WHAT ARE YOU SEEKING?🔗

There is nowhere to go but in!

You are a conscious miracle of Existence!

You are fulfillment itself.

Nothing needs to be added to you,

and nothing can be taken away from you.

Understand, there is nothing to be achieved by you.

Simply become aware of this Truth, that is enough.

When you look inside yourself to realize this Truth, it is meditation.

When you start expressing, radiating this Truth in your life,

That is what I call jeevanmukti, Living Enlightenment.

The right question to start with! Why meditation? Is there really a need for meditation in our lives? Let me ask, Why are you reading this book? Of all the books you could be reading at this moment, you have chosen to read this book. Your action itself shows that there is a deep-seated need for meditation inside you - and inside every one of us.

What is your ultimate aim in life? To earn more? To stay forever young, healthy, beautiful? To have better, longer-lasting relationships? To improve your personality? To find inner peace? The list is endless. For each individual, there will be a specific goal, or several goals. But every single goal - without exception, every single goal - points to the same thing: a yearning for fulfilment. Can anyone disagree with that? Can anyone say, ‘I am not interested in being happy, being fulfilled, being blissful?’ No! Each of us is searching for nothing but fulfilment. However intellectual, however sophisticated may be the ways in which we express it, we are all seeking only fulfilment! Only the ways in which we are searching are different. Through money, through power, through relationships - through all the comic and tragic dramas of our daily lives, we are searching for fulfilment. It is the single motivating force of our lives.

But ninety-nine percent of us are not even aware that fulfilment is our true goal!

We are only aware that there is something lacking in our lives, some vacuum that we cannot fill with money or relationships or possessions. Tell me, what have you collected so far in the outer world that is of any lasting value? I mean of really lasting value. Nothing really! Still, we continue to search. And because we are unaware, we search outside ourselves. We search everywhere in the world for something which is within us! Whether you know it or not, whether you believe it or not, whether you accept it or not, fulfillment is our true nature!

One evening, a man was searching hard for something in the courtyard in his house. His wife asked him what it was. He replied that he had dropped a gold coin. His wife also joined in the search. Soon, others gathered and practically the whole neighborhood was searching for the lost coin. Suddenly one neighbor asked the man, ‘Where exactly did you drop the coin? How come we still haven’t found it?’ The man replied, ‘Oh, I lost the coin inside the house.’ Everybody searching became angry and asked him, ‘Then why are we searching here?’ The man replied, ‘The problem is I have no lights inside my house. So I started searching by the light of this streetlamp here!’

This is exactly what we do in our own lives. We are all experts in searching for answers in the wrong places. We search for fulfilment everywhere, in money, power, relationships, ideologies, but we don't move in the one obvious direction – inwards.

The first step towards awareness is realizing that the coin you have lost is inside your own house. Then you will automatically stop searching for it in the streets! Meditation is nothing but a preparation to rediscover the state of fulfilment that is already within you.

The moment you realize the futility of searching for fulfilment in the streets, you are naturally ripe for meditation.

You are fulfilment, therefore you seek fulfilment!

Deep inside, each of us is aware that our true nature is a state of completeness, of total fulfilment. That is why we are unable to rest until we reach that state. If depression and restlessness were natural to us, would we try to get out of it? No! We would be totally comfortable with it.

There is a beautiful verse in the Upanishad: Om poornam adah poornam idam Poornaat poornamudachyate Poornasya poornamaadaaya Poornam eva avashishyate

It means: That is Whole, and this too is Whole. From the Whole came the Whole. If you remove the Whole from the Whole, what remains is still the Whole.

Here the word 'that' means the Universal consciousness, and 'this' means the individual, each one of us. You are not a limited body mind as you think. You are a complete expression of Cosmic Consciousness. You are deeply linked to the Source. But you have forgotten this link. That is why, unless you reconnect to the Source, you will never experience fulfilment.

The root of all your fear, all your sorrow, your deep dissatisfaction, is the idea that you are a limited individual, cut off from Existence. All your running, your striving, your restlessness is just the expression of your desire to reconnect to your true nature. Meditation is nothing more than rediscovering this connection.

Remember, there is nothing to be done, nothing to be achieved. All you need to do is to become aware and start expressing this Truth in your life.

This is what I call Living Enlightenment.

You are already enlightened, just express it!

