Is everyone drugged, in this world? Only a man, who works on his awareness, moment to moment, will know it.

"ALL ARE ASLEEP"

OUSPENSKY'S EXPERIENCES WITH GURDJEFF

Gurdjieff, in this century, emphasized this fact that man is asleep. ”In fact,” he said, ”man is a sort of sleep. Everyone is deeply asleep."

Gurdjieff worked on this method continuously. His chief disciple, P. D. Ouspensky, relates that when Gurdjieff was working on him with this method, and he was practicing for three months continuously this remembering of ”I am, I am, I am,” after three months everything stopped.

Thoughts, dreaming,everything stopped. Only one note remained inside like eternal music: ”I am, I am, I am, I am.” But then this was not an effort. This was a spontaneous activity going on: ”I am.”

Then Gurdjieff called Ouspensky out of the house. For three months he had been kept in the house and wasn’t allowed to move out.

Then Gurdjieff said, ”Come with me.” They were residing in a Russian town, Tiflis. Gurdjieff called him out and they went into the street. Ouspensky writes in his diary:

”For the first time I could understand what Jesus meant when he said that man is asleep. The whole city looked to me as if it was asleep. People were moving in their sleep; shopkeepers were selling in their sleep; customers were buying in their sleep. The whole city was asleep. I looked at Gurdjieff: only he was awake. The whole city was asleep. They were angry, they were fighting, they were loving, buying, selling, doingeverything.”

Ouspensky says, ”Now I could see their faces, their eyes: they were asleep. They were not there. The inner center was missing; it was not there.”

Ouspensky said to Gurdjieff, ”I do not want to go there any more. What has happened to the city? Everyone seems asleep, drugged.”

Gurdjieff said, ”Nothing has happened to the city, something has happened to you. You have been undrugged; the city is the same. It is the same place you moved around in three months ago, but you couldn’t see that other people are asleep because you were also asleep. Now you can see because a certain quality of awareness has come to you. With three months of practising ”I am”continuously, you have become aware in a very small measure. You have become aware! A part of your consciousness has gone beyond dreaming. That is why you can see that everyone is asleep, dead, moving, drugged, as if hypnotized.”

Ouspensky says, ”I couldn’t bear that phenomenon – everyone asleep! Whatsoever they are doing,
they are not responsible for it. They are not! How can they be responsible?”

You have to win the heart of Jnani, by your devotion and your desirelessness. - Papaji.

" Worthiness must be there. You cannot demand freedom and expect to get it if you are not worthy. If the worthiness is there you will not even have to ask. If the Guru see that you are worthy, automatically everything will be given to you. The Guru cannot pass it to unworthy person, and an unworthy person cannot get it by demanding it. You have to win the heart of Jnani, by your devotion and your desirelessness. Once you have won his heart, his whole kingdom, his whole treasure automatically becomes yours" Sri Papaji

Our connection with the earth

Sadhguru : It is very important that you are constantly reminded of the nature of your body. Right now, you are a mound of earth prancing around. When the earth decides to suck you in, you just become a small mound.

In the ashram I always tell people, no matter what work you are doing, every day you must stick your fingers into the earth at least for an hour. Do something with the garden. This will build a natural bodily memory in you that you are mortal. Your body will know that it is not permanent. That realization in the body is extremely important for one to keep his focus on his spiritual pursuit. The more urgent the realization becomes, the stronger the spiritual sense becomes.

Cooking with Love, Chants and Hymns.

Your physical body is just the food you eat.  With how much care, tenderness and love, you handle the food, thats how your body will be.  As a child, my mother and grandmother never prepared food for the children without singing some hymns or chants about some God or Goddess because they want the food to be enriched.  And it makes such a difference.  A child would never grow up feeling depressed, rejected or neglected. - Sadhguru.

