1. U S 82 - 53 PARK FOREST # 2 [Tape continued from Park Forest #1 Freedom Hall][Rapid Fire] ... careful. Because by using the wrong mantra y ou're jarring your entire system. You know, these maharishis Mahesh Yogi, and Muktananda, and all these guys are so afraid of me because whenever I go and see them I give them hell! Maharishi, for example, oh, I feel sorry for him, really. I love him , make no mistake. He picks off 16 mantras bija mantras and hands them out on age basis, which is totally wrong. Which might not be in compliance with your personal vibration. Then Muktananda I give him bloody hell right. He has mantras pri nted on a card and you ask for a mantra and he gives you one card. It's become such big business. These damn gurus, I don't know what the hell they're doing. And yet, I'm proud to be the poorest guru in the world. These pants were given me by someone, t hese socks were given me by someone, this shirt was given to me by someone. And so was this shawl. So these guys devise these plans very well modulated toward business, and I believe in `78, 1978, Maharishi took in $40 million. I need nothing. I need no thing. I don't even feel hungry. I never do. It's only when these chelas of mine push food onto me and says, "You must eat, Guruji, to sustain your body." Then I eat. So a mantra must be based on your personal vibration. In other words, if there was so me machine that could boil you down, mind, body, and spirit, into your primal essence, the vibration vibration is sound then that should be the sound you should be using and not anything given to you arbitrarily. It will jar the entire nervous syste m, it will disturb the vibratory level of your subtle body, and then when you ask these guys, "Oh, this is happening to me, and that's happening to me," you know what they tell you? You're unstressing. That's what they tell you. You're unstressing. Wha t is unstressing, dammit! If true meditation cannot produce joy in you, then you don't need to meditate. Meditation becoming closer to your inner self is a joyous process. Then when you reach the end of the road, you will find that the path and the goal is one. They become one. You see. So if you have to do any practice, and if there is a qualified physician available, go to him. Don't go to quacks. Your mantra is picked up at the superconscious level in a very subtle form and then I have to bri ng it like an ice cream cone from the thin end to the broaden end so it becomes audible and speakable. Right. But as you continue with your meditation you will find it becoming finer and finer and reaches the level when it is picked up: integration. An d you draw from that energy, you draw it automatically, spontaneously it comes to your mind and your body. If you spend half an hour in a perfume factory you will come out smelling like perfume. You spend half an hour in a mmmmmm [Laughter]. Sewag e?

2. U S 82 - 53 VOICE: Sewer. GURURAJ: You know, this fellow went to a restaurant on one of the meditation courses. And being of continental extraction, he put his napkin around the neck you know, when they eat spaghetti they normally tuck the napkin in there. Fine. So now this is not done. It can be done neatly, ok fine. We don't do it in America, do we? We Americans don't do it here. Right. So the managers saw this and he called the waiter over. He says, "Please be very diplomatic, be very tactful, because this is a very important customer, and ask him to remove the napkin and put it on his lap." So the waiter went over to the customer, and he said, "What would you like, sir, a shave or a haircut?" [Laughter] While you're thinking of more questions, see if I can find some thing here. Oh yes. You know why fat people are good nature? Fat people are always good nature. And this fat man was asked this question that you are so good nature. So this man replied, "We are forced to be good nature because we could neither fight n or run. [Laughter] Questions? QUESTIONER: Is the intensification of suffering a necessary phenomenon in the spiritual process? GURURAJ: No. It is not. The intensification of suffering is not a natural process on the way to God. The intensification w hich you feel on the path to Divinity is imaginary, it is image making. You make that image of suffering, when the path is so smooth. And the path to God is very smooth. You can even use roller skates. QUESTION: [Inaudible] ... no growth without pain? Is that the same he asked and you said you don't have to have pain for growth. GURURAJ: No. You do not need pain for growth. It is the misunderstanding of growth that gives you pain. Understanding is to stand under. How about above standing. VOI CE: How do you try to go above? GURURAJ: Learn to meditate, damn you! [Laughter]

