Category Archives: 3. BE INSPIRED

(Quote from) A NEW EARTH by Eckhart Tolle –

EGO: THE CURRENT STATE OF HUMANITY.

FROM DESCARTES’S ERROR TO SARTRE’S INSIGHT.

The seventeenth-century philosopher Descartes, regarded as the founder of modern philosophy, gave expression to this primary error with his famous dictum (which he saw as primary truth): “I think, therefore I am.” This was the answer he found to the question “Is there anything I can know with absolute certainty?” He realized that the fact that lie was always thinking was beyond doubt, and so he equated thinking with Being, that is to say, identity I am with thinking. Instead of the ultimate truth, he had found the root of the ego, but he did not know that.

It took almost three hundred years before another famous philosopher saw something in that statement that Descartes, as well as everybody else, had overlooked. His name was Jean-Paul Sartre. He looked at Descartes’s statement “I think, therefore I am very deeply and suddenly realized, in his own words, “The consciousness that says ‘ 1 am is not the consciousness that thinks.” What did he mean by that?  When you are aware that you are thinking, that awareness is not part of thinking.  It is a different dimension of consciousness. And it is that awareness that says “I am.”  If there were nothing but thought in you, you would not even know you are thinking. You would be like a dreamer who doesn’t know he is dreaming. You would be as identified with every thought as the dreamer is with every image in the dream.  Many people still live like that, like sleepwalkers, trapped in old dysfunctional mind-sets that continuously re-create the same nightmarish reality. When you know you are dreaming, you are awake within the dream. Another dimension of consciousness has come in.

The implication of Sartre’s insight is profound, but he himself was still too identified with thinking to realize the full significance of what he had discovered: an emerging new dimension of consciousness.

SWAMI BAWRA SPEAKING ABOUT YOGA … continued…

This transcript continues from Blog entry below. This will be edited and checked.

This mountain is a very old mountain.  ……..  

And there is [sounds like ? satipeaka].  So many yogis are living here my boy, he told, and you are very lucky you saw one Yogi. Okay. And people were (6.51) telling before that there is one person. Sometimes he can out and his feet is very tall and two persons can put their feet and then they will be the same and he is very tall person maybe more than seven feet.  But I was not, you know, believing.  I was hearing about such kind of yogi.  I have seen, you know, in my life. (7.10) So my boy there is so many Yogis, and such Yogis are Master of Hatha Yoga. They can make their body, they can change their body, you know, and there was one Yogi and I met him.  He was very great yogi too.  And he was doing so many kinds of, you know, extraordinary work.  (7.38) You can’t imagine how he was living and how he was [SL thinking].  He told me, ‘I can sit in this position six months, not only one and two, he told me …… sixteen hours …… great yogi I can sit six months, can you sit with me and I told, ‘No I can’t!’

His name was [SL Vishvadan]. [?] He told, ‘You were sitting only sixteen hours and you were thinking they were great yogi.  Oh my boy you are child.’  (8.04m) Okay now you are [SL develop] (8.08m) you are not a yogi.  Don’t be proud.’ He told.  Don’t be proud.  You are sitting only sixteen hours and you are thinking you have become great yogi. You know. Can you sit with me. Master. He told, ‘I was sitting six months’ he told [in] that posture. ‘I was sitting six months in this posture. [he said], ‘Can you sit?’

‘No sir.  I can’t.’

He was saint. His name was [SL Vishvadan]. He was a great yogi.

