Practical Steps for Challenging Times – part 2

Satsang with Mohanji  
16th August 2020

Question: We have multiple tasks being done at the same time; managing the home, children, etc and there is no time for spiritual practice. This is causing irritation. I would like to understand how I can make it more efficient.

Mohanji: We have a feeling that we have many tasks. We do have various responsibilities; home, office and a variety of responsibilities. Why don’t you take these as Sadhana or practice? It is possible. Do everything as an offering. Your work itself is worship! Everything can be worship. Breath is worship, thoughts are worship, actions are worship; everything can be an offering. Imagine like that – then it is perpetual meditation; all the time you are meditating. Don’t try to compartmentalise your life. It is one life, in which you are playing various roles; you are playing the role of a wife or a mother or a child or a father or uncle or any other role. You are playing these roles every day and it is part of your responsibility. YOU MUST! But there is a YOU in the middle. There is YOU who is playing these roles; connect to that you, who is no role, but the actor. Not the role you play, but the actor. Connect to this actor, the real you and meditate on that actor. Not the role; roles will change, even in a day it changes many times; let it change, play all the roles. But at the same time, connect to yourself, the actor. And you feel how it is. You will start feeling very peaceful and meditative.  The actor is not changing, roles are changing. You are everything. But you are NOT anything. You will understand that experientially. You will understand and experience that.

That will make a difference in your life.

Question: What is the significance of special occasions, like certain times for deities?

Mohanji: Every time has its significance, just like day or night. Similarly, there is significance to seasons, certain planetary configurations which shift the energy frequency, and we perform certain rituals at that time, all of them have significance. Each of these, as you connect to it, is transformative, even if temporarily. When you participate in a festival, you feel excited. You forget your sorrows, wear new clothes, eat good food, and you feel great! The purpose is to rejuvenate you, to press the restart button! So what happens is you look forward to these holidays, those experiences. Whether it is spiritually significant or not, what happens inside is the real story. Are you happy? If you are happy, it is worth it! What is life for? Happiness. We want to experience what is happiness on earth. We want to experience ecstasy, bliss, love, great things in life which makes us feel good. All these festivals that society has created are for that purpose. If you really understand that you will start appreciating all these things.

If you look at festivals connected to Lord Krishna, all joy and dance and singing, etc. Why is it so? Because life should be a celebration ! Life means celebration. Janmashtami happened a few days back. Everybody celebrated the birth of Lord Krishna. Krishna was born about 5000 years ago. But we celebrated as if He was born now!  What happened in the minds of people?

A rebirth happened! Reborn, Rejuvenated, in a way, Reinvented!

This is the beauty of festivals. We must celebrate, Datta Jayanthi , Sai Baba’s Samadhi day, and so on. We celebrate everything and it is worth it. We sing, we chant, we connect, we rejuvenate and then we reinvent and we restart ourselves.

Question: A person who has always helped others, and never harm others still suffers greatly. How can this happen, is it karma?

 Mohanji: Life is a flow. We must flow with life. Two things life is a flow through bodies life flows. That means through rebirths life flows. So, we do not understand the flow completely. What has happened in the past lives? What did we do in the past lives, what is happening in this life, is a reflection of what happened, or what we did in our past lives. And so, we only experience this life right now. You will not understand the cause. That is why this question, why is something like this happening?

In fact, imagine somebody did all sorts of atrocities in another life; anger, hatred, jealousy, revenge, betrayal. He did everything possible in that lifetime. Then he produced a new lifetime based on the karmic wealth, he accumulated in that lifetime.

He took another birth. So he came in this life but he can’t remember what happened in the previous births, which caused this life.

Probably in his previous life, at the end of his life, he regretted doing all those things. He died with regret and he took a wow, “ I will never do these bad things anymore.” And he took a new life, a good life. This life is good, doing all the good things, but the karmic bank balance keeps following him.

In a Mirabai bhajan it says, if you betray a master, a spiritual master, it takes you about 80,000 lifetimes to come back to where you have been before. That means betrayal, criticizing, scandalizing, gossiping all these have a price to pay. Don’t think that,” Oh I can gossip about somebody and it doesn’t matter”. It matters.

Appreciation and honoring, expressing gratitude – these are good, because then you have reward. But if you gossip, talk bad, character assassinate, betray, all these things have huge price; you may end up paying that over lifetimes, many lives.  Because it’s as if you took a huge bank loan, gambled and lost everything. So you end up paying your entire life. It’s almost like that but in the case of betrayals and character assassination, and such issues, the price goes through many, many lifetimes. I always tell people do not engage in any gossip. If you don’t know, just forget it. Don’t talk bad about anybody; even if somebody has done something bad to you, leave that person to his karma; karma will take care of it. Don’t worry. You should not keep thinking about it and creating your own future.

There are people who will come to you as problems, because you might have been a problem for them in another life. As I said, life is a flow, it is a continuous flow. Bodies are temporary and to each body. They have experienced something, then this body is gone, another body, they experience many different things. This goes away, then,  another body; like this, we have taken many bodies.

We will take more if you don’t dissolve into the Supreme Consciousness in this life, we will take further bodies.

This is why you need a very powerful master to connect to, where you dissolve into him, and you don’t have to take any more bodies, unless you want to.

That’s the difference, birth by choice. Birth for the sake of Dharma is different from birth for the sake of karma. They are  two different things. So we may not understand why we are experiencing certain things but we can assume that if we are experiencing bad things in this life, we might have committed something bad in another life. So it’s come back to us. This life, if you’re done good things, the merits of it will go to another life. Probably you’ll be born in such a family in the next life where you get only the merits of it. This happens. So, what you do today will have its payment later. Means you do your work now and you get paid later. Like that whatever you are doing now, you will have the results later.

But please remember, there is no escape from karma.

If you have done something, if you’re committed something you must pay for it, especially death, destruction, betrayal, character assassination, gossip, the negative aspects. Also, please remember we watch these programs in the television and movies and different forms of entertainment; the soap operas where it’s about bad relationships, criticism, judgment, betrayal, and such in the stories and we occupy ourselves with these; we imbibe those emotions within; we can probably have a similar future, or   a similar experience in the future. This is possible. So please be aware! That this is why all the great Masters insisted on satsang – good company, good company.

satsangatve  nisangatva

nissangtve nirmohatva

nirmohatve nischallatatva

nischalatatve jivanmukti

That is exactly what great masters have said. That means with good company you learn to detach from the wears and tears of life, from the fluctuations of life. When you are in a kind of detached state your desires are reduce, desires becomes fewer. When desires become lesser, mind becomes still. What is causing the mind to be restless? Numerous desires.

That is why I always say let’s get it fulfilled, let’s do it and finish it off,  so that the mind is still.  The mind must be still. When the mind is consistently still, liberation happens to you. Moksha happens; mukti happens. We must understand that we are the source of our own destiny. We are creating it every moment; every day; every moment, whatever we are doing there is a reason, result.

So there’s a past for everything; there’s a present for everything and there’s a future for everything. You should understand this. And when you’re very involved and have a clutter of thoughts; you can’t see the truth. And we start looking at the world through our ears; through other people’s words. That’s the worst thing. We should not see through our ears. Ears are to hear but then other people’s opinion, should not be our spectacles to see the world; which means, we should look at the world ourselves as we are and experience it; and detach from criticizing, blaming, and talking bad about anything, including yourself. Do not criticize others; do not criticize yourself. Do not judge others; do not judge yourself. Like that if you respect everything, life will be better, for sure.

Question: This question came in relating to acceptance. Yeah. So how can we accept, even the bad aspects of ourselves? Why is self-acceptance so difficult?

Mohanji: Why is self-acceptance so difficult? It’s because we always worry about the bad aspects in ours ourselves. We all have it, 7.5 billion people, have good and bad in them; positive and negative in them. Don’t think that you are the only one who has all the negatives in you; it’s not true. All people have it, so we must understand that this is how creation works.  In every human being, there is positive and negative; and we must really understand that we have to focus, on only positive and ignore the negative. We have to ignore the negative. We have to focus on the positive, and that’s the way we can accept ourselves better. Let the negative be there with us, and don’t look at anybody in the world as only positive; it’s not possible. It is just not possible. There will be some negative in everybody, and don’t focus on the negative; because then we are missing the whole thing.  Focus on the positive; let’s strengthen the positive; we unite together; work together; be together like one family, and then it will be glory for everybody. We have that power!

Question:   Is there a way to dissolve past karma, and also what’s the consequences of any parent’s actions on the child destiny?

Mohanji: Past karma – We’ve taken this life to exhaust past karma; it means pending desires and our, our driving force, or our inclinations are our vasanas. Vasanas are our driving force, tendencies, and inclinations. And we are going ahead with experiencing our pending desires at each point in time in life, right from childhood till death. This is what we are doing. Part of it is lineage karma, that’s coming from the lineage, from our father and mothers’ side, coming together; that merges with us.  Each individual has personal karma, pending desires of personal nature, and also pending desires of the lineage nature; they are coming together. They come together, and we are experiencing that in life.

So, how do you exhaust them? Automatically, without your knowledge you’re exhausting it. Whatever you’re experiencing each day that’s exhaustion; every experience amounts to that karma. If you block it, it stays postponed. If you experience it and move on, then it’s done. So the best way to come out of all these karmas are, by being good and doing good; so that when you express your best in everything, whatever you can, as per your capacity ; and be kind; be compassionate; be generous, and then this karma gets dissipated. So the more good things you do; by good things I mean because of your existence, you help all the beings of the nature; then automatically your karmic configuration starts changing; and improvement happens, and you reach a level where there is no ownership of action.

When you have ownership of action, you have karma. If you, if you surrender everything to the Almighty, then there is no karmic binding. When you get up in the morning itself have the right attitude towards life; surrender attitude and connect to one master; seriously and consistently, whatever happens let it not change. Again as I said before, the Master and the man should be different, considered different; a person has his needs and requirements, but a Master is the settled aspect of that person; so connect to the Master aspect. You don’t have to connect to the person, so that you can avoid an illusion. That is why I said so. So, connect to the Master in that way, as settled consciousness; after you have sufficient proof for yourself for that sake. Don’t just look at the picture or somebody words and follow somebody; it won’t work, because if you look at just the picture and the words of opinions of somebody it may not be suitable to you, but you need to know whether this person is stable within. If it is not, don’t follow.

Once you start following; don’t leave. This is your integrity. This is how it should be. Then somebody else says at some point in time;” Oh! He’s not good or this is that. Don’t change your mind!” Your experience is true to you; your experience is most important for you and you follow that whatever happens in the world; then you will have progress. So this is an individualistic journey; it’s an individual journey. You are the traveler; you are the journey; you are the destination. You are the experience of the journey; everything is you.

So if you understand that clearly, you will not have lot of distractions, or distortions. This is the truth.

Question: How can we be liberated in this life, is it possible, with nothing pending that needs to be taken forward?

Liberation is possible right now, right here! How it is possible? It is possible firstly, by keeping that as your priority. Your top priority should be liberation. And then second is increase your awareness; increasing awareness is very simple. It means just be aware of your thoughts, words, actions; be aware and slowly start detaching from them, by just being aware. I am not the thought; thoughts are happening through me. I am not the doer; actions are happening correspondingly through me, so there’s no ownership. I’m not the action; actions are also happening through me. I’m not the doer, but it doesn’t mean that you go and kill somebody and say, “I didn’t kill, it happened through me.” Not like that. You should be responsible as well. You have to have responsibility. So, everything you do, you’re responsible; so only good actions, good thoughts, good words, and then no, no negative feelings or expressions or any of those kind of things. And then you have clarity that everything that is born will die. Everything has a duration. Whatever is born, will die. And all things are interconnected, you cannot exist alone. Everything is connected in the world; the plants, the trees, the birds, the animals, human beings; we are all interconnected; we all have something to give and take; so that kind of a total acceptance is essential. And liberation is a state which you experience right now, where you do not have binding on something, or something does not bind you. We do not have binding out of place, a person or situation or emotion or experience. We are not bound by anything. Our desire level is very low, very less.

Once you understand that and accept that and when you are in that kind of a mode; automatically you will start feeling detachment from the world outside. That doesn’t mean that you hate anything; there’s no hatred here, it’s just that, you don’t want it. You don’t want it; which means you have no need for it. When you have no need for something; you are free from it. When you have such freedom, you are liberated while living; and that means you’re not collecting more and more desires anymore. So, what happens? No desires, no reincarnations! Simple, so liberation is possible, just by investing in awareness. Investing in awareness – that is the secret. Invest in your awareness; be aware of who you are, what you are, where you are, why you are; of all those be aware.  Also understand all the things around you during waking state do not exist when you’re sleeping or it doesn’t exist for you when you’re sleeping. When you wake up, they are there. So, what is there? That your experience is connected to you! You can have experience or no experience based on your moods, your situations,  your emotion at that time. Everything is like that. So, this is very simple, it’s easy to understand. When you really know that you are everything; and you don’t need much, then you are liberated. So liberation is a state of mind; it’s an attitude, which you can easily cultivate, just by awareness. Awareness is the fire.

Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt and Padmini Ravi Kumar
Proofread by Vidya Rajagopalan

The soul after death

Question: To a certain percent, the Earth is feeling so congested these days. Why is that so?

Mohanji: Well, actually, at the gross level, we have almost 7 billion people in the world. Naturally, we have overgrown, we are occupying a lot of space, and there are various levels of sensitiveness, various levels of consciousness, various levels of conditioning. So, each person, when he or she expresses their constitution to the world, the world is becoming more and more polluted.

The thought is the first level of creation, the word is the second and action is the third. Before the thought, there is an inclination, a vasana. A person who’s performing cruelty on somebody has that inclination to perform; sadistic people, people who perform cruelty, people who cannot express kindness. Or the other side also, those who are compassionate by nature, they are expressing kindness all the time. So, different varieties – various combinations are walking the Earth at any point in time. Now, this is the gross aspect.

PC: Google Images

Now, look at the subtle aspect; the subtle aspect is that which the eyes cannot see. That’s something which we cannot ‘see’ with the senses, (means eyes basically), or we cannot feel, or sometimes we can feel when we are in a subtle state, we can feel that there are various entities around us. Of course psychic people, the subtle people you’re talking about, they feel there are a lot more people than we see. So, if you categorize them, there are two major types of souls when they leave the body, they are not leaving the Earth.

One is the confused souls who are Earthbound completely while living. They are only focused on material aspects; they had no inclination for anything higher. I am not talking about people going to the temple and coming back or church and coming back. They just do it ritualistically, that cannot deliver elevation. Any ritualistic activity is just like eating food. You go to the temple by default, or because it’s a practice; it’s a habit. That’s not useful enough. So, a person who has not tried to taste or to connect to the higher always feel earthbound; always will be Earthbound. This is also why, in the past, most of the names of the children were of Gods, Goddesses because you learn to chant the name; you’re calling them – Krishna, Rama. Automatically, you chant the name. Thus it automatically connects to a higher entity.

And there are various stories also accordingly. One man, he did all sorts of atrocities, and he was not at all good, but he gave his son the name Narayana. And at the time of his death, he saw the God of death coming towards him (and he became very frightened) with his team, coming to take his soul away. (This is a story) He was frightened. But even at that time, his mind is working differently. He wanted to know if Narayana would be afraid. He knew his son was subtle, he could see. So, he called, “Narayana, Narayana”, loudly. So, when his son came running, because the name he chanted was of the Lord, this God of Death went away and he survived. That was transformative for him.

PC: Google images

So, what is said is that at the time of death, what you are connected to, there you will go. It’s important that while living we have to stay liberated. And we have to connect to the higher so that while leaving, while exiting the body, automatically you merge with the higher. By a confused soul, (the soul can never be confused) I’m talking only about the garb, the coat the soul wears, which is of conditioning. A person who’s only operating in the material plane is greedy, trying to accumulate, trying to gather more and more, and do not know why, but they feel that these material things will give them pleasure, but eventually what they do is they become watchmen of their own material, their wealth. They fail to enjoy. They are more concerned about hoarding, rather than enjoying.

So, the sukha prapti, the achievement of happiness doesn’t happen. Accumulation happens. But it doesn’t get converted into actual pleasure. Such people, when they leave, they do not want to go. They are afraid that their wealth is here; the things are here. This we call the confused souls. As I said again, souls are not confused, souls are always pure, but what they are covering themselves with, this is the confusion, so these set of souls roam around. They do not leave. That is why we have the rituals related to the soul’s elevation after death. We perform the rituals saying, “Everything is okay. Now you can go. You had your life; you enjoyed the Earth, you expressed yourself. Now you may go.” And that is why if you cry too much over a dead person that soul also feels it.

See, what happens at the time of death, except the physical, everything is intact, right? The more you cry and the more you try to bring them back, it suffocates them. It pulls them down. This is one set of souls; the confused kind of souls. They are not bad. I mean none of them are bad, they’re just like us; good and bad – all mixture, but they cannot leave the Earth because they do not know what to do when they leave. But some of them go into the white light and they go to the astral plane. But some of them cannot leave and they stay on. So this is one set of entities that live with us.

