1. IR 84-4 Gururaj. I ask people to open their eyes slowly, but when I try to do it, I can’t. The eyelashes are too long and they stick together, I have got to give it a jerk. Good, now at every Course we have a rapid fire question and answer session. Now most of you will know what this means that when if a person asks a question and I speak a whole hour on it, and there might be others who want to ask questions and don’t have a chance. Rapid fire question means anyone here can ask any question they like, even abou t the Kerry-man and Kerry-woman or even how to make a cake. Who’ll start it off this morning? Questioner. Beloved Guruji, how can teaching meditation help us along our spiritual path? Teaching meditation helps you along your spiritual path because while you are teaching you are being self-taught and you become more deeper and deeper in your own practices. You can ask any teacher that teaches at an ordinary school, that they learn more from the children than what they teach the children. They start learning the human mind, how a child operates, what is the psychological basis of the child’s mind, because every little child is a class on its own. So say, a teacher, teaching Standard 1 or 2 what do you call it Form 1 or 2. In South Africa the same. If you have 40 or 30 children, remember the teacher has 30 Classes. By teaching you are clarifying your own thoughts in your own mind to a more finer and finer degree and as the saying goes, the giver is always the receiver and you receive more. And when you teach and you find the person going into that deep comfortable state, there is something that happens to your heart as well. Because what you are emanating, that person will take on and what that person in a relaxed state would emanate, you would take on too. So it’s mutually beneficial. I go around the world teaching and you’d be surprised how much I gain myself, studying the various personalities and I am a student of life, and a Master of it too. But I first had to be a student to master life. So teaching has the greatest benefits possible, and it is not for everyone to be cut out as a teacher. They must have that little ability. For therefore, when we appoint teachers, we are very careful just not to appoint anyone. Okay, good. Next Question. Questioner. Dear Gururaj, why do some people start meditating and then stop? Gururaj. Very good. Many people start meditating for many different reasons and I have studied statistically that there might be less than 2% that start to meditate that really want to find the Kingdom of Heaven within. Most people start to meditate because of their personal problems. They could have psychological problems, financial problems, domestic

2. IR 84-4 problems, you name it and therefore they start meditating. Now they think that meditation is like a magic wand, that you just wave the wand and all your troubles are gone. Now I say that is nonsense. Your troubles will go, but they will go gradually. By meditation as I have said before, as you learn to face yourself more and more in the mirror and start realising your weaknesses, you start removing your weaknesses. Now those that stop meditating are people that do not want to persevere. For some people come to meditation just for the sake of curiosity. Now anything in life you’ll find takes some time. If you are a housewife and you are cooking, you can’t just wave a wand and the meal is ready cooked. If you are a carpenter and you want to build a table, you can’t just wave a magic wand. Even Jesus had to work hard with his saw and his hammer to build tables and chairs and cartwheels and what have you. You see, so perseverance, consistency and you will find, and doing meditation in a proper method, you will find that your troubles will disappear gradually, because you are becoming more and more stable. And the more stable you become, the more integrated you become, the greater would your benefits be. Now don’t think that I’m going to start meditating now and tomorrow a million pounds, punts are going to fall in my lap. Forget it! But through meditation you can develop the stability, you can develop the integration, your mind becomes more powerful, more clear in thinking, so that you can make the plans whereby you can create that million pounds. I am using this as an analogy but it applies to everything else. So those people that stop meditating, I do feel sorry for them, sorry in the way that these tools are given to them for nothing. I don’t charge a penny for teaching people to meditate, not a penny. The ten punt postal order that is sent with your Form, that goes towards expenses. There are secretarial expenses, there are telephones to pay, there are lights to pay, there is filing to be done, dictation, postages, it goes on that. I don’t charge. I give it free; I give it as a gift, totally free. And to-night we are going to have the Communion Practice where I become one with Divinity. You do nothing, you just sit still, and tonight I will give you a more, deeper explanation of it. Right. Now I have to go through a similar state in order to initiate someone into the person’s practices. And that is given to me as a gift. And when people misuse a gift, it is their fault, I cannot help it. I give and I give and I give. How they use it or misuse it or don’t use, I can’t do anything about it. Now people always want to have things instantly, instant pudding, instant coffee, it doesn’t work that way. People are so fragmented in this world, after millions of years of existences and do expect a miracle happening like that. It does not. You can create miracles or so-called miracles because there are no miracles really. It is only to know the finer laws of nature and the man that has reached a very high level of spirituality will understand the finer laws of nature. I have said this many times, that say a hundred years ago, someone tells you that a 2,000 ton piece of iron can fly through the sky, you will say he’s mad, because they did not understand the laws of aeronautics. I can sit here now and