So there are so many yogis in India still now.  Luckily anybody see them.  It is not possible to see them. Okay. It is very hard to see them.  Luckily any time if by their own grace only you can see.  So this is a great sphere, Hatha Yoga. Has great meaning my dear and other is, you now, Kriya Yoga. And Kriya Yoga has three aspects, Penance.  [Sancrit verse: (9.12)Sa batswa sya…] Penance. Do penance. Control your senses through penance. Austerity.  That has great place in that process. They are not doing religious [?]. They are not doing other things.  They are only doing austerity. Penance. Controlling their food. Okay. Controlling their food they are taking only fruit, either they are taking only milk and taking only fruit, you know, once a day.  So many yogis they are living on water only. Okay. (9.43m) I have seen one yogi and she was, a woman, not only one and two day my boy, forty five years without taking water and without taking food. Forty five years. She was. Okay. (10.05m) And she climbed mountain with me sixteen thousand, you know, [feet] height. She visited with me to [amanata] and she climbed [SL ? sheshanaga] height sixteen thousand.  And she was [satima]. She left her body just, just, so many, four five years, before, ago. She left.  She didn’t take water and she doesn’t take food and she was walking , she was talking, she was teaching people. Okay. 

And you will be surprised in Jaypur there is a medical institution.  There was a doctor, principle of that institution.  His name was Doctor Sharma and he requested her Mother I want to examine you.  (10.55)

She smiled, “Oh my boy.  What will you do?”

“I want to test Mother how you are living without food without, you know.  This is against our, you know, science. …And now we know science can prove it.”

“Okay then you can examine my boy.  I don’t know how I am living without this.”

And she came; he came, that …. woman two months, and he was searching and in the end he declared that she has no stomach in her body.  There is no belly; here is no intestine; all was dried, you know, shrink so she has no place to put anything. You know. Lower than her throat. No anything – he told. He declared.  He name was Satima.  She died just. Left her body. Okay. So my dears there are so many …. (12.03m) and I asked mother, how it happened.

“Oh don’t ask about it! Only this is the grace of divine Lord Rama.  I am chanting only Rama, Rama, nothing else.”  She told me. 

I was fifteen days with her – okay. And she told me, “My boy. My child, I am only reciting Rama, Rama, Rama, Rama can do everything. Okay. If you repeat this word then you will be a great yogi too.” She told me.  It was 63, 1963, I was with her.  So there are so many yogis. There are Kriya Yogis and there are Hatha Yogis too in India – many kinds of yogis.  Whatever processes are continuing in our country you will find a great yogi, great master of those yogas. Okay. Hatha yoga, Kriya Yogas, … Yogas, Raj Yogas, Gyan Yogas.  So many yogis you will find.  Okay. But you can’t find them in a city. You can’t find them where there is path, you know, sign board. ‘A great yogis live here.’ They never put sign board there. Okay.  You can’t find them there.  There are only business men. Okay.  They laugh always.  They think they are only business men. They become yogi. Okay. They are only propagating. They don’t know about what yoga is.  There are so many people. They [real yogis] laugh.  And in Himalaya, that is the abode of yogis.  There is no doubt. Still you will find many yogis are living there. Okay.  In Gangaltri.  I visited Gangaltri once. [Source of the Ganges] 1962 I was, you know, visiting in the Himalaya and I saw there. There was one yogi without cloth, without loin cloth too. He was living naked. In that place. Okay. And you will be surprised and sometimes more than twenty feet [of] snow fall there; more than twenty feet. That is, you know, (14.20) glacier. And he was living there without any clothes; without anything.  He was enjoying his life.  His name was Swami Ramanada.

