We have spoken about alternative realities in the past. Today, let’s touch upon the subject of illusions. We have heard time and again that the world is an illusion. How can the world be an illusion? It’s so tangible; it’s so real. It creates emotions, so it can’t be illusions. But the truth is, we see the world as we are. If we are in a very romantic mood, we see the whole world as being romantic. When we are pessimistic, we see the world as being pessimistic. When we are happy, we see the world also as happy. When we have sorrows, we see the world as being full of sorrows.
So, what is the real world? We really do not know. The world is as it is, and it reflects our state, how we are, how we think, or how we feel. The world just reflects it. Various masters and people have told about some of the realities which are not so tangible, like Kailash, like the Siddha Loka inside Arunachala (Tiruvannamalai, TamilNadu, India); all those worlds which we can possibly see in certain states or frequencies. They reflect as we are too.
Lahiri Mahasaya was initiated by Babaji in a beautiful palace, with gold and diamonds and all sorts of riches. But the morning after the initiation, there wasn’t anything. This was an illusion, but it was real and tangible at that time. Likewise, when we have divine romance brimming inside us, when we see the world of Shiva-the Kailash, it’s beautiful, deeply enchanting and highly intoxicating!
At the same time, when we are in a mood of despair or when we are not so happy, or even if we are a bit terrestrially influenced, we see Kailash as murky, grey, and snow. So, this is exactly how our views are. We see Kailash as murky, grey, like ashes, just a snow-clad mountain; we may not even see inside that mountain. The world – the Shiva Loka inside, cannot be easily accessed; it’s not easy to access. You should reach a level of elevation, a frequency so that you can access it. But that’s squarely up to the blessings and grace of the Lord of Kailash, or (you would have to reach) the frequency that would suit us to enter that space. It’s all about frequencies.
Everywhere, wherever you are, wherever you go, it’s about frequency; whether you’re able to access Siddha Loka or Naga Loka, or Shiva Loka; Loka means the world. The world of all these frequencies; it’s that, we have to gain that level, or we have to attain that level of frequency. Otherwise, we can only see, not understand. We may not even be able to see if our frequency is much denser. We would only see the immediate, the gross.
We have to gain a lot of subtlety through chanting, through purifications, through practices, to reach the levels of subtlety where we can actually witness. When we go to Vrindavan, for us to see Lord Krishna playing his Rasa Leela, we must have subtlety; we must see the world through subtle eyes. It’s possible; it’s not an illusion.
Then what is an illusion there? The illusion is that we see the world only as we are. This is the main illusion. That means we do not see reality. So, when do we get to see the reality? When we completely merge with the Supreme Consciousness, unchangeable, pure brightness.
Once you merge with that brightness, brighter than a million suns there is no illusion anymore – you are brightness. You are one with brightness, just like a drop falling into the ocean and becoming the ocean, you completely dissolve back into your original state. That means pure consciousness; that pure consciousness already sits in you as your Atma tattva, the principle called the soul. Atma tattva is our walking reality, no illusion, it is reality. It is not relative. It’s real. If we are able to find the Atma tattva within, then we are able to access a world without illusions. No parallel realities, no illusions, no imaginations or hallucinations, it is reality, all the time. In that mode, your operating platform will be that of unconditional love, peace within, no thoughts, happiness.
Think about this. I wish you a great day ahead, and I wish you great success in life.
Hello friends. Today, I have been thinking about our limiting beliefs. I think I have already told you about the story of how a wild elephant is tamed by the trainers to use them in various capacities. The first and foremost is that freedom is limited. In the wild, they are wild and free; they can do whatever they want. They roam around as they like, and elephants usually live in groups, they are social beings, very intelligent beings. When an elephant is caught, it’s tough to discipline it. What these trainers do is to tie a very tight rope on their hind legs and leave them like that. The elephant does its best to break free, pulling at the rope all the time. And it starts getting injuries because of friction. The frictional injuries start to grow as the days go by. The trainers do not try to heal them; they just leave it like that. And the pain would be tremendous; continuous and consistent pain because of injuries in the hind legs. Then and the elephant stops pulling it because it hurts when it pulls. The elephant drops it and doesn’t pull anymore. It understood that these ropes could not be broken. And if he pulls, it gives pain and suffering. So, the elephant surrenders.
Afterwards, the tame elephant is used for various entertainments or utility matters. But they are tame; they obey the tiny human much lesser in size, and much lesser in strength than itself. But the initial limiting belief, which the trainers were able to give the elephant, stays on forever. Limiting beliefs are the point. We all have limiting beliefs, just like this elephant. Some traumatic memory from the past, its corresponding agony, the feeling, the helplessness and associated emotions and memories that we carry leads us or binds us with our limiting beliefs, and it works through the whole life.
We shy away from many things of life. We fail to achieve only because of our limiting beliefs. This is the truth. We must understand that all these limiting beliefs apart, we are as wild, free and strong as a normal elephant would be in the forest. We should be successful in our daily life. And we should also be a significant part of our society by delivering as per our capacities positively to society. Sometimes these limiting beliefs are so hidden that we don’t even recognize them. It needs introspection, needs contemplation.
How many times, how many situations we could not handle because of our limiting beliefs? Try to understand. Sometimes limiting beliefs are given by our parents, our teachers or society. Sometimes limiting beliefs are given by religions; all of them create an almost similar effect. We have seen that over history. Limiting beliefs have taken away great opportunities for great progress in human existence. This is very important to understand, limiting beliefs exist, and limiting beliefs are really, really important to understand and come out of.
We are supremely powerful. Nothing can stop us from doing our good work in the world. I always tell my people, the people who believe in me, we are powerful as a team, and our intention is always pure. We do not want to harm anybody; we have no violence in us; we do not have anger, hatred, jealousy, revenge in us, because they contaminate our inner space. We only have love; we have compassion; we have kindness. This is very strong. And these are very powerful. Compassion is powerful; kindness is powerful.
To have the strength and to have discipline – power without discipline can create havoc. Power without discipline creates atomic bombs which destroy an entire race. We saw the devastation that happened in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. But today, we have much larger, much more destructive atomic capacities with us to wipe out entire mankind. We must observe restraint, we must accept love, and we must be compassionate and kind. Just imagine having great strength, great power and exercising great kindness, how it will be. It can be very transformative for the entire human race. Having great power, and having great strength and capacities, but using it for dividing, harming, or destroying, literally shakes the root of our species.
Nature has given us all the options. Nature has given us everything. And nature continues to provide us, to experience and execute it. We have to be realistic. We have to be responsible. And we have to lead a life of purity and harmony, like one of those great Lamas, who was arrested and imprisoned and tortured by the Chinese authorities after they invaded Tibet. When he was released, he told about his time in the prison. Apparently, it was very torturous; it was very disturbing for him, for his equilibrium, because they tried their best to break him down. As always, as a prisoner of war, he was tortured almost every day for 25 years.
When he was asked, did you have fears, he said yes because a truly spiritual person will have no fears. There is no room for fears. If you’re really walking the path of purity, you should be fearless. God can be loved because God sits in you as your soul factor. God is to be loved; God is love. So, Lama said, I had fears. Three times it appeared in the canvas of my mind. Each time it was the fear that I may end up hating the oppressors, the guys who are torturing him. And that can cause inner contamination. I didn’t want anything to do with inner contamination. That fear happened trice.
To maintain the purity, you need constant vigil. You’ve got to make sure every day, every moment that anger, hatred, jealousy, revenge, or any emotions which are draining and negative by nature should not enter your mind. You should be free from all that. This is important. This is vital.
Fear binds you, so you must practice fearlessness. Anything which gives you the fear of anything should be avoided because one fear leads to another fear. Fear binds, and fear distorts our vision. It’s important to know to understand that we are born free, and we have every right to exercise our highest potential and possibility of existence while we are living on Earth. Life has got to be lived. Life has got to be experienced. Life has given us an opportunity to attain the highest possibility of human existence. We must make use of that, not existing like bricks on the wall. It’s living a full life. We have the capacity, and we have the ability.
