The hunger of darkness and the feast of light, part 2

Part I: Aspiring intensity and over-eagerness

Don't pull

No difficulty can appall you

Your future-life untimely.

No imperfection can frighten you

Your past-life foolishly.

Question: How can I have intensity in my spiritual life?

Our physical body is composed of various parts: our head, arms, legs and so on. Although the body is one unit, you will see that the hands do not always co-operate with the legs or the eyes do not always co-operate with the nose. Everything seems disoriented. One limb has nothing to do with another. Then, besides the physical sheath, we have a vital sheath, mental sheath and psychic sheath. All of these also seem to act independently. But you also have to feel that there is a specific place where you receive all your strength, energy and determination so that you can run the fastest inwardly. Once again, that place is your heart and your soul.

Question: Sometimes I really want the life of God and I aspire very intensely and I am very happy. But sometimes my mind makes me think that the spiritual life is just a wild goose chase, and then I feel sad and sort of lost. How can I maintain my aspiration at a high level all the time?

Again, it is up to you to maintain this inner urge or to lose it. Your soul is victorious today, but this victory need not last. Tomorrow you may lose your inner cry. If you want to preserve today's inner victory, then you have to meditate again tomorrow and the day after. If you have a Master then try to get inner guidance from him. Every day when the time comes for you to meditate, just think of him for a few minutes and you are bound to get inspiration and aspiration.

To learn, we go to school. For every new endeavour a Master or guide is needed. If you do not have a Master, you should seek one. The sooner you get a Master, the better for your progress. You may feel that the time has not come for you to look for a Master because you are an absolute beginner. You want to lead a better and a higher life, but you are not prepared and you may feel that the Master will demand things from you that are beyond your capacity. In that case try to read spiritual books written by real spiritual Masters, not by mere philosophers or professors. If you read writings of spiritual Masters, their consciousness will enter into you. Then one day you will get inner awakening, and you will discover which path you should follow. Once you get your own realisation you won't need a teacher. At that time you will have all the inner capacities.

If you have to go somewhere far away, either a boat or a train or a plane will have to take you to your destination. If you don't know the way, somebody has to be your pilot. In the spiritual life you also need a guide and a path. Otherwise, today you will be inspired, but you won't know where to go. Today your vital will be stronger than your soul and no-one will be available to encourage you or inspire you. But if you have a guide and you are walking along the right path, then who can prevent you from reaching the goal?

Question: What does it mean when you have a pain in your chest when you meditate?

Your entire outer existence has to be totally dedicated to the spiritual life. If you really want God for God's sake, then there can be no pain during your meditation. If pain comes, then you have to feel that the vital wants something which is not approved by the soul. Usually we make a deplorable mistake when we say that a particular truth is coming from the soul or the inner being. Our vital is very clever and at times treacherous. In a clever way it makes us feel that the message we are getting in our physical mind is coming directly from the soul, which is not true. In your case sometimes the vital is acting without the approval of the soul. That is to say, the soul wants you to do something but the vital is telling you to do something else. Your physical mind is becoming unconsciously one with the vital. It thinks that the message, the light, the wisdom is coming from the soul — which is not true. Again, I must say that the soul need not offer its messages to your mind through the heart. You can get messages directly through your soul. Many times you have done it. But sometimes you don't listen to these messages. Sometimes you take the messages of the vital as the soul's messages, and sometimes you try to pull beyond your capacity.

What should you do to correct these mistakes? You should try to make your life a life of inner sacrifice. When you feel that you have become sacrifice itself, you will see that the vessel you have inside you is automatically enlarging itself. Then, inside the chest, inside the heart, the soul will be able to bloom like the lotus. When the heart vessel expands, you will feel no pain in your chest, no matter how much light enters.

Question: When I meditate I feel a lot of pressure in my head and my eyes. Can you tell me why that is and how I can get rid of it?

The heart of light

God gave me the heart of light

To cry

God gave me the light of heart

To smile

Part II: Patience and will-power

Sincerity speaks

Lethargy's sincerity speaks:

Aggression's sincerity speaks:

Suspicion's sincerity speaks:

Timidity's sincerity speaks:

Uncertainty's sincerity speaks:

Failure's sincerity speaks:

Question: Although we get along well, at times my husband's lack of aspiration is sheer torture to me, and I feel that if I want to make inner progress perhaps I should leave him.

Question: Sometimes when I am meditating I feel that my vital being tries to create a noise in my mind and fill my head with darkness.

Question: Do we need to use our will in our spiritual journey?

Question: Can self-effort ever be detrimental to our meditation?

Sooner or later you will get intuition. In the meantime God has given you intelligence. If you get up early in the morning, then you will be inspired to meditate; if you get up at eleven o'clock your inspiration will be gone. We have to use our common sense. We have to make the effort to get up early in the morning if we want to have a good meditation, and we have to meditate during the day or in the evening as well if we want to make considerable progress.

