Kundalini, Shaktipat and Grace

Question 1

There is a relationship, and a deep relationship at that, between the two processes. In fact, it is the breath that connects the soul with the body; breath forms the bridge between the two. That is why with the cessation of the breath life ceases to be. Life goes on even if the brain is damaged. One can survive even if one's eyes or other bodily limbs are amputated. But if the breath stops, life will come to an end immediately. Breathing really joins the body to the soul.

And it is at the junction of the soul and the body, at their meeting point, where the energy known as kundalini resides. Kundalini, or whatever name you give it, is the same energy, and it resides at the junction of the body and soul.

Therefore this energy has two forms. When this energy flows towards the body, it becomes sex; and when it flows towards the soul, it becomes kundalini or whatsoever you call it. And this energy is descendent while moving to the body and it is ascendent while moving to the soul. So while kundalini is an ascending energy, sex is a descending one. But the seat of kundalini, the place of its location, is hammered and moved by breathing, deep and fast breathing.

You will be surprised to know that you cannot keep your breath tranquil while making love. Love- making brings about an immediate change in the movement of the breath. No sooner is one excited sexually, than breathing is stepped up. Because unless breathing hits this center, sex energy cannot get moving without being hit and stimulated by breathing, sexual intercourse is impossible. The same way, samadhi or ecstasy is impossible unless this kundalini is hit and stimulated by breathing.

Samadhi is the apex, the highest point of the ascending energy, and the sex act is the nadlr, the lowest point of the descending energy. But the breath ing works equally in both directions.

Try it. If your mind is full of sex, relax your breathing, slow down its pace. Or if the mind is in the grip of anger or any lustful desire, slow down the pace of breathing, relax it, and you will find sex, anger, or whatsoever it is, has left you. They simply cannot last, because the energy that sustains them comes through breathing. Without being stimulated by breathing this energy cannot work. Therefore no one can be angry if he keeps his breathing slow, steady and relaxed. And it would be a miracle, nothing short of an absolute miracle, if one can be angry while breathing in a very slow and relaxed manner. It is impossible. Anger disappears as soon as breathing is slowed down and relaxed. Nor can one be sexually excited in a state of slow and relaxed breathing. Desire for sex disappears with the slowing of the breath. So slow down and relax your breathing when the mind is full of sex or anger or any other desire.

And when your mind is seized with the thirst, the longing for meditation, then accelerate the pace of your breathing and hammer the kundalini with deep breathing. Because with this longing within and the hammering of breathing, the energy is firmly set on its journey of meditation.

Deep breathing has a profound effect on the kundalini. Pranayama, the science of yogic breathing, was not discovered unnecessarily. Through long experiments and investigations and through enduring experiences it was known that a great deal can be accomplished with the help of breathing and its hammering on the kundalini. Really a lot can be done through deep and fast breathing. And the more intense and strong the hammering, the swifter the movement of energy. And so far as we ordinary people are concerned, whose kundalini has been asleep for countless lives, the need for intense and hard hammering, hammering with all our strength is much greater.

Breathing hits the kundalini, the basic center of energy. And as your experience will deepen you will clearly see even with closed eyes the exact spot where it is hit by breathing. So it often happens that with the hammering through deep breathing one gets aroused sexually. It so happens because your body is acquainted only with this experience, the experience of sex being aroused through deep breathing. So as a mat ter of habit the body begins to move in the familiar direction of sex whenever you breathe deep and fast. And that is the reason why many seekers - both men and women - have the feeling that deep breathing stimulates their sex center immediately.

Quite a number of people had similar experiences in the presence of Gurdjieff, and it was just natural.

Many women thought that as soon as they went up to him, their sex centers were hit and stimulated.

This was only natural. But because of it Gurdjieff was much misunderstood and maligned; although he was not at all at fault. The blame should not lie at his door. The fact is that the vibes around a person whose kundalini is awakened, are such that they begin to affect your kundalini as soon as you go near him. And since your own kundalini is asleep near your sex center, the vibes of the awakened one hit you at your sex center. That is how it happens at the first contact.

Deep and fast breathing is bound to have a profound effect on the kundalini. And all the centers, which you call chakras, are nothing but halting places for the kundalini on its journey's way. These are the centers through which the kundalini passes. Ordinarily there are any number of such centers, and there are different estimates of them. But broadly speaking there are seven important centers where the kundalini, while moving up and down, is likely to halt and rest for awhile. And it will have its effect when it comes in contact with them. And its first effects will be felt on the center which is your most active center as such. For instance, if a person constantly works with his brain, then with deep breathing his head will become very heavy. It will be so because his brain center happens to be his most active center. The first impact of breathing will be felt on his head, his active center, and it will become heavy. And if a person is sexual, his sex center will be stimulated in the first instant.

Similarly a loving man will find his love stimulated, enhanced and flowing. And if one is emotional, his emotions will be heightened.

