Deception Turned into the Mind—
And You Like the Mind

Every human being is anatma darshee (seer of not-Self). Anatma darshee means that Atma Darshee (Seer of Self) is not, body consciousness is. A body seer, a name seer, a form seer, an individual seer and a world seer, that is what our status is. Thus, we cannot become Atma Darshee. Yet, all of you have that much knowledge that you are not satisfied with anatma—with body, name and form, world, diseases and sickness—because you have seen that everything that is in the body is dying. Up to this time, as many years as have passed for you, that many years are dead—that many years’ time, that many years’ happenings and years’ knowledge on the body level have died. Thus, you know that anatma is a field of dying, and you have that much inquiry, or knowledge, that a dying field is not relishable.

Therefore, all of you thought to join some kind of Sat Darshan (Pure Existence Vision) and become Sat Darshee (Seer of Pure Existence). Sat, which is never born, is never going to change, is never going to be diseased and sick, is never going to die, is never going to be destroyed. This much, all of you have the knowledge of. It is a great attraction for me that there are some persons who began to like Sat, the company, association or knowledge of Sat, and the people knowledgeable of Sat. Yet, having joined us, and now with forty-six years having passed, why is it that you are not Atma Darshee? Because practice is lacking.

In the beginning, we met and began to say that you are Pure Free Forever, you are Sat-Chit-Anand (Pure Existence-Pure Consciousness-Pure Indivisibility), you are Truth, you are Love. But because you are born, a born person—with a body, name and form—is considered to be in deception. Guru knows that it is all one Atma, but every one of you knows, “I am an individual—maybe the Atma, but an Atma-individual, an Atma-person.” So you became Atma associated with the body, or anatma, which was never there as the Atma. The mechanism and construction of the body is such that it is like this. All human beings think, “We cannot get out of it, therefore this is the only good thing. We are better than animals, at least we are human beings.”

But among human beings, you began to think, “A human being is not so good, because he changes.” Fifty years before, he was just a little child, alp, or small. He grew, but not as bones. He grew in intelligence, in buddhi, in intellect. He became an alp buddhi person, and now you want to train yourself into more buddhi—into more names, more forms, more names, more forms—and you are satisfied with that. Yet, some kind of dissatisfaction from deception is lurking, so that you do not want to remain under deception your whole life and dies, and then again deception and dies, and then again deception. A human being is in such a predicament. He eats, sees, hears, talks, walks, works, earns and learns, but he is under deception. Another word for deception is illusion—but that word does not create an impact on you. Somewhere, you do not like the idea of deception. Death, you do not like, but life you like. Whenever we want to see you pleased, we talk about life and you are pleased with that. Death, you do not like. Deception, you do not like. But illusion, you do not mind.

We are under deception, because we have never been time. This is what I say. But you think that time begins with your birthday. We celebrate that also, thinking you will come to know that birth was never there—You were there. But you are never convinced you were there. You are convinced only that you are here, a born person, a male or female, just the same life—to die. Watch, this never becomes untiring. You are tired, yet you remain in that tiredness, and get more tired, more tired. That shows that deception is so stubborn that it does not leave you. Wherever you go, it is there. In which form is it? Guru says in which form it is stuck: it is stuck having turned into the form of the mind.

Deception turned into the mind—and you like the mind. That means you do not mind deception, you like it. Deception is working his ways. You are Pure Free Forever, but deception says, “No, no. Your body is me and me is your body—and it is changing, and it will die.” Thus, deception is getting you destroyed: it is taking you towards destruction. Guru comes and says, “Well look, all of you have joined us. You are dear to me, because you know the knowledge of the Self.” Otherwise, why would you like to join Guru? Better to join some rich man, some Bill Gates, where you can get some expectation met.

