Beautiful sharing by a meditator on Devi Yantra's experience

Question: When someone reincarnates, does one usually come back as the same gender?

Sadhguru: Not necessarily at all. There are people around me who are of a different gender now than what they were in an earlier life. I have a very immediate experience of this in many different ways with quite a few people.

Gender, even species, need not necessarily be the same. All this could be determined by your tendencies. It happens to people, it happened around certain yogis, and it definitely happened around Gautama Buddha. It so happened that a lot of monks were reborn as women. When they had sat with the Buddha [in their past lives], the male monks greatly exceeded the women in numbers – mainly due to cultural reasons. In those days, a woman could not renounce when the children were below a certain age.
So the monks who sat there as men, noticed one thing – the female monks’ contact with the Buddha seemed to be better than that of the male monks. This was because it is very natural for a woman to make a very deep emotional contact. These men were sitting and meditating hard, but these women were just looking at the Buddha, and tears were flowing down. They loved him and the Buddha looked at them gently. The men envied that.

Somewhere within them, there was a longing to be connected with the Buddha like the women were. Because of that longing, a lot of those monks came back as women in their next birth. After a certain period of time, they realized who they had been, and that now they had become women. They were shocked, “We did so much sadhana – did Gautama abandon us? Why didn’t he make us monks once again? Now we are here with our children, our husbands, and this whole drama.” This happened because they had envied the women.


Depending upon your longings, depending upon your tendencies, nature gives you an appropriate body. Let’s say you long to eat continuously and you happen to die at that time. The next time, you may come back as someone’s pet pig, really well-fed. People think it is a punishment to come back as a pig. This is not a punishment for you. Nature is not thinking in terms of punishment or reward. Depending upon your tendencies, to fulfill those tendencies, what kind of body would assist you best, that is what you get. Now these monks came back as women. It was their tendency, their longing for what the women were having. When they were longing for the women’s ability to love the Buddha and connect with him emotionally, they unknowingly aspired to become women.

What gender or form you take is determined by the type of longing that you create. So, to maintain focus on your goal and create that longing which is beyond all these limitations is the best way to ensure that nature does not know what to do with you. When nature does not know what to do with you, it is good for you because you can work your things out very effortlessly. When nature knows what to do with you, you are put in this chamber or that chamber – male chamber or female chamber, pig chamber, cockroach chamber, or some other chamber – a body is a chamber.
So if you maintain that longing which is not for this or that, you simply stare at nothingness and are absorbed, now nature does not know what to do with you. It cannot push you this way or that way. It cannot make a decision on you.

Paramahansa Yogananda's meditation room picture

Go to your room and shut the door—make no fuss. Sit down and talk to God. Practise meditation. Let your mind become so intense that the next time you sit to meditate you won't have to make the effort; your mind will be fixed immediately on Him. If you don't make a great effort to conquer physical and mental restlessness in the beginning, you will have difficulty every time you meditate throughout the years. But if you make that supreme effort at the start, you will soon be happy and free.

Paramahansa Yogananda
Paramahansaji's meditation room in his family home

God is in Your Genes ​ - The Science of Kula Gotra​

Linga Bhairavi - A Window Into the Creation

Speaking Truth - The Acid Test

Swami Rama :

I remember an occasion when I was traveling with my master. The station master in a town we were passing through came to me and said, “Sir, give me something to practice, and I promise I will follow it faithfully.”

My master said to me, “Give him something definite to practice.”

I said, “Why should one fool misguide another? It will be better if you instruct him.”

So my master said, “From this day on, don’t lie. Practice this rule faithfully for the next three months.”

Most of the employees of the railroad in that area were dishonest and took bribes. But this man decided that he would not take bribes or lie any more.

That very same week a supervisor from the head office came to investigate him and his assistants. The stationmaster answered the probing questions of the supervisor honestly. This inquiry brought serious trouble to his staff. All the employees who had been taking bribes, including the stationmaster himself, were prosecuted. He thought, “It has been only thirteen days, and look at the difficulty I am in. What is going to happen to me in three months’ time?”

Soon his wife and children left him. Within a month his life had crumbled like a house of cards from a single touch.

That day the stationmaster was in great agony, and we were some three hundred miles away on a bank of the Narmada River. My master was lying under a tree when he suddenly began laughing. He said, “Do you know what is happening? That man whom I instructed not to lie is in jail today.” I asked, “Then why are you laughing?” He answered, “I am not laughing at him, I am laughing at the foolish world!”

