Something to contemplate for us.

Even though the reality of the Self has been explained in many ways, the truth of it remains unspoken because it can only be known by directly experiencing it. Those who seek liberation are prevented from having this direct experience by their minds which hold onto the deeply-rooted conviction 'I am the body / mind'.

Falling in love with Devi.

Question: Namaskaram Sadhguru. We were fortunate enough to receive a Devi Yantra from you last year. She has completely transformed our home, and she is actually transforming lives in our neighborhood too. There are people who, whether they have to deal with family situations or a divorce or health issues, will come and sit in the Devi room. I am just stunned to see her grace. She has revved it up quite a bit for me, but I am still wondering, how to earn more of her grace?

Sadhguru : The processes that have been taught to you work best if you make Devi your priority. This is not just so with Devi – this is so with anything subjective. Even for a love affair to work, it is a question of priorities. If you regard something or someone as far more important than yourself, that dimension becomes beautiful for you. But if you do that with people, we do not know how mature the other person is. A man who looks at a tree and thinks this is wood may look at a woman and think this is sex, nothing more. The basic consciousness has been trained in such a way that if you see something, you think of how useful it could be to you, in the sense, “What is the takeaway for me?”

A Devi yantra is a powerful energy form that has no intention of its own. You are also an energy form, but you are not able to maintain a particular level of consciousness because the compulsions of your thoughts, your emotions, and your body will rule and contaminate your consciousness. You have seen this with human beings: one moment, they are so wonderful – next moment, they are shockingly horrible.

So we create a powerful form that has no concern about itself and no compulsiveness because this is a pure energy form. The physical form of mercury, copper, and stone is only a scaffolding to hold up the energy form. A yantra is a kind of machine. The Devi machine [yantra] and the Detroit machines [cars] – both of them will take you places. The fundamental difference between an external machine and such an energy form is, the Devi yantra is a perpetual machine that does not need any real maintenance. You just need to create a certain atmosphere because Devi does not want to stay in an uncared-for space.

The Devi yantras are extensions of the mularupa, which means the original energy form, of Linga Bhairavi [next to the Isha Yoga Center]. You can create millions of such yantras across the planet. All of them will be alive as long as the original energy form is kept up in full vibrance. You must hold Devi as the highest entity in your home. If your home catches fire, the first thought on your mind should be how to save Devi. It is not a question of what you do – it is a question of what your priorities are. If Devi is a top priority for you, your receptivity will increase. If you think, “This is just some stone Sadhguru has given. Let’s see what I will get out of it,” at the most, your health will improve. If you become very healthy but you are otherwise a miserable human being, it is a disaster.

Two New York philosophers met in a bar. They started discussing the difference between a misfortune and a disaster. One of them said, “Right now, we are about to have dinner. Suppose the cook dies, you cannot call it a disaster. It’s a misfortune – not that he died, but that we cannot have our dinner.” See, this is a takeaway world. “But let us say all the congressmen of the United States were on a Caribbean cruise and the cruise ship sinks, that is a disaster, but by no stretch is it a misfortune.” This is not my opinion.

You just have to set your priorities straight. You go to a temple, church, or mosque because you believe that by going there, your life will be enhanced. In India, there are various ways to relate to God. You can relate to God as your father; you can relate to God as your mother; you can see God as your husband; you can see God as your lover; you can see God as your child; you can be a servant to God, or you can treat God as your servant, as the whole world does. There are specific practices and ways to be, depending on your choice of relating.

You can relate to Devi whichever way you want, but the important thing is – if you hold her as the highest priority in your home, she will function in a tremendous way. If you think, “She is a tool. Let me leverage it for my benefit,” she still works – but in a mediocre way. If you see her as the highest priority, if you see her as higher than yourself, the kinds of things that will happen will be too phenomenal. Logical minds can never, ever decipher how this works.

To the extent that you intensely relate to this simple, yet very powerfully reverberating form, to that extent it functions. If you relate to it, it becomes the most fabulous thing. To relate means you have become willing. This goes for everything in life – what is horrendous and what is fantastic is just a question of whether you go through it willingly or unwillingly. If you become willing towards something, it becomes a phenomenon.

Receive the yantra during the sacred ceremony on the Pournami night of December 16, 2013 in the presence of Sadhguru. You will be initiated into a powerful process while receiving the yantra directly from him.

Link : http://lingabhairavi.org/offerings-and-rituals/devi-yantras-gudis/yantra-ceremony/

Why is the Vilva Leaf Dear to Shiva?

