DEFINITIONS GIVEN BY SHRI MATAJI
NYASA
How to get into meditation - Dollis Hill Ashram, London 1979-11/18 (see the full meditation further):
Now it’s opened out if you see. Now you can open again your Sahasrara like this. Just take it down again and see that you are stationed there. Once this has been done, then you go into meditation. This is like cleansing, you see: called it Nyasa. Now, now if you find any other obstruction, you can also say, like, if you have got, say, Mahakali’s problem, you can say that mantra. Clear it and then you sit down for meditation. Any individual thing, you can take it out. Like if you have the ego problem, if you think, then you should start with Mahatahamkara. It is what you have to find out: what is your problem, where is the Kundalini stopping? You can feel it within yourself.
Some of you may not feel. If you do not feel it, feel it on your fingers. If you are not feeling within yourself then feel it on your fingers, you can feel it. Ah! Better. How is it now? Better? Where is the problem? Hmm?
Some of you may not feel. If you do not feel it, feel it on your fingers. If you are not feeling within yourself then feel it on your fingers, you can feel it. Ah! Better. How is it now? Better? Where is the problem? Hmm?
(Nyasa is also the meditation and invocations that prepare the appropriate state to performing a Puja)
DHYANA
Sahaja Yoga Is Born with You, Public Program - Caxton Hall, London UK, 1979-08/06:
… But as I said that realization is within your reach, nothing to be frightened about. If there is any such problem, we’ll correct it. For that we use a method, a technique which all the Sahaja yogis know. For example, they raise your Kundalini. I can raise also. I raise my own Kundalini, on which I raise your own Kundalini. This is called as dhyana yoga. Actually, Sahaja Yoga is the Maha Yoga. It’s the greatest yoga by which, you see, you can raise the Kundalini of another person with your own hands, because the vibrations are flowing from your own hands, the divine vibrations, which can revitalize … It can give you a balance.
MahaShivaratri Puja - Pune, India, 2004-02/15:
…This is a subject which you can only explain in Hindi language, which says that this Guru Pada you get from somebody else. But that somebody else is itself, is endowed with, the power, the power of peace of mind, to begin with, and also the power to overcome all kinds of earthly problems, mental problems, physical problems. All these problems you can solve through your mental balance and mental blessings from your Guru. When you become the Guru, you yourself have the power to bless others. With your blessing power, you can create a guru out of many. And once the Guru is created and there is a Guru, who has this power, it’s very satisfying …
The satisfaction is so much that you don’t want anything. This is the power of Shiva. You have seen Shiva, doesn’t have much clothes, He doesn’t decorate Himself, He is just sitting in meditative mood, all the time. He doesn’t want anything. He’s so satisfied with Himself that He doesn’t want anything. And that is the power you get after the Self-realization, if you have a Guru, and Guru of that level and caliber. One should not try to become a Guru. That’s very impractical. If you try to become, you will never. It has to come to you automatically, without any asking, without any effort.
So the only way you can get to it, is through Dhyana. Dhyana is meditation. When you meditate, just meditate, and meditate: do not ask for anything! Meditation itself gives you that instrument which can bear this great power of the Guru. And then automatically you give this power to others; you don’t have to work it out. Just in your presence, people can get this power of complete satisfaction. And there is salvation, for you and for others.
So all the problems which are faced for the journey of ascent, are finished and you are now drenched in the bliss of heavenly peace, and joy. That’s why it is called as Kaivalya, means only, only the blessings. See, that means there is no other word to translate it. There’s no other way of explaining it. It’s a state. It’s a Stithi: it’s a state, in that state you have to rise and you know that you are in that state. It’s a very remarkable thing, that once you reach that state, you don’t have to ask for anything. It’s all there, and you are so satisfied. I can go on talking about this special power but I think whatever I have said please meditate on that. And you are all capable of reaching that state. That state of complete peace and joy. May God bless you!
But what I’m trying to tell you is this, that now you’ve got everything simple - easy this thing- but in a subtle way still all these nonsensical things are sticking on, and even if you are in the boat now, still it is there and they are creating a heavy weight, and this heavy weight can really take you down again, and when you go down after a certain height, you go down very fast.
Guru Pada, see: http://www.hindupedia.com/en/Guru_Paduka_stotram
DHARANA
Sahaja Yoga is born with You. Public Program - Caxton Hall, London, UK 1979-08/06:
Take the name of the deity at that point, as you know the mantras are, you know how to coin the mantras yourself. Now you know all the shastras of mantras. So you put your mantras properly wherever is the need. Then you put the complete attention flowing, dharana absolutely, you see, till it sustains it completely, continuously and then you go into your enlightened, enlightened awareness, samadhi. So this is: dhyana, dharana, and samadhi. 
