FAQ – About more or less EVERYTHING

Selfless service purifies us immensely

Q: What is BTW meditation for you?

A: BTW is seva (selfless service) for me. I am performing my dharma, duty, as a citizen of the universe. I am giving forth everything, unconditionally. I maintain my purity by controlling and nullifying my expectations. Through BTW meditations, I am trying to serve the society, unconditionally. I really hope it is working!!! Anyways, All those who are associated with me are doing the same. They all are doing it unconditionally. Unfortunately, spirituality is bought and sold these days. The higher the price, the more is the demand. In this scenario, we are trying to give something truly precious to society, without any price tag. I believe that’s the best one could do. I strongly believe that my spirituality is priceless. I am giving you something priceless too. This is why profound grace flows in our meditations. Masters appear and bless everyone. The reason for grace is the lack of conditions and supreme inner purity. Ever since we started conducting the meditation – in October 2007, we have touched many lives positively. I am deeply indebted and grateful to the Almighty for that.

Inner purity gets expressed spontaneously

Q: How can we maintain purity?

A: Purity of body can be maintained through habituating proper hygiene and cleanliness. The mind can be kept pure through devotion and attitude of gratitude. The purity of intellect can be maintained through entertaining selfless action plans. Spiritual purity is achieved when we stop comparisons and perform with detached attention. Purity will establish within, by eliminating expectations slowly and steadily. This also means accepting everyday realities as your own unconscious creation and owning each experience whether good or bad as part of your whole life process. The understanding that the food that comes to your table today is the medicine for you, even if that food is not what you probably would have voluntarily chosen. I am not saying that a vegetarian should eat non-vegetarian food if that’s what is being served. You need not compromise on your vision and dharma.  Resistance of any kind creates agony. Acceptance and adaptability to everyday situations will keep you soft, supple and peaceful. You can also remain pure by making sure every thought, word, and action that takes birth in you, is rooted in love and simplicity. Purity of thought, word and action happen quite automatically, if our attitude is that of selflessness. Selflessness ensures purity. Purity ensures grace. Purity is a state of mind that you automatically achieve when all your transactions are perfectly in tune with your conscience. Nevertheless, please remember that complacency and procrastination amount to tamas. This should not be entertained at all.  Hence, do your very best, without ownership or attachments to the results of action. This will keep you pure.

Meditation is the soul’s call to itself

Q: Who can meditate? suggested age group?

Anyone who can understand the guidance can meditate. Age has no meaning. Inclination towards meditation is good enough. Physical age has nothing to do with spiritual age. In that context, a grandchild could be much older than his grandfather of this life. So, anyone who wants to meditate and can understand the guidance can meditate. Age is no bar.

Q: What position is best for meditation?

A: Any posture where the spine is erect, is good enough for BTW meditations. The problem with lying down is that you could slip into sleep. Otherwise, even lying down on a hard surface is good enough for BTW meditation, apart from sitting in sukhasana (free cross-legged posture) padmasana (lotus posture) or Vajrasana.

Q: Meditation and its need

A: The nature of the human mind is restlessness. Through meditation, we are trying to bring the wandering conscious mind to calmness and dissolution. If a person operates on a perpetual awareness level, he does not need to meditate. That means if he operates with perfect presence of mind, or, if his mind is available with every thought, word, and action, he does not need to meditate. He is perpetually on a meditative mode. He exists in the present. Maximum energy loss happens when the mind oscillates between the past and the future. Past is associated with nostalgia and guilt and future is associated with anxiety. Both are unnecessary. Past is over and the future is yet to be. We have to live in the present. If we create many anxieties, our future will be uncertain. If we walk with determination and purpose, with our mind steady, our future will be picture perfect. Using meditation as escapism from some unwanted situation (or nagging wife – ha ha), is absolutely useless. Then, he is not meditating. He is just pretending. This is also the same for the ritualistic meditators. This will give them no effect. Just like some people say, “Oh, without the morning tea, my day is useless”, this one will say, “Without the morning meditation, I feel incomplete”. He has become a victim of that habit. Any habit that rules you is a hindrance to your spiritual progress. So, we need to shift our consciousness to perpetual meditation. Always be in the present. Always exist in NOW.

Greed of any kind hinders spiritual growth

Q: What hinders spiritual growth?

A: Tendency to swap our own experience for other’s words hinders spirituality. Man stagnates because of constant detours. Any kind of attachment and binding also hinders spiritual growth. This includes habits too. Liberation from everything is the aim. In order to achieve that, we should start accepting ourselves the way we are, with all our deficiencies, pluses and minuses. We should also accept our experiences and own them and be free to express them. It does not matter even if the entire world may laugh at you and consider you as a dreamer. Your own experiences should be cherished and honored. Belief in them is essential to transcend them. This does not mean that you can develop an attachment to them. You should accept them as a personal experience and keep walking further. Never care for other’s opinions about it, unless it is coming from a higher Master. Once we accept ourselves, we can detach from anything. Otherwise, resistance to everything will bind us to all that we resist. This is often why we tend to stagnate. We may not know where or why we are going wrong. Look deeper, you will see that you are resisting something. You are against something. Whatever we energize, stays with us. This includes relationships.

