Q&A🔗

Q: Shakti, buddhi, yukti, bhakti, are these in an order or is it a combination?

There is no order. It is not that first shakti will happen, then buddhi will happen, then yukti will happen, then bhakti will happen. No! All four can start happening simultaneously. Usually all four start growing simultaneously.

Sometimes, suddenly you will have bhakti for no reason. I have seen, one sight and people have a strong feeling connection, bhakti. Bhakti makes all these other three to happen. Sometimes, the clarity, yukti, makes all the other three to happen. Sometimes, you feel shakti for no reason; you feel you can just change what you want. With that all the other three will happen.

Anything may click at any time. From any corner, anything may happen. There is no such thing as one by one, there is no order.

Q: Swamiji, when we are used to considering it reality when it is a dream, how do we break away from that and live with the clarity that it is a dream?

No. Don't try to break it immediately, don't be too greedy. All I am saying is just constantly remember it is a dream, that's enough. Just constantly try to remember that it is a dream. That's enough, nothing else is required. It will sink in by itself. Don't be greedy, 'How will I realize the whole thing is a dream now itself?' It will go inside by itself. There is no need to ask for a technique, just remembering this is enough.

See, anything you constantly remember for 11 days in the waking state will go into your dream state. And if you remember for 21 days, it will go into your deep sleep state. It will completely purify your subconscious and unconscious mind. So just remember it is all a dream. Constant remembrance is enough. It will sink into your system. It will become a part of you.

Q: We all know that when we dream, it seems so real. It is very hard to realize it is a dream when you are dreaming. It is the same problem in our life. We are so intensely involved we cannot realize it is a dream.

Why do you start hypothesizing now itself, 'I can't realize it is a dream'? See, you say you are so involved that you can't realize it is a dream. What do you mean? It is like saying, 'I am sick, so I can't take medicine.' Understand, because you are so involved only you have to remember it is a dream. Because you are sick, just remember it is a dream. That will work like a medicine.

Q: All this is a dream is an intellectual idea for me. I have no concrete experience. How can I make this a concrete actualization that does not fade or is temporarily forgotten?

See, any truth can never land on you as a concrete experience. It can land on you only as an idea. All I am saying is, just go on arguing with it, that's enough. Go on fighting with it, that's enough. Suddenly you will see you have become friendly with it. See, anything you find friendly, you will start fighting with it. Anything you fight with, you start getting friendly with it.

Whether you start in a friendly way or as a fight with the truth, there is no problem. See, even when you are fighting constantly, you will start getting friendly, because it is giving you a kind of company. In Bharat the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law will have a constant fight, constantly nagging. But they will miss each other if they are not together. When they are together, messing! When they are not together, missing! But you will see a constant fight.

So even if you fight with the truth, it is okay. Just fight. Don't be just unattentive. See, sometimes you ignore. Don't ignore. Even fight, no problem. You will see it sinks inside you. Truth is so powerful, even if you fight with it, it will become part of you.

Q: Shakti is the energy to change whatever we can change. Buddhi is the intelligence to accept what we cannot change. There are obvious things which we can't change. However, even in things we can change, we feel with right energy we can change everything with effort. How to priortize, or even understand what to let go and what to change?

This is something you can decide only based on the situation. I don't have a readymade map. I can only give a torch. Please understand, I can only give you a torch. When you walk in the forest, you can use that and pass through the forest. I can't give a readymade map for the forest like 'Go right and on the seventh mile you will see a lion, go left and on eighth mile you will see a snake.' I can't give a roadmap for a forest. Life is a forest. I can only give you a torch. Please use the torch.

Don't bother about making mistakes. All these days, you have not had a torch. Have you not lived? You made blunders! Now at least let's make mistakes, nothing wrong. You don't have to be 100% foolproof from the day one.