Perseverence and Faith is the key in Sadhana

BHAGAVAN RAMANA TELLS THE STORY OF THE SPARROW

When a sparrow was flying, holding its egg in its beak, the egg slipped and fell into the ocean. The sparrow, anxious to retrieve it, repeatedly dipped itself in the ocean, sucked some water through its beak, came to the shore, released the water and fanned its wings. The sage Narada who was passing that way saw this action of the sparrow, enquired, and came to know the reason.

‘You stupid sparrow! Is this something you can accomplish?’ said Narada.
The sparrow replied, ‘I don’t care whether it is possible or not. If I persevere tenaciously, beyond that it is in God’s hands.’

Narada, delighted with its faith, went to Garuda and told him everything.

Then he said, ‘A creature belonging to your bird tribe is exerting itself with so much faith. Is it proper for you to keep quiet? Can you not help?’
After hearing this story Garuda flew quickly to the sparrow. As soon as he flapped his wings there, all the waters of the ocean separated into two, leaving the egg of the sparrow visible. The sparrow immediately picked it up in its beak and flew away.

Similarly, those who meditate on the Self and do good deeds, if they labour hard without feeling ‘This is a mammoth task! There is no one to help! Is this possible for me?’ then the help of God will come automatically.

Will the waters of the ocean get diminished by the sparrow sucking water through its beak and by its releasing it on the shore? The sparrow performed its task with faith [sraddha] and perseverance. Similarly, if anyone makes an effort, it will not fail to bear fruit at some time or other. For all things faith alone is important. For those who engage in good deeds, if they work with faith, the help of God will come, just as it did through Garuda.
Until it comes one should stay with one's sadhana without any faltering of faith, and with utmost exertion and steadfastness.

Letters from Ramanasramam

Chinnanchiru Kiliye - Subramaniam Bharathiar song

God feels that way, too.

We put forth our hands to receive God's gifts of life and sun and food and all the other things He bestows on us; but even as we receive them, we are unmindful of the Giver. If you have lovingly given presents to someone and then find out that he never thinks of you, how hurt you would feel! God feels that way, too.

Paramahansa Yogananda

All of us in the world are seeking peace. But are we serious?

Sadhguru : Before looking at how the world should be, you should look at how you should be within yourself. If you can’t keep yourself peaceful, keeping the world peaceful is just empty talk. Young people, who have their life ahead of them, should first invest a certain amount of time on their inner wellbeing. How you should be within yourself should be a primary concern.


Today, it is entertainment for people to talk about world peace. I
have been to a number of international conferences and what I see is, people simply enjoy talking, they are not serious about what they want to do. Ninety percent of the people seem to be happy that they got a ticket to travel, they are staying in some big hotel, and that’s it! I don’t see the seriousness in people – that they are there because they are interested in creating peace.


This is because violence has its investment and conflict has its benefits. Someone is benefiting from the whole thing and it is a charade that is kept up. Many people have not suffered the pain of conflict, they do not know what it means to really be hit by these things. They only see it on television, as some kind of excitement, seeing bombs blow up and body parts fly all over the place. These kinds of movies are popular. And now, you don’t have to see any movies because it is on the news every day. Somehow, people are not serious about peace, except those who are really hit by its absence.

If this has to change, the first thing a human being has to learn is to be peaceful within himself. As there is a science and technology to create external wellbeing, there is a science and technology to create inner wellbeing.

Sadhguru , https://www.facebook.com/GloriousSilence

When Buddha disappeared one night from his palace................................

Osho : When Buddha disappeared one night from his palace, he wanted to tell his wife that, ”I am going.” He wanted to touch the child who was just a day before born, because he would not be back again. He went to the very door of the room. He looked at the wife. She was so fast asleep, must have been dreaming; her face was beautiful, smiling, child in her arms.


Then he waited for few seconds on the door; then he turned. He wanted to say, but then he became afraid. If he said something, then the wife is bound to cry and weep and create a scene And he is afraid of himself also, because if she weeps and cries, then he may become aware of his own promises, that ”I will love you forever and ever, and I will be with you forever and ever.” And
what about this child who is only one day born? And she will, of course, bring the child before me, and she will say, ”Look what you have done to me. Then why you gave birth to this child? And now who will be his father? And am I alone responsible for him? And you are escaping like a coward.”


All these thoughts came to him, because in sleep everybody promises. Everybody goes on giving promises not knowing how he can fulfill them, but in sleep it happens because nobody is conscious what is happening.
Suddenly he became aware that these things will be brought and then the family will gather – and the father and everybody else – and he is the only son of the father, and the father is looking at him, and in his sleep he has promised him also. Then he simply escaped: he simply escaped like a thief.


