Know Yourself – part 1

Satsang with Mohanji-Montenegro, Luštica Bay, 17.11.2019

PART 1

How are you doing today? Thanks to all of you who have come from a long distance, from various places. We have some kind of connection, that is why we met, and we are here again. I always feel grateful when people give me time. I try to give more each time to people, to all the people who took the effort to come and meet me, I try to give them much more. That is how I feel. Because I feel grateful that we are meeting in this lifetime, this time, this space. It’s not an ordinary thing. It’s a great thing that we are all meeting, sharing the space, sharing some aspects of life. It’s interesting, isn’t it?

Q1: How to choose a life partner?

M: You know, many people have this question, that is why they choose not to have a partner. Instead, they choose puppies. It’s more consistency. Every meeting we have, there is an energy exchange. You think about every meeting in every day, we are meeting so many people. We interact with so many people. Everything has an energy exchange. Something is being exchanged. Something is shared. With some of them, we feel good. With some interactions, we don’t feel good. With some interactions, we want more. For some, we say, ”No, its enough.” This is natural. But, when we think, I must find a partner, or I must have a boyfriend or husband, we are looking at everybody as a potential candidate. But what are people? All people are a bundle of strengths and weaknesses. We all have strengths and weakness, nobody is apart from that. We usually see good things, something which we can relate to, some compatibility in a person. After that, when we are both familiar, what do we see? Only weaknesses. This is human nature. This is why you can see a lot of people married, but separated inside. They stay married probably because of children, or because of some others matters, but they are divorced inside. That is because when you are becoming too familiar with somebody, you only start seeing the weaknesses. But we also have a good quality: when people die, we forgive them. Then we are happy. All the weaknesses are forgiven. But when living, we have pain.
Now I will come to your question, this is the background. How can you find somebody who is compatible with you, and stable with you? This is the question, right? The secret of a successful relationship is – have nothing to do with the other. If you put freedom as the ingredient in a relationship, the relationship will have no problem. But if freedom is not given in the relationship, it hurts. If you are mature enough to keep your partner free, you will find your best partner; the best possible partner, because you will not be worried about his strengths and weaknesses. You will love companionship, you are meeting because of some reason, let it be any reason. But, if you put freedom as an ingredient in the relationship, not ownership, not possessiveness, only freedom, then you will have a great relationship. So, the secret of a successful relationship is giving freedom to the other. Just allowing them to be free, to be themselves. Then it will last forever.

Q2: Thank you in advance. Even though I earn sufficient money, I cannot keep that money. I always spend everything I earn.

M: Congratulations (laughs). What is the question? This is a statement actually. Well, the nature of money is movement. Money is energy. It is transactional, it moves, it has to move. If money is not moving, it is useless, right? I remember an example. Maybe this is not a very good example, but just to tell you about how we cling on to money.
Barbara and I were in Vietnam, in town Da Lat. A lady said, ”You must come to my house.” It was to see her mother, who was in her death bed, sick, but not dying. For six months she had been lying like that, she was not leaving. Everybody was waiting because she was not well. She was supposed to die, but she was not dying, she was waiting. I went there, I saw her, and she was holding a bunch of money in her hand and lying there. There were clear signs of death: her breath was going up all the way, and suddenly it holds. I could see that the soul really wanted to leave, but something was holding her back – this bunch of money in her hand.
I asked her daughter, ”What should I do, what do you want me to do?” She said, ”You bless her, so she has a smooth death.” I said, ”I cannot bless anybody to die. I don’t do that. I will probably release her from the bindings, but I cannot tell when she should die. That is up to the soul to leave a body, whenever it wants, I will not interfere.” I just took the money from her hand. Suddenly she looked at me. Until then, her eyes were up, but suddenly she looked at me, as something precious had gone. With the weak hand, she tried to come towards the money, but I didn’t allow it. I gave the money to her daughter, and I touched her third eye. That night she left the body.
We have no idea how many things around us don’t allow us to leave free. So the answer to the question or the statement is: You understand money is coming – thank you very much; you understand money is going – thank you very much. Just watch both as you are just an actor in this whole drama of flow. Then, when you are not thinking it is your own money, it is happening through you, you will start seeing that the right amount of money will always be stored. Did you understand this point? What is the difference here? When money comes, money doesn’t stay, money goes – its a pattern, which means that is the way you are. It is a pattern that is working without any control. You are not controlling anything. You just allow it to happen.

