To enter into the quiet

stop in yourself the breathing kriya has to be repeated – to help one to arrive at meditation.

The use of kriyas, techniques consciously done and repeated, is required to arrive at being present, to arrive at being conscious of being present, to arrive at being in the presence of your Self. So have no hesitation to use the breathing. If you are already quiet, it will only enhance the quietness, it will help you further to deepen the quietness.

There may come a moment when you may feel a tightening of the breath: it is when the breath is in so to speak. And when the breath is in you are in.

So breathe that you may arrive in your self—ten minutes. It will rejuvenate the whole of your being; it will bring you to a rest in yourself; it will bring you to being centred. It will bring you to being conscious and in the presence of your self—and from there to the awakening to one’s self.

Feel for the quietness in yourself as you breathe in and out. Where your attention is, there you will be, there you will arrive. So through the breath and from the breath your attention will carry you to arriving in the presence of your self.

It will intoxicate you and awaken you to your self.

Meditation is the priority of your life—prayer and meditation. Your work, your activities is prayer; your meditation is prayer. When you are with yourself you are in prayer, you are reaching out to God and God is reaching out to you. Feel for it. It is the truth of your existence and in that you are one with God and all things.

Feel for it, be conscious of it – then a moment will arrive when it is a reality to you.

Whatever one does in one’s life, let it be a worship unto God, unto one’s self. Feel for the joy in whatever you do, a joy that is reaching out to God, to divinity. You will be touched. Then all your works, all your activities will be a freedom, joy divine.

You and your activities are not different. They are you in movement. So let your activities exalt you, lift you, reach you to profundity. Be conscious. Your works, your activities is meditation. So rejoice. They are the festivals of your being. Let them be your celebration.

When you sit with yourself feel for your depth—there is no limit to your depth. When you sit with yourself, feel for your heights—there is no limit to your heights. Come alive in yourself; reach for the profundity of your Self. You are all there is to be known!

You are the beginning, you are the end—yet an end that is endless…

And I tell you, all this you can arrive at through your breath. It will carry you to your freedom. So breathe for it is your life, a life that is reaching out to its own fulfilment.

Be exalted. Through the breath the quiet space, the quiet stop; and through the quiet stop to exaltation. Through the exaltation the unfolding of the Reality which is your Self. Rejoice and be celebrated. Then your life will reach to the heavens and the earth shall worship you.

So breathe that you may be free. You are free now—each time you breathe you are freer, your freedom increases. All of life is a process of increasing freedom. Be conscious of your freedoms. But remember, with increasing freedom comes increasing responsibility. There is always a catch somewhere!!!

Increasing responsibilities bring you to increasing dignity and increasing sacredness—which is exaltation. You have arrived at Godliness. Then in sacred Godliness you will walk hand in hand on this earth.

So feel for your breath. Then through the breath, through the increasing of the breath, increase yourself by arriving at being present, in the presence of your Self. To begin with it may be only a moment that you may be in the presence of yourself. Continue. That moment will increase; it is the law of existence. When you pursue something, your achievement of it increases proportionate to your pursuance, and that pursuance is an adventure.

The more you seek the more you shall find. Seek it in all things; seek it in all acts. Seek it in your works, seek it in your breath, seek it in the wind, seek in the streams, seek it in the stone… Be conscious and you will find.

And the more you find, the more the seeking – the more the seeking, the more the finding—endless. And with others seeking with you it can become a festival—if you allow for it.

And in moments of struggle see them for what they are. Be conscious. Through the understanding go beyond: arrive at being present. Being more than the situation, the victory will be yours.

Then you will laugh to and at yourself and rejoice. And when you laugh at yourself the whole world will laugh with you. Then you truly laugh.

Learn to laugh at the situation. But of course, remember a ‘footnote’—one must know when to laugh… Most times the situation laughs at us. Can we laugh at the situation? It is easy when it is easy; it is difficult when it is difficult—at that time the situation is laughing at us! Remember this when next time you find the situation difficult.

I will give you an example from personal experience. The cricket match is on and it is a very crucial moment—and the light goes off! You run to the generator and the generator does not start—crisis! (Laughing:) You pull at the generator again and again and you wonder where all the energy comes from suddenly – and if the generator does not start… You throw a fit! The situation is laughing at you, at your discomfort! You are desperate; you jump up and down, you scream at the generator. The situation laughs even louder! And you lose all your awareness for you are so involved in your desperation! And if you were to look at the generator I tell you, you would see it laughing at you!!

It is amazing how things like this happen. At other times it can start so easy, but at that time, especially when it knows you are desperate…  These are uncanny situations I tell you—they teach you a lot. The things that bother you most, they happen… the most!

At that moment if we could present ourselves in our presence, laughter would come at the beauty of the situation—and suddenly the generator starts, and you find the light has also come back! Abundance!

How to make the difficult easy… Then there is genuine laughter, genuine festivity: you have transformed the situation. Then the situation will laugh with you. It is better that you both laugh rather than the situation alone laughing at you!

I wish we could be Masters of humour, so that we could bring it at will. And that is why the situations are opportunities: so that you may be a Master in any situation. Who prevents it? It is one’s self. And who can bring it about? It is one’s Self. If you allow the situation to be more than you, then it will laugh at you.

Each time there is a bigger situation so that you may increase.  This is the skill. This is what Krsna says in the Gita, ‘Yogaha Karmasu Kaushalam’—Yoga is skill in action: how to overcome. Not to beat the generator black-and-blue because at the moment it is how you feel, so you would like to do it—but then the generator would never work! Through skill then—the skill of transformation.