3. IR 84-4 within two minutes, one minute, immediately, I can speak thousands of miles away to my wife. If you had to tell that to people before, they would say that you are mad. Now these subtler laws which people don’t understand as operating within themselves, because they do not know the subtler laws, they have no appreciation of it. So to repeat again, perseverance, and I can show you thousands and thousands of letters on my files from people, even though I do not need appreciation, but they write how meditation and spiritual practices prescribed by a true Master has really transformed their lives. Now, if people are impatient and do not want to persevere, that is their business. Do you see? You know this man, this Kerry-man got a letter from his bank, from the Manager and he says “Look come and see me immediately”. So the Kerry-man went to this bank manager and the bank manager told him “Mr So and So, Mr. Kerry- man you’ve got a five hundred punt overdraft and you must clear it immediately”. So this man said “Sir, I’m sorry I didn’t realise it but can I give you a cheque for it”. Next Question. Questioner. Guruji, we are always interested in finding happiness. An old Chinese proverb says, if you want to be happy for an hour get drunk; if you want to be happy for three days get married; if you want to be happy for ten days, kill your pig and eat it; if you want to be happy forever, learn to fish. Please comment. Gururaj. That is all very true except the last one. If you want to be happy forever, learn to fish, that is true but the Chinese proverb does not mean the fish that’s in the waters. It means that Eternal fish, forever living and that is within you. People are like fish too. They are beside a river and yet die of thirst. And yet the river is just there, one step away. Meanwhile that is meant as a joke, that proverb. If you want to be happy for one hour you get drunk, but how unhappy won’t you be after you get sober. You’ll have a terrible hangover and your troubles are still there. And if you want to be happy for three days, you get married. That’s also not true. There are many married people here who have been married for years and years. I have been married for thirty seven years and I am very, very happy. So that is actually meant as a joke. It is like the other Chinese proverb that says, rape impossible. Woman with dress up can run faster than man with pants down!! Now that makes sense. Just a bit blue but it does not matter; all grown-up’s here. But it is a fact. Now there was this one Kerry-man, he was describing to his friend the two yellow lines we have on the road - you have two yellow lines, fine. “If there is one yellow line it means you must park with two wheels on the pavement and if there are two yellow lines, you park with all four wheels on the pavement”. Next question.

4. IR 84-4 Questioner. Guruji, we find a difficulty sometimes, getting people to understand that we are teaching meditation and we are not teaching religion. So many people, so many Christians feel that meditation is taking them away from their religion. Could you please comment? Gururaj. Now our emblem there, that could be shown to them and everyone has a picture of it, that we have nothing against any religion. All the major religions are portrayed there and this eternal circle here, the red one, the spiralling eternal circle here as we call it, represents any religion that is not on the board. For example many people formulate their own personal philosophies and their own religions, they do that. So I did explain to you the other day that what I normally say that if you are a Christian become a better Christian. If you are a Buddhist become a better Buddhist. If you are a Hindu become a better Hindu, right. And the purpose of all that is this, that it takes you to the light within, so therefore we have the flame in the centre. So they must be told that meditation is a systematic and scientific process and it has nothing to do with religion. And as you would know, I have given thousands of talks round the world and I have never talked from any religious point of view, because my teachings are universal. I might quote from the Bible or from the Upanishads or from the Koran or from the Torah, for the purpose of illustration. So as you would know yourself and you have attended so many of our courses, you and our dear Bill and you know that our teachings are totally universal. And I have had one experience, it is this, that I have spoken to very, very large crowds and small crowds as well and the largest crowd that I ever spoke to was thirty thousand people. And when I sit and speak to anyone, if it’s a Hindu that is listening, he will say ‘Ah! Gururaj is talking of Hinduism’ and the same if it is a Christian that is listening, he will say ‘Ah, Gururaj is talking of Christianity’ and so it applies to everyone because our teachings are universal. We go to the basis of truth and there is only one truth and truth is God. So this must be explained to them that we do not teach religion. We teach you a scientific method, a systematic way how to go deep within yourself, gain that inner spiritual energy and you will naturally and automatically become a better Christian or a better Buddhist. These explanations must be given. These people have a terrible misconception. They say meditation came from the East, which is not true. In the beginning because the East being so much older, the Eastern cultures like the Indian and the Chinese and those cultures being thousands and thousands of years older than the Western cultures; for example in India they discovered Mohenjo Dara and Harapa and they were excavated by archaeologists and they found the most perfect sanitation system. And that was about four thousand years before Christ.