There is a greater power that knows the way, that takes care of this world, this Universe. And it needs no help from you. - Robert Adams

NO HELP IS NEEDED

Do not concern yourself about this world. For mortal man can never understand this world at all. This world appears very confusing, very chaotic. There seems to be so many wonderful things in this world, and yet there seems to be so much destruction, man's inhumanity to man. Dastardly things going on everywhere intermingled with the beauty and joy of this world. It becomes very confusing to the mortal man. Then you see yourself getting older and older. All of your material plans have gone by the wayside. And even if you have accomplished great things, you have to leave them when it's time to go. You start to think to yourself, what is life all about? Who am I? What am I really? What is the Source of everything?
And no one has ever explained these things to you. So you believe life is a chance. A chance that you've been born, you've gone through prevailing conditions. You get old and you die. You have no idea what's going on. Therefore I say to you, leave the world alone. Do not believe you have to bring peace to this world. There is a greater power that knows the way, that takes care of this world, this Universe. And it needs no help from you.

ROBERT ADAMS IN ‘SILENCE OF THE HEART’

Consecrated Spaces - Linga Bhairavi

A Women of Substance

If You Love, Love Openly

Twenty monks and one nun, who was named Eshun, were practicing meditation with a certain Zen master.

Eshun was very pretty even though her head was shaved and her dress plain. Several monks secretly fell in love with her. One of them wrote her a love letter, insisting upon a private meeting.

Eshun did not reply. The following day the master gave a lecture to the group, and when it was over, Eshun arose. Addressing the one who had written her, she said: "If you really love me so much, come and embrace me now."

Is he rich or poor? You decide.

He has been described as "the world's 'poorest' president", as he donates around 90 percent of his $12,000 monthly salary to charities to benefit poor people.

DEEPENING PRACTICE OF MEDITATION—Swami Smarananandaji

Stillness is of most importance. In fact, if I am to give you only one or two keys to deepen your meditation, I would say, one is REGULARITY, two is practice of STILLNESS. These two are of most importance for success in our daily meditations…

[Stillness] is true communion where neither the devotee nor God needs to talk. In the ultimate sense, who is talking to whom? I am communing with my Higher Self…It’s deep communion with my Higher Self. That can happen only in stillness. That doesn’t happen when we are practicing hong sau, kriya or Aum…no, it happens only in stillness. That is why the meditation techniques hong sau, Aum, kriya, are to be treated as vehicles to take us to a point where we START MEDITATING, COMMUNING WITH GOD IN DEEP SILENCE…

Just put yourself in the presence of God. You assume that Guruji is in your heart, just feel. Or, you are in the heart of Guruji. And sometimes I visualize that little picture of Guruji with the puppy in his pocket. Like puppy I keep watching Guruji, I am the puppy, you know (audience laughter). It’s bringing in God, there’s no conversation. Just before Christmas, I bring in Christ, those few weeks. Before Janmashtami, Bhagava Krishna. Just be in the consciousness…be one with him. That is stillness, there’s no talking.

Then you feel what is this meditation all about, why saints say that meditation gives us JOY. That stillness always comes with a sense of joy, that feeling. Never miss that, never miss that. It’s very, very important…And toward the end, practice of devotion, talk to God and pray for others, pray for yourself…

LET ME SHARE WITH YOU A SHORT STORY. A devotee came out of his meditation, someone asked, “What did you do in your meditation?”

He said, “I was communing with God.”

The next question was, “What did you tell God?”

He said, “I did not tell anything to God, I was listening.”

That was followed by another question, “What did God tell you?”

“God did not tell anything either. He was also listening.” (laughter from the audience)

When you do this regularly, you come to a point where you will say—each one of you—it is not difficult for me to sit for meditation, but it is difficult for me to get up from meditation…you don’t feel like getting up from meditation…And that can happen every day, if you give time for STILLNESS.


excerpts from “Deepening Practice of Meditation” Swami Smaranananda CD

L to R, YSS Swamis Shraddhanandaji, Smarananandaji, Shantanandaji

What is the right cocktail for you, to do Yoga. Find out.

