1. Shiva Sutras - Sutras 01 - 05

This is a dialogue between lovers, a God and His Goddess. This is the ultimate truth of how life should be lived. This is Shiva's way!

THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM began speaking about the Vignana Bhairava Tantra, which he always refers to as Shiva Sutra, in January 2005. He started speaking on Devi's doubts: What is life, beyond form pervading forms?

THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM then said:

'Frozen into one frame, Mother or Lover, I am easy for you to capture and retain. I am then easier to market. It's good business for me, not good business for you. I want you to be confused so that you become enlightened. I want you to die so that you are awake. Come to me with your ignorance; it's my duty to show you the path. Don't hesitate to fall into my arms with love; you will soar with me into bliss.'

As we heard him we wondered: Who is he? Is he Father, Mother, Son, Brother, Friend, Lover or a Fake? We know he would love to be called a Fake. That would make the confusion more complete. Is he all forms in one? He can be the terror of Shiva. He can also be the nectar of Krishna. Is he better as a bitter nightmare or a sweet fantasy?

There were times when he chided, eyes aglow with anger. One learned to stay quiet. The grimace morphed into a grin; Shiva morphed into Krishna. Tears come to my eyes even as I write; what to speak of being in his presence.

He is all forms and no form. He refuses to be captured in a frame, turned into a stone, worshipped as an image. He is not a master who will be hung on the wall by his devotees, a master at the hands of the fantasies of his devotees. He would rather be the 'simha swapna' (deadly nightmare) awakening us into wisdom. He would rather be the Zen stick that prods us into wakefulness, than the crutch that we are comfortable with. He relates to us on multiple frames and planes, just to keep us off balance and in confusion, than allow to be frozen into one frame that kills the master and ourselves.

The Master is beyond forms; beyond dimensions. He is not uni, bi, tri or multi dimensioned. His dimensions and forms are infinity; infinite dimensional; infiniD.

He calls us to embrace him to soar into bliss. We are so used to falling into mud that we hesitate. Soaring into bliss is not our nature as we understand it. Our anxieties and fears work upon us creating nightmares and fantasies.

We are watching a movie all the time. It's only when the movie stops that we see the screen beyond without which the movie can't be projected. We know not it's a dream till we are awakened. Unless we experience the 'no mind', we have no idea that we have been fantasizing. A child when she plays still knows that she is playing. An adult keeps playing not knowing that all he plays with is unreal.

It's the Master's job to rudely awaken us to show us a glimpse of the reality. He enhances our problems so that our small worries are drowned in much bigger ones; with his grace the troubles fade and the Sun shines into reality.

When we dream, when we fantasize, it is about others and us. The first person attaches the second and the third. 'I' includes 'you' and 'they' as well. When the dream breaks, the movie stops, the circus gets over, you and they merge with the 'I'. Then the 'I' disappears and only the Consciousness remains.

Form and forms disappear once we realize we are watching the movie; even the screen collapses. Nightmares and fantasies cease. We awake.

This is the point of Ananda Gandha, the bliss spot, where the energy centers merge and where the form merges with the formless, and Devi's doubt answers itself: What is life, beyond form pervading forms?

What THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM presents in these discourses is the Consciousness of Shiva as he takes us through the responses of Bhairava (another name for Shiva) to Devi. Each sutra is an understanding of the state of Shiva Consciousness followed by a meditation that takes us into that Consciousness. THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM has said time and again that in these 112 techniques each one of us on this planet can find a technique that suits us to elevate us into our own awareness and enlightenment.

These discourses are quintessential THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM. Profound and never serious, communion and never a lecture, these words resonate long after one has read them. Each word is a 'click' as he calls them, a transformational experience that changes the way we think and act.

Let me give an introduction about this book… just a few words. Then we shall enter into the sutras. We shall then enter into the Shiva Sutras.

Shiva Sutras is a five thousand-year old book. It is the essence of Inner Science technology and the core of the Science of Enlightenment. It is the essence of five thousand years of research and development by more than one million inner scientists and more than one million inner science laboratories. By inner scientists, I mean the great ancient seers and sages who dedicated their whole lives to research of the inner world, of the science of enlightenment. In Bharat, we have more than one million inner science laboratories, meaning temples and ashrams that are alive, which are still maintained. More than a million temples receive everyday worship.

Please understand that I am not talking about the temples that are in the dilapidated condition. I am talking about the temples that receive daily worship, temples that are used by people. More than a million inner science laboratories and more than one million fulltime dedicated inner scientists worked on these concepts. Bharat even today has at least a million swamis who have dedicated their whole life to inner research and development. I am not speaking about the wandering swamis who are living in the streets, in caves, who are not living in the monasteries. If you count them the number increases to something like ten million. I am referring only to the those who are staying in one place and dedicating their life for the research and development of this inner science. That alone is one million. We have a billion people following this technology. This is the strength of this great inner science.

This book is the essence of this inner science, the inner science that was developed over five thousand years by one million inner scientists in one million inner science laboratories and practiced by one billion people. It is the ageless truth and ageless wisdom that we call Sanātana Dharma, the eternal path. This book is the essence of that wisdom, essence of that technology. This book gives hundred and twelve meditation techniques to experience bliss, to experience peace and joy that reside eternally in every one of us. This book gives the ultimate techniques to experience the ultimate bliss that is inside our being, which is in our inner space. This book has so many beautiful meditation techniques.

Not only we will read and understand the sutras, but we will also experience the sutras. These are Shiva's beautiful techniques to enlightenment. Let's enter into the sutras, and then we shall study their meaning.

Sometimes, I am shocked, how could this book have been written five thousand years ago. It's too long a period! We have a solid record of this book existing at least for the last five thousand years. Of course, we don't know the exact age of this book. At least five thousand years old, that's what we know.

The story how this book was discovered is this. A great devotee of Shiva had the darshan of Shiva and Shiva guided that devotee to go into a cave in a hill. Inside that

cave all these sutras were written on the walls. Shiva told him: Just copy these sutras and give them to the whole world. Still the cave exists. The sutras are still there on the walls of the cave. The devotee brings the sutras and gives them to the world. This incident happened at least five thousand years ago. We have a solid proof that this book existed at least five thousand years ago.

I was shocked how five thousand years ago somebody could have thought so practically and so clearly about all modern day human problems. All our problems such as fantasies, phobias, fears and depression, each one of them is answered in this book. For every problem, Shiva gives solution. That's why I say this book is not just a book. It is the essence of five thousand years of research and development. The Hindu Vedic system is at least ten thousand years old. I can't say it is exactly ten thousand years, but at least ten thousand years. We have solid records to prove that the system is at least ten thousand years old. This book was discovered five thousand years ago. So, five thousand years of R & D expressed itself in the form of this book. Otherwise, it is impossible to give so many practical techniques.

It is very easy to hand out philosophy. It is very easy to deliver teachings. It is very easy to say what should be done and what should not be done. That is not a big thing. It is very easy to tell people, 'Do this, don't do that'. It is very easy to create a philosophy.

To create a philosophy, you don't need anything. I can tell you three simple ways by which you can become a philosopher from tomorrow. All you need to do is just criticize anything and everything. Whatever you see in front of your eyes, just start criticizing. Do not bother about what you are criticizing. Second way is that never create a system that people can understand. Third way is that make things as complicated as possible. That's all. Nothing else is necessary! To become a philosopher is very easy. Finally the fourth way that is an important footnote - never give any solution!

Shiva is not creating philosophy. Creating a philosophy is easy. He is not giving you philosophy. He is giving you the techniques, the technology, the 'how to'. He is not telling you what to do and what not to do. He is telling you 'how to do'. Straightaway he is giving you the technology to experience the inner consciousness, to experience the ultimate consciousness, to experience the Shivatvam, which means the consciousness of Shiva, the experience of Shiva. He is straightaway teaching us the techniques, not just giving words. That is why I say, this is the ultimate and amazing book that gives straightaway teachings and techniques to experience the ultimate consciousness.

Thousands and thousands of scriptures have been written on this planet, each by a different master and each one addressed to different types of disciples, for different purposes, at different times, in different countries, and for different conditions. Why have spiritual scriptures been written? What is the purpose of these spiritual scriptures? What is the point of all this spirituality?

The purpose and need for spiritual scripture is to liberate you from your conditioning. It is to give you a glimpse of your original nature. The real purpose is to give you the experience of who you really are.

There is a big problem in this field, in this field of spirituality. Nobody entering this area knows the end result. Nobody knows the method, and nobody knows even where to start! There is no clear logical system or no logical scale by which to measure the spiritual system. In the field of mathematics, it does not matter whether you are in Germany, Australia, or China. Two plus two is always equal to four. In the field of chemistry, we know that if you add element A to element B in the right conditions, you will get element C. Things are very clear. The method to reach the conclusion is written out in a straightforward way, and the answer is easily reproducible.

In the area of spirituality, things are totally different. Neither is the goal clear, nor the path from which you start. Nothing is clear. Each individual who has experienced spirituality simply expresses, proclaims, and shares the way in which they experienced. Each expression is unique. Therefore each scripture is unique. Each scripture is different.

This can be very confusing. It is confusing.

There is a beautiful saying in Bharat that says if two masters say the same thing, be sure that one of them is lying. A master can only be a master if he has experienced the truth. When one experiences the truth, the expression is always unique. So, if two people express something in exactly the same way, one of them has not truly experienced. One of them is copying the other.

That is why all the scriptures are so different. For the layperson, navigating this ocean becomes so difficult.

People come and ask me, again and again, 'Master, there is so much confusion in the spiritual world, where do we start?" This is a problem, especially for Hindus. There are not just one or two Hindu gods. Some scriptures say there are 3,300 gods. Some even say there are 33,000,000 gods. There are so many different gods, so many different methods. There is the concept of the Ishtadevata, or personally preferred god. Each individual picks a god of his personal choice. This has caused so much confusion.

People ask me, 'What is this, master, how do we know which God to follow? What should we do? This is the biggest weakness of Hinduism.'

I tell them, 'No, it's a great advantage. It is the biggest plus point of Hinduism. It is a wonderful level of freedom.' Of course, whenever you have freedom you tend to create variety.

Vivekananda says, 'Freedom is the basic condition for growth, any growth.' In the East, there is spiritual freedom. In the West, there is social freedom. Because there is spiritual freedom, East created so many gods, so many techniques, and so many methods to move on the spiritual path. It has become very difficult, though, to enter into the system for this very same reason. Because of the tremendous amount of variety and choice, it is very difficult to analyze the system! There is no scale by which to measure one aspect against another. Actually, you cannot say that this thing is right or that thing is wrong. In spirituality, there is in fact no good or bad. There is no judgment. The vast magnitude of the spiritual field defies measurement.

Within all of this variety, all of these scriptures, one finds oneself without a map with no understanding of the destination. People ask me again and again, in many places: 'Master, exactly what do you want to express? Please tell us.'

To tell you honestly, whatever I want to express is already expressed in the Shiva Sutras. If you look at all the scriptures and all the books written in the spiritual realm, you can classify them in three major categories.

The first category is books written for people who are head-oriented, for people who are intellectual. These are people who are constantly thinking, thinking, and thinking. Thinking about how to develop their life, how to develop their body, how to develop their mind. These intellectuals are constantly thinking about developing their external self. They understand about goals, about paths, about action. We call these śāstras.

The second category is the scriptures written by people who express themselves more from their hearts, from their emotions. These writings are more like songs, music, stotras (religious chants), reciting the glory of the divine.

The third category is about techniques. These are practical techniques to allow one to experience the path, to directly experience the goal. In Sanskrit, these are called sūtras.

In the first level – that is śāstras, the scriptures are more like teachings. You receive words and more words. It appeals to the intellect. At the next level are the stotras, in which you only hear of the experiences of others. It is as though somebody had a taste of nectar and then sings about the nectar. That is not really going to help you.

If someone states, or writes a scripture explaining that nectar is life, this would become a teaching. This is śāstra. This is the first category of scripture. If another person, after tasting the nectar, expresses his joy, that expression would be stotra, the second category. Neither of them, śāstras nor stotras, is going to help you directly.

It is only at the third level, which we call the sūtras, or techniques, where real help is given.

Actually, śāstras have done more damage to human consciousness than stotras have. At least stotras do not hurt anybody. When you express your love of the divine, when you let your heart flow with this expression, at least you do not become egoistic. But in śāstras, you start to claim that what you say is the ultimate truth. The ego behind the idea that this is the only truth starts penetrating the śāstras, which are simply intellectual knowledge, or teachings.

According to me, these spiritual teachings create the biggest problem. I can say that if somebody has not read the scriptures or śāstras, that person is actually saved by God. There are simply too many words and too many messages. To tell you honestly, almost all the teachings, almost all the scriptures either make you fell inferior, or create a deep guilt in you, nothing else.

People spread the message of spiritual scriptures to get customers for confession, so that their businesses can run. This is the basis of spiritual scriptures. Honestly, most scriptures are only political or social. The do not directly aim at spiritual growth. They do not liberate you. In the name of liberation, they play with words. With the teachings, you continue to struggle.

A small story,

A lady was driving a car and drove into a motorcyclist. A police officer came and asked 'How could you do this in broad daylight with no traffic? How did this happen?' She replied, 'I couldn't see through my windshield because there are so many 'Safety First' stickers on it.

See the irony? Too many stickers about safety made her less safe. In the same way, too many words and too much teaching completely corrupt your consciousness. You become too loaded with words.

Just yesterday I was telling one of my devotees that morality makes your bones weak. The idea of morality makes your bones weak. We are constantly just using blanket statements, like 'be good, be truthful, be this, or be that', but what do we do with these statements? You are not able to turn the statements into reality, but at the same time, you cannot forget the statements either. These statements are inserted into your consciousness very logically.

When something is put into your mind very logically, you start struggling with it. I tell you, almost all teachings are given to create deep guilt in human beings, so that they can be ruled, so that they can be exploited. Teachings, as such, are nothing but methods to exploit human beings.

For all these teachings, I can give you two or three methods that will make you a great teacher or a great philosopher. First, just start teaching or writing things that are impossible. Secondly, start writing or teaching that which cannot be done. Third, never speak or write in a simple way. Create as many complications as possible. Finally, maybe the most important thing, never give any solutions. These are a few tips on how to become a so-called great philosopher or teacher. This applies to almost all teachings.

Whosoever is giving only words, be very clear, they are not giving any solutions or guidance. People who can hide their personal lives, people who can keep their privacy, they go on intruding into other peoples' privacy in the name of teaching. If you enter deeply into your consciousness, you will understand just how much your consciousness is disturbed by these teachings. You will see just how much your inner space is stolen by these so-called teachings. You have lost your inner space because of these rough, dull, dead words. They have conditioned you and have become part of your samskaras. They have embedded themselves in your unconscious as your value system and beliefs without any understanding.

People who do not have concern for you give you only words. They do not create the condition within you to let the words transform you. They simply throw teachings at you. People who do not care for you only throw words at you whether or not you can catch them, or want to catch them. Such preachers and teachers have no concept of what they are actually doing to other human beings, because they themselves are not clear about what they are teaching. They express words that they themselves have not imbibed, words that have not become a part of their experience or being. A man who has experienced his being will never give you teachings, never. If he starts speaking, a man who has experienced his being will only express his message as techniques. Teachings are words that come from a man who has not experienced. Techniques are words that come from a man who has experienced.

Teachings create deep guilt in you. People who do not practice or who cannot practice go on giving you teachings, and you go on receiving more and more words. You are so filled with these words that you start overflowing with them. When you start overflowing with words and when you are not able to practice, you start catching other people and start to teach them. It's really a nice way of escaping from guilt. By making others feel guilty you reduce your guilt. Teachings are just words given to you to make you feel guilty so that you can be exploited easily. The moment a human being starts feeling guilty about something, he can be exploited. Now he starts fighting with himself. When you fight with yourself, it becomes much easier to exploit you. It becomes easy to cheat you. It becomes easy to control and enslave you.

Techniques, on the other hand, are entirely different from teachings. Teachings are just words and more words that create more and more conflicts. Actually, a kind of violence is present in teachings. They are violent because they do not care whether you

are able to follow them or not. They do not care if you are able to practice it or not. The words are simply flung at you. From the start these words are given to you as commandments, orders.

Today I am introducing you to a book, which is not a set of commandments or orders. It is a beautiful expression of love and energy. One thing I can say about the great Shiva Sutras is that in these verses there is no argument. This is probably the only scripture where there is no argument. It is one of the only books where there is not a question and answer format. There is only one question and the rest of the book is the answer, that's all. There is no second question. Actually, the first question is really not even a question, it as a doubt. The word 'question' itself is too violent, because there is arrogance in the act of questioning.

Let me be very clear, I receive thousands of questions, but almost 99% of the questions are just expressing violence. What do I mean by this? The question is only arrogance or an expression of arrogance. Usually, we cannot accept or digest somebody sitting on a stage. You will ask yourself, why should he sit on the stage and not me? If he sits on the stage and he claims to be somebody 'superior', then let me check, poke, prod, and test him. Let me see whether or not he is really qualified. This subtle arrogance is what expresses itself in the form of a question. You see, if all that you were really seeking to know was the answer to your question, then that is one thing. The problem, though, is that you are trying to test something else using your question as a vehicle for this other test.

Somebody came to me and asked, 'Master, please tell me how to become enlightened. Tell me how to see God'. I started talking about something else. I started asking him about himself, where he came from, what kind of job he had, etc. He answered my questions. After that, he was with me for three hours and he did not raise his original question again. He no longer wanted to know how to become enlightened and how to see God. Now we can see the lack of intensity in the question itself. It was pure, simple curiosity. The question had no depth, no energy behind it. It was only a question, not a quest. If he really wanted to know the answer to his question, he would have persisted to find out. Some mere questions I posed to him about his life should not have distracted him so easily. He did not really want to know the answer. He just wanted to ask for the sake of asking, or he wanted to show that he is a seeker, or he just wanted to rate my response.

You do not want to know the actual truth, you only want to know whether the master knows it or not. This is why arguments happen. They happen because a real answer is not sought out. There is some other intention, arrogance, or purpose behind the question. Be very clear, when the master is speaking and the disciple asks questions, only teaching is happening. Techniques are not shared.

Here, in this book, the Shiva Sutras, there is no teaching. This book is filled completely with techniques. Another name for this book is the Vignana Bhairava Tantra. This

book gives Shiva's techniques for reaching His consciousness. It is an expression of His consciousness. There are no teachings, no questions and no arguments.

You will find that the Shiva Sutras are completely beyond any country, religion, conditioning, or philosophy. If you want to enter into the world of Shiva, you have to completely drop all conditionings. He will not support any of them. He isn't the least bit bothered about creating another religion, establishment, or country. He is completely disinterested in developing a creed. He isn't bothered about anything. He is purely, simply, expressing what he feels. He is expressing what he experiences as the Ultimate Truth.

Somebody once asked me 'Master, why does Sanatana Dharma not have any organization?' Sanatana Dharma is the name by which the Vedic culture was known, and many religions including Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism arose from this culture.

I answered that Sanatana Dharma, which is a culture and a philosophy, is just too vast to be covered by an organizational structure. The greatness or the beauty of our dharma is not that it is against organization, but that it is beyond it. It is beyond organizations. Of course, we do have small organizations where the scriptures are preserved and the techniques are kept alive, but these organizations do not represent Sanatana Dharma. They have no right to be representatives. They are only a small part of this whole ocean. The Sanatana Dharma is so vast that you cannot bring it within one umbrella or organization because it is not based on teachings. It is based on techniques. It is not based on violence. It is based on love.

Almost all teachings are directly or indirectly violent because the people spreading them are not experienced. Anything they teach will be only words, with no spirit, no experience behind it. It is like a knife in a child's hand. The same knife can perform a healing surgery by a surgeon, but in the wrong hands it can be dangerous and can maim or kill. Words without the spirit and experience of truth create violence. They create violence against others and violence against your own self. Words without knowledge or experience have no meaning.

If any help is to be given to humanity it can only be given through techniques that are based on the truth of experience. Techniques are the technology to experience the consciousness. Only those who have experienced the truth must give these techniques. If people who have not experienced the truth express techniques, they will become mere rituals. They too will be another teaching that is dead and dull. On the other hand, even teachings, if expressed by one who has experienced the Truth, will become techniques, or sūtra.

The underlying difference between teachings and techniques is that teachings are answers to the question 'Why?', whereas techniques are answers to the question 'How?' If you ask the questions, why there is suffering? or 'why death happens to innocent children?', or 'why life is full of pain and suffering?, there are no answers.

Even if you create some answer it will not be a solution. Again, you have created more and more words, and now you may create more pain and suffering.

People ask me, 'Why should I go through these problems, Master? Why should I have this suffering?' I tell them clearly not to ask me the question 'why?', but to ask me the question 'how can I come out of it?' Only then I can then help them come out of the problem situation.

After all, what good is it to know why you are suffering if you cannot get out of it. What use is the question when you are no longer suffering? We think suffering will reduce if we know the reason for it. Actually, by knowing the reason for suffering, more and more complexities are created. The situation becomes more and more complicated. You start to think that you can now solve this suffering by doing this or by doing that. By doing this and doing that, you create greater difficulties and greater problems. If the 'why' is answered, it becomes teaching. If the 'how' is answered, it becomes technique.

All of the Shiva Sutras are the answer given by Shiva to the question of how not why. It is an intense and intimate expression of energy. Usually, whenever energy is intense or powerful, intimacy is lost. Whenever intimacy is high or the energy is soft, intensity is lost. In the Shiva Sutras, though, Shiva's expression is both intense and intimate. By his very nature, Shiva is intense energy. Shiva is expressing himself to the intimate energy of Devi, who is his consort.

This combination of intensity and complete intimacy is why the Shiva Sutras is perhaps the purest spiritual scripture without politics, without any mixture of social conditioning. It is completely removed from social conditioning, and in that state it is a pure spiritual scripture. The one and only pure spiritual scripture on this planet is the Shiva Sutras. All other scriptures are influenced by the political setup or the social setup or need of the moment.

For example, Sankaracharya had a vested interest to convince the Buddhists, the dwaitis (dualists), and all other sects, that advaita (non-dualism) is the ultimate philosophy. He wrote the commentary to the Brahma Sutras for that reason, to convince everybody that advaita is the ultimate. The same thing happens with Ramanuja. He writes Sribhasya, his commentary on the Brahma Sutras, to convince people that his philosophy is the ultimate.

Even Krishna, he gives us the Gita to convince Arjuna to fight. There is a vested interest, there is some ulterior purpose. The moment something is written with vested interest, be very clear, the purity is lost. It is simply lost and is no longer a pure spiritual text.

Here, in the Shiva Sutras, Shiva has no vested interest to convince Devi. She has already disappeared into him. She is not even a seeker. Be very clear, even if you are speaking to your ordinary disciple, you have a vested interest. You want him to be under your control throughout his life. When Shiva speaks to Devi, there is no vested interest. She is far more than a disciple; she is his partner.

Shiva has no ulterior motive. He is just expressing himself. It is a pure expression of love. He has just opened himself, his whole being. When you have a very intimate moment with someone, the truth flows between both of you in a very pure and sincere way. There is no room for vested interests.

The Shiva Sutras are therefore not teachings, they are techniques shared intimately. In this intimacy, Shiva is not going to argue, and neither am I. There is going to be no effort to convince. I am simply opening up to what he says. I am just repeating what he says. I am not adding, making commentary, or trying to convince you through these discourses.

The way the Shiva Sutras start is a very beautiful setup. There is a beautiful ambience where the whole thing is expressed. Devi sits in the lap of Shiva, and Shiva expresses himself. You need to understand every word in this sentence and understand what it means. Devi is not somewhere else, she is not a disciple; she is the beloved. She is sitting in his lap in deep intimacy, where you do not need to tell a lie or convince the other person. There is no greed or fear, there is nothing to gain or lose. He has no need to convince Devi about his greatness, and no need to convince her that she needs to practice something. With teachings, they are given for a reason: either to express that I am great or that you are not yet at my level.

In this situation, neither of these reasons is present. Shiva has no need to say that he is great, and there is no need to convince Devi because she has already completely surrendered unto him. She is not even going to use these techniques as she is beyond them. She is completely in tune with Shiva. She has disappeared into him. Why is he even speaking? Why does he even express these techniques? The only reason for his expression is so that other people can experience this same Devi or Shiva consciousness. If you feel like arguing, or if you feel like questioning, you should study the Brahma Sutras or the Gita. If you are tired of reading and your sincere interest is to experience your Being, the Shiva Sutras is the book for you.

Someone once went to Ramana Maharishi and asked him 'Bhagavan, how does one practise the technique of self-inquiry?' Self-inquiry, in Sanskrit it is called atma-vichara, was Ramana Maharishi's cardinal technique of experiencing your being. In this technique one questions oneself with the question 'Who am I?' This inquiry into the nature of who you are leads to an understanding of your being, and experience of your being.

The man continued his question to Ramana, 'I cannot believe that just by asking myself the question, Who am I, I will become enlightened. Can I chant some mantras, can I do some stotras?'

Bhagavan Ramana said 'OK, please do it'. After two years the man came back and complained to Ramana. He said 'Bhagavan, I am tired. I have chanted all the mantras and done all the stotras that I can do. Still, I find no result. I find that there is no result at all.'

Bhagavan replied, 'No, never think what you have done is a waste. When you found out that there was no result, that itself is the result. Getting the knowledge that you will achieve nothing from these mantras was the greatest result. That is the result you were supposed to achieve! Now you are ready for higher level practice. Now it is time to enter into your inner space through self-inquiry.'

If you aren't yet tired of arguments, and if you still aren't tired of reading, of teachings, then the Shiva Sutras are not for you. Let me be very clear, this book is not for you. If you have read enough words, if your mind has had enough of them, this book is for you. If you are tired of speaking, then this book is for you. If you have fed your brain enough food, this book is for you. The Shiva Sutras is for you only if you are tired of simply swallowing words and tired of being bombarded with philosophy. That is the beauty of this book. There is no philosophy. At no point in this book does Shiva speak about Atman, Hiranyagarbha, Brahman, Non duality etc. He only gives you pure techniques. Straightaway, he gives you the technique.

The other day I was telling a devotee that I experienced Brahman (cosmic consciousness) before I knew the word Brahman. See, before I had read or heard of this word, Brahman, I was fortunate enough to actually experience the state. In this way, God actually saved me. If this had not happened, the experience would have been postponed.

The very idea of the words, before experiencing them, creates ideas that are not based in reality. They are simply fantasies. They simply make you know more and more words. Learning about more and more philosophy simply postpones the experience. You can never settle in the present moment when your mind is being pushed by these words. The Shiva Sutras are for people who are just tired of words. Once you say 'enough!' you have arrived at the time to experience the Truth. Instead of more words to describe the truth, Shiva gives you the pure technique.

The Shiva Sutras is not a book to analyze or argue about. The basic need for the student is trust. I am always telling people not to simply believe what I am saying. I encourage people to doubt and question what I say. With this book though, you need a deep trust because neither your doubts nor your questions are going to help you. If you are still in an inquisitive mood, please read the other books I have written and watch the other DVDs I have produced. These may be more satisfying. But if you really feel that you can enter into the zone of experience, read on.

I have no inclination to waste time on question and answers, and I do not want to spend any time convincing you. I am simply tired of convincing people. In this book, I decided to directly express what Shiva expressed. So, whoever can relax and listen with deep trust can experience what Shiva expressed through his Shiva Sutras. In the past three years I have answered more than three thousand questions giving answers to all the possible questions in the spiritual field. I will be coming out with a huge twelve-volume book filled with these questions and answers. I even threw in some questions I created and gave answers to them. All your questions will be answered in these twelve volumes. So, if you are still in a questioning mood, please play with these three thousand questions and answers. Play with them as long as you want.

Enter into the Shiva Sutras only if you are totally tired of playing with words and arguments and intellectual games. Here, I am not going to give you any brain candy to chew on. I am directly going to open up what Shiva expressed without convincing or teaching.

Everyday we shall have a meditation technique flowering from what Shiva expresses in each Sutra. He has given 112 meditation techniques in 112 sutras. Each day we will practice one technique and I will give more importance to technique rather than teaching. As I said before, teachings are trying to convince you whereas techniques are given for you to have the experience. With a teaching, at most you will think the teacher is a great person with some great knowledge. With teaching, my business will flourish, but yours will not. With technique, your life will flourish. Your experience will happen. If you are still interested in teachings, there are many volumes available. Go ahead and play with all these volumes, spend some time with them. If, however, the technique is what you are really interested in, you are at the right place.

Today, we will practice a technique of entering into the Devi consciousness. Unless you become like Devi, Shiva cannot land on you. He cannot descend upon you. Unless you completely drop the masculine energy in you, you cannot experience Shiva. Let me be very clear, I am not saying that a man cannot become a disciple of Shiva or that he cannot become a devotee of Shiva. However, if you flaunt your masculine energy, arrogance, violence, questioning, and argumentative mood, then you can never relate to Shiva. Maybe you will be able to relate to the Gita or Brahma Sutras, but not to the Shiva Sutras.

The Shiva Sutras are the solution for people who are ready to connect right away. It is the answer to people who are ready to feel intuitively connected and really want to experience. So, I am neither going to argue nor try to convince you. I am simply going to open up to what Shiva says. I will simply open my being for whoever wants to experience the breeze. So, just open the door and let the breeze in. May you open yourself so that you can experience Shiva consciousness, the eternal consciousness, so that you may enter into pure energy.

From tomorrow onwards, we will start the sutras, or aphorisms of Shiva, the Shiva Sutras. From tomorrow onwards, we will start the techniques of Shiva to enter into his consciousness. To begin, today we will first open ourselves so that we can enter into the Devi consciousness. This way Shiva will descend upon us so that we can experience Shiva consciousness. This way, Shiva can happen within us.

Now, let us enter into the Devi consciousness. When I say Devi consciousness I mean that you should just be completely open and receptive, with no opposing or supporting words. Just be available to whatever is happening inside and outside your being. Just make yourself available and you will be in Devi consciousness. I will just guide you. You will be visualizing yourself as a lotus. Just open yourself, petal by petal, leaf by leaf, and wait for Shiva to descend upon you in this deep, receptive mood. Lay aside all your doubts and questions. Become flexible ready to receive whatever that happens to you. When you are in this totally trusting mood, completely in the present moment, you are in the space of Devi, receptive, accepting and becoming a part of the energy that descends on you. Become Devi and experience the bliss of accepting and enjoying all that happens to you.

May you be in Nithyanandam, eternal bliss!

In a sense Vigyana Bhairava Tantra is a dialogue. At least it starts as a dialogue between two people who could have just as well been one. In fact they were one. The womanly aspect of the ultimate form of the formless asks the manly aspect to clarify doubts that she has.

Why is that the woman asks and not the man?

I can easily say that it is in the nature of women, and it may be true as far as humans are concerned. But here we are talking about Shiva and Parvati, Shiva and Shakti, the ultimate energies of manliness and womanliness.

Shiva is purusha, the origin of all that there is, was and will ever be, and the passive, unmoving, undisturbed principle. Shakti is the active principle; the kinetic as different from the static energy. She created all that there is, was and ever will be. It is the ever moving, ever active cosmic energy asking the unmoving, centered cosmic intelligence to explain what it takes to reach the state of that unmoving center.

This dialogue, or if you prefer the monologue, between two parts of the same cosmic principle, is the most definitive guide to enlightenment that you would ever come across. It is delivered in a form that is cryptic, and for good reasons. It is meant only for those who have the ability to understand. It is said only to those who are ready for that state of consciousness that Shiva represents. For others, it needs a guide to walk them through this pathless land. Let me be your guide. Hold my hand and begin this journey. Listen to me with our heart and being and understand.

In order to fully comprehend and internalize the true meaning of what has been said in a book or a speech, one needs to understand completely the mindset of the person who has written the book or has spoken the words.

THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM delivered these sutras to his consort, lover and disciple Devi Parvati. These words, these mantras and these techniques were spoken from the heart from a lover o his beloved. Shiva spoke and Devi heard. The wisdom of the speaker reflected the nature of the listener, so much in tune they were. The supreme master speaks to the supreme disciple. Unless we understand the mindset and body language of the speaker and listener, and their intense feelings for one another, we cannot grasp the truth of these techniques.

If you read superficially with your intellect without understanding the mindset and feelings of the master and disciple, without visualizing their body language, your understanding too will be superficial. You may wonder why one should have this understanding, what is the link? Unless there is an intense connection between the speaker and the listener truth can never be understood.

Only an enlightened master like Shiva would have the deep love and compassion to express the truth in line with the mindset, feelings and receptivity of the listener. Had he

been a philosopher his concern would have been to establish his knowledge by using as complicated an expression as possible without any reference to the listener's ability to receive what is expressed.

Another complication would be if the listener was someone who considered himself more knowledgeable than the speaker, in which case his interest would be to argue to establish that he know better. Either way, whether the speaker is bent on establishing how clever he is or whether when the listener is bent of establishing how much he knows, in both cases the transmission suffers. In both cases just words flow unceasingly, but truth does not get expressed or received.

