1. UK 82-6 Gururaj. You have made the announcements that there will be a Communion Practice tonight. Good. Fine. Seeing how we have taken up some time with the meeting, so it would be a good idea if we have a Rapid Fire question and answer session which you normally have at every Course. So ask about anything you like, how to make Chappattis or Questioner. Is there much activity in Cape Town in these days? Gururaj. Yes, there is a lot of activity in Cape Town. We still have a very nice group going there, going on and apart from that I have also embarked on different kinds of activities. I attend the Groot Schoor Hospital three times a week when I am called in for particular patients that have to undergo major surgery. I put them through meditational practices which calms them and which the doctors tell me is very, very helpful when the operation is really done because they are in a calm, quiet, happy frame of mind. So that takes up a lot of my time. Then in Cape Town there are various organisations, and there is not a week that goes by when I am not invited to give a talk on some particular subject, - like the Theosophical Society, Lifeline, the Aquarius Group, Sufi Movement, all kinds of societies, I do talk to them. And then of course there's always the consultations with people having problems and this, that. We do our best and help as much as we can. So I do have a very easy day, about sixteen hours, not bad, four hours for the family and four hours for sleep. Well balanced! Next. Questioner. ... (Inaudible) ...... practices... not attend Courses ...... (Question inaudible). Gururaj. Therefore we have these reviews, and if there is something else to be given, meanwhile, I think the Mandala practice for you is good enough for you personally for the next twenty years. Don't worry. Okay. Questioner. .................. (Question inaudible). Gururaj. Yes. Yes. Everyone is a master into himself but I'm sure those are not the Masters you are talking about. In this present world situation, there are seven basic energies and these basic energies are not necessarily incarnated in body form. But the seven energies or perhaps out of the seven, one, two or three that is embodied at the moment, is forever in contact with the other energies. Once one reaches the oneness of all existence which we call Self Realisation, or whatever name, liberation, whatever name you want to put on it, these are labels, they are in contact at will, to draw upon or to be in communication with any particular one of those seven energies and use those energies as and when required for specific purposes. And it is done every day, I do it. Next.

2. UK 82-6 Questioner. Can I, Steve, I wonder if you could come up to the microphone to make your question. Sorry, I forgot about that before, so that it can go on tape. Questioner.(Cont’d) It's just to ask if there is any special significance about the numbers, why for instance a hundred and eight chants per round? Gururaj. Good. Now the Hindus, the Hindus believe that there are a hundred and eight names for Divinity. I don't believe that. To me John, Jack, Jean, Joseph, Peter, Thomas, they're all names of Divinities. Everyone is Divine. But there is some scientific value in the hundred and eight beads to the Rosary. And that is for the purpose of timing. It has the sufficient duration of time to achieve a certain change in mental energies. Those are used for timing purposes. Now tomorrow morning, I am going to lead the chant. Fine. I believe, there had been some, I was told, some little mix-ups with the chants yesterday or something and I'll have to cancel some of the appointments I have with people just to fit in that time to do the chanting. And before we start with the chanting, I will give an explanation on what the chant and the hundred and eight beads are all about. I'll do that. What affect it has physiologically, biologically, psychologically, spiritually, all these various aspects we will cover tomorrow in a short talk, although I have made a very long tape on the meaning of all these various practices. And I'm sure the master copy would still be in the archives, if you have one. So I'll give a talk tomorrow morning on the meaning of chanting, and thereafter I will lead the chant. How it is really done. Mind you this has been done since I first came to England, about six, seven years ago and I don't know why someone slipped up yesterday and not really doing it properly. Yesterday or the day before, I don't know. So we'll do that tomorrow. Fine. Next. A lady came to see me this morning in an interview and the question she asked me was this that 'What happens after death because we are all afraid of death’. So I said 'Let me rather see someone that needs me more here in the private room and let me answer that question rather in the Satsang. It might be of interest to most’. People fear old age. Meanwhile, this one man that turned a hundred was interviewed on television, so the interviewer asks him 'What is the secret of this long life'. So this man of a hundred answers 'That's very easy, I just keep on breathing!' And then this other guy that turned a hundred, he was asked, 'What is your secret and this that and that' and they had a long chat about it. So the interviewer tells him 'Well, happy birthday to you, Sir and I do expect to see you