So the most active center will be hit and stimulated first by deep and fast breathing. But very soon it will begin to affect other centers too. And accordingly a change, a transformation of the personality begins simultaneously. You will begin to know that you are changing; you are not the same person that you were up to now.

We don't know that there are very many possibilities within each one of us. We are familiar with only that center of ours which is active and dominant and where we exist. So when another center opens up it seems that our old personality is gone and a new man has appeared in its place. Or it seems we are now not the same as we were before. It is like this: I am aware of only one room in a house where I live, and I carry the imprint of this room in my mind. And suddenly one day a door opens and another room appears before me. Then my whole mental map of the house will undergo a change. Now the house that I had thought to be mine will be a very different house, and I will need to arrange it anew.

So as the various centers will be hit and activated, new dimensions of your life will begin to unfold and manifest themselves. And when all the centers will be active together - that is, when energy will flow through them all uniformly - then for the first time we will live a whole life; we will live totally.

Ordinarily no one lives wholly, totally; we all live fragmentary lives. All our upper centers remain untouched. So deep breathing is going to hammer and activate them all.

And the question "Who am I?" does the same thing; but it hammers the centers from another direction. So try to understand it, as you now understand the functions of deep and fast breathing.

How does the chant of "Who am I?" work on the kundalini?

You don't know why when you close your eyes and make a mental picture of a woman in the nude, your sex center is immediately stimulated. You are just imagining and yet your sex center has been aroused. Why?

In fact, every center has its own imagination, and if you imagine something approximating it, the center concerned will be stimulated instantly. So no sooner you think of and imagine sex, your sex center starts working; you are sexually aroused.

And you will be surprised to know that in this matter a real woman in the nude may not be as exciting and effective as the thought of her. The reason is that the thought of the naked woman will take you into your imagination which will start hitting the sex center immediately and powerfully. But a real woman in the nude cannot take you into imagination, because she is directly before you, she is so immediate. So she will affect you only to the extent an immediate object can. While the real woman hits you frontally, the imaginary woman will hit you from within. And a frontal attack cannot be as powerful and deep as an attack from within. Therefore, there are many men who prove impotent before real women but who are very potent in imagination; there is no end to their imaginary potency.

Because the assault of imagination touches your center from within, while the frontal attack of a real woman cannot touch you from within; it touches you directly from without. And because man lives in the mind, so he can work on these centers more effectively through the mind.

So when you ask, "Who am I?" you are just making an inquiry, you are mentally raising a question.

Which center is this question going to touch? It is bound to touch some center. When you ask this question, when you inquire who you are, when you are full with this thirst to know, when your every fiber asks, "Who am I?" then you are going within; and surely some center within you is going to be hit and activated by it.

But because "Who am I?" is a question you have never asked, it is not going to strike any of your known and active centers. This is a question you have never asked of yourself, this is an inquiry you have never made. You have never been filled with the thirst to know who you are. You have often asked, "Who is he? Who is she?" and questions like these; but you have never asked "Who am I?"

"Who am I?" has been an unasked question so long. and therefore it is going to strike an entirely unknown center which you have never touched. And that unknown center, which this question "Who am I?" is going to hit, is very basic - because this question itself is very basic.

"Who am I?" is a very fundamental question and a very existential question at that. "Who am I?"

is a question which involves the totality of our existence in all its depth and heights. This question will take me where I was before I was ever born, behind all my past lives. This question can take me where I was in the primeval beginning. The profoundness of this question is infinite. And so is its journey equally profound. Therefore, this question will immediately strike the basic center, the deepest one - the kundalini.

Deep breathing strikes the center physiologically, and the question "Who am I?" does the same job mentally, psychologically. This question hammers the kundalini with mind energy and deep breathing hammers it with body energy. And if both the hammer strokes are strong enough... Ordinarily there are only two ways of hammering the center - one through breathing and the other through asking "Who am I?" There are other ways as well, but they are a little complicated.

Another person can also be helpful in this mat ter. If you do it in my presence the effect will be quicker and greater, because then there will be hammering from a third direction of which you have no idea. That is the astral direction whose hammering is subtler than the physical and mental ones.

When you breathe intensely it hammers the center physically. When you ask "Who am I?" it does the same thing mentally. And when you do it in the presence of an other through whom your astral body is hammered, then a third journey begins. So if fifty people meditate here together, it will be much more intensive than if only one person meditated. Because of the longings of fifty persons combined with the vibrations of their intense breathing, an astral atmosphere will pervade this room, and a new kind of electrical light waves will begin to circulate all around, which will hit you from another direction.

