Clarity of Purpose Gives Will-Power, Part 2

Mohanji Speaks Zoom Satsang, part 2

24th March, 2019

Sensitive but not emotionally reactive

Q: How can one practice being sensitive and compassionate towards others without being emotionally reactive?

Mohanji: I think I explained this matter in the first discussion. It is about being controlled by the three faculties  I spoke about. The mind controls us. The mind is the seat of emotions. It is also the seat of expectations. Intellect controls us when we analyze too much. We try to position ourselves in the society or with people. Sometimes it becomes escapism too. As an escapist, you say “Oh! This is not my cup of tea. I don’t want to be here”.  Then our ego or personality controls us, with thoughts such as, “Am I being respected? What do people think about me?” and so on.

When I was doing my Sadhana, I would never tell others what I was  practising  I was connecting to my spine, I was doing vertical breathing,  but I never discussed this with anyone  because this is not a subject we need to discuss. Sadhana is something that suits you, so you practise it alone, in silence, spend more time with yourself, stabilize yourself and let the practices stabilize you from within  more and more, settling your doubts. This is how it should be.

In any case, whenever you say “I am emotional”, “How can I not get involved with this?”, etc. always remember, there is an expectation connected to it. This is fundamental. If you have no expectations you will deliver and you will be completely detached. And if you are expecting applause, award, appreciation, there’s always a binding. We end up doing our activity only for that sake of the appreciation. If you have given up that aspect, you do everything you can do at your maximum capacity. But at the same time, you are free, you are not bound by other people’s opinions or appreciation or rejection. Be sensitive enough, to the extent it motivates you. The right amount of sensitivity can be a motivation. Instead if the sensitivity is overwhelming, it does not help you in any way. Sometimes, we may stop doing good things and good work because of other people. That is actually our loss.

Please understand that whether you do something or don’t, in about 80 or 90 years you are history. Hence it‘s not worth it to think too much and not do. I believe in POSITIVE ACTION, not just any action. And my beliefs about the do’s and don’ts are based on non-violence. If something is violent in nature it is a complete ‘no’ for me. Secondly, being sensitive is a good idea but at the same time, it should not hinder our activity.

You FEEL, but don’t blame other people, as they have nothing to do with it. They’re only expressing you, as to what you are to yourself because you need to know what YOU are at some point in time. If you are lazy, you can’t expect other people to be fully active as they will reflect your laziness. Likewise, everything in life is connected to how and what we are. And our experiences are also connected to what we are.

This is the entire structure; what you need to do is forget about everything and focus on your action. Within your capacity, keep doing more. That way, you will increase your capacity and keep delivering. Once you keep delivering it in this mode, you will not worry about being appreciated. You may not even look at how many people are looking at you or whether they are looking at you with kindness, they may not. I have experienced that even after doing so many things, some people criticize you very bitterly. They may talk poorly. What you need to do is, stop worrying about it. Just focus on what you have to do and keep delivering. Those who have eyes to see you will see. Those who cannot see you will not see. They should not see either, I say that because it’s not their time yet,  to connect to you, to recognize you or appreciate you. You should never be looking at people for appreciation.

Also, I’ve seen that most of the connections are based on convenience. “If it is convenient to me I connect, else I don’t connect.” So that is purely a mind based connection. Those kinds of connections will happen in life too. Sometimes they connect and then at some points in time, they are just not there – selective or convenience based connection. These are part of life and we should not really pay much attention to it. Those who are supposed to be with you will be with you. Those who are supposed to see you, will see you. Those who are supposed to appreciate you, will appreciate you. Nobody can shake them because their integrity will be steadfast, uncanny and very powerful.  And they are the ones who will walk with you. That is why Buddha made his entire empire with 5 people. Jesus had 12 people with him. They created their empire with a few people, with those who stood steady, despite any situation, without criticism or doubts and without judgment.

In everyone’s case, all of us are walking this earth and doing many things. When you do things, do not expect something. If you don’t do anything, there is no criticism, but then there is no existence either! If we are doing anything, there will be opinions and that is alright. Let opinions happen. We have to accept it and do what we have to do and what we can do.

Overcoming a sense of isolation

Q: Mohanji, I’m surrounded by people, but I’m lacking a sense of belonging. What can be done to overcome this isolation?

Mohanji: The first part of the sentence is equal to expectation. You are surrounded by people and you do not know you are still in isolation. That means you are becoming more and more mind and you are not even looking at people. They are almost like walls or stones. You don’t see them. Then how do you connect? You don’t recognize them because you don’t recognize yourself.

Here, the fundamental question is about self-acceptance. How much have you accepted yourself? If you have accepted yourself with all your weaknesses, all your strengths, then automatically you will connect to the world with ease. This is because you see only perfection in every being. You will not see many people; you only see your own reflection in many forms. So, the first and the last step should be self-acceptance. You have to start with self-acceptance. At the same time, spend time with yourself and try to feel yourself and understand yourself without judgment, criticism or comparison. There has to be complete acceptance with all your negativity and positivity. All of us have strengths and weaknesses.  No one has only strength or only weakness.

