Consciousness, the mind and meditation | Thus Spake Babaji - online Q&A, No.169

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Consciousness, the mind and meditation | Thus Spake Babaji - online Q&A, No.169
Recorded on 14 January 2024 with US participants.

0:00 Introduction from Babaji
0:29 Mind has to become quiet to know the Self
10:05 How can we strengthen our faith so we can realise the need for meditation and make more effort?
14:49 When the watcher no longer sees an object, what happens to the watcher?
15:55 Difference between consciousness and awareness
17:47 How can consciousness of eternal existence be aware of itself before Mahasamadhi?
19:03 'The present has no story'
21:09 Why is no target given in the instruction of Jangama Dhyana?
22:27 Why does matter appears within space?
24:10 Babaji's meaning of pure consciousness
25:32 Are we returning to consciousness from which we came or is that just what we are?
27:39 Is the experience of neutrality towards externals closer to wisdom than positivity?
28:33 Does spirituality play an evolutionary role?
29:28 is it ok to imagine a mental axe chopping the thoughts down in meditation?
31:46 How to deal with auditory distractions
32:45 Where does supreme consciousness stop and start in terms of Mother Nature?
36:17 Does being in nature help the process of Self Realisation?
37:19 The most amazing thing as described by Yudhishthira
38:58 A devotee's comment on Babaji's teachings
40:48 Do stronger thoughts come as we progress in meditation?
42:11 Is there a conscious mind and a subconscious mind?
44:15 Does the act of not following a habitual thought, take away the power of it?
45:49 So are samskaras not real?
46:38 Is every thought a vibration that is making our reality?
48:03 Loka Samasta Sukhino Bhavantu translation

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Transcript

Thus Spake Babaji, Online Q&A, No.169 – ‘Consciousness, the Mind and Meditation’.
 Recorded on 14 January 2024 for US participants

Introduction from Babaji
It's an opportunity for you to stop your mind, to become quiet. You, yourself try to become quiet mentally. Enough of the chatterbox that life after life, life after life, so many lives you have been doing. Now you want to see the Divine, your Real Self? It's time to become quiet. 

Question: Normally people think of themselves as a body and a mind. They rarely think of themselves as the consciousness of existence. You think of the body and the mind as this solid thing, but in reality, the Self is the only thing that's really solid. It’s abstract in that it's not physical or mental. But it's the only thing that's always there and never changes. Everything that's not the Self comes and goes, appears, disappears, changes, things like that. 

And one of the key things that Shiva said to Swamiji has stuck with me, and You keep repeating it in Your own way too. And that is that people have forgotten how they exist as the consciousness of eternal existence. And Your teaching is basically that consciousness can be on thoughts and the world, or it can be on the Self. But if it's on the world, and on anything really that's in the mind, since it's impermanent, it will never find contentment. The mind will always be looking, trying to find permanent fulfilment, and that's only found with quieting the mind. And you started today, it was beautiful, so simple, You said, if you want to see the Divine yourself, you must become quiet. It's so beautiful, it's the whole teaching. And the meditation is just the technique to silence the mind and to know yourself. You'll never find it in knowledge. No matter how many books you've read, how many gurus you go to see, you're never going to find the truth of your existence there. You'll only find it when the mind becomes quiet. Would You talk about that whole subject? 

Babaji: Yeah, it's simple - you see, when you're watching a movie, either your attention is on the movie, or your attention is on yourself, that you are sitting and watching the movie. And when you're watching the movie, it will not stop into one character, or one thought, or one type of thing because so many characters, matters, everything has been imagined. So the story keeps changing, the mind keeps jumping and spinning. The world also is like that. Either your mind is in the world with its own imaginations, preoccupied watching those imaginations, so thus is unable to watch itself, is not aware of itself. 

Another thing I had told, between every thought there is a gap. That gap goes unnoticed. Everybody notices the thought. When you enter the room, nobody notices the space also that is there. But everybody notices the matter; there is a sofa, there is a fan, there is a wall, there is a pillar, there are people sitting, and so on and on, like that. So now you have to turn your attention towards the Truth, because nobody knows where the Truth is. The Truth appears as if it is not there. That is the greatest wonder. It is there, and it is not there. It is full, absolute, and it is zero, void. That's how it looks like. 