After twelve years, when he came back, the wife asked him the first thing that had come to his mind that night when he was leaving. The wife asked, ”Why didn’t you tell me? The first thing I would like to ask – for these twelve years I was waiting for you – why didn’t you tell me? What type of love is this? You simply left me. You are a coward.”


And Buddha listened silently. And the wife was silent and he said, ”These all thoughts had come to me. I had come just to the door, I had even opened the door. I looked at you; in sleep I had promised many things. But if I am going to be awake, if I am getting out of the sleep, then I cannot keep the promises given in sleep. And if I try to keep the promises, then I cannot awake.


”So you are right. You may think I am a coward; you may think that I escaped from the palace like a thief, not like a warrior, not like a man of courage. But I tell you, exactly opposite is the case, because when I was escaping, to me at that moment, that was the moment of greatest bravery because my whole being was saying, ’This is not good. Don’t be a coward.’ And if I had stopped, if I had listened to my sleepy being, then there was no possibility for me to awake.


”And now I come to you; now I can fulfill something, because only a man who is enlightened can fulfill. A man who is ignorant, how he can fulfill anything? Now I come to you. That moment if I
had stopped I couldn’t give you anything, but now I bring a great treasure with me, and now I can give it to you. Don’t weep, don’t cry; open the eyes and look at me. I am not the same man who
had left that night. A totally different being has come to your door.

I am not your husband. You may be my wife, because that is your attitude. Look at me – I am totally a different person. Now I bring
treasures for you. I can make you also aware and enlightened.”
The wife listened. The same problem always came to everybody. She started thinking about the child. If she becomes a sannyasin and moves with this beggar – her ex-husband, now he is a beggar
– if she moves... and what will happen to the child? She has not said anything, but Buddha said, ”I know what you are thinking, because I have passed that period where promises given in the sleepy state all crowd together and say, ’What are you doing? – your child...’ You are thinking that, ’Let the child become a little more aged, let him be married, then he can take over the palace and the kingdom,’ and then you will follow.

But remember, there is no future, no tomorrow. Either you follow
me right now or you don’t follow me.”

So Buddha said, ”I know what you are thinking, and I know you are a greater dreamer than me. But now I have come to cut all the roots of your sleep. Bring the child. Where is my son? Bring him.”

The feminine mind played a trick again. She brought Rahul, the child who was twelve years of age now, and she said, ”This is your father. Look at him – he has become a beggar – and ask him what is your heritage, what he can give to you. This is your father; he is a coward! He escaped like a thief not even telling me, and he left a one-day-old child. Ask him your heritage!”


Buddha laughed, and he told Ananda, ”Bring my begging bowl.” And he gave the begging bowl to Rahul, and he said, ”This is my heritage. I make you a beggar. You are initiated. You become a
sannyasin.” And he said to his wife, ”I cut the very root. Now there is no need to dream. You also awake because this was the root. Rahul is already a sannyasin; you also awake. Yashodhara, you
also awake, and become a sannyasin.”

The moment always comes when you are in the transit period from where sleep turns into awakening. The whole past will hold you back, and past is powerful.
Future is powerless for a sleepy man.
For a man who is not sleepy, future is powerful;
for a man who is fast asleep, past is powerful, because a man who is fast asleep knows only dreams that he had dreamed in the past. He is not aware of any future. Even if he thinks about future, it is nothing but past reflected again; it is just past projected again.

Only a man who is aware becomes aware of the future. Then past is nothing.

Osho, https://www.facebook.com/GloriousSilence

The Significance of Kalabhairava -- The Most Fearsome Form of Shiva

Tribute to Shree Maa _/\_

Those lines "Whatever happens in my life, It is my karma." Does it have any significance? Sadhguru explores.

Sadhguru : We have always been a diverse culture and
we have managed this diversity very well, mainly
because of the fundamental spiritual ethos where
we always saw that whoever and whatever you
may be, is your making. “It is your karma” means
it is your making. Because of this, you are driving a
Mercedes – I am walking on the street, and there is
no resentment.


Tarun Tahiliani: Do you subscribe to this prevalent
thought that it is your karma? I don’t think that this
is my karma.


Sadhguru:No. When I say “karma,” I mean
whatever I am is my making. It is a most dynamic
way to exist. Slowly, this most dynamic way to exist
has been corrupted to become a fatalistic existence.
If I tell someone who is not doing well “This is God’s
will,” he simply has no choice – that is the way he
has to be. When I say, “It’s your making,” it means
he can make it something else if he wishes. When
we said, “It is your karma,” it means everything that
you are is 100% your making. That means you have
to create your own life.


