1. US 83- 26 FINDING FREEDOM IN ATTACHMENT GURURAJ: ...for as soon as you start questioning yourself, there should be no room for doubt. And there should be no questions left at all as to your love for your beloved. And yet, we start with doubt. And the reason for the doubt is two fold; firstly, the feeling of inadequacy, which here would mean that, am I worthy of that person; and secondly, is the love that I am pouring out really received? But the most important question would be, am I really pouring out that love? How do you test yourself in pouring out that love? What have you done that could show you to yourself that you are really pouring out the love? Man and wife are married, for example. She does her household duties. She's not doing the man any favor. She sweeps the house, cleans or cooks or whatever. No favors done. That's her job. The husband goes to work and brings in the bread and beans, that's no favor either. That's his job. So it is a partnership, a business relationship, where each is supportive to each other in a certain, particular way. If I have a company I would have a sales manager, a production manager, and various other managers, and they work together as a team. Yet those managers might hate each other's guts. So when two people are together and they feel that they are in love and they say, I pour out my love to such and such a person, it's just merely a presumption of the mind. Because once you start pouring, you are not conscious of what you are pouring. You only become conscious of it when you start analyzing the pouring: Oh, I give him so much love. I mend his socks, I polish his shoes, I make tea for him six times a day. You start analyzing and pouring, pouring, pouring. So as soon as that consciousness of pouring comes in, it ceases to be love. Just perhaps a partnership or at the best, a companionship. Now, because it is a partnership and a companionship, one goes into further analysis. Because of the duties that are to be done, one feels that one is attached. And you feel that you are in bondage. Bondage of what? You are in bondage to yourself and no one else. The spouse has not bound you. But you have bound yourself, because you have started analyzing love. As soon as you start analyzing love, the whole idea of the giving disappears. Then there is no giving, for it should be a spontaneous welling up. The spontaneity is lost. The giving is lost. The surrendering to love is lost. After all, what do you surrender to? Not the object. But you surrender yourself, and the object is just a means for that surrender of yourself to yourself. The object is just a means of giving that you are giving yourself to yourself. Do you s ee it is selfishness? There is motivation. If you perform all your duties and all the givings, it might be done with a very deep ego sense: Oh, I did this, and I did that, and I did that, I cooked a beautiful meal for you tonight, or I, as a man, I worke d overtime and brought home five hundred dollars extra. I did that. So surrender can never come about as long as that I is existent. The I has to be gone. Not that it is annihilated, but there is no emphasis on the I at all. I am not doing anything.

2. US 83- 26 I ain't doing it. Hm? Then you allow yourself, you open the tap, the faucet, of your heart and the water just keeps on running. A beautiful flow like the river, ever fresh at the beginning, in the middle, and in the end. But to merge away int o the beloved, the ocean, that is love. So on the one hand you speak of attachment, and the other...and on the other hand, you speak of freedom. Attachment is bondage; and freedom is that which is non bondage. How are you going to reconcile the two factors, hm? How are you going to reconcile the two opposites? You cannot. As far as human emotions go, you cannot reconcile them. It would become impossible, because you are right in between a conflict. On the one hand you feel attached, and on the other hand you're striving for freedom, but that freedom can be gained by non attachment. Now, what do we do with non attachment, that is the question? How do I become non attached to my beloved? Hm? How do I become non attached? There is only one way: when I stop thinking, when I stop analyzing. You are so attached that the attachment would breed in you jealousy, possessiveness, and all these other so called negative qualities. Your beloved leaves the room for five minutes and you wait for her to come back, and the five minutes seems half an hour in your mind. So you are tormented, tormented for half an hour. Meanwhile, she was just away for five minutes. But in that torment it is not a longing or a yearning. That torment could take so many different forms. Then your mind starts thinking: who is she with, who is she talking to, what is she doing, why is she so late? And this is a natural not a natural, but a very common human occurrence, and I deal with a lot of cases of this nature. So here we come to the point where attachment becomes an obsession. An obsession is a distorted view of life, or of any particular thing. This distortion takes place in the left hemisphere of the brain, where it keeps on pulsating, where it is caught up in a whirlpool she's away for five minutes, who the hell has she gone to? Where is she? That five minutes seems half an hour of torture to you. It's one of the signs of attachment. Now, to get rid of attachment there should be no desire. This does not mean that you are desireless, for as long as you have a mind, as long as you have a body, there will always be desires. But those desires, the very energies spent in those desires, could be used in a totally different way. Which are the ways in which that desire can be used, that is the question? It is the same expenditure of the same energy. The desire could be that, oh, wherever she has gone to let she be happy. In other words, you got to free yourself from bondage, then your desire will assume a different form altogether. If she's gone somewhere, she's doing some work, or she's doing some good, she's looking after things. So immediately you start watching the functioning of your mind. Is it functioning in jealously? Is it functioning in possessiveness? Is the woman or man you love do you say, she's mine? Could you really ever possess anything? And the least a human being who is an entity, an individual thinking entity, a so called the highest in evolution on this planet.

