Between events, during the day Daaji spent time with visitors and abhyasis in meditation and informal conversations. He shared many profound insights. Here are just a few:
The potential for evolution
In response to a question about samskaras, Daaji explained, “You can see who are those abhyasis who do their Cleaning well every evening. Even their physical body is full of light. There is no heaviness in their system. But unfortunately most people do not do the Cleaning.”
He became wistful and continued, “We are perfectly placed to evolve in this life. We have the support of the great Master, Babuji Maharaj, we receive Transmission from the Source, and still our abhyasis do not practice, so how will they benefit from what is offered so freely to us all? With such support, if we cannot make it in this lifetime, I don’t think it will be possible in any other lifetime. Right now we have the optimum possibility. Otherwise we will have to wait for mahapralaya in order to return to the Source.”
Those around him felt that this was an invitation to all of us to introspect on this grand endeavour of evolution.
Cause and Effect
Daaji: There’s a saying, “Bin badal barsat,” meaning, “Rain without clouds,” like Babuji's statement, “There are effects without causes.”
You expect clouds to cause the rain, but for God to get you into a state of Grace, there need not be a cause. We are always following Newton’s second law of cause and effect, action and reaction. You see there are causes without effect and there are effects without causes.
For example, you try to please your wife. You’re trying to cause it, but it may not happen! Where is the effect? [Laughter] We don’t have to search in philosophy, it is right there in our personal lives.
Q: Maybe there is no cause for creation then?
Daaji: But such a huge creation must have had a cause, and an expected result of it. The cause is the initial stir, initial disturbance. Or perhaps the disturbance was there and that became the cause of creation. … I think it’s too futile to discuss why God created the universe. There’s no end to this discussion.
He has already created it, so what’s the point of asking, "Why was I created?” You’re there now, so stop worrying about it. Maybe if he asked you before creation, you could have been there to receive the answer. But now you’re already here. Babuji had a joke that “If you had been there, God would have consulted you first.”
There are questions, “Which came first, the chicken or the egg?” You can go round and round, but Babuji said the seed of the tree came first. He said that “God was not a fool. He preferred to create a subtler thing, which could grow into a bigger thing. And then the cycle continues. If he could get away with creating a small thing, why create a big thing?”
It’s always the subtle that creates the grosser. Thoughts result in action. Thoughts are subtler than action.
I like this idea of Original Creation, where no creation means there’s a zero state, zero dimension. There’s nothing in the Universe; no stars, no galaxies, not even a light. You need stars and galaxies to have a light. There’s nothing there. It’s a total void.
Now what happens if you apply Newton’s principle here? Normally when you throw something, it will move to a certain distance and then stop because of friction and gravitation, but where there is nothing - no friction, no gravity, nothing to stop it - even a small movement will go on forever. So can you say a thought or an idea can also expand like this? That’s also energy, which can be infinite.
Q: There was no time before. Time got created then.
Daaji: Even now there’s no time! (Laughter) It’s our idea.
Universal Principles
Daaji: It’s a simple thing to understand that the whole universe was created based on simple principles, for example, the principle of balance. Anything that disturbs it leads to chaos, be it human relationships or anything else. Balance is required, be it within or between people.
When do you become universal? When you move away from your centre of selfishness. When you become all-encompassing.
Q: Who created those principles?
Daaji: They are existential. Nobody had to create them. The whole of existence is run by those principles. For example, “Love all.” Who would write such a thing? That’s the only possible principle that can keep things in balance. So when we talk of God, instead of that it would be nice to talk of Godliness. When we talk of God, we are talking of a person, which has limitations.
Q The word ‘Source’ is also subtler.
Daaji: Yes. Existence.
Q: I don’t think anyone has used the word ‘Centre’ before Babuji.
Daaji: No, no one. And all can understand it, even if you’re not a believer of spirituality. Centring yourself – when you focus and have your attention inwards fully centred – brings so much peace.
