9. The deep spiritual experience🔗

For the spiritual experience to happen, two conditions need to be fulfilled. One is that you must be completely open and available to the surroundings. The other is the intense energy field.

Sometimes even if you are open, if you are not in the intense energy field, the first cracking of the coconut of your ego does not happen. The first spiritual experience is just like breaking open a coconut. Once the first opening happens, it is not difficult to break the rest of the coconut. The first opening needs an intense spiritual energy field.

These two factors are what resulted in my f i r s t spiritual experience. I was open and available to the surroundings; and I was in the intense energy field of Arunachala.

Fortunately, I was attracted to the beauty of that hill. Normally, if you see a hill or a river or an ocean every day, you will take it for granted. Somehow I never took that hill for granted. I never thought I knew about it. I was continuously open, available.

Understand, being open and available every time, seeing it every morning with the eyes of freshness or with the mind of openness is what I am calling ‘being open and available’. Many times, we completely close ourselves to the society.

We just come to some conclusion, some understanding and after that we never update our understanding or our effort with the result. Every day, the Arunachala hill was living for me. Everyday it was never the same old hill that I saw yesterday. I had a very funny routine. In the morning when I got up I would not open my eyes. I would slowly walk from my room to outside the house holding the parapet wall. I would come out and stand in a place from where I knew the hill could be seen.

Only then I would open my eyes so that the first thing that I saw in the morning would be that hill. Somehow my brothers knew that the first thing that I wanted to see was the hill. They would want to have fun teasing me.

When they knew that I was out from my bed and slowly walking, they would come and stand in front of me. If I opened my eyes and did not see the hill and instead saw their faces, I would go back and lie down again. I would lie down again, sleep for half an hour, then again get up and slowly walk back to see the hill and open my eyes. Only if I saw the hill the first thing in the morning, I would carry on with my routine.

It may look funny and superstitious but I always felt I took birth, I took this body, because of that attraction and pull that hill has got for enlightened beings. There is a very beautiful verse in Tamil that describes the hill as ‘the hill that attracts enlightened beings around it’. The hill is especially respected for attracting enlightened beings not only from this planet earth, but also from other planets and spaces, towards planet earth. I never took the hill for granted. It was an ever living presence.

9.2 Encounter with the Divine One day I was trying to sit and meditate. It was a full moon day (Poornima) and the moon was rising as the sun was setting. I was just sitting on a rock on Arunachala hill, trying the meditation technique that the disciple of Ramana Maharishi and enlightened master Annamalai Swamigal¹⁰ had initiated me into. I was sitting on the rock trying to find the source from where the feeling of ‘I’ was rising. On that day I was sitting for a particularly long time trying to find the source in a deep way. Suddenly something happened and I felt like I was being sucked inside, pulled inside. I was sitting with closed eyes but I saw very clearly that something opened inside. The moment that opened inside, I was able to see whole 360 degrees around me. My eyes were closed but I was able to see complete 360 degrees, whatever was happening in all the directions - front, side, back, up, and down.

Not only was I able to see, but I was also able to feel very clearly with the same intensity how we all feel alive inside our skin, that I am alive in everything I was able to see. I was able to see

Nithyananda towards his deep spiritual experience as a young boy.

whatever was around me, all the plants, rocks, trees and everything. I was able to feel that I am alive in everything. In the same way you all feel you are alive inside your body I felt alive with the whole cosmos, with the whole Existence. Till then I was just a mere body. After that, I realized I am body also. Understand, ‘I am body also’.

It was a very deep experience. If it was just a word or imagination, it won’t have that much impact on your inner space. It was an intense conscious experience. You see, now you know you are inside your skin. You will listen to anything as long as it does not disturb you. Naturally you know how to protect yourself because you are alive inside and that is your conscious experience.

No matter however many people teach you that you are not just your body you will only listen but you will not allow them to work on you! Because your conscious experience is your body. My experience that ‘I am this whole Existence’ became my truth. That is why I started living according to that.