Enlightened awareness is, first of all, thoughtless awareness. So try to keep in thoughtless awareness and also later on into collective consciousness. These are the two stages you have already reached. Try to maintain them, clear them and establish yourself there. This is the way it should be done. And as we call in Hindi language baithak, you must have a baithak, means you should be able to sit on it, you should be able to do it for quite some time, but not with what you call a kind of obstinacy about it, but out of joy. As long as you feel the joy of it, you start doing it and you will be amazed to see how you establish your chakras and your deities and at the beck and call of you, just even a mention of that, it will start working like that.
Questions and Answers - Bordi, India – January 1977:
…Prithvi tattwa (earth element) is expressed through Shri Ganesh. Shri Ganesh is the form of a, you can say, purified principle of the earth element and is the same. I mean, you can say in a flute you have two notes, the first and the last are the same. In the same way in a human being the seven notes: the first one is a Ganesha and the last one is also a Ganesha, so these seven notes are the same. And these seven notes make the earth element and, are not completely the earth element but started with earth element purified then it loses its earth element problems completely. It is ParaBrahma, I mean, say, it becomes all Brahma, because earth element is, outside is the earth element, but inside is Dhara. Is Dhara - Dharana is the power to sustain, is the power to sustain/withstay and that power is the purest form of earth element. So, you see, that you become later on gradually, the whole earth element drops out and you become that.
So it is the Dharana Shakti as they call it, the power of sustenance, is Shri Ganesha. …
So it is the Dharana Shakti as they call it, the power of sustenance, is Shri Ganesha. …
SAMADHI
Public Program - Bucharest, Romania, 1990-10/16:
Question: …to know if Samadhi and all the other terms which are known in Indian philosophy or Buddhism are the same with this Realization which You are talking about.
Shri Mataji: Of course, of course …Of course, it is the same. Have you read the Patanjali Yoga, such a big book like that? In that they have described of the Nirvichara Samadhi, Nirvikalpa Samadhi and this is what exactly this is to be, three types, three types of Samadhi described in Hatha Yoga. All of them you will experience, all right?
Question: (in Hindi).
Shri Mataji: This is the trouble with you. You read some nonsensical books – Samadhi, Bindu, this, that, all that. Now please forget it, please forget all these things! Sama-dhi. Samadhi means, first is the Nirvichara Samadhi. First is Nirvichara Samadhi that you achieve and the Kundalini just comes out of your head: sama-dhi means, the dhi means the buddhi, and when it has got enlightenment it means Samadhi.
So first of all, the buddhi gets enlightened - just now I told you about that only, the first enlightenment.
Talk at Dollis Hill Ashram. UK, 1979-04/22:
Shri Mataji: They were asking what is Samadhi. I told you. It is enlightened awareness. Enlightened awareness. You are aware - …In Sahaja Yoga first is Nirvichara Samadhi that is thoughtless enlightened awareness, and second is Nirvikalpa Samadhi, where is doubtless enlightened awareness. So, to go to that doubtless condition you have to change your style. You see, other thing you might have achieved, but Sahaja Yoga you achieve to be strong.
Assume your position, Seminar (About Ritambara Pragnya) - Lodge Hill, England, 1983-07/23:
So this morning I was telling you about this new awareness – Pragnya. ‘Gnya’ means the knowledge and ‘Pra’ means the awakened knowledge- which comes out of meditation, sustenance of meditation, and then the Samadhi is the effect of that. It’s a kind of a fruit ripening. When this ripens, then you get the taste, the sweetness of character, and then you start seeing around, how the Nature, the Divine, is sweetly playing with you. This state must be achieved.
For every Sahaja Yogi, it is important that they must achieve this state, because unless and until you have minimum achieved this stage, you’ll be still in a dangerous zone, which, as I told you, upsets me very much.
So everybody must decide to reach a state where you everyday see the blessings of God manifesting. That means you have entered into the kingdom of God. This is the kingdom of God, in which you are looked after, protected, guided, and properly taken to the place of heavenly bliss. Through material manifestation, through mental manifestation, through financial manifestation, through relationship manifestation, through so many things, and also the natural manifestation by which you see the sun, the moon, the stars, the heavens, and all the five elements, they help you.
This state, all of you must achieve, all of you! Again the word is “all of you should achieve”, and then only the higher ascent works out.
This state, all of you must achieve, all of you! Again the word is “all of you should achieve”, and then only the higher ascent works out.
…So what have we to do? First of all, by God’s grace, as I told you, you all are realized people so your ascent is made in the center, which is a very, very, difficult thing, absolutely difficult, no doubt. But you should learn to keep in the center. But how to keep the attention in the center is the problem for many people who are still not above themselves.