Patterns happen due to ownership. It’s my money – ownership is me and mine. Now, you look at it as it is happening, I am an actor, I am watching this show. Zero ownership. What will happen? The pattern will dissolve. A pattern means ownership. When you do not own it, the pattern dissolves. This is the same for everything in life. Anything which is coming, again and again, is a pattern. When you detach within, ok, it’s happening, then no problem. When a pattern is dissolved, things change. Have you seen any animal in nature insecure? You won’t see it. They are not worried about tomorrow’s food. No bird is worried about the next day’s food. They do not store anything, thinking tomorrow there will be no food. I am not talking about animals in the house, because they are as insecure as you are. In nature, you will see no insecurity. You will never see a bird or an animal betraying another one. These are all our possessions. As human beings, we have all these things. If you want to change any pattern, not only money pattern, you need to detach from that whole thing, me and mine, and look at it. This is happening, let it come, let it go, but it is not mine. I am not owning it. Ownership keeps patterns.

Q3: How to overcome fear and the need to control everything in life?

M: That is again connected to me and mine. Most of the things connected to life, which is blocking our progress, will be me and mine. Have you seen it? Most sorrows, most insecurities are connected to me and mine. Fear is a state where you have no faith. What is the medicine for fear? Faith. Faith in oneself, in yourself. If you decide that you will look into the eyes of your fears, all the fears will go. Because fears are like shadows. They need something else to depend on.
In the movie Rambo, with Silvester Stalone, a man says, ”You can’t defeat him (Rambo), because he is trained to survive.” We can train ourselves to be fearless. How? By increasing your awareness. What is awareness? Firstly – the awareness that everything that is born will die. If you are born, there is a certain death. While we are walking on this earth we are just on a tourist visa. We have a duration. Secondly – the world existed before us and the world will exist after our death. Third is that – only when we wake up in the morning we have a world outside, when we sleep, we do not have the world outside. Our world depends on whether we are awake to the world. There are a few more things, but most important is that everything that comes will go. In other words, nothing is permanent. Life means changes. We were very small sometime earlier, a few years ago, now we have become this size. Every time the body has changed, the mind has changed, everything has changed. All things have changed. We were B-shaped sometimes, now we are A-shaped. Everything changes. Why do we have to keep fears? If you look at fears in the eyes, they will vanish. They will all dissolve. There is no room for fear. And one way you can be sure fears don’t bind you is to lead a life of love, purity, and purpose.

When you wake up in the morning (I normally do this when I wake up in the morning), think, what else can I give this world? Even if I fail, I have no fear. I try my best. What else can you give this world? Instead when you wake up and say,”What will people give me?” Then you will have all the problems. Otherwise, we will not have problems. I said, ”What else we can give,” that means we should continue giving. But in the morning every day, think what more we can give so that we are always self-motivated. Even if you fall down, you get up and walk again. Otherwise, if we have a lot of expectations, there will be a lot of disappointments. And eventually life will be paralyzed, because of disappointments.

Q4: How to prevent negative emotions towards people with whom we have a conflict?