 Okay. And another yogi was living with him in other place.  Near to him.  His name was Swami Krishnananda.  And Swami Krishnananda was, you know, that person who founded; put foundation of Hindu university. You Know, In Varanasi (Benares).  That was Swami Krishnananda.  And he was Guru of M…. And he was great yogi too.  He lived there naked, naked without anything and I enter in his room and I felt that this is heaven. You know there can’t be other heaven [than] this place. And there was nothing, no clothes nothing. Only grass.  They put some grass and grass was very, very fine and very, you know, good smell too. You know.  You can see that there is only, what you say, that scent is everywhere but not scent. There was grass and he was, you know, living on that, sitting on that sleeping on that, living in that room.  So there are so many yogis now also my dear. But, you know, that is ah, you know, err, that is very bad. Swami Ramanada and Swami Krishnananda they left their body now. Living yogi in India and living lovely men. So great people.  So great person. So Many and five great saints died, you know left their body last year. Last year.  Five. There was [Yoya]baba one among those. Okay. And Brahmdev and Brahmacharya and so many and five left last year. And five years ago five great yogis left their bodies too. Okay. So my boy I was telling that in India there is many kinds of method and Lord stated here, that he who is eager to achieve highest level of consciousness, he wish to attain up to his own destination. (16.38) He must adopt some process. [Sanscit text. A……yoga.]  Only Muni (sage).  Muni means desire-less person.  Muni means, a great thinker. A great desire less person can only sublime up to highest level of consciousness. But he who want to sublime up to that level of consciousness, he must adopt some process. [Sanscit text. A…….](17.08) [Perception] is the cause. [Means.  Cause is means.] [Sanscit text. A…….] But when he sublime that highest state is reached, then [Sanscit text. Yoga…….](17.20) Then sign of yoga hood, being a great yogi, is saman [quiet, calm, resigned] serenity. Serenity is the sign of a great yogi.  How one can believe that he is yogi now? If serenity is in his mind; tranquillity is in his mind. If his mind is tranquil [saying] then you can think he is yogi. Yoga …. means (17.55) He become, you know, he become [iyuda] he become [separate], He become [separate] himself into yoga and highest level of consciousness. (18.01m) It is a sign. Serenity is the sign. A sublime person. So [Sanscit text. Yoga…….] He state.  But before being yoga[hood].  Okay? He who has not established himself in the highest level of consciousness.  He must try to adopt some method.  If you will adopt some method and you will continue today.  And Lord has stated don’t be, you know, don’t be frustrated because not today but tomorrow, if you are adopting one path. Okay?  And you are walking on that; not today but tomorrow you will reach there. In the end in {chapter 6 in the [Bagavad] Gita Lord stated “Not in one day.” [Sanscit text. Bahuna  …….] (18.53) okay, [Sanscit text. San  …….]  Slowly, slowly you will develop your level of consciousness.  Don’t think that in one day you will be a great yogi. No!  And don’t think that in one life you will be a great yogi too.

There was a great yogi.  One day he went for alms.  In India, mostly yogis are living on the alms.  Asking alms and living.  I spent twelve years on alms.  I was getting one chapatti

from one house. I was begging and living on the alms. Twelve years.  Not only one and two.  From [48] 58 to 70. Okay. And I left that begging when I came in London in 1972. Okay?  So I was living on alms to.  Getting one chapatti from one house.  So in India mostly yogis were doing it.  So one yogi was one man.  He reached.  There was a householder woman.  And she was very apt and very wise too.  When she saw him, young boy came for alms and she asked, “Oh you came very early my boy.  You came very early.”  You know. [SL What his name …] You came very early – it means: “Very young lad. You become yogi.”

And he replied, “My Mother.  My journey was stated not today but yesterday. Okay.  I started my journey not to today but yesterday.”

Yesterday means in my past life I did that. Okay. This is my own experience my boy so many kinds of yoga activities. I come in my life without learning, without learning.  From any person.  Many, you know, exercise of yoga and very subtle exercise came in my life without learning. Why?  And I was stunned then my master told, “Why you are worried about it? These are all activities you did in past life. (21.20) Okay? And that appeared automatically. You did […..] Lord stated in sixth chapter that when a yogi leaves this body then go and live in divine sphere some years and after that take birth in holy families and after that all sanscaras, all activities, whatever he did in past life appear in this life automatically and he start his journey again. Okay. So not in this life. Whatever you are doing today you don’t think that will vanish. No. That will live with you and tomorrow when you will get another birth and you achieve all impressions in your life without any effort. And you journey will start again.  And one day in this process. One day. [Sanscit text.    …….] Lord has stated. ‘Not only by one birth.’ [Sanscit text.    …….] because Hindu believe [in river] Why? Because we believe in evolution of life. And complete evolution will take place when you will achieve Godhood in your life. (22.33) Okay? So unless you are achieving Godhood your journey will continue. Be aware. And one day will come in your life when you’ll achieve that.  So don’t be frustrated.  Try to adopt one path and continue and tread on that divine path.  And one day you will reach your destination.  There is no doubt. Lord stated it.  [Sanscit text.   So …….Yoga…] this is a sign. Okay? First it Kama mean – Means. And some particular process become means for achieving highest level of consciousness.  When a person established himself into higher level of consciousness then some […..ity] become sign. (23.28)  That now he achieved.  Automatically all [SL .exem?] leave. (23.34) And he become calm and quiet and serene. And without any effort he live in higher level of consciousness.  That serenity become a sign of being a yogi.  That state is called yogi. Okay?