I’ll leave these thoughts in your plate today. Contemplate on it and discuss it.
Hello, my dear friends. Today, I would like to answer a question, connected to our Power of Purity meditation. What are the signs of unhooking? One of the key purposes of the Power of Purity meditation is to unhook from the past; from the bindings, from the attachment and from anything which prevents you from progressing in your connection with yourself. So unhooking is one of the primary aims of the Power of Purity. We unhook from various things.
The question is, “What are the usual effects of unhooking?”
I’ll give you certain thoughts, upon which you can ponder, expand, and also check within to see if some of these things have happened to you. If yes, it means that you have actually done this meditation, with full concentration and full application.
So, here is the science of unhooking: primarily, there will be overall mental freedom. You will feel free when you forgive and forget the past. There is no way that we can feel free when we are burdened by the past.
Forgiving and forgetting are essential for our own sake. The Forgiveness Process that we have created and uploaded on the website is because it is essential to move forward in the path of liberation.
Similarly, the Power of Purity meditation will help you release many of those bindings and hooks from the past and keep you steady and going in the Path of Liberation. So you will feel overall mental freedom; the past is buried and settled, or the past is well disposed of. You are free in the present, and the future will be better.
The second point is that you will refrain from judging, interfering, criticizing, gossiping, and scandalizing people at any point in time. Because you will know that all are carrying their own burdens, and you have nothing to do with it. You are carrying your burden of the past, your burden of desires, your burden of anxieties and fears; you’re carrying so many things. But so is everyone, all people.
So, why do we compare? Why do we judge? Why do we criticize another? We are the same, in different forms, but we are the same. We are all a bundle of patterns; we are all a bundle of desires and a bundle of inclinations and tendencies. Everybody is the same; nobody is immune to any of this. Then why do we judge, criticize compare, and compete? We will stop doing all that, that’s a clear sign of progress.
We would not care too much about material possessions and positions. We will have them; we will enjoy them; we will appreciate them. We will be fully involved in them, but at the same time, we will have clarity that they are all temporary. Time brings things; time takes things away. So we will not be too happy, nor will we be too disappointed. If we give too much importance on things temporary, the result is a disappointment. So when you continuously, consistently, practice the Power of Purity, you may not have many disappointments.
Another aspect is, you will have deep remembrance of higher purpose. That means, what is real for you in this lifetime? Is it just what it seems to be? Is it this illusory world, where you have possessions and positions? Or is there something better you can do in life? At least that thought will come. What exactly am I supposed to do? And the answer also will come. What capacity do you have? What skill or knowledge or experience do you have? What disposition do you have? What kind of motivation you have?You will work accordingly.
It is incomparable;some people have great motivation to do great work on Earth; some have medium motivation to do some work on Earth; some people will have no motivation. So, they have to follow a master, or they have to follow guidance from somebody, and they have to walk in the steps, which are suitable for them. And the people who have medium motivation also should be associated with something that will motivate them to do more. Those who have great motivation can lead other people to the right way of life.
Another aspect is self-inspiration, just for the sake of it; Self-inspiration for doing great things in the world. Whatever your field is, you can do well in your own chosen field. You can do well in your own life. You can perfect yourself as much as you can, in your own life. Actually speaking, we have limited time on Earth, and we do not have the luxury of expanding or contracting our time. So, what is the best thing to do? Be inspired to do your best every day; self-inspiration. Self-inspiration also comes when we are unburdened from the past; when we are not prejudiced. We are not sitting around, and gossiping about people, talking bad, character assassinating, and contaminating our inner space. When we do not do such things, we have self-inspiration; we will be focused on what we can do for this world or give to this world, share with the world.
Self-motivation, that is one of the advantages when you’re unburdened, unhooked.
Another aspect is deep acceptance; along with it (unhooking) comes the acceptance of everyone and everything. In other words, we are contented with what we have. It is this feeling of gratitude with what we have, and we feel good with everybody and everything.
It’s not that you become a doormat and accept all the hits and wears and tears from society. Instead, it is simply through deep acceptance of yourself and everybody and everything around you, will be contented; you’ll be happy. This happens when you unhook from the past. This is another point.
We have our complexes – inferiority complex, superiority complex, all sorts of complexes. Along with those, we have our fears; we have our anxieties; we have prejudices; we have patterns; they become simplified. Many of them dissolve or at least reduce. You can see the patterns reducing, its impact is less, and you can feel a difference, some lightness in yourself.
Then, another effect is reconciliation with oneself – the past, the people from the past. As I said when you unhook, you are reconciled. You accept things as they are. You remove guilt; you remove regrets; that makes you light. When you bless people, when you unhook yourself from all those things, of the past, which are unnecessary to maintain; this means you don’t have to maintain them; when all these things are unhooked or removed, reconciliation happens, and you will feel light and beautiful.
You feel good inside. You will feel the beauty of yourself, within yourself. And essentially, because the past is all reconciled, you will live in the present time. And that’s the only time you have; the future has not yet happened – the present, this here now. And that’s what you have; you will be fully in the present, no regret, no guilt; no anxiety over the future, either. That’s a very great feeling; feeling light; feeling pure; feeling good.
And when you are reconciled with yourself, and you’ve accepted yourself fully, you will feel one with all materials and beings around you, people around you. Times and states, emotions and various flavours of life, will be fine with you because you will experience everything as you are, with full capacity, and you know very well whatever has come, will also go. Nothing stays forever.
The understanding of impermanence will help you a lot in saving yourself from disappointments. So, you will experience that.
Once the mind is settled, the mind is not disturbed; the mind is not ridden by regrets and guilt, fears and phobias, likes and dislikes prejudices, comparisons, a feeling of injustice in life. When all these things have settled and are removed, you will start connecting more and more to your soul principle, S-O-U-L principle, which is the driving force within you. That is the most silent, the most permanent aspect of you. You will start experiencing the soul principle, better.
Another aspect the society may notice in you is because you have reconciled with yourself, you have become a full unit, and the corresponding power and presence increase. When you are not distracted, when you are stable, when you are aligned, your power and presence increase multiple folds. And this will be reflected in the society; the society will see it. The society will experience a change and transformation in you, and you will definitely shine bright. This can happen only when you practice it consistently, every day, or maybe even twice a day, if possible. And you should have the conviction that there is bound to be a great transformation.
Let it take time, but it will happen, eventually. When you have reconciled with yourself, when you’ve accepted yourself when you have accepted the world around you, you will be filled with humility, gratitude, compassion, and you will not pretend anymore; no pretensions. You have no artificiality; you are not artificial at all, because you are yourself. You are well-grounded. There is no burden of the past, such as regrets, guilt, and no burden of the future, which are anxieties, fears, phobias, and prejudices. You have accepted yourself. You accepted society. You have unhooked yourself from all the bindings. There is no hypocrisy anymore. There are no masks anymore. There’s purity written well on your face. There is confidence. Powerful presence. Thus if you’re unhooked, you will live in freedom. You will love; you will be totally romantic because life is an eternal, divine romance. It’s not a man – woman romance. It’s romancing the entire existence. Seeing the beauty of love in every creation; the beauty of love, within you and outside of you, everywhere, and you will see bright, look bright, you will be bright and shining all the time.
I hope this is clear, there is much more to it, but I think this is sufficient for you to understand what unhooking means and what unhooking will give you as a gift.
Today, I would like to discuss with you the philosophy that I have followed for a long time. Just like many of you, I have been a rebel, and I was quite passionate about various situations in society; and I had the will and the need to express it as an activist. I did not participate in many activist activities, but I had strong opinions; I still hold some of them. I do have a strong opinion about any kind of bloodshed.
I do not endorse bloodshed. I do not endorse wars. I do not like canned hunting or hunting of any kind. I strongly object to the killing of beings. I do not approve of corruption. I do not approve any kind of negativity in thoughts, words, or actions. These are a few of the things which I do not endorse at all. There are some more.