3. UK 82-6 at the same place next year.' So the old man replies, he says 'Well, I see no reason why we should not. You look healthy enough.' This fear of death - I've made a very long tape on this at some previous Satsang in England and I'm sure that's in the library, so I'll just go over some of the salient factors. There have been books written like 'Life After Death' and 'Life After Life' and things like that, with researches done by doctors. I'm sure some of you might have read those books. There were a few articles in the Observer, a two part series on the very same subject. There is one thing they stress is this, that when a person dies, a light comes to meet you. Now, that is an untruth. This is evidence they got from people that were just about passing over and recovered again. No light comes to meet you but the light - am I right or wrong (Gururaj laughs) - dear me, no light comes to meet you, but what you will see is your own light, that is within you, your own spiritual light that is within you, which you, after discarding the physical body, and just having the finer mind left, could recognise and you feel that you are meeting this light. So, in the other dimension, those little bulbs have no time to come marching forward to you. Right. Death is one of the finest experiences man could ever have. I have died many, many times, at will, where you can send your soul out of the body and re-enter the body. You project it out, which is what some people call out of the body experiences, but that is a misnomer. That does not happen. Your astral body, the word which the occultists use, is that your astral body leaves your body. No. It does not leave the body. The astral self or the subtle body is projected out of your physical body and you have what is called, a dual consciousness. So half your consciousness is contained in the subtle body and half of it is contained in the physical body or the grosser level of the mind, so that the recognition could take place. And if you are thinking of America, you are in America and then you would remember it afterwards because part of your consciousness remains behind. Now if there was a total severance, then you would be dead. Now at the time of death most people, ninety nine point nine per cent of people lose consciousness and losing that, in the process of losing that consciousness, they feel they are going through a tunnel and on the other end is the light. But that is not the way to die. Why must you die being unconscious? The real way to die is in full consciousness. And that can be achieved through our practices, where you are fully conscious of leaving the physical body and it is such a beautiful ecstatic experience, indescribable in words. There is no suffering at all. People fear, because it is the unknown but those that know it, don't fear. It is very beautiful. When a person in old age perhaps suffers of cancer, or some whatever kind of disease, remember it is the conscious mind, while they are still alive that is suffering. But when the conscious mind is deadened, because it is only the subtle levels of the mind that goes ahead, when the conscious mind is

4. UK 82-6 deadened that suffering does not linger. And having shed that part of the analytical mind, having shed the encumbrance of this physical frame, you feel such a beautiful sense of freedom. You feel so free. You feel free because you are now away from a grosser environment into a much more finer environment, a more subtle environment. And there the soul or the make-up, the samskaric body rather, which we call soul, feels as light as air. Now that part of the soul, the subtle body also has powers of thought but on a subtle level, not like the conscious mind. And with that power of thought, you can call forth anyone you desire to meet, because in that dimension there is no space, there's no time. So when we hear people saying 'Oh, I'll meet you on the other side', a lover saying to his beloved, 'I'll meet you on the other side' or a friend saying that to a friend, that is possible. At the time of dying, if your thought forces are strong enough and you say 'I want to meet such and such a person', you can in his astral or subtle body. You can do that. There won't be any shape, at all. Mary will not look like Mary, and Amantha will not look like Amantha, and Jean will not look like Jean, right, but the recognition occurs. The recognition is there that 'Ah this is Jean, this is Joan, and this is Jack.' Communication takes place there, without words. Feelings are exchanged and one could discuss things and not necessarily help each other. You can't because those souls are busy working out, formulating the process, formulating the basis of their next birth. They are evaluating and they are trying to find the vehicles through which they could be born again. Some of the Hindus believe that if you live a bad life, you'll be born as a cat, or a dog or a cow, whatever. That is rubbish. I tell them that evolution is always progressive. Once you have reached the human kingdom, you will never go back into the animal kingdom. But there is one thing that could happen. Imagine to yourself, four squares, one on top of the other, mineral, plant, animal and man. Fine. Now, in the man kingdom, say this is the width and by not performing good actions, you could be up there and come down to a lower level but still remaining in the human kingdom. That could happen. But you would never become a cow or a donkey. Yeah. You see? Now, at the moment of death, it is nice to die consciously. Fine, it is an ecstatic experience. Most people become unconscious and do not notice that beautiful transference of oneself into another dimension. But even when one wakes up from the unconsciousness, one thing happens, in a flash of a second, your entire life is reviewed, every happening in your life since birth. You will see the entirety in a flash. And you yourself start judging yourself then. There's no guy sitting on a throne, judging you, or turning over the pages of his books. You are seeing it all there in a flash. You will say 'Ah, I didn't do right with that', 'I didn't do this right, or this was okay, or this was okay’. And that will be the basis of you

