Q: Although we know at the intellectual level, that we need to surrender our ego, we are unable to. Why?

You see, man never wants to let go in totality. He wants to cling on to something all the time and that something is his ego. Your ego is your very strength. You have guarded it so well over the years. It is the basis of your very existence.

You don't know that there is a world beyond your ego which is much more blissful than what you are feeling now. Your ego is a life-sustaining element for you. But the simple truth is – you have to let go of it!

It is like this: Imagine that there is a seed that is sown. The seed has to rupture for the tree to grow, is it not? If the seed thinks that it will wait for the tree to grow and then rupture, is it possible? No! Like this, man's ego has to rupture for him to blossom. The longer he guards his ego, the more he is postponing his own flowering.

Until man meets his master, he might not even know where his blockages are, where his ego is hindering. But once he meets his master, he will know! He can transform. The master's sole purpose is to remove the ego of each of his disciples.

The words and actions of a master will seem abrupt and inappropriate when you see it from your logic. But it is pregnant with the truth; it is pregnant with the single intention of destroying your ego. A master himself descends out of sheer compassion for mankind. He has no vested interest in anything or anybody. He is beyond the treacherous ocean of desire. He is here simply to lift you to the state he is in; the state of eternal bliss; the state where only consciousness exists without the 'I'.

In the Chandi recitation, which is a recitation of 700 Sanskrit verses on Devi, the female energy principle, it talks about how Chandi Devi kills the various evil demons. It is not that She killed real humans. If She had killed real humans, we would not be worshipping Her through the recital!

The demons symbolically represent the various kinds of evils or ego inside man and it is this ego that is slain by Devi to liberate man from them. We have to understand that. One of the demons is a buffalo-headed demon! This is to make us understand that some of us are so thick skinned that no matter how many times the master awakens us to his path, we firmly stick to our path! We are not sensitive to the master's call. Understand, arguing with the master is the greatest punishment that you give to yourself. I tell you honestly, when you are caught in arguing with the master, no one can do anything more to harm you. You harm yourself enough.

Anyway, the master knows how to make each one flower in his or her own way and the least that one can do is open up to him with faith and courage.

Q: Although I know that You are my master, I feel hesitant and scared in your presence.

The very fact that you have come out with this statement means that you want to overcome your fear. You have decided to take the leap.

Let me explain. Your being has clearly identified me; but your mind is fighting. If your being has not identified me, you would not keep coming to me again and again. You face a lot of trouble at home for coming here, do you not? The easiest thing for you to do is stay at home and do your work. That would have made your family happy.

Why is it that you again and again want to come to the ashram and see me? Why do you want to again and again face the arguments at home for coming here? Is it not easier to just stay at home and make the others happy? The reason is, the pull that you feel is at the being level. It will not allow you to go back, once it has recognized me. Try as you might, you can't escape!

Your being now knows me. But your mind seems to be the hindrance. Remember to always follow your heart. That is exactly what you need to do here. When you follow your heart, you will reach me. When you follow your mind, you will keep missing me.

You are so afraid of losing yourself to me. That is your problem. Your ego comes under threat. You feel insecure about losing your identity. You start wondering where you are heading without an identity for yourself. Your ego faces a grave crisis when you come near me.

The ego immediately demands its food and the only way to provide it, is by running away from me. Your mind sways like the elephant's trunk, from one side of intense love for me to the other side of intense fear.

Remember, love is from your heart while fear is from your mind. Always, always, follow your heart. Love is natural; fear is societal. Fear and doubt are deeply related and are mere conditionings that have gone into you.

Understand very clearly that there is nothing wrong in doubting either. Doubt is your torch to enlightenment. It is very difficult for your mind to proceed without doubts. But your doubts should be ultimately transformed to trust. Only then you are progressing. As you move inwards, this will happen.

Q: What do we need to do Swamiji**?**

Just fall totally in love, that's all! Falling totally in love is falling totally into the egoless state. That is why a master who is in the egoless state is capable of only love and compassion. All other emotions like anger, irritation etc. are pseudo manifestations of his infinite love. He pretends to be angry and irritated. He comes down to your level, emotes at your level, and takes you through one more phase of understanding, that's all. He talks in your language until you understand his language - the language of Existence!

