MAYA AND THE ILLUSION OF SEPARATENESS

 

                          Satsang UK 83-9

Unprepared talk by Gururaj Ananda in response to ad-libbed questions

Session hosted and recorded by the British Meditation Society

From talk number UK83-9. Edited by J Lamb. Words in parenthesis added by editor.

All references to the masculine also include the feminine

 

 

Questioner:  Guruji, most methods of working with Divinity within us, our inner guru etc., by the very essence of using communication techniques, reinforce the illusion of separateness.  How can we best avoid reinforcing this illusion of separation?

 

Gururaj:  The very idea of separation is an illusion.  And the illusion, as you would know by now, is created by the mind. Yet the question still remains, “Is the mind an illusion?” 

 

If the mind is an illusion, would it be capable of creating an illusion?  Now, reality comes from reality.  But this does not apply to illusion.  An illusion can never come from an illusion.  But an illusion can come from reality.  So reality has two parts, it can create an illusion as well as create reality.  If the mind is so conditioned that it follows the path of illusion, then reality would seem to be an illusion, but if reality recognises itself as reality, it would follow the path of reality.

 

          The very existence we have here - is it an illusion or is it reality?  When it comes to communication there has to be duality.  For, who are you communicating with?  There has to be a subject and there has to be an object for any communication to take place.  And this is so necessary in the world that we live in.  So, an illusory factor has to communicate with another illusory factor.  How is this done?  What are the mechanics thereof?  What do we mean by communication in the first place?  

 

 What people normally mean by communication is verbal.  One speaks to the other and that is the outward form of communication.  The subtler form of communication is feeling with one another.  And if there is the same feeling between two people, then the two people cease to exist (as two) and only the feeling remains. In true communication duality does not exist anymore; duality becomes an illusion.  The same thing applies in love.  First, there is the object of love and the subject who is the lover.  But that remains totally on the very gross plain, love and the lover or the lover and the beloved.  But when the physical entity ceases - not cease in the sense of annihilation but cease in consciousness that I am John and she is Joan - then duality ceases and what would remain would be love.

 

          Love knows of no duality.  When I tell a woman 'I love you', I am being very false to my real self.   Because the very moment I say 'I love you', it means that you and I are apart from each other.  And apartness as we know is duality.  The very phrase 'I love you' is wrong.  For there is an 'I' and there is a 'you' and love is just put in between for convenience.  That is not love.  It's better to say 'I am you'.  That expresses real love and you only use the personal pronoun 'I' for the sake of expression. 

 

Really speaking you do not need to tell your beloved 'I love you'.  Those are words.  Just one glimpse into her eyes and the message is conveyed and that very glimpse or glance is the real communication.  That very glance, that very look expresses the entirety of the feelings that are welling up within you, not the words. The words are superfluous, although they are used every day.  So, real communication does not require verbalisation.  The same thing applies to hatred, that's also communication.  Just one cross look on the face will tell the person the feelings are not so mutual.  Yet the other person might feel that the feelings are not mutual, but even in that hatred there is a mutuality because it is non-verbal.  So, all the feelings and the emotions we have can be conveyed non-verbally and understood without words - and they would have a greater effect. 

          So, here when verbalisation ceases in communication then we do experience truth.  For what are you really expressing in telling a person 'I love you'.  You are expressing a certain truth that is felt within yourself. It could be limited depending upon the person's state and it could be so unlimited.  But how many can reach the levels of that unlimited communication of love? Very few.  It’s a great illusion when you say 'I love you' to your beloved. Are you really truthful about it, or is it just for that moment? A feeling wells up in you and you express it verbally and then later on the feeling dies away.  So therefore it is not truth, for truth is eternal. 

 

Truth, being eternal, will forever dwell there without any need or any want. Even the presence of the person is not needed.  So our love and communication is a very limited reflection of what love is all about. 

 

When you look into a mirror, you'll find your image there.  Can we say the image is not real?  The image is real, but if you shift away from the mirror, where is the image?  So, in the first place was the image an illusion or was it a reality.  For anything which is temporary cannot have the totality of truth in it.  For truth as we said earlier is eternal. 

