HOW THE MIND WORKS🔗

How does the mind work? The diagram shows how the information that enters through the eye is processed; actually, not just the information through the eye but information through all the five senses, that is through the nose, the ears, the tongue, touch and the eye. As an example, we are now taking the eye. Let me explain it to you.

When you see something, first, the eye sees it. There is something called chakshu in Sanskrit, which digitizes the information seen by the eye. It is something like a digital signal processor – the DSP. The signal or the input is converted into a digital file by this chakshu. As I said earlier, this conversion happens to the information received through all five senses, not just the eye.

Then the file goes to the memory - chitta. In the memory, a little more work is done on the file. It analyses the file received through the process of elimination as the first step to identify what has been received. For example, if you are seeing me now, the file is processed through the chakshu and taken to the chitta, memory. The memory starts analyzing it. It starts saying, 'This is not an animal, this is not a plant, this is not a rock,...' It does the process of elimination.

Then the file goes to the mind or manas. The mind does the job of identification. It concludes, 'This is a human being, a human being who is teaching a class.' The mind concludes, 'This is it.'

Next, the whole file takes a quantum leap to the ego and your ego decides to act based on your past experiences. If you have stored past experiences with similar classes, say yoga or meditation, and they have been alright for you, you will decide to sit here, or else you will think it is better to move on!

Let us go through the process again. The first step is you seeing me. The eye passes the information to the chakshu. The chakshu converts it to a digital signal. The memory then does the elimination work on the file – 'This is not…', 'This is not…' Then, the mind does the identification of the file – 'This is it.' Then the whole file takes a quantum jump to the ego. In this zone of stored memories, you decide whether to sit here or leave.

I always give this example to understand the process of elimination versus that of identification:

Let us say that you want to find the word 'Home' in the dictionary. You start from the letter 'A' and you eliminate: not A, not B, not C, until you come to the letter 'H'. Until you come to the letter 'H', it is only an elimination process. Once you come to 'H', it is an identification process. You start identifying 'HO', then 'HOM', and then you come to 'HOME'. Even in the identification process, there is elimination, but that cannot be considered elimination, because your whole attitude is different during this time. Until you come to 'H', you don't even look at anything; you only eliminate. Once you come to 'H', 'H' becomes a standpoint. Then you start looking for HO, HOM, etc. There is a difference in your attitude in the identification process when compared to your attitude during the elimination process.

It is like this: you have thousands of files stored in your mind. Now let us say that you are seeing me. You will first start eliminating: this is not a stone, this is not a tree, this is not an animal. Then you come to man and say, 'This is a man.' Once you come to man, you start identifying me: six feet tall, saffron clothed, talking about meditation, my master, THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM! So, you are eliminating until you find the right classification. That is the first step. Going in-depth into that classification to identify what is seen, is the next step. Elimination is breadth, identification is depth. The elimination process is like handling many files. The identification process is like going deeply into a specific file.

The process between the eye and the mind is logical and conscious. You are completely aware of this process. Now, the quantum leap from the mind to the ego is mostly unconscious. That is the time when actual decisions are made and is mostly an unconscious process for you. It happens without your awareness. During this time, you simply decide illogically; you decide against your logical thought process. You make an illogical decision.

Why does this happen? Why do you decide unconsciously and regret it later?

The reason is that this unconscious zone is filled with restlessness and negative memories. All of your past memories, which we call samskaras in Sanskrit, are stored in this zone as different files. In the field of psychology the word engrams is used to denote these stored memories. There are so many of these files stored in this zone. Without any logical connection between each other, these memories or incidents are stored together here.

What happens is that when the incoming information takes a quantum leap to this zone, the heavy data stored here causes so much restlessness in you that the incoming file does not even reach the ego properly for a decision. The stored engrams just start playing on the information received. They just impose themselves and cause havoc in the decision making process. As a result, the ego makes a hasty decision purely from an instinct level, and passes the file back. It happens as an unconscious process.

For example, according to the data that you have collected, you know that smoking is injurious to your health; it is not good for your body or your mind. But once the mind takes the leap to the ego, the engrams just instruct you to smoke; you simply decide to smoke! The conscious process says, 'No, it is not good for my health'. But the unconscious process says…actually it doesn't even say, it just makes the decision and you execute it!

It is because of your engrams that you repent what you have done and regret your decisions most of the time. You wonder, 'Why did I behave in that fashion? This is not me! How did I allow this to happen? How did I make that decision?' This happens because the unconscious mind that is filled with all your samskaras has emotional attachments to your memories. If you only remember the past in a detached way, you learn from it and the resulting intelligence is used to make better decisions in the future. But if there are positive or negative emotional attachments associated with your memory, what happens? You are not able to see anything objectively. You look at the present through the tinted glasses of the past, tinted by the memories of the emotions that you went through when so-called similar incidents happened in the past. You are not able to look at this incident as a fresh and new moment of your life.

