Kundalini - The Sleeping Serpent

I do not know why you have come here. Perhaps you too, do not know. Most of us live in such a way that we are not aware why we are living, where we are going and why. We do not ask of ourselves, "Why?" When our whole life is spent without asking these basic questions it is no wonder if you all have come without knowing the purpose of your coming. Maybe a few of you know it, but the possibility is very small.

We live and walk and see and hear in such a state of sleep, in such a state of deep unconsciousness that we fail to see that which is. We fail to hear that which is said, and we fail to come in contact with and experience that which surrounds us from all sides - within and without. So it is no wonder if you have come here unknowingly, unaware.

We do not know why we are alive. And we are not aware of what we do - so much so that we are not conscious even of our breathing.

But I well know why I am here. And that's what I want to share with you.

Man's quest continues through lives, and it is after the endeavor of countless lives that he gets a glimpse of what we call bliss or peace or truth or God or moksha or nirvana - call it what you like, although there is no word that can say it. One attains to it after many many lives. And all those who seek it think that they are going to enjoy completely after they have found it; but they are very mistaken. They find after attainment that it is just the beginning of a new labor, a new undertaking, that there is no resting.

Until yesterday they strove hard to find it; now they are rushing about to share it with others. If it was not so, Buddha would not have visited our towns, Mahavira would not have knocked at our doors and Christ would not have called on us. After coming in contact with the supreme, a new kind of work begins. In fact, whatsoever is significant in life brings great joy and bliss when you find it, but it is much more joyous and blissful when you share it with others. One who is blessed with bliss or God becomes restless to share it with others. Just as a flower on blooming broadcasts its fragrance, or as a cloud rains or a wave rushes to embrace the seashore - similarly, when somebody finds something of the beyond, his soul thirsts to reach everywhere with its fragrance and spread it.

I am aware about me, why I am here. And this meeting of ours can be meaningful if you too are here for the same reasons, and if you and I meet each other at the same plane. Otherwise, as it often happens, there can be no meeting whatsoever even though we are crossing each other's paths. If you are not here for the same reasons as I am, there will be no meeting point between us in spite of our living in such close physical proximity.

I would like you to see that which I now see. It is so near that it is amazing how you don't see it. And many times I suspect that you have deliberately closed your eyes and ears. Otherwise how could you miss it? Jesus has said again and again that people have eyes but they don't see and they have ears but they don't hear. Not only the blind are blind and the deaf are deaf, even they are blind and deaf who have both eyes and ears That is why you don't see and hear and feel that which is so near and which surrounds you from everywhere. What is the matter?

Undoubtedly there is some small obstruction in the way of your vision. It is, however, not a big obstruction. It is like a speck of dust that gets in the eye and obstructs the view of a whole mountain.

Just a tiny speck of dust can blind your eyes. Logic will say that it should be a huge thing that obstructs the view of a mountain. Arithmetic will say that the thing that prevents you from seeing a mountain must be something bigger than the mountain itself. But in reality the speck of dust is a very small thing and so are our eyes. But because the dust covers the eyes the mountain is covered and thus made invisible to the eyes.

Similarly, what obstructs our inner vision is not something as big as a mountain, it is but a little dust.

And it is what has made us blind to reality. Because of a tiny obstruction all the truths of life remain hidden from us.

Certainly, I am not talking about the physical eyes with which we see things. This creates great confusion. Remember well that in existence only that truth is meaningful for us for which a sensitivity is created within us to receive it, to grasp it, to accept it and to live it. If I have no ears, I cannot hear even the roar of the sea which is so loud and powerful. Even if the ocean continues to roar for eternity I can never hear it. Just for lack of ears the roar of the ocean will be wasted on me. And even if the sun appears at my doorstep I cannot see him if I have no eyes. And similarly if I don't have hands I cannot touch anyone, howsoever I may wish to touch him.

There is so much talk about God and bliss: there are any number of scriptures in the world, millions of people are praying and singing hymns in temples and churches and mosques, but in spite of it all it does not seem that we have any contact with God or that we see him, hear him, feel his heartbeat in our being. It seems to be nothing more than empty talk. Maybe we continue to talk about God in the belief that through talking we can either find him or belie the experience of him. But nothing will happen if the deaf talk for lives about musical notes and the blind talk for eternity about light. It is possible, however, that they will fall victim to the illusion that they are not deaf and blind. Through talking about them, they can come to believe that they know what sound is and what light is.

Temples and churches and mosques that we have built all over the earth have succeeded in creating this illusion, this deception. People sitting in and around them possess nothing but illusions. At the most they can believe in God, but they cannot know him. And believing is not worth more than talking. We can believe if the talk is convincing enough. If someone argues forcefully and proves the existence of God and we fail to prove that he is not, then we feel defeated and we begin to accept God. But believing is not knowing. Howsoever we convince the blind man about the existence of light, he cannot know light and he cannot see.