Vivekananda, disciple of enlightened master Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, was the first master who brought the Vedic tradition to the West. He is the first person who brought respect for the Vedic tradition in the West. He expresses beautifully the amazing truth, 'Freedom is the basic condition for growth.' This one idea can completely work inside you. Whenever readymade solutions are given, they only hinder your growth.

He says one more beautiful thing, 'Without a goal, if you are making 5000 mistakes, with goal you may make 50 mistakes. But go with the goal.' So when you start with this idea of constantly remembering that the whole life is a dream, I am not saying you will be foolproof. I can say you can reduce the number of mistakes by at least 90%. So have the courage to commit one or two mistakes, there is nothing wrong. Have that much of freedom. After all, freedom to commit mistakes is energy.

Q: How can one avoid letting the ego get in the way of knowing the truth?

Don't bother too much about ego and all those things. See, with ego, you can't handle any situation. Stand in front of your situation with openness. Understand, every situation that comes in front of you is not against you; it is trying to understand you.

Understand, what Brahma writes with so much effort with his right hand on your head, the Master can just wipe it with his left leg. So relax!

Every person who comes in front of you, every situation that comes in front of you, is trying to understand you. Just connect with it; it is trying to understand you.

Sister Nivedita, a great disciple of Vivekananda, when she first met him, asked him, 'Will you marry me?' Vivekananda laughed. He was not egoistic. If he was egoistic, he would have said, 'How dare you ask me this question! I am a monk…' He understood it was just her sincerity. All she wanted was to be around him. And she knew only one relationship for that, the husband-wife relation.

Then, when Vivekananda explained, see her courage and honesty! She left the whole thing and went with him. When she understood the attitude and understanding, she lived around him as his daughter. She always felt she was her daughter and he was her father.

Whenever situations come in front of you, persons come in front of you, things come in front of you, understand they are curious about you. They are not trying to hurt you. If we are too much covered, prejudiced with our ideas, then it is going to hurt us. Why should we be too much prejudiced? Why should we be too much disturbed? Just be open. They are just trying to understand you.

Life is trying to understand you when you are trying to understand life. Have that much courtesy with life. Understand this one truth when any difficulty comes in front of you, any situation comes in front of you. When you are trying to understand life, life is trying to understand you.

It is like a romance. It is like a relationship. When you want to understand about somebody, that person also wants to understand about you. When you want to understand life, life wants to understand you. So just be with that openness, you will never be hurt. You will never have the ego, you will never be disturbed.

Understand, whenever you think life is bringing difficulties to you, life wants to understand you. It just says, 'If I talk like this, what will you do? If I ask like this, what will you do? If I do this, what will you do?' If your beloved or spouse asks a question, see how you respond. In the same way, life is your partner. It is asking you, 'If I present myself like this in front of you, what will you do?' Just be graceful and ready for it, that's all.

Q: How to remain in unclutched state for longer?

Be unclutched! Unclutch even from that desire to be in that state for longer.

See, bliss is choicelessness. When you choose bliss, you are in suffering. Bliss is choicelessness. When you are choicelessly unclutched, you are in bliss. When you choose bliss, when you try to hold onto bliss, you are in suffering. So don't even choose bliss.

Q: If we experience the bliss, is it enlightenment? How do we keep the feeling?

The one experience of bliss may not be enlightenment, it may be satori. So all you need to do is, without changing your lifestyle continuously try to remember that. Don't try to bring it back. When you try to bring it back, it is not of the same quality and you lose your confidence. Just try to remember. However much comes back, it is okay.

See, choicelessness is bliss. When you are choiceless, relaxed, suddenly bliss happens to you. When you decide I should retain this bliss forever, you have chosen suffering. It is like when your hands are in a river, if your hands are open, the river is in your hands. The moment you close it to hold the river, you have only empty hands.

In the same way, the cosmos, the universe is flowing through you. The moment you try to hold, 'This experience should be with me forever,' it is gone. The joy has left you. Choicelessness is bliss, all choice is suffering. When you are choiceless, the satori happens to you. When you try to hold, when you try to catch the satori, it just escapes from you. Just try to remember, don't even make the choice that it should stay with you. Just the remembrance, it will sink inside you, you will be in it.