 

          So, you look into the mirror, you see your face and for that moment it is real to you and when you move away from the mirror then the mirror is blank.  But here's a third factor that comes into play - the person, the image and the mirror you see.  Here is a cause.  You are the cause, the image in the mirror is the effect and the two combined produces what we call the instrument or causation, the one that sets power to the cause and effect into motion. 

 

Now, what is illusory?  The image is illusory and you in your relative way are real.  So, in the same manner, from the absolute point of view, this entire world is an illusion.  It’s like a motion picture with all the action seemingly so real, but an illusion created there.  And yet behind the scenes, on the screen, there is the stabilising factor of the screen and that is the reality.  And that reality is the spirit within us.  So, from the spiritual aspect, everything is an illusion - called Maya in Sanskrit.  There’s another word used also - Mithya, worthless.

 

          So, what do we attach our importance to, the illusion or to that which is real?  Here, the mind is the devil.  The mind takes us into believing the illusion to be real and the real to be an illusion.  Who can say he's known God?  Very few.  In this whole world you can count them on your fingertips.  So, is God not just an abstraction to us?  Is God not just an illusion formulated by the mind. That there is a God, but without experiencing him, how do you know there is a God?  You say there is a God because our Scriptures have said that, our Rishis and Sages and Saints have said that for they have experienced and we believe what they say that there is God.

 

But on what grounds do you base your belief?  Are there any grounds?  Have you any tangible proof that there is a God?  You would (of course) say 'Look, I walk, I breathe, I eat, I drink, I sleep.  There must be some power that makes me do this'.  Everything is held together.  This chair has millions of atoms in it.  What holds all these atoms together?  There must be something that holds all this together, that makes the entire universe work in a most systematic manner without fault in such precision.  But is this not an assumption?  Scientists would say that this is all a process.  Physics would disprove you if you say there is a God.  This is because it has to work that way and there's no two two's about it.  That's what physics would say.  And yet the man on the spiritual path knows.  He just knows that there is that Divine energy holding everything together.

 

          So the mind leads you to blind belief.  But there is something else there.  There's something else within you that you cannot explain that just knows that there is a God.  You have not seen him yet.  You have not recognised him yet.  You have not realised him yet.  But there apart from all the scientific arguments, you just know something inside there's a glimmer, a pulse there that tells you that there is a God.  And that is the only proof of the existence of God.

 

          Spiritual unfoldment really is the unfoldment of the heart where the opening of the heart, the greater energies, could flow and overpower the thinking of the mind.  The mind denies, the heart accepts. For the heart knows the core of the personality, cognises the factor of a higher being.

 

So the more we are involved in spiritual practices, the more the heart unfolds and the more energies rush out and overcome the thinking of the mind.  And when the thinking is overcome by the energies of the spirit within the heart, then the mind will still think. It will not believe but have faith. 

That is the difference - to have that faith.  And that faith just does not come on its own.  It requires some effort on our part to awaken that faith, that burning faith - burning, burning, and yearning to know the totality of truth.  For when the totality of truth is known, one has realised Divinity.  And that is the aim and end of each and every one of us. 

 

Preachers preach from pulpits.  They know not what they say - go to a Theological College for three or four years and get a DD, Doctor of Divinity, as if Divinity requires doctoring.  Divinity is to be found experientially and all the rationalisations and intellectualisations can never bring Divinity to us.  No.  And we can't bring Divinity to us in reality.  We just prepare the ground of opening the heart and Divinity comes to us.  It comes of its own accord.  It’s like in Holland, the dyke, you knock a hole there and the water will rush in and flood the city.  Like in everything else, just have a little opening, knock down one brick and all the other bricks, with the force of that power, will knock down all the other bricks that forms a wall around your heart.  Just one brick.  That's all. 

 

         

          Now, if we analysed peoples’ minds, we would find that most of them are trying some sort of escapism. We make up all sorts of things and allow ourselves to be attracted to all sorts of excitements, even perversions, trying to escape from ourselves, giving temporary peace of mind by being away from it all. 