5. UK 82-6 still going further into other lifetimes and thereby seeing the entirety of your existence since the primal atom, to the stage of man at whichever evolutionary stage you are, in the kingdom of man. Now adding all these - it's a pity you can't take a calculating machine, a calculator, it would make it easier. But it happens so fast. There are two kinds of people, that takes a long time to be reborn again, one is a very, highly spiritual man and the other is a very, very evil man. The highly, the very highly spiritual man takes a very long time to be reborn because it is difficult to find the right vehicles to be born through. We choose our parents, our parents don't choose us. So the highly evolved man will take a long time to be born again. And the very evil man will take a long time to be born again, because he might not find people evil enough to be born through. Hitler went to a fortune teller and he wanted to know, 'When will I die?' So the fortune teller looks into his crystal, his crystal rubbish and ah, crystal rubbish and he says 'You will die on a Jewish Holiday'. So Hitler asks 'Why on a Jewish Holiday?' So he says 'The day you die it will be a Jewish Holiday!' So you see, in reality there is no death. The spirit within is eternal but we are faced with the problem of this transition, going from one room into the other, which we call death and even that transition holds no fear. It is your own mind fearing because it is the unknown. Now, in true meditation, at the highest level of meditation you are dead, because you are in the land of the unknown. And when man reaches that highest peak of Nirvikalpa Samadhi, he experiences that death. And that's the same experience he will have, when he discards this physical body. That is to die consciously, still be aware of the transition. Very few people reach that kind of meditation, very few people reach that Nirvikalpa Samadhi. It is a Sanskrit word, Samadhi, a meditation that is totally without form. Good, so to repeat again, there is no fear. One should never fear death, never, never to fear death because even if you have reached that height, even if you die consciously or unconsciously, it still remains a very ecstatic, exhilarating experience and you feel so much freedom and not only that, you don't have the conscious mind to block you. That cunning animal is left behind and in that true evaluation of yourself, you find that the wrongs I've done, I know that these were wrong. At the same time, the solution appears how to make it right. So this lady that spoke to me this morning, she says 'I haven't got a husband, I'm living alone and I'm feeling so afraid, fearful. What will happen to me, if I should die’? So that is the answer. Do not fear, it is a beautiful journey, and you will find whatever you want according to your conception. The Islamic religion for example, they forbid you to drink wine but they do promise you that after you die, that after you die, there will be Houris, you know those pretty damsels, any amount of them looking after you. There will be

