Month: July 2013

How Is Your Silence Going?

Posted on by ahymsin

Many of my friends and initiates in all continents write me asking, “Swamiji, how is your silence going?” I am tempted to answer, “How is your talking going?”

Majority have a not five-year but life-long vow of talking. To many, silence is something not so natural. To others, seekers after truth and serenity, silence is the nature from which we have emerged and into which we will dissolve. Through all our externalised sense operations, an inner substratum of a silent stream continues to flow. Some of us have chosen to take a dip into that stream.

Some treat my five year vow as ‘heroic’ or something I have done; perhaps an act of tremendous self-denial! The fact is that I have chosen to indulge into this pleasure.

Yes, my indulgence in this pleasure is going very well but it is not accomplishing all that I had meant to accomplish through it. My hope was to be free of all involvements in matters of the organization and the Ashram. Few leaders have taken over certain areas of these and freed me to a certain extent, but not yet fully, and there are still hundred e-mails a day, all needing attention. So also matters relating to the Ashram. I manage to give thoughts and suggestions in writing but I would rather write instead my Vedic poetry that flows in moments of silent contemplations.

One thing I find unpleasant is anyone talking in my presence. I want total silence but people around me go on chattering and do not always even realize when I am inwardly tuned and my solitude needs to be accepted.

I do speak sometimes (a) giving guided meditation or initiation to a very select rare few and (b) in blessing children under 8. I find hugging a child a great experience in silence and it enriches me and enhances my silence. There is no better lesson in mind’s silence than hugging a child.

Silence has helped conserve the shakti in many ways. It has helped improve the physical strength of this 80 years old body and when I do give the rare initiations and guided meditations, the energy manifests itself. This is because my Guru has taught me how to absorb the shakti and assimilate it and not waste it all the time in talking, chattering and idle pursuits. Instead of ex-pressing, I have chosen to im-press this energy into myself and it grants a subtle joy and serenity.

Swamiji, how did this idea of a five year silence come to you?—people ask. It came when I was perhaps six years old. My father and I had gone for an evening walk on Rajpur Road in Dehradun where I was born. We were going uphill. From the opposite side was walking down our neighbour Pandit Dharmadeva Shastri, a philosophy teacher at the Gurukula where we lived. Later he established one of the most important relief Ashrams for lepers under Gandhiji’s guidance (another inspiration that remained waiting to be realized until KHEL was established).

He, coming downhill, was accompanied by a Swami in saffron robes with a brilliantly shining face. Pandit Dharmadeva knew of my father’s interest in yogis. He introduced us to the Swami and told us that he met him sitting by the roadside. He was a silent swami and had not spoken a word for 25 years while living in the mountains doing sadhana. I cannot remember his name. There is more to this story but here this much suffices. That was my first inspiration. I knew then that it was something to aspire for and that some day I would take a 25 year vow of silence. My ambition remains unfulfilled.

Since then I have met a few silent swamis and each one has left a spark of inspiration, strengthening my ambition. My friend Swami Chandra who has an Ashram at the bank of the river Yamuna in Domet village near the mountains has not spoken a word for over 27 years. I often send our ashram members and visitors to visit his Ashram.

Majority cannot imagine for those who are inwardly attuned, how difficult and unnatural it is to have that attunement interrupted and to fulfil the world’s demands that you become outwardly tuned.

I wish these five years are never over but I know they will end. 138 days are already gone, too fast. When five years pass, it will be painful to speak again, a major effort of will.

I wish for the people of the whole world to learn to enter the profundity that is silence.

Lectures at the 2013 Sangha Gathering – Lecture #4

Posted on by Mandala

March 3, 2013
at the 2013 Sangha Gathering at SRSG

Om
Gurave namaḥ.
Parama-gurave namaḥ.
Parameṣhṭhi-gurave namaḥ.
Paramparā-gurubhyo namaḥ.

Akhaṇḍa-maṇḍalākaraṁ vyāptaṁ yena charācharam.
Tat padaṁ darshitaṁ yena tasmai shrī-gurave namaḥ.

Hiraṇya-garbhād ārabdhām śheṣha-vyāsādi-madhyamām.
Svāmi-śhrī-rāma-pādāntāṁ vande guru-paramparām.

