Gudi Padwa, "Meditation in thoughtless awareness". Delhi (India), 30 March 1976. We cannot meditate; we only can be in meditation. When we say we are going to meditate it has no meaning. We have to be in meditation. Either you are inside the house or outside the house. You cannot be inside the house and then say that: “Now I'm outside the house.” Or when you are outside the house you cannot say: “I'm inside the house.” In the same way, you are moving in three dimensions of your life - of emotional and physical and mental being. You are not inside yourself. But when you are inside that you are in thoughtless awareness. Then, not only that you are there, but you are everywhere, because that is the place, that is the point where you are really in universal... From there you are in contact with the Principle, with the Shakti, with the Power that permeates into every particle that is matter, into every thought that is emotion, into every planning and thinking of the whole world. You permeate into all the elements that have created this beautiful Earth. You permeate into earth; you permeate into Akasha [sky, ether], into teja [light], into sound. But your movement is very slow. Then you say: “I'm meditating,” that means you are moving in permeation with the Universal Being. But you are not moving yourself, you are just unloading yourself to be free from the weight of things that do not allow you to move. When you are in meditation you must allow yourself to be in thoughtless awareness. There, the Unconscious Itself, the Achetana itself will take charge of you. You will start moving with the force of Achetana. The Unconscious is going to work it out. It is going to take you there, where It wants you to go. You keep to thoughtless awareness all the time. Try to keep to thoughtless awareness as much as you can. When you are in thoughtless awareness you must know that you are in the Kingdom of God and His people, His arrangements, His consciousness, is going to look after you. Even when you are giving vibrations to other people, I have noticed that you are not in thoughtless awareness. If you give vibrations in thoughtless awareness, you will not catch anything because all these entities that enter into you, all these material problems that come into you, come when you are in those three dimensions. Through Sahaja Yoga, you have opened your gates of your own being. You have entered into your own kingdom, but you do not keep there. You come out of it and again you go back and settle down - doesn't matter. You should not feel so disappointed about it, so frustrated. You know people have worked for thousands of years and they could not separate themselves from themselves. Only you people, the Sahaja Yogis, whom are made after the pattern of Shri Ganesh himself, are so powerful, that they can give awakening and realisation to other people. Even if you are caught up, you have seen you have powers. Even if you feel that the vibrations are not coming, you know you have powers. You can give realisations to others. In your presence people get realisation. But you have to be that power completely. Supposing there's something wrong with your car: But as long as it is moving, it's alright. You have to repair it. You have to repair all the time all our moods, which we have caused ourselves by our foolishness, by our lust, by our greed, by so many false identifications we carried with ourselves. We must have a complete attention towards our weaknesses and not towards our achievements. If we know what are our weaknesses it's better, that we can really swim across better. Supposing, on a ship there is a hole and the water is coming in through that hole, the attention of all the crew, of all the staff and the captain itself will be on that hole from where the water is coming in, and nowhere else. In the same way, you must be on the watch-out. There are so many pitfalls for a Sahaja Yogi - I have seen it. Of course, even the past is over- even the past can be overcome. In the present also they have many shadows of the past working. For example, when you are sitting in a group, you are involved with each other. Those who are involved with each other, by any relationship whatsoever, must know that this kind of involvement is not going to help them to attain their individual ascent. Everybody is ascending individually though you are collectively contacted with each other and in communication; but the ascendance is individual, absolutely individual. So whether he is your son, brother, sister, wife, friend, you must remember that you are not responsible for their ascendance. You cannot help them for their ascendance. Only Mother's Grace and their own desire, their own effort, to give up all that is three dimensional will help them. So whenever a thought comes like that, you must know that you have not attained the thoughtless awareness in its full extent and that's how you have problems, which are three-dimensional. Sometimes, a Sahaja Yogi will find, an emotion will come into his mind. It will be an emotion of dejection or frustration and he will be disgusted with himself or with others. Both things are just the same. I have seen some Sahaja Yogis get very disgusted with others. There should be no disgust that is lasting. Of course, for a short time, you might feel a disgust. It's alright. It's a passing phase. Or you might feel disgusted with yourself - may be a passing phase. But if you go on hankering on to it, or if you go on clinging to it, that means you are conditioning yourself, that means you are not in thoughtless awareness, that means that you are in your past, you are making your past a solid mass on your head. In the present everything is fleeting. Everything