But the point that I would like to tell you is that we have two ways to approach life or live a good life. One is through acceptance that there are varieties in the world; so many different things, people, diversity. Each person, or each community, or similar activity can bind people together. Each community has its own expression. Each person has his own expression; societies have their expressions.
We are living in a world of great variety; our languages are different, our food habits are different. Our likes and dislikes are also oriented to our upbringing. There are different religions, and that’s mostly connected to what we are used to. And we conglomerate, we become clans, we come together because we like it or we are used to it. Mostly, it is not what we like; but what we are used to, which is comfortable. We are used to a certain diet, and that’s comfortable for us. We are used to a certain language, which is comfortable for us, and so on. It’s not a question of whether this is the right or wrong thing happening in our lives; it is as it is.
Our language, mother tongue is beautiful for us; another person will feel the same for his mother tongue. Life thus goes on. We have two options here, acceptance and resistance. What happens with acceptance? When acceptance happens, the mind is stable. Acceptance does not mean that you accept everything like a doormat. I’ll explain that further.
When acceptance happens, transformation happens because we start accepting everything around us. For that, we have to start with accepting ourselves, and we should appreciate that there is a variety of things around us. If these are harmless to society, harmless to the world, we can accept them. Thus acceptance automatically brings a kind of approval. We agree with so many things, and that leads us to have greater stability in mind. The mind is stable and peaceful.
Resistance, activism leads to violence; disapproval is predominant because of what we disapprove in society. We are against it; we are fighting it, our mind is fully occupied with the disagreements. We have the right to approve and disapprove. We don’t have to approve everything in life. We can approve what suits us, or what stabilizes us.
I always approve of what is nonviolent. I’m a very strong advocate of nonviolence in thoughts, words, and actions.
I normally approve, or I agree with anything, which has no violence involved in it. No violence, no manipulation, no corruption, etc.; I easily approve them. Where there is discrimination, there is violence; there is division; all those things that separate people, I do not approve of them; I disagree with them. So we have the right to disagree.
But how can we approach it? I like to bring the awareness of people, to the level of their highest potential refinement. We are a refined species because our existence is connected to our intelligence. With most of the other species, their existence is connected to how they are made or their physical mettle.
Our strength is our intelligence. How do we express the higher refinement in social life, in daily life? It is very simple: express the highest level of compassion, kindness, selflessness, and unconditional love; total acceptance of the society, through acceptance, through love, goodness factor, kindness factor, righteousness factor; by binging all these into our lives, we transform society.
By fighting against it, or by being an activist, there are dimensions where it could be very inconvenient. The system may attack us, victimize us being an activist; we have seen that happening. Various activists could not survive the course of time because they had been victimized, by the established system.
We have to understand these methods. One is through acceptance, being a pro-life, and through resistance, being against something, a life of conflicts; will that happen, or not in the world? It is happening; it will happen because people are a variety. What we would like to do is to bring awareness to the level where corruption completely dissolves, violence totally dissolves; no wars, no bloodshed, no displacement, no hunting, no killing; no bloodshed of any kind. And a life where beings of all species can live their whole life peacefully, without any fear of any predator. By saying this, I do not mean that there are no lions, or there are no tigers, or there are no crocodiles. All beings exist, all the creations have their dharma, their method of life, and they will follow it. The reason for this is because of ecology, or the balance of the beings in nature. So that will happen. And we have to allow nature to be natural.
That apart, I’m only talking about the human intervention side. We should stay away; we should keep our hands off nature and leave nature to itself. It will beautifully work its way. We have to be in the system to change the system. What we can change in the system is the greed factor, the manipulative mind factor, manipulating for the sake of dominance, or we can guide people to be humans, towards positivity – this is the point here, always positive. This way, we can bring the awareness of the people to the idea that love, kindness, mercy, and good things, or good feelings can really transform the world. Imagine generations coming together on the platform of love, acceptance and companionship, care and share. They can’t create anything adverse to it, because their minds are all focused on the higher refinement of human existence; being totally human. The goodness factor, righteousness factor, kindness, unconditional love, mercy, compassion, righteousness, and the conscious maintenance of conscience; these should come together. I have explained earlier that conscience is the bridge between our conscious state and our soul. So this conscience should be well maintained; if the bridge is well maintained, we can cross over easily to the soul particle or the soul aspect/principle.
The maintenance should be very well organized; we should maintain our conscience; we should not do anything beyond or against our conscience. If we nurture it as a person, a group of people, a society, a community, a country, we can bring forth huge changes in the world. For example, we have been given good, non-polluting powers for our sustenance such as sun rays, wind, water; they all have power, and this power can be well used so that we can have a very good life, without polluting the Earth.
We do not need fossil fuel. We can make a big difference in the world. This COVID situation has brought forth great possibilities of having a pollution-free existence, a pollution-free environment. COVID taught us that this is possible. But why have we not been thinking about this before? Habitual, native existence. Natural existence, which is, we thought, “Okay, pollution is fine! We have to live in pollution.” We thought so even though we have been talking about global warming, climate change, the forest fires; all of which are very destructive and not conducive to human existence. We created hell on Earth because of our greed factor, and we know this very well! Do you think we could fight it and solve it? I doubt it! It’s like jumping into the fire and burning ourselves completely. Instead, through awareness, through life itself, through our own life, through our own thought process, through our own conviction, we can transform the world. And this is very important to understand because by being against, by resisting, by fighting against, we are burning ourselves. And another point is that activists will definitely get a lot of support because of the noise and the movement; birds of the same feather (flock together). I’m not against activism. I know it exists and that it has to because there are people who would like to make noise; otherwise, people wouldn’t know.
But what is the right way to do it; without harming people, without harming the environment, without harming the mind, without harming our conscience? We can bring the right, elected people to represent us and make a difference in society through the right laws, right actions, and right methods which would be progressive, rejuvenating, and proactive towards a better life; a better world, a world, which is peaceful, unpolluted, uncontaminated, where everybody is living a peaceful existence.
While saying this, am I accepting all the bad things happening, by bad I mean those activities that are harmful to the world? Absolutely not! I do not endorse 5G. I do not endorse the frequencies which are harming lives on Earth. I’ve been told by scientists; I have read that 5G is not suitable for any kind of being on Earth. All these frequencies can create a different frequency which affects our brains. Beings will behave in strange ways because their brains are affected. Water pollution, air pollution, earth pollution, plus all these barriers have created caste, country, culture, colour, religions; so many barriers that we see, a lot of walls; and we have 190- 200 countries in the world.
What is human refinement? One world, One family is human refinement.
We should be together. We should love each other, and through love and through nurturing, we bring forth a better world. This world is possible, and this is our responsibility. I would like to reiterate that our method, especially as Yogis, those who walk the path of Yogis, is to lead a life and lead by example that through positive thinking, positive actions, and by giving forth positivity, we can transform the minds of people, towards the highest human refinement.
What is the problem with activism? Activism, there is no problem. This is a group of people coming together for a purpose, that’s fine. But please remember, they could be victimized by the system, that is number one. And there could be divisions happening – pro or against. We have to choose between being pro or against. It’s not that. We can choose a different thing. We do not have to be pro or against anything. Instead, we can bring forth our life, with deep conviction in compassion; real adherence to our conscience, and being human. We can make a difference, and through our literature, etc., instead of fighting something, we can bring awareness to the minds of people.
If there is no demand, there won’t be any supply. Our demand or the demand that we create is creating the requirement for all these unnatural inventions. If we cultivate generations based on love, compassion, kindness, and no corruption, no greed, no jealousy, no anger, hatred, if we can bring that awareness into the lives of people of Earth, generations will be happy. When the greed factor is removed, there won’t be manipulations. There is no need to manipulate minds. When the profit factor, predominantly controlling the markets, are taken away, or diluted, we will be more ethical. To have an ethical existence, we must cultivate higher awareness. There’s no other way. We have to lead by example; we have to live it.
We can easily endorse fighting against something. Fighting brings in some elements of violence in our minds; it could be any kind of fight or disagreement. We should avoid violence in mind. We should avoid violence in expressions and actions because violence breeds more violence.