Om tat sat brahmārpaṇam astu.
Om śham.

Is everybody happy in spite of any discomfort? It must be a bit hard for the people who have to stay off campus and have to go back late at night and come back early in the morning with no time to rest and not enough sleep. I don’t know what kind of breakfast you are getting over there and how you are managing with the food here. Sometimes it is a little too spicy or a little too salty. I have a principle of tasting the food every day. It is brought to me to check. And I eat a little of what you eat. So I imagine with your international taste it might be too salty or too spicy. But you are managing. Okay. So, thank you. Thank you for your tolerance and your patience.

And maybe we should have one day where there no activity and there is total silence. What do you think? [Reply] Oh, you mean you get the rest and I don’t get the rest. I was trying to wriggle out of one lecture. [Laughter]  You can figure it out; you can let your opinion be known. But on that day, then really resting and not going about chatting and socializing; just relaxing and resting, and staying put and meditating.
I’ve been asked to cut this talk a little short today, because I have some business things to take care of with planning for the future. You know, all this organizing and putting up all these tents and so forth, and you know how much effort goes into that and how much planning we have been doing for the past three years. But here now it’s a question of the continuity of the teaching and the tradition, which apart from the purity of the tradition, requires a certain material, physical, relational, social, organization base. And you are here to take care of both parts: the pure spirituality and the applied spirituality in your organization. And so there are some times when you need to pay attention to that, and I’m asked to close ten minutes early so we can discuss the question about whether this swami will be traveling during his five years of silence; there are some tricks to that. And my committee of four ladies, who take care of me day and night to keep me alive, will present a plan for you – if the traveling is workable – if it is workable. Because it’s not easy; it’s really not easy. So feel free, and please don’t feel burdened, that demands are being made on you. If I cannot travel, I’ll stay put, and you travel and come. And even if I do travel, you travel, too, and stay put and relax here at Sadhaka Grama.

Many, many years ago, maybe ten years ago, I taught a series called Signs or Marks of Spiritual Progress.  I suggest you use that series to always check to see whether you are making progress. That is one step. Then read Swami Rama’s The Art of Joyful Living over and over and over, and see if you are  truly applying the principles that he has go generously, so lovingly, so beautifully, and so effectively presented to us. And then comes this little book that has been presented to you: Sadhana in Applied Spirituality, in which I have given, hopefully, some practical suggestions on your thought patterns, which result in a change in your communication patterns, which result in a change in your relational patterns, not only in the family, but even in the workplace. And I would like these three to be your study, your contemplation, your discussion and especially your application over the next five years. I still have not managed to do the recording that I promised would go with it, but I will do it before you leave, within a day or two. I’m not getting the time.
Yesterday we spoke of the grand, cosmic presence of the Divine Mother and how from a few specks from the dust of the feet of the Divine Mother – now, if that is just a few specks from the dust of the feet of the Divine Mother, what is the Divine Mother like? – from those few specks, flung – creating spaces, not flung into spaces, but flung and creating spaces – this multi-billion-galaxy universe arises, in whom it continues, into whom it dissolves. And the ashes of that burning fire, that burns the products of this universe, Shiva rubs on his body, and you rub on yourself as ashes. That is where the Christian idiom “sackcloth and ashes” comes from. I suggested to you to expand your consciousness, to expand your consciousness so that this piece of paper can lead you to enlightenment. As I explained to you yesterday, the smallest fiber in a piece of your clothing can lead to you to enlightenment if you understand its reality, but not by sitting there and imagining.

Don’t get trapped by the very captivating net that your imagination, arising out of your unconscious mind, weaves for you. Do not get captivated by that. Many people who are the arm-chair spiritualists, who sit there and let themselves be caught in this very captivating net of imaginings arising out of their rajasic and tamasic and very confused unconscious minds; that is   not what we are talking about. Spiritual progress is the field of sattva, the brightest light, the purest, the clearest, the most luminous, the most pacific, the most benign; it leaves no confusion.