I am here with the understanding that knowing is possible.

Undoubtedly there is a center inside us which is lying dormant - a center which once in a great while a Krishna comes to know and begins to dance in ecstasy, which a Jesus comes to know and cries from the cross, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they are doing!" Certainly a Mahavira comes to know of this center, and because of this center a Gautam Siddhartha becomes Buddha - the awakened one. Definitely there is a center - an eye, an ear - which is lying asleep. And I am here especially to help you to awaken this center.

Here is an electric bulb shedding light on us all. If you cut the wire that connects it with the power house it will cease shedding light, although the bulb will remain the same. If the electric current fails to reach the bulb, there will be darkness in the place of light here. It is the same bulb turned inactive since the current is not passing through it. And what can the poor bulb do if the current does not reach it?

There is a center inside each one of us through which God is known, but because the life force does not reach that center it is lying dormant, inactive, asleep. Even if your eyes are normal and healthy, they will be useless if the life force does not reach and activate them.

A young woman was brought to me by her relatives. She had fallen in love with some young man.

When her family came to know of it, they came in the way of their meeting each other and they erected a wall between them - a real wall. We have yet to create a good world, in which no walls will be raised between a pair of lovers. The family stopped all con tacts between the girl and her boyfriend. The girl belonged to a respectable family and her lover lived next door and they usually saw each other from the rooftops of their houses. So literally a wall was erected to prevent their meeting.

And the day the wall was erected the young woman suddenly went blind.

In the beginning the parents were suspicious; they thought she was pretending blindness. They berated her and threatened to beat her. But blindness is not cured by threats. Then doctors were consulted who said that her eyes were okay, but they also said that she was not lying; she was really unable to see. They said that they could not do anything in the matter; it was a kind of psychological blindness. The life force has stopped reaching her eyes, it has been blocked. That is why she went blind, although nothing was physically wrong with her eyes.

Then she was brought to me. I tried to understand the whole thing. I asked her what had really happened, if anything had happened to her at the mind's level. Recalling her story she said, "My mind then said that there was no use for the eyes if they cannot see the one they were meant to see. It is better they ceased to see at all. A single thought haunted my mind the whole day when the wall was erected, and it was that I was going blind. Even in sleep I dreamed that I had gone blind.

Because if my eyes were denied the privilege of seeing the very person who delighted them, who meant everything to them, then it was good that they lost their power of sight."

The young woman's mind had consented to her blindness, and so the life force stopped going to her eyes. The eyes are m good shape, they can see, but the energy with which they see has ceased to reach them.

There is a center of our being, hidden within us, where God is known, where we get a glimpse of truth and where we relate with the primordial energy of life. It is this center from where the celestial music is heard, a music that is created without the help of any instruments, and from where such fragrance becomes available which is not of this earth, which is ineffable. It is again this very center which knows no bondage whatsoever and which is the door to freedom, absolute freedom. And it is, this center that leads us to the beyond which has no frontiers, which is a limitless and infinite expanse, which knows no sorrow and which is nothing but bliss and more bliss and more bliss; nothing but abounding bliss.

But our life force does not reach that center, it is impeded somewhere on its way to it, somewhere quite close to it.

It is necessary to understand this thing very clearly, because what I call meditation is going to be our utmost effort for these three days - to reach the life force to that center where the flower can bloom, the lamp can be lighted, the eye, the third eye can open and the super sense can be availed. It is this center from where a few have seen truth or God or whatsoever you call it, and from where all have a right to see it.

But it is not necessary for a seed, just because it is a seed, to become a tree. Every seed is entitled to be a tree, but they don't become. Although the seed has the potential to be a tree, it is also necessary to sow it and to fertilize it. It is necessary for the seed to break up, to disintegrate and to die as a seed so that it can become a tree. Only that seed is transformed into a tree which is ready to disintegrate and disappear into the soil. And if we look at the tree and the seed together, placed side by side, it is difficult to believe, how a tiny seed could turn into a large tree. It seems impossible.

It seems impossible, how a little seed is trans formed into a large tree. We have always had this feeling whenever we looked at men like Krishna or Buddha. Standing near Krishna we felt that it was impossible to be like him. So we said, "You are God, and we are just ordinary persons; we cannot be like you. You are an avatar, an incarnation, and we are just petty people who can only crawl anyhow. It is not in our power to be like you." Whenever a Buddha or a Mahavira has crossed our path, we touched their feet and said, "You are a teerthankara, an incarnation, a son of God, and we are very ordinary people." If a seed could speak it would say the same thing to the tree, "You are God and I am an ordinary seed; how can I be like you?" How can a seed believe that a large tree is hidden in it?

