Chapter 3 Mind Your Mind!🔗

Beloved Master,

I feel a sort of love when I am in Your presence; a deep, warm love. But I find that when I am not near You, the same feeling does not persist. I am confused because I thought that time and space played no role in the relationship between the Master and disciple. Please explain.

Yes, it has always been that space and time play no role in the Master-disciple relationship. This relationship is one of great love. Space and time shouldn't matter at all. The problem is that in the beginning, the love of the disciple is not pure.

Yes, the love is there, but it is clouded by possessiveness and expectations. You expect that the master will do this and do that. You expect him to flow in a particular way. You feel upset when he talks to others and not to you. This type of love is still not desireless. It is only because of these expectations that jealousy arises and space and time seem to matter. Otherwise, not only in the relationship with the master, in any kind of relationship, unconditional love is the only thing that should be there. Desires should not even be present. I mean any desire, including that of enlightenment. This is the main thing stopping you from realizing.

There is one thing that you have to realize in order to actually love the master. Understand that he is forever in your heart. It is not like he is in your heart when he calls your name and talks to you and leaves your heart when he is doesn't. No! He is in your heart right now and all the time. His laughter is the very blood that pumps from your heart. His dance is your very breath. If this is the case, what is there to feel upset about when you are not in his presence? You should be happy and feel him with you all the time, wherever you may be, wherever he may be.

But somehow you seem to miss this. It is only when you realize that the master is within you, will space and time not make a difference at all. This difference comes in only with desires. These desires are practically unavoidable in the beginning. I am not talking only about normal expectations. I mean the desire of enlightenment, the expectation of enlightenment also. And this desire is practically unavoidable because you do not see it as a negative desire.

Let you be clear: there is no such thing as a positive desire or a negative desire.

As I said before: the desire of enlightenment is the only thing that is stopping you.

Your wanting enlightenment is so strong that you simply miss it. Only when you relax, only when you are fully in the present moment, only when the very idea of enlightenment has left you, enlightenment will happen. Only when you have dropped the idea, will enlightenment happen.

Forgetting completely about the future will make your love pure. Only when your love has become pure, with no desires, no expectations from the master, will enlightenment happen.

Do not try to fight with your desires. Then you will only be suppressing them. Don't go behind the expectations also. Simply remain undisturbed by them, fully aware. Let you see witness all your desires. The only way to overcome desires is to watch them, not to go behind them. The next time you feel a pang of jealousy, simply watch it. When you see me talking to someone else, do not let those feelings of possession take over your whole mind. That is not the way. Tell yourself, ‘I am on my way to enlightenment, and jealousy is not a quality of enlightenment. Then what for should I be jealous?’

You will see that if you watch jealousy, if you watch your body reactions as a result of jealousy rising in you, you will automatically go beyond it instead of getting entangled in it.

Then, your love will become pure.

Beloved Master,

I have been meditating for a few years now and since I have started I am able to see tremendous changes in my life. Changes have been happening by themselves, without my trying, or doing anything. I feel as if something wants to express itself and that I should allow it. Am I waiting for something to grow strong enough, or am I just lazy?

Yes, experiences will happen with meditation. You may find a deep change within yourself since you have started your spiritual journey. But this is where you start missing as well: you go on asking for more. You are not just allowing it to flow in its own course. Life is a river: flow with it. But our problem is that we always flow against life's currents.

A small story:

There was a couple travelling with a group in the wilderness. They came across a rapidly flowing river. The wife thought it was beautiful. She went close to it and fell in.

The husband immediately jumped in and tried searching for her, but was unable to find her. He then started swimming against the current hoping to find her.

One of the members called out to him, 'Why are you swimming in the wrong direction? The river's currents would have carried her away. Why are you swimming against its current?'

The man helplessly replied, 'Yes, but I know her. She would have gone upstream only!'

This is exactly what we are doing every minute of our lives. Life is nothing but a river. It is continuously trying to carry you away. But what do you do? You swim against its current instead of flowing with it. There is a popular saying, 'Go with the flow'. It means nothing but this.

Now you will ask, 'How to flow with life?' Simply allow life to happen; that's all! Do not think about the future. Do not think about the past. The present should be the only thing for you. Just be in the present moment.

Allow your experiences to happen by themselves. Do not think about not having a particular experience. Do not worry about you not doing anything to help your experience happen. All this is nonsense! How can you help Existence give you an experience? You cannot do anything better than what Existence is already doing. Just offer yourself to the river; offer yourself to Existence. Allow Existence to do what it pleases with you.

One more thing: laziness and relaxation have been misunderstood; especially for these workaholics. When you sit under an umbrella on the beach and worry, you call it a vacation!

When you are in the office, you worry about the house. When you are in the house, you worry about when the next vacation should be. And then when your so-called vacation finally comes, you sit and worry about the office again! And this is happening all the time in our lives. Whether we are aware of it or not, we are continuously worrying.

So, as I was saying, laziness and relaxation have been misunderstood by people who simply don't know how to relax. Be clear: what you are feeling is not laziness at all. Laziness is only for those workaholics who don't know how to simply sit.

There is a Zen practice where you are meant to simply sit. You are just meant to sit with yourself and move into a deep relaxation. It is called Zazen - simply sitting.

Relaxation is to be at complete ease with yourself. It is to be unaffected by whatever happens outside of you. Actually, it is to be totally centered within yourself.

You say, 'Changes have been happening by themselves, without my trying, or doing anything. I feel as if something wants to express itself and that I should allow it. Am I waiting for something to grow strong enough, or am I just lazy?'

