Enlightenment - Have It🔗

THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM

Today's topic is Enlightenment – Have it. On the first day we saw few basic things about enlightenment based on Ashtavakra Gita: Enlightenment - It is possible. Next day, we understood few things from Enlightenment -Guaranteed. Now today, Enlightenment – Have it.

Let us enter into the Sutra and see how Ashtavakra says that we have it and how to have it.

Sutra:

Virtue and vice, pleasure and pain are of the mind, not of you. Oh all pervading one, you are neither doer nor enjoyer. Verily you are ever free.

In this sutra, Ashtavakra directly addresses Janaka as the all pervading one. Here he directly says to Janaka, oh, all pervading one.

Till this point he was saying, 'You are this, you are that, you are pure consciousness.' Now he straightaway addresses Janaka as, all pervading one.

Virtue and vice, pleasure and pain are of the mind, not of you.

Actually, Ashtavakra is answering the doubts that will come after listening to the truth of being unattached. Yesterday I talked about how there is no shaft in our being. We are completely un-clutched. Every moment by our nature, we renounce our thoughts. Unless we renounce one thought, we cannot have the next thought. By our very nature, constantly we are renouncing our thoughts.

Only fools try to create same thoughts over and over again. Whether you try to visualize or verbalize the same things constantly, you are damaging your being. Please be very clear, the eastern consciousness is suffering so much because you are constantly trying to visualize or verbalize something. Almost all the people who take up spiritual life try one exercise or another. Constantly they try to visualize something or verbalize something through some mantra or some form of technique. Both damage our being. By our very nature we are unattached. By our very nature we renounce thoughts. The more we try to stay with one thought, the more we suffer.

I've seen people who try to chant some mantra or use some visualization for thirty or forty years. After forty years they come to me and ask me, 'Master, how can I learn to concentrate? Please teach me how to concentrate.' To tell you honestly, let me be very clear, I do not know, because it never happened in me. I've seen thousands of seekers constantly trying to repeat a thought or to repeat the same mantra or to bring the same visualization in their minds. But until the end they never succeeded. They got utterly frustrated and completely failed.

After that failure, they try to find other solutions. Please understand, by our very nature we constantly renounce thoughts. Unless we renounce one thought, we cannot go to the next thought. The moment we renounce one thought, we go to the next thought. By our very nature we are renouncing thoughts.

If we try to keep our mind focused on a single thought, we will only be torturing ourselves. I've seen people torturing themselves through some mantra or some visualization. But whether mantra or visualization, both create only more and more pressure and stress in us.

By repetition of words or repetition of mantras you can't achieve anything other than trying to create a consistent shaft. Trying to create a consistent shaft is impossible. I have done it myself in my own life and I can tell you that it is impossible. If you are in the habit of repeating some syllable or some word or mantra, you will understand what I mean. You will be just waiting, 'When will I finish this?' You will be waiting to finish it. In the same way, if you are trying to avoid something, you will see it constantly surface and you will be fighting with it.

Already you have so much of pain and problem. Now you create one more pain of repeating some mantra or creating some visualization. Be very clear, by your very nature you cannot be with the same thought constantly. You cannot be with one thing. All you need to understand is that by our very nature, we are unattached. That is what Ashtavakra means when he says, 'By your very nature you are unattached.'

There is no linear connection between one thought and another thought. The only relationship between thoughts is that they are from the same source, that's all. There is only a vertical connection but no linear connection between a thought and a thought. The moment you hear this truth you are shocked because you are constantly connecting a thought and a thought in a linear way.

For example, you will connect your today's depression with yesterday's depression. The moment you connect the independent incidents that happened in your life, you start creating an idea that you are a depressed being. Or if you connect all joyful incidents of your life, you come to the conclusion that you are a joyful being. You come up with some concept about yourself by connecting all your thoughts in a linear way.

Be very clear, thoughts are not linear; they are vertical. Just like the bubbles in a fish tank, how the bubbles come up from the bottom, constantly rising - just like that your thoughts also come. When one bubble comes and reaches the surface of the water, the next bubble starts and then the third bubble starts. You start connecting all these bubbles on the top, the surface layer of the water. Because of your memory of pain or pleasure, you start connecting all the bubbles and start thinking that your mind is linear. No, your mind is not linear; it is vertical. Between every bubble, from one bubble to the next you can't go horizontally; you can go only vertically. Every bubble is coming from the Atman, soul, your being. Every bubble is coming from below.

