February 1, 1981
Questioner: Maharaj says that the world exists only when the consciousness arises in me, Does at mean that the world exists only so long as the consciousness exists, as far as I am concerned?
Maharaj: The world exists so long as this sense of presence is there. The sense of presence is in consciousness - not my consciousness or your consciousness but universal consciousness. The total manifestation of the universe depends upon this sense of presence, the general sense of presence.
When this sense of presence disappears, where is your universe?
Other than the three states: waking, sleep and "I Amness," I have no experience, but neither can I give up these three states. I am loaded with them, I cannot get rid of them. They have come without my knowledge. Nobody asked me if I wanted these three states.
I do not consider any of you to be different from me; at the same time, as far as I am concerned, I have wiped out the total existence and therefore, since there is no individuality, there are no bindings on the words that come out of me. With the giving up of individuality, all the poses go - that one is a sannyasi, a jnani, or something else. Along with a pose are restrictions, "I am so and so, I must not say such and such." The whole thing is an illusion, merely entertainment.
Consider from your own experience, is there anything constant?
Even your own image of yourself is always changing.
My own experience is that nothing has really happened in this world. The seeker, the seeking and the sought - none of these three is true. Nothing is happening - everything that goes on in the world is a fraud. When will you come to an understanding or to peace? Only when you understand this fact and understand the spiritual truth, only then will peace descend.
Q: What is the ultimate truth?
M. You. You can get as frustrated and angry as you like, it does not disturb me at all. My state is unchanging.
Q. Are my experiences in meditation the truth?
M. All experiences are in time, time-bound. Truth is not time-bound.
February 2, 1981
Questioner: How can I make the surrender to the Guru permanent?
Maharaj: Have you not been told that there is nothing permanent in this world? That is the search itself - what am I when this temporary state is gone and before it came?
You have a clock which is made to last for 100 years. At the end of that 100 years the clock stops - it has served its purpose. When the clock of the body stops, the same thing has happened - that body has served the purpose of consciousness.
Q: Total surrender means two, something joining, one surrendering to another.
M. During that temporary state in consciousness, everything is correct. Whatever the plot of the story, it is correct, but the story is fiction. What I am telling you is absolutely open - an open secret. There is nothing that I keep hidden from you. Try and understand. It is merely a question of understanding.
Q Guru's grace is always there.
M: Guru is not an individual. You are thinking in terms of a form. The consciousness is all pervading. You find out what is this "you" that is seeking grace. In that body the "I Am" is ticking - that is the Guru. You worship that "I Am" principle and surrender to that Guru and that Guru will give you all the grace.
In consciousness there can exist nothing without its interrelated counterpart. The moment you say knowledge, knowledge can only be in ignorance, so this knowledge one has about Guru is also ignorance.
When will the knowledge be Guru? When that knowledge and the ignorance both disappear into vynana. Jnana is knowledge, ajnana is ignorance, both disappear into vynana.
Q: I am caught in that process of watching the body-mind.
M: Dream occurs in objective, material, manifestation, in the consciousness. It is not you, it is something other-objective, material.
What you call "I Am" and birth, you are not that, it is material. Suppose that there is a Muslim boy that I have adopted; I have not sired that boy, but I now claim him as "my" boy. Like that, this "I Amness" is not directly me, it is something other, something material, something Muslim, I am not that. I, the Absolute, have nothing to do with that.
People are sometimes confused because they expect an answer which is based on their concepts. You ask someone to bring you a spoon, and instead he brings you a needle. Both are words, both are knowledge, but that is not what you want. What you will receive is the true knowledge, even if what you are asking for is not the true knowledge.
Q: I must reach that level to be able to understand.
M. There are millions of grains, made into millions of forms, but the seed is only one. All these millions of forms are because of some particular seed, but I am not that seed.
The Ultimate knowledge does not have any knowledge. This knowledge "I Am" has appeared spontaneously, as a result of the body. See it as it is, understand it as it is.
When the waking state is gone, sleep begins, when sleep is gone, the waking state begins. When both are gone, I am at home. Why did they leave me? Because it was all foreign, it was not me.
Take this advice: better not to be trapped in the spiritual knowledge business; have a nice time, a good life, be of service to others, and in due course, when the time is ripe, you will die.
Q: Without your advice, millions of people area already following your advice.
February 3, 1981
Maharaj: The knowledge that I am expounding will dissolve your identity as a personality and will transform you into manifest knowledge. The manifest knowledge, the consciousness, is free and unconditioned.
It is not possible to either catch hold of or give up that knowledge because you are that knowledge, subtler than space. This knowledge that you are the manifest must be opened through meditation; you do not get it by listening to words.
Is not this consciousness prior to any other experience and is there not something on which this consciousness has come about? That waking state, deep sleep and the sense of presence, who has these experiences other than That which was prior to these experiences?
That which is talking to you is that state which is time-bound, which has come temporarily upon my original state. Therefore you and I can have no sense of fear; it is only this changing state which has identified with the body which has fear.
