Guru Purnima Satsang 2020 – Part 2

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.

Transcribed by Rakshitha Ananth

Proofread by Rekha Murali

Q&A – Is it possible to be totally unselfish?

Mohanji: Dear friends, 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 comes from a listener who asks, “How to be totally unselfish?” So, on the face of it, for him or her, people may think that they’re quite unselfish, but deep down, they know that this isn’t 100% true. The heart cannot even feel 100% gratitude or 100% love. So, it’s not total. What can be done to correct the situation?

Mohanji: Nobody is unselfish. We all are selfish in an absolute sense. But in daily life, we can choose to be selfless, that’s our choice. Why did I say that we are all selfish? Only one main reason, because we are karmic beings. What is karma? Primarily, unfulfilled desires. Unfulfilled desires mean desires which seek fulfillment. That means it’s selfish pleasures or selfish fulfilment, contentment, completion. In that context, all of us are selfish, right from childhood. From birth, till death, we are pursuing the completion of our own unfulfilled desires. So, when you look at this, every moment, it’s our satisfaction, our gratification, whatever the activity is. It could be any kind of desire; minor, major, small, big, easy to fulfill, difficult to fulfill, any type of desire, you name it. But it’s all for personal gratification. Where is contentment? Inside us. Where is satisfaction? Inside us. Where is happiness? Inside us. Where is joy, bliss? Everything is inside us. It’s our satisfaction, it’s our gratification. That means we are selfish.

Then, there is this exaggerated version of selfishness, that is connected to things outside of us. Our need for things which are not ours, by merit. It means, we have a desire but we do not often deserve it. What comes to us is what we deserve not all that we desire. What we desire may happen at that time or may not happen as per our eligibility. Sometimes, what we desire happens immediately or sometimes in space and time, much later. A desire, if it is strong enough, if it cannot be fulfilled becomes a pending desire. And that’s the ingredient for further existence.

How can we change the selfishness which we display in the world outside? We can change the way we look at the world. We look at whatever is outside of us, as outside, even if that thing comes in our life or does not come in our life. End of the day, it’s only about a certain set of experience, regarding that object, regarding that person or in association with that person or situation.

Summing up, our life is a bundle of experiences of various levels, various times, various situations. Experiences are the essence of our existence. When we realize or when our awareness grows beyond the selfish feelings of ownership, we understand that end of the day it’s only experience. Like for example, you’ve got to have a place to stay, you need a place to stay, whether it’s a rented house, or it’s your own house. It really doesn’t make a difference as long as you are comfortable, you’re okay. A good place to stay is good enough. But the mind will definitely tell, “No, no, no, but you don’t own it, so you should own it. What if somebody asks you to leave.” Okay, those kinds of things, yes. But finally, when it all boils down, it’s your experience of being in one place or having the shelter. So, this is the way we can look at everything in life. You’re hungry; you have food. What food comes is not important. Did you like the food? If the experience is good, you should accept it.

Like that, if you look at life, narrow it down to the necessity level in terms of experience, then you should be okay. That takes you off the selfish attitude, “I must have it all. I should have better than other people.” Then the competition, the comparison, all those things will not happen; provided you’re happy, you’re contented. That doesn’t mean that you are lethargic. That’s not the point here. It’s not lethargy, it’s not that you don’t do anything at all and think that everything will fall on your lap, it won’t happen that way. But we need to work hard with full awareness, keeping the awareness intact. We should be fully aware, that we are only experiencing life here. We are not owning anything, we can’t own anything permanently. Awareness is the best antidote to tackle selfishness. And compulsive acts of selflessness totally takes it away, eradicates it.

Thank you for listening to this podcast. 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 Rekha Murali

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Q&A Unconditional Love Part 1

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: Mohanji. This is about love. So, it’s asking the question Q: When is true unconditional love possible?

