Welcome to the Space!

Swami Shyam: The Space is our true nature that remains forever the same. When a form arrives, something happens to the heart of every being—he feels a freshness, and the arrival is recognized as that space. Thus you feel like welcoming again and again and again. Even though it is eternal, forever, there is no change in it, therefore it is free from appearance and disappearance. In the same way it is also free from that which exists in between appearance and disappearance.

This is the sport that the Lord Himself has been playing since eternity: He appears and calls Himself the form of appearance, and that which has always been formless is never recorded. Then, on the level of the form, he gets a name and imbibes the knowledge of everything that is in the atmosphere of time and space.

We are blessed with the awareness that our reality is Oneness. And we never forget that Oneness, knowing that it never becomes anything else than Oneness. As with a tree, its seed is one, but the multiple aspects of the tree appear to be many. Now the seed will not know that it is the source-power of manifestation and the source-power of knowing (as consciousness) which records the manifestation of the tree, from root up to fruit, unless, in the fruit, the seed is again built.

As human beings, we equate with the life of the tree or for that matter the life of everything that appears. We are alive, knowing that this is the most wonderful, beautiful incarnation where there is the possibility to initiate action once, twice—always the possibility of fresh action—and the result of old action (which never worked), can be sent to the past.

Sing the glory! We meditate on the well-being which is our delight and which is our true nature. That is why we remain in bliss. We are in bliss, we should remain in bliss, we sing the glory of that bliss, and we welcome bliss as soon as it dawns in our hearts. Oneness is our true nature and the multiple aspects are our manifest aspects. Meditate on that which never gets divided. We are undying, immortal, blissful.

Amaram Hum Madhuram Hum.

Surrender is . . .

Dikpal: I was reading about surrender in the Gita. What does surrender your action or mind to God mean?

Swami-ji: The word surrender has been very popular for ages. Even at the time of Krishn and Arjun it was popular.

If you drive to Manali you cannot drive to Mandi. If you are not surrendered to one goal, how will get to the goal?

Arjun’s goal was to listen to Krishn. That is why he befriended him and accepted Krishn, rather than requesting the assistance of the millions of army men. Millions of soldiers were on one side, and Krishn was not even wielding his discus. Krishn was Arjun’s choice. Krishn was ready to give him his army or himself.

Arjun said, "I like you, Krishn. I want you to be with me. That is all." He completely surrendered to Krishn saying, "I will do what you say."

When he requested Krishn to drive the chariot towards the front line of war he got overwhelmed and forgot. He got into his "I" (ego), thinking, "I am Arjun. I feel overwhelmed. I feel fatigued. I am exhausted just from thinking about my relations," because of the death that is involved in war. He could not get out of this thought which occupied his head. Only by surrendering would he be able to get out of it.

To make oneself free from mind is the act of surrender.

Swami-ji You can understand by using this example:

  As long as 'I' was there, you had to fight. But you became awakened to the fact that that this war was not necessary, therefore you surrendered. You stopped killing. You sat together and figured out how many people died for nothing, how many people were dead because of your ego. If you had not been ego-ridden, the war would not have taken place. You were both egos, so the war took place.

Ego blocks the understanding, the brain, and then man becomes pro-senses, pro-body and his knowledge gets lost.

Krishn tells Arjun, "As long as you have not surrendered your 'I' sense to me, you will be victim of your senses and body and think you will die early. But I am beside you and I will not let you die."

He is telling Arjun to be immortal, to be established in the blissful state which means to surrender the ignorant understanding of death, of things and forms.

Before surrender: confusion

Before surrender takes place, a person reaches the point of confusion where he cannot think anymore and wants to tell somebody, saying, "I am surrendered on the level of the mind. I am unable to know what to do or what not to do."

That was Arjun’s case.

Krishn said, "Why worry? Just surrender to me and I will take care of you."

Arjun said, "I cannot do that because you are separate and I am separate. You have to do your movie. I have to do my movie."