People are surprised that I lived such a strong intense life in such a young age. They feel that it is very difficult and unimaginable. It is unimaginable for you because it is not your conscious experience. It was easy for me because feeling the whole cosmos is me became a very solid experience.

There is a beautiful example of the power of intensity in the life of enlightened master, Ramana Maharishi. When he was sixteen, spontaneously this happened to him. He was in Madurai near his native place called Thiruchuzhi, which is in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Suddenly one day he started feeling that he was going to die. The great death fear arose in him.

We also sometimes feel that fear of death when we hear about some relative’s or friend’s death or when we see an accident or when we come across some news about death. We are so well-versed or trained to suppress our emotions and control ourselves that we never allow this fear to come out. We are such hypocrites that we don’t even know we are cheating ourselves! Many times we can see the fear rise but we are an automatic mechanism of suppression.

Over time we learn how to balance ourselves or suppress ourselves. We suppress ourselves and just forget about it or try to do something. We just turn the attention elsewhere.

But Ramana Maharishi did not do anything. He used the door to take the jump. We are also again and again going near this door. Whenever we hear about somebody’s death or whenever fear attacks, we also go near the door. But we are afraid to take the jump. We have trained ourselves so much to be hypocrites or not to be intense. We somehow balance and we escape. We switch on the television or we just move our attention towards something else.

Ramana Maharishi used that door to take a quantum jump into deathlessness. He just lay down on the floor and did not move his body and allowed death to happen. After the enlightenment, he says beautifully about his experience:

Suddenly for no reason I felt the deep fear that I am going to die. I was not sick. I was not having any mental problem. Physically, mentally I was healthy. Suddenly the thought came, ‘I am going to die.’ I just cooperated with that fear. I did not try to jump, I did not try to run away, and I did not bother about anything else. I did not feel like doing anything else. I just sat and allowed the feeling. I just sat and allowed death to happen to my being. I lay down, and I decided let me see what happens.

What can be done? I just accepted and I consciously started moving into that fear. The fear started working on me. I could see that I am dead. My body is not moving, nothing is happening in me. I could see very clearly that I am out of the body. Suddenly like a flash the intelligence or the truth descended on me that my body is dead but I am alive. ‘I’ am not dead. My body is dead, but I could see, I could feel that I still exist.

It means I am something beyond the body. That single experience of the truth shook me completely and I realized I am not just the body, and that I am something beyond the body. After that I never faced the death fear or any other fear. Once and for all the fear had disappeared from my being. The moment I understood that even after my body dying, there is something in me that is not dying, why should I bother about my body’s death? Why should I bother about the death of my body? Because even if it dies, I am going to continue, I am going to exist, I am alive. That means I am something more than what I think. I am something more than this body. This realization has never left me. I have never moved away from this realization after that one experience.

How can a fear create such a big transformation in Ramana Maharishi when in our lives it happens yet we are unchanged by it? The answer is intensity. Such an ultimate experience can suddenly happen without any reason. It is purely your intensity.

Be very clear, if you want to really serve society, the first thing you need is intensity in your purpose. I have seen many people doing something in the name of social service, just because they can’t sit with themselves. Be very clear, if you are not able to sit with yourself and do social service like going to some temple, going to some social service organization or doing some such service, you will never be able to experience the truth.

Going to the temple or doing some social service should be like overflowing. You feel so full, you feel there is nothing more to be done and think, ‘I have so much of time, let me do some service to society, it is beautiful.’ Then it will lead you to enlightenment.

The service itself can lead you to spiritual experience. You feel overflowing and think, ‘God has given me so much, this whole life is so beautiful,’ and you go to a temple or church to offer your gratitude.

Then it will just liberate you and you will become enlightened. If you are going to the temple or for social service just because you don’t feel relaxed within yourself, you can’t sit quietly. There is so much of restlessness within you that you just want to do catharsis in some way.