Mohanji: Unconditional Love is the only possibility. All the other things are relative love, which is loving for a particular reason. For a cause, means loving with expectation. They are all unnatural. They’re all mind oriented. Unconditional Love is the substratum. That means it is permanent, it’s permanent always. Means something which is permanent is unconditional love. And why we do not experience it? Because we are connecting love with something external an external object or an external being, and we decide that we have a choice to love or not to love. But if you remove all these choices you have a state where you are sleeping, you have a state where you awaken and you’re a state where you’re dreaming. All of these states are real. And that which transcends all these states is unconditional love. But how do you know about this? That means, how do you know that there is a state where you need nothing, but you still love?

You have to connect to yourself. You have to look at yourself.

Look at the harmony, which is called you. All the organs of the body, which are different functions are working in perfect synchronicity in harmony. And you understand there is a deep love or deep connection. The connection between all these activities which are happening, which makes you stay alive. That cementing material, or that which unites everything is deep love.

If you really connect yourself, you will be overwhelmed with love. It’ll be like a treasury, treasure house of love within. You do not see that outside. When you’re interacting with the outside world, you’re looking at people, you’re looking at differences, you’re looking at materials. You have expectations, you have desires inclinations tendencies. When all these things are happening It’s not easy to feel love, because we are occupied with all these things. In that mode, very, very difficult to find unconditional love. But if you take a close watch at nature, you’ll see a tree gives fruits with zero expectation. It’s only desire, by giving forth the fruit is that its seeds get distributed and new trees will come. But it produces much more fruits than it actually needs to have another tree. Why so? So, it’s doing its Dharma, its duty to serve the world unconditionally. It gives shade. even to a woodcutter somebody who’s come with an axe to cut its branches. It gives shade. It gives shade to birds, shelter to birds. And it gives nourishment to the beings, without any expectation. You can see this harmony this truth everywhere. This is unconditional love.
Love without conditions. And you are able to observe yourself the true yourself. There’s a physical aspect of the gross aspect. We a subtle aspect, the experience, aspect, which consists of the intellect ego-mind, all these things. Then we have further a causal aspect which causes everything to function within us. Look at all these aspects. On the gross aspect, you have an identity, you have a personality. You have a certain existence, and you are identified as a certain person all these things. Then the second level, subtle level, where you are nurturing and maintaining these things. In both these places sometimes, sometimes you can’t find unconditional love, because desires surpass our feeling of unity. Desires overwhelm. Sometimes we don’t even see the possibility of unconditional love. But when you go still further deep within, causal layer, it has no interest in any of the activities. It has no interest in any experiences. It is completely neutral, but it is love, its expression is love. It continuously assists all the other faculties to experience life, with totally free and unconditional existence. So, inside us, we have deep unconditionality. But why do we not experience it? Why are we not experiencing it is because we have so many emotions, connected to expectations connected to our existence when all these emotions are happening one by one like waves on the ocean. We fail to see what’s behind all this. When all these emotions are gone, you never see a calm sea always, calm in the sense, waveless sea. There are waves all the time. Such emotions keep on happening, we fail to see there is a sea underneath. So, you got to take some time, connect deep within. Go within. I say contemplate, contemplate, contemplate.

Contemplate going within. Deep analysis about what you are not. Anger comes – I’m not anger. Hatred comes – Why should I be hatred. Hatred kills me. It disturbs me. I’m not hatred. Jealousy comes -Why should I be jealous about somebody, I’m unique internal focusing on my uniqueness why should I look at somebody else? Like that with the contemplation, you can remove the intensity of each emotion. Then what remains is unconditional love. One by one layer by layer, you remove the grip of emotions. Then emotions don’t grip you anymore. When you’re fully yourself when your inner journey is strong, you’re more inclined to go inside than outside emotions can’t catch you. Emotions exist with outside objects outside entities, beings, people, places, all these things. But when you go within there’s nothing to hold on, except some memories, something which is stored, such as fears memories inclinations, likes and dislikes tendencies experiences impressions. Apart from that, there’s nothing inside. You are constantly seeing the existence of these materials inside. You start feeding, ‘That’s not me at all fleeting things, something which comes and goes. So, I’m not all this! Then what am I? That’s when you really start connecting to the deeper core, where there is somebody something in you, which needs nothing. Totally free. Unattached with all your activities, all your likes and dislikes, all your emotions, all your desires, everything, and still happy.

