10. Solutions for physical, mental and emotional problems🔗

When we unclutch, the first thing that will happen to us will be an inner healing effect, a deep silence and peace in us. Second, that inner healing will start radiating as physical wellbeing, which is our health.

Third, naturally it will start radiating in our relationships also. Fourth, because these three are going beautifully, we will be creative and productive!

People come and tell me, ‘Swamiji, for the last twenty years I have had knee pain.’ No, it cannot be! Please understand that in reality it cannot be. I am not disrespecting you or adding more suffering to you by saying all your problems are only in your head. I am just telling the truth: all your problems are in your head! I am just stating the truth.

The knee pain you experienced two years ago, the knee pain you experienced one year ago, the knee pain you experienced two months ago, and the knee pain you experienced two hours ago are independent experiences.

Only because you connect all of them, you conclude that you have been having knee pain for twenty years. Is it really true that you have knee pain continuously for twenty years? What happens to the moments of ‘no knee pain’ in between? The important thing you need to understand is that because you connect and see all these as one continuous incident, you block the possibility of selfhealing.

The depression that happened one month ago, the depression that happened one year ago, and the depression that happened three years ago are independent, individual, unconnected, and unclutched.

The problem is the same as with physical pain. You start connecting them and concluding that you are having the same depression continuously. You create an idea that your life is depression. Then you start fighting with it. That only gives more life to the depressive thoughts.

When you strongly beli-eve that your last ten years have been filled with suffering and depression, you create a strong mental setup surrounding it. Naturally you start thinking that your future is also going to be painful and filled with depression.

Suppose there is a person sitting in front of you who you think is an enemy. Suddenly if you notice that his head is separate, his legs are separate and his hands are separate, would you even feel like fighting with him? No! He is not even worth fighting! He doesn't even have a solid existence, as you imagined him to have.

So what is there to fight? In the same way, only when you imagine you have a huge problem in front of you, that a big person is in front of you, you start fighting and getting into more trouble.

Your depression is not the huge enemy that you think it is. It is just like the person with disjointed body parts. It is you who joined the parts and gave it life. Your fighting with depression is the root cause of your depression.

In Ramayana¹³ there is a beautiful story. Whoever stands in front of the monkey king Vali¹⁴ and fights with him, loses half of his power to him. In the same way, whoever stands in front of the thought shaft and starts fighting with that shaft, half of their power will go away to that shaft.

The moment you unclutch from the shaft, you experience the neutral space, and inner healing starts. The moment inner healing starts, physically also you are healed.

Do not try to renounce your depression, because by your very nature it is getting renounced, flowing away from you.

By your very nature just as joy disappears from your mind, depression also disappears from your mind. The moment you try to eliminate the depression, you will extend it and give it more life. If you have a deep depression, will you stop going to the office? No! You may carry the depression in your mind but your body moves. You work. You may not be that productive or efficient. But your body still moves.

Instead of 'living depression', I am saying, 'live unclutched'. When we live in depression, we don't have all these questions, 'If I am depressed, how can my body move?' We don't have such questions. The depression becomes part of our life. In the beginning you may have questions, 'How can I live unclutched?

How will I even move my body?' Understand that the constant remembrance of unclutching does not interfere with your mind or body movements. It only removes the depression because it lets the depression thoughts rise and fall without clutching to them.

What is addiction? It is a behavior or action that if you don't do it, you will feel terrible that you are missing something. But, if you do it you won't feel any joy, it will only be mechanical. Addiction means believing that joy or ecstasy happens due to some object, person, or situation.

Understand that this is the definition of addiction: trying to elongate the joy shaft by recreating it. You bring the same persons, situations, incidents, or happenings into your life again and again, knowing that the same joy is not going to happen. Some people are addicted to partying, some to smoking, and some to drinking and there are so many addictions.

Remember that anything you bring to your life again and again will not give you the same excitement as it gave you the first time. It can only lead to addiction, not happiness.

The first time you enjoy a sweet, it is a wonderful experience. The excitement is totally different. But if you keep eating more of the same sweet, the same experience is not there anymore. Eventually if you eat enough sweets, you will not even like the sight of them.

You will look at them and say, ‘Oh no, not more sweets. They make me feel terrible.’ In the same way, when meeting a person for the first time, the excitement is totally different. Later on, the excitement falls off. People come and ask me, ‘How can I break my habits?’ 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’, the shaft ‘it’ will die. Only when you remove ‘I’, only when you throw ‘I’ away, will it completely die.

Your smoking two days ago, ten years ago, and twenty years ago, 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, the belief creates a shaft.

Then you start fighting with it. That is what I mean when I say the ‘I’ has to be dropped. It is your belief that makes it a habit. If you drop the belief, the habit drops. If you believe it is a joyful experience, you continue to smoke more and more.

If you believe it is a painful experience you start fighting with the 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 never really joyful.