One big problem is that you do not connect all your thoughts. Instead you choose just a few thoughts and connect them. Some people feel that their whole life is pain and some people feel that their whole life is joy. When you connect your thoughts in a linear way, you create an idea that whole life is pain or whole life is joy or pleasure. If you feel that your whole life is pain, you try to break the shaft. If you feel that your whole life is pleasure, you try to extend that shaft. Either way you will fail. You will be a complete and utter failure because there is actually no shaft.

Connecting and seeing your thoughts in a linear way is the original sin you commit. Creating the shaft is the first original sin. It is because of this, you create something that does not exist in you. This something is what I call the mind. Mind is a pure myth.

Somehow we have learnt the habit of keeping files. I've seen people keeping files, not only about themselves but about others too. Let me tell you about an incident, which happened during one of my visits: One

gentleman around forty-five years of age came up to me and said, 'Master, I am going to divorce my wife, please bless me.'

I told him, 'I only bless for marriages, what made you come and ask me to bless you for a divorce?' He replied, 'No, no Master, you have to bless me, because I have suffered too much.'

I said, 'Suffering is always give and take. It is never just taking. You must have given her enough suffering too. So please tell me the truth about what happened, and then we will analyze the situation.'

But again he said, 'No, no, Master, you don't know how much I have suffered. You are a Swami, so you don't know about all these things.'

I said, 'Please do not attack me directly. Just tell me a few incidents. Then we'll come to some understanding.'

To this he replied. 'Which ones you want me to tell, and which ones you want me to leave out? From day one she has been torturing me. You do not know how much of torture I've gone through!'

In Hindu villages, when weddings take place, after the ceremony the newly married couple plays games. For one of the games, a ring is placed inside a pot filled with water. The husband and wife put their hands inside and compete to pick up the ring. Whoever grabs it first wins. These small games were created mainly to zero down the distance between the couple, because in arranged marriages it was only during the marriage that the couple first meets. They have these kinds of small, small games to zero down the distance between them, because they are new to each other.

This man mentioned, 'During that game after our wedding, she scratched my hand. With her nails, she scratched my hand Master.' And he started a big story about everything that she supposedly had done to him since that day. He practically had a file, like a CID police report from day one of his marriage.

After two or three incidents were narrated I just told him, 'Please stop; if this is the case, she will be happier than you to part ways, because it is very difficult to live with someone who keeps such big files in their head.' For anything she does, he will be constantly looking through the files. For example, he told me the immediate reason for the divorce was that she spilled little bit of coffee on his clothes! That was the immediate reason.

He said, 'Yesterday we had a fight. She spilled coffee on my clothes, Master.' I replied to him, 'Spilling coffee on the clothes cannot be a reason for a divorce. You cannot give me such small reasons for divorcing your wife.'

To that his response was, 'No, no Master, you don't know. Today she poured coffee; tomorrow she will pour acid!' He really said this. I did not understand the connection. I asked him how he could connect coffee and acid. Again he said, 'No, no Master you don't know.'

Then I told him, 'Look at the incidents as independent incidents. She brought you the coffee and she spilled a little bit on your clothes by mistake. And in any case, probably she is the one who washes your clothes. You are not even going to wash them yourself. It was just an independent incident. But when you have a huge file, when you have a huge case history, before passing judgment about a small incident, you just verify the whole file. In two or three seconds you verify the whole file and then you start shouting. Then you start creating words in your mind that today she poured coffee and tomorrow she will pour acid. You start creating big, big statements in your mind.'

Please understand, when I mentioned that he said, 'Today she will pour coffee and tomorrow she will pour acid,' you all laughed. But you all are also doing the same thing with yourselves. Constantly you are creating a connection, which is illogical. You forget to see incidents as independent. You forget to see thoughts as independent. By your very nature, you have only independent thoughts. All your thoughts are completely independent.

If you just learn this one simple technique of un-clutching, the energy released in your system, in your being will be so much you will be ten times more productive and more creative. Your relationships will have so much of friendliness because you will not clutch and see. As of now you will never trust the other person, that your spouse has become intelligent in the last few years. You sincerely never trust that he or she has grown and become intelligent because you never trust that you could grow and become intelligent.

Because you do not trust that you could become more intelligent, you cannot trust that your spouse could also become intelligent. You will be maintaining the same idea that you had formed about him ten years ago. Whatever he does you will only look through the same lens. Whatever she does, 'She is trying to disobey me'; whatever he does 'He tries to boss over me'. You have this pre conceived clear-cut idea.