Questioner : Master, there are so many different kinds of yoga. How do I know which type of yoga is best for me?

Sadhguru : Right now, the only things which are in your experience are your body, your mind, and your emotions. You know them to some extent, and you can infer that if these three things have to happen the way they are happening, there must be an energy that makes them happen. Without energy, all this cannot be happening. Some of you might have experienced it. Others can easily infer that for these three things to function, there must be an energy behind them. For example, the microphone is amplifying the sound of my voice. Even if you don’t know anything about the microphone, you can infer that there is a source that powers it.

 

So these are the only four realities in your life: body, mind, emotion, and energy. Whatever you wish to do with yourself, it must be on these four levels. Whatever you wish to do, you can only do it with your body, your mind, your emotions or your energy. If you use your emotions and try to reach the ultimate, we call this bhakti yoga. That means the path of devotion. If you use your intelligence and try to reach the ultimate, we call this gnana yoga. That means the path of intelligence. If you use your body, or physical action to reach the ultimate, we call this karma yoga. That means the path of action. If you transform your energies and try to reach the ultimate, we call this kriya yoga. That means internal action.

These are the only four ways you can get somewhere: either through karma, gnana, bhakti or kriya – body, mind, emotion, or energy.

“No, no, I am on the path of faith. I don’t need to do anything else.”

Is there anybody here who is only head, no heart, hands and energy?
Is there anybody here who is only heart, not the other things?

You are a combination of these four things.

It is just that in one person the heart may be dominant,
in another person the head may be dominant,
in yet another person the hands may be dominant, but everybody is a combination of these four. So you need a combination of these four.

It is just that, only if it is mixed in the right way for you, it works best for you.

What we give for one person, if it is given to you, it may not work well for you because that person is so much heart and this much head.

That is why on the spiritual path there is so much stress on a live Guru. He mixes the cocktail right for you, otherwise there is no punch.

There's only your Self. If you think something is horrible, you're speaking about your Self. - Robert Adams.

Again, what I'm saying is this. Every position that you find yourself in every situation that you find yourself in, with whomever you find yourself, the positions that you have or don't have, whatever you may be in this world, is your right place at this moment. Bless this, love it. I know it sounds hard when you think of a horrible condition and you say, “I must
love it?"

Let me explain again. The reason you love it, is because
GOD is ALL THERE is.
Try to remember this.

THERE is NOTHING BUT GOD.

Therefore if you hate something, you're hating God which is your Self. It's all coming OUT Of YOU. YOU ARE THAT.
You must learn to trust and love your Self, your precious Self.

When you become despondent, depressed, hateful, feeling sorry for yourself, this is what blasphemy really means, for you're feeling this way about your Self. Can't you see? There's only your Self. If you think something is horrible, you're speaking about your Self. You look at a situation, you watch it you observe it you never react, you leave it alone.

And then you'll be given the power that you need to handle it, to go through it, without thinking, without any commotion, without any noise….

ROBERT IN 'SILENCE OF THE HEART'

The kind of man, we need in the political system.

"District collector, U. Sagayam of Madurai, Tamil Nadu - By refusing to take bribes, the Madurai collector has earned 18 transfers in 20 years, a modest house and bank balance and lots of respect"

Three years ago, as district collector of Namakkal, Tamil Nadu, U. Sagayam voluntarily declared his assets: a bank balance of Rs 7,172 and a house in Madurai worth Rs 9 lakh. Once, when his baby daughter, Yalini, who had breathing problems, was suddenly taken ill, he did not have the Rs 5,000 needed for admitting her to a private hospital. At that time he was deputy commissioner (excise) in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, and there were 650 liquor licences to be given out. The going bribe for each was rumoured to be Rs 10,000.

