adapted from a video conference with Brazil, December 5, 2009
The first thing to realize is that it is not your mind or somebody's mind, it is the Human Mind. We think it is our mind but it is not really so. That's why we call it the one mind. All mind, whosoever's mind it is, that one mind, has fear at its center. Fear is the core of the mind. Not only that, mind is nothing but a flow of thought from the past, through the present, into the future. This is what the mind does. And mind has got jealousy, anger, lust, desire; all these things are the qualities of the mind. No matter whose mind it is. They have the same qualities.
So, the first thing to realize is that all mind is only one mind. Let us say you have tuberculosis, you can not say "it is my tuberculosis" or "her tuberculosis". Tuberculosis is tuberculosis. So, the mind is the mind. It is not your mind, or his mind or her mind. There's just the one mind with those qualities. This we must first realize.
Next we must realize that this mind is very, very ancient. It's as old as man is. It has not changed at all. The brain itself has changed very little and the human mind has virtually not changed. The ancient man had fear of the tiger or the lion or something and modern man has fear of the share market or losing his job or girlfriend, so it's the same thing. The ancient man desired for a spear, you desire for a car or a house, or some such thing.
So it is the very same mind, only the object of fear or the object of desire has changed. You must realize this is an ancient mind. Not only is it the one mind, it is also the ancient mind.
Just like sugar has some qualities, like it tastes sweet, its specific gravity is something, its specific heat is something. If you take salt, it has its own taste and its specific gravity is something, it's specific heat is something. Those are the qualities of salt; those are the qualities of sugar. Sugar, you cannot make into salt, or salt into sugar. Similarly, these are the qualities of the mind, as designed by nature, as designed by your brain. There's NOTHING you could do about it.
It must strike you, like a ton of bricks, that it is impossible to change the mind. It must really strike you, not intellectually, not even as an insight, but actually you must see that the mind can not be changed. It was, it is and will be the same.
So, what you must see is that it is the one mind, it is ancient and it is impossible to change it. If you really see it, you will become free of the mind. It will not trouble you. It will be there, but it will be working on its own. It will not infringe on your consciousness, it will not take charge, it will not trouble you. It's like a stranger living in your house, it will be there working on its own. It won't bother you.
Then, who is there in charge? Your consciousness is in charge. Consciousness knows how to respond to different situations. Not the mind, but consciousness takes over. The mind generally reacts to situations. Consciousness responds.
When the mind does something it will go back and think, "Did I do the right thing or the wrong thing?" When consciousness responds, you do not go back and think whether it was the right thing to do or the wrong thing to do. Whatever consciousness does, it is perfect. It would take over and there will be no problems at all when consciousness functions. When the mind functions, the mind being divisive, creates problems.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Spiritual Growth, by Sri Bhagavan
adapted from a broadcast to Verbania, Italy December 6, 2009
Is it OK to follow my natural tendencies to avoid or reject things or people that I don't like? Or do I have to confront them even though I think it is useless?
Sri Bhagavan: The whole process of spiritual growth is confronting oneself. If you do not confront yourself, you are not going to grow. It's only when you confront yourself, you know who you are. And unless you know who you are, you cannot accept yourself, and if you cannot accept yourself you cannot love yourself, and if you cannot love yourself you're not going to love the other, and all spiritual growth stops so in this case you should not follow your natural tendencies. You have to learn to confront the darker side of yourself. You are trying to avoid the darker side of yourself. You have to get in touch with the darker side. Getting in touch with the positive side is not of much use, but what is important is the darker side the negative side. Each one of us has got an inauthentic side, a darker side, a negative side, a side of which you are very frightened. Unless you hold it like a baby, you examine it carefully, and you look at it non-judgmentally, there is going to be no growth. But if you keep avoiding it things will move from bad to worse. Your life could very well become miserable.
Is it OK to follow my natural tendencies to avoid or reject things or people that I don't like? Or do I have to confront them even though I think it is useless?
Sri Bhagavan: The whole process of spiritual growth is confronting oneself. If you do not confront yourself, you are not going to grow. It's only when you confront yourself, you know who you are. And unless you know who you are, you cannot accept yourself, and if you cannot accept yourself you cannot love yourself, and if you cannot love yourself you're not going to love the other, and all spiritual growth stops so in this case you should not follow your natural tendencies. You have to learn to confront the darker side of yourself. You are trying to avoid the darker side of yourself. You have to get in touch with the darker side. Getting in touch with the positive side is not of much use, but what is important is the darker side the negative side. Each one of us has got an inauthentic side, a darker side, a negative side, a side of which you are very frightened. Unless you hold it like a baby, you examine it carefully, and you look at it non-judgmentally, there is going to be no growth. But if you keep avoiding it things will move from bad to worse. Your life could very well become miserable.