But you should also feel that if you are determined to do something, actually there is somebody else within you who will do it. You are not the doer; you are the instrument. Somebody else is acting in and through you, and that Somebody is the Supreme.

Part III: Sleep-world

His mistakes

He sleeps too much;

He desires.

He thinks too much;

He cries.

He fears;

He fails so soon.

He doubts;

He dies so soon.

Question: When I am meditating in the morning and feel sleepy, it is a real struggle to concentrate. But if I don't struggle, then there is complacency. How can I prevent this feeling of struggling with sleep?

Early in the morning when you are meditating, please feel that your Master is there. This is not false imagination. You must keep his living presence inside you. If you have that kind of feeling, that he is physically present, then you will not sleep during meditation. If you feel that you can only meditate when your Master is actually in front of you, then I tell you it will be impossible for you to meditate. If you need his physical presence to give you a good meditation, that is a terrible insult to your soul and to your Master's soul. Your soul will feel that you are useless and your Master's soul will feel that you are more helpless than an infant. Even a child feels his mother's presence protecting him when she is not in sight.

Question: Sometimes when I wake up at night and I am lying awake in bed, I feel as if I am meditating; I feel very blissful. But if I sit up it all goes away.

Your age-long hunger

Lord, today You are

Alas, how can I offer You my food,

"Son, I am terribly hungry;

My cosmic hunger cares not for taste;

Soon I shall invite you to be My guest.

Like Me, you too must not care for taste,

Of your age-long hunger."

Part IV: Self-discipline and loving obedience

Your obedience

You fool,

Humiliate you.

Your obedience takes you

Your obedience

And

Friend unparalleled.

Question: Would you please say something about self-discipline?

How can you discipline yourself? Through concentration on the things you want most in life. There are very few things on earth we should feel we really need, but unfortunately we are cherishing everything and everyone around us. What we must cherish is truth, light, peace and bliss. If you concentrate on truth, inner truth, then it is truth that will come to the fore in you. Truth can come to you in the form of divine peace or divine light or divine power, but if you really concentrate on the inner truth, automatically and spontaneously truth will come to you.

If you feel the necessity right now of having thousands and millions of things from life, try to minimise your needs. You will see that, while you are in the process of minimising your needs, your life will automatically become disciplined. When you don't give countless outer things your attention, you will see that truth is looking right at you and giving you the strength to discipline your life. The best way to discipline oneself is to pay attention only to the things that are of real need, that are of importance in the inner life. In the outer life we cry for name, fame and many things. Then immediately we are besieged by worries, anxieties and fears. But in the inner life we cry only for God's Concern and God's Compassion. If we will try to feel God's Concern and God's Compassion, then we will see that our life is becoming disciplined.

Question: How can I develop self-control in my life when everyone makes fun of my efforts?

Unfortunately, we are living in an age when self-control is not appreciated; it has become an object of ridicule. A man will be trying hard for self-mastery while his friends, neighbours, relatives, acquaintances and the rest of the world mock at him. They find no reason for his sincere attempt to master his life. They think the uncontrolled way they are living this life is far more worthwhile, and that the man who is trying to control his life is a fool, wasting his time and giving up all his joy.

Who is the fool: he who wants to have control of his life or he who wants to remain a constant victim to fear, doubt and anxieties? Needless to say, he who wants to conquer himself is not only the wisest man, but the greatest divine hero, the divine warrior. He fights against ignorance in the battlefield of life to establish the Kingdom of Heaven here on earth.

It is true that people mock the sincerity of a man who is trying to control himself. At times we see that even the spiritual Masters are ridiculed and mercilessly condemned by society. Even the Master or the great aspirant whose snow-white heart is purity itself, whose life, whose very breath is the flower of purity, falls victim to the criticism of the ignorant world. This reminds me of a Zen story. Perhaps most of you know it. There was a Zen Master who was very pure, very illumined. It happened that near the place where he was living there was a food store, and the owner of the store had a beautiful daughter. As ill-luck would have it, one day she was found with child. Her parents flew into a rage. They wanted to know the name of the father, but the girl would not name the man. After repeated scolding and merciless harassment, she gave up and named this Zen Master as the father of her child. The parents believed her and they went to the Zen Master, scolded him most vehemently and left the child with him. The Zen Master accepted the child and took care of it. All his good reputation came to an end and he became an object of ridicule. In this way days passed into weeks, weeks into months and months into years. But there is something called conscience in our human life. The young girl was tortured by her conscience and finally, one day, she disclosed the name of the real father of her child to her parents. The man who operated the fish market happened to be the father of the child. The parents again flew into a rage.