If you compare with the matter, the Ultimate Truth appears to be void simply, because the matter keeps moving in that matter of voidness of the consciousness, or the Ultimate Truth. But that is the Truth. Simply, in other words, we need to start thinking positively. If the matter is moving and existing in the space, that means space is very special. Space has allowed any matter to pass through its surface. And also space has allowed any matter to exist in its surface, whereas seldom any other matter-object may have any such capacity to allow anything else to exist, any other matter to exist in that freely - just like you exist in the space. So now the attention needs to be turned to itself. Means, your attention needs to be turned to yourself. So as long as you are preoccupied on one thing, you are unable to watch yourself. So first you need to stop watching the thoughts, watching the visual effects, anything. So you begin with just watching. You might wonder, what Baba telling you must stop watching the thoughts means? Means, it should not be visible to you. To that extent, you just have to become quiet. 

Now, let us keep the watching aside for a while and just talk this. You are not quiet. You are thinking, you are visualizing, and that is why thoughts are appearing. That means you are imagining and the thoughts are appearing to you, visions are appearing, a world is appearing, matter is appearing. And the more solidly that you are becoming obsessed with that imagination, matter appears to be solid. Whereas if you slowly see, if you try to withdraw your attention, your thinking, then you will see that matter is not at all solid, it was only an appearance, which can very quickly disappear. So that is what is happening. That's why I told, you have to stop watching.

Earlier we told and we keep telling during meditation, “You just have to watch in between eyebrows”. So there you just have to watch, means you just have to watch the thoughts and visions that are in the mind which the mind had imagined earlier. But now, if you can understand that you have to become quiet, you need to stop watching the thoughts also. But how can you stop watching the thoughts? As long as there are thoughts, you are forced to watch. But when you stop thinking, the thoughts and visions will also disappear. So that's what you need to understand.

The third point in the meditation instructions, “Do not imagine about anything”. You are imagining about the things that appear within your mind. Stop imagining about them. Means, don't try to think whether it is good or bad what is in your mind. About the world also, I have told, if you think this world is very good, then also your mind gets involved. You think this world is very bad, then also your mind gets involved. Either way you stop thinking. You have to raise your consciousness above the dualities of this world, good or bad, then the world disappears. Because either of the two has to be there. If both are not there; you don't recognize either the hero or the villain, the cinema disappears, finished. 

So that's what you have to do precisely. Now stop watching any thoughts or visions. Means, you stop thinking. That's what you need to understand when you are watching, means you are stopping to think. You are trying to stop to think, that you understand. And then you stop to think, and watching also stops. You won't watch anything. There is nothing else. When there is nothing, there is nothing for you to watch. So that's all that has to happen in the sadhana of meditation. 

Same Questioner: Baba, the knowledge, it gives us faith. It encourages us to practice, to do the sadhana, to make the effort, to realize this, although most people have limited experiences. You know, faith is believing something you haven’t experienced, that it can happen. And I think most all of us have faith in spirituality and the Self or we wouldn't be on this Zoom chat right now. But if we can strengthen our faith, and realize the urgency of the need for meditation and Self-Realization, maybe we would make more effort, not get so absorbed in our lives that we don't have time to realize the most important thing, our Self. So how can we increase our faith or increase the sense of urgency? You've used the analogy of the time bomb. We don't have unlimited time. When you realize it, time is limited, when you're about to run out of time, you'll do anything to get free. 

Babaji: The physical body is racing towards its end. Every day it is closer to the death what we call; to come to an end. One more day is struck. It's finished. Delete this one day. Don't count this one day. This today is gone, like that it's happening. So that's what we need to realize. We have very little time and we need to consider the matter as a priority. We need to set the matter as a priority. Say, if today we do not eat a meal, we are going to die. That's what it is. Then we will set a priority. A hundred of your friends are coming and calling, “You need to address the United Nations, you need to address this thing and you have to travel in the plane and you have to do this, you have to do this…” “I can do anything, everything, but first, let me eat something so that I can live. Otherwise, if I don't live, what will I do?” 