Dimensions
Daaji: We always debate about the physical world. Nobody thinks about other dimensions, because we can’t, we don’t have access to them. When we die, what happens to our soul? It goes to another dimension. Where is that dimension? Is it physical? No, you can’t say that. Had it been physical then the soul would also be physical.
So creation of all those dimensions happened simultaneously. Just as there is this manifest world, there are also unmanifest dimensions. Will they manifest? I don’t think so, because their frequency is like that. The energy level of those dimensions is too subtle.
Q: Do we experience them in our meditation? Can we experience them?
Daaji: Always. When we go very deep in meditation, where we are not aware of ourselves, we are in a different zone altogether, a different dimension, and we don’t remain cognizant of that dimension. We somehow cannot recollect what happened there. We cannot describe it except to say, “I was lost.”
And when we ponder over the inner condition we had during the depth of meditation, was it outside? It was not. It was within us only. That much knowledge remains, “It was within me. I was lost within myself.” So all those dimensions are within us.
Barzakh
Q: Lalaji would talk about barzakh between one chakra and another chakra.
Daaji: Barzakh is a state of limbo, a stage in between. To help us understand, Babuji used the following analogy: You are used to walking on land. That means you are used to one particular condition of the heart. Now when you move to the next point, when your intention is to cross the in-between space to go to the next stage, It’s like crossing a river from one bank to another bank. You are used to walking, and then you come to the riverbank, but you don’t know how to swim to get to the other side. So this barzakh is the intervening space, which you’re not used to. If you can swim, it’s great. Otherwise, take the help of a Master who can give you a ride in a boat, and you’re there easily, without any chance of getting drowned.
According to Babuji, if you can cross it on your own without the help of your Guide, that is the best thing. That means when you’re not able to meditate, and you still struggle and make solid efforts to meditate, and get out of this situation of not liking to meditate, then you are mastering yourself. Then you’ll cross. That progress will be the best progress, compared with being carried across. It’s like a millionaire’s son or a daughter: The income they have is not of their own, they’ve never worked for it, so they have no value for it.
Awareness
Q: What to make of the recording we were listening to of Babuji, where he was saying that during his abhyas he fixed the first day of the next month with the thought, "On this day I will be in the next region." Every following month, he would move from one region to the next. He simply fixed the date as a plan.
Daaji: It’s beautiful. It means I have to know my station, where I am right now. That means I must be able to say confidently how I feel right now, the present inner environment, the present mental state, the present feeling that I have. Whatever be the feeling at the moment, it is incomplete. Always. So the need to move forward.
Until something else comes up and you feel, “I wish I had that which will complete it.” But by the time you reach that state, you’ll still feel incomplete. If you really still feel incomplete, it’s good. It means at least you’re able to see and feel that state. So, you move from one incompleteness to another incompleteness to the next incompleteness.
You have to become aware of that. When you are aware of this incompleteness, you will feel that the “there lies my perfection” in the next thing that you see. But it is not so. It will, however, make you move there. Slowly and slowly it becomes more and more refined. So we move from imperfection prevailing at lower to imperfection prevailing at higher, or better put, from a grosser state to a subtler state. So awareness is required. Inner awareness. Thus, moving from finer to the finest…
Otherwise, it is like that joke about Mulla Nasaruddin. He and his wife were planning for a baby for years.
And his wife constantly reminded him, “What about when we have a baby, where will the baby sleep?” She was reminding him, “Let’s have kids.”
He said, “When we have a baby, I’ll move, so he or she can sleep in between.” Then she asked, “What about when we have a second one?”
So he moved a little further and said, “We can fit the second one here.” “What about the third one?” she asked.
He tried to move across further and fell off the bed and broke his leg. The whole neighbourhood woke up with his screaming in pain.
He said, “Look at this! My child, who is not even born, is giving me so much pain!” [Laughter]
So these are statements arising out of unawareness, foolishness.
To be continued