Twelve people in that man’s office had gotten together and said he was a liar, although he had been speaking the truth. They accused him of being the only one guilty of taking bribes. He was put in jail and all the others were released.

When the stationmaster went to court the judge looked down at him from the bench and asked, “Where is your attorney?”

“I don’t need one.”

The judge said, “But I want someone to help you.”

“No,” said the stationmaster, “I don’t need an attorney; I want to speak the truth. No matter how many years you put me behind bars, I won’t lie. I used to share in bribes. Then I met a sage who told me never to lie, no matter what. My wife and children have left me, I have lost my job, I have no money or friends, and I am in jail. All these things have happened in one month. I have to examine truth for two more months no matter what happens. Sir, put me behind bars; I don’t care.”

The judge called a recess and quietly called the man to his chamber. He asked, “Who is the sage who told you this?” The man described him. Fortunately the judge was a disciple of my master. He acquitted the stationmaster and said, “You are on the right path. Stick to it. I wish I could do the same.”

After three months that man did not have anything. On the exact day that the three months were up he was sitting quietly under a tree when he received a telegram saying, “Your father had a huge plot of land that was taken long ago by the government. The government now wants to give you compensation.” They gave him one million rupees [about $100,000]. He had not known about the land, which was in a different province.

He thought, “Today, I have completed three months of not lying and I have been rewarded so much.” He gave the compensation to his wife and children, and they happily said, “We want to come back to you.”

“No,” he said. “Until now I have only seen what happens by not lying for three months. Now I want to find out what will happen if I do not lie for the rest of my life.”

Truth is the ultimate goal of human life, and if it is practiced with mind, speech and action, the goal can be reached. Truth can be attained by practicing non-lying and by not doing those actions which are against one’s own conscience. Conscience is the best of guides.

Swami Rama
Living with the Himalayan Masters

Breath - Your constant companion.

Questioner: Why should we focus on the breath during asanas?

Sadhguru: Your mind and emotions need a single object to focus on. If both of them stay with the same object, you are at maximum ease. If your body goes in one direction, your mind goes in another, and your emotions go in yet another direction, you will be struggling. Let’s say you have a job that you are very involved with, a family at home, and an affair on the side, you will be in a lot of mess – never at ease. Only if your body, mind, and emotions are focused in one direction, you will be at total ease.

Nothing and no one – neither your job nor your wealth nor your family nor your love affair – are as reliable as your breath. As long as you live, it will always be there. It is the most steady and reliable thing to focus your mind on. If while doing an asana, you do not focus your mind onto the breath, it will go all over the place. Therefore, focus on the breath. If I take away your breath now, you and your body will fall apart. It is your breath which holds you and your body together. This kurma nadi, as we call it in yoga, is like a thread that ties you and your body together.

If you constantly stay with your breath, if you really travel with it, one day, you will understand where you and your body are linked. Once you know this, you can hold your body at a distance, and all your trouble and suffering will be over. All the trouble and suffering in your life arise from your body and your mind. If you can hold your body and your mind at a distance to yourself, this is the end of suffering. And only when there is no fear of suffering, a human being will dare to explore his life at full stride.

So, being with the breath is very important. One thing is your mind has a steady companion to stay with. Anyone may leave you, but your breath will not leave you until you die. And another thing is it will transport you to a place where you and your body are linked. If you don’t want your life to be determined by multiple factors of compulsiveness, if you want to do or undo your life by choice, it is important to know this place.

Source Link : http://www.ishafoundation.org/blog/yoga-meditation/demystifying-yoga/focusing-breath-essential-asanas/

Do not react - Robert Adams

Now what do I mean by not react.
Do you ignore the summons to go to court?
No, you don't. (students laugh)
You do what has to be done.
When you go to court, but you realize, 
"Who's going to court?
My body is.
My body's going to court, but who is my body?
There is no body.
There is no court.
It's all an illusion.
It is, really" (students laugh)
And then, really, if you look at it that way,
something good is going to happen. (more laughter)
Strange as it may seem you will overcome and
transcend that predicament.
But if you don't, if you react like everybody else does with fear,
and say, "I'm not guilty. I didn't do it."
Then you've got a problem.
You're going to have to repeat that condition over and over again,
as I mentioned before until you're able to realize that
nothing has ever happened to I.
I is free.
I has always been free.

