Prabhaker

Immigrants to make up HALF of London population in 15 years http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/631471/London-population-immigration-migrants-infrastructure-strain

When a rich person comes to spirituality, he has money, he has employment, he has a house, he has health—he has everything that one can have. And suddenly he has come to a realization that nothing is fulfilling. Then the search for something higher starts. Yes, sometimes a poor man can also be spiritual, but for that very great intelligence is needed. I am talking about Buddha himself. Are these Buddhist monks wiser than Buddha ? Buddha was a prince, he had everything. He left his kingdom to find the last, ultimate luxury. When your bodily needs are fulfilled, psychological needs arise. When your psychological needs are also fulfilled, then your spiritual needs arise. When a person has listened to all the music that is available in the world, and has seen all the beauty, and has found that it is all dream; has listened to all the great poets, and has found that it is just a way to forget yourself, just a way to intoxicate yourself, but it does not lead you anywhere; has seen all the paintings and the great art—amusing, entertaining, but then what…? Then hands remain empty, more empty than they ever were before. Spirituality is luxury—the last, ultimate luxury. A rich man, if he is not spiritual, is stupid. A poor man, if he is spiritual , is tremendously intelligent. Those Buddhist monks are escapists, they may know about techniques to reach meditation but meditation is not their experience. Meditation is a luxury , meditation makes life a celebration.

You are correct , for most of the people it is not ultimate truth. Most of the people are obsessed with food, money, power, domination, sex. Even on their deathbed this obsession continues.

If you attempt to break anybody's sleep, he will take revenge on you.

Yes, watch , don't judge, don't resist. Don’t do anything unconsciously.

I was talking about enlightened masters. Unless a spiritual teacher becomes famous, how will his message spread ?

@Alex4 When you are counting your breaths, you are using your mind. By counting you are concentrating , not meditating. This is something to be understood. Either you can think or you can watch your breathing. You can't do both together. Breathing and thinking are such processes that only one can exist in you -- in awareness. In unawareness, both can continue: you can go on breathing and you can go on thinking. But if you become aware, either you can think or you can breathe; and when you breathe with awareness, thinking disappears. Your whole consciousness becomes focused on breathing. And breathing is such a simple process: you need not do it, it is already happening. You can just bring your consciousness to it. If thinking appears, watching disappears. When you have become alert enough to watch your thoughts and let them disappear through watching, then move to feeling -- which is even more subtle.

There are mystics who are enlightened but illiterate , they know nothing about worldly affairs, never become famous and teach others.

Over 2000 women killed in India for practicing 'black magic' in 14 years http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/over-2000-women-killed-in-india-for-practicing-black-magic-in-14-years/1/696147.html

I talked with them many times, asked many things about meditation and other paths.

I live in India, I have met many mystics who live in remote areas and small villages, who can see past and future and have many other capabilities. Most of them live in poverty, never demand money. In big cities most of them are cheats, fake. I have fallen back many times from states of higher consciousness.

Drugs are as old as humanity itself, and they certainly fulfill something of immense value. The drugs are capable to give you a hallucinatory experience beyond the mundane world. Meditation brings you to the real experience. To meditate is difficult. The drug is cheap. But the attraction for drugs is spiritual. And now we have more advanced drugs, synthetically made, and we are capable to purify them more. We can make drugs which have no bad effects at all. We can make drugs which are not addictive. And we can teach people how to move from drug to meditation. Just to talk about meditation remains simply verbal. There is no way through the words to give you any experience. But drugs are immensely useful. The words can explain to you what meditation is, the drug can give you an hallucinatory experience of it. And then you can be initiated into a method. And now you will not be moving in darkness. Now you know that something… if an ordinary drug can do so much, then there must be some way to find an authentic transformation, to experience it without any dependence on anything. Under proper guidance drugs can be of immense help. I am against drugs because if they become addictive then they will be the most destructive for your journey towards the self.

We are rewiring the way our brain works but meditation is much more than that. Beyond mind, there is an awareness and there is no experiment up to now which has found any center in the brain which corresponds to awareness. Meditation is to make you aware of all that is mind and disidentify yourself with it.

Right now, you can't do both , you have to concentrate on your lectures. The ability to concentrate is useful, of course, useful — for others. Useful in scientific inquiry, useful in business, useful in the market, useful in politics. Concentration is a tense state of mind; you will never be relaxed. If you meditate. first concentration will disappear and you will be feeling a little at a loss. But if you go on, by and by you will attain to an unfocused state — that’s what meditation is. Once meditation is attained. concentration is child’s play — whenever you need to, you can concentrate. There will be no problem about it and it will be easy and without any tension.

