1. UK 83-2 Gururaj. This morning down stairs with the meditators and it reminded me of a British Officer who was posted to Nigeria and he was very renowned for the lovely coffee he served at his parties. So, one day his guests wanted to know how the coffee is done, so they sent for the cook, this native cook. So they asked him "How do you make coffee?" He says "Boss, me take water, boiled water with milk and then I put in the coffee." So, they asked because in Nigeria you don't get the fine coffee we get here it’s a very rough coffee and so he says "How do you strain the coffee?" And so the native cook replies "I use my boss's silk socks." So here the officer got very angry and he said "What, you use my best socks." So the servant was terrified, he says "Boss, me no use the clean ones". (Gururaj laughs). Dear me. Good. Now let us have a nice deep philosophical question. What shall we talk about? We'd like to have you recorded as well. Questioner. Guruji, Nirvikalpa Samadhi - is there any possibility of us reaching a state of high evolution sphere and in the event of us being able to reach this high sphere, would we be able to recognise this high sphere of evolution, Guruji? Gururaj. Good. You're talking of Nirvikalpa Samadhi. Nirvi means not, kalpa means thought - the Samadhi that takes a person beyond thought. Now, with the, that, another question could be asked - what is true experience? What is the highest experience that a person can reach? And I will tell you emphatically, and this is a revolutionary idea, that the greatest experience is no experience, because all experiences are confined to the mind. Now, in a person's daily life you have all kinds of experiences, good ones, nasty ones and grosser ones and subtler ones. So only there, in the realms of the mind is experience involved. So a gross experience is from the conscious or grosser level of the mind and a more subtle experience can be obtained through the subconscious. And the subtlest or the finest relative could be experienced through the superconscious mind. And the superconscious mind, all these three facets or aspects of the mind, are totally inter-related. And that is why the experience of the superconscious mind, the subtle conscious mind, can achieve some recognition by the conscious mind which in turn translates itself through the body, for body, mind is interconnected. There is no dividing line between the body and the mind. If I ask you where is your mind, you could never say it's in my big toe or in my head. For you are the mind. And when we look at it from the bodily aspect then we are sure to know that the subtleness of the mind, which is also matter, and mind doesn't matter, is translated through the body. So the body is also mind, and so the final analysis, you are the mind. And the interpretation or the living of daily life is conditioned by various factors of your Samskaras, of how much that subtle level, that superconscious level could be portrayed and brought about in daily living. Now, when more and more, through meditation and spiritual practices, is brought about to the body, which translates itself into action through our five senses - hearing, touching, seeing, smelling, tasting, then we have experience.
2. UK 83-2 So, the more one could bring out or draw out from the inner layers of the mind, the more so-called happiness is received and that we call experience, a happy experience, a joyous experience. Or if not, in between the force of that flow there are negativities or veils blocking that flow, then the fullness of it cannot be felt. And that is why we find certain experiences to be negative or miserable or unhappy. Now, these are the mechanics of the mind which psychologists are still trying to unfathom. But the supreme experience is no experience, because you could never be conscious of the supreme experience. When I go into Nirvikalpa Samadhi, I am totally lost, I am not conscious of the five senses. I am not conscious of the mind in all its three aspects at all and then I am in another sphere, the sphere of the spirit. And the spirit is not capable of experience. Only that which is limited is capable of experience because experience too requires a comparison. You experience heat, how would you know you are experiencing heat if you cannot compare it with coldness? So here in comparison between anythin g - you eat bland food or you eat curried food, now how would you know this is curried food if you cannot compare it with boiled food or the other way round. So, here what happens is this that there is a duality. So only because of the duality, the dual existence of which the mind conceives, can one experience whatever experience there is to be had be in this embodied being. While in the spiritual realm, when you merge into that which