That's why I tell people; you live with the other person only for six months; in six months you create an idea about the other person. Once you create an idea about the other person, it's over. You have created an idea - 'I don't have to go to hell after death because punishment is given now.' And she creates an idea, 'God has sent me this as punishment; I will finish all my karmas.' You will create some ideas like that. After that whatever he or she does, you look only through that angle. You never un-clutch from your ideas or your prejudices. You do not listen to arguments to pass judgments. You only collect arguments to support your judgments. Judgment is ready and you are just waiting for arguments to support your judgment. Whenever you find a solid argument, you catch hold of it and support your judgment. That's all.

If you do a very simple experiment for just ten minutes then you will understand this better. Sit and pen down whatever thoughts go on in your mind. Sit alone and write down whatever is going on in your mind. Do not edit, do not suppress. It is an experiment only for you and don't show it to anyone else, at least not to your family members. Visualize as if transcribing software is connected to your mind. Just like how transcribing software connected to a taped speech transcribes everything, transcribe whatever is going on in your mind.

Pen down everything. You may think, 'Oh, nothing is coming out.' Pen down that also; that is also one more thought. Whatever goes on just pen down for ten minutes. After that read that paper only once. You will understand how a big, mad asylum is going on inside you.

When you pen down do not edit, do not say it is a wrong thought, do not say it is a bad thought or do not say it is a good thought. Don't judge; just pen down whatever goes on for ten minutes and read that paper only once. You will understand how every thought is completely illogical, irresponsible and unconnected to each other, how they are completely un-clutched. For example you are sitting here and suddenly you will get these thoughts, 'Why not I take a month's vacation? NO, no why don't I go home and do some work. Think I should go to this Swami's ashram and see what he does. Can I go tomorrow? He is still not finishing and I'm hungry. What is happening?'

You can see how it is flowing in your mind. Actually if you pen down like I said even only once, sit silently, just pen down and read, you will understand how un-connected, illogical, independent and un-clutched those thoughts are. This understanding is so transforming. I can tell you, this very understanding transforms your way of thinking about yourself and your way of conducting yourself with others and with yourself. It just transforms your whole life.

When you read what you've written, you will understand what I meant when I said that you are nothing but unconnected, illogical, independent, unclutched thoughts. For example, if you see a dog in the street, you will immediately remember the dog about which you were afraid when you were young or with which you used to play when you were young. The next thought would be about your childhood. Third, the teacher and the room you used to sit in the school and fourth, the place where your teacher used to stay.

You can see the thoughts flowing. There is no logical connection between the dog you saw on the street and the teacher who taught you in school. But in few seconds you would have just drifted away. There is no logical connection between the two; but your thoughts are moving away, drifting away.

By your very nature you are unconnected, independent, illogical and unconnected thoughts. So many things are happening in you. For the sake of your convenience, you pick up few thoughts randomly, clutch them and create a shaft and start believing that shaft is you or that is a representation of your past and that is your identity.

It's like ten thousand flowers are there in different colors. You just pick a few flowers randomly and create a garland. You start thinking that the garland is the representation of the ten thousand flowers. No, that garland cannot be a representation of the ten thousand flowers.

Same way, the shaft that you have created that your life is painful sometimes by mistake you even create a shaft with the idea that your life is joyful, but it is very rare and it is by mistake - anyhow even if you created that shaft, whatever shaft you created, whether 'life is pain' or 'life is joy', that shaft is not the representation of your past. That is not the totality of you.

Understand, you pick up thoughts in a very random way and connect them, clutch them and create a shaft.

Let me give you a small diagram; then you'll understand how you clutch and create the shaft. It's a simple diagram to understand how thoughts flow in your being and how you connect them. Each thought is a square or rectangle, different shape and different size. Thoughts are flowing in you, moving. One maybe related to pain, painful experience. Another one may be related to joy, joyful experience. The next one maybe related to joy but you think of it as pain. We can call it as JP – joy pain. Similarly you may have a thought that is related to your painful experience but you may think of it as joy. This we can call PJ - pain joy. Many times you may name pain as joy and joy as pain. Something continuously goes on in you. This is how thoughts are flowing n you. Understand they are all completely unconnected, independent and illogical.