So, like that, you have to set a priority, “Let me have some peace. Then I can attend to anything, anybody, any work that needs my attention. But first, I need to have some peace. I need to take control of myself. I need to know myself. To have faith, I need to experience myself that I exist.” So that's what you have to observe. You are there. You just observe, and you see if it is in your hands to make yourself disappear? You will not disappear. You are there. You go on watching. You stop thinking. All thoughts stop. All visions stop. But you are there. You will not disappear. You will not stop. You will stop from spinning, but you will not disappear. You are always there. Consciousness of Existence is such an important wonder about our own existence. So like that, one has to apply intelligence and think also, a matter of inquiry. Then practice just watching, and then practice just keeping quiet. Then your eyes are also not watching because if you start settling into your Self, the eyes also stop watching anything because all the consciousness settles into its Self. Just now, the consciousness is penetrating through the eyes. That's why it is able to see. And first, we practice concentrating and just watching. Now, afterwards, enough, stop watching now. You just become quiet. That is the next stage. So that has to happen. Then the wonder will come and you will know your Self being there. 

Same Questioner: Babaji, thank You. 

Question: Pranams, Babaji. Baba, during the Jangama Dhyana, when the watcher no longer finds an object in their vision, in their watching - by object I mean no object, no character and no world, no imagination, no sound, no name, no form - what happens to the watcher when they no longer find an object? 

Babaji: The watcher is there. Watcher is not going to disappear. That consciousness of existence, you will experience you are there. But you may not be able to see yourself with the naked eyes. Because you are simply consciousness of existence. Through the naked eyes of the physical body, if you try to see, it will appear as if you are not there, but you are still there. That you have to feel yourself. The watcher is there. But he has stopped watching. He has become quiet now. 

Same Questioner: Someone once made the comment that the difference between consciousness of existence and awareness of existence is simply that consciousness of existence requires an object, whereas awareness requires no second, because the Self alone is, there's no second. Is that accurate? And is this what happens when there's no longer anything to watch?

Babaji: In my opinion, consciousness of existence is also the same. There need not be any second object. Just for our understanding in the beginning I have told, consciousness means wherever you apply your consciousness, you become aware of that object or that existence. This is important - I have always told, either you become aware of that object, you become aware of that existence. So now you stop applying your consciousness to any object, any of its own imaginations. So when it becomes quiet, that consciousness gets applied to itself, and that consciousness becomes aware of itself, “That ‘I’, I'm existing, this existence is here.” So like that, consciousness is also the same, like you just become aware of yourself. Awareness, consciousness is same. You are conscious of your existence; you are aware of your existence. For me, I don't see much difference in these two things; to be aware, to be conscious. 

Same Questioner: Babaji, how can consciousness of eternal existence become aware of itself before Mahasamadhi? Because there's still some lesha-vidya; the body is there, the breath, whatever. In the very, very faint background, however microscopic a speck of awareness is aware of the body. How can it happen while a brain, a body, a mind exists, even though it's not attached to itself? 

Babaji: It has to practice to remain quiet. That is what is meditation. Consistently, every day one has to meditate so that the thinking habits are all stopped. So then the thoughts and visions all disappear. Don't recognize any vision or any thought, they will all disappear and the consciousness of existence is there. Before merging, you experience that you cannot make yourself disappear. This awareness also comes along with the awareness of the existence, and then you merge. 

Same Questioner: Babaji, one of the statements that you made on one of your posts was that the present has no story. Could you explain what you mean by that? 

Babaji: Yeah. When your mind, or your consciousness tries to go into the future, means it has to imagine, because no future exists. It has to simply imagine about the future, as a plan, as something that's going to happen, or as if it is happening. Or to the past also, it has to imagine; only anything has to be in the memory, because the past is over - these two things don’t exist. But when in the present, simply existence is there. The moment it starts thinking, it will jump into either future or past, it cannot remain in the present. Just like the needle in the wall clock, the needle cannot remain in the present, the minute needle, or the second needle what you call it. It keeps moving consistently, the second needle always, 30 seconds, 35 seconds, 40 seconds, 50 seconds, 60 seconds, and again starts, one second, two seconds like that, it keeps moving. So that is what is the future and the present, past. 