Arjun was filled with the sense of duality. Krishn was teaching the sense of Oneness. He knew that when they started, they were Absolute Bliss Consciousness. Like us! We were one blue space, and Shyam Space ejected us from the bonfire into the time and space dimension; we entered into our various mothers’ wombs and became bodies. Being bodies, we were ego-ridden; our perception was that our mothers are separate from us, our fathers are separate from us, and we are separate. Therefore, human beings with I-consciousness, ego-consciousness, cannot surrender.

But without surrendering, everybody quarrels. Relationships do not work because neither person is surrendered to the other. Why? Because human beings are not supposed to surrender their 'I.' Suppose I want to take a bath; you may stop me saying that I will get a bad cold, but I feel that I will be fresh. Not only does somebody else expect you to do certain things, but your own mind tells you, "Don’t take a bath. Just go to satsang."

I am in harmony with the thought that I should go to satsang, but yesterday I didn’t take a bath, and if I skip taking a bath for two days, it will be trouble. So I say, "Look mind, you are also surrendered to me, so why lay a trip and expect me to obey? Remain surrendered, let me have a bath, and then I will not chide you."

Arjun’s mind said, "I will not act."

Krishn told him that in life you have to act up to the last breath.

Arjun said, "You say that I should act, but I can stop action. Do whatever you like, but I will not act." Arjun was so ego-ridden.

Krishn knew that he would have to act, he could not sit quiet. Nature would compel him to act. Since as he has body, he has to do action, karm.

It was Arjun’s ego sense that said, "I will not act." His highest sense was that which was so powerful that he chose to give up the army and wanted only Krishn with him.

To act or not to act . . . Arjun had acting-consciousness. The scriptures say, "Don’t be a doer." But he became a doer because of the mind. If you are in the waking state, you are a person, and you will act, you will do.

Krishn said, "If you don’t act at this time, then you will bring calamity to your family and the world. You have suffered the last twelve years."

That was Arjun’s case. Everybody trusted him to be a great warrior, but his condition was that he didn’t want to act.

God or Guru is surrendered to the devotee. Krishn never acted for himself; he acted for Arjun. Krishn said, "I am surrendered to you. Why can’t you understand that you should surrender to me?"

If my hand is surrendered to me, then I can pick up my maala and repeat [mantra]. But if my hand doesn’t surrender and makes a fist, then no action will take place.

Surrender means be knowledgeable of the situation, the relation, and what is essential at this time. Be tuned in to Krishn Consciousness.

How will that be possible when Arjun wields his ego? Only when Arjun went beyond mind was it surrender.

Knowledge is surrender

Breaking ignorance Krishn wanted to break ignorance. Surrender means to have the knowledge that you and Krishn are one reality.

Unless Arjun surrendered, he could not act.

The ego sense, which binds you, prevents you from the unfoldment of the awareness that you are immortal, you are infinite, you are blissful. You think that you can be here and do what you want. You see a loophole and think you can do what you like. You must surrender your ego sense into the Absolute Bliss Consciousness, Sat Chit Aanand, where your are nobody to act as ego.

You are the body, and body has to act knowing that God acts. And when God acts, God acts everywhere.

Krishn meant that Arjun should have God Consciousness. Arjun didn’t know God sitting in the chariot. He didn’t even know Krishna as Guru who was guiding him. Arjun got into his own brain, his own ego, and thought he was a separate person from Krishn and thought he could do whatever he liked. Krishn is giving advice, but Arjun is not listening because he has become ignorant.

Krishn says, "Surrender the ignorance, not the 'I,' not the ego. Listen to me. You are not a body to die. You are not a body, dependent on this and that, to be chaytan or consciousness. You are already bliss. Don’t become dependent, because the ego will make you stupefied regarding our own true nature, and you will be bound by the residual ignorance which feels that you cannot survive without this or that."

Being victim to insufficiency, you act for the sake of the body; you are bound and you perish; you become stupefied like a drunken man that doesn't know where home is or where the bottle is and ends up lying in a ditch. When you are ignorant, whatever you think is true.

Surrender means be wise; it does not mean to hoist a flag, surrendering in a situation of war.

Whatever you do, don't digress Whatever Guru says, do. Guru will not say that which goes against your joy, your bliss, your preferences, or your needs. Guru gives you total freedom because he knows that you are not going to die. Yet he knows that whatever you are doing is all wrong.