Now when you meditate, try to meditate in a sustained way, first of all sustain it. Then you find that you are getting into the state of Samadhi, means at a state where you start feeling the joy and the bliss of God’s blessings, and then you start saying “O God, what a blessing, what a blessing, and what a blessing!”
Once you have reached that state, then you have to realize “Who am I”. Who are you? What are you? You are the Spirit. After establishing your sustained attention on the Spirit you’ll develop a state where you’ll be in a complete state of witnessing with joy.
…You have to experience and then believe into it. It is not that what I told you is a conditioning on your mind, nothing -you experience it yourself and learn. But those who have that penetrating intelligence, who have that penetrating love, emotions and those [who] have that penetrating movement of their understanding, they are the ones who experience, learn, experience, learn, experience, learn. They do not allow their mind to play on them: “No, no, no! This mind of mine has got experiences of the past, and is based on that. No, I have to take everyday a new experience and that experience must be silenced within me, must be sustained within me, must be conditioned within me.”
Sahaja Yoga experiences are the good conditionings, “How can it be? -I've seen it, I have faced it, I've had it. How can it be?” But for that also, to have the best experiences, first condition is of Ritambhara Pragnya, where you should be of that level that you really get those experiences, otherwise you'll be just a mundane type of a person all the time, and you may live with Me, but you will not have those experiences, you'll not have that blissful feeling, nothing, that joy.
So this penetration starts by your meditation and sustenance of the meditation, and the Samadhi seed sprouting, manifesting the new dimension within. This sort of an attention, one has to develop, by watching the attention, Chitta Nirodha. As you watch your money, as you watch your road when you drive, as you watch your child when it is growing, as you watch the beauty of your wife, or the care of your husband. All put together, you watch yourself, your attention, where is it going? Where is it lagging behind? “What is happening to my attention?”
Such people have no problems. You'll be surprised, that such people, when they want to do something, it becomes dynamic. They can work it out. Nobody has any problem, and if there is a problem, which you are facing all the time in you, then know there is something wrong with you!
Public Program -India Tour, Madras, P 2, 1991-12/07:
…Now it’s the reflection of one Sadashiva. Naturally all the reflections have to be the same; their effects have to be the same. Of course, before realization is the reflection on a stone, we can call it, or on a wall, or maybe on some sort of an opaque thing. After realization you become reflectors, beautiful reflectors, and it reflects you. And everyone reflects the same thing. So the effect of Atma sakshatkara (=self realization) is the same on every person, that first he starts feeling this cool breeze in his hands, then out of his fontanel bone area. All of them feel the same way. Then they start feeling these centers and finding out what’s wrong. Also all of them become thoughtlessly aware, first stage which we call as Nirvichara samadhi. Instantaneously it works.
…Now it’s the reflection of one Sadashiva. Naturally all the reflections have to be the same; their effects have to be the same. Of course, before realization is the reflection on a stone, we can call it, or on a wall, or maybe on some sort of an opaque thing. After realization you become reflectors, beautiful reflectors, and it reflects you. And everyone reflects the same thing. So the effect of Atma sakshatkara (=self realization) is the same on every person, that first he starts feeling this cool breeze in his hands, then out of his fontanel bone area. All of them feel the same way. Then they start feeling these centers and finding out what’s wrong. Also all of them become thoughtlessly aware, first stage which we call as Nirvichara samadhi. Instantaneously it works.
You may say, “Mother, it’s very difficult. How does it happen? People had to go to Himalayas.” All right, it doesn’t matter, you don’t have to go. Those days are gone. After all, the civilization, this tree of civilization, has grown so big, its roots have to be grown; otherwise the whole civilization will be finished. And this is the knowledge of the roots, and that’s why to know this knowledge you have to become subtler, sukshma. This is only possible when the Kundalini rises and pierces through your fontanel bone, and makes you connected with the the all-pervading Power of God’s love.
…So first of all you become Nirvichar, Nirvichar samadhi, and you start working out your collective consciousness by giving realizations to others. You become entitled to raise this Kundalini; with your hands you can raise the Kundalini. You know these people who are singing here, some of them have given realization to a thousand people, and you can do it also, because now you have the power.
But the problem is, you have been given the throne, you have been made to sit on that, now you have been also adorned with a beautiful mukuta. But still you don’t want to believe you have become the king. Now how to make you believe?
…So the second nature of the spirit, apart from that it is a collective being, it is an absolute being.
Question: Should we focus our attention while meditating, on the top of the head?
You don’t have to focus anything anywhere. You’re not doing anything: it is the Kundalini which is coming up. So you don’t have to do it. Don’t fight with your attention. It will just – she will manage it. She knows her job. That’s one point.