Q. If fulfilment is our true nature, why do we need meditation? Because you are not aware! You are not conscious that you are infinite, you are whole, you are complete. Because the mind cannot conceive of the infinite, you are not aware of who you are. I tell you, You are a conscious miracle of Existence. You are more than this limited body and mind. You are pure energy! Nothing needs to be added to you, and nothing can be taken away from you. You are infinite potential!

But can you trust this Truth and simply start expressing it, living it?

Because you think you are bound, you need techniques for liberation. Because you are in deep unconsciousness, you need techniques to pull you out. You need meditation!

> Meditation is any technique, any method, which > raises the frequency of your consciousness.

Of course, nowadays there is enough research that proves that meditation results in good physical health, mental health, greater productivity and so on. But these are not the straight results of meditation, they are not the actual purpose of meditation. They are just the side-benefits of meditation. Good physical health, mental health, etc. are all wonderful to have, but they are only side-effects of meditation. If somebody asks me, why meditate, my straight answer would be, to raise your consciousness! The human body is designed to experience expanded consciousness. The human brain is wired for enlightenment. Do you know that, by your very nature, you are wired for living enlightenment? That is why, only when we bring all the possibilities of life into a living reality, only when we express our potential completely in our daily living, can we experience real fulfillment.

So please understand, meditation is not an option. It is a very basic need of your life!

People come and ask me, “Is meditation for me?”

Actually, all the young people are thinking, ‘Why should I bother to meditate now? I will have enough time in my old age. I can do meditation when I don’t have anything else to do!’ And all the older people are thinking, ‘I should have done this in my young age, when I was fresh and receptive!’

I always say, Bringing meditation into your life is just as necessary as reading the owner’s manual before you start driving your car! Meditation is like an owner’s manual for your body and for your life. Don’t wait for an accident to start meditating! Don’t wait for depression and suffering to happen in your life. Be intelligent. Start here and now!

Q. For a beginner like me, what is the right way to approach meditation?

Actually, when you feel you are a beginner, you already have the most important qualification! You have the ‘beginner’s mind’. The beginner’s attitude is always sincere, humble, open, full of enthusiasm. When you know that you don’t know, you have the highest chance of learning! If you are a ‘professional seeker’, it’s too big a job for you to learn anything new. Whatever new information you come across, your logic will start fighting with it. Your cup of knowledge will already be too full!

Sometimes, beginners on the path have doubts about whether they are really ‘qualified’ for meditation. I tell you, there is no such thing as being qualified for meditation!

Once a man approached the great spiritual Master Ramana Maharshi and asked him, Bhagavan, am I qualified for the spiritual life? Ramana answered him with a question, Are you alive? The man was startled. He said, Yes, of course! That is enough!, Ramana replied. You already have the necessary qualification for spirituality.

When the Divine does not impose any restrictions on you, why should you impose restrictions on yourself? Simply enter into meditation as an adventure. After all, it is the biggest experiment of your life! Be sincere, not serious. When you are serious, you miss the whole point of meditation. Spirituality is all about realizing that life is nothing but leela, Divine play. So just celebrate meditation. Simply enjoy!

In the beginning, you may have to consciously introduce meditation into your lifestyle. But as you keep practicing, you will see that you naturally move from ‘meditation in life’ to ‘life in meditation’. Just one glimpse of the joy of meditation is enough to make you fall in love with meditation. Then you will no longer ask how many hours you must practice! When you wake up, your very first thought will be of meditation. When you take a shower, when you dress, when you eat, you will do everything with such complete awareness that every act, every moment will become alive with meditation. You will then begin to live life in meditation.

Q. Different people emphasize different paths of meditation like yoga, tantra, bhakti (devotion) etc. Which path do you feel is best?

Understand, all the methods that lead man to realization are, essentially techniques to raise your consciousness! Their non-essential components may be different - but each method is essentially emphasizing the same thing. In essence, it is only awareness that leads you to the ultimate goal.

So whatever you are doing, whatever method you are practising, it makes no difference. The different paths are just different names given by different people in different ages for the same technique. There are not many paths. There are many names for one path, and that one path is awareness! None of the authentic paths contradict each other, they only complement each other. So you can practice different methods, if you wish. Only one thing: don't mix-and-match techniques and make your own technique! Practice them independently. Retain the purity of the technique. If you start thinking, 'I understand all these techniques, I have caught the common thread running through all of them, so now I can make my own technique!' - that is where you will miss the whole thing! One more thing: there is nothing wrong in learning from many sources. Sometimes, people feel guilty if they have been initiated by one Master, or into a particular technique, and they move to another. I tell them, the ego is such that it cannot be broken by one method. You need blows from every direction!