is beyond, then you are experience-less. It is the drop of water might experience itself falling down - to use an analogy - experiencing itself as falling down as rain, but when it falls into the ocean and merges with the ocean then the experience of the drop is lost. There is no drop so there is no individuality. And it becomes one with the ocean. And when the drop becomes one with the ocean, if the drop could talk it will say "I am the ocean." When the individual mind merges into the universal mind and the universal mind merges into the spiritual reality, then there is no experience. Now the spiritual reality is what we call Divinity and Divinity is devoid of any experience. For, if Divinity should experience something then automatically the analytical process is brought in, and it falls into limitations, while Divinity is limitless, without limitations. Now, if something is totally unlimited, there is no sphere for it for any experience, it just is. It just is, in that total unified state which is beyond the conscious mind, beyond the subconscious mind, beyond the superconscious level of the mind. Now, most philosophies, including the Vedanta, go to that level of the superconscious mind where you experience absolute knowledge, although it's a contradiction of terms because knowledge is a quality of the mind and how can it be absolute? Then they say absolute knowledge, absolute existence, another contradiction of terms, because existence, interpreted by your mind, can never be absolute. And then they talk of absolute bliss. Now bliss is also something experienced by the mind which is limited. So how can it be absolute? So the highest which the highest philosophy can reach is knowledge, existence and bliss. But when we go to the field of Nirvikalpa Samadhi, then there is no existence,
3. UK 83-2 there is no bliss, there is no knowledge, you just are. And you'd be surprised to know that knowledge can be an impediment, an obstacle for you to merge away into the Divine. For, as I said, and to repeat because these are subtle points which require repeating, that Divinity is beyond all experience. Therefore it knows of no knowledge, nor existence or bliss. It is like electricity that does not know itself and yet it's such a powerful force. But in its expression it brings light, it brings coldness in the fridge or heat in the stove. So it becomes the manifestation and it manifests itself into a grosser level, yet it not is the grosser level and yet it is the grosser level too. Do you see? So, in the realm of mysticism, or the spiritual field, this to the ordinary mind sounds very paradoxical. It says yes and it says no. For example, one of the injunctions in the Kenna Upanishad, says 'The universe is unreal.' Listen to this very carefully, because the greatest minds in the world, minds, intellectualising philosophers, have yet not been successful in interpreting it. Now this injunction says 'The universe is real, the universe is unreal, only God is real and the universe is God’. The universe is unreal, only God is real and the universe is God. Do you see the paradox there? But it is really not a paradox, for reality and unreality both can co-exist and interpenetrate each other. So our concept of reality is a limited reality and that which is limited is unreal for it is forever changing, changing, changing. Only that which is changeless is real. But now, that is in the realm of metaphysics. But bringing it down to physical existence, the best man can do is to draw upon the highest level of the mind and allow it to infiltrate the conscious mind and thereby experience joy, existence and knowledge. But that is not the end of all. Nirvikalpa Samadhi, we are totally unconscious of everything and you just are. And the unconsciousness comes about with the drop of water just merging away in the ocean. And yet, upon the ocean that which we see to be real are the bubbles. And yet the bubbles have their own reality in its own sphere, the relative sphere. But when the bubbles burst or the waves subside then reality exists. So the subsiding of the waves is the total mergence in the ocean which means that the individual self, the mental self, the bodily self merges away in the spirit and that is the final end one coul d achieve. And yet it is not an end, it is a beginning for the ocean, and you are the ocean then, brings about waves, they make waves. Do you see? Now, that is the unified state. Now there was a young couple that got married and went to a hotel for a honeymoon and so they're in their room, beautiful suite. So the man, the husband says “Oh my darling, my beloved, at last we are really one." So the wife, while patting her curls, says "To be on the practical side, though we are really one, we should order dinner for two". You see?