We can bring great frequencies on Earth through compassion and kindness, through lack of selfishness, by being selfless we can bring great vibrations on Earth, in our society, in our country, in the world. There is great potential, we can actually dissolve the territories and boundaries and walls, just by dissolving our greed factor. There is sustenance for everybody’s need in the world, but not for everybody’s greed because there’s no boundary for greed. But there is sustenance, there is food, there are materials for a good life; we have them; if we share and if we are considerate about everybody around us, we’ll have a good life; the society will be better. We have the right, and we have the responsibility for it.
To conclude this, I would like to say that our path is that of compassion and kindness. Through disciplined determination, through adherence to our conscience, in all our actions, we build up a world that is pure, uncorrupted, unpolluted, and unmanipulated. We live together as a kind community/society, as a good generation that will set precedents for the generations to come. We strongly adhere to righteousness, goodness, and we can make laws and rewards based on the goodness factor, the goodness quotient in us. And let the world be oriented on this matter. It will happen if you believe in it; if you have the conviction.
Once again, the adverse side of activism is that it is mostly selective towards something, or against something. And that may retaliate, and they may destroy. But we can change the vibration, the frequency of the world to goodness and happiness; choose goodness over everything; choose kindness and compassion, beyond everything. We accept our life, accept ourselves without judging or criticizing, and we accept the world and guide the world to better awareness, to a higher awareness that we are a great, intelligent being, walking on Earth, experiencing Earth. We can make this place much better.
I leave this thought on your plate now. Please do discuss it, share this, and also talk to people about it, and make a difference in their mindset.
Again, as I mentioned earlier, I am not endorsing any violence, any war, any kind of bloodshed. I am not endorsing anything which is not suitable for human existence, including certain foods, certain medicines, certain vaccinations, or any of those kinds. I’m not endorsing. Do not think that I’m supporting them, and I’m saying that let them all exist. No, I don’t do that.
I’m saying that through higher awareness, we should transform the mindset of the world, and that takes effort, consistent effort. We have to believe in it; we have to have conviction in it. And we should live it. This is the way we can transform this world, now and forever.
Welcome to Mohanji Speaks. Hello friends, hope you are doing well.
Today, we’ll talk about the anatomy of gossip. We are used to it, right? People talk bad about people. People gossip about people. We read a lot of stuff in the sleazy magazines. And it sells well; people are curious to know who’s sleeping with whom, who’s got more money, how he made it, so many different things we are curious. We love scandals, right? But there is a price for all this. The main price is the contamination of our mind, internal contamination. Whatever we consume, leaves an impact on our system. If we consume negativity, our mind becomes negative; the residue remains in our mind. If we think positive, talk positive and do positive things in the world, our inner space gets purified. Our existence is between this contamination and purification.
Now we take a step further, let’s analyze it a little bit. What are gossips? Why are they happening? A) It is the curiosity that we have about other people, their lives, their ways. Secondly, it could be jealousy we have, or we feel underprivileged than certain people, so we would like to know that they are not all right. We would like to know the bad news because we feel better when we hear this bad news. This is a sadistic pleasure. Another reason could be the appetite for negativity. Many of us have an appetite for negative things, so we like to consume them by default. It’s like a smoker, we keep smoking, and we don’t know that it’s bad for the body, or any addiction, for that matter. We keep doing it, and we think it’s fine until we become so heavy. Another problem with this is, as I explained earlier, what we consume, we become. So, when we consume negative things, we start looking at the world through the eyes, which it has provided. Gossips, scandals, all kinds of thoughts, actions, talking bad about others, character assassinating people, especially in public; these produce heavy karma, a huge price for doing this; because we are talking about another karmic being, just expressing and experiencing their own karma, in their life. In fact, we have nothing to do with it. But we interfere, intervene, we think, we talk, and we pay the price for it. Everything has a price; nothing is free.
When somebody creates gossips, scandals; when somebody character assassinates another person, who’s responsible? Primarily, the person who’s initiating it is responsible. He or she ends up paying the real price. And it’s quite a huge debt, based on the impact it created. First of all, the person who initiates it has to pay a huge debt. Maybe it will take various lifetimes to clear. It’s absolutely not worth it. Secondly, the contamination that it creates in the minds of various people, who gets to pay for that? The person who initiates pays for that also. If that person whose mind has contaminated the reader, the listener, and they transfer it further; they also end up paying a part of it.
This is how it works. That means the initiator pays the maximum. Then whoever is contaminated is also the responsibility of the initiator. He or she has to pay for their contamination, or their state, whatever happens with them. And if they further transfer it to others also, they have to pay, to some extent.
So, every level of contamination has a high, big, huge price; this should be very clear. So, it’s not just a very ordinary thing, a simple thing. It may sound very simple. And it is sometimes even pleasurable. We talk bad about people spontaneously as if it’s nothing. But there is a price to pay. With our contamination, there’s a huge price. Our mind is contaminated because we are the producers. Then, when we write it, and we contaminate other minds, we pay the price for that as well.
All of these are very complicated. Personal contamination is vital. Because when you sow something like this, you have to reap the same thing. It means, other people may contaminate you further, or people may go against you, you may experience the same thing which you have initiated. People may talk bad about you, say that you are very bad. All those things are possible. All that I’m saying is, what you initiate, you end up consuming. What you cook, you will end up eating. You may share it, and some people may eat it; some people may reject it. The price is vital; this has to be clearly understood. Don’t think that you can talk anything, do anything, say anything and even write anything and you will be out of it. It’s absolutely not true. Whatever you initiated, whatever you sowed, you have to reap, the price has to be paid.
What is the reward for the victim? This is also an interesting subject. Imagine you contaminated or you talked bad about somebody; automatically, they get purified. The people whom you are talking about will have a sudden level of purification because it’s like some bad energy has happened in somebody’s body and a mosquito came and took it away, or some insect came and took it, or released it. Leeches suck the bad blood, and the bad blood is gone. Like that, a person about whom these people are talking, these people are also taking their bad energies out. An element of purification happens to the victim; the victim is purified. So, that way there is a bonus, there is a good thing. But that’s not the intention of the talker, the sayer.
The intention of the sayer is to contaminate, tarnish the image, character assassinate the person, for which they have to pay a very, very huge price. It will go into debt, and also it goes into the lineage. We talked about the lineage earlier. This is bad karma for the lineage. The lineage ends up paying for a long time because of the bad actions of this person. It says that when a saint happens in a lineage, at least seven generations before him and seven generations after him, are purified, are benefited, are elevated. The birth of a saint in a family is a big deal. Likewise, the birth of a negative person in the family is the opposite. At least seven generations before him and seven generations after him or her will have to pay the price.
It is not only the contamination that you create within yourself; it is also that you create in the world outside, as well as you create in the family lineage. Understand this very clearly, and before you spontaneously gossip or unconsciously scandalize somebody, please remember the price that you have to pay. It is not ordinary, it is invisible, but you will know in real life how it takes place. You will experience either the same thing or a much more serious thing. Or you will see that as various types of blockages in your own life. Don’t think this is something silly and just enter into a bad company and talk bad about people, gossip, write about them and scandalize them; a very, very big price to pay. And any friends who are influencing you to do such things should be immediately thrown out. If you’re doing this under the influence of somebody, please remember that person will not take responsibility. It will entirely come on your shoulder because you are in the firing line; you are exposed. People know that you are doing it, even if you don’t put your name, they will know you are doing it. And the person who instigated or inspired you to do it will not be responsible, will not take the blame; they will not take the burden. You have to sort that out yourself.
I leave you with these thoughts. Please be careful how you interact with what you do. If you dislike something, if you dislike somebody; walk away. Go away. Stay away and leave them alone. They will handle their own karma. Karma is always truthful; karma always pays. If you have done something wrong, you will end up getting the rewards for it, positive or negative; you don’t have to worry about it. We do good work in the world. We spread positivity, we spread love, we spread compassion, kindness, selflessness, and that will keep us elevated at all times. I hope this is clear. If you have any questions, I will clarify further.
