An opportunity (relating to material world) comes one’s way in normal course without any effort or initiative.  One starts pursuing the opportunity and soon the door is closed.  What is the teaching in this?

The question refers to a pursuit that did not bring the desired result. Interestingly, the pursuit began when an opportunity one was not looking for on the conscious plane surfaced rather suddenly all by itself. It led to a certain involvement that eventually petered out into nothing. Naturally, the questioner is wondering as to why such a thing happened.

It is a very genuine query, which, I feel, everyone, specially a seeker, must contemplate. Here are the thoughts that arose within me out of my contemplation.

Why do things happen the way they happen?

In spirituality, there is an undisputed rule about life. Expected or otherwise, the things that happen to us in our in lives are those that we have sought for ourselves at the level of the mind, a repository of our karmas.

The sub-conscious mind and how it controls us

We are normally barely aware of what goes on the surface of the mind. Yet, the mind is very huge and can be compared to an iceberg. What lies below the surface is much more than what is visible. We normal refer to this hidden area, below the surface, as the subconscious mind. This area holds impressions of all kinds of unfinished businesses, through our present and earlier lifetimes. Though apparently dormant, these impressions are at work. They keep transmitting their signals and continue to attract those forces of nature that will bring life’s hidden agenda to fruition. This is how the subconscious mind determines our life, without giving us any hint of what it is doing. We are held hostage to what lies at the subliminal level of the mind.

We can acquire freedom from the machinations of these latent impressions in two ways alone – by not resisting change and by intelligent interference.

The choice of resisting  vs not-resisting the subconscious

The uninitiated or the ignorant have no option in the matter. They succumb to whatever the latent impressions bring up.  So, things and events materialize and fructify in the normal course. This eventually starts lightening the carried forward baggage of the sub-conscious mind.

However, those who are initiated have two options. The first option is of intelligent interference. So, one chooses not to invite or fight any particular latent impressions. He does not bother about any opportunity, pursued successfully or otherwise. He simply intensifies his sadhana so that he can burn latent impressions in the fire of yoga so that in-process karmas can be avoided. Such a person, when he has sufficiently evolved, reaches a state of choicelessness. Then he does not seek or shun anything. He simply witnesses what is happening. He has become Shiva himself.
 
Exploring the sub-conscious mind in meditation to make the transition from the unconscious to the conscious

The mind, below the surface, is the ‘chain’ that is holding us back from liberation. We are not aware of it primarily because we are mostly caught up on the surface. When we begin to meditate, we start this journey within. Then we begin to explore these hidden or deeper areas of the mind.
 
No wonder, each one of us, after he has started meditating, begins to discover new dimensions. Hidden possibilities, totally new traits, and fresh talents begin to sprout. In this journey, quite often, a meditator also starts noticing sprouting of even unsavoury things — anger, selfishness, cowardliness, depravity in sex, or some follies.

Self-exploration is like a massive churner that first sets loose and then churns out everything, precious or base. It allows all impressions to travel from the subconscious to the conscious areas of the mind.

When they come up in the field of vision of the conscious mind, one’s consciousness is coloured by them. Certain things may be very pleasing while others may be quite unpalatable. The key is to become a witness. If a person simply witnesses these impressions, they surface into the region of the conscious mind and are purged out.

Yet, it is part of the healing process, whereby the subconscious mind is being set free of all entanglements, hidden or otherwise. One starts becoming free.

Reacting to the sub-conscious mind

Here we must understand that in so far as its events are concerned, life is governed by a higher intelligence that a limited mind cannot probe. Here it must be understood that a limited mind is engaged with ‘BECOMING’, while the empty mind is established in ‘BEING’ (absorbed completely in pure awareness). Being is elusive. We touch this state each night in deep sleep but we don’t know it because our awareness is shut. Hence, to make the transition to ‘being’ we must first be fully established in ‘becoming’.

Futile pursuits (or even fruitful pursuits) are necessary tools used by life to educate us in our evolution. Sometimes, a futile pursuit may be sent into our lives to help us learn and inculcate the virtues of planning, focus, and execution. An improvement in these areas will help us when the next opportunity comes our way. In a way, this is to strengthen the ‘BECOMING’ in a positive way. Only when becoming is strengthened sufficiently, it will be possible for one to realize its futility.

Therefore, a futile pursuit may be sent into the life of a sufficiently evolved person to teach him about something still higher – the futility of all pursuits. This may engineer the final letting go – the leap into ‘BEING’. This may lead to complete surrender to the divine will, where one is living in perfect choicelessness. He does no do anything on his own. He merely participates in what is happening around him. 
 
Each one has to contemplate what the happenings in his or her life (including futile pursuits) are indicating to him.

For the sadhaka the choice is one of sadhana. This alone will take him across.

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Brahmaprakash Gaur belongs to the Indian Revenue Service and is currently posted as Chief Commissioner of income-tax, Mumbai, India. He met his spiritual Master, Gurumayi Swami Chidvilasananda, in 1989 and has been meditating since then. Contact him at b_gaur@hotmail.com.