Q: If everything is a dream, why do we have the dream of life?

Somebody asked me, 'If everything is a dream, you are also one more dream. How is it going to help me wake up?'

Understand, if you see a lion chasing you in your dream, you will wake up. I am the simha swapna. Understand, I am the nightmare for you. I will wake you up. I'll just wake you up!

I may be part of your dream but I am a nightmare! See, sometimes if you see a nightmare, or if you see too sweet a dream also you will wake up. If you want to be with somebody and the person is there, and you are about to go near the person, you wake up. So, fantasy dream or nightmare, you will wake up. If it was a sweet dream, you will think, 'O God! The dream could have continued just for ten more minutes! It was such a nice dream!'

Whenever the frequency of the dream is intensified through fear or greed, you wake up. In the same way, when you see a Master, he intensifies that strong feeling connection inside you. When that frequency becomes higher, you wake up.

• Q: What is energy?

There is a beautiful Zen story:

A Zen master became enlightened. Even after that, he was spending a lot of time just meditating in the deep silence, in the tapas. So all the angels appeared in front of him and asked, 'Ask for some boon. We want to give you something.'

He said, 'Enlightenment is the ultimate thing. I already achieved that. What else do I need? I don't need anything.' They said, 'No, no. Ask something otherwise it will be forced on you.'

Then he thought for a long time and said beautifully, 'Let all the good things happen around me without my knowledge. Let all the energy flow through me without my knowledge, without my awareness.' Understand, I can say this is what will happen when the energy is flowing through you.

You know energy is flowing through you. But you will not have any type of disturbance. What exists beyond suffering and joy is bliss. It is not that you will be carrying bliss like having a big smile etc; you will be just overflowing and people will feel you are joyful. People who live around you will say you re blissful. You yourself will see, it is there, that's all. You won't feel any difference.

Q: Can there be negative energy?

See, the power of the negative energy is your faith on it, that's all. All negativity has a power over you only when you believe it. Whether it is Satan or Devil or Rahu or Ketu, any dosha or defect has power over you because you believe it.

People come and tell me, 'O, my sun is in uccha (high), my ketu is in neecha (low), my rahu is in uccha... I tell them, if you are in your high, no neecha, no uccha can disturb you. If you are in your low, whether the planets are in high or low, you will be disturbed.

All you need to bother is whether you are high or not. Raise yourself to that high, that is enough. I always tell them, your guru is in uccha, so don't bother! There is no need to bother about other things.

There is a beautiful sutra by Varahamihira, the father of the science of astrology. After describing the whole science of astrology, he says beautifully, Brahma writes this whole horoscope and fate etc with his right hand, but the guru can wipe it with his left leg.

Q: What is the higher purpose of music in Existence?

I think I told you, from where the music comes, it takes you there. Understand, when the experience is expressed, if you connect with the expression, it will take you to the same experience. That is why when you listen to the great enlightened being's words, poetry, songs, suddenly you are elevated to the same mood. You are lifted to that same ecstasy. You feel connected to that same joy.

Whenever I listen to Andal's songs, I know she is an insider, means she is talking about what she is living. That strong feeling connection! There is a beautiful couplet by Ramana Maharishi, another enlightened master from my hometown Tiruvannamalai, 'O Arunachala! I gave me and lost me but got you. Who is more intelligent!'

Understand, he says, you got me but I got you. Who is the winner? I gave me only myself, meaning the body filled with disease, mind filled with suffering, soul filled with depression. But I got you who is a body filled with joy, mind filled with bliss, being filled with consciousness. So who is more intelligent? The moment you listen to this idea, you know what he is speaking, you know what he is expressing.

So when you listen to the music by an enlightened being, suddenly you know you are in that plane. So that is the higher purpose of music in Existence, to elevate you again and again and again to the higher consciousness and higher mood.