But normally you have only two direct ways - one is physical and the other mental. So "Who am I?"

is going to hit harder; it will hit harder than deep breathing. But we start with breathing, because it is of the body and is easy to do. Asking "Who am I?" is a little difficult, as it is of the mind. We begin with the body and when the body begins to vibrate fully, it prepares the mind to ask the question "Who am I?" A right situation is needed for this asking. It won't do any good to ask offhand, "Who am I?" any time and every time.

In fact, every question needs a right situation when it can be asked. For example, when your whole body begins to shake and tremble, a question arises automatically and you ask of yourself, "What is it all about? How am I doing all this?" And then you know that you are not doing anything, you are neither raising your feet nor turning your head and dancing; and yet dance is happening. And if all this happens without your efforts, your identity with your body begins to loosen. Then a new question arises before you, you want to know who you are. The new question is that if what the body does is not your doing, then who else does it, and who you are. Now a schism, a gap is created between you and your body.

This is the right situation, when through this gap the question "Who am I?" can sink deep in you. It is precisely this opportunity when it becomes necessary to ask the question. Really every question has its own right time, right season. And it is very important to find out the right season for this question "Who am I?" It is not a question to be asked in an offhanded manner; it cannot be asked anytime without due preparation. If, sitting here, you ask casually "Who am I?" it will be lost in the air; it will not reach anywhere. A gap, an opening in you is necessary from where the question can penetrate you. An opening is a must.

With the hammer-strokes of these two things - deep breathing and "Who am I?" - the kundalini will awaken. And with its awakening extraordinary experiences will begin to happen; because all the experiences of all your past lives are associated with the kundalini - in a way they are deposited there. Your experiences of infinite lives, including your lives as a tree, as a fish, as a bird, the experiences that you went through in the entire course of your evolution are lying strewn on your journey's path. And this serpentine power known as kundalini has absorbed them all. Therefore many kinds of things can happen and you can identify yourself with these experiences. Any kinds of things, unthinkable things, can happen. You have no idea of the many subtle experiences with which the kundalini is associated.

For instance, there is a tree standing in the garden, and a strong wind and heavy rains have just swept across the garden. The way this tree has experienced and known the wind and the rains is exclusively its own; neither we nor anyone else can know it. The way the tree has known the rains, we can never know it. How can we know it? It is impossible. Even if we were standing near that tree, we could not have experienced it the way the tree experienced it. We can know it only the way we are capable of knowing it.

But at some stage in the course of your life's journey you must have been a tree as well. Now if the kundalini, as you are breathing and asking "Who am I?" reaches the spot where your experiences as a tree are deposited, you will suddenly come to know what exactly this tree had known when it was raining. You will really know that it is raining. And then you w ill be frightened, very much frightened, and you will wonder what it is all about. And only then you will understand why sometimes you feel like an ocean and sometimes like the winds, and you will go through the same experiences as the ocean and the winds do. And as a result of it your aesthetic capacity and many other capacities, of which you have no idea whatsoever, will begin to unfold themselves.

There is a painting of Van Gogh in which a tree, an immensely tall tree, is reaching for the skies.

The tree is growing so high that it has left the stars, including the sun and the moon, far behind it, much below it. The stars, the sun and the moon, all of them look like tiny objects lurking at the foot of the tree, near the earth, while the solitary tree is rising higher and higher into infinity. Someone said to Van Gogh, "You are crazy to paint a tree like it. Can a tree ever grow so high that the stars lie way below it?" Van Gogh said, "Perhaps you have never known a tree; you have not seen the inside of a tree. But I know the tree from its inside; I know it in depth. It is immaterial if it cannot go beyond the moon and the sun and the stars of heavens, but all the same, there is no doubt whatsoever that every tree longs to do so. It is irrelevant that the tree cannot surpass them; all the same it is its thirst, its longing for the immense. It is true, I cannot even think of it. It is its limitation that the tree cannot grow that high, but I know how its spirit, its being, is always soaring higher and higher and reach ing for the highest heavens."

Van Gogh often said, "The tree is earth's longing to reach for the heavens. The tree is really earth's desire; through it the earth is stretching its hands to touch the heavens."

Through the kundalini we will know the rain the way the tree knows it, even though we will not know it so clearly as the tree does. But, of course, we have been trees and many other things too. And so any thing can happen in meditation. Apart from this, we will begin to have glimpses of our future possibilities. We will not only know that we have been in the past, we will also come to know what we can be in the future.

And after we have entered the path of the kundalini, after we have joined its pilgrimage, our story as the story of an individual comes to an end, and the story of consciousness, the whole consciousness begins. Aurobindo used to speak in these terms, and it is difficult, the thing could not be very clear.

Then it is not the story of an individual, it is the story of consciousness itself. Then you are not alone, you are joined with all the infinity that ever happened in the past and also with all the infinity that will ever happen in the future. Then the entire infinity will be within you. It is like a primeval seed that ever goes on unfolding itself, that ceaselessly continues to manifest itself, and there seems to be no end to it. And when you will so see your limitless expanse, an expanse that is without a beginning and without an end, an expanse with an infinity behind it and an infinity in front of it, then your state will be different altogether, then everything about you will undergo a sea change.

