Become the master of your own mental energies

London 6 July 2008 – Q & A Part Two

Question:

Babaji, there is the story of the person who goes to the sea with his bucket and fills the bucket with water but there is a hole in the bucket. I feel like that. Last year I spent the whole week with You and I felt wonderful. There was one week I went back to my old habits and in one week I lost it again. I've come back and now I feel wonderful again. My life has been like this and I wonder what can I do about this hole in my bucket?

Babaji:

There is always a technology, some way definitely to close that hole. Through some means it will always be possible. If only you positively try. So that is what it is. If you can be positive always and keep trying, never give up. Someway the technology will penetrate your mind.

Like the story I said, for one thousand nights that Emperor wouldn't give up trying to bringing back that ghost Betal. Every night he used to go and take the ghost on his back, trying to bring him back. Every night used to be the same type of story. It used to give him a puzzle and he had to answer. The condition was if he knew the answer he had to answer or his head would explode. But if he answered the ghost would go free. The moment he answered it used to run away, so it was like the hole in the bucket. Suddenly on the last night it occurred to him, "If I do not listen to this, if I keep quiet then it will have to come back." Like that, some way you will be able to realize what is happening, why this weakness is happening so do not lose faith and hope. Faith and hope means have confidence in you. That is what is most important. If you have confidence in you, you can definitely achieve it and God will also help. Do not give up come what may be, until the last breath of life. At least you will have the satisfaction that you have put in efforts whether it happened or not. So like that if you go it will definitely happen. That's how we were all taught since childhood, to be determined, not to lose hope all the time, to be positive and keep trying, keep trying, keep trying.

Question:

My job is quite demanding. I work long hours and I get up very early to meditate. By the end of the week I'm so exhausted that I wonder whether the meditation actually has any benefit - I'm so tired?

Babaji:

Meditation definitely has a benefit I can assure you because I have practiced and I have achieved, I can guarantee you. While practicing the hardship always appears until you become expert. So that is when you are likely to feel tired, sometimes it appears as if it is very hard. Anything in this world when you want to achieve it appears very hard.

Sometimes to earn a livelihood is not easy; it is not like eating ice cream. Every day you have to work hard eight to ten hours and go on but still you won't feel that hardship because you know that you want that food to sustain you. So it is the mind that gives you this negativity or positivity. Like for a valiant soldier the battlefield is never a hardship it will be an opportunity to show the valour. This world can also be like a battlefield. If you are using it as an opportunity and have positive thinking you will definitely be able to do it and meditation will definitely be beneficial for you, because when you are able to control the mind finally, then you become the master of your mental energies. Then you will see how peace descends. Whenever you want to think, you can think and work in this world. When you don't want to think, you can remain relaxed, at peace at all times.

Question:

Babaji you mentioned something in Oxford about how this world is a projection of our mind and that it is like we may be asleep somewhere in another world and that this is not actually real. Could you explain a bit about that please?

Babaji:

While doing meditation I would advise not to go into so many dimensions of imaginations. That was just one technique that I tried to tell; that this world appears to be based on your imaginations, but during our teachings we do not try to elaborate because if your mind picks up all such habits you will start imagining a hundred and one dimensions like that.

What I was trying to tell, like when you are sleeping in the night time your body is lying down but you would be dreaming. When you are dreaming that dream appears so one hundred percent real, so solid you can never make out that you are dreaming as long as you are dreaming. In the dream everything appears so real, time and space and happenings, everything. You also see yourself as a role into it and everything that is happening appears to be as if it is happening to you and you are watching that dream also all the time. So who is that watching? So when you are watching that dream you have forgotten that you are sleeping on a bed. You won't be able to recollect or remember at all. Only when you wake-up suddenly you will realize that you were sleeping and that you were only dreaming. Just like if you were dreaming about this world while you have been sleeping in some other dimension. You have forgotten. Like that this world is an unreal thing.

So this is taught so that the mind can become detached from this world and go back to the Self-awareness, that is important. As long as the mind does not realize this as an unreal illusion it never gives up the attachment to this world so then it becomes so difficult to gain that Self-awareness. So that is why in one of the schools of spirituality repeatedly the illusion theory is taught; illusion, illusion. The mind gets sucked into this illusion and everything appears so real. This world appears to you based on the attitude of your mind; one man's food is another man's poison. The world has nothing to do with this. It is in its place. If you like it you will be happy, if you don't like it you will be unhappy. So that is the attitude of the mind. This is what I was trying to teach a little bit.

Question:

When we dream is that the whole dream is us but we have imagined a small role in that dream? Is this world like that, this whole illusion is us?

Babaji:

In a different potency, in a higher consciousness, you are visualizing but within that dream this is a small portion. So that is why this world appears so big for you. Whatever you imagine it is within your mind only, nothing but the mind. It doesn't go out of the mind. You are sitting and you would be picturizing, your mind constantly picturizes. So everything that the mind picturizes is true but the pictures that are in the mind are not true. But that is also within your mind, within your consciousness. That is how this world also appears within the consciousness of the existence only. That is what a Yogi experiences in deeper Samadhi. One after another you go back and the potency increases, this small amount of potency of mind comes back, comes back from all directions and its consciousness increases. Then it becomes able to go back. The more and more it gathers it starts going back to the Self and gets absorbed and you become aware of yourself as the All-Pervading Spirit, the Divinity. That is how it happens, this is a small clue.

