What is the Attention?

The Attention – online Q and A No. 148
Recorded: 17 September 2023 with US participants

Start of Questions and Answers

Question:   So, I’d like to talk a little bit more about ‘attention’, today, go into ‘attention’.  It’s such a fascinating thing.  It seems to be something very special because if your attention is on the mind in the world, you only know those temporary things.  And of course Your message is that the attention has to shift onto the Self to know what’s eternal, what’s lasting.  So, Baba, what is the attention exactly?

Babaji Maharaj:   In the earlier years also, I used to talk about this. Like for meditation, I tried to give an understanding of a definition; ‘Your attention to,’ that means you pay attention.  So, you practice so that you pay attention.  In the paying attention, you don’t have to think anything, you don’t have to hold on to any thought or visions.  Just, you have to pay attention.  This is possible when you apply your mind because mind is nothing but you.  You are the combination of consciousness and energy.  This is what it is.  So, just now you are paying attention to your imaginations – for everybody, human beings.  So, they need to stop and withdraw that attention of the consciousness, then its attention goes to itself.  That is the beauty of the attention.  You are that soul, but common people are unable to pay attention.  That’s why they are not aware of it – how they exist as the eternal entity as the soul.  So, that is what attention means.  You pay your attention.  So, now you are paying attention to world and your body.  It needs to be turned to itself.  So, the sucked one needs to be withdrawn; your mind needs to be withdrawn from its imagination.  When it stops the imagination, then it can pay attention to the right and the truthful thing about itself, which is an eternal entity.

Question:   So, if the attention is not given to the mind, then the mind will become quiet and the attention goes to itself?

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah, exactly.  You always pay attention to the thoughts and visions that come.  They are there because of your own imagination previously done.  That’s when we try to tell, whenever you sit for meditation, in the beginning thousands of thoughts, millions are coming.  Thoughts and visions could be coming.  And you pay attention and you get involved, you try to analyze.  If you don’t pay attention at all, then you don’t have to analyze.  You don’t have to make any judgment.

If you all remember, I have told the story of King Vikram and the ghost.  So, King Vikram’s guru was doing a sacrifice worship to Goddess, and needed to offer either a king’s head or a realized soul, that head, anything as the offering to Mother Goddess.  So, he sends the king (the king is a devotee of that guru only).  So, he orders, “O Vikramaditya, I need you to go and bring the ghost that is hanging on that tree.”  He said “Okay, no problem.”  He was a very valiant person and he knew all techniques.  So, he just went and got hold of the ghost and started carrying.  But then it started putting up a condition.  It used to tell every night; it continues like that – the ghost said, “I am going to tell a story and then ask a question.”  So, after listening, if you understand, still you don’t want to answer, your head will be broken into a thousand pieces.  But if you open up your mouth, you don’t maintain silence, then also I will escape from your hands.  That is possible.”   So, such a challenging thing was given to the king.  Some spiritual concepts also can be made.  They say that, in a thousand nights, every day he used to go and try to carry the ghost.  But the ghost would tell a story and he had to answer because he knew; he was very wise.  He used to listen to the ghost’s story.  The last day he starts thinking, “Now how to take this ghost?  Every time it tells a story, I know the answer.  So, I have to tell.  The moment I open my mouth, it escapes.”  Then he comes with an idea.  “Now, tonight, let me not listen to its story.  Let me remain introverted, mentally.  Let it talk anything.  If I don’t hear it, then my head will not be broken into thousand pieces, so I don’t have to open my mouth and answer.”   So, thus, he captured the ghost finally.  He won and he could bring that to his guru.  Well, the story says a little more.  The ghost says after surrendering, “Now you have become very… real cleverness has been used by you.  You did not open the mouth and also survived by not listening to my story.  So, then if you go, your guru will ask you to do pranaam.  When you do the sashtang prostrations, then he will cut your head.  His job will be done.  Instead of that, you request your guru to show how to prostrate.  So, once he prostrates, cut his head.  Here, it is either you kill or get killed.”   So, like that it says, and the story ends.