 

But we can be away from it all, away from this illusion, and lead our minds towards reality which is goodness - see good, hear good, do good.  Do you see?  Same energy required.  Just a right about turn.  That's all that's needed, for Divinity is not far from you.  It’s within you - so near.  It’s nearer to you than your eyelid is to your eye.  Because that which you regard to be yourself is the great illusion.  And reality is still nearer to you than the illusion because illusions are always projected while reality is never projected.  It just is there within you and everywhere else - all at once, always, always.  

 

          So, with this illusory mind, we have various kinds of attachments and these attachments are the things that produce misery in ourselves.  We are attached to a man or to a woman or to our home or furniture or whatever.  Yes these are attachments and with attachment there is always expectation.  That is the worst thing about attachment, there's always an expectation.  And if the expectation does not come up to your idea, then there is disappointment.  You see.  I'm so attached to some object and the object breaks, I feel disappointed.  But if I was not attached to the object and say it to myself, “Oh it’s a lovely object, I admire it, I love it, but whatever happens to it, so what”, then there's no disappointment.

 

          The illusion contains within itself all that brings misery and suffering and yet we are involved in this world of Maya – our attachment to our perceptions. It’s a world of illusion and yet this world has a reality of its own. But we fail to recognise the limited reality that we are involved in.  We forget to realise that although this seems real enough, because I can touch, feel, smell, see (this microphone here), it’s a limited reality. 

 

Now, if I rise above the five senses then taste will disappear.  I will not have a craving for taste, whether it be a dry piece of bread or a beautiful seven course dinner. I will not be attached to it.  In other words, that means my sense of taste is under my control.  If I see something good, to others it might seem ugly.  If it’s a pretty object or a so called ugly object, I would have an equal eye to both because I am non-attached to the object of my sight. 

 

Feel - another sense - feeling.  If it’s cold, I would start complaining, oh so cold, so cold.  If it’s hot, oh it’s so hot, put on the fans, put on the air-conditioner.  We're always showing dissatisfaction because our minds have a mental conception of what comfort is all about.  But if you can accept heat or cold – whatever comes - that's how it should be.  It’s part and parcel of the game of life.  Then you'd be non-attached.  Your feelings, although you have them, can be set apart and you can enjoy. 

 

          Hearing - you like to hear nice music.  You like to hear sweet words from another, flattery mostly, it makes you feel great.  It builds up your ego.  And if someone says a bad word you'd start mulling over it and might lose a night's sleep.  Why?  Because you have conditioned your mind with your own particular idea that at all cost you must preserve this ego, your idea.  But if you do not wish to preserve the idea and say okay the man praises me or blames me, (and either is acceptable to me) good, fine so what.  I, the real self in me is not affected.  Why should I allow the mind to be so troubled when the mind is neither here nor there, forever changing all the time?  You might like something today and tomorrow you won't like it so where is the stability of the mind?  We are all insane.  Yes, we’re damn mad!  (Gururaj laughs).

 

          Then touching, yes.  That is one of the most powerful senses we have, more powerful than seeing and hearing.  You always like to touch something which you think feels pleasant.  And you have your own idea of touch.  A husband likes to touch his wife, and the sensation produced, he finds it pleasurable.  Why?  Why does he find touching his woman to be pleasurable?  Because in him there is a highly developed sense of eroticism.  That is why he finds it pleasurable and that eroticism is nothing but an idea.  It’s an idea.  I should not go into this here but it’s relevant that when you touch someone and feeling is heightened by the touch, your idea of the feeling becomes strengthened.

 

Then (with these senses) it becomes a vicious circle. Preconceptions are what dominates people's lives today, preconceptions. 

 

         Through meditations, we neutralise our minds.  And you can only neutralise your mind if you go to the deeper of the mind and draw energy from there to cleanse the misconceptions or the ideas, distorted ideas, that you have and bring them, bring the instability into stability.   