3. US 83- 26 So thinking is the basis of desire. So what one has to do is to modify one's thinking, and the way to do that is immediately to catch the thought when it starts. What is she doing with John alone there catch it there, that very moment that thought starts and analyze the thought. What is she doing there with John? Now, when you catch the thought there at that level as soon as it arises, one thing will happen is this, who is John, who am I, and who is she? Does she belong to me? Or does she belong to John? And when you start analyzing in this way, you will find the answer that if is she is spending so much time with John, then she does not belong to me in totality. And if she does not belong to me in totality, or over which I have no right whatsoever, then I get rid of that idea, or the desire, that she is mine and no one else's. Good. So having that idea in mind, you automatically free yourself, for you are not seeking the freedom of her or him, you are seeking the freedom within yourself. And that is where freedom lies, nowhere else. Hm. We cannot create any bondages for anyone, and at the same time we cannot create freedom for another person at any time whatsoever. Bondage or freedom can only be created by oneself, for oneself. So when you view the world or your beloved, in this question of yours, when you view it through the aspects of bondage, then you are not binding her, but you are binding yourself to a patterned way of thinking. This patterned way of thinking might have some cultural roots, might go back into your personal samskaras in previous lives, perhaps, where you have lost someone you love very much. Or in your culture where, in some cultures, where there's no question of equality between man and woman. There is a similarity between man and woman, but never an equality. If they were equal they would be born in the same way with the same characteristics. But man and woman have different characteristics, never the same. Say, for example, women's lib. There is some good in it but it is done to the extreme. What liberation are you seeking for? Seek first to liberate yourself, and if you try to liberate yourself, from what are you liberating yourself? Are you liberating yourself from male dominance? And that very action of liberating yourself from male dominance could show the other side that you want female dominance. But rather the recognition of the similarity. So that liberation or freedom that one seeks must be born within oneself and not outside oneself. As long as that quest... As long as that quest is there, lead me from bondage to freedom, then know that you are in deep conflict within yourself. To be free is to be not only in bondage but boundless. The heart becomes boundless, all encompassing. And then you are doing nothing for your beloved, you are just surrendering yourself, not to your beloved, you are surrendering yourself to yourself. And your beloved feels that you have surrendered to him or her. And then all the actions that takes place in between, like rubbing his head when he has a headache, or he rubbing her feet when she's tired, these actions are secondary. It could just be done for the sake of duty. It could just be done, oh, let me make him feel happy tonight so that he could work well tomorrow. We are very far off the mark when we are in bondage, and ninety nine point nine, nine, nine

4. US 83- 26 percent are in bondage, including myself. Perhaps your bondage is far more than mine, but as long as you are embodied, even the most realized man still has that two percent bondage in him, always. This is fallacious, this theory promulgated my Eastern philosophies, that you can find jivanmukti, which means to find total freedom, while still being embodied. It’s impossible. For as long as you are embodied you will still have two percent trace of that ego. It is like gold. Gold is twenty four carats, pure gold. But you cannot use pure gold to make ornaments or jewelry, it's too soft. So you mix it with two percent alloy to give it the hardness; otherwise, it is useless. So the purest gold jewelry in the world, the best quality, would be twenty two percent. Likewise, in man, you'd find ninety eight, the most realized man, ninety eight percent is free, but the two percent is bondage. Otherwise he cannot function, you'd become non functional. He would not be able to rationalize, live, work, or even go to the bathroom so that two percent will be there. But he exists at that fine level of superconsciousness, where the light of the superconsciousness drowns that two percent of bondage that he has, but he is conscious of that two percent all the time. And the only time he can shed that two percent of bondage is when he sheds his body. Great men, great yogis, great spiritual masters go into mahasamadhi. That means they willingly take death upon themselves. I've done that a thousand times over, I know it's very easy. Just close your eyes and stop breathing and you're gone. Now, why do people like [Ramtersa?] and such great, great men go into mahasamadhi? It is not suicide. Suicide is for people that are mentally ill. Suicidal tendencies are pathological. But these great masters go into mahasamadhi because of that two percent bondage they have, and they want to be rid of it. They say, "My work is done, I've done the best I can. Now I've got to merge away, get rid of that two percent that I cannot get rid of if I still carry on with this body. Do you see. So how can I be attached and yet have freedom? It's a question that contradicts itself, because attachment and freedom opposes each other. And the only way you can make it non opposing is to see that attachment as freedom, or the freedom as attachment. Ahh. It's a revolutionary factor I'm putting forward to you tonight. See all attachment as freedom, for you can find it to be freedom even though attached. You can just by having a special mental attitude, and a spiritual strength and fortitude. I am sitting on this chair. Am I attached to the chair? No. I don't even know who it belongs to. And yet, if this chair was not there I would still be happy sitting on the floor. The only reason it is plausible or practical to have a chair on a little stand like this is that I could have eye contact with all of you. If you sit there you won't be able to see me. But if this chair and this podium was still there, you'd still be able to hear me. So how important is the chair, hm? In this juncture, in this instance, the speaker is important, the spiritual master is important, not the chair. My love for her is important, not her as a being, whatever her name could be. So I am attached in that love for her, but in that love, in that attachment of love for her, I say that that very attachment is freedom itself, because I, through the grace of whatever power there be, has given me the freedom to love the freedom to love, even in attachment.