Q: When remembrances are overwhelmingly strong, how can I still unclutch?

Only the first few times when you unclutch, the remembrance will be overwhelming. After few times, it will become pale. You see, anything which you relive, relive, relive, you will relieve! This is the sutra, this is the key. Anything you relive will be relieved. Reliving is relieving.

If you remember again and again the same thing and unclutch, suddenly you will see it loses its power over you. The more number of times you unclutch, they lose their power over you.

In enlightenment, you need three things: first is trying and unclutching, second is trying and unclutching, third is trying and unclutching! Because the second time will be different from the first time, the third time will be different from the second time. So it is not the same as you think.

Q: If our life is all a dream, then what is our role and responsibility?

Just enjoy! That is what I am going all over the world telling, you don't have role, you don't have responsibility, but they don't believe! They say, 'No, no, no. We have role, we have responsibility.' Then I tell them, 'Suffer, what to do!'

Whenever I tell the simple truth straightaway, they think, 'No, no, no. This swami doesn't know much. I think he has to go back and study little more!'

Don't bother about your role, responsibility and all those things. Don't keep that as a load on your being. Just relax, unclutch.

You will see you will perform your role and responsibility ten times better. You will become such a wonderful, productive citizen to the world and such a productive head of the family. You will suddenly see all your roles are happening beautifully.

See, a multidimensional person is a person who is able to unclutch from all his dimensions. This may look like a paradox but this is the truth; catch it!

Life is all about joy, nothing else. There is no role, no responsibility. But the egoistic people cannot believe that there is no role or responsibility. They think I am dismantling the whole social system. No.

Please understand, I have worked with disciples. All my disciples have only become more productive, more useful to the society and the family with unclutching. They made more wealth, they became richer. Otherwise how do you think so much interest or sincerity can be created in so many people? Because when they practice, they see the utility. They see directly how they are more productive to the society, how they are happier, how they are connecting more with the relationships.

That's the reason I am spreading so fast. The very fact that I am spreading so fast proves that what I am talking is practical and doable. See, if I am sitting in some forest in the Himalayas, and I am talking, 'Unclutch from everything,' you may see, 'He is impractical. He is sitting in Himalayas…' I am not sitting in Himalayas. I am running an organization. I make at least 200 to 300 major decisions per day. And still I am sitting and attending office. Still I have my own laptop; I work for hours on my laptop - either proofreading or answering emails or answering questions, taking administrative decisions, doing so many things.

Understand, I am living with you all. So what I am talking is practical. I am not saying the masters in Himalayas are impractical. If I am like them, sitting in Himalayas, you may say I am impractical. I am not living there, I am living with you all. I fly miles per year, travel another miles on the road. So I am living with you all, I am relating with you all.

I am running an organization just like you all. See, at the end of the day, the organization may be non-profit. But the whole day, the decision-making has to be run like any other institution. So please be very clear, running a profit organization is much more easier because you can hire and fire. You just pay; if he is not doing what you are saying, fire, over!

But running an organization with volunteers is not a joke. You have to be constantly motivate them and inspire them. So understand, I am doing a much more difficult job than you - because I don't feel it is difficult. This is what I call 'loose-fitting master'.

When you are loose-fitting about your whole life, suddenly your whole life seems so joyful. Suddenly you will see a new kind of intelligence is awakened.

See, nine years I lived walking all over Bharat. I walked the length and breadth of Bharat and lived in villages. Actually in this year 2009, from January to March, I did one more padayatra, from Kanyakumari to Bangalore, covering 1200 km. It was such a joy, going and living with the villagers. I went and ate in their huts, stayed with them. I had lived nine years like that during my spiritual wandering.

People ask me, 'Swamiji, it is such a difficult thing, walking, begging and eating, and sleeping anywhere.' When they talk to me they talk as if it is a big sacrifice. I tell them, actually when I see your life only, I feel it is a big sacrifice! Same house, same car, same wife! I always tell, only you people are sacrificing, living the same kind of life.