4. UK 83-2 Now, no man could ever live in Nirvikalpa Samadhi for more than twenty-one days, never. Your entire body will disintegrate. Because when you go into total unconsciousness which is beyond the superconsciousness, then naturally, being devoid of consciousness, the body and the mind has to disintegrate. But we want to live in this bodily form. We take a trip in Nirvikalpa Samadhi for a while, a holiday, away from the consciousness of life or the superconsciousness or whatever. We go for a holiday and come back and be our normal selves. We enjoy the beautiful flowers and the trees and the birds and the bees and whatever goes with it in this worldly existence. But coming from there, you are a totally different person. And the greatest result it could produce, all the talks I give come from not intellectualisation, although one has to use the mind to express the inner self, although very, very inadequately, everything I talk about comes from personal experience. And drawing from that infinite source, - mind you, people would be lucky enough if they could just draw from the superconscious, which is the quietest state of relative existenc e - but to draw from that which is beyond ah, then you can really live as a God on earth, a God man and yet, if you put it on a scale, the God will be heavier than the man. In other words, you live more as the Divine than as man, and yet you have all the characteristics of man. Enjoy a good meal, enjoy your scotch and soda before going to bed, night-cap, what. Enjoy it, nothing wrong with that. But you have the constant remembrance, every second of your life, that Divinity is in you, you are Divine. And because of that you find that total unified state of all the existence as man knows it. Now, finding that total unified state, you become non-attached to the world, to be in the world but not of the world as I have said many times before. And that is the secret of viewing the world in a different perspective which we talked about yesterday. And then nothing can hurt you, nothing can harm you. If a man comes up to you and pierces a sword through you, then you say "So what?" Forgive him. For who has pierced the sword through me? I myself, for I am not apart from him. He is an expression in this turbulent, tumultuous world that is expressing itself in a different form. That is why Lor d Jesus said "Someone strikes you on one cheek, give the other". For who is the striker and who is the recipient of the slap? There's no difference. The actor and the action are but one. The thinker and the thought are but one. The creator and the creature are but one. Now these are not things that should just be intellectualised, for it only reaches the level of the mind. These are things that go beyond that level where the mind is not necessary. There you swim away into this beautiful Divinity, no experience, you just are. And there's one thing you do though, merging away in that ocean, that you support the waves, you support all the boats and the ships sailing on you. You energise everything in existence, relative existence. You become the energy that gives life to existence and that is the secret of Gurushakti. Do you see? It is very deep where although you possess a bodily form, and having been connected and experienced that non-experience state, you can bring about, through the mind and body, experience and pass it on to those that could receive it. Do you see?
5. UK 83-2 It's like where the Bible says about seeds, some seeds are thrown on fertile land, some on barren land and some on the rocks for the birds of the air. So the giver gives. How much can the receiver receive? Now, when we do our meditations and spiritual practices, we become greater recipients of Gurushakti which is Grace. So the only way to draw that Grace is to become a good recipient. But if you are like a sieve, even all the Grace that's coming is just going to flow through. But when we are integrated then we cease to be a sieve. And then we could contain that Grace within ourselves and express it in our daily lives. I always try to take the highest physics and metaphysics to daily practical levels because that is what people need. There was a young man, married, he had two children and from morning till night he was just involved in reading philosophical books and metaphysical books. And he read all the ancient philosophers, Socrates and Plato and Pythagoras and all the Eastern ones, Vaginavalkia and Sankaracharya and all that, and from morning till night he was busy with that. So his wife came to see me and she says "Would you please speak to my husband, he is involved from morning till night in all these studies and we are starving at home, there is no bread." And I spoke to this chap. I said "Look, all this is very fine but how much have you been able to translate all those philosophies in day to day practical life? Are you doing your duties to you and yours and to the society that you live in?" So it took me a bit of a while to convince him. And later when he started doing that, it was good knowledge that he has achieved, received and worked for, he put into practice and life became happy. There were no squabbles at home. So Nirvikalpa Samadhi is the aim of everyone of total mergence while still in this body. But that must be filtered through, and it would, very spontaneously through the channels of the superconscious mind, going through the subconscious mind, burning up the seeds of karma as the expression goes, and coming to the conscious mind where all thoughts are just right, all actions even without thinking about them, without analysing them, are just right. You come to a fork in the road and you will just take the right road at the fork, so life becomes spontaneous as the flower is. Nobody prods it on to grow. In other words, you become yourself. And then only can one answer the question, for no one will answer it for you. Then only can you answer the question 'Who am I?' Now if I tell you that the answer to the question of 'Who am I?', is you are Divine but that makes no sense. I tell you, you are Divine and then you will think in your mind, oh, Guruji says I am Divine but look at all the problems and things I am going through, how can I be Divine? My wife scolded me for coming home late, you know, the other day, and this and that and all these problem, the kids are rowdy and putting on the hi-fi and I can't stand it. Look at all this, how can I be Divine? You are Divine but because you have not recognised your Divinity, you suffer all the surface waves of the ocean that you really are. Do you see? Yes, we are