~Robert Adams - T. 26 - Dealing With Problems 

If your prarabdha does not give you satsang with a jnani, go directly to the source and have satsang of the unmanifest Self. - Annamalai Swami

 CONVERSATIONS WITH ANNAMALAI SWAMI

Q: We are able to have satsang here. It is very nice, very sweet.
men we leave here, how can we get such satsang?

Annamalai Swami: If it is not your destiny to stay with a jnani you can always try to establish contact with the formless Self. This is the real satsang.

You say that it is your prarabdha to live in a big city. Prarabdha only pertains to the activities of the body. No prarabdha can
prevent you from turning inwards and putting your attention on
the Self. This is a freedom which every human being has irrespective of his prarabdha. If your prarabdha does not give you satsang with a jnani, go directly to the source and have satsang of the unmanifest Self. This satsang is much harder to achieve and maintain, but if you have no other alternatives you must try it. Small babies live in towns without being affected by the atmosphere or the people there. If you live a pure life and make the right effort you can also reach the state in which the world cannot effect you.

Q: It will be very difficult. I shall be calling for help very frequently.

AS: If you have a desire to have satsang, or a desire to be always engaged in meditation on the Self, these things will happen. If your desire is strong enough the power of the Self will make all the arrangements for you. It will send you a Guru, or satsang, or whatever else you might need. If you are earnestly doing meditation on the Self, everything you need will automatically come to you.

Living by the Words of Bhagavan

Shared via Ramana Hridayam

Sadhus subsist only upon alms offered to them with love. - Papa Ramdas

Why don't you earn your own bread?
A story by papa ramdas

There was a Sadhu in Malabar, a tall and stout person. He was in the police service before he became a Sadhu. He used to wear only a small towel round his waist. Once when he was going for his Bhiksha, a householder, seeing his good physique, asked him why he should not work and earn his bread, instead of begging for it. The Sadhu was told that he would be given a meal if he was prepared to cut a few logs of firewood that were lying in the householder's courtyard. The Sadhu, without uttering a word, started splitting the firewood with an axe given to him and, within a short time, cut the whole lot and stacked the pieces in the proper place.

Then, leaving the axe near the stack, the Sadhu simply walked away.

The householder saw the Sadhu going without taking food. He called him back and asked him why he was going before taking his meal.

The Sadhu then replied, "I do not take my food where I work, and I do not work where I take my food!". This means Sadhus subsist only upon alms offered to them with love.

Being empty and Being in a state of offering

Sadhguru : It has been almost sixteen years since we consecrated Dhyanalinga. Sixteen is an important number in the yogic system. When Adiyogi transmitted his knowing, he explored and expounded one hundred and twelve ways in which a human being can attain to his ultimate nature. But when he saw the time it would take for his seven disciples to grasp these 112 ways, he divided them into seven parts of sixteen each.

When the seven disciples had grasped these sixteen ways, Adiyogi said, “Now it is time to go and share this with the rest of the world.” They were completely overwhelmed because they could not think of a life without him. When they were just about to leave, he said, “But what about Guru Dakshina?” In the tradition, the disciple must make an offering before he leaves. It is not that the guru needs the dakshina – he wants his disciples to leave with a sense of offering something precious, because in a state of offering, a human being is at his best. These seven people were bewildered – what to offer him? Except for the loincloth they wore, they had nothing.

Then Agastya Muni said, “I carry sixteen gems within me, the most precious kind. These sixteen gems that I received from you, I offer to you,” and he placed these sixteen ways at his feet and became empty-handed. The other six took the cue and offered back the sixteen ways they had gathered from Adiyogi and also stood empty-handed. You must understand this – their life’s aspiration was to gather this knowledge, they spent eighty-four years of heart-breaking sadhana to earn this – and in one moment, they put it back at his feet and stood empty. They left with nothing in their hands.

This was the greatest aspect of Adiyogi’s teaching. Because they went empty, they became like him. Shi-va means “that which is not.” And they became “that which is not.” Otherwise, they would have carried these sixteen ways like a crown, marketing it to the rest of the world. Because they became empty, all one hundred and twelve ways found expression through all seven of them. Things they could have never grasped and did not have the capacity for became a part of them simply because they offered back the most precious aspect of their life.

