death. This is Karma based on Dharma. Dharma is the substratum, the ground. Karma is our operating pattern or our road map for existence. Third is the human law. Human law is connected to social well-being and again it is all connected to survival. If you look at all the human laws, they are based on peaceful survival. Now in this society, there are various types of people, 7.5 billion people. They are all universe of their own. They are all in their own world or they are a world of their own, in their own right. So in this world we can’t have uniformity because they have been created by Karma, unfulfilled desires.

Now if there is a suppression of some nature, their predominant interest will be to fulfill that. So whenever we suppress, deny, avoid or make it sinful, associate guilt with it, etc. that will definitely stay within and become something else. When you continuously and consistently suppress something, that will become your predominant emotion, need or desire for fulfillment. That is the way it is. Because in your own life you see, if somebody says, “Hey you can’t have that!”, that would be your only thought. The main point is we will always think about  that which has been denied, even if it is not significant in life, it. That is human nature.

Thus with this kind of structure, creation has made us like this. Certain things when suppressed over time, for example, an abuse happened in childhood, that person grows up with the fear of a potential abuse. Some people have the fear of a theft in the house and they attract that. They attract that effect. So whenever you fear something, you suppress something. When you think about something as unhealthy or not good, (I am not talking about healthy food or unhealthy food), something which is not good, a taboo, that is what we are trying to move towards. You remember that. We always remember and we try to get that. This is human nature. Hence with this nature, the only solution is  the right awareness. The needs and desires are unending, but you can bring your awareness to the level where the highest human potential can be experienced in a lifetime, which is compassion, kindness, unconditional love, selflessness, companionship without comparisons, togetherness. This, we can nurture.

Also I believe very strongly that from childhood, at the school level, you should have more counselors – people who talk to children. Many times we don’t talk to children. We are busy making them bricks on the wall just as we want and that is causing a lot of calamity in them. They are not natural because they are chasing something. They are always running after something and that’s what we train them to do. We train them to be more and more result oriented, not fulfillment oriented. Fulfillment does not happen in this manner. While going through education, everybody is learning how to earn money. They also are later trying to earn money. But what is this money for? They believe that when they have a lot of money they can have great life. That is not true. There is no guarantee. You can have lot of money and you can be completely unsettled. We can see many like that. Insecurity can grow with money too. But we do not train children to be content. Hence we are not attending to the mind factor.

Till date, we are busy attending to the physical ailment part. What causes physical ailment most of the time? An unsettled mind causes a physical ailment. An unsettled mind, insecurities, suppression, depression, all these kinds of things are connected to mind.

We have three faculties to experience the Earth – mind, intellect and ego. Mind is the seat of emotions. Intellect is the seat of knowledge or it needs answers. Ego is the seat of personality. These three factors are vital for us. When someone respects you, honours you, appreciates you, applauds, your ego is happy, ego feels settled. When you get answers, intellect is happy. Intellect asks for answers. And sometimes intellect will need answers that it will accept, which means, the answer is not the truth, but one that suits it. That is based on the stored data, what you are. Likewise emotions, romance, love, various emotions of life – these are food for the mind. So in this mode if you don’t attend to the mind matter, which is mind, intellect and ego, we miss life. That is the reason for calamities such as wars, displacements, bloodshed, the expressions of anger, hatred and insecurities; you see a tremendous amount of insecurity. If you are not insecure, you will not criticize another. This is the simple truth. If at all we are looking at someone else as bad, it means we have that insecurity in us. We are eager to prove ourselves. Who wants to prove to other people? Those who are not settled inside. If you are settled inside, you don’t have to prove. People will recognize you as stability, stillness. If you are unsettled, you are insecure, you feel the need to prove. We keep proving and ultimately become tired of it too. We become more and more tired and unstable because of that. So it is very important to understand, the entire society has come out of us and also every child is the responsibility of the society, not just the parents. Every child is being groomed by the society. Society grooms each child, not just the parents or the teachers, it is society. So it is the responsibility of the society to bring children to the right path.

Now you had asked a question about what god is doing. God is doing exactly what your soul is doing – not interfering, but aiding your life. Once the soul leaves, you call it a dead body, which means this body, this constitution has no value. God is the larger soul, the whole universe is inspired and energized by this large soul, called supreme consciousness. And God does not interfere in your micro matters. He does not script your life. It does not even write a script for the world. What he does is that all scripts are accepted, which will have a hero, a villain, a comedian and every role there is. All these roles are perfectly accepted. As long as the drama goes on, the entertainment goes on. And that’s about it.

