Day 10: Destination Unknown

Chapter 1

If we take a sound meter with us, there are many sounds. Birds chirping, brook flowing, leaves rustling, but one can watch silence descending inside. Similarly, stillness is not absence of motion. Allowing this even theoretically as a possibility to begin with, I see my mind wandering away, making its own noises. I don't need to fight it. Strictly speaking, if I can become indifferent to it and more interested, not that I am against it, but what am I for?

For example, right now I wish to find some level in me which is much more interested in the great mystery of my own existence and less concerned about the moving mind or the noisy mind. And if I am interested in this mystery, I realize that it's almost as if I am trying to hear some whispers and that I need to be quiet. That quietness or silence actually is a very different part of myself. Theoretically we know that our ordinary biological body also has subtler bodies. But even theoretically I allow first of all the possibility that there are subtler bodies within me and that subtler bodies have different laws, different interests.

Thank you. Then it's almost using a kind of a geographical analogy as if I turn my attention upward without turning my head. Even acknowledging that there may be all kinds of sounds, even agitation going on below, but my interest now is something towards this subtler reality, even subtler sounds that I wish to hear. And keeping my attention is always assisted very much by having connection with my breath. So as if I am breathing the atmosphere above my head through my skull, and as I breathe out, I place my breath and whatever subtle energy I receive to nourish the whole of my body down to the toes.

Again simply reminding myself that I am much more interested in the great mystery wishing to hear the little whispers not fighting my ordinary mind. Breathing in through my skull and whatever I receive with that nourishing the whole of my body. Whatever I can now understand as an internal reality receiving something from a higher level, nourishing the level below, then in life this can become my calling, a very profound remark of Maestro Eckhart. What we receive in contemplation we give out in love. But again and again returning to its internal analog that's where I make connection with subtler levels of reality, receiving something, nourishing within myself the ordinary level of my body.

Again simply reminding myself that silence belongs to a different level than sound. It's not absence of sound. All the sages in India have said that the vibration of Aum is not only sound but subtler level from which the whole universe originates. That is why the great enunciations of every religious tradition arising from India Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Jainism, they all begin with Aum. So we would actually now each one of us contribute to the sound Aum three times without trying to necessarily coordinate with each other but much more importantly to watch where does this sound resonate in me?

What kind of intimation of mystery does it carry? Not trying to analyze it. So at our own temple each one of us just simply contributing the sound three times. Aum Aum Aum Now if my eyes are closed I can rub my hands and they become warm to place them on the closed eyes not pressing them down and open the eyes blinking a few times and then to bring the hands down. Thank you very much.

Chapter 2

But I mention this because as you know in the Bhagavad Gita the very first chapter is describing why Arjuna has a crisis of Dharma. So that gets called the yoga of Arjuna's crisis. So in a way the word yoga therefore needs to be understood fairly widely. It can be obviously in sense of final kind of destination in which I am united with Brahma or one becomes one with Brahma one could say that is goal. But the journey itself the path itself is regarded as yoga and then whatever initiates us onto the path is also yoga which may be as I said a crisis for many people.

Sometimes it's not so much a matter of crisis although I have to keep reminding you again the way Patanjali in the yoga sutra speaks about Vairagya. One aspect of Vairagya which he calls lower Vairagya is that something is not satisfactory in my usual life in my usual connection with the world or my understanding of the world that it is being driven by fear or desire or something is not satisfactory. So it's a kind of repulsion from something. That is one kind of force that wishes to push me towards something else. And one would call it lower Vairagya is what Patanjali calls it.

Then higher Vairagya because if I have experienced something sublime then it is difficult for me to be satisfied with the lower kind of thing. If you have sometimes heard a remarkably touching piece of music then you are not easily taken by just usual music going on in the supermarket. Similarly, actually one of my own personal problems these days is that having met some two or three such remarkable teachers it's very difficult for me to be very easily impressed by a lot of propaganda that goes on on the internet and everywhere else about in the name of yoga, in the name of spiritual this or that or awakening. Lots of things go on. But once you meet somebody who you are deeply touched by it's very difficult to be easily taken by something like this.