5. IR 84-4 You know they have a way of finding out the time during the excavations. So it was a very highly civilised people. They are not so civilised today any more. Nevertheless therefore, many of the teachings have come from the East. And I could tell you one thing that when I am finished with this book on the life of Christ, you will find all this, how the thirteen years that were missing, people don’t know what happened in that gap of thirteen years. He went to the East, he went to Tibet, he went to Egypt, he went to Tibet, he went to India and studied under great Masters. And he brought those teachings back to Israel and tried to combine it into Judaism, the Old Testament, which of course later was brought about into the New Testament. And therein too Jesus teaches of meditation. “Man know Thyself”. How do you know yourself? The only difference between Jesus’ or Buddha’s teachings and mine is this, that they told you, do this and do that and do that. Now this is an extension of their teachings not a reversal of their teachings or a contradiction of their teachings. It is an extension. They said Man know Thyself, I tell you the same “Man know Thyself” and I show you the way how to know yourself. Those times, he used to teach the peasants, and those people, not highly sophisticated and educated as you are, so he could only teach them at that time “Believe in Thy Father in Heaven”. “Believe”. Today you tell someone believe, they’ll say Ah, this chap is loco, he must be mad. And that is the trouble with our churches today and the Temples and the Synagogues, the whole lot of them, I am excluding no one. If they could only give people an experience, that there is a Divine Force, then automatically they will start believing. It is no use tell the mind only, believe, believe, believe; that doesn’t work, it becomes blind faith but when one has to have some experience inside. Say you have never been near a fire and I tell you believe that the fire is hot. But you have never seen a fire and never been near a fire and I tell you believe that the fire is hot, you will be a bit sceptical. But if I take you to the room, to the fireplace and show you and make you feel the heat coming from it, you will have experienced the heat of the fire, and then you will truly believe that fire gives off heat. So that’s the only difference that I show how! And not only teaching how, but also imparting that spiritual force to you, to be used and if you are receptive enough, you will feel that Spiritual Force most definitely. We call it Gurushakti, the universal forces that flow through me, this little me. I am also flesh, bones and blood like all of you. I do all the things that you do. I eat, I drink, I go to the toilet. I perform all the biological functions, I am human. And Divinity is abstract. The human mind can never conceive of Divinity. So what does Divinity do? It sends down that Spirit in a human form so that a human could impart that impulse of the Spirit to another human. Otherwise that abstract cannot be conceived of or received except through a human being that you can relate to. And that is how that Divine Spirit or spark or Gurushakti is imparted and that is why people like Mahavir, Buddha, Krishna, Christ came on this earth. And then of course there were other lesser saints as well. So that is how people are taught to learn to believe.