So that’s when you realize, oh, there is something much deeper, much happier than this fleeting happiness or pleasures of life. And that gives you that awareness. There is something very deep and unconditional within. You got to find it. It’s like finding a treasure, you’ll dig and dig and dig and beneath all the mud and rubbles there is a treasure box within us. When you find that you’ve found everything. There’s nothing more to find. Meanwhile, we are deceived trying to find something outside of us like a relationship, some possessions, some positions. We are on a mad rush all the time. But are we happy? We are not happy. We need more. We need different things, we need variety, plus we engage in emotions such as criticism judgment comparison and that hooks you to the outside world. If you just leave it. Don’t judge anybody. Don’t criticize anybody. Don’t compare with anybody, you are unique.

If you’re less hooked to the world outside your inner journey becomes easier. If you are more hooked to the world outside first of all you have to unhook; that’s why we have The Power of Purity meditation, unhooking. Unhook yourself from the world outside. And then come inside slowly, slowly. Take one step at a time. It may take time; I don’t even know how much time it depends on individuals. How deep you’re connected to the world outside. If you’re lesser connected to the world outside easier to come inside. So, this is approximate, I mean I’m just giving you a broad picture because unconditional love is something which you got to feel where you are able to love everybody, everything like a mother to the child, mother of any species to its children. How deep is the bonding, how much love? With no expectations. And if you look at the animal kingdom, their love is far more unconditional than the human kingdom.

Speaker: This is the first podcast of three on the topic of unconditional love. It was quite extensively covered by Mohanji. So, there’ll be two more to come. We hope you enjoyed it. And the next instalment will come very soon. Have a good day.

Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt

Proofread by Maja Otovich

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How to attain permanent happiness?

We all know deep inside, chasing the paltry pleasures of life is not life. We know there is something deeper. We all know, we all feel that there is something deeper and profound in this existence. And many times, we feel that what we’re doing is not the right thing. That’s why people will ask the question, what’s the purpose of my life?

Well, karmically the purpose of your life is every moment experience; the waking state experience, the dream state experience and the deep sleep state experience. Sum total is life. We express what we are to the world outside, and that’s also part of the purpose of our existence. But we know deep within, we feel that this is not what the whole thing is about. These pleasures are temporary, they come and go. And then we crave for more. Then it becomes a habit, then it becomes an addiction. Like that it goes, going round and round, it doesn’t evolve. We go for the familiar likes and dislikes. So, we have this continuous need for pleasures. But at the same time, we are not happy. We are happy when pleasures are accomplished. Familiar situations make us happy. Comfort zones make us happy and we crave for it. If that’s taken away, we feel like a fish out of water. That’s a very scary feeling, you know. People become restless and people become insecure.

So, we are experiencing a situation like that, now, with this lockdown happening. We do not know what to do. We don’t have the usual freedom which we are used to, for a long time. So we feel, how do we handle this? It’s a very good time to get back to yourself and ask this question. It is a good time to ask a good question. What is a good question? What makes me really happy? What is happiness? What makes me really happy?

None of these recurring needs for certain pleasures is making us happy. They’re making us feel okay. That’s not happiness. Happiness is a permanent state. That question happened in everybody’s mind at some point in time. And this is an inevitable question.

When the great masters went deep inside exploring this question over time, again and again, they realized a few things. One of the major things is the cause of sorrows. The cause of sorrows, they narrowed it down to dependencies, deep expectations and fears. These are the causes of sorrows, major causes of sorrows. There are many minor causes but a major cause of sorrows are expectations and dependencies, as well as fears, and then, they started working on them.

First and foremost, what are dependencies? We are dependent on so many things in life, including the dress we wear, the food we eat, the places we are used to, the relationships that we have, and the environment, spaces, time, and so many factors. And these are the things which are very detrimental for us; to leave the usual patterns and reach a state of freedom with no patterns. What they found through contemplation, they could correct also through contemplation, by going individually, facing each fear, understanding each dependency, accepting each expectation.