People with this type of attitude, even if they go to temples, will be sitting there and shouting at everybody, ‘Don’t do this. Don’t do that. What are you doing? Don’t you know god wants this?’ They will start representing god! Not even representing, they will even start acting god. This type of persons, even if they do some service will be only putting their ego in front. They will only be torturing others. They will not be serving others.

A small story: There was a schoolteacher who was a scoutmaster. He had made a rule that all his students should report to him of at least one good activity or service they did that day. One day three friends got up and said ‘Sir, today we helped an old lady cross the road.’ The scoutmaster said, ‘Old lady crossing the road is fine but why did she need three of you to help her cross the road?’ The three boys replied, ‘Yes sir, it took all three of us to help her cross the road because she didn’t want to!’

Be very clear, many times you start doing things just for the sake of service, not feeling. You don’t feel what you are doing. You don’t feel the need of the other person. You need to fill your time and you need to show your project report to somebody, maybe to the higher authorities or to the society. Just for that when you do it, you create a mess and more difficulty for others.

I always feel service should be overflowing out of your being. It should never be done for some other purpose. Whenever it is done for some other purpose, be very clear, you will not be intense and you will not be growing in your being. Your love or service will be pure hypocrisy. I can say ‘impure hypocrisy’, not even pure hypocrisy! If you are pure you will be liberated. It is impure hypocrisy.

In Bengal, there is a particular group of people who believe that Krishna is the only man and those who follow him are all women no matter what gender they physically are. They look to Krishna as their beloved. They feel so intensely about this relation that even the men dress like women.

The enlightened mystic from Bengal, Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, followed this path also for six months. The hallmark of this great master, Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, was that whatever he did, it was with totality and intensity. He used the same clothes as women not only at night, but also during the day because he felt he could not be one person during the day and another during the night.

You may be shocked to hear this but he actually started becoming a woman. It was not being like a woman, it was being a woman. His voice changed, his gait and manner of walking changed. The intensity was such his breasts started growing. He even started having monthly periods! During the six months he was doing this practice, he just became a woman. It took almost six months after he stopped for the change to reverse and for him to become a man again. So understand, the power of your intensity is such it can change your very body, your very DNA!

Look at the biography of enlightened master and founder of Buddhism, Gautam Buddha. He searched for six long years. He tried various paths but the beauty is that in every attempt he put in his whole being.

Whatever he decided to follow, he did with complete, unwavering intensity. He tried various techniques such as fasting, continuous penance, chanting and many such methods. He tried all possible techniques but nothing worked.

During his seeking, a teacher told him to eat only one grain of rice per day for three months. Buddha sincerely followed his instructions. He was reduced to skin and bones and became extremely weak. One day, he stepped into the river to bathe. He had become so weak that he couldn't even move his legs and was being swept away by the current. He caught hold of a tree branch and while h a n g i n g onto it he s u d d e n l y realized the fruitlessness of all his efforts. He had been mortifying the body but in the process he had only lost his bodily strength.

He felt a deep depression that he could not achieve anything in the inner world and he had nothing meaningful in the outer world. He came out of the river and sat under the tree. He was frustrated but the difference between ordinary frustration and Buddha’s frustration was he was complete and intense in his frustration as well.

There was not even a grain of hope he had. He completely gave up. There was nothing to achieve, nothing to look forward to. It is said that on that night as he looked at the sky ready to sleep, he attained nirvana¹¹.

The one factor that resulted in Buddha achieving It is intensity. So many of us claim we are doing everything but nothing is happening. Look little deeper and see how integrated you are in your thirst and seeking. Whatever you may seek, integrate your energies completely and go for it. You will then see the Universe open up to you completely.