The present one is always still. So that's when your mind becomes to the present, it becomes still, it becomes quiet, it doesn't move, it doesn't think about any past, it doesn't think about any future, it has no imagination, no memory, nothing, it simply exists. That's how the watcher is there when he has become totally quiet, and being there is in the present. 

Same Questioner: Babaji, could you explain why no target is given in the instruction of Jangama Dhyana? 

Babaji: Because if you are given a target, you will imagine about that target, and your mind can be stuck into that target, it will be a separate entity other than you, which can only be imagined. So here, you have to become aware of your Real Self, that is the target. Here, target also you, watcher also you, you have to become aware also is you, everything, it’s you. So that's why no other target is given. That's why I had told in this meditation, when you practice silently watching, when the mind becomes silent, its attention automatically turns to itself, because no other target is there, means no other imagination is given. No concept is given at all, nothing. Beyond and above all concepts is this meditation. 

Same Questioner: Babaji, when you were talking about space and matter existing within the space and how unique space was a little while ago, my understanding is, please correct me if I'm right or wrong, the space doesn't care whether the matter appears within it or doesn't appear, it's unaffected, is that true? 

Babaji: Yes. 

Same Questioner: And so why does the matter appear within the space, the space could care less, the space is unaffected, and there's no cause, so why does the matter, the story, if you will, appear in the space? 

Babaji: A part of the space has come out of the space and has started imagining, creating. So that's when these things have appeared. Then every incarnation that has started splitting and getting diluted, diluted, diluted, and now it has become your consciousness, so it is so diluted; as a microscope speck it is watching the world and universe in a big way. The space itself is not watching anything. It is just in itself. And this space, that's why, is the Ultimate Truth, Divinity, actual Parabrahma. From that an enormous consciousness came out and started creating. 

Same Questioner: Thank you, Pranams Babaji, a very nice description for me. 

Question: Babaji, I'd like to just ask something related to what you were saying to Clifford. So, some teachers, I think, consider consciousness, whenever the ‘I’ is available, the ‘I am’ is there, and when that ‘I’ goes away, they consider that as the Parabrahma or the Absolute. But I think Your pure consciousness is the same as that, there's no ‘I’ there, You've transcended all individuality?

Babaji: Yes. Yes, there's no individuality, so there is no ‘I’, because there is no second entity, that's why the ‘I-ness’ also has disappeared. If ‘I’ is there, you also have to be there, if I am here, you are there, that type of duality. In the duality only this identity comes. Otherwise, everything disappears. If you are not there, I am also not there. 

Same Questioner: Some people might distinguish between consciousness and pure consciousness, you know, consciousness with an ego and consciousness with no ego. 

Babaji: Consciousness is pure. If consciousness has ego, that comes to be known as mind. 

Same Questioner: Yes. Thank You, Baba. 

Question: Why are we meditating to return to consciousness from which it came in space, or are we? Is it that just is what we are? 

Babaji: You see, a peculiar illusion has happened, making you to forget about your Real Self, you being the space, the Ultimate, All-pervaded, Absoluteness. From that, a portion came out to create, and then next generation, next generation, that went on getting diluted with the ego of I-ness, the I-ness. So a long journey has happened, a long way it has come, which is making everybody miserable, into happiness and unhappiness, good and bad, into dualities. So now a Yogi like us, we come and advocate, advise, try to teach to overcome the effects of this happiness and unhappiness, get rid of both once and for all. 

If there is no happiness, there is no fear of unhappiness coming, both are finished, so you will have the peace, that is the supreme peace. To achieve that back, to return to your Real Self is this meditation. Whatever you have imagined, you lost control over that imagination, went on imagining, went on imagining, life after life, life after life, life after life, so that went on imagining, so that is what the delay that has happened. Now you have to get back to the Self. You have to get rid of all the imaginations, so that is why the meditation is recommended. 

Same Questioner: Thank you. 

Question: Ram Ram, Babaji. Baba, the experience of neutrality toward externals would be closer to wisdom than the experience of positivity? 