NIRVIKALPA
Spirit, Sat Chit Ananda. Public Program - Houston, Texas, 1981-10/07:
So the growth is to be achieved by purifying your attention, and to purify this attention is to keep your Agnya Chakra open and be in thoughtless awareness. You watch something, you don’t think about it. Zen said the same thing but I think people didn’t understand, you see, before realization it’s like telling about colors to a blind man. Zen said the same thing: you watch a thing without thinking about it. They created patterns which didn’t mean anything, which you see it without thinking. But that’s only possible after realization. So the thinking process minimizes and you start witnessing.
The higher state than that of attention, is that you jump into Nirvikalpa samadhi, into the state of doubtless awareness. Now it is not doubtlessness because you’ve argued it out or anything. But is a state where you’re doubtless about things. I mean the way you speak, the way you behave, the way your attention is, you can make it out that “I’m doubtlessly there.” The discrimination becomes so sharp that you can just say, “This is so and so and so” there’s no fanaticism about it.
CHITTA NIRODHA
Spirit, Sat Chit Ananda. Public Program - Houston, Texas, 1981-10/07:
… “Here you have come to pay attention to Mother and to her work and pay attention to your Spirit. But if you are paying attention to all the rest of the people here, then you are going to catch them.”
Is a very simple thing, “Where is your attention?” Ask this question! This is a very common question in an Indian home, a mother will ask the child, “Where is your attention?” The basis of Indian life is chitta nirodh, is to fix your attention in a proper way. Where is your attention? Is it on your Spirit? Or is it on somebody else, like, “My brother is sitting here, my mother is sitting there, oh, that woman is very bad, she’s jealous of me,” all this nonsense. Where is your attention? When you get realized, then you start seeing through the window of the Spirit, your position changes. As you’re looking at me now, then you come back here and start looking at you this way. Till you are realized you are sitting before me, but once you are realized you come here and see others from there, that’s your fort. Nobody can touch you there. From there you see others, your attention is detached.
So the attention becomes enlightened after realization. You pay attention to anything, it works. It does work, no doubt, you try. Those who have got realization should try this. Try your attention - but attention has to be pure. You have to purify your attention, and the best way to purify it is to keep your Agnya Chakra open. When this centre is open, which is the centre of Christ, which I have shown that it can only open through the Lord’s Prayer after realization, when you open that, then you are in that state where your attention is divine. And you’ll be amazed how things work out, even the smallest things, the material things, the useless things and the great things, and the subtle and subtlest, and how you start growing..
Introduction to Mooladhara Chakra - New Delhi, 1981-02/05:
Now, in India, we know what this susanskara is, susanskara there is a word like ‘su’ which I don’t know even in English language if it is, but ‘su’ - is good, we must have good sanskaras, we must have discipline of our mind.
The concept of Indian life is chitta nirodh- you must control your attention, shouldn’t allow your attention to pass out, shouldn’t allow your attention to spill out, from childhood we ask our children: Where is your attention? Where is your attention? Where are you lost? Then Indian personality knows that your attention is not to be frittered.
Assume your position, Seminar - Lodge Hill, England, 1983-07/23:
But for a Sahaja Yogi the most important thing is, you must save your attention. It’s called as Chitta Nirodha. Nirodh - is saving of your attention. “Where is it going, It's such a precious thing for me. Where is it running?” Then, how do you save your attention?
It’s through concentration. Concentrate. Try to concentrate. Don't allow your attention to wobble. Gradually you will develop concentration. You can watch my photograph, it’s the best. Concentrate, bring it in your heart, let it be integrated in your heart. You are lucky people, you don't have to build up a photograph, and then give it up because it is just an Avalambana, means it's just dependence, and then you remove it. It's a complete dependence for you and a load for me - of complete joy!
So when you are concentrating in Sahaja Yoga, absolutely fully in Sahaja Yoga, then you are controlling, saving, your attention. This is one type of people.
Then the another type of an attention, what we call, are the people who sort of take a very negative attitude. The first are the positive, so called, so called positive, who are saving money, saving everything that is useless. Now the second type are the “archbishops of all that is disaster, misery, mishaps” - this type of an attention. If you read newspaper every morning you will have an attention like that. All the newspaper people have that kind of an attention, to find where is the disaster. I mean, in a sinister way, they feel happy there's a disaster. I've seen people, “Oh Mother, I came to the seminar but the problem is, you see, there was no water.” The attention is in finding disasters within and without. “What happened?”, “There's a disaster”, “What happened?” “I lost the pin”. Absurd, to have such stupid ideas!