The fear of death is the fine for accepting the identity of the body as a separate entity in the total functioning. It is only birth which fears death.
Presence and absence are interrelated dualities, this was understood only after the sense of presence arose, earlier there was no sense of either absence or presence.
Questioner: What if we understand only intellectually and we have not yet realized?
M: The big advantage of even intellectually understanding is that you will not be bound by fear of death. Birth did not give you anything and death can take nothing from you.
According to the world I have this terrible disease; I keep on talking exactly as I talked earlier, it has no effect on me. Only that which has taken birth will disappear, how am I affected?
You are fortunate to hear what I say. Listen, but do not make any effort to understand it, because only your intellect can try to understand and intellect does not reach That. What you have heard will have its own results; do not interfere.
Even if you have certain emotions of fear, etc., understand that they are of that chemical of which the body and mind are made. You have nothing to do with that temporary state.
In the name of spirituality many people commit a lot of atrocities on the body, thinking they will get superior knowledge. From where and what? What are they going to gain?
This knowledge is - provided I am.
February 17, 1981
Maharaj: I am neither a Guru nor a disciple. This is all the play of the five elements. Body is just a biological development, a vegetation growth, and we take pride in it, asserting that I am somebody. But this is just a natural growth, just like plants.
Questioner: Is the experiencer eternal?
M. If the experiencer had been eternal he would have not made enquiries, asking what is this, what is that. Had he been eternal he would already have had all the knowledge of this objective world.
Q. How can we find the way that is meant for us?
M. If your urge to realize the Self is very intense, your urge and the consciousness will direct you in the correct course.
Q. Sometimes when I understand, something happens to me. I either get tense or I begin shaking in my head or neck and sometimes there are noises going on in my head. I don't understand it. Should I ignore it or what?
M. Just ignore it. Those are good signs.
Q. Physical sickness is there sometimes.
M. It is not sickness, it is the expression of the five elemental body.
Q. Can one realize through nama-mantra?
M: So many sages have developed into the highest state only through nama-mantra. Whatever you recite should merge into you, prior to mind.
Q: Some people tell about Gurus giving power and energy.
M. It is possible. I have deliberated only on my Self.
Q: Trances, visions, samadhi - did Maharaj go through all those experiences?
M. Any number of them. I did not take delivery of all those experiences.
Q. Why do some people go through it and others don't?
M. The design of each seeker is different. According to the seeker's quality, he will encounter experiences. There have been so many Self-realized Sages, but each one's experience has been different because the qualities have been different. The experiences of Rama and Krishna were different. Any jnani discards the experiences; he does not get associated with them. He does not Lang on to them or try to invoke them again.
February 18, 1981
Questioner: This identity with a body, as an entity, is present. Could anyone, at any stage, have done anything which could have prevented this identification?
Maharaj: It is the nature of this beingness to associate itself with a form. How can an imagined entity separate itself?
Q: Is this wanting to be separate also natural, a part of nature?
M. Yes. It is all part of natural functioning - part of the show. The entire thing is a concept. All that can be done is to understand. Look at the apparent contradiction: my own form is suffering, when that is known more people come here, more people receive advantages.
Those advantages happen automatically, spontaneously - I am not working for those advantages which you get.
The talking which I do, and your listening, is part of the total functioning. You consider it as one individual listening to another individual, that is not so. What you hear is universal consciousness. This knowledge is not to be conveyed to a human being who is a spiritual infant.
The human being is trying to collect benefits for an individual. When this identification is given up, the receptivity for the talks will be created. From an enormous tank of water you dip a tiny tumbler full and say, "This is me."
Whatever status and achievements one has attained will remain only so long as the name and form remain; once they have gone where is the entity who thinks he has achieved something? If this is deeply apperceived how can anything in the world bother you?
What I am talking about is this original concept, the consciousness, before which there was nothing. Whatever is in this original concept will remain only so long as the consciousness is there -- then we go back to our original nature. When consciousness exposes itself to you and shows you your true nature, then you will have no form. Without a form can there be an image?
The entire manifestation is a hallucination, the nature of which is to be inconstant.
February 22, 1981
Questioner: What should I do during the day? What kinds of thoughts or actions should I have in order to find out my true nature and have Peace of mind?
Maharaj: Any thoughts or actions will be based on body-mind identity and in order to see your true nature there must be abandonment of this identity with the phenomenal center. This cannot come by any volitional action - it happens without any special efforts. There is no question of doing anything because there is no one to do anything.
The mind can only work with some name or form or image. If you give this up, the mind will be helpless. What I am saying about your true nature ig so simple that the mind cannot grasp it.
What is has always been there. Give up conceptualizing and what is remains. People will stop only at seeing the manifest. Who will go behind the manifest and see that the manifest and unmanifest are not two - they are one?
The manifest is seen as light, the unmanifest as dark, but what is is the same thing-That which perceives both.
For the one who has abandoned the identification it is simple. Words can only point at something. That which is is neither like me or like you, it is not even aware of what it is. Only when consciousness is conscious of itself can there be knowledge of anything. It is prior to any knowledge.
