So many people write me asking much the same questions. They don't understand Samadhi; they want to know more about soul; Is there really a God?
Just how do we chuck out as you have recommended? Why don't you put up a sign "Only Atheists Wanted"? How much practicing should I do? When will I see results while doing Kriya? Why do you give these lessons when ultimately there is nothing to do as we are already perfect?
These are all fair questions and as repetition is one of the hallmarks of spiritual discourse I will again be repeating myself, but hopefully in such a way that it may give some insight into the complexities of discerning what is real about you and what is not.
One day with a concerted loving intent in your studies, BELLS WILL RING AND LIGHT WILL SHINE. How that happens is quite unique and individual with each person, and usually has nothing whatsoever to do with Yoga. In some cases it will. Already after just practicing a year or so, some students tell me they have acquired the breathless state while practicing the Kriya technique. Others report health has improved with added mobility. While others say their sense of self worth is a hundredfold greater. These things in a sense are worthwhile, yet that is not what Yoga is about - well yes, the breathless state is a good start, for something happens when it is first experienced - and it is THAT which is important.
One can free the mind from its turbulence of thinking by meditating, by concentrating, by loving, and piece by piece chucking out all the useless paraphernalia one collects during their life time.
Just think! The Zillion pieces of information stored in your consciousness and subconscious mind have all been input by "others". It takes those others to do it to you. Even walking down the street talking to a friend, while concentrating on what they are saying, thousands of things going on in the street or the restaurant are entering your brain and registering in the subconscious - all put in there by others.
We absorb information like a sponge keeping it filed away until we need it, either to feed a desire or in such things as in a dream, a fear. We wonder where all these desires and fears come from because at the time, as far as we know, there is no reason for their arousal.
Much of the major influence by others is THEIR concept about religion and also much by culture and family input. All the rest of the condition we receive is of not much importance really, but it does add to the jumble and the confusion so many people have over their own existence. Do we live after death? Is their re-incarnation? What and who is God?
Well that is not so strange as cave man had the same concerns, crudely standing in awe at the great power of the lightening and the thunder and other natural forces, which he gave the names of gods such as Thor and Wodin, the God of Thunder and Lightening - later to be the God of War.
Later in history as man became more and more complicated and thus influenced by superstition and control by Priests, they had Volcanic Gods which were appeased, if not by throwing a young virgin into its boiling pit, but by eating out the heart of some poor victim first to give the Priest added power.
Religions in those days were rather crude but very powerful - not because they in themselves were powerful, but because the masses were superstitious and ignorant of natural law.
It was not all bad, as later religions taught the laws of cleanliness and diet.
Now we find right to this present date religions still hold a strong power over their subordinates through fear of some hell and damnation, plus also, the hope of salvation.
It was these two forces that changed religion in the world and insidiously crept into the furthest depths of man's consciousness to grip him both in fear and in hope, and even in the event that a person would wish to change his beliefs these insidious samskaric worms hold him fast. He is bound. And you know, that is what Religion means, to be bound. It comes from the Latin religero, to be bound, chained.
In the last hundred years the quest for freedom from all these fears began in the west in the earliest part of the 20th century - that is - on a grand scale. Yoga and Buddhism and various other religions of the world opened up to us, BUT, what aspirants didn't realize was that in letting go of most of what they had learned, in order to become involved in these new ways of living, that guilt would creep in from deep down in the subconscious.
The drastic pull of former conditioning has held back so many people from embracing these new ways of thinking full heartedly and slowly they revert back to former thoughts. It did not take the leaders of these new advent schools such as Yoga to realize what was happening so they adopted Jesus and Christianity in to their main teachings. This allowed the western adept an almost guilt free ride to Nirvana.
Almost, because in order to attain the state of Nirvana one must liberate the mind completely where one is in a state of No-Mind, but in order to do that one has to chuck out - chuck out all the past conditioning. Just think about it for a minute - what you must do. Chuck out all the useless trivia, all the important meanings to your life - chuck out Jesus, Buddha and the whole shebang of prophets and Saints.
Just imagine with what freedom the mind would have if it never ever thought about re-incarnation again. That would be a huge weight thrown out from mind. Start with one thing at a time and see how you can live without it.
Take reincarnation for example, it absolutely makes no difference to you whether there is such a thing or not. Of course if you believe as the Hindus that a bad deed may karmically, return you as an ant or a deer, then it may make a difference, but that difference is one of control, to make you do good in life, so as not to return as an ant. Forget reincarnation as it is totally unimportant in your life. Why waste a second on it? What else is not important that you can throw out. Throw out Soul. What good does it do you to either know or not know whether you have a soul. Believing you have one, or don't have one does not change your life one iota. Get rid of it.