…. So this penetration starts by your meditation and sustainance of the meditation, and the Samadhi seed sprouting, manifesting the new dimension within. This sort of an attention one has to develop by watching the attention, Chitta Nirodha. As you watch your money, as you watch your road when you drive, as you watch your child when it is growing, as you watch the beauty of your wife, or the care of your husband. All put together, you watch yourself, your attention, where is it going? Where is it lagging behind? “What is happening to my attention?”
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"...people think that Kundalini should work it out itself"
Morning Meditation, Bordi Shibir, India, 1980-01/27:Everybody was feeling very nice when they came here, happy and they felt their vibrations were all right. But it was not so. So be on the alert, see - ask each other to check you, be humble about it. You must go on checking. Unless and until you check yourself, how will you know what's the thing you are catching? Ask others to check you and be humble, very humble about it. Do not take things for granted because, unless and until we transform ourselves, Sahaja Yoga has no meaning. We could be very material way of expression of Sahaja Yoga like this radio or this transistor or this loudspeaker are just radiating. We have to know that Sahaja Yoga is not just to pass energy through us, like all other material things are passing energy. This mike is passing the energy, this transistor is passing the energy and all other such things are just passing the energy. Nothing goes into them. Like a... an artist is singing and the, nothing passes into the radio. In the same way, if our power starts flowing because somehow the Kundalini has been connected with the mains; it has not done its job neither you have done any justice to yourself. So you have to absorb that flow of the Ganges within you and assimilate it and transform yourself. The Ganges would be flowing but if it is flowing through the stony area, the stones are not going to absorb anything from the river Ganges. But if it is flowing through fertile land, everybody will be making use of that water. So you have to make use of your Kundalini by transforming yourself. Try to transform. See that, how much you transform. Now, the preparation about Kundalini becomes, becomes so, so Sahaja - they call it in the very funny manner, that people think that Kundalini should work it out itself while we are stones on both the sides and the Kundalini is going to work it out, which is very, very wrong idea. If the river Ganges is flowing you have to go to the river. You have to fill your pitchers, you have to have beautiful pitchers; you have to carry them; you have to bring them home and then use the water for enrichment of your food, of your household. In the same way, if you cannot transform yourself, if you do not, cannot change yourself then this Kundalini will be just going like a thin line and you'll be catching all the time and there won't be much progress. The progress must be shown outside.
Those who think that by saying mantras morning till evening they are going to achieve much, they are sadly mistaken; it's all mechanical then. So many people have a habit of all the time shouting mantras. It's not habit. Mantras should open your chakras otherwise it has no meaning. They should be used properly at key points, with great respect, with a great understanding and then allow them to open your chakras by which you take the water in, of that great thing known as Kundalini. The greatest blessing will come to you through Her love. But not the way, people are just taking - there should be no transformation. If you are identified with your ego and think you are all right, you are sadly mistaken. You have to transform completely, within yourself. Some people, if their circumstances are changed then they feel very well and they think oh, they have achieved the highest. It is not so, is only the circumstance that has changed, only the atmosphere that has changed and that makes you feel that you have achieved something great. You have to achieve it wherever you are. It should be retained and must be there. But by coming to a quieter place you can pay more attention, that's why you are here. But by coming here, if you just feel nice and think that oh, you have achieved everything, then it's... you are sadly mistaken.
You have to grow in this atmosphere; you have come here to grow and to be changed to be different person altogether. Do not be identified with your ego and do not get satisfied with something that you feel... "feeling nice and good." That's not the way to look at things. You have to transform yourself and see for yourself "how are you behaving? How are you feeling about it? Are you taking a new view of things or not?" Now the worst thing that comes, in the way of ego - is obstinacy, of your own obstinacy. Obstinate people are extremely difficult and they find pride in their obstinacy and they'll go on saying that yes, I'm obstinate. What to do? If you take pride in all such nonsensical things then you carry the load of these stones on your head - this life, next life and many lives to come that you are going to be. All such stones must be dropped immediately and should shake them off because you have to achieve your beauty. You have seen how a flower shakes off all that is not needed, blooms out, pierces its head outwards, opens out just to give fragrance to others. If you want to give fragrance to others, how far fragrance within you, is there fragrance within you that you are going to give fragrance to others? So that is what one has to find out and has to do it. First and foremost thing: how far you can love others? How far you can fulfill your duty as a husband, wife, child, father, mother - everything. It is not the way people understand Sahaja Yoga,- is that you hang in the air somewhere and then you say that I am all right. Of course, there are difficult people and difficult relationships but a Sahaja Yogi must have a very...a detached view of the whole thing and should be able to correct all those problems that exist and should take a very strong and stern view of the people who are not Sahaja in their family and around and tell them off, that what are you doing? Are you going to carry on like this all your lives and are going to die with this... all this load on your heads or are you going to get rid of it? But first of all you have to be all right.