This has been partially and
conveniently misunderstood to a certain point, but
still it has kept people free of resentment, anger, and
hatred. That is why India is incapable of a revolution.


Tarun Tahiliani:So far at least, yes. I would agree.


Sadhguru:Yes. Once we lose this spiritual ethos, if
even the terminology disappears from day-to-day
culture, which is beginning to happen…. I don’t
think today’s generation is even using the word
“karma” anymore.

My grandmother said for every
little thing, “Ayyo! It’s his karma – my karma – your karma.”
My mother said it much less.
I am speaking to people in a different way,
but the next generation is barely talking about it.

Once this disappears, resentment will grow in people.

Resentment and anger can lead to a revolution. A revolution can
sometimes lead to wellbeing, but it usually only
replaces one tyrant with another set of tyrants.


We are beginning to believe, and many people
today in the political sphere are talking in those
terms, that anger is the only propelling force for
change. We never used to see it that way in this
nation. For thousands of years, we have seen that
you can propel change out of sheer human longing
to be better. Every human being is constantly
longing to be a little better than he is right now.
Just that longing is enough to transform a society,
an individual, and the whole situation – if only
you create a situation where everyone has the
opportunity to find expression to that longing.
Otherwise, if major change has to happen, it has
to happen with anger, brutality, and blood. People
have gone to the extent of saying that only blood and
tears move the wheels of history. It need not be so.
Human love, human compassion, human ingenuity,
human intelligence can truly move the wheels of
history, and that is what is happening in modern
times. Information technology and other aspects
are a clear manifestation that human ingenuity can
change the world. It need not necessarily happen
with blood and gore.

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Existence cannot be forced to go according to you; it flows in its own way. If you can flow with it, you will be positive. - Osho

I was staying in a village rest house. It was a very poor village, but it was filled with many dogs. They all gathered in the night around the rest house; it must have been their usual habit. The rest house was a good place – big trees, shadows, and they must have been resting there every night. So I was staying there, and one minister of a particular state was staying there. The minister became very much disturbed because the dogs were barking, creating much nuisance. Half the night passed and the minister couldn’t sleep, so he came to me.

He said, ”Are you asleep?” I was fast asleep, so he came near to me, made me wake up and asked me, ”Please tell me how you could fall into sleep amid such noises all around. At least twenty to thirty dogs are there, and they are fighting and barking and doing everything that dogs ordinarily do. So what to do? I cannot sleep, and I am so tired after the whole day’s journey. If I cannot sleep, it will be difficult for me. The next day I have to go again on a tour, and I will leave early in the morning. Sleep doesn’t seem to come, and I have tried all the methods I have learned and heard about – chanting a mantra, praying to God, etc. I have done everything, but nothing happens, so what to do now?”

So I told him, ”Those dogs are not gathered here for you or to disturb you. They are not even aware that a minister is staying here; they do not read newspapers. They are completely ignorant. They are not here purposefully, they are not concerned with you. They are doing their work. Why are you getting disturbed?”

So he said, ”Why should I not? How not to? With so much barking, how can I go into sleep?”

So I told him, ”Do not fight with the barking. You are fighting – that is the problem, not the noise. The noise is not disturbing you, you are disturbing yourself because of the noise. You are against the noise, so you have a condition. You are saying, ’If the dogs stop barking, then I will sleep.’ The dogs won’t listen to you. You have a condition. You feel that if the condition is fulfilled, then you can sleep. This condition is disturbing you. Accept dogs! Do not make a condition that ’If they stop barking, then I will sleep.’ Just accept.

”Dogs are there and they are barking; do not resist, do not fight, do not try to forget those noises. Accept them and listen to them, they are beautiful. The night is so silent, and they are barking so vitally – just listen. This will be the mantra, the right mantra: just listen to them.”

So he said, ”Okay! I do not believe that this will help, but as there is nothing else to do, I will try.” He fell asleep, and the dogs were still barking. In the morning he said, ”This is miraculous. I accepted them; I withdrew my condition. I listened. Those dogs became very musical, and their barking, their noise, was not disturbing. Rather, it became a sort of lullaby, and I fell into deep sleep because of it.”

It depends on your mind. If you are positive, then everything becomes positive. If you are negative, then everything turns negative, everything turns sour. So please remember this -not only about noises, but about everything in life. If you feel that something negative exists around you, go and find the cause within. It is you. You must be expecting something, you must be desiring something, you must be making some conditions.