The NSP is all about going deeply in and cleaning your deep-rooted samskaras that are controlling and playing havoc with your life. We will understand in depth about the various layers or energy bodies that we have and which emotion or samskara each of them is ruled by. This intellectual understanding along with the actual cleansing of the samskaras is the essence of the NSP.

THE HEALING EFFECT OF THIS PROGRAM

The NSP has a complete healing effect at the physical, mental and spiritual levels. People come and ask me how I heal through meditation. Please understand: I do not heal through my physical body. It is my presence that heals. When the sun rises, the lotus blooms by itself. The sun does not go and open the petals of the lotus. Similarly, in the presence of the master, healing happens. Be very clear that healing is not done; it happens.

I can heal your body, since it is in my presence. In the same way, if you open your mind too, it can be healed. In the NSP, that's what we do - opening of minds. You are asked to write down about yourself - about your pains, desires, guilt and pleasures. You will not be showing these to anyone else. It is for you, to know clearly what your deeply embedded samskaras are.

During the NSP, people ask me why I have them write down all this since they are neither expected to show them to me nor to each other. Understand: by writing it all down, you are opening your mind in my presence. You are opening your mind and hence I can heal your mind. If you open your wounds, the sun can heal them. Similarly if you can open your mind, the energy will heal all the wounds.

NSP opens up your energy layers one by one. Your pains, pleasures, guilt and desires are opened up. Once these open up and get healed, you experience a glimpse of God within you. At the end of the program, you don't even have to search for God, your mind will be so clear and relaxed that you will realize that God is already within you and is not something separate from you.

START RELATING WITH REALITY

There are seven energy layers or bodies in us.

You need to understand three things.

The first thing is that it is because of these layers that you are not relating with reality as it is. The mystics always say, 'The world is God. God is everything. Whatever you see is God. Everything is God.' But we don't experience everything as God. We always see everything as evil! We always think, 'Everyone is trying to exploit us. Everyone is trying to enter into our territory. Everyone is trying to disturb us.' So what the mystics say is one thing, and what we feel is a totally different thing. Why do we feel this way? It is because we are not able to relate with reality as it is.

So the first thing you need to understand is that because you are not experiencing these layers as you should be experiencing them, they just become a cancer. Whenever something is not becoming a part of your being, it becomes a separate growth, a cancerous growth.

Unless you express, unless you start living these layers, you will never have the satisfaction that you have lived. Because, if the major portion of your life is unlived, you will never have the satisfaction in your life - not only in spiritual life, but also in the material world.

THE POWER OF VISUALIZATION

One more thing: we will be working with so many techniques related to visualization; you will be asked to visualize so many things. Generally, we have a very deep disrespect for visualization. We always think, 'Oh… with my imagination, what can I achieve?' Understand: your whole life is nothing but your visualization. Your whole life is nothing but your imagination! So, it's like using one thorn to remove another thorn. If one thorn enters your foot, you take another thorn and remove it with the other thorn, don't you? In the same way, so much of imagination has entered without your knowledge, without your consciousness. To remove this, conscious imagination is going to be put into you and the process will be done. So, whenever meditation instructions are given, just put your total energy into making them happen. Don't bother about your opinion of them.

THE I NSPIRATION FOR THE NSP

The person who creates a formula to re-create his experience of the outer world is a scientist. For example, Newton created the law of gravity. He had a certain experience. When he saw the apple falling from the tree, he had a certain experience. So he created a formula to reproduce the same understanding about gravity for others.

A person who creates a formula for others to understand the experiences of the outer world or the things of the outer world is a scientist. A person who creates a formula to reproduce the experiences of the inner world is a master! Understand: a person who creates a formula to reproduce the things of the outer world is a scientist. A person who creates a formula to reproduce the inner world experiences is a master. This whole program is a formula created by me to reproduce certain experiences that happened in me a few years back. So we will see what those experiences were and how this formula appeared.

First, we will see how this experience happened in me, and second, how this formula will reproduce the same thing in you. Unless we understand these two things clearly, we will not be able to work with the formula.

DEATH IN MY PRESENCE - BEFORE ENLIGHTENMENT

The whole motivation for the NSP came out of two incidents in my life.

The first one happened before enlightenment.

It was probably in the year 1999. I was in Varanasi – Kasi. There was an elderly sannyasi – a very old sannyasi suffering from cancer. He was in the hospital, in the Intensive Care Unit.