Monday, November 30, 2009
Shifting Core Problems, by Sri Bhagavan
adapted from a broadcast to Verbania, Italy November 28, 2009
Some are stuck facing a core problem. How can we shift places we are stuck inside?
Sri Bhagavan: If there is a core problem, and you cannot get out of that. Stop fighting. Any effort to understand or analyze a problem will prevent it from getting resolved. The problem is in trying to analyze the problem. Analysis is paralysis. You must realize with that external problems are different. With internal problems do not use analysis.
Once you realize analysis won't work, you will naturally feel helpless and have to stay with the problem. It is like a hen hatching an egg. You must sit with the problem. Then, the problem will hatch and the solution will come out.
With the fight for Indian independence, Ghandi did not know what to do, so he sat quietly with the problem. He was not able to understand the problem, so he just stayed with it until a solution came to him from the inside. The solution that came to him was to boycott salt for India's independence. The whole country was shocked, but eventually they realized that this would free them from British rule. Do not try to fight with the problem, then you'll get your salt for your core problem.
Some are stuck facing a core problem. How can we shift places we are stuck inside?
Sri Bhagavan: If there is a core problem, and you cannot get out of that. Stop fighting. Any effort to understand or analyze a problem will prevent it from getting resolved. The problem is in trying to analyze the problem. Analysis is paralysis. You must realize with that external problems are different. With internal problems do not use analysis.
Once you realize analysis won't work, you will naturally feel helpless and have to stay with the problem. It is like a hen hatching an egg. You must sit with the problem. Then, the problem will hatch and the solution will come out.
With the fight for Indian independence, Ghandi did not know what to do, so he sat quietly with the problem. He was not able to understand the problem, so he just stayed with it until a solution came to him from the inside. The solution that came to him was to boycott salt for India's independence. The whole country was shocked, but eventually they realized that this would free them from British rule. Do not try to fight with the problem, then you'll get your salt for your core problem.
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Anything Fully Experienced Turns to Joy by Krishnaraj
Becoming awakened doesn’t mean you don’t face challenges and difficult emotions like fear, pain, etc. All these are experiences that are very much a part of the mind. This is how the mind begins.
The objective of all spiritual processes put us into a state of consciousness where you do not resist. How well can you experience, how quickly can you pay attention to your feelings, and turn the experience of hurt and pain into joy?
When you move to gratitude, you feel stillness inside, and there’s not much need to resist or fight with anything. Things look more still, perfect and calm – this is bliss. This is your aim: to help people reach a state where there is a constant stillness and calmness, while experiencing life’s situations and emotions. Stillness is NOT the absence of thought.
Move into a position where you can watch the experience, and observe the mental activities. When there is resistance to what is happening inside, the process of trying to move away consumes a lot of energy. It makes you feel low, and that is when you cannot experience reality as it is. This is when you go on accumulating more charges, end relationships and create many problems in your life.
Your most important focus in life is to ask the question: How can I pay attention to these experiences?
Freedom is about experiencing what is inside, not about finding a way where all life situations are perfect without adversity.
The objective of all spiritual processes put us into a state of consciousness where you do not resist. How well can you experience, how quickly can you pay attention to your feelings, and turn the experience of hurt and pain into joy?
When you move to gratitude, you feel stillness inside, and there’s not much need to resist or fight with anything. Things look more still, perfect and calm – this is bliss. This is your aim: to help people reach a state where there is a constant stillness and calmness, while experiencing life’s situations and emotions. Stillness is NOT the absence of thought.
Move into a position where you can watch the experience, and observe the mental activities. When there is resistance to what is happening inside, the process of trying to move away consumes a lot of energy. It makes you feel low, and that is when you cannot experience reality as it is. This is when you go on accumulating more charges, end relationships and create many problems in your life.
Your most important focus in life is to ask the question: How can I pay attention to these experiences?
Freedom is about experiencing what is inside, not about finding a way where all life situations are perfect without adversity.