Existence cannot be forced to go according to you; it flows in its own way. If you can flow with it, you will be positive. If you fight with it, you will become negative and the whole cosmos around you will turn negative.

OSHO

Golden Quote of Yogananda

The Lord is found through unceasing devotion. 

When you want only the Giver, and not His gifts, then He will come to you.

- Paramahansa Yogananda

A devotee does not have a personal agenda - Sadhguru narrates a story on Ramakrishna and Vivekananda

The play of Devotion

The first building of the Madras Monastery cracked in several places within a couple of years of its construction. When it rained, water would come down through the fissures in the roof. At such times Swami Ramakrishnananda would go into the shrine to see whether water was leaking through the ceiling.

One night it began to drip inside the shrine too, right on Sri Ramakrishna's picture. Swami Ramakrishnanda stood there holding an umbrella till the night passed and the rain stopped. He did not remove the picture to a safer side because that would wake his Master from sleep at an untimely hour, which would be wrong."

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THERE IS A POSSIBLITY OF COMMUNICATION BETWEEN MAN AND TREES

Osho : I used to sit by the side of a river in my village, under a small tree. It was the same kind of tree under which Gautam Buddha became enlightened, and because of Gautam Buddha’s enlightenment, the tree’s name has become the bodhi tree. I used to sit under this bodhi tree by the riverside for hours. It must have been almost the middle of the night, a full moon night, and we had become such friends….


Just that day one of my teachers had told me, “I hear that you are saying to people that there is a possibility of communication between man and trees?”

I said, “Yes.”

He said, “Don’t spread strange ideas for which you don’t have any proof.”

I took him with me on that full moon night and I told him, “You touch the tree and just tell me how you feel.”

He said, “It is cold.”

And I said to the tree, in front of the teacher, “It is a question of your friend’s word. I want you to respond in some way. And the easiest will be that when my teacher puts his hand on you, show your warmth, don’t be cold.”

The teacher said, “You must be mad, you are talking with the tree!”

But I said, “There is no harm in trying. The tree is willing – I feel the willingness all around. You put your hand there.”

He said, “I don’t believe that there is any possibility of communication.” But he put his hand on the tree and was shocked – the tree was so warm, and it was a cold night.

He said, “My God, now you have got me also into trouble! Everybody thinks you are a little bit crazy, now what about me?”

I said, “You are my disciple – first disciple! Just start spreading the news that….”

He said, “I have never done such a thing…but I will have to do it because I have experienced it myself.”

He told others and everybody laughed. And I never wanted so many people to hear, because I was not certain how much the tree liked people, who she liked, who she did not like, whether she liked to be in a crowd or just to be alone, standing high in the sky – or perhaps just with a chosen few friends.

OSHO,

Thrice he repeated the offer. None accepted. Then he said: 'The offer is withdrawn'. Incident from Swami Ramdas life.

TAKE THE WHOLE, IT IS THERE FOR THE TAKING!

Q: Since you have found your freedom, will you not give me a little of it? 

M: Why little? Take the whole. Take it, it is there for the taking. But you are afraid of freedom!

Q: Swami Ramdas had to deal with a similar request. Some devotees collected round him one day and began to ask for liberation. Ramdas listened smilingly and then suddenly he became serious and said: You can have it, here and now, freedom absolute and permanent. Who wants it, come forward. Nobody moved. Thrice he repeated the offer. None accepted. Then he said: 'The offer is withdrawn'.

M: Attachment destroys courage. The giver is always ready to give. The taker is absent. Freedom means letting go. People just do not care to let go everything. They do not know that the finite is the price of the infinite, as death is the price of immortality. Spiritual maturity lies in the readiness to let go everything. The giving up is the first step. But the real giving up is in realising that there is nothing to give up, for nothing is your own. It is like deep sleep -- you do not give up your bed when you fall sleep -- you just forget it.

Lessons from Meher Baba

One episode of this trip revealed to us Baba's benevolent attitude toward suffering. When we reached the top of the mountain, a poor emaciated dog came limping from the bushes toward the group. His face was almost eaten away by some disease. The only visible eye looked pathetically at us, as he whined miserably.

A couple of the younger women cried out hysterically and involuntarily drew back from him. Baba instantly came forward and, leaning down, gently placed his hand upon the running sores. The dog sat down on his haunches and turned his face up to Baba, obviously grateful for the healing balm which was being poured upon him. His whine changed into a deep sigh of contentment as the hand of the God-man wiped away the intolerable pain.

Turning to the group Baba admonished: "If you can do nothing to help suffering, don't make it worse by indulging your emotions."

from AVATAR, p. 216 1947 © Jean Adriel