Q: But how do we start falling in love totally? It seems like it is easier said than done!

The first thing is to flood awareness into every action of yours. Become the watcher. You will start feeling that the whole thing is a drama and you are only watching it while playing a role yourself incidentally. The second thing is to stop being judgmental about everything that you see. When you stop being judgmental, you will simply love everyone and everything with total innocence.

When you are judgmental, you don't see what IS, you see what you want to see. Most of us have already formed our judgments in advance. They are the foundation stones for us. Then, we simply act using them as a base. Anything we see, the first thing we do is, view it through these judgments.

If we act in this fashion, how will we see things as they are? How will we ever fall in love? You can fall in love only if you welcome everything with freshness, with innocence. But what do you do? You start analyzing the pros and cons for even loving. When you start analyzing, you miss it. When you finally decide to do it, it may be too late.

See, the master-disciple relationship is there only for you to lose your ego. When you are alone, you cannot lose your ego. The master becomes the device, the support, for you to lose your ego. The more you dissolve into him, the more you will be ready to open up and lose your ego. When do you know that your ego is dissolving? When you start experiencing a certain joy that you have not experienced before.

You will start feeling joy for no reason at all. Just existing will make you happy. Of course, with the master, you are always undergoing a surgery of your ego and there will be moments of suffering as your ego is getting slashed. But when you emerge out of those moments, you would have taken many steps forward in your growth and you will feel boundless joy for no reason at all. Just look at young children. They are so enthusiastic towards life. They are so loving. Have you ever wondered why you are not as enthusiastic as them? You were like them once upon a time, were you not? Then, where have we lost this enthusiasm and innocence?

(one participant ventures) We have grown up and become more mature Swamiji*. We are more experienced than them.*

Experienced at what? Boredom? Be very clear: We all think that we are more mature than children and that we have the right attitude towards life while children need to go through life and acquire this maturity.

The truth is, we have become so intellectual, that we have lost our connection with our heart. We operate purely from our minds. Even our emotions are dictated by our minds. We have stopped emoting from our being. We have lost touch with our core.

When we arrived in this world, we were in a state of celebration and spontaneity. Over years, society conditioned us and created the mind for us. The mind then solidified itself and started dictating terms to us. The spontaneity in us got lost.

Let me tell you, in this whole process of shedding our ego, we are trying to rediscover the child in us. When we were young, we were closer to realizing God. As we grew and became so-called mature, our social conditionings marred the child in us.

So many people ask me, 'Swamiji, how is it that although you speak about the ultimate truth, you appear to be so childlike?' Now you tell me, am I childlike because I have not grown up and become mature? No! You simply interpret things in your own convenient ways, in your own philosophical ways; that is the problem.

But for societal conditioning, we have the ability to swim and fly without any training. It may sound absurd to you, but it is true. We have these abilities in us. We can swim and fly, until people start telling us that we are not capable of swimming and flying. If you place a new-born baby in a swimming pool, it will stay afloat without drowning.

The ego manifests itself in so many ways and we live according to it every minute of our lives. We all actually use masks in our day-to-day lives. We use one mask when we deal with our mother; we use a different mask when we deal with our father; we use a different one for our boss and so on. As long as we use the right masks with the right people, it is alright. The moment we use the wrong mask with a person, it means the ego has stepped in. All you have to do is switch masks efficiently and enjoy the show. Then you are a watcher and not involved in the game as a solid entity.

You can enjoy only when you know that you are something beyond the mask. Otherwise, you will get carried away by the mask and lose the whole charm of living. When you know that you are only using masks, your desires will drop.

It is like this: When you grow up, you automatically drop your toys. The toys don't interest you any more. In the same way, when you look at these masks intelligently, you don't have any desire for them; you simply use them and keep moving.