So, while understanding each dependency, they realized that they are all connected to certain notions of pleasure. If I have this person with me, I am happy. If the person goes away, I feel insecure. If I have this relationship; if the person is happy with me, I’m happy, if the person is not happy with me, I’m sad. Like that, there are so many permutations, combinations which we have created for ourselves. So, they found that all these relationships had an element of conditionality; that so many relationships are very conditional and it’s related to a certain time, space, moods, so many factors. So, there is no continuity there. How can you change that?  Make all relationships unconditional. That solves that issue, which means less expectation.

Give more than what you take. So, if you require less from people, from the relations, then you’re free. So, freedom is connected to the expectations of a certain nature. If expectations are less, we have more freedom. Likewise fears. Many fears that we have, have no root. They are connected to certain notions, certain beliefs and certain things which we have picked up from society, from education, from people, and from religion. So, these fears, they bind you because you don’t do anything about it. Then they realized that it is good to face those fears, address them, look into the eyes and accept them. The moment you start looking into your fears; you’re not afraid of your fears anymore. Fears wither away. So, every dependency every addiction, every pattern, they are all kind of staying there because we don’t address them.

So individually, contemplation has a lot of value. We contemplate on it, and we come to terms with it. We start accepting ourselves more and more, and we start doing things in a non-reactive way; we don’t react. We don’t react at all. We respond. And we do not resist. Instead, we accept.

This became a big help. And that’s the way they guided the next generations. These masters guided the next generations to accept themselves, assimilate themselves and have permanent happiness, freedom.

 

Permanent happiness is a possibility when the dependencies are fewer, expectations are less, acceptance is more, fears are less or fears are taken care of. If we go into that kind of a mode, then, we do have the possibility of a permanent happiness state. Permanent happiness is when the mind is not running after needs, requirements, and wants; when the mind is stable and peaceful. That’s when the permanent happiness happens. So permanent happiness is a state which is definitely achievable to every individual. For this, the step is not meditation, it’s contemplation, introspection, acceptance.

Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt

Proofread by Rekha Murali

 

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Depth of illusion

Hello, my dear friends! This is Mohanji.

Welcome to another podcast. Today, we will discuss the subject – illusion. What is illusion? I’ll tell you a story. Probably, you can figure out some aspect of illusion. In Sanskrit, it is called Maya. Maya is a relative truth. Relative truth, it is a truth, but its relative. Relative truth means it has existence, only on a relative level; it doesn’t have existence on the absolute plane.

So, relative truth is what we experience most of the time when we are awake. When we are awake like the sun rises, the mind rises; when we wake up, the mind rises, and then we start perceiving the world around us. And when we sleep, the mind sets. Nothing around us is of importance. So what rises, and what sets, is the relative mind. The mind, which is connected to relative things. But we still have an element of satisfaction, an element of happiness, even in sleep.

So, we are not dependent on any items or any things around us. Our happiness is not dependent on people, places, time, situations, experiences of external nature; we are not that, they are all outside. We are only completely inside when we are sleeping. But we are happy, we are happy with that sleep. There is a satisfaction that is happiness. When we wake up, if somebody asks, “Did you sleep well?” “Yeah, it was a beautiful sleep. It was enjoyable. I was happy.” What is enjoyable in that sleep? This is something which we must perceive so that we will somewhat understand the relative truth.

What we have outside is not always experience. We see so many things outside. Eyes see ears listen. So many things, so many factors we go through every day. But everything is not experienced, imagine there are so many people around. We are not experiencing everybody’s relationship.

I’ll tell you the story, and then I’ll talk further. There was one guy; he was meditating in Ganga, in freezing water for a long time, just to find out the truth of Maya, the illusion, or the relative truth. And finally, one day, God appeared and said, “Why are you meditating on something which is insignificant which you are experiencing and it may not be possible for your intellect to understand it. Why do you want to know?” Then he said, “I would like to know the depth of Maya, illusion.” God said, “In time, you will understand, let time, teach you this lesson.” God disappeared. He was disappointed because he thought that God will give him clarity, but he did not get it. So, while he was sitting there, his children came, he left for his home, and the children took care of him. He was living with his children, but at the same time, he had a deep urge to know the truth of Maya, illusion.