I had the responsibility of taking care of him. He was a great sannyasi, but not an enlightened person. He was a great

tapasvi – a spiritual seeker undertaking severe asuterities. Everyday I used to bring him food, take care of his needs and stay in the hospital.

One day, the person in the third bed from him was slowly passing away; he was dying. I was just sitting on the bed and watching the whole thing. The doctors were standing around him. They were trying their best to help, but they were not able to do anything.

Even though I was not enlightened at that time, I had had my conscious experience of death by that time - one of the most wonderful spiritual experiences I had ever had. Because of that, I was able to see what exactly was happening to him.

Slowly, he started suffering and struggling. First, he started suffering tremendous pain in the physical body. His face started showing the pain. Next, he became breathless. He started inhaling and exhaling erratically. I was able to see very clearly the pain and the agony. The pain was what it would be like if one thousand scorpions were stinging him at the same time. His whole consciousness was being torn. Just imagine… if we cut our little finger with a blade, how much pain we experience! Now imagine… his six-foot body was as if it was literally being cut into pieces along its length. Imagine the suffering!

I was able to experience the pain, the agony, the feeling which he was undergoing. Of course, slowly, very slowly, he started moving away from the physical body.

Even though it is a little difficult to receive this whole thing logically, even if it is a little difficult to understand this intellectually, this is what really happened. Understanding this whole thing is like working with a formula like X x 2 = 4. To understand the formula, to understand how to solve it, first we assume some value for X. First we assume that X = 2. Then, we put 2 in the place of X. Then we understand: 2 x 2 is 4. Once the answer is right, we know X is 2. Until the calculation is done, we have to have a little patience. But when I say, let us assume X = 2, immediately if we start raising the question, 'No, why not 3? Why not 1? Why not 4?' we will not be able to proceed at all. Even if we understand it as a hypothesis, it is enough. At the end of the calculation, we will be able to understand how this whole thing happens. It is the same with what I am sharing with you. It may be difficult to understand it logically, but just relax and take it as a hypothesis for now.

I was able to see and experience the tremendous pain and agony of that being. It was an excruciating pain and deep suffering. The being started moving from the physical body to the pranic layer, which is the second layer body. The Pranic layer is our breathing energy.

All these seven bodies are seven energies or energy layers of our being. When the being started moving towards the pranic layer, again there was deep suffering! Our prana shareera – breath body - is filled with all our desires. Our breathing and our desires are very closely related. If we change our breathing, our desires can be changed. Our desires and breathing are very closely related. So, when the energy was moving into the pranic layer, all the desires of the being started coming up. The being started suffering with all the unfulfilled desires.

Then, when the being started moving towards the next level body, all the guilt started rising - 'Oh! I should have lived that way, I should have lived in this way, etc.' In this fashion, slowly, the being moved layer by layer and finally died. I saw the whole death happening right in front of my eyes. I was able to see the whole process of death very clearly. But I was not able to help in any way. I was not enlightened at that time. I was not able to help. I just witnessed the suffering. But the pain created in me just by seeing the suffering itself was too much.

I started feeling a pain similar to what we might experience if we witness a nasty accident on the road. What will happen? Will we be able to eat for the next two days? If we see a terrible accident on the road, will we be able to eat soon after that? No! It was the same kind of feeling for me. In an accident, we see only one body. But I was able to see all the seven layers, all the seven bodies. Then imagine the pain I felt. The pain became so deeply engraved in me. It was recorded in my being so deeply that I was not able to eat or sleep for the next three to four days. Anyhow, after a few days, I Ieft Varanasi and wandered further.

DEATH IN MY PRESENCE - AFTER ENLIGHTENMENT

I continued with the tapas and after about a year, became enlightened. Then, driven by the will of Existence, I came down to South Bharat. I stayed there for one or two years. It was around that time that again, I had one more opportunity to see death happening in front of my eyes.

Again I saw the second death in a hospital, and in an Intensive Care Unit. This second person did not suffer at all. He simply passed away, moving through one layer after another seamlessly. I was surprised. I asked his relatives if he was a highly spiritual person. They said that he was far from it; he probably never went to a temple all his life. Nor did he meditate or do anything remotely related to spirituality. I started analyzing, 'Why did the first person suffer and why did the second person not suffer?'

The death that I saw in Varanasi was so painful; there are no words to describe it fully. But the death that I saw the second time was so different! I saw that the person neither experienced pain nor did he have any suffering. He was moving beautifully from the first body to the second layer, to the third layer, to the fourth layer and so on! Like how a ball rolls in the snow, just like that his being was moving! I was surprised. As I was watching, his being slowly moved away and just disappeared. He became enlightened! He was liberated.