Each thought may be related to some experience which you had in the past or which you want to have in the future. All your thoughts are related to something about the past or something about the future. You can't have thoughts about the present. In the present moment you can have only consciousness, not thoughts. The thought are Shartlated to some joyful experiences, which you had in the past or want to have in the future or painful experiences which you had in the past or which you don't want to have.

Of course sometimes you want to have pain also because it gives you ego boosting. Really, it satisfies your ego a lot. You can tell others, 'See how much I struggled, how much I suffered for you.' Constantly this is what you tell your kids to create guilt, so that they listen to you - 'See how much I am doing for you.'

Sometimes we go through even sufferings or we invite sufferings because it gives us ego satisfaction. It gives us an identity; it gives us a feeling of fulfillment. That is why we allow suffering also to happen. Many times we have vested interest with our suffering.

Sometimes, when you suffer you get attention from others. Small, small sickness like headache, fever, body pain - there are lot of this type of things, which are nothing but just ways to get the family's attention. The mind knows that with a little sickness, the whole family will give attention; at least they will listen to you. Now-a- days who listens to others? No one has time for that.

Actually if you look inside yourself a little bit, you'll understand that you create these small, small diseases just to get attention. If you are asked or forced to do something that you don't want to do you just say, 'I have knee pain, I have this pain, and I have that pain.' And once or twice you'll say that as an excuse and the third time you'll see that really happening. Your mind is very powerful to create whatever you want.

Anyhow, some thoughts are related to some joyful experiences that you had, or that you want to have. Some thoughts are related to pains that you had and which you don't want to have.

There are so many thoughts; so many experiences are going on like a conveyor belt inside your inner space, your inner consciousness. Some are related to joy and some are related to pain; some are related to past and some to the future. Things are constantly happening. Each thought is completely independent, completely unconnected to the other thought. Understand, this is one of the important steps. No thought is logically connected; no thought holds responsibility for the other thought. They are all randomly appearing, independently appearing, illogically happening.

For your archival purpose, you collect all the painful thoughts and create an idea that your life was depression, your life was pain and you create a pain shaft. The moment you create a pain shaft, your life is hell. Because after the pain shaft is created, whatever goes on in the conveyor belt, you will not bother. You will only pick up the painful incidents and again and again confirm what you believe.

They are all independent pain experiences, no way connected to each other. But in your memory, you want to keep them all in one file for archival purposes, for reference. You put all your depression experiences in one file and keep them in one file so that you can refer to that archive file.

See, for archival purpose storing them all in one file is OK, but by and by you start believing they are all connected to each other. That is where the problems start. Please understand that you do not collect arguments and pass judgments. You pass judgments and collect arguments. You have ready-made judgments in your life. You just collect arguments to support your judgments.

So if you have already decided, passed the judgments that your life is painful, life is suffering, your life is depression then you will be just waiting to get more and more arguments to strengthen the judgments which you have already made, which you have already created.

Sometimes rarely you may create a joy shaft connecting all the joyful thoughts. You may start believing life is joy. Again, even if you create a shaft that life is joy, you will create an idea that there is some object, which gives you joy and which is the reason for the joy. You will try to hang on to that object or person or incident or space. You may identify your joy with an object or a person or a space or an incident or with something. Now you will try again and again to bring that back in your life. Anything that you try to bring again and again will not give you the same excitement as it gave you the first time.

First time when you enjoy a sweet the excitement is totally different. The experience is totally different from all the other times you eat the sweet later. It is the same way with a person also. First time the experience is totally different; the excitement is totally different. Later on the excitement will not be the same; the experience will not be the same. That's why we call that experience as honeymoon and not 'honeysun'. Have you heard of the term 'honeysun'? No. What is the life of a moon? Sixteen days. Honeymoon is the excitement that will stay only for sixteen days.

When you try to bring the same person, same object, same thing again and again in your life, suddenly you will realize that the same excitement is not there. Please understand, same person, same object same place do not bring the same excitement again and again. So whether you have created a pain shaft or a joy shaft, both ways you have created hell for yourself.

The moment we create an idea by connecting our thoughts in a linear way, and create the thought that I have pain, I have suffering, I have this, I have that, I am this type of person, I am this type of being - if we are blissful or joyful we will try to extend this idea. We will try to stay in the same mood for some more time. And if the idea is painful, we will try to break it. Neither breaking nor extending is possible, because the shaft does not exist in reality.

After a discourse one of the devotees came up to me and said, 'Master, it is such a blissful experience for me, I am so clear about everything; I am afraid I may lose this. Please tell me, how I can retain this?'

