Effective Personality, part 1

Zoom Satsang 7 July 2019, part 1

Telling lies

Question: Day to day life can consist of us lying to someone; the scale of lies varies from telling lies for petty things to huge lies having a significant impact. How do these small lies, perceivably small lies, insignificant lies impact in our spiritual progress?

Mohanji: I don’t believe that there is great significance to any aspect of it, lies are habitual. It’s more or less habitual. We are used to hiding things and this is part of proving something to the world. If you have deep integrity, if you have accepted yourself completely, then there is no need to lie, you will just be natural. Whenever we are unnatural, that shows we have not accepted ourselves completely. As I said last time, in the last episode, the only thing you need to do in a lifetime is to accept yourself. You don’t have to accept anybody else in this world, because everybody outside is your own reflections.

The world outside is there for you only when you wake up. There is a world outside, but that’s not yours. When you wake up, your world wakes up. When you sleep, your world sleeps. Your interaction with the world outside is connected to whether you wake up to it or not. In the waking hours, we try to pretend to be something which we probably are not and that’s where you have to lie. Otherwise, you can just be natural, you can be truthful and you can just flow.

I believe that sometimes you know the absolute truth, but if you tell the truth, it will hurt a lot of people. And if you do not tell the truth or if you keep quiet, maybe the balance is maintained. In those cases, you do not have to articulate. You can just observe the truth, understand the truth and stay quiet. But otherwise, I would say you stick to the truth which expands you. When you lie, when you compulsively lie, which is habitual as I said earlier, you automatically feel much weaker, much lesser and also poor inside. If you want to feel rich inside, you must stick to the truth. I always say stick to the truth, do what is right. 

What is right?

What is right is something which expands you. It really makes you feel good, makes you feel rich. What contracts you what makes you feel poor is something which is not you really, it’s pretentious. Avoid all the pretentious activities. And just stay with the truth and keep expressing it continuously.

In case you can’t express the truth, first and foremost, try to be quiet. Observe silence. Probably silence is better, rather than telling a lie or pretending you are something else. Stick to what you are and within your capacity. All of us have a given capacity, we have a given frequency, we have our character constitution, we have our duration. Everything is defined, pretty much defined from birth till death. We have to express certain things in life, we play roles in life, like a father or a son, various roles each day. When we wake up and before we sleep, we are playing all these roles. So my suggestion is always be natural in all this. Just accept as it comes. Don’t try to pretend that you are somebody higher or somebody lower.

When you try to prove something to the world, you always compromise. You don’t have to compromise, you can just be natural and that being natural will maintain stability in you. And that’s the only stability you need in life. When you are fully natural, fully contented, and fully in acceptance of yourself, you’ll be flowing like a river. And that’s the only thing you need in this life. Being successful amounts to a lot of acceptance. If you want to really feel successful, feel rich, you need to accept yourself. There’s no other way. If you do not accept yourself, you will have to lie, you will have to pretend on various occasions, and then sometimes you will not remember those lies, and that’s again a problem. Once you don’t remember those lies, then you know the repercussions are bad.

Question: Some days, I’m all energetic and accomplish things with full awareness. On other days, I simply give in to procrastination and tamas. When I’m having low days, what is the bare minimum I can do so that I don’t go further in the tamasic path, and am able to rebound quickly.

Mohanji: In your low days, I suggest you brush your teeth, take a bath, take it easy and give some time to yourself. If you look at your whole life, right from the time when you were aware that you are living, to until now, it’s like a wave. Since you’re asking this question, you have definitely reflected on your life. It’s never constant. Some days you are full of inspiration, and some days you’re not inspired. So it’s like a wave. It’s always high, low or somewhere in the middle. When you’re feeling good, when you’re very energetic and when you’re in a good mood, do your best. When the mood is low, sometimes you feel very low self-esteem and you don’t have the initiative to do much. You feel a lot of tamas. Sometimes you feel like sleeping and procrastinating, be that completely. But if that becomes your comfort zone, then get out and run. That’s what they say, there’s only one way you can destroy procrastination, it’s compulsive action. There’s no other way.

Meditations and other things won’t work. Because for meditation to work you need to be in an active mode already. So if it is procrastination, if you’re in a very low energy level, allow it to happen, the body is probably asking for rest. Maybe because of hyper action you have reached a level where you would like to now take it easy and relax, you may want to recoup just to compensate for what’s lost, the energy that’s lost. So you go with that.  Don’t try to maintain it. Because then you’re actually pushing yourself against the natural state. When it is high, be very high, when it is very low, be low, and just be there. Don’t try to swap these things, be very natural.