6. UK 83-2 talking of married life, someone asked this young bride, how do you find married life? She says "No difference at all" from when she was single. She says "Half the night I used to wait for George to go home, now half the night I wait for George to come home." (Gururaj Laughs) Yes. Nirvikalpa Samadhi is not something that can be explained or described. I can only tell you something about it, but you can only know it when you experience it. The experience of non-existence, the experience as Karl Jung would say, the unconscious, although of course he was very limited in his rationalisations because this cannot be rationalised. I gave a lovely talk on the shortcomings of Karl Jung's psychology. I gave the talk in America and you should really get a tape of it here. You'd find it very good and I believe it has been published in the Scientific Journal. I did that talk a Vidya's home and we had a lot of people there. Good, that's besides the point. So, Nirvikalpa Samadhi is something that you cannot describe but you can experience. Right, but what would be good, which can be lived in daily life, is Cervikalpa Samadhi. Samadhi not in the non existence but Samadhi in existence, in other words Samadhi with form and all religions do that. (Gururaj coughs), the lovely British weather - Samadhi with form where you formulate a certain ideal or whatever. It could be a piece of stone, like, for example, the Hindus have the shivalinga, the form. It aids to the purpose of concentration, it aids to the purpose of becoming one-pointed and, if it is done in the form of Gurushakti, you draw to yourself that infinite force that flows through the channel. Electricity is there in the water but we could never have it here without the concrete generator. The electricity in the water is abstract but to draw that abstract to us, we need the concrete generator. That is what Buddha, Jesus Christ and all of them were, Krishna, all of them were generators. For having a bodied form, you can only be the generator because you are concrete and not abstract. But the generator's so powerful and has the mechanisms there in that bodied form, to draw that abstract power, that abstract electricity and pass it on to us in our every room, in our every facets of our mind. For the mind contains many rooms but in this mansion, how many of the rooms are in such darkness? Perhaps one room has light but we have to light up the whole, all the rooms of the mind, to feel the fullness of that beautiful mansion in the dark, that ev en from a distance the place is lit up like a fairyland. So, what is the fairyland? This world. By lighting ourselves up, we light up everything around us and how do we light it up? With love. It's expressed through love. And that is how we love our neighbour as ourselves, for our neighbour is not a part of ourselves, our neighbour is ourselves. Do you see? That is how all hatred disappears, animosities, resentments, they all go away and when these go away, what is left? Love and peace. Isn't that what we want? For in
7. UK 83-2 the lights of love and peace, that darkness of anxieties and distrust and animosities and resentments cannot exist. Darkness cannot exist in the presence of light, yet it is there but it is banished by light. Do you see? So when the mind is lightened up by drawing from this Divine force and yet everything is the Divine force, everything contains the Divinity and not only contains it but it is. For that 'Isness' is universal and yet transcends the universe. There lies the crowning beauty of what we call Divinity. Do you see? So, as man can be in the world and yet not of the world, Divinity is also in the world and not of the world. You see the sameness, that man and God are so similar. He too is in you and yet beyond you. You too are in the world and beyond the world. So, here we can see in everything the same pattern follows, the same pattern follows. For example, like our concept of the Trinity, you can analyse anything and you'll find the Trinity there. The Hindus for example, Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva, creator, preserver and dissolver. In Christianity we find the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. There's a Trinity in everything. There's a Trinity in you the body, the mind and the spirit, anything we can analyse we can bring it down to the Trinity. Yet when we say Trinity, it does not mean three different things. It means three different aspects of the same thing. For God is man, God is in Jesus, in Buddha and Krishna. He's there. And when He is totally there then we can say that he is God, and that is what we mean by Incarnation. The Incarnations on earth are those that are filled, totally filled with the Divine. All the rooms in the mansion of the mind are all lit up and yet he can be so ordinary. I said a few times before, I don't know where, that if our Lord Jesus should walk down the road he might be arrested for vagrancy. So whose fault is it? Our fault for not being able to recognise. And to be able to recognise, we have to be at that high stature, to have enough awareness to bring in us the recognition of that which is Divine. It is only - there is an Indian beautiful saying - that it is only the jeweller that knows the worth of a diamond. Someone else might pick it up and say, ‘Oh, this is a piece of glass’. You see? So therefore it is our duty to ourselves for the peace in ourselves to find that integration. And I could never stop emphasising the value of spiritual practices and meditation. Do you want me to end at quarter to one? Oh, we still got some time. You know I have a friend who loves smoking cigars big ones. I don't know if he's here in the audience. He loves his cigars. So I was - his birthday was coming - so I was speaking to his wife and I said "What did you buy for your husband as a birthday present?" So she said "A hundred big cigars." I says "That must be expensive. How much did you pay for it?" So she tells me "Nothing". "Nothing for a hundred big cigars". So she says "For the past several months
