The essence of spiritual teachings

The Essence of Spiritual Teachings

You’d be surprised I’m keeping myself together. [Gururaj laughs] Keep yourself together through the power of love. And therefore the scriptures, all the scriptures say, «Love thy neighbor as yourself.» But I would add onto that, not only your neighbor. Here’s my neighbor, that’s my neighbor, this is my neighbor. Do you see?

So who is the doer? But I need to cognize. And that is why you are given this mind, this thinking ability which separates you from an animal. And what should the mind be thinking? That everything in this world is good. Yeah. And when you recognize that everything is good, slowly the one «o» in «good» will be rubbed away. It will fade away, and there’s only «God.» Do you see.

The problem is the mind. And when you can transcend it, go beyond it and watch it act, then there’s another part of you that will tell you, this part of the heart will tell you, «Ha, the mind is playing tricks, let it have fun. Who cares.» You become the observer, and then nothing can affect you. And what really observes is not you, but the real doer. He is also the observer. So when you reach that area of being able to observe objectively, then the mind will not affect you. It will not affect you because you have become non‑attached from the mind. You let the mind perform. Let the mind be able to do whatever it wants to do. To hell with it. And when that is ingrained within you, you would be pouring out that heart that is within you. A true master might analyze your mind, but his greater job is to open your heart. And when the heart is opened you become more and more receptive to everything around you, because the heart only sees and feels and acts in goodness, which is godliness. Ain’t God good, huh? [Gururaj laughs] He sure is. Ya.

So when we stop thinking of ourselves as the doer, what happens is this, that we are surrendering to a higher force, which is in us and all around us. For the easiest place to start from is that place in us. Because if you have some cognition and recognition of what is in you, you will automatically project it to everything outside you. That is how one starts. That’s how one starts‑‑until you feel that there is nothing outside you. Everything is inside you. So this is the process that you start off with: duality; and you progress to qualified non‑duality; and the last step is total non‑duality. If everything is found to be within you, what can hurt you? Nothing can hurt you, because no one purposely would like to hurt themselves. Do you see. And with this sense one can find greater happiness and peace.

Now there are three things which you must indulge in: sense, common sense, and nonsense. People think… they don’t even understand the word «nonsense.» Where you don’t make sense of anything, and it’s fun. The greatest humor in life is based on nonsense. And when you view it with common sense, you develop the real sense of what is nonsense. It’s beautiful, beautiful. Yah.

So man should be a combination of all these three things: sense, common sense, and nonsense. And it’s a greater art to be able to view nonsense with sense. You see the humor in it then. And you find life to be filled with fun, because you now have developed the sense and the common sense to see the nonsense, and nonsense is humor. You become humorous. Not tumorous, humorous. [Laughter] For who wants a tumor on the brain? I think I must start doing operations on all of you. Cut away those tumors. You see. It’s a pressure on the brain, unnecessary pressure. And that is why you find things going wrong or right‑‑because of that pressure on the brain box. Here’s another way out: instead of having a brain in the head, fill it with sawdust. Yes. Then you won’t be able to think all the rubbish you think about. Yes. But feel, feel, feel. Feel the joy. Feel the beauty. Yes. And you will see with clear eyes all the beauty around you. (Let me wipe my eyes.) [He laughs]

You know, I was telling someone the two most sensitive parts of me is my feet‑‑the soles of my feet‑‑and my eyes. You know why my feet has become so sensitive? It is because of walking around the stupid world. And I can feel all the rubbish that’s going on in this world. And that’s why my feet are so sensitive. And why are my eyes sensitive? Because I see all the rubbish around me, which should not be there. But it’s helped me‑‑by feeling with the feet and seeing with the eyes‑‑it has helped me to become more and more compassionate. And it has made me more and more kind. It has made me feel more. That if you have a headache, I feel your headache; if you have a toe ache, I feel it too. And if you have a bottom ache, and there’s another word for that, I feel that too.

It is a bit cold, isn’t it, huh? It’s all right. Tonight we must remember to bring a blanket down. No, no, you need that darling. No, no, you need it. Aren’t you using that?

PRIYA: No, I’m certainly not. I have a sweatshirt on. Do we take care of you or what? [Laughter and remarks]

GURURAJ: Thank you, dear. You see, I was feeling cold, and now you guys are trying to heat me up. [Laughter] Look at the contrast. And aren’t both beautiful? Nothing wrong with coldness, it is nature. And nothing wrong with heat. So you accept them equally with equal eyes. And when you can see things with equal eyes, you become one‑pointed. And when one is one‑pointed in any endeavor, life becomes more happier. You see. So, scatterbrains, gather yourselves together.

Every sentence I would speak is a poem in itself. And poetry is something which wells up within you. It’s not the mind at work, it is the heart at work expressing itself spontaneously. And that is what we need. That’s what we need, that spontaneity of life where we just flow‑‑and flow very gracefully. And when you flow through life gracefully, you attract more and more grace to yourself. That’s your 90 percent. Do you understand? Your 10 percent is just to be gracious. And that 90 percent of grace just dawns onto you. It does not wait to come in by the door. No. It’s always waiting at the door. And your 10 percent is in opening the door to let it in. If the room is stuffy, what do you have to do? You just have to open the window and the fresh air will come in by itself. You don’t need to go and call it. Like another analogy I’ve used somewhere, I don’t know where, you don’t need to go and chase butterflies all over the field. Make your garden beautiful and the butterflies will automatically come. Do you see? Yah.

And that is how life is lived. That is how the beauty of life is received. Then you say, «Ah,» in gratitude, in thanksgiving, that «Lord, you have been so merciful to me.»