The teaching sessions at the ashram went off quite smoothly. I grew in confidence. Within the next one year, I started introducing meditation to my office colleagues (at Mumbai, India). This brush with the energies of group meditations has been quite rewarding.

In 1991, my office had a group of 40 odd female staff members, pursuing spiritual practices. They had the same guru. Bound by this fellowship, they would get together in the office every day during lunch recess to study scriptures and to meditate. Once or twice, I joined their sessions and they did mine. Then the requirements of work took me away from Mumbai. The contact was severed.

I returned to Mumbai about a year back. One day, I happened to meet one of these ladies at the office. She filled me in on her group. The guru had passed away and was no longer there in the physical body to guide them. Several members of the group, including the one who led them, had retired from service. Some members had been transferred to work at offices in other locations within Mumbai. These developments had forced abandonment of the daily satsang. Yet, the group had largely remained cohesive. Those members, who could, met for four-five hours of practices one Saturday each month at some convenient place.

My contact with the group having been renewed, soon they invited me to lead them into meditation at a get-together they had organized within the office. It was nice to meet them. A few months later, once again they invited me in. This time, I encouraged them to speak about issues relevant to their sadhana. We dealt with several questions. How did they feel about their sadhana? Where did they think it was leading them? What issues they felt they had to work on? How to evaluate the inner work, carried on by the awakened energy? How to deal with the physical absence of the guru? And so on………

Very soon it became apparent what was a significant issue with many. They were being bogged down by unwarranted judgment about how little sadhana had done to them in helping them get rid of undesirable thoughts or habit patterns. Just because they were focused elsewhere in areas of want, they were overlooking the wonderful transformation that was all too evident in their lives and did indicate great progress through inner work.
In the course of discussion, I was the facilitator allowing them to change focus to look for and appreciate the positives. Gradually, the result was obvious. Their general demeanour began to change perceptibly. Faces began to lighten up more and more with hope and self-belief.  This discussion had consumed considerable time. So, I suggested that we had had a “discussion satsang” and we could call it a day.

However, the ladies weren’t ready to forego meditation. Looking for a swift way out, I thought I would give them a short visualization for healing and be done with it. I began giving instructions accordingly, beginning with a breath awareness induced limb by limb relaxation starting from toes upwards. I was half way through, when I began to feel a great build-up of energy within. It started taking hold of me. The instructions, I was giving thus far, had to stop.

A few seconds later, a suggestion for a different kind of concentration and meditation began to take shape within me. It was about meditation on the guru’s form (by identifying one’s body with that of the guru). Instructions began to form in my mind spontaneously. I went ahead with the flow and started articulating whatever came up.
It began with the awareness of the toes. There was silent repetition of the mantra “Om guru Om” with the suggestion that the toes were no longer ours but those of the guru. Limb by limb this visualization was carried forward with silent repetition of the mantra. Eventually, we reached the crown of the head.

Normally, I would have stopped at that and would have let the ladies meditate on the inner silence arising out of this identification with the guru’s form. But, this did not happen.

New instructions began to come forth. These were about visualization of a very private and intimate meeting with the guru, seated comfortably on a lovely chair in the cave of the heart. Everyone was taken through the steps of this process slowly – welcoming the guru, seating the guru in the chair, offering their most loving service to the guru, and sharing with the guru their innermost feelings and gratitude. Each one was asked to sit in silence and listen if the guru had any words of advice, instruction and benediction; and, let the words sink in.

Perhaps at this point the instructions stopped. We were in an office hall. There was some loud conversation outside. But, a pool of silence had engulfed all of us. We sat quietly, each one deeply absorbed in the company of the inner guru.

After a while, I began to guide every one into regaining consciousness of their bodies and the outside world. I looked at my watch. More than 45 minutes had passed since we started the meditation. Even after everyone had opened their eyes, a curtain of silence hung over us. No one was willing to speak. It took quite a while before we spoke out.

This experience was a strong reminder to me of how the inner guru guides from within. My ‘limited’ mind had conjured up a concept of the meditation I needed to give those ladies that day. Obviously, the inner guru thought otherwise. He acted decisively and with grace, compelling me to fall in line and change course. What eventually took place was hugely more enjoyable. The guru had used me as an instrument. What a splendid blow to any sense of doership that I might have had.

There was another teaching that came to me strongly from this experience. I had gone to these ladies as a ‘teacher’ – ‘somebody’ who would help them ‘receive’ ‘something’ but it their love for spiritual life, simplicity, purity and receptivity that largely engineered the experience that had befallen me.

And, lo and behold, the teacher became the taught.

Ladies! My heartfelt salutations to each one of you!!

This is the greatness of satsang. It allows one to discover his or her better part in the most inscrutable ways.

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Brahmaprakash Gaur belongs to the Indian Revenue Service and is currently posted as Chief Commissioner of income-tax, Mumbai, India. He met his spiritual Master, Gurumayi Swami Chidvilasananda, in 1989 and has been meditating since then. Contact him at b_gaur@hotmail.com.