But it is a fact that what is a large tree today was once a tiny seed, and the tiny seed of today will turn into a large tree tomorrow.

Infinite possibilities lie hidden within each of us. But so long as we are not aware of them, no scriptures and no godmen, however loudly they say it, can prove their existence. And it is as it should be, because it is sheer deception to believe what we don't know. It is better for us to say that we don't know that God is.

But it is equally true that a few persons have known God. And a few others have known them, and their whole lives have been transformed through it; they have seen celestial flowers blooming all around them. But we cannot have it just by worshipping them. Unfortunately, religions have stopped with worshipping. But how can a seed become a tree by worshipping it? And a river cannot become an ocean however much it worships the ocean. And however much an egg worships the bird it cannot spread its wings in the sky. The egg will have to crack its shell; it will have to disappear as an egg first. When, for the first time, a chick comes out of its shell it cannot imagine that it can fly.

Seeing birds on the wing it cannot believe that it too can fly. Even as its mother flies, even as the mother urges it on to fly, it lacks confidence, it feels shaky. It sits on the edges of the bough and gathers courage. How can one who has never known flying believe that it can fly and go on a long journey in the vast sky?

I know well that for these three days you too are going to sit on the edges of the pine trees here and wonder if a journey into the unknown is possible. Howsoever loudly I urge you to jump, to leap, to fly, you will not believe that flying is possible. How can the birds that have never been on the wing believe that flying is possible? There is no way but to take a jump. For once you will have to leap without knowing what it is. It has to be a leap in the dark, to begin with.

Somebody wants to learn swimming. He will not be wrong if he says that he will not step into the river without having learned swimming. It sounds right and logical - how can he step into water before he knows how to swim? But the teacher will say that he cannot learn swimming without entering the river. And this discussion about swimming can go on without end. What is the solution? The trainer will insist on his entering into the water first; otherwise swimming will not be possible. And he is right.

In fact, learning be gins with stepping into the river. Everybody knows swimming; they do not have to learn it. If you have learned swimming then you know that it has not to be learned. Everybody knows swimming, but he does not know how to swim methodically. You get the method, the knack of it, only after you have entered the river. In the beginning you throw up your hands and feet in a haphazard manner, and as you go on, as you persevere, you do it skillfully. Everyone knows how to throw up one's hands and feet, but when you practice for awhile it becomes methodical. So those who know will say that swimming is not a learning, it is a remembering.

So those who know say that the experience of God is a remembering. It is not something which we are going to learn today. The day we will come to know it we will exclaim, "Hey, so this is swimming!

We could have done it anytime, we knew it. But we never gathered courage to take the jump, we just kept hanging on the bank of the river." Stepping into the water is very necessary, and as soon as one is inside it the work begins.

The center I am talking about is hidden in our brain. If you ask the brain specialists they will say that only a very small portion of the brain is active; a major part remains inactive, and it is difficult to say what is hidden in that major part. Even a genius uses a very small part of his brain - the rest remains dormant and unused. The brain is the abode of what we call the supersense, or the sixth sense, or the third eye. This center is closed and dormant, and once it is opened we shall see life in many new dimensions. Matter will disappear and God will appear; form will be lost and the formless will be revealed; the figure will vanish and the figureless will be known; death will cease to be and the door to the deathless will open. But the center from where it is seen is closed at the moment.

How to activate that center?

As I said, the light bulb remains inactive so long as the electric current does not reach it. You reach the current and the bulb will be alive. The bulb is always waiting for the current to reach it. But the electric current cannot appear on its own, even if it is racing through the wire; it needs the bulb too.

Both the current and the bulb are equally needed for the light to become manifest. The life-force is within us, but it cannot manifest itself unless it reaches that center which can make manifestation possible.

We are alive only in name. Do you think that just breathing is life? Do you think that digesting food is life? Does life only consist of going to bed in the night and leaving it in the morning? Is it life that a child grows into youth and old age and then dies? Does life comprise only birth and death? Or is it just leaving a few children behind oneself?

No, even machines can do it. If not today, tomorrow the machines are going to do it. Children will be born in test tubes. Childhood, youth and old age are mechanical processes. When a machine is made, it passes through its youth and old age. Every machine has its childhood, youth and old age.

Even when you buy a watch it comes with a guarantee that it will run for ten years or so. The watch will be young and old and then die. Every machine is born, it lives and it dies. So what we ordinarily call life is nothing more than a machine.

Life is a very different thing.