6. IR 84-4 And once I had a Press Conference in London a few years ago where the Press people were invited and I told them that the churches lack one thing that ‘They talk, talk, talk, talk and nothing is imparted’. It’s a nice place to go and have a snooze, a sleep actually. But if every priest or every pastor or minister during his theological training is put through meditational practices and could impart an experience to his Congregation, the churches would become more full. But what is happening today, churches are becoming empty and the disco clubs are becoming full. You see. So that’s the only difference. This one Kerry-man, he committed a lot of crimes and the total years he was to be jailed for was five hundred years, you know with the sentences running concurrently as they say in law. So he made an appeal. He was sentenced to five hundred years. So he appealed against the sentence. So in the appeal they lowered his jail sentence to four hundred years. Next question. You are open to ask anything you like. Questioner. I have been asked several times, why people had not heard of any Western Gurus. Gururaj. Ah hah. There are some Western Gurus. To me everything is a Guru. Every thing. To me you are Gurus, if I can learn something from. Everything that teaches you something is a Guru. Guru means teacher. The word Guru is in two syllables, Gu means darkness and Ru means light. The one that leads you from darkness to light is a Guru. Now there are some Western Gurus but the Easterners are more noted for it because the Western society, when the Western people were running round naked as Barbarians, the Easterners were very highly civilised. So they are better equipped because of their whole background they have, the cultural background they have, and the Eastern mind has always been orientated to Spiritual things. So therefore you’d find more Eastern Gurus, and just very few of them are genuine. So what happens when they can’t find a job, when a man can’t find a job, he either becomes a Politician or he becomes a Guru. And that is why we have a lot of sham, false Gurus around the world. Very few true Gurus. If you look at the bank accounts of say Maharishi for instance, millions, millions, millions. If you look at Muhktananda’s bank balance, he’s got millions and millions and millions. And I could go on and on, with a long list. Therefore whenever I visit them, when I’m invited by them, I give them hell. They are shivering in their damn pants. Some of them don’t wear pants by the way, they wear those long kaftan type of thing. Yes. So because of the long heritage - now that has weakened India. The Western people have attached more importance to materiality, to external things, while the Easterners have attached more importance to Spiritual or inner

7. IR 84-4 things. Now if you go to any extreme, it’s an imbalance. What I teach is this, create a balance between the two, between materiality and spirituality. As I’ve always said, if you have a five roomed home, have a ten roomed home, if you have a Volkswagen, have a Rolls Royce. There is nothing wrong with that. But do not become attached to it. It is here today and gone tomorrow. So while you are developing your external circumstances, at the same time develop your internal purity and internal unfoldment. Combine the two, because in the final analysis, there is no difference between relativity and the absolute. There is no difference between the relative and the absolute; they are but one. And therefore we say God is omnipresent, He is present everywhere, so He must be present in all material things as well. But man, the Western man does not seem to or want to rather realise that. So I say the Easterners are wrong and the Westerners are wrong. They both go to extremes. And what we teach is this in our Organisation, I would rather call it our Family; I don’t like the word Organisation, or Movement or things like that, you know in our worldwide family what we teach is to live in the balance of both. So I say many times if I were given a slice of dried bread or a king’s feast I would choose the latter, okay, but if I am given a dried piece of bread, I will not feel disappointed. Dry bread tomorrow, tomorrow with perhaps a little butter on it. Fine and perhaps some day, a little jam also, okay, I accept. You see. So we try and strive to bring about a good balance. If I can wear a decent shirt - this was made for me by the way by Gloria, who is the wife of the Bolivian Ambassador to America, she makes all my shirts for me, as gifts - if I can wear a decent shirt, why must I wear a ragged shirt. Why? What’s it going to prove? But yet I am not attached to the shirt. If I do not have this shirt or this pants, I’ll come down in my underpants and give you a Satsang. Yes. You know in England we had fun once. I caught a terrible cold - I don’t know i f you and Bill were on the Course - it’s known as the Pyjama Satsang. What happened was this, Charles - were you there? – yes, you were there. I had this terrible cold and flu, you know change of climate, change of water, change of food, all this, so I got sick. And we had four doctors on the Course who are meditators, all running up and down up and down to my room. They say “Guruji, you are not going to get out of bed. You must stay warm to get rid of your cold”- because I still had many more Courses to do and other countries to go to – “and we can’t allow you to get sick. From this cold you could get pneumonia and from pneumonia you could get ‘heaven’ pneumonia. And we don’t want you there yet. We want you down here”. Right. So I said “No, I have to make my Satsang, I can’t fail my people”. So I thought for a moment, I said “Wait a moment, I have a good idea. I’ll stay in bed and shift all the chairs, there is another big room just under my bedroom, shift the chairs to that room or let people sit on the floor, they don’t mind and get the fellow, Mike, his name is Mike, to bring a microphone upstairs and lead the wires downstairs to the speakers”.