The reason for the expression is of great importance in the transmission of the truth. The speaker's emotional state, the listener's mindset and the reason for the expression are the three essential conditions that determine the character and the truth of a sutra.

In the case of Bhagavad Gita, the speaker Krishna was an enlightened master. However, Arjuna was a proud prince who had been conditioned all his life into an inflexible and uncaring mindset. This mindset became the biggest block to Arjuna's receiving the truth of what Krishna was trying to impart to him.

That is why Krishna had to speak for 18 chapters. There was nothing in what was said to warrant 18 chapters and 700 verses. Again and again Arjuna questions and Krishna has to repeat himself. One wonders what kind of a depressive mindset Arjuna would have been in.

Had Arjuna not been a prince but an ordinary man perhaps he would have led a life that would make him flexible enough to accept the views of other people. Being a ruler, he did not have to listen to others. He had no reason to change himself. Being a prince perhaps he was a better mirror of the attitudes of the people of that day. Had he been an ordinary man, there might not have been the need to deliver the Gita.

Because he was a prince and was of such a rigid frame of mind, Krishna had to express the truth to him in many different ways and many different angles. When truth is expressed in such diverse ways, there is a chance of completely missing it.

This is why Krishna had to express various aspects of the truth as Karma yoga, bhakti yoga, dhyana yoga, raja yoga etc. This creates the possibility of confusing the listener. Another issue here is the reason for Krishna's expression. Krishna wanted Arjuna to wage war against his kinsmen. Krishna had the need to inspire Arjuna to fight.

Whatever may have been the reason, it influenced the teaching. Reasons or objectives will compromise the teaching. Truth will not be revealed truly. Automatically, the Truth will be watered down. The moment there is a reason behind a teaching, the quality of the teaching suffers.

If you go by all these factors and look at Shiva Sutra, then you will know that Shiva Sutra does not belong to any other classification ordinary sastras, stotras and sutras. Shiva Sutra expresses the quality of the ultimate truth without dilution, since the person who teaches is an enlightened master, and the person who receives the highest teaching is also an enlightened soul. The sutras are delivered by Shiva to Parvati, after her enlightenment. The sutras are not delivered when Parvati was unenlightened. Another important thing is that there is no particular reason for the teaching. Shiva had no motive to influence Devi act in one way or the other. This dialogue is an exchange of divine love.

Without any reason, there was this exchange of divine love! Shiva Sutra is a wave of bliss born out of the ocean of bliss. Someone, somewhere, saw this bliss wave and documented it. That's all. The ocean of bliss for no reason created a wave of bliss and that is Shiva Sutra. By delivering Shiva Sutra, Shiva is not trying to prepare or inspire Devi to wage a war or to stop a war.

While Krishna delivered the Gita, Arjuna's ego and restless mind kept raising questions. Arjuna was not able to imbibe the truth before he was shown a glimpse of the Truth, the Vishwaroopa Darshan. He had doubts deep inside. He thought that Krishna was trying to make him wage war for His personal reasons. Here we have to understand an important issue. When the disciple is sitting in front of the Guru with a doubt, then Guru has to use so many words and different ways to convey the truth and in the process, the truth to be delivered is not delivered completely.

The truth cannot be delivered in such a manner. It disappears without being delivered fully and totally. It is like the seed not being allowed to become a tree. The Guru has to take a big responsibility to try to get the disciple out of doubt. When there is a doubt in the disciple's head, it certainly affects the quality of delivery of the truth. This is what happened in the case of Gita. Fortunately it did not happen to Shiva Sutra.

The person who delivered the Shiva Sutra was the genuine embodiment of the ultimate truth and the person who received it was also the genuine embodiment of the ultimate truth. There was no selfish or selfless reason for delivering the sutras. Because, even if there is a self-less reason, there is a possibility that the quality of the truth will suffer.

This is what is meant by the Zen Koan 'sound of one hand clapping'. Two hands become one. There is no differentiation between saying and listening. The speaker and Listener merge. Shiva and Devi have already merged.

If we look from these three perspectives, the state of the person who expresses the Shiva Sutra, the state of the person who receives it and the reason for its delivery, we can understand the highest level of quality of the Shiva Sutras.

Sometimes, if the disciple listens to the Guru without genuine seeking, the truth will be compromised. The disciple will sleep closing his eyes or with open eyes. There will be

tamas, if there is a compulsion or there is a lack of interest. When Arjuna was listening to Gita, he had only one reason. He wanted to get out of his dilemma. The desire to come out of depression makes him to ask more questions and keeps him listen to Krishna's words. He hopes hat he will come out of depression by listening to one aspect or another of Krishna's teachings. In Shiva Sutra the listener is also a great enlightened soul. Therefore, there is no reason for Shiva to water down the truth, dilute the quality of the Truth. Out of overflowing wisdom, love and compassion, Shiva teaches the sutras to His beloved as she sits on his lap.

Usually there is a compulsion for the Acharya or Guru to convince the disciple that he knows something more than the disciple. Only then will the disciple sit and listen. If this reason is present then it will dilute the quality of the teaching. When Adi Shankara offered his teachings to the disciples, they were not in poorna, they were not complete. When Buddha taught his disciples they were not in sunya, in mindless state They had to engage with and win over arguments with their disciples. There was a need for them to convince their disciples that they knew more than them. When someone tries to convince another, the quality naturally suffers.

For Shiva there was no reason to convince, prove or explain his inner state to Devi. Because Devi had already touched the peak of love, devotion and enlightenment! Not only that, she enjoys the proximity, physically and psychologically, to her Guru. She sits on Shiva's lap itself. She enjoys the spiritual presence of the Guru as well as physical presence of the Guru. She is already in communion with Guru at all levels. Hence there is no reason for Shiva to convince Devi.

In other words, Devi offers such a wonderful platform for the Guru that the Guru does not have to remain in a particular frame or state or be bound by a reason. We have to understand one thing clearly. It is because of the lack of such wonderful disciples that the Tamil Siddhas created fictional disciples and sung to them songs of wisdom. All along this has been the problem. Gurus are always there but there is always a dearth for disciples. A siddha sung songs to agappai (in Tamil, agam refers to one's inner space and pei to ghost), inner ghost. He took out his own mind and assumed it as his disciple. Paambatti Siddha sings 'aadu paambe, aadu paambe' (exhorting snake to dance); Idaikkaadar creates Koonaar and Kuthambai Siddha sings to Kuthambai, both being fictional characters.

This is a great problem for Masters. Only a disciple, who does not exist, despite his lack of presence can understand the truth that exists despite Maya. If disciples are not available even though they are physically present, they will not know how to go beyond the mind that shows what is not there. Only that one, who is not there even when he is there, can understand the truth by going beyond the mind that reveals what is not there.

Actually, when a genuine seeker is born truth reveals itself on its own. There always exist a deep connection between a genuine disciple and a genuine guru. There is no doubt between these two. There are no disturbances between them.

When Dakshinamurthy taught his four disciples, there was no disturbance between them. However, there were no intimacy of feeling or relationship between him and his disciples. In Shiva Sutra, there is a communion of body, mind and emotions between the guru and disciple. There is no boundary between the two.

Even though glorified in thousands of ways, exalted in thousands of ways, the relationship between Dakshinamurthy and his four disciples had nothing to say beyond a point. The disciples saw Dakshinamurthy as their leader. It is called dasa bhava, one of the devotional relationships between a guru and his disciple. Seeing guru as a friend is saka bhava. Arjuna saw Krishna as his friend. That's why when Krishna shows the Vishwaroopa Darshan, Arjuna cries out, 'Oh! Lord. Not knowing who you are, I called you Yadava, using your caste name, as a friend. Forgive me!' Since Arjuna saw Krishna as his friend, the truth cannot be revealed fully.

Seeing guru as a mother is matru bhava. The relationship between Ramakrishna and Kali is that of son and mother. Even here there is only so much that can be told. At this level, maybe the path can be shown. The full truth cannot be transferred. 'After this, you have to go beyond me', Kali herself says to him. Totapuri, Ramakrishna's guru, tells him to go beyond Kali. Matru bhava can only show you the path to the truth and not the truth itself. There will be always a boundary between guru and disciple.

Seeing Guru as a child is vatsalya bhava. Yashoda sees Krishna as her child. Krishna shows her the entire cosmos when he opens his mouth to her but he could not reveal the truth. There is a boundary in all these bhavas. Even if it is between the mother and the son, there is some limit. If the son is 15 years old or above, the mother cannot hug her son more than two minutes. If they hug for some more time, there will be some disturbances in their feelings. They both may feel uncomfortable. Whether it is son or daughter, as soon as they are physically matured to become a father or mother, the boundary between them and their parents gets established.

Only madhura bhava, seeing guru as the beloved transcends all boundaries. The relationship between Shiva and Devi is that of a pure madhura bhava. That is why there is no time gap, no space gap, no disturbances, no doubt between them and the truth is fully revealed. The wave of truth emerged from the sea of bliss, fell on the sea of bliss and consumed fully by the sea of bliss. Someone saw this and captured it. Thus did the Shiva Sutra get revealed. There is not an iota of dilution in the truth. The Truth was sculpted by the truth, revealed by the truth at the pinnacle of love, intimacy, and wisdom.

So far, we understood the environment in which the truth was revealed. Now, let us understand the Guru, Lord Shiva. We may have some doubt. Is it really written by Shiva or someone wrote the Shiva Sutra and attributed the authorship to Shiva?

People doubt even when they see me talk in the recorded video. Someone asked me, 'Swamiji do you keep a 'teleprompter' in front of you when you speak?' I told him, I can understand if you doubt a printed article because many appoint ghost writers. But this is the first time I understand that there is a possibility that people doubt even a video. When we are capable of doubting a video, there is all possibility that we will doubt a palm leaf. There is always a doubt as to whether Lord Shiva was in a human form? Whether he is a god? How can we call Lord Shiva, who is God, as a guru?

Someone asked Vivekananda: 'We can understand if you call Ramakrishna as your Guru but how can you say that he is God. Is it not an exaggeration?' Vivekananda asks this person. 'Do you know who is God? Can you tell me whatever you know about God?' Only then the questioner realized that whatever he knows as God is just the collection of ideas from his reading a few books and his listening to others. These ideas are imaginations and mere concepts. Ramakrishna was beyond all the ideas and imaginations. That is the reason why Vivekananda says his Guru is more than God.

There are five universal actions called pancha kriyas. They are: creation, protection, destruction, creating illusion and pulling a soul out of maya with grace. God performs these five actions. The dancing Shiva, Nataraja, has four hands. His upper right hand holds the drum, symbolizing creation; upper left hand holds fire, symbolizing destruction; lower right hand blesses seekers and lower left hand points to raised foot, both pulling them out of maya into liberation. Caught under his leg is the demon of ignorance. The snake around him symbolizes Shakti, who is the creator of maya. Inside of all this Shiva is tranquil.

Shiva carries out these five activities in what is called the Shiva Tandava, Ananda Koothu, Divine Dance*.* The energy that performs all these five activities is the Cosmic Energy. Shiva performs the first four actions from his inner most nirvanic layer or bliss layer. One needs to understand all the seven energy layers. The first layer is the gross physical layer which is made of flesh and bone. The second layer is the pranic layer of breath energy. The third is the mind layer, the layer of thoughts. The fourth is the etheric layer or subtle body, comprising the flow of emotions. The fifth layer is the causal layer that we experience as deep sleep. The sixth layer is the bliss body. We can experience this layer when one realizes oneself. The last Nirvanic layer is when we merge with Existence becoming one with God. The Divine Energy can perform all the four actions of creation, protection, destruction and putting souls into illusion, from the nirvanic layer itself. However, to perform the action of pulling souls out of maya or illusion, it has to take a human form. The reason is that Divine Energy does not need your cooperation to do the first four actions of creation, protection, destruction and putting you in maya, but when it comes to pulling you out of maya it needs your consent.

Creation is not done with your consent. Protection is also not dependent on you. Similarly destruction takes place without your consent. God puts you in maya without seeking your support.

However, to make you enlightened, God needs your support. Imagine that God asks you to fill an application requesting you to provide details of who you are as in a visa form to issue you the visa for liberation. You need to fill it up and sign it. You may not fill the application or you may delay the process. To get your support for your own enlightenment, God assumes the human body. God assumes all the seven layers or bodies when he descends on earth as Guru. When performing the first four actions, he only had nirvanic body but when he comes to give you enlightenment he assumes all the seven bodies. In fact, when God comes down as Guru, he is not coming down, he comes up!

Hence, when we say God is Guru, we are not belittling him. Lord Shiva was on earth like us with seven bodies. He was here as Guru. His lotus feet were on this earth. Wherever his feet touched, those places became locations of cosmic energy, places of worship of sacred water and temples of linga. The first truth is that Shiva assumed a physical body and was there on this earth.

A: Whatever I or anyone else can say will be inadequate and therefore will be a lie, whether it is about God or about enlightenment. This is why atheists have a field day. They gloat that you can prove nothing about God and realizing God.

Of course, they are right. And they are completely wrong as well.

You cannot prove anything to others but you can prove for yourself. You can experience God yourself if you have the courage, if you have the determination and if you have that quest. The problem is that one who has experienced God does not find it necessary to talk about it. It is no longer necessary because one feels fulfilled by that experience.

People who have not experienced can either talk about achieving that realization or that there is nothing to realize. Both are wrong.

There is nothing to achieve because you are already with God and in God. You just need to be aware that is all. Realization of God is merely the realization of your true nature.

Our true nature is divine. This is why again and again I say to you: I am not here to prove that I am God. My mission is to show you that you are God.

All that you need to do is to wake up to that awareness, that is all there is to it.

I can tell you only one thing; be aware and you will experience God, nothing else needs to be done. When you experience and come out you will also have the same trouble and you will tell others that you are not able to explain. Actually, before enlightenment before I read all these great books, I used to think that these fellows were playing a game. They don't have a definition for the main product they are selling, whether god or enlightenment. None of these fellows are able to give explanation. They are selling something that they can't even define. I thought, what is happening? What kind of business is this? But after I entered into the business I also understood. Nothing can be done about it. I can do one thing; I can put you in the same problem. I can put you in the same space where you will have same problem. Otherwise I can't explain. And whatever I say will be the half-truth.

What happens during enlightenment again it is difficult to explain. Let you be aware and experience for yourself. See, all these questions you ask because you don't have confidence that you can be reach that state. You don't have confidence, you think, no, no, what he talks is right, but I can't experience all those things, so let me at least have a little knowledge and go back to the house.

Please be clear, you can experience. Here in the talks that follow, Shiva gives you the techniques to help you into that awareness. Just be sincere and follow, that is all.

urdhve praano hy adho jeevo visargaatmaa paroccharret utptidvitayasthaane bharanaad bharitaa sthitih

Oh Parasakti, as you express your nature unceasingly in the upward and downward breaths, be aware of the originating points between the breaths and Shiva Consciousness.

Shiva starts his response to Devi with the word:

Bhairava is the Consciousness, the Cosmic Consciousness that is beyond the mind and all that can be grasped by the mind. Shiva is Bhairava. The word Shiva means causeless auspiciousness. When the Consciousness is present, causeless auspiciousness is present. All that happens is for the good.

When we accept that all that happens around us happens for a reason we accept life. We then live life. Otherwise we just bear with life. We struggle, we resist and we try to outwit life. That does not work.

Vedanta talks about 'srishti drishti' and 'drishti srishti'. 'drishti' is to see and 'srishti' is creation. The first word 'drishti srishti' means that we see the world as it is. We make no attempt to amend, alter, add, subtract and change. The second word 'srishti drishti' refers to creating a reality that corresponds to our perceptions.

Our perceptions are always fantasies. Instead of accepting the world as it is and live life as it unfolds we try to fit it to our fantasies. All our sufferings arise out of this effort. Once we let go and accept life as it unfolds, there is pure bliss.

Shiva does not waste words here. After the preliminary response to Bhairavi, his beloved Devi, he now gives her the answers that she seeks in the form of techniques. Each sutra from now on, each aphorism in the form of a verse, is a technique that can be practised and results achieved.

Straightaway Shiva is entering into the techniques. He is not giving any intellectual introduction. He is not giving any teachings. Let's enter into the Sutra then we will see the meaning, we will understand it.

Sri Bhairava uvaca Oorthve prano yaado jeevo Visargatma parochareth Otma titvideyasthane Varanatve thereestithahee

Oh Parasakti, as you express your nature unceasingly in the upward and downward breaths, be aware of the originating points between the breaths and Shiva Consciousness

To tell you honestly, this is the first spiritual book without an introduction. It aims straight at the point of enlightenment. He is not interested in wasting his time nor is he interested in giving us words. He is not interested in giving us any teachings. No teachings, no words, straight to the subject, straight to the point of enlightenment. He is not interested in convincing us.

Let me be honest, all teachings, almost all teachings are given either to convince us that the teacher is great or to convince the teacher that what he believes is the Truth. Teachings are given either to convince us that the teacher is a great person or for the teacher to convince himself that his teachings are great. Only then teachings are given. If there is no need for convincing, only techniques are given. Here, Shiva doesn't have any need to convince Devi, his beloved. He is straightaway giving the technique.

Be very clear, never learn from a person who has to convince you about his authority. It just shows that he will be talking too many big things that neither you understand nor he himself understands, simply because he has the big job of convincing you.

Listen to this beautiful story.

This book is the basis of Kashmiri Shaivism. The only, I can say, the only living religion, or the only living tradition, which has carried the light of Shiva, light of Shaivism, the energy of Shiva till today.

One Kashmiri Shaivait pundit went to his King and said, 'King, I wanted to teach you the Shiva Sutras and I want to initiate you.'

King said, 'I don't feel like receiving this knowledge or initiation. First you read it fully and understand and then come to me.'

Pundit was taken aback. He said, "I have read for last 12 years, I have mastered it completely."

King again said, 'No go back and read again, then come.'

After six month, pundit again came. 'Now I wanted to teach you, now I have read everything.'

King said, 'No, go back, read little more, then come.'

After six months, again the pundit came.

King said, 'No, go back and practice, then come.'

Pundit was shocked. He started thinking, 'I think somewhere I'm missing something.' He went back and this time started practicing what he read.

Six months passed and he did not go back to the King. He was sitting in his ashram in the forest blissfully. The King suddenly remembered this man and told his ministers, 'Please go and find out what has happened to the Pundit.'

All the servants of the King came to the Pundit and they said, 'Sir, are you not coming to the King, are you not coming to the Palace to teach him?'

Pundit said, 'No, I am not interested. No I don't feel like teaching anyone.'

The ministers returned and told the King what the Pundit said. The King said, 'Now I can go and learn from him. Now it is time, now he has ripened, I can go and learn from him.'

Now, Pundit doesn't have any need to convince the King about his greatness. If there is a need to convince the disciple, if there is a need to convince the student, be very clear, Truth cannot be expressed hundred percent.

If the bridge of trust has already happened, then sharing the truth is possible.

I always tell people, do not think that to doubt you need intelligence. To doubt you don't need intelligence, just intellect is enough.

Yesterday one devotee was asking me, 'What is this Master? You always encourage doubting and questioning but suddenly you changed the whole trend. Yesterday, you started saying, only fools doubt, only fools question.'

See, please understand that doubting and questioning are good for accumulating knowledge, but not to experience.

If you just want to learn, if you want more and more words, if you want teachings, doubting is beautiful, questioning is beautiful. But when it comes to techniques, doubting or questioning is not going to help. Straightaway if you want to experience, only trust can help you.

I always tell people, When intellect is ripened, it becomes intelligence. When emotion ripens, it becomes trust, when your being ripens, it becomes enlightenment.

If your intellect has reached its peak, the experience showers Intelligence. If your emotion has reached its peak, the experience showers trust. If your being has reached its peak, the experience showers enlightenment.

To doubt you don't need intelligence, just intellect is enough. You can doubt anything. The more you doubt, the more you question, the more people will start respecting you. No, it's a Truth. If you just want to show yourself as a great person, simply start doubting everybody and start criticizing everybody. It's a beautiful technique, start criticizing everybody, start doubting everybody, start questioning everybody, you will become a great scholar and philosopher, and people will start respecting you.

Here, no teachings, straightaway Shiva enters into the technique. He does not even say, 'Now I am starting meditation techniques.' Even that much he is not saying, He goes straight to the technique. He says, 'Start doing it.' He is not speaking about anything else. No introduction, no teachings.

Yesterday one devotee asked me, 'What is this Master? When you spoke about the Bhagavad Gita during your discourses on the Gita, you said that Gita is the ultimate book. Yesterday you pulled the Gita completely down. Now you say Shiva Sutras is the ultimate book.'

See, Gita is a beautiful book to start. It has got a little bit of sastra (scripture), little bit of stotra (praise or devotion for God), and a little bit of sutra (collection of aphorisms). There are some techniques and there are some stotra, the glory part, and there is also sastra, which gives you the intellectual base. It's like a mix of everything. But the danger is that we may miss the essence. We may get caught in the sastra or stotra, and we may lose the sutra part. We may lose the technique part. It's a mixture.

Whenever we mix things, there is always the possibility of confusion. We may miss the essence of the message and we may miss the truth of the experience. But here, we cannot miss the truth for it's a fool-proof book. Anybody who goes through this book cannot miss what is being said. It's a fool-proof technology, we can't escape, and we can't miss the truth because here nothing else is there, no sugar-coating, nothing. Straightaway Shiva gives the truth, nothing else. There is no teaching, no intellectual stuff.

There is no need to avoid anything, there is no need to use your intellect to separate, to analyze what is truth and what is not truth and you don't have to use your intellect at all. As far as this book is concerned no preparation is required except to open it and start practicing. It's a practical manual, it's a work book. That is why it contains no teachings. This is not for the people who are yet to be convinced. It's a work book for the people who want to practice.

I have brought few stories to tell you all about the teachings, about how teachings work.

A patient goes to a psychiatric doctor and says, 'Doctor, I have had enough. It is too much to bear. I can't run my life like this. I don't know what I can do but one thing I know is that I can't live my life in this same way. I have too many problems.'

The psychiatrist replies, 'Yes, we all have problems, I know. Let's try to help each other. I'll start four sessions at a week, hundred dollars per session. We'll start from tomorrow.'

Patient says, 'Yes, Doctor, I understand, this will solve your problem, what about mine?'

So teachings may solve the problems of the teacher, but not of the student. All teachings are like that. Either they are given as commandments or as theories. One thing, at least with commandments you know that they are directly given to you. But when you start reading theological theories, in a very cunning, subtle way the commandments are inserted into your inner space. Logically you are convinced, without being told to, to follow these rules. Logically you are convinced about these teachings. Then great damage, permanent damage is done to your consciousness. Let me be very clear, unless it becomes your experience, any teaching only does damage to your inner space, it does great damage to your Consciousness.

It is better to escape from teachings than having them without the experience.

I have one more story:

One day a farmer suddenly noticed that one of his cows was missing and there was a railroad near his farm. And he sued the railroad company thinking that cow had been hit by a train and killed. The railroad company hired the best lawyer, a big lawyer from the city to settle the matter out of court. Somehow the lawyer convinced the farmer and the farmer accepted 50% of what he was claiming and settled.

After the settlement, after the farmer signed the release form and took the check, the lawyer felt really happy and he was not able to keep quiet. He was talking about his victory and he said, 'I'm really happy I won the case because I didn't have a single witness, I did not have much to stand on in the court. I am happy that we have settled out of court.'

The farmer said, 'Yes, I'm also happy, I was worried yesterday about how to take only half of the amount but today morning the cow came back home. So I agreed.'

Be very clear, neither the farmer nor the lawyer knows what is going on. The farmer is trying to cheat the lawyer while the lawyer thinks he is cheating the farmer.

Similarly, with teachings also, the person who teaches thinks that people are all listening to him, he is talking for them. People who are sitting are thinking, anyhow he is talking what is there to do? I have to sit since I have come here. It becomes a sort of routine. Anyhow, we are stuck. We cannot do anything else. He is going to speak anyway. So, let's listen and try to have a good time.

Please be very clear, neither the teacher knows what he is saying, nor the student understands what he is hearing. All teachings only add more and more words, more and more trouble. That's the reason that here Shiva is not here to convince us, he is here to give the experience.

One more thing, I have always seen a deep inferiority complex in all teachers. Teachers suffer from an inferiority complex. They only start teaching to hide their inferiority

complex. See when you are teaching, you can show you are an important person. Really it's a big addiction. You don't realize that it's a big addiction.

Let me tell you a story, it's not story, it is history, his-story.

Shah Jahan, when he was arrested by his own son, Aurangazeb, and imprisoned, he fell sick. Not only did he fall sick, he was just rapidly deteriorating in health. Aurangazeb went to see him since after all it was his father. He went to see him and he saw that Shah Jahan was practically dead. He asked, 'I know you are missing your Kingdom, I can't give that Kingdom back. But tell me something to bring you back to life. I can do something to bring you back to life, to make you alive, to keep you alive. But I can't give you the kingdom, except that ask me for anything.'

Shah Jahan said, 'I don't want your Kingdom, but just give me 30 boys. I'll start teaching them and give them classes.'

Aurangzeb said, 'That is not a big thing, I can give you 100 boys, have a 100 boys.'

He sent 100 boys for Shah Jahan to teach. After a month Aurangazeb came to the prison, he saw Shah Jahan so alive, just like a King. Aurangzeb was not able to understand what had happened. He's so alive, he's back, he was looking just like a King again. He asked the officers, his prison officers, 'What happened? How come he is so alive now?'

The officers said, 'Lord, everyday in the morning he makes all the 100 people sit in front of him and he starts conducting his court. One behaves like he is a minister, another one acts like a soldier and someone else like a spy. Each one is coming and reporting to the King. He makes them do everything that he would do in the court. In the evening he divides them into two groups and makes them fight each other. He does everything that he used to do in court. So psychologically he has regained his feeling of being a King. That is why he is so alive and active.

Be very clear, teaching gives us a big strength, we feel very important. Our ego is strengthened when we teach. That is the reason you will find thousands and thousands of teachers, but not a single student.

Be very clear, never think people who are sitting in front of the teacher are students, no! They are just learning to become a teacher, they are not students, they are just waiting to jump into that seat. You can't directly take the seat, you need to know something. So just for that, they put up with the teacher's teachings. The student thinks, 'Anyhow, alright, tell us whatever you want. One day I want to sit in that chair. For that I also need to repeat all these things. Let me listen'.

Students are polite, they relax, keep quiet, so that they can start their turn, that's all. Never think somebody is a student just because he is sitting in front of the teacher.

All teaching is just a pure ego game. The teacher is trying to show his greatness and the student is just waiting so that he can show his greatness to somebody else. He is just putting up with the teachings so that when the time comes he can start too. That is why I've always seen, the moment class is over, people go back to their house and start teaching.

If we have digested the teachings, we will never feel like opening your mouth. I have seen that even as people listen, in their minds they make notes, 'I should go and tell this to my mother-in-law, I should go and tell this to my father-in-law, I should go and tell this to my friends, I should go and tell this to my wife'. The wife thinks, 'I should go and tell this to my husband'.

You just develop your intellect so that you can use it on your family and friends. You just use all these teachings to support what you want to express, what you want to show off. One more thing, I have seen people sharpening their intellect with my teachings and using it to fulfill their wishes. Whenever they can't get something out of somebody, they will start using these teachings in their own form. In their mind, they will have all the notes, whatever is said, when they go back they will manipulate others the way they want and use it to get what they want.

Let you be very clear, that's the reason why Shiva is not interested in giving any teachings here, he is straight. I think he doesn't want to contribute to the already existing confusions. To tell you honestly, whenever I go to these spiritual bookshops I feel it is pointless to produce more books. Oh God, there are millions of books already! What am I going to write, what am I going to achieve by writing some more books?

Then I decided I should write books at least to tell people not to read books. At least to pass on that message I need to write books, to convince them not to waste their energy in unnecessarily reading, I have to keep writing books. At least to do that, I have to write. That is the reason I have written so many books.

Actually, Ramana Maharishi says beautifully, 'Whenever you can be in the state of ātman, that enlightenment, be in that same ecstasy and bliss. Books that encourage you to go into the experience of bliss and which again and again tell you not to read are books written by great enlightened masters. These masters will always convince you not to be with the books but to enter into the experience. I can say that the ṛṣis (sages) are the only courageous people who said, 'Vedas are not the Ultimate authority. Our scriptures are not ultimate authority. They are mere guides for you to experience.' Our ṛṣis were the most courageous people, let me be very honest. They had the courage to declare the books are not ultimate, that their words were not the ultimate authority, that they were just a help to reach the experience. One more beautiful thing, these ṛṣis were the only people who kept the possibility of updating scriptures open and available for the next generation. We can update our scriptures; there are smṛtis continuously we can update. Updating is possible.

If you read the Gita, Krishna is so beautifully eloquent. He says:

Yatha Yatha hi dharmasya Klanir bhavathi bharatha Arbhyudharma dharmasya Thadatmanam srijyanmagam

Krishna keeps the possibility open. He says, 'Whenever dharma declines again and again I shall come down'. He means that he is keeping the space for the next generation of enlightened masters. He keeps the whole thing open to the following generations, the next master can come up and say, 'Yes, now I have experienced Krishna Consciousness, now I am speaking from the same experience, Come, let's update, let's grow.' The possibility for growth, the possibility for the next generation is kept open with the ṛṣis. They never say, they never claim, 'We are the ultimate authority.' Even software can be updated.

Be very clear, anything that cannot be updated will be outdated. Either update or get outdated. If some scripture can't be updated means it has to be outdated. It has to be outdated. Only that which can be updated can keep living. These are the two important changes that came after the IT revolution in recent times: free knowledge and the possibility of updating.

Five thousand years ago our masters had thought about these two concepts. In Bharat knowledge is still free. In our ashram, we have one year programs where we provide free food, stay, clothes and books to study the spiritual philosophy. Anybody who wants to come and stay is welcome to come and stay and practice for one year. For one whole year, we give free food, stay and syllabus, the atmosphere, the ambience, which is very important and teachers. General descriptions about humanitarian activities are welcome.

In Bharat we believe that knowledge is free and that there is always the possibility of updating. Rishis don't claim they are the ultimate, they don't claim they are the last. They do not kill the idea of updating; they don't stop the growth or the expansion of spiritual intelligence.

Ramana Maharishi says beautifully, 'Read the books of enlightened masters who are constantly telling you to drop books and go deep into experience.' Try to be always in that ecstasy, or bliss or the no-mind space that again and again inspires you to go into that state, instead of reading books.

Here, in this book, Shiva is not even convincing you, he is not even saying, 'Go into experience'. He straightaway gives the technology, straightaway he starts with the technology. This is a beautiful Sutra, the first sutra. Let's enter into the sutra.

Ūrdhve prāṇo yādo jīvo visargātmā paro’charet utpattisthānayo rbhedāt ātma tattvaṁ dvayīdaṁ vrajet

If at all we have to choose among the meditation techniques, if somebody asks me, Master there are millions of meditation techniques, which one will you prescribe, for anybody? If there is going to be a tsunami and all books are washed away, and if all books were to disappear and if only one technique can be kept alive, if God gives me the choice, I'll keep this technique alive. This technique is so beautiful. Except this technique if the whole spiritual literature, if all the techniques are taken away from the planet Earth, even then Planet Earth can survive. It can have spiritual growth and it can have enlightened masters with this single technique. Except for this one Sutra, if God takes away all spiritual literature, all meditation techniques from the planet Earth and if suddenly overnight everything is over, gone, even if that happens, we will be able to produce enlightened masters on the Planet Earth with this single technique.

According to my experience, this is the technique that created millions and millions of enlightened masters. No other technique has helped so many millions of people like this technique did. The whole of Asia including China, Thailand, Japan, Sri Lanka and other countries became enlightened with this single technique.

Buddha uses this same technique in the name of Vipassanā. Whether it is Upāsanā or Vipassanā is not material. Upāsanā means 'sitting with the God', Vipassanā means 'sitting with yourself'. Whether it is Vipassanā or Upāsanā the technique is one and the same because You are God! Sitting with yourself or sitting with God is one and the same. When you don't trust yourself, you sit with God. When you trust yourself, you sit with yourself, that's all. If you trust God, it is called Upāsanā, if you trust your own Self, it is called Vipassanā, that's all.

But this single technique has liberated millions of people. This is the one and only technique that Buddha promoted. The whole basis for Buddhism is just this one technique, the first technique of Shiva. The first line of Shiva is the whole essence of Buddhism. The whole of Asia produced so many millions of enlightened masters only based on this single technique.

The whole basis for Tibetan Buddhism is this one technique. Throughout Tibet, if you travel, you will hear only about this one technique. No other country has spent so much energy, done so much research, like Tibet, in the field of Consciousness. If at all Tibet is brought back to its original glory and given the freedom of the spiritual research and development and it can contribute to the Planet Earth so much. It has so much spiritual wealth to contribute to the rest of the world.