Every now and then I receive a letter: “Swamiji, I am having this revelation. I am having this experience. So what do I do next?” And my reply is, “Well, if I am driving from here to Delhi or from New York to Los Angeles, what do I do next? Well, you were going to go to Los Angeles, weren’t you? Do you want to settle down in Chicago now? You don’t want to go any further? Well, so carry on in the same way as you have been driving.” What’s the problem? What’s the question? Okay?

Today, and for however many number of days it takes, I will mark for you a few stations that you will pass through. You just need to recognize them when you are at that station; you don’t have to do anything about them. People write me: “I am at this station; what do I do about it?” You are to do nothing. Just look at the station: “That is what it looks like” and carry on.

There are these stations in many different dimensions, not in just one dimension. A one-dimensional growth is incomplete. The multidimensional growth that I will describe for you, whether it takes thirty minutes or whether it takes three lectures, you will keep with you, and you will learn to recognize those stations. Some of them are very interesting stations. When we did here the study of the Shiva Sutras, we came across a phrase. A few of you were here; most of you were not. Can anyone remember that phrase that we popularized? Smera, smera stimita. Does anyone remember from that course? Can you say it? It has a very nice musical sound. Smera, smera stimita. Smera, smera stimita. Smera, smera stimita. And the commentator who is writing on the Shiva Sutras says that as you come to these stations, you smile in amazement; you smile and you will become stilled. It is not that you become all excited. It is not that you become a dancer. Stimita: you become stilled, stopped in amazement. That is, the effect of those stations at times in your spiritual progress is this smera, smera stimita.

I can tell you, there is no journey more interesting than your spiritual journey. For your worldly journeys you need to pay for a sea cruise, you need to buy airline tickets, you need to service your car, but for this journey: free of charge. Everything is free of charge. The whole cosmos: free of charge. And I don’t know why people don’t take the offer. It’s a free lunch. The spiritual universe is a free lunch. Don’t you want to enjoy this transcendental free lunch? Learn to enjoy it, and wait for that smera, smera stimita. At every revelation a smile, your mind smiles and goes further – stilled.

(Coughing) This daily speaking is not good for my body. My cardiac muscle gets tired. Please forgive me.

So, enjoy whatever little smile of the mind that comes in your view, comes in your way, and every moment of whatever relative stillness and amazement that touches you. You know, sometimes you see that you are amazed and for a moment you are stopped still. That is the way it is in your spiritual journey. You are stopped still. And if one of those moments – Don’t ask me when; there is no clock; ask my guru – if it once happens and Mother Infinity reveals her glimpse and all her cosmic music pours into you, if even for a fraction of a second, even that fraction of a second, which is a fraction of a second by your worldly clock, feels like an infinity passed, because Infinity showed one of her multiple faces.

These are not false promises. This is not a pep talk. That is the way it goes. And there begins to come in you gradually, gradually, gradually, a sense of fullness. And wherever there were empty quarters in your personality, in your heart and in your mind, they begin to fill and you begin to sense and fullness. Then what do you do with that fullness? It pours out of you to others, and you become a teacher; you become a healer. You don’t get a teacher by getting a teacher training certificate; you become a teacher because there is this fullness in you, and this stillness is overflowing and touching the hearts and minds of others, and you cannot help it; it’s just there. And the more you progress to the next smile, the more you progress to the next station in stillness, the more it pours into you and overflows from you. Don’t waste it; be creative with it; channel it. Don’t waste it; be creative with it; channel it.

“Bahu-jana-hitaya, Bhau-jana-sukhaya.” When the Buddha sent his first batch of monks to go teach in the world, he said in the Pali language in which he spoke: “Charatha bhikkavo charikam bahu-jana-hitaya, Bhau-jana-sukhaya.”  “Wander, O monks. Wander a great wandering for the benefit of the many, for the comfort of the many.” If your spirituality does not benefit many and if it does not comfort many, what is the difference between a worldly material, selfish life and a spiritual life? So: “for the benefit of the many, for the comfort of the many.” In your stations of progress, this will arise in you naturally. You don’t need to try. You are helpless. You cannot help it. If there is a space under a tree, you will sit under a tree and, like Socrates, people will gather around you, because they are thirsty and you have the potion of elixir, or water. That depends on how diluted your elixir is. Dilute it less and less over time. Dilute your elixir less and less over time and serve it in its purest forms.