When I was pondering over these two incidents, suddenly the truth jumped up: the second man left his body in the presence of an enlightened being. That was the reason why he left the body painlessly. When the first person was dying, as I told you earlier, I was not enlightened; I had only had a conscious death experience myself. So, my presence did not in any way influence his death. Whereas, when the second man left his body, I was there in his presence and the very enlightened energy caused him to leave the body easily.

No sooner did this revelation happen than did the means to design a program for human beings to leave the body painlessly and consciously come up! That is the formula based on which the NSP is done today.

MY OWN DEATH EXPERIENCE

Let me narrate to you my own conscious death experience in Varanasi. Let me describe exactly what happened within me when I had my experience with this technique. I always used to think that I should have an experience of death, that I should face death directly. But somehow, that thought never became a priority.

Any thought has to become the topmost priority, only then the corresponding experience can happen; it should not just be in one corner of your mind.

Usually on our 'to do' lists, we have washing, cleaning, paying the rent and phone bill, and finally if time permits, enlightenment also! And if time permits, meditation also. No! Enlightenment will not happen if it is this way. Only when it becomes a top priority, only when the urge becomes urgent, everything around you will start aligning itself for the experience to happen in you. And this is the case not just with enlightenment. With anything, it is true. Understand: if you are complaining that what you wish would happen is not happening, it is because it has not become the topmost item on your priority list, nothing else. Nothing else and no one else should be blamed for it. You will see that the moment it becomes the topmost priority, there will be an energy play that comes into being and it will simply happen. Until then, it will wait for you, that's all.

A small story:

One man goes to the doctor and says, 'Doctor I tried to commit suicide by taking 1000 aspirins.'

The doctor asks, 'But what happened?'

The man replies, 'After taking two, I felt better and I stopped.'

Understand: only when the desire is in the absolute top position on the priority list, the experience can be achieved. The death experience was not my top priority and so somehow, it was getting postponed.

In my wandering days, I had been to Varanasi, the holy city for Hindus. It has the largest floating population in the world. Per day nearly 300,000 people enter the city and leave. Further, per day, 300 dead bodies are burnt in a place called Manikarnika Ghat on the banks of the sacred river Ganga. It is traditionally believed that if somebody dies or somebody's body is burnt in that area, they will be liberated; they will have direct enlightenment. It is not just a traditional belief. Ramakrishna confirms it with his own experience. He says, 'I saw very clearly, Mahadeva (Shiva) himself going near every burning body, taking the soul, unclutching it from the body-mind and liberating it!' So you can't say that it is a mythological belief; it is a solid experience.

I had the fortune of going to Manikarnika Ghat. Traditionally, it is not only believed, but it is true, that for the last 2000 years, the fire that is used to light pyres has never been put off.

Whether it rains or shines or there are floods, people never bring fire when they come with a dead body to Manikarnika Ghat. The fire will already be burning and they will just take it from there and light the dead body, that's all. The fire has never gone out. It just continuously burns the bodies as they arrive. Sometimes I would see that two to three bodies are burnt at the same time, so many bodies keep coming!

Especially in the evenings, the bodies will be more in number. From near the place where the person dies, they will start walking, carrying the dead body, chanting mantras such as, 'Ram naam satya hai, Ram naam satya hai' (It means Rama's name is the ultimate and eternal truth). By evening, they will reach Manikarnika Ghat.

The scene there, the very experience of just being there, I cannot describe to you verbally; only you have to be there to experience it. To tell you honestly, the fear of death just disappeared from my system. You see so many bodies continuously being burned every day. You feel, 'I am also going to go like this one day, alright', that's all! You feel there are so many people giving you company! It's like one more trip that you make, that's all; you don't feel lonely about death at all.

In your life, if you see maybe one or two bodies being burnt, then you will still have the fear of death. But in that place, there will be no ritual done. They will bring the body and straightaway dip it in the river Ganga three times while chanting, 'Ram naam satya hai, Ram naam satya hai, Ram naam satya hai'. By this time, the fire will be ready, and the wood will be arranged. They will bring the body straight from the water and burn it, that's all!

One strange thing you can see there, none of the relatives will stay there and do any further rituals. The moment they dip the body in the Ganga, they will place the body for burning there and go away, that's all! The people who maintain things there will take care of the rest. You will not know how long it will take for the body that you brought to be burnt completely. There will be a queue and bodies will be burning continuously.

I thought to myself, 'Let me try to sit here and see what goes on.' I sat. In just an hour's time, I felt that death is no more a strange incident which happens once in a while only for some relative or friend. I was watching bodies arriving one after another. It was like: ok, next, next, that's all. Different sizes, genders, ages, communities, of people arrived to be consumed by the same burning flame.