Needs can be fulfilled, but desires cannot be. Nobody has been ever able to fulfill his ambitions. Desires do not die with fulfillment. Desire fulfilled only for a moment gives you a relief, and that relief has also to be understood. In the moment of a fulfilled desire there is relief. There is relief because in that small moment you are desireless. Desirelessness is joy. When one desire is fulfilled and before the mind projects another desire, between the two there is a small interval when there is no desire. That moment is of meditation.

Self-inquiry is mainly known today through the teachings of Ramana Maharshi. It is an ancient method of meditation, but full of dangers. Unless you are alert, the greater possibility is that you will be led astray by the method rather than to the right goal. Raman used to give a technique to his disciples: they were just to enquire, “Who am I?” If you want to go rightly into the method, then the question has not to be verbally asked. “Who am I?” has not to be repeated verbally. Because as long as it remains a verbal question, you will supply a verbal answer from the head. You have to drop the verbal question. It has to remain just a vague idea, just like a thirst. Not that “I am thirsty,”—can you see the difference? When you are thirsty, you feel the thirst. And if you are in a desert, you feel the thirst in every fiber of your body. You don’t say, “I am thirsty, I am thirsty.” It is no longer a linguistic question, it is existential. If “Who am I?” is an existential question, if you are not asking it in language but instead the feeling of the question is settling inside your center, then there is no need for any answer. Then it is none of the mind’s business.The mind will not hear that which is non-verbal, and the mind will not answer that which is non-verbal. Raman Maharshi, used only this method for his disciples: “Who am I?” But they are nowhere near the ultimate experience. And the reason is because they know the answer already.

@quantum Ramana Maharshi’s whole system of meditation was based on self inquiry. He used to say, “There is only one form of meditation, and that is to ask yourself, ‘Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?’’’ He would say, “Put all the energy that you possess, put your whole life’s energy at stake in asking just this one question, ‘Who am I?’ Ask this question as if your life depended on it. Let each and every cell of your body cry out for this answer. And go on asking this question, but don’t give any answers, because all the answers you give will be false. Let the answer come by itself, don’t give the answer. You are always in such a hurry to supply the answer, and all your answers born out of your hurry are false – because such answers are already present in your head even before the question has been asked.” Ask, “Who am I?” but don’t give any answer. Use all your energy in asking the question, and don’t save any of it for answering – because your answer does not have any value. Your answer will be something which you have heard somewhere or the sayings of some sages or from your social conditioning. It will be like dust which has gathered on you from the outside: it will have no value. Ask as if you do not have any answer left to give. In your process of asking the question, all your answers should have dropped away and only the question should be left. And the day that only your question remains, your question will shoot like an arrow into your innermost self – because then there aren’t any answers on the periphery to stop it. Then, you will travel inwards, then you know. But that knowing is not an answer: it is an existential experience.

Language has its limitations, we can't do anything about it. When a wave appears in the sea, it can think it exists, still it is sea, not separate.

Enlightenment remembrance of that which is already there. You have forgotten who you are. The only thing that has to be done is that you have to remember who you are. The question is only of remembering.

The great cosmic joke is that you are what you are seeking.

If you want to be enlightened, you have to die a psychological death. You have to be reborn as a new spiritual being, and you don't know anything about spirituality. All that you know about yourself is your mind, centered around the ego. It is not so cheap, to reach to the ultimate realization of truth. You will have to create the path by walking yourself; the path is not ready-made. Enlightenment also needs you to be ready to be killed.

It is a mystery. Mystery means there is no way to solve it, whatever you do is going to fail. Rather, live it -- drop solving. Perhaps through living you will come to an understanding. But that will not be the answer, it will be more than the answer; it will be an alive experience. You will have become part of the mystery itself. Great courage and patience is needed. It the greatest gamble you can play.

Mind will try to convince you that, “With me is safety, security; with me you are living under a shelter, well guarded. I take every care of you. With me you are efficient". It is just like the staff of a blind man. The blind man needs the staff just to grope his way because he does not have eyes. But when you have eyes you can drop it. A staff cannot be a substitute for eyes: it is just a groping in the dark. A blind man needs it, and it is helpful.

You can know it through logic, words, language. You can live it. Something can be said about enlightenment but it whatever said will not be enough.

MIND IS A DISEASE. This is a basic truth the East mysticism has discovered. The West says mind can become ill, can be healthy. Western psychology depends on this: the mind can be healthy or ill. But the East says mind as such is the disease, it cannot be healthy. No psychiatry will help; at the most you can make it normally ill. End of the mind is enlightenment.