PC: Google Images – Victimised Souls

The second set of entities are the victimized souls; again, as I said, souls are not victimized, the garb, they wear is. What are the victimized souls? Those who are tortured and killed, those who are held captive or those who are imprisoned; those who feel helpless at the time of death or murdered or suicide; because normally when the soul exits the body at the time of death, in 80 out of 100 times, you can see people opening their mouth. So, the mouth is the opening through which the soul goes. That is a 100% sure sign that they will take another birth.

PC: Google images

The soul enters the body through the top of the head. That is why in small children you can see this part is very, very soft. And also, in great saints, you can see this part is very soft. That is because the soul entered through it. And as a saint, he’ll be breathing through that always. So, this is open. Otherwise, we have the Nava Dwars, the nine openings in our body – eyes, nose, mouth, ears, and the genitals. So, usually what happens in a normal, natural death is (that) the soul exits through the mouth. But in the case of a saint, that is what the whole spirituality is about; through which opening you came, the same opening you will exit. That means you have achieved salvation, you achieved Moksha.

PC: Google images:

In the case of people bound, tortured and killed during Auschwitz, or Pol Pot’s regime, (Hitler’s Nazis are supposed to have killed 6 million. Pol Pot is supposed to have killed 2 million. I don’t know how many other people killed, so many millions…) so, when these souls are leaving, as a victim, tortured, bound, helpless; they just get out of the body and they don’t know what to do. They have been living in a tortured existence, and they are leaving (in a kind of) flushed out from the body. When such a thing happens, usually what happens is that the soul doesn’t know what to do. It is just out of the body, but it is completely confused. But the other confusion is different, what I told earlier. This is more of a helpless kind of confusion because the soul doesn’t know what to do and it is kind of in a state of hanging. They enter into other bodies where possible. So this is one set, this is also applicable to animals.

This is not only human beings. For example, a cow in the developed country, a cow or a calf, as soon as it can produce children, it is artificially inseminated. It is raped in a way. And nine months it takes for the child to grow in the womb. As soon as the child is born, the mother doesn’t even see the child, because, in the womb, the mother develops a bonding with the child. It’s my child. It’s growing, and there’s a lot of feeling inside. But as soon as the child is born, the child is taken away by the farm owners or the people who run the farm. And the mother is in agony. It wants to touch and feel the child; the child wants to drink mother’s milk. Nothing is allowed. And if it is a girl child, if the calf is a female, it is kept to breed further. But if it’s a male calf, it is slaughtered for veal, v-e-a-l. Just imagine the agony of the mother. Then they are attached with this equipment to take the milk out. The milk that it is producing for its child is completely drained by commerce, profits. And then what happens, the cow is injected with something so that the milk doesn’t stop. So, it’s drained off. And as soon as the milk stops, the cow is impregnated again for the next child. The same thing is repeated. Just imagine, a cow going through this process, the whole life. And finally, when it cannot produce any more children, it’s slaughtered. What happens to such a soul? The soul is operating in a body which is suffering all the time; full 24 hours, 365 days, the whole life.

Then what happens, the soul exits. When a murder happens, the soul usually gets out of the body in a hurry. And it is normally through the lower region. Now the cows are killed with the throat slit etc., murdered. So, the soul is exiting through the lower parts, and then what happens, it’s confused. It enters into another body, not a womb to be another child but usually another body. Any murder or suicide is the same. It enters into another body and it again goes through the same suffering. It’s a repeated process. Some people have asked me, some people who are psychic in nature, they have asked me – when an animal is slaughtered, you can see a few souls leaving the body. How can a few souls exist in one animal?

The answer is the same. They just enter into another body because they don’t know what else to do. They do not know what the process of recycling is. You know, go to the astral plane and come back and take another body that they don’t know because their whole life they have been tortured, and then they are assassinated. And also beaten; all the things you can imagine, while they are standing. The pen or the cowshed will be sufficient just to stand. They can’t even move; the whole life. These are the kind of victimized souls, they cannot leave.

Thus, if you look at the whole structure of the Earth, the people, the animals and birds and the souls which are not able to leave this plane, when all put together, this area is congested. And they also have a vibratory level, except the body, they have everything. What happens is their vibration also affects the individuals. Sometimes you become restless because all around us there is restlessness from various bodies, from various beings. It affects people. And when saints or higher entities come, they redeem many of them. That is why they wait for redemption.

 Each body is just like a 10-bedroom house. If the soul is not sufficiently strong to occupy the whole body, the whole house, other entities can enter and stay. But again, they are not harmful. They’re existing because they are helpless. They do not know how to go because, in their lifetime, they only caught hold of their inherent fears and phobias and characteristics. They are not able to leave when they leave the body. Like a person who’s jealous by nature and jealousy is the main expression; that person will definitely enter into a body and stay jealous. The soul will enter into a body and stay jealous because it doesn’t know how to come out of that state.

This is why it is important to be spiritual. Not ritualistic. Connect to the higher, feel the higher. Breathe through the spine and feel the top of the head. That is why most of the Kriyas, most of the spiritual practices that people do are for higher elevation. Use this life, so that you elevate to the highest so that when you leave, you leave in perfect order. Learning to die is very important. You know, just like learning to live. That is why many of the subtle people feel that the Earth is too congested. Only subtle people will feel it. The gross will not feel anything, isn’t it? Being subtle is important and doing something about it is even more important.

 

Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt

Proofread by Rekha Murali & Biljana Vozarevic

 

Q & A on Suicide

An excerpt from Kriya Intensive retreat in Bosnia, May 2019

Q: Both of my husband’s parents committed suicide, not at the same time. Is their karma inherited by my children or by my husband? Does that affect their or my karma?

Mohanji: The karma that pushes you in that kind of density or pushes the family is usually lineage related. It’s not individual. The individual is part of it, but lineage brings that weight on people. Some of the things which create heaviness in life are unnatural deaths, wars, displacements, betrayals, etc. If you take Balkan, it has faced WWI, WWII, Balkan war. There are a lot of wars which have affected a lot of families in this region.

I’d like you to understand there could be many reasons for suicide, but what happens to the soul after suicide? This is important for you to be aware of. Understand this clearly. Imagine a person has a life span of 70 or 80 years. And this person decides to end his life at the age of 60. First of all, there are 20 years of potential life pending. So everything minus the body remains for the next 20 years; everything – all other sheaths, all other attachments, except the physical body. You cannot do what you can do with your body.

What is the emotion then? Helplessness. Deep helplessness. Then what they do? They have all other emotions, all other feelings except the body; deep helplessness happens. Then they start bothering other beings; because of their helplessness – they have everything except the body. They want to do something, but they can’t. But they have to be here around this place. Any kind of unnatural death causes this. This is one part of the story.

Now imagine this soul is wandering around, it doesn’t know what to do. ‘Soul’ means all other things connected to it such as all the koshas (manomaya kosha, vijnanamaya kosha, annandamaya kosha) which have pending desires, but it can’t fulfil them because it doesn’t have the body. You are carrying all these as a burden but at the same time, there is no fulfilment for 20 years. I am giving you an example. So that is 20 years of wandering. And there are a lot of beings of various nature in this world such as viruses, bacteria, which we know through our microscopes. Like that, there are many beings in various levels of subtlety, existing in this plane, which we can’t see. Animals can see some, humans can’t see any. And these guys can sometimes be bound by some beings who have this habit of capturing and using these wandering souls.

First, there is no faith, there is no connection to a Master. There is no connection to God. That is why they are wandering. They are totally helpless, totally vulnerable. So, they are trying to reach various masters in a physical and a non-physical form, asking for help. That’s a different side. But imagine, they are not connected to anything. Some of these guys are caught by the beings who bind them and use them. Just like we have domestic animals, etc.; we bind them, we control them, of course, we feed them, but they are under our control. Similarly, some of these guys are caught and used. Then there is no guarantee when they can come out of it. Forget about 20 years; because they have no release. Until they get released, they are bound. Then you don’t know when they can actually get liberated. It takes ages.

Devi: Nice subject.

Mohanji: I want you to know this because people do not know the subtleties of suicide. Why I am explaining this is because in case people have depression, you must make them understand the seriousness of it.

Q: What happens to the souls of people who did not end their life on their own will but their life ended because of certain circumstances? 

Mohanji: I will come to that. Let me complete this. Otherwise, I’ll lose the thread.

So these people can be used by others. There is a possibility. Now, human beings, some people follow certain practices, like black practices. What are black practices? Those which are based on control and conquest, not connected to liberation. We do not use this kind of things. Why? Because we aim to attain the highest possibility in a lifetime.

What is the highest possibility? Complete dissolution. Total dissolution. Not even enlightenment. Beyond enlightenment, to become the ocean. That’s our aim.

However, the aim of many practices is not dissolution. The aim is earthly i.e. terrestrial powers. Some people are practising this and I always tell my people, “Never go that way.” Even if you get some powers, it’s eternal binding. You have no idea when you can get out, so don’t look there, don’t go there. Your practices should liberate you. Become one with Shiva, one with Supreme Consciousness. It’s important. Even if you are facing hardships, if somebody tells you, “I’ll sort it out for you fast,” leave it. It’s not worth it. But some of these people use these wandering souls for their purpose. They bind them using certain mantras and certain rituals. You must be very clear about the dark path and the white path. The dark path is for powers of earthly nature – miracles and powers. Not all the miracles. Masters perform miracles too, but that’s different. But these are for powers and they use certain practices, certain rituals for creating that effect. Without those practices and rituals, they have no effect in this world. In the dark path, you are creating an effect using mantras, rituals, using and controlling certain things. On the other hand, in the white path, it’s unbound. You attain the energy and power and it’s forever. Through your alignment of body, mind, intellect, ego, and spirit together, you become one unit, you become fully powerful within and that is what you are expressing in the bright path.

These are two opposite paths. I hope I am making it very clear. I want you to know because many people do not know this. And I have always seen that those who practise these things talk about the white path as unreal, bad. They always do that because it is important for their survival. They should say the other path is bad. So you get disillusioned. Their job is to disillusion you, to confuse you.

Many people don’t know the differences and get trapped. They get fascinated by some kind of power, but they have no idea where the power has come from. They get trapped and then it is very difficult to come out because they hook you.

There are even some methods of healing connected to the dark path. People don’t know this. The moment you get involved in it, they will immediately give you a result. You’ll be very happy. After that, you are stuck forever. Then when will you get out, nobody knows. This happens on Earth. There are so many beings operating this way. I would like you to know. I am not trying to scare you here. I want you to be very clear about the white path and the dark path. The white is only about liberation. It doesn’t have any fancy but it is about total dissolution. Our path is about total dissolution. It means you become brightness where you don’t have existence otherwise. You are fully bright. You are fully light. Nothing else matters. No powers, nothing matters here.

The souls we are talking about here either wander, they don’t know what to do, or some non-physical beings try to control them just like some of the predators who snatch some deer or some other beings in the forest. They are snatched away just like that because they are helpless. Or people who are practising certain things, try to control them and use them as slaves. And they cannot come out of it easily. It’s very difficult to come out of it because they bind them. These people bind even physical people – people with bodies. They are using these people for their purpose. They also do that. This also happens in life.

What is the clear sign of the path of darkness in one word?

FEAR. They use fear a lot. We do not use fear at all. We do not have God-fear, we only have God-loving. There is no usage of fear here. What do you fear? We have no value for fear. Fear means unknown, ignorance. Fear is ignorance. They use fear a lot so that through fear they control people, control minds.

Minds can be easily controlled with fear. These practices are of the dark side. Dark practices, practices of control. It is not only in India. I met one guy in South Africa, he was telling me there are practices like this. These guys practice in the burial grounds, and when they bury the dead body, they try to capture the souls and use them. Instead of liberating the souls, they bind them.

There are some practices in South America. They may look like shamanic practices that look positive, but please remember it is very hard to differentiate between the positive and negative. If at all, fears are being sold. If they are using fear to control, run away. You do not need them. There should be no fear – you should be fearless. You should be powerful. This you should remember always. And only you can save yourself in this context.

If you are deeply connected to a Master or God, very deeply, means unshakeably, then nobody can touch you. Then you are completely safe, but we do not do that. What these people try to do is, they put a doubt in your mind. Correct? Once they put a doubt in your mind, then you are always thinking “Is this real?” That is enough. That doubt is enough. That opening is enough for them to enter and work on you. When you lose trust, the faith, connection; that is the way they operate. But if you are deeply connected to a Master of the white tradition, automatically you will know – when there comes fear you will know – these are the things that are not good for me.

I will give you one example, normally I do not tell what I do but this actually happened in Serbia a few years ago. I was conducting a program and one of the people who attended the program said there is a person who is a teacher in Serbia, but he is completely controlled by these beings. Sometimes it happens, when you try to control these beings for a long period of time, if you do the wrong things, they start controlling you. So this guy was stuck, and he was talking very bad things about me at that time. He said Mohanji is a devil, Mohanji is all this… So that was going on. And then he got stuck. And he told this person, his disciple, “Only Mohanji can help me. So please get me an appointment.” I said I do not have time because I was there actually only for a week. And I said I cannot leave because all these people are here. I have to take care of them, I do not have time for anybody else. Then this person told me, please, if I had some minutes because he desperately needs it. He wanted to apologize for what he told about me. He doesn’t even know me, but he was talking extremely bad things about me. That was due to his own insecurity. Then I said, “Ok, in that case, you come at lunchtime.” I was having lunch and I saw him with a lot of people surrounding him, means pulling him back. He did not want to come in. He was stuck. Then he bowed down from a distance. I said I will come and I went to him. I said, “You come to my room. If you dare to enter my room, I will save you.” I knew he could not come. Because they didn’t allow him to come. I went to my room, I sat and said nobody should come into my room, and then this guy came. He reached the door and he was holding onto the door, he was struggling to come in. But he could not enter. I said, “Come in.” And he could not enter. They did not want him to come. I said, “If you dare to come, I will save you.” And then he jumped, he fell inside, and he sat down, but he was sitting like this (Mohanji showed how he was sitting). He said “Mohanji, you are so powerful. I cannot handle your energy.” I said “Keep quiet, just sit there. Do not do anything.” He sat there, and then everything vanished. After that, he attended a couple of our programs, and he wrote things about me, he apologized in public, in writing saying “I made a mistake, and he is the real one.” This is what I am saying, and why I say this is just for awareness. But a level of helplessness happens when you practice these things. After a while you do not have a grip, you cannot control it, and then the whole thing goes bad. This is why I said – never leave the white path, the Path of Liberation, because all these things are not worth it. Immediately you may get some advantage, but you will pay through your life, lifetimes.

 

Why I am explaining this? Why is this explained in so many details?

Because there are so many disillusioned people. They think of the dark as the white. It is easy because they also use eyes. Why we use the eyes as the symbol is because the eyes are the gateway to consciousness. It is the signature of the stature.

We use eyes as a signature of the stature. If you connect to the eyes, you know who this person is, and which level he is operating from. That is why we use eyes. They use eyes for attracting something else. This is the difference.

We must be very clear that in our path – I think Avadhoota Nadananda has written about using eyes in the tradition – what they signify. Somebody like that lady from Washington DC, she said she wants to see my eyes before she invites me for a program, and she saw my eyes and said you are welcome. Those who have eyes to see the truth they will understand the person through the eyes. So, they are the signature of the stature. And what is the use of these eyes? They connect you to the right path. So you can understand you arrived home. That understanding happens. Today we are in the gadget world, we only see gadgets, we do not see eyes. So, what will happen, you miss a certain reality. You miss a certain truth.

All that glitters is not gold. Always remember the white tradition, the white path, you can easily use the benchmark of the inner silence. Fewer thoughts, inner silence, stability, and Tradition only talks about helping the helpless as a practice, proper practice. The rest is turning the mind, intellect and ego inwards. This is what they talk about. Turn the mind, intellect and ego inwards and do something good for the world. Have a higher purpose. That will liberate you. That will take you all the way forward. Of course, Kriya and those kinds of things help, but when you go for powers and instant something, you may enter into something which is not so good. Then they may not be able to help you later.

I was talking about the souls who are exiting the body with violence, like suicide. I spoke about all the scenarios possible. I told about two or three scenarios, like wandering until the end of their actual life. Another is death. Beings who are invisible can hold them, capture them. Then these beings who practice certain things can hold them, capture them, use them. So, you are very vulnerable in that mode. This should be made understandable to all the people who have these tendencies, self-destructive tendencies. It is important.

Imagine nothing of this happens and they are just sitting. They still have desires, right? They still have everything except a body. So they get connected to people who have similar desires. They get connected to the people with a body who have similar desires. Sometimes, they enter them and use them. They have emotions, they have desires. When they cannot express those emotions and desires, they try to connect to those bodies who have similar emotions and desires.

One Master was standing and looking at a tree, another came and asked him, “What are you looking at?” He said, “Three people are sitting there on the tree. I am just watching what their plan is.” The guy said, “I cannot see them, there is nobody there.” “These three people do not have their bodies, you cannot see them, but they are sitting there, waiting for somebody.” Then they saw one man walking down the road, fully drunk, in a half-conscious state, walking. And that guy did not see these people. But they saw him. He walked and then he went around the corner and went. While walking, he was falling down and getting up, totally drunk. The Master said, “Okay, let`s go”. The guy asked what happened. He said, “Those three people joined him. Four people went together.” Then he asked, “Why did they go with him?” “He went into a brothel around the corner. All these three people also wanted to go to the same brothel but they did not have a body. They are using this body.” This is exactly how it works.