And next stated in Sloka.  Lord stated, what is the sign of yogi? How I can declare.  How I can know now I become a yogi really? Okay? And how I can declare others that now he become yogi, really.  Lord stated.  I will tell other sloka. That fouth sloka. Okay?

[The Sanscrit Prayer indicates the end of this talk by Swami Bawra.  

Om Aum Bhuh Bhuvah Svah, Tat Savitur Varenyam, Bhargo Devasya Dheemahi, Dhiyo Yo nah Prachodayat.]

(MUSIC) To hear Gayatri Mantra sung Click the link below.

Existence – Gayatri Mantra

(VIDEO) SWAMI BAWRA SPEAKING ABOUT YOGIS AND WALKING ON WATER.

The reposted video in the post above, ‘Swami Bawra speaking about Yogis and walking on water’ is shared here for reasons that will become apparent in later posts. Swami Bawra shared these stories with me many years ago but I never heard him tell of these saints openly in a talk until I came upon this recording.   In a world of hard nosed scientific realism this is a precious gem.

This is a word for word transcript of Brahmrishi Shri Vishvatma Bawra Ji Maharaj.

speaking on HATHA YOGA and YOGIS in a discourse on Chapter 6  of the Bhagavad Gita – Talk Part 2.

Part 1 can be viewed here:

 ... all are related with these. In our Hatha Yoga all must be, you know, special subject and you can describe, you can be master, and real yogi. If you can be master for that, of that, then you can be a real Yogi.  And [a] Hatha Yogi has great power. But that is related to material power.

One day I taught you that there was one Yogi, Hatha Yogi, and his name was Chan [Gyan] Deva in India then. He lived fourteen hundred years, okay, fourteen hundred years, old he was when Gyan Deva was born (0.42) in 500 years ago [he was]. There are so many other yogis too; they are living in India and they are doing.  I met one yogi and he was 300 years old and he was sitting, he was controlling his breath and I wrote this in my one book about his life. So there are so many Yogis still now in India.  They are, you know, living and so many years; maybe a thousand years old.  They are living in Himalaya and some other places too. (1.00) I met so many yogis in my life. 

Once [when] I was [a] very young boy I was studying and doing penance; very hard penance and …… I was drinking only Ganges water. I was not taking any other thing. Okay. And I was living in Vindhyachal, that was a big holy place in Uttar Pradesh. One day [in the] early morning I came to [the] Ganges and I was taking that holy water because that was my food. And I was taking Ganges water twice.  Early morning and in the evening – twice a day. So there was only my skeleton only not flesh or any other thing. Okay. This is 1954. This is 1954.  One day when I was drinking water I saw a Yogi and he was standing on the bank of the Ganges river.  And he saw me and smiled and he called me, ‘Oh my boy.’ 

When I saw I prostrate him and I forget who is he but I prostrate him and I follow him.  He indicate, ‘Come.’ And I follow – he started and he was walking and I was following him.  He went about three miles on the bank of Ganges River.  And after that he walked on the water and I was seeing and [he] entered on the water. When he went some extent, then he sleep on the water and call me, ‘Come my boy.’

I was stunned.  How I can go there? I told, ‘No sir I can’t. I have no strength. I can’t tread.’

 ‘You know how to swim.’

 I said, ‘Yes I know but I have no ability.  I am very weak now and I can’t be.’

