14  Mind TC  "14  Mind" \l 1

The universe is nothing else but mind. Mind is nothing else but matter, existing in various gradations from the totally subtle to the totally gross.

Our temperaments are such that we are searching and seeking, but oddly enough, we do the seeking and it is Divinity that finds us. This happens because our search is from the mind.

When stillness of the mind is produced then the mind is subjugated. When the ripples of a pond are made still, the reflections of the bottom of the pond become clearer to our view. Stilling the mind is like stilling those ripples to get a proper view of the bottom.

Get to the superconscious level of the mind . . . that is the greatest reflector of being.

The mind is necessary, but it requires refinement to experience the real essence of Divinity.

The mind can only accept a principle when it is in a calm state. It is only when the glass of the mind is clear that the light of Divinity can shine through.

God plus mind makes man. Man minus mind makes God.

The mind has the capacity to reach the entire universe, and the entire universe is contained in our minds. The secret of the whole universe can be found even in an atom. The secret of the whole universe can be found in the universe itself; and its fullest extension is that of the mind.

The more you exercise effort in controlling the mind, or controlling thought, the more will thoughts come. Thoughts are like monkeys in a tree. If you want to quiet the monkeys, it does not help to shake the tree; they will jump even more. If the thoughts are left to themselves, they will settle down by themselves.

Man is a composition of that which is good and that which is not good. But all the time, within the human mind, a sifting takes place, or a churning process, like the spinning of milk to separate the cream. That is how the mind is purified.

The mind is a very cunning instrument. We doubt everything and everyone. The only thing we do not doubt is our mind, and that must be doubted the most, because it is so cunning! It is the mind that leads us astray.

Knowledge can build a steel wall around us so that we think we know, though we don’t know. It all remains in the realm of the mind. What the mind thinks that it knows is all within the framework of the mind, and that knowledge can be useless.

Being able to think deeply is a double-edged sword. It can tie us up into more knots or it can cut the knots free.

Many people say, “I think,” but they do not think thoughts in their purity. Thoughts are always mixed with some kind of emotion. When emotion is involved in a thought, the quality of the emotion is very important. If our heart does not have the proper amount of purification it will discolor an emotion. When emotion loses its purity it can turn into hate, greed, and covetousness. The only pure emotion is the emotion of love.

A conscience is nothing else but a subtle energy which always wants to be directed for our own good, and for the good of others.

As we unfold, we draw more from the level of the superconscious, pure consciousness, and that force is very powerful. Everything at its subtlest level is infinitely more powerful than anything at a grosser level. If you drop a two-thousand-ton bomb it might create a big hole, perhaps a square mile, but if you split a tiny atom it will destroy a whole country. Anything existing at the subtlest level is infinitely more powerful.

When we draw those energies from the inner Self, the force is so great that the turbulence in the subconscious mind is brought into balance and tranquillity, so that the ripples start to subside. What science tries to do is tackle that area of the mind with external means, while we tackle that area of the mind by internal means. When this force starts permeating, awakening the subtler levels of the mind, then all the dross and dirt are dissolved and swept out.

It is the mind that invents the satans and gods. The entire universe is nothing but mind and all problems in life are created by the mind. Tutoring that mind, we learn through meditational practices how we can overcome the mind and go beyond it, and there truth is found.

The mind, being a finite mind, could never know everything. Scientists, for example, have been inquiring into the atom, and as they inquire into the atom they come to various subatomic levels, and even reaching there, they feel that there is still finer matter; and the search will go on and on. The real cause, the essence of matter, will never be found with the mind.

The mind is susceptible to the suggestions put to it, and those suggestions can work in a negative or a positive way. The major part of people’s illnesses is imaginary, created by themselves.

The conscious mind is associated invariably with its senses; seeing, touching, smelling, feeling, and hearing. So, when an experience of a subtle nature comes to the conscious level, it is also connected with one of the senses.

People say they think. They only think that they think. They do not really think. The slightest bit of experience in the present triggers off a memory in the past through the law of association.

One of the means the mind uses to project itself into the future is expectation. The expectation of the future is lived now in the present.

Expectation is the root cause of suffering.

The past can be relived in the present, and that is what human beings do. They make themselves miserable by filling their minds with circling thoughts, most of which are of the past.

In the context of the Absolute, the past does not exist and the future does not exist. Only the mind recognizes them.

When you have a headache be thankful, because if it was not manifested outwardly it would still be bottled up inside the mind. The mind, peculiar as it is, can create inner explosions rather than outer explosions—and that is how people end up in asylums.

The fear of facing the future or of turning away from that with which we are so familiar is a sure sign of instability. It is a sure sign of lack of faith and a sure sign of the disbelief in Divinity.

What prevents us from wanting to change? What prevents us from moving out of suffering? Inwardly we would like to get away from suffering, but we are tied and bogged down because of how we have been conditioned. Our mind is nothing more than a product of conditioning.

A negative thought is worse than a rabbit—it just breeds and breeds and breeds. It duplicates itself, triplicates itself, quadruplicates itself, and it does it thousands of times throughout the day.