That is why if you have anger, the beings who accent anger enter and they accent your anger. If you have jealousy, same thing. What your basic things are, that will be accented by various beings surrounding you. So, you may have ten units but it becomes eighty when three or more people join. This happens. When somebody commits a crime and something happens, usually maybe it is not only that person. It is a collective thing making a scene. Why am I explaining this? Everything is not as it seems to be. It is not what is obvious. There are so many other factors connected to it. Therefore, you cannot blame anybody. Maybe there are so many beings working through him, because of his vulnerability. We must be very clear about this. That is why I said, we should be compassionate, bring people out of it. The moment their attitude changes, these guys leave. Only when jealousy sits, a being of jealousy will enter. Only when there are deep anger and frustration, such beings enter. The moment it changes, they leave because they have no room there. They’re not interested anymore.

So what should we do? We should elevate the awareness to the level where all these emotions drop off and you are clean and serene. All these beings leave you, they are not interested. Who is interested in the liberation that way?

All these things are created. It is important to understand before you marry depression. It is not worth it.

 

Accidental death

What happens to those beings who have an accidental death? Many times the accidental death, which is also untimely death, is caused by the karmic combination because that’s the way they exit. In karma, it might be equal to natural death. Because time ends there. Sometimes accidental deaths are not as bad as deciding to kill yourself. Not as bad, but again it is an unnatural death. Sometimes, in unnatural deaths, accidental deaths, the soul hangs on until there is time for the next life, next birth. And what causes accidental deaths? Usually the trapped fear. Trapped fear of an abrupt ending.

So, whenever we have emotions trapped, it’s an effect we do not know, we cannot predict. It is important that in this process what we have to do, we have to do, and also we have less emotional bindings. Emotions can become diseases, or even can become death. When there is a fear of theft in the house, there is usually a theft in the house. When you fear attacks from unknown people, it happens. In all these things, there is a trapped fear as a cause.

Likewise, sometimes we have visions and images of certain situations. Even as simple as going to a restaurant or something like that. Whenever there is a suppressed desire or denial, then they manifest even as a dream, and it can get fulfilled there if it cannot happen in real life. So it is not as we read. There are so many factors creating those effects in life. It can even happen in a dream state. In a dream sometimes, we fell down from something and we died. Then we wake up in the morning and we realize we are not dead. But we had that effect at least for some time. So those things are all stored emotions, what you have packed in your system.

The animal trainers will tell you, some dogs and some animals have perpetual fear because somebody was ill-treating them when they were babies. Then the whole life they carry that trauma of ill-treating. We also have that. It takes a lot of effort to burst that thing off, completely destroy it and be free. I try to hold hands of such people, I try to help them. And usually as a thumb rule, Mai-Tri healers can say better, for women, everything is connected to the uterus. For men, it is below the ribcage. This is a kind of a focal point. From there, everything goes into every dimension. All storage, attractions, connections. So, the healing for a woman’s body is uterus-related and for a man, below the ribcage. The difference is there. The trapped fears can affect anywhere. It can be all trapped fears in all the places. The root cause of many of these things is trapped fears. Trapped emotions.

Q: I work with a child who is very suicidal, how do I tell this to a child? 

Mohanji: When the child is very peaceful, you can tell like a story. “You know what happens when the soul leaves the body?” Like that, gently. Not like a detrimental thing. But it is good to give awareness. It is not like “You end this body, you do not end” story. This has to be told properly because it is important to guide. Very small things happen, an emotional thing and people hurt themselves. That is very, very bad. And you know sometimes, they provoke as well. “Why are you living? Why don’t you just come and commit a suicide?” It is like the fox who lost its tail, “It is very nice to have no tail,” and the fox convinces a few of other foxes to lose their tails.

These things happen with these disembodied spirits. They sometimes try to tell things. That is why you need to have FIRM faith. Let me tell you a remedy. FAITH. Connection with the Master. You will never deviate. But it should be unconditional faith, strong connection. People will try to put doubts in your mind. “Are you sure? Is this the right Master?” Things like that. Does not matter. You say, “Even if he is a donkey, I do not have a problem. My faith is firm.” The moment you have firm faith, you cannot be touched.

A lot of emotional decisions are connected to lack of faith. They do not trust themselves and they do not trust another. I always tell people; the first preference is to trust yourself as a complete incarnation. If this is not possible, trust a Master. Master will do the job. But it should be firm. 100% firm, unshakeable. Weak trust has no value. It’s almost like no trust. Conditional trust has no value. Today, I am happy, I trust, otherwise, I do not trust. That is of no value. It is actually a mind game. It does not work. But it should be firm; if it is firm, nothing will touch you.

These points which I said, I meant it. Because all of you should know the path. Whenever you follow a path, you should know the path and follow. Do not get fascinated. Do not get distracted. It is important because lifetimes can get wasted like this. Going in the wrong directions, detours. In chasing something which you do not know. Somebody can manipulate you, and those who manipulate will say others are manipulating. They will not say they are manipulating. It is always the case.

What is manipulation? Manipulation is telling an untruth for their benefit. You can easily understand manipulators. How? They will need something from you. They are using the technique for their advantage. This is a manipulator. If the path is liberation, the Master will need nothing from you. This is a benchmark you should remember. Master needs nothing from you. Their only way is to take you forward. That is the benchmark. If you can understand that, all you need is average intelligence to know. A manipulator will need lots of things from you. They will trap you so that they can always milk you.

The real, true Master of the path of liberation will need nothing from you. Their only aim is to take you forward. Thank you.

 

Look into the eyes of fear

Welcome, my friends, to Mohanji Speaks. I hope you have enjoyed the previous episodes.
Today, let’s talk about an overwhelming subject, fear. There are various dimensions of fear that we see in our lives and around us.

Have you ever thought about fears objectively? There are numerous types of fears. Some are very paralyzing fears; fear of height, fear of insects, fear of wild animals, and so on; the intensity of each varies. Let’s look at some of the worst fears of our life.

One of the most intense fears of everyone’s existence is death. The fear of death is very common. We will look into how we can counter the fear of death a little later. There are other fears, such as fear of people, fear of talking in public, fear of doing a task, fear of not receiving approval from people, fear of criticism and fear of judgment. We have various types of social fears: How will people look at us. What will they think about us?

I have seen some people who are afraid to say they’re following Mohanji or that they’re connected to me. I have no problem in connecting to anybody, and I have no problem in saying I’m with them because when you decide to do something in life, it is your prerogative. You have full freedom. You have free will. Then there is no way anyone can object. Nobody has the right to point a finger at you, because you chose an experience. Choose an experience. It’s our choice.

We also have the fear of failure and it is so crippling that we don’t even attempt certain things in life. This means we lose the chance for that experience.

We have the fear of losing friendships. So we bend backwards and forwards to accommodate people in our life. (It) means we become unnatural. Still, we accommodate; we try to accommodate people in our life. Sometimes it’s better than some friendships are lost because they are too heavy for us to handle. When I say lost, I do not mean that we convert them to enemies, but to understand that it’s alright to be away from these friendships. It is good to not have toxic friendships, crippling friendships, draining friendships!

We have fear of examinations. The real examination of life is life in itself, every moment; the decisions that we make every moment without knowing what the result will be. These are real examinations in life. We should not be afraid of life. We should embrace life. We should embrace life with Love. This will give us stability.

We are afraid of losing our comfort zones. This is another fear that we entertain. We have certain things which we have obtained in this life and we hate to lose it. We have fear and wonder what will happen if it goes away. But life is about changes. Everything changes. Life changes, situations change. Can we help it? I doubt it. We have to go with the flow. We have to be like water; flow.

Coming back to the first question about death, how do we overcome the fear of death? One word answer is awareness. Whatever is born, will die. Everything that’s born has to die. And at each point in time, we are made aware that everything is temporary. All situations, all emotions, all things around us are temporary. When we close our eyes at night, we don’t have a world around us. It’s gone. When we open our eyes in the morning, there exits the world around us in which we can move and experience things. But they are all temporary. This is a reminder that the world and life are temporary. Everything is temporary. It is a good way to know that we will die someday, and there’s nothing to be afraid of. Everything that is born will die.

If we increase our longevity, increase the lifespan… even if we extend our lifespan, if there is no contentment factor, is it worth it? A real-life, good life is when you are healthy; when you are experiencing life as a healthy person. When you’re unhealthy, when you need help from people, that’s not the right way to live. That’s not a healthy life.
We are afraid of losses; economic losses, monetary losses, loss of friendship, loss of near and dear ones, loss of relationships, various types of losses. Many of us are afraid of them. We are afraid of diseases. We fear them; we fear losing wealth. And we fear society in a certain context. How will society treat us if we don’t have this wealth?

Thus there’re so many dimensions of fear which we entertain each day. People give you fear, such as when relatives say, ‘’Hey, if you lose this job, you’ll have a problem, you won’t be respected in the society.’’ You then cling on to the job. We fear not getting tasks done, so we end up bribing, rather we enter into corruption. There are many things which are controlled by fear.

An important fear is the fear of God. God is Love. Why do we fear God? What’s there to be afraid of God? God means the substratum. Everything sits on Him. The whole universe has come out of this intelligent energy called God. We can give it a form; we can keep it formless. All the forms have come out of God, and all the forms will dissolve into God. And we call it God.

If you’d like to call it energy if you call it Consciousness, there is no problem. It’s all the same. But why do we fear? A particle of God is sitting inside us. We call it a soul. And this is a very important aspect of our existence. If it leaves the body, we call the body a dead body, useless piece of flesh and bones. God is to be loved, respected and appreciated.

Also, we should be grateful to God for creating the universe, the variety of all these experiences, the possibility of experiencing them, and to have a life. This life is given so that we could experience all this. Not that God chose to give life. God is not like a school teacher or a king, sitting high up somewhere, invisible, pointing a finger at things. It’s a substratum where we can create our life; we can create our existence.

That is why when Lord Dattatreya was asked by people who he was, He said, “I am just a worshipper of nature. I’m a connoisseur. I love nature, and my love for nature and wonder for all these creations is my inspiration.” How beautiful!

We also have fear for tomorrow. What will happen tomorrow? Tomorrow happens just like the previous times. Our tomorrow is made based on how we created our life, our patterns, our likes and dislikes, our orientation, and disposition. If you change your disposition, if you change your attitude, if you change your likes and dislikes, tomorrow will be different. So, who’s creating it? We are creating it. Who’s maintaining it? We are maintaining it when we maintain our likes and dislikes when we maintain our orientation, when we maintain our disposition, then the world is the same. But if we decide to change, then the world is different. The world is just a reflection, a projection, of what we are.

Where is the room for fear? In the path of liberation, there is no room for fear. The one thing we need, to overcome all the fears, is our ability to look into the eyes of fears and tell them, “I’m not afraid. Come on. Bring it on. No problem!” Secondly, we need awareness; awareness is key. When you have awareness, you have no fear. Faith is the third aspect. These are not in hierarchical order, not one above the other; all of them are important to control or to contain fear. To explain faith, the primary faith is faith in yourself, then faith in the Universe and also acceptance is another aspect. Acceptance is when you say, ‘’Okay, I have fear, but I’m not bound by fear.’’ Fear is sometimes acquired. People gave it to you. Understand and let it be, no problem. All these aspects can help you counter your fears.

Look at us now; take a look at society. Society sometimes sells fears. We have feature films, horror films. This is selling fear, and why do they do that? There is an element of entertainment and satisfaction in these fears. That aspect is sold. We can very well be away from it. It is our choice; to be afraid and be happy, or stay away from all this nonsense and be peaceful. This is our choice. I’m not against horror films, but I don’t watch them. I’m not interested.

Here is another aspect I would like to bring up; a young boy told Caesar (I think it was Octavius Caesar or maybe it was Augustus Caesar), ‘’My Lord, the people love you.’’ The king replied, ‘’No, they fear me. This is better.’’ Fear is used by political leaders, religious, spiritual leaders to control people. Fear is the weapon there. Fear is a very powerful weapon because it cripples you and that’s used to control people. It is a very negative way of handling situations. I always believe love is much more powerful and is much better in handling issues.

There is a disadvantage though in that if people cannot handle love, they can go against you. Some people prefer fear to love based on their orientation and disposition. This is utilized by political leaders, spiritual leaders and rulers to control people, which is a negative way of handling things. That’s not correct. But society uses fears; so does the government, to control people. Fear of retribution and fear of punishments are very crippling. People obey because of these fears. Fears have varied dimensions. Let us cultivate love. We don’t need fear. We should not fear, we should love. This life is a beautiful garden. We should swap all of our fears with Love. We can love God, we can love Gurus, we can love Masters, we can love friends, family, society, nature, and we can love everything. You can then get it back.

What you sow, you reap. So, you give love and you take love. Whenever somebody tries to control you with fear, go away from them, because you don’t need it. If somebody or something or a situation or infrastructure or machinery (such as the government), tries to control you with fear, try to step out of that and go away or through your love, transform them. Through love, you can transform others. Everything can be transformed with Love.

Today, we have extended the speech for some time. I spoke a little bit more because the subject is deep and very important. I would like to leave you with these thoughts. We can talk more about fears, later. But these thoughts should be pondered upon. I would like you to do something to get out of all your fears. You don’t need fears. You should be fearless. Then you are liberated. Freedom from fears is also liberation. And that leads to complete liberation. Love, that’s all you need.

Lots of love.

This is Mohanji.

Transcribed by Maja Otovich

Proofread by Vidya Rajagopalan

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ASK THE MASTERS

Shlloka: We are kick starting, Ask The Masters. It was a long time coming. And it is such a privilege to have all of you here. I am Shlloka, your host and with a lot of pleasure, I introduce my co-host, Dr. Nidhi Kumar.

Dr. Nidhi Kumar is the lead anchor for Doordarshan. She’s a rubicon of journalism, very iconic and she has been championing various social causes and spiritual emancipation at many levels. And this is one such initiative. I would also like to mention our co-host “Mystics of India”. Mystics of India is a platform which endorses spirituality. And it talks about the tales of mystics through their platform. Finally, I’d like to acknowledge our partners for this episode – Mohanji Foundation. It’s truly a blessing to have you associated with us through this medium and with our first episode. So thank you to all of you for joining…

Dr. Nidhi Kumar: Thank you, Shlloka. And before we introduce Mohanji, it’s time to greet all our viewers here. Namaste, Sairam and welcome, as we kick start the first episode of ‘Ask The Masters’ and go inwards.

By the way, a few questions. Did you know?

• 70% of the content online is pornographic
• India is the hub of student suicide in the world.
• You know what is trending on Google these days? How to cope with anxiety, depression and stress!

These rates are off the roofs. The initiative is to challenge the strength. We can do better and we will do better. The intention is to shift people from ill-being to well-being at the touch of a button. And hopefully, by the end of the series, you would have the solutions that you need to have, to have a happier, healthier life. I now request Shlloka to introduce Mohanji.

Shlloka: So who is Mohanji? This is my first time hosting any event, so I was reading a little bit about him on his website. The core of who he is, is that he is a renowned humanitarian who is focusing on positive human values that we can add in this world and without expectation, through our existence.

But what struck me the most was that Mohanji does not exist. This really caught me because the description that I read was him being an everyday man. So what is it about Mohanji that makes so many people gravitate towards him? It is the fact that he does not exist! And whenever anything does not exist, it doesn’t have a frame, it doesn’t have dimensions, it doesn’t have personalities, it doesn’t have qualities. It is empty, there is nothingness. And because of this emptiness, Mohanji becomes a doorway for something bigger and larger to happen through him.

Mohanji, it is such a pleasure and privilege for a seeker to be associated with you and be in your midst. So thank you for gracing the occasion.

Mohanji: Thank you so much.

Shlloka: We have people joining in from all across the globe. And the first thing that I would like to ask you is about your spiritual journey. What led you to this? What got you started, can you talk a little bit about that?

Mohanji: Well, after going through all phases of life – the different phases, physical, emotional, intellectual, the many phases that we go through, right from childhood, (and mostly unconsciously, because we don’t know we have shifted to various levels), at some point in time, this question comes to you. What exactly are you looking for? Since I had been working in the shipping industry earlier, I could taste whatever money could buy. But it wasn’t happiness. So I was literally searching for happiness for a long period of time. I used to go to the Himalayas often. Whenever I used to get leave, I flew to the Himalayas. But the problem was that when I went back, I couldn’t carry the Himalayas with me!

So at one point in time, I started asking myself, “Is this really what you want to do?” When you have time you’re going to a place and that place has peace. But you’re not carrying that peace with you. So you need to find peace amongst all activities or amidst everything. So that’s when I literally started focusing on myself. And it continued for a long time, about five or six years of deep penetration. My path was very simple. I didn’t have a guru. So I was literally connecting to my spine and just switching off from the front-orientedness.

We are generally front-oriented, because all our sensors are in the front and we tend to go to the front and hence everything is front-oriented. That is how we are made. Usually we don’t even think about our spine in our daily life because we don’t have to, unless there is back pain. I simply tried to connect to my spine, started feeling my spine and that literally took me inside – meaning I used to connect to my spine and breathe through the spine, etc.