Now in our being, we have manas on the, from the left-hand-side it comes to the right hand and goes backwards and we have also got ahankara which is the ego, which goes - comes up on the right hand side... from the right-hand side to the left-hand-side and in the brain each comes forward, on the left-hand-side it moves. So with these two things, two - ego and superego, manas and ahankara we have got - in between these two is the buddhi, is the intelligence is between. But this intelligence if it is not, if it is not balanced by wisdom - by subuddhi, it can be very dangerous and it records all that you are doing. It knows what you are doing. But if you're identified with your ego and superego, the buddhi cannot go too far. In the beginning it may try to tell you that "this is wrong, you should not go there, you should not do that," but then it becomes silent. So you have to be very careful about your intelligence also. Your intelligence becomes suddenly silent; it doesn't help you. Then the ego takes over or the superego takes over. Then all your thinking, all your understanding goes according to the...according to the lines of ego and you go ahead with it and you just don't know where you are going, what you are doing.
So when we are in this place, we are... decided to have a very good session of Sahaja Yoga, it is important for all of us to know, when we go from here, "how much changed are we going to be?" Otherwise there's a puja, there's a havan, there's this... every time and what is the progress within ourselves - we should see. Is it as much as a little ant moves in one minute or is it something much more? The progress is slow because we do not want to transform ourselves. Every moment try to see that you transform yourself. I have seen people who have been living like hippopotamus - have been living like hippopotamus. Those who are living like hyenas will remain like hyenas. They go on remaining with their own identification, feeling very happy about it which is a very wrong thing. You have to bloom out, bloom out like flowers. Change yourself, transform yourself! This transformation is going to help you. This is like triggering into a new dimension of life. Unless and until this triggering shows, your life has no meaning, Sahaja Yoga has no meaning to you. So try your level best to trigger this transformation - every minute of your life - then you will be amazed at the enrichment of life. Whatever I may try, just now I've cleared you out quite a lot, I think. I have cleared you out up and down - quite a lot. Isn't it? But, despite that, now it is for you to keep it there. First of all your attention, I don't think it's that all right. That's why you catch on the right nabhi and on the liver. Attention has to be on one side but if you go on moving your head, moving your attention then you cannot be on Nirvichara. So to keep on Nirvichara you have to keep your attention first steady and once this steadiness is achieved then you just have to see that you are in Nirvichara, put all your thoughts in that stream of Nirvichara and it will solve your problem.
But transformation is definitely a positive stage, where you see yourself. You see, you see yourself; you call yourself, say, you call yourself Nirmala. Then you say, "Oh Nirmala, now, is this the way to look at things?" Transformation is identifying yourself with that self which sees you. So that, once you start identifying with that self and expressing something to this self, which is Nirmala, then you are separated; then the transformation takes place. Because first you should see and then you should be identified with that self so there's a transformation within yourself. Otherwise, only you'll be carrying some energy within you by which you may do little miracles - you may raise Kundalinis. But, what about you? You will be where you were. So it is important when we come to a place like that, that we must not be carried away by something very outward and absolutely of no value to Sahaja Yoga. Now in the later day, I will tell you how to raise your different powers but just now I think we must decide, we'll go from here absolutely transformed into new persons.
May God bless you!
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Morning Meditation, Bordi Shibir, India, 1980-01/27:Everybody was feeling very nice when they came here, happy and they felt their vibrations were all right. But it was not so. So be on the alert, see - ask each other to check you, be humble about it. You must go on checking. Unless and until you check yourself, how will you know what's the thing you are catching? Ask others to check you and be humble, very humble about it. Do not take things for granted because, unless and until we transform ourselves, Sahaja Yoga has no meaning. We could be very material way of expression of Sahaja Yoga like this radio or this transistor or this loudspeaker are just radiating. We have to know that Sahaja Yoga is not just to pass energy through us, like all other material things are passing energy. This mike is passing the energy, this transistor is passing the energy and all other such things are just passing the energy. Nothing goes into them. Like a... an artist is singing and the, nothing passes into the radio. In the same way, if our power starts flowing because somehow the Kundalini has been connected with the mains; it has not done its job neither you have done any justice to yourself. So you have to absorb that flow of the Ganges within you and assimilate it and transform yourself. The Ganges would be flowing but if it is flowing through the stony area, the stones are not going to absorb anything from the river Ganges. But if it is flowing through fertile land, everybody will be making use of that water. So you have to make use of your Kundalini by transforming yourself. Try to transform. See that, how much you transform. Now, the preparation about Kundalini becomes, becomes so, so Sahaja - they call it in the very funny manner, that people think that Kundalini should work it out itself while we are stones on both the sides and the Kundalini is going to work it out, which is very, very wrong idea. If the river Ganges is flowing you have to go to the river. You have to fill your pitchers, you have to have beautiful pitchers; you have to carry them; you have to bring them home and then use the water for enrichment of your food, of your household. In the same way, if you cannot transform yourself, if you do not, cannot change yourself then this Kundalini will be just going like a thin line and you'll be catching all the time and there won't be much progress. The progress must be shown outside.
