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Harih Om Tat Sat. Harih Om Tat Sat. Jai Guru. Jai Guru.
Yesterday I was speaking about how from the so-called concentric absorption in the Self during meditation, the seeker or the knower expands himself completely to have a universal dimension, continuity of the Self awareness. I thought I would speak again on the subject.
There is a verse in Vivekacūḍāmaṇi. When I was reading these texts, I always had a habit of going into the last portion of the text without covering the whole of preceding portions. Because in the last portions you will always find some very good conclusive statements made by the author. In Vivekacūḍāmaṇi also, you will find very beautiful verses presented in the last section. One such verse is this:
When it is presented in Sanskrit poetry, it facilitates remembrance. And the lines, the words, the sequences in poetry cannot be replaced at all. Our brain will always pick up one letter after the other, one word after the other, only then the meter will be agreed. So for remembrance, it is very good.
When a person with a lot of striving is able to realize the Self, what will follow the self-realization? Is he going to drop his body? Will every activity of his stop? Will he not be taking food? Will not the food provide nutrition and the nutrition will end up in energy which warrants utilization by activity? So as long as he takes food, activity and interaction cannot be denied or set aside.
What will a man of self-realization do? He will spread the message of self-realization. Very few people are there for it. So he will always be in this disseminational mission. When he goes on moving like that, there will be public life, public interaction, quite a number of people will come and he will have to interact with a variety of situations, even circumstances and the like.
Na khidyate no viṣayaiḥ pramodate
Na khidyate - He does not get afflicted or tormented or depressed.
No viṣayaiḥ pramodate - On the other hand, he is also not going to exult and have extra delight.
Look at his life, his life will be open. In a family, your life will be very limited. In an Ashram, so many people will come, anybody can come, they do come. Sometimes people will come, even five-ten people come without announcing that they are arriving, and they will be arriving at a meal time. And innocent people think “It is an Ashram, when we go there, we will certainly have food”. They don’t think further about the logistics and trouble of food making, but they think like that.
So anybody can come, anytime they can come, so our life is very very indefinite. In that indefiniteness, different kinds of experience and interactions will follow. There will be occasions which tend to torment you or at least give you some difficulties.
He says, na khidyate, you will not be tormented. No viṣayaiḥ pramodate - when favorable and pleasing developments are there, this is a categorization of what takes place. So far as his mind is concerned, it will not unduly exult, delight or rejoice. The mind is capable of striking such a transcendental note.
Na sajjate nāpi virajyate ca. This is a point that people always miss. He does not get attached to anything nor does he get detached from anything. Normally the mind works on this two-way position. It is either attached to something or it is totally detached to something.
“Oh! We were friends. That day my friend told me something. I could not tolerate. Our friendship terminated”. This is what people always say. As a friend, does he not have opportunity to make some mistakes? Can you not take it as a free expression? We should not mind it. Na khidyate.
Similarly, na sajjate nāpi virajyate ca. He doesn’t have extreme attachment to anything nor does he have distance and detachment from anything. This transcendental, middle position is what you should always focus on. Once you accept this middle position as the ideal, everything is an opportunity for you to reinforce it. At no point of time for the swimmer, the water has lost its drowning power. The water will try to drown him, but he will have to wave his hands and legs to remain afloat.
So the alternatives are coming repeatedly in the form of sukha and duhkha. He will not be either getting attached to anything or detached from anything. Then what will he do? When he has nothing to draw him this way or that way, he will always be resting on his own self. And what will it be like?
Svasmin - In oneself, inwardly in oneself; sadā – always.
Krīḍati nandati svayaṁ - He is sporting in himself. He is rejoicing and reveling in himself.
Nirantar-ānandarasena tṛptaḥ - Contented by the unceasing bliss produced by his own consciousness, mind.
Just see? All of you are misers! Misers to the core! Why? You only want some drops of pleasure from this world and life. Here is a possibility where you become a receptacle for uninterrupted, uniform, incessant, peaceful bliss and this will be generated not in a state where you are away from everything, but in a state where you are involved in everything. Mark my words, you will be facing things which are tending to attach you to, things which are tending to detach you from. In the company of both, you will see that I am neither attached to nor detached from. This middle position, this transcendental position, this self-position, this natural position is so beautiful that you start becoming harmonious with the world, integral with the world.
Some people will like you; some people will not. Some things you like; some things you will not. There are so many items of food, not all of them you like, so you take what is acceptable to your system and leave the rest. Do you have any hatred for the others; do they cause problem? In a house, some vegetable preparations, sabjis will be there. One day the sabji will be not to your liking, so you avoid it, or take a little. Sometimes you will relish it, okay take more. But don’t create a fuss. It is absolutely possible.
You know, it is so comfortable, so easy, so light-hearted. Unfortunately, people don’t know this! They feel that either I should be in the world or I should be out of the world. Where? In the Himalayan peaks where you only think of, you never go and you will never go in your life. Not such distancing is the means. The mind has got a middle position. It enjoys, it grieves. Allow it to enjoy when it is so; allow it to grieve. I tell people, “Why don’t you grieve for five minutes or ten minutes and feel relief after the tears?” The tears should not enhance your grief. It should be just like urination or sweating.
Once you understand this verse, commit it to memory, and chant it, repeat it, remember it, you will find the whole life will unfold a different meaning for you. Our spiritual attainment is not something to be had by being away from the world but by practicing ‘away-ness’ in the world itself. And our mind makes ample provision for it. The provision is that ‘middle’.
I was looking into the meaning of the word ‘meditation’, ‘Mediterranean’. Mediterranean Sea is called Madhya-dharaṇy-āzhi – Madhya-dharaṇya-samudra; means what - it is the ocean at the middle of the sea. So the word ‘medit’, ‘meditation’, ‘med’, ‘mid’, it has always got the meaning that you should be at the centre and in the middle. Middle of what? Middle of two things; and what are the two - Sukha and duhkha, like and dislike, good and bad, sin and virtue, life and death, body and soul. The soul is initially different from the body. But when you understand the soul, body is not different from the soul. Soul alone is. Therefore, if the body is, that is also the soul. Differentiation is the first means to get at the object. Once you are understanding the subject better and better, you will find this differentiation is not necessary. Everything becomes the ‘Chit’, everything becomes sentience, it becomes the soul. Try to understand this.
Harih Om Tat Sat. Harih Om Tat Sat. Jai Guru. Jai Guru.