It does not fit in together, because you want to be in the company of Guru and at the same time you want to be under the sway of deception. Guru says, “Deception you are not. You have never become deception.” He continues saying this, and you continue listening to it. But you have decided not to accept what Guru says. Rather, unless Guru agrees with you, he is not a Guru for you. Guru does not mind your deception and your no deception, your knowledge and your no knowledge. He knows that you know that you were not born at one time. But now you think you were born. What is that? Is the first thing true or the second? You doubt your knowledge, your Knower. Guru says, “No. The Knower is doubtlessly Being, Pure Free Forever.” …

 

Poornima: You made us aware what deception is, or that we have accepted that the I is the body and mind. So now I am watching that deception. But the doubt is that while observing the deception, am I still under its sway?

Swamiji: Yes.

Poornima: Because you say there is no deception, in truth.

Swamiji: A human being is born, and born means deception. You knew that you were unborn—but born, because the very deception, ongoing for millions of years, does not leave you. It has taken the garb of a man, or man (mind), or manushya (mankind). You cannot say that deception is man. Only Guru knows that this man, who you think is a man, will die. He will not remain. Yet you think deception is good, man is good, a person is good. That is where you have to neutralize this knowledge of the body. If you can succeed in lessening it, lessening it, lessening it, then there is a possibility that you can lessen it so much that you are like Guru. He never thinks that he is a body, although he works. He uses the eyes and ears, but he remembers that he is not a body. He comes to satsang, although he is not a body. He eats and drinks, although he is not a body. It cannot be explained by Guru why he knows this. He knows only for your sake, so that you should also know it. …

This conviction is such that all satsangees do not give up the staunch idea that their I is the body, so they are anatma darshee. I say to them, “You are Atma darshee, because you know that you were not there, born.” That is where all human beings are passing time. They die after a hundred years, and then they again take birth for a hundred years; they again take birth for a hundred years; they again take birth for a hundred years—and death also. And they suffer, and all that. But basically they are the Atma, and the Atma remains non-suffering. That non-suffering Atma turned into the body, so it got the body traits, and as the body suffers, so the Atma thinks, “I am also suffering.”

In this way, hearing and hearing, it is just possible that you can figure out what is being said by Guru. If you cannot figure it out, then you have already figured out that you are a name, you are a form. Guru takes you, not to the body, he takes you to the water; not to the water, he takes you to the fire; not to the fire, he takes you to the air; not to the air, he takes you towards the sky; not to the sky even, he takes you towards the ego; and not only to the ego, he takes you towards egolessness. He talks about it, but your attention only goes up to the body, name and form, to years, to eating and drinking and all that. This is a human being.

All the time, we talk about a human being, telling him, “You are not an animal.” You are satisfied hearing this. But all the ways are of animals, so what can satisfaction do? It will look good as long as your happiness is there, and you will never know that happiness is because of sattwa guna (the quality of luminosity, which is anatma). You become a little bit worried or agitated because of rajogun (the quality of activity, which is anatma). You become dull or sleepy because of tamogun (the quality of inertia, which is anatma). For ages, a human being has been trained “If I am spaced out, I will be good, for then there is no mind.” He wants to create a situation as if there is no mind, but the mind is under his feet all the time—and he thinks he is spaced out. That is not a good method.

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You have not been informed that identification with the body cannot be dropped. Somehow, in your listening to me, or in listening to the scriptures, you concocted the idea that identification should not be there. If identification is not there, how will this space [in front of him] know “I am the Space”? A human being must be there, a male or female does not matter, but he has a nervous system, or nardis (channels), which can give him the buddhi, or intellect, so that he can know if he is alive and awake or alive and sleepy. The space does not know these two things. If you are sleepy, you are never identified. Why would you expect that you should be de-identified and then identified with the Self? If you are de-identified, you are dead.

Poornima: We think identification is agyan (ignorance of the Self).

Swamiji: That is correct. Identification is agyan. But without agyan, how would you know that gyan (knowledge of the Self) exists? So agyan cannot be gone, because through agyan you came to know that agyan should not be there.

Pavitra: But then does the agyan go by knowing?