The ego manifests itself in many cunning ways. That is why all these explanations are needed about it. All these will help you see where you are standing as a blockage in your own journey inwards.

The fewer blockages you have inside you, the more fluid and flowing you become. When you have fewer blocks, you are more porous and vulnerable. When you have many blocks, you are solid and difficult to penetrate. Your ego poses such a solid barrier to everything.

For example, whenever someone says something to you, what is your first reaction to it? Your first reaction is a certain resistance, a 'No'. When you say 'No', it is so ego fulfilling. You feel solid and firm inside yourself. When you say 'Yes', you feel liquid and vulnerable. Your ego feels submissive. So you say 'No'.

This is also why you feel good when you break rules at home or school or workplace or anywhere. Actually, the moment you defy a rule, you will have a great feeling about yourself. School and college students feel good when they cut classes. Why? Because they feel good in breaking the rule. With small children, the moment you say they are not meant to have certain things, they will ask only for that. Grown ups also enjoy defying each other in so many ways.

Husband and wife rarely concur in the first instance about any suggestion! Take for example our own devotees. If the husband gets attached to me first, the wife's first reaction will be only resistance to me. She might even read my books secretly and like them, but in front of the husband, she will not be willing to embrace me. The same holds good for the wives who get attached to me first. Their husbands will do all that they can to make it difficult for them, before finally falling in tune with me.

Such is the play of ego. Saying 'Yes' keeps you flowing naturally in a liquid state with no blocks. This does not mean that you should blindly say 'Yes' to everything. No! It means, make a decision trusting your spontaneity without the influence of your ego, that's all. Automatically, you will fall in tune with the right things.

Understand that saying 'No' is not a cautious move or any protective force that is going to be your guardian angel. Just be open without resistance and preconceptions; that is enough.

Comment: But Swamiji*, I was thinking until now that claiming self-importance is the only manifestation of ego!*

No! Ego comes in various forms: active and passive, which we have been discussing until now. That is why it is such a tricky element to discern.

Active ego and passive ego

The active ego is easy to recognize. People with active ego will behave in a highhanded fashion; they will claim self-importance openly; they will not bend down to people; they will be haughty. This ego is actually easy to deal with, for a master. He just needs to bang on it a few times and it will break!

A small story:

A man lost all his wealth in gambling and got reduced to almost a pauper.

One day, he went to a roadside hotel and sat at the table for breakfast.

The waiter came to take orders.

The man was surprised. The waiter was his old friend who had been as rich as he had been earlier.

He looked at him and said, 'You serve as a waiter in this sort of a hotel!'

The man replied, 'I'm only a waiter. I don't eat here.'

Active ego is very easy to recognize! A person with an active ego will not be willing to let go of it even if all his other defenses like money, wealth etc. are taken away from him. Active ego can be easily pruned.

But passive ego is very subtle and cunning. People who have passive ego will pose to be very humble, lacking courage to face people, shying away from taking credit etc. The worst part of this is, they think they are like this because they are not egoistic! The truth is, they are more egoistic than the other lot! They are so carefully guarding their ego from getting hurt by doing all these humble things.

When you are in deep awareness and understanding, you will be a mere watcher of your ego and in this state, you will automatically be neither humble nor egoistic; you will neither take credit nor shy away from it. And you will not even think or claim that you are

neither of these; you simply will be, that's all. When anyone appreciates you or gives you credit, you will simply resonate with Existence and leave it at that, that's all. And there will be no need for any comparison or claim.

So be very clear: Most often, people think that active ego is the only kind of ego ever present. No. There is something called passive ego, which is more difficult to deal with.

People with active ego are like a dried and hard twig. If you bang, they will break. People with passive ego are like a fresh and green twig. Each time their ego is hit, they will bend but they will not break! Their ego is so well safeguarded that it becomes difficult to deal with it. Actually, they work very hard to safeguard it, but in a sweet and passive way. Passive ego is more dangerous than active ego.