Those who think that by saying mantras morning till evening they are going to achieve much, they are sadly mistaken; it's all mechanical then. So many people have a habit of all the time shouting mantras. It's not habit. Mantras should open your chakras otherwise it has no meaning. They should be used properly at key points, with great respect, with a great understanding and then allow them to open your chakras by which you take the water in, of that great thing known as Kundalini. The greatest blessing will come to you through Her love. But not the way, people are just taking - there should be no transformation. If you are identified with your ego and think you are all right, you are sadly mistaken. You have to transform completely, within yourself. Some people, if their circumstances are changed then they feel very well and they think oh, they have achieved the highest. It is not so, is only the circumstance that has changed, only the atmosphere that has changed and that makes you feel that you have achieved something great. You have to achieve it wherever you are. It should be retained and must be there. But by coming to a quieter place you can pay more attention, that's why you are here. But by coming here, if you just feel nice and think that oh, you have achieved everything, then it's... you are sadly mistaken.
You have to grow in this atmosphere; you have come here to grow and to be changed to be different person altogether. Do not be identified with your ego and do not get satisfied with something that you feel... "feeling nice and good." That's not the way to look at things. You have to transform yourself and see for yourself "how are you behaving? How are you feeling about it? Are you taking a new view of things or not?" Now the worst thing that comes, in the way of ego - is obstinacy, of your own obstinacy. Obstinate people are extremely difficult and they find pride in their obstinacy and they'll go on saying that yes, I'm obstinate. What to do? If you take pride in all such nonsensical things then you carry the load of these stones on your head - this life, next life and many lives to come that you are going to be. All such stones must be dropped immediately and should shake them off because you have to achieve your beauty. You have seen how a flower shakes off all that is not needed, blooms out, pierces its head outwards, opens out just to give fragrance to others. If you want to give fragrance to others, how far fragrance within you, is there fragrance within you that you are going to give fragrance to others? So that is what one has to find out and has to do it. First and foremost thing: how far you can love others? How far you can fulfill your duty as a husband, wife, child, father, mother - everything. It is not the way people understand Sahaja Yoga,- is that you hang in the air somewhere and then you say that I am all right. Of course, there are difficult people and difficult relationships but a Sahaja Yogi must have a very...a detached view of the whole thing and should be able to correct all those problems that exist and should take a very strong and stern view of the people who are not Sahaja in their family and around and tell them off, that what are you doing? Are you going to carry on like this all your lives and are going to die with this... all this load on your heads or are you going to get rid of it? But first of all you have to be all right.
Now in our being, we have manas on the, from the left-hand-side it comes to the right hand and goes backwards and we have also got ahankara which is the ego, which goes - comes up on the right hand side... from the right-hand side to the left-hand-side and in the brain each comes forward, on the left-hand-side it moves. So with these two things, two - ego and superego, manas and ahankara we have got - in between these two is the buddhi, is the intelligence is between. But this intelligence if it is not, if it is not balanced by wisdom - by subuddhi, it can be very dangerous and it records all that you are doing. It knows what you are doing. But if you're identified with your ego and superego, the buddhi cannot go too far. In the beginning it may try to tell you that "this is wrong, you should not go there, you should not do that," but then it becomes silent. So you have to be very careful about your intelligence also. Your intelligence becomes suddenly silent; it doesn't help you. Then the ego takes over or the superego takes over. Then all your thinking, all your understanding goes according to the...according to the lines of ego and you go ahead with it and you just don't know where you are going, what you are doing. So when we are in this place, we are... decided to have a very good session of Sahaja Yoga, it is important for all of us to know, when we go from here, "how much changed are we going to be?" Otherwise there's a puja, there's a havan, there's this... every time and what is the progress within ourselves - we should see. Is it as much as a little ant moves in one minute or is it something much more? The progress is slow because we do not want to transform ourselves. Every moment try to see that you transform yourself. I have seen people who have been living like hippopotamus - have been living like hippopotamus. Those who are living like hyenas will remain like hyenas. They go on remaining with their own identification, feeling very happy about it which is a very wrong thing. You have to bloom out, bloom out like flowers. Change yourself, transform yourself! This transformation is going to help you. This is like triggering into a new dimension of life. Unless and until this triggering shows, your life has no meaning, Sahaja Yoga has no meaning to you. So try your level best to trigger this transformation - every minute of your life - then you will be amazed at the enrichment of life. Whatever I may try, just now I've cleared you out quite a lot, I think. I have cleared you out up and down - quite a lot. Isn't it? But, despite that, now it is for you to keep it there. First of all your attention, I don't think it's that all right. That's why you catch on the right nabhi and on the liver. Attention has to be on one side but if you go on moving your head, moving your attention then you cannot be on Nirvichara. So to keep on Nirvichara you have to keep your attention first steady and once this steadiness is achieved then you just have to see that you are in Nirvichara, put all your thoughts in that stream of Nirvichara and it will solve your problem.