Still I can't relate to the idea of vacation. People come and tell me, 'We went for vacation, Swamiji. It was so joyful… we went to Hawaii, Honolulu…' All those photographs they show me. I can't understand the idea of vacation. See, wherever you go, you carry the same mind, right?

Unless you make your life loose-fitting, there can't be vacation. Even in vacation, what will you be doing? You will be lying down on the sand beach and thinking when you have to go back. Then better lie down in your verandah, that's all!With me, the whole life is vacation. Either your whole life is vacation or your whole life is duty, that's all.

So, understand, make your life loose-fitting. There is no such thing as role or responsibility. Suddenly you will become so productive, so alive. You will start working like a leader. You will not be working like a follower.

There is a big difference between the two. Work like a leader, not like a follower. Leadership depends on your consciousness, not your status. See, by status, you may become a leader. But if you have not become a leader by state, you cannot be a true leader.

Status is achieved in the outer world; that you can achieve even by politicking – if you know leg-pulling, back-biting, politicking, you can become a leader. But achieving the leader state is living like a leader. It needs meditation.

Live like a leader, work like a leader. For that you don't have to do any politics or back-biting. All you need is 'in-biting' – bite yourself inside! Look inside, raise yourself, you will see you will live like a leader.

So you don't have to bother about roles, responsibilities and all those things. Look inside, be loose-fitting. Suddenly you will see you are so productive, so alive, so joyful, so radiating. Living a loose-fitting life and being productive to the society and the family and the surroundings and to yourself is what I call jeevan mukti. You will not become irresponsible, you will not become lazy.

Alright; let us enter into living enlightenment. I will try to explain a simple truth through a diagram, how the mind works.

Please understand how we experience the different states of our being. You have two states of your mind and two states of your consciousness. The mind can be in two states: with thoughts and without thoughts. Now do you have thoughts? Yes; most of you at least! In the deep sleep, do you have thoughts? No. So there are two states of the mind: with thoughts and without thoughts.

In the same way, there are two states of consciousness. One is with the idea 'I exist', with 'I' consciousness. Now do you have the idea of 'I'? Yes; now you have the idea. Do you have it in the deep sleep? No. So there are two states of consciousness: with the idea 'I exist' and without the idea 'I exist'.

When these two states of mind and two states of consciousness crisscross each other, we go through four different states. The first state is the waking state; in Sanskrit we call it jagrat. In this state, you have thoughts and you have 'I' consciousness. This is the state in which you are now, the waking state.

The next state is when there is no 'I' consciousness but thoughts are there. That is what we call the dream state. Here you can't decide what you want to dream and what you don't want to dream. Without the control of the 'I' the thoughts are just flowing.

You can see in your dream state, there is no continuous 'I'. Just thoughts flow. That is why sometimes you will dream that you are going to school with your wife, sometimes with your grandkids. It is a confused identity. In the dream, there is no single 'I', there are only thoughts. It is just an overflow of different thoughts. There is no consistent 'I' which connects thoughts.

In the waking state, 'I' is there; thoughts are also there. That is why you can change your thoughts, because 'I' is more powerful. In the dream state, there is no 'I' but thoughts are just overflowing.

Just thoughts moving around is called swapna, dream state. Swapna is a state where the 'I' consciousness doesn't exist but thoughts exist. That is why you can't control your dreams. There is no 'I'. The third state is sushupti means deep sleep. Here there are neither thoughts nor is there 'I'.

See, these are the three states you usually experience everyday. You go through waking state, dream state, deep sleep state everyday. There is a fourth state where the idea 'I' will exist but there won't be any thoughts. This state we don't experience usually.