Friday, September 11, 2009
9 Steps for Handling our Experiences
from Sri Anandagirij at the Oneness Conference in Milan:
1- Become conscious that we are suffering.
We need to admit it. When an emotional charge surfaces, when we are not feeling all right, the force of habit and social conditioning is to tell ourselves that we are feeling fine. When we are in pain and suffering, we need to acknowledge and accept it. No need to make any effort to move away from it. When you are in fear, there is no point to say you are feeling fine. Admit you are feeling low.
2- Become aware of habitual questions of the mind to take us away from the discomfort.
The mind throws up wrong questions: Who caused this suffering to me? Why did they do it to me? Why should life be so cruel to me? This makes us interested in finding cause and blame to attribute to somebody or a situation and disperses our attention to the questions instead of experiencing what is going on inside. If we get stuck in these questions, we cannot concentrate. What habitual questions are you asking? Once you're suffering, the important part is how you deal with it. It's irrelevant about right and wrong or because of who or why you are suffering.
3- Ask the right questions.
Right questions are driven by a vision to experience our emotions. So the question must be how to I deal with the pain? How do I experience it? How do I become free? This takes you right into the experience instead of distractions of the wrong questions. Liberation comes from the attention to the feeling in our body and our hearts. As we pay attention, this is where the process moves deeper. Who and why are irrelevant. You can feel immense focus building up as you ask the right question of how do I become free of it through the experience.
4- Become aware of the habitual response of blaming, fighting with the situation, or losing all motivation in life.
Moving into depression and self-hate. All these are old habits, how we have trained ourselves to deal with it. We fight with ourselves or others, feel guilty, blame others, and condemn ourselves or others. Attention is then moving outwards. Constantly prompts you to believe liberation is elsewhere by someone else or situations changing. By doing something else and turning attention away is the habit and the biggest mistake. This brings you more entanglement.
5- Make the decision.
Once you know this is a habit and no sense or logic in it. It's just a track where the mind is moving out of habit. Breaking a habit requires a firm resolve. We need to become clear in ourselves and re-program our responses. Making the decision that I am not moving away from this experience come what may. I'll do anything and everything required to pay attention to the experience. This will break the old habit pattern. This is not a one day affair. Every time you get in touch with emotional charges and you keep repeating your resolve, you will be more able to engage. It takes practice.
Resolve and face your feelings each time and eventually you will have a breakthrough and the process will get easier. Even if we fail 100 times, we need to resolve the 101st time. That is our ultimate goal. We must reach it. No moving away, no other alternative. Body posture will also help to reprogram new habit-to physically anchor by sitting erect as you make the decision. Close your eyes and breathe deeply and keep your left palm below and close it with the right palm on the right thigh. As you inhale, then hold your breath, make the decision-"I am experiencing this feeling completely." Then exhale. Do this 7 times.
6- Invoke the Divine presence.
It's also a matter of Divine benediction. We need the intense focus and extra bit of energy. It's important that the spiritual energy is activated by Divine grace. The brain must be pushed into concentrating all attention. This is like focusing a magnifying glass lens onto cotton in the sunlight. That is what is happening in consciousness. Our emotions can undergo a transformation. You can ask for a blessing from your experience of the Divine, from AmmaBhagavan by touching their picture, or from another facilitator.
7- Allow yourself to go through the whole experience.
Just see what you are feeling physically and go with it. There is nothing to make sense of, it is just an experience to go through.
8- After you complete the experience and feel sense of silence, joy or gratitude, you will make an affirmation that "Suffering is not in the fact, but in my perception."
Repeat this 7 times. With the firsthand experience through the first 7 steps, this teaching will be deeply lodged and the next time the teaching will be inside you and you will effortlessly begin to focus inward. Breathe in and out as before, joining hands and your heart-as you breathe in and hold the breath, make the affirmation, and then breathe out.
9- Conclude with expressing gratitude to the Divine.
Spirituality is not so much about experiencing higher states and mystical happenings, but about re-programming our responses. Our responses determine our destiny. If we respond out of old habits, we break up our relationships and cause disease. If we respond through acceptance and experience it and see the transformation, we are creating a new consciousness.
Teach yourself this new response and keep doing it. It will become faster and faster. It is like kick-starting an engine that has not been started for a long time. If you follow these 9 steps, we are retracing our mind back. If you become a master in this and it is a habit to transform suffering into bliss, imagine how much confidence you will feel.