For example, you are now with me in this class. So many questions must be arising in you. But do you spontaneously voice all of them? No. You manipulate them inside yourself and finally repress them. You manipulate because you are afraid you will look foolish. You don't want to appear foolish and so you don't ask. You are shielding your ego. If your questions dissolve in my presence, it is a different matter. But here, you are suppressing your questions.

You care so much for other's reactions and opinions about you. This ego is your very anchor point. If it is jolted, you will feel anchorless. So under the pretext of being submissive, you keep quiet. You miss one more opportunity of exposing your ego in the master's presence. You miss one more opportunity in taking a step towards flowering.

Let me tell you one thing: All questions are foolish at the end of the day. Don't for a moment think that some questions and therefore some questioners are wiser than the rest. When deep understanding happens, the questions will dissolve on their own. This is real wisdom. Anyhow, we all play so cautiously to safeguard our ego.

Social ego

There is another, one more play of ego which we all nurture well – what is called social ego.

What is this social ego?

You feel that your life is highly private to yourself and that no one should be exposed to it. Also, there is a social image that you have created for yourself which you safeguard.

For example, people come to me to discuss their child's erratic ways. But they are not comfortable when there are others around. You don't want others to know about these things because you have this built up 'image' in the eyes of society for yourself and your family members. If you let people in on your family matters, you feel like you are exposing your whole self to them. You are afraid that your image might come crashing down and there will be nothing to prop you up in society. This is social ego.

The image that you have so painstakingly built, the image which has become the identity with which you identify yourself in society, is at stake. It is more of an identity for yourself than for others! If you can show yourself and your family just as you are, you will be more relaxed because then there will be no pressure to cover up anything.

Of course, you might say, 'Swamiji, the only reason we want to keep these things a secret is, we don't want people to start gossiping about it.' Let me tell you: No one is qualified to talk about another. If they talk, they are fools. Remember this and automatically the power you give to them and their talk will simply disappear. It is you who have given them the power to affect you, is it not? Now, that power will disappear.

Just decide and live like an open book, that's all. By seeing your courage and body language, people will automatically understand that it is not going to help gossiping about you! Drop your social ego and live without any privacy. It is a great liberation.

Because of our social ego, we are all the time so self-conscious also. We are self-conscious because we think that people are looking and talking about us all the time. Be very clear: When you are self-conscious, you are very egoistic. You think that you are a big entity and that everyone's eyes are on you all the time. People actually have better things to do!

If you thought that you were a 'nobody', would you be selfconscious? Only because you think you are a 'somebody' you are self-conscious. And on top of it, you think that you are exhibiting humility by being self-conscious. That is the danger!

When you become self-conscious, you are living and yet not living. It is like a barrier to your beauty and grace. Your beauty does not come forth freely because of this. Look at animals and nature. They flow so beautifully and freely. Why is it so? Because they are not self-conscious. They are simply happy just being one with Existence. The moment you start thinking that people are watching you, ego has stepped in and you lose your natural beauty.

Children are not as self conscious as adults are. If you watch them play, you will see: There will be so much beauty and innocence in the whole thing. Even when you take pictures of yourself, you will notice that pictures taken without you being aware that you are being photographed look much better than the ones taken asking you to pose for the camera!

The moment you are asked to pose, you become self-conscious. Your ego is afraid as to how the picture might come out. The self-conscious ego is all the time calculating the pros and cons in everything. It is all the time weighing others' eyes and opinions and losing out on its own freedom.

Even in our meditation classes, if you see, I tell you to tie your eyes with the eye bands given to you before starting the meditation techniques. But what do you do first? You first see if the other person is tying his eyes properly! Some of you don't do the meditation properly because you are self-conscious of the volunteers and me who have our eyes open! You do the meditation in a restrained fashion and end up losing the very purpose of coming to the meditation camp.

When you stop calculating and start being innocent and open, you will be filled with wonder and freshness all the time. Life will never become dull and restrained for you.

Also, the innocent person never does any harm to anyone because to do harm, they need to calculate. Even if they do harm unknowingly, people will not get hurt because they know that they didn't really mean it. Their very body language will speak out their innocence and stand by them.