8. IR 84-4 And I remember very well the question that was asked, because it was so amusing. They were sitting downstairs and I was there lying in bed upstairs, propped up with pillows and giving a Satsang. They were all downstairs and they were so close and most of them were sitting on the floor. And such a beautiful rapport developed between the people, they really felt as if they were as one beautiful family. And I remember the question that was asked “What is the nature of personal identity”. I never remember what questions are ever asked of me and I never remember what I talk about but this being such an unusual circumstance, it stuck to the mind. Do you see? A Kerry-man bought a paper shop and you know what happened, it blew away. Next Question. Questioner. Gururaj, I would like to know the nature of marriage and in how many levels marriage could function? Gururaj. There is only one nature to marriage because marriage is nature itself. Everything in the world you find around is marriage. Look how beautiful those leaves are married to the branches on the tree and those branches are married to the trunk of the tree and the trunk of the tree is married to the roots of the tree and the roots of the tree are married to the ground. And in that ground, the ground is married to all the minerals and the vitamins or whatever they are in the ground. And that is married to God because he provides them. Everything that forms a union, that forms a togetherness is a marriage. But marriage has been so mis - nice chap - interpreted, it has become a miscarriage instead of marriage. You go to Court or you go to the Church and have a marriage and they give you a piece of paper. You know what you can do with that piece of paper. I would not even use it in the toilet. It’s too hard. A piece of paper means nothing at all. That is only for legal protection so that if the husband is cruel, the wife could have some rights and not be chucked out on her ear in the streets or the other way round. The weaker party, the weaker sex, by that I don’t mean the woman only, because many times the men are the weaker sex though they won’t admit it - male chauvinistic or something, - so that the weaker sex could be of any male or female, is not done any injustice as far as material things are concerned. So that piece of paper is concerned only with material things. The real marriage is this, it comes from the heart where two hearts meet on oneness, then that is true marriage together. At first two people before they know each other, walk with four legs, two legs, two legs. But when they are joined in union with each other, they walk with three legs. Each leg of each other is welded together and they walk through life in feeling. That is marriage. Marriage is not a closeness of the body, but true marriage is the closeness and

9. IR 84-4 oneness of the spirit. And the spirit in actuality is but one, but people fail to recognise that. That is true significance of marriage and not the piece of paper. So, two people that really love each other, do not need to look into each other’s eyes but the pairs of eyes must look in the same direction. That means harmony. They look in same direction, same way. Their minds are attuned to each other. Their bodies are joined to each other, through the power of the realisation of the one spirit that flows in both. This is body, I am sitting here and you are there, do you think that we are apart from each other? No, we are so close to each other. There are millions and millions and billions of atomic particles that are floating between you and me, the same kind of particles that constitute your body and my body. We are together. We are not separate. And when people realise that in marriage, there is no separation but there is that togetherness, then that is real marriage. People get married for many reasons. People get married for say monetary gain, ah she’s a rich girl. Right, fine, good. People get married because she’s got or he’s got a lovely nose, and beautiful eyes, and nice chap, nice girl, infatuation. It is only of the mind and then the marriage does not work out and they separate. You know why they separate, because you have not married that man, you have not married me; you have married the ideal that you have formed in your mind of me, your own conception. So you have married not me but your conception of me. And so courting days, while they’re courting, it is okay fine, the boy will come around, he is always well dressed and clean shaven and nice and the girl too. After they get married he doesn’t care a damn, he wouldn’t shave or clean himself up for you; look spruce and tidy. He doesn’t care; ‘Ah, I’m married’. And that is wrong? Marriage should be a courtship all the time, all the time you live. So when two people are really in love, then this kind of thing would not happen. Now sometimes, one party is more to blame than the other and sometimes the man could become very cruel and a separation comes about. And this has happened throughout since this world has been existing. So marriage is a union of the mind, body and spirit and if all these three things are fulfilled then life is happy between two people. Life is very happy. They have the occasional squabble, you know, so what, nothing, but don’t take it to bed with you. There’s was a person, her name was Marie Topes and she was a sexologist, a sex psychologist, she wrote many, many books. You might have heard her name, Marie Topes. And now she was the first one that invented separate beds. Twin beds. I’d like to shoot her, it’s a pity she’s dead. No separate beds. No! Double beds or even a King Size Bed. So you might have a little squabble, you go to bed. She’s angry, you’re angry, you turn your backs to each other but yet you’re touching each other and slowly even in your sleep you might turn around and put your arm around her. You might while lying in bed having discussions – say, ‘Sorry my darling. I said this, I said that and I really did not mean it. It was my stupid damn head that said it. It wasn’t really me. I must have been drunk!’ Yes.