8. UK 83-2 I have been taking out one or two from his box (General laughter) so when I give it to him on his birthday, he'll be very delighted that I bought the very brand he smokes." (Gururaj laughs) You know this grand old lady was with a friend watching this parade going by. This friend was from up country. So she says "Well, there is the Duke and the Duchess in front and behind them is the Mayor and Mayoress. And if you look on the right-hand side there is the Vicar and the Vixen." (Gururaj laughs). Good. See if we can find another one. We can't think too much, it’s too heavy for the brains. Yes, this Sir John Tinglepoop, he tells his Secretary, "Smithers, cancel all my engagements". So after a while when he phones through, he says "Smithers, did you can all my engagements?" He said "I did Sir, I cancelled all your engagements but Lady Millicent wasn't happy because she said you’re supposed to marry her next week." Yes. Nirvikalpa Samadhi, that's what I go into when I do the Communion Practice, really. Good. Now that is the ideal stage but that takes years and years perhaps even lifetimes to reach that but for the present moment what we need is greater and greater peace in life. What we need is to smooth out or iron out the wrinkles. And what could do that? Meditation, understanding and both require some effort. And later you will find that at first many times the person tells me , "I can't sit down to meditate, Guruji". I say "Look, make some effort and then later you will find that the effort becomes effortless and you will look forward to the time to sit down and meditate." So effort becomes effortless and in that effortlessness, you would find great activity happening within yourself on the subtle sphere. And then you will know the meaning of what has been said to find action in inaction and inaction in action. For the greatest action is not necessarily the physical action. That is only the grosser counterpart. But the greatest activity happens on a subtle level in the mind where, especially in the sub-conscious mind where the various samskaras forever are trying to balance themselves. So if any suffering comes about, remember it is very, very good because that very suffering represents an unconducive samskara coming out of you. You're shedding off, shedding off. So therefore it is not something to be sad about. The man on the spiritual path will say "Come what may, for all is well. Everything is good". Then suffering is nothing but an offering. Do you see? We talked about this of acceptance and things. So all our disappointments come about because of expectation. And expectations are mostly if you analyse it closely, is nothing else but wishful thinking. I expect my son to be good to me. So I'm wishing for that. It's wishful thoughts. So expectation is another word for wishful thinking. Expecting means you are demanding a certain thing. I expect the customer to buy this overcoat in this rainy weather and the customer might not like it and you are disappointed.
9. UK 83-2 So by having greater and greater integration in us, we become non-attached and because of non-attached there is no expectation. We take life as it comes for it is always for our personal evolution and for our benefit. Some people who are not apparently but who are genuinely happy, remember they have worked hard for it. Perhaps not in this life, they have made effort, perhaps in a previous life. If I am a spiritual teacher, do you think it is all gained in this lifetime. If I have become one with Divinity, do you think its all in this one lifetime. No. No. So many hundreds of thousands of lifetimes might have been filled with effort. Likewise with everything else, with everything else. So despair not but repair, repair to where you have to go to, to what you belong and to what you really are. And then you can love, even those that wrong you, you love them. You don't even say a word against them. I have had these experiences here in England where people have taken my teachings and used it for their own means, very wrongfully in a wrong way for their own personal ego and selfishness and back pockets. I love them still. I have nothing against them. Although as a father, I could reprimand a child that you are doing wrong my son, but it does not mean that I do not love them. That is how you love all. After all whatever people are doing, all the churches and splinter groups and everything, after all in their own way they’re talking of God. They are talking of goodness perhaps. Don't mind if they do it with a selfish motive. As far as religions are concerned, the two most wealthiest Institutions in the world is the Church and Insurance Companies. Yes. Yes. The churches promise you heaven after you are dead and the Insurance promise you a lump sum of money after you are dead. I promise you peace here and now while you are living. But no Spiritual Master can just wave a magic wand. He'll wave it, for the energy is flowing to you but are you doing your bit? Are you meditating? Are you trying to gain better and better understanding? Are you instead of reading cheap novels reading good books, having good thoughts in the mind? Are you progressing gradually from negative feelings to positive feelings and thoughts? And these things are important. So, we were talking of hope yesterday. Hope is never lost. No one is hopeless for everyone is embodied hope, as the manifestation of the Manifestor. For the Manifestor could never bring a manifestation which is hopeless. Do you see the logic? You can only take out water from water. And what is the difference between the water in your bucket or the water in the well, the same water. You are the water in the bucket and the well is the one that supplied the water for your bucket. Divinity is you and you are Divinity. You're in an individual form like in the small bucket and the Divinity in a universal form, like in the well. Okay. I think it’s brought us to quarter to one. Thank you. END