M: Emotions you can’t control. It happens, right? We don’t choose to have negative emotions, but it happens sometimes. My recipe is very simple, I increase my positivity. Of course, it’s not easy to control emotions, is it easy? When the emotion happens, it’s like a wave. It comes and takes over. You can’t do anything, and it is like a pendulum on the clock, its positive-negative, life goes like that. Each day goes that way. But, predominantly every day, if we have more positive activity; that is the way you can come out of these negative days. Of course, there are people who are heavy with negativity in our society, we can’t avoid them. That’s part of the society. But if you spend sufficient time with very positive people you can manage both. That is why in Sanskrit there is a beautiful saying, If you indulge in the company of good people, people of positive nature, you will learn to detach from negative things around you. When you start detaching from so many things around you, whether it is negative or positive, you are fine with the nice energy of good people. When you detach, then your desires also become weaker. When desires are more, you are never satisfied. When desires are less, you are contented. So, peacefulness and contentment happen inside. Just by your association with people of higher energy, positive nature. What happens when desires are lesser in the mind? The mind goes into silence. What is the sound of the mind? Thoughts. Where are thoughts coming from? Desires. When desires become lesser and lesser, the mind becomes calmer and quieter. When the mind is calmer, what happens? You become the master of your own life. What is the secret here? Connection, integration with positive energies. That’s why we love to be in the company of the people who are positive, right? Because naturally, we feel good. We feel nice, comfortable. But please understand, society is both, positive – lighter, and negative – dark and heavy. You can’t avoid it. We are all existing. You cannot say I only choose this, you have to choose everything. Try to maintain good relationships, good company with powerful and positive people. Even it is painful to maintain the company, sometimes it is not easy, but it is worth it. Because that is your antidote, your medicine.
Another point is to express compassion, practice compassion. Do something for your society all the time, whatever you can. Keep sharing. Keep giving. When you do that, automatically your energy levels will be higher. You can counter, or you can sustain or survive so many negative things.

Q5: Do all experiences that happened to us come from God so that we learn a lesson and become better people, or are they a result of our decisions?

M: I can answer it, but it depends on what we believe on. Everything depends on what we believe in. Our whole life is based on our beliefs. When I say what we believe in, if we believe in God with a form just like a human form, he is watching everything we do, and says, you have done good, or you have not done good, etc. and gives accordingly, this is ok. You are fine in that mode, you live with those rules. In some systems we have a God outside of us, who is looking at us and is saying this is ok, this is not ok etc.
In some systems we connect to ourselves and we go into the level of silence and we experience inside, there is something inside of us telling us, ”Don’t do this, you can do that.” This is all connected to beliefs; what we believe in, what our belief system is. As a general thumb rule, this is a natural phenomenon – when you do good things and when you do positive work, many positive things come to you. Life becomes positive.
In the Indian system, or in Buddism, we talk about karma. What is karma in simple terms? Let’s say, unfulfilled desires. Desires which need fulfillment. That causes birth. Where you were born, how you are born, what you have, what you don’t have, it’s all connected to karma. And your duration of life is also connected to it, time of birth, time of death, everything is like that. But how is karma created? Unfulfilled desires, as I said earlier, but karma is created by actions with ownership. If you feel that I am the doer, that ‘I’ creates karma. Imagine, we have no ownership, we have only an awareness, where we say, ”It is all happening through me,” I am not owning it, I am experiencing it every day. Then no ownership, no karma. That doesn’t mean you go and kill somebody and say, ”I did not do it, my hands did it,” it won’t work. That is not what I mean. When you understand, when you are not emotional about ownership, ‘this is mine, this is me,’ if that is not there, then desires become weak. What is the best way to lead a very simple life? First and foremost, you have to accept yourself completely with all your strengths and weakness. Total acceptance. Nothing else. Not half, but 100%. Accept yourself totally.
Second, do not own, do not have feelings of ownership. You may have so many possessions, so many relations, so many things, but do not have ownership – this is mine, and a kind of craving to keep everything for yourself, which really weakens you, makes you more and more insecure. If that happens, you will have whatever you have, but you will be free and you will be happy.

The third aspect is – remember that when you came here, you had nothing in your hands. When you go from here, you will still have nothing in your hands. Even this body, we have to leave here. If we remember that, we are free. That is why I always believe when we take flowers, give it to the people while they are alive, not going and putting it in the graveyard after death. Respect people, love people and do whatever you can for the people when they are alive so that they can enjoy it. After death, whatever we do, how will they know? Love today. Express love today. Care today. Everything today. Tomorrow we don’t know whether we will be alive to do all that.