Now in India, the Pitru Paksha is happening. That’s a time to remember the ancestors and offer them our gratitude. How do we do that? How do we express gratitude to the departed? We usually do it through certain rituals, through specific mantras and rituals together, conducted by priests who know the methods. We also serve food to all the beings around us, starting with ants and insects, to people and all the species of the animal/bird kingdom as much as we can.
Pitru Paksh Ritual
There’s nothing better than feeding the hungry. You know that, and we do that. Now, let’s think about the Science behind, Science, as in S-c-i-e-n-c-e, and not s-i-g-n, behind this thought process. It’s important to know. We are inheritors, all of us. What have we inherited? First of all, we have inherited ourselves. Where did we come from? From two people, father and mother. So, we have inherited ourselves from them. So, if you think backwards, who is our father and mother? They are the representation of the lineage that we came from. As we have inherited ourselves from the lineage, we have inherited our parents as a living representation of our lineage. This is very important to understand. So, when you take care of your father and mother, you are taking care of the lineage. Suppose you look after your father and mother with love, care, genuine devotion and genuine love, that automatically transmits or transfers your gratitude to the lineage, because most of the people in the lineage probably are not existing now. Many people, like your grandparents or grandparents of your grandparents, they would have all gone. How can you express gratitude to them? How can you express kindness, love, compassion, respect? You can’t because they are not there. The right thing to do is to consider your father and mother as the living representation of your lineage and respect them. Express gratitude, express love and kindness. Do whatever you can for them.
Many of us are working outside our houses; we are not even in our hometown. We may not even be in our neighborhood where we can go and meet them. They’re probably far away, flights away. So how can you make sure your father and mother are happy, and they’re taken care of? You need to hire support. You got to hire support; use a part of your resources to ensure that your parents are happy.
So, it is our responsibility to look after our father and mother because they represent our lineage. When you look after them, and they are pleased, the lineage is pleased. That’s the only thing you can do about your lineage, at any given point in time.
If your grandparents are existing, take care of them as well. Look out for them, make them happy, provide as best as you can within your given capacity for them. As I said earlier, we are inheritors. We did not happen by ourselves. So, when you inherit, you’re also responsible. Inheritance comes with responsibility. People are doing all sorts of things, just for the sake of wealth; sometimes things which are totally inappropriate for the sake of wealth. That’s very harmful to the lineage, not only for the person. Remember, your children are going to inherit from you. What are you going to pass on to your children? If you do not clean up your lineage as best as you could, you would be passing on contamination to your children. They will have a heavy burden of bad karma, i.e., bad actions. Bad representation of anything is a heavy burden on ourselves. We need to clean it up; we need to clean our thoughts; we need to clean our actions. We need to clean up everything like we clean up our house every day. This is not just this one time; as long as you are alive, as long as you are active, as long as you have the capacity, you must take care of our lineage.
Same with children. Children are also a continuation of our lineage. We must take care of them. So, our responsibility is not just to take care of ourselves. As a refined species, with the capacity to understand and assimilate the subtle, even the capacity to experience the supreme consciousness, we must behave accordingly.
We have inherited two major things from our lineage. One is the subtle, and one is the gross. We all know the gross. Gross consists of wealth, property, name, fame, and whatever we have inherited from our lineage. What is subtle? Subtle are the aspirations, desires, good and bad things they did in society, that residual effect – they all come in the lineage. Everything is inheritance. You cannot just say I will only have property and wealth, but I don’t need anything else from anybody. That’s not true. It’s like a huge treasury where whatever actions each person has done has left a residue or a kind of bank balance, which all the lineage members inherit. It especially goes to the people who are leaders of the clan, the eldest people or the decision-makers and those kinds of people will probably get a larger share. But as a principle, it goes to everybody. The good and the bad that you do definitely go to your children in essence form along with the gross inheritance that you transfer. So, the subtle is also transferring or getting transferred, as is gross. Both are getting transferred.
Pitru Paksha is the right time, considered as per the astrological calculations, to express gratitude and respect to the lineage, so that it lightens the inherited subtle aspects. It makes the residue of the good and bad actions of our ancestors slightly lighter, which will, in fact, reflect in your own life as a lightness of existence. So, what can we do? There are rituals, as I said in the beginning, conducted by priests, all the rituals are expressions of gratitude and expressions of respect. And that automatically makes things lighter. It’s not about one person. Don’t think that I’m doing it for my ancestor. Of course, you are doing it for your ancestor because there should be a point of contact; some representation, which you can connect to and do something. For that purpose, you are doing it for the departed, the known departed. But there are many unknown departed in your own lineage; probably you don’t even know them, but they are all getting benefitted.
So, it’s like a conduit, a pipe. When you do it, do the proper stuff, it goes to everybody. Just like the good and the bad which your lineage did has come to you. And what you do or what they did, along with what you do, goes to your children. So, this is the approximate picture. Then through feeding the poor, feeding the hungry, you dilute yourself, that’s basically sharing your wealth, with the underprivileged. Even all the species around, they all deserve to be happy, contented. So, we help them to be happy and contented, which makes us lighter and brighter.
As I said earlier, parents are the living representation of our lineage. They are the living representatives. So, when you take care of your parents, automatically, the people who left, and the people who are going to be-both will be benefited, because they are an important link with the lineage just like we are an important link to our lineage. So, respect them and look after them as best as you can. Serve them with gratitude.
Now, gratitude is a very, very powerful thing. Probably the word gratitude is so much used, it’s become a cliché, but gratitude has huge power, just like respect. Respect is immediate. You can see the reflection of that in the society almost immediately; when you respect somebody, you automatically get more respect, it’s more tangible. But gratitude is an attitude.
If you have the attitude of gratitude, it kind of cleanses the air; it’s like a purifier. It purifies, not only inside; it removes all the negativities from the environment. So, gratitude can never be underestimated. Gratitude is very powerful. This activity is on this ancestral time of Pitru Paksha is actually an expression of your gratitude to all those who lived in your lineage and departed plus all the people who are going to come and take birth in your lineage in the future. So, gratitude is extremely important. This is a clear sign of expression of gratitude; when we give food to all the beings, we are extremely grateful that they are receiving it. There are beings whom we can serve. When they become contented, we become contented. And when you keep giving, you keep growing; when you share, you become bright, you become light.
So, this is a time for extreme purification, where you express extreme gratitude to your lineage, and in a year, this period should be considered as one of the most important periods to make yourself light and bright, where you are deeply integrating yourself into the lineage, expressing respect, expressing love and compassion, expressing every positive aspect of you, in association with your lineage. And as much as possible, pass this on to your next generation. If your children ask you, “Why do we have to do this, they are already gone, we can’t see them?” You have to say, “You can see them. Where? In yourself.” You are the representation of your lineage, living representation. There is nothing invisible. People have come and gone, but you have not gone. If you are alive today, if your heart is beating today, you are representing the lineage whether you like it or not. There is no other way.
Some people do not know their parents, orphans; people are born into difficulties. They also must do it, because this is their opportunity to cleanse up their path. Instead of hatred or instead of remorse or disrespect to the lineage, if they choose to respect and gratitude and do whatever they can and for whoever they can, I always tell people that all the old people should be considered as your own parents. All the elderly should be respected as your own father and mother. So, all the people can be considered as your own. And that changes you. That changes the frequency of your lineage, that changes your own frequency. That makes you lighter and more effective in the world. Gratitude is a very powerful tool to make you graceful. Gratitude brings grace. Gratitude makes you grateful. So, gratitude can never be underestimated.