(He needs a special mention here because the assets of an IAS officer-couple in Madhya Pradesh were valued at Rs 360 crore. They had 25 flats in three cities)

'Reject bribes, hold your head high', says a board hanging above Sagayam’s chair in his modest office. That’s the code he lives by, even if politicians are incensed they cannot bend him their way—he’s been transferred 18 times in the last 20 years—and has made enemies of both superiors and subordinates. “I know I sit under a dangerous slogan and probably alienate people,” he says. “But I have been the same Sagayam from Day 1. Standing up against corruption is not for a season. Nor is it a fad. It’s forever”, he says.

On a hot summer afternoon, on Madurai’s busy main road, the district collector, U. Sagayam, saw a young man talking on a cellphone while riding a motorbike. He asked his driver to wave the man down, got down from his car and meted out instant punishment: plant 10 saplings within 24 hours. Somewhat unconventional justice, some might say. But that’s how Sagayam works.

He also took on a mighty soft-drink mnc when a consumer showed him a bottle with dirt floating in it. He sealed the bottling unit and banned the sale of the soft drink in the city. In Chennai, he locked horns with a restaurant chain and recovered four acres valued at some Rs 200 crore.

Sagayam’s masters degrees in social work and law come in useful in his role as an administrator. He knows the rulebooks in detail and is not afraid of using them, however powerful the opponent. No wonder then that Sagayam’s career is marked with the scars of countless battles.

Sagayam’s wife Vimala has stood by him all these years but she was rattled by some of the threats during the elections. “He always says if you are right, nobody can hurt you,” she says. “But sometimes it becomes difficult.”

Sagayam says he learnt honesty on his mother’s knees.

http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?277990
http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Madurai/article2768382.ece

The more you are attached to the pain, the more intense it is. - J.Krishnamurthi

Questioner: I am thinking of people who are suffering physical illness. Can meditation bring about a process of healing?

Krishnamurti: Most of us have had pain of some kind - intense, superficial, or pain that cannot be cured. What effect has pain on the psyche, the brain or the mind? Can the mind meditate, disassociating itself from pain? Can the mind look at the physical pain and observe it without identifying itself with that pain? If it can observe without identifying itself then there is quite a different quality to that pain. I do not know if you have observed that if one has a toothache or stomach ache, one can somewhat disassociate oneself. One does not have to rush to the doctor or take some pill; one observes it with detachment, with a feeling of looking at it as though one was outside it. Surely that helps the pain, doesn't it? The more you are attached to the pain, the more intense it is. So that may help to bring about this healing, which is an important question and which can only take place when there is no `me', no ego or self-centred activity. Some people have a gift for it. Others come upon it because there is no ego functioning.

When flooded with thoughts, while meditating

SADHANA AND SAHAJA

Meditation is your true nature now. You call it meditation, because there are other thoughts distracting you. When these thoughts are dispelled, you remain alone, i.e., in the state of meditation free from thoughts; and that is your real nature which you are now attempting to gain by keeping away other thoughts. Such keeping away of other thoughts is now called meditation. When the practice becomes firm, the real nature shows itself as the true meditation.
Other thoughts arise more forcibly when you attempt meditation.

There was immediately a chorus of questions by a few others.

Sri Maharshi continued: Yes, all kinds of thoughts arise in meditation. It is but right. What lies hidden in you is brought out. Unless they rise up how can they be destroyed? They therefore rise up spontaneously in order to be extinguished in due course, thus to strengthen the mind.
- Talks 310

No matter what happens to your body...................................................................... Paramhansa Yogananda

No matter what happens to your body, meditate. Never go to sleep at night until you have communed with God. Your body will remind you that you have worked hard and need rest, but the more you ignore its demands and concentrate on the Lord, the more you will BURN WITH JOYOUS LIFE, LIKE A GLOBE AFIRE. THEN YOU WILL KNOW THAT YOU ARE NOT THE BODY.

Paramahansa Yogananda