Q6: When I will start to drive a car on my own?

M: It depends on your horoscope (laughs). If you believe in yourself, you can. It is about believing in yourself. If you really believe in yourself you can even drive a flight, or even a rocket.

Q7: What should a mother know who is raising her son on her own?

M: Being a mother is a very powerful experience. It is a big opportunity. Because you have a relationship with your child nine months more than society. So your responsibility is nine times more than that of society. Having said that, please remember, each child is an individual. They have a constitution, a character, they have their likes and dislikes, patterns, concepts, so many different things which they have brought. I believe that mothership should be like a friendship. There should be respect, not like a servant serving somebody, it’s like a friendship where you can discuss, you can understand each other. Discuss, talk and make powerful people.

If we are clear how responsible we should be, for every citizen of the world, it means every human being. Imagine 7.5 billion people on earth. Each person is responsible for others. The society is responsible for everybody, for every child. Why? Because every child learns and takes from society, just like every mother, every father, everybody. We are all interconnected. Our responsibility is for our species, across the species. It doesn’t matter which country, which nationality, which culture or color. We are all responsible for everybody. If we don’t take responsibility, nature will wipe us off. Like a virus. Nature has wiped off dinosaurs and mammoths, so many species have been wiped off. If we don’t take responsibility for our own species, our species can also become extinct. If this responsibility is executed form the level of motherhood, every child will be powerful. The world will have a good generation. How we can bring up a child? What is the right way? One word – respect. Love is part of respect. When you respect somebody you will definitely love.
I always say, today we see so many old age homes in the world. Why is that? Actually the parents should be in our houses, right? But we don’t have that. Instead, they are in old ages homes. Why? Because we are disconnected. We don’t feel connected. Either the parents are like the servants, or they dominate, both are not good. There should be a friendship, where everybody can be together. We must develop that culture of togetherness. We should cultivate a generation with respect, based on respect. So next year, the slogan for Mohanji Foundation globally is, ‘Self-respect through self-discipline.’ Self -discipline is more or less like no excess of anything, that means a healthy lifestyle.

Q8: Can we know what is good for our child?

M: Of course. It depends on the nature of the child. All children have their own nature. We all have our own nature. We like something, we don’t like something. If you understand the nature of the child, what he likes to do, just support him. Dragan is training Ena in tennis. She loves tennis. So, that is natural for her. Your strength is what you are natural about. We all have our strengths and weaknesses. What is natural for us means what is effortless for us. That is our strength. If we support that, we will become successful. But in the society, we look at our child with other children and think, our child should be like that child. Then we completely ignore the naturality of that child, that is where the conflicts happen. Every person has a nature which is yours, your own. If you understand that, that is your strength. For that, you need to connect to yourself and see that in your own children. Just watch and witness them. What is spontaneous for them, strengthen that, support that. And the child will be really, really solid and stable in society.

Q9: Does truth have a boundary?

M: Absolute truth has no boundaries. Relative truth has. What is relative truth? A truth that is different between us about something. If you see one thing, I see another thing, it is relative truth. What is absolute truth? We all see the same thing. Relative truth changes with time. Absolute truth never changes. One absolute truth is that whatever is born will die. It’s an absolute truth. What is the relative truth? Everybody dies at their time. This is individualistic.

Q10: How do I know I am on the right path?
M: You will be effortless about it. If you are on the right path, you will love to do that. If it is full of effort, and if it is difficult, then you think again. If you are on the right path, you will flow through it. It is so effortless. Even the right relationships. It is like that. It will be easy and effortless. Whatever needs a lot of effort to continue and be consistent is not the right path for you. When you are connecting with somebody or when you are practicing something, or even you go to a place or you meet a person, if you feel nice and if you feel natural that is the right thing. Because you have a nature, everybody has their nature, and every activity has its nature. If there is compatibility between all these, then that is the right thing for you. If it is not, walk away. Don’t be there.

Transcribed by Nada Rakovic
Proofread by Shyama Jeyaseelan