So here also, every day you are listening to your ghost story in your mind.  You are listening and that ghost escapes.  The ghost here is the identity of the Self.  That escapes, and only the thoughts and visions are there.  So, you have to become silent.  Then its attention as we were discussing, attention, it goes to itself.  That’s what is needed.  One needs to understand this point.  Then meditation becomes so beautiful and smooth; everything will be wonderful.  You don’t listen to stories of your mind which is the ghost.  Then the mind will always exist.  You cannot finish the mind.  So that’s what happens.

Question:   So, the mind produces all the thoughts and imaginations.  But then the mind must be more than that because it also has the ability to just watch without getting involved in a thought.

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah, definitely.  Time and again, I have tried to tell this point.  There are two aspects of the mind.  One is it is able to watch and another is it is able to think.  So here, first you practice watching so that the mind forgets to think.  As it stops thinking and forgets thinking, then all thoughts and visions will disappear.  They are all there as long as mentally you hold on to it.  Once you stop doing that one, it will all disappear.  Then what remains is the Pure Consciousness.  Its consciousness, attention is always to itself.  That is the beauty of it.  So, that’s what you have to achieve through meditation, paying attention.  First you pay attention so that you are just watching and you are not doing anything.  So, then you become one with yourself finally.  Automatically it happens.  So, if you remove, from here it comes to here.  It cannot be destroyed.  Mind cannot be destroyed.  So, if you just withdraw your mind from the thoughts and visions and just watch, then it shifts; its attention shifts to itself.  A consciousness is now hidden into the body’s reflections by the brain.  So, the moment you are able to withdraw that, make the mind quiet.  If the mind becomes quiet it gets detached from the brain’s reflections also.  So that’s when it becomes aware of itself.  “Ah, this is me.”  Like “I am That” – type, “I am this.”

Question:   Baba, it’s actually a very subtle aspect of the mind that is the attention that becomes aware first of the Self.  Is that kind of “I am” state?

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah, “I am” state in that duality is there still.  So, then this “I am” state also comes.  Like you see, you are trying to watch or analyze about yourself as a separate entity.  You cannot watch yourself.  You can feel yourself, your existence.  But you cannot see in the naked eyes.  Just like I always tell, nobody has seen the mind in the naked eyes, but they can feel that there is a mind by thinking, by thoughts and visions.  So, that is why silence of the mind needs to be achieved.  Then its attention automatically turns to itself.

Question:   So Baba, that feeling state, when the mind becomes almost completely silent, and you feel like you are unbounded, you don’t have any boundaries, you feel unlimited.  But yet you still are.  You are aware; you have an awareness of your existence.  But there is still this “I am unbounded”.

Babaji Maharaj:   Exactly, when all thoughts and visions all dissolve, that’s when you are liberated.  Means, otherwise with those imaginations, you are undergoing since time immemorial all happiness, unhappiness, tension, fear, everything was there; so much of stress.  Once all the thoughts and visions disappear, now mind has stopped imagining, it is just watching then its attention goes to itself.  Because consciousness … beauty is that.  It itself has the ability to pay attention.  And without paying attention it cannot keep quiet.  Either it has to be in itself, or it has to be thinking something.  That’s what happens.  So, you stop thinking, then its attention goes to itself.  The moment… that is the stage you are talking, “I am”-ness is there still.  Still the duality is there.  “O,” you start thinking, “This is it; this is the truth.”  Then slowly the consciousness totally shifts onto the real Self, detaching from the body’s reflections at all times.  Then you will be wondering about yourself, “O, this is it.”  Like that it happens.

Question:   So, just automatically then, since there is no real mind or even intention at that point, just automatically that “I am”-ness or that feeling of existing gets absorbed into the eternal existence or into the Self?

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah, eventually when that