6. UK 82-6 rivers of wine and there will be gardens, all those beautiful things. Now a devout Moslem that believes in this, will definitely experience that. So what is going to happen in the hereafter is determined by your belief that you have now. It could be a true belief or it could be an erroneous belief. But that will happen. It is sure to happen. So if we have the belief or the faith or the knowingness through our meditational practices that on the other side there is joy, you will find joy. And there is. I tell you of personal experience, there is nothing else but joy. A person could be afflicted with physical diseases or mental diseases on this planet, but those things being of the grosser mind and body are left behind. They are not taken with you. Only the finer self of yourself goes. There is no Heaven and there is no Hell. It is all here and now. But if you do believe that there is someone up there with a tail and a trident, and a fire and what have you, you will experience that because your mind is experiencing that. Your mind is creating that and the entire world, the entire universe is created by thought and thought becomes concretised. So it becomes a reality to you. So this one chap died in hospital and on the other side - he believed in the pearly gates - so he approached the pearly gates and St. Peter was there. So St. Peter looked up his list and he says 'Oh, you're not due for today'. So this man says 'Look, I know', 'You're not due for today, try the other place.' So he says, 'No, St. Peter I've lived such a good lif e, I have been charitable, I have been kind, I have been helpful, I did so many good things and I'm sure my place is here. Please do me a favour St Peter, won't you run my name through the computer again’. So St Peter being a good guy, he ran the name through the computer again, giant computer. He says, 'Ah, here it is, we've got your name here, yes, but you're only due here after three years. But anyway who was your doctor?' So you see, my dear lady in the audience that asked me this, this morning, there's nothing to fear. It is just joy and it's a pleasure. It's a pleasure. When a person dies for example in an accident, you wonder what great suffering. No, there is no suffering. They become unconscious and off you go, trotting along. Fine. There is no pain. The pain that man suffers is just his illness while he is here in the physical. And once he lets go of the physical, once and you will fin d Yogis in India - this has happened in the past and it can be done, where you sit down in Samadhi and release yourself from your body and discard it. It can be done by will. It is not suicide. It is a conscious going away from this body into another dimension. So they wouldn't do it if there was a fear or suffering involved. So it is so easy. Beautiful, lovely. And I say to all the old people everywhere, don't fear it. It is a beautiful experience. Good. Next. Questioner. Guruji, if we should pass over, could we use our Mantra at that time when we feel it's time to go?

7. UK 82-6 Gururaj. That is very, very brilliant. Yes. Yes. Yes. The whole idea of a guru giving you a Mantra is this, that that Mantra represents you. If there was a machine or some device whereby your mind, body and spirit could be pulverised, liquidised or whatever into sound, your mantra would be the sound that would be heard. Now at the highest level of meditation, you don't need to use your mantra anymore. You become the mantra. You are the Mantra. Remember, some of these so-called Swamis and gurus that give you Mantras, God bless their hearts, their poor souls, there are so many in a book, they do not go deeply into the physical, mental and spiritual make-up of a person and in this state of Samadhi, conceive of that sound. What happens is this, that that sound is picked up at the very subtle high level where your totality exists as an individual. Then, that sound because it is inaudible to ordinary ears and not pronounceable or speakable, the guru has to take that subtle sound and bring it to a grosser equivalent of it, so that you could speak it and hear it. So it's like an ice-cream cone, from the thin end to be brought to the broader end. And that is how it is given to you. Now as one progresses in meditation, you will experience the subtlety and the greater and greater subtleties of the Mantra, so that afterwards the entire Mantra disappears and only the impulse remains. And when you reach that stage of the impulse of your original sound, then you have become the Mantra. Do you see? Now for people that has not reached that stage and that have been meditating for some while, it is very, very good to repeat that in one's mind when you feel yourself sinking away. Sink away in your Mantra. I'll be watching. Right. Now there's another thing. When that mantra is given from that subtle level, when that Mantra is given from that subtle level, the reason I don't send Forms back so early is this, that it is not something mechanical. If it was mechanical and just to make up sounds, I could do five hundred initiations a day. It would be very easy. Have a secretary sitting there and say blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Okay. No. No. It's only many times I have to sit with a form on so many sessions until I make contact. You don't know what frame of mind you are in, at that time and where contact just becomes not easy. Therefore, I initiate when you are asleep. So you know I work at the time differences between various countries and that is the best time when you are asleep and your conscious mind is quietened. And that is how the contact is made with the inner self. Now when that Mantra is sent to you, the day that Mantra is conceived, that is the day you are initiate d already because the contact has been made from your spirit to my spirit. And then afterwards when it is sent to the teachers, they teach it over to you, with a little ceremony, a sacred ceremony. It's the greatest gift a man could ever have . Now the important part of the Mantra that is given to you, is this, that all the spiritual strength and force that the instrument represents is sent forth with that Mantra. That is why it works so effectively. Otherwise you could say apple, apple, apple, plum, plum, plum, plum. But what would be lacking is the Spiritual Force and that Spiritual Force is the thing