It is very simple. People who are considered to be very learned come here, how do I see them? I see them as being in total ignorance.
Q Why is there a fear of darkness?
M: Your question is totally irrelevant. Go to the source without which neither light or darkness could be cognized. What is the use of talking about what is objective when I have told you to go to the subject?
Q. I consider myself to be good or bad at different times.
M. This can only be with identification with the body; abandon this. From now on I will only say what the position is, thereafter you must perceive. I have no physical resources for a dialogue. Whatever you hear cannot and will not go to waste.
February 23, 1981
Maharaj: If you have really understood the core of the matter no questions can arise. Questions arise only to an entity. The question is usually - "What can I do?". Where the "I" itself is not, who will want to know anything? Every manifestation is an appearance in consciousness, perceived and cognized by consciousness. There is only manifestation functioning and perceiving.
Questioner: My mind is too agitated for consciousness to be in consciousness.
M. You have not been listening carefully to what I have said. The words have not reached you. I have told you that consciousness is always there and anything that happens is in consciousness, so let consciousness remain in consciousness.
Why do you, considering yourself as a separate entity, try to meddle in it? All that is is consciousness.
Q. Can I ask about the meaning of suffering?
M: Now you are developing a new concept - that there is something meaningful or profound behind suffering. This concept itself is going to strangulate you. Any concept erupting out of you - how can it give you knowledge? You must get rid of all concepts. You are the very basis, the foundation, out of which concepts erupt. You are not the concepts, you are prior to concepts. You must be firmly convinced about this.
Q. Do I suppress the concepts?
M. Leave them alone. You watch the concepts erupting and disappearing. You are apart from concepts, do not identify with them.
Q. I don't have the ability to do that.
M. If you are not, where are the concepts? Where is the question of ignorance or knowledge if you are not there? That primary concept "I Am" hangs on to the body as its identity, hence all the trouble. Will you ever come to the conclusion that you are not the concept?
February 28, 1981
Maharaj: When the body was formed you did not bring any information with you. Later on you- collected information externally, and on that basis you are full of pride and conduct your dealings. Did you bring any information with you, right from the beginning?
Questioner: No, I had no information.
M: If you had no information, who is the customer for all this now? You have the primary information that you are which sprouted spontaneously in you - that was your primary capital and all this further mischief is because of that primary information. Is it not so?
Q. That is true, yes.
M. Do you understand what it is, to have your own being, to be?
Q. I do not clearly understand.
M. It is not to be understood through words. Whatever knowledge you derive out of words is ignorance only. To be is not to be understood, it is.
Q. It is just a feeling.
M. Who knows the consciousness?
Q. Consciousness knows itself
M: Consciousness understanding consciousness - by this method you will not have emancipation. You have torask yourself, "Who knows this beingness?" If I know that I am, at a particular point, then it means that prior to that point I did not know that I am. That which was not aware of Its existence became aware of Its existence when the consciousness came, and this consciousness is only the nature of the physical body - it is made of material and is therefore temporary.
Q. There is no knowledge in the Absolute?
M: All knowledge is only in the grasp of the five senses and words. Suppose these three, the waking state, deep sleep, and the knowledge "I Am" are not there - what are you?
Q. Just knowingness, consciousness?
M. Is this knowingness, consciousness, in your association continuously, forever?
Q. No.
M. Then give it up. Why do you lean on that which will not be in your association eternally? All our scriptures say that only the Parabrahman is the truth, nothing else is, and you are That eternally.
Q. Why did I separate myself from That?
M: When nothing else but That prevails, how can you be separate from It?
Q. There is a poem written by Jnanaswara to that 1400 year old Sage; one line says, "The vision of knowledge becomes weaker and weaker. " What is the meaning of that?
M: The vision of consciousness will also drop off in the ultimate analysis, because knowledge and ignorance are in the realm of consciousness.
Q. I do not want to let go of a single word of yours.
M. How long are you going to hang on to words and the meaning of words? How long?
Q. They are useful so long as the "I Am" is there.
M. This "I Am" is a concept also, is it not? And you want to hang on to this concept also. This "I Amness" is not going to remain in your association, and when it goes, everything relating to that "I Amness" goes. When this is the state of affairs, what is the use of trying to gain or assimilate knowledge?
Words are not exactly applicable; I have seen exactly how I am not. In the absence of "I Am," what that state is, I have seen, or am seeing, therefore I don't lose anything. In that state there is no question of seeing or experiencing, but for the sake of communication we have to borrow these words.
These are great men, full of wisdom, profound; but how do I look at them? They are just like me. This one is a legal luminary and a Sanskrit scholar; with the combined effect he is trying to capture Parabrahman in his words. He is very good at it, but what is the gain?
Q. To realize that my state is without concepts, that itself is the gain.
M. You are standing on a concept "I Am," and trying to paint that with another concept.
Q. This is a different kind of court, the lawyer is hauled into the dock.