Many times I spoke to my master and I said, “Master, I am very jealous of all those great yogis who sit in the caves.” He said, “Tell me of what benefit are they to the world?” Of course, that is his way of answering. I know of what benefit they are. Sitting there, they are of greater benefit at times than shouting and yelling like me here. But something will happen in you. And if there is space under a tree, you will fill people there, or whether you sit under a tent, or you sit in a palace or an ashram or a monastery or wherever, this teaching will flow from you, healing will flow from you – healing of minds.

One of the things that begins to happen is that the mysteries of the universe begin to unfold before you. You begin to understand the principles and the laws by which the whole universe operates. There is a meta-science about which I have indicated in one of my writings,     the science of sciences by which all the sciences operate. The principles are the same. When I talk to an architect, I tell them to learn music if they want to improve their architecture. Have you heard that before? Because architecture is music. And music has its own architecture, so architecture has to have its own music too. So we had a musical performance by a master architect yesterday, and he could tell you what the structures are of that architecture – what are the pillars, what are the roofs, what are the floors, what are the spaces in it? So, this happens for you. You begin to understand the science of sciences in which all sciences become one science. It is not something multidisciplinary that you create – that you gather this discipline, this discipline, and this discipline, and you create a concoction. But there are some fundamental principles by which all the science and all the arts operate, included in your theology and your philosophy, and these begin to unveil themselves to you. And the next then, then you begin to understand the relationship of this cosmic science with yourself, with your entire being, with your interior being. You begin to understand the architecture of your internal music of which there is a whole orchestra in you.

So, as the sciences reveal themselves, you learn to apply them. I know of a great yogi who studied only up to the fifth grade, and then went off to devote himself to the Grandmother of the Universe. And when his sādhana had reached its fructification, the Divine Mother ordered him to go to someplace which is all very rough-looking and establish himself there. So he went and he sat down under a tree outside a village in a very rough-looking area. Well, all he has to do is sit down, and next somebody put a tin shed over his head and the villagers started coming. Next, someone built a little room, a little chamber for him. And if you take a 30-minute drive from the Delhi airport to the Chattarpur Temple complex, what he created is a wonder of architecture by guiding the architects about how each pillar was to be adorned and decorated. And when my master and I went to see him, he said the same thing: “I have reading instruction only up through the first grade, but I have designed all this architecture.”

And, you know, I will tell you something: I don’t know what people do in schools. I don’t know because I’ve never been to one. I have no idea. What do they do year after year after year? All you have to do is close your eyes, and the knowledge will reveal itself to you. Listen to a language once and you will speak it. But . . . that requires a mind that is free of all this green stuff that accumulates on the surface of the water. Your mind needs to be like clear water, sattvic and pure, so that the full moon can reflect in it unbroken and not in fragments. At present in your sciences you are studying only those fragments, and one who knows just one tiny fragment does not know the rest of the fragments. As your purification occurs, this happens naturally.

I’ve been told to close at 5:50 today because my keepers, mothers are waiting to give you ten minutes of explanation over the other questions.   I promise I’ll continue with these talks. So God bless you all.

Reflections on my Mantra Initiation

Posted on by Mandala

Dr. Judith Wermuth-Atkinson is a lecturer at Columbia [University] and a long time seeker. She was introduced to me recently by our beloved friend and scholar Siddhartha Krishna. I made an exception in her case to initiate her personally. She has written a description of the initiation which may be inspiring/instructive. — svb

Dear Swamiji, I am sending you the description of my mantra initiation with some delay. I was not entirely happy with what I wrote and I am very concerned that I might disappoint you. I am afraid, in my description I was too analytical and too practical, and I did not manage to convey the greatness of the mystical experience. Perhaps there are things that I cannot put into words – no matter how much I love writing. — Judith Wermuth

As I do not claim myself to be a Master, wherever the word Master occurs in this composition, please read it as a ‘Master’s disciple’. — Swami Veda Bharati

I have been practicing meditation for many years but before I came to the SRSG center in May this year I had never had any other guidance than that I found in books. I also have been in Rishikesh several times before. I had heard about the SRSG center and particularly about Swami Veda Bharati from my friend Siddhartha Krishna, who thinks very highly of the center, and who admires Swami Veda deeply. For years I have been hoping to meet Swami Veda and to be able to study in the SRSG center. However, I was coming to India always in late May – a time when Swami Veda was usually teaching in the United States or in Europe, and when the semester of classes had already ended. This year I was extremely fortunate because when I arrived in Rishikesh the center was still open. I was able to take a few classes, and I had the great honor to meet Swami Veda Bharati. The decision about my mantra initiation, however, was something I had not expected, and it came as a wonderful surprise to me. I was overwhelmed with joy.