Even if you just remember your spine, you will know that your connection has gone to your third eye. This was my practice and it took some time. From the world of sounds which I was totally involved in, like everybody else, I started going into the core of sounds which is silence. Like the ocean, from where the waves are coming out and going back to the ocean, all noises come out of silence and they go back to silence. So I could go down deeper and deeper after a lot of effort. Don’t think it’s easy, because it takes time, and because we are used to sounds. We are used to noises. And we think it’s natural for us to be in the noises. I was one of the noises in the world of noises.

But then 3 am to 8 am was my time. The rest of the time I had sold for money because I was working. So from 3am to 8am, I used to focus on myself, on the spine, and then go deeper. Silence used to be in the form of less thoughts initially, and no thoughts eventually. Once I touched silence, I realised I didn’t need to go anywhere. So in the midst of activity, I could penetrate to the world of silence. Then later I came back to the world of noises as silence. That was the difference. That’s why Shlloka said a little bit earlier that I don’t exist, because I don’t exist as a noise. I exist as silence which is probably not so visible. You have got to have the ‘eyes’ to really see that, but that was fine with me. Everybody need not connect because many people connect to the world of noises easily but silence is very difficult. From the world of noises to the world of silence was the transition for me. And that created Mohanji.

Shlloka: The iconic Mohanji as we say.

Nidhi: Absolutely! We resonate with your views. Because the purpose of ‘Ask the Masters’ is to go inwards and introspect, especially in these quarantined times/ lockdown times. However a lot of people are very stressed because of the current situation and there’s a lot of anxiety in their minds.

In the present times people are suffering both on macro and micro levels. On the macro level, people are losing their jobs. They are starving. And on the mental level, some of them are going through a lot of hell. There’s a lot of mental abuse happening as we speak and the statistics are quite alarming. Then there is domestic violence also on a different front. On a micro level, people are stressed, angered and their relationships are actually getting strained. How do we tackle this suffering?

Mohanji: I would say don’t try to tackle situations, instead tackle yourself. That’s the right thing to tackle. Because externally, we do not have control over various things since we are only participants. However, internally we can control everything. This is a God-given time, to be ourselves; to really penetrate within and understand this thing called ‘us’.

You have got to really take time and look at your structure and try to segregate yourself and say, “Okay, this anger, agitation, confusion, insecurity etc. is not me.” You can take various aspects like, “I’m not the anger, I’m not the hatred. I’m not the comparison” etc. and start detaching yourself from all that you are not. All these emotions are connected to the world outside.

In actuality, the world for us is only after we wake up. There is no world for us when we sleep. So the world that we are talking about i.e the people, materials, time, space etc. is only when we are awake. When we are sleeping or when we are dreaming, we don’t have that world. Hence we should understand “What are WE amongst or amidst this world?” We should then try to understand yourselves in that context. The moment you start recognising who you are, you will start witnessing yourself in the whole situation. You will not be JUST a participant, you will be a reliable or a relevant participant – meaning, you will actually tend to add value to the situation.

Many times I feel we don’t have to speak. Silence is a good idea. We don’t have to react, speak or get involved every time, but we do it habitually. It’s our habit. If somebody calls us by a bad name or bad thing, we react immediately. But we don’t have to. We can just watch that person venting the anger and becoming calm after that. So in many places, we don’t need interference. If we are able to see that in ourselves, and we look at the world, like a mirror, I think most of these things can be sorted out.

Second point, we should try not to analyse situations. In general, we have a deep wish to know why something happened. We always try to put the blame on somebody or blame the situation. And it costs us a lot of time, stress and also spoils our mind. But as human beings we do have our (limited) life – if we live 80 years, it’s only 29,200 days, it’s not a lot of days. By the time we realise we have lived, we are (almost) dead. So in this lifetime, we have the right to be happy and content. We can’t and we should not give that possibility or that key to somebody. WE should keep that key.

That’s why I say, “Any situations in life are only a reminder that they exist and that’s an experience.” So apart from the experience point of view, we should not interfere. I’m not saying that you need to be an escapist. You be there. But be there as stillness or an icon of peace, where you do not have to react. You say, “Okay, this is the situation. We’ll talk about it, let’s sort it out”. Then, we try to help them come out of it. Just as we clear a roadblock. This is possible for us. We can all be policemen sometime, but non-interfering policemen.

Dr. Nidhi Kumar: Yes, like you said we need to handle these kinds of situations with a lot more equanimity.

Question: How to be positive, healthy, stable, peaceful and relaxed in such challenging times like the one currently? What is going to be the duration of this situation? How long do we need to stay stressed and why are we stressed? How do we be positive?

Mohanji: Being stressed is our choice, but being observant and being calm in any situation is our right. We can be very easy and non-stressed. But have we observed what brings this stress? Number one is expectation. We have a lot of expectations everyday – from the time we wake up in the morning.

Today I heard something – the time between when you wake up and when you get out of the bed is your amount of success; that means if you wake up and still lie down without getting up, it means you have earned laziness – meaning your success rate is affected. So this is something to think about. I would say, “Be purposeful”.

Also understand that situations are probably not engineered by us. A situation happened – it was given to us. What can we do in this peripheral? We have time, space, certain awareness, certain intelligence and certain people involved. In this context, we have to act. You can actually imagine that you are an actor playing a role. You can really play the role very well. So, this is your option.

In the current condition, Nature has told you: “You have no control”. An invisible particle has created a lot of havoc amongst us (the visible particle, for we are visible in this world). An invisible thing (we don’t even know what a virus looks like) has actually created a scare in the whole world. And it put everybody indoors. In this context, we need to spend time to understand and assimilate ourselves. It’s a very good time for us to know how we react to situations. Because this kind of thing has not happened in the last 200 years as far as I know, or probably ever since mankind started. We have a God-given opportunity.

There is a lot of stress connected to finances, stress connected to activity, stress connected to choices, we can’t travel (movement) etc. All the stresses have come together. And secondly, we may have to live together with people we really do not like, for example: our relatives and friends etc. in one space and being forced to see them. So this is something which is giving added stress.

Now you have every chance to re-wind yourself, recycle yourself, reset yourself. This chance should be well used. This is what I feel. And then there are so many methods and practices which great masters have given us including pranayama, the hyper-ventilations, connecting to yourself through certain meditations etc. But contemplation (manana) is very good. Manana makes a Maanav – this means that one who is able to think and contemplate, is a human being (man).

So we have a lot of opportunities to penetrate and contemplate: “Is that me?” Like Adi Shankara said….

Mano buddhi ahankara chittani naaham

Na cha shrotra jihve na cha ghraana netre

Na cha vyoma bhumir na tejo na vaayuhu

Chidananda rupah shivo’ham shivo’ham

But the point is that you can actually think, “Am I the body? Am I the intellect? Am I the ego? Am I the Spirit? What are we?”

So this will really make you fully collected and composed. And the moment you start realising you are very powerful, that you’re completely the universe, you will stop looking at the whole world through a keyhole. You will realise that you have the opportunity to see the whole universe. The moment you understand this, there ends the story. Then there is no stress for you anymore. There is no confusion, there is no agony, anxiety, anger, etc. It will all leave because you very well know that we are the universe and that nothing outside can touch us actually. Unless we are only external, then we get beaten up. In other words, we give the remote control of our happiness in somebody else’s hands, like neighbours or friends or relatives. Keep the remote control with you and use it wisely.

Question: I get scared very easily. I am scared of death basically or scared of what could happen to me.

Mohanji: Faith is the antidote for fear. Whenever we have fear, we understand that faith is lacking. So firstly, it should be the faith in ourselves; faith, not on something outside because your own personal Guru is inside. When you connect to yourself and assimilate yourself; when you understand that body, mind, intellect, ego, spirit, it is all within and that our body is just a case (shell), we start connecting to ourselves. Then we will feel peaceful.

As I said, first you have to have faith in yourself. You are born and you have a space here, you have relevance here. So in this relevance and space, you do what you can, within your given capacity. You don’t have to compare, you don’t have to compete. There is nothing to compete or to compare with. You are being yourself and that is exactly your contribution to this world. So whenever you feel fear, understand that fear has no basis. Fear is like a shadow where light exists. So connect to the light, which is you. Then you can connect to any guru, any master, any god which you like to follow.

But essentially, it’s all about you. The whole spirituality is about you. “Tat Tvam Asi – You Are That”. That is exactly what the great masters have said. Over a period of time, you have been trying to find yourself. This is the only point here. If we understand this, there is no confusion. But if you are chasing something and if you don’t get it, there is disappointment. Please remember that when we have found ourselves, there is nothing anymore to find. This finding ourselves needs time, and we have to accept ourselves. Acceptance is very important. Most of the time, we don’t accept ourselves even if others accept us. That’s where the problem lies. If somebody has an opinion about us, we buy it and think it is real, and that it is true, then we have stopped accepting ourselves.

We all have weaknesses, we all have strengths. We all have everything. We are a mixture. Nobody is higher or lower, not even equal. We are all unique. We should remember that we are a unique creation and this uniqueness is what we are giving to this world. The world may accept it or reject it. That is not our problem. We are existing today. This is the real celebration – that we are alive. This life is the celebration and this presence is the celebration. When you remember this, there will be no fear. Fear cannot exist together with light. Darkness cannot exist together with light. Fear cannot exist together with faith.

Dr. Nidhi Kumar: As you said, I’d like to reiterate the same thing….O Light of Exceptional Glory, enlighten the darkness of our minds, for dark is the path and you hold this light. The next question is..

“I am a stay at home mom and I wish to work again. I do not know what career to choose and do not know how to figure it out. My mind is in a quandary.”

When we were speaking yesterday, you told me that you’re getting so many calls from the US where people are losing jobs. It’s the same kind of apprehension.

Mohanji: I feel that the job loss situation will be all over the world because of the economic meltdown. But my answer to that is – let us not focus on the negatives. If you focus on negatives, there are plenty. Let us focus on the positives. First and foremost, how do we know what’s good for us? It’s very simple. It depends on our nature. What is our nature? We all have our unique nature. Some people have a nature for being a doctor. Some people like that profession, because their nature suits that kind of profession. Some people like to be a lawyer. Some people like to be in the sports field. Hence all these are connected to one’s individual nature. If your nature is not suiting that profession, you won’t be successful there.

So first and foremost, sit down and understand which profession suits you. That’s the first right step. Then you go towards the profession with full confidence. I would first say, “If you really want to be successful, you have to really apply yourself”. There’s no other way. Working smart is accepting yourself and applying yourself fully and doing only what you have to do. You don’t have to do the whole variety of things. Don’t try to multi-task and spoil your entire career. Instead focus on something which really suits you and dig deeper and deeper until you finally see water.

What suits you is what you can do effortlessly. That means if you like something and if you’re effortless about it, that shows that the profession/work suits you very well. That’s a sign of it. It is very easy to understand. If you are feeling stressed to even get up in the morning and if it is a pain or pressure to go towards your work, implies that you are doing something which you do not like to do or doing something which does not suit you. It’s like wearing a shirt which is not your size.

Even in spirituality, what suits you is your path. Some people like devotion. They like to sing, chant, praise etc. Some people like intellectual stuff. They would like to listen, analyse, understand and only then they accept. Some people like Karma Yoga. They go out and they serve the world. Some people are a mixture of all this, but there will be some predominance and that is your path. Whatever is predominant in us; that’s exactly what we are. That’s our path.

Dr. Nidhi Kumar: That answers our question. I would like to add a little thing to it that it’s good to be rooted to your values. Let us move on to our next question.

Shloka: In extension to the career question, there are many individuals who talk about or who write about being compelled to be on a career path because of certain constraints. The constraints could be like financial constraints or it is too late in life to change career, or have a family to take care etc. So how would you advise those people to go through a career and the profession effortlessly?

Mohanji: The Upanishad says, “The food that came to you today is the medicine for you, even if that’s the food you never chose.” This means the food was delivered to you. Sometimes you are compelled to do something just for survival. In that situation, I would suggest you to always do the work with full dedication, but at the same time, have a hobby on the side, which you would like to do. So it compensates. For example, a person likes to be a photographer, but instead he is working as a government servant. So be a government servant fully for the sake of earning but at the same time practice photography as a hobby, so you don’t really miss it. And that gives equilibrium.

Sometimes life provides us with things which we may not have vocally asked for (but probably we may have been ‘eligible’ for that, we don’t know). If such a thing lands on your lap, accept it, then deliver your best. When you get something, you should do justice to it. Otherwise it’s not worth it. By rejecting or by resisting, it stays further. But by accepting it and by fully involving in it, maybe you will start liking it. Actually, the dislike starts with resistance. We keep pushing it away to an extent that it becomes painful. Then, we suffer. We don’t have to really suffer. Through acceptance, we can remove the suffering. We do not really have to cope with it – instead we dive into it and say, “Okay, what best can I do about it?” Plus, we take up a hobby which develops our other side, which blooms us through doing our chosen activity.

Question: How do we effectively use our time during this period amidst the stress and fear?

Mohanji: Go online…(laughter). Very simple. We can’t go outside the house, right?

Question: How do we motivate ourselves in this situation to begin and continue daily meditation and practices, especially early in the morning despite our busy schedule with family and work?

Mohanji: We have an Early Birds Club now. That’s the reason why I started this club recently. We have to start early in the morning at 4 am. Then have a pattern of activity until 6 am. By the time you reach the usual waking time, you have actually covered a lot of distance. It’s not easy to just start the day early and do nothing, because then the usual habits pull us back to bed. So we have started the Early Birds Club for that purpose. And this is really creating a difference in people’s lives. Now people have actually written back saying that they now have a lot of time and there is a lot of peace, contentment, etc.

To start early, you need a bit of effort initially, but eventually it becomes a pleasure. You will feel quite good because you’re not just wasting time sleeping, procrastinating and then being lazy and feeling wasted. Instead you wake up early then do something. Some people have started writing their own stories. People say that it looks like another life or feels like another life. You can do so many things in this time; you can be very creative. As said in the beginning, there are so many domestic issues going on. I would like everybody to inspire people. It’s not the prerogative of spiritual teachers alone to do that.

All of us have our stories, have our history. We have a lot of wealth inside. We are not short or small. We can always share some insights with people, with the world outside and give some kind of a consolation or solace to people outside. It need not always be the teachers and the masters. Sometimes people get bored with these spiritual people (laughs) Normal people in the world can also talk. I always inspire people to share their experiences. You share your story, it might resonate with some because some people have actually survived total hardships like displacements, wars, etc. Many people who follow me around the world have gone through wars, they have been displaced, lost their houses, family members, etc. So I tell them to share it, even if it is painful to remember. Maybe it will be purgatory sometimes, and you may get purified through it. And that happens. People can be natural and be themselves in this time because you cannot go anywhere. You can use the online facility and communicate, which will help people. I feel that we all have a great potential. All we have to do is accept ourselves, and then we’ll realise that we can do a lot in this world.

Dr. Nidhi Kumar: Absolutely. Now we take the viewers to the next segment, which is on emotion. One of the greatest forms of suffering is to deal with death. So we have a lot of questions on this. How does one deal with death because it becomes an overwhelming and imaginable sense of grief, to deal with death.

Question: How to overcome the anxiety and the debilitating feeling that happens after some loved one passes away. How do you deal with that?

Mohanji: This is a traditional fear – the fear of death. For all the 7.5 billion people in the world, the biggest of fears is the fear of death. And the next fear is usually the fear of failure and society, fear of failure etc. But the fear of death is a part of us.

The driving factor of all species is instinct – that’s the driving factor. While for human beings, the driving factor is usually the inclination or vasanas, and of course desires. But the instinct part which is common across all species is the main instinct for survival. So this fear of death is connected to survival instinct, because we like to survive. Every being likes to survive, and the other side of survival is death. So we fear something which we do not want to happen, but it’s true and inevitable that we will die.

As human beings, we have the capacity to understand and assimilate the idea that we are deathless. That is only for us because we have that capacity to connect to something which is permanent. So we have that thing inbuilt in us, we have that capacity. So what is the antidote to fear of the inevitable death? The death that we are walking towards every day, even at this point in time when we are speaking, after our conversation, we are closer to death. It goes like that, right? Every moment we are taking one more step towards death that is supposed to happen.

So how do we come to terms with it, with the inevitability? It’s very simple – we must understand that we have something within us which is deathless. And that’s the reality. The shell that we carry, the form that we carry, the name, the position and the positions that we have, are all temporary; while there is something which is bright and brilliant, which is real and that’s hiding behind this whole paraphernalia or this structure. So we start looking at it and we say, “Oh, this guy doesn’t want anything. He has no interest in life. He has no interest in death. He is deathless. He is a time rider. For him, time is like a horse. He rides time.” Because time doesn’t ride him, time only rides the body, the body, the mind, intellect, ego. But the thing which is bright within us, it’s beyond time. So, the moment you start connecting to that, then death is just a phase.

In fact, every day we are dying for a few hours. That is the deep sleep state, where we do not know whether we are a man or a woman, time or space, whether we are a guru or a disciple, we know nothing. Then when we wake up again, we realise that this is the garb which we have been born in. We are born in this life and we come to know and then we start behaving like this particular role, this personality. So every day we are experiencing that and every day we are coming back to life in the morning. That’s why it’s a new life every day. So what happens in actual death is that we come back in another body, or we don’t come back at all – we dissolve. So this is the option. When we have awareness, awareness is the antidote – it is the antidote to the fear of death. This is the way it is.