If this dead bulb does not know of the electric current, it would think that, as it is, is life. When a gust of wind pushes it about it will say, "I am alive because I am being pushed about." The bulb will take it to be its life. But what will the bulb say, if it can speak, when the electric current reaches it for the first time? It will say, "It is just indescribable! I don't know what it is that has happened to me.

Until a moment ago I was filled with darkness, and now it is all light and the rays are flowing in all directions." What would a seed say the day it grows into a tree? It would say, "I don't know what has happened to me. It cannot be said. I was a tiny seedling, and now I don't know what has happened to me. And it is equally difficult to say that it has happened through me."

Therefore, those who realize God do not say that they themselves have realized, they only say that they don't find any connection between what they had been and what they have become. They say, "Now it is all light where it was all darkness before. We were all thorns; now we are all blooming flowers. Then we were frozen with death, now we are flowing with life. No, no," they will say, "we have not realized, we have not realized." Those who know will say, "It is all his grace; it has happened to us through his grace and not through our efforts."

But it does not mean that effort has no place. It is true that when you realize God you feel that it is his grace, but to reach to that grace, a journey of great effort is needed. And what is that effort?

In one sense the effort is small, but in another sense it is very great. It is small in the sense that the center is not very far. The distance between the place where the energy is stored and the spot where the eyes open with which you see life is not much. It is hardly a distance of two or three feet.

After all, we are only five to six feet in height. So our whole life structure is limited within five to six feet; the whole set up is confined in this small area.

The space where the life force is stored is like a kunda, a pool near the sex center; that is why the energy is known as kundalini, as if it is a kunda or pool of water. Another reason it is called kundalini is that it looks like a snake coiled and sleeping. If you have seen a sleeping serpent you know how it lies in coils with its hood on top. But if you disturb the sleeping serpent it will wake up, uncoil and raise its hood up. This energy is called kundalini also because the pool of life-force, or the seed of life is precisely located near the sex center and it is from here that life expands in all directions.

It will be good to remember that the small pleasure that we derive from sex is not the pleasure of sex, it really comes from the vibrations arising in the pool of vital energy along with sex. The sleeping serpent is slightly moved by the sex act and we consider it to be the whole pleasure of life. We are not at all aware of what happens when the whole serpent is awakened and it travels across our entire being and reaches the ultimate center in the brain. We are completely unaware of it.

We live on the first step of the ladder of life. There are other steps, greater steps, that lead to God. The small distance of two to three feet that is there in our body is in another sense a very big distance; it is the distance between nature and God, between matter and soul, between sleep and wakefulness, between death and immortality. That distance is very long. But there is also a small distance inside our being which we can traverse in meditation.

If you have to awaken the energy that is lying asleep in you, you should know well that it is not less dangerous than trying to disturb and awaken a sleep ing serpent. In fact, disturbing a sleeping serpent is not that dangerous. It is not dangerous because in the first place ninety seven percent of snakes are not poisonous at all. So you can easily play with ninety seven out of a hundred snakes; they are harmless. And if ever someone dies from their bite, he dies not because of the bite really, but because of the thought of being bitten by a snake. These snakes are not poisonous, so ninety seven out of a hundred snakes do not kill anybody, although many people die of their bite. They die because of their belief that one has to die after being bitten by a snake. And when a belief grips anyone, it becomes a reality. Playing with really poisonous snakes too, is not so dangerous, because at the worst they can deprive you of your body. But playing with the kundalini power, which I am talking about, is dangerous indeed; there is nothing more dangerous than this. No danger can be greater than this. But what is the danger?

This too is a kind of death. If the energy within is awakened, you will die as you are right now and a totally new individual will be born - an individual that you never were before awakening. And it is this fear that prevents people from becoming religious. It is the same fear which, if it grips a seed, prevents it from becoming a tree. Now the greatest danger facing a seed is that it will be buried in the soil, it will be treated with water and manure and then it will die as a seed. It is again the same danger that faces an egg when it grows and breaks its shell. Then it has to die as an egg so that it becomes a bird. In the same way we are in the preceding state of something yet to be born. We are like an egg which is going to become a bird. But we take the egg to be everything and nestle down in it.

When this energy will rise, you will be no more; there is no way for you to survive. And if you get frightened, your fate will be what Kabir describes in a beautiful couplet. Kabir has said a beautiful thing. He says, "He alone found it who sought it by diving deep in the sea. But I proved myself a fool as I kept sitting on the seashore, although I had been there seeking." When someone asked Kabir why he remained sitting, he said, "He alone found it who sought it by diving deep in the sea. But I proved myself a fool as I, afraid of being drowned, kept sitting on the seashore."