Let's enter into the technique. This experience may dawn. He starts with the word, beautiful word, 'Parasakti'. Parasakti is the ultimate energy. She is the one who created everything, who has everything and is able to share, who is having and who is able to share.

There's a big difference between a Mystic and a Master. A Mystic is a person who achieved the experience of truth. A Master is a person who has not only achieved the experience but who in addition can share that technology to experience it with others. Here, Shiva is addressing Devi as 'Parasakti', who is radiating enlightenment. Not only had she experienced it, she could share it with others. This book is of an enlightened master speaking to another enlightened master. That is why this book is the essence of enlightenment. Not even a single word is an unnecessary word. To tell you honestly, all other scriptures like the Brahma Sutra, Yoga Sutra and the Gita can all be edited, but not the Shiva Sutras.

When I spoke on the Yoga Sutras, I spoke only on 10 verses because the essence of the book is in 10 verses. When I spoke on the Brahma Sutra, I spoke only on 3 verses because the essence of the book is in these three verses. Brahma Sutra has got 550 sutras, I chose only three and spoke on that. Gita has got 700 slokas, I chose only 120 and spoke on that. Again Yoga Sutra has got 196 sutras, I spoke only on 10 to 12, essence. But when I decided to speak on Shiva Sutra, I am not able to remove a single word. I'm going to speak on all 112 sutras. Because I'm not able to edit, I'm not able to take out something saying that this is the juice or this is the essence, No! Every single word is essence. You can't edit a single word.

Now I'm going to speak on all 112 sutras, simply because, I can't edit. Shiva has spoken and he has expressed with minimum words the ultimate truth. You can't edit further. Now, let's start:

He says the enlightenment, the Shiva consciousness can happen to you if you can go deep into the space where the breath is taking turn from out to in or in to out, up to down or down to up. It looks very simple. He's talking about your breath. He says you can experience the Shiva consciousness between the spaces of the two breaths.

First let us understand something about breath. From the moment of our birth till our death, the one and only thing that we do without any discontinuity is breathing. Anything else can be stopped. One may be a child or one may be young man, or one may become old, or one may fall sick, one may eat, one may not eat, one may sleep, one may not sleep, but all through these states one cannot stop breathing. That's the basic thing of life. Breathing is the one and only activity that one is engaged in continuously.

Our Being is made out of five elements: First is the earth element, prithvi. Our bone and the flesh structure are made out of this earth element. Next is the water element, apu. Our blood and so many other things in our system represent this water element energy that forms nearly 80 to 90% of our body mass. Next is the fire element, agni, which is constantly burning in our manipuraka chakra, the navel energy center. This digests all the food that we consume. We call it vaishvanaragni, the fire that is inside our navel center. Krishna says:

I am residing in every being as the vaishvanara fire. He's the fire element. If this fire goes away, your body has to be put in the fire. As long as this fire is alive, you'll be alive. If this fire goes away you body will have to be cremated in the fire element.

Next, is air, vayu or the breath, prana, breath element or the air element. The fifth is ether, akasa. Ether is our mind, where our visualizations are happening, where our thinking happens, that space is ether. This is the subtlest of the five elements. Five spaces, five elements are present within us and Tantra says, if you can directly work with the subtlest element, you will achieve enlightenment immediately.

Starting to work with the earth element means then you have to move to the water, then you have to move to the fire, then you have to move to the air, from there you have to move to the ether. You will have to move from one step to next. We can see that each will be subtler than the next lower energy. If you go deep, it will be subtler, subtler and subtlest. The earth and the water will have form and the fire is formless form, air and the ether will not have form. Fire can lead from form to formlessness. These are the five elements. If you can work with the subtlest element of ether or akasa straightaway you can become enlightened. We can reach the cosmic energy. We can reach the atman.

Taittreya Upanishad says beautifully that from Atman (soul) comes the akasa (ether), from akasa comes the vayu (air), from vayu comes the agni (fire), from agni comes the water apu, from water element comes the prithvi, earth.

If you can work with the subtlest element, straightaway you can reach enlightenment, the inner space. Here the subtlest element is akasa, ether. But the big difficulty is that you cannot directly work with ether. You cannot directly work with ether because you cannot directly work with your mind. The more you try to work with your mind, the more you may create suppressions and more and more difficulties.

That's the reason why Shiva is working with air to begin with. It is a little less subtle, but it is practical. Shiva is creating these techniques for human beings on the planet Earth, who have lived, who are living and who are yet to come. He is creating techniques for all kinds of human beings.

As I was telling you yesterday, sometimes I myself create questions and give answers because people are not even that intelligent to pose intelligent questions. People are asking the questions only out of ego and violence, they don't ask them out of innocence. Questions asked out of innocence are worth answering. Questions asked out of violence, can neither be answered, nor is it useful to answer them.

Let it be very clear, sometimes people are not even that intelligent to ask the right questions so I myself design the question and give the answers so that it is recorded for future. Same way here, Shiva is creating techniques that will be useful, that can be of help not only for the human beings present now but even for the people who are yet to come.

And he says, look to the source of the breaths, the gaps between them from where they arise, after the breath comes in and just before turning up.

One more thing, directly or indirectly He wanted to create that space which you will experience. Here, the technique itself directly may sometimes not give you the experience. But when your mind is engaged in that technique the experience will start happening as a by-product, the experience will start happening as a by-product. That is why Shiva has created a fool-proof system.

The technique itself may not directly give you the experience.

A small story:

One lady went to the grocery store and asked the grocer to give her cat food for her husband.

He said, 'No, no you can't give cat food to your husband, he will die.'

She said, 'No, no, for the last one week I have been feeding him cat food for his lunch and he is enjoying it, so it's alright for you to give it to me for him.'

Everyday she comes and picks up cat food. This guy was shocked and surprised.

Anyhow, after a week, this grocer happened to browse the obituary column of the local newspaper and he saw that the lady's husband had died. The next day when she came to the store, he said, 'I told you, not to give him cat food, see he is dead.'

She said, 'No no, he is not dead because of the cat food, he is dead because he broke his neck, trying to lick his body all over. When he tried to lick his body all over, he broke his neck and died.'

Directly or indirectly, what had to happen did happen.

Let you be very clear, these techniques also directly or indirectly will give you the experience. They will give you enlightenment.

You may ask, 'How can I become enlightened just by observing, just by going deep into my breath?' Logically you will not be able to understand the concept. Logically can you understand how the cat food killed the husband? You may not understand logically but that is what happens. Whether you understand logically or not, it happens. Sometimes things happen directly, sometimes indirectly. Here, you may have the question, 'How can I become enlightened just by watching my breath? How can just going into the space where my breath is taking a turn enlighten me? How is enlightenment possible?' Logically you may not understand but when it happens, it happens.

Let you be very clear, here, Shiva is creating the subtlest possible technique for human beings. Human beings, as such cannot work directly on the ether, on the mind. The element that they can directly touch is only the breath and breath is the bridge between us and the Universe. It is the bridge between our body and the mind.

You can see very clearly, till breath you are only body, after the breath, you are mind. If you look at all the five elements, till you come to air you are only body, whether it is earth, water, or fire or the air. All these four are only body, but after the breath, after the air, after the prana it is mind. The ether is mind. The breath is the bridge between your body and mind. You are body, mind and spirit. Body is the matter, mind is the energy distributed in matter, while spirit is the energy. Breath is the bridge between your body, mind and spirit. Breath is the bridge between your body mind and the energy of the Universe.

Please be very clear, you are constantly connecting with the Universe. You are relating with the Cosmos through your breath. The moment you stop relating, you are dead. The moment you stop relating, you are dead.

He says, 'This experience arises between two breaths, after breath comes in and just before turning out.' Once the breathing goes in and before it turns out, it touches your inner space. Let you be very clear, every single breath is directly managed by your atman, not by your mind. Let you be very clear, that is why even if you forget, you go on breathing. If this function were to be under the control of our mind, we would have stopped breathing a long time ago. Because we forget so many things, we would have forgotten this also. It is not under the control of our mind. It is under the control of Consciousness.

With every single breath, we go and touch our inner consciousness. We straightaway go and reach our inner Consciousness and then come out. Every single breath is directly related to our inner Consciousness. That is the easiest method to reach enlightenment.

Let me be very clear, with any other technique you have to do something. Here, you don't have to do anything, just be and automatically you will be taken into the space where the enlightenment is happening. Automatically you will reach the space where Consciousness is your very nature. Automatically you will enter into the space where you are in Shiva Consciousness. Every moment you are reaching the space of Shiva Consciousness, you are entering into the space of Shiva Consciousness, even without your knowledge. The only thing you need to do is, just be with the vehicle that goes into the inner space of Shiva consciousness.

If you just keep quiet and sit in the train that is enough. Your breath is the train, the vehicle that is going into the Shiva Consciousness every moment. But the moment it goes near the Shiva Consciousness you feel a little suffocated and you say, 'No, no, no, no, no, this is not for me, let me get down.' You get down. And when the train comes back to your station, you get into the train and then come back again.

You think of going from here to Seattle, get into the train but the moment you reach the Mount Shasta you feel, no, no, no, no, no, it's too cold, it's not for me, you get down and wait there. When the return train comes, you sit in the train and come back to LA, that's all. Every moment, God has already created an automatic mechanism for you to reach enlightenment. Understand one thing, he doesn't trust us. He knows. He knows that any job left to human beings, they will mess it up. All they know is to make a mess of it.

Let you be very clear, He has already created an automatic mechanism where you don't need to do anything. All you need to do is just sit in the train and relax. As they say in the flights, 'Sit back and relax, enjoy your flight.' Nothing else needs to be done. You are in Shiva Consciousness. All you need to do is sit back and relax. You are already in Shiva Consciousness.

Here, the first technique is such a beautiful technique. He says, 'The state of fullness is found by fixing them in two places of the origin, just before the turning up', there will be always a gap where you don't breathe, where the breath is not happening, where it is taking a turn. If you can relax in that gap, if you can be aware of that gap, a sudden explosion of Consciousness is possible in you. You may think, how can I achieve enlightenment? You can just by watching the gaps between the breaths.

Please be very clear, your breathing and your thinking are directly connected, they're directly connected. If you observe the length, breadth and depth of your breath you will find the connection. The length, breadth, and depth of your breath change according to your thoughts. Let me be very clear, every single thought changes the length, depth and breadth of your breathing. The length, breadth and depth of your breathing can never be the same with two different thoughts. Every single thought brings a change, a slight change, maybe in length, or in breadth, or in depth of your breathing. Every single thought is associated with a particular length, breadth, depth of your breathing.

So your breathing is not the same as you think it to be. You can see this obviously when you are caught in some emotions. With emotions like anger you can see your breathing totally changes. Emotions like lust, you can see your breathing is totally different. When you are caught in the emotions you can see how your breathing changes. You may think that your breathing changes only in the high emotions. It changes not only in the high emotions, even in ordinary thinking, even in an ordinary way of thinking every thought has got it's own length, breadth, and depth of breath.

Be very clear, every single thought brings its own change in your breathing. If you work on your breath, straightaway you work on your mind. If you work on your mind, you are straightaway working on your breath. But the difficulty is you can't work on your mind. You cannot work on your mind, it is too subtle, it is too difficult. You cannot do anything. Try your best to work on your mind and at the end of the day you will feel only bored or tired, because nothing would have happened. It is like arguing with your spouse, it will never end, nothing will happen. You can continue, continue, continue, and continue. Either you should become tired or she should become tired. Otherwise nothing else can be done.

One of our devotees' husband came to me. He is involved with some other meditation group and she is involved with our meditation group. He came to me and started complaining, 'What is this Master, after she came to your meditation classes, the peace in my house is completely lost.' I said, what happened? Please tell me. 'No earlier both of us were going to same meditation group, we used to practice meditation, we would get energy to fight 15 minutes, I will shout 15 minutes, she will shout 15 minutes, things will be over, done! Now, she has come to your programs, she gets energy for one hour! I am going to the same meditation and I have power only to shout for 15 minutes. And she gets energy to shout one hour, now what to do? I am not able to do anything and the peace in the house is lost.'

Be very clear, and he's really honest when he says, 'She does all your meditation techniques and it is so active and alive. I'm not able to do anything with her.' I said, then come and join in our group. That's the only way, nothing else can be done.

Anyhow, arguing with your spouse leads nowhere. Same way working with your mind, nothing can be done. But working with your breath, something can be done. Here, Shiva gives you a beautiful technique to work on your breath and reach the state of Shiva Consciousness or thoughtlessness.

One more thing if you observe, if you stop breathing, you can't think. Your thinking will stop, even for a moment, stop breathing, thinking will stop. And if you stop thinking, breathing will stop. You can't stop thinking completely. But you can enter into the space where breathing is not happening in you. You can beautifully enter into that space without any side effect or after effect. The only byproduct or side effect will be enlightenment and Shiva Consciousness.

Let's have a small break. After the break we will enter into the practical side of this technique and start practicing. We will enter into the technique itself.

It is time. We'll enter into the technique.

One important thing, I want you to know. This technique will bring tremendous energy into your system. See, it will bring enlightenment, that is one thing. Second thing is that before bringing enlightenment itself, this technique will bring tremendous energy in your system. It will awaken high energy in your system.

I want you to understand this. Energy without intelligence is dangerous. If you start using the energy without intelligence it is dangerous. So before entering into this technique I wanted all of you to know, immediately after finishing the meditation do not have any strong thoughts or desires. After finishing the meditation, at least 10 minutes do not do anything which needs your complete attention or in which you need to emotionally involve because those thoughts will become alive and they will start acting as a guiding factor in your life.

Please be very clear, energy without intelligence, now you are going to have energy. Of course you may have enlightenment but immediately you are going to have energy, even before enlightenment. So this energy if it is used for some of your desires, if you have strong desires after the meditation, this energy you will start using it to fulfill those desires. You do not even know whether they are good desires or bad desires.

One more important thing you should know is that if all your desires are fulfilled, your life will be much worse and a big mess. It will be hell on earth. Because you don't know what to desire you just desire something and only when you get it you get the side effect also and then have all trouble. You start thinking, Oh what happened, why did I do this?

A small story:

In the River Ganga, there was a big black blanket floating. One sadhu was bathing in the Ganga. He saw what was floating and thought, Oh God, such a big blanket, I can use it for 10 years. He ran, he swam into the Ganga and caught hold of that blanket. After a few minutes, he was trying to leave and it was not leaving him. Then he understood that it's a bear! It was a bear floating in the water. First he went and caught it and after that it caught hold of him.

Same way desires too catch hold of you. Do not give energy to the desires till you have intelligence.

Now, this technique will awaken the kundalini shakti. It will awaken the energy so you need to be relaxed after meditation, after meditating for at least 10 minutes. Of course,

today I will not allow you to go outside. I will make you sit 10 minutes here. After meditation you will sit here for 10 minutes.

But, if you practice this meditation in the house be careful with this aspect. Usually people don't practice meditation at all. I know. For the last three years I am teaching meditation and millions of people have been learning. From that itself I can guess. If people had really been practicing meditation at least by now people would have become enlightened. Three years is too long a period not to get enlightened, especially in the way in which I am giving the techniques! I don't think people practise, at least I don't trust that they practise.

You may trust me but I don't trust you.

Anyhow, if at all you feel little bored then you want to do some meditation. Only if you feel bored, tired of TV, bored of same spouse and if you're bored of something then you may start doing meditation. If you do like that and practise some of this technique, please do not get involved in anything for at least 10 minutes after the meditation. For ten minutes do not involve yourself in anything emotionally because in that pure inner space if you create some strong desire or emotion, that will get recorded and your whole body-mind energy will start flowing towards that engraved memory. What you think will become reality. But the difficulty is, you will not know what you thought is right or not, right or wrong. You can use the energy for the right purpose, or wrong purpose. It is after all your will.

Small story:

One guy was driving. He stopped at the signal. A homeless guy came near him and asked, 'Please give me a dollar.' This guy said, 'Will you use this money for drinking?'

'No, no, no I don't drink.'

'Will you use this money for gambling?'

'No, no, no surely I won't and I don't gamble.'

This guy said, 'In that case I will give you $100 but you have to come to my house.'

Homeless guy, he's not able to understand, 'Why, why are you calling me to the house?'

This guy says, 'No, I wanted to show my wife what happens to a guy who doesn't drink or gamble!'

So you can use this technique for anything, you can use meditation also for right or wrong purposes. So please be very clear do not take the homeless guy to the house and show him to her to prove to see what happens to people who don't drink or gamble.

Alright, I'll guide you. All these meditations are guided meditations. I'll guide you. Tomorrow onwards please bring the eye band or I'll tell the ashram to provide. Today if you have your kerchiefs you can tie the kerchiefs or any other piece of clothing to cover your eyes.

Let me give the gist of the technique. Gist of the technique is that you are going to enter into the space where the breathing is taking a turn. That is the gist of the technique. Why I ask people to tie their eyes is this. Whatever said and done, we have always a little temptation to peep. We think, why not open one eye and see what's going on. I think Swami is keeping quiet, maybe meditation is over and everybody has left or what? Or am I just sitting, am I lost in the meditation? Please be very clear you will never be lost in the meditation.

Please close your eyes, tie the ribbon. If you don't have anything then at least close the eyes tightly that's all.

First, let us offer our gratitude and thanks to the great Master Shiva, who is our Master who has given this great technology to the Planet Earth. Feel connected to Shiva, offer your humble gratitude, and thank him for this great technology.

Offer your humble salutations and gratitude to the great Master Shiva. Feel peaceful and loving. Send loving thoughts to all corners of the world. Remember your friends, and relatives who are far away. Send them all loving, happy, blissful thoughts. Remember them and send them your love. Remember your enemies also and send them your love.

Sit in a completely relaxed position and let your body be completely relaxed. Start observing your breath. Start witnessing your breath. Do not increase the length, do not increase your breathing, do not inhale or exhale. Just witness it, let the inhaling and exhaling be normal and natural, just witness. Just observe.

Stop observing the breath that is going in and coming out. Be aware when the breath goes in, just witness only the breath which is going in. For first few minutes be aware of only the breath that is going in. Do not bother about outgoing breath, just witness the breath that is going in.

Part 2: Shiva Sutras - Sutras 01 - 05

Now witness only the outgoing breath, forget about the ingoing breath. Witness with your full awareness only the outgoing breath. Do not put your effort to inhale or exhale, just witness what is happening.

Now, start witnessing the gap between incoming and outgoing breath. Be aware of your breath taking turn between incoming breath and outgoing breath. Be aware of the gap between the incoming breath and outgoing breath.

Be aware the incoming breath and the gap and the outgoing breath. Feel your whole body being rejuvenated and alive. You are in a silence that is alive and energetic. You are in energetic silence. You are vibrating with high energy.

Witness the gap between incoming breath and outgoing breath. Just be the witness. Be aware of the gap between the incoming breath and outgoing breath. You may feel you are not breathing at all, witness that also, witness that feeling also.

Witness the gap between incoming and outgoing breath. You are in Shiva Consciousness.

Relax, let your eyes be closed, do not do any meditation, just relax but do not think actively. Just let your mind settle down. Just be relaxed for a few minutes.

Relax and come out of the high energy zone slowly. Very slowly you can open your eyes.

There is nothing in life that is inauspicious or bad. Everything that happens to you happens for a purpose and it happens with auspicious intent.

In the Hindu mythology of Dasavatara or Ten Incarnations, Vishnu moves from fish to tortoise to boar to half man half lion before he takes human form. If the fish form had not embraced death and resisted it, it could not become tortoise. If the tortoise had resisted death it could not evolved into a boar. No evolution, no transformation would have been possible if death had been resisted as something inauspicious.

If a permanent life solution had been available to the boar, the boar would have a boar all through its evolution. No progress would have been possible. If you wish to live for

ever, you negate the opportunity of moving beyond the human form. Shiva as the Rejuvenator gives you this wonderful opportunity to shed this form and seek another.

Death does not subtract anything from you. It adds quality to your life. Once you trust that everything that happens in your life, including death, has a purpose, you experience Shiva. As I said before, in Sanskrit, the word Shiva means causeless auspiciousness.

A small story.

A wise master watches as a well decorated horse runs past him in the forest. The master's son manages to catch hold of the horse. The king's soldiers who come in search of the horse thank him and give him another horse as a gift.

The master's neighbors congratulate him on his son's gift. Master says, 'That is good'

A few days later the son falls down from the horse and breaks his leg. Neighbors come to commiserate with him and the master says, 'That is good'. They are surprised and ask how his son breaking his leg can be good. Master remains silent.

A week later the King declares war over a neighboring kingdom and calls able bodied young men to the army. Master's son who has a broken leg is spared while all other young people are taken away.

Neighbors come to congratulate him and master responds, 'That is good!'

The mindset of equanimity that allows one to see goodness in everything, whether others consider them as good or bad, success or failure, threat or praise, is what differentiates one with awareness from another who is unaware.

Time and life are non judgmental. They just are and move on. We can either move along with them accepting things as they happen without complain or we can judge each incident that arises and differentiate it as good and bad. If you accept life as is, you do not ride a roller coaster. You do not move as events move around you. You are still centered.

If you choose to differentiate and label, you ride the roller coaster. You scream with joy one minute and with fear at another moment and with deep pain at yet another moment. It is a choice that each of us can make that decides the quality of our life.

If you accept that all that happens around you and to you is auspicious all the time, you are always in bliss. Nothing can shake you. Even if you seemingly lose everything, you realize you are only losing your bondages. You realize that you are gaining freedom.

If you judge with your senses and label the good, bad and the ugly, your life too moves between the good, bad and the ugly. Soon, even what you consider good no longer seems as good as you keep seeking for the better. What you end with is bad and ugly.

Problems that you face in life are challenges that strengthen you as you experience them. Nothing in life as it happens is inauspicious. When you accept this you truly enter into Shiva consciousness.

marutontar bahir vaapi viyadyugmaanivartanaat | bhairavyaa bhairavasyetham bhairavi vyajyate vapuh ||

In that instant when the breaths do not move between gaps, Oh Bhairavi, let Shiva Consciousness be realized.

Whenever incoming breath takes a turn as outgoing breath and whenever the outgoing breath takes a turn and become the incoming breath again, you experience the neutral space that is the gap that is the source. Your breath moves only in a circular way. It is not parallel line as you think. Because it goes in and comes out in a straight way, you think it's a parallel line. It's not parallel. It takes a turn to continue and parallel lines never meet.

Your breathing and mind, both are very closely associated. As I was telling you yesterday, the prana and mana, breath and mind, prana sareera and mana sareera, breath body and mind body, are very closely connected to each other. If the prana becomes slow, the number of thoughts, thoughts per second also reduces. Along with the length, breadth, depth of the prana, thoughts per second also reduces.

Please understand, as I mentioned earlier the length, breadth, depth of the prana is directly related to the number of thoughts that you are having. For example here, if the prana is slowly coming down, slowly going into the inner space to take turn, this is the space in which it takes turn and becomes out going. This is the prana, and along with that the mind also slowly slows down, very slowly slows down, but the difficulty is that you are afraid of losing your mind. Because you are afraid of losing your mind that you never keep your awareness in this zone. This is the neutral zone.

If you know driving, and you drive with the traditional stick shift and not automatic transmission, you can understand that whenever you shift gear from first gear to second gear or second gear to third gear or any change, you have to come to the neutral gear. It is only after coming to the neutral zone you can change the gear. Even if it's from first to second or second to third or third to first, whatever gear change you make you have to come to the neutral zone. Same way, when the incoming breath takes a turn to become the outgoing breath, it goes through this neutral zone.

You are afraid of this neutral zone because in this neutral zone you are empty. You have no thoughts here. You don't have any identity. The biggest fear human beings have is fear of losing the identity, fear of stopping to think about oneself. I tell you even fear of losing death is not as great a fear as the fear of losing identity.

Fear of losing death is nothing but the issue of not knowing what, where and how you will be after death. If you are very clear you'll be in some form or another, you don't have the fear. Here you are not very clear about how you will be after death or how you will be after you leave the body. The fear of losing your identity is much worse than fear of death.

Here, when you pass through this neutral zone, when your breath stops your mind also stops. You do not want this pain. That is why you just jump over this pain. You never keep your awareness, you are never aware of this space, because you do not want to lose your identity. Your mind stops you'll not have identity for few moments. You will lose your identity and you always think that you are only identity. You exist only as

your identity and when you feel you have lost that identity you feel you are no more. That's the reason whenever you come to this zone you just take a jump; you jump over it. You are never aware of this zone.

Every moment this zone is happening in you again and again. Whenever your incoming breath takes a turn as outgoing breath or outgoing breath turns into incoming breath, those are the neutral zones. But you are afraid of these two neutral zones. You just take a jump over them. You do not want to be aware of this space. Every moment when the incoming breath takes a turn as outgoing and outgoing breath takes a turn as incoming, you are afraid of theses neutral zones. In the neutral zones you don't exist and you are scared. In the neutral zones your identity is lost. You do not want to be aware of losing your identity. You do not want to lose your identity.

You are so obsessed with your identity. You are so caught, completely caught with, your identity. You do not want to remain even for a moment, even for a kshana, a moment, without your identity. Constantly you are protecting your identity, but the big problem is that your identity is completely social. It is not an existential truth. It is just a comparative reality. It is not existential reality.

Whatever you think as your identity, your money, relationships, your age, your sex, whatever you call as your identity are all just societal and suicidal. None of it is existential reality. It is just comparative reality. Since you are afraid of existential reality and you are trying to protect your comparative reality while thinking that you are protecting something that is very real, it becomes real fun actually. You are trying to protect your identity against your reality. This is where you miss the whole game. That is why our life is such a big failure. You are trying to protect your identity against your reality and that is where you miss the whole game. That is your whole life becomes wasted.

You are trying to protect that which is not, that which does not exist and you are trying to fight against that which is. Life has got an existence, it has got positive existence but darkness does not have positive existence. It exists only in a negative way. It does not have positive existence. You are trying to protect that which doesn't have positive existence while fighting against something that has positive existence.

Your reality lies in this space, in this zone, the neutral zone or the inner space or consciousness. It's the truth that exists in you every moment. Every moment when your incoming breath takes a turn as outgoing breath or outgoing breath takes a turn as incoming breath you are in that neutral space. You are in that consciousness and that zone that you neither want to experience nor feel comfortable with. You are so caught up in your identity, especially in the Western culture. Here surrender means death. Just by hearing the word surrender, people get frightened. But you don't realize that you are trying to protect some thing that doesn't have basic existence.

Your identity is what your mind represents. This is what your is your mind is, your mind is breath. Mind is nothing but your identity. This is the zone where neither breath is happening nor the mind is working. This is the zone where both stop. When your breathing stops, when your mind stops, you experience the zone of consciousness. This is what I call neutral zone.

If your mind doesn't feel comfortable, if your identity doesn't feel comfortable, then naturally you just jump over this zone. You do not want this zone in your life. Constantly you are trying to avoid God. You are trying to escape from God. Constantly you are trying to escape from consciousness. Please be very clear that when Jesus says 'Knock and it shall be opened', I tell you that he's knocking for you. Just open. Jesus says knock and it shall be opened. Now, he's knocking every moment. When your breath takes a turn, he's knocking at your door. All you need to do is just open the door. You don't have to knock; he's already knocking. The main thing is that you need to feel comfortable with the neutral zone.

The more you feel comfortable, the more you feel protected, the more you feel secure in the neutral zone. You will start experiencing the neutral zone again and again. When you start experiencing the neutral zone, you will stay in consciousness. Yesterday Shiva was giving a technique to be a witness of only one neutral zone, incoming breath taking turn and becoming out going breath. He was speaking about only one neutral zone because immediately you can't be aware of both the zones. Only one you can start with.

Yesterday he started with first neutral zone, now he goes deeper. He goes deeper now and he says be aware of both the neutral zones, be aware of both the spaces of no mind. Lets enter into the technique and see how it works.

'Oh! Bhairavi', he starts with a beautiful word, 'O! Bhairavi!' Yesterday he started with Parasakti. Everyday he gives new, new names. Understand Shiva is not speaking a single word unnecessarily. Not even a single word from Shiva's mouth is unnecessary, and not even a single word can be edited. As I was telling you yesterday, when I wanted to speak on Brahma Sutra I could edit Brahma Sutra from 555 to only 3 slokas, only 3 sutras. When I wanted to speak on Yoga Sutra, from 196 I chose only ten or eleven sutras. When it came to Gita with 700 verses, I chose only 120. But here, Shiva has given 112 slokas and I'm not able to drop a single sloka. I couldn't drop a single sutra as every sutra is just overflowing with energy. It is pure essence that is already distilled. The whole essence is completely used in expressing this intelligence. Whatever maximum can be done Shiva has already done. Nothing more needs to be done.

A multimillionaire went to a New York Bank and asked for a $5000 loan. The Manager asked him to give him some guarantee, some collateral. The man said please have the key of my new Rolls Royce car. He gave the car key. Manager took the car and safely parked it in the underground parking space. The man left for a European trip. After one

month, he came back. Straight from airport he came to the bank and said, 'Sir, I want to settle the loan. I want to give your money back'. Manager said $5000 and $15 interest. Man gave the check and took the car key. Manager asked, 'Sir, when you were away I checked your account. I checked your identity and I found you are a multimillionaire. Why did you take just $5000 loan? What happened, you surely don't need the money'.

He said 'See, where else can I park my Rolls Royce for $15 for one month in New York?'

Be very clear, where else you can learn much better way about spirituality than from Shiva. He has done whatever can be done, just like that person, just like that guy. Shiva has distilled the whole thing. Now nothing more needs to be done. He has given the essence. He starts with the word, 'O! Bhairavi'.

The word Bhairavi is a beautiful word. He says Bhairavi; means the person who has gone beyond 'bhaya'. There are many meanings for this word. In Sanskrit, you can give at least 25 meanings to a single word. Because it is poetic language, it is not prosaic. The whole language is poetic. You can give at least 25 meanings to a single word.

In a dictionary you fill find that Bhairava means terrifying, frightening, and inspiring fear. In mythology Bhairava is the aspect of Shiva who clips off with his fingers the fifth head of Brahma to teach him a lesson in humility. Bhairavi likewise will be rendered as fear or awe inspiring.

I would like to translate Bhairava and Bhairavi as bhaya ramyate, which means one who can flirt with fear. Understand the meaning of flirting with fear. Ramya means flirting. Bhaya means fear. Be very clear, fearlessness is not bhairavatva. Fearlessness is suppressing fear. We also sometimes experience fearlessness. When you are really shaken, when you have to cross some dark area in the night, you start chanting, Rama, Krishna, Govinda, invoking all the deities for protection. All Gods will come only at that time in our mind. You will really feel that you don't have fear because your inner chattering is engaged with something else.

Whenever you engage your inner chattering in something else, you'll really feel that you are out of fear. Please be very clear when you repeat the mantras, you are only diverting your attention. Don't think you have the solution. You are not solving the problem, you just divert your attention, and you just turn your attention somewhere else. It's like this.

There's a proverb about cats. You can see that cats will always close their eyes tight when they drink milk. They think once they close their eyes the whole world becomes dark. They think nobody can see that they are drinking milk.

You are also doing the same thing. When you chant some mantra, because you don't pay attention to the fear, you think the fear has disappeared. Let you be very clear,

fearlessness does not mean non-existence of fear. It means the fear will be there and you'll have tremendous energy or courage to live with it. Who can flirt with the fear? Only a person who lives with fear and tolerates it, flirts with it can be truly overcome fear.

The maximum fear and the energy or courage to live with it is the quality of Bhairava. Bhairava does not mean that he doesn't have fear but that he can flirt with fear. He is not affected by fear.

One more thing, the very quality of life is fear. People come and ask me, 'Swamiji I'm always having the fear of unknown, what to do'. I tell them, 'Please be very clear, you are alive'.

There is a possibility of losing something and that is why you are afraid. If you don't have any possibility, you'll never be afraid. That is why these barbarians, barbaric societies, they are never afraid. You can see that these fellows are constantly going out and killing people. In all wars you will see that only people who are barbaric win in the war. Big problem is that people who are sensitive and respectful of life don't feel like fighting. They don't feel like fighting because they don't feel that there is a need to protect anything. But barbaric people go on killing everybody.

Please be very clear, fear is the basic quality of life. You can be fearless only if you are buried in the graveyard. If you are already buried in the graveyard, there is no need to be afraid of anything. There is nothing to loose. If you have something to loose, you will have fear. Nothing can be done about it. That's the quality of life itself.

Here Shiva says, Bhairavi, O! Bhairavi means O! Energy who can flirt with fear, one who can go beyond fear. You are neither attached with fear nor detached from fear. One more thing if you are afraid of fears, if you are frightened of fears, again don't think you are detached from fear. It is one more kind of attachment. All detachment is one more kind of attachment. The negative way of attachment is detachment. If you are afraid of fear, if you are frightened about fear, again you are in fear. Your consciousness will be moving around the fear.

Sometimes if you are energetic, if the hormonal pressure in your body is high, you do things without intelligence. You act without thinking about the result. That is what you call as courage. Let you be very clear, whatever you think as courage is not courage when you do not think about consequences. When you are in a hurry, when you run, you do not know what you are doing and you just do it. You do not know what you've done or you do not know what you want to do, you just run and finish it off.