Nidhi: How do we free ourselves from the bondages of emotions and become mentally strong? How to overcome negative emotions like fear and negative energy?

Mohanji: We have three processors in our system which are mind (processing emotions), intellect (processing, information), ego (processing personality matters like positions and possessions, role in society etc.). So this together is what we call as mind-matter. Actually it’s one material or one processor, but we segregate them so we can understand. The body has three processors and these three processors need food. The food of mind is emotion, but when we have so many emotions to handle, the mind has obesity. When we have so much information to handle, intellect has obesity. When we have so many positions, possessions and ego stuff to handle, then ego has obesity. If you eat a lot of food, the body has obesity. So obesity is part of our existence and the 7.5 billion people around the world have some obesity in some way.

So what do we need to do? How do we handle these emotions etc.? Emotions are coming in all the time. But we need to understand – like our stomach for example, we need to know how much we should eat, what we should eat, and what quantity etc., so that we are in control of our food consumption. Like that, we should be in control of our emotions, and emotional consumption as well. Emotions are available outside; this is all coming from outside. We need to control what comes inside and don’t just get involved in emotions habitually, because that’s what we do normally. And the same with information, so much information is coming that is mostly negative in nature – like 200,000 people died, so many people are in quarantine, this country closed the doors, that country closed the doors; so many people lost their jobs. This is what we hear from television.

What we need to do – we need to have an antidote. We go and search for something positive and read that, basically the life of great masters. In India we have a great tradition with the tradition of liberation – moksha. If you look at the whole world, the purushartha (dharma, artha, kama, moksha), these four aspects out of which moksha is defined only in this country, and that’s well-defined. And out of this many religions came out like Sikhism, Buddhism, all these came out of one aspect called moksha. So we have that big, huge tradition and depth of wealth. So if we read or assimilate materials or things connected to moksha, the highest potential, we can superimpose that moksha on mind, intellect, ego everywhere. And with the benchmark of conscience – our own conscience, which is like a guard, like a firewall, which protects us from all the impacts. So we do not compromise our conscience, and we use the potential for liberation for all of us. We all have it as the benchmark. And if we don’t get involved in things which we don’t want to get involved in, we will always be safe.

Suffering is in the mind. It’s only a waking state thing. Pain can be in the body. Like what Ramana Maharshi said when somebody asked him, when he had cancer, “Swami, do you have pain?” He said, “I have pain, but I have no suffering. I choose not to suffer.” Suffering is always connected to resistance. We try to say, “Oh, why did this happen to me? Why am I such a good man? Why are bad things happening?” All these confusions leave us with a lot of junk and suffering. So this we can definitely avoid – self-pity, sympathy all these things should be plucked out and thrown away. Life is happening. Take life as it comes. And when emotions are coming, which you don’t want….. like when we go to vendors or vendors coming home (when there is no Corona situation). When they come home to sell things, what do we buy? We buy only what we need in the house. We don’t buy everything. When we go to the supermarket, what do we buy? We only buy what we like to consume, otherwise we don’t buy. So this is what we should do all of our life. Whenever we are awake, we should be controlling our consumption. We should not indiscriminately consume, because if you do that – obesity happens. And this is a continuous thing, and sometimes we are so helplessly involved in it, and that’s a big trauma for us.

So as a general answer, I can say to control your consumption: physical consumption, emotional consumption, intellectual consumption, and also ego things like pride. Don’t try to consume everything that you get.

And also, you do not have to prove anything in life. Because people who love you will accept you; people who do not love you will not accept you. That’s how the world is. Not everybody will accept you. Those who have eyes to see will see you; those who do not have eyes to see, can’t see you. That’s fine, because that’s the way creation has happened. So let us be realistic. And let us say that we don’t have to prove to anybody. We are living our life without violating or without violence. We are not trying to harm anybody so that we are on safe ground. We contribute what we can contribute. And we always ask the question, “Can I do something for you?” so that our purity is always maintained. If you focus on what you can deliver and not what you consume, you will feel peaceful. This is the right time for understanding that.

Nidhi: To add a little bit to that question, there is societal judgement that comes in, you know. You say to live in the moment, but sometimes society kind of judges you on a lot of things, and a lot of you (viewers) have been writing to us: “My mother-in-law or my so-and-so..” You have to get over that judgement somehow by realising that it’s your life and you can live it whichever way you want to, because God ultimately wants you to be happy. So what may be a sin in say, the eyes of society or your friend circle, may not be a sin in your own eyes.

Mohanji: Well, the minds of the other people are in their own bodies or their own systems. We do not have much control over it. But I would say that if we have not been affected at all for a period of time, then the impact becomes less. If we’re reacting to everything, it will be increasing because then there is a pleasure on the other side. Like if somebody is abusing us, or judging us, criticising us, which I have experienced many times. I don’t respond, and say to myself: “okay, this is their opinion, my reality is totally different.”

So we must have trust in ourselves, faith in ourselves. We don’t buy things which we don’t agree with. Because we can’t change people, change other people’s minds. We interact with many types of people every day, right? And we don’t have many choices for it, because society has a variety of different types of people. We have to interact with them consistently. We don’t have any choice. So while we’re doing it, make sure that we remain clean and unaffected. Unaffected means – let them say whatever they want. If they have pleasure, it’s okay. I believe in that. If somebody abuses me, I think: “okay, maybe because of me, he has that pleasure.” So this is okay. He has the right to have pleasure, like everybody. So even if he is abusing me, it’s fine. As long as I don’t buy it, it stays with him. You know, I normally say this to people: when people try to gossip about others to me, I say, “You must have done a lot of hard work to get this information. This is precious for you. Keep it with you. Don’t give it to me.” So they don’t tell me again.

Q: Can you kindly share with us at what stage of your sadhana (with regard to the number of months or years) you first started experiencing the state of blissful existence? As someone who has recently started to meditate, I would like to know more about it so that I can be not immediately bothered about such expectations hindering the entire process.

Mohanji: Yes, I would say that, first of all, we should not keep any expectation. This is the first point. Second is that the experience is usually individualistic, because we all have our own constitution. We can’t say that another person had this experience, so I should have it. It may not happen that way. Third is that for me personally, I did not know what I was looking for. Because as I told you, I was working in a company and I was practising.

So one thing I would always say is that you have the same place for meditation or practice every day. Don’t change locations. Because what happens is the mind gets occupied with it. So I used to keep one room and I had covered the whole room – I made it like a cave, so that there was no light entering from anywhere. And I only had one lamp, no pictures, nothing in that room, so that the distraction level was less. Initially there’ll be a lot of distraction because we have habitual thoughts coming in, and things like the pleasures, which we like to indulge in. That comes like, “I need to have coffee or tea”, or, “it is time to check the mail”, things like that. But for that I used to start at 3 am every day, but I don’t recommend that because that was my own style. I used to have my time, my own personal time and that was 3 am to 8 am every day. That is when I was practising – means I was actually trying to explore myself. I’m not asking you to replicate anything – I’m just telling you in a broad spectrum, one space, always. One space, one kind of environment and one lamp (with flame) or one thing to connect to. Plus one practice – same practice. Sometimes it’s so boring but you still do the same practice. If it’s a mantra, chant the same mantra again and again and again. So what happens is the mind finally breaks up. Mind can’t hold it anymore. Mind likes variety. The repetition kills the mind, and that moment when it breaks is when your whole identity is broken.

So for me, it was consistently about six months before there was a slight change in the whole thing – where I could assess the difference by not getting affected with the world outside. That means whether a thing is there or not, I’m not affected. Earlier, I used to have certain requirements every day. If I get up in the morning, I take a bath and once I’m done, then I do my prayers. But then after that, I need to have a coffee or something. But all those needs became optional. So that was the first step. So like that, eventually, tremendous detachment happened with the world outside. When you start touching the silence deeper, at that time, the world of noises is somewhere far away. You can hear the noises, but that’s not yours – so far away. Then you feel totally separated from it. If you want to go to the noises you can go. But again, you are not affected. It’s like with some people who smoke a lot, who can’t handle being without cigarettes. Then after the moment they decide to stop smoking, after a long period of time, even if somebody smokes, it doesn’t matter, because they have overcome that – like that. The world of noises is probably a temptation for some time, and then the temptation also goes. So, I would say it took six months before I could actually start connecting to myself by crossing over the tendency for searching for noises, because that was my world like everybody else’s. This is the world of noises. We are used to it and we think that’s natural for us, but it’s not. We think it’s natural.

Nidhi: There was a question regarding the sadhana, is it traataka by any chance?

Mohanji: So, one technique as I said, I was looking at the lamp but I was not looking – my eyes were open and connecting to the lamp but I was connecting to my spine. I didn’t practice traataka.

Nidhi: Shlloka, let’s take the next question and then move on to the next segment liberation.

Shlloka: The next question, as you’ve touched upon it earlier in your segment as well. You know, it’s a very natural tendency for people to want to tide over suffering and reach a state of pleasantness, pleasure, enjoyment, whatever you may want to call it. You have stressed upon awareness as being that seat of pleasantness and enjoyment. You’ve also spoken about how presence is the highest practice. So if you can tell our viewers who are watching you for the first time as to what is the importance of awareness and why so much stress on it?

Mohanji: Yes, awareness starts with very small things like for example, we are talking. Just be aware of every word you utter. That means no absent-mindness, first of all. Then we are moving our hand or we are doing something – be aware. In other words, let the mind be present with everything, every word, every action so that your mind is right here in the present. This is the number one thing. Then you can go deeper and deeper in awareness and eventually you are aware of your heartbeat, you are aware of your breath, you are aware of your aura; you can be aware of everything. You know, it’s very interesting if you start connecting to yourself and start assimilating and you will know that the heart has a particular frequency; that the liver has a particular frequency, that every aspect of you has a different frequency. And it’s like an orchestra inside. You know, every organ is playing in the orchestra, that’s a synchronisation – it’s like a huge beautiful melody. So you start connecting to yourself and then you realise, “Oh my God, I’m a big universe, what I was looking at outside is nothing compared to what I am or what I can see inside”. So awareness takes us there. Awareness is so important. Now, in daily life, what happens is that we get so involved that we lose that awareness a little bit – because we forget that we are the actor. We forget that we are not the role. We are the actors but we forget that thing. So, what happens is – we get involved with the role and we believe that we are the role, not the actor at that point in time. We get affected and that’s where suffering happens. Because the role has suffering, you also have suffering. Otherwise, if we always remember: “I’m an actor and this is just a role I’m playing and this is temporary”, then there is no suffering. So, suffering is connected to our deep involvement – then we tend to blame the other actors. We are in these role plays every morning till evening.

Nidhi: I am reminded of Shakespeare’s saying, Mohanji. He said that famous line, “Today, we have our exits and our entrances. So each of us is a player and it will be curtains down soon for everybody. That’s what he said.

Mohanji: Yeah. So this awareness is that, but consciousness is different; awareness and consciousness are different. Consciousness is our driving mechanism which has three distinct aspects every day: the waking state, the dream state and the deep sleep state. So the same consciousness operates in three dimensions each day in 24 hours. But awareness is that we stay over all that’s happening to us – like a view from above. So you can see all the role plays, but at the same time you remember you are always the actor. So that gives you that immunity as well as power. That makes you powerful.

Shlloka: So we have a question from someone – you just spoke a while back about sadhana. And you mentioned that there is so much resistance. As a spiritual practitioner myself, I experience that as well – how every day, one doesn’t want to get up and do sadhana – there’s so many things to do, don’t do it. There is so much resistance and one sometimes succumbs to the mind. So the question is being asked:

How does one conquer the fear of limitations in the way of one’s sadhana?

Mohanji : That’s only in the initial stages. In fact, after a while you will not even feel anything if you avoid expectations, if you avoid agenda. For example: “My friend who was doing sadhana achieved a level of silence. So I should also do that.” Don’t do that. You just be yourself, don’t compare, don’t compete and just follow. I never used to tell anybody what I used to practice – that’s a very good idea. Because if you try to share with people, then they would all have opinions and sometimes they derail us. So I would say that keep your own practice close to you, do it as quietly and consistently as you can, and after a while, this becomes a usual thing.

See, the subconscious mind reproduces what you do repeatedly – like for example, if you do 21 days or 41 days. That is the point of the Early Birds Club that I spoke about earlier. That means people wake up at a certain time and do a particular sadhana. After a few days, they automatically wake up because they can’t sleep. Then that becomes enjoyable. And if you’re not competing and comparing, you will have no sorrows connected to it. So I would always say that you must consider that you are not the mind, you are not the intellect, you’re not the ego and don’t analyze and don’t keep on digging the seed out to see if the roots have formed. The root will happen at its own time – everything has its time. But I always believe that everyone has the clear potential, like everyone else, to touch the highest consciousness or to touch the state which is consciousness. So, all of us have that power and we are never higher or lower than anybody.

Shlloka: Mohanji, in connection with this, can talk about the importance of sadhana, what are the benefits of sadhana or yoga for that matter? You know, there’s so many people who are non-practitioners who have written to ask :

Why should one be pursuing the path of sadhana? Are there any other ways to achieve the ultimate, or is sadhana the only way? If it is the only way, what is the benefit?

Mohanji: Well, sadhana is nothing but a systematic practice. That means something which you’re committing to. And anything you are committing to, you should have conviction about it, you should believe in it. Not because somebody else said or is doing or not doing. We should check whether it suits our nature, whether it is natural for us or whether it is suitable for us, and then we follow that. For example, a person who’s devotional by nature cannot follow a guru or path of knowledge or jnana yoga. This person can only follow bhakti, and that’s what suits a person of that type. So this is the first point – that when you practice something, make sure it suits you. Don’t just follow like a cow; a cow’s tendency is that if a cow goes in one direction, every cow goes in that direction too. So we should not do that because we are human beings. We should not have herd instinct. Instead, we should look at what suits us and choose. If something doesn’t suit us, we should be happy to say that’s not our cup of tea. That is the first thing about sadhana.

Secondly, consistency as I said earlier. Then the question about why one should have sadhana – it’s very simple, otherwise you miss a great personality!! Instead you will be immersed in the world outside, a world of noises with so many things, varieties, colours etc. And it is never ending because you will always have more and more desires. And finally get tired because all this while you’ve been running after so many things and materials, you got so many things but are not still happy.

So, how do we find happiness instead of going for various pleasures? We come to ourselves and then we realise, “Oh my God, I never needed anything, I am happy otherwise.” So, for understanding this you need to have practice. I always say two D’s — one is Discipline and the second is Determination. The other side is distraction. So to overcome distraction, you need to have discipline and determination. Determination is to connect to yourself. As I said earlier, the whole spiritual path can be crushed and the essence of it can be said as — “You are that. You are what you’re looking for.” So this ‘You’ is a great story. We know that we only connect to ourselves as incidents based on what we have experienced. That’s not us. We have so many other things, other faculties and factors. We are a conglomeration of all that. So if you do not connect to yourself, you miss that great opportunity.

Nidhi: Mohanji, we are completely out of time now. I’m just going to take two more questions. One person said that she’s been praying to Sai Baba and she’s been seeing your face. There are many more questions like that. Another one is:

Why is Sai not answering my prayers? What should I do? It’s been a decade. What would you like to say to such people who’ve been asking plenty of such questions?

Mohanji: How can I say why Sai is not answering? But I would say that Sai always answers. We have living Masters and we have had great Masters who have lived here as beacons of light and power. And they always respond, I believe so. Because the thing is that we are probably asking for something which can’t be delivered, something personal or selfish. They don’t cater to it.

Or secondly, they would have delivered something which we fail to see because we are focusing on something else. This happens many times. What we got, we may not see. But what we don’t have or what we thought we should have, we will see. It is the same with the gurus, you know. The tradition says or the scriptures say, “The one who has appeared in front of you is your Guru. Connect to him completely.” But then we have probably an image of Babaji, an image of Sai Baba and we say, “Oh, that form did not come to me. So I don’t accept it.” So you miss it. This happens in our life.

I would say that no master ever denies anybody. This is my experience. All true masters are here to serve. They’re not here to earn or eat and eat more etc. They are here to serve. If you stop asking, maybe you get much more, maybe you are supposed to get a Mercedes but you asked only for a Maruti!

Nidhi: How lovely! How beautifully you summed it all up, Mohanji. And I think we’re going to have many more sessions with you. It’s almost time now to wrap up. It’s truly been a very insightful, incredible journey packed with so much wisdom and this intersection with you has been wonderful to begin with. We have many, many more questions, which will not go unanswered I’m sure. To wrap up, I’d like to give special thanks to you, Mohanji for gracing us, to my team Union, for producing and marketing this show headed by our volunteer Ajay. Thank you so much. Thank you to the Mohanji Foundation. We thank you for making it see the beautiful light of day. Now, I leave it to Shlloka to end this session for today.

Mohanji: Thank you. Thank you. Thanks to all of you.

Shlloka: It’s been a pleasure. And you know, the viewers have flooded us with questions.

Nidhi: I think even ten sessions with you will not be enough. There were hundreds of questions, and you have thousands and millions of followers. So we have to have this again very soon. That’s a promise to our viewers.