Babaji: Experiencing the neutrality, it will be beyond any wisdom, because once you settle into yourself, no knowledge, no wisdom, nothing is required, only you are there. As long as a second entity is there, you need to handle that, you need a wisdom, you need to be wiser. So when there is no second entity, you don't need any wisdom at all. 

Same Questioner: Baba, does spirituality play an evolutionary role, or is it entirely independent of evolutionary forces?

Babaji: It plays an evolutionary role; it helps you to get elevated, evolve yourself back to the Real Existence from which you had fallen, you had slipped down. So it helps you to stand up and get back to yourself. Thus, evolution happens when you meditate. You have belittled yourself too much. Now you will overcome that belittling, and you will elevate yourself, that's how evolving will happen. 

Question: Pranams Babaji, so really what I had planned to ask is what we've been talking about, as is the case so often. But I would just like to get a little bit of a clarification. My understanding, and I’ve got a better understanding of it as we’ve been talking now, is that the true quieting of the mind, when we reach that level where we're able to truly meditate, to sit for an hour without thinking any thoughts, that's a product of the culmination of much practice and why we meditate every day. You just can't instruct somebody to sit down and say “Okay, don't think for this next hour”. 

But what I was wondering is, a lot of times when I'm sitting and a thought will appear in my head, whatever it is, say a cat for instance, if I watch that thought, the cat will begin chasing a bird which will be in a neighbourhood in a suburban area, and the cat will get a colour, and the thought will just keep gaining traction more and more and more. But if I tell myself right when a thought comes, “Just axe it, just stop the thought immediately”, sometimes I even imagine like a mental axe just chopping the thought out of my head. So, I'm wondering if that seems to be something that's okay to do, because if I do that, sometimes that thought will just go and another one will just pop up anyways. So, is this a good technique, or should we just allow for now continuing to watch? 

Babaji: This technique also can be helpful. To a certain extent you can keep trying this, but never give up. When thoughts appear again, don't lose heart, don't tell “Why this thought is appearing?” Let it go, then it will go. So you keep trying this technique also, along with just watching, it is helpful. 

Same Questioner: Another question I have was distractions, like auditory. Sometimes where I live there's a lot of construction going on outside, or there'll be kids here with my sister and my nieces and nephews and at certain times when I'm trying to meditate there's just a lot of noise. Should I learn to try to just be with that, or should I put in ear plugs or noise cancelling headphones or something?

Babaji: Both you can try. For some time you put in ear plugs, and then try to practice putting up with it also so that your mind stops noticing, even if it is there. So slowly practice both of them. So whichever one will pick up then you can increase that way, that will be helpful. 

Same Questioner: Thank you Babaji, Namah Shivaya.

Question: Pranams, Baba. My question is, the Supreme Consciousness that is us, where does it stop and start, in terms of, for example, mother nature? Mother nature is creating all of the time, trees and plants and all these beautiful things. Is there a Supreme Consciousness to mother nature? Secondly, it seems like so many people are enlightened in nature, Gurus go to the Ganges or in the mountains where they experienced a divine inspiration, or enlightenment. Could you just speak to that? I'm too ignorant to actually probably formulate the correct question here. 

Babaji: Yeah, from the mother nature there is a Supreme Consciousness of existence there, that is the Ultimate Truth. So different cultures may speak differently, like the same thing in Indian culture has been explained for this mother nature as the Brahma, Vishnu, and Maheshwara, Shiva concepts. The Brahma creating, the Vishnu protecting that creation, and Shiva is withdrawal of the creation back to the Self. The Self is recognized as the Ultimate, the Parabrahman. So, these trimurtis are recognized as mother nature; Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva. They created but they remained in the Self. So that is why they are recognized as divine personalities, trimurtis. 

But afterwards next generation like the Devatas, the angels and demons, they all became insecure and wanting the power, wanting to be secure of certain things, and the conflict arose. So thus, generation after generation the pure consciousness went on becoming impure, thus becoming a mind in creativity. Whatever it created, it got involved with the creation. So thus, by the time one has become a human being, it has come a long way with pollution and corruption. So to go back to that Self is the practice of meditation that is being taught. So this is the important thing.