You can see this in children. Children are always active, they’re always energetic. The reason is, they are not worried about the past or the future. Most of us do not have energy because our mind goes to the events, the feelings, the emotions of the past, mostly negative ones, and then to the anxiety over the future. So these are the two things which actually take a lot of energy from us. If you’re fully here in the present and you’re looking at life into the eyes, right now, energy loss will be very less, more or less. There’ll be a balance in life.

But again, as I said, we are all human beings. We have our highs and lows. We have left and right. We are good and bad. We are everything, that we have to accept. And we are not just one thing.  We are not only high or only low. Everything changes. Every moment things change. Just like our body changes, mind changes, our understanding changes, awareness-stage changes, everything changes. Change is part of existence. It’s like a wave, when you’re on top of the wave, when the wave is very high, be high, and when the wave crashes, and you are very low, be in that state. So there is no resistance, if you do not resist, there is no pain.

If you resist the various aspects of life all the time, you will always have conflicts. That’s why many people eventually have crashed experiences. They crash and lose their self-esteem and say I can’t do anything more, any more. The lack of self-esteem, sometimes depression, are all caused because of constant resistance to something. We believe that we should be something else. You can’t be. We are what we are right now. Every moment is your reality, this is what you are. So don’t try to think that you could be something else. You could be somewhere else. That’s all impossible.

What you are doing right now is what’s happening to you. What is your reality right now is what happens to you right now. This is the only thing you need to understand and accept.  When you accept every moment, then there is a flow to life, otherwise, there is resistance. When resistance is more and more and more, you’re tired, you become physically weak, and you are mentally very tired. That’s when you feel very low. I also said last time, sometimes we are extremely happy. Maybe there’s no reason. But sometimes without any reason, you feel very good. Sometimes you feel very low, very sad, very depressed. So when you are feeling very happy, be happiness a hundred percent. Usually, we don’t do that. When you’re feeling happy, you think, oh, how can I be happy? Or probably sadness is just around the corner. Or when you’re sometimes feeling very sad, you feel kind of resistance to sadness. So neither happiness nor sadness is fully experienced. That’s why we don’t experience life in its completion each moment. When happiness is the state, just be happy. Be happiness, hundred percent. Just laugh out loud.

I asked this question last time. When was the last time you really laughed? You know, many times we forget to laugh and that costs our youth, youthfulness. Even if you’re 90 years old, you can be very youthful. But when you stop laughing, when you stop accepting, when you keep on resisting, we lose our youthfulness. We become so redundant and very old. That is why many people in the world are very rich, but they have only money. They have no richness inside, they’re very empty and poor inside. That’s a sad state. Instead, you should be very, very happy when you are happy, you should be fully happiness. When you’re sad, be fully sadness, so that every aspect is fully experienced. Life should be fully experienced every moment. When you continuously do that, you will feel very stable. And stability is essential for having a good life.

Likewise, the same with inner richness. Inner richness is always connected to sharing. What can you share, only what you have. Maybe you have knowledge to share, maybe you have skills to share, maybe you have money to share, time to share or love to share. Share what you really have, then that sharing will keep you rich inside. That’s why when somebody asked me recently what did you earn from this earth? I said, love. When I go to many countries, when I meet a lot of people and they love me, that love is my earning. It’s not the money or any other aspects of existence, because that’s not important. But the love that you earn, the richness that you build within is your real earning.

If you have done nothing in life except eating, drinking, sleeping, making some houses or buildings, which you think will give you happiness, eventually, you realize that life is already lost. You have done nothing on Earth, that’s a big regret. That’s why I told you last time, make sure when you wake up in the morning…  this is what I normally do. When I wake up in the morning, I thank the Masters, I just tell them, thank you for using me. That’s all you need to say. Gratefulness for being an instrument for delivering love, delivering brightness. I feel that I should always be a light to this world so that the world is brighter. Each of us can be light, I’m not special, everybody is the same. All people are the same.

So what should your focus be when you wake up in the morning? You ask yourself, what else can I do to this world? What else can I give?  I’m not saying what can you give? What else means you should always be giving, sharing. But at the same time, when you wake up in the morning, ask this question, what else can I do to this world? Depends on what your skill is, what your strength is, all people need not be outside on the street, or in the society. You can write, you can express. There are so many faculties today, YouTube, various kinds of social media systems, networks, all those things are there. Today expression is not a problem. I’m talking to you, and you’re listening to me from many parts of the world.  This is exactly how we communicate, we inspire. One is that we do the right action. Another is that we inspire by doing the right action by correct communication. If this is mixed well, your life is rich. You have actually delivered richness. You are rich and let it show that this is exactly what maintains your richness. 