May God bless you!
WHAT MEDITATION IS NOT…
Talk after Mahavira Puja - Gidgegannup, Perth, Australia, 1991-03/28:
Do you know how a yogi becomes a Realized soul, in the normal way? The other day I was reading a book about Upanishadas, one of them it was, today only I saw it, in the morning time when I got up. There was written about a yogi that, “you have to really starve yourself, first of all. Then you have to do shirsasana (standing on the head), with that you have to do pranayama, then you have to get up four o’clock in the morning and take your bath, and then sit down for dhyana, and for five hours you must sit for your dhyana. After that you have to do pranayama. “
That’s also special style. It’s not easy for normal person to do that, (it) is: till you say sixteen, you raise your left side, take the prana through your - I mean you breathe through your nostril, left one, now sixty-four you say, keep it here, and then [out] ,you do the taking it out 32 times- can you imagine? This you have to do 108 times, every day, minimum. This is the minimum.
Now, there are so many exercises, if I tell you that, you’ll be shocked. So like, you have to stand and suddenly jump and put your both the feet five feet apart –imagine! (Shri Mataji laughing) Then turn round, to clear your nadis you see, you have to turn round (Shri Mataji laughing) and put yourself on the left side. Now on the left side you put yourself, and it’s quite a big thing they have described, but in short it’s a stretching exercise, and you put your hand on the left side and go down stretch yourself, again go back to normal, again jump and go five feet apart. Then put to the other side. (Shri Mataji laughing) Nadi cleansing is this way. But there are so many others described you see. They are so horrible! They said ordinary exercises for ordinary people, but for a person who wants to achieve yoga, he has to do all these horrible exercises; are, I don’t know, I mean, by that time all your body will be broken the way it is, or in any case you’ll get moksha!- you see? (Shri Mataji laughing) It’s like that!
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| Diwali 2007 |
DEFINITIONS IN SANSKRIT
From Cologne Digital Sanskrit Lexicon - http://webapps.uni-koeln.de/tamil/
nyAsa m. putting down or in , placing , fixing …; putting away , taking off , laying aside … consigning or intrusting anything to the mind ; mental appropriation or assignment of various parts of the body to tutelary deities
dhyAna …n. meditation , thought , reflection , profound and abstract religious meditation
dhAraNA …f. the act of holding, bearing, wearing, supporting, maintaining; collection or concentration of the mind (joined with the retention of breath) to exercise concentration; firmness, steadfastness, righteousness
samAdhi…m. putting together, joining or combining with …profound or abstract meditation , intense contemplation of any particular object (so as to identify the contemplator with the object meditated upon ; this is the eighth and last stage of Yoga ; with Buddhists Samadhi is the fourth and last stage of Dhyana or intense abstract meditation ...absorbed in meditation
cit …to perceive , fix the mind upon , attend to , be attentive , observe , take notice of …to aim at , intend , design … to understand , comprehend , know … , reflect upon .
citta … mfn. `" noticed "`" aimed at "‘, longed for n. attending, observing intention, aim, wish
nirodha…m. …restraint, check, control, suppression, destruction … suppression or annihilation of pain
kaivalya n. isolation Va1m. ; absolute unity; perfect isolation, abstraction, detachment from all other connections, detachment of the soul from matter or further transmigrations; beatitude
sthiti f. standing upright or firmly , not falling ;, remaining , abiding , stay , residence , sojourn in or on or at; maintenance of discipline , establishment of good order (in a state &c.) Ragh. ; continuance or steadfastness in the path of duty, virtuous conduct, steadiness, rectitude.
RtaMbhara mfn. bearing the truth in one's self; intellect or knowledge which contains the truth in itself
PrajJa mfn. possessing the above knowledge (said of a class of Yogins)
mokSa m. emancipation, liberation, release from … from worldly existence or transmigration, final or eternal emancipation; death; also: sacred hymns conducive to final emancipation; setting free, deliverance (of a prisoner)