One day, when he was sitting outside on the porch of the house, he heard one beggar singing a song and walking outside on the road. And he had a glimpse of the beggar, he was in tatters. He had no clothes or very little clothes, fully dark and kind of shabby, not at all clean. And he felt a lot of disgust. And also, he felt this is very bad or something like that in his mind, and soon afterwards he died. So, his predominant thought at that time was disgust.

When he was reborn, he was born again, as a beggar. And he had no memory of his past life, and he was walking around, singing songs, just like he had a glimpse in the previous life. He went on like that, he married a woman, but she didn’t live for long. And meanwhile, she had a few children, children also died.

So, he was very sad, he was disoriented and he was wandering all the time. And one day, it so happened that he was wandering through one city and that King of that city had died, and they were trying to find a new king. So, the astrologers or the wise men told that the new king should be chosen by an elephant, by the Royal Palace elephant, a trained one, as it has the power to see who is divine. It was given a garland and the elephant was wandering through the streets, looking for the right person to be the next king. Then he put the garland around the neck of this beggar. Everybody was surprised, but they said this is the decision of God. Then they took this guy, they bathed him and they gave him fresh clothes and they coronated him, he became the king. And he married again, he had a few wives and he had children and all those things.

And he was ruling the country. He had some kind of inclination for a good rule, means without selfishness. He was a good king and he was having a good way to assess the good and the bad and make good decisions. So, everybody liked him. Eight or nine years went on like that. Meanwhile, one day he was walking in the garden outside his palace, and he heard a beggar singing, same like he used to do outside on the road. He immediately called the beggar, and he sat with him and he also started singing. All the palace people, the ministers and the people in the court, they saw this, and they were a bit disappointed. And they were saying, “oh, we did not know the past of this King, we must know.’ They went around their search and they found out that he was born in a beggar’s colony, and he was a beggar himself. This was his story. So, they were very disappointed. A couple of queens committed suicide knowing this. Some ministers also went away and there were so many calamities. This also made him very sad, so he also decided to jump into the fire and die. He jumped into the fire and died.

Suddenly the man who was meditating, or doing penance in the river got up. He realized the illusion, he realized what is untruth. The whole story, that means he’s still alive, but at the same time he saw him dying, him taking birth, him becoming a king; all this happened in about a minute. He realized it was a parallel reality, it was not true. It was a reality. So, God wanted to tell him what is reality and what is illusion.

Was this a reality? While he experienced, everything was real. He had sorrows, he had happiness, and he had everything. But now he realized that he’s not even dead, he’s still there. His sons have not picked him up. So, he was pretty much confused, he did not know what is real, what is untrue, what is not the truth. He was contemplating on it. And then he decided, “Okay, let me do penance again. Let me ask this question to the deity,” whom he was worshipping. And he started doing penance.

And while he was about to do that, one wandering man came to the place where he was sitting. Then he asked, “Who are you, where have you come from?” So, the wandering man said, “I was living in a city, there was a king who was a beggar, but we did not know he was a beggar. So, we coronated him as a king. He was ruling the country well, but later on, we realized that his background was not good, then we had a lot of problems in the country. Because of those problems, I decided to go wandering, because I had no other way to do.”

Then he realized, “This is my story, this is a story which I saw, but I saw all this in one minute. While this man is telling that this really happened. So what is reality? Whether my story is right, whether what I saw is real, or how did I perceive this? It is about me he is talking about, but I have not gone anywhere. I’m sitting here, and I’m experiencing this from another person’s mouth.” Then he decided, “I must get this answer.” He did penance, and the deity came, and the deity said, “Look here, your mind cannot comprehend Maya. It’s not possible. What your intellect, your logic is trying to understand, only some reality is connected to what the brain can understand, but there is much, much more. There are much deeper dimensions to everything, you will not be able to understand’.”

Ramana Maharishi

Just like that, somebody asked Ramana Maharshi, if a person dies, will he come back in two years into another body? And Ramana Maharshi said, “Yes, he can come back in two years in another body, and he can also come back into a body tomorrow. At the same time, he would have probably already lived for 75 years.” That means he can come back into a body in two years from this death to new birth. At the same time, and parallelly, he could have probably lived about 75 years.