I had mentioned about my deep spiritual experience where I felt one with Existence and had a 360 degree vision of everything around me. There are so many people practicing so many different meditation techniques. What is the difference, what is the reason why the experience happened to a small boy? I can say that one important reason is that my whole inner space was ripe, ready for this small technique to awaken and open it. Constantly I used to be in that high frequency of the masters without even my conscious awareness.

See, especially in the young age, whoever inspires or impresses you becomes the hero of your inner space. These great masters impressed me so much that in every situation I would think, ‘How would these great masters behave?’ For example, if I had some fear, I would remember, ‘How will Annamalai Swamigal face this fear?

He won’t bother. He is enlightened. Let me also be like that.’ The inner space was so inspired and impressed by these great masters, that before every step I took in my life I would think, ‘How will he behave? Let me also do that.’ The inner space was so pure also at the young age and I had no heroes other than the masters. At every step I used to think, ‘How will he behave? Let me behave like that. How he will do? Let me do like that.’

I used to go for a circumambulation of the Arunachala hill. It is more than twelve kilometers around the hill. I used to go late at night. When I had a little fear I used to say, ‘How will Annamalai Swamigal behave? He won’t bother about fear. Then let me also be like that.’

Let me tell you about one incident. It was raining heavily that night as I went around the hill. I had some fear seeing the heavy rain, thunder and lightning. Immediately I thought, ‘How will Annamalai Swamigal behave? He won’t bother. He will just walk. Let me also do the same way.’ I was walking through the traditional crematorium. In India both cremation and burial are done in the same place.

I was walking in that place because when you go around the hill the path goes through that crematorium. Suddenly I saw a dog biting something and eating. When I went near, the dog started barking at me. At first when the fear came up I thought, ‘How will Annamalai Swamigal behave? He won’t bother. Let me just go.’ I started moving.

Anyhow when I started moving the dog got scared and ran away. When I got nearer I saw that it was a dead body which was not completely buried. It had come out in the rain and it was lying on the road. Just imagine a twelve or thirteen year old boy, alone at midnight, seeing a dead body without a head, since the dog had the head in its mouth.

The fear started but it did not even reach my being completely. The shock, the fear stroke did not even happen completely. As soon as the first thought started coming up, with intense awareness I thought, ‘How will Annamalai Swamigal react now? He will just walk around and go. Just walk around and go.’ I continued to walk. That’s all. I took a detour and walked away. I did not even turn back and see. The fear stroke, which was like a bubble, which was about to start, did not even open up, did not even reach my body. The heat or the shivering from fear was not even there in the body. It just died.

Intensely, the whole conscious inner space was ready. That is the reason, just a punch, just a small inspiration was able to put me into that experience. That is what I call ‘living enlightenment’. When you live the master’s body language you live enlightenment. Whenever any thought came into my inner space, whether it was related to clothes or food or anything, the first thing I would think was, ‘How will Annamalai Swamigal behave? Naturally he won’t have any desire. Then forget about it!’ If I felt a little lazy to meditate or to circumambulate the hill, I would think, ‘How will Annamalai Swamigal think?

How will he handle this situation? Naturally he will not bother about this laziness. He will just get up and meditate, that's all! So just do that!' So constantly, from morning until night, these masters became the reference. They became my life center.

I asked Annamalai Swamigal once, 'I saw Devi¹² in my dream. Do you also see her in the dream?' Annamalai Swamigal replied, 'No, I don't have dreams.' I was shocked, 'You don't have dream! Then how can I have dream!' That night I said to myself, 'Now, no dream. Annamalai Swamigal said 'no dream' so I cannot have dream.' You will be surprised, that night when some dream started happening, I said clearly from inside the dream, 'No! Annamalai Swamigal doesn't have dreams. How can I have dreams?' The dream disappeared. Just the dream disappeared. The inner space was so thorough, so innocent, so direct, it just happened.

Even if I felt cold or anything, I would remember, 'How will Annamalai Swamigal behave? He won't bother. Then don't bother. That's all.' There were no further questions or arguments inside.