I’ll come back to your question. When you are very happy, or when your mood is right, do your best. When you are not in the right mood, or when you feel low, the body is probably asking for rest or the mind is probably saying that, okay, let me take it easy now, then only I can do better later. So just be, just at that point in time. Just slow down. Just reduce your speed. Take it easy, procrastinate, probably you can even observe silence. Maybe you can do fasting, controlled fasting, not that you suddenly stop eating, but you can reduce your quantity of food. Do not talk that day, withdraw from everything for a day or so. And then observe yourself, feel yourself. I’m not even talking about meditation or chanting or yoga. Just be with yourself. Accept yourself. And also spend time with yourself. This is the only thing which we don’t do most of our life. I always remind you, the only book that you must read in this lifetime is called you. You don’t have to read any other book. If you do not read yourself in this lifetime, if you do not connect with yourself in this lifetime, you lose a great personality, a great opportunity.

If you start looking within, you will realize that you are the universe, everything outside depends on you, and how you are, that’s how the world is. If you’re very happy, the world is beautiful. If you’re very sad or depressed, the world is like that. If you’re sick, when you look outside into a beautiful garden, you will not feel anything. If you’re romantic, then romance happens, everything looks beautiful, everything is nice, even the worst of things are beautiful. Why is it so? That’s the state of your mind at that time. Your state of mind determines your reality. The outside world is your reflection. The world outside is as you are. It can’t be as it is because we don’t see the real world. We don’t understand people. We don’t understand situations. We don’t understand the actual length, width, and height of every matter. We just see the world as we are. We form opinions. We form concepts. We like and dislike based on what we are. So this “we” should be well oiled and maintained, only then can you have a great life and it’s worth it. It’s your birthright.

Question: What is the difference between self-respect and ego?

Mohanji: Ego is the skeleton of your personality. There are three faculties with which we are working with or connect to the world. The first is the mind and emotions. The second is the intellect which is the analytical part, with which we analyze aspects of life. And the third is the ego, which is the personality, the projection of what you are. People recognize you based on what you project. These are the three major aspects or the faculties of perception that we use to live in this world.

Ego is an essential thing for everybody. Ego is the skeleton of your personality. It is not an ego like a bloated ego, where you expect respect. We expect so many things from the outside world, that’s a different thing. But ego is very essential. Self-respect and self-esteem are connected to the level of acceptance that you have, that’s not ego. Ego is different and acceptance is different. Acceptance is that you have accepted yourself as a complete incarnation. You are unique. You are neither higher nor lower nor equal to anybody. You are unique.

That is why your thumb impression is unique in this world. Your retina of the eyes is unique in this world. You as a creation are totally unique. That acceptance will give you self-respect. Otherwise, most of the time we compare, we push children to compare with the other students and say, look here that guy is doing well, why are you not performing well? We try to make people/children, another brick in the wall. But have you ever said to your child, you know what, you are absolutely unique. There is nobody like you. Be unique and that’s your strength. Have you ever said? We don’t say that in schools or in our life. We always try to pitch one against the other, we tell them to compare, compete, etc. That’s all totally against our natural existence. Our natural existence is that I am what I am. And that’s all I need.

You don’t have to be somebody else, you can’t be somebody else. All other people are already taken, they are all different. We have certain benchmarks like we think our performance on this earth is equal to money. About how much money do we have in our bank. How many buildings and houses do we have. But how many houses can you sleep in, just one bed. The whole idea is that inflated feeling of feeling good, the feeling good part. This is basically an illusion. It’s an artificial thing. That is why when some money is lost, or somebody steals something, when you lose something, you feel so sad, you feel so bad. You feel bad because you think that they are things you have lost. But you’d never think that you got it from here. All the things that come to you now, including your relationships, your money, your positions, your places and possessions, everything arrived at a certain point in time. Not that it was there when you were born.

Each point in time, things change, things fluctuate. This is how we have always lived. This understanding is important. That level of acceptance is also important. When you accept yourself at that level, then there’ll be no competition, there’s nothing to compete. Each individual is unique and they are doing their part in this world. 7.5 billion people. Look at life today, the child who’s born today will not be existing on this earth in the next hundred years. All of us will be gone. It will be a new set of people. From our past, our grandfather, his grandfather, all these people were amazing personalities. If you look at anybody from the past, our own lineage, mother’s and father’s side, you see everybody had personalities. If you have known them, if you have seen them, or if you have experienced their presence, they were all very, very powerful people in their own way. But they all vanished. They stopped their roles, or their roles finished and they all went, we will also leave. Even the child born today will not be existing and walking this earth in the next hundred years.