A small story.

Few friends ran to the railway station at the last moment at 10:21. 10:20 was the train departure time. Somehow two of them made it. They got into the train while the third

one was left standing on the platform. Station Master came and patted his shoulder, trying to console him, 'Don't worry, at least your friends have made it'. He said, 'Oh, no, they came to see me off. I am the one with the ticket'.

Be very clear sometime in the hurry, you don't know what you are doing and that is what you claim as courage. When the hormonal pressure is little more than your intelligence or logic, you do something that you claim to be courageous, that's all. Otherwise, except a man who has experienced his neutral zone, nobody can talk about courage. The real courage is to let go your identity, which you think as you.

To relax from the identity that you again and again associate as you, whether it is your wealth or your relationships, whatever you think as your status and power, is courage. Whatever gives you the power as of now, the source for inspiration or the source for power is only that which matters. Your bank balance, your house, your relationship, your car or whatever you think as yours, your education, only these seem to matter.

You derive inspiration from the 'I' and Mine, fear and greed, your wealth and relationships. Let you be very clear, if you are deriving inspiration from these, if your fear or greed or your properties or your identity is the source of inspiration for you, it means, let you be very clear, that you are not too far away from depression. How long greed will be alive, how long fear can be alive. The greed will disappear the moment you have the product or if you understand that you can't have it. If you understand that you can achieve or you understand you can't have it, both ways the greed will disappear. Then you don't have any source of inspiration. You don't have anything that makes you run and you don't have anything that brings you to life. It works the same way with fear.

If your identity is based on society, be very clear that you are nothing more than a puppet. Big problem is that at least in puppet show one man handles all the puppets, whereas in your life you are handled like a puppet by thousands of people. Any single man can put you into depression. One word is enough, you are already in depression.

If somebody asks, are you mad, you then shout and prove that you are mad. If somebody asks, are you crazy, you shout and prove yes, I am. I always tell people, if you don't open your mouth people may suspect you are a fool, but if you open your mouth, you'll confirm it.

If your identity is based on the outer world, you will not feel comfortable in that neutral zone. Person who feels comfortable in the neutral zone will be constantly rejuvenated in what I call eternal bliss. Constantly, you'll be energized. Understand, it's like every moment you are sent to a high plane, every moment you are high.

I just wanted to name this lecture 'Get high on Air'. Get high on Prana.

Every moment if you start feeling comfortable with the neutral zone, every moment you get high on prana. Prana means the life source, the life force. It is the energy or the consciousness that is the base for your existence. Let you be very clear, the word prana does not mean air.

In Sanskrit, the word prana has got deeper meaning. It is not simply air. Air is the product delivered from the outer world and prana is the energy which you receive from the product. Prana is the energy. It is like a lorry is coming into your house and delivering some parcel and going away. The lorry is air and the parcel is prana. What is directly useful or what is directly the energy base of your consciousness is what is addressed or called as prana.

If you can be comfortable in that neutral zone, be very clear again and again you'll be infused with energy, because that is the energy zone. That neutral zone is what I call Shiva Consciousness, eternal consciousness, bliss space, Ananda Gandha or whatever, samadhi, satori whatever names you wish call as God. These are the different names we give the neutral zone.

If you can be comfortable in that neutral zone, every moment again and again you'll be rejuvenated, flooded with energy. In this lower neutral zone, when the incoming takes an outgoing turn, you are flooded with energy. When the outgoing takes the turn of incoming you are flooded with intelligence.

Please understand, as I was telling you yesterday, incoming breath is life and out going breath is death. This is the life line and this is death line. With the life line you are flooded with energy and with death line you are flooded with intelligence. If you are unaware, you'll miss the energy and you will also miss the intelligence. Every death experience teaches you every time.

One more thing, when I use the word death, I don't mean only physical death. If you loose some money, say suddenly you loose a million dollars, some part of your being is dying and that is why you feel so much of pain. Your identity as a millionaire is dying. Same way, even if you don't have a good relationship with your parents, if they die suddenly you feel emptiness, the pain. I've always seen in Bharat, as long as parents are alive these guys will not give even little water to them, they won't take care of them. The moment they are dead, they'll have beautiful big photographs and put all kinds of food and sweets in front of that photograph and pray.

There's a nice proverb, nice one liner I read, 'As long as the grandfather was alive, he lived only in the out house. The moment he died, he was allowed inside the house as a photograph'. His photograph will stay in the main hall, but he had to stay in the outhouse. You don't feel, even when they are alive, you don't feel so connected to them. But when they are dead you feel the emptiness because something in you is dying. With every such incidence, something in you dies.

If you can be aware, if you are aware of that moment, you will receive intelligence. Every incident teaches you. Be very clear every incident in life teaches you something if you are aware you learn the lesson, or you miss it. Then again the life has to teach you but till you learn, life is not going to leave you.

Be very clear, a small story.

A singer was trying to satisfy the audience. He started singing Carnatic music, Aa, Ee, Oo. After he finished the whole group, the whole audience shouted once more, once more. Again he started. After he finished, again the audience shouted, once more, once more. He thought, Oh! God, people are all enjoying and it went on and on five times. He started to suspect that something strange is happening, anyhow after the sixth time, again the people started shouting once more, once more. Then he asked, are you are all enjoying the song so much.

They said, 'No! Till you sing properly, we are not going to leave you. Till you do at least once song properly, we are not going to let you go'.

Be very clear, till you learn the lesson, life is not going to leave you. If you are aware of the death and birth gap you will be aware when you loose something, when life teaches you something you will be awakened to intelligence.

Let me repeat once more, this technique does not mean that you'll only sit for half an hour and watch the breath incoming and outgoing or outgoing taking turn into incoming. Please understand, it is not just half an hour technique. You'll sit with eyes closed and you'll observe incoming breath, outgoing breath, outgoing breath, and incoming breath. That is the way to start but that is not the complete technique.

When I say be aware of incoming breath taking turn as outgoing breath and outgoing breath taking turn as incoming breath, I mean be aware that you are flooded with energy and intelligence. When you are given life, sometimes even a single desire can bring life to you. Sometimes you are lying on the bed in the weekend and you don't feel like getting out of the bed. Suddenly, you'll remember some friend, somebody's name and you just want to meet him. A single thought, your whole body is alive. You are out of the bed and you just run.

When you are flooded with energy, be aware that is happening in this neutral zone only. Same way, when something is taken away from you, you are flooded with intelligence. If you are losing something, immediately you are given some message and some understanding about the life. Be aware when you are flooded with intelligence. This is intelligence neutral zone; this is energy neutral zone.

When the birth is disappearing into death, when the death is disappearing into birth, be very clear you are flooded with intelligence; energy and intelligence. If you can bring

your awareness to these two zones and the whole day you'll be constantly flooded with energy.

Yesterday, Shiva was teaching us to be aware of this energy. See, yesterday I warned you not to create any strong thoughts or emotional attachments after the meditation because you'll be flooded with energy. Any thought that you create will become alive and you do not have the intelligence to use your viveka, discrimination, to analyze whether it is right or wrong for you.

Now with this meditation, you don't have to control yourself. You'll awaken the intelligence also. When you watch both the gaps, when you are aware of both the gaps, you'll be constantly be flooded with energy and intelligence. If you go little deeper, you'll understand one more important thing. You realize that every moment you have thought and energy.

Zero and one, the whole binary system is based on this only. The whole binary system of zero and one, thought and energy, energy and thought, thought and energy, energy and thought, one after another they follow and both are directly related. Actually, for a moment you'll be flooded with ichha shakti, energy of desire and the next moment you'll be flooded with kriya shakti, energy of action.

One moment you are flooded with energy, next moment you are flooded with intelligence. Constantly, these two are playing the game. This is the game of Shiva and Shakti. This is the whole cosmos, matter and energy. Constantly in your inner space, Shiva and Shakti are dancing; the matter and energy are dancing. If you can be aware of the gap, you'll experience the eternal Consciousness, the Shiva Consciousness.

Ichha and kriya shakti are both dancing in your inner space. If you can be aware of the gap, you'll achieve the gnana shakti, energy of knowledge. Ichha shakti and kriya shakti, both of them are just dancing, the energy is enjoying its self, the energy is expressing itself in your inner space and if you can be little aware of the gap, you'll be flooded with the Divine Consciousness.

Sit in a completely relaxed position and let your body be completely relaxed. Start observing your breath. Start witnessing your breath. Do not increase the length, do not increase your breathing, do not inhale or exhale. Just witness it, let the inhaling and exhaling be normal and natural, just witness. Just observe.

Be aware the incoming breath and the gap and the outgoing breath. Feel your whole body being rejuvenated and alive. You are in a silence that is alive and energetic. You are in energetic silence. You are vibrating with high energy.

Witness the gap between incoming breath and outgoing breath. Just be the witness. Be aware of the gap between the incoming breath and outgoing breath. You may feel you are not breathing at all, witness that also, witness that feeling also.

Witness now the gap between incoming and outgoing breath. You are in Shiva Consciousness.

Be aware the outgoing breath and the gap and the incoming breath. Feel your whole body being filled with intelligence. You are in a silence that is intelligent and energetic. You are in intelligent silence. You are flowing in intelligent energy.

Witness the gap between outgoing breath and incoming breath. Just be the witness. Be aware of the gap between the outgoing breath and incoming breath. You may feel you are not breathing at all, witness that also.

Witness now the gap between outgoing and incoming breaths. You are in Shiva Consciousness.

Now, start witnessing both these gaps. Be aware of the neutral spaces between incoming and outgoing breaths as well as the outgoing and incoming breaths. Be aware of your breath taking a turn between incoming breath and outgoing breath, and again between the outgoing breath and incoming breath. Be aware of both these neutral spaces.

Let you now be immersed in the intelligent cosmic energy. Let you awake into Shiva Consciousness.

Om Shanti, Shanti , Shantihi

Yoga is very much misunderstood term is this age. Yoga is the process of uniting body, mind and spirit. The entire science of yoga as expounded by Patanjali is a holistic combination of different practices that cannot be isolated and practised as techniques. Each of the eight limbs of ashtanga yoga is a part that seamlessly merges into another and makes sense all together. This is what we teach in Nithya Yoga.

Yoga is about adding life to your movements, not adding more movements into your already overcrowded life!

First, let us look at asanas. You will find that those whose aim in life is only to practise asanas are the most egoistic people you can see. They become like body builders and lose the perspective of what they started with. They end up in a situation that even

when the spirit wants to leave the body, the body that they have so assiduously built refuses to let go. They suffer. They are sad people.

Prana is not breath. It is the energy underlying the breath. Breath is the vehicle that carries this precious cargo of energy into your mind body system. Prana is energy. Prana is the energy of your desires. In an impure mind body system prana will inflame and aggravate the negative tendencies, the vasanas and samskaras. These practices were developed in Patanjali's age when people had far less corruption. They had far fewer samskaras.

Now if you practise pranayama without preparation you will enhance the samskaras that are already in you instead of eliminating them, as yoga should help you to do. Practise meditation, dhyana, before you practise pranayama. Practise only such pranayama as would benefit your system. Your Nithya Yoga teachers can advise you on these.

Otherwise pranayama can be like steroids. They temporarily and seemingly can reduce some difficulties that you presently have, but will in the longer term leave you with deep scars.

I do not say do not practise pranayama. I only say that first cleanse yourself before you activate your mind body system with the powerful pranic energy through pranayama.

na vrajen visecchakti-rmarudrupaa vikaasite I nirvikalpatayaa madhye tayaa bhairavarupataa ||

In the middle of that unmoving expanding energy space, be unclutched and witness Shiva Consciousness.

Shiva is taking us into the deeper layers day by day. Today he is taking us to a different dimension. Let's enter into the sutra:

The translation is,

In the middle of that unmoving expanding energy space, be unclutched and witness Shiva Consciousness.

The energy of breath should neither move out nor enter. When the center unfolds by the dissolution of thoughts, be unclutched, then you attain the nature of Bhairava, then one attains the nature of Bhairava.

Again this is also a technique related to breathing. Actually, first nine techniques of Shiva Sutra are related to breathing. First day itself I was explaining that breathing is the right place to start. That is the right place to begin the spiritual practice. There are so many masters who try to work on people on this planet earth. All the religious techniques, the puja, yoga, all of them start with earth, the physical part. Then there are some techniques related to fire, homa, yaga and such techniques to fall in tune with fire. There are also some techniques to fall in tune with ether. But the problem is that when you try straightaway to fall in tune with ether, akasa energy, sometimes you are not subtle enough to enter this subtle energy. You will not be able to grasp it.

Prana, the air, is the right space. Anybody can start from this space. Nobody will miss it. There are many masters who directly try to work on ether. A great master J Krishnamurti worked straightaway on the consciousness. He has always said that 'no technique is necessary, nothing needs to be done'.

The big problem is that he was not able get through because he was talking to people who were far less subtle. To them, listening to J. Krishnamurti became one more ritual, an intellectual ritual.

For 40 years or 50 years people used to go, sit and listen to him since he was a very powerful and logical speaker. His messages went above their heads. It's like he was sitting on the 10th floor and calling 'please come, come, come', but people do not know where the lift is or where the steps are. It's like he's telling you to come, but he has not given you directions.

He says, 'truth is the pathless land'. This is absolutely true. It is the expression of a realized soul. But I tell you, straightaway trying to work on the Consciousness may not help all the individuals.

Here Shiva is trying to work through the breath, through the prana. He is taking us to the same height as he is at, but with directions that work. He is leading us to the same height through proper methods, through proper channels, through proper techniques, by helping us to work on the breath. You are supposed to start where you are. You can only start from where you are located. You can't start where you have to end. You are

supposed to end in consciousness, but you can't start in consciousness because you are not there.

If you are already there, why do you need all this teaching? You don't need anything. You don't need meditation.

Somebody goes to a great yogi and asks, 'Master, I want to learn meditation' Master says, 'No, no, first you have to master the yama, means first you have to practice yama and niyama as described in yoga sutra.'

'What is the yama, niyama?'

'Be truthful, practice brahmacharya, don't steal other's things, live a non-violent life. You have to practice all these things. Only then you can start meditation.'

The disciple asks 'If I can do all these things, why do I need meditation? If I can do all these things already, then why I need to meditate?'

When a master starts placing all his emphasis straightaway working on consciousness, he forgets that a person who can straightaway work on consciousness doesn't need anything. He doesn't need teachers. He doesn't need any help.

You have to start where you are. You can't straightaway think of the goal. Goal is truth. But, you can't start with the goal. Shiva is practical person. I have read thousands of spiritual books. If at all I am asked to choose a single book amongst the thousands, I will choose these Shiva Sutras only. It is the pure essence of the great truths, and not only that, he is so practical. He is taking us to the same height, but step by step. He is beautifully leading us step by step to the highest truth. Today, he is opening up, and declaring the highest truth, but not straightaway, only after preparing us first. With the first two sutras, he has prepared us. Now he is opening up with the truth.

In the middle of that unmoving expanding energy space, be unclutched and witness Shiva Consciousness.

As I was telling you, the other day, a scientist is a person who creates a formula to reproduce the understanding that happened to him in the external world. Master is the person who creates a formula to reproduce the experience that happened to him in the internal space. Scientist is a person who creates a formula to reproduce the intellectual understanding related to the outer world.

For example, Newton saw an apple falling in his garden and all of a sudden he had some understanding. He had the glimpse of truth. Why the apple should fall? If we saw, either we would have picked up and eaten or forget about it. Why unnecessarily think about all those things. Why it falls? Why should it be attracted towards the earth? Anyhow he had some understanding. Why is it falling? He had the glimpse of truth. He created the formula for us also to understand the truth. He created a formula to reproduce the same understanding in us that happened in him regarding the outer world.

Master is a person who creates formula, who creates a technology to reproduce the experience related to the inner world. Here, Shiva is just reproducing the technology to achieve the bhairava consciousness, Shiva consciousness. He says 'one attains the nature of bhairava'. He says 'bhairava rupata'. You achieve me. You achieve the same consciousness in which I am staying. You achieve the Shiva consciousness. You achieve the bhairava consciousness. You become me!

There are so many levels of experience of the ultimate truth that is called mukti or liberation. These are salokya mukti, samepya mukti, sarupya mukti, and Sayujya mukti. Salokya mukti means the state in which you get to live around the master. It's like you stay in the same space in which the master stays. I always tell people, it's like becoming an Ashramite. You live around me. That is the salokya mukti. You enter into his loka, you enter into his world. That is salokya mukti. So lot of problems will be avoided because you don't have to think for your life. He will think for your life. So many things, so many responsibilities are taken over by him. He takes care of you. He takes over your responsibilities.

The next level is samepya mukti. This is living closely around him. I compare and tell people that this is the state of the crew members who always travel with me. That is samepya mukti. You are 24 hours around the master.

Third is sarupya mukti. Sarupya mukti is the state where you take the master's own form. You are in that same form and body language and you do what he does. It's like becoming an Acharya, a Nithya teacher. You do what I do, at least you try to. You become a teacher and start taking classes. This is sarupya mukti. That is why you can see in all the temples that the features of the guardian deities, dwarabalakas, will be almost the same as the main deity. Whatever weapons and accessories that the main deity is carrying, the same weapons and accessories these guardian deities will also carry. If the main deity is wearing naamam, vertical stripes on the forehead, then these guardians will also be wearing naamam. If the main deity is wearing the kumkumam, the red dot, the dwarabalakas also will be wearing kumkumam. This is sarupya mukti. They achieve the same swarupa. They are in that same rupa. That is sarupya mukti.

The next, last, and ultimate is sayujya mukti. You achieve his consciousness. You achieve master's consciousness. You become him. You start staying in the same space where he is staying. You achieve the same consciousness. Shiva doesn't believe in the

other three levels of mukti. He doesn't believe in salokya, he doesn't believe in samepya, he doesn't believe in sarupya. Straightaway, he takes us to sayujya. He gives us the techniques to reach the sayujya state. Beautifully he says, 'bhairava rupataa'. You achieve the same consciousness in which I am staying. You achieve the same space in which I exist. You achieve the Shiva consciousness. You become me!

The key in this whole sutra is 'be unclutched'. Shiva, straightaway comes to the subject. But sometimes I don't go straightaway into the subject because I need to prepare your mind. Shiva is speaking to Devi, but I am speaking to you. That is why I am not straightaway entering into the subject. Our mind is too much bothered about matter. Unless I prepare your mind, you don't start listening to the truth. It takes a lot of time for us to come and settle down into the hall itself. Be very clear, you may be sitting in the hall but you have not settled down into the hall. You may be sitting in the hall. It takes at least 20 minutes for you to settle down into the hall. I have always seen. At least 20 minutes. That is why I am not entering into the sutra. I am just playing.

Shiva is speaking to Devi, so he doesn't have to use more words. He doesn't need jokes. Throughout this book, not even a single joke! Not even a single small story! That is because he is speaking to Devi. She is already completely settled. There is no need for any story. There is no need for any jokes. She is straightaway concerned only about the essence. Actually, in our case, we are too much concerned about too many other peripheral things, and we miss the essence. We just miss the spirit.

One yuppie stopped his BMW on the highway and opened the door. Suddenly, another car came and crashed into his. The door was completely ripped out. The yuppie started screaming. Police came, and the yuppie started weeping 'See what has happened to my car!' The officer looked at him and starting shouting 'You yuppies don't care about your life. You bother only about your materialistic things. Don't you see, your left hand is missing?' That guy looked at his left hand and screamed 'Oh my God! What happened to my Rolex watch?"

'What happened to my Rolex watch?'

Again he is only bothered about the matter. Now we are too much engrossed in the matter. We forget the life itself. That's the reason I first try to settle down before entering into the sutra. If you missed your Rolex watch it's OK you can get another, but you can't get another hand. You missed the BMW, it's OK, but you can't get your life. If you miss the introduction it's OK, but you can't miss the sutra itself.

If straightaway I start talking on the sutra, you will miss the sutra, because your mind takes little time. Just the other day one of our devotees was suggesting 'Swamiji, you should start the silent satsang (spiritual gathering).' It is true, I can sit in silence, but you can't. If I sit in silence you will start talking inside your head. Actually, I can convey much more beautifully and the transmission of energy can happen much better if I am in silence. If I am sitting here in silence, much more can happen in you then through speaking.

People ask me 'Swamiji, I don't know English, can I attend your meditation program'. I tell them, 'only you are qualified to attend, don't miss the chance.' There are so many people who come from France, who don't know English, who come from South America who only know Spanish or Portuguese, all these people, they come and ask me through translators, ' I don't understand English, can I attend your program?' I tell them 'you are the only person qualified. Don't miss that chance.' Those who understand English think they understand, that's all. And they will constantly be trying to get the meaning out of the words that I am expressing.

Let you be very clear, you can never understand anything, because I myself don't understand. I know for sure I am not speaking what I want to speak. I am not expressing what I want to express because words are too small to express these truths. Words are too small. You can't express through words. If you don't understand, at least you'll be clear that you have not understood. If you think you have understood, really you are missing. But I can't be in silence. I can't be in silence because if I don't speak you will start speaking in your head. At least you will be a little silent if I start speaking. I am speaking so that you will be silent. If I am silent, you will start speaking. That's the reason I don't do silent satsangs.

Of course, at the higher level, when people are really mature, I do sit with them. In teacher's training, sometime I sit with them even 10 hours silently. Not even a single word. Not even single word is shared. Not only are no words shared, nobody even thinks. Nobody even bothers about talking. We have Nithyanandam programs. It is a 15 days program. 18 hours each day people sat with me. Neither they felt that they needed to speak, nor I felt I needed to tell them anything. At deeper levels you will be able to sit silently. In the initial level, you won't be able to sit. If I stop teaching, you will start speaking in your head. You may not speak with others, but you will start speaking with yourself. And it is better even if you misunderstand. It's ok, at least in the end I can give you a little clarity.

One more small story.

One lady was speaking to her next-door neighbor. She was telling her 'Today I started my day beautifully, I really feel good. I gave $5 to a bum.'

Neighbor asked '5 dollars? It's too much. Your husband didn't say anything about it? What did he say about it?'

'He just said thanks, and left!'

First you may miss what I am saying. At least at the punch line, you may get what I want to express. With the first line you may miss what I want to say, but with the punch line, you will catch what I want to express. That's the reason I am continuously speaking.

All right, it is time and let us enter into the sutra. I request all of you to be totally attentive. Please sit straight so that you won't miss. Here, Shiva is taking us word by word to the deepest experience. I tell you, one thing, if you can be aware the next one hour, if you don't miss a single word, I promise there's every possibility of liberation. You don't need to practice this meditation because this meditation doesn't need to be practiced. The very understanding will lead to experience. He leads you step-by-step into your core. Every word takes you to the next layer, and he's showing you the very nature of your being, to the core of your being. He is trying to express it. It is better if you don't close your eyes.

Usually if you close your eyes, you may think you are listening, but slowly you are lost. Moreover, I express more in body language than through words. So when you are listening to audio discourse, you can close your eyes, but when you are listening directly from the Master, sit with full awareness.

Ramakrishna always says, 'whenever I go to an extreme state, whenever I go to the level of expressing the truth, I feel suddenly that somebody is choking my throat'. Only to a certain extent, I am able to express. After that I feel that somebody is choking my throat. I am not able to say what I want to say. When I first read this about Ramakrishna I felt how can this be true? Who can choke your throat? How can you say you cannot express what you want to express. I didn't believe, but really now I am able to believe. Now I am able to experience what Ramakrishna means.

There are some things, when you try to express it through words, put it through words, so much comes up that a big traffic jam happens in the throat. The traffic jam of the truth happens in your throat. Your vak, energy of communication, loses the power to express. If one or two things are to be expressed, then your vak is alive, active. You can express. But if there are so many things ready to be expressed they crowd the passage. When the passage is overcrowded with the truths and the traffic jam of truths happens, you really feel your vak is too small.

Vak means the power to express. The ability to express is too small to tell the truth, to communicate it adequately. To tell you honestly, I am really feeling the same thing now. The vak is too small. The power to express is too small to express this great truth that Shiva is expressing in the sutra. So I may try to express it inch by inch, little by little, and layer by layer. Please be attentive for the next one hour. The understanding will

lead you to the deepest experience of your being. And there is every possibility you will be liberated in that very moment of understanding.

In the middle of that unmoving expanding energy space, witness Bhairava and be unclutched.

Then one attains the Shiva consciousness.

You don't need to even practice this technique. All you need to do is just be aware of this technique. There are some techniques that you need to learn and practice to experience. There are some techniques in which the very understanding takes you to that level, takes you to that depth when you suddenly see that you are experiencing. In Vedanta, there are three levels. The first is sravana, which means understanding the technique by listening to it. Next is manana, which is meditating on it, contemplating, and practicing it. Finally it is nidhityasana, which is expressing the truth.

You need three steps to internalize, which are understanding, practicing and expressing. Here, with this technique you don't need the three steps. The very understanding simply liberates you because he's taking us to such a deep level, to the depth of your being. He's taking us to the core. He's taking us to a different space that I call the 'Zen Zone'. Zen zone means the zone in which already you are liberated. It is the zone in which you are unclutched. It is the zone in which you exist as you are. He's taking us to the zone beautifully without any practice. As far as this technique is concerned, the very understanding is enough. You will suddenly wake up realizing, 'Yes, I am in that state'. Nothing else needs to be done. He's taking us to that zone.

The energy of breath should neither move out nor enter.

Yesterday I was explaining how to be relaxed or to feel comfortable in the neutral space. We feel comfortable with incoming breath or outgoing breath but we don't feel comfortable with the neutral space. That is why you just jump the neutral space. You don't give your attention to neutral space. Whenever the neutral space comes, you say 'quit', and you jump. Whenever the neutral space comes, you do fast-forwarding. You just fast forward it. Continuously you are fast-forwarding the neutral space. When you sit and watch a movie, if you don't like some scenes, you fast-forward it. You just jump. Same way, whenever the neutral space comes you jump and you fast-forward.

Yesterday I was asking you to feel a little comfortable with the neutral space, in the neutral zone. Now he is taking us to a different depth. He says you don't even have to feel comfortable with the neutral zone. Just understand you have neutral zone and relax. Whether you want or not, you are going to have neutral zone. Even if you do fast-forwarding or jump, the neutral-zone is your nature. Every moment, the neutral-zone is going to happen in you. That space is happening in you. The neutral space is constantly happening in you. Even if you avoid, the neutral space is happening in you.

He says:

In the middle of that unmoving expanding energy space, be unclutched and witness Shiva Consciousness.

Let me explain how your mind is moving and how you are thinking. First, in all the sutras so far he has spoken only about breath. He never used the word mind. First time he is bringing that word. First time Shiva is introducing the mind. First time he is bringing the word mind and first time he is uttering the word nirvikalpataya. This means, be unclutched. It is the state in which you don't have any vikalpa. You don't connect and see. Vikalpa means connecting the kalpana, imaginations*. Nirvikalp*a refers to the space where you don't connect anything. Kalpa itself means 'connecting' or 'imagining'. Imagining is what meant by the word kalpa. Here, he says nirvikalpa, where you don't connect. You are unclutched.

Let me just explain how you think, how you think you are thinking.

I am describing this zone. I am describing only this zone. This zone I describe in a detailed way, at a much deeper level. This is the close-up view. Shiva is taking us little further, so I am giving you the close-up view. This is what I call 'neutral-space'.

Every moment, every kshana, again and again you experience this neutral space. Constantly it is happening in you. Whenever your incoming breath turns around as outgoing breath or outgoing breath turns around as incoming breath, this neutral space is happening in you every moment. You are constantly changing gears. Whenever you change gears you have to go into neutral space. Let you be very clear, if you are constantly changing gears, this also means that constantly you are unclutched. Every moment you are unclutched.

Now one more thing you need to understand. Yesterday I was telling you that because you don't feel comfortable with this space you just fast-forward over it. You jump over it. You jump from here to there. You do not give your attention to this space. You give attention to this space and that space, but not to the neutral space. You give attention to the incoming breath and the outgoing breath. You don't give attention to the neutral space. You just jump. You fast-forward. You jump the neutral space. That is why you

feel this gap of breaths is more and this gap of neutral space is less. That is why you feel the incoming breath time and outgoing breath time is more than neutral spaces.

One important thing you should know. You may think the incoming breath time and the outgoing breath time is more than the neutral space, but in actuality they are not more. The times are the same. You need to understand now about time.

According to the Western mind time is chronological. Time is measured in seconds. According to Eastern mind, let me say the Eastern 'no mind' understanding, according to the Eastern sages time is psychological, it is not chronological. Kshana is not equivalent to a second. Please be very clear, in Vedic system, we measure time with the unit called kshana. Kshana is not the same as a second. Kshana is the gap between one thought and another thought. Kshana means the gap between thoughts.

Please understand, if you can follow, if you can come a little deeper into this sutra, Shiva is straightaway showing you the ultimate truth of your very nature. Shiva doesn't believe in changing your activities. He believes in changing your belief about yourself. He doesn't bother about your activities.

Throughout this book, not even a single statement of morality is given. He doesn't say speak the truth; he doesn't say be non-violent; he doesn't say be a celibate; nothing of that sort. He doesn't give a single moral injunction. He doesn't give you a single instruction. He straightaway shakes your core, changes your idea about yourself. He just shakes and changes the idea that you carry about yourself. Done. Over.

He doesn't believe in cutting the branches. He straightaway removes the root. He goes straight to the root. Then naturally morality will flower in you. That's why I say that Shiva is the only solution for the modern day. He doesn't speak ill about anything. He never says what you should do or what you should not do. He gives no rules at all. He says just do it.

Let me tell you that rules make you schizophrenic. If you are interested in becoming schizophrenic, if you want bipolar disorder, start practicing some rules and regulations. It is a direct method for madness. With rules nothing sensible can be done.

With the truth you don't need to do anything; simply the whole thing will start expressing itself. Shiva just changes your idea about yourself. See, the moment your idea about yourself changes, you start existing in a different consciousness, altogether in a different space. Nothing needs to be done. No teachings are necessary to control you.

All teachings are like the police. They are just cops who are sitting inside you. Teachings are nothing but cops who are sitting inside your brain. Here, there is no reason to give you any teaching. Just this single understanding is enough.

Just this single understanding is enough; your idea about yourself will be completely changed. The moment your idea about you changes, there is no need for any morality, any teaching; you will simply start expressing the morality. You don't bother about anything else.

If you are given morality, if you are given teachings, you will be constantly bothered about the other half. For example, if you are asked not to do something, you will be constantly thinking about that only. If you are a grihasta, a householder, you will constantly be fantasizing about sanyas or monastic life.

People think about me, 'What a beautiful life he is leading. You see, it is a liberated life. See, he goes all over the world. People are always bowing down to him. When he says something people listen.' And if you are a swami, a monk, you just fantasize about the other zone. 'I think am I missing something. I don't know what all is going on in life.' On both the sides you will be missing something about the other half.

Of course, a paramahamsa is not a mere swami or sanyasi, be very clear. Paramahamsa is a person who has experienced the truth of his being, who is beyond the four ashramas of brahmacharya, grihasta, vanaprasta and sanyas; celibate, householder, forest dweller and monk. He is beyond all these four ashramas. Only then he is called paramahamsa. Any one else will always be bothered about the other half.

A small story:

A seven year old boy was taken to the psychiatrist because he was not eating. Doctor made him to sit and after one hour slowly he said 'whatever you want you can eat, please start eating something; have something'

The boy said 'I want to eat worms'.

He ordered a plate of worms and some worms were brought.

The boy said 'I don't want a plateful, I want only one'

The doctor threw away all but one worm.

The boy said "now, cut it in half"

It was cut into halves.

Then the boy said 'now, you eat one half. You eat half, only then I'll eat'

Finally, the poor doctor since he had to do something somehow swallowed one half.

Then the boy started crying "Oh, no, you ate my half!"

Be very clear, if you are stuck with rules, you will be bothering always about the other half. You will be missing the other half.

Here, Shiva is not giving you any rules. He is just taking you step by step to the core of your being, and giving you the clarity, you are not what you think. You are not what you are thinking as you.

Now you need to understand the circle. There is the neutral space. This is the incoming breath. This is the outgoing breath. For you to understand, I expressed this as more space and this as less space, but Shiva says that this is not so. Both spaces are the same because the gap between one breath and the other breath is the same as the breath itself.

The gap between one thought and another thought is the same. Be very clear, kshana means the gap between one thought and the other thought. It is not one second as you think.

Gap between this thought and the next thought is what he calls as kshana. He says further that whether you give your attention or not, this space and that space, the NS the neutral space and the incoming or outgoing breath, all spaces are equal. We think that the breathing space is more because we give too much of attention to it. Even if you give much more attention to it, the space is not more.

Let me give you one small example. If you are sitting with somebody with whom you feel completely comfortable and in tune, you are just relaxed. Even if two or three hours pass you will not know how time flew. Suddenly you realize, 'Oh, god, it is already 8 o'clock. I have to run. I have so much of work.'