Nothing has permanent value here. Every creation has duration. Everything has it’s time, space, situation, relevance and death. This includes galaxies and planets; the sun, the moon, the stars, everything has a duration. Thus god has nothing to do with it. God is the supreme consciousness, out of which all this manifested universe has happened and into which the manifested universe will dissolve at the end of the day. And we are like small ants in the whole system; maybe not even an ant, something tinier than that! Our ego makes us feel great, but otherwise we do not have much importance. Thus God does not get involved. But every child, every baby born in this world is the responsibility of the society, not just of the parents. And society has to groom them. Society has to behave well. In a world of corruption, in a world of competition, in a world of comparison, how do you expect each child to be individual and free? It is very difficult. That is what we are feeding the child with! The child is fed with the thoughts of comparisons, thoughts of competition, thoughts of success and success means failure is unacceptable. All these things have created the child in a mode which emphasizes – “Go and kill and win”. This is what we are teaching children.

As I said earlier about our nursery rhymes, “Humpty dumpty fell down and broke the crown…” That was a disaster and nobody could fix it. Hence we are telling a child, “You can’t fix the life, it’s not easy to fix life.” But that’s not true. You are life. Life is about what you see and what you express and everybody is fine. Nobody is higher or lower, nobody is a master, nobody is a disciple, nobody is a Guru, nobody is a shishya (spiritual teacher). Everyone has a role to play in this world and that has duration. I call it effective years. Effective years is the time period you are actually delivering to this world. Rest of the time, the world does not care, neither is it good for you;  the time you used for accumulating wealth. We accumulate, accumulate and accumulate and finally die, leaving everything behind. So what was this whole show about. Usually, the people who chase money, wealth, fame, etc.  don’t realize it is short lived. It has duration.

Also don’t expect everybody to appreciate you. Forget about appreciation, many people won’t even recognize you. Many will criticize you, because you don’t fit into their frame of mind. This is all part of existence. How do we care or what can we do about it? We should do nothing about it. All these things happen mainly because of insensitivity. We are not looking at this whole world as heaven. We can create heaven here. Just be harmonious, just accept, just love. We all have weaknesses, every being has weaknesses and strength. Every being who has walked this earth has experienced success and failure, these are part of life and we cannot say only success or only failure. It’s not so. Only strength or only weakness, this is not so. Everyone has everything – success, failure, strengths and weaknesses. We have to accept them all. Instead if we try to prove to the world, we hide our weaknesses, it is a big disaster and that is what is causing all these events we spoke about.

When we suppress a lot, when we hide our weaknesses, over a period of time, it will bubble up. That will push for a realization. Then what will happen? It will cause calamity in life, be it personal life or in the society. So whatever you suppress for a long period of time, it expresses itself with violence or sometimes in an uncontrollable manner, compared to how it would have, had it been channeled out.

All of us experience excessive anger today, insecurity connected to anger. Why does anger happen? Again it is suppressed expectations. When expectations are not met, disappointments happen. Disappointment causes anger. And this is how it is. There is no other way. We have a tremendous amount of suppressed emotions. We have many expectations about ourselves and other people. We have expectations from the society. We always talk about rights, we never talk about responsibilities. All these things are creating a society which is on an explosive mode. Also ideas such as “my god is better than your god, my guru is better than your guru” are of no value. Each guru, each god, each religion, everything is valuable to somebody, respect it. We need to learn to respect everybody. A person who appreciates his Guru, will feel good about his Guru, that’s why he appreciates it. But that does not mean everybody else is bad. All people have their relevance; like you – you have relevance on earth just like everybody else. We all have relevance. We have our time and our space for relevance. This has to be respected.

I have suggested in many forums that we need to have many more counselors in schools, just to understand children, be with them. Teachers and parents are busy. Sometimes they are not able to complete even their work. So there should be a system of counseling. Just ask questions like, “Are you alright? How are you doing today? Is there anything you want to talk to me about? “I visited Mohanji Kā Aangan in Delhi only two times. I went there on my birthday February 23^rd and I was with all the children. One girl came up to me and asked, “Do you remember my name?” This is because the previous time I had asked her name.  I said, “I remember your name.” She did not expect it. When I uttered her name, she was very happy. Then I asked her, “Are you happy?” She said, “No”. I did not get enough time to talk to her and understand what she was going through. So I called somebody and told them they should go there and talk to all children individually, understand what they were experiencing, ideally it should be a lady. What I mean to say is that we don’t understand what the children of the society are experiencing. We assume that everything is ok, everything should be ideal; these are assumptions. Assumptions may not be the reality. We must face the reality. We must look into the eyes of the situation. Then you can understand. And if you try to strengthen the children of today, society will be much better tomorrow. It’s our responsibility, everybody’s responsibility, not one person’s responsibility. And there is no magic wand to change the whole thing. We cannot change in one day, what we created over time. You need to cultivate change and that will happen over time.

Transcribed by Kishore Mundanat
Proofread by Vidya Rajagopalan

Read Cultivate Change, part 2