8. UK 82-6 that activates. Therefore in the Sanskrit literatures written thousands and thousands of years ago, they say Guru, Benag, Gnana, Nahee. It means, without the guru, true Spiritual knowledge cannot come. And the reason is very simple, by knowledge here we don't mean theory and the talks we have. What we mean here is the Spiritual Force that is imparted by the guru, rather through the guru, to the initiate. And that is the Force and the Power, and that Power transforms the lives of people. Many times it is not too easy. It's not easy. Today we look for easy things. Many times there could be a lot of dirt and dross that has to be cleared away, cleaned away, dissolved. But finally when a greater amount of clarity comes, then you start living. Now you are dead. Yes. Fine. Questioner. Guruji, you were just mentioning about the Yogis choosing the time of their death and going into Samadhi. In the foreword to Autobiography of a Yogi, it states that Parahamsa Yogananda did just this and his physical body was perfectly preserved for something like three hundred days, I think. Could you explain this to us, the reason why it happened and could this be termed a Siddhi or - ? Gururaj. Yes, yes, that's understood. What happens there is this, that although, although the subtle body has departed and it being of such great power that the light of it is still left in the body. What analogy can we use? You have a heate r in this room and even after you switch the heater off, heat still remains in the room. And that is exactly what happened to Yogananda and it happened to Aurobindo and to many others, to many others, many others. Because as I said, you can switch off the heaters, the heating system and heat still remains in the room for a little while. Right. Questioner. Guruji, you have just told us that people have preconceived ideas, like rivers of wine and all of them they will find there after they die. Must it not be a rather long and painful process, must the person not have to realise eventually that these preconceived ideas were wrong and won't that not be painful to him? Gururaj. No, it will not be painful. At first he has preconceived ideas where he thinks, that this or that he will find and that he will find. But then remember he is still in the process of evolution and perhaps in many births later, he finds out that all these things were just ideas. After the rivers of wine, he might develop a new concept in a different life where he might find a different set of circumstances. And that too if his belief is strong enough, he will find. And like that through all these various experiences, he will come to the conclusion 'Netti, Netti', not this, not this, not this. Then he will, when he reaches that, then he will find total mergence with all that is in the cosmos. Right. Questioner. I'm changing the subject altogether.

9. UK 82-6 Gururaj. Good. Questioner.(Cont’d) What can we do, to help the world, the people in all this trauma which we seem to have in the present time? I want to do it all now. Gururaj. Yes. Yes, sure, so would I. That is a question which was very similar to which Graham Parr asked last night, that if people have hatred and anger, how can we help them? I think that would cover your question really. Questioner........ (Inaudible) Gururaj. What is very commendable is the very desire you have in you, to help others. That desire alone, if it is brought to fruition would have a greater force and power. But even if it is not brought to its practical counterpart or actual worldly counterpart, the very intention in itself serves a great purpose. And as you said, I wish that all the problems of the world were like a boulder on the world's chest, that I could just go and remove and take off. But that is not to be. It could never be. The entire world - total peace can only come with enlightenment. Fine. And the population of the entire world cannot be enlightened at the same time. There are teachers in this world that teach of the Age of Enlightenment and that I regard to be just a bait and a fallacy. A bait in the sense, because people by nature always have a desire, perhaps not in the forefront, but an inner desire to be helpful to others. They have that and by promulgating the Age of Enlightenment, the hearts of people are titillated, that you can help. It's not true. Now what happens that in this vast continuum of existence, we are just in this small little sphere. So as the highly evolved pass out this way, other beings from a lower plane, enter into our world. So you will always have this, always, it is a continuous flow like a river, continuous flow. Bu t then in the river, the water is here, the water is there, the water is everywhere. The water is at the beginning and at the end. And who says one bit of water is better than the other bit. So we're all passengers, all travellers, wayfarers on this pat h. If people would only realise that the path and He Himself is but one. For that is the way, that is the life, that is the truth. Now. Next. The bell didn't ring yet? Voice. You can't hear it, Guruji.

10. UK 82-6 Gururaj. You can't hear the bell. Let me tell you this one then. There it goes. This tourist went to New Mexico and went to an Indian Trading Post, Red Indians, and was souvenir hunting. She bought a lot of souvenirs and amongst the souvenirs bought a lovely Indian peace pipe, so ornately made, intricate. And something was written on it, in the Red Indian language. And so this lady was so excited, she went up to some Indian and says 'Would you read this for me and translate it for me?' So this man read it and he says, 'Oh, that is easy. It says, smoking is hazardous to health!' END