So, this is exactly what is the depth of illusion, or the relative truth. We have so many parallel existences, which we may not even know. And some of these existences could be creating an interconnecting effect on each life.

So, I leave you with this thought about illusion. Don’t be confused. If you’re confused, it only means that this is something which creates confusion. So, just look at it that way, and we can explore it later. But it’s not really something which you can comprehend with the normal, available intellect. Don’t worry; all the people who heard this story, even the masters are confused about this.

So, the depth of creation and the depth of illusion in the creation, parallel realities and all these things, they are all real. But we have nothing to do with it. For us, what is experienced, that’s what we are. Experience, as I said in the beginning, we are experiencing everything, as we are. Outside, there are so many things that can only be perception; everything will not become our experience. We meet a person, we get a thing, materials, places, time, and they all may not give us experiences. But we are the experience. That experience also remains with us, when we are sleeping, when the mind is set, still, we have experience. And that’s what we are.

So, that experience when everything sets, mind, senses, all the aspects of the waking state sleeps, that’s exactly what we are. That’s worth exploring. What are we?

So, this is a good question. I leave you with this question. It’s a bit longer today, but to tell the whole story, it took some time.

I leave this thought on your plate. Contemplate on it, and then we’ll talk further.

Lots of love.

Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt

Proofread by Rekha Murali

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The real wealth in life is YOU

Hello friends. This is Mohanji.

Hope you are enjoying the podcasts and hope you are commenting, or you’re giving suggestions continuously.

Today, I would like to discuss with you about a very, very important aspect of our life, which most of the people are chasing their whole life. That thing is wealth. What exactly is wealth? This question, it needs a lot of contemplation. What is wealth? What is real wealth?

I would like to tell you a story. A child went to his father and told his father, “What is the most important thing that I must do in my life?” Father said, “You should remain wealthy. If you’re not born wealthy, that’s not your fault. That’s your destiny. But if you die poor that means you did not do well in life.”

Then the child started wondering how to earn wealth? He went to a Master. The Master said, “Whatever you earn from outside, it is not permanent. What you earn inside, it’s permanent. That means, what you can take with you everywhere, without effort, and what you can take when you leave from here, naturally, that’s your real wealth.”

The child started pondering and then the contemplation, like we are doing now, the food for thought happened. He started investigating.

He worked hard, and he earned some money. He saw many people around him; they were working hard, the rich people and the people who were striving for more and more. And then he found that many people do not get satisfaction, contentment. They’re always busy, they’re always stressed, they’re always anxious.

Then he saw another set of people who are lazy, they don’t do anything. They complain, they don’t have the energy or they have tremendous inertia, and they don’t do anything in life. So, that’s the other side. Then he also saw a lot of people exploiting others and living; many political people and those kinds of people who live their life exploiting others; so he did not like that. Then, he got a real view of the whole world, various types of people from beggars to millionaires; nobody’s happy, nobody is satisfied. Then he understood what the Master told him. What you can carry inside is real wealth.

So what is the real wealth? He understood; every moment, I must be happy. So he started working sufficiently, and he decided that this is only to make a survival. Then, he found a lot of happiness when he gave or shared what he had with others. When he took care of his parents, he became very happy; he was feeling good. And when he was taking care of the stray animals, feeding the stray animals, he was happy; he was feeling good. He found that happiness is in these small things of life; being available, being aware and being able to share. Not that waiting for some happiness at some point in time, which is elusive happiness; it’s not coming. It may happen or it may not happen. So, he started focusing on what he could do in this world, and he started giving more and more, whatever he has, started sharing, so he maintained his happiness. And then he understood. This is real wealth.