When you smoke, in that moment, just see what is happening in your inner space. You are not enjoying anything. You are just trying to escape from something. You merely believe that smoking is joyful. Even if you don’t feel joyful when you are smoking, you try to squeeze joy out of it.

If you deeply scan your life and see, you will understand that whether it is smoking, or sex, or money, or any other pleasure, even if you don’t feel the same joy as you felt the first time, you try to squeeze joy out of it. You try to console yourself, ‘No, this is joy. What else is joy?’ You try to cover the frustration by believing it is joy. You want to believe it is joy. Try your best to drop some addiction. You can never be successful. Even if you drop it you may be dropping it out of some fear or greed, which is a much bigger addiction. If you drop smoking out of some fear or greed, you are not doing anything good to your consciousness, to your inner space.

You are only damaging yourself more. You might have dropped smoking, but the fear or greed that made you drop it will be added to your inner space. At least with smoking, you will destroy only this body. With fear or greed you will destroy your whole being, life after life! In the next body, you will carry over the fear and greed. The smoking habit may not carry over to the next body but the emotions of fear and greed will be carried with you to the next body. So the best way is to drop the idea that you have an addiction, and it will drop.

A person once came and asked me, ‘I am haunted by the fear of death. I have so much fear about losing my wealth, and about my death. Give me some solution. Please remove my fear.’ I told him, ‘Please have a cup of coffee.’ He said, ‘What do you mean?’ I said, ‘Just think of having a cup of coffee, then have a cup of coffee.’ He was not able to believe me and asked, ‘How can that help me?’

I asked him, ‘The moment you are able to think of having a cup of coffee and decide to have a cup of coffee, the death fear that is haunting your inner space has left your inner space. Am I right? Even if it is only for a split second, the fact that the thought about coffee has entered your system means that the death fear has been pushed aside!’

Unless the death fear leaves his inner space, he cannot think of having a cup of coffee, right?

We have already seen that only one thought can exist in your inner space at a time. If the older thought comes back, it means that you have consciously brought it back, like bringing back a trashed email to your inbox. So naturally, a simple thought to have a cup of coffee can remove the so-called powerful death fear.

The man said, ‘No, it looks too simple! The death fear definitely comes back, what should I do?’ If it comes back, have one more cup of coffee, that’s all! It is just a simple understanding.

Fortunately, you can have only one thought at a time. The moment a new thought comes, it means the old thought has lost its power over you. Otherwise, the new thought cannot arise. If the old thought is so strong, it should just be able to multiply and sit on you. It shouldn’t be able to leave your inner space. So the moment a new thought comes, it means the old thought was not very powerful after all.

It easily lost its power over you and left you. Because of that, the new thought has come inside. So, the moment you have a thought to have a cup of coffee or a cup of water, he so-called death fear has left you. The man asked, ‘Suppose it comes back? I can drink a cup of coffee once, but the next time what should I do?’ I said, ‘Then drink a cup of water, that’s all!’

Understand one more thing, your very fear about the fear coming back will invite that fear back. Why do you want to empower the fear thought? It is actually just like any other thought. Why don’t you give yourself the luxury of entertaining some other thought? Because you give too much importance to the fear thought, it comes back. It is just another thought, why give undue importance to it?

You neither have to worry about your fears, nor about your greed. Your worry about your worries, your worry about your fears, and your worry about your greed is the only problem. Your fear is not the problem, your fear about the fears is the real problem.

Fear exists because of the possibility of not achieving your goal. Fear is not connected to your failure. Fear is connected to your fear of failure.

The ayurvedic science says that we get stomach problems like constipation, etc., only if we constantly hold on to our body. If we can just relax and witness, if we start understanding that we are not the body, we will never have stomach problems. I tell you from my experience with millions of people that I have met and worked with, if you have stomach problems, try this technique for just two or three days. Constantly think that you are not the body. I assure you, you will be liberated from any stomach problem. Your stomach will simply be healed.

If you have stomach problems like ulcer, constipation, irritation, or any problem related to the stomach, this technique will help you. For two or three days, just continuously think, ‘I am not the body,’ ‘I am not the body.’ Just relax and allow the body to function. I tell you, within two or three days you will be healed.

All your allergies and your phobias are nothing but the connection of independent thoughts. The only thing needed is the courage to be unclutched. Please be very clear, I have healed at least one thousand people with allergies in the last three years.

When I was giving discourses in Hyderabad, India, a man complained about twenty five years of allergies to lentils.

Even if he ate a spoonful of cooked lentils, his whole body would start swelling. I said, ‘Bring the lentils and eat them in front of me.’ I sat next to him as he ate. I just told him, ‘I’ll take care. I’ll heal. Don’t worry.’ He ate and there was no swelling. The allergy simply disappeared. All that is needed is giving these people the courage to be unclutched. When I said that I would take care, he was able to break that shaft of fear which was causing his allergy!