And the second question that you were asking also, for many people enlightenment is such a thing where you come to know of that, but you cannot try to make anybody else to know that. That type of very peculiar thing. And to become Self-Realized is a different skill, and to be able to teach that Self-Realization is another different skill, is a very higher skill. To be a good teacher after Self-Realization is not easy. It's a very rarest of rare thing. There might be many who are enlightened but there are very few who are enlightened teachers. 

Same Questioner: I was wondering if nature can expedite that process because of the energy and closeness to nature?

Babaji: Only through your mind you can go back to the nature. Through this nature, the visible nature that is universe, it will be very complicated, because millions of objects are there to distract you easily. So you need to concentrate on one thing. So that's why spiritual sadhana is always taught to go introvert, within you. With closed eyes you have to meditate so that you can get rid of the outside world, nature also, and inside also you go back to your real nature. That's what is recommended. 

Question: Pranams, Babaji. You have stated several times a few moments ago that the Supreme Consciousness of Existence is the most wondrous amazing experience, and your statement reminded me of one of the episodes in Mahabharata where Yudhishthira encounters the question - answer session with Yaksha. Yaksha asks a question, “What is the most wonderful thing?” and Yudhishthira answers, “The most amazing thing is that even though every day one sees countless living entities die, the person still thinks and acts as if he will live forever.” So, is the most wonderful thing the ignorance, or… 

Babaji: You see, slightly one needs to understand the question. The Yaksha, when he was putting this question to Yudhishthira, he asked “What is the highest wonder, greatest wonder”. So, what I talk is, what is the greatest highest wondrous thing? The greatest wondrous thing is the Existence of the Self. Well Yudhishthira said rightly, “Everybody thinks that they are going to live here forever, and everybody knows that they have to die one day. This is the greatest surprise, highest wonder for me.” So, thin edge of difference is there. 

Question: Namaste, Babaji. Since I started joining your Zoom sessions and practicing meditation, and listening to your Spotify podcast and YouTube, I have been noticing that those visions or imaginations as I sit have… I mean they come very strongly, but I keep telling myself, “Do not imagine, do not think, just watch”, like a little mantra just to tell the mind again to stop. This has been helping me so much. I also have been reading your books and chanting ‘Om Shivaya Shivabala Yogendraya’ regularly because I noticed… I have enough time, eight or nine hours – I spend my time with my special needs kid, he gives me a lot of time, financially supports me - I don't have to deal with the outside world. Like he’s created an ashram like environment at home for me. If I am doing anything it is out of my mind. If I’m watching a movie I can choose not to, I have the option not to sit in a meeting and work with a boss. I have this freedom, this time to just observe my mind, listen to the podcast and meditate. I really seek your blessings at the mantra ‘Om Shivaya Shivabala Yogendraya’ really takes me to the permanent Self-Realization. Please bless me Baba.

Babaji: We will pray that may the Divine Guru Shivabalayogi is also with you to protect. Our blessings and our good wishes are always with you. 

Same Questioner: Thank you so much Babaji, thank you. 

Question: Pranams, Baba. I just had an observation and then a question. So the observation is, it seems with meditation, it reminds me of waking up from a dream, a lucid dream where there's just an involvement in a thought and then it's like zooming out from the thought, “Oh that thought's not real”, and then keeping zooming out from there. Is it true that as that happens, stronger and stronger thoughts keep coming, and I guess then it seems like the challenge is just maintaining the resolve to just keep watching there, and coming out of those thoughts? 

Babaji: Yeah, right, it's the very right way. The nursery school a smaller test comes and you pass it, then you try to become more stronger. Then a bigger test comes in the next class. Next class a bigger test comes, like that. Finally, when you clear everything, then you are done with. The more tests come, you try to become more stronger, so then you get it out that one. So that is the right technique and right way. May you be blessed. We will pray for you. 

Question: I've wondered, in science or talks about having a conscious mind and a subconscious mind. Do You see it that way? Is there a conscious mind and a subconscious mind? What would You share about that? 