So this is understandable. So higher Vairagya has a slightly different meaning that one is more drawn by attraction rather than by repulsion. So there are these two different forces. So every situation in our life can be a yoga or lead to yoga or wishing for yoga. So keeping that in mind then again to remind ourselves that both Krishna and Arjuna are within us.

They are us at different levels of myself. This is something again and again needs to be said. Every teaching that at least I am aware of reminds us that there are many levels of reality and those levels are not only outside but they are also inside us. So if potentially I have many levels and particularly in the Indian tradition ultimately I am also Brahma or Krishna especially if we take the language of the Bhagavad Gita but that's not usually where I am. So that becomes the potential possibility.

So that also is important to keep in mind again and again that the journey is not merely futile that it is a call. And then occasionally one does have an experience of something a little subtler or higher within oneself or outside oneself that then does not leave one to rest so easily. This is actually one of the difficulties of either one is completely asleep to oneself and one can be more or less okay or one is completely awake like the Buddha or Christ then one is okay. Otherwise there is always a little bit of a restlessness. But don't be against that because the whole meaning of search after all why do I need to search?

Because there is something I don't know. So the whole meaning of search actually requires that there is not a satisfaction with what I know with what I am. So don't be against dissatisfaction but it's the question of what kind of dissatisfaction is it only the dissatisfaction because I don't have ten times the money I now have that can also be dissatisfaction but is it dissatisfaction about my own connection with a deeper level or a higher level, clarity of my life? Why am I here? So to be dissatisfied can be a very negative kind of thing but I am inviting you to consider that this sort of crisis that Arjuna has or we may have but that crisis doesn't have to be literally in a battlefield but we are all engaged in the battle of our life in any case.

So we have Krishna in us as well as Arjuna in us. So as Arjuna whatever our skill is to be more and more skillful. Arjuna was an absolutely skillful warrior. But at the same time to try to understand what is my Krishna and how do I submit to it. Let me take a few minutes here first of all to remind in the Bhagavad Gita at least a dozen times Krishna says I am seated in the heart of everyone.

Sometimes even in the mind of everyone or in the heart of everyone in fact on one in one particular occasion this is in the 17th chapter and I'm now quoting this particular shloka. He says those who undertake severe austerities torment not only themselves they torment me who is seated in their body. Interesting remarks. So he's not only in our heart not only in our mind but also in our body which in a certain way one could say logically if everything is Krishna which is one of his definitions of yoga that a yogi sees that everything is Krishna then in a way even a mouse or a mosquito everything is Krishna. This is not an easy realization so we can of course use the words try to understand it but not to pretend that one actually realizes this or experiences this.

Then very strong remark of Krishna this is in the 13th chapter we're much saying much the same thing but slightly different language so I will mention that. He says everything that exists is a combination of the field and the knower of the field and I am the knower of the field in all fields. This is very important to understand because it is if you like in a certain way radically slightly at odds with contemporary scientific assumptions that there is the field let us say the body and then there is the knower of the field the consciousness and Krishna identifies himself with the consciousness but in everything that even a piece of stone one would say has some consciousness in it. And this has been by the way my ongoing I think I mentioned to you at one stage that there is a commission now actually set up called Commission for Extended Science what are some of the difficulties of modern science some assumption and most of the changes are being brought or being suggested coming from the mind sciences but really even at the level of physics which is dealing with matter in motion there are some fundamental assumptions which need to be questioned and one of them is that everything begins from dead matter without any consciousness and what Krishna is on the other saying that everything that exists has him in it and he is the knower of the field in all fields so one needs to question this. So first of all that Krishna is within us in our body in our mind and in our heart but so is Arjuna and it is very useful for each one of us to discover what is my Arjuna what is my Krishna that was a suggestion I made the other day.

Then there are three words in Sanskrit which are very intimately connected with each other which I would try to draw your attention to. The first word is Swabhav. Let me quickly mention the other two you see how related they are. Swabhav, Swadharma, Swakarma. So Swabhav means what is my essential nature what is my deep being and before I even go further the call in the whole teaching of yoga in the Bhagavad Gita the form it takes is that this Swabhav needs to be transformed to come to the level of being of Krishna.