And the whole gamut lies hidden in the kundalini.

Then many new colors will appear before you that you had never seen before. In fact, you will find there are not as many colors on the outside as there are within you, when you come to this experiencing. Because in the course of life's infinite journey you have known these inner colors from time to time and in quite different ways. A kite wandering high up in the sky sees the colors in one way, and we here on the ground see the same colors in quite a different way. If you go to a cluster of trees you will see only one color, the green one. But if a painter goes to the same cluster of trees, he will see a thousand and one kinds of colors. Green is not one single color; there are a thousand shades to it. And not even two shades are the same; each shade is unique; it has its own individuality. To us green is simply green; there the matter ends. We have a broad and gross and generalized concept of the color green; there is nothing more to it. But its reality is quite different from what we know. Green is not one color; it is really a thousand colors. And as such every color has a thousand colors within it. So when you will go within yourself, you will go through thou sands of very fine, subtle and rare experiences.

In the matter of sensory perceptions man is a weak and poor creature; animals and birds are far superior to him. Sense organs of animals and birds are very powerful; their sensitivity is simply profound - both in its height and depth. What they lack is that they cannot get to know consciously and think about it. But their sensitivity, their alertness, their experiencing is nonetheless very deep and profound.

There is a bird, a very common kind of bird in Japan. This bird leaves its villages a full twenty four hours before an earthquake rocks the village. When that bird is not seen anywhere in the village, its inhabitants immediately know that an earthquake is bound to occur within twenty four hours. Even with modern scientific instruments that we have, we cannot forecast an impending earthquake more than six hours in advance, and even then it is not that reliable. But the forecast made by these birds is hundred per cent correct; their sensitivity is so high and acute and infallible. And these birds are so common and numerous that when they disappear, the whole village comes to know that an earthquake is on its way. It means that even the extremely subtle vibrations of an impending earthquake are felt by these ordinary birds, and they leave the village.

If ever in your long past you have been this bird, you will feel such vibrations in the course of your kundalini's practice that you had never felt. But in reality you did experience them before, but you don't remember them. Nothing happens in the course of kundalini's awakening which has not happened before in your past lives. So you will see colors that you have never seen. You will hear a sound that you have never heard. Kabir calls it naad, or subtle sound.

Kabir says, "Dance, O monks, nectar is raining." And the monks ask, "Where is it raining?" Now this Kabir's rain of nectar is not happening on the outside; it is an inner experience. Kabir also says, "Listen, O monks, to the naad of great drums." And the monks again want to know what it is. They don't hear any sound, in spite of Kabir's repeated calls to them to listen to it. You, too, can hear those sounds that Kabir hears. You can also experience such tastes of the palate that you never experienced before.

So a vast world of subtle feelings and experiences is linked with the kundalini. All of it will become alive and awake and confront you from every direction. That is why, in such a situation, one often looks like a madman. Because when we are quietly sitting, he suddenly breaks into laughter for he comes to see something that we don't see. And he might suddenly begin to scream at a time when we are all laughing, because something may have happened to him which will not happen to the rest of us.

So ordinarily there are only two ways of hammering the kundalini. And the third way is an extraordinary way - the way of shaktipat, or transmission of energy. This is an astral way, and it needs a medium, a vehicle. You can achieve intensity in meditation only if another person helps you. The other person does not have to do anything; just his presence is enough. He becomes a vehicle, a catalytic agent.

Infinite energy permeates the world all over. It is just a question of tapping it. Now we fix an iron rod on our rooftops so that when lightning strikes the house it passes through the rod and sinks into the earth, and the house remains unharmed. Lightning can strike the house even in the absence of the iron rod, but then it will destroy the whole house. But the iron rod is a recent discovery, and lightning has been there from time immemorial. The shaktipat of lightning has been there for long, but we thought of the rod only recently.

Man is surrounded all over by infinite energy which can be used for his spiritual growth. Infinite energy is there and all of it can be utilized for man's spiritual upliftment. To do it, however, a medium, a vehicle is needed. You can be your own medium, but initially it can be dangerous. The shaktipat, the fallout of energy, can be so powerful that you may not with stand it. It is just possible that some delicate senses of your body are jammed or they break down. Every energy has a measure, a voltage which has to be in the right proportion to your capacity to withstand it. The medium of another person serves as an instrument regulating the energy in its relation with your capacity to withstand it.

To act as a vehicle for shaktipat it is essential that divine energy has already descended on the other person. Then only can he plan and manage the shaktipat according to your capacity. And he is not required to do anything in this regard; his mere presence does everything that is needed. Presence is all that is needed. His presence acts as a catalytic agent; the medium himself does nothing.