When you continuously see dead bodies being burnt, you actually lose respect for death! Now you have too much of respect, too many ideas about death. That is the problem. It is actually nothing but this: the breath that goes inside the body doesn't come out, that's all. Nothing much can be done about it. Neither you can rewind it nor fast forward it.

As I was watching this scene continuously, initially the little fear that I had for death also disappeared and slowly it became interesting to watch. I went near the people who maintain the fire and started helping them. As I was helping them, I was thinking to myself, 'After all, this body of mine is also going to become like this one day.'

When you remember that death is going to happen to you, the respect that you carry for your ego will come down. Because, whenever you think that something should not leave you, it is just the ego, nothing else. When you know for sure that everything is going to leave you, then the respect for the ego just drops drastically. The respect I had for my ego dropped at that moment.

Then I decided, 'After all I am going to die. Either I should have a conscious death experience now itself and live the rest of my life without the death-fear, or really die, that's all.' But I decided that I have to see the death happening to me one way or the other. There was a small Shiva temple around the corner and a small tower above the temple. I went and sat in that tower so that nobody would disturb me.

I sat in that tower and from there I started seeing the dead bodies being burnt.

I still remember the strong click that triggered the whole experience that was to follow an elderly lady's body being burnt. She had a big belly; the cloth was consumed by the fire and the fat that was in the belly started melting and flowing. Sorry for describing this so vividly! I could see clearly that because of the fat flowing, the fire was burning with full momentum. That

gave a very strong click to me and I said, 'God! Yes, the same thing is going to happen to this body also. Let it happen!'

That click opened up a deep fear of death inside me. The fear spread all over the body, but I faced it consciously. I could see very clearly, the fear spreading all over the body, and when the fear met my awareness, when it hit my awareness, that became the death experience. I went through a conscious experience of my own death, and came out of it.

Whenever your fear is suppressed, it stays inside you as a suppressed fear. Whenever it comes out and you are not consciously facing it, it becomes a fear stroke, and shakes your whole nervous system and breaks it down. If it is faced consciously, it becomes the death experience, that's all!

If you just escape from the death-fear, when the fear happens, it becomes death. When you face it consciously, it becomes death experience.

Death-fear not expressed plus unconsciousness is suppression.

Death-fear expressed plus unconsciousness is a nervous breakdown.

Death-fear expressed plus conscious awareness is the death experience!

I have given a clear equation now. Understand again:

Death-fear plus unconscious-ness, is suppression or perversion.

Death-fear plus unconscious-ness means, you don't suppress but you don't face it either. You just get shaken, frightened, have a fear stroke, or a nervous breakdown.

Death-fear plus conscious awareness is a death experience.

I was able to see very clearly, the fear that arose. When I faced it consciously with awareness, it became my death experience. The body was dead; it was not moving.

For two and a half days I had no food, no water, no thought, no question, no doubt. The body was there. Only after the experience had passed, I realized that I had been like that for two and a half days! I could see with closed eyes that the body was dead, and there was no movement. Suddenly, after two and a half days, the click happened again, 'God! The body is dead but I still exist! I am there!' That clarity, when it clicked, became such intense ecstasy in me. The fear of death left me once and for all.

I was in such deep ecstasy, such joy, such bliss. I slowly opened my eyes and I was able to move the body. The first thing I felt was such a surge of ecstasy and gratitude. I went down to the

Ganga, sprinkled a little Ganga water on myself, took the Ganga water in the kamandalu (small water pot that I used to carry, as wandering monks do), took a little ash from the fire, and went straight to the Kasi Vishwanath temple. I went up to the Shiva linga, offered the ash I had brought, did the puja. It was done with such inexpressible gratitude. I saw that Vishwanath was alive there.

Understand, because I died Vishwanatha became alive! Until the day before that, because I was still alive, Vishwanatha was always an ordinary stone. I had always felt that to touch this stone, 300,000 people are coming everyday from so far away… what foolishness!

You see, when you touch the deity yourself, you will tend to lose respect for it. In South Bharat, you can't touch the deities in the temples. But in North Bharat, you can touch it yourself and do the offering. Anyhow, I always felt that the Vishwanatha deity was an ordinary stone. I felt that way because I was still alive. When I died, I saw clearly, He is alive! Only one can be alive, either Him or you. When you see the Truth, He will become alive. You will not be alive anymore as you now think.

The fear of death left me once and for all. I can say that this is one of the very strong experiences that transformed me to search for the ultimate experience of enlightenment.