On the other hand, if you are sitting with somebody with whom you don't feel comfortable or with whom you don't feel relaxed, every five minutes what you will do; you will look at your watch. And you will say 'What is happening? Did my watch stop or what? Don't you have any other work?'

If the number of thoughts is more it is hell. If the number of thoughts is less you are in heaven. Be very clear, if the number of thoughts are more chronologically it seems to be the same time, but psychologically you feel time is more. It is because you give more attention here you think you have more thoughts here and you think this space is more than neutral space.

You think that the breathing space, breathing time is more than the neutral space. Please understand, this is because you think you are having more thoughts. Because you think you are interested in thinking. Because you give more emphasis to your identity you may think that the time of incoming breath and outgoing breath is more

than the time of neutral space; but in reality it is not. It is just a psychological game. The kshana of breathing space and the kshana of neutral space are one and the same. .

Because you are having too many thoughts, you think this breathing space is more, but in reality this space is not more. Do note that you also miss the depth of this space. Here in the incoming breath space you have identity. In outgoing breath also you have identity. In both you have identities. Identity is the space that you know. However, in the neutral space you don't have identity. The big problem is that when there is an identity you are able to connect and see all the identities. You connect and see. Let you be very clear. Let me explain to you this way.

Between the incoming breath and the outgoing breath is the neutral space NS. Your identity exists in the incoming and outgoing breath spaces. Constantly you can connect and see you are connected. But because in this gap, this gap of neutral space your identity does not exist, you don't connect the gaps; so you jump over this gap.

For example, the thought which came to you 10 minutes ago, the thought which came to you 10 years ago and thought which came to you 20 years ago are all independent of one another. They are independent, unclutched and separate thoughts. But thoughts have got identity. Because they have identity you connect them and see.

The thought that happened 10 minutes ago is number one. Thought that happened a year ago is number two. The thought that happened 10 years ago is number three. You can connect all of them because they have identity. However, the gap between thoughts that happened 10 minutes ago, the gap between thoughts that happened 1 year ago and the gap between thoughts that happened 10 years ago are not connected because they lack identity; you don't connect them and see that you are constantly experiencing gaps.

Let me put it in a little deeper way, in a little subtler way. The depression that you had 10 years ago, the depression that you suffered 7 years ago, the depression that you suffered 3 years ago and the depression that you had yesterday are all independent, individual, unconnected thought shafts. But because they are thought shafts, you start connecting all of them and create the shaft of depression. You have an idea that your life is depression.

'For last 10 years I am suffering with depression, Swamiji'. You create a big shaft. You take all these unconnected, unclutched pieces. Each bit is a small unclutched bit. You just take all the unclutched bits. You connect all these small bits and create a big shaft.

Be very clear, the pain which you had 10 years ago, the pain that you had 9 years ago, the pain that you experienced 7 years ago, the pain that you experienced 3 years ago, and the pain that you experienced yesterday are all unconnected, independent, individual thought shafts. You connect all these thought shafts and create one big shaft; then you start thinking and you start believing that 'life is pain'.

The joy that you experienced 10 years ago, the joy that you experienced 9 years ago, the joy that you experienced 3 years ago and the joy that you experienced 1 year ago are all independent, individual, unconnected thought shafts. Now you connect all of those thoughts and create a big shaft of joy.

In life, the only thing that you do is either creating the shaft of pain or creating the shaft of joy. When it comes to the shaft of pain you try to stop it. When it comes to the shaft of joy you try to enlarge it. But you don't understand that you can neither enlarge the shaft nor stop the shaft; simply because the shaft itself doesn't exist.

The shaft is not there for you to enlarge or stop. The very shaft is your imagination. It is an imaginary connection. Please understand that this connection is just imaginary. Whether you want or not, in every moment there is an unclutched space. You are unclutched. You are unconnected. You are an unclutched shaft but just because of your imagination or fear of losing identity you create constant connection to maintain your identity. This identity or this connection is imaginary.

For example if it is a pain shaft with the pain experience 10 years ago, the pain experience 1 year ago and the pain experience 10 minutes ago, you connect all of them in your mind. Through your imagination you connect them and create a pain shaft. If it is a bliss or joy shaft, the joy that happened 10 years ago, the joy that happened 1 year ago, the joy that happened 10 minutes ago, you connect them through imagination and create joy shaft.

If it is a pain shaft you try to stop it. If it is a joy shaft you try to increase it. You don't understand that you can neither stop the shaft nor enlarge the shaft because this shaft does not exist. Whether you see it or not it is pure imaginary shaft. It is a purely imaginary shaft whether of pain or bliss. Whether it is a pain shaft or joy shaft you can neither stop it nor enlarge it because the shaft doesn't exist.

Just write for 10 minutes whatever thoughts come to your mind without any editing; do not touch them up, just write whatever comes out and then read. You will suddenly realize that all your thoughts are unconnected, irresponsible, completely unclutched, illogical and independent thoughts.

Be very clear, your first thought and your second thought are no way connected. There is no logical connection. There is no responsible connection. There is no link between the first thought and the second thought. If you just write whatever comes in your mind for 10 minutes and try to read that paper, suddenly you will ask: what is happening with me?

For example, if you see a dog on the street you get the same fear that you had when you were a young boy. Next moment you start thinking about your childhood and the dogs that you were afraid of in your childhood. Third, you start thinking of your childhood days. Then you start remembering the teacher who taught you. Then you remember

the place where your teacher had his house. Logically, the dog that you saw on the street and your teacher are not connected at all. Of course, both of them have barked at you; that is different. But logically they are not connected. See from where your mind starts and where it ends.

Just write down, pen down whatever you think for 10 minutes without editing and read that paper. Suddenly you will realize that all your thoughts are unconnected, independent, illogical, irresponsible and completely unclutched thoughts. They have no connection. Logically they are not connected at all. By your very nature, you are unclutched.

The whole social training is to make you believe that you have continuity of thoughts. Society constantly trains you to hold onto either the shaft of pain or the shaft of pleasure. If you start believing the shaft of pain, you will spend your whole life trying to stop that shaft and waste your life. If you start believing in the shaft of pleasure, you will spend your whole life trying to enlarge that shaft and destroy your life.

The one and only maya, illusion, is in believing that your thoughts are connected. That is the only illusion. Let me be very clear and honest. Whatever spiritual techniques you may practice, whatever meditation techniques or anything else that you may practice to enlarge this shaft, let me tell you that you will never be successful.

Please understand, I am saying the truth. I did what all need not be done and so have the right to tell you what can be done and what needs to be done. I have done things that were not necessary; this is why I say I have the right to say what is necessary. Whole day and night I would chant; actually after some time even when I am sleeping I am able to rotate that mala. Even if I was sleeping, one part of my mind was constantly moving those beads. By constantly repeating you are trying to create a shaft; it may be of pleasure or what you think as pleasure or what you believe as pleasure.

See, at some point when you suddenly entered into some new experience you must have felt joy by singing 'Rama Krishna' or 'Govinda' or 'Shiva' or some name. You must have felt some ecstasy. You are trying to reproduce that ecstasy by repeating that mantra; then the whole experience disappears. It is just like the way a person feels really happy and blissful when he dates and he then tries to reproduce that experience by marrying. Now you will understand. Now you understand what I mean. It is the same thing; exactly the same experience.

See, you feel joy when you are dating because you experience the gap. You experience the unclutched state. You feel the joy when you are singing that name or chanting some mantra at some moment because you relax in that unclutched space. It is not because you are repeating the mantra but because of the unclutched space. Suddenly, somehow you fall on that NS, neutral space. That is the reason you experience joy. When you try to make it as a ritual all you will have is depression.

Let me be very clear, however many years you may practice you can never make your mind concentrate on anything. Let me be open and clear. I tried my best. I spent years. I was not able to concentrate. Only two things happen. You either suffer with the shaft and die or realize that you are unclutched by your very nature.

The shaft doesn't exist by your very nature. There are only two choices. No other choices. You can never enlarge that shaft or stop that shaft because that shaft doesn't exist. The connection itself is imaginary. How will you fight with the imaginary enemy? If you have the shaft, you can enlarge or stop, but the shaft doesn't exist.

The shaft is purely your belief. The pain that you had 9 years ago, the pain that you had 10 years ago and the pain that you had 20 years ago are independent and separate incidents. When you start connecting them and try to create logic and try to create an understanding, then you create the shaft that 'life is pain'.

When you try to generalize your experiences you create a shaft of pain or joy. The moment you start believing in the shaft of pain or in the shaft of joy you have created hell for yourself. Then you will always be behind that shaft, either to enlarge or to stop.

Your whole life is nothing but playing with the shaft which doesn't exist. That is what Sankara means when he says 'life is maya'. Maya literally expands into 'ya ma iti maya'; meaning that which does not exist. You are fighting with a thing that doesn't exist. You are just fighting with imaginary shafts. You are trying to stop or enlarge the shaft that does not exist.

Let me be very clear, whatever techniques you practice to stop this shaft without understanding that the shaft itself does not exist, you will never be successful. Once you have this single understanding then you don't need any technique. This very understanding is a technique. You are liberated. With this very understanding any simple technique can liberate you. Without this understanding no technique can help you.

I have seen people chanting, 'Rama Krishna Govinda' or some such thing for years. Not years but decades, all they had is decay, nothing else; nothing else. See the people who chant sahasranama, the Lord's thousand and eight names. After a few minutes they will be singing the number; they will look at whether they have reached 200 or 300. What are they doing?

Honestly, tell me, is there any single person who doesn't look at the number when he chants sahasranama? I can't believe any one can do it without peeking at how far they have progressed. I know, because I have done it! I am talking the insider's view. It's not that I have not done it. I am speaking the insider's viewpoint. And nothing can be done about it.

A small story,

One young novice brahmachari, an initiate, young guy, he goes to an old monk and asked, 'Master, how can I control negative thoughts? How to get rid of these lustful thoughts? How long does it take to get rid of these lustful thoughts?'

The old monk says 'How long? I don't know how long it takes to stop, but not surely until 90'

So, be very clear, how long it takes I don't know, but even if you practice 90 years, you cannot concentrate. You mind cannot concentrate. No technique will help you unless you have this understanding. With this understanding there is no need for any other technique. Even if you practice a simple technique with this understanding such as lifting your hand or talking to somebody or just sitting quietly, you will be liberated.

This understanding is the base for the whole spiritual journey. All your thoughts are completely unconnected, independent, illogical, and irresponsible. Above all, they are unclutched.

If you write down your thoughts for just 10 minutes you will understand. Your thoughts are completely mixed up; sometimes good, sometimes bad, sometime this and sometime that. You don't know what is happening. You can always see that even in the peak of joyful moment there will be one negative thought and you try to think 'no, no, no, I should not think about this all this time. Let me divert my thoughts.'

Even in the time of some deep negative problem you will suddenly have a positive thought. Even in deep suffering you will have some positive thoughts; even in the worst suffering you will have some unconnected joyful thought. Even in the peak of joy you will have some unconnected negative thought.

By your very nature, you are unconnected. You are unclutched. When you start believing you are clutched by your imaginations and when you start believing you are connected and you start connecting the thought that happened to you 10 years ago, the thought that happened to you 7 years ago and the thought that happened to you 3 years ago and you try build the shaft, you are creating an idea about yourself.

You start creating an idea about yourself and you start creating an identity. The moment you create an identity, you have created a state of hell for yourself. You will try to work constantly to improve that identity. If you think that identity is painful you will constantly be trying to make it better. If you think that identity is beautiful you will constantly work to better it. The moment you try to create an identity, be it pain shaft or bliss shaft you have created hell for yourself. You can neither enlarge the shaft, nor stop the shaft because the shaft just doesn't exist.

The shaft doesn't exist. Every moment you spend in trying to improve your identity and your personality is a waste of time; all this self development is pure rubbish. Your

self cannot be developed. You are completely unclutched. You may be given an idea that your self is being developed.

Let you be very clear. Because you carry one thought that your self is not good, I can just take away that understanding and give you one more understanding that your self is beautiful. You are instantly developed.

I always tell people, people come and ask me 'Swamiji, how do you heal us? You take away so many negativities, so many karmas, how do you heal us, please tell us Swamiji.'

Now I tell you clearly the whole business secret, let you all be very clear. The very first thought that you have, the idea of body mind is by itself is an illusion. When you come with that illusion then you have some pain or some disease, I just take away that illusion and give you one more illusion you are healed, that's all. I just take away the illusion that you have disease and give you another illusion that you are healed. You are so strongly attached with the first illusion that you naturally get attached to the second replacement illusion and become alright, that's all; nothing else.

Please understand first that the thought that you have a body itself is an illusion by itself. That's the first thought shaft that you create and suffer as a result. Now, neither do I stop that shaft nor I enlarge that shaft because neither can be done. I just add one more shaft that 'you are healed'. And now you struggle with this new shaft. You leave the old shaft and you catch hold of this new shaft. Of course, you think that this is little better shaft. You are made to believe that this shaft is little better shaft.

One guy says, 'I was rich, now I am poor, I feel richness is better.' Same way, you were healthy and then you suffered with disease. You believed the health shaft is much better, so I just take that disease shaft away from your space and insert the wellness shaft, that's all, nothing else. The new idea about yourself straightaway creates your new body.

Let me tell you another personal experience.

I lived in the forests of Central Bharat during the days when I wandered as a monk. I lived with some tribal people for a while. I saw once that they erected a new hut in one corner of the village. A pregnant woman went into it in the morning and after a few hours came out with a baby. Then they celebrated. I was within hearing distance of this hut and there was no screaming, nothing at all. Then the woman came out with the new born baby.

I asked one of the elders in surprise as to how the delivery took place with no pain at al. in did not hear the woman utter any noise.

He was surprised at this question. 'Pain, what pain?' he asked, 'Why should a pregnant woman feel pain while delivering a baby?'

In that culture there was no conditioning. There was no connection between delivery of a baby and pain. This amazed me till I understood how this happened.

Recently, I read a beautiful book by Dr. Bruce Lipton called Biology of Belief. He says clearly 'your body is not controlled by cells and tissues as you are made to believe. Your body is controlled by your positive and negative emotions and your belief systems'.

Be very clear, he says very clearly that your body is created and controlled by your thoughts and not by cells or tissues. If you believe that you have disease, you create a disease body. When you are made to believe you are healed you start creating the healthy body. It is purely the shaft with which you are playing, nothing else. Nothing else is there. You first play with that shaft and then you play with this shaft.

That is why I tell you that in every gap you create your body. In every gap, in every neutral space you create a new body. But if you again and again bring your old identity, you will be again creating the same old body. Biologists say that once in every 6 months you have a new liver; not even a single cell or atom of the old liver exists in you now. Once in every 21 days your whole intestine becomes new. Your whole body is replaced within one year.

Whatever body you had a year ago you don't even have a single cell from that body today. It is completely new. 'Then why are we carrying the same diseases, Swamiji?' you may ask. When you believe that you are same person and when you believe that you have the same identity you also carry the same disease.

When you bring the same old identity, by your faith, by your imagination, by your connection and by creating the thought shaft, you also bring the same body. You reproduce the same body that you had one year ago. Constantly you are creating your body. If you create the same personality by connecting and creating the shaft, you will create the same body.

If you start experiencing the truth that by your very nature you are illogical, irresponsible, independent, unconnected and unclutched, you will start creating a new, alive and fresh body, like that of a child. Kids are so alive because every moment they create a new body. They are not stuck with a shaft so they don't have any idea about themselves.

That is the reason why even if yesterday you fought with them, today they will be smiling at you and they will be laughing. They don't carry records in their minds. They don't carry identity. They don't have shafts. They do not connect with

yesterday's fight, day before yesterday's fight and the fight that happened one month ago. They are free from the shaft.

Now, Shiva says, very clearly,

When the energy of breath neither moves out nor enters, meaning it is neither incoming nor outgoing and when the center unfolds by the dissolution of thoughts, meaning when the neutral space is happening in you, become unclutched.

Realize that you are already unclutched. This thought and that thought don't have any logical connection. Except for your belief that you think that they are connected nothing else is working against you.

People come and ask me 'Swamiji, how to break my habits?' Be very clear, 2 days ago you were smoking, 10 year ago you were smoking, or 20 years ago you were smoking. All these three incidents are completely independent. They are not connected. Mentally, when you start connecting, when you start believing that you have the habit of smoking and that you are addicted to it, this is the belief that creates a shaft.

You then start fighting with the shaft that doesn't exist. Understand this one truth. The shaft that you create doesn't exist. You connect the smoking of 10 years ago, 9 years ago, the smoking of 3 years ago and how you smoked yesterday. You connect all these and create a thought shaft, a belief system that you have the smoking habit and that you are addicted to it. Then you start fighting with it.

If you believe it is joyful experience you continue to smoke more and more. If you believe it's a painful experience you start fighting with that shaft. Either way you don't win.

Even if you believe that smoking is joyful, try to smoke without restraint and see for yourself how you feel. When you smoke and inhale it can never be a pleasurable experience. It is not joyful. You can see this in your own life.

The definition of addiction is this. If you don't do it you will feel terrible that you are missing something. If you do it you won't feel the joy. If you do it, it will not be great; it is mechanical. If you don't, you will feel that you are missing it. If you start believing that smoking is joyful, if you don't smoke you will miss it.

When you do smoke, in that moment, see what is happening in your inner space. You are not enjoying anything; you are just trying to escape from something. You are just running. You are restless, that's all. You are not relaxing. You just believe that smoking is joyful. Even if you don't feel joyful when you are smoking, you try to squeeze joy out of it. You try hard to squeeze joy out of it.

See, deeply scan and screen your life to see whatever you think as joy even if you don't feel joy. Whether it is sex or greed or taste, any pleasure, even if you don't feel the same joy as you perhaps felt the first time, you try to squeeze joy out of it. You try to console yourself 'no, no, this is joy. What else is joy?' You try to cover the frustration by your belief that it is joy. You try to cover the frustration that it is not joy. You are not ready to believe it is not. You want to believe it is joy.

Same way, if you decide something is pain, if you start believing something is pain, even if it is not painful, you try to force yourself, you try to imagine, you convince yourself it is pain and continue to struggle.

Whether it is the habit of addiction or the concepts of joy or concepts of pain, everything is purely unconnected, unclutched and illogical thought shafts. You connect them. Now you have a tremendous fear 'If this is true, how I can live? My whole life is messed up now. Some thoughts are coming, some thoughts are going.'

Please be very clear, because you believe some thoughts are connected and that they are joy, you start giving life only to those thoughts. If you believe some thoughts are painful, you try to take energy away from those thoughts. You are not able to live your whole life, you are choosing with which part to live. You are breaking your life into parts. You are choosing.

If you understand that you are unclutched and that you are full of independent, illogical, unconnected and unclutched thought shafts, suddenly you will feel deep integrity in yourself. Suddenly you will feel that you are elevated to a different plane. Suddenly you will feel a discipline happening in you that doesn't need to be monitored.

You don't need supervision and rules. You don't need any balancing. You are flowing in a totally different way. As of now, you are afraid. 'If it is true that I am unclutched and unconnected, then what for am I running? Then where am I running? What for I am going? What for I am living? What is exactly happening? Then how will I live my life?'

Tremendous fear rises in you. You start thinking, 'if I am unclutched, how will I go back and do my work? How will I go back and live my life? Somebody may take away my property. Physically, I may be swindled, and mentally, I may lose my balance, I may start doing anything and everything, because I am unclutched, unconnected.'

Be very clear, these are fears created by your mind. Your mind never allows you to trust yourself. The moment you trust the gap, the neutral space, you will lose respect for the thought shafts. You can have trust either in the thought shaft or in the neutral space. Both the neutral space and the shafts influence you. If you trust the neutral space, then you won't be able to trust the shaft. If you trust the shaft, then you won't be able to trust the neutral space.

From a young age, through your school, college, university and office, everyone has taught you to trust the thought shaft and to develop the thought shafts, work on the thought shafts. You call this self-development. Now you know the meaning of the self-development. Constantly you are taught to work on yourself and on your thought shafts that do not exist. Even if you try to develop yourself, even if you attend thousands of seminars, unless you understand this truth, your self can never be developed.

You cannot develop the shaft that you think constitutes the self because it doesn't exit. How can you develop anything if it doesn't exist? It is purely your imagination. Somebody asked me, 'Then how do we feel so good when we go to these self-development courses, Swamiji?' You have the idea that you have low self-esteem and they just take away those words and give you new words. It is just the feel-good factor, nothing else.

Somebody goes to Ramana Maharishi, "Bhagavan, I'm so happy to see this Arunachala, I'm in heaven, the moment I see this Arunachala this whole beautiful energy field and space."

Bhagavan says "Be here for three days, everything will become alright".

Three days after the self development course you are back to normal. That is what it is. All these are feel good factors, nothing else. Do not be cheated by the feel good factor. Please understand the truth, the reality, as it is.

By your very nature, you are unclutched, unconnected, illogical, random and independent thought shafts. When you understand this, suddenly you will see that witnessing consciousness is rising in you.

When you understand you are neither this space nor that space, when you understand you are neither the incoming breath nor the outgoing breath, when you understand you are neither the breathing space, nor the neutral space, you will realize that you are just this paper where both are written and when you understand you are neither the pain shaft nor the bliss shaft, then suddenly you realize you are the witnessing consciousness in which the whole drama is being played.

When you understand you are neither this shaft nor that shaft, suddenly you wake up to the reality that on you all these shafts are drawn. You realize you are not the movie that is being played but that you are just the screen on which the movie is going on. If you are engrossed, if you are completely lost in the movie you forget the screen.

When you open up, when you wake up you realize that you are not the movie but that you are the screen on which this movie is getting played. Your mind will never allow you to believe that you are unclutched because of two things: Whatever you possess as your identity, your outer-world, your wealth, relationship, everything is based on the

idea that you are connected thought shafts. This is your collective identity. If you relax from that identity you may lose all those things, who knows? That fear is the first thing.

Next thing is your morality, your idea about what you should be doing, is it right or wrong? If you lose the identity, if you don't trust that you are connected thoughts, your identity about yourself itself will be lost. The identity that you show to others will be lost and the identity that you have about yourself will also be lost. How will you then realize what is right and what is wrong for you? There is no basis to judge. Mind will never allow you to believe that you are unclutched.

Be very clear, as long as your mind doesn't let you trust you are unclutched, it can control you and it can play its games on you. The moment you trust yourself and trust your consciousness, your mind cannot control you and it cannot play its role on you.

One important thing, even you can see in your profession is this. The person who wants to exploit you will first make you believe that you can't run your business without him. He will give you the impression that you cannot survive without him, that's the first thing. Then he can go on exploiting you and he can play all his games. You can't do anything about it. The moment you start believing that you cannot survive without him, you will put up with him.

Same way, the first thing your mind does to you is to convince you that you cannot be alive without it; that you cannot survive without it. It makes you trust that you cannot survive without it. The moment it convinces you that you cannot survive without it, you are lost; you've created your hell. The moment it convinces you of this, then nothing more can be done. Then you will never try to drop the mind. You are caught with the fear. You are gone. You are finished.

Your mind will not let you believe so easily that you are unclutched. It'll try to bring all possible logic and if it can't bring any logic it will bring tremendous fear: 'What will happen to my property, what will happen to my personality and what will happen to this and that?'

Be very clear, nothing bad will happen. Everything will happen in a much better way and much more smoothly. Just understand this one simple example, and then you will be able to understand what I mean by the fear of mind.

Understand this one simple example. In Hindu forests, hunters will place a stick on a string to catch birds. To catch parrots and sparrows they will just hang a stick tied by a string between two trees. When the stick is hanging between the trees the parrot will come to sit on it. The moment the parrot sits, because of the parrot's weight, what will happen? The stick will just turn topsy-turvy, upside down. The moment it turns upside down on the stick, the parrot will start thinking 'Oh, if I let go I'll die!' and it will hang on to that stick.

The moment it turns upside down and loses its sense of balance it will feel totally shaken and just catch hold of that stick. It will hold on to that stick and hang on to that stick. It will think 'If I unclutch my feet, if I let go, what will happen? I'll fall and die', because it is hanging upside down. Now, because the bird thinks, 'If I let go, I'll fall and die or hurt myself' it will just catch the stick tightly, and hang on to it.

The hunter will come leisurely after 4-5 hours and will pick the parrot up, put it in the cage and go. The foolish parrot doesn't know that if just relaxes, he could have flown out and be liberated. He doesn't know that he can just open up and be liberated. This is not fiction. I have seen this done with my own eyes.

Similarly you do not know that if you just leave your mind, at that moment you can become paramahamsa. At that moment you can be liberated. At that moment you can start flying. The same fear that the parrot had is what you are having now. Your fear and parrot's fear are one and the same. The parrot believes that he can't let go and if he relaxes he will die. Similarly you too hold on to your mind and you feel, 'I can't let go, if I start trusting that I am unconnected, unclutched, independent and illogical thoughts' I am lost.

You will have the fear, 'what will happen to my identity that I project to the outer world, what will happen to the identity which I'm projecting to myself?' The tremendous fear that the parrot experiences, is the same fear that you feel; nothing else. One important thing lesson is that the parrot is not flying by holding on to that stick out of fear. What is happening? Slowly the hunter will come, take the parrot away and put it in the cage. The parrot neither has the freedom to fly nor the stick to balance.

In the same way, Yama, the god of death, will come to remove you from your identity. You will neither be a paramahamsa, a liberated soul, nor will you be able to hold on to the identity that you have. You will neither have the freedom nor will you have the stick that you are holding.

Be very clear, the hunter is Yama. He will come for you, for sure. When the hunter comes, the parrot will lose the freedom it had and the stick that he held. He will lose both. Same way, when Yama comes, you will lose the freedom that you had, the inner space, or the consciousness and the identity that you hold on to now tightly. Both will be lost.

Let you be very clear, just the same fear the parrot has, you too are having. You too are holding on to your identity and hanging for dear life. This moment, trust yourself, do not bother about losing your identity, trust that you will never have any problem, just trust yourself and let go your identity. You will become paramahamsa straight away and you will be liberated.

All you need to do is to trust that you are unclutched. Even if you don't trust that is the truth. Even if you don't trust, that is the truth, nothing can be done! But you have a vested interest in your false identity. If you trust that you are unclutched, it is too much to believe. Your vested interests are getting shaken.

Let you be very clear, even if you try to avoid the truth because of your vested interests you cannot save yourself. The hunter will come today or tomorrow, just pick you up and put you in the cage. You are exactly in the same situation as the parrot is. You are just a parrot hanging with the identity, nothing else. You believe so seriously that if you let go you will fall and hurt yourself or die and so you hold on to your identity.

Let me tell you, if the parrot lets go and relaxes, just for a moment or two it may flutter to balance; one or two moments it may have to balance itself but it will never fall and die. Let you be very clear, let go and you will never fall and die; you will only become paramahamsa.

To become paramahamsa all you need is trust; to trust yourself and let go. You will never mess up anything and you will never miss anything because you have never tried even once. You never had anybody to tell you.

Let me be honest, I tried. I relaxed. I never missed anything. You never had anybody around you to advice. Now you have. Relax and let go. You never had any courageous words. You never had anybody before to tell you. Relax. Let me tell you, I was in that space and I know what will happen. You will never fall and die and you will never hurt yourself. All you need to do is to let go and you will beautifully start flying. You too will become a paramahamsa.

Society can never accept what I say. It cannot tolerate your freedom; that is why it never gives you the courage. You cannot then be enslaved. You cannot then be manipulated. You cannot then be exploited, if you are a paramahamsa.

If you are in their cage, they can play with you and they can make you repeat all the words that they want you to. They can feed you when they want, what they want. And they can make you fly as they want. They can make you sit on their shoulder. You will be useful. You will just be a utility.

That is why you are never given the confidence that you are a paramahamsa. You are paramahamsa. Just relax; you may have one thousand fears rising in you about losing your identity; don't worry. All those fears are just those parrot fears. Even if the parrot falls two three feet and then balances, it is worth risking. It is a worthy risk. Understand, even if you fall for few minutes, if you are not able to balance for a few minutes, nothing wrong. It is worthy risk. May you let go and be liberated.

May you all become paramahamsas.

It is now time to enter into the technique. To tell you honestly it is not even a technique; it is just entering into the space, because no technique can guide you into that space. It is not even a technique. Now we are going to enter into that space. Now we are just going to realize what we understood. We will enter the same space in which Shiva exists. Shiva gives a beautiful technique in this sutra to experience that space of 'be unclutched'. Once you experience this space, no technique is necessary.

Actually, to tell you honestly, this whole truth is the wisdom of Shiva. Don't even mistake it is mine. Let me offer the whole thing humbly at his feet; at the feet of the great master who landed on the planet earth. Never ever think it is mine or anything, if at all you feel grateful for knowing this truth; just be grateful to Shiva*.* It is his wisdom, his truth.

Let me be very clear, when I myself experienced this I felt so much of gratitude. I wondered how he could think so deeply and give a solution exactly suited for modern man. See whatever you think as your problem, whether physical, mental, emotional or health, straightaway this technology can solve. The moment you experience this space, straightaway physical healing starts happening. All your irritations and mental health issues of addiction or depression will disappear the moment you experience this technology.

The moment you experience this space they will disappear, because the depression which happened one month ago, the depression which happened 1 year ago, the depression which happened 3 years ago are unconnected and unclutched. The problem is when you start believing that you had depression and same depression you are having continuously, that is when you start fighting with it.

If you know it is unclutched, independent and separate, you don't think the enemy as a huge giant who is sitting in front of you. You don't even feel like fighting. His head is separate, his leg is separate and his body is separate. There is no huge giant. You don't think of fighting with him.

Only when you imagine you have a huge problem in front of you, you start fighting and getting into more trouble. Your fighting with depression is the root cause for your depression. Let you be very clear. It is the same way with fear. Your fighting with fear is the base support for fear.

In Ramayana there is a beautiful story. Whoever stands in front of this monkey king Vali and fights with Vali loses half of his power to Vali. Same way, whoever stands in front of that shaft and starts fighting with that shaft, half of their power will go away to that shaft. Vali and thought shaft are one and the same. You will never win. You can never win.

You create the shaft because you fight with the shaft. You create the whole thing because you fight with the whole thing. The moment you experience this neutral space,

the healing starts, because the inner healing starts happening. The moment inner healing starts, physically also you are healed. This technology, this space, is the best space to heal the depression. It is the same with your addictions.

All your addiction as well as attitude towards addiction will disappear. You will even forget the idea that it is joy. Then naturally where is the question of going and running behind that habit. It simply disappears.

See, habit is a beautiful word. If you remove 'h', 'a bit' will remain, if you remove 'b', 'it' will remain, only when you remove the 'I', which is the shaft 'it' will die. Only when you remove 'I', only when you throw 'I' away, it will die. It will disappear.

It is the same with all your problems of guilt. This one space is enough. You will lose completely the idea about guilt, because the guilt of yesterday, guilt which happened one month ago, guilt which happened on year ago, they are unconnected, unclutched, independent thoughts. Only when you connect and create you give power to the thought shafts, which by themselves they don't have.

In Bharat, in every town one gangster will rise. Every year, new gangsters will come up. If you are living in any town in Bharat you know this. One gangster, one don dies or goes to the jail, next don will come up. They either will die fighting amongst themselves or with the police or they will go away to jail, then the next person will rise.

See, first day when the gangster comes out, he himself will have a little fear, but the moment people know he is a don, they will start obeying him. When everybody obeys him, though at first he himself may not have confidence in himself, but when he sees everybody obeys him, he will then get the confidence. 'Yes, now I can take these guys on!' His whole body language will be transformed.

Same way, when mind comes to attack you, it will not have enough confidence. When you are afraid of it, when you are caught by it, then it gets the confidence. You give confidence to mind to attack you. Once you show your fear, once you show that you are very fragile, that's enough for your mind. Now you are caught. Now it gets its seat.

For spiritual growth as well this is the ultimate space in which you can experience the pure witnessing consciousness. When you understand you are unconnected, illogical, random and unclutched thoughts, you realize that you are the space in which the thoughts and the gap are happening. You are the space in which the incoming breath and the outgoing breath and the neutral space are happening. You are beyond all these three. You are just beyond all these three.

This neutral space is neutral space only as long as you have the incoming and outgoing breaths. When that is diffused it can't be called anymore as neutral space, because it is the nature; it is your original state. This is what I call eternal consciousness, Shiva consciousness.

Now it is time. Let you understand and liberate yourself, let you all become paramahamsas. The moment you understand this truth, the moment you relax, the inner healing or the bliss comes out and you feel the freedom. Once you start feeling that freedom that is enough; it will give you tremendous confidence and courage to fly, to spread your wings in the sky. You will see that your being just becomes paramahamsa in mahakasa, in the pure cosmic consciousness.

Let us enter into the Shiva consciousness. Please close your eyes. Sit straight. Now you can wear your eye bands. One more thing, now, the technique that you are practicing, once you have that experience, after that you don't even need to practice the technique. Just remembering this experience is enough, you will be again in that same space. Only in the initial level, you need to relax. Just like a parrot, taking off. Once you take off, you don't need to bother about anything.