So if someone claims that he can do anything, he is utterly wrong. No one can do shaktipat, but someone's presence can catalyze it, cause it to happen.

Now I think that when seekers attain some depth in meditation, shaktipat will begin to happen here with full force. There is no difficulty about it; there is no difficulty at all. Nobody need do anything; it will happen on its own. You will suddenly find that quite a different kind of energy has entered you from without; it does not come from within you. Whenever you will experience the rise of kundalini, it will seem to be rising from within you; and whenever you will experience shaktipat, it will appear to be coming from the outside, from above. It will be so. It will be felt as clearly as one feels water falling on him from above and water rising about him from below.

The experience of kundalini is like drowning, as if you are standing in the bed of a river and the level of the water is rising from below and you are being drowned in it. The experience of kundalini is always like this - one of getting drowned in a river. You will feel that something from some depth is rising up and you are being engulfed in it, drowned in it. But the experience of shaktipat is quite different; it is like rains falling from the skies, falling from above. That is what Kabir speaks about when he says, "O monks, nectar is raining," and his monks ask where. It falls from above and makes you soaking wet.

Now if both these processes take place together, it will at once step up your progress. Then, simultaneously the rains will be falling from above and the water of the river rising from below.

Then the events of rainfall and the river being in flood are taking place simultaneously, and you are being drowned, you are being destroyed from both ends. Both processes can happen together; there is no difficulty involved in it.

Question 2

The fact is that a lasting effect stems from your own kundalini; shaktipat is only an aid. Shaktipat can never form your base; it can never become your basic structure. What happens within you is more important; it is basic, fundamental. That is your real wealth. That alone is your basic wealth.

Shaktipat will not add to your wealth, but it will certainly step up its capacity to grow. This difference should be properly understood. With shaktipat your wealth will not multiply, but what is called its growth rate, its rate of expansion undoubtedly will be intensified with shaktipat.

So shaktipat is not your own riches. It is like this: you are running and I am after you with a gun in my hands. Now my gun is not going to add to your power of running, but it will surely make you run faster. It is you who will run in any event; it is your energy that is going to be spent in running. But because of the gun you will bring into use even the energy that was lying unused in you. The gun does not provide you with any extra energy; nor does it lose even an iota of its own energy in the game. If you examine the gun later on, you will find it is the same as before; it has lost nothing. But the impact of the gun will quicken your running, the intensity and the speed of your running. Where you were walking leisurely before, you will now run and run fast.

So shaktipat does not add to your wealth of energy, but it undoubtedly steps up its capacity to grow and expand.

Shaktipat works like a flash of lightning. A flash of lightning does not light your path, it does not serve you as a lamp in your hand; it only gives you a flash, a glimpse of the road ahead and its surroundings. But this single glimpse is very precious; now your feet are firm, now your will is strong, now your resolve to reach your destination is hardened. You have seen the road and you know it is there and that you are not wandering aimlessly. One flash of lightning and you get a glimpse of the road you have to pass, and of the temple which is your journey's destination. And soon the light is lost and you are again engulfed in jet black darkness; but now you are a different person, although you are standing on the same spot you were before the lightning happened. Now you are confident, and you know you are going to go ahead. Now you know the road is there and the temple, although invisible, is at hand. Now you feel assured. Now you have confidence and trust, which fortifies your will and resolve.

So the effect of shaktipat is indirect, and therefore you need it time and again. Once is not enough; a second flash of lightning will benefit you the more, and a third still more. What you may have missed the first time will be seen with the second and the third flashes. They will, at the least, strengthen your confidence; they will reinforce your will.

So you cannot achieve your ultimate goal through shaktipat; it is you who will have to walk your way to destiny.

You can reach even without shaktipat, but then it will take more time; you will reach late. For lack of the flash of shaktipat you will be less confident and you will need more courage and strength. Doubt and fear will grip you now and then; you will not be so sure of your path and its destiny. All this will happen; nonetheless you will reach your goal.

But shaktipat is a help indeed. I would like, if you make some progress, that shaktipat happens to a large group of persons, instead of one or two individuals at a time. Why confine it to one or two individuals? It can happen collectively to ten thousand people standing together; there is no difficulty in the matter. Because it takes the same time whether it is done with a single person or ten thou sand persons. It makes no difference whatsoever.

Question 3

The effect is bound to decline. In fact, every effect wears off gradually. Effect itself means that it has been caused by an outside agency, and so it will decline. But the energy rising from within you is going to stay, because it is your own. Energy coming from without is bound to diminish and disappear. But what comes from your inside is not going to diminish; it will stay. Also that energy will stay which rises under the impact of shaktipat. Your basic capital does not wear off, but the effect does.