Mata, mother, with whom you have a relationship, more than the society, at least for nine months; father, the protector and the provider, who helped you to stabilize yourself on your feet, and Guru who guided you to the inner truth, which is sitting inside you. And finally, God, the energy aspect of you. So, Mata, Pita, Guru, Devo- Mother, father, Guru, God are four integral parts of your life, especially for your stability. If you connect to these four aspects, with respect, with gratitude, with extreme love and compassion, with kindness, with selflessness, you will have a great life; you will have a very stable life. If you just look at them as individuals, (f course they are individuals), but then you have something to do with them, and they had something to do with you. So, lineage had something to do with you. Without lineage, you are not here. You have to do something for the lineage. It is said that the karmic combination of every individual is a mixture. One is the unfulfilled desires that you came here to fulfill, that means what you wanted to do with a new life, with a new body. Second is the representation of the lineage, the aspirations of the lineage, the residue of the good and the bad which people of the lineage performed at their times; that residue. So, karma becomes more complex, when you think about these two main strains which have made you. Your unfulfilled desires, as well as the inherited desires of the lineage, they come and mix together like milk and water.
When you serve the lineage, when you pay respects to the lineage, when you devote yourself to the welfare of the lineage, and not only your family; (as I said earlier, looking at every species as your responsibility), then the lineage gets cleaner, lighter, and that will enhance your existence on Earth. You can see that in your stability, in your thought process. If you fill your heart with gratitude, you can weather any storms.
I leave this thought in your plate. Ponder over it. Think about it; discuss it. I wish you happiness, always.
Hello friends! Hope you’re doing well. Today, let’s talk about a very famous quote by Swami Vivekananda, which goes like this, “We can forsake anything in the world, for the sake of truth; but we should not forsake truth, for the sake of anything.” This is a very deep and profound statement. What does it mean? You can forsake anything in the world, the sake of truth. You should not forsake truth, for the sake of anything. What is the ultimate truth that you are born with; that exists with you and travels with you, or stays with you until death; and it survives death as well? That’s your soul principle. S -o -u- l soul principle or ‘Atma tattva’. That is the real truth that we always live with.
When you say, or when Vivekananda said that we can forsake anything in the world – they are all temporary; the places, the time, the people, the relationships, the materials, the possessions and positions are all temporary. Atma tattva – the soul principle is permanent. If you sell your soul, for the sake of the world, you lose your soul and you will anyway lose the world because world is impermanent or temporary. But if you forsake anything in the world, for the sake of your soul, or you invest your time in your soul, you have the soul forever.
Let’s talk about the other side of it. How do you forsake your soul for the things of the world? Usually when the conscience is affected, the connection with the soul is challenged. How can the conscience be affected? When we cheat, steal, betray and we lie and do acts that disturb people or the world, our conscience dies. Conscience is like a bridge between your conscious state and your soul. Your conscious state includes your body, mind, intellect, ego, the senses and all that are part of your conscious state. So when you abandon or forsake your conscious character by betraying others, taking things from others or stealing what belongs to others, and doing negative actions in the world, then the bridge called conscience is burnt and you disconnect from your soul. That’s what Vivekananda says; burning the bridge is not worth it. So don’t cheat, don’t steal, don’t betray, don’t gossip, don’t talk bad about anybody. In other words, character assassination, gossips, betrayals, all these, burn the bridge called conscience. That’s your connection with your own soul.
You can forsake all things in life, but not the soul, not the truth.
Truth is permanent. Soul exists with you all through your life, survives your death.
If you forsake the permanent in you, for the sake of the temporary, such as body, mind, intellectual, ego, senses, materials outside of you; when you attach yourself to all those things and forsake your soul, you miss the opportunity to invest in your permanent aspect.
I hope you understood this point. You can forsake anything in life, but not the truth. Likewise, never forsake truth for anything in life. If you remember this clearly, that will lead you forward, in a very effective and efficient way for rest of your life.
I leave these thoughts in your plate today. Think about it, ponder over it and think about how many things you have done so far, which have detached you from this truth factor, from the conscience factor, the bridge. And if you think that you have been chasing things without ethics, you’ve been chasing things for the sake of yourself, selfishly, it means that you have swapped selflessness, which is normal in us, natural in us, for the sake of selfishness, selfish desires; then it’s time to change; it’s a good time to change.
Our nature is pure consciousness.Our true nature is the soul factor. Let the nature be natural. Our external nature also is the same. Let the nature be natural. Then it is effective. Think about it.
Do not leave ethics.
Do not leave purity.
Do not leave selflessness.
Do not leave compassion and kindness.
Do not leave yourself.
You are the only truth that you need to know, need to understand and need to connect with; everything else is relative. Wish you success.
There are certain signs which denote that a person has become one with God or has elevated to the level of God-consciousness. Usually, this is mentioned in the context of an avatar. What are the signs of an avatar? It’s approximately like that, so this is told in the context of an avatar like Lord Krishna.
There are 16 signs, which are mentioned in the scriptures, which denote that an individual is an avatar. Number one is Sri Sampada. That means a person of that stature will always have abundance, richness, inner richness, that means the richness of spiritual stability and the corresponding outer richness, which is the material wealth or the people wealth, all kinds of abundance, positive abundance. So that is Sri Sampada.
Number two is Bhu Sampada. That means these people will have many properties, various lands and those kinds of things, basically, an abundance of land at their disposal.
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The third is Kirti Sampada. That means they will have fame across the world, people who know them, can connect to them, people will feel them as a part of themselves or their family, there’ll be a universal acceptance for them. There will be fame in that context.
The fourth is Vani Sammohanada. That means their speech will be attractive to people, spontaneously attractive. Their words will soothe them, calm them, and make them connect to themselves. Their words and expressions will be transformative.
The fifth is Leela. Leela simply means divine play. People will be happy just by their presence. If you just look at them, you will be happy. Since they have recognized God, and they have recognized God within themselves, they will have divine play all their life. Life itself will be like a play. And it’s not measurable. You can’t really divide or put it into any frame. They might be very unorthodox at times, but they play with true life, and that play will be transformative. The divine play will be for the sake of transformation.
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The sixth is Kaanti. Their form will be very attractive. Their form will have a kind of magnetic attraction. And that’s obvious. Once you see that person, you won’t easily forget him. Their form would be in the corner of your mind somewhere, even if you’re not connecting deeply.
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The seventh is Vidya. They’ll be proficient in skills or management of things which are useful for human existence. In other words, they will be effortless in the management of their life.
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The eighth is Vimala. Their mind will be pure. They’ll be no impurity in their mind at all. They will always be operating in pure consciousness, pure awareness, and purity.
The ninth is Ulkarshaniyata. They’ll be very patient. They will encourage people to do good for the world spontaneously, and they will always aspire and be active for the ultimate goodness in the world. They will always be enthusiastic about doing something great for the world. And they will inspire people to do that. They will be extraordinarily patient with people. They may not be bound by the results of action, but they will continuously do good actions, good for the world.
The tenth is Vivekam. The power of discrimination or wisdom, displayed wisdom – Neera ksheera vivekam especially. Neera is water, ksheera is milk, to separate water from milk – that kind of wisdom, that kind of power of discrimination between the good and the bad, between the positive and the negative. They will have wisdom, and they are able to discriminate between the good and the bad. Just like the paramahamsa (swan), we talk about, who has the power to discriminate between milk and water if they are mixed together. They will make the people who are with them, stable, and even famous. They have that power because they have the power to discriminate between the positive and the negative.
The eleventh is Karmanyata. They will always be active; they will never be idle. They will also encourage others to be active in the right way, in a positive way.
The twelfth is Yoga Shakti. They would have controlled their minds, they would have controlled their senses, and they will be stable within themselves – inner stability through yoga, through the power of yoga (yoga shakti), they would have attained inner stability, and it’s visible in their eyes. They are very stable and still inside. The eyes will display that.
The thirteenth is Vinayam – humility. They will have zero egos. They will be very humble because they are very stable. They are not in competition with anybody; they do not compete to win, or to prove anything because they are very stable inside. Humility is a clear sign of an avatar. They will not boast. They have no pride. They will probably display only 10% of what they actually are. They will display nothing much. It is up to the seeker to find them. And the more you indulge in them or indulge in their awareness, the more you can find. But they will not display, and they will not boast or will have pride over anything that they have. They’ll be extremely humble.