3. U S 82 - 53 SAME VOICE: [I don't doubt that?] GURURAJ: We believe in the 3 L's: life, love, and laughter. For that is what you really are. You are life, you are love, an d when yo u combine life and love, laughter joy. Enjoy the joy. Let's find another joke. [Laughter] This woman was ill and of course she went to the doctor. And the doctor advised she must go to the ocean and have salt air. Fresh air, salt air. So not being a ble to afford to send her to a seaside resort, he bought a herring [much laughter]. Oh, this other guy wanted to get married, but he says, "I'll marry a girl who is very rich." So his friend says, "Why do you want to marry a rich girl?" So he replies, "S o that I can buy everything that she likes with her money." [He laughs] Next question. QUESTION: When you talk about life, love and laughter.... GURURAJ: [British style] Laughter.... SAME QUESTIONER: .... laughter [Laughter from group] it seems [????] responsibility. [inaudible] GURURAJ: Look. Analyze the word "responsibility." There has to be response and the ability to respond. VOICE: [Inaudible] GURURAJ: That's it. You go t to develop the ability to respond. And that is respondability. And responsibility. Too much? VOICE: Too much [???] GURURAJ: I don't think so. You're sitting in Freedom Hall and talking of responsibility? What are you responsible for? [She respon ds inaudibly] Beautiful, beautiful. To develop the ability, to develop the integration within yourself so that you could respond totally to life. Questions? I'll find another joke then.

4. U S 82 - 53 This guy goes to a restaurant and it was a time when electricity w as just more or less invented. So he ordered a steak, and the waitress brought the steak, and then chatting a bit with her she told him that, "We use all modern methods in our cooking. We have electric do das to do your steak." So he told her, "Would yo u please take the steak back with you and give it another shock. [Laughter] How are we with time, love? VOICES: [Inaudible] GURURAJ: Why don't you both ask it together. I got two ears, you know. I can hear them both together. VOICE: My question wa s on suffering earlier. I was referring to the suffering that is already present in the individual not that which makes itself [???], but that which is already present. Doesn't the spiritual process make one aware of that fact? GURURAJ: Suffering is ne ver in the present. Suffering is a memory of something that happened in the past and it is gone. So what you are really doing is reliving the past in the present and thereby totally ignoring the present. So what do you do after that? You project the pa st into the future and feel it in the present. So if you live totally in the present... here's another favorite one of mine: nowhere. Shift the "W" to the left now here. This is the only moment I know. For I am here, not in the past and not in the future. Here. The past is gone, the future might never be there. But I am here. Therefore we say, "I am that I am, Yahweh." And if this lesson can be learned, then this very moment of my existence in time and space, because of being bound by relativit y, is only now. Now here. And that realization comes through integration. It is the fragmentation that makes you go into the past and relive the past. Yes. And it is the very fragmentation that makes you project yourself into the future. So where are you then? If you're not here now you are either in the past suffering the happenings of the past, and suffering the happenings of the past you project it into the future and you suffer more because that suffering becomes fear. And when you land in the ar ea of fear, you fear inadequate, insecure, insufficient in everything. So the secret and the joy of life is here and now. Nowhere else. And when we learn this, believe you me believe you me when you learn to live in the here and now, there is no su ffering, there is no pain, there's no fear, there's no inadequacy. For you are totality in itself and not a nality. Totality.

5. U S 82 - 53 QUESTION: You talk about [???], you talk suffering we ourselves create. How about the suffering others are causing [???]... . GURURAJ: Yes, they do, but... your husband swore you yesterday... SAME VOICE: Yes, but people do affect your life. GURURAJ: I'm giving you an analogy... SAME VOICE CONTINUES: I'm giving you an analogy... SAME VOICE: [Arguing, but not clearly] GURURAJ: ...is he swearing at you now? Or are you sitting in front of your guru? SAME VOICE: No, but yesterday say he did... GURURAJ: Yes, yesterday. But that was yesterday. SHE CONTINUES [Inaudible] GURURAJ: That was yesterday. [She continues] Forget it! Let it go! Let it go. It is your attachment that is making you think of what happened yesterday. Your attachment comes from the little ego self that thinks it is something. And yet that little ego self is nothing. So what remembers? What brings to your memory? What is the factor involved? What brings yesterdays sufferings now? Your ego self, which is nothing else but composed of memories and impressions and experiences caused by the impressions. VOICE: But aren't those impressions and memories in themselves suffering? suffering? GURURAJ: Who is suffering? Who is suffering?

6. U S 82 - 53 SAME VOICE: I asked you first. [Laughter] GURURAJ: I'm going to do Socrates on you. Ok. Watch it. I'm going to make him answer his question himself. Who is suffering? SAME VOICE: I asked you if the sense of ego itself wasn't simply a conglomeration which seems to exist, but really it's just suffering itself. And so my original question was isn't [??] the process involved with identifying that fact, that suffering... GURURAJ: Ok, I'm supposed to be a lecturer. What do you mean by identification? SAME VOICE: I've lost the context. GURURAJ: What is the meaning you said you identify yourself with suffering. I'm asking you what is the meaning of identification? SAME VOICE: I don't know. GURURAJ: If you don't know, then how could you know any form of identification? That is causi ng the suffering. SAME VOICE: Does a duck know how to swim? GURURAJ: Yes, a duck knows how to swim, but it will not swim against the current. He swims with the current. Why are you swimming against he current? And you talk of suffering. What is suff ering? What is suffering? SAME VOICE: Well, I'll go with the ego self. GURURAJ: How do you recognize suffering?