Whoever has found it has done so by seeking it in the depths. What is essential is a readiness to be drowned, a readiness to disappear. If it has to be said in one word - though it is not a happy word - it is death, readiness for death. And he who will be afraid of being drowned will of course survive, but he will only survive as an egg; he will never become a bird on the wing. He who will fear being drowned will of course survive, but he will only survive as a seed; he will never become a tree under whose shade thou sands of travelers may relax. But is it worthwhile to survive as a seed? It would be worse than death really.

So there is great danger. The danger is that the person that I was till yesterday will not survive; when the energy will be awakened it will totally transform me. New centers will be awakened, a new individuality will emerge, new experiences will happen - everything will be new. If you are prepared for the new then you must gather courage to part with the old.

But the old has gripped us so firmly in every way, it has fettered us so strongly, that the vital energy cannot raise its head, cannot rise upward.

The journey to God is really a journey into in security. But the flowers of life and beauty only bloom in insecurity. So I should tell you a few important things about this journey, and a few not so important.

First, I hope that when we meet here tomorrow morning and start on a journey of awakening the life force, you will stake everything and withhold nothing. This is not going to be a small gamble. He alone will win who stakes his all. If you withhold even a little you will lose it. It is not possible for a seed to save a part of itself as a seed and allow the rest to become a tree. If the seed dies, it dies totally, and if it saves itself it does so totally. There is nothing like a partial death. So if you withhold even a bit of yourself the whole labor will be wasted. Please let go of yourself completely, totally.

Many times, as one holds back in the slightest, everything is lost.

I have heard that when gold mines were discovered in Colorado for the first time, the whole of America rushed there. News had spread that if you buy a piece of land you will find gold there.

People started buying land in Colorado. A multi-millionaire sold out his whole property and bought an entire hill in Colorado with the money. And he installed huge machines to mine gold. While small people were busy mining gold on their tiny bits of land, this man staked large scale mining on a whole mountain with the help of high technology.

He and his men worked hard, but there was no trace of gold. And then he panicked, because he had staked his entire fortune on this adventure. He was so much scared that he told his family that they were ruined. He had squandered his entire fortune and gold was nowhere to be seen.

Then he advertised in the newspapers that he wanted to sell his hill, along with all the machines and instruments of mining. His family members said, "But who is going to buy them? Everybody has come to know that the mountain has no gold and that you have wasted millions for nothing. He will be a madman who will agree to buy it." But the man said, "Who knows? There may be another like me."

And a buyer really came forward. The multi-millionaire felt like warning the person who had offered to buy his hill that he was in for a mad adventure. But he could not gather courage, because of the thought of the consequences if the hill was not sold. So the hill was at last sold. But after the deal was completed he told the buyer, "You seem to be a real madman. Don't you see that I am selling the hill after it has ruined me?" The other man said, "You cannot say how life is going to be. Maybe there was no gold as far as you dug the hill, but how can you say that there is no gold even where you did not dig?" And the multi-millionaire nodded his head saying, "That I cannot say."

And the wonder happened, as it happens some times. The gold mine was found just one foot below the surface where the previous owner had left off digging. The previous owner was now twice as miserable when he learned that the whole hill was full of gold. He visited the new owner and congratulated him on his good luck. But the man said, "It is not a question of good luck. You did not give of yourself totally to it. You turned back before you had done enough digging. You should have gone deeper."

Things like this happen every day in life. I know any number of people who go to find God - but they don't go the whole length or they don't give of them selves wholly to it, and face disappointment.

Many times they miss the divine by just an inch; when God was only an inch away, they turned back.

And at times I see clearly how a seeker turns back when he had almost made it.

So remember that you will not spare yourself even a bit and that you will stake your all. And do we have much really that we can pay for God? But we are miserly even in this. No, miserliness will not do. There is no place for the miser at the door of the di vine. There we will have to stake everything.

It is not that we have much that we can give. What we have is not the question. The question is whether or not we have staked our all. Because as soon as we stake our all we touch the center where the life force resides and from where it begins to move upward. But why do I insist on a total stake?

In fact, it is only when we have pressed all our energy into meditation that there arises the need for the reserves of energy lying in the reservoir, to wake up and come to our aid. It is only then that the life force begins to rise, and not before. Until then it lies asleep in the kunda, in the pool. So long as there is even a part of our own energy left unused, we have to depend on it. The reserve forces in us come to be used only when we have no energy left. It is only then that life force is needed. The center is activated only when we have staked our all. Only then it becomes urgent to draw energy from the reservoir, from the center, not otherwise.

For example, I ask you to run and you begin to run. Then I ask you to run with all your strength and you run with added strength. In reality you have not yet put all your strength into running, although you think that you are running with all your strength. Tomorrow you have to take part in a long running competition, and then you find that you are running faster than before, that your speed has increased. It is because of the competition that you run with full energy. But even this is not total.