is fleeting that is not eternal. In the present the eternal stays, the rest all drops out. It's like a moving river which doesn't stop anywhere. But the moving river is eternal. The rest of the things are all changing. If you are on the Eternal Principle, all that is not eternal changes and drops out, dissolves and becomes nonexistent. We have to understand our own dignity, our own essence. The first and foremost is that all the Sahaja Yogis are the chosen ones. They are the people whom God has chosen. In this city of Delhi there are thousands and thousands of people. All over the world there are so many people that we are suffering from overpopulation, but in Sahaja Yoga there are very, very few people. And when you are chosen the first, you must also realise that you are the foundations. You are the stones that are to be laid down and have to be strong, have to be forbearing and that's why it is necessary that all of you who are now few, who are the first lamps that are going to enlighten other lamps in the world, you have to enjoy the strength of eternity, the strength of Divine Love, the strength of this Universal Being that you are. This is what meditation is. So when Sahaja Yogis ask me: “What should we do for meditation?” You be in thoughtless awareness that's all. Don't do anything. At that time, not [only] that you are moving towards the goal, or that the Unconscious is taking charge of you, not only that, but also that you are emitting, for the first time, the Divine into the nature, into your surroundings, into other people who are universally connected to you. Only thing is that we are used to one thing, that is we must do something about it, and so that's why we start doing something. Meditation is the most Sahaja method.Then we have prayers and we have also puja. Prayers are also, if said in your heart, with the feeling of complete surrendering and asking for the Eternal, it will be granted. Just ask for that and the rest will take [you] step-by-step. All the Sahaja Yogis have a problem. And they have problems because of their past, because of their future aspirations. Now when you have problems, in Sahaja Yoga you have learnt how to overcome them. There are so many methods other than meditation - you know them very well that, you must know what is the chakra where the Kundalini is. Now, if the Kundalini has been stopped, by a certain chakra which is not working, you shouldn't get frustrated about it. Supposing your instrument or your car has stopped on the way, what's the use of getting frustrated with it? You have to learn the mechanism. You have to be a good technician and then you can manage it very well. So all the techniques of Sahaja Yoga must be learned and mastered. This you can only do by giving it to others and learning from correcting them and correcting yourself. There is nothing to be frustrated. That's the worst thing. If you get frustrated and unhappy with yourself then there is going to be a problem. You have to laugh at yourself and laugh at your mechanism that is out of gear. When you start identifying yourself even with the instrument, then you are not there. You are not the chakras, you are not the different channels. You are the awareness, you are the power, you are the Kundalini. So you don't have to worry about all these things being not in their proper conditions. If they are not, you can solve it. Just now the lights went off. If the lights have went off because of the electricity failure, it's a serious thing. But if the lights have gone out because there is a fused bulb: oh, you can replace it, you can do all that. So there is no need to worry if your chakras are spoilt. Worrying itself, or frustrating yourself, itself is a wrong attitude towards Sahaja Yoga. 'Sahaja', in other terminology also means, is ‘a simple thing’. ‘Sahaja’means to be Sahaja means in - I can say how Tulsidas (Kabir) has said: “Jaise rakha hu taise hi rahu” [You keep me as you like]. That kind of an attitude takes your attention inside, because outside it is let alone, to the dogs; let alone. We are not bothered about the outside part. “As you keep me, I will be, in that manner”. And you will be surprised everything clicks out very well. Even, sometimes, you might feel: “I should reach a certain place”, “I must have this bhajan done”, “I must get these things done” and it's not done sometimes. Sometimes by mistake something as you want is not done. You must accept it as the will of God. That is what He desires. It's alright. That is the desire of God and now you are one with His desire. You are here to communicate the desire of God to the whole world and, at this stage, if you start having your own desires and ideas about yourself then, when will you become the desire of God? This ‘I-ness’ has to go away. That is what meditation is. Where you are no more 'I' but it is 'You'. Kabirdasji has written a beautiful poem about it that, when the goat is living and [kicking?], she says: “Mai, mai”, that is “I, I”. But then she dies and her intestines are drawn out into wires and some saint fixes them on the "tutari", that instrument that they have, ektari [one string] as they call it. And he goes on pulling it with his fingers, then it says: “Tuhi, Tuhi, Tuhi,” that is: “You are, You are, You are”. That is how we have to die and we have to be resurrected. You have been already, but Sahaja yoga as I have told you, is a kheer [Indian milk sweet], or what you call, the sweet dish cooked in a raw pot: "Kachche ghade ki kheer hai [kheer cooked in clay pot]. So the soil of the raw pot also is mixed up. But your attention can be with the kheer, with the milk, and can drop out all that is the mud of the raw pot. That discrimination is spontaneous. It