Already the mind seems almost empty. Yet, there is still that nagging worry that you should be doing something to become better, to become pure, to be righteous and good. Are you really that bad that you have to waste time thinking about that. Chuck it out also. The laws of the land will keep you as much in line as you need to be.
Now chuck out those things that mean so much to you - Chuck out Jesus, Allah and all things spiritual. What is spiritual anyway? No matter how hard you try anything, you still remain the same, so why not stop trying and get rid of this ego desire to improve. Improvement is an ongoing achievement. It literally means you are continually dissatisfied with who you are as you are always trying to improve. What a life! What a trap people keep themselves in. There is never any happiness.
Now look into your mind. It's going crazy with nothing to think about - nowhere to go, so now what do you do?
It is here where most people come to a standstill because most people do not want Samadhi - or Nirvana. They do not know what it is, so how could they. They do not know what to do in order to get it, and when they do, from the foremost exponent of Yoga, Patanjali, they refuse to let go and empty the mind. They think that emptying the mind can be had by a ½ hour meditation, just like that, and then in the next instant carry on with a full mind the way they were before - empty- full, empty - full. It can never be done.
I have tried to explain that an astute concentrated effort to realize how you have been conditioned to think and believe should be realized and then thrown out.
Have you noticed in political arguments where bloodshed may be spilled, that whether you argued for the right or the left would in effect make no difference to you, except where bloodshed is concerned, you were the loser.
But in the long run, the world goes on, peace and war have always existed. Trials and tribulations, poverty and starvation is the main course for man.
Before allowing the mind to get into these mental gymnastics with opponents, chuck them out. Be free of them. Who really cares whether you or I are right about reincarnation, or about there being a Soul, or that there may be or not be such a thing as spirituality. What does it matter to you? It will give you nothing to feel correct about it. All your ideas you have ever had have not given you liberation. In fact it is these ideas that have driven you to the quest, to seek freedom, but in seeking liberation, one should not get caught up in the search for the right answer about reincarnation or soul or God. One has to get rid of them all in order to get liberation.
For those that have just tuned in, Patanjali says first, Abhyassa of the Chitta Vritti, which means "restraint of mental fluctuations". It is for this reason that one practices Yoga, to learn how to control, with love - his mental workings.
But next he says Chitta Vritti Nirhoda, meaning, "Total annihilation of ALL mental fluctuation" It is this final stage that gives one Liberation or Moksha - first by beginning samadhis, then on to the higher ones.
In practicing Yoga you learn dharana, which is concentration, then dhyana, contemplation, then samadhi, union. The sooner you learn to be brave and really chuck out all the old beliefs while practicing your Yoga the sooner you can unfold attributable conscious to the unattributable state of Pure Consciousness. It is this pure state which has nothing in it - No-Mind.
Well? This is what most of you who study with me are seeking. I can't imagine anyone wishing to quest for anything else. To unite with Ultimate Reality fully realizing you are not this illusion the ego has created about you.
So many of you have kept a running dialogue going with me and your questions are most revealing, showing the real understanding you have of this complicated subject.
So when I say DUMP - CHUCK OUT - I am not being cruel or hard, but realistic, The longer you play with the mayic illusions of religions and cults and Yoga, the more you drive yourself away from the Source you seek.
Of course in the beginning you must practice some techniques, but don't become lost in them as they then become the reality for you and you lose site of Ultimate Reality - Atman.
Think of a great musician - a pianist - who practices sometimes 8 hours a day on the technique of making his fingers obey his brain, and also obey what his teacher has explained is the best way to achieve this easability of fingering.
It is only when this has been achieved that he can forget the technique and allow the music the composer has written to be expressed.
It is the same in Yoga. Learn your techniques and then forget them so you can then allow the Atman to be expressed and experienced by you.
When do you give up - or chuck out everything you learn in Yoga? When you realize what I have been saying in the above. By this time you will have learned to sit still and remain silent. Your consciousness will remain alert to its purity - without attributes - fluctuations or samskaras, and like Buddha sat under the Bhodi tree and gained enlightenment - you learn to do that.
There is nothing else to do really.
Ramana Maharshi has this to say about Gnana Yoga:
(v) jnana is the annihilation of the mind in which it is made to assume the form of the Self through the constant practice of dhyana or enquiry (vichara). The extinction of the mind is the state in which there is a cessation of all efforts. Those who are established in this state never swerve from their true state. The terms 'silence' (mouna) and inaction refer to this state alone.
So you can see now what needs to be done.
Namaste.
Swami