Once you are on line and on the road towards God, don’t digress whatever you do. Remain tuned in to God. That is your goal. Know that you have always been God, you have never been bound.

But you will say, "I am bound. I need release."

Then Guru says, "Do that which releases."

You say, "Only a bottle of whiskey releases."

So he says, "Have two. Double release!" Guru is not dependent on you or your ideas. Guru, being free, is useful for those who want to be free. I come in the morning for anyone who wants to uplift his consciousness and come out of confusion. Guru is acting for you to be tuned in to Guru Consciousness.

You say that the only life is to eat, drink and die in a grave and be eternally settled. So you act only for the body’s sake. You know only the body’s joys and you eat this and that.

A system to know your Self Guru says you have a system to know your Self, that your truth is infinity. Your truth is eternal bliss. You are indivisible. But you had to take on a body to learn what doubt is, what duality, pain and suffering are, and to know what is the system of the mind that concludes negatively and makes you miserable. You are in satsang, but as soon as satsang is over, check your mind. It will say, "You didn’t pay attention in satsang today. You couldn’t please Swami-ji."

But you are doing all right. Mind is always that which puts something in your ear so that you should feel sad, sorry, frightened, small, or full of death and destruction. That is what the mind does. We say study it and understand that it doesn’t exist anywhere.

Krishn tells Arjun to act and Arjun says, "This [war] is not a good act." That is the human nervous system. Arjun is one nervous system. Krishn is another. Krishna is the transcendental reality. Arjun is overpowered by blindness.

Be wise I have been speaking—saying that you are eternal, you are immortal, you are blissful—for thirty years. I cannot think that you haven’t learned it.

The only message available from our web site 'shyamspace.com' is Amaram Hum Madhuram Hum.

So surrender means be wise.

It takes time.

Surrender is God Consciousness Arjun wanted to get away from the chariot, but Krishn arranges for him to listen to him again and again.

Krishn’s Gita is meant for intelligent persons to know whatever Krishn knows; they should know and be God Consciousness.

Human beings have learned individual consciousness a lot. You are practicing surrender with the hope of it being wiped off completely. You should merge into God Consciousness. That is what is meant by surrender.

Surrender is God Consciousness.

Wisdom in brief - Changing your fate

Attain that freedom My talk doesn’t go to your head because your head is so completely blocked by your image of a God who suffered and gave his life. For us, God is liberation from whatever has bound us.

Attain that freedom. That is God.

Awareness you are Awareness is not a substance. Awareness cannot be described. Therefore, when I say that awareness you are, you should not identify with this body.

How will you identify?

A person sitting in the living room sees the sun. He came outside and lays down under the sun. He begins to think that his body is sunlight because sunlight is falling on him. He tries to dust it off, but he is convinced that he is sunlight.

If you are that person, what will another person say to you? "You have gone crazy. Let her come to my room which is dark and see that she is not sunlight."

In this way the human intellect is caught. It is jarh, but says, "I am chaytan," because it is under the sky and Pure Consciousness is reflecting. So the intellect says, "I am God. I am Pure Consciousness." Why does your intellect say that? Amaram Hum Madhuram Hum.

The 'you' that doesn't change When you were meditating you were you, but you were not this. There is some you who changes and some you who never changes. That you who is close to the territory of the senses changes. When your eyes see, when your ears hear, you change. You call that 'I,' and that I is always changeful. Therefore, when you hear, "I am immortal, I am blissful," from Swami-ji, you question your perception of the you, which you see daily, who is changeful, mortal, sick and happy and unhappy, and you ask," Swami-ji you say that I am immortal, I am blissful. What I are you talking about?"

You have to understand the stages. When you were young, you functioned differently. When you were adolescent, you functioned differently. When you become eighty years old, you will function differently. At that time you will not have the same energy, the same thoughts. You have to have love for the Self that is unchanging. Then you will have a difference in the regard for the Self which is changing and the Self which is unchanging. The one who loves you eternally, you will regard differently form the one who loves you only when you bring Swiss chocolates and then changes. Then your regard will only be a chocolate’s worth.

Those who know me only for my words, my actions, my invitation for dinners or for travelling are limited in their regard.

Those who know me as eternal, their regard is eternal.