So start looking at yourself fully, completely. Look at yourself as a complete being with every quality. In that mode, when you start looking at the outside world, you will have no expectations. If you have no expectation with your own self, why would there be an expectation about other people? If you don’t have any rejection about yourself, you won’t reject anybody else. If you accept yourself completely, you will accept everybody. This is the fundamental truth. This is exactly how life should be. It’s not a rocket science. It’s about how much have you accepted yourself. That’s where everything begins, everything starts.

Dilute ownership, change your destiny

Q: Can FAITH overcome prarabda?

Mohanji: Faith is important. Faith is like oxygen. Faith helps survival. Also when your focus is on a master or a God or a deity, then many of the calamities which are happening around you will not be so strong or so detrimental because your level of ownership will be less. Pain is connected to OWNERSHIP.

If you have more pain in life, it’s connected to more ownership in life. When you have ownership of people, relationships, possessions, positions, materials, etc. it causes pain. Possessiveness causes pain. Now, if you are connected to a master and operating in “surrender” mode all the time, the ownership will be very low. And so is your pain. What is happening in your life now is a creation from the past. The “Prarabda” or the destiny is a creation of the past. Something you did in the past created this existence. All that you are experiencing now is connected to something of the past. So that will have to happen and nobody can change it. Every experience as it happened is what you are meant to experience. But when you surrender, the impact becomes less because ownership is diluted. With diluted ownership, you are freer, prarabda weakens or the impact will be less. That is a beautiful thing.

Those who are connected to masters or certain deities, those that practise a certain type of worship  consistently, with integrity and conviction, have survived various tests. This is  because when there is no ownership, the event that is meant to happen might not even happen. Sometimes it does happen but it will have a much lower impact than what it was originally meant to be. Thus it’s all connected to ownership. Faith is very important, it is wonderful, and it makes your life better. You can breathe well if there is a good amount of oxygen in the room. Similarly, Grace is the very oxygen in our daily life.   When you have surrendered, the grace factor is high. But when you have ownership, grace factor is low. So the factor of grace is very important.

Gratitude also helps. Even if it is a small thing, be very grateful. You have to be very, very grateful for everything;  grateful that you are alive;  grateful that you are breathing. Be grateful that you have all these possessions and positions. Be grateful that you have food to eat. Be grateful that you have shelter, a roof over your head. Be grateful for your awareness. Be grateful for your relationships. Be grateful for everything. Just be grateful. Being grateful brings grace, lots of grace. And your expression of gratitude  in this world should be kindness and compassion. Be kind and be compassionate. Don’t judge, don’t criticize and don’t talk bad. These are all very negative and you are actually attracting more poison by being that way.

A story

As the story goes, there was  a saint who was  looking at a tree.  A passerby asked, “What are you looking?” The saint said, “There are three people sitting in the tree. All three are people without bodies, which means,  they are dead. They are souls of non-bodied beings”. This passerby next asked, “What are they doing on the tree?” The saint said, “They are waiting to enter somewhere, maybe for their next birth or so.” Then they both saw a person coming from the village road, far away, fully drunk. He was completely unconscious of the world. He was tottering, falling down, picking himself up and still kept walking. He was coming that way. The saint said, “Just hold on. Just wait and see.” So this guy came and he didn’t even look at these beings on the tree, he simply walked past. When he walked past, they also went behind him.

This guy who was watching asked the saint, “Where is he going?” The saint replied, “In the same street around the corner, there is a brothel and he is going there.” He also added, “ Not just he, four people all together, have gone to the brothel, and that includes him.”   This means that the three souls who were sitting  on the tree entered him and went with him. They didn’t have a body of  their own and hence needed a body for the experience. So they all went together to the brothel.

It is very important to understand  that when your energies are of anger, hatred, jealousy, revenge and similar negativities, such energies will enter you and  aggravate it even more. We should always remember that walking the path of purity is very important. We shall not criticize. We shall not judge. We shall not complain. We will never be involved in any kind of polluting or negative emotions, because when you are in the grip of such emotions, when you are in such a mode, various energies of similar nature enter you, because they are all looking for a body for expression.

Some of them do not have the power to create a new body. So, they enter a body which is already in  that mode, means “birds of the same feather” kind of situation. They enter this body and work in a negative way. That is why I always insist not to sponsor, not to nurture or subscribe to negative emotions, criticism, judgment, revenge, etc. If you do encourage such negative emotions and thoughts, the energies around you which are of bad nature, will enter you and aggravate your situation. So you need to remain connected to higher consciousness, remain connected to a master who is connected to higher consciousness or worship a god or a deity you like to connect to. In some way, you should purify yourself. Please remember, this is YOUR journey, YOUR body, YOUR path, YOUR destination, YOUR destiny. So, YOU need to nurture it well. Nobody else can do it for you.