So do not think that just because you learnt from one source, you should not learn from another. No! Learn from all possible sources and raise yourself. Of course, when you approach an enlightened Master, he will straightaway pick the technique that is right for you. He knows which is the right key to your being!

Q. Isn't meditation also based on belief?

Meditation is the effort to end all beliefs! Meditation is going beyond both belief and doubt. Be very clear, your strongest doubt contains some doubt, and your most powerful doubt carries some belief! It is inevitable.

A SMALL STORY:

A Master and his disciple were crossing a bridge over a river, when suddenly the disciple fell into the river. He started thrashing his arms and legs about crying, 'Master, save me! Save me!' The Master said, 'Fool! You can save yourself. Just stand up!' The disciple started crying, 'No, no, only you can save me!' The Master repeated the same instruction. Then the disciple started complaining, 'I had so much faith in you, but you have betrayed me!' The Master replied, 'If you really trust me, have the courage to stand up and see.' Finally the disciple, because he had no choice, slowly put his legs down in the water. He was shocked to find that the water was only waist-deep!

This is how strong all your beliefs are! It takes only a moment for the belief to turn into doubt.

Meditation is beyond both belief and doubt. It is entering into the space of trust or shraddha. It is the courage to experiment, to trust the enquiry.

The supreme spiritual treatise called Brahma Sutras starts with the words athaato brahma jignaasaa, let us enquire into the reality. It means that the guru and disciple are both deciding to have the courage to follow wherever reality leads them! Meditation is not just an enquiry into the Truth, but the courage to go wherever the enquiry leads, wherever the understanding leads. It is a pure science. Have the courage to try it and see!

Q. Swamiji, can you speak about the health benefits of meditation?

A. First of all, we must be clear about what we mean by the word ‘health’. Usually when people enter into meditation for health reasons, all they expect is a way to cope with some disease, some little healing - and maybe some peace of mind. That’s all!

You don’t know, meditation has the power to completely transform you - physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually!

Only when you are healthy in mind, body and spirit can you be really called healthy.

Physical health is essentially the ability to digest your food well and having that food become part of your body.

Mental health is the clarity to digest and work with all the ideas and problems that you encounter and arrive at the most effective solution. It means living a conflict-free life, with yourself and others. When you add meditation to your life, you will experience a flood of transformation, especially at the mental and emotional levels!

Spiritual health is the maturity to receive all the great Truths and the energy of enlightenment, digest them and live a liberated life. Having all three is total health.

Each individual experiences meditation in a unique way, but these are some of the changes that meditation can bring about in you:

A REALLY HEALTHY BODY

If your digestive system is working perfectly, that is physical health. I tell you, you don't need anything else. If your digestive system is absolutely perfect, you don't even need food! Your physiology will be so intelligent that it can take in energy directly from the ether. You may have heard of saints who live for years without food. It is not a miracle! If your digestive system works efficiently, you will need very little or no food. Not only food, meditation is a complement to medication also. Through meditation, you can regulate your blood pressure and blood sugar, you can increase your body's resistance to disease. You can heal even chronic problems like skin allergies, asthma and arthritis. No disease can escape the power of meditation.

GREATER MENTAL CLARITY

First of all, meditation can bring tremendous awareness in the outer and inner worlds. You start living your life in a much better way, with greater awareness and intensity. You will be more alive, more creative. Yet internally, you will experience a deep and undisturbed silence. Understand, when you are aware, you are absent. When awareness is present, your ego can't exist. When your ego exists, awareness can't be present. 'Your absence' will make you live enlightenment. You will no longer be doing - you will only be watching the doer! This is the whole secret of meditation - to become the watcher, to become the witness of your own actions and emotions.

As you start witnessing your own actions, you will realize that there is someone inside you who does not change, who does not get angry or feel sad, who does not care about money or security or fame. That is the real you! The real you can never be touched. The rest is just a personality you have formed around yourself. Once you become aware that the real you is not the one who acts, that the real you is not the one who feels angry or hurt or depressed, then you experience a tremendous sense of peace. This will happen through meditation.