Madhabhav as Krishna repeatedly says. So Swabhav is my essential nature then Swadharma means what is the Dharma that corresponds to my essential nature. Now remembering Dharma has many meanings in this context it will be what is my responsibility, what is my obligation, what is my duty that corresponds to my real being, my essential being and then Swakarma very much follows from that then what are the actions that correspond to my responsibility. I could for example say that I am by nature a searcher of truth that is my Swabhav. If I can say that honestly I often remind my friends nobody has ever so far invited me to come to play the piano.

It will be very interesting because they will be so disappointed if they invited me. So clearly there is something that doesn't correspond to my deep being. That doesn't mean that nobody else does not have that being. Clearly one needs to therefore understand that Swabhav can be quite individual. This is we are talking about something individual here.

And then supposing I say that my Swabhav is to search for truth then what is the Dharma, what is the responsibility that corresponds to this. I could say that that is I am searcher of truth so let's have another glass of whiskey. Is that what corresponds to this? So then one reminds oneself there are very ancient sayings about some of these things actually what I was about to say just now in a moment is from a very ancient text Shatapati Brahman that when a person is born at very birth certain obligations follow a person. One is obligation to the devas or responsibility to the devas.

Then responsibility or actually debt, debt to the sages. Debt to the ancestors, debt to the society. So if I am a searcher particularly then one would say well how do I understand what the devas are or what the sages have taught. For me personally I was actually speaking to somebody even when we had a break. It has been a very interesting question.

I was born in India but I am more than half a century I have been in the western world. Does that correspond to just my own personal project or is there a suggestion from some subtler level or from a deva that I need to undertake something here. But one doesn't need to be dogmatic about any of these things if you are searching here open to an inquiry and then corresponding to this the question naturally arises for me. If I have indebted to the sages who are the sages for me? Only the ones in India?

Why is Lauth say not a sage for me? Why is Christ not a sage for me? We are in a different world. So for me many of these questions arise. Of course it is true each one of us including myself has limited time, limited energy.

So we cannot necessarily seriously study all the sages. That would be very difficult. But at least intentionally one does not bar oneself just because I happen to be born in India. So only the Indian sages are the sages for me or if I happen to be born in a Christian family I keep reminding people most people who call themselves Christians just happen to be born of Christian parentage. There is nothing special that they have decided to be Christian similarly the Hindu, similarly the Muslim.

Vast majority of people everywhere just more or less label themselves the same as their parents or in the society. And usually concern a little bit only at the time of marriage or funeral. Otherwise they are just Christian. Maybe they might go to church at Easter for Christmas. But that's it.

Similarly in India. It's not only I mention here in Christian context. But the question then arises if I am asked to be responsible for studying what the sages taught. Who are the sages for me? Are they just restricted?

So I raise some of these questions because I'm partly inviting you to consider this. We are in a different world. It is by nature now a planetary culture. Just to be stuck with one label or the other is just an old idea. But in any case so to search for swabhav corresponding to which then what is my responsibility that's what I was saying if my swabhav is that I wish to search for truth then certain responsibilities follow from it.

And then corresponding to that is swakarma. An action that I need to undertake. And one thing which is very important that Krishna actually explicitly says in the Bhagavad Gita that I reside in everyone as their swabhav. So the suggestion is that there is if you like a particle of Krishna or a particle of divinity which is really what we mean by soul in me and it manifests as my essential nature. And that I cannot come to Krishna until I come to my own deepest self.

This is very important point that follows from it. So I need to understand what is my deep calling. How does my swabhav manifest itself? What calls me? What will not let me quite rest until I attend to it? So that Krishna it's a little bit like the I think I mentioned this early a remark of very great Western philosopher Plotinus that our soul is amphibious in nature.

It can sink completely into matter or it can soar into the one. So swabhav is just like our soul if you like is if I pay no attention to it, it can completely sink into the matter. But the call in any case of the Bhagavad Gita is can it rise and become one with the level of Krishna? This is the great transformation that yoga is all about from the perspective of the Bhagavad Gita. As you can see the language is a little different here than in Patanjali's Yoga Sutras or even in the Upanishads because here Krishna is incarnating himself and therefore he can refer to himself to come my level of being rather than come to Brahma which would be slightly more philosophic way of saying much the same anyway.