A normal human being just lives in the three states and dies. He doesn't go to the fourth state. Only rarely, the spiritual seekers experience the fourth state. Here, the 'I' consciousness will be there but thoughts won't be there. There won't be any movement, there won't be any waves but the ocean is there. Understand, this state is what we call enlightenment, nirvana, atma gnana, brahma gnana, God consciousness, Christ Consciousness, Krishna Consciousness, Shiva Consciousness…This is the state where you know you exist, and you are alive, fresh, bubbling, open, overflowing. But there are no thoughts. This state is what we call samadhi, turiya, blissful state, THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM state.

Whenever you are living in the fourth state, you are living enlightenment. When you are out of the fourth state, you are leaving enlightenment.

Understand, we experience the three states regularly in our life: waking, dream and deep sleep. But we don't experience the fourth state regularly in our life. Experiencing the fourth state and feeling connected to the fourth state more and more is what I call meditation.

Meditation means a technique or an act which you do to experience and feel more and more connected to the fourth state. Turiya means in Sanskrit 'the fourth state'. Our masters didn't give any name, they just called it the fourth state. It represents the spiritual freedom just like in the West you have social freedom.

In the fourth state, the awareness 'I' is alive; it is not like in deep sleep where you don't have the idea 'I exist'. Here you will have the idea 'I exist' but you will not have thoughts. There will be no movements. It will be a pure state, beyond form and formlessness. Don't think it is formless. It is beyond form and formlessness. Even if I say formless, you will visualize a big ocean or you will visualize a big sky. It is neither with form nor formless; it is beyond.

Q: Practicing unclutching I sometimes feel empty. Is this bliss?

Actually when you feel empty while unclutching, it is peace.

Q: Should I follow my gut feeling and do what I feel instinctively?

If you feel from your being, do it. Your heart is more powerful than your head. So don't worry; just go with your heart. You will never miss; you will never lose. It will always add more to your life. It is your heart which should be the deciding factor, not your head. If it is head, even if it is success, it will be failure. With your heart, even if it is failure it will be success.

Q: How do we interpret premonition dreams?

People ask me how to interpret dreams. There is no need to find meaning in your dreams. See, only if you see your master in your dreams, that also in multicolor, you know that in the inner space the master is there. If you see your god in the dream, it means in the inner space that god is there. That is ok. Other than that, nothing is useful. I tell these people who come to me asking for the meaning of dreams, your waking state, reality itself has no use, what about your dream!

Q: Where does the wakeup call come from?

Me. Wake up! What do you think I am doing, going from city to city? Do you think I am partying! I am going around giving the wakeup call.

Q: What is awareness? How is it different from consciousness?

I can say, awareness is the path, consciousness is the experience. Sometimes, when the awareness is intense, you can experience the consciousness at that moment.

Q: What should you be aware of during meditation?

Just be aware that you are aware, that is enough.

Q: Why do we get dreams?

If you have the day-dreaming, you will have the night-dreaming. Please understand day-dreaming means living a life with unawareness, almost sleep-walking. Whatever you may be doing, inside something will be going on. If you have day-dreaming, you will have the night-dreaming.

Q: Is compassion enlightenment?

No; enlightenment is an experience. Compassion is a quality that happens as a result of it. Enlightenment is beyond qualities.

Q: What is the difference between seeing the world as a dream in the case of maya and yukti?

When you consciously remember that everything is a dream, it is a technique. It awakens energy in you. And you will not become lazy. Usually people don't consciously remember. When they are hit by some incident in life, they just brush it aside saying, 'O, everything is a dream.' They use these ideas just to justify their laziness. They themselves don't believe strongly. If you consciously believe and start remembering, your food, hunger, everything will have a change. Straightaway the quality with which you walk, with which you talk, will change. It will become part of your very inner space. That is what I mean by yukti.

Q: If we had a glimpse of bliss through art or meditation, how can we make the blissful state to happen again and perhaps stay longer? Once it happens, will it naturally happen again?

It doesn't happen naturally; you should know the science. Only then it can be brought back again and again. That science is what I call meditation. We will enter into that science now. It is very simple. All you need to do is unclutch and rest in that restful awareness. Continuously unclutching and resting in that restful awareness is the technique.