When you are in an easy state everything is easy, when you are in a difficult state suddenly you find everything is difficult. The lights go off, the generator does not work… the Indian team starts losing! There is a shortage of everything suddenly! And even the stock market crashes—then you take to the Himalayas! (Uproarious laughter) Suddenly you remember about enlightenment!!!

So through the breath you can overcome, because it will remind you to present yourself to your Self. You will see; it will change the situation—first in yourself, then outside. Miracles will start to happen. And even if they do not, who cares? You are free—you have arrived. And there is always the next match…

In those desperate situations you lose awareness. You do not even look up or around, but if you would, you would find that the light is back—and you are pulling at the generator again and again tiring yourself out!  And you wonder why the generator is laughing… Then a child comes and says, ‘Maharaj, light is back!’ (Everybody laughs) ‘Through the child the God-Self speaks’, it is said! This little Navin says: ‘Maharaj! Maharaj! Light is back’—and you are pulling away at the generator! Never was this statement so true: ‘Through the child God shall speak’! Immediately you are embarrassed—and self-aware, centred! And sheepishly you look around if anybody is watching!

Can we laugh at ourselves? Then you transcend yourself.

At that moment of course, it is difficult. That is why I say to go through your past in retrospect. But you can bring the retrospect closer and closer to the moment itself. Then you become like the child—and God will speak through you, for you would have come to the original innocence. And that innocence is always present. And the generator is only helping you, when it is being difficult. It is just that at that moment you cannot see it. But in retrospect when you go over things, it starts entering your memory, your consciousness, your Being. Then you start to remember at the moment itself. And yet a part of you struggles with it: it refuses to see the funny side of the situation. And if somebody else sees it—it is even worse!

It is better that we learn to laugh with the situation. Otherwise the situation will continue to laugh at us, and that is not such a pleasant feeling.

So it is good to have a few Navins around, so they can make you look at yourself and laugh.

Somehow everything is connected; you have to go through these moments of catharsis—only then can you laugh finally, and life-situations provide you that opportunity. We can laugh now because everybody played their part in the life-situation drama.. The generator played its part, the pulling at the generator played its part, Navin presenting himself with his cap, denim jacket and all played his part… He was so funny: barefoot, denim jacket, his cap, and he had his brown trousers with a big hole in the back, you could see his back-side. ‘Maharaj, Maharaj, light is here!’ (Laughing uproariously:) And Maharaj is sweating! (Seems to roll over with laughter)

You see, for the drama you need all the actors—how else would it be a captivating drama? That is life – it is celebration. Otherwise, if everything went your way it would get boring!

There is everything in life. Tragedy, disappointments, difficulties—everything is there, and presents itself, then makes for the whole Mahabharat…

It reminds me of the song, Why do the children play…

The quicker we learn to be playful again the better it is… As children we played, and somehow as we grew up we grew out of it.  Of course, we should know when to play…

 

All forms of situations, all kinds of situations will present themselves to you. That is the way of life—different combinations and permutations. And the onus is always on you, the players, how you play, and how free you are to play. If you have the skills you can play well. Again if you do not have the skills, it is an opportunity for you to grow in the skills — and therefore you can play better and better. That is life — simple.

The better you play, the more you can laugh, the more you are one with the situation and all life. And in that laughter there would be room for compassion too. So when to laugh? The best is when you can laugh at yourself. When one has learned to laugh at oneself one can laugh at anything, for one has learned to laugh, when to laugh. This  is a life-sadhana.

Then you shall laugh your way to God, and God shall laugh with you.

 

So situations are opportunities through which God brings many messages. If you have the eyes to see you will see. If you have ears to hear, you shall hear. The generator had its own message. Navin had his own message. All messages… India losing has its own message! The electricity going has its own message. They are all opportunities, they are all messages.

It does not mean of course that the lights have to keep going off. Neither does it mean that we keep a generator that does not work. Maybe it is also asking to be fixed… And definitely the Electricity Department needs to be talked to! This all forms part of the skill. Otherwise you would just be laughing and nothing would be done!

The stocks will be going down and we will  be laughing—and will do nothing about making them go up again, and the whole of the economy would come crashing down.

So there are many sides to the lesson.

 

Your perception, your perspectives also increase with your skill. You see more, much more. You reach to many dimensions—infinite are your dimensions. And in that you are spontaneous and in your spontaneity you are wise. Then you are situated in dharma, the law that is present always.

These are the steps to your awakening. Through the breath the quiet stop; through the quiet stop the awakening of the Force; through the awakening of the Force the Unfolding of the Reality, which is You, turning you divine—simple. Making a God out of the human.

Remember it is a process.

And when you awaken to yourself you awaken to the rhythm of your Being, and in that rhythm there is the whole of life, the whole field of the play of life, wherein things can be added, things can be eliminated, things can be enhanced, increased, reduced, levelled off. You are the Master of your life, the Mistress of your life.

Allow for the beauty of life to fill your Being. It is all around you — and it is your own Self! It is the freshness of your Being.

 

So – whenever – use the breath to arrive at being present and through that reach to the knowing of the Reality, which is your Self, through a process of Unfolding. And through the breath you will find the vastness unto the Heavens, and compassion, oneness, unto the Earth.

 

Arya Vihar

8 April 2001