Is spiritual practice a must for everyone?

You have to insulate yourself from the effects of worldly living. The environment has its strong impact. The external world is in a rat race for greed, glamour and respectability. It does not bother about real joy and purity. Naturally, external influence affects an individual. In this rat race even if one wins one continues to be a rat. Glamour gives you an illusory joy but your soul needs to grow.

‘Why does a fish in an ocean try to jump out?’ asked a Zen student.
‘The fish is trying to explore a world beyond the ocean,’ answered the Master.
Consciousness in each one of us is like a fish that wants to explore the unknown, to evolve and grow. If you do not insulate yourself from negative forces, there will be a leakage of energies and that would hamper your growth. So it is necessary not to struggle in life and not allow negativity to control your life. One has to learn to float in life, to let go, let in the essentials and negate unessential feelings.

How can I insulate myself from negative influences?

People live life in fear. It is out of fear that they worship; out of fear they get married; out of fear of insecurity they beget children. Whenever fear emerges, there is a leakage of energy. Fear creates a hurt body and it then tries to survive by quoting philosophy and logic.
We try to protect ourselves from fear through the influences of worldly life…by acquiring more money and more power. But spiritually we can insulate ourselves from fear, only if we have trust. We were secure in our mother’s womb. At term when we were pushed out into the world, it was as though we were facing death. We experienced tremendous fear.

After being born, is it death or birth that marks our lives?

Trust that when one door closes, another door opens. Such trust insulates us from fear. The spiritual way of seeing is, if there is an impression or a negative impression of fear in the mind, one has to deidentify with it. This detachment or de-identification is the insulation that i am talking of. In yoga, it is called atma smaranam, selfremembrance.

What happens when we insulate ourselves from negative impressions?

Worldly influences do not touch us. Instead, we would be in touch with higher vibrations and open ourselves for higher influences. The higher centres in us are constantly communicating something profound to us, but we close ourselves to them. It is like a cup turned upside down. No amount of rainwater can fill the cup. The moment we are available for higher vibrations, we attract nobler aspects of life. Lower states attract lower aspects of life while the higher states attract higher aspects of life. This is the law of attraction.

Why is devotion necessary?

Devotion activates our higher centres. Devotion purifies our emotions. Devotion allows the finer vibrations to flow into our lives. With devotion, your third eye or intuitive eye opens, and you would see many meaningful coincidences occurring in your life. You will see the mysterious hand of God blessing you.

Satsang: Swami Sukhabodhananda

www.prasannatrust.org

With consciousness we have created beautiful concepts. One of them is the idea of relationships. Whatever we create, whatever we discover, it is to make this life more comfortable, beautiful, peaceful and happy. The first relationship has to be with oneself. You must have a very clear relationship with yourself, knowing why you feel the way you do, why you think in a particular way. The first step is to be aware of your own self.

Why do we want a relationship? For happiness, for security? We have to establish a relationship with the Divine. And what is Divinity? The soul. You must have a relationship with your psyche; that relationship can give you everything you need, more than a hundred other relationships.

The clarity of these two steps evolves over years of learning. In daily life, how do you find divinity in your partner, for instance? Sincerity and faithfulness are important. Give without expectation.

Mental, vital, physical, spiritual impulses also create relationships. Even hunger can create relationships: you enter into relationships with food for each particular part of your being.

You must grow with relationships, with contacts, and at the same time you must remember that all the possibilities are inside, they are not coming from the outside, what you are looking for outside you is inside you.

You see this box, the human body, is displaying all the time, like a television set. When your channel starts displaying negative things, you can choose to change the channel.

When we meditate we are feeding the soul, and when you feel the hunger of your soul then constant meditation begins, and it becomes effortless. Real meditation begins there, and no one can break that meditation.

It is like when your stomach is empty, all you think of is food, all your being is looking for food, but when you are full you don’t think about food at all. The souls food is the Divine. Right now we are making an effort to remember the Divine, but when we start feeling the hunger, we will not have to make the effort; it will come naturally.

Aurobindo gives this concept of Divine life: he didn’t say that life is an illusion; that we have to run away from life, or go to the Himalayas. He just said that life is beautiful, and the future of life is life divine, sooner or later, when the psyche hunger starts. And life divine means that here, in this world, with these situations we have to awaken to the hunger of our being, listen and find that hunger, when we do that we will start seeing the Divine everywhere. If we feed the psychic, with its influence, the vital, mental, and physical being will transform. There will be no ego.

Relationships sour primarily due to ego. Use your ego. But do not allow your ego to use you. If you know how to use it, it will build you and give many wonderful things. If the ego is using you, you will see ego everywhere, if you are using ego you will not see it. Only ego sees ego.

Ego is not made of any substance or material, ego is without substance: a lack of knowledge, a lack of light. Hate is too much love. You never hate someone you don’t know. We call it hate but hate has also substance of love there. It is too much connection.

Swami Brahmdev lives in Aurovalley Ashram, Raiwalla.
As told to Sudhamahi Regunathan.
Talk: Swami Brahmdev