In relationships, the fear of losing invokes attachment. It creates so much bondage that we come back again to live together, through time into eternity. Familiar souls come together to exhaust their karmic vasanas. The roles change, yet they do get together. In short, the emotion element attached to any thought, word, and action essentially comes back as karma. The emotion element adds the incident to your checklist of things to do. This keeps adding as emotions are released unconsciously by people. If we perform any thought, word or action without emotions, objectively, with mindfully with it, there will not be any backlog. A job well done and well completed. We can easily move on. The mind will not stay with it anymore. The mind will stay with you because you have moved on. The mind will stay with your present moment. Past is well performed in the status of dharma (duty).

Money is good. Attachment and ego related to money are bad.

Q: Money

A: Why do we think that money is bad? This is a wrong notion. Money is good. Money is matter. Matter is made out of energy. Elements are also matter. Our physical body is made out of elements. It is the same as money. Money is good. Emotions attached to money are bad. This includes attachment and ownership. These make you happy or sad. Both are to be understood as bondage to money. There is a saying, “If you have a handful of currency, you own it. If you have currency till your neck, it owns you”. So, be in a state where you act as a custodian of money. Be grateful for that role. The money will stay with you and will be useful to you. The moment you shift your stance and become a watchman for your wealth, you will start suffering because of the associated attachments and anxiety. Money should be considered primarily by understanding its nature. A. Money is a terrestrial transactional tool. It travels from hand to hand. Nobody owns money and we are always only a temporary custodian of money. B. If it stagnates, it loses its potential. C. Attachment to wealth creates anxiety and fear. D. Non-attachment along with gratitude for wealth creates liberation within. E. Money develops an ego and if that is checked, we stay free and liberated. F. Money has no value at the time of birth, till we are of age, at the time of death and also during our sleep. G. Money enhances power and social standing. If ego, attachment, and greed also grow accordingly, we will have a spiritually poor existence. If humility, compassion, and grace grow with the monetary richness, we gain a lot in life. So, wise men handle money with detachment and gratitude. Ordinary people handle money with ego and pride. They remain extremely poor inside, while rich outside. They trade love for money, in other words, they fall into isolation and lack of love from the world because of their fear and anxiety of losing their wealth. The wise men, gracefully handle their money and use it for the well being of themselves, their family and the society. They will then earn love and grace from the world too. Only they are truly rich. The one who has a rich heart is the real rich man. When we are capable of bringing happiness and solace to at least some people who are not immediately related to us, our life becomes meaningful. Otherwise, as an anxious watchman of our own wealth, our life gets wasted. Usually, for such people, their next generation will waste their hard earned money. The new generation does not know the emotions behind this money. They will squander it in wild abandon. This breaks the heart of their fathers and usually, they die heart-broken and helpless. What they predominantly carry to their next life will be this helplessness. The graceful rich man leaves behind a legacy of selflessness to his children and they learn by the example of their father. They also learn to give. These graceful fathers die a peaceful death after a life well-lived. True happiness is in giving. Give only what you can give. But, learn to give without inhibitions and emotions. Give to the needy without any feeling of doer-ship. You will stay liberated and peacefully happy.

Man travels through time

Q: Chronology of action

A: Behind every action, there is a word. Behind every word, there is a thought. Behind every thought, there is a “vasana” (inclination or inherent desire). Behind every desire is the prarabdha or karmic push from the past. This is the chronology of action. Karmic push – vasana – thought – word and action.

Strength of Gunaas determine our Character

Q: Gunas.

A: The nature based on how we act depends on our gunas (primary qualities). The gunas are also classified as satwa, rajas and tamas. Our character is based on the nature of our gunas – which one is relatively more predominant than the other. A rajasic man will always be hyperactive and will also be subject to the swing of emotions. A satwic man will automatically start his day between 3 and 6 am, at the time called Brahma Muhurtha, the subtlest of all times. A man who possesses predominantly tamasic nature will tend to procrastinate and indulge in addictions of intoxicants. In everyone, there is a mixture of gunas. Each cocktail has degree variations. Depending on the strength of ingredients, and which guna is in predominance, determines the flavor of the man. Gunas subtly create bondage with senses and aid our desire for sensory objects. Gunas exist in perfect balance or equanimity in the Divine Consciousness or enlightenment. This is a karma less state. Its imbalance induces karma. Everything is born out of the subtle Divine. “Prakriti” (nature of beings) is born out of the Divine. Gunas are born out of nature.

Gunas are similar to ego states

Q: Gunas are ego states?

A: Not quite, but close. In order to understand gunas easily, we could consider them as close to our ego states, such as child, adult and parent ego states. Indeed gunas determine our response levels, just like ego states do.

Egolessness creates oneness

Q: I feel so close to you, as if you are a part of our family. Even though we met recently, I feel as if I know you since ages.

A: Indeed, this is true. We all are related. We are spiritually related. Our familiarity is due to our past life connections. We have walked this path together in other lives too. I came back to serve you in your spiritual growth. Spirituality, unlike material possessions, starts from where you stopped in your last life.  The continuity is never disrupted ever. Masters will appear to guide you time and again, over lifetimes, until you merge with your Father. This is the duty of Masters. They appear as road signs, every time you take a detour or deviate from the main road.

This will continue…

Lots of love

M

No Fear. Eternity Belongs to us