Slowly start witnessing only the incoming breath. Do not bother about any other movements, or neutral space. Just witness the incoming breath first. Be the witness. Be aware of incoming breath.

Slowly start witnessing only the outgoing breath. Now forget about the incoming breath, just witness, and be aware of outgoing breath.

Slowly, very slowly, be aware of both the neutral spaces; when your incoming breath turns into outgoing breath; when your outgoing breath turns into incoming breath. Be aware. Witness both neutral spaces.

Intensely, be aware of both the neutral spaces.

Be aware of neutral spaces and incoming and outgoing breaths. Just be aware of incoming breath, neutral space, outgoing breath, and neutral space.

Be unclutched. Whatever thought comes in your mind, do not connect. Do not even think you are thinking constantly. Even that idea comes because you connect your thoughts. They are just completely independent thoughts. Do not connect them and create one more thought that 'you are thinking'.

Let independent bubbles rise and fall. Let independent thoughts come and go. Do not connect them and think you are thinking. Be unclutched. If they come let them come, if they go, let them go. Do not think you are thinking. Every thought is independent, illogical and separate thoughts. Do not connect them, and think you are thinking. Your idea that you are thinking is a lie. Relax from your mind. Let go. Be liberated.

Be unclutched. Do not even try to be unclutched. If you are having thoughts, let them come, let them go. Just understand that they are unclutched. They are independent, individual thoughts.

Relax. You can open your eyes. Try to be in that same space. Just see. Even these thoughts are completely unclutched. Your inner space is beautiful and purely unclutched.

Now when you come back to your identity, let you understand one more important truth. Now you know that this is your identity from which you fly. Once you learned flying, then it is no more a trap, then you can just come and sit on this stick and swing. The trap can become a swing for you.

Same way, once you know that you are unclutched your identity is no more a trap for you, it can just become a swing for you. When you come back to your identity, just be very clear, you are unclutched. That space will give you the tremendous freedom that your identity is no more a trap on which you are hanging, it is just a swing on which you are swinging.

Now, whether you are flying as paramahamsas or you are playing with your identity, you are liberated. Let you be liberated, and celebrate this great liberation from Shiva himself.

A: Every thought passes. Each thought is independent, random and unconnected. Therefore, every thought shall pass, when the next thought takes over.

I am not asking you to do your duty. Duty is a word of conditioning. It is something that you feel you must do because that is what you have been brought up to believe. It is not something you do out of awareness and intelligence.

Responsibility is a better word. I always tell my disciples that spontaneity arises out of the responsibility that you feel to all that is around you. You do not define your responsibility as in a job description. It is not a boundary. It is not that you will go this far and no further, and let someone else take care of what lies thereafter.

The same definition holds good, not only in space, but in time as well. When you are in the present moment, unclutched, you automatically take care of the future and the past. After all it is the present that reaches out to the future. Once you take care of the present in awareness, your past cannot haunt you and the future will not disappoint you.

This is what Krishna meant when he said not to worry about the results of your actions. He said to renounce the results of actions to him not because he is going to get rich by collecting all the stuff that you think you worked for, but because he wants to lessen your suffering arising out of expectations.

When you are unclutched and in the present moment, you allow things to unfold as they ought to. You do not renounce action but the results of action. You become more energetic since thinking about and worrying about the results of your actions no longer stress you. You are constantly double-checking, constantly second-guessing. No, that is not what Krishna meant.

This too shall pass can be interpreted in two ways. If you interpret it in a fatalistic manner thinking what can I do, everything is destined, then you are misunderstanding the statement. Nothing is destined. You have the free will to shape your destiny.

What it means is that life is not an even climb or an even descent. Life is a roller coaster. If you accept whatever happens as normal and with equanimity, you will stay centered. Alternatively, if you are centered, you can take everything as they happen to you without flinching. Joy and sorrow are the filters we use to create those emotions. They are the slides we project, not the screen. The screen is blank. You can change the slide.

We create pain and pleasure shafts by connecting thoughts that happen randomly. Once you truly understand this concept that each thought is independent, random and unclutched, you become liberated from these pain and pleasure shafts and develop an energy that allows you to do what you think is the impossible.

Comparing me to Jesus and Krishna is just another clutching on your part, that is all. You only read Jesus and Krishna, you do not understand them nor imbibe them. Please do not do the same thing to me. When you understand me, you will also understand Jesus and Krishna. Our words may sound different but the energy is the same.

If you had really understood Jesus and Krishna, their words would have by now woken you up from your slumber. You would have been enlightened by now. Since that has not happened, you have become my responsibility now! So, don't let me down.

Be very clear, these teachings are given to penetrate you. Do not make one more shaft out of them. Let them straight away touch your being, let something straight away happen in you. Let you not be the same person, when you go back tomorrow after the program.

Someone asked, could I use this shaft in the initial stages of my spiritual path? This is an important issue. Be very clear, none of you is in the initial stage. No question of

initial stage or ending stage. Spirituality is not like a cancer. In cancer only 4 stages are there; in enlightenment no 4 stages. Either you are enlightened now or never.

Patanjali says beautifully about the 8 steps. Until Samadhi, you have not even taken the 1 st step. After Samadhi no steps are required. He says very clearly, even though he has described 8 steps, until Samadhi you have not taken even the first step. After Samadhi no step is required.

Let you be very clear, thinking that in the initial level you are the seeker, you are in the beginning level, all these things are words that confuse you to postpone the transformation.

Let you be very clear, the idea that you are in the beginning level and all these things are just consolation. See, I have seen people who say, 'Swamiji, after 30 years only now I've started growing'. It will never happen. These are all words. Why do you want to come to that stage after 30 years? Let me tell you the truth now itself.

I have a big Research and Development department. I have so much of data available from all the professional seekers and seekers who are seeking for the last 30 years 40 years. I am making the whole thing available to you. Why don't you use all these things? Why don't you update yourself? Why don't you update your intelligence with all this available data? Why do you want to wait and after 30 years come to the same understanding? Update yourself with the intelligence available.

Let me be very clear, you will never feel you are progressing with your mind. You will always feel that you are in the initial stages. This is also a false shaft that doesn't exist. This shaft that says 'I feel good and energized after meditation' is just another pleasure shaft. You should feel like that all the time and you can.

Let me be very clear. Anybody can come and give you some technique and tell you that you are having spiritual progress. Spiritual progress means straight away having enlightenment. Anything less than enlightenment straight away means that it is an empty guarantee. It is a feel good promise.

Let you be very clear I am also teaching so many meditation programs. It will all give you the feel good factor. Nice thing. It's like you go to a temple and sit for half an hour and chant something and you feel very relaxed. You feel relaxed because you forgot about your problems, your mother in law, your family and your wife, nothing else. Just that feel good feeling, it is no way related to spirituality. If you are happy with that, do that. I have no problem for you to start at that level, but please do not stay there, don't get stuck there in the empty hope you are making progress.

But, if you are really serious about your transformation and if you really wanted dhyan, try to understand what I am saying*.* When I use the word dhyan, I mean the experience

of samadhi. If you are really interested in the ultimate experience or the truth, understand that what I am saying is the truth.

There are levels of truths. Physically doing anything, physically offering yourself is worship. Verbally offering is japa. Mentally offering is the visualization. Now I am saying completely offer your being, offer your identity itself. Only then you will be able to transform your being. Otherwise part by part you will be just playing games.

So, nothing needs to pass except your thoughts. Just unclutch from them. Understand that they are your bondage if you connect them and that you can be liberated once you understand that there is no connection at all between one thought and another.

Let you be liberated!

kumbhitaa rechitaa vaapi puritaa yaa yada bhavet | tadante shaantanaamaasau shaktyaa shaantah prakaashate||

When inhaled breath is held or exhaled breath is held or again filled, experience Shiva Consciousness in that state of purity.

Today's subject is 'Find your center, deep within'. We will see the sutra. Then, we will enter into the subject.

Kumbhitha Rechitaavaapi Puritaavaa Yathaabhavaet TadhaDante Shaantana Maasou Shaktyaa Shaanta Prakaashate

When inhaled breath is held or exhaled breath is held or again filled, experience Shiva Consciousness in that state of purity.

Still we are working on breath. First nine techniques, Shiva speaks only on breath. You will be shocked. He speaks only on breath and gives nine meditation techniques. He is taking us to deeper and deeper levels. He is trying to give us deep experience of our own being.

Breathing is something that is continuously happening in you in spite of you! Whether you want or not, it happens. Be very clear, you are not breathing because of you. In spite of you, you are breathing. In spite of you it is happening. That can be used as a beautiful method to take jump into the cosmic energy or into your own self.

Here, Krishna is taking us. Shiva. Sorry! Anyhow, I can justify (Swamiji laughs). On breath, both Shiva and Krishna have given many techniques. Even in the Dhyana Yoga in the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna speaks elaborately and extensively on breath. Here Shiva is taking us step by step deeply.

Yesterday in the last sutra, Shiva explained how to be unclutched. He speaks about how our incoming breath, outgoing breath, and the neutral space gaps are all equal. He was saying that we are liberated based on the concept of time. Now he is taking us a little deeper. He is showing us that we are liberated based on space. He is taking us to a deeper level of space. In the last sutra, he explained that we are liberated. We are already what we are supposed to be! He explains step-by-step taking us into deeper levels of our breath. In the last sutra he explained through time. Today he is explaining through space. Let us understand how he is explaining.

He is adding one more word. Beautiful phrase! Experience Shiva Consciousness in that state of purity.

Yesterday somebody asked me after listening to that last sutra. One person came to me and asked in the energy darshan, 'Swamiji, how to practice being unclutched?'

I said, 'God! You lost! You have not understood'.

There is no need to practice. All you need is to understand that you are already unclutched. Just remember again and again. The moment you want to practise, be very clear that you have missed the truth. You don't have to practise the truth. Truth is. Truth can never be practised. You don't have to become unclutched. You are unclutched. Your being is unclutched. The moment you asked how you can practise, be very clear, you have not understood whatever I've spoken. You can just play with words. By playing with words you can hide yourself from others. But by playing with words you can't hide from yourself from yourself. The moment you asked how to be unclutched, let you be very clear, you slept in the discourse! You have not heard. You have not understood what has to be understood. At least now, don't miss.

Here Shiva is playing with beautiful poetic Sanskrit. He is using different words to take us to a deeper space. In the last sutra we understood incoming breath, outgoing breath and the neutral spaces. In last sutra Shiva was explaining that this space of incoming breath and outgoing breath and the neutral spaces are all equal. The time for this incoming breath and outgoing breath and the time for the neutral spaces are all the same. The time taken for the breaths and the gaps between breaths are the same.

Now he says, 'Not only in time but also in space these are one and the same'. He goes to the extreme of saying, 'Nothing is happening in you. You are already in pure conscious state. Whether kumbhaka (retention) is happening in you, rechaka (exhalation) is happening in you or puraka (inhalation) is happening in you, you are in a space where you are already unclutched. You are already in that state whether you remember it or not.'

Let me explain how Shiva is coming to this understanding or how Shiva is going to give us this understanding. How he comes to this conclusion, step by step, beautifully and how he is going to transmit that understanding to us. People who have not attended the last sutra should forgive me. I think you will find a lot of things new but nothing can be done because it is an extension of the last sutra. The next two sutras are also extensions. He is just taking us to deeper and deeper levels. Alright!

When inhaled breath is held or exhaled breath is held or again filled, experience Shiva Consciousness in that state of purity.

Part 3: Shiva Sutras

In the last sutra he said, 'When the incoming breath taking turn as an outgoing breath your mind disappears; your mind doesn't exist'. Now he says, 'The universe doesn't exist'. Universal pause. In the last sutra he means 'mind'. In this sutra he means 'universe'. You need to understand one important thing. Your mind is universe. Universe is your mind.

Even though Shiva doesn't give you any intellectual theories or concepts separately he gives all the truth when he gives the techniques. It is an important thing you need to understand. The key and the essence of this sutra is this: mind and the universe are one and the same. What you think as mind and what you perceive as universe, both are one and the same. Please understand, sometimes because of your pain or suffering you may say, 'How can the universe be connected to my mind Swamiji? Universe is independent and my mind is separate'. Whether you understand or not, truth is truth.

One Rabbi after his retirement from the service went to a hotel and wanted to fulfill his lifelong fantasy of eating pork. Somehow he couldn't control himself. He went to the hotel and chose a corner. He sat in the corner and ordered for pork. He was waiting. He was waiting and fighting with his conscience. Not only was he waiting, he was also fighting with his conscience.

As things will happen one family from his congregation entered the same hotel. According to Jews, nobody should eat alone. So naturally they straightaway came to the Rabbi's table and sat in his table to share the food. In five minutes the waiter brought the big plate and opened the lid to reveal the roast suckling pig with a big baked apple in the mouth. They were shocked. The Rabbi also showed as if he is shocked and he started shouting, 'Look at these guys. I ordered a baked apple and look what I got!'

You may use these words to escape from others but you can't escape from yourself. After it comes you may think that you have not ordered or you may act as though you have not ordered. But nothing is served to you unless you order. Your mind and the universe are directly connected. What you enjoy, what you get from this universe is nothing but your mind.

Shiva says in the last sutra that your mind stops. Now he says the universe stops. Your mind and the universe are the same. In Vedanta we have these two beautiful words, 'drishti srishti' and 'srishti drishti'.

'Srishti drishti' means 'What is, you see'. That is what we all believe. We are seeing 'what is'. But 'drishti srishti' means 'you create what you want to see'. It is a little deeper level truth. It is difficult to understand with our ordinary level logic. But the truth is that whenever the mind stops, the universe stops.

Ramana Maharishi explains this concept beautifully.

Whenever your mind is not functioning, the world is not functioning. The world will not function. You can see in your life. When you are in the dream space it looks like reality. When you are in this waking space, this looks as reality. When you are awake and here this looks as reality. When you are in dream space, that dream space looks as a reality. When you are in deep sleep, nothing is reality.

Neither dream world nor this world exists when you are in slumber. Let you be very clear. Whenever you enter into the dream world, this whole world or 'jagrat' or waking state becomes completely faded. It becomes black and white and that becomes multicolor. As of now your dream world, when you remember your dreams, you feel it as black and white. The dreams look vague.

In Bharat if you see the State TV channels, Doordarshan, this is how those channels will appear, all blurred. Against that this world looks like a multicolor vision, strong and clear like private TV channels. This looks like a superior experience, like a 4-D experience. If you go to the Universal Studio, for Shrek-2 they give 4-D experience. They rock the chair. You know 3-D. In 4-D, not only there is a three-dimensional view, along with that they add the movements. The chair also moves. It is overpowering, especially the mummy in that movie. They give you that mummy experience. Literally everybody screams. They give you the 4-D experience.

Same way, now you are experiencing this world in 4-D form. In the dream state whenever you experience the dream consciousness you experience the dream state as 4-D and the waking state becomes 2-D. This waking state completely fades away and that dream becomes reality.

Let you be very clear: then how can you decide or how can you choose which one is real? Or which one is unreal? You have no scale to choose whether this is real or that is unreal. You may put a question. 'No Swamiji. Whenever we come back to this waking state, this world is same. I have same car, same house and same wife! It is not changing. Whenever I enter into the dream state I have a different car, different house and different wife. Dream state things are different and more interesting. How can you say this and that are one and the same?'

You may ask this question. Please be very clear: the question may look logical but it is not logical. You should understand one subtle truth. For example, sometimes you live 10 years of life in one night dream. Am I right? You can live ten years of your life in one night dream. In one night dream, you take birth, go and finish your education and do so many things. Does it mean that in those 10 years you had not slept? Inside the dream you fall asleep and come back to the same dream and play the game and fall asleep and come back and play the same game. Understand. This is a very subtle truth.

If you give your attention you can understand the truth. The very understanding of this truth will totally transform your inner space. See in one night, in just one night's dream you lived one full life. Sometimes you experience 10 years, 20 years or even 30 years. Even in these 30 years you have fallen into unconsciousness or sleep. Then you come back to the same dream and play with the dream, again fall asleep and come back to the same dream to play the game and again fall asleep.

Be very clear: the way you live 30 years in dream spanning a night, in the same way you live your 70 years in another dream of a lifetime. Life is the longest dream. Dream is a short form of life.

Small life is dream. Long dream is life.

Let you be very clear: the very concept of time itself is an illusion. That is why in one night, in just 10 hours you live 30 years of life. Thirty years of life is lived in one tenhour dream. How is it possible?

This is because the concept of time itself is created by your mind. The concept of time itself is an illusion. It is completely an illusion of your mind. That is why Ramana Maharishi says beautifully, 'Whatever you see, as long as the seen, seer, and the seeing all three exist, be very clear, you are in illusion'.

Somebody asked him, 'Bhagavan, if that is the case how is seeing an enlightened Master in dream state going to help us?'

I am also one more dream for you now. Be very clear: you really can't be sure you are sitting in a temple and listening to my discourse. It can be dream. Suddenly you may wake up and understand that you are lying in your bed and dreaming that you are sitting in a temple and listening to a discourse.

You may think, 'No. No. No. I can pinch myself'. You can pinch yourself in dream also. In dream also you can pinch yourself. Let you be very clear: there is no scale to measure whether you are in awareness or dream state. You can do whatever you are doing now, whatever you can do now, you can do everything in dream also. In dream also you can be sure that you are not dreaming.

The big problem is that the moment you suspect whether it is dream or reality, you will come out of the dream. You can verify this. Whenever you seriously suspect what you are seeing, your awareness and attention will turn towards the seer. Now, as long as you don't suspect the reality of what you are seeing your awareness will never be turned towards the seer. The moment you suspect the truth or the reality of what is seen, the moment you suspect, immediately your awareness will be turned towards the seer.

You will be awakened as you turn towards the seer. All these techniques again and again turn your awareness to the seer. You are now constantly attracted by what is seen.

So much of colorful dance and so much else is going on in the outer world. You don't have awareness or attention to turn towards the seer.

In all these techniques, Shiva is trying to turn you towards the seer. He is trying to give you the glimpse of the seer. The moment you suspect what is seen, the moment you think what is seen is not as you think, what is seen is not as you understand, immediately your awareness turns towards the seer. The moment you are turned towards the seer, you are awakened.

What happens in the dream state is the same thing. Whenever you come out of the dream state be a little aware of what is happening in that space. First thing you will notice is that either you will have too much of greed or fear. If you have greed or fear beyond limit both will awaken you out of your dream. Sometimes it is a nightmare and at other times it is a beautifully pleasant dream. Both nightmare and a beautiful dream will bring you out of the dream state. Both will kick you out of dream space.

First thing, you will start suspecting whether it is dream or reality. Next moment, your whole attention will turn towards the inner space. Then you will be awakened. Same thing will happen in this space also if you want to get awakened. First thing, you need to see, you need to be aware, and you need to understand. By understanding, you will naturally have the doubt whether what I'm seeing is truth or unreality. Is it true or false?

If you start suspecting what you are seeing, the moment you seriously start suspecting what you are seeing, your whole awareness and attention will turn towards the seer. Seer will be automatically awakened. As long as you are engaged with the second person and the third person, the first person will never be awakened. If your interest towards the second person and third person is lost, immediately your attention will turn towards the first person. You will be awakened to the truth. You will wake up from this big dream.

I was telling you about the beautiful question. Somebody went and asked Ramana Maharishi also the same question. If everything is dream, seeing you in this dream, how is it going to help me?

Ramana Maharishi says, 'When you see a lion in your dream, what happens? You wake up. When you see me, you wake up.'

That fear of the lion wakes you up. Or even if you see a beautiful actress you will wake up. The greed will wake you up. See, whenever you try to elongate that shaft, whenever you try your best to elongate that shaft, sometimes beautiful dream, you try to hold on to that dream, and suddenly realize that it is dream. Sometimes frightening dream, you just want to escape from that dream, because of so much of fear. When you wake up you realize it is just a dream.

If you want to hold, or you want to escape, both the ways you will come out and understand it is just a dream. Whether it is greed or fear, both will awaken you. Whenever you see a Master, Master is like a 'simha-swapna', a lion dream, nightmare. It is like seeing a lion in the dream. When you see the lion in the dream, naturally out of that shock you will be awakened. You will be out of the dream. Same way, if you see the Master in this state, he will be like a 'Simha-swapna' and will awaken you.

I always tell people, 'Master is not a dream to fulfill your wishes. He is a dream to awaken you'. He is a dream to awaken you. Same way, greed also can awaken you. Master and actress, both can do the same job. Both can do the same job. That is why I always tell people, 'Whenever I can't train people, I just get them married'. I tell them, 'Please get married. That's all'. And they get trained. Sometimes, if Master takes 10 years, the wife takes hardly one or two years. In our ashram, that's what I tell our brahmacharis. Either you learn from me or learn from your wife. But learning from me will be with lot of love and courtesy. That is the only difference.

Greed and fear, both can teach you. Yoga chose the path of fear. It just controls you, controls you, controls you, controls you and corners you. At some point you are awakened. You understand that you are dreaming. Tantra chose the path of greed. It gives you, gives you, gives you, gives you and suddenly you understand that you are dreaming. Both ways, whether you are with greed or with fear, the theme or the idea is to put your attention on your Being. It is to turn your awareness on your Being. Whether it is fear or greed, we need only one thing to awaken us.

One important thing you should understand again is that your mind is universe. Only when your mind works you see the universe. If your mind doesn't work you will not see the universe. It is as if your samskaras, your engrams, are what decide your universe.

Shiva says, 'When breath is held or filled Shiva Consciousness, the Universe, is experienced'. Shiva is talking in the last three sutras about the neutral space. In the last three sutras he is discussing the same thing about the neutral space. He is telling us how to enter into the neutral space and helps us step by step. In the neutral space itself he is guiding us step by step. First he spoke about the neutral space. Next he said the neutral space and the breaths' time are one and the same. Now he is saying that the neutral spaces and the breaths are not only same in time, but they are also the same even in space.

By this he means that just in the neutral space, whenever you are in the neutral space, you are enlightened and you are liberated. You are in that full awareness. You are in the

Shiva consciousness. There is nothing more that needs to be done. There is nothing else that needs to be done. One's ego vanishes. That is what he says beautifully. You don't have to do anything. You don't have to kill. You don't have to fight. You don't have to do anything. It just vanishes.

He adds one more line. Beautiful line. 'This is difficult only for the impure'. 'Ashanta-prakashate'. This is difficult only for the impure. No we will have to understand what Shiva means by the words, 'This is difficult only for the impure'. What does he mean by the word impurity?

It is difficult only for the people who think it is difficult! If you are already clear that this is not going to work for you, this is not going to help you, this is not what you want in your life, then be very clear that this is not going to help you. The moment somebody thinks, decides that this is difficult for him, it is indeed going to be difficult. It is you who is creating a shaft. If you think 10 times this is difficult, difficult, difficult, the thought that it is difficult that happened today, the thought that it is difficult that happened to you yesterday, the thought that this is difficult that happened to you one year ago, you will connect all these thoughts and you will create a shaft that it is difficult. Then nothing can be done.

If you have that thought that it is easy, it is easy. Then again you will create a shaft that it is easy. If you create a shaft that it is easy, it is going to be easy for you. If you create a shaft that it is difficult by all your ideas of believing it is difficult, then it is going to be difficult for you. Let you be very clear: whether it is easy or difficult both shafts are created by you.

There is a beautiful song written by Ramana Maharishi in Tamil that says, 'So easy, atma vidya, Self Knowledge is so easy'. Somebody goes to him and says, 'Bhagavan, it is very difficult to achieve enlightenment'. Bhagavan says, 'It is so easy to achieve atma vidya. It is so easy'. They ask him, 'How?'

He says, 'To achieve something in the outer world you have to work. To achieve something in the inner world, nothing needs to be done. Just relax'.

Your mind says it is difficult but Masters say it is easy. According to me it is neither easy nor difficult because it is there already. You don't have to think it is difficult. You don't even have to think it is easy because it is already there. Nothing needs to be done. Nothing needs to be achieved. If you have to achieve only you need to say whether it is easy or difficult. Here you are not going to achieve anything. It is just there. Existence exists. It is just the truth. It is there already. All you need to do is just remember, 'You are unclutched'. You are already unclutched.

As I was telling you yesterday, even your thinking is nothing but connecting. All the thoughts are thinking that you are thinking. Actually your thinking is not a problem for you. Your thinking that you are thinking is the real problem for you.

See your thinking is not a big problem for you. It just comes and goes. But when you start thinking, 'Oh! I am constantly thinking. I'm not able to stop thinking'. That is where you start creating problem. All your problems, when I say all, capital letters, ALL your problems are just because you create shafts. You create a shaft that does not exist. If you just understand you are unclutched, by your very nature you can see, even if you try to clutch you can't clutch. Try your best to connect your thoughts. Try to be on the same subject. Try to concentrate your mind. You can't concentrate because God saves you constantly. God is protecting you. That is why you are not able to concentrate.

People come and ask me, 'Swamiji, how to concentrate my mind?'. They don't understand what they are asking for. Be very clear: The more you concentrate your mind the more you will start suffering. As of now concentration will bring you only suffering. When you concentrate, what will you concentrate on? Whatever is out there in your mind is what you will concentrate on. In your mind you have only sufferings. If you start creating the concentrating power, your suffering will become more and more.

People come and ask me, 'Swamiji, I forget things. Please give me the power to remember'. I tell them, 'You don't know what a big blessing it is!' Because you forget things, you soon get healed of your mental pains. You heal yourself. If you can't forget things, be very clear, you will be constantly suffering because all you know is only one thing: suffering. You do not know how to be in bliss. You do not know how to be in joy. You do not know how to connect the gaps and create the shaft of gap. All you know is how to connect the thoughts and create the shaft of thoughts. Any thought will create only suffering for you.

As of now, the fact that you do not have concentration is a big blessing for you. According to Tantra one of the great functions of Shiva is about making you forget things or making you move away from the past. If you start trying to have more concentration power be very clear: you will bring more and more misery and suffering for yourself.

That is why the people who practise hypnotism, mesmerism and yogic practices to concentrate their mind are always in tension. They will always be in tension. Attention means you are at tension. At tension means attention. When you start giving your attention be very clear: you are at tension. Such people will always be serious. You can see. They will have constant headache. Really, they will have headache because they are constantly trying to think on one subject. It means they are trying to create a shaft. They are trying their best to create a shaft. One more thing, without doubt they will turn schizophrenic.

That is why I tell you that if you start doing some of these yogic practices without the needed intelligence, if you start doing without the necessary maturity, you will end up only in more problems. You will end up in only more and more difficulties. You

experience more and more problems because in concentration you exclude everything. In awareness you include everything.

In awareness you are not aware of a particular thing. You are purely aware. Anything can come in front of you. You will be just aware. That's all. In awareness you work on yourself. In concentration you work on something outside. You concentrate on something. Your whole consciousness is centered on something. In concentration you are working towards a different angle. In awareness you are working towards different angle. The whole West is suffering from concentration. So much of depression exists because they misunderstood awareness as concentration. They started thinking concentration is going to help. No. Concentration is in no way going to help you. Concentration will bring you more and more suffering. You will create more and more shafts. You will create too many shafts and you will start fighting with those shafts. All concentration is excluding something.

For example, if you concentrate on one line you exclude everything else. In that one line if you concentrate on one dot, again you exclude everything else. You are excluding. By excluding you will not be able to achieve anything. But with awareness you will aware of the whole board. You will be aware of this whole scene. You will be aware of this whole space. You will be aware of this whole universe. In awareness you do not exclude anything. You only start including things. In concentration you will be excluding things.

When you start creating shafts, when you start thinking that you are thinking be very clear: you have lost purity. Then it is difficult for you. Then you can't achieve what Shiva is teaching. Even you believing that you are pure or impure is nothing but a shaft. Let you be very clear: all your guilt, all your pain, everything is pure shaft. The mistake you made ten years ago, the mistake that you made seven years ago, the mistake that you made three years ago, they are all independent, unconnected incidents. But when you connect them and start thinking, naturally you will start creating guilt.

Let you be very clear: you cannot be helped by creating guilt. Is there a single person who says, 'No no, I changed myself by creating guilt, Swamiji?' Never!. Be very clear: you might have stopped expressing the attitude. You might have stopped doing that act. But never think you are liberated from it. Never think you are liberated from it. Symptoms may change but you are not cured.

A doctor asks a patient, 'How do you feel after the medicine. You came to me with the complaint that you are hearing a ringing sound in your ears?'

Patient says, 'Oh, after the medicine I get only busy tone!'

'I get only the busy signal. I'm not getting the ringing tone'. The ring tone may change into the busy signal. But you will not be cured.

Let you be very clear: by creating guilt you may just change the symptom but the healing itself will not happen. Changing the symptom is not liberation. Changing symptoms is not going to help you.

Let you be clear about what you are supposed to do. Inner space needs to be completely awakened. You need to bring your awareness to your inner space. You need to be completely aware of your inner space and whatever is happening in it. Let you be clear: even your thought that this is difficult or impure is nothing but shaft. One more thing: even if you practise some purity or some discipline for 10 or 20 years you will not feel you have achieved it. At least I have not seen anybody who has got the confidence that they have become pure. I've seen hundreds and thousands of Swamis, hundreds and thousands of spiritual seekers, and hundreds and thousands of yogis and sadhakas, practitioners. Nobody feels that they have become pure in their inner space. They can't feel the purity because constantly they are creating these shafts inside.

Let you be very clear: your inner space, inner thoughts are in no way logically connected to the outer world. There is one important thing. Just now I said, 'You see the universe as you want'. Now here is another statement. Let you understand these two statements that appears contradictory. But Shiva is answering how they are not contradictory. They are complementing each other. First I told you, 'You create the world which you want to see'. Now I'm telling you, 'Your inner space is in no way connected to the outer world'.

When I made the first statement, I meant that you project this world and see. That is the truth. When I made the second statement, I meant that your inner consciousness is not disturbed or affected by the outer world as you think. You think that if something is wrong with the outer world, you will feel the suffering. Or if some nice thing happens in the outer world, you will have the joy. But it doesn't happen always logically. Sometimes even if you have something nice in the outer world, you don't feel the excitement, the joy in the inner world.

Sometimes, if something seriously wrong, when something goes wrong, suddenly you see a confidence rising in you. You stand up and you show your strength. Mentally you may be thinking, 'If that happens, I will completely collapse. I cannot do anything'. But when it happens, suddenly you will see that you are able to handle it. You are able to manage it. You are able to live through it.

Be very clear: two things you need to understand. Your thoughts or your response is in no way connected to the happenings of the outer world. Second thing, your thoughts themselves are not directly, logically connected with each other. Your response to the outer world and your response to the inner world, both are illogical, independent and un-clutched. Your thoughts towards the outer world and towards the inner world, to your own self, both are not logical or connected as you think. You are made to believe you have a logical identity. It is only a belief.

As long as you believe a logical identity, you will be constantly bringing more and more suffering. You will not have the spontaneity. I've always seen that people who are not logical and educated, they will be spontaneous. They will be so alive and spontaneous.

Whenever I utter the word 'spontaneity' I remember a beautiful incident that happened in my young age. I think I spoke of this incident in some other lecture. But I will tell this once more at least for the new comers.

In my young age, in our village, they used to recite the Mahabharata. It is the history of Bharat. In every village there will be recitation of Mahabharata every year. During the day they will recite the story. In the night they will enact the drama. The play is not enacted by a professional group but with just four or five old villagers. They will decorate themselves and come. There will be two small benches. On that bench they will fight. That is the stage. They will sing some songs and enact the play. Thanks to these types of programs, Bharat is still alive. The whole country is still connected morally and culturally because of these types of programs. It is done in a very ritualistic way. Morning will be the recitation. Evening they enact the drama. Drama will be very nice and very spontaneous.

There will not be many accessories. There will be only one stick. That will be used as veena (traditional musical instrument) when Narada, the celestial bard uses it. If he holds it horizontally like a guitar, it is veena. If the monkey god Hanuman holds it vertically it is his mace. You have to just understand. Who holds it and in what way he holds it makes the difference. It is a nice village program.

One day the story was 'Draupadi Vastraharana'. If you know the Mahabharata, you will understand. The Kaurava princes insult Draupadi, wife of the Pandava princes, in their court. That is the story. Of course only males will decorate themselves as females. No females are allowed to act in those dramas. Only males took on the female roles also.

Draupadi will be wearing seven saris. She will come wearing seven saris and the person who is supposed to remove the clothes will be pulling the saris off one by one. After the sixth sari he will say, 'Oh! I'm tired' and he will fall. That is the story and Krishna will appear to save Draupadi.

By the time the guy reaches the sixth sari, Draupadi has to shout 'Krishna, Krishna'. Till then she will be shouting different names like Gopala, Govinda, Madhava, Madhusudana etc. When it comes to the sixth saree she will shout 'Krishna' and Krishna will come from behind the stage. From behind the stage he will jump into the stage. There will be small screen. Behind the stage Krishna will be standing. He will jump into the stage and say, 'O Draupadi, I've come to protect you. I've come to save you'. By the time Krishna comes Dushassana, the evil Kaurava prince who is pulling the saris off has to say, 'Oh. I'm tired' and he has to fall. This is the story that is supposed to happen.