My initiation began after the evening meditation with Swami-ji – a powerful experience that should be described separately. My body was quite relaxed, and my mind was calm. I did not know at all what to expect, since I had never spoken to anyone who had been initiated. Nevertheless, at that point I felt such profound trust in my Master that I was ready to put my life in his hands. Having said this, I should emphasize that I do not become too excited about the greatness of people, that I do not tend to follow teachings and instructions blindly, and that in my long conscious life I have studied many different spiritual traditions, but I have practiced consistently only one. However, this time I felt differently. I may be wrong but it is my belief that for every individual who is working on her/his spiritual development, there is a particular teacher. In other words, I think that one Master could have many disciples, but that for each disciple there could be only one living Master. The first time I met Swami Veda I believed to have found my Master. And that very Master had offered to initiate me into my mantra – something that I thought would help me in understanding myself, my mind, meditation, and even God on a much deeper level. It felt that my life-long spiritual quest was rewarded. At the same time, I also realized that this was only the beginning of even harder work, and of having yet more profound responsibility for spiritual development.

I know that I should not be exaggerating the role of the person who initiated me. I know that it is God whose will we join when great things happen in our lives. I also know that it is Prana that we feel when we feel that enormous and inexplicable power during the initiation. However, so far no other living person had ever been able to take me to that state of mind in which I join God. Perhaps, that is what only a Master can do. And now my Master did precisely that – gently, and without any kind of imposition.

First he helped me relax, sit comfortably, and breathe uninterruptedly. I am not even sure how it happened. I was not simply following his instructions.  It felt as if, along with his quiet words, he was actually changing my breath, the position of my body, even my thoughts, by means of his own mental power. Or perhaps he created some energy field around me so that each movement, each attempt to relax certain parts of my body became easy and natural, as though I was not doing anything at all. I felt that I was in a place, or in a space that was separate from the physical room where we were sitting – a space, in which things were easy and happening quite fast.

I believe that part of the reason I felt the way I did was my Master’s voice. I could not ignore the effect of this particular, absolutely unique voice. I may be extremely sensitive to voices because I used to be a musician and, thus, sound has plaid a major role in my life. Hearing the sound of my Master’s voice, when he started pronouncing the mantra, was the most mystical experience during the initiation. (Remembering it later, I could compare that sound only to the organ music of Bach). This sound was tremendously deep, quiet but very powerful, vibrating, and at the same time absolutely stable. Pronounced in this voice, the mantra created a new space, or rather new levels of space, ever deeper and deeper, and ever wider and wider. I am not sure whether I had a thought of history, of the past, or whether I simply felt as if I was taken far back. I cannot say where to. Along with that feeling, I also had the feeling of different sources of energy or strength. Did my Master tap into those different sources? Did he establish a connection between me and those sources? I cannot tell. I just felt some tremendous expansion of my Self. At this very moment, when I was feeling as if I was moving into some bigger or deeper levels of consciousness (for lack of better words), something interesting happened on the physical level.

I had a silly, violent cough attack. I had brought some flowers to my Master. The flowers were placed in a basket on the floor, right next to us.  I might have been allergic to them. I started coughing and could not stop for a while. I felt as if there was an earthquake. Everything in me was shaken, torn apart. But it was as if I could not formulate thoughts. Thus, I was not upset with myself. Nor was I worried that I might have spoiled everything. I just did not know what to do. Then I felt the gentle touch of my Master’s hand on the side of my arm. The touch of hands means a lot to me. Sometimes I make judgments about people (which I should not be doing) on the basis of the way they shake my hand. This was now the touch of a hand that was telling me lovingly to relax, to stay calm. It was a touch that did not judge me but encouraged and supported me. And I did relax quickly – even before someone from the outside brought me a glass of water. (Later I thought that I wished to feel the touch of this hand every time when life was hard on me.)