Let me tell you an incident from the days of my spiritual journey:

I went to a village where there were many elderly Lamas¹⁵. I asked one villager, 'Can I see an elderly Lama?' He said, 'Go to that field. There is a Lama working there. You can speak to him.' I went up to the Lama and spoke to him while he was working in the field.

I asked, 'I heard that you are a very elderly person, can I ask about some of your experiences, something about your life?' He started laughing. He said, 'What? Elderly!? I am only a middle-aged man. I am only 136! There are so many people who are 190 and above, go and talk to them.' I was shocked! I asked, 'How do you live so long?'

He simply replied, 'What is there to say? From childhood onwards we know that the human lifespan is 300 years.'

From the beginning they are taught that they can live up to 300 years. Your body is just like a child. Whatever you tell it, it will follow. All you need to do is create a correct, strong belief. If you are unclutched, things will take their own course. You will constantly rejuvenate yourself.

You are made to believe that human beings age and die by seventy to ninety years. By the time you become seventy, you are prepared for death. You constantly say, 'Oh, I have become old, I am ready to die.' Then you prepare your body for death.

Your body creates or maintains a particular disease according to the identity that you create with respect to that disease. Tiredness, chronic fatigue and all these related disorders are directly related to this identity. We can call it the 'identity shaft'.

What do we mean by identity shaft? Take tiredness for example. You connect yesterday's tiredness, the day before yesterday's tiredness, the tiredness that you experienced one month ago, etc., and create an identity shaft for yourself that says, 'By eight o'clock tonight I will become tired'.

Then every day, by six o'clock, you start preparing your mind, 'By eight o'clock I will start feeling tired....' You feel compelled to fulfill your identity! So you start creating dullness or lethargy by six o'clock. You have to prove your identity because you created it.

Sometimes you may even forget to prove your identity to the outer world, but you will never miss proving your identity to yourself! If the outer world doesn't believe your identity that is okay, but if you start suspecting your own identity, that is too dangerous for your ego. You will never let that happen!

Even if you felt the fatigue one year ago, there is every possibility that you can update yourself today. You may not actually have that problem anymore, but you are not interested in trusting that you are free from fatigue. You want to retain the old identity.

Your ego can sacrifice anything except your identity. That’s why you play a very polite, but cunning game, you hold onto the belief of the fatigue and become fatigued.

One person came to me and said, ‘I constantly suffer because of my smoking habit. The moment I get up in the morning, I have to smoke. But after one hour I have deep guilt. After two hours, when I am getting ready for work, again I have to smoke - again an hour of guilt. What should I do? I am constantly suffering with guilt and I am always suffering from this habit. What should I do?’

I told him, ‘You should either drop smoking, or drop the guilt. Drop either thing. You will be liberated from this habit.’ He was shocked to hear this. He said, ‘You know that I am not able to stop smoking.

If I drop the guilt also, I will smoke even more! How do you say that I will drop smoking?’

See, it is a vicious cycle. When you have guilt, what will you do? You will constantly keep repeating, ‘I should stop smoking,’ ‘I should stop smoking.’ Naturally what will happen? In your mind you give power to the word ‘smoking’. So the memory of smoking keeps getting engraved deeper and deeper into your system. How do you expect that you will be able to stop smoking?

When you cannot forgive yourself, it is called guilt. When you cannot forgive others it is called vengeance. When you unclutch, both guilt and vengeance disappear. Not only will you forgive, you will also forget because there is no longer a connection between your behavior and these thoughts.

You may ask, ‘If we unclutch, then how can we learn from past experiences?’ Real learning from the past happens only when you unclutch from your past experiences. When you unclutch from your past experiences, the essence of your past experiences, the teachings that you need to learn from them will become part of your being.

When you are continuously clutched to the past, only the pain, suffering, and guilt reflect in your being. You will never pick up the essence or the ‘juice’ from the past and update your intelligence. Also, if you have a deep respect for or dependence on your past, you will never be able to live in the present moment. You will be always carrying the past into the present, corrupting it and your future. How can you live blissfully if you do that? You can’t! Unclutch from the past, let the lessons be easily integrated and celebrate life in the present moment.

Because you believe some thoughts are connected and that they are joyous, you start giving life only to those thoughts. If you believe some thoughts are painful, you try to take energy away from those thoughts. Because of this, you don’t live your whole life, you keep choosing which part to live with. Because you have gone to such an extreme of relying on your mind, you cannot understand that you can live without the mind. You are afraid that you might go to the other extreme of being a mindless person with no morality in your life. Let me tell you, a person who understands that by their very nature thoughts are unconnected will naturally lead a moral life without society’s rules to tell him how to live.

It is only in this type of person that you see a strong, deep sense of conscious morality. It is only in his or her life you see an extraordinary discipline. This discipline can never be shaken and this morality can never be taken away from him or her. It will be a morality that does not come out of fear or greed. True morality is the flowering of deep understanding of the self, world and god.