Swamiji: Agyan will go away when you know gyan. When sunshine comes, darkness goes away; you do not have to throw it away, it goes away. You have to be knowledgeable of the formula. Identification will remain till death. You will be Pavitra, and as Pavitra you will die. You cannot be some Arlene to die and then die as Arlene. You have to eat, and only if you are identified, then you can eat. If you are not identified, you are dead or sleepy, and you cannot even eat. So a human being remains, maintained as a human being. A human being has the nardis to know that sleep exists. You know that at that time identification is not there, for sleep is de-identified. A person cannot cherish sleep; again and again he cherishes the waking state, or the mind. He has to change his habit. He has to know that if he is the Self, then the Self is gyan. Just by knowing that the Self is gyan, your agyan has automatically been dropped.

Hridaya: … You said this morning that the reason we do not know unborn, or are not doubtless, is because we have not practised.

Swamiji: We say practice so that you can be appeased and satisfied that practice will yield the knowledge of unborn. When I have said to you that you are unborn, practice is not necessary. But you are not going to accept unborn, so you have to practise in order to see, “Can I do it, or not?” That is the mistake. Even after finding out a Guru, you are still wanting to know what Guru is. …

You remain with your identification intact and do not have identification with the unborn—which you can only do when you have identified with the body. Otherwise, how would you know unborn? But Hridaya just said, “Swamiji when you say unborn, you have taken a sword and cut all the identification.” It is not that I do that. I say, “You are Heidi, and you have faith that you are not born. Why can you not accept your faith?”

Hridaya: … I do have the faith and the patience that that is unfolding, or opening. But is that still a process-oriented approach?

Swamiji: A human being has grown, and when his mother’s eyes see him, they see him as a process: now this, now this, now this. All human beings are fixed in claiming a process to be right. When you die, there is no process. And you know it. Everybody nodded his head now for that. But no, after satsang is over, again the same thing. Whereas anybody among you who has a sharp and speedy buddhi knows, “I am born a human being, that is alright. But now Guru says, You were never born. Alright.” If you were not born, why would a born buddhi trouble you? Since everybody says, “Yes, yes,” I do not disturb him. I say, Alright. Because I have enough patience that you can write this down ten times, what is it to us? Again, you come. Again and again, you come. You can join ten satsangs, then you can come again, eleven times. You can go away, fine. Because you were never there. You can come again. You were never there.

That is possible to know, because all of you are the same Being. If I say you are the same Guru, trouble will come, for then you will try, “My Guru acts like that, so I should act like that.” You do not have to act like Guru, you have to act the way you are. The way you are is only one Being. One Being has made all the names and forms and constructions of the world. That a human being cannot get, because he became second to it. So we allow him to continue doing practice. He can practise for a hundred years, but he will not get it through practice. But at least he can manage in an uninvolved state quite a lot. Otherwise, what is the use of satsang? …

Hridaya: You just said that a human being has born buddhi, and you said that practice is not going to work.

Swamiji: No. Only practice will work, which you are doing alright. But you heard me saying once that practice will not work, and you got that.

Hridaya: Born buddhi!

Swamiji: See. You cannot dodge your buddhi....

There are three gunas [the fabric of manifestation]. Sattwa guna is light, like the white light of the sun, which is neither happy nor unhappy. A human being wants to remain sattwa and then wants to be happy, because if it is a dark night or a dark cloud, he becomes unhappy. That is not correct: it will not liberate you. You can be happy and will be in happy surroundings, but liberation will not come. So continue knowing the light of Atma, not the light of sattwa. Atma light is neither happiness nor unhappiness....

Maya, or deception, is after everyone. It is testing everyone. In every situation, it gives you something. …

Poornima: Is it called Yog (Unity) maya because it comes from the Self?

Swamiji: Mr. Yog is not maya. But when you “miss” Yog, when you leave Yog, then there is maya. [Laughter] ...

Freedom from birth: Atma. Freedom from death: Atma. Freedom from all actions: Atma. Freedom from no action: Atma. Freedom from living: Atma. Freedom from not living: Atma. But a human being gets confused. Therefore, he should know that when he is confused, he is the Atma. [Laughter]. He is free, that is all—under all circumstances. That is freedom. The word “freedom” is misleading, but it is Atma. Atma is freedom from sattwa, freedom from rajogun, freedom from tamogun, and these three gunas have made the whole world. So if you want to be free from the world, get beyond the three gunas. That is Freedom. Thank you.

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