Conference with San Diego Jan 10, 2010

Bhagavan: Namaste!

Gail: Namaste, Bhagavan! So nice to see you. So we have about 80 people here today. We have 42 people to be initiated this afternoon, they’re all here. And a lot of the new blessing givers are here and a lot of the people who have been … (inaudible)

Bhagavan: I will give them all a very strong blessing when we meditate. So could we go ahead with the questions? … Yes, the first question, please.

Question 1: Bhagavan, sometimes a charge wells up in me so strongly it is hard to stay with the experience – there is so much fear, or terror, or whatever the emotion is.  Even feeling what is in the body is hard at that time.  Other than asking for a blessing and invoking the divine presence for help, is there anything else I can do when that situation occurs?  Is there anything a blessing giver can do to help me other than giving me a blessing, Bhagavan?

Bhagavan: Mind, breath, and kundalini form a triangle. If one is affected, the other two are automatically affected. So what you can do is, if you are really helpless and the charge is becoming really powerful inside you, you could alter your breathing pattern. If you alter the breathing pattern, the charge lets go of you at least temporarily. That is what you could do. With a little practice, it’s possible to alter the breathing pattern and it’s quite easy.

What the blessing giver can do, in case he is not able to give you a blessing, he could start praying for you. And once he starts praying and you alter your breathing pattern, you will get very, very quick results. So that is the easiest way to handle a crisis.

So that is the answer for the 1^st question. We go on to the 2^ndquestion?

Question 2: Bhagavan, I have difficulty with the concept of there being one universal mind when my mind chatter seems to be specific to my situation. Is it my ego that is driving the universal mind chatter to specifically apply to me?

Bhagavan: In Oneness we do not emphasize on concepts or really give it much importance. The universal mind has got to be realized. You must discover it for yourself as a living experience. You should not make it into concepts. And if concepts are troubling you, you must drop the concepts. Then ultimately, as you move to higher states of consciousness, you will find there are no concepts at all. It is just a living experience.

So concepts could become troublesome. In this case, it looks like the concept of the universal mind is troubling you, so I would recommend [to you] to drop that concept. And maybe as you go along, you would find yourself in tune (?   ) with the universal mind.

(Much laughter) 

So, we move on to the 3^rd question now … (laughing)          

Question 3: When I hear teachings from you - for example, “Nonresistant awareness of the ‘what is’ is oneness,” or, “Letting go of the need to control…is surrender” - what comes to my awareness is how I am actually the opposite – how much I resist or hold on.  Your teachings always seem to show me how I am not what you teach. You have also been emphasizing how nothing will change. How is this process helping to awaken me to oneness, Bhagavan?

Bhagavan: Yes… You are not any of the things which I teach – that is what I teach in the first place. (Laughter) The teaching itself is very, very simple. All the teaching says is – you cannot change. And the impossibility of change must strike you like a ton of bricks. The whole problem with you is all the while you have been trying to change. You do not like the way you are and you would like to be something else. That is the problem.

The teaching is remarkably simple. All that it says is, “Something is going on there. Please look at it.” Do not condemn it. Do not judge it. Do not give explanations. Do not say it is right or wrong, good or bad, or [sacred or profane? 5:54 ]. Stop naming it! If you stop naming what is going on as jealousy, as anger, as hatred, as selfishness, you actually begin to see.

Now the problem is you are imagining, or you’re thinking, that if you see, something is going to happen. Something very great is going to happen – you are going to be awakened, you are going to be enlightened, and all that kind of stuff. Now what you don’t realize is – that seeing is the awakening. That seeing is the enlightenment. That is the be all and the end all. There is nothing more at all.

The only problem with you is you are not seeing. That’s all. If you start seeing, there is no seer. He is gone. There is just the seeing. There is neither the seer nor the seen. There is just the seeing. And that is meditation.  That is enlightenment. That is awakening. That is advaita (? 6:40). That is everything.

But unfortunately you make the mistake - you begin to see, you don’t stop there. You are expecting something to happen. So what you see, you want it to undergo a transformation. Nothing odd (? 6:50) is going to happen.  The moment you start seeing, the seeing is all that is there! You start living. You experience reality as it is.

I could go on talking more and more, but then you would make them all into concepts. (laughter) So I am not going to. I think I will stop there. You will discover it for yourself.

When you meditate, what I am going to do is, I am going to help you see. That’s all. Once you see, it’s up to you. You can write books on that … (laughter), you can go out and preach about that(? 7:30), that’s up to you.

So now that we have finished the questions quite early, probably we could go for a longer meditation, 5 or 6 minutes meditate. (Applause) Shall we start?

[Meditation]

(Edited to ~ 1 minute, due to poor audio quality)

Vikram:  Shanti, shanti, shanti.

Bhagavan: Love you all… Namaste.

Love, you, Bhagavan! Namaste.