I told him, 'Do not try to retain the feeling. You felt the bliss because you understood that nothing could be retained. You felt the deep joy because you were choice-less. You felt the deep joy because you were completely disconnected. You felt such a big relief because by your very nature you are un-clutched.'

If somebody comes and tells you, 'I am in ecstasy because I played tennis and I enjoyed it,' you think, 'Oh, playing tennis brings ecstasy.' You create an equation. Now continuously you are banging, playing tennis. But nothing is happening in you, no ecstasy. Then you think that this guy cheated you. Be very clear, he did not bother about joy; he was completely relaxed while he was playing. Because of that joy happened. Choicelessness is bliss. If you choose bliss, it will not happen because you have chosen already. When you are choice less when you are utterly relaxed bliss happens in you. When you are concerned about bliss, whatever you do to get that will never happen in you.

Someone who is playing just to achieve joy can try their best, but nothing will happen because you can do nothing directly to get joy. When you decide this person, this object, this place, this space may bring joy to my life and if you try to reproduce the same thing, you will see very clearly it will not bring the same thing.

Knowing that the same object is not bringing the same excitement in your life, but not being able to give up is addiction. You know that it is not giving the same experience but you are not able to give it up. It is because you think that you have at least this now and if you give up this also what will happen, you will be alone, what to do? That is what I call addiction.

Whether you create pain shaft or joy shaft you end in hell. Creating shaft is hell; if you create pain shaft then you will be creating pain. If you create joy shaft then you will be creating addictions. All addictions lead to hell. Whether it is pain shaft or joy shaft you are creating hell for yourself. Understand that they are all independent experiences; no way connected to each other.

The moment you try to retain an un-clutched experience, you clutch yourself. The clutching starts. The moment you clutch yourself, you create a shaft. Then you will be fighting to extend the shaft or destroy the shaft. The moment you start trying to extend the shaft, you will start suffering because you are not able to extend it. The moment you try to break the shaft, you will suffer that you are not able to break the shaft. Both the ways you will be a failure; utter failure.

Understand only one thing - there is no shaft. Do not try to renounce your depression, because by your very nature it will be flowing, it will be going away. By your very nature just as joy disappears from your mind, depression also disappears from your mind. The moment you try to kill the depression, you will extend it. You will create more and more complications.

Thoughts are purely independent just like water bubbles coming from the bottom of a fish tank. Just as independent water bubbles come up in a fish tank, independent thoughts come up in us. When the gap between them is too small, we think all the bubbles are connected to each other. But they are not; each bubble is an individual, unconnected, illogical, independent, and un-clutched bubble. It is because the gap is too small you think all the bubbles are connected.

In the same way in our mind, by our very nature every thought is independent, illogical, unconnected and un-clutched. Between every thought we experience a neutral space. As the gap between the two thoughts is too small, as the neutral space between two thoughts is too small, you think all the thoughts are connected and it is in the shaft form, but it is not.

When we change the gear while driving a car, whether we change from neutral to first gear, first to second, second to third - whatever gears we may change, every time we come to the neutral space. Only then we can go to the next gear. In the same way, between every thought we experience a neutral space. That neutral space, that silence is what I call peace, bliss. The peace that exists is the bliss that already exists in us between every thought. The gap between the thoughts, that neutral space is peace. That is bliss.

When you understand that you are unconnected, independent, illogical and un-clutched by your very nature, you will start experiencing the neural space in you. With knowledge of this neutral space, which exists in you, you will start living from moment to moment in spontaneity.

But the moment I utter the words that there is no linear connection between thoughts, people are completely shaken, frightened. Their first fear is, 'If that is the case, if I start living without connecting my thoughts who will pay my bills? I may lose all my wealth, I may not remember where I kept all my money; I may not live in the society successfully. '

Then you start asking, 'How will I do my job? How will I take care of my things? Will I not just lie down in my bed without doing anything?'

Understand, the moment I say these things the first question people ask, 'If I am un-clutched, why should I go to my job?'

I ask, 'Why should you not go to your job?' The moment you ask that, it means that you have a little hatred or a little vengeance against the job. That is why the moment you find some excuse you want to escape from that. You are expressing your anger, your violence against your routine, nothing else.

I always tell people, 'Alright, if you don't do anything and just be unclutched, how many days will you be lying in your bed? Probably ten days, until your tamas gets exhausted.'