The fourteenth is Sathya-dharanam. They exist in truth, they are always aware of the truth, and they display truth. They are extremely patient, as I said earlier. They will base themselves in truth; the truth may not be the truth of the two-dimensional society. Truth is more of karmic truth and mostly dharmic truth. They will be totally true to dharma – righteous duty. They will not deviate from the karmic flow, the flow of karma. The social dimension is different because that’s conditional, or situational. Here dharma is not situational; it is perpetual. They will be rooted in dharma, and they will operate as per the law of karma, totally adhering to those principles.
The fifteenth is Adhipatyam. Their presence will be powerful, so they automatically become leaders. They can lead a lot of people by their sheer stability, vision, and compassion. Automatically they get predominance, even if they don’t want to, or even if they don’t display, because they can’t conceal what they are easily. Because of their energy and aura, because of their purposefulness, because of their determination, and because of the clarity and vision, they will attain leadership naturally.
The sixteenth is Anugraham kshamata. They will be able to transform people; they will be able to bring clarity to the lives of people. They will only exist for the sake of raising awareness of the people. Whoever comes to them, will not go empty-handed. They would have delivered whatever they can, as per their capacity, or the person who has come to them. They live to serve, they serve unconditionally, without expecting anything back. They will be powerful, and they will not use their powers for their personal gratification, manipulation, or for personal gains. Instead, they will be focused on the welfare of their subjects like an emperor. Like a true emperor, their whole focus, their whole life will be dedicated to their empire and their people. They do not like to disappoint anybody who comes to them, and they treat the people who come to them as their responsibility. They take care of them as best as they can.
These are the 16 qualities mentioned in the scriptures about the signs of an avatar, or the signs of somebody who is God-conscious. I have said this just to give you clarity and awareness. So, if you understand that, you can clearly see the signs of such avatars in your world. If you observe consistently, you will know whether that person is real or pretending. Only through consistent observation, you can actually understand the third dimension of an individual. I hope these signs will help you connect to the right guide in your life.
Today is August 23, 2020. 20 years ago, on August 23rd, 2000, Ammu passed away. Many people ask me about the memories of that time. I always maintained, “This is my personal sorrow and I don’t want to talk about it because this sorrow is not relevant for the whole world.” The loss of Ammu affected us as a family. It affected me, especially, because I was deeply connected to her. I used to talk to her as a friend. Even though she was only four years and 10 months old, I always interacted with her as a friend, not as a father. She somehow made me connect to myself, connect to that aspect of love, which I was missing, or one that I had never experienced in life. And I respected her, for her individuality.
I always tried to provide the best I could, within my means, at that time. We were living in Dubai and it was quite expensive there. Most of my salary; about 40% of it used to go for rent. So it was not that easy for me to provide many things, because I didn’t have a lot of money. Still, whenever I used to go to buy grocery etc., she used to come with me and would pick up some toys or other small playthings. She was usually happy about it. I came to India for holidays towards the end of July for almost a month. I planned to spend some time in Kerala, with Ammu, my ex-wife, her mother and my parents, and then to go to Pune to look at some land which I had bought at that time and then further to Rishikesh to feel the Himalayas; and then come to Delhi and then fly to Dubai. That was the plan.
On the 23rd of August was my flight from Kochi to Pune. So I decided to leave on 22nd afternoon. I had an appointment in Kochi that day, so I decided to honour that, and then proceed further to Pune.
On 22nd, post-lunch, as I was preparing to leave; a taxi had already come; almost suddenly Ammu started crying. She was used to my travels; she was used to my absence. So this was unusual, and she asked me to lift her, to hold her in my arm. I lifted her up; I held her and with her right hand, she was kind of soothing my chest. She said, “Papa, please don’t go”. She was crying. I kissed her and said, “We will meet in a few days; after 10 days we’ll be meeting in Dubai, Papa has to go.” And she was still crying; my mother, my father, and all of us tried to pacify her. Then I kept her on my lap, and I sat on the chair for a little bit. She was still soothing my chest with her right hand and she was still crying, ”Please don’t go”. And I said, “I have to go, but I will meet you soon.”
Then I got ready to leave; I sat in the car – the backseat of the taxi, on the right side; the glass was down, and through the window, she kissed my cheek – my right cheek. It was wet with tears. My father was holding her, and she was leaning in through the window, and she kissed me on my cheek. My cheek was wet for some time. The taxi left for Kochi. I never saw Ammu alive again.
On 23rd early morning, I left for Pune. I reached Pune. I came out of the airport; while I was in the car, I heard the news of Ammu’s accident. They didn’t tell me that she died. They told me that there was a major accident and that Ammu was in the hospital. Intuitively, I knew that she was no more. This was August 23rd. I did not visit the land; I tried to find a way to reach Kerala, but there were no flights from Pune to Kochi. I had to go to Mumbai. Somehow, we managed a taxi. And I had to find some money to pay for the additional flight because I had already booked to fly from Pune to Delhi etc. Everything had to be cancelled. I reached Bombay (Mumbai); got a night flight, and by morning 6 am on August 24th, I reached Kochi. I went directly to my ex-wife’s house where Ammu’s body was kept. It was the end of a part of my life, rather, Mohan, died that day; died with Ammu.
Ammu was with my mother and father on 22nd. And on 22nd, there were preparations for Sri Krishna Janmashtami which was on 23rd that year, and Ammu insisted on going to the temple to see the decoration of Krishna.
She kept insisting, and there was rain. So my father said, “It’s raining, so let’s not go”. But Ammu said, “No, we should go!”. They took her to the temple. She went straight up to the Sanctum Sanctorum, as much as she was allowed to go. She stood there watching the beautiful Krishna, and she prayed for a long time.
My mother and father were watching her from behind; they kept calling her, but she did not look and kept praying to Lord Krishna for a long time, quite unusual for a four-year-old child. Then, while coming back, my mother asked why you were praying so much. “What were you praying for?” She said, “No, I’m playing with him. I’m playing with Krishna. I play with Krishna”. My mother said, “We are human beings, we can’t see Krishna. We can only see the idol, we can’t see the real Krishna”. She said, “Of course, I can see Krishna. I see him. I play with him!” Then she said that you cannot see because you are not praying enough. You are not surrendering enough!” A four and a half-year-old child is saying this to her grandmother!
So, on the 24th, we cremated Ammu. We gave her body to the fire. And 10 days I had to spend there, even though it was very painful to talk to people and to communicate when I wanted isolation. A lot of people were coming. There was a huge crowd, on the day of her cremation, unusually large for a four and a half-year-old child, and at that time I was not known as Mohanji; this crowd was unusual.
And then, as I said, one phase of my life ended. I came back to Palakkad, after all the ceremonies. When I opened my briefcase, which I had packed to take to Dubai, three unusual things were there in the bag, which I had not packed. One was a ‘Pears’ soap; a soap with the brand “P-e-a-r-s”, a transparent soap; the second was a small bouncing rubber ball; the other one was a bangle. The bangle and the ball belonged to Ammu that was the last gift, which she had wanted and we bought for her, just a few days ago and she had kept it in my bag; she had returned it. And the bangle, I don’t remember when we bought it for her, but she had kept it also there, in the bag, to give it to me.
As for the ‘Pears’ soap, there is a brief history. When I came from Dubai, in July, I came home around 5 am, it was a night flight, and I wanted to take a bath. So I told my ex-wife,” I’d like to have a soap”, and she gave me the soap which Ammu uses. Ammu said, “ No, I want this soap, don’t give it to anybody. Don’t give it to Papa”. So my ex-wife gave me another soap. And I used it for my bath.
Probably out of guilt, she had kept the same soap; Ammu used to love Pears soap and she always wanted to use that soap. She kept that soap, a fresh one, in my bag as compensation, because she didn’t give me hers. Later on, my ex-mother-in-law said they had bought and kept a few soapboxes and one box was empty. She had taken the soap; Ammu had taken that soap. So, she was returning something, and that thing was in the bag; she kept it! Looking back, the whole event was extremely painful!