What best I can do is  show you the light and guide you. But I cannot walk for you.  It doesn’t  work that way. You have to walk. If you fall, it’s my responsibility, I’ll hold you. But YOU have to walk. Always remember, what brought you here is your prarabda. Your destiny brought you here, to this state. Losing this state is very easy. All you have to do is to enter into bad company, talk poorly, and engage in bad activities. Then more such energies will join you and pull you down.

If you have already managed to reach this level, all you need to do now is,  take one vow, one decision, a firm decision – that you will not take one step backward, because it is not worth it. One step backward means “Punarapi Jananam, Punarapi Maranam”, which translates to, again you are taking birth, again you are dying, again the stage of being in the womb of a mother … Like this, we have existed. So we MUST be very clear about this now.

We will not take a step backward. We are only going forward to the path of dissolution. We are only going in the path of becoming one with pure consciousness, which  has nothing to do with anything, so that we are very clear and focused and this is exactly how we should lead our life hereafter. That is the biggest gift you can give yourself. Even if somebody says something, even if you have many lures around you, even if all the people in the neighbourhood are negative, you don’t have to be. You can still stick with your integrity, stick with your experience, stick with your conviction and stick with your determination to remain pure in thoughts, words, and actions. This is all you need to do and this will automatically elevate you to very high levels of awareness.

Maintaining equilibrium

Q: As I continue with my Sadhana and my awareness increases, I find it very difficult to handle the conflicts and insensitivities of the corporate world. How can I maintain the equilibrium?

Mohanji: Everything has a price. Every state has a price. Nothing comes easy. The challenges of the outside world will always be there, whether it is our relationships or the place of work or our own notions and concepts, those  sitting inside and the ones sitting outside, both of them may fight you. But you need to be very firm if liberation is your priority. Liberation means not running away from everything. Liberation means, having everything but you are not attached to anything. Attachment causes ownership, ownership causes pain. So, we need to be aware that we are the whole story. The whole story is us. We make our lives, we break our life and everything is us. Let things flow. Anything can go wrong. In my case, when I was doing my practices, I went through a series of problems including the death of my daughter, Ammu. All my possessions were stolen. My investments went away when the property dealer ran away. I lost my job. I contracted a disease. All these events happened within a short span of time (5-6 years). So I lost everything that I had ever had and this was challenging. Then there were corporate challenges on the other side such as targets, performance and the related activities.

But I never left my path. I never ever discussed my practices with people. I was alone and practising on my own. And it was purely the Vedic path, connecting to my spine and connecting to my breath. This is the only thing I did, but with consistency, conviction and focus. I never sought  results. Basically you are only giving time to yourself, connecting to yourself, being with yourself.

Later on, when I started my public life, I realized that many people  who come are not coming with kindness. Some people will come, abuse your connection in some way and then walk away. Also, they  contaminate the minds of other people. So I decided that I will have nothing to do with it, let it all happen. But we need to be very firm and very stable. And that’s what I deliver.

Hence your stillness, your stability is your choice. What happens outside is definitely not in your control; you can’t control it. That will happen based on  what our prarabda, what our destiny gives us. Your workplace, where you live, what you have, etc. are all connected to destiny. We have no control over them  because they are predetermined. But you can definitely make sure that you will stick to your tradition and path in this life. Nobody can challenge it. Even if somebody challenges it, if you reinforce your conviction then you can’t be defeated. You are very powerful. Actually, you will know that you are very powerful when you decide that “Nothing else matters, only liberation matters.”  If everything matters to you, then you are scattered. If only liberation matters, if you are fully focused on yourself and your liberation, then it doesn’t matter what your environment is, what concepts or fears you have or what is outside. It doesn’t matter. Nothing matters at all. You are focusing only on the path of liberation.

That requires two things: no ownership of action, no ownership of the result of the action. These are absolutely essential to be in the path of liberation. And if you just focus on lack of ownership, that will be fine;  then clarity of purpose as I mentioned in the beginning, and also gratitude, deep gratitude. Always be grateful, don’t allow negativity; rather don’t buy things which you don’t need, especially those that are negative in nature; talking about people, talking about situations, concepts, and so on. You don’t need any of them. In fact, just focus on clarity of purpose, which is, liberation.

As I said, there are two sticks you can hold while you are trekking – no ownership on the action, no ownership on the results of action. Keep walking.

Wish all of you great success and deep love. All the best. Thank you! Love you!

Transcribed by Rakshitha and Ananth Sankaran
Proofread by Vidya Rajagopalan

Read Clarity of Purpose Gives Will-Power, Part 1