is there. You have got it: self-actualisation. You can feel yourself. You know you are not that. You have started talking about your chakras in the same manner. But the only thing, the only problem, or the only defect that is with the Sahaja yogi is that, still, though he is there, his attention is involved with outside. That's the only defect. If the attention is removed...how to remove? That's the point. That is the first thing. Once you say, “how to remove?” means you have created the three-dimensional involvement. You are not to remove. It is [already] there! If your attention is outside, then I would have said: “No, your attention has to go inside. It has not got yet.” But it is there. You are sitting there. I am sitting here. But my attention is outside. I have to just feel myself where I am, that's all. Some have felt it, some have achieved it. You know among yourselves there are some who have gone very high up. The other method we employ is of puja. I've found that works very well with human beings – puja - because it satisfies lots of demands of the past habits that you feel that you are doing something about it. Then you start giving whatever you think God has given you - the blessings. And the Rishi and Muni have found out - they're very clever people - they have found out how to please the Deities, how to please the Mother. So they have told you, as they have told you even in this lifetime of mine, how to please Her. They say She is Stutipriya, that means ‘She likes praises’. It's not that. But when you praise someone from the heart that means you are accepting it, and that is the time the chakras start creating a force by which you are thrown, you are triggered, into that realm of God. So these puja methods and prayer methods and the mantra methods have been devised and found out by great thinkers of Sahaja Yoga, the great masters of Sahaja Yoga. And it is the effort, or you can say the effortless effort, of the Sahaja yogis that makes my body vibrate, extracts the essence from my body, I should say. They make, it makes, the Infinite release Itself through this finite being. And it works, it clicks, I have seen it, it works out very well. But you know that, after puja, I get little tired because, if you cannot receive it, that Force, I want to sleep and get rid of that additional vibrations into "sushupti" [deep sleep] by entering into the Infinite State. If you could receive whatever I am emitting, in balance, with your puja, then only it helps better. That means, when you are doing puja also, receive it. Be in thoughtless awareness when you are doing puja, completely concentrated in receiving. But while [doing] puja people are talking. I've seen that they’re moving about. I mean, I don't know how to explain it! That's the time something is oozing out, the nectar, and you just receive it at that time with full devotion. It is oozing out. If you feel my vibrations of my chakras at that time, you will realise that even the minute, small little, wheels in my body are moving at different spaces, at different speed, at different dimension. And I really don't know how to explain! But, you see, it creates a melody. You have to receive it and it is a melody individually, suitable for every individual. And when you receive it, it triggers in you that state of infinity. So at the time of puja you must know that all your attention should be in reception. Today is a very great day with the New Year. Within two years from today, Satya Yuga is going to start. It’s a great day for many things that nine days are celebrated after this, for the advent of Mother. It is the date, or I should say, the calendar was started by my forefathers and they perceived that this is the day when the Mother started creating. And this is the day She created Ganesha to begin with. In the Utpatti stage [first stage, Genesis], She started her work this day. And that’s why they put this date as the first date because the time started from this date long time back. And that’s why this date is very important, and if you cross this date then you are beyond time. You have to step on to this date and go beyond. You have to step on your dharma, on to your religion, and go beyond : ‘dharmateet’. You have to be those three gunas and to go beyond : ‘gunateet’. You are all those three. But the steps on which you are standing have to be all right, or those which are crossed or, have to be all right too. So, when you are beyond, you have to repair those steps, which you have crossed somehow. This can be done through meditation, puja, prayers. But the most important, the greatest advancement is done by giving the Universal through your universal being. You all must dedicate your life to Sahaja Yoga and give more and more. Among us, there are some people who have given a lot and by that they have achieved a lot too. You have to give, talk about it, spread it and bring more people to get this. Otherwise, they will be left out of evolutionary processes. There’s no time for you to doubt and think; don’t waste your time in all these useless activities. If you have still doubts, it’s better to give up. It’s high time that you get into the process. So, today, I wish you happy New Year for a journey in the spiritual life of this world. You have to think of all the Sahaja Yogis who are far away from us and our thoughts should carry our love for them and they should be blessed as you all are blessed here. I hope these important days that I am here, you will fully dedicate yourself for your emancipation on those four lines that I have told you. And whatever program comes in, take it sahaj. You should not insist on times and timings. Whatever comes sahaaj, accept it. May God bless you.