And when I came back to Dubai after all this, my company told me that they were reducing staff and that I would have to look for another job. After 2000, one by one, everything that I had built up crashed. I separated from my wife. I lost my belongings; it was stolen; I had kept it in the house in Kerala and it was stolen. I had invested in a house, in a flat and the builder ran away. Later we all assembled, and I could sell it, and pay back the loans. Then I lost my job; it was a crazy existence, literally. So many turbulence in life. Everything was falling. The sand beneath my feet was slipping. The agony which I experienced at the death of Ammu, the only closest connection I had in this whole world was lost; plus all the other materials. Later on in life, I have experienced betrayals, stabbing from behind, etc. But they seemed like nothing, compared to the loss of Ammu.
So, these are some of my memories of that time. I am talking about it because some people asked me to recount it; not for any sympathy; I never accept sympathy at that time and even now; nor do I have self-pity.
What the world should know is what I made out of that experience of sorrow. That’s probably important for the world. Ammucare happened. ACT foundation happened. Ammu’s energy touched many lives; transformed many lives; gave solace to many lives. What happened after this incident has more value than the incident.
There are so many children dying in the world; so many people are dying; because we don’t know them, it doesn’t touch us. We need a world where we should care; we should be sincere. We should be sensitive. And death will be there; diseases will be there; old age will be there. It’s all part of existence. But how we can transform that to something positive, this is what makes us.
Hello friends, I hope you have enjoyed the previous podcast.
Today, I’m here to talk about two music Maestros who touched my heart, at various points in time. These are two great Masters of music, Indian music, with whom I interacted at different points in time. One is Pandit Jasraj; he left his body yesterday, at the age of 90. From the age of 10, he started learning and practising Hindustani music. He was truly a maestro; amazing voice; amazing rendition; amazing feeling he could deliver with his music. I’m not very knowledgeable in Hindustani music; except if I hear music, I can say whether it touches the heart or not; only as a connoisseur. I don’t know the intricacies of music.
The first memory is when I was working in Dubai. I was invited to a concert at the Indian Consulate. It was a concert by a few maestros. At that time, I used to do my podcast; my radio shows called Mohan’s World, and the theme music of those radio shows was from U. Sreenivas – the Mandolin Maestro, a prodigy. Remember, this was in the mid-2000s. I was doing these radio shows in Dubai, for a channel called ‘Pod Me’, and we wanted theme music for it. So, the producer told me to find music that is not copyrighted, and which I like. I was listening to various music. I love the Beatles; I love Elvis Presley, I love U2; many different music bands I like, but they were not really non-copyrighted, they were all copyrighted, so, I couldn’t use that music. Remember, this was the time when I was not known as Mohanji. I was still working in a company and I was known as ‘Mohan’, my official name. And just around that time, a friend of mine who had met U. Sreenivas told me about him and told me about his philanthropic mind, apart from being a musical genius. And I happened to listen to U. Srinivas’s mandolin in the car. I loved it.
I contacted my friend and said, “I would like to speak to U. Srinivas. Can you introduce me?” He called U. Srinivas; he had met him a few times and he knew him. He said that his friend Mohan would like to speak to him, and he gave me the number.
Mandolin Srinivas
I called him and I told U. Srinivas that I would like to use a part of his music for my radio shows. And I asked him, “Since it’s copyrighted, should we have an agreement or some kind of a paper you’d agree to me using it.” Before I could complete this sentence, he asked me, “Mohanji, Are you Mohanji?” I said, “Yes, I am Mohan of Mohan’s World.” He said, “Yes, I know, I know you through this brand, of course, we have not met.” And he said, “For you, no copyright. Use any music you like as much as you want, from my albums.” He gave me a blanket approval; verbal approval. And I used a piece of his music for my shows.
Much later, or probably a few months later, I had been to Vrindavan in Bangalore to visit Sathya Sai Baba, and I had His darshan and I was going to a friend’s home.
Meanwhile, I can’t remember whether I called him or he called me. I spoke to Mandolin Srinivas. He asked me, “You were there at the Vrindavan?” I said, “Yes, I came to see Baba.” Then, he said, “I was there as well. How come we did not meet?” And we agreed to meet at a different time. What hit me deeply about him, the most striking thing about Srinivas was his humility, deep humility. He was a child prodigy and a Maestro but humble to the core. This is very important to understand; greatness is displayed much more with humility. He is not in the body. I could not meet him physically, he left his body. I did the podcast for about one and a half years – about 59 or 60 episodes, that’s it. This is one part of the story. One Maestro, one great musician, I could physically interact with.
Now, Pandit Jasraj, left his body yesterday; that is the 17th of August 2020 in New Jersey. Most of you know that I used to use his music, ‘Govind Damodar Madhaveti’, often in my programs because it used to really stir emotions inside and bring things out.
Pandit Jasraj
I wanted to tell him this and take his permission as well because I don’t like to use any music without anybody’s permission. So, I wanted to meet him. Before that, just to rewind. I did meet ‘Mandolin’ Srinivas. There was this concert at the Indian Consulate where I was invited.
It was Pandit Jasraj, Mandolin Srinivas, and a few other maestros together. Beautiful concert. And Pandit Jasraj’s daughter, Durga Jasraj, was compèring this program. After the program, I walked towards Durga Jasraj and I introduced myself and I said, “I would like to meet Mandolin Srinivas because I’m using his music.” She said, “Absolutely. Please come.” So I went on stage, I met him, and he was very, very nice and kind. He said, “We must meet again.” And I shared that I was really, really impressed with the music and Pandit Jasraj was there. I didn’t want to spend a lot of time on the stage because other people were also coming in, dignitaries, so I congratulated Mandolin Srinivas. I thanked him for allowing me to use his music, and he said, “At any time, no problem.” That was it, and then I came back, that was the only time when I met him.
That was also the only time when I met Pandit Jasraj also. Later on, as I was using his music in my shows, I wanted to meet him and thank him. And Madhu organized a meeting with him in Bombay, a couple of years ago. He was not too well at that time. I met him. I told him about his music which I’m using, and he was very happy. I said, “I would like to have your permission and blessing for me to use it.” He said, “I’m honoured that you’re using my music. Thank you for using it. You don’t need any permission. Please use.” He was so kind, so humble, and so full of love. He said many things to me, he discussed so many things. I gifted him our books which I was told he kept in his personal library, and some people contacted us after seeing my books in his library. He appreciated us visiting him.
I went with Madhu, and he said, “Mohanji, I have a concert two days later, and I’m not well. My throat is not okay, just pray that I can do this concert.” I said, “Panditji, it’ll all go well. Nothing to worry.” And when I was leaving, he came up to the elevator and thanked me. It was a very beautiful heart to heart connection. And he kind of delivered himself so profusely without expectations, and he doesn’t even know me that well because that’s our first time we were meeting and talking. And then he said, “Please do visit me more, whenever you come here, or we will keep in contact.” So all those beautiful things, he said. Then he said, “Bless me”, and I said, “No, no you’re such a maestro.” He said no, he took my hand and put it on its head; so humble, so much humility. And then we parted. Later, when we released different books, we sent a copy to him, which he received. Then later he went to New Jersey.
Pandit Jasraj and Mohanji
What I want to tell here is that when we are gifted with a skill or talent, we should accompany that with humility. All the great masters I have come in touch with, come in contact with are humility incarnates; those who are not so humble are also insecure. Here, both these maestros were amazingly secure, stable and they deserved all the following that they had, or that they have and their music will continue. People will cherish it. People will carry their music in their hearts. They delivered amazing stuff to the world. They made the world brighter, they were positive. They brought positivity.
So, we can all do something positive and brighten up this world within our capacities. We don’t have to be a maestro, we don’t have to be a greatly talented person; within our capacity (all of us have it), we can change the world for the better.
I would like to offer my humblest greetings and gratitude to these great maestros. These maestros will live forever through their music, through what they have delivered to the world, and through their humility, and kindness. Just like I remember them as humility incarnates, the world will remember them as bright stars on the horizon of mankind.
Thank you for listening to me. Wish you happiness and peace always. Wish you purposefulness, and also inspiration, self- inspiration to lead your life purposefully.
Thus Spake Mohanji 