What is real wealth? That every moment happiness is the real wealth. It’s not the money you have in your bank account or what you do not have, and we naturally tend to compare. This is human nature. Who do we compare with? Always somebody who’s above us, or more successful than us. That’s natural for us. That’s human nature, we can’t help it. That’s fine. That’s okay. But at the same time, comparisons and competitions, they are all distractions. Instead, he focused on his work. Then he understood; the real effort is in applying what has been given, or what you are doing at that time. So, he started applying himself. He started becoming successful. He also became wealthy that way and whenever he had wealth, whenever he got something, he did not think twice, but he started sharing. So, he maintained his wealth. The maintenance of wealth for him, he understood was his ability to share; not in hoarding, in keeping more and more for himself. And he knew that many people who are wealthy are extremely insecure because they tend to keep everything, and they don’t enjoy them – the fruits of success. And they do not do anything to keep the flow. So, he understood, sharing makes wealth more meaningful.

And finally, one day, he went back to the Master, and he told the Master, “Master, I have understood your message. You told me to go out and seek wealth, but spend more time to go in and seek wealth. I found the real wealth sits inside me. I’m happy now, I’m contented and peaceful, thank you for guiding me.” Then, the Master said, “But please remember, the real wealth is YOU. You are the real wealth. If you are not existing, none of these options and opportunities will be existing.”

Finally, real wealth is YOU. If you are there, then the world has you. If you are not there, the world does not have you. And if you are there, you have a world. If you are not there, you do not have the world. So this is a relative existence.

And be happy with yourself, then you have found wealth. I leave you with this thought. Ponder over it. Try to digest it. Talk about it, discuss it with others, share this thought, and do let us know whether you liked it or whether you did not like it or what else we can talk about. Let’s talk, let’s communicate. I wish you a great week ahead.

Be successful. Be yourself.

Lots of love.

 

Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt

Proofread by Rekha Murali

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Time to Unify Based on Love – part 2

Mohanji Speaks – Zoom satsang, part 2
on 10 November 2019

Question 1: How can I get out from self-sabotage, fear, conformity and the paradigm of the impossible?

Well, that’s very simple. As I explained in the beginning, it has to start with accepting yourself. There is some element in you which is not accepting yourself fully. And you probably are depending on other people’s opinion about you for your acceptance of yourself. But please understand, nobody can understand you, sometimes even you cannot understand yourself. Because you are a full and complete being, if you really accept and understand that aspect of you, where you are full and complete, then you will spontaneously feel no kind of expectations, judgments, or criticisms about yourself in you. Only we can raise ourselves or pull ourselves down.

It is all our story. This is a unique story and we are the author of this story. Because of our authorship we have this life. This person or this book of life is written by us. What we call destiny is our script. So, if you really accept yourself, you will not sabotage yourself. Sabotaging also happens with expectations, which you probably derived from the society, somebody told you that you should do like this. We also have a lack of acceptance in us.

If you look at everyday life, we will feel that. There are so many factors which we don’t like. “Oh if only I was like that… If only I was like this.” We have a certain benchmark; we have certain expectations. They are all unnecessary. We are what we are, whether we take it or leave it. There’s nothing you can do about it. Because this is the script you made for this life right from your birth till death. The script is well written. All the people coming into your life who are giving you experiences and flavours are all connected to the script. You allowed them, you allowed these people, you allowed these situations, and all these happenings are your choice. If you look at it as a drama, the whole drama from birth to death, you allowed all these people who are walking in your life, you allowed all the experiences. So, all you have to do now is just witness, watch this drama and be happy. Because there’s nothing you can do now. If you want to have another script, you have to take another life.

Question 2: Is reciprocating the bond between a dog or any animal and its human expression, a type of bhakthi?

In any kind of bonding or any kind of relationship, don’t look at them as animals, people, etc. Then you won’t understand. Understand that every being coming to you is a soul in action. They are all souls in action. So, when they are coming close to you, think about why they are coming closer to you, because there is a connection. So, the cause is a connection, which is a continuation, and the duration depends on the intensity of the connection. The flavours or emotions that we share with them as well are connected to this connection.