Our existence is so fragile, everything is temporary. We are evolving each point in time, we can never be constant. Even our body, mind, intellect, ego and awareness, everything is changing. In this changing awareness, all you can do is to be stable and look at life without any kind of flavor. Life, as it happens, is ok, this is my reality and let it come and go. No resistance is equal to acceptance. That maintains your self-esteem. That will help you stabilize in your plane of existence. This is exactly what you should do. But ego is your personality, like I asked you, who you are. If you say I’m not too sure, I don’t know, then it will be a problem in this world. Ego is that aspect which tells you about your own incarnation, about your identity. I am so and so in this life, I am this life, as long as I perform, I am so and so.

When you are sleeping, where is Mohanji for you? I am with you of course energetically, and it’s a different story. But that play, not many people can see or experience. When I’m communicating with you, and I’m active in this world, you have me, otherwise, you don’t have me. I spoke about Jesus last time. Eight years was his active years, out of 32 years of his duration of life. Eight years was the time when he actually delivered himself into this world. And he delivered so many things. Those eight years created him. Just like that most of us have our effective years, the active effective years, this is very important. But if you look at 7.5 billion people, most of them are invisible. The world doesn’t know that they live, they exist, just like there are so many bricks on this wall. You wouldn’t even know which brick is which. They exist almost like that. If you look at their whole existence, they are invisible.

It’s important that you have effective years. Effective years are  during which you actually deliver into this world. Those are your only effective years, not what you take from this world. All of us are in a hurry taking a lot of things from this world, and we leave everything when we die. We can’t take anything, not even a pebble can we take from Earth. All the things which we collect over a lifetime are left behind, and nothing do we carry. What you can give this world consistently and effectively is your net worth. What you deliver to this world. How you make a difference in this world. How you can make this world better, brighter because of your existence. Those are your effective years, and all of us have that power and strength.

We can all do what’s good within us, what’s our strength. All of us have strengths, all of us have weaknesses. Forget about weaknesses, that’s fine, let it be there. Strengths, what are your strengths? What do you have in abundance? Everybody has something in abundance. That’s why I said earlier that even materially poor people could be very, very wealthy in the heart compartment, where they will be probably very rich inside. That’s the abundance they have. The richness of love that they have, that’s the abundance, and they can share that love. Materially, you may not be able to share because you may not have much money. But from the heart, you can definitely give to the world. All of us have our strengths like that and those strengths, if we use well, are our effective years. That’s your net worth. That’s all you need to know.

The ego is where you are projecting yourself as a personality. That is why I always say; always project yourself as you are, not as you would like the world to see. Because, when you try to pretend, you have to compromise quite a lot of things. You have to prove that you are something. This is a very, very heavy burden. Whenever there is high stress, if you look, there is always an expectation and also a pretension behind it. We’re trying to be something, we’re trying to meet our promises. Meaning we have promised something which we can’t deliver. When you promise, you must give, otherwise, do not promise. That gives you integrity. We may not have all the capacities which we would like to have. So we only promise what we can actually deliver. If we can’t deliver, it’s okay, we can tell them, it’s not within my capacity, or I do not have the time nor I have the resources, that’s fine. Because you are telling your truth. When you tell the truth, it always helps. There is no confusion. You don’t need to speculate. People don’t speculate when you say this is your reality, this is the only thing you can deliver, and this is your capacity. This is good.

If you lead a life with clarity about those understandings, life will be very easy. So self-esteem is connected to your integrity that way. Integrity where you’re keeping your promises, and you’re not promising anything unnecessarily. You say, ok this I can’t do, or I’m not capable of doing, I don’t have the capacity, but this I will do for you. Then you do it before the time they expect. That will help your self-esteem always. When you promise and you deliver you feel good inside, that is self-esteem. You promise and you don’t deliver, you lie all the time, you’re trying to take something which the other person has, or you’re trying to cheat, steal, betray, you will feel miserable eventually. Probably immediately you may say, okay, I got this, I’m happy. But then eventually you will feel miserable, you will feel; Oh, why did I do that? That was unnecessary.