See, you have a certain amount of tamas in you. In Sanskrit, keeping quiet is tamas, doing hard work or restlessness is rajas, and doing smart work is sattva or pure intelligence. Be very clear, if you just un-clutch you will not work hard, you will work smart. Until your tamas gets exhausted you will lie there. But after that will you do? Naturally you will start working: you will start moving.

Do not be afraid; do not be afraid that if you are un-clutched, you will not do your daily routine. I tell you, what you think as you is not necessary to run your day-to-day life. This is the basic truth. This truth hurts us. See, if somebody is happy, independent of us, we can't tolerate it; it is too much. Constantly we want to feel that we are needed. That is why we project our sufferings, so that we feel important.

You know that in your profession, the first thing you have to do is to convince your boss that the job you are doing is too big and it cannot be done. And second thing, if it can be done, it can be done only by you. Third thing, even then, only if you give your whole life to it, it can be done. Only if you convince your boss or your customer of all these three things, you will get a high paycheck.

First, anybody who wants to exploit you has to instill a thought in you that you cannot live without him. Even your employee can exploit you, cheat you if he can manage to instill a thought in you, that without him your mission cannot happen; without him your business cannot run. If he instills that thought in you, he can easily exploit you, he can cheat you.

Same way your mind, your ego has created a churning thought, a fear in you that you cannot live, you cannot survive in a balanced way without it. The moment you accept that fear, it is over; your mind will completely exploit you. Your ego will completely cheat you. Please be very clear, that all these things are just simply fears.

See, in the story of the blind man, he is not able to understand that he can walk without the stick after he gets his eyesight. Only when the man opens his eyes, only when he gets his eyesight, he will understand that he can walk without the stick. Same way, only when you relax and understand that by your very nature you are unattached, suddenly you will realize you can live without a mind.

The walking stick is just extra for the blind man. Same way, the mind is extra for you, because by your very nature you don't need the mind to live. Because you have gone to such an extreme of relying on your mind, you cannot understand that you can live without the mind. You are afraid that you might go to the other extreme of being a mindless person with no morality in your life.

But let me tell you, a person who has understood that by his very nature he is unattached, can never go beyond basic morality. You can never disturb a life with discipline. It is only in his life that you will see a strong, deep sense of morality and it is only in his life you will see an extraordinary discipline. It will be a discipline, which can never be shaken and morality, which can never be taken away. It will be morality, which does not come out of fear or greed. Only in him, morality happens out of understanding. In all other beings it happens out of fear or greed.

Morality based on fear or greed cannot take you beyond the body; it will constantly bind you in the body. Only when you understand that by your very nature you are unattached a new, beautiful morality starts happening in you and you start tasting your being and you start experiencing your being.

There are so many fears constantly happening in you. You might wonder that if you start living with this one thought and have no linear connection between thought and thought, how you can live your life. Do not get stuck with hypothetical questions. Just drop the mind and start living. You will see that you are able to.

There was a Zen Master who was once crossing a river with his disciple. Suddenly the disciple slipped and fell into the water and started shouting to his Master for help. He thought he was drowning.

The Master just looked at him and said,

'Ātma dīpo bhava'

'Save yourself, guide yourself'.

The disciple cried out, 'Master, do not talk philosophy now. I am dying. Please help me.'

The Master just said, 'Stand up', ignored him and walked on. This was too much for the disciple to handle. He shouted out, 'Please help me, I said I am drowning.'

The Master simply turned around and shouted, 'Fool, I said stand up.' The disciple was completely shaken by the very voice of his master and he just stood up. To his surprise he found that the water came only up to his knee level!

You are always asking for help because you think you are getting drowned. Just stand up, water is only up to knee level.

In this sutra Ashtavakra says: Virtue and vice, pleasure and pain are of the mind, not of you. They belong just to this shaft that does not really exist. They are not from your being. Only an enlightened master can boldly declare, you are ever free. Only he can say, there is no virtue and vice, there is no pleasure and pain. It is the people who want to keep you under their control, who will never declare the truth to you.

In almost all the fields a person who wants to keep you a slave, constantly tells you that you are weak in some way. People who want to keep you under their control socially, constantly beat the idea that you are weak.

Even in the film industry, where so much importance is given to looks, a person who wants to keep you under their wing will give you an impression that you are ugly. They project the movie stars in an extraordinarily beautiful way to make you feel that you are not beautiful enough. You would also find that it is normally the cosmetic industries that conduct the beauty contests to constantly promote the idea of beauty, which makes you believe that you are not enough unto yourself. Unless you feel you are not enough, you will not opt for cosmetics.