This shows that your mind is worried about what is happening. If your experiences grow, the mind will lose control. This is why it is going on questioning what is happening to you. The mind is always afraid of losing control.

You see: meditation is a deep waiting for the unknown, for the unpredictable. The more you wait the more purity there is and the more grace comes out of it. There should be no hurry, no expectation of what is to come.

Just wait and let what has to happen, happen. Let Existence decide what has to be done. Wait and let things happen to you; don't get involved!

Just wait for tomorrow, but be sure not to lose the spirit of today. Be sure that in your waiting for tomorrow, you don't lose today. Just wait. Every day holds something new.

Existence is extremely compassionate; it wants to share its beauty with all of us, but only gives to those who don't demand. Just wait with deep trust. Then all that Existence has to offer will be given to you.

Asking always leads to frustration. Only when you ask nothing of Existence, will it give you everything that it has. Just put your asking and questioning mind aside.

That is why there is a board outside the hall. Did you see it? It says, 'Keep your mind and footwear outside'. And this is a statement that should be followed.

Simply leave your mind outside.

Do this much; your desires will automatically drop.

Yes.

Beloved Master,

I really don't know how to express my gratitude for Your immense love and compassion! How does one be aware, especially during the time of anger. I mean, the feeling of anger is just so strong that I don't know how to handle it. And honestly, I am just fed up with the emotion! Please throw some light on this.

You are making a small issue big; that's all! That is the essence of the whole thing.

I ask you: how can you not be aware during the time of anger? After all, it is not such a big emotion to make such a fuss about. Anger is just a small thing.

If you can just watch yourself, you will be able to easily handle it. If you can watch it, it will leave you. It will enter your system and leave it without any effort. Patience along with awareness, is what is needed here. If you cannot be patient, the ego will start to magnify emotions like anger and brand them as 'difficult to handle'. Just discard it as nonsense.

All emotions such as anger, jealousy and greed are all very small. It is our ego that magnifies and makes them big. The ego has to make everything big, everything great. With its great anger and great guilt and great greed, it becomes great itself. This is the game which your mind, your ego, is playing on you.

And the mind - what a cunning guy! It simply wants to rule over you. And what do you do? You simply allow it to rule over you. And through this ruling, you yourself begin to feel that you are the ego! What a fluke for the mind!

But you are not the ego; you are nothing but the witness. So if you become the witness in times like anger, what can it do to you? Nothing at all, because it is not doing it to you! You are only the witness! And it cannot do it to the witness because it is only supposed to witness!

You are just like a passerby. The whole incident is happening to someone else; you are just an on-looker watching the whole thing.

Think of your life as a movie. You are sitting in the theater and watching the whole thing. It is not happening to you at all. You are completely on a different plane. And you should have the intelligence to understand that none of this is true. It is not reality! How can a movie that has been conceived, directed and enacted be reality? But somehow, you have begun to think that it is the truth. You laugh when there is a joke; you cry when the hero is dead, even though you know that he never died and he is still alive doing his next movie!

So what I am telling you to do is to do nothing at all!

I can see many blank faces looking at me.

Let me explain a little more.

Just watch your emotions. Watch your thoughts. Don't say anything for something or against it.

A small story:

A young girl became pregnant. Her parents were extremely upset with her. They went on pestering her in hopes of finding out who the child's father was.

After a lot of questions and a lot of scolding, the girl named a Swami who lived close by. The parents went to the Swami, yelled and literally abused him for his criminal act.

The Swami listened to all their accusations and calmly asked, 'Is that so?'

After this incident, everybody started speaking ill of the Swami. He became a man whose name, when merely mentioned, would make everyone uncomfortable.

When the baby was born, the girl's parents took it to the Swami and asked him to bring up the child by himself.

The Swami took the baby without a word. He took good care of the baby, getting it milk and clothes from his neighbors. He did whatever was necessary to bring up the child.

About a year later, the girl confessed that she had lied to the parents. The actual father of the baby was a young man. The girl's parents immediately went to the Swami. They apologized endlessly for their behavior and requested him to return the baby. They told him that the actual father of the baby was another man.

The Swami said, 'Is that so?' and returned the baby.

This is a beautiful story. Just watch how the Swami reacted to the things that happened to him? This is what I mean by 'witness'. Now, do you understand?

Just be a witness to everything that happens. That is why I say, 'Don't say anything for something or against it.'

When you become the witness, you will be simply shocked! Whatever you have always thought to be a very big thing will start looking small. It won't seem to matter at all. But what have you been doing all this time? You have thought that even small things like anger are very big!

When anger comes, it is not that it is going to kill you. It has never killed you, and you have been through it many times before. You have come out of it perfectly well. The only thing is that every time you get involved in anger, you fight with it; it leaves you with a very bitter feeling. Now I am asking you to do only one thing in a new way; just watch it! The next time anger comes, just watch it. Don't be affected. Watch it as if it doesn't belong to you. When you do this, you will see that the anger simply disappears in a matter of seconds!

It is only when the anger disappears in such a peaceful way without any struggle does it leave behind a loving feeling. An extremely beautiful, silent and peaceful love will take over your whole being. Earlier, the same energy that would have taken over your whole being as anger, has now turned into love. And it is such a beautiful love, so you won't fight with it; you will enjoy it.

Anytime that anything arises in you, it is a great chance to watch it and see it transform into this pure love, this pure energy. So just watch, that's all! That angry donkey will simply run away!

Just watch and the emotion will be transformed.

Thank you.