Let everybody have their share of life. What is in another person’s pocket should remain there. If something has come to somebody, they earned it. They are eligible for it. If you’re supposed to get something, it will come to you. It will definitely come to you. Because as per the eligibility, distribution happens in this world. Eligibility is something which you have earned, earned over a period of time. It’s not even the skills or your experiences of this life. But what you are, that’s your earning, that’s your eligibility. What you actually are is not only about what efforts you have put in. It’s where you have come to, from where you started. Just like your orientations; some people like to be a doctor, an engineer, a pilot, a scientist, or an artist, based on the orientation. If they’ve engaged in that job, that activity, they will feel powerful. But we don’t even do that. In life, if you look, most people are working just for a living, just for earning money. Their whole life is spent on earning money, and they’re so busy with that.

Eventually, because they compromise their health and other things, they become very sick. First of all, there’s no happiness in the job. Secondly, they are always pushing against their will.  When you continuously do things which are not exactly within your natural inclination and orientation, it’s very stressful. It is pressure and that pressure becomes a disease later. And then whatever you earn, you spend on sorting that out. Sometimes, that’s not possible. Whatever you arrived at, sometimes is not reversible. This is what you see in this world today. I am suffering, I’m tired, I don’t know what to do with life, I’m emotionally broken, all these things are coming. Depression is a very clear sign where your purpose was unclear.

When your purpose is very clear, you will be positive, you have to be positive. When the purpose is unclear, then you’re searching for inspiration for any action. And that’s very difficult. When your purpose is very clear, when there is clarity of purpose, you don’t have to search for inspiration. That clarity of purpose will give you inspiration. That’s the same I said about Jesus. Eight years he was up there in the world, and he was fully occupied in his activity, he fully immersed himself into his activity. You look at any of the great Masters of the past, irrespective of country, caste, culture or color, they were all very much self-inspired. They didn’t look for inspiration elsewhere.

I can’t give you inspiration unless and until your purpose is clear. I can give you inspiration or I can only give you inspiration with my life. My only contribution to this world is my life, how I live, what I believe in or what I do. This is my message. Not what I speak, words are not good enough in that way. What you are and how you express, what you express in this world, that’s your message. Your life is your message. All of us, irrespective of country, culture or color, our life itself is our message. Without knowing we are always conveying some message into this world. We must be aware of this. Your body language, your attitude to life, the words you speak, everything is conveying your story. And please remember, all people have a story. All people have a history. This is very important to understand, nobody has just happened like that.

Of course, when you look at individuals, they all stand alone. But at the same time, there is always a network, there’s always a background. So we must understand our orientation, and converting that orientation into a powerful purpose, will maintain our self-esteem, will inspire us, and life will flow. You don’t need to search for anything. Life will happen as it is, and you will be doing your best. And at the time of death, you don’t have to look back and think; oh, what did I do? I could have done more, or what exactly happened? I’ve said, at the time of death, you wouldn’t even care if you have a million dollars or a few million in the bank. Your relationships, your children, you will care about nothing because you’re leaving. Your show is over. You’re exiting the body. If you are thinking about shares in the market, the property that you’ve earned, your position in the society… nothing matters, you’re leaving.

Always remember, at that point in time, you have no more time to do anything. But right now you have, you can make your life extremely effective. That is only possible when you are delivering to this world, not in what you take from the world. We are only focused on taking, not giving. Right from childhood till now, how much have you given to this earth, keep a note. But again, after that don’t count. Just for your awareness, you look into your life and say what have I given to the earth instead of taking. That’s why I said responsibilities more than rights. Everybody is after rights, we are fighting and screaming, shouting for rights. But responsibilities, that’s exactly what makes you. So count your responsibilities, you can do so many things.

This Earth has given you a space to exist, the water, the electricity, the air, the oxygen, and space, everything is given to you, and you have it. But you can be here only for a certain time. All of us are on a tourist visa. We are here for a duration of time and at a certain point in time, we have to leave the body and we go. The same thing has happened in the past. All the people of the past existed for some time, they expressed themselves as they were and they left. We don’t have them today. Tomorrow, in the future, our children and their children will have their existence and they will have their life. They will have their expressions and they will also leave. Another generation will come, it’s a continuous flow like a river. In this mode, you only have this time, this time in life, where you can express. Tomorrow we have not seen whether we will be healthy, will be able to talk, will be able to express, we don’t know, we don’t know anything about the future.  Right now, our heart is beating. We are talking, we are breathing. Do something that will maintain your self-esteem and self- worth. And that is exactly what will make you an effective personality. And that’s our message to the world or our signature in this life and for the world.

Transcribed by Kishore Mundanat
Proofread by Shyama Jeyaseelan