Question:

Babaji, you said something - when you see people you see them as pure consciousness. Is that the same with inanimate objects as well because they are atoms of energy, so it is all alive? Do you see that all in the same way?

Babaji:

Everywhere. Everywhere a Yogi sees the same Self. The same universal energy exists everywhere, but because of the body, and the brain and the instincts so different features show but it is the same Self.

Like you have a red earthen pot, black earthen pot, green earthen pot, ten types of pot. The space is the same inside but because of the earthen pot it appears different. You cannot say, this is a black space, this is a green space, red space. You won't call it like that, simply the pot outside appears so. Like that it appears but it is the same one universal energy that is the Supreme Consciousness of existence. That is how a Yogi is able to love everyone unconditionally. That is why in religions also it is taught God is everywhere, love and try to see God in every heart, everywhere, in everything. If you love really then also you become really spiritual. Your mind gets cleansed; you will be able to accept everything as the Divine's Grace.

Question:

Babaji, I enjoy meditation when I do it but I find great difficulty with being disciplined enough to stick to one method. I have done over the years so many different types of meditation. When I am within the particular environment I'll do what's required, but when I am at home, I'm undisciplined about one method.

Babaji:

One important thing as long as you don't get confused, there is no harm in practicing any number of methods. If you understand one concept. The basic concept is, mind control. The mind has to come to your control. So with the many methods you can practice and see. In any method if the mind will come back, then you will be benefitted. There is no need to be confused. It is good; you can carry on with so many methods.

Question:

Do you have any advice for when an emotion takes over and you get angry or upset?

Babaji:

That is a very important thing. Emotions can be your strength and they can become your weakness also sometimes, when the things take over you. That is where this type of sadhana (this is called meditation) meaning, your efforts to achieve mind control is known as sadhana in spiritual talk. If you regularly practice this you can always tap the energies, such emotional energies into single-pointedness. If you have the main switch under your control you can control every effect, like all energies.

These are all the mental energies, like the ancient sages in our philosophy, they spoke of six shapes that the mind takes. Six types of emotions they are called the six enemies of the human mind, they said Aristadwarga, six types of enemies meaning, kama, extreme greed; krodha, extreme anger; loba, extreme stinginess; moha, extreme attachment to the materialistic things; mada, extreme false pride ego; matsarya, extreme jealously with others. These are the six shapes.

Whosever mind goes into these shapes their mind is the first casualty. They are losing that peace and such things take over but if you regularly practice this meditation and you said you practice different religions. In those religions definitely prayers would have been taught, different prayers are all taught for the basic purpose that you can control the mind, so thus you can be able to control your emotions also, and channel them into a better way. So instead of getting involved into all these, anger and everything, love everyone as God and then you will be able to overcome these emotions in a much better way.

Question:

Babaji, when doing a silent meditation, thought process stops for five or ten seconds then I fall asleep. Is it called bliss or sleep?

Babaji:

So when you fall asleep it will be bliss for a while but the meditation would not continue. For meditation to continue you need to keep the brain aware always. The brain should not go into sleep. If in the night time you practice for ten or fifteen minutes and then you feel quiet and go to sleep, that is good for health of course. But when you want to progress in meditation, you should sit to meditation at such times when you are fresh and when you have taken sufficient rest, that is important because then only you will be able to concentrate the mind. You will always be existing; you shall not vanish or become unconscious, that is important in meditation.

Question:

In Babaji's talk, You mentioned that when you try to quieten the mind sometimes you may even feel like the head is going to explode. I have that tension sometimes in my head and further down my neck. It is not a real pain because after the meditation is fine. Do you just ignore it and continue?

Babaji:

Remain calm, be determined and continue the meditation because one technique is the mind suddenly gets applied so much on the brain and the force increases then gradually it gets de-linked, then you will feel peace. You will have to continue because the mind is trying to hit back and jump outside. You are trying to keep it introverted and quiet so with all its energy when the mind is trying to jump back, that is when you are likely to experience this type of force. So if you have patience and remain quiet, don't feel irritated with the mind as the mind is very silky and slippery. It is such an infinite thing, if you feel irritated the mind will jump back, it will run away, so stay calm and have patience, then it will be all right. After the meditation you are saying that you feel so much of peace, like that the after effects will be very nice.

Question:

Babaji I am a reiki practitioner. When I do reiki I might visualize the deities or some spirit guide or Guru. Is that my mind visualizing or am I connecting to some higher source?

Babaji:

You are always trying to connect to the higher source, that is one thing but when it visualizes it is the mind which is projecting and using that the mind becomes more and more focussed because God is not a personality who is existing, that is why we say all religions are equal and honorable, there is no difference. In Hindu religion these are all concepts that are given so that you can focus the mind and the mind goes introverted. Mind's Ultimate Truth is the Divinity that is All-Pervading, beyond form and formlessness.

First mind is visualizing with imagination. In spirituality, in bhakti marga, that is also recommended as a good thing because your mind can become more focussed on that. If you start loving that form of God that you are visualizing unknown to you gradually you will see that it is the mind projecting, that is what happens. So if you continue in that also it will be possible that you can get connected to the higher source.