Question: It seems to me that self-control can be carried too far. I don't see any necessity for things like flagellation and semi-starvation and things like that.

Self-control means self-transcendence. Self-torture, self-mortification, lead us to abysmal self-destruction in the heart of ignorance. For self-mastery, self-control is of paramount importance. Self-control leads us to self-illumination. But this takes time; it cannot be achieved overnight.

Through self-examination one can achieve self-control. Here I wish to tell an incident that took place in the life of Socrates. Socrates, with a host of his admirers, went to see a palmist. The palmist read Socrates' hand. "What a bad person you are, full of lower vital problems and corruption of all sorts," he said. Socrates' admirers were thunderstruck and they wanted to punish the palmist for having the audacity to say such uncomplimentary things about their teacher, who was a very pious man, a real saint. Socrates immediately said, "Wait. Let us ask if he has something else to say." He said, "This man has all these undivine qualities in him, but they are all under his self-control. They are all at his command."

Self-control is the answer to your worst problems. Before one gets illumination, one may be attacked by undivine forces and may be the victim of all these forces of the lower vital. But one can easily place them at one's feet. Socrates did it, and all aspirants, who are more conscious of God-realisation than ordinary people, can also conquer the wrong forces within themselves eventually. Countless times they may be attacked by vital impulses, but each time they can manfully, boldly and courageously place their feet on the heads of the dark forces.

When the golden day of self-control dawns and the light shines in us, everything in our nature will be transformed. Emotional problems are transformed into a dynamic strength for God to use. But until then the aspirant has to fight hard.

In the outer world one can be the slave of only one master. But in the inner world one can easily be the slave of many masters, and these masters are doubt, fear, anxiety, temptation, frustration, imperfection and limitation. Self-control can only be achieved if we stop deceiving ourselves. We are apt to say that the world is deceiving us, but if we are sincere enough, if we go deep within, then we come to see, feel and realise that it is we ourselves who started this game of deception. We came from God. We could have continued the game in infinite Light and, at the end of our journey's close, returned into infinite Light. But we entered into ignorance instead; we became enamoured of ignorance. Ignorance loved us and we loved ignorance. Finally, we started eating the fruits of ignorance voraciously. The result was self-limitation and self-destruction.

It is we who opened the door of deception. Now other undivine forces have entered into the inmost recesses of our being. How can we push them out? Through aspiration, through our inner mounting flame, we can illumine the unlit forces in us and awaken the slumbering being in us to see the light within and without. Aspiration is the answer. Impurity in our heart is spiritual sickness. This sickness has only one medicine: devotion — devotion for the cause, devotion for the goal, devotion for the Inner Pilot.

Self-control also means self-giving. The more we give, the more we gain. Self-control means self-sacrifice. The more we sacrifice ourselves, the more the Supreme's infinite Power and Plenitude enter into us. Let us play our part; let us give what we have. The Supreme will play His part; He will give us what He is. What we have is a bundle of ignorance; what He is is the infinite inner Wealth.

Question: Guru, I have a tendency to feel resentful when somebody tells me to do something, even the most unimportant thing, and even if it is you who is telling me. How can I become more obedient?

He who listens has the same strength as he who commands. I am your spiritual Master. I may tell you to do something and you have the power to listen to me. If you don't have the power to listen to me, then at that time you and I are not equal. If I say, "Do this," and you say, "Oh yes, I have done it," then we are one. Otherwise, if I tell you to do something and you don't do it, we will be in two different worlds. In the spiritual life obedience comes first. The Supreme has told me and I tell you, "Do this." An ordinary person might call this blind obedience because the person who is obeying is not using his brain. But I say he is using his wisdom-light. I have real Light and you are becoming one with me, so you are not so much listening to me as fulfilling the Supreme.

Part V: How to live in two worlds

Not even once

Not even once

From the outer world.

My inner life is kindness incarnate.

Of the outer world.

My inner life taught me

Everything.

My inner life taught me

Everyone.

Question: How can we protect ourselves from unaspiring people that we're constantly thrown in contact with and make them feel our aspiration, even though they may be almost hostile in their attitude?

If we sincerely do not want to be affected by our unaspiring neighbours, then our own aspiration will protect us. But we have to have a constant and humble desire to inspire them or to influence them divinely. We must not feel that we are so divine because we are praying and meditating and they are undivine because they are still sleeping. If we feel that others are full of undivine forces, evil forces, what is the next step? We will begin to show off. We will try to make them notice that we are doing something magnificent, something superior.

We have to live with ordinary people as well as with those who are aspiring. The world is very vast. We have to move around: we have to mix with others. We should mix with the spiritual world as much as possible in order to gain inner strength and to share our inspiration and at the same time to be inspired. But when we mix with the ordinary world we must also be ready not only to offer but also to receive inspiration.