On this day Draupadi came as usual wearing the seven saris and Dushashana started pulling them off one by one. One small mistake happened. Dushashana forgot to count. He forgot the count. Suddenly he forgot which sari he was pulling, whether it was sixth, seventh or fifth. Since he forgot to count, he started pulling off the seventh sari also. Now it is dangerous. He was supposed to pull only six and according to the story by the time he pulled the sixth sari Draupadi had to shout 'Krishna' and Krishna had to jump into the stage and Dushashana would fall.

Because the guy forgot to count and he started pulling the seventh sari also and Draupadi got so disturbed. She straightaway started kicking Dushashana. Instead of shouting 'Krishna', she started kicking Dushashana.

We were like, 'What is going on in the story?' Draupadi was not supposed to fight with Dushashana. She was supposed to shout 'Krishna, Krishna''. She lost her temper and started kicking, 'Hey, Hey'. And this guy did not understand what Draupadi meant. He thought she was really acting and stated pulling the sari off again. Both started fighting with each other. In that fight nothing could be done. Dushashana finally pulled the seventh saree off.

Now Draupadi was standing on the stage with female make up and with a blouse on the top and with shorts below. The face is full of turmeric and flower. He had complete female decoration above the hip with all the jacket and female dress. Below he was standing with shorts. Krishna was behind the screen smoking a cigarette. He was thinking, 'What is happening? Still I'm not called'. He was enjoying his cigarette and standing behind the screen and thinking, 'Still I'm not called. What happened?' Because only when Draupadi shouted 'Krishna'. He could come in. Till the sixth sari Draupadi had to say, 'Madhava, Madhusudana, Govinda, Gopala'. Only on the sixth sari she would scream for 'Krishna' and Krishna would appear.

Krishna was smoking his cigarette and waiting. 'Still I'm not called. What happened?' Now the whole scene was over. What to do? We saw Draupadi standing in shorts and blouse on the stage with all make up.

The actor playing Draupadi was spontaneous in his reaction. He shouted, 'Krishna, because you were busy smoking your cigarette you made me a male and saved my life and my prestige'.

The whole scene took a different turn. Actually this spontaneity can happen only if you are not intellectual.

If you are an intellectual you can't be spontaneous. What will you be doing? At the most you will be picking up another sari and hiding. What can be done? Already everything is open. Of course, this spontaneity will be alive and active in you when you are not programmed intellectually and when you know you are unclutched. Even once

if you experience the unclutched state, this spontaneity will be so alive and active in you, no cloud can cover your inner space. You cannot be disturbed, you cannot be depressed, and you will not be perturbed by your vasanas, tendencies of your mindset.

In Zen there is a beautiful saying, 'Birds don't leave their footprints in the sky'. If you work with that clarity that you are unclutched, your activities will not leave their footprints, the samskaras. No activity will leave the samskara or engrams in your inner space. Nothing will touch your inner space.

There is a beautiful story of Janaka in our puranas. Janaka was an enlightened master. He was a king and an enlightened Master. Both. Suka Brahma was another master, the first Paramahamsa on Planet Earth. Suka's father was Vyasa, the sage who compiled the Vedas. Vyasa sent Suka Brahma to Janaka. Vyasa said, 'Go to Janaka and learn the ultimate truth from him.' Suka Brahma went to Janaka's court. At that time Suka Brahma was not enlightened. He went to Janaka's court and saw Janaka sitting on the throne and enjoying himself. Suka Brahma did not know that Janaka was a king and he did not realize Janaka would be sitting in a throne. Suka Brahma thought, 'When my father told me to go and learn from Janaka I thought he was a sage, a rishi, and even if he is in a court, I thought he would be a raja guru (King's teacher). But now I understand that he is a king himself and what will I learn from a king?'

In those days, kings were not respected in Hindu tradition. Only spiritual people were respected. The rishis hade created such a wonderful system, the Vedic lifestyle. The person who did not own anything, who didn't have anything, was respected more than a king. Neither a vaisya, a businessman who had money nor kshatriya, the king who had power was respected. Only the brahmana, the scholar who had the intelligence and spiritual wisdom was respected. Only the rishis were respected.

Suka thought, 'What will I learn from a king? After all, he is a king. He won't have anything to teach. Anyhow, my father said to learn from him'. He goes to the king and he asked him, 'What will you teach me?'

Janaka says, 'Stay here for three days'.

People come to me and ask me, 'Swamiji, give us a glimpse of meditation, please teach us how to live in the bliss'. No. To tell you honestly, I can't teach you, but you can pick up. I can't teach you, but you can learn'.

I always tell them, 'Just be with me for 24 hours for a few days. I cannot teach you with verbal language. With words, you cannot learn anything. May be you can pick up from my body language. Just see how I live. Feel how I'm living. That may give you a glimpse. That may give you the confidence'.

Be very clear: words are not going to teach you. Here also the words that I'm uttering are not great and I'm not an orator. And I know my English. Oh God. I have my own

way of expressing. Anyhow, I don't bother about that also because I'm not here to teach you English. I'm not an English teacher. I'm only teaching spirituality.

Somebody asked me, 'What is this Swamiji? You should improve your English a little bit'. I said, 'I'm not teaching English, I'm teaching spirituality. Do you understand what I want to express?' He said, 'Yes. I understand'. 'That's all. For that much only we need language'. Language is necessary to convey. That's all. That's enough. Nothing else is necessary. We don't have to bother about anything else. I'm not giving you words. Words can't do anything else. The words that I'm using are not important.

The confidence that is radiating in my eyes, the honesty that is in my body language when I utter this truth is the reality. I always tell people, 'If you can pick up this honesty and confidence, then you have achieved. If you have picked up these words it means nothing. You are not going to be helped. But if you pick up this honesty and confidence, then you have done what you are supposed to do. You have achieved what you are supposed to achieve'.

I always tell people, 'Stay around me, be around me, watch. Just be a spy. See how I'm living. 24 hours'. See you can't hide something from someone 24 hours. You can't act 24 hours. It is impossible. You can act two or three hours on stage. Stage show is very easy. Anybody can get into the stage and do 2-3 hours of show. That is not a big thing. But you can't be the same for 24 hours. Be around me 24 hours. That may give you something.

Janaka says the same thing. 'Stay with me for 24 hours and you may learn something'. Take swimming for instance. Nobody can teach you swimming. But you can pick up swimming when you see somebody swimming. Nobody can teach you. When you see somebody swimming, you will understand three things. First thing: Swimming is possible. Man can float on water. Secondly, you get a tremendous urge. When they can do, why not me? Why can't I? I too can. The third thing: Let me jump in; the courage.

Same way, when you see an enlightened being walking on planet earth, when you live around him, you will understand three things. First thing: Enlightenment is possible. You can live like a God in this Planet Earth. Next thing: When he can, why not I? Because he will radiate such simplicity and such ordinariness, naturally you will have the confidence. Third thing: the courage. Let me also jump in. All these three will happen only if you live around a master, seeing the body language. Nothing else can help you. I always tell people, 'Spirituality can never be taught. You can pick up. It can't be taught'.

In the same way Janaka said, 'Live around me, stay here'. Suka Brahma stayed there for three days. He was not able to understand. Suka Brahma was not able to relate with what is going on there. Janaka was sitting enjoying his wine and opium. Singing was going on. Dancing was going on. Whatever was normal in the court of a king was going

on there and Janaka was just enjoying the whole thing. Suka Brahma was not able to relate with the whole scene. He was not able to understand what there was to learn.

After three days, again Suka Brahma went to Janaka and asks, 'Do you want to teach me anything?'. Then Janaka said, 'See how I'm living, and try to learn'. Suka Brahma said, 'I'm not able to learn anything. I don't understand anything. I'm seeing only one thing. You are living happily with the whole kingdom. I don't think I can learn anything from this'.

Janaka gave the boy a pot filled with oil and said, ' Please carry this pot and go around this palace for 7 times. Even a drop of oil should not spill out. That is the condition. Suka Brahma went around and returned successfully. Janaka asked him, 'You went around the palace 7 times. During that time period, did you see anything? Did you notice all the dancing or singing or anything?'

Suddenly Suka Brahma realized that not only was he not aware, he did not even remember all these things. All these things are going on and everything was in front of his eyes. It was not that he was away. He was not in a forest. He was not in his gurukulam school. He was in the palace. But nothing had created any engram or samskara in his inner space.

Then Janaka said, 'Like how, in these few moments even though you are here, nothing has created engrams in you, samskaras in you, in the same way even though I'm here for 24 hours, nothing has created engrams in me. No samskaras are created. My inner space is not touched by all these outer events. Nothing of this world touches my inner space. I'm pure in my inner space'.

Understand the meaning of purity. Purity does not mean that you will be sitting in Himalayas somewhere, hiding yourself, not ready to face the world. No. Purity does not mean that you will escape somewhere. Purity means you will have a beautiful inner space. The outer world things will not be able to penetrate you. The outer world events will not be able to fill you. Outer world things will be not be able to enter into you. Your inner space will be beyond any conditionings or samskaras related to the outer world. All you need to do is to understand and remember that you are unclutched!.

Remembering that you are unclutched will take you beyond body and mind. It will take you beyond space. In yesterday's technique Shiva taught us how to go beyond time. Now he is teaching us how to go beyond space. After a small break, we will see the technique and practise it.

A: All the 'Omni's you want to, put all those 'Omni's together. I am talking only about that Self-realization. I am not talking about small 's'. I am talking about the capital 'S'. Be very clear, in enlightenment there is no variety. It's not like a pizza you can order with different toppings. According to me there is only one kind of enlightenment.

I don't use those big words like atman because they are too much loaded. People are afraid of those words. Constantly people are asking me again and again, 'Swami, should I become sanyasi, should I renounce everything to achieve to attain enlightenment?'

Just renounce what you don't have. That is enough. There is no need to renounce what you have. Whatever you have, keep it. Just renounce what you don't have.

The one important thing that you don't have, I mean the shaft that you don't have, is what you are constantly creating. Drop it. Just renounce that shaft, that's enough. One more thing, as of now, out of 10 000 flowers you just pick a few and make a garland and you start identifying yourself with the 10 flowers. You give power and attention only to the 10 flowers. If you stop giving power to the 10 flowers the whole heap, 10000 flowers will have energy.

There is a possibility of all your thoughts becoming reality. All your thoughts will have tremendous power and strength. I'm talking about an important thing. In tantra they say that to achieve the state of enlightenment there are two ways, either you have to make all your dreams into reality or you should understand all your reality is nothing but a dream.

If you make all your dreams into reality suddenly you will realize that all your reality is nothing but your dream. If you do the first step, the second step will happen. If you do the second step first will happen. Both are directly connected. If you realize what you think as reality is nothing but a dream, all your dreams will be realized. If you realize all your dreams, all your reality will become nothing but a dream.

As of now you just pick up a few flowers and create a shaft and give power to that. Give your attention to that. You think you are only that. You're identifying only with that, that is why all the suffering. If you stop identifying with that selected thoughts, you have a big selective amnesia problem. If you stop identifying with those selected thoughts, suddenly you will see all the thoughts get the power. Your whole being is energized. Whatever is happening in you is having the same attention, energy.

First thing, you will be able to realize all your thoughts as reality. Be very clear, this a very simple powerful method to make your dreams into reality. Whatever dreams you have about future or life, if you can relax, if you can unclutch, you will see suddenly a

new kind of energy flowing through the thoughts. Even to achieve what you want, unclutching is the ultimate technique. That is a powerful technique, even to achieve what you want; whatever you want. Let you be very clear, the unclutching is the ultimate technique, which can give you everything.

Understand the shaft is a lie, and once you do even if you create a shaft what is there to worry? Even when you create a shaft and suffer, remember, even this idea that I am creating a shaft is one more shaft. The shaft which I created 10 years ago, the shaft which I created 9 years ago and the shaft which I created yesterday, they are not connected. Connecting all these shafts is one more shaft. That's all. Connecting all these shafts is one more shaft.

Let me be very clear, even connecting and creating these shafts is one more shaft. This understanding when it goes to the deeper level, that itself is enough. You don't have to think that emotions override rationality. Understanding once again to form shafts you will need to practice. Do not practice. When you remember this moment that shaft is a lie don't create shafts.

Don't bother about the next moment. The big problem is that you want to be assured now itself that you won't create shafts once and for all in your future. You can't have that assurance. When you want to have the assurance that you will not create shafts, you should achieve a state where you will never create shafts any more. You can't do that now.

Let you be very clear, when you try to create that state you create problems. When you don't create shafts you feel some inner relaxation, an inner healing. You will see if you are tortured with your mind, if you are suffering with your mind, this truth will give you such an inner healing, relaxation; now you will become greedy about this joy. Now you have become greedy about this joy, you are then afraid in any moment you may forget this truth; you will start getting caught with this shaft again.

So, now you want an assurance, 'Swamiji, tell us some way that we should always remember and not to create this shaft'. When you are trying to obtain that assurance, be very clear you are creating one more shaft. The moment you decide this is joy and you want this to be permanently with you, what you have done? You have started creating one more shaft. Then you are in trouble, whether it is joy or pain, the moment you create shaft you are in trouble. You are in trouble.

He is asking how you deal with it. You don't have to deal with it, why should you deal with it? If the shaft is there then you can deal with it. Here there is no shaft so why should you deal with it? All you have to do is know that you are constantly telling yourself that there is a shaft. You are doing everything to yourself to believe that there is a shaft.

aa mulaat kiranaabhaasaam sukhsmaat sukhsmataraatmikaam chintayetaam dvishtakaante shaamyanteem bhairavodayah

Meditating upon the radiating energy rising from the muladhara dissolving in the subtlest center of consciousness between eyebrows, let Shiva Consciousness be expressed.

Today's subject is Awareness: the Gates of God. Awareness is gates of God, gates to God and gates for God. It is everything related to Divinity. Yesterday, I was explaining the difference between concentration and awareness. Today we will go deep into the subject of Awareness.

Shiva is expounding a new Sutra. From today he starts speaking on a different center. Last 4 sutras were related to breath. Today he is moving to a different center. Let's see the sutra then we will see the meaning.

aa mulaat kiranaabhaasaam sukhsmaat sukhsmataraatmikaam chintayetaam dvishtakaante shaamyanteem bhairavodayah

In this sutra Shiva says,

Meditating upon the radiating energy rising from the muladhara dissolving in the subtlest center of consciousness between eyebrows, let Shiva Consciousness be expressed.

It is one of the esoteric mystical techniques. First time he is introducing esoteric technique to us. In the first 4 techniques, Shiva is very plain, simple, and direct. He is just making us feel comfortable. He is giving us feeling of homeliness. Now he is taking us to a deeper level.

Subtlest center of Consciousness between eyebrows: he speaks of the third eye, what we call Ajna chakra. The whole East, all eastern religions masters, mystics, whoever is from East, they continuously work on the Ajna chakra, the third eye. Whether it is Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism or any other spiritual group from the East, they will be working on their third eye. Third eye is the greatest gift given to planet earth by the Eastern mystics.

To awaken this third eye, there are at least 5000 techniques. There in no master or no teacher who has not worked on the third eye in the East. In the East, they start with the third eye. Anybody interested in spirituality, they start with the third eye. Even in our regular life in Bharat, constantly people work on the third eye. Sometimes they work indirectly through cosmetic approaches. Placing kumkum, the red powder, on the forehead between the eyes is a technique to work to the third eye. Constantly you will be aware of third eye. The turmeric in the kumkum activates the ajna chakra. If you constantly give attention to third eye it will be awakened. It will start directly expressing energy. It will start expressing pure consciousness.

All Vedic powers are expressed from this third eye only. All Vedic powers, whether it is power of materializing or the power of teleporting or power of telling the future or power of making dreams into reality, all these arise from third eye only. Third eye is the

subtlest and the most powerful energy center. Here Shiva is teaching us how to awaken the third eye and use in our normal life.

One simple thing, very simple thing, I will tell you about third eye. If somebody is sitting in front of you, just look at his third eye. You can look from the rear of the head as well, you don't have to look from the front. Just give any command. Simply the person will obey. Now you can check. You can test this on your neighbor.

You don't know the power of third eye. Simply a thought will be created in his consciousness. If you concentrate on his third eye, and utter a particular thought, simply his inner consciousness will get that thought. In his space that thought will be reproduced. I have seen many times the power of this third eye.

I was staying with a great master, a Naga Baba. Naga baba means a saint who does not wear clothes. He was a great sanyasi. He stayed in the Himalayas. I had opportunity to learn from him. Whenever people came to him to learn, to study anything, he would not teach. He would put his trishul, trishul means a trident that Shiva carries, and he would put his trishul and ask them to look at the tip of the trishul. Trishul has three tips, so he would ask them to look at all the three tips at the same time. At a single moment you should be able to look all three tips, only then he would teach you. He would place the trident in front of people who came to him to learn and make them focus on it. I have seen people sitting for months with him in front of the trident.

It is not as easy as you think. You may think, what is so difficult in looking at all three tips at the same time? After all it is a small trident. What is there? Never think like that, you cannot see anything in the same moment. One moment you can see one tip, next moment next tip and the next moment the third tip. You can't see completely.

As and now you can see 120 degrees at best, that also if you focus and see. Otherwise you have maximum 30 degree vision. If you start concentrating more you exclude things. The more you concentrate the less degree you can see. That is what I was saying yesterday, concentration means excluding things.

When he asked me to do this I was surprised,. I also used to carry a trishul when I was wandering. He told me look at all tips of this trishul at a time. You cannot move your eyeballs. But you should be aware of all the tips. He has got a strange test to see if you are really aware or not. He will look at your eyeballs and put his finger on the three tips. A small movement in the eyeballs also he will notice.

Remember, a small movement in the eyeball, means what, you are not aware of the three tips at a time. He will just shift his finger and ask: are you aware of this tip? He will clearly find out whether your eyeball is moving or not. When he started I too thought what is so special and difficult. I thought I can see the three tips of the trishul at a time, but then I understood that without moving the eyeballs, without changing, I was not able to see more than one point.

Actually trishul is a great weapon to centralize, to create awareness on the third eye. I was shocked, oh God, I can't even see this small trishul at a time. That is the truth and he will keep making people look at the trishul. I have seen people sitting for three months, morning till night. He would not give them food also. He would not allow them to eat from morning to night. Poor brahmacharis, they have to sit and stare at the trishul. He had 12 trishuls. So whoever comes, he will first put up the trishul and make them sit and stare at the trishul. I was shocked.

Now I understand it's a great technique to expand awareness. As and now, you can see 120 degrees. If you start looking at one particular point, slowly it will become 30 degree. If you have to be aware deeply, it will become 10 degree, not more than that. You won't be able to see more than 10 degree without awareness. Through this technique of staring at the trishul, he was trying to expand our awareness.

If you center yourself on the third eye, slowly, not only 120 degrees your awareness will expand and you will be able to see 180 degrees, then 240 degrees and ultimately 360 degrees you will be able to see and experience. Creating awareness, centering yourself on the third eye means awakening your consciousness, awakening your awareness.

Actually, I was surprised, why should he make all people meditate. Not everyone comes to him to experience. Many people come to him to learn Vedanta. He used to teach Vedanta. He knew a little bit of English, of course he is a scholar of Sanskrit and Hindi, but he knew a little bit of English. He used to teach. One Western seeker came to him. I was there at that time. He unleashed his brahmastra, this nuclear test, on this poor guy as well. The baba asked him to stare at this trishul and told him that only when he can see all the third tips he will teach him. That guy got frightened. He just came to learn to some philosophy. He was not interested in this meditation and all these techniques. He said I came to learn some philosophy. I will sit in your class whenever you teach to others and I will listen. Baba said, 'No. Unless you see all these three tips at a time I will not teach you, I will not allow you in my classes.

I wondered why he was so fanatical about his technique. I couldn't understand but later on I read on a book on a great philosopher and fountainhead of mysticism in the west. In his life there is a beautiful incident. He went to Egypt learn spirituality in a gurukulam type of school. Before allowing him to the gurukulam in the monastery, the master tells him, 'Hey sit here and concentrate on your third eye for third months, only then we'll allow you inside'. Pythagoras says, 'I am not interested in your philosophy, I am not interested in your meditation, I want to learn only philosophy. I want to only study. I don't want to become enlightened'.

The master said, 'No. We won't teach you philosophy unless you are mentally mature because when people learn philosophy without maturity they become criminals'.

There are three strengths: the physical strength, the mental strength and spiritual strength. Without spiritual strength if you achieve physical strength you will become a gangster. Without spiritual strength if you achieve mental strength you will become a criminal, a politician, a legal gangster. Anyhow, without spiritual strength if you achieve physical strength or mental strength you will become a danger to humanity. You cannot be allowed to become a danger to humanity. You will be only disturbing people. That's why the master says, 'No. First meditate for three months only then we can allow you inside, only then you can learn philosophy'.

Philosophy is a weapon, and unless you are mature person if you learn the logic you will become a very dangerous guy.

A small story, then I will explain. It's a little big so not a small story. I will read out. It's a nice story and I don't want to miss a single word.

A guy was reaching 25 and he had not dated a single lady. So his Rabbi called him to his office and asked him what's going on. Why did he not go on a date yet? This guy blushed and replied that he always grew up with his brothers and has never spoken to a girl anywhere near his age. He always thought that it will disturb his learning.

The rabbi put a fatherly arm around him and said don't worry about learning, it always happens. As far as what to talk to these young women, I can help you. The rabbi told him that he can talk on three topics: interests, family and if all fails talk about philosophy. So the guy was happy, he went home: family, likes, philosophy, family, likes, philosophy. He was happy that now he knows what to talk.

Finally the day comes and this guy goes on a date with a young lady from his congregation arranged by the rabbi. He sits in the restaurant with the girl, a little uncomfortable. He realizes that he should start a conversation. He went on the first item family. So he asks if she has a brother. The girl replies 'no'. Then he thinks what to ask and remembered that he should ask about family. So he asks her about her interests. He asks her if she likes baseball. The girl replies no. Then he starts thinking what to ask. Somehow he remembered philosophy. He comes up with a philosophical question and he started in a very low voice and asks her if you had a brother, do you think he would like baseball.

All your philosophy is just assumptions. Big danger is unless you have spiritual strength the philosophy is very dangerous. You will do some foolish things like this. Anyhow, Pythagoras was not allowed to enter the monastery. He was asked to meditate for three months. After three months passed, the master says now you are ready. You can come inside and learn philosophy. Pythagoras says no. I don't have the interest to learn philosophy. You changed me. I am no more the same person. Master asked, tell me exactly what happened to you.

Pythagoras says when I came to you to learn philosophy. I had so much of violence in me, so much of vengeance in me. I wanted to learn philosophy just to become a politician. I wanted to rule people. I know I am not strong enough to rule physically. But I know if I have little knowledge I can rule them through words. That's the reason first I came here to learn philosophy, but these three months of meditation has done something to me. Now I don't have that violence, now I don't feel like ruling anybody. I don't want to become a politician. So I don't want to learn philosophy. He says, Master teach me, or give me something more if you can in the same line of meditation.

The Master says that you are a right person to learn philosophy now. If I give you philosophy it will not be abused, it will not be misused. It will not be used to enslave others.

Buddha also used to say same thing. Whenever people used to come to him to learn spirituality, to learn about nirvana, he will ask them to go and sit in the burial grounds for three months and meditate, then come back. Only then he will teach you. Always these great masters have emphasized on meditating, not only meditating, meditating on the third eye before learning philosophy.

Pythagoras also learned this one technique. Actually he took this one technique and started spreading it in the West. That is how he became fountainhead of mysticism.

Let me tell you my experience with this naga baba who used to ask people to stare at his trishul. Whole day we will be sitting and staring. Unless he is very clear that we are able to look at all the three tips of the trishul without moving the eyeballs, without even a slight movement. He knows when you move your eyeballs. He will not even look into your eyes. He will just hold your hand. I have seen his test. He will hold your hand and put his finger on the tips. Are you aware where I am placing my finger, he will ask. If you say 'yes Swamiji', he will change the finger and say now are you aware. By that time your eyeball will move automatically, one movement and that's all. He will feel that in your hands. He will say now sit again and start staring. Only when you practice you will understand really that you are not looking through both the eyes.

Please be very clear you may have two eyes but you are not using both the eyes. You use only one eye at a time, that also hardly ten degrees. Somehow you picked up this habit. Constantly you see ten degrees after ten degrees by shifting your eyeballs and that is why you think you see the whole. You are seeing 120 degree bit by bit. But as and now your awareness is not enough to use both the eyes.

When it comes to senses, we use the word chakshu in Sanskrit. Please be very clear, Chakshu is not a plural word, it's a singular word that refers to the energy of the senses. In English you use the word eyes and in Sanskrit, we use chakshu. They don't use the word as a plural referring to two eyes, but as a singular word. Only for enlightened masters they use the word trinetra, one with three eyes*.* Either you have three eyes or

you have only one eye. You don't have two eyes. According to the mysticism, they have only singular word or the three.

In Sanskrit we have three numbers for each word, single, dual and multiple. In English you have only singular and plural. Sanskrit is a very beautiful language. It's created only for mysticism. That's the reason the language is directly related to spirituality. In Sanskrit, we have the word chakshu, referring to eyes in the singular. As and now you have only one eye. Never ever think you have two eyes. You may have two physical eyes, but you can't use them. There is an energy that looks through the eyes, that is active only in one eye, because you are constantly jumping, you won't notice the gap. That is why you have so much of eyeball movements. Constantly your eyeballs are moving.

If you know a little bit of mythology you know, there is a belief that our god's eyeballs don't move. What does that mean? It means that the person who can see completely without any eyeball movement becomes God. The one who can see without eyeball movement, with full awareness, he becomes God. That's what Shiva means by Awareness, the gates of God.

In Hindu mythology, we believe the Gods don't move their eyeballs. Their eyeballs don't move. If you want to find out if somebody has come down from the heavens, if one is some extra ordinary being, watch his eyes his eyeballs will not move. They say that is the mythological belief.

Anyhow, one thing is clear, if we can see without moving our eyeballs; your awareness is exploded in the third eye. This naga baba, this Swami, he was such a beautiful, wonderful master. I have never seen him taking bath or eating or drinking. I have never seen him doing anything that normal human beings do. I have never seen him sleeping. All he will do is only one thing, smoking ganja opium, that's all.

I asked him, what is this, you are a great enlightened master, why do you smoke opium? Why do you smoke these leaves? He told me. See a big elephant cannot be tied in a small hut. My awareness is so much that unless I tie myself down I cannot enter this body. I cannot live in this body. So I have to reduce my awareness little bit. I have to bring myself down.

One person asked me, Swamiji, if they can smoke, why not us? Be very clear, you have to bring yourself up, they have to bring themselves down. There is a big difference and one more thing; you are already down, where else can you go down?

There is a beautiful Zen saying, don't do what masters do, do what they say.

There was a great Zen master who used to smoke continuously. He will always tell people not to smoke, don't drink. A disciple asked him, what is this, master? You

always tell us, don't smoke, and don't drink. But you are smoking every day. You are a chain smoker and you are not even hiding it. You are smoking in front of us.

Master replies beautifully, I don't have to follow what I teach, because I am not in the same plane as the people to whom I am teaching.

This is a beautiful truth. I don't have to follow what I teach because I am not in the same plane of the people to whom I am teaching. It is a great truth.

Anyhow, this baba will ask everybody to sit and do the same thing. Unless he is very clear that person is aware of all the three points without moving his eyeballs, he will not allow them to his class. But once he accepts them into the class he will take care of them and see that the person achieves some spiritual experience.

I wanted all of you to understand about this 120 and 360 degree vision, because that is the basis of this whole technique. This whole technique is about awareness, especially awareness of the third eye, the idea about the third eye. One more important thing, if somebody's third eye is awakened, you will see a totally different grace around him. Apart from the physical measurements, you will see a different grace.

See beauty comes and goes by age, but the grace is totally different. It's no way related to body, it's no way related to age. It's something beyond age.

A small story.

One actress asks the photographer. What is this? Last time you photographed me, it was so nice, now you have done such a bad work. What is happening?

Photographer says, 'Yes. Last time I photographed you, I was 10 years younger'.

Be very clear, beauty comes and goes with age. It is directly related to spare parts. In the West especially, everything is spare part. Everything is given on a hanger. Morning you put on and night everything is back on hanger. Everything is a spare part. Beauty is related to spare parts and the grace is related to your being.

When your third eye is awakened, something radiates around you beyond the body. I have seen that grace in that great naga baba. He was a dark tall person with long hair. If you see him first time, you will feel frightened. But there was something around him, tremendous grace, just like a child. His whole body and his whole being was so alive, just like a child. I can imagine how Shiva would have looked like by remembering him, a great mahatma.

Anyhow, let us understand about this third eye. As and now, we have only vision on 120 degrees. If you concentrate on something, you will be reducing your vision and the degrees of vision will reduce. The more you concentrate less the degree of your vision.

Instead of concentrating on something else, if you put your attention on the third eye, instead of concentrating on the object, if you turn the awareness on the subject, the degree will start expanding. It will not reduce the vision. It will start expanding. You will start seeing things much more clearly, in a detailed way and an expanded way.

Here Shiva is telling us to bring our attention between the eyebrows. Concentrating on the third eye will awaken your awareness, you will be able to see more and more in a detailed way with much more awareness.

He says one more thing: let mind be before thought. You will be aware even before the thought is rising. As and now once the thought comes up you may try to suppress or follow. Once the thought comes up you will try to suppress it or follow it. You will not be aware before the thought comes. Here Shiva says let mind be before thought. Let you be aware before the thought is coming.

There is a beautiful commentary of Abhinava Gupta on Shiva Sutras. Abhinava Gupta was a great Kashmiri Shaivism master. He comments on the sutra: he says creating, maintaining and destroying, these three are the responsibilities of the trinity. Brahma creates, Vishnu maintains, and Shiva destroys.

In your mind, you do this work continuously. You create a thought or maintain a thought or suppress a thought, kill a thought. If you don't do all these three, you go beyond, you will become Para Brahma. You will become enlightened. You will go beyond Shiva, Vishnu and Brahma. You will go beyond Existence. As and now you are doing these three things: creating, maintaining and destroying. If you don't create a thought, if you don't maintain a thought or if you don't destroy a thought, suddenly you will be awakened to the reality, to the ultimate reality that you are Para Brahman, you are existence.

Shiva says here, if you are concentrating on the third eye, you will be aware of your thoughts. Even before your thoughts are rising you will be in Shiva Consciousness. You need to understand this one thing: this is a greatest liberation. Being aware before the thought rises is the greatest liberation.

Usually always you are by the thoughts. See even before you look into something clearly, you decide. I always tell people, 2 things: collecting arguments and passing judgment and having judgment and collecting arguments to support your judgment. Usually we never collect argument and pass judgment. Your judgment is ready about anybody and anything. The moment you see, you decide, you pass a judgment. Once the judgment is ready then you just collect some arguments to support the judgment, about a person, or about a situation or about anything. You create a judgment and then you collect arguments to support the judgment.

If you are aware before thoughts rise only then you will be free from the judgmental attitude. You will be liberated from constantly judging. You will be above the

judgmental attitude otherwise you will not even be aware of the thoughts raising and falling in you. You may suppress the thought, but after the thought comes, even if you are suppress you are not going to be out of your problem. Be very clear, whether you express or suppress, you are with the thought. If you express, you will create a chain outside, for example, anger. If you express your anger, you create a chain outside. If you don't express and suppress, you will create a chain inside. That's all.

Either you create a chain inside or you create a chain outside. But you will be having some chains. Neither expressing nor suppressing will help you. Being aware before the thought comes; being aware before the anger comes is the only way to liberation.

Liberation means not suppressing. Be very clear, I have seen people suppress, how much they suffer. At least if you express you will not carry that in you. You will not carry that smell in you, but if you suppress you will be constantly carrying that smell, the dirty smell in you. I have seen people, if you express your anger, at least you will be angry to that person straight, over. If you suppress the anger, you will be banging the door, throwing the shoes, and shouting at people for no reason.

Be very clear, suppression creates more problems. If you suppress, your whole body language is changed. Your whole body will change. Suppression is no way going to help you. Suppression is not going to solve the problem.

Shiva is giving you first time solution for the problem. Again and again they come and ask me, Swamiji, how I can control myself. How can I escape from these emotions? How can I save myself? Be very clear, neither expressing nor suppressing will help you, being aware before the thought raise is the only way to liberation.

Let you be aware of yourself before even thought arises, otherwise you will be lost. Be very clear, the moment a thought comes, your consciousness is lost. Your consciousness is no more pure. You have started entering in the space mind. You are not in the no-mind zone. You are not in Zen zone. You are in the zone of your mind. Before you lose your consciousness, before you lose your Zen zone, let you be aware of your neutral space.

Small story.