Question 4

There is no way to fall down or go downward. This thing really needs to be understood clearly. It is very interesting to know that there is no way to go downward or backward. You can be helped to go higher up from the place you have reached, even your rise from there can be obstructed; but there is no way to pull you down from that place. There is a reason to it. In the course of your ascent, your upward rise, you have changed, and you have grown, and even an inch of growth cannot he canceled or reversed. Retreat or regression is not possible in life.

It is like this: We can help a child in being promoted from grade one to grade two; a tutor can be engaged to help him in the matter. But you cannot find a tutor who can make the child forget what he has already learned in grade one. It is, however, possible that after going to grade two he falls into the company of some foolish friends and in that event he is detained in his grade over and over again. But it is never possible that foolish friends will make him go back to grade one. Is not it so? It is also possible that he is kept in grade two for all his life, that he is never allowed to move to grade three, but it is impossible to bring him down to grade one. He will get stuck; that is all.

In spiritual life there is no going back; it is always a matter of going forward or getting stuck. And this getting stuck is what you call downfall or regression. But really regression does not happen; the worst that happens in spirituality is stagnation.

Question 5

The difference is great, really great. In fact, there is a great difference between shaktipat and grace.

Shaktipat is a kind of technique which can be planned and managed. Shaktipat has to be planned and manipulated. It cannot be brought about anytime and anywhere. Do you understand what I mean? For shaktipat to happen, it is very necessary that the seeker is in a right state to receive it and that the medium is a right medium. And when both these conditions are fulfilled and they synchronize, shaktipat happens. This is a matter of technique.

Grace comes uninvited, it comes in the dark. You cannot call for it, you cannot have it on order.

Neither can it be planned, manipulated and managed. It is an event that happens once in a great while, and happens on its own.

The difference between shaktipat and grace is the game as it is between the electricity in your home and the lightning in the skies. You push a button here and there is instant light; but the lightning of the skies is quite different. Lightning happens on its own, you cannot have it on order, although elementally it is the same energy that works in both electricity and lightning. While your home electrically is technologically managed - it is controlled by an instrument and a technique - we have no control over lightning. Grace is like lightning of heavens. It happens at some unexpected and rare moment. And if the seeker is in a right state of receptivity at that moment, grace can happen to him. And then it is certainly not shaktipat. Although it is elementally the same as shaktipat, yet it is grace - very different from shaktipat.

There is another difference - that no medium is needed to receive grace; grace will dawn on you direct. It does not need a mediator to reach you; it will come straight to you. And grace is always a sudden happening. And it is rare, it does not happen often. And it cannot be planned and manipulated like shaktipat. I can say that if you come the next day at a fixed time after making certain preparations, shaktipat will happen. But all this is irrelevant in the case of grace. It may happen, it may not happen. It is not in our hands; it just cannot be managed, manipulated.

With this difference, grace is the same as shaktipat.

Question 6

Planning can be done in an egoless state; ego has nothing to do with planning. Egoless planning is absolutely possible. Ego is a different thing; it is a different thing altogether. For instance, we plan that with certain necessary preparations we will sit for shaktipat tomorrow at five in the morning. In this planning the seeker is not required to be egoless, but the medium must be so.

Egolessness is not a transient state that now you are egoless and now you are not. If you are egoless, you are; if you are not egoless, you are not. If I am egoless, I am; if I am not egoless I am not. It is not that tomorrow at five I will be in an egoless state. It is ridiculous. How can it be? There is no way to be so. If I am egoless right now, then only I will be egoless tomorrow at five. And I will be so, irrespective of whether I plan or do not plan, whether you turn up or do not turn up, whether I am awake or asleep at that moment. If I am egoless, I am it. If I am not egoless I am not it.

Egolessness is not a matter of degrees like body temperature, although we are used to thinking about everything in terms of degrees. All our thinking is like this. If somebody's body temperature is ninety eight degrees fahrenheit, we say that he is okay. But if his temperature rises to ninety nine degrees we say that he has a fever, he is running a temperature. Ninety eight degrees is also fever, but we call it normal fever. At ninety-nine degrees it becomes abnormal; back again at ninety eight it is normal. Ninety eight degrees is also fever but because everybody has it, so it is called normal.

A slight deviation from the normal causes trouble.

Ordinarily it is the same with our ego; it is our fever. If somebody has ego in the same measure as all others have it, we say that he is a modest person, a good man. A slight deviation from the normal ninety eight degrees - if he touches the ninety-ninth degree of ego, we say at once he is an egoist, he is arrogant. And in case somebody comes down to ninety seven degrees, we call him an absolutely humble man, a full mahatma, a very great soul.

Ego and no ego are different things altogether; they are different states as such. They are not concerned with degrees, with quantities. They are not like states of fever and non-fever; they are not to be measured as ninety-eight and ninety-nine degrees. In fact, only in regard to a dead man can we say that he has no fever. As long as there is body heat, whether normal or abnormal, it is fever. It is fever with the difference that ninety eight degrees is normal and ninety-nine is abnormal.