10. IR 84-4 This guy came home late one night, nice and tipsy, drunk. So next morning his wife – you know that night his wife asked him “Where were you?” He said “Oh, I went with Mr. Wilson to the Grand Hotel, and we had a few drinks too many”. So, this lady Mrs Smith goes to the Supermarket one day, just the next day and meets Mrs Wilson. And she says “My husband went out with your husband last night and he came home so drunk”. Mrs Wilson also says “My husband was also very drunk”. “Where were they, by the way?” So Mrs Wilson said “They were at the Hotel Trocadero”. So now here Mrs Smith was a bit angry. She comes home and when the husband came home, she said “Why did you tell me a lie John, why did you tell me a lie. You were not at the Grand Hotel”. So Mr Smith says, “I am very sorry my darling, but I was in no condition last night to pronounce the word Trocadero”. And she understood that he was tipsy and he wasn’t really telling a lie. Understanding, that is the point I’m driving at. And if two people really want to understand each other, they can understand each other, there’s no problem. So marriage is a union of the spirit first and then the mind and then the body. That’s nice... Questioner. Beloved Guruji, on Monday you spoke about that you would leave your body when you chose to leave it and that you would be with us twenty years. In the States, in the last two years you spoke many times that you would not be with us that much longer. Whenever that might occur, you have never spoken to us, perhaps it’s a longer question, but you have never spoken to us of how we might prepare for the time that you are no longer in the physical body. Could speak to us about that and how we should put forth your teachings. Gururaj. The way to give forth my teachings is to try and get transcribed, these tapes can get lost. Try and transcribe as many tapes as possible. Get them compiled in book form so they could be generated again, and again and again, generation after generation. That’s how it has happened with all true Spiritual Masters, right from Buddha down to Krishna to Christ, to Ramakrishna to Vivekananda because they were transcribed and put into book form. And when I’m ready to leave, you’ll know without me telling you. A long time to go. This man at the North Pole and he took his dog with him, Rover, and he ran out of food. He was very hungry. So he killed his dog and ate the dog, licking the dog’s bones and then he thought to himself “Oh what a pity, if Rover was here, he’d really have enjoyed the bones”. Half past one. Do you know how to recognise a car if it belongs to a Kerry-man? You can easily recognise a car if it belongs to a Kerry man because the windscreen wipers would be on the inside!

11. IR 84-4 You know there was another Kerry-man who was a world famous clairvoyant, you know what’s a clairvoyant, a world famous clairvoyant that he even knew - and this comes upon the question which six foot four asked us – Baldevji – this fellow was a world famous clairvoyant he even knew the day when he was going to die and the time that he was going to die. The judge told him!! Have you heard of this film “Grease”? Did it play here in Ireland? The name of the actor John Travolta that’s right, I just wanted to know if you knew the film. So here this girl goes to her father and asks for money and she says she wants to see “Grease”. So the father bought her a return ticket to Athens!! It’s one o’clock, lunchtime. Good. See you this afternoon. We have a meeting of teachers at half past six, right - those people that are going to do the Mandala, learn the Mandala Practice, they will be meeting at 4 o’clock, - 3.30 Mandala, 6.30 Teachers and 8 o‘clock we’ll have the Communion Practice. Now the Communion Practice is a very holy thing. So when you come to Communion Practice have a nice bath again. I know you had a bath morning. It’s nice to have a bath again, dress as if you are going to Church and then I’ll explain what it’s all about this evening.