Babaji: Sometimes I have referred to it, telling that in the mind itself that habit is there, but at all times everything, every habit that is in the mind may not appear. Like many people complain, “When I sit for meditation, millions of thoughts are coming. I keep wondering, when did I think about these things?” So that is what is recognized as sitting there in the subconscious state. It is not there as a separate entity, symbolically it has been spoken; in the subconscious state, the mind within the mind. That habit is sitting within the mind, but at all times it is not coming out. So when you meditate it is stirred, and everything comes out, those chronic habitual things, that all gets cleared. So that is what is symbolically known in the scientific world, they refer to as a subconscious state. There is no such separate entity away. It is within the mind, main mind only it is there. 

Same Questioner: Would you consider latent tendencies or samskaras to be there, but not always in the conscious mind? 

Babaji: Yes, that is what I tell; the tendencies are there, acquired habits are there, but every time everything may not be visible. So sometimes something is visible, sometimes something is visible, so this happens - but it is there, tendencies.

Same Questioner: So as latent tendency rises up and you become conscious of it, is the very act of not following that habit, does that actually affect that, and take away some power of it? 

Babaji: Yes. You do not recognize that seriously. You just watching, you are ignoring that, then that will disappear, that will not be there anymore. It is there in memory only, in imagination only. So when it crops up, it tries to attract your attention within you only. So then if you just watch, if you are forced to watch, means maintain your silence. Like, I am trying to tell a joke to you and I want to make you laugh, but you ignore me, you just watch me telling a joke, but you don't give rise to any laughing. You are able to keep quiet and watch, then my joke loses its effect. I start thinking, “No more use to crack any jokes, you are not laughing at all”, so I become quiet. Somewhat like this, these tendencies also they come up, they try to attract your attention, but if you don't pay attention, that collapses, dissolves, disappears.

Same Questioner: There was a statement in Yoga Vasishta about disregarding samskaras. So, they're not real, all of this, incarnations and samskaras. So, within our consciousness if we start being unmoved, we don't have to be affected by them, is this correct? 

Babaji: Yes, definitely, exactly the same thing. So it's not real, it's not there at all. Like, there is no problem at all - if you don't imagine that there is a problem, then you don't have to face a problem.

Same Questioner: What came to my consciousness about being still was, we've talked about the mind spinning, but I saw it from the standpoint of frequency. Like everything's a vibration, like sound. When you're silent, there's a flat line, but if you saw sound when I'm talking, it goes like this, there's a vibration that comes out of it. So today, earlier you were mentioning when you really obsess and think about something, the matter gets stronger and so every single thought is a vibration coming out of us that's creating our reality.

Babaji: Yes, exactly, exactly - that's what's happening. The word used for this vibrating is the spandana. Even Vasishta refers to this. Spandana means it wavers, waves come, that’s what is the vibrations. So you make it flat, so that naturally it stays there, that's a Yogi.

Same Questioner:  I have one last question. ‘Lokah samastah sukhino bhavantu’, when we hear the translation, it doesn't feel right. Is it truly that they want all beings to be happy? What is the real translation from the Indian standpoint? Is it different than the American ‘happy’? It seems so superficial to me.

Babaji: A peace is prayed in the prayer. Like this world, though it is in illusion, just now we are watching this world, and this exists for a while when we are in this world, in this body, and there are so many beings there. So “Divine, we don't know how many worlds you might have created, like this. If at all it is there, may all beings in all the worlds have peace.” Means everywhere in every soul, let the consciousness settle down to peace, ‘Om shanti, shanti, shanti’ is the recommended goal. Not to have the happiness of the worldly type of imagination. Make all consciousness settle down to peace from everywhere. A Realized soul understands it is the same consciousness everywhere, why should it suffer unnecessarily? May you bless, so that it all settles down peacefully. May peace prevail upon, everywhere.

Same Questioner: So Baba when You're saying it, I realize you're coming from that place that it all exists within You, one single Self. So it must have a great power that commands to have peace. When I say it, I’m still thinking I’m praying for all this thing outside of me, but I should start recognizing it's all within me? 

Babaji: Yes. Like many times, many devotees keep writing to me, asking me, requesting me, “Please pray for us, please pray for us.” I tell “We will pray for you. My blessings are there”. So like that it happens. So their faith also can work wonders for them, and when we pray we know that everything is within that one Self only. So like that if you also start considering, you will get elevated.

Same Questioner: Thank You, Baba, thank You.


End of Session.