Tomorrow somebody pursues you with a gun in his hand, and you run with the greatest speed ever.

Even you are surprised, you did not know that you could run so fast. Now you are running for your life. Where is this energy coming from? This energy too, is your own energy that was lying asleep in you.

But even this energy is not enough for meditation. Even when you run for your life, being pursued by a gunman, you are not running with your entire might. In meditation you will need to stake much more than this. You will have to stake your utmost. And the moment you touch the point where your entire energy is pressed into action, you will find that you are connected with some other energy, that some hidden energy within you has started waking up.

For sure, you will experience the awakening of this extraordinary energy. It is like you have suddenly contacted some electric current. You will feel that some energy within you, lying low at the sex center, has started rising upward. This energy is hot like a laming fire, and at the same time it is cool like the morning breeze. It is like a harsh prick of thorns and at the same time it is as soft as a flower.

And many things will happen when that energy will be rising upward. Please don't withhold yourself at any point when the energy is moving upward. Let go of yourself completely, like a man leaves himself in the hands of the river and just floats with its current. In short, "let go" is the key.

Now the second thing. First you have to stake your all; and when as a result of this total stake something happens to you, then you have to leave yourself fully in the hands of that "something".

This is the second thing. Let go of yourself; just float as one floats on the surface of the water. Just floating. You should be ready to go wheresoever the current of the river takes you. It is true that to a certain extent we have to provoke it, but when the energy is awakened, we have just to leave ourselves in its hands, we have to let go of ourselves. Higher forces have taken over, we need not worry anymore. We have to just float.

And third, with the upward rise of this energy many things will happen. Please see that you don't get scared when they happen, because new experiences are frightening. When a child is born, when he comes out of his mother's cozy womb, he gets frightened. Psychologists call it a trauma, a traumatic experience, an experience which a child will never forget, which will haunt him for the whole of his life. The child's fear of the new begins with his birth; because he had lived in complete security in the mother's womb for nine months. He had no worries whatsoever; he did not have to breathe, or eat or cry or do anything for him self; the mother did everything. The child was in a state of absolute rest and comfort. Coming out of the mother's womb he encounters a new and strange world altogether.

This is the first shock of life, and it is here, at the very doorstep of life that fear grips him.

That is why everybody fears the new; they cling to the old and fear the new. It is the first experience of our life that the new puts us in great trouble. Mother's womb was a much better place than this world. That is why most of our contrivances that we use in daily living are fashioned after the mother's womb. Our cushions, sofas, cars, living rooms are all modeled after the mother's womb.

We try to make them as cozy and comfortable as the womb, but we do not really succeed. So the first experience after coming from mother's womb is one of fear of the new.

The experience of the awakening of the kundalini, the primordial energy, is a new experience greater than the child's, because while the childbirth happens only at the level of the body, the awakening of the kundalini happens at the level of the soul. It is therefore, a totally new birth. It is for this reason that we call him a brahmin who goes through this experience. brahmin is he who is twice born. He is also called dwij - one who is twice born.

So when that energy awakens, a second birth happens. In this birth you are both - you are the moth er and you are the child. You alone are both together. Therefore you will have to go through double suffering - the pains of childbirth and the trauma of insecurity, together. For this reason it can be a frightening experience. Apart from the trauma of insecurity you will also have to go through the pains of childbirth as the mother does, because here you are the mother and the child combined in one. You are born, but there is no separate mother and there is no separate child. You are taking birth, and you are also giving birth; your birth is happening through you. So the pains can be very severe and intense.

I have received complaints that someone cries and screams and shouts during meditation and that he should be restrained from doing so. No, let him cry and scream and shout. He alone knows what is happening to him in his inside. A woman is crying while giving birth to a child and another woman, who has never known childbirth, comes along and says, "Why do you cry and scream? If the child is taking birth, let him. Why weep and groan?" Such a woman can say so, because she has never gone through the pangs of childbirth. Men will never know the pains which women have to bear during childbirth. They cannot even think of it; there is no way for them to have a feel of it.

But in meditation men and women are alike; in a sense they all are going to be mothers. They are going to give birth to the new. So pain and anguish need not be suppressed. It is not necessary to restrain someone if he falls and rolls on the ground and screams and shouts. Whatever happens should be allowed to happen freely. Let go of it; don't suppress it. Any kinds of experiences are possible. Someone may feel that he is levitating, and another may feel that he is expanding, and yet another may feel that he is shrinking. Diverse kinds of new experiences are possible; I need not enumerate them. Many things can happen; anything new can happen, and each one's experience will be different. So one need not worry and get scared.