And so therefore it becomes very important for each one of us to become clearer and clearer what is my swabhav, my call of my being, what is the nature of my being and then what kind of responsibilities arise from that and then what kind of action follows from that. So swabhav, swadharma, so karma very intimately connected three words and we have already spoken about karma and dharma but bhav it can also mean deep feeling but being essential nature and this is a very helpful but challenging remark of Krishna that Krishna resides in each one as their own swabhav. It's almost like saying that our soul has a particular divinity then the soul wishes to rise to the level of God. One could use that expression. That's not the word that is used by Krishna but swabhav.

Okay, then gradually Krishna very much moves towards emphasizing Bhakti Yoga and in that context I wish to read to you two or three remarks from the Bhagavad Gita and I thought I will actually literally read that from some notes here because to be accurate about them. The yogi who has no egoism and no selfishness, who has friendship and compassion for all beings and hatred for none, who is impartial to pain and pleasure and is forgiving, who is ever content, self-controlled and firm willed and whose mind and attention are given up to me, such a one is my devotee and is dear to me. So not an easy yogi as you can see. That's the reason I wanted to read this. Anybody can claim Krishna loves me.

It's all very nice but it's not so easy. So Krishna is explicitly saying he's dear to me. One who strives after me with an unwavering yoga of love passes beyond the forces of nature and is prepared to become Brahma. I am the foundation of Brahma, the immutable, the immortal and I am the foundation of the eternal Dharma and endless joy. Let me read just one more.

So it's not easy to be a devotee of Krishna. When the self is serene and absorbed in Brahma, one neither grieves nor desires. Impartial to all beings, one discovers supreme love for me. By love, one comes to know me, who and what I am in essence. Knowing me in essence, one enters into me, undertaking all actions, constantly trusting in me, one reaches the eternal and imperishable abode by my grace.

So it's a very large call to love Krishna. But here I would very much like just partly to remind you that really great teachings everywhere sooner or later come to this kind of understanding. Here is actually a remark from the great Christian's classic of spirituality that I have already mentioned to you, the cloud of unknowing. Let me read this to you. Thought cannot comprehend God, and so I prefer to abandon all I can know, choosing rather to love Him whom I cannot know.

Though we cannot know Him, we can love Him. By love He may be touched and embraced, never by thought. This is the cloud of unknowing. I was actually invited once by Temenos Academy in London to give a talk, and I intentionally chose the cloud of unknowing and Patanjali's yoga sutras to show the great similarity in their teaching not to be taken by words. The cloud of unknowing is constantly talking about love.

Patanjali does not even use the word love even once. But if you read these two texts very carefully, you would see much of their practical suggestions are exactly the same. The cloud of unknowing speaks about putting everything below the level of forgetting, below the cloud of forgetting, and Patanjali speaks about vairagya. So you would see not to be taken in by just words because the word love can sound very resounding, but what is the practical implication? There is actually a remark in this case of very great Indian philosopher Shankara.

Generally, I'm not a great fan of Shankara, but there's many things he said. I'm often criticizing him. But he makes this remark in one of his classical texts that a disease is not cured by simply saying, medicine, medicine, medicine. One has to actually take the medicine. And so the Brahma is not approached by saying Brahma, Brahma, Brahma, but by actually practicing connection with Brahma.

This is Shankara. We have actually a very similar remark of Christ. People may not often realize it. You're not saved by saying, Lord, Lord, Lord, but by obeying the teaching that I give you. This is Christ's remark.

So one has to keep this in mind. It's very easy to sing the praises of Krishna and he says, I love him. It's all very nice. But am I taking the medicine, which is actually the discipline of yoga and not simply physical exercises, but there's nothing wrong with that. But transformation brought about by complete freedom from myself, submitting to something very subtle.

But let's return for a moment now to some very general remarks I want to make here. First of all, very strong emphasis in the Indian tradition, for the simple reason that I have maybe more than once already said, that the chief source of all our problems is ignorance, avidya. Therefore, there is much more emphasis on what is the right knowing, what is the right knowledge, not so much on obedience. There are four shlokas in the Bhagavad Gita, starting in the 18th chapters, 63rd, 4th, 5th and 6th, which are regarded as the Paramavakya, the ultimate sayings. These are remarks of Krishna.