Question: I feel aggressive and destructive vibrations in the atmosphere all around me. How can I cope with this?

Question: Isn't it easier for people who have very little money, as is true in many Eastern countries, to be detached from worldly things and make faster spiritual progress than we in the West?

Question: Why is there so much selfishness in the world right now?

Selfishness comes into our lives only when we want to see the man-made truth and not the God-made Truth. There is a great difference between man-made truth and God-made Truth. God-made Truth means infinite, boundless Consciousness and Light. Man-made truth is the immediate satisfaction of desire. This is the truth that man sees. This is the truth that we, as ordinary human beings, understand.

God-made Truth is infinite Bliss, infinite Consciousness. But we do not care to have this infinite Bliss at our disposal. We want only immediate pleasure, immediate satisfaction; we want everything instantly. Even when we try to achieve something inwardly, we feel that it must be either now or never. When we don't get what we want immediately from our outer life, we revolt against our inner life, and at that moment we invite selfishness into our life.

The inner life is always in touch with the highest Truth, Light and Bliss. But we consciously cherish the outer life with all its ignorance, darkness and imperfection. We are totally afraid of the wealth of Truth and Light in the inner life. We feel that inside us there are very powerful, dynamic forces that will destroy us the moment we meditate for a minute. We feel that inside us there is a volcano that will destroy us. At the same time that we are trying to possess the world, we are afraid of our own inner possessions.

Selfishness comes when we refuse to be satisfied with what we already have, when by hook or by crook we want to obtain something which does not belong to us. And when we don't get these possessions we feel miserable. But we will never get everything we hope for in the outer life. Even if we do get it, there will be no satisfaction for us. If we get thousands of dollars today, tomorrow we will say, "I need millions of dollars." But if we enter into our inner life instead, there we will get infinite Peace, infinite Light, infinite divine Wealth.

When we are dealing with Infinity, how can selfishness exist? "From Infinity, when Infinity is taken away, Infinity remains." So say our Upanishads. When everything is boundless inside us, why should selfishness exist? It is only because we are limited that we want to compete with others and have more than they have. We don't want to bring to the fore what we already have inside — Infinity, Eternity and Immortality. Because we live in the superficial outer world we want to possess and be possessed. We feel that we will be satisfied only with the wealth and achievements of the outer world, and not with those of the inner world.

But this selfishness can be uprooted. There can be no selfishness if we feel that the inner life is the real life. From the inner life if we enter into the outer life, then the outer life will have meaning. If we don't do this, then selfishness is bound to remain.

Question: Who is responsible for the ugliness in this world?

Question: I want to realise God, but I also feel there are many world problems I should help solve. How do I reconcile the two aims?

You are having inner experiences, so in your case God-realisation should be given the utmost importance. Politics is also God's creation, science is also God's creation, everything is God's creation. But if we realise the Creator first, then it becomes easier to deal with the creation.

If we try to create perfection in the outer world and in our own inner world at the same time, then at every moment we shall expect or demand something from God. We will say, "Why is God not interfering in this particular problem? This family is suffering, that country is starving and there are all sorts of similar problems." Demanding thoughts will enter into us and we will become God's judge. We will say, "God is indifferent. That is why He is not doing anything." But if we approach God with aspiration, love, devotion and surrender, we will feel, "Let me realise the highest and deepest in me, let me realise myself first. Until I know who I am and who others are, how can I dare to judge the world on the strength of my limited knowledge?" We may have more knowledge than a particular person, but at the same time there are others who have far more knowledge and wisdom than we have. But who has the infinite Knowledge, the infinite Wisdom? Only God. If we can enter into God's Consciousness for God's Light, Truth and Bliss here on earth.

Question: I am new to the spiritual life, and feel an uncontrollable urge to share my experiences with everyone I meet. Is it true that this is not desirable?

When you get inspiration to help or inspire people in any way, you have to know whether the message that you want to offer to the world has been approved by God or has been commanded by God. If you feel that God has asked you to share your experiences with some particular person, then do it. Whether he accepts it or not is unimportant.

Question: How can I best please the Supreme in my inner and outer life? I would like to go back to college and get a higher degree, but I don't know if I should.

If you see that the Supreme wants you to have success in the ordinary, human life, then you will meditate and at the same time you will have to enter into the world of outer achievement. You will have to take your outer activities as an expression of your inner capacity. But if the Supreme says, "First things first. You have to realise Me first," then your inner life is your only duty and in fulfilling that duty you are fulfilling the Supreme in every way. If the Supreme wants you to meditate for your own realisation and at the same time help those who are sincerely in need of your help, you have to embrace the spiritual life for yourself and also help others who feel that you have the capacity to help them. But, if you want to help the world with your capacity, you have to be very careful to know whether it is the Will of the Supreme or not. Here ego may come in.

Editor's introduction to the first edition