Shlloka: Mohanji, people have written to us, of course with their questions, but you know, it’s also just amazing to see the kind of profound gratitude that they have for you. For example, we have an individual who talks about and thanks you for your protection and for your grace – and many more messages.

We wish to have Mohanji back once again, so please keep your questions coming, viewers. And in the meantime, we would urge you if you have more questions, you can always visit Mohanji’s website, Mohanji’s Facebook page, it’s flashing on the screens. You can always stay connected and be answered to the best possible way, until we meet again. Thank you Mohanji once again, see you in the next one.

Shlloka and Nidhi: (To the viewers) We hope you would take all the answers and implement them in your life and we do hope you’ve liked Ask the Masters.

Transcribed by Nada Rakovic and Rakshitha Ananth

Proofread by Geetha Iyer

Which are you? Fixed or flexible mindset?

Hello friends. This is Mohanji.

Hope you’re doing well and hope you’re digesting the subjects that we had chosen in the last few podcasts and hope they are helpful to you. Today, I was thinking of taking up a subject which you can use as food for thought.

The subject is a mindset. Mindset is not an easy subject, because it’s not easy to put the mind structure into compartments. But it’s important because that is the advantage of understanding ourselves more so that we can remove all the clutter and we can bring clarity. This is the advantage. The more clarity we have, life will be cleaner; life will be better. Otherwise, confusions and clutter can take over.

So, what are the major mindsets that we see in this world? Let’s categorize them into two. One is a fixed mindset, and the other is a flexible mindset or a growth mindset.

The fixed mindset, they usually avoid challenges, they don’t like challenges. Then they hate changes, they like fixed routines. If any change happens, even if it’s a change in material like food on the table, they become unhappy, they become upset; their life pattern changes. So, they can’t leave patterns. They are very, very bound to patterns. They hate changes. They also think they can do very little to change the situation. Then, they do not like criticism, they don’t accept criticism. If somebody comes and tells them, “Look here, why don’t you make a difference in your life? Why don’t you try this? Why don’t you try something new?”, they can’t accept it. Because they are sure what they’re doing is the right thing. And they won’t look at a person or any friendship or any connection favourably if they are starting to interfere in their life. For example, if somebody tries to correct them or makes a change in their life for the better, even that will not be accepted because they don’t like an intervention. They want to stay in their own comfort zones, they are very, very afraid to leave that comfort zone, to leave their pattern. They only see obstacles. They see obstacles all the time because for them, “Oh, this is a problem, that’s a problem”; they always discuss problems. And they try to tell people that people are not right, the situation is not right, problems are happening, like that they will always think about problems. Then they also feel that putting efforts are useless because life happens anyway. Why do you put a lot of effort? This is a fixed mindset. A lot of people are like that in the world. They just live and die. Anonymous, we won’t even see them, because they have a fixed mindset, and they are kind of like how the animals live; the routine life. That’s it. If anything just happened in their life, they are upset. They don’t like changes.

Now we look at the flexible mindset. They welcome challenges. “Bring it on”, you know, that attitude. And they embrace changes. When changes happen, they just melt into the changes. Then they think everything is possible. There is nothing impossible in life, they think impossibility is an illusion, we can do it. If somebody can do it, we can do it. If there’s a thought, we can make it happen. If there is a firm wish or a desire, it can be accomplished. They treasure feedback and would learn eagerly; they like to have feedback. They ask, “What do you think about this?” or “Can we improve on it?” and they use everything, or every faculty, or every connection so that they can improve in some way. So, every day, they think about what else can we do? How we can improve this? How we can make the standards better? It’s not maintenance anymore. They are builders, they can build. They don’t worry about what’s already happened. But in their mind, they’re always thinking, “What else we can do, what else can happen?” So, they are always on a mode of improvement, or they try to upgrade everything. So, they like feedback, and they want to change things in a positive way. They love exploring new things and they look at results. Their focus is, “This is my aim, I want to reach there,” and they reach there. Obstacles on the way, it doesn’t matter. There will be obstacles, there will be detours in life. No problem. They keep moving. And every failure for them is a lesson.

So, this is approximately how a person with a flexible mindset thinks. It’s a good thought for us so that we understand where we stand, you know. So, there are a few things which we can check to see where we are in these two categories. Are we from the category of a fixed mindset, or are we from the category of a flexible mindset? So, a few things you can look at is; are we lazy? How do you measure that?

The time when you wake up, and the time when you get up. So when you wake up, if you’re lying in the bed thinking about “Oh my God! It’s morning again.” That’s a lazy attitude, means purpose is not very clear. There’s no clarity of purpose. This is one of the signs you can look at. That’s why we started the Early Birds Club with definite clarity. When you wake up, you are sharp, you have a fixed schedule so you can wake up and you can go through the process so that laziness, the tamas part can be slowly taken away. Please don’t underestimate tamas. Tamas is a very, very dangerous thing. It’s like cancer, we wouldn’t even know that it’s existing inside until and unless we become completely paralyzed. That’s why the Early Birds Club I’m stressing on and I’m telling people to try that because you know, that way you can change your mode from a lazy or a fixed mindset to a flexible mindset, and also attain a lot of success in life. Our aim is to create successful people; positive people. For positivity, you need to have a positive lifestyle.

So, are we lazy? Secondly, are we restless and distracted all the time? That means we do not have a stable mindset, stability is affected. If you are restless and if you are distracted all the time, the mind is like a monkey jumping from one branch to the other. We are disappointed with so many things; we are distracted in various ways. Then it is time we get to something which inspires us from within; concentrate on it. This is important.

So, what can we do about it? We can try to find something which is self-enhancing; self-rejuvenation, self-inspiration, this kind of thing, which would be a thing connected to your nature, and your own inherent constitution, how you are made. It is based on your inclination, your tendencies. That’s what’s suitable for you. Cultivate that thing, then you can improve on it, but it should be something positive. Not something negative, which is draining or which costs a lot of money or efforts and stuff like that. Whatever is natural will be effortless for you. So that’s the right thing to do. Usually, if you are preoccupied with unimportant things, for example, some people are just addicted to WhatsApp or Facebook; they waste the whole day like that. Some people are addicted to games on the computer. Some people have other material addictions and all kinds of things.

So, our waking hours, how best are we using? If we are preoccupied with the not so important things that detach us and deviates us from the actual purpose of life, then we must correct it. Because, what are you here for, what is your actual purpose? Let’s say, if your purpose is liberating yourself completely so that you are fine with life, you’re not in conflict with life, you’re very stable with life, you’re enjoying life, you’re accepting life, you’re respecting life, and then, respecting all the people connected to you. You’re not discriminating, you’re not criticizing, you’re not trying to push people away, you’re accepting everybody, you’re kind of walking with them and you’re in a mode of liberation. Let’s say, a mode of liberation means a lifestyle of liberation. In that case, don’t wander on insignificant things. We must understand that they are not helping us to progress.

But recreation is fine once in a while, we can watch a feature film, we can have a good dinner outside. I’m not saying that we avoid all our happiness, all our enjoyments. We should look at, are we spending a lot of time on unimportant things?

Another thing is, is our energy flow proper? How does energy flow become proper? First of all, if you indulge in positive things, positive thoughts, positive words, positive action, energy flow will be good. Secondly, if you are involved in activities which you love to do, energy flow will be good. But what you love to do should adhere to your goal of life. This is very important. What you love to do, should not be something which wastes your energy, like indulgences and addictions. Many people spend a lot of time on addictions, even though energy flow might be good, but it’s not positive.

Then another point is, your thought process, you have no control. Where are the thoughts coming from? Thoughts are coming from inherent inclinations, so be aware of that. And if you’re able to regulate and guide them to the goal all the time; or as we mentioned earlier, our goal is liberation. If our thoughts are all going towards that goal, you’re on the right track because you have set a goal, you’ve set your destination right. So, if you’re travelling in that mode, and your energy flow is in that mode, your thoughts are in that mode, you are absolutely on the right track. This is all you need to do.

Now, I would sum up so that it becomes food for thought. All these ingredients we have to cook together and make a nice, tasty curry. So, first of all, analyze, where you stand. Do you have a fixed mindset or a flexible mindset? Secondly, how do you know where you stand? We have explained, various options for it. We can explain more later but this I don’t want to elaborate too much. And thirdly, this understanding will help you to correct yourself to the right track.

So, there are more things, we will talk about next time. I leave you with this thought at this point in time. Let’s understand, and let’s assimilate, and let’s improve ourselves in the right way. I leave you with these thoughts. Be happy, and be bright, the world needs light.

Lots of love.

Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt

Proofread by Rekha Murali

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Mohanji on his Journey

I believe that our biggest or the most important net worth, or the net worth of human life is what we give to this world, not what we take from the world. This is my strong conviction that our net worth is always what we deliver to this world, and not what we take from this world.

Secondly – Effective Years. Effective years are the time when you live for the world, not that you live for yourself. As a child, as a youth, we have been learning; we have been learning skills, we have been trying to position ourselves in the world, to get a job, to earn some money, to pay the bills and stuff like that. That’s all for us; all for individuals – that’s not an effective life. Effective life is the time when we start giving back to the Earth; selflessly, unconditionally and consistently. So effective years is what actually makes a person a real personality. This is my strong belief.

I have walked this Earth, more or less alone, since my youth or probably even before. My dependencies on people and on materials were very limited. Even now I feel that I’m not bound by people, time, space, materials, maybe very mildly not substantially bound or not bound in a very strong way.

So, this question was on my mind. What am I supposed to do in the world? At one point in time, I spent a lot of time trying to penetrate into the world of noises. I was living in a world of noises like everybody else. A world of noises means a world of communication, a world of sounds – a world of noises. I spent substantial time during the early morning hours continuously from 3 am to 8 am trying to go deeper into the source of these noises, which was silence. And I kind of touched there.

The moment I touched the silence, then this world of sounds became outside of me. I was not like a dry leaf in the wind, carried by the world of noises. I was stable, because every noise has come out of silence, and every noise goes back to silence. So, silence is more or less like the calm, deep ocean and I could taste or touch that, I could stabilize there. It took about six to seven years for that; a long time for that.

The moment I started stabilizing further and further into the world of silence, every sound became outside of me; inside it was silence. The inside world is the real world. The outside world is a relative world. When you wake up, you have a world outside; when you sleep, you don’t have that world outside. So, it’s a relative world. But the inside world, it’s always there; when you’re sleeping, when you’re awake when you’re dreaming. It’s always there. That world was established in silence. Why I’m explaining this now is that you understand where I’m coming from.

So I spent a lot of time assimilating this treasure, which I received; which came. So, what happens with that existence is that you need nothing from the outside world. Everything is fine. Everything is as it is, everything is okay. You don’t really have any need, or you’re not bound by the world outside, no materials, no places, no people, no person; and I never had any particular addiction that way, without which I could not exist. So, this was the state and I continued like that. That’s the time when I was asked by my higher-ups; the Masters, to go and speak in the world of noises. That was a big violation or violence. Once you are totally established in the world of silence, to go back to the world of noises is a big trauma. It’s an impossibility. No way, I can’t go into the world of noises again. A world of noises means a world of differences. There are ups and downs – the dualities; all the dualities of life are played in the world of noises, outside of you.

You have already done all this and you have nothing to do with it anymore. So you have literally spent time digging deeper and deeper and found the source – the core, and you settle down there; you are happy. From that mode, you are asked to go back again; by the seniors, by the Masters, by Guru Mandala; to go back to the world of noises. I said I can’t do that. They said you must, otherwise, you may take another birth, because you used this plane to get what you wanted. Now that you got it, you pay back. So, I was again brought into the world of noises, but this time as Mohanji – a personality, a person; a recognizable personality, I would call it that way.

So, I came back into the world of noises as silence, not as another noise. I existed in the world of noises as another noise in the beginning; later I came back to the world of noises as silence. This is probably what attracts people to me. This depth of silence is what some people are able to touch, feel and experience; this is my understanding. This could be the reason why people would like to meet me and the rest is history. The mission spread; various places, various activities, various people started connecting. They were all connecting to one core point. Their desire to be in the same state or same space; which means their desire to experience unchallenged silence, un-distorted silence, stable silence.

So what can you give? The highest you can give is yourself. I gave myself to this world. When you give yourself, you’re very vulnerable because you are in a world of noises as silence; you’re like a fish out of water. It’s not easy. I’m sure some of you understand the state.

People look at you as they are and they judge you as they are. They criticize you, sometimes character assassinate you, sometimes love you, sometimes want to own you, possess you as they are. You can’t do anything because you are here to deliver. You deliver to everybody as they are, as they can take. There’s no choice. There’s nothing else to do. I’m not complaining; I have never complained. I never asked for favours from the Masters. I never asked anything from the Masters. I just obeyed orders because you don’t ask anything; you have everything, you’re one with everything. What can you ask?

So, in this mode, a personality is accepted, just like various other personalities have been accepted as they are in the world and we remember them. Like that, Mohanji was accepted in the world to some degree; acceptance, rejection, all these things – everybody will not accept you, everybody may not like you, everybody may not dislike you. So, in this world, there is a position and a place for everybody; all species, every person has a position and space. Mohanji also has a position and space.

Some people found the truth in me and they came to me and they said, “I want to stay with you. We want to be with you.” I never called anybody. I never asked anybody to come, but when they come, I accept them. I accept them as they are sent and their eligibility I never questioned; I never rejected anybody. I never asked anybody to leave. I never asked anything from anybody, any favours from anybody. So, this clarity I already had. There’s no confusion; there’s no distortion. Then, what will I give or what is my style? AS I AM, that’s it. I can’t be somebody else. And there’s no need to be somebody else; you can’t be somebody else either; you are you. You are unique as you are, I am unique as I am. So, I deliver as per what I am.

This may be accepted or may be rejected by people, we don’t know. We can’t say anything because people are people, they are themselves. They will accept only if they can accept; they will reject if they don’t want to accept. Then the growth; whatever happened – various countries, various people started connecting for various reasons. This show started where I had no control. I never scripted it. I never directed it. I just acted my role, played my role. Simultaneously, I continued to play my role as a son to my parents, as a father to my daughter, as a husband to my wife, as whatever people considered me as they think, I played that role. I never restricted any roles, because it’s not my job to restrict. People connect to me as they are, as I told earlier, and I just reciprocate. I do not tell people, “Hey, don’t do that.” Nor do I tell people; no, I can’t do that. So wherever there is a resistance or a rejection, there is also a continuation for that matter. So I don’t want anything to be postponed, let everything happen. Good, bad, ugly, all those things; it will happen.

I never created any kind of personality mania, but people must have a personality to connect to, they need an object, a frame, a form, a method, a known practice to connect to. This is essential otherwise what will they connect to? If there is no Mohanji, what do they connect to? If I never existed, there’ll be no Mohanji to connect to. So, I was created and sent by somebody. I’ve never even asked why I am here.

Since I’m here, I do my job; what I’m supposed to do. Whatever are the dimensions of operations, I never tell, people experience. Let people experience, let people talk. Let people write. This is their thing, not mine. I always tell people – be truthful with your experiences. Only if you believe in your experiences, you write about it. You must trust your experience and should believe in it. Then you write about it. That way everything is authentic. If you fake it, or you hallucinate about it, it will not work because people are not stupid. They understand; all the people are intelligent. I believe that everybody is intelligent. Nobody can be fooled. So you can’t really keep on delivering something fake and say, “Oh, now I fooled everybody”. It never happens. For some time maybe, you fooled some people but that price you have to pay; I never wanted anything to do with it. When you fool somebody, when you harm somebody, when you confuse somebody, when you character assassinate somebody; there’s a huge price. Maybe it will last lifetimes. When you gossip about somebody, when you betray somebody; the price to pay is unbelievable. Believe me. I don’t want anything to do with it. I never betrayed, I never character assassinated, I never gossiped. I just delivered what I can. When people talked badly or people judged me, I just kept quiet because they are paying the price. What’s my problem? If they want to pay a price, a huge price for criticizing me, that’s their job; they decided to pay, maybe through lifetimes. It may take lifetimes to pay off the debt.

So, I never created any personality cult here. You need to have a face to speak to. You need to have somebody whom you can identify with. You need an image, which you can recognize and connect. This is important and that image should be static. I never ever created one image. I was always free with my life. I just moved around as I am. I walked in various costumes. I did my thing effortlessly as I am. I just walked through this earth. So, people’s opinions, people’s concepts, they’re all sitting in somebody’s minds, I have no control over it. I will never control it either because if they are good to the world, they get rewards. If they are bad to the world, they have to pay the price. This is very simple. You do good things in the world, you talk good about people, you are benevolent, you’re compassionate, and you’re kind; you get a lot of rewards as energy comes as grace to you. At the same time, you criticize people, judge people, character assassinate people, talk bad about people – you probably don’t even know about that person, but you judge them because of your prejudices, because of your concepts, then you are paying the price. You pay a huge price for it. Sometimes it goes into your children’s life. Sometimes it goes to your ancestors, sometimes this huge debt you create, maybe the whole tribe will have to pay. It’s possible. When we harm somebody, we have a huge price to pay. When we kill, we have a big price to pay.