1- Become conscious that we are suffering.
We need to admit it. When an emotional charge surfaces, when we are not feeling all right, the force of habit and social conditioning is to tell ourselves that we are feeling fine. When we are in pain and suffering, we need to acknowledge and accept it. No need to make any effort to move away from it. When you are in fear, there is no point to say you are feeling fine. Admit you are feeling low.
2- Become aware of habitual questions of the mind to take us away from the discomfort.
The mind throws up wrong questions: Who caused this suffering to me? Why did they do it to me? Why should life be so cruel to me? This makes us interested in finding cause and blame to attribute to somebody or a situation and disperses our attention to the questions instead of experiencing what is going on inside. If we get stuck in these questions, we cannot concentrate. What habitual questions are you asking? Once you're suffering, the important part is how you deal with it. It's irrelevant about right and wrong or because of who or why you are suffering.
3- Ask the right questions.
Right questions are driven by a vision to experience our emotions. So the question must be how to I deal with the pain? How do I experience it? How do I become free? This takes you right into the experience instead of distractions of the wrong questions. Liberation comes from the attention to the feeling in our body and our hearts. As we pay attention, this is where the process moves deeper. Who and why are irrelevant. You can feel immense focus building up as you ask the right question of how do I become free of it through the experience.
4- Become aware of the habitual response of blaming, fighting with the situation, or losing all motivation in life.
Moving into depression and self-hate. All these are old habits, how we have trained ourselves to deal with it. We fight with ourselves or others, feel guilty, blame others, and condemn ourselves or others. Attention is then moving outwards. Constantly prompts you to believe liberation is elsewhere by someone else or situations changing. By doing something else and turning attention away is the habit and the biggest mistake. This brings you more entanglement.
5- Make the decision.
Once you know this is a habit and no sense or logic in it. It's just a track where the mind is moving out of habit. Breaking a habit requires a firm resolve. We need to become clear in ourselves and re-program our responses. Making the decision that I am not moving away from this experience come what may. I'll do anything and everything required to pay attention to the experience. This will break the old habit pattern. This is not a one day affair. Every time you get in touch with emotional charges and you keep repeating your resolve, you will be more able to engage. It takes practice.
Resolve and face your feelings each time and eventually you will have a breakthrough and the process will get easier. Even if we fail 100 times, we need to resolve the 101st time. That is our ultimate goal. We must reach it. No moving away, no other alternative. Body posture will also help to reprogram new habit-to physically anchor by sitting erect as you make the decision. Close your eyes and breathe deeply and keep your left palm below and close it with the right palm on the right thigh. As you inhale, then hold your breath, make the decision-"I am experiencing this feeling completely." Then exhale. Do this 7 times.
6- Invoke the Divine presence.
It's also a matter of Divine benediction. We need the intense focus and extra bit of energy. It's important that the spiritual energy is activated by Divine grace. The brain must be pushed into concentrating all attention. This is like focusing a magnifying glass lens onto cotton in the sunlight. That is what is happening in consciousness. Our emotions can undergo a transformation. You can ask for a blessing from your experience of the Divine, from AmmaBhagavan by touching their picture, or from another facilitator.
7- Allow yourself to go through the whole experience.
Just see what you are feeling physically and go with it. There is nothing to make sense of, it is just an experience to go through.
8- After you complete the experience and feel sense of silence, joy or gratitude, you will make an affirmation that "Suffering is not in the fact, but in my perception."
Repeat this 7 times. With the firsthand experience through the first 7 steps, this teaching will be deeply lodged and the next time the teaching will be inside you and you will effortlessly begin to focus inward. Breathe in and out as before, joining hands and your heart-as you breathe in and hold the breath, make the affirmation, and then breathe out.
9- Conclude with expressing gratitude to the Divine.
Spirituality is not so much about experiencing higher states and mystical happenings, but about re-programming our responses. Our responses determine our destiny. If we respond out of old habits, we break up our relationships and cause disease. If we respond through acceptance and experience it and see the transformation, we are creating a new consciousness.
Teach yourself this new response and keep doing it. It will become faster and faster. It is like kick-starting an engine that has not been started for a long time. If you follow these 9 steps, we are retracing our mind back. If you become a master in this and it is a habit to transform suffering into bliss, imagine how much confidence you will feel.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
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