And if anybody has something to say he should see me at noon and talk to me individually. Don't discuss it among yourselves. And there is a reason for not discussing it among yourselves. It is not necessary that what happens to one should happen to others too. And if you share your experiences with someone who did not have the same experiences he will laugh and say that you are crazy. Every man is his own measure; that is why everyone thinks that he is right and others are wrong. Even if the other person does not laugh at you, he will tell you distrustfully that he did not experience anything like it.

This experience is so personal and subjective that it is better not to discuss it with any other person.

One should not confide even in one's wife or husband, because no two persons are very close and intimate in this respect. And in this respect no one can understand the other easily; understanding is so difficult in this case. Anyone can say that you are crazy. Let alone you, they will not spare a Jesus and a Mahavira. The day Mahavira stood naked on the road, he must have been declared mad. Mahavira knew what it meant to him to be naked, but he was declared mad.

It is, therefore, necessary that you don't discuss it with others. Moreover, as soon as you speak to anyone, he is not going to have the wisdom to keep quiet; he will immediately say something. And this "something" can come in the way of your experience itself. His remarks can work as suggestions and it can be an obstacle in the way of your new experience. So what ever happens to you, you should discuss it with me directly, and not with anyone else. I am here so that you can discuss your problems with me.

Before you come here for meditation tomorrow morning, you can take some liquids like tea and milk, but no solid food. Don't eat your breakfast. Tea, milk or any liquid can do. If one can do without tea and milk also, it would be better; it will make the work on meditation easier. And you should reach here five minutes before the scheduled time, 7:30 a.m.

Between 7:30 and 8:30 we will have a discussion if necessary. I have decided on a discussion rather than a discourse, because a discourse is a very impersonal affair. In discourse you don't seem to be talking to anybody; it is like talking to the winds. So you will sit very close to me tomorrow morning, and not at a distance. Be as close to me as possible. And you can ask any questions on what I have said today and we will discuss them for an hour. And then we will sit for meditation between 8:30 and 9:30.

Remember that you come to meditation with an empty stomach - without taking any solid food. If you can do even without liquid, it would be better. But don't force yourself to be hungry; if you cannot fast, then take something like tea or milk.

Also remember that you come in loose clothes and properly bathed. No one should come without bathing; bathing is a must. And the clothes should be as loose as possible, should not be tight at all, not even at the waistline. Along with the rest of the body, the waistline too, should have loose fittings. And while sitting for meditation keep your whole body loose and relaxed.

Even our clothes have done a lot of mischief at the level of our body mind; they have created any number of obstacles. When some energy begins to rise upward the clothes put obstacles in its way at various levels.

Another important thing to remember is that you should go into silence a half hour before meditation will begin. Some friends, who can, should observe silence for these three days that we are here.

They should be in complete silence. And other friends should see to it that they are not disturbed in their silence. The greater the number of people going into silence, the better. And it would be good if one could be silent throughout the camp time. Nothing would be better.

If you cannot go completely silent, then see that you speak as little as possible. Use as few words as possible, as you do in telegraphic messages. While sending messages by telegraph you do with the mini mum number of words - say ten or eight words - be cause you have to pay for each word. Even in life you have to pay for every word that you say; words are really costly. So those who cannot go into complete silence should do with the minimum number of spoken words.

In the same way, use of the sense organs should be reduced to the minimum. For example, use your eyes less and less. When using them lower the sight to the earth or raise it upward and see the sky. Watch the sea. But as far as men and women are concerned see as little of them as possible.

Because most of our mental associations are formed of human faces, not of trees, clouds and seas.

Look at the trees and the clouds and the seas; they don't give rise to any thoughts in you. Human faces, on the other hand, immediately stir all kinds of thoughts in your mind. While walking, lower your gaze and keep it confined to a distance of four feet from you. And keep your eyes only half open so they concentrate on the tip of your nose. That is enough. And help others that they see and hear as little as possible.

Things like radios and transistors should be shut down; they should not be used during the camp.

And don't allow newspapers to enter the campus.

The more rest you let your senses have, the better. The more rest you have the more energy you conserve, which can be used in meditation; otherwise you will exhaust yourselves. Most of us are exhausted and spent, like spent cartridges. We spend ourselves completely in twenty four hours; we save nothing. What little we save during the night's sleep, we start squandering right after leaving the bed in the morning. Going through the newspapers and listening to the radio, the squandering begins. We have no idea of what conservation of energy means, how a lot of energy can be conserved.

Meditation will need much energy. So if you don't conserve it, you will soon get tired and exhausted.