So, I am very clear about this and I wanted to give you clarity because this question kept coming up. What am I trying to create in the world? The answer is very simple, NOTHING. What will happen? I don’t know, and how things will happen, how it will evolve, I do not know; I never make a plan. I have no agenda. All these 10 years when I’m in public life, like 2012 to 2020 – 8 years plus, I’m in public life; I have never scripted any agenda. It all happened. I neither asked people to come to me nor did I ask people to go away from me. I loved everybody who came to me, I accommodated everybody; I gave what I can, as per my capacity to everybody who came and I made sure nobody leaves empty-handed from here. I gave whatever I could, but I have my capacity like you have. So I gave whatever I can and then some people were disappointed because their expectations were too high. How can I sort it out? Some people were very happy, and they wrote about it. They said, “I got what I wanted. I’m thankful. I’m grateful”. I’m also grateful for their confirmations and love. So, this is how life is. Those who criticized me, judged me, character assassinated me; I thought they wanted this experience from me. They got it that way and if they are satisfied, I’m satisfied. Nothing touches me that way. Of course, there is an inconvenience. When somebody talks bad about you, it’s inconvenient for you. But nothing is permanent; the same people may talk good about you later. So, nothing in life is permanent.

I’m very clear about this. So, there is no personality cult. There is no cult. There is no sect, nothing here. What will I do with all these things? I exist as a person who has been appointed to do a job, to spread warmth and love, to spread compassion, to spread kindness, to spread unconditional love, selflessness, to spread liberation or to bring the thought of liberation to people. How many people will be liberated? It’s not my job, I don’t know.

I am bringing the thought of liberation to people. Some people may be liberated; those who are consistent and they will never change their connection. They’re always focused. They are fully clinging on; they will probably get liberated or probably because they will connect to my state or what I am and that happens to them. But there’s no guarantee here. It depends on the people. How many of them will be staying with you, fully connected to you; I do not know. I never ask.

“Are you going to stay with me?” I never ask. I even tell people, you can go now if you like. I’ve told this to people. You got what you wanted. Now you can go if you want. I never ask people to go, I have never asked anybody to go ever; I will never ask either.

So, this is exactly how I am. I think I have explained in a broad perspective, who is Mohanji in this world, what am I doing here and what is my purpose? My purpose is to bring awareness higher if I can if people are willing to accept or connect consistently. There should be consistency, without consistency nothing happens. Otherwise, it’s like a pot with a lot of holes. You pour water the whole day, but eventually, at the end of the day, there’s no water. People go to various masters, various methods, various practices, and they try to compare, criticize, judge.

Mohanji and Ganeshananda Giri Babaji

That’s not the right thing to do. I never ask people to stay with me. If some people say I found another master, please go. You have all my blessings. I never bound people to me. I will never bind. Also, I never went to any guru for something. Vittal Babaji gave me the title of Raja Rishi, Raja Yogi. I never asked. After meeting me, within 5 – 10 minutes, he gave me the title. We didn’t even discuss or I didn’t even tell him what I do in life. He said, “Oh, precious diamond, this is your title.” And he gave this ring to me from his hand. Likewise, Avadhoota Nadananda transferred his spiritual wealth to me. I never asked. I never even knew that such a thing can happen. Ganeshananda Giri, Vasudevan Swami, Devi Amma, all these masters who are deeply connected to me, they all support me, protect me, they love me not because I asked for anything. I never asked anybody for anything. I never asked for a title. I never asked for any kind of favour; nothing.

So, life is very simple. I still am that silence which I earned almost 15 years ago. I still maintain that silence. I feel some people like that silence and they get attracted to me or some people like me. Some people come because somebody else told; those people don’t stay as the connection is not direct. They have come because somebody else has come or somebody else has told them to come; that never works. If your connection is not direct, it never stays; it never happens – forever. You should feel, you should assimilate, you should connect and it should be suitable for you just like the shirt you wear. That connection should be suitable for you. You should feel good with that connection. Otherwise, it won’t stay. Never ever have a connection because of somebody’s compulsion. That will not work, especially in the path of spirituality.

I never told anybody I am their guru. I never told I’m enlightened. I’ve never told anybody I will give them something or you come here, I will make you enlightened. I don’t give such promises. I don’t want to give promises. This is all individualistic. If the wood is sufficiently dry, one spark can create fire in the wood. But if the wood is green, wet; you can use the whole matchbox but it will not catch fire. So, if dry wood comes to me, maybe they will catch fire. Again, I’m not promising. I’m only delivering as best as I can. Sometimes some people say that he doesn’t know anything. I accept that I don’t know anything. Some people say he knows a lot of things. I accept; that’s your call. Anyway, I am judged as per what they are. So, I don’t worry about it.

This is my answer.

Mohanji

 

Transcribed and proofread

by Rekha Murali

 

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A Spoonful of the Highest Knowledge – Birthday Satsang

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Know Yourself – part 2

Satsang with Mohanji-Montenegro, Luštica Bay, 17.11.2019

PART 2

Q11: Is my spiritual path real, and should I dedicate myself to the gift that I have?

M: What is spiritual path? Every moment, what happens is spirituality, not doing something apart from that. We have a body and we all feel the body. Am I right? We have a body, we agree? We have a mind, do we? We agree or not, it’s there. How do you know you have a mind? If you have emotions, you have a mind. Then we also have intellect, the analytical part. How do we know? When we start analysing, are we judging, that is also coming from the intellect. If you do that, you do have it. We also have an ego. That is definite, right? How do you know you have an ego? If somebody abuses you, do you feel hurt? Or do you feel nice? If somebody tells you, you look like a donkey, do you feel good? If you feel good, you have no ego. If you don’t feel anything then you again have no ego. If you feel angry, then it is ego working. See, we call people fools, right? We call them, you are an idiot, you are a fool.” Whom do we call like that? (Audience – to ourselves). No, to somebody who is not an idiot or a fool. When a person is actually an idiot we will not even call like that, because there is nothing to call.

So we have a body, we have the mind, we have intellect, we have an ego. When do you feel all these? When you are awake. When you sleep, you don’t know its there. In a state of dreaming, you don’t know whether you have a body, mind, intellect, or ego, you don’t know. But when you wake up, you feel all these. You see everything happening. And in our 24 hours, we have a deep sleep state, where we don’t know whether we are a man or a woman, we are like the dead. Have you ever thought, who is running this show? There is some energy in us, which is managing all these. For 24 hours it is all happening: various experiences, various emotions, various feelings, so many things are happening in every 24 hours. And, somebody is running the show. Are you with me on this?

There is an energy which is activating all these: physical, emotional, intellectual, egotistical; something is activating all of these. That is how we are gaining experiences. What do you gain from this world? Experiences. It can be good experiences or bad experiences, forget about good or bad. What is it actually? Experience. These faculties are giving you experiences because of an energy which is operating through it. Otherwise, we have no experiences. Do you agree that we have something like that? We may not know the energy, right? But there is something which is waking us up, which is taking us to our dreams, which is making us deep sleep, experience all these. So, there is something going on. That awareness is spirituality. Very simple. Awareness of the spirit body, which is the energy body within us, within ourselves, which is activating our experiences, that awareness is spirituality. So, we are all spiritual.

Nobody has to give you spirituality. We have that inside of us already. We do have it. Nobody is giving you from outside. You are only becoming aware of your energy which is already inside in you, and that awareness is spirituality. The more and more you go inside and see this, the more spiritual you become.

How do you know when you deeply connect to that energy? How can you connect to the energy part of you? By being aware. Very simple. How do you know whether you are actually connecting? When you connect deeper and deeper into your own energy, what experience you will have? Less thoughts. More feelings, you will have more feelings of yourself. When you have less thoughts, there is more peacefulness. When your mind is more peaceful, you have a high level of clarity. When you look at something, you will see through that thing. Because you are fully focused.

Do you know why our experiences are sometimes not very fulfilling? We have experiences but we don’t feel contented. Do you know why? Because the mind is scattered. The mind is not fully there. Otherwise, when you are doing a job or doing something if your mind is fully focused on that, your experience will be very good. Good in the sense that whether it is positive or negative, you will have a complete experience. Sometimes it’s sorrow, sometimes it is happiness. But, when you are fully in that, that is fulfillment. That is completion.

True spirituality is your marriage to yourself. It’s a deep relationship with yourself. You don’t need any help for that.

When I used to practice, in the early 2000s, I used to wake up every day at 2.30 am, because I used to work for a company. I had a job to do from 8:30 to almost six o’clock. During that time I worked for money, but the night was mine.  But because of the profession, sometimes travells, sometimes parties, all those things were there. But, every day, I get up early morning at 2:30; then take a bath. I had very short hair,so it was easy to take a bath; now it is not easy. Then I sit in a room, which I created for myself, just one lamp, nothing else, connecting to that and I used to connect to my own energy. Just like I said , I just tried to be inside, just to feel. My point of connection was my spine. Because we are always focused on the front: eyes, nose, everything is focused on the front. We hardly remember the spine unless we have a back pain. My whole meditation was: I connected to my spine, I feel the spine, and I sit like that for five hours, until 8 am. Everyday. After a while, the whole thing started changing. Awareness shifted. I was the head of the country. I sit in the office, I see myself doing my work. No anxiety, no fear, no stress, no ownership of action. And serious situations I faced. But I overcome all that. This is the experience you will get when you marry yourself. That marriage will last forever.

You wouldn’t even believe how powerful we become when our body, mind, intellect, and ego are all together. Because they are scattered, we don’t know. The mind is scattered on a lot of things, things of the past, many anxieties about the future. The mind is all over. Past and future, less in present. Intellect is busy analysing things. Am I progressing, is this ok, all those things. Ego – looking at the people if they are respecting me, accepting me, this is the problem. Everybody is busy with their world. We are all everywhere. When you look, you don’t see. Because your mind is not there. Eyes are looking, but the mind is not there, so we don’t see. When you bring everything together, when you look, mind, body, intellect, ego, and spirit, everything is looking. Imagine that power. It’s intense and powerful. Every experience becomes powerful. Then you don’t want a repetition. You will experience that 100%. Every point in time. Whether it is happiness or sorrow, 100%. Imagine a life like that. Every moment we are being 100%. Because body, mind, intellect, ego, and spirit – everything is together. Nothing is scattered. The past is finished. Future – whether it will happen, we will see. Right now, what we have, we do 100%.

If we live like that, every moment is powerful. Living in the moment. It happens by itself. We are not planning like that. We are not thinking like that. It happens.

Did you understand? We are all spiritual. We cannot be otherwise. The problem is that we compare, or we are thinking that religion is spirituality, that is not true. Spirituality is your connection with yourself. Religion is a road map to attain or to realise God. Religions are road maps to realise God. But spirituality is your relationship with yourself. These are two different things. If we continue between these two, we will not understand the story.

Q12: How to control emotions and our attitude?

M: How to control emotions – I would say do not try to control emotions. Be aware of them. Do you like somebody controlling you? Nobody likes it. What happens when somebody tries to control you? How do you feel? Suffocated, angry. The same things happen when you try to control your emotions. It becomes suffocated. When you suppress something, any emotion for that matter, when you push it down, its like a spring. When you take your hands off, what happens? It bounces back. It’s important that we accept those emotions as they are part of us. Anger, hatred, jealousy, all those things. If it is inside of us, we don’t know what is the reason, it doesn’t matter, whatever is the reason. If you have them, first and foremost, you need to accept them, ok they are all there. They are all my companions, partners in life. First is you accepted them, they are all sitting there. They are sitting with me, walking with me, sleeping with me, no problem.

Second level – why should I feel them? I didn’t ask them to come with me, but they are with me. After acceptance, you are not supporting them. So, what happens, when you become angry? You watch yourself becoming angry. You are becoming angry and enjoy that feeling. When you start accepting your anger as it is, it will come and it will vanish. But, when you have ownership of anger, when you actually become angry, you will know that you will become weaker. You become very weak. When you accept it, ok, this man is getting angry or this woman is getting angry or Mohanji is getting angry, I am seeing myself getting angry. But I know that I am not the anger. How would it feel? It will be very weak. Just like a mother telling a child, ”If you don’t eat medicine, I’ll punish you.” Mother is not angry with the child, but the mother is concerned. The root of that anger is love. When the foundation of your anger is love, it has purity. If it is anger out of disappointment, there is an expectation. Disappointment – anger. That is not pure, because there is an expectation. But if the expectation is not there, and it is love, in that case, that anger itself has purity. It is not sustained anger. It comes for that purpose, for intensity, and it goes. Just like a wave coming from the sea. It comes out, it goes back. It always comes like that.

The answer to all your questions is very simple – it’s YOU. If you have a lot of emotions, ask yourself, ”Have I accepted myself?” Don’t try to heal your emotions, let them come and go, no problem. But – acceptance, you have no choice. If you accept yourself 100% today as you are, freedom starts now, then you will start living a life. Otherwise, you are existing, with all the baggage. But if you accept yourself totally, with all your weaknesses and all your strengths right now, you will start experiencing freedom. You will start living, not existing.

What is the clear sign of accepting yourself? You will not compare yourself with anybody. There is nothing to compare. You will accept yourself as a complete creation. If you did not accept you will think,that guy is better than me, or I am not good enough. Complexes and all those things are because of non-acceptance.

Please understand, that you are incomparable. You can’t be compared with another person. All of us are unique. We have our own uniqueness. That is our signature.That is not comparable. If you really, really accept yourself, you don’t worry about any of the emotions coming and going, because they will all come and go, but the level of acceptance will be above everything. How do you manage your attitude? Some people have tremendous attitude. And that isolates them completely from the society. How do you manage that? Any idea, suggestion? Gratitude. Have gratitude for everything. Gratitude for being alive, gratitude for breathing, for digestion, shelter, cloths, be grateful without reason. Your ego and attitude will obey that behaviour. Gratitude is a very powerful thing, very, very powerful. It’s the opposite of ego and pride. Gratitude is very good medicine that you can eat every day. I believe that your spiritual progress will be very fast if you base it on gratitude.

When you go deeper and deeper into silence, you will start experiencing realities that you don’t normally experience. Sometimes you become very egoistic, ”I am better than the other people. I can see all these things. I have all these powers.” That is dangerous. That is the time when you start falling.

When I was going through these experiences, before something happened, I knew it will happen, and it happened. I decided, ok this is now not a good game. Because I may become very egoistic. And I will start falling. So what I was practicing was, one, gratitude and the second was insignificance, which means I am not important, not special, I am ordinary. It maintained my practices. It didn’t affect my practices. Third thing, I didn’t discuss my practice with other people nor I told what I was experiencing. So that nobody could inflate my ego or pull it down. I never spoke about it. I never discussed. When did I start speaking? Six or seven years later, after I settled down in my practices. Until then, I didn’t speak. I was not available to the world. So, everybody needs some time. We all need time to settle down. All of these things will happen. Because awareness changes, it shifts.  You will have so many different experiences, and if you become too eager to tell people, everybody will shut it down.

Q13: Do you believe that you have crossed the border of suffering? Do you think you are one with God?

M: I think it depends on how you look at me. I was saying in a television interview, that I went through a series of tragedies at one time in life. In 2000 I lost my daughter, then I lost all the money I had which I invested in a property and that man ran with the money. All my materials got stolen. Whatever I had at one time, I didn’t have in another time. I was pretty much naked and totally alone in the world at a certain point in time. After having everything and reaching a certain level in my work, I was the head of the country. At that time, I had lots of friends. My position was good, money, social status, everything was good. Then everything went away. So at that time, when I used to call some friends, they wouldn’t pick up the call. So-called friends, people who were friends with me, they wouldn’t take my call,  thinking I would need money or support from them. Then I stopped calling. But that was good. That is what I was saying in the TV interview, I didn’t complain. I understood one thing. At the end of the day, your only true friend is yourself. Other people come to you, when they need something. Mostly, not everybody. There are some people who really stand by you even in your worst times. There are people like that. And I try to be that person for everybody now. I stand by people when they are in their worst situation. Because I learned it that way. I experienced it. Then later on, I got a job and I became a CEO of the company, I got all these people back. They all came back. This is very interesting this was a case study for me. I understood life. In every situation, there is something to learn.

If you stop resisting and complaining, you can learn so many things from life. These are real lessons. I really believe it was, if you really want to become a great ornament, you have to go through fire. Gold is beaten, and put in fire, melted before it’s made into an ornament. Everybody has their parts. I decided one thing: I will never leave the hand of somebody when they are in a problem. If they are successful and they don’t need me, this is ok, I’ll leave them, I allow it. I don’t leave anybody. But in the weakest time, when you leave somebody, your integrity is a big question mark. I remain solid and stable, that is probably why a lot of people are coming to see me, wherever I go. I believe they see stability, they see consistency. I feel there are no fools in this world. There are no idiots. People have awareness, they have eyes to see. They see truth. Whatever you try to pretend, they will see the truth. I don’t pretend, I just present myself, and people connect naturally. This is what I like. I do not tell them I am close to God more than they are closed to God. Nor do I tell them I am a realised Master, I just say I am one of you. I am your friend, you can talk to me if you like to talk to me. I am always with you. This is my offering to this world. That is all I can do. I remain stable and that is the only thing I can do. There is a lot of hardship before you reach a certain level. Which level, we don’t know. What will happen tomorrow we don’t know. Today is our reality, we do the best today. That is all we can do.