5. US 83- 26 So one can overcome the law of opposites. Otherwise man will become a totally irresponsible person. If you have a wife that goes out at night, wherever, and comes home three, four o'clock in the morning, or a husband that does that, you've all the right to reprimand her or him. Why not? Why have you formed this relationship with me when I have to sit up here at night 'til three o'clock waiting for you. Like this young couple that just got married, and the friend asks the woman that got married, "Do you find any difference before when you were courting and now?" So she replies, she says, "No difference at all. Before, I used to wait up 'til three, four o'clock to get rid of him, now I've got to wait up 'til three, four o'clock in the morning for him to come home." [LAUGHTER] Yes. So let me be free to love my beloved. I'm attached to her, yes. But my attachment must not be pathological. As long as you are a human being, two people living with each other, there will always be the sense of togetherness. And togetherness is attachment two gather. The two gather together, ah. The two gather together. Just two. As long as there is two there is attachment. That's the world, we have to face it. But we got to take out the pathological problem out of it. And the pathology, the agony, would exist in extreme jealousy, in extreme mistrust, or distrust, or in extreme possessiveness. As a matter of fact, I would love my wife to be a bit jealous of me. It reassures me that she loves me.... [END SIDE ONE] GURURAJ: ...that she loves me. Do you see. So there would be this attachment in it, but attachment in the sense of a genuine, sincere feeling that in this togetherness we have, we are marching on the path of oneness that we are one. Now, how can we be one, two separate bodies? It is only when the hearts are melted away completely. It is only through spiritual practices where the heart is totally opened, where you merge, two totally open hearts, into each other, and that assumes that beautiful brightness. Whenever you go to see a stage show you'll have two spotlights on either side at the back. And those two spotlights, when they are shining singularly, would not be bright. But when the two spotlights come together and merge, how bright that light becomes, and that is the oneness. Unfortunately humanity, as they stand today, have a far, far way to go to find that oneness. For as soon as you find that oneness with your beloved, you would automatically find that oneness with Divinity. For your beloved is none other than Divinity itself, in any form, in any shape , in any size. The Divinity is but total oneness. Hm? But we can only talk about oneness when we have reached there. Until then the predominant thought in the mind should be that in our togetherness, free from these extreme pathological problems, we are marching, marching, marching, to find that oneness, that self realization, which would mean not this self, but your self and this self is but one self.