7. U S 82 - 53 SAME VOICE: When it hurts. GURURAJ: What hurts? SAME VOICE: When I hurt. GURURAJ: Who is the "I" you are talking about? SAME VOICE: I'm not sure about that. [Inaudible] GURURAJ: [Laughing] Right. So one factor is established, that I don't know the "I" that hurts. Ok, you with me? VOICE: I didn't hear.... GURURAJ: The fact we have now established is this, that I d o not know the "I" that hurts. Isn't that what you answered [he says yes.] Right. Now, if you do not know the "I" that hurts, how can you recognize it? SAME VOICE: Not knowing in a total sense. The recognition. GURURAJ: You are not total, you are not total. [Same voice interrupting, but inaudible] So how can you talk in a total sense? When you're not total. Now, the "I" that hurts within you, who is the observer of that little "I" that's hurting? SAME VOICE: Who is the observer of that? I don 't really know... [Inaudible] GURURAJ: [Laughing] When I really do not know which part of me is suffering then where does the identification take place? Because you've got to identify yourself with suffering or else you will not be able to recognize suf fering. Now which part of you is recognizing the suffering? SAME VOICE: The mind.

8. U S 82 - 53 GURURAJ: What is the mind? ANOTHER FEMALE VOICE: Consciousness [???] ego. GURURAJ: Ego. Ego is inseparable from the mind because the mind is the ego. Ego or I go. "I", the real "I" do not want to go. But let the "E" go. And then where is suffering? Where is the suffering then? SAME MALE VOICE: When the ego goes? There wouldn't be any. I was speaking of the [???] fear of [???] GURURAJ: That's the answer. Th at's the answer. Let the small I go, for the Big I knows of no suffering. Now, how do you let the small I go, that is the question which is of paramount importance. How do you let your small I go? Hm? By merging it into the Big I. So simple. And the spiritual practices are designed for you to make the small I merge into the Big I. You see. So intellectualization, rationalization, will not answer your question for you totally. It will give you some understanding, but true realization comes experientially. As I said earlier, I think, you cannot explain the sweetness of sugar, you've got to e xperience the sweetness of sugar. You can take it to any laboratory and they might break it up into its chemical factors or components. But yet it won't give you the sweetness of sugar. Experience through spiritual practices. You cannot destroy the ego. There have been many teachers around the world that tell you "destroy the ego". I say no, you can't. I told you earlier on you can't even control the thoughts in your mind. And if you can't control the thoughts in your mind which is nothing else bu t ego how can you destroy the ego. But you can merge the ego into the real self within you. You cannot destroy darkness, but you can switch on the light. And darkness disappears when light appears. So simple. QUESTION: [????] letting go of the sel f or becoming selfless but not loading self identity. Is that more or less what your saying? GURURAJ: You do not become selfless. You could never become selfless. Even the highest realized man, the man that has merged totally into Divinity still has to preserve a little bit of ego. Otherwise he won't be able to sleep, he won't be able to eat, and he won't even be able to go to the toilet. So that two percent will be there until you shed this body. So it is not a question of selflessness; it is a que stion of being yourself.

9. U S 82 - 53 VOICE: [????] difference between being yourself and selflessness. GURURAJ: Oh, yes. "Selfish" is such a beautiful word. In Sanskrit "ish" means God. Selfish the self is God. QUESTION: [Something about joy] [Laughter] V IDYA: We're selling the tapes afterwards. GURURAJ: Well... [???] why didn't you wave back. Good. I think, ah, do you want to carry on longer? Shall we call it a day? One more? VOICE [Indian?]: You mentioned the wrong mantra can be harmful. How ab out a person who is practicing meditation without the help of a guru? Should he practice without a mantra? GURURAJ: [answers with Hindu or Sanskrit] That means without a true guru there is no self knowledge. Because the guru does not only give you a m antra or any other spiritual practices. He gives you himself. The entire force of the universe a true guru represents, comes with that mantra to you. You see. SAME VOICE: Like you mentioned that some of the gurus are giving bija mantras, they can be ve ry harmful and dangerous. GURURAJ: Oh yes. Oh yes. They can be very harmful to a person if they are not working in accordance with your personal vibration. Mantra what is a mantra? A mantra is you. You become the mantra. And how can you become the mantra if it is not in accordance with your vibration? And what is more harmonious to you than your own vibration? "First was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word is God." Hm? [Sanskrit or Hindi] And who can show you that Rama? Well, su ch a beautiful evening. ****END****

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