How do you know the operating level of another? By their range of operation. For example, you have a night light, that can probably illuminate this room. But if you have a flat light, you can see something a mile away. A person becomes a power when he is fully aligned. His range of operation will spread all over, which nobody can deny. So, there is no need to ask somebody where they stand, look at the person and their level of operation, many people are operating from the mind level. Many people are operating from an intellect level, and so many people are operating from the ego level. When you cross over all these levels, then you become everybody and everywhere. That’s a sign you can depend on. Because I can say whatever I like, how do you know I am not lying? This is how you can understand somebody’s operating level so you are not fooled.

Q14: Did you cross the line of all forms?

M: Of course.

Q15: How to become peaceful within?
M: I answered that question. Self-acceptance. Accept yourself. Totally, with all your weakness and all your strengths.

Q16: How do I channel the creative energy from the second chakra? What to do when there is excess of this energy?  How to transform it into spiritual energy?

M: You don’t need to transform any energy into another energy. When you engage yourself into activities of positive nature, when you deliver more to the world and to the earth etc. then that energy automatically gets channelised. Each chakra is a regulator. It regulates each aspect of you. For example, the second chakra regulates the water aspect in your system. So everything to do with water of your body, it has its role. And 80% of our body has water content. So it has a big role. When you channelise your activity for a selfless purpose, automatically the second chakra will align.

Q17: Why it is difficult for me to meditate, and how to start meditating?

M: If it is difficult for you to sit down and meditate, don’t do that. Instead, what you do is make sure all your activities happen with your mind being present. That is good meditation. In every activity you do, let the mind be there. No unconscious activity. That is a good way of meditating. Then you bring yourself to yourself.

Thank you!

Transcribed by Nada Rakovic
Proofread by Shyama Jayaseelan

Know Yourself – part 1

Satsang with Mohanji-Montenegro, Luštica Bay, 17.11.2019

PART 1

How are you doing today? Thanks to all of you who have come from a long distance, from various places. We have some kind of connection, that is why we met, and we are here again. I always feel grateful when people give me time. I try to give more each time to people, to all the people who took the effort to come and meet me, I try to give them much more. That is how I feel. Because I feel grateful that we are meeting in this lifetime, this time, this space. It’s not an ordinary thing. It’s a great thing that we are all meeting, sharing the space, sharing some aspects of life. It’s interesting, isn’t it?

Q1: How to choose a life partner?

M: You know, many people have this question, that is why they choose not to have a partner. Instead, they choose puppies. It’s more consistency. Every meeting we have, there is an energy exchange. You think about every meeting in every day, we are meeting so many people. We interact with so many people. Everything has an energy exchange. Something is being exchanged. Something is shared. With some of them, we feel good. With some interactions, we don’t feel good. With some interactions, we want more. For some, we say, ”No, its enough.” This is natural. But, when we think, I must find a partner, or I must have a boyfriend or husband, we are looking at everybody as a potential candidate. But what are people? All people are a bundle of strengths and weaknesses. We all have strengths and weakness, nobody is apart from that. We usually see good things, something which we can relate to, some compatibility in a person. After that, when we are both familiar, what do we see? Only weaknesses. This is human nature. This is why you can see a lot of people married, but separated inside. They stay married probably because of children, or because of some others matters, but they are divorced inside. That is because when you are becoming too familiar with somebody, you only start seeing the weaknesses. But we also have a good quality: when people die, we forgive them. Then we are happy. All the weaknesses are forgiven. But when living, we have pain.
Now I will come to your question, this is the background. How can you find somebody who is compatible with you, and stable with you? This is the question, right? The secret of a successful relationship is – have nothing to do with the other. If you put freedom as the ingredient in a relationship, the relationship will have no problem. But if freedom is not given in the relationship, it hurts. If you are mature enough to keep your partner free, you will find your best partner; the best possible partner, because you will not be worried about his strengths and weaknesses. You will love companionship, you are meeting because of some reason, let it be any reason. But, if you put freedom as an ingredient in the relationship, not ownership, not possessiveness, only freedom, then you will have a great relationship. So, the secret of a successful relationship is giving freedom to the other. Just allowing them to be free, to be themselves. Then it will last forever.

Q2: Thank you in advance. Even though I earn sufficient money, I cannot keep that money. I always spend everything I earn.

M: Congratulations (laughs). What is the question? This is a statement actually. Well, the nature of money is movement. Money is energy. It is transactional, it moves, it has to move. If money is not moving, it is useless, right? I remember an example. Maybe this is not a very good example, but just to tell you about how we cling on to money.
Barbara and I were in Vietnam, in town Da Lat. A lady said, ”You must come to my house.” It was to see her mother, who was in her death bed, sick, but not dying. For six months she had been lying like that, she was not leaving. Everybody was waiting because she was not well. She was supposed to die, but she was not dying, she was waiting. I went there, I saw her, and she was holding a bunch of money in her hand and lying there. There were clear signs of death: her breath was going up all the way, and suddenly it holds. I could see that the soul really wanted to leave, but something was holding her back – this bunch of money in her hand.
I asked her daughter, ”What should I do, what do you want me to do?” She said, ”You bless her, so she has a smooth death.” I said, ”I cannot bless anybody to die. I don’t do that. I will probably release her from the bindings, but I cannot tell when she should die. That is up to the soul to leave a body, whenever it wants, I will not interfere.” I just took the money from her hand. Suddenly she looked at me. Until then, her eyes were up, but suddenly she looked at me, as something precious had gone. With the weak hand, she tried to come towards the money, but I didn’t allow it. I gave the money to her daughter, and I touched her third eye. That night she left the body.
We have no idea how many things around us don’t allow us to leave free. So the answer to the question or the statement is: You understand money is coming – thank you very much; you understand money is going – thank you very much. Just watch both as you are just an actor in this whole drama of flow. Then, when you are not thinking it is your own money, it is happening through you, you will start seeing that the right amount of money will always be stored. Did you understand this point? What is the difference here? When money comes, money doesn’t stay, money goes – its a pattern, which means that is the way you are. It is a pattern that is working without any control. You are not controlling anything. You just allow it to happen.

Patterns happen due to ownership. It’s my money – ownership is me and mine. Now, you look at it as it is happening, I am an actor, I am watching this show. Zero ownership. What will happen? The pattern will dissolve. A pattern means ownership. When you do not own it, the pattern dissolves. This is the same for everything in life. Anything which is coming, again and again, is a pattern. When you detach within, ok, it’s happening, then no problem. When a pattern is dissolved, things change. Have you seen any animal in nature insecure? You won’t see it. They are not worried about tomorrow’s food. No bird is worried about the next day’s food. They do not store anything, thinking tomorrow there will be no food. I am not talking about animals in the house, because they are as insecure as you are. In nature, you will see no insecurity. You will never see a bird or an animal betraying another one. These are all our possessions. As human beings, we have all these things. If you want to change any pattern, not only money pattern, you need to detach from that whole thing, me and mine, and look at it. This is happening, let it come, let it go, but it is not mine. I am not owning it. Ownership keeps patterns.

Q3: How to overcome fear and the need to control everything in life?

M: That is again connected to me and mine. Most of the things connected to life, which is blocking our progress, will be me and mine. Have you seen it? Most sorrows, most insecurities are connected to me and mine. Fear is a state where you have no faith. What is the medicine for fear? Faith. Faith in oneself, in yourself. If you decide that you will look into the eyes of your fears, all the fears will go. Because fears are like shadows. They need something else to depend on.
In the movie Rambo, with Silvester Stalone, a man says, ”You can’t defeat him (Rambo), because he is trained to survive.” We can train ourselves to be fearless. How? By increasing your awareness. What is awareness? Firstly – the awareness that everything that is born will die. If you are born, there is a certain death. While we are walking on this earth we are just on a tourist visa. We have a duration. Secondly – the world existed before us and the world will exist after our death. Third is that – only when we wake up in the morning we have a world outside, when we sleep, we do not have the world outside. Our world depends on whether we are awake to the world. There are a few more things, but most important is that everything that comes will go. In other words, nothing is permanent. Life means changes. We were very small sometime earlier, a few years ago, now we have become this size. Every time the body has changed, the mind has changed, everything has changed. All things have changed. We were B-shaped sometimes, now we are A-shaped. Everything changes. Why do we have to keep fears? If you look at fears in the eyes, they will vanish. They will all dissolve. There is no room for fear. And one way you can be sure fears don’t bind you is to lead a life of love, purity, and purpose.

When you wake up in the morning (I normally do this when I wake up in the morning), think, what else can I give this world? Even if I fail, I have no fear. I try my best. What else can you give this world? Instead when you wake up and say,”What will people give me?” Then you will have all the problems. Otherwise, we will not have problems. I said, ”What else we can give,” that means we should continue giving. But in the morning every day, think what more we can give so that we are always self-motivated. Even if you fall down, you get up and walk again. Otherwise, if we have a lot of expectations, there will be a lot of disappointments. And eventually life will be paralyzed, because of disappointments.

Q4: How to prevent negative emotions towards people with whom we have a conflict?

M: Emotions you can’t control. It happens, right? We don’t choose to have negative emotions, but it happens sometimes. My recipe is very simple, I increase my positivity. Of course, it’s not easy to control emotions, is it easy? When the emotion happens, it’s like a wave. It comes and takes over. You can’t do anything, and it is like a pendulum on the clock, its positive-negative, life goes like that. Each day goes that way. But, predominantly every day, if we have more positive activity; that is the way you can come out of these negative days. Of course, there are people who are heavy with negativity in our society, we can’t avoid them. That’s part of the society. But if you spend sufficient time with very positive people you can manage both. That is why in Sanskrit there is a beautiful saying, If you indulge in the company of good people, people of positive nature, you will learn to detach from negative things around you. When you start detaching from so many things around you, whether it is negative or positive, you are fine with the nice energy of good people. When you detach, then your desires also become weaker. When desires are more, you are never satisfied. When desires are less, you are contented. So, peacefulness and contentment happen inside. Just by your association with people of higher energy, positive nature. What happens when desires are lesser in the mind? The mind goes into silence. What is the sound of the mind? Thoughts. Where are thoughts coming from? Desires. When desires become lesser and lesser, the mind becomes calmer and quieter. When the mind is calmer, what happens? You become the master of your own life. What is the secret here? Connection, integration with positive energies. That’s why we love to be in the company of the people who are positive, right? Because naturally, we feel good. We feel nice, comfortable. But please understand, society is both, positive – lighter, and negative – dark and heavy. You can’t avoid it. We are all existing. You cannot say I only choose this, you have to choose everything. Try to maintain good relationships, good company with powerful and positive people. Even it is painful to maintain the company, sometimes it is not easy, but it is worth it. Because that is your antidote, your medicine.
Another point is to express compassion, practice compassion. Do something for your society all the time, whatever you can. Keep sharing. Keep giving. When you do that, automatically your energy levels will be higher. You can counter, or you can sustain or survive so many negative things.

Q5: Do all experiences that happened to us come from God so that we learn a lesson and become better people, or are they a result of our decisions?

M: I can answer it, but it depends on what we believe on. Everything depends on what we believe in. Our whole life is based on our beliefs. When I say what we believe in, if we believe in God with a form just like a human form, he is watching everything we do, and says, you have done good, or you have not done good, etc. and gives accordingly, this is ok. You are fine in that mode, you live with those rules. In some systems we have a God outside of us, who is looking at us and is saying this is ok, this is not ok etc.
In some systems we connect to ourselves and we go into the level of silence and we experience inside, there is something inside of us telling us, ”Don’t do this, you can do that.” This is all connected to beliefs; what we believe in, what our belief system is. As a general thumb rule, this is a natural phenomenon – when you do good things and when you do positive work, many positive things come to you. Life becomes positive.
In the Indian system, or in Buddism, we talk about karma. What is karma in simple terms? Let’s say, unfulfilled desires. Desires which need fulfillment. That causes birth. Where you were born, how you are born, what you have, what you don’t have, it’s all connected to karma. And your duration of life is also connected to it, time of birth, time of death, everything is like that. But how is karma created? Unfulfilled desires, as I said earlier, but karma is created by actions with ownership. If you feel that I am the doer, that ‘I’ creates karma. Imagine, we have no ownership, we have only an awareness, where we say, ”It is all happening through me,” I am not owning it, I am experiencing it every day. Then no ownership, no karma. That doesn’t mean you go and kill somebody and say, ”I did not do it, my hands did it,” it won’t work. That is not what I mean. When you understand, when you are not emotional about ownership, ‘this is mine, this is me,’ if that is not there, then desires become weak. What is the best way to lead a very simple life? First and foremost, you have to accept yourself completely with all your strengths and weakness. Total acceptance. Nothing else. Not half, but 100%. Accept yourself totally.
Second, do not own, do not have feelings of ownership. You may have so many possessions, so many relations, so many things, but do not have ownership – this is mine, and a kind of craving to keep everything for yourself, which really weakens you, makes you more and more insecure. If that happens, you will have whatever you have, but you will be free and you will be happy.

The third aspect is – remember that when you came here, you had nothing in your hands. When you go from here, you will still have nothing in your hands. Even this body, we have to leave here. If we remember that, we are free. That is why I always believe when we take flowers, give it to the people while they are alive, not going and putting it in the graveyard after death. Respect people, love people and do whatever you can for the people when they are alive so that they can enjoy it. After death, whatever we do, how will they know? Love today. Express love today. Care today. Everything today. Tomorrow we don’t know whether we will be alive to do all that.

Q6: When I will start to drive a car on my own?

M: It depends on your horoscope (laughs). If you believe in yourself, you can. It is about believing in yourself. If you really believe in yourself you can even drive a flight, or even a rocket.

Q7: What should a mother know who is raising her son on her own?

M: Being a mother is a very powerful experience. It is a big opportunity. Because you have a relationship with your child nine months more than society. So your responsibility is nine times more than that of society. Having said that, please remember, each child is an individual. They have a constitution, a character, they have their likes and dislikes, patterns, concepts, so many different things which they have brought. I believe that mothership should be like a friendship. There should be respect, not like a servant serving somebody, it’s like a friendship where you can discuss, you can understand each other. Discuss, talk and make powerful people.

If we are clear how responsible we should be, for every citizen of the world, it means every human being. Imagine 7.5 billion people on earth. Each person is responsible for others. The society is responsible for everybody, for every child. Why? Because every child learns and takes from society, just like every mother, every father, everybody. We are all interconnected. Our responsibility is for our species, across the species. It doesn’t matter which country, which nationality, which culture or color. We are all responsible for everybody. If we don’t take responsibility, nature will wipe us off. Like a virus. Nature has wiped off dinosaurs and mammoths, so many species have been wiped off. If we don’t take responsibility for our own species, our species can also become extinct. If this responsibility is executed form the level of motherhood, every child will be powerful. The world will have a good generation. How we can bring up a child? What is the right way? One word – respect. Love is part of respect. When you respect somebody you will definitely love.
I always say, today we see so many old age homes in the world. Why is that? Actually the parents should be in our houses, right? But we don’t have that. Instead, they are in old ages homes. Why? Because we are disconnected. We don’t feel connected. Either the parents are like the servants, or they dominate, both are not good. There should be a friendship, where everybody can be together. We must develop that culture of togetherness. We should cultivate a generation with respect, based on respect. So next year, the slogan for Mohanji Foundation globally is, ‘Self-respect through self-discipline.’ Self -discipline is more or less like no excess of anything, that means a healthy lifestyle.

Q8: Can we know what is good for our child?

M: Of course. It depends on the nature of the child. All children have their own nature. We all have our own nature. We like something, we don’t like something. If you understand the nature of the child, what he likes to do, just support him. Dragan is training Ena in tennis. She loves tennis. So, that is natural for her. Your strength is what you are natural about. We all have our strengths and weaknesses. What is natural for us means what is effortless for us. That is our strength. If we support that, we will become successful. But in the society, we look at our child with other children and think, our child should be like that child. Then we completely ignore the naturality of that child, that is where the conflicts happen. Every person has a nature which is yours, your own. If you understand that, that is your strength. For that, you need to connect to yourself and see that in your own children. Just watch and witness them. What is spontaneous for them, strengthen that, support that. And the child will be really, really solid and stable in society.

Q9: Does truth have a boundary?

M: Absolute truth has no boundaries. Relative truth has. What is relative truth? A truth that is different between us about something. If you see one thing, I see another thing, it is relative truth. What is absolute truth? We all see the same thing. Relative truth changes with time. Absolute truth never changes. One absolute truth is that whatever is born will die. It’s an absolute truth. What is the relative truth? Everybody dies at their time. This is individualistic.

Q10: How do I know I am on the right path?
M: You will be effortless about it. If you are on the right path, you will love to do that. If it is full of effort, and if it is difficult, then you think again. If you are on the right path, you will flow through it. It is so effortless. Even the right relationships. It is like that. It will be easy and effortless. Whatever needs a lot of effort to continue and be consistent is not the right path for you. When you are connecting with somebody or when you are practicing something, or even you go to a place or you meet a person, if you feel nice and if you feel natural that is the right thing. Because you have a nature, everybody has their nature, and every activity has its nature. If there is compatibility between all these, then that is the right thing for you. If it is not, walk away. Don’t be there.

Transcribed by Nada Rakovic
Proofread by Shyama Jeyaseelan