6. US 83- 26 Now, you can do this with someone of an equal category to yours. And if you do not find that someone of your own particular category of your level of evolution, then what do you do? You have acceptance. You accept. Right. So I've got a Ph.D., and she's only got grade three. I accept that. Why do I need her to have a Ph.D. as well. I accept. And yet, me with my Ph.D.s, the string of them, might be worth nothing in equality to her grade three. Do you see. So when you accept those pathological problems of extreme jealousy, possessiveness and attachment fades away. They do not become non existent. You have not reached that stage yet for it to be non existent, but they fade away into the background. And the emphasis is on the freedom freedom of one's self in total honesty and sincerity. And when a person is totally free within oneself, then thoughts of doing any harm to the beloved automatically fade away too. Do you see. So how many people in this world are compatible one with the other? Very, very few. Very few. Hm? There are very few people like the Harmins. Very few. The rest plod along the path. For total compatibility would mean an equal state of spiritual evolution. Then only can you have total compat ibility. So be free to accept. And therein lies your freedom, because only you can accept. And when you can accept, then there's a greater chance for the spouse to accept you. So here you are creating a certain environment for yourself. And all those thoughts that you think, such as acceptance, emanates from you. Thoughts are real, they are things, they are actually tangible. But because man hasn't got that developed sight yet to see the tangibility of thoughts, as man cannot see atomic structures without the use of a high powered microscope, in the same way you are emanating all the time. You're emanating love, love, love all the time and acceptance. And you will get accepted in return. And in that very acceptance comes surrender. So how far we reach now, that the surrender is freedom. And yet, you are attached, but the emphasis is not on the attachment. The emphasis is on surrender, unmotivated surrender, unselfish surrender, unselfish giving of oneself as much as possible to the beloved. Now, we in the West do like this very, very much, where out of every two and a half marriages there's one divorce. Look at the proportion. Tamaji will bear me out that in the East it is far, far, far, far, less. In India there would be one divorce perhaps in a hundred thousand acceptance. My wife, for example, a beautiful woman, a very good woman, she can't read or write English. She's well versed in Gujarati. I can't sit down with her and have a deep philosophical conversation. Right. I can't sit down and discuss with her the arts or poetry or music, so what do I do? I'm married for thirty five years to her, what have I done? I've accepted the fact that she wouldn't understand my poetry, I cannot discuss any philosophical or metaphysical concept with her. So I accept that fact. Yet, I'm surrounded by friends. Friends in the field of music. Friends in the field of art. Friends in the field of literature and everything philosophy and I have the most beautiful

7. US 83- 26 discussions with them. But at the same time, Lata is my wife, and her devotion is so great to me, the self sacrifice, the surrender is so great that it compensates a million times over and over again her lack of the knowledge of the various humanities. So what do I look for in my spouse? Do I keep on finding fault? Because my finding fault is not the fault of the opposite person. By finding fault, the fault is you. You are at fault, therefore you see a fault. You always find a drunkard accusing another person of being a drunkard. Meanwhile, he is a drunkard in the beginning himself. You'll always find that. You'll always find a thief accusing someone else of thievery, because he is a thief. Hm. Do you see? So what we do is we just reflect ourselves and project ourselves upon others, because we cannot handle ourselves by ourselves or see ourselves. So we try and see ourselves in others. But it would be good if we can see our faults in others and improve ourselves. That we don't do. That we don't do. Do you see. So if we use a mirror. We try and improve ourselves. Why do you look into an ordinary mirror, for example? Hm? To see that the rouge and things are well put on, not excessive powder, excessive lipstick. This one woman runs into an office. There's a man with a white coat. So she says, "Doctor, tell me what's wrong with me?" So this person looks her up and down from head to foot and says, "I want to tell you three things," he says. "You are fifty pounds overweight, and you've got to scrape off all that powder and rouge you have on your face and lipstick. And thirdly, I'm not a doctor, I'm an artist. The doctor's down the hall." You see. So when we can look at ourselves in a mirror, we always try to see ourselves, or make ourselves more beautiful to see if our hair's well combed, to see that we are not shabby. Yes, that's what we do to improve our appearance. But why can't we do that when we look at others and find similar faults in others that we have and decide, let me improve myself instead of looking at faults in someone else. In any case that person might not have that fault. It is my judgment, because it's a projection of my mind. And the same thing applies in freedom and attachment of love. Do you see how it works? Ahh, you know that favorite poem of mine of Mira, I've quoted it before. She says, "Oh, Lord, do not grant me freedom of self realization, but let me be born again and again so that I could worship at your feet and find the joy of worshiping you." That's the kind of attachment. Ahhh, that is attachment. She's attached...Mira is attached to Krishna, but what is she seeking for? For the joy of devotion, the joy of worship. She does not want that oneness with God or with Krishna. But she wants the joy. So yet in that attachment of Mira to Krishna she feels that freedom inside her of worshiping. And all kinds of worship of your beloved is joyful. And joyfulness, according to man's stage of evolution, is a form of freedom itself. Let us not talk of total freedom, then you merge away into God, then you do not need this world, and you do not need this body. You don't need your beloved. You need nothing then. But while there is need within you, find the joy in the attachment as Mira has found joy in her attachment to Krishna.

8. US 83- 26 So we have come to the point where we first said that attachment and freedom cannot be reconciled. And we, through a very logical process, have come to the conclusion that bondage and freedom can be reconciled and used very, very joyfully. Thank you. Don't want to make you think too much tonight. So while you're here with your wives, and [???????] it's fun. [LAUGHTER] **** END ****