If you look at the whole picture, so many beings have come to you and given you experiences, not just human beings. But we have a special kind of feeling towards human beings because we are of that species, not because we have something else to do with human beings. All relationships have their unique flavour and their relevance. We must accept all relationships as the same. What caused it? It doesn’t matter. How long it will last? It doesn’t matter. Right now, you have it; experience it. That’s all. Life has to be looked at that way. Right now, we have it. This is our time; this is our experience, that’s it. What will it be tomorrow? We do not know. What about yesterday? It has finished. So, we look at life like this.

We don’t know who all will be with us tomorrow. Whether it will be an animal body, bird body or a human body, it doesn’t matter. Who will live with you or walk with you, be with you forever in the future? We don’t know. And how long will we be with them, walk with them, talk with them? We don’t know because, we don’t know when we will die. There are so many things which we do not know. What you know is the reality. Right now, you are listening to me and I’m talking to you. This is a truth. This is a reality and that’s about it. Next hour, we don’t know. Basically, past is finished; future we don’t know. So, don’t worry about these two. Right now, we are here. You make the best out of it. That’s it.

Do not look at the body and underestimate the soul. The soul is the same and it has taken various bodies. In the story of Krishna, when the Avatar was happening; Krishna was taking birth and various beings decided to come as cows, calves etc. so that they could touch him, and they could be with him. Various beings decided to come even as grass where he walks so his feet would fall on them. Such things like that can happen. So, everything has its relevance. Do not underestimate the grass or even a falling leaf. Everything has its flavour. Everything touches you, if you look around, if you witness the light, witness the world. Everything will touch you from deep within, and it has its relevance.

Also understand, at the end of the day, life is equal to the experiences that you have. So, make your experiences beautiful. We must completely remove all the anger, hatred, jealousy etc. All those things are not needed. Just be plain and simple and accept the world as it comes. Accept the people as they come and accept the whole dimensions of life as they are, so that you have no conflict; you have no resistance; you are in total acceptance and then see how beautiful your life is.

Question 3: How do we know if we are in a purification mode or just suffering because of ignorance?

Suffering is always ignorance. There’s no other way. Suffering cannot be of something else. When you are fully aware, you won’t suffer. Ramana Maharishi had cancer. When somebody asked him if he has pain, he said, “I have pain, but I have no suffering.” Understand that suffering is a choice. Suffering is usually due to resistance. When total acceptance happens, there is no way you will be suffering. In total acceptance mode, there is zero suffering.  Whenever there is resistance, we tend to suffer.

Purification is very simple. It’s an every-moment thing. You can always be on purification mode. How? Make sure all your thoughts, words, and actions are selfless. You have no enemies. You have no anger, hatred, jealousy, revenge, etc., and you have no negative feelings about anybody on Earth. Everybody has done their part in your life. Some have given you good experiences. Some have given you bad experiences. They’re all experiences at the end of the day. You have lost nothing. Because you have abundance of experiences, you should be rich. The richness that you have, the scars on your face, should talk about your survival, not your pains and sufferings. It should be a life of strength, power and abundance. Abundance happens only through acceptance.

Generally, we resist so many things. We don’t even enter an experience because we are afraid. Then, that part is completely removed from life. Instead, we should focus on what is. This is what has been given to you; this is the time, this is the place, this is the situation, these are the people, these are the experiences. Use that hundred percent and enjoy that experience. Whatever the result is, it doesn’t matter. When you are in pain, go into the depth of the pain and come out victorious. When you have happiness, dive into the depth of happiness and come out victorious. When you have suffering, go deep into suffering and come out of it. Happiness or sorrow, you should dive deep into everything and come out of it. You will see that you are fully yourself. It will be a life well lived.

Whatever happens in life, always surrender at the feet of your Master if you have a Master (Guru), or at the feet of the Lord, if you have a Lord that you worship. Whatever religion you are, whatever method you follow, it doesn’t matter. If you do not believe in God, keep surrendering at the feet of the existence because, existence has provided all these. Whether your connection is with a Guru, a teacher, or a God that you imagine, or the supreme consciousness, pure brightness, whatever it is, keep surrendering everything and say, “Thank you, I’m feeling grateful.” Live every moment with gratefulness. Then you are rich. A life well lived.

Transcribed by Rakshitha Ananth

Proofread by Shyama Jeyaseelantttt