In a crowded cafeteria there is a large sign that reads, 'Watch your hat and overcoat'. One guy entered the cafeteria he started turning this side and that side, every minute, constantly taking care of his coat and hat. His friend, he was also sitting with him. After half hour, he got really irritated. He said stop, enough of your nonsense. Stop looking at my overcoat. You don't have to take care of my overcoat. Stop looking at the overcoats.

This guy said, who said I am looking at your overcoat, I am looking at mine. Yours was lost half an hour back.

Yours is not there. I am only watching mine. Yours is gone for over half hour. Let you be very clear, after thought comes, you can't do anything. Your inner space is gone. If you are aware before thought rises in your inner space, then you are intelligent. Let you be intelligent, be aware before thought rises in your inner space.

One more thing: you need to know about this, third eye, as long as your third eye is not awakened, as long as you are using only these two eyes, let you be very clear, you will have constant inner chattering, you will be constantly judging. Your eyeball movements and the movement of your mind, both of them are very closely connected. If you are using only two eyes, it means that your eyeballs are continuously moving. Then naturally you will be creating more and more thoughts. Even if you don't have any reason to create thoughts, even if you don't have any reason to think, you will be thinking.

Let you be very clear, you suffer because you are constantly thinking even when you don't need to think. You can't switch off this tape recorder. It goes on and on and on. You can't do anything; continuously it is going on. Even if you don't have any subject, new material from outside, you take old material from your old files, you take something from the past files and you start chewing the cud like a cow. Cows bring up their food from their stomachs after eating back into their mouths and start chewing.

Same way, please be very clear, this chewing gum also is directly related to inner chattering. People who are in habit of chewing gums continuously, you will see that they are deeply depressed. Depression and chewing gum are closely connected. I am not joking; I am telling you the truth. When you can't handle your inner chattering you want some way to relax. Same is the case for biting the nails. It is expressing your violence. You are expressing your violence. You see, the nails and the teeth are both directly connected to violence. When you are an animal you use your nails and teeth to express your violence. Now, you are cultured, you can't bite anybody. Somebody will sue you. You can't bite others and you can't attack others. So what to do, bite your own nails. It's an indirect way of expressing your violence.

Chewing gum is directly related to inner chattering. Your tongue movement is also directly related to inner chattering. Eyeball movement is also directly related to inner chattering. If you are using these two eyes, let you be very clear, constantly your eyeballs are moving and thoughts are rising in your inner space. You can't do anything.

You can see in your life that the moment you see a rose, immediately you get a thought. Oh! This is beautiful. Next all the old memories are kindled. At some point, the roses that you gave to somebody, whether that person rejected it or accepted it, the memory of that person, how that affected you, all these things start rising in you and you will simply forget the real rose that is in front of you. You will not be able to enjoy the real rose that is in front of you.

One more thing, the moment you label, the moment you think this is the rose, immediately you start thinking about the rose. You miss the very flower itself. The beauty, the very flower, you simply forget about it. You don't enjoy the flower anymore. You simply start verbalizing. Only your memories related to roses will come up. You will be sitting and talking to yourself about all these things.

Let you be very clear, the moment you start creating words in you, you stop enjoying the flower, you stop enjoying its reality. You are no more connected to the flower. The flower is there but you are thinking about something else, you are no more connected to the flower.

One important thing: the moment you create the word rose, you think you know everything about that flower. Let you be very clear, rose is not a rose; the word rose is not the flower rose. When you create the word, the moment these two eyes are active, the moment you create the word rose, the moment your eyeballs move, more words are created. You are simply with the words; you are not connecting with the reality.

Try this simple experiment. Look at the flower without creating any words, without creating any words about that product in your inner space. Do not think that it is a rose. Witness that it is red in color and it is beautiful. Do not create any thoughts. Just look at it. Just try to relate with it without any words. Suddenly you will see you are in a different space. You are able to connect with the flower much more deeply than you ever imagined.

Let you be very clear, you do not relate with the world, constantly you are playing with the words between you and the world. Constantly words are coming in your inner space. If you are looking with two eyes, it is equivalent to blindness. According to Tantra, either you use one eye or three eyes.

According to me, either you use three eyes or no eyes at all.

Even if you see with your eyes, you are not seeing what is. You are just playing with words. The moment you create a word, you are no more connected to the world itself, or the product itself. That is why if you see kids, whenever something is brought in front of them, you see their whole body flowering, they enjoy with the whole body. But once you grow, hardly your eyes will open, little bit, not more than that. Once you create words, all the excitement is lost. Adults verbalize, children visualize.

One more thing, the rose that you are seeing today is not the same rose you are saw yesterday, the moment you create the word rose you connect all the roses you have seen and you think I know everything about roses what is there to enjoy. The excitement is lost. Let you be very clear, the moment you verbalize them, the excitement is lost. You are no more in reality.

There is a beautiful story of a great master who lived in Madhya Pradesh.

He used to take only one kind of food, same variety of food everyday. After 10 years, the devotee who used to cook for him, she was bored. She told him, 'Master, I am bored of cooking the same food, how are you able to eat the same food everyday? Don't you feel bored?'

Master replies beautifully, 'What same food? I am not eating the same food. How can I eat the same food everyday? I can't eat the same food everyday'.

He says beautifully, everyday for me it's a new food. It can't be the same food. But your mind plays a big game. The moment you start holding on to the words, the excitement is lost. Then you start looking out for new excitement, but within two-three days that excitement is also lost.

That is why I always tell people, changing partners will not work because all excitement will be lost after the honeymoon, because you will start creating labels. You will start analyzing that person. Oh this person, this much only, over. The moment you start creating labels, the whole excitement and the joy is lost. Never create a label. The moment you start creating labels, the joy is lost. Changing partners is of no use, changing your mind alone will work.

That's why you can see that kids whenever they see something, their whole body expands. They are just bubbling, alive. You can see their eyes, how they expand. When they see something new, their eyes expand. Eyes expand at least three times when they are in high energy, when they are in high emotion. Once you grow nothing can excite you. That's what they say your mind is so powerful.

Never think if you have mind you can enjoy things. If you have mind, it only makes you dull. You can never enjoy anything with mind, because mind means logically connecting two things. Naturally you will not be able to enjoy. You won't have that excitement. You won't have that feeling of new.

In Zen they say, Buddha's mind is the beginners' mind. Beginners' mind is Buddha's mind. When you begin something in what state you are, that is what they call the Buddha state. Joy, excitement, curiosity to be open, to express excitement is what they say is the Buddha state.

Awareness and the third eye are directly connected. Either you see with all three eyes or you don't see at all, because even if you see with ordinary eyes, your mind will be there before awareness, before you are aware, thought will arise. Thoughts are like curtains, they will not let you see the reality as it is. They will not let you understand the reality as it is. You will start giving your own meaning to things.

One small story.

One guy was talking to his wife on his deathbed. He says, oh my dear you have been with me through all the bad times. When I got fired, you were there to support me, when my business failed, you were there to support me, when I got shot, you were there by my side, when we lost the house you gave me support, when my health started failing you were still by my side. You know what dear….

Wife asked, what, what is it that you want to tell me.

I think you brought me bad luck!

You can give your own meaning to everything, because thoughts are there before awareness. You are ready with your judgment. See this same thing can be interpreted in two ways: one way you can say she is such a nice person, she was always with him, and other way you can say she is a bad luck.

Please be clear, your mind is in front of your awareness.

According to me there are only two kinds of people, one whose mind is there before their awareness, second whose awareness is there before their mind.

If your mind is there before their awareness, mind your mind, you need treatment. You need meditation. No medication will help. Especially no physiatrist medication will help.

One more small story.

A patient was asked by his friend, 'Didn't the Physiatrist help you, why did you stop going to him? You didn't get any help from him?'

He says, 'What is the use? He is asking the same questions and charges me. My wife asks me the same questions without charging me'.

So be very clear, analyzing is not going to help you in any way. Anyhow, you can see the same thing, in a different way if you have already prepared your judgment; you will not be able to see the truth.

I read this beautiful definition of a husband. Husband is a person who stands by you in all the problems that you face in your life which you would not have had if you didn't have him in your life in the first place.

If you ready with your judgment, nothing can be done. If your third eye is not awakened, if you are not aware enough, your mind will be before your awareness.

Here Shiva says let you be centered on your Ajna and let your awareness be before your thoughts. Let you be aware even before your thoughts rise in your inner space. It's a beautiful meditation technique. He is now explaining.

Before entering into the technique let me explain what exactly this technique is supposed to do for us and how exactly to practice this. Do we really need this technique?

As I was telling you, we are constantly suffering with 120 degree vision, not only in the outer world, even in our inner space you are not clear about things, because before you see them thoughts are there. The moment thoughts arise vision is distorted, completely distorted. You don't see things as they are. You don't experience things as they are.

Let you be very clear, your mind is so powerful. Your thoughts are so powerful that anything can be distorted into anything. You can see in your own life. The moment you lose faith on somebody, the moment the trust is lost, anything can be twisted into anything. Even simple things can be twisted into different ways. When you don't have that trust, that faith, even good things will start judging a bad way. Your inner space will not be able to experience straight. You will not be able to relate with anything directly.

Now by creating awareness on the third eye, if you can have the vision, when I say vision of 360 degree, not only you will be able to see everything, you will be able to see things clearly without judgmental attitude, without passing any judgments, without giving some idea before you study about it. That's a big problem, you see judging something before analyzing, and you don't know how many things you lost in your life when you judge something before you analyze.

I have seen so many people, let me tell you a small incident. It really happened in my life.

Once in our Bidadi ashram, I was sitting on a rock without any paraphernalia, no secretary, no assistants. I was sitting alone and enjoying the cool breeze. One old scholar, a Pundit, came near me. He had not seen my photo, he only had heard about me. He came to me and asked me where is Swamiji, I want to see him.

I understood. I told him please go to the meditation hall, he will come there at 4 pm. I got ready, went in and I was about to sit in the chair. He said, 'No, I want to see the big Swamiji'.

I said what can I do? In this ashram I am the big Swamiji. Please understand.

He said I want to meet THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM Swamiji who healed my cousin.

I told him the name of the person who got healed and told him that I am the person who healed him.

To tell you the truth, he was not able to relate with me. He knows somebody is being healed and he knows everything logically, but he is not able to relate because he is a great intellectual.

Somehow in the pundits' mind, the knowledge is always associated with age, especially in my field, the spiritual field. The basic two three things are the trademarks: big belly, long face, big beard. These are all the trademarks of spirituality. So somehow he was not able to relate with me.

Again he insisted that he wants to meet the big Swamiji, THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM. Then I had to take the ultimate step, I showed him a poster in the meditation hall and asked him to match the name and the face. I told him see the THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM in the poster and said, look at me, I am that face. I can't say anything more. We don't have a habit of carrying a calling card. I don't have any ID.

You will be surprised. He did not talk to me and went away. He really went away. He said, 'I am not interested in talking to you, I had some questions, I wanted to clarify some doubts, I wanted to have answers'.

He did not talk to me. When you have judgment, some idea, you will miss the whole life itself. Not only this one incidence, there are thousands of incidences, you can see in your life because of your judgment you will miss so many things in your life.

Once this third eye is awakened, you will start living life of freedom. You will be liberated from your inner chattering. You will be able to relate with what is. You will not just be with what you think. You will live with what is and this third eye is the energy center for intuition. This can give you clear view about the past and the future.

Let you be very clear, if the third eye is not awakened, you will neither be clear about your past nor the future. People ask me, 'Swamiji, we understand that we will not be clear about the future. That is ok, but how do you say we will not be clear about our past? We know our past; how do you say we will not be clear about our past if the third eye is not awakened?'

Please be very clear, if your third eye is not awakened, you will not remember the past as it happened, you will remember only as you want it. You will remember only the sufferings or you will remember only joyful moments, you will not remember as it happened. You will not remember completely. You will remember only what you want to remember. You can see in your life, you don't remember the people who helped you, but you will remember the people who abused you, whoever disturbed you, because you are just waiting to be disturbed. What can be done? You are just begging people saying please disturb me. Please give me some trouble.

Let me tell you one incident, one of a local politician who came to the ashram, who is a close disciple. I told him please make get the approach road to the ashram repaired so that the villagers would be able to use this road. In Bharat you know roads are the gateway to hell, straightaway they will take you to hell. I told him, please repair this road, villagers are suffering.

He is a nice person, really sincere person. He replied, Swamiji, tell me anything else and I will do. I will make roads for the ashram, but please I can't make this road, at least for next one year.

I asked why. He said, Swamiji, when elections come and I make this road, people will remember me. If now itself I make this road, people will not remember me.

He was right. You remember people only who create problem for you and you don't remember people who serve you. He said if I serve now, people won't remember at that time. Only at the last moment they will remember. If I have an assurance that they will remember me at the last moment, now itself I can make. They have to suffer, and in the end if I solve the problem they will think I am a great person.

It is true. We remember only the people who give us suffering. We never remember people who give us solution. That is why people give you only sufferings. Please remember one thing, a simple thing, if somebody gives you small present, you will remember that person for a month or at most 2 months or so. But if somebody snatches your purse you will remember that person for your whole life.

So if you want to remember somebody what he should do? He should disturb you. If he does something bad to you, you will remember. You are waiting to be disrespected. That's the reason you are constantly abused. Please be very clear you don't even remember your past as it happened unless your third eye is awakened. It will not be clear to you as you think.

Be it your past or future, you will remember clearly only when you are aware before thoughts rise in your inner space. Awakening the third eye, you will become God. That is why all Hindu Gods have a third eye. You see any Hindu God, Shiva, Ganapati, Surya, Skanda, all of them have third eye. Only if your third eye is awakened you are God. You see, man plus third eye is God, God minus third eye is man.

If your third eye is awakened, you are a spiritual being with human experience and if your third eye is not awakened; you are a human being looking for a spiritual experience. Third eye makes a big difference in your inner space. All the visions, darshan and the extra ordinary things happen in people's life only because of the third eye energy.

I have heard of a great mathematician, Ramanujam. He was from Tamil Nadu in South Bharat and was a great mathematician. An Oxford University mathematician was not able to solve the problems that Ramanujam can solve. Ramanujam was called to London and many studies were done on him. They say that Ramanujam gave the answer in a few seconds to some of the problems that the great mathematicians at Oxford took hours to solve.

In his autobiography he has written about some of his reminiscences with people in his life. It is a beautiful book. In that they ask him, how are you able to answer? He says, the moment a problem is given to me, something happens within my eyebrows, within my third eye. Both my eyes are just sucked in by the third eye. My attention becomes alive on the third eye and I have the answer. That's all.

Let you be very clear, all the great things happen only when your third eye is awakened. Man plus third eye is God, God minus third eye is man.

There is a beautiful story in Shiva's life.

Shiva opened his third eye and burned the manmata. Manmata means maya, or the illusion that you are seeing or which you are thinking as life. Your vision disturbed by your past memories is maya. Your vision disturbed by your samskaras is what I call maya. If your third eye is awakened, your vision will be clear; you can also burn manmata. You will be liberated from manmata. You will live like Shiva. You will live like Maha Deva.

We shall enter into a meditation technique to awaken the third eye. One more thing: I assure this technique will work today itself. Be very clear, as far eye third eye is concerned, the path and the goal are not two difference things. From today itself you will start experiencing the third eye.

I am not speaking like the American TV. In American TV what all advertisements they have, free trial, risk free trials, only shipping charge, and so many things. Be very clear, I am not talking like American TV. I am telling you the truth, the honest truth, nothing but the truth. You can see the power of the third eye and you can start experiencing the intuition from today. This technique you don't need to practice everyday. It is just awareness, even when you drive the car, when you are seeing the TV, when you are relaxing, when you are talking to others, you can just bring your awareness to your third eye. Simply it will be awakened. If your third eye is awakened, you will know with whom you are relating. What for he is sitting in front of you, what is the right step in everything you do. Your intuition will be sharp and alive.

It is time to start the meditation. It is a very simple but yet very powerful technique. There are two steps in working on the third eye, working on ajna chakra. First, you will bring your awareness on your third eye. Compose yourself completely. Center yourself on the third eye. This is the first step. Second, you will look through third eye.

You will feel as if that energy is showering all over your body and see through third eye. The second step is the real thing that you need to learn.

Please understand: the first step: you will close your eyes. Put your awareness on the third eye. One important thing, do not concentrate. Do not put pressure on third eye. Do not concentrate on third eye. Put your awareness in a very relaxed way. If you are gazing at rose flower, how relaxed way you will do, same way gaze at your third eye in a very relaxed way. Let you be completely relaxed. Let your awareness be on the third eye.

Second step: visualize as if you are looking through the third eye. There is a hole in this area and you are seeing through that hole.

Third step: I will guide you. In the third step, you will feel as if that energy is showering all over your body. I will guide you in the third step.

Let me repeat the instruction once more. First step: close over eyes and let you be centered on the third eye. Let you be aware of third eye. Do not concentrate. Do not force yourself. Just be aware of the third eye. No need to tie the ribbon. Just be aware of the third eye.

Second step: Feel as if you are looking through third eye. One more thing, first few moments only you will feel as if you are looking through the third eye. Suddenly you will see you are really looking through the third eye. Once your energy is centered, you are really seeing through the third eye. There will be a candle in front of you on the table. Just gaze at that candle in the second step.

First step: you will close your eyes and put your awareness on your third eye. Second step: you will look through the third eye to the candle. Third step: you will close your eyes and visualize the whole energy showering from your third eye all over your body.

Third step, I will guide you. Now we will start the first step.

Please close your eyes. Sit straight.

Inhale and exhale as slowly as possible, as deeply as possible.

Feel the inhaling and exhaling breaths touching the third eye. Your incoming breath is taking turn as outgoing breath in your third eye between the eyebrows.

Let your attention be centered on the third eye.

Inhale and exhale through the third eye. Feel your third eye is inhaling and exhaling.

Put your awareness on the third eye. Let you be centered on the third eye.

Do not concentrate. Just relax. Be aware of the third eye.

Just be aware of the third eye. Do not concentrate. Just be aware. Let your attention be centered on the third eye.

Let you be centered on the third eye. Let your third eye be filled with bliss and energy. Let your third eye be alive. Let your third eye be awakened. Let you be spiritually awakened.

Let your third eye be filled with awareness. Let your awareness be centered on your third eye.

Let your third eye be filled with awareness. Let your awareness be centered on your third eye.

Slowly, very slowly, you can open your eyes and look through the third eye.

Visualize as if you are seeing through the third eye and gaze at the candle.

Let your awareness be centered on the third eye and look through the third eye.

Let your awareness be completely centered on the third eye.

Let your awareness be centered on your third eye. Look through your third eye.

Let you be completely centered on your third eye. Look through third eye. Don't look through ordinary eyes. Look through third eye.

Close your eyes. Visualize and feel that energy is showering from your third eye to all over your body.

Shakti is showering like a light all over the body.

Feel you are being showered with energy like a light. Feel at the top of your head, energy is showering as light spreading all over body.

Feel you are showered with light and energy, you are showered with bliss.

Om shanti, shanti, shantihi.

This is a beautiful meditation technique for all the eye problems and I problems. You can heal eye problem and I problem, both. Both these problems can be solved by this meditation technique.

Let these teachings and techniques of Shiva lead you and give you, let you be in, become one with eternal bliss, THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM. Thank you.

In our first level Life Bliss Program, that is also called the Ananda Spurana Program, we cover all the seven chakras, seven energy centers, of the body mind system. Actually the chakras are six, the last being the Ajna or third eye center. What we refer to as the seventh chakra, sahasrara, is really a gateway beyond the centers.

Chakras govern one's energy state, through the energy state one's emotional state, and through that the mind body system and one's health and wellness. When your chakras are energized or awakened or unblocked they are in a healthy state and so are you. When they are blocked, you too become blocked and unwell. So, it is important to keep your chakras unblocked and energized. In the first level LBP courses, you are taken through a series of meditative techniques and the understanding of your chakras to energize the chakras and help you control your emotional state and thereby your wellness.

The ajna is the control center of chakras. It is energy wise linked to the Pituitary gland, the master gland which controls all other hormonal glands. From the chakra perspective ajna is the seat of intelligence and intuition. When the ajna is awakened you have the power to make your dreams come true. What you wish happens. The word ajna in Sanskrit means will or command. When the Brihadaranya Upanishad says, 'as your will is, so you become', the reference is to the state of the awakened ajna chakra.

Normally, the ajna is blocked by the development of one's identity, or one's ego. This happens as a result of our conditioning from a very young age as to what we should be, based on guidance from elders and experiences. We build an outer identity or exterior ego, called ahankara in Sanskrit that projects who we are to the outer world. Always, but always, this is an exaggerated version of who we are that we want others to believe. At the same time we have an inner voice, an internal ego, mamakara, that constantly reminds us of how insignificant we are. The gap between these two egos causes us all the sufferings we experience.

You may say that you do not consider yourself insignificant. In fact you think very highly of yourself, especially if you are an American. Let me then ask you, how many

of you think you are God. Not even one, oh, my God! If you said you were God, you would be worried that you would be certified and rushed to an asylum. But, in fact, you are God. Your inner nature is Divine. Anything less you think of yourself is a diminished inner ego, mamakara.

When the ajna awakens one expands in consciousness to the understanding that we are not individual islands but connected consciousness. We realize that we are not merely the waves in the ocean, each pretending to be linked to another wave close by, but that we are in fact the ocean. That realization brings in a focus upon one's own Self, which in turn moves one away from the 'I', the self identity. For the first time you awaken to the realization of who you are.

In the tantric representation, ajna is shown as a twin petal lotus flower. One petal is buddhi or intelligence and the other is shakti or energized power. When ajna is awakened both petals are activated. We gain intelligence with energy. We gain the energy to turn all our dreams into reality. At the same time, we gain the intelligence to realize that all we think as reality is a dream!

yâvasthâ bharitâkârâ bhairavasyopalabhyate | kair upâyair mukha.m tasya parâ devi katham bhavet | yathâ samyag aha.m vedmi tathâ me brûhi bhairava || 23 || Shakti says to her beloved Shiva

Oh Bhairava, creator, maintainer and rejuvenator of this universe Remove the doubt that still persists Studying scriptures and imbibing their essence Help me clear my mind

What is your nature in reality? Are you of the words of the world? Are you the nine forms of tattva? Are you the seed mantra? Are you the feminine energy? Are you the energy of words and light? Are you the energy of the chakras? Or are you pure formless energy? Are you in form or formless beyond form?

How can you be letters, words, colors and bodies? And yet be the energy that binds them? Are you in parts or composed of parts? Or are you the transcendent indivisible One beyond all? Who are You?

Favor me and clear the doubts that assail me!

Bhairava responds to his beloved

Excellent, my dear, what you ask is the very Truth Let me unravel this secret for you My form is an illusion for those led by intellect Obsessed with rituals and consumed by fantasies

I am not any of what you described

Words, forms, mantras, chakras and energies Are for those yet unprepared for the truth To lure them by greed and drive them by fear Into the path of righteousness

I am beyond time, space and description Seen when one is beyond the mind Experienced in the inner bliss

Of the egoless state

That is my nature as Bhairava Immaculate and all pervasive Highest reality for worship In the formless state

You are the same as I am Just as fire is no different from the energy of fire Separated only as a step that leads For you are my undifferentiated face!

Asks Devi again

Oh Lord of Lords, please tell me in simple words How one can experience the bliss of the Bhairava state? How can I be the step to reach Bhairava? How does one reach Parasakti?

Shri Bhairava uvaacha

urdhve praano hy adho jeevo visargaatmaa paroccharret utptidvitayasthaane bharanaad bharitaa sthitih

urdhve: as the upward breath, prana: breath energy, athaha: as the downward breath, jeevo: life, visargatma: the unceasing Self, para: Parasakti , utptidvitayasthane: in the space they originate, bharanaad: awareness, bharita: perfection, sthitih: achieve

Oh Parasakti, expressing your nature unceasingly in the upward and downward breaths, be aware in their sources to reach perfection.

marutontar bahir vaapi viyadyugmaanivartanaat | bhairavyaa bhairavasyetham bhairavi vyajyate vapuh ||

marutaha: breath energy, antar bahirvapi: going in and out, viyad: in a trice, yugma: in its gaps, arivartanaat: does not turn, Bhairavi: Oh Bhairavi, bhairavyaa: bhairavasyetham vyajyate vapuh: understand the nature of Bhairava

In that instant when the breaths do not move between gaps, Oh Bhairavi, let Shiva Consciousness be realized.

na vrajen visecchakti-rmarudrupaa vikaasite nirvikalpatayaa madhye tayaa bhairavarupataa

na: not, vrajet: turning, vishet: entering, shakti: energy, marut rupa: in the form of breath, vikasite: expanding, nirvikalpataya: unclutched, madhye: middle, tayaa: through ii, Bhairava rupata: Bhairavaa is seen

In the middle of that unmoving expanding energy space, witness Shiva Consciousness and be unclutched,

kumbhitaa rechitaa vaapi puritaa yaa yada bhavet | tadante shaantanaamaasau shaktyaa shaantah prakaashate||

kumbhita: holding the inhaled breath, rechita: holding the exhaled breath, vaapi: or again, puritaa: filling, yaa: where, yada: always, bhavet: becomes, tadante: at the end, shaantanaamaasau: the pure state, shaktyaa: by this practice, shantaah: Bhairava state prakaashate: is experienced

When inhaled breath is held or exhaled breath is held or again filled, experience Shiva Consciousness in that state of purity.

aa mulaat kiranaabhaasaam sukhsmaat sukhsmataraatmikaam chintayetaam dvishtakaante shaamyanteem bhairavodayah

aa mulaat: From the muladhara, root energy center, kiranaabhaasaam: radiating, sukshmaat: from the subtle sukshmataraatmikaam: to the subtlest chintayetaam: meditate, dvishtakaante: center of consciousness, shaamyanteem: dissolved, bhairavodayah: expressing Bhairava nature

Meditating upon the radiating energy rising from the muladhara dissolving in the subtlest center of consciousness, let Shiva Consciousness be expressed.

THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM ("SPH"), Jagatguru Mahasannidhanam ("JGM"), His Divine Holiness ("HDH") Bhagavan Sri THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM, is recognized as the 1008th living incarnation of Paramashiva as per Sanatana Hindu Dharma ("Hinduism") and by His predecessors of enlightened masters and adepts

THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM is reviving Hinduism as the 1008th Acharya Mahamandaleshwar (the head for all spiritual leaders) of Atal Akhada (ancient apex body of Hinduism), coronated as Mahamandaleshwar (Supreme Spiritual Head) of Maha Nirvani Akhada (largest apex monastic order) and the youngest Mahamandaleshwar, ordained as the 233rd Guru Mahasannidhanam (Pontiff) of Thondai Mandala Aadheenam, ordained as the 293rd Guru Mahasannidhanam (Pontiff) of Shyamalapeeta Sarvajnapeetam, ordained as the 23rd Guru Mahasannidhanam of Dharmamukthi Swargapuram Aadheenam, and coronated as the 203rd Emperor of Suryavamsa Surangi Samrajyam.

The Srimad Karana Agama, Purva bhaga, Patala 71, Sakalotpatti vidhi, Sloka 8 & 9 (Sacred Ancient Hindu scripture) declares:

इत्येवंनिष्कळं प्रोक्तंपरं भावमिति स्मतमृ ।् सष्टिृ स्थंलोकरक्षार्थं लोकस्योत्पत्तिकारणम।।् साधकानांहितार्थं तुस्वेच्छया गह्ृ णतेतनःु।

In this way (Shiva) who is Nishkala - without any body and parts, who is the Ultimate Supreme Being, who is established in the Creation, who is the Cause of the creation of the Universe, assumes a body out of His Free Will for the protection of the Universe, and for the welfare of the Spiritual seekers and Devotees.

THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM is the reigning spiritual emperor of 17 ancient traditional Hindu kingdoms and the reviver of the most ancient, most peaceful, still-living and long-lasting demonstrable system that shows the possibility of peaceful co-existence amongst people. Following the coronation to establish KAILASA worldwide at the age of 16, for the past 27 years, THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM, as the face of the unified Hindus, has been single-handedly, tirelessly inspiring the dispossessed Hindu Diaspora to reclaim their Hindu centric freedom and stand unified for the centuries-old Hindu genocide.

The 1008th living incarnation of Paramaśiva, THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM stands as the unifying force for the 2 billion born and practicing Hindu diaspora worldwide and established the Hindu State, KAILASA for the persecuted Hindus in over 100 countries.

THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM has made resolute efforts towards recognizing and legitimizing the Hindu genocide which has been receiving scant consideration by global leaders and international bodies, THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM founded KAILASA Uniting Nations. For the past 27 years, this international body has been responsible in building relations, bridging dialogs, inspiring leaders, uniting nations towards acknowledging the Hindu policies which are universal, life positive as referenced from the ancient text of Hinduism. This is the 'ahimsa' (non-violent) way of bringing acknowledgment to the horrors of the Hindu genocide, the untold facts of the darkest act of mankind on Earth to the most contributing civilization - KAILASA.

KAILASA is an apolitical nation whose vision is enlightened living for all. Towards this goal, KAILASA is the only Hindu nation on planet Earth today bringing legitimacy to the principles of Hinduism. Social principles, economic principles, judicial principles, Hindu medical principles, and Hindu economic principles. KAILASA is THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM's response to humanity's global problems of poverty, hunger, illiteracy, disease, violence and global warming and the continuing ethnocide and genocide of over 80 million Hindus worldwide since 7 centuries.

Over the last 50 years, the effects of meditation and its significant impact on stress, crime rates, violence, political decision making and even war in local and global consciousness is well established. Unfortunately, in the last two hundred years, forcibly we are made to believe Hinduism is a functional principle only for enlightenment and spirituality. It is absolutely dysfunctional for the political, social, economical system. Making Hindu family structure, Hindu social structure dysfunctional is the greatest crime done against humanity.

Sanatana Hindu Dharma has faced both historical and ongoing religious persecution and systematic violence, in various forms including assassination attempts on living incarnations, targeted elimination of Hindu pontiffs through bio war and lawfare, cyberbullying, Hindu phobia, forced conversions, documented massacres, demolitions, desecration and grabbing of worship temples and monasteries, looting of Hindu temples properties, destruction of Hindu educational institutions, elimination of well known Hindu libraries, the gross violation to the freedom to practice the Hindu school of liberated thinking (Sankhya), Hindu schools of living enlightenment (Jeevan Mukthi), gross violations of the right to freedom of religion that includes violations of the right to life, personal Hindu integrity or personal Hindu liberty, mass execution, looting and enslavement.

Hinduism was once practiced freely in over 56 nations across the continent from Afghanistan, Bharat, Nepal, Burma, Sri Lanka, all the way to Singapore, Malaysia, and Cambodia and Indonesia, and in 200 states, 1700 samasthanas (provinces) and 10,000 sampradayas (traditions). Over several centuries the combined forces of foreign invasion, political upheaval, colonialism and religious persecution systematically ended millennia of Hindu Swarajya, or self-rule. Today Hindu temples remain in a few countries but the Hindus who worshiped in them have been ethnically cleansed.

The revival of Hinduism through the civilizational nation of KAILASA globally irked vested interests of atheistic terrorist militant elements, caste supremacist terrorists and other anti-Hindu forces who executed a massive persecution and genocide on SPH and His followers on 2 March 2010 that continued for the next whole decade and comprised of over 70 assassination attempts, over 250 sexual assaults on SPH and his monks and disciples, lawfare of 120 false cases over 10 years, massive hate propaganda in electronic media of over 14,000 hours and print media of over 25,000 articles in 5 years, destruction of heritage properties worth over 27 million USD, and the continuing ethnocide and genocide of over 80 million Hindus worldwide since 7 centuries. Specifically, the lawfare involved:

• Delegitimizing THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM by hate propaganda, disenfranchising Him of His civil and human rights, prejudicing Him from fair representation and fair trial
• Repeated illegal imprisonment, with brazen torture, custodial assassination attempts, supported by system justification in various forms, including the common processes of bureaucracy, indifference, self-deception, diffused responsibility and has resulted in continued systemic complicity with torture, murder and genocide
• Well-planned multi-layer false hate propaganda by the 'fourth estate' media sustained by moral disengagement, leaving the broader public in a state of willful ignorance, motivated denial, out-group victim-blaming, dehumanization and bystander apathy to even genocide.

THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM stands in solidarity with the untold, multi-level social, political, intellectual, religious, cultural, linguistic, economic, legal, digital persecution done to Hinduism and faced by Hindus and Hindu minorities worldwide for the past several thousands of years continues through the modern day. THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM has been recently acknowledged by the United Nations for the persecution of The SPH and the KAILASA global community, especially the affected women and children.

The KAILASA with de facto spiritual embassies operating across over 100 countries and having presence across the globe as the largest spiritual knowledge source on Hinduism is spiritually governed with the life positive, all-inclusive, universal policies sourced from Hinduism revived by THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM. Having enriched and enreached more than one billion individuals over the past 27 years the KAILASA raises the voice to protect Hindus, defend Hindus and preserve the Hindu narrative for the world.