We have heard that meditation gives freedom, so we turn to meditation in order to be free. But we misunderstand the word ‘freedom’. What we search for in our ordinary lives is either ‘freedom for’ or ‘freedom from’. ‘Freedom for’ is the freedom for doing, having, and being all that we wish – freedom to live as we imagine right. ‘Freedom from’ is freedom from all the things that we dread and hate – disease, worry, anger, stress, low self-esteem, pain. In all our actions, we are prompted by one of these things – freedom for or freedom from. The greed for something good, or the fear of something bad. Our whole life is controlled by these two ropes of greed and fear. But when you are being controlled by these two ropes, where is the freedom that you are craving for?

A few weeks back a casual visitor, an artist, was speaking to me. He was telling me why he hated meditation. He said, ‘I hate all these rules and discipline. I like to be free to lead my life the way I want. I get up at ten o’clock, first thing I have my coffee, then I go for a swim whenever I feel like it...’ He described his whole day to me.

Then I asked him, ‘What if someone woke you up at six o’clock? Or what if your coffee didn’t arrive at your bedside one morning?’ ‘Oh, that would make me really mad!’ he said, and laughed. ‘And what if it was raining and you missed your swim?’ I asked. ‘Yes, that would be a bad thing. If I can’t go for my swim, I feel really bad the whole day.’ Then I asked him, ‘If your freedom is dependent on so many conditions, are you really free?’ He was shocked! To be really free is to be free no matter what. That’s what I call real freedom, not ‘freedom for’ or ‘freedom from’. Real freedom comes out of living completely in the present moment. Freedom that doesn’t depend on any external circumstances is the only true freedom. This is the freedom that you will experience with meditation.

LOVE FOR NO REASON

With meditation, one strange thing you will start experiencing is Love! When they start meditating, people are prepared for all kinds of miracles. They are ready to receive visions, to have the darshan of their favourite deities and what not. But they are least prepared for the miracle of love! You will be amazed to find how much love arises and floods your being when you enter into meditation. Through meditation, you will experience some awakening, some level of your being that you haven’t touched before. You will want to share your joy with everyone you meet! This joy will overflow from you as love. And just like freedom, this love is different from any love you have ever experienced before. All our life, we have been giving and taking our selfish little loves.

Please be very clear: you always love for a reason! Either consciously or unconsciously, you enter into a relationship with your own ideas of give-and-take. Even in the most intimate relationships, even between husband and wife, between parents and children, there are hidden reasons for loving. All our love is tainted, destroyed by jealousy, possessiveness and expectations. Love for a reason is not love, it is business! With meditation, for the first time you will understand what it means to love for no reason. For the first time, you will not be giving in order to receive. You give love simply because you have so much to give! You shower love upon the world in the same way that a raincloud showers upon the earth, or a flower spreads its fragrance all around. You love because you can't help it!

JOY UNLIMITED

With meditation, life becomes a joy that you cannot find a reason for. When joy happens for a reason, it is sure to bring pain sooner or later. If you are happy because you have just had a good meal, you are going to become miserable when you get hungry again – that's all! If you are happy because you have fallen in love, you are going to be sad when the first fight happens. Don't think it won't happen to you! It happens to everybody. That is the rule of life. All happiness leads to pain when it ceases. That is why, in ancient India, they had only one word to denote both happiness and pain: the word pain! But the joy you experience with meditation is undisturbed, undisturbable. You may be healthy, you may be ill – the joy will remain the same. It may be cold, warm, raining, snowing – the joy remains. Neither your own condition nor external circumstances can make a difference. When you experience lasting joy that no external circumstance can alter, it means that you are moving deeply inwards.

Life is changing all the time. Intelligence is nothing but the ability to respond to life moment to moment, to be awake to the challenges that life throws at us. Intelligence is to be aware of the situation, to alter your answers according to the demands of the moment. When you don't have confidence in yourself, you have to depend on the rules and regulations put down by society, by law, by religion. Understand, the intelligent person lives without a script. He doesn't need one! He depends on himself, on his inner guidance.

Intelligence is taking your responsibility upon yourself. We are all born intelligent – but society is cleverer than we are!

Right from our childhood, when we are unprepared, society sets up its rules. It manages to build walls around our intelligence. It prevents our energy from flowing naturally. The ultimate intelligence is nothing but the ability to break free of these chains of conditioning.

Meditation is the surest way to awaken intelligence – because the chains which are binding it are all in your mind. With meditation, you go beyond the mind, into the being.

In the being, no rules exist. You become free to explore your full potential. That's why, with meditation, you will suddenly find yourself at ease with your surroundings. You will find yourself easily able to cope with new situations. You rediscover spontaneity.