There are religions that teach that we should believe, believe, believe. They are not wrong. It is not wrong for a child in Grade 1 to be given Grade 1 lessons. Although we know the time will come when the Grade 1 child will reach Grade 12, where there are different lessons to be learned, the Grade 1 lessons are a necessary beginning.

Belief stems from the mind. That is why scriptures and most religions start us off by saying, “Believe”—believe in something above us which is abstract and cannot be proven by the mind. The creator of belief is the mind.

To reach intuition is to reach a level that is very deep within. At that level, the subtle vibrations existing in all mankind become in tune with all the vibrations around us . . . that tuning-in is intuition.

True intuition is neither intellectual nor emotional, it is beyond both qualities. But the intellect and the emotions play their part—they are the instruments through which intuition is portrayed. We can use the analogy of a flute. The flute with all its holes (for variation) can be regarded as our emotional nature. Intellect is the beautiful breath of air that flows through it.

To fight the mind with the mind will never work because the mind is not perfect. The easiest way is to dive deep within. Through our meditational and spiritual practices we draw on that infinite storehouse of glory and grace and the conflicts in the mind subside, and peace comes about.

With the 10 percent of the mind that we use, we can conceive of only a part of the vast continuum, which extends from the primal atom to the highest development of the intellect, and further, to the total unfoldment of the spiritual value of man. When, with our limited minds, we think of man as a whole, or think of the animal, plant, or mineral kingdoms, we are only getting a glimpse of a very small portion of this vast continuum.

Now, as the primal evolutionary force reaches up through the animal kingdom, it being controlled and propelled by itself, there is no impediment put in its path. At the human level, however, is the mind.

The greatest impediment towards self-realization is man’s mind. But within that very mind are the power of discrimination, and the power which is realized through meditational and spiritual practices. These powers will turn the tables and use that same impediment to realize Divinity.

The subconscious mind is forever turbulent because of the currents created in it by all the impressions it contains. A balancing process must take place. Here the three gunas—tamas, rajas, and sattva—exist in their most powerful form because the subconscious mind is very subtle and has the reach of the entire universe. You have known the entire universe. It is contained in your mind. You have traveled a long way through various forms of existences until you have reached the stage of mankind.

All imbalances are caused by friction and friction is caused by knowledge, not in the true sense, but half-baked, where you know a little of this and a little of that. You put it all together and the mind creates a conflict within itself and deludes itself into thinking that it is not well. Knowledge can be dangerous. When knowledge is improperly digested, it causes indigestion. There is not only physical indigestion, but there is mental indigestion too. That is the cause of all illnesses.

Because it is limited, the mind cannot conceive of reality in its truest form. One has to go beyond the limits of relative reality to know and to experience actuality. That is where experience experiences itself, past is no more, present is not there, and there is no future.

It is the nature of the mind not ever to be satisfied because the mind is forever changing, changing, changing. Wherever there is change, there is motion. Satisfaction, peace, and realization come in stillness, not in motion.

The mind continues from the body. There is no division.

A dream is a reliving or a living on a subtler level.

If I tell you who you are, you will only appreciate it on the mind level. Any appreciation on the intellectual level is necessarily limited, because the finite mind cannot comprehend the infinite. But when the realization dawns within you, and you can answer to yourself, by yourself, and for yourself the question, “Who am I, and why am I here?” then you become realized. The you operate in the field of knowingness.

Our mind is connected to the entire universe. So many wires are leading from our mind to all the various facets and aspects of life. When a belief is strong enough, we are activating a force that will bring to us the idea that is required and that is compatible with our minds. After that, with a bit of hard work and proper planning, that belief becomes a reality.

God exists because you exist, you exist because God exists. Nothing in this universe can ever be destroyed. Even a single thought you have in your mind cannot be destroyed, for thought itself is a form of subtle matter.

The human being as he is today is a fully aware person. He is, today, a fully self-realized person, for he is a divine person, and Divinity has within itself full realization and full awareness.

It is a fact that peace, understanding, and realization can only come from within you. No external force or power can create them for you. The creation of that peace and self-realization and understanding wells up from within and the reason is this: it is inherent within you. It is your birthright and it is there. Every human being is born with that Divinity within himself.

Through meditational and spiritual practices, the mind using itself as an instrument, can allow itself to be led from its grosser level to its finest relative, which is the superconscious level. When one reaches the superconscious mind, one reaches the cognition that all is One. The conscious mind is limited, extending only to the environment of the little speck of dust which we call Earth. But the superconscious mind has within its framework the entire universe, and that is how the mind can cognize the entire universe.

By cleansing, ridding the mind of all those impressions, good or bad, you are refining the individual self, and that is how you reach the Universal Self.

When even one person thinks a thought, a good thought or a bad thought, it must affect his environment. The more powerful the thinker, the vaster the range of his thought. That is why an enlightened person who is forever dwelling on the sattvic level can think a thought here and affect someone who is 20,000 miles away. This is how healing works and how questions are answered.