There is no need to constantly compare your body with some other body. God is not an engineer; he is an artist. If he were an engineer, then he would have made a mold and ordered for one million Ms. Universe models and one million Mr. Universe models to be made and sent to planet earth.

But He is an artist who paints each one of us and carves each one of us. That is why each one of us is unique. The very moment the thought enters your head that someone is more beautiful or more handsome than you, that very moment you create a gap between you and your body.

We can see in our very lives that constantly many us are craving to look like somebody else. The more you try, the more you feel that you are not. The moment you crave to look like someone else, a gap is created between you and your body. Then you start using cosmetic products and start trying all artificial methods to project yourself in a different way than you are. Unless you are given the idea that you are not enough unto yourself, you will not buy these artificial things. You will not help the cosmetic industry sell their products. So people who want to exploit you and sell their products, give you the idea that you are not enough unto yourself.

People who want to enslave us socially, give us the idea that we are weak and that they are necessary to protect us. A person who wants to sell his products, teaches you that you are not enough unto yourself by putting these kinds of ideas in your mind. We forget that we are created by the Divine. We start chiseling ourselves to develop God's work and give it a final touch. We are trying to give a final touch to what He has done. But it cannot be developed any further.

Even in the spiritual field, people who want to keep you under their hold, constantly instill the idea in you that you are not enough and you need to perform various meditations, mantras, pujas etc. so that you will go back to them again and again. In all the three fields - socially, physically and spiritually people try to exploit you by putting the idea in you that you are not enough unto yourself.

Only an enlightened Master such as Ashtavakra can liberate us from all these bondages. He has no vested interest, which is the reason that he straightaway gives us the truth with such honesty. Honestly, I have never found straight truths like the ones in Ashtavakra Gita.

In my opinion, even when Krishna gives his teachings in the Bhagavad Gita, it is because of an ulterior motive - to convince Arjuna to fight. Actually the entire gist of the Bhagavad Gita is narrated in just the two sloka in the beginning, in the second chapter, when Krishna begins to talk. But the entire Gita consists of seven hundred sloka delivered by Krishna to Arjuna, in order to explain the supreme truth. In one of the chapters, Arjuna declares that he is more confused at the end than he was before asking Krishna to talk. Krishna talks continuously in seventeen chapters until Arjuna becomes completely tired and frustrated and surrenders to Krishna.

Some times when you torture people with your talk, they go out and praise you to others, so that others can also experience the torture and suffering.

Let me tell you an experience that happened to me. When I went to San Jose, the devotees there were trying to get me to go on a roller coaster ride. Even though I refused, somehow the devotees finally convinced me to try it. Actually, devotees convincing the master happens more easily than the other way around. Especially the women devotees just stand there and won't let go till they convince you.

Anyway, then I said that first I would go and watch the people getting off the ride. If they seemed to be coming out with joyful expressions on their face, then I would try the roller coaster. When I watched, I could see that the moment the roller coaster stopped, these guys getting off were screaming, shouting and were full of joy. That convinced me and I agreed to go on the next ride.

The first thing that happened when the ride started was, my turban went flying! The ride was a complete churning process, from side to side and up and down. It was a complete churning process. Now I tell people, that a roller coaster ride is just like marriage. Anyone sitting inside wants to jump out and the ones standing outside are tempted to try it at least once.

They had secured me to the seat with a belt and I had no means of escape until the ride was over, just like the belt around one's neck in a marriage. In many parts of Bharat, instead of a wedding ring, a necklace is given to the bride as a token of marriage. In both the cases, the belt is secure and one can't even jump out! After a minute or two, the roller coaster stopped and I was also screaming and shouting. It was then that I understood, that the people getting off were screaming and shouting not out of excitement about the ride, but because of the relief that the ride had stopped and it was over.

When I came out, the other devotees standing by asked me, 'How was the ride, Master?' I said, 'It is really good; go, go, don't miss the ride.' I thought, 'Why should only I suffer, let these guys also go and have the same experience!'

Same way, sometimes when you are tortured in a discourse, you go out and say, 'You can't see another Swami like this. He is so intelligent. Please come tomorrow and listen to his lectures.' You try to bring somebody else to go through the same torture.