And the abnormal heat causes us physical trouble; we experience disease because of it.

Then there is another angle to the ego. If some one's ego hurts our ego, we think him to be an egoist. And if somebody else's ego comforts our ego, flatters and placates our ego, we say the man is egoless. But what is the measure, the criterion to know it? If a per son comes to me in an arrogant manner wanting to make his importance felt on me, we will call him an egoist. But if the same person comes and touches my feet, we will say he is so humble, so good. What criterion is there to test it?

We have only one test for ego: to us ego is that which disturbs our own ego. If somebody hurts our ego, he is an egoist, and if he placates our ego, he is a saint, a humble man. But it is always our ego which serves as the measure. It is our own ego with which we judge if the other is an egoist or otherwise.

That is why we fail to know the real state of non ego. How can we know it? We know how to measure ego in degrees, whether it is more or less. But where the degrees are absent altogether, we find ourselves in great difficulty to know it, to know the no ego.

But in the matter of shaktipat the medium must be egoless. Egoless is not the right word, so I will say that only a no ego should be the medium. And bear it in mind that such a person is a recipient of grace, that grace is showering on him all the twenty-four hours of the day. He will manage it that you too have a taste of it, but so far as he is concerned, the nectar of grace rains on him day in and day out. That is how he can see to it that when you are open for a moment or two, a few drops of that nectar enter you through that opening.

Question 7

Direct grace is only received on ultimate attain ment and not before. It is only when your ego disappears that grace descends on you. Ego is the only hurdle in the way of attainment. And attainment is the ultimate state after which nothing more remains to be attained.

Question 8

It is just spiritual... You know that eating is physical, but if you don't eat, the soul will soon leave your body. So although food goes into the body, yet it is necessary that the body be in a particular state so the soul stays in it. The same way although the kundalini is psychic it is necessary that the kundalini be in a particular state so that you can reach the soul. If the kundalini is not in a particular state, if it is different from what it should be for you, then it is not possible to reach the soul. So although kundalini is psychic, it serves as a stepping stone to the spiritual. It is not spiritual in itself, and if somebody says so he is wrong. If somebody says that eating is spiritual, he is wrong. Eating is physical, but it serves as a base for the spiritual.

Breath is material, and thought too is material; everything is material. Breath and thought are matter really. But their subtlest form is called the psychic. Psyche is the subtlest form of matter. But all of them - breath and mind and psyche - serve as a base for the seeker to take a jump into the spiritual. They serve as jumping boards for a leap into the divine. It is like a man wants to dive into a river, and to do so he first stands on a diving board erected on the bank of the river. The diving board is not the river. Now someone can argue that since the board is not the river why should he, who wants to dive into the river, stand on it? Why can't he stand in the river itself? But no one can stand in the river with a view to dive into it. One has to take his stand on the board first, and then he can jump into the river. And the board is absolutely different from the river into which one dives.

The board is not the river.

So it is through the body, through the mind that you can take a jump into the spirit, the soul. And the spiritual is attained only when the jump has been made. For the present you have to prepare for it from where you are at the moment. So the body and mind are your jumping boards. However, when the jump is made you will have reached the spiritual.

Question 9

There is no question of good and bad here. I understand your point; it is not a question of good and bad. You have only to find out which of the techniques gives you more peace and adds to the momentum of your meditation. It cannot be the same for everybody; they will experience it differently. There are people who attain to relaxation only after they have run themselves into the ground. And there are others who can go into relaxation instantly; but they are few and far between.

It is rather difficult to move straight into silence; only a handful of people can do so. For the majority of people it is necessary to go through a lot of exertion and tension before they can relax. But the purpose in both cases is the same - the final objective is the same. It is relaxation.

Question 10

It is a sadhana of tensions. It is absolutely a discipline of tensions. In fact, every discipline of energy is a discipline of tension. Energy itself means tension. It is through tension that energy comes into being. We succeeded in creating a tremendous amount of energy from the atom, because we split it into two and put its most subtle components in a state of tension. So the whole discipline of power or energy is a discipline of tensions. If we understand it rightly, tension itself is energy.

Question 11

It is positive, absolutely positive.

Question 12

This should be the last part of our discussion for this evening.

In fact, all of what Buddha had said was not recorded, that is the biggest difficulty in the matter. Many things from the teachings of Buddha were not recorded deliberately. And then his teachings were recorded a full five hundred years after Buddha's death. They were not recorded in his life-time. For five hundred years, the bhikkhus, the disciples of Buddha, who were in possession of his teachings, refused to reduce them into writing.

Then a time came when these custodians of Buddhist knowledge themselves began to disappear from the earth. And so a large sangha, a congress of Buddhists, was convened which decided to record Buddha's teachings for the first time, because there was a danger of their being lost completely after the last of the bhikkhus who were in possession of them were no more.