Some people tell me that they tire after an hour's meditation. But it is not meditation that is responsible for it. The real reason is that you have squandered all your energy and that you live on the point of exhaustion. You have no idea that you spend energy when you just focus your eyes and see a thing. When you tune your ears to hear something you again spend energy. Even when you think, energy is being spent. And energy is also spent when you speak. Whatever we do, it costs energy. In the night, how ever, we save some energy, because other activities are suspended - although a little energy is spent even in dreaming. But this is a different thing. A little energy is saved in the night however, and that is how we feel fresh in the morning.

So for these three days you have to conserve energy so that it may be wholly used for meditation.

I am giving you all these instructions so that for the coming three days I may not have to say them again.

We have on our schedule an hour of silence in the afternoon; during that hour there will be no talk.

During discourse I communicate with you through words; during the hour between three and four I will communicate with you through silence. So all of you will be present here by 3 p.m.; no one will come after three. People coming late will be a kind of disturbance; they will be really harmful. I will be sitting here, but what will you do between three and four?

Two things have to be kept in mind. One: that each one of you will sit at a place from where I can be seen. Not that you have to look at me, but you must find a place for yourself from where I can be visible. Then you will close your eyes. If any of you prefer to keep your eyes open, you can do so.

But it would be good if you keep your eyes closed.

This hour of silence will be just a waiting for the unknown. You don't know who will come, and yet he will come. You don't know what you will hear, and yet you will hear. You don't know what you will see, and yet you will see. You will sit silently for an hour, just awaiting the unknown guest whom you have never seen and heard. You may sit or lie down as you would like. But be receptive, become receptivity itself, for a whole hour. Be passive, but receptive to that which is, or is going to happen.

Let it just happen. Be passive but alert and awaiting, wakefully awaiting. And through silence I will try to communicate to you what I have to say. You may, perhaps, understand through silence what you don't understand through words.

Again at night I will answer any questions that you may have to ask. And then again an hour of meditation will follow.

We are, thus, going to have nine sittings in the course of three days. And right from tomorrow morn ing you should begin exerting your all so that by the ninth, the last sitting, you will have really exerted your all.

But what are you going to do in your spare hours?

You have to be silent. A lot of trouble is removed just by avoiding conversations. There is the beach, go and lie down on the beach and listen to the waves. Even at night those of you who can should go to the beach with your bedding and sleep quietly on the sands. You can sleep under the trees as well. But be alone, don't form groups of friends and families. It is just possible that a few people will form groups and fool around. Keep away from them and live alone. Know that for these three days each one of you is all alone here. Because if you are going to meet with God, you can only go alone; no one will walk with you. Each one of you should know that you are the lonely pilgrim and you have to go it alone. It is a journey of the alone to the alone. So be alone - alone to the greatest extent.

And now remember this last instruction: don't grumble, don't complain about anything. Stop complaining for three days. Don't grumble if the food is bad. Don't grouch if mosquitoes bite you at night. For three days let there be total acceptance of all that may happen. Mosquitoes will of course gain something, but you will gain more, much more. If the food is not right it will harm your body a little, but it will harm you a lot if you grumble about it. And there are reasons for it - a complaining mind is never at peace. Our complaints are petty, but what we lose is too much. So don't grumble; for three days know it clearly that you will not grumble at all. What is, is. Howsoever it is, is. Accept it absolutely. Then these three days will be wonderful. If for these three days you stay above petty matters, if you accept everything as it is and delight in it, then you will cease to have any com plaints for the rest of your life. Because then you will know how peaceful and joyous it is to live without grudging.

For three days give up all petty matters.

If you have any questions you can bring them tomorrow morning. And when you ask a question, remember that it is something of common interest. You can ask anything that comes from your heart and mind and that you think to be necessary.

I told you why I am here. I don't know why you are here; but I will meet you tomorrow morning in the hope that you are here for the same reasons as I am. Ordinarily our habits are very ugly. Even when a Buddha appears at our door we feel like telling him to go away, because we assume that everyone comes to ask for something. So we forget that, and when someone comes to give we tell him too to go away. Thus a grave mistake is made. A grave mistake indeed! I hope that you will not make the same mistake.

These three days you have to create a milieu here so that something real can happen. And it is possible. And it depends on each one of you to create such a milieu. In three days this entire forest of pines can be charged with mysterious energies. All the trees, each grain of sand, the ocean and the air, can be filled with a new life force. And all of us can cooperate in its creation.

And remember, nobody should put obstructions in its way. No one who is here should be just an onlooker. And drop all fear of what others will say. Then alone we can reach the supreme. And then you will not have to repeat Kabir's words, and you can say, "I did not fear and I took a jump."

I am grateful to you for having silently heard me with such love. I bow down to God dwelling in each one of you. Please accept my salutation.