And the 63rd shloka there in the 18th chapter explicitly says, now I have taught to you the subtlest of subtle teaching, reflect on all this without leaving anything out, then you do what you wish. There is no suggestion that he must obey. Reflect on all this without leaving anything out, then you do what you wish. In fact, one of our very great scientists in India, I heard him once give a talk. He says, I'm not a great fan of the Bhagavad Gita, but the one shloka in it is the heart of the matter.

This is the one he spoke of, that you reflect on everything without leaving anything out, and then you do what you wish. Now, this is very much really quite central to the Indian teaching. It's not a question that you must now obey something. Obey something in order to learn something. So don't be against obedience.

Actually, just to remind you, in fact, initially it was reminded to me by Priscilla. The word obedience comes from two Latin words. Ob adir, having heard something. If you have heard the truth, you cannot not obey it. Sometimes it's useful to go back to the roots of some of these words because modern language gradually becomes, as I have said, it gets watered down.

It comes down to the usual sort of level. One forgets that there is a great call behind all of these things. So obedience is a very interesting, or sacrifices I mentioned the other day. Anyhow, so why, for example, Christ says, if you love me, you will obey my commandments. If they have actually heard Christ, they could hardly not obey.

But hearing itself is not so easy. We hear many things, but we don't let them penetrate us. Anyhow, coming back to the issue here, remembering that we have both Arjuna and Krishna in us and that there is already the particle of Krishna in us, but it needs to develop. It needs to be more and more transformed so that the call is that ultimately it will be at the level of Krishna himself, Padabhava. And that again and again a reminder that this call is not by abandoning the battle.

It's not by abandoning, now the word battle, you could use it struggle. Everybody in their life is engaged in some struggle. And there is no suggestion certainly in the Bhagavad Gita that one should just leave all this and go to the Himalayas and meditate. That's not what he's asking Arjuna to do. So this is why I said this is very much a teaching in life.

That one is engaged in life and to do whatever one is doing as skillfully as one can, but at the same time inviting greater and greater vision. So we could say Arjuna is in a way at the ordinary level he's representing the action and Krishna is representing the vision. But to take it in many different levels it's not just the, you know, each one of them is higher and higher vision and similarly more and more skillful action. So that both are required to be engaged in the battle skillfully but at the same time to be above the battle simultaneously. So that requires already an awareness of the two levels within me and sometimes for most of us to attend to these subtler level requires at least temporarily as it were withdrawing from the world.

We say we're going to meditate for 15 minutes or half an hour. So I'm basically withdrawing from the world. At that time I'm not undertaking any action except inwardly. That's why I asked you to think is the Buddha undertaking any action sitting under the Bodhi tree? But it's obviously a different kind of action.

So but strictly speaking actually if you use the classical especially in the Bible the discussion dying to the world. Meditation is actually dying to the world at least for half an hour or 20 minutes. So that then I can attend to something else. But there is certainly no suggestion in the Bhagavad Gita that you constantly withdraw from the world to be engaged in the battle. Then very strong maybe let me take a moment here.

What is the transformation of Arjuna that takes place? He said it's really right in the very beginning of the second chapter but it's coming starting from the first chapter when he's beginning to have the crisis more and more. But in the very beginning of the second chapter is Dharmasamur Chaita Sahib which is to say my mind is bewildered about dharma. So but he therefore turns to Krishna. So he turns to his own deepest self.

But having also said that I will not fight he gives up his bow and arrow even if they kill me I'm not going to fight. So you see that's withdrawing from life. Then at the end what does he say? Here I stand my confusion is ended. I have recollected myself.

I will do your bidding. He submits himself to something much deeper within himself which externally is Krishna. But to be able to even hear what my deepest self is asking me to do requires being willing to hear something. Usually these come in whispers rather than in very direct words. But as I have often said all this needs to be externalized for the sake of transmission of culture from one generation to the next.

So Krishna standing here and having this dialogue etc. So transformation of Arjuna is not abandoning this skillful warrior nature of him. But that his action is now in the service of something much subtler or deeper or a deeper higher Dharma. But even if it's now conflicting with a lower level Dharma he needs to undertake certain action. And in fact the very last shloka in the Bhagavad Gita explicitly says wherever there is the skillful warrior Arjuna and the lord of yoga Krishna there is victory or plenty of plenitude different translations.