Here Arjuna is completely tortured. If somebody recites seven hundred sloka continuously in front of you, what will happen, tell me? But Krishna goes on reciting one after the other, what to do? Finally Arjuna tells Krishna, 'I do not know anything; I have given up. Please do whatever you want to.'

Then finally Krishna recites the Sloka about Surrender:

sarva-dharmān parityajya mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja ahaṁ tvāṁ sarva-pāpebhyo mokṣayiṣyāmi mā śucaḥ

Abandon all varieties of religion and just surrender unto Me. I shall deliver you from all sinful reaction. Do not fear.

Now what else can Arjuna do? Naturally he has to surrender. It is actually a technique. It is a method to make the other person surrender.

But here Ashtavakra has no other ulterior motive. He has only one motive: Janaka has to experience the truth that he has experienced. He has no other reason to speak. All he wanted to do was to transmit the experience, just to share that experience which happened in him.

He is creating the technology, through which Janaka can experience the same thing, which happened in him. That is why I say that Ashtavakra Gita is pure, honest truth. There is nothing in Ashtavakra Gita that could be taken out; that could be edited. Ashtavakra is pure energy and pure truth. That is the reason he is so courageous to declare: Truthfully you are ever free.

He is not playing with words such as your atman is free, you have to do this or that, etc. He says:

Verily you are ever free

You are the one seer of all and really ever free.

Verily this alone is your bondage, that you see the seer as other than such.

When the seer (one who is looking) is affected by the scene, the bondage starts. Please understand, when the seer is affected by the scene, the bondage, the problem starts. Your very being is pure. But the moment you start associating yourself as one other than the seer, the problem starts. This is the only bondage, which you have. There is no other bondage. There is nothing else.

I was telling you in the last chapter, enlightenment - guaranteed, how the bird is afraid and tries to hold on to the stick, thinking that if he lets go of the stick, he may drop and die. He does not realize that if he lets go, he will only fly. In the same way let me tell you: let go, you will only fly. You will never drop and die.

In Vedanta they say, srishti-drishti and drishti-srishti. It is not that the world is there and you see. No, because you see, the world is there. You need to understand that. But the next question that you will immediately ask will be, 'How can you say that Master? I am not the only one who sees it, but the person next to me also sees the same thing. So how can you say that the world exists only because of our seeing?' Be very clear, the world exists just because you are seeing.

Even the modern day psychologists say that you see only what you want to see. Your mind records only two percent of what has happened, only two percent of what is happening around you. You do not see what is happening; you only see in the way you want to see. You choose the two percent and see the way in which you want to see.

Drishti-srishti means that you project in the way that you want to, you connect in the way that you want to and you understand in the way you want to. You neither see things as they happen, nor realize, nor hear things as they are said.

Many times people ask me questions starting with, 'Master, you said this' and misquote me. I tell them, 'Never say, you said; always say, I heard.' Please be very clear, in the gap by the time the word travels from one place to the other, the meaning becomes totally different.

A small story:

In a Christian high school, at the end of twelfth grade all the kids were leaving after a farewell party. The chief nun was enquiring the kids as to what they wanted to become in the future.

She called the first girl and asked, 'What do you want to become?'

She said, 'I want to become a nun and serve God's mission.' The nun said, 'Oh, that's nice, beautiful, you can do it.'

She called the next girl and asked her, 'What do you want to become?'

'I want to become a doctor and serve in our mission hospital, mother.' The mother superior was very happy. She said, 'Yes, that is great.'

She called the third girl and asked 'What do you want to become?'

The girl said, 'I want to become an engineer and serve the mission.' Mother superior was happy.

She called the next girl and asked 'What do you want to become?' She said, 'I'll become a prostitute.'

The Mother fainted and fell and after regaining consciousness, she questioned the girl again. 'What, what, what did you say?'

The girl clearly repeated, 'Prostitute'. Again mother asked, 'What did you say?' Again she said, 'Prostitute'. Again mother superior fainted. After few minutes when she regained consciousness and asked the girl, 'Tell me clearly, what did you say?' The girl said loud and clear, 'Prostitute'.

The Mother then heaved a sigh of relief and said, 'Oh god, I thought you said protestant.'

Understand, you listen to only what you want to listen to, and not to what is said. In the same way, you only see what you want to see; you do not see what is.

When the seer is affected by the scene, the scene can never be the reality. When the seer is affected by the scene, the reality can never be seen. That is what Ashtavakra emphasizes here: when you start seeing yourself other than the seer, you are affected.