As long as Buddha's teachings could be preserved orally through memory, his disciples stubbornly refused to reduce them into writing. The same thing happened with the teachings of Jesus and Mahavira. And it was necessary to do so.

There were good reasons why the teachings of Buddha and men like him were not recorded. Firstly, these people had been teaching through word of mouth, so it is their spoken words that comprise their teachings. Among them many different things were said for different kinds of seekers. And all of them were not necessarily useful for the beginners of spiritual discipline. They could have been harmful for them.

It happens often enough that when teachings meant for advanced seekers are passed on to those behind them they only make their position unsteady as learners, because then they are seized with the idea of getting to the advanced stage which in turn makes them ignore their own homework.

There is yet an other difficulty in this respect. Many things taught to the beginners become not only redundant but even false for the advanced seekers. So if the beginners come to know things taught to the advanced learners too soon, they will not take their own lessons seriously and trustfully. And in that event they will get stuck; they cannot advance further. It is therefore very necessary for the teachings to be true for them at their own stage. Then only can they rightly learn and make progress in spiritual discipline.

When a child is learning his alphabet, he is taught to say "G belongs to God." Now it has really no meaning to say so; "G" can belong to goblin as well. And there is no relationship between God and goblin; they don't belong to the same fraternity. In fact, "G" has no connection whatsoever with either God or goblin. But it would be dangerous to say it to the child learning his alphabet. If his father tells him, "You fool, "G" has nothing to do with God; "G" can belong to a thousand and one things as well; it does not belong to God exclusively", then this child will never get the alphabet "G".

It is therefore necessary that for the present he should only be told that "G" belongs to God". Leave aside thousand other things associated with it. It would be enough if he learns "G" in association with God. Later on he will also learn the other thousand things; and then he will know for himself that "G" is not exclusively connected with God. As with God, it is connected with many other words.

And then God will drop and he will know "G" independently.

So in spiritual discipline there are a thousand things belonging to a thousand levels. And then there are a few things that are very personal and secret and esoteric. The meditation that I am teaching you now is such that it can be talked about publicly; but there are things that I cannot discuss in large groups; I will not. I will talk about them with only a few chosen individuals who are deserving.

So although Buddha had said a lot, all of it was not recorded. The same way, not everything that I will say will be recorded. All of it cannot be reduced to writing. Firstly I will say only that much publicly which can be recorded without any risk. Publicly I will say only that much. And that which needs to be treated and preserved as secret teachings will never be disclosed to the public. I will transmit them to deserving individuals who will save them in their memory.

Question 13

No, there are many other things involved in it. There should be no difficulty in recording what I have said here these few days on the question of the kundalini and the chakras. There is no difficulty whatsoever. My difficulty is that there is a gap of twenty five hundred years between Buddha and our times, and it has made a great difference; over this period man's consciousness has grown. I now think there are many things that Buddha thought should remain hidden that can now very well be made public. Twenty five centuries have made a basic difference. So I say that a great many of the things that Buddha thought to be secrets can now be taught openly. Similarly a great many of the things that I consider to be secret can be revealed twenty-five hundred years after me, provided man's consciousness continues to evolve the way it should.

Do you follow what I am saying? Even if Buddha were to come back, he would like to reveal many things he had held back from his own times.

Buddha did one thing of great understanding and import. He had decided on eleven questions that no one was allowed to put to him. Because if any of them were put to him, he would have to answer them in some way or another. And while it was not proper to give a wrong answer to them, it would have been really wrong to give the right ones. So he had decided on eleven questions that were prohibited, because they were unexplainable. Before Buddha entered a town it was publicly announced that no one should put any of these eleven questions to Buddha, for he would not answer them. So the announcement said no one should embarrass Buddha.

And there was a good reason for Buddha to have refused to answer them. It would have been harmful if he had answered them, and if he refused to answer them, he would have felt guilty that he was sup pressing the truth. So the best way was that they should not be raised at all.

So every village was informed by beat of drum that as Buddha was visiting them they must not put one of these eleven questions to him, because it would amount to embarrassing him. These questions were treated as avyakhya, as unexplainable questions. And they were not raised really; one never put them to Buddha.

And whenever an opponent of his insisted on putting it, Buddha would say to him, "Wait for some time, and do some sadhana in the meantime. And when you will be deserving of it, I will answer your question." But he never answered really. And this is what his critics and opponents used against him. The Jains and the Hindus alleged that Buddha did not answer these questions just because he did not know the answers. They also said that since their own scriptures had answered each one of them, it seemed that Buddha was lacking in knowledge. But his critics forgot that it was so easy for Buddha to have repeated the scriptural answers if he wanted to answer them.

The truth is that right answers are not written even in the scriptures; they are not possible really.

So the question should not arise why Buddha did not speak about the kundalini and the chakras.