My Master explained to me quietly that when the process of initiation is interrupted one has to go back to it and continue as if nothing has happened – simply ignore the interruption and refocus on the meditation. If we could only learn to do this with everything bad that happens in life – ignore it, do not let it disturb us, and refocus on the things we ought to do! This thought came to me later too – not during the initiation, but I learned a great lesson. We all talk about “not getting stuck in the past, in our mistakes, or in the bad experiences we had.” During my initiation I experienced the practical means of doing this, and I can only hope that I will be able to apply it.

In addition, when I was distracted by my cough I realized another interesting thing on the physical plane. The position I was sitting in was new to me. I had been sitting in that position for about an hour prior to the initiation and, although it was generally a comfortable position, at the beginning of the mantra initiation I felt some slight discomfort. However, my concentration on the mantra was so strong that I literally “forgot” that I did not feel completely comfortable. When I started coughing and I came out of the state of meditation briefly, I was absolutely unaware of that part of my body where I had felt discomfort – in my lower back. I was fully aware of the rest of my upper body but I had no sense of my body below the waist line. This was no numbness. I believe that I was so strongly focused on the mantra that the part of my physical body that was in the way of my concentration was, so to speak, eliminated in my mind. It was “cut off” so that it could not disturb me. At least this is how I could explain that strange feeling. I do not even remember if I tried to get back the sense of having a lower back or not. I do not think so. I went back to the state of meditation quickly. I must have been unaware of dealing with the lack of sensation.

In my Master’s entire approach to my mantra initiation there was also a very fine consideration of the individual who was initiated. I realize that choosing the appropriate mantra is an inspiration and that receiving this inspiration is one of the Master’s gifts. Yet, I was amazed by Swami Veda’s choice. The particular mantra my Master gave me helped me focus on something profoundly important for my spiritual development and for my entire life that I, however, might have been underestimating before. This realization alone was extremely inspirational. It redirected my quest and took me to a whole new path. If I had never walked along that path, all the spiritual work I had tried to do would have remained incomplete.
The brief explanations of meaning and of grammar were also tremendously helpful to me. I speak several languages. Grammar is therefore very important to me. It helps me understand logic, as well as the way of thinking in particular cultures. Thus, offering a brief explanation of a grammatical detail made a big difference to me and helped me grasp the significance of the mantra better – already during the initiation.

After the coughing incident I did not go back to that enormously deep and wide space, but I did get back to observing my mind.  And there, in my mind was the mantra: pronouncing itself, with its own speed, repeating itself in the form of a canon – before the end came, the beginning was already there again. The sound register changed: there was the deep, soft, velvet-like voice, but the sound was also moving up – as if the mantra sounded in its overtones as well. It was as if a choir was singing my mantra. I did not try to reduce this choral manifestation of the mantra to one single voice – mine.  The mantra did not come to my lips. I still have not pronounced it in my mouth.

Long after my Master told me to leave and to go in silence, the mantra was still sounding in my mind. I did not break my silence. I did not break it even when I left the ashram on the following day. There was something I wanted to preserve and to protect –perhaps the sacredness of the experience. I was afraid that I might destroy it if I talked. But then I realized that even out there, in the external world, in the whole mess of our activities and emotions,  now there is  a place for me where I could find, again and again, the peace of my beloved Himalaya,  the certainty of having guidance, the love in my Master’s voice – a place where I could join God. I know this place will always be accessible to me – in my mantra, in my mind – as long as I am aware of it.

I am not sure I can describe how I feel about all this. Perhaps this is how we feel when we realize that God loves us.

Editor’s Note:

Dr. Judith Wermuth-Atkinson has taught different languages, literatures, and cultures at universities in Europe, the Middle East, and the U.S.A. Currently she teaches courses on world literature and philosophy at Columbia University, New York. Her research focuses on the comparative study of literature, art, philosophy, and religion in Eastern and Western civilizations. She is also translator of literary and philosophical works, as well as author, writer, and poet.