‘But I am here, come. You come.’

I said, ‘No sir I can’t.’

 ‘Oh!’ then he laughed, ‘Okay stay there. I will come.’

 And he was sleeping on the Ganges water. And after maybe one hour and some one or two hour. And I was sitting and looking [at] him. And he was sleeping.  And you [will] be surprised and Ganges water was flowing but he was not flowing with water. He was sleeping there. I was stunned.  But after some hour he came out and he touched my head and he told me, “Oh my boy. You scared? Okay. Okay.”

 And he do in this way, [holding up his hand in a reaching gesture] and got a book, a small book and gave [to me and said], “You are doing very hard austerity. Okay? I know, so I giving you this blessing. Take this book and one day you will be very learned person my boy.  And you will be great Yogi too.”

 Oh! I was stunned. And he blessed my head and then blessed me and he told, “Go now.”

And then I went some extent and then I saw, you’ll [be] surprised when he touched my head, my head was up to here, [pointing to the bottom of his rib cage] okay, here.  He may be seven foot tall.  ?both of that too …. I remember still now my head was up to his this place, stomach only. And I am six feet and he was so tall person. 

When I left him I went some extent I thought, because at that time (5.25) and [from when] he called me and when he allowed me to go, between those times I was spell bound.  I was unconscious. I was not in my sense.

 And when I went outside and I thought, ‘Who is he?’

Then I, you know, memorise [recalled] all these things, whatever happened, how he walk on the water, how he sleep on the water?  And who is he?  Then I come again there.  And I was searching, searching, and I couldn’t see him again.  And then I cried. I thought maybe God (6.00) came to me, [laughed] and I cried, I cried there, but I didn’t find him again.  Then I was searching him again on the Ganges River [but] I didn’t see him again. 

Then I got his book, whatever he gave me. Okay? And I pacified myself, okay, he is in the form of book. Okay.  I just held my heart and whole day.  Not only whole day.  So many days (6.28) I was thinking about him only.  I have seen such kind of yogi.  And I told some other person and they told there are so many yogis living in Vindhyachal.  This mountain is a very old mountain…….. “  talk continues…

A full word for word transcript of this entire lecture is available by email from malcolm@gaiatechuk.com.

(Letter) on Spiritual Experiences.

Dear E….

I added the Ramana Maharshi Quote and our discussion to my blog and thought I would send you the link because the distinction offered by Ramana is an important one.  Jnani is the path of Knowledge by which false understanding (ignorance) is stripped away. It asks ‘Who am I?’ As distinct from Bhakti which is the path of Devotion.  Our leaning toward one or the other is a predisposition in our Nature.

http://www.gaiatechuk.com/wordpress/?p=1431

There are a handful of jewels that illuminate the path to emancipation beyond which nothing else is required.  We come with all the tools necessary to realise enlightenment.  A single idea defines the Nature of Reality.  ‘We are Consciousness’ .  That’s it.  That is the mystery.  But the realisation of the profound depth of this simple statement requires an inner condition, [Or you can say an inner stance – a way of being internally] or it cannot be a stable experience.

Ramana 02

The most important thing to understand is that there is nothing to gain.  There is nowhere to go.  The path is only a process of removing obstacles to the realisation of that Truth.  By being a conscious being you are a channel for consciousness, Now, Now, Now.  It is there always in its absolute perfection at your heart (centre of your being).  All that is required for us to experience it is the sweep away Ego/Mind.   Ego/Mind is like a forest that stands between us and the rising sun.  There is no problem with the sun.  Only the presence of the forest blocks our view.  This understanding is a Jnani concept.  Two ways fell the forest – insight (knowledge) and devotion (complete surrender to God or Self.  And by this I do not mean the God of speculation that is a mental construct).