So, sixteen is an important number for us, and there are certain things we will be doing with Dhyanalinga to make him more available during the next sixteen-year phase. Very few people have really consumed it, but it is a tremendous storehouse of knowledge; nowhere else has it been done like this. The form of it is very, very unique. It is time people become more sensitive to him. I am not saying this with any disregard, but people come like tourists and sit for fifteen minutes, and at the end they ask, “No Prasadam?!” Or, “When is fifteen minutes going to be over?” Other people go through fifteen minutes like a moment. If you come like a tourist, so what? But if you leave the world like a tourist, that is a pathetic state. Before you leave this world, that which made this world happen should be yours – at least a little bit. If it is not yours, all you are left with is a lump of earth (body) – which they will anyway take back.

If something is ignited within you, if something more than the warmth of your body is on, then in the coming year we will offer possibilities to tweak up the way Dhyanalinga functions for you – whether you are living in the ashram, or just here for a short period of time. It is my only endeavor that you should experience something more than your physicality. This will not happen by you seeking experiences, but by preparing yourself to become receptive. Your Sadhana is your lifeline. I am with you.

Love & Blessings,
Sadhguru

Source Link : http://www.ishafoundation.org/blog/sadhguru/spot/sixteen-years-dhyanalinga/

Do not identify with what you see. Identify with reality. - Robert Adams

You can't bring peace into the world while you're still in illusion.

Become peaceful and you'll see peace.
Become loving and you'll see love.

In this kind of world in which we live, since time immemorial there has been man's inhumanity to man, there have been riots, wars, destruction, chaos, confusion. And there have been people saying we're going to make peace and turn this into a peaceful world. This is the way of the world. And the world is a mirage.

So if you identify will all the things you see you will always be confused, you have to because the nature of this world is confusion.

Do not identify with what you see. Identify with reality.

We're going back to the space again, what I was talking about. All these riots are taking place in the space.
Is the space affected?
So are you the rioter or are you the space?
With what do you identify?

If you see the rioters reality then that is the world in which you live and you suffer accordingly. But when you go beyond that and you realize the space or consciousness or pure awareness is the only reality then you leave this world.

And the Lord said "I will wait"

In one of His aspects, a very touching aspect, the Lord may be said to be a beggar. He yearns for our attention. The Master of the Universe, at whose glance all stars, suns, moons, and planets quiver, is running after man and saying: "Won't you give Me your affection? Don't you love Me, the Giver, more than the things I have made for you? Won't you seek Me?" 

But man says: "I am too busy now; I have work to do. I can't take time to look for You." And the Lord says: "I will wait."

- Sri Sri Paramahansa Yogananda

The Presence of Jnani mirrors back your state

Papaji : The enlightened man, the jnani, does not do anything.
He just sits quietly, like a mountain. 

He does not respond to your requests by doing anything, but if you go near him with a desire in your mind, there will be an automatic response. If you throw a rubber ball at a wall, it will bounce back. The angle and speed of the ball off the wall will depend on the angle and speed at which you throw it. The wall does not have to decide how to respond to the incoming ball. When you go into the presence of a jnani with desires in your mind, the appropriate response comes back automatically. You don’t even have to talk about them. If your mind is in the presence of a jnani, it will be flinging its desires at the wall of his enlightenment, and that wall will give you back what you desire or need. But if you go into the presence of a jnani without any thoughts or desires, what will be reflected back will be the state of thoughtlessness and desirelessness. In his presence you will be established in that state. This is the sannidhi, the presence of the jnani, at work. You don’t need to ask for anything. Just go near him. 

PAPAJI
(Nothing Ever Happened, volume three, pp. 335-6)

Is my Guru greater than other Gurus ?

Does Swami understand Jesus Christ to be a jnani like so many other jnanis, or was he something more than that? 

Annamalai Swami : If the ego is destroyed, only non-dual consciousness remains.
There is no higher or lower in that state.

You cannot say that one jnani is in a different state from another. You cannot say that Jesus Christ is better than Bhagavan or vice versa. There is no higher state than that of the jnani and there is no jnani who is superior to any other jnani. 

Although the inner state and experience of all jnanis is the same, their outer activities differ because each of them has a
different destiny to fulfill. Some will become teachers and some will not. 

If there is water in a glass it will quench the thirst of one man; if there is water in a big pot it may quench the thirst of thirty or forty people; if there is water in a well it can quench the thirst of all the people in a village or a town. 

Some spiritual aspirants have done tapas only for their own realization. After realization they may be able to help a few people. But some jnanis have done prolonged tapas not only for their own realization but also to help liberate others. The jnanis who have done this kind of tapas become world
famous masters and have many followers.

- Living by the Words of Bhagavan