But basically the suggestion is that both are required. Arjuna needs Krishna and Krishna needs Arjuna. This is slightly different way of saying what I said earlier. Without God it cannot be done whatever it is and without human beings it will not be done. So we need to play our part.

But am I doing my own thing or am I being an instrument of Krishna? That is in a way the call again and again. So we see the transformation that is required is not abandoning my skill or my action but submitting it to a higher level or a deeper level. In India we would often say deeper level but that's just a geometrical imagery. And listening to that following what is called and then carrying out the corresponding action in the service of that call as an instrument to that.

So then actually this is in fact a remark of my own teacher Miranda Salzman that the true individuality consists in voluntarily placing oneself under a law. Then one is truly an individual not doing my own thing but voluntarily placing myself under a law. Remember the remarks of Christ. He is not doing his own thing but thy will be done. Voluntarily placing oneself under a law which is what Arjuna is doing here.

He is now placing himself under a law and then he becomes now this is as the human being an intermediary between the world and the absolute between Krishna which is why one can then actually truly be able to bring something which is why one could actually truly say that Christ becomes an intermediary between God and human beings. But that requires a complete sacrifice of oneself. It's not his shtick. He becomes the, he submits willingly to a higher law. So therefore now I'm going to slightly just try to summarize some of this whole undertaking.

First of all for us to recognize that neither one of, none of us creates oneself. We don't create ourselves. There is a very nice remark of Einstein in this case. Maybe I remind you. Human beings, vegetables and cosmic dust, he puts it all together.

Human beings, vegetables and cosmic dust. We all dance to the tune of an invisible piper. This is Einstein, hardly a negligible scientist. Always I keep reminding people, scientists are also human beings. They also fall in love.

They also worry about death. One should not forget this. And so therefore a reminder that I did not create myself. If I have even a remote feeling which all our scriptures say, all the great sages have said and all the great scientists have said that there is a cosmic intelligence. Labels vary.

They are inevitably going to vary from language to language, religion to religion. But that there is an all pervasive intelligence, then it becomes a very serious question that this intelligence in this very large universe has bothered to create me for a few decades. And that there is a call for this. It's not just accidental. Then it's not intelligent.

If it's randomly things are happening. If there really is a cosmic intelligence, then it means whatever is taking place is being done with some intelligence, with some intention, with some purpose. Then one would also see, more or less follows from it, I am, you are, each one of us is actually a beloved child of the universe. It's not just random accident. Precisely because of that we are responsible.

I sometimes say it's almost like a family business if one actually begins to realize this. Because otherwise, all of us, the only choice we actually have, however smart we might think we are, either to be unconscious slaves of these very large forces, or to become willing servants. Then some people, very few in the history of humanity, but they become the great teachers, can not only become willing servants, they actually become more and more conscious because these highest energies are really ultimate consciousness, and can become one with that. So Christ can then actually say, my father and I are one. Aurya Gubalaki, I am Brahmasmi, I am Brahma.

Not the words, anybody can use the words, but does it correspond to their behavior, to their attitude? So then this becomes really the call, that I am a wanted child of the universe, and therefore corresponding to it, there is a certain responsibility, that all level of the universe is trying to rise in consciousness, ultimately towards God or the absolute, and if I do my part, I assist that, and then sometimes some people, depending on their own work, and also always calling not only their work, but also the grace of God, some of them can rise very high. But even to assist the earth, the planetary level, is like a pyramid of consciousness. Not everybody can be the top stone, but even the lower stones help maintain the place of the top stone. Christ needed the disciples to maintain even His own position.

I know this even from many, many great teachers. Krishnamurti, in my own case, even actually on one occasion, because I was often asking many questions, some of his people around him were getting annoyed with me, asking so many questions. He actually said to me in their presence, Sir, please keep asking, that way you assist as a midwife at the delivery of something which is difficult to deliver. Even for the great sages, it is not easy to deliver the real truth. Any teacher can tell you this, any music performer can tell you this.

Quality of the audience very much affects what can be conveyed. So you have been a very good audience. I am grateful to you, but always return to the idea. Be more and more interested in the journey, because the destination really is unknown, and our mind will make up something, and then it will imagine something, it will create something. But if you get interested in the journey, every step is wonderful.

Thank you very much.