The result of rendering Ego/Mind silent is the experience of Bliss – a property of Consciousness.  It is ‘that peace that surpasses all understanding [1]about which all sages speak and which fuels what often becomes an Ego driven craving for emancipation particularly when emancipation is seen as a panacea for mental turmoil.  That Sublime Peace is always present but drowned out by Mind.  If encountered a devotional person will likely experience this Bliss as a love for God.  We can be an atheist (rejecting of a notion of God) or a believer (accepting of a notion of God) it makes no difference because both these are attached to the Ego/Mind and not Reality. When bliss manifests in experience, concepts are irrelevant.

Many people accidentally experience a Bliss State.  History is awash with them and profound as it appears at the time this is not the stable state enjoyed by Seers because Enlightenment is a dynamic not a passive state requiring the penetrative insight that prevails in Satwic Mind (a state of harmony, balance, joy & insightful wisdom).  It can be fleeting or last for hours or even days, but in the absence of any fine understanding or guidance the individual will usually becomes mentally unstable by trying to cling to the experience and all too often will be diagnosed as delusional or even psychotic.  This premature experience is not one to invite without access to a wise teacher.  If it happens then understanding its nature and cause is everything.

In 1988 I ran a meditation course in Surrey.  Nineteen people enrolled.  Before I started the first session I asked how many people were there because they had had what they would term a Spiritual Experience.  All but two or three hands were raised.  In those days I was nowhere near a reasoned explanation.

The clue as to why it happens, unbidden, lies in our devotional nature. And this is also the key as to why it is usually intentionally unrepeatable.  Many people who have ‘enlightenment’ experiences spend years trying to repeat what they think they did or make the experience mean something when it means nothing – except to reveal only that we are Consciousness.  Actually it was what they did not do that made it occur.

Essentially one is surrendering without realising it.  In a moment of ‘Grace’ (you can say) ones Ego is set to one side and The Self, Consciousness, God is momentarily revealed. Hence Ramana Maharshi said;

“The moment when ego is completely surrendered, the Self shines”

It is the Ego that wishes to repeat the experience.   It will fade as soon as the Ego asserts itself again – as my experience.  Quite often the experience is accompanied with tears of joy, and a feeling of complete devotion to God. The experience of the Self is beyond description and life changing.  In such moments there is no desire.  One is completely fulfilled – immersed in unconditional love.

But ultimately devotion is not enough.  Anything suppressed can reassert itself so one has to realise the true nature of the Self and remove all impressions (Sanscaras) to be a completely free Soul.

<[1] “… And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding.” Philippians 4:4-7 (English Standard Version)

(Thoughts) on Surrender

It is the Doer that gets in the way. Which is why practice is effective when we are not doing it. How hard is that? Remember the camel and the eye of the needle? If the Doer is doing it, it is not just difficult, it is impossible. And then one day, as if by accident, something different occurs and we can be sure that it did so because for the briefest of moments we, little we, got out of the way. So what do we do – we try harder, and centuries pass, (or so it seems) and then one day, as if by accident, something different occurs… again. It is mysterious how it happens, which is why the masters call it Grace. It is Grace because We can’t do it. The Doer is powerless. The accident that made the camel slide through the eye of the needle was a moment of surrender. Every moment is potentially such a moment.

(Quote) by Ramana Maharshi on our relationship to God.

“UPADESA SARAM”

Verse 24:  isha jiva yor vesa dhi bidha. Sat Svabhava yatho vastu kevalam.

Verse 24:  “By existing (irukkum) in their real nature which is Existence or Sat, God and souls are one substance (vastu).  Their adjunct knowledge or adjunct consciousness alone is different.”

Adjunct = a thing added to something else as a supplementary rather than an essential part.

(Video Link) by films for action.

http://www.filmsforaction.org/watch/enoughness_restoring_balance_to_the_economy/

We may come to realise too late that any amount of  technological wizardry would never have made us happy.  We were sold false dreams engineered by peddlers of nightmares and paid the price for not being awake to the danger.  In fact such trinkets will have the opposite effect.  They will makes us less satisfied, less contented, more distracted and therefore more pray to suffering.  We can live in a far simpler, far more natural way and still live in heaven.  But by reaching inwards not outwards.