 

          There is only one reality and that reality is Divinity.  Your body is Divine. Your mind is Divine, because it is also a subtle matter.  But where is the illusion?  Your ideas. That is the illusion.  You have certain philosophies in this world that says this whole world is an illusion, it’s a dream and when you wake up you will find that it’s not there.  That's what certain philosophies say.  I say no, everything is real.  Everything is real.  You are real.  The only unreal, the only illusions, are your conceptions and your ideas of reality.  That is the illusion and that is what one has to overcome.

 

Forget all these philosophies.  Philosophy is good for philosophers and not for the seekers of truth.  These pros and cons mean nothing.  They are just ideas.  One philosopher will tell you this, another will tell you the opposite.  Descartes would say 'I think, therefore I am.'  What happens if you don't think?  You still are, aren’t you?

 

          And some other philosopher would say something else.  And we can go through the whole gambit of them, Kant, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Spencer, the whole works, Spinoza and then the Eastern philosophers, Sanchracharya, etc. etc Ramunuja, Maduva, etc. And after studying all these philosophies in the world I found that these are just but all mental gymnastics.  Then I followed another path through my Master, my guru. “Find your heart m’lad, find your heart m’lad”, he repeated.

 

         And how are you going to find your heart?  You can't go out with a torch to find it.  No.  The light is within you shining bright, it’s just to take our eyes inward and see the light.  And this is done through spiritual practices. 

 

        Please, please, please do not underestimate spiritual practices.  They can only bring you joy.  They will rub away the dirt, rub away the preconceived ideas a person has about things.  Preconceived ideas do contain positivities and negativities as well.  But to rise beyond all that, and see the truth, to see the light which is the Divine, then life is well lived.  So much peace dawns.  That is the grace of Divinity.  Call it Gurushakti, call it by any name it - doesn't matter.

 

          So we have ideas of everything.  ‘This is good and that is bad’ and ‘this will be nice and that will not be nice’.  It’s the trickery of the mind.  For all is the same.  The power of Divinity is in every atom and therefore all is the same.  Things look different to us because of name and form which we have applied to it, which we have applied.  You can have a bracelet, or earrings or a nose ring - Indians wear these nose rings you may have seen it, - or necklace or whatever, forms, but melt it all down, it’s gold, one essence formed differently by the jeweller.  And you are the jeweller that formulates your life.  You are the jeweller that brings form to your life and you call it by various names.  Yet the essence is but one.  Same thing moulded in a different way.

 

It is not wrong to mould things in different ways for different uses, but the main factor must not be forgotten that all these ornaments of life, that I make, is of the same substance.  And once we remember that then from morning till night the memory of God, the remembrance of God will always be at the back of your mind, always.  And when the memory or the remembrance of God is forever in the back of your mind, whatever you do will not have any karmic value.  It’s like throwing water on a hot pan.  It just burns away, evaporates.  You see.  So have within you that heat of Divinity.  Then any action performed in life has no bondage over you, does not bind you.  There will no cause and no effect. 

 

          And that is what true Masters are all about.  They can do anything they like.  They are a law unto themselves.  And yet there's no karma that will bind them.  Buddha, he lived in the garden of Anarkali, and he asked Anarkali, “Teach me to love.”  He stayed there many years.  He was not married to her in the sense of marriage.  Right.  Krishna with his sixteen hundred Gopis frolicking around in Brindaban, the garden of Brinda, the forest of Brinda.  Jesus wining and dining with the money lenders, I'm sure getting nicely nipped some nights.   There's a very long story to Jesus' life which one day before I leave this body I will tell you.  And yet they were so established in Divinity that nothing could bind them.  They were beyond the framework of karmic laws, the karmic laws of cause and affect. Because forever being established – as The Gita says - 'Be established in self and then perform action' –

 

First be established in self and then perform action. (That’s what ‘remembering god’ means) But if you are not established in self and you're performing any form of action, it is binding.  Good action is binding and bad action is binding.  Good action will bring you a bit of joy and bad action unhappiness.  But both puts you into bondage.  So one has to rise above bondage by being established in self.  By remembering and feeling the heat of the light that is within.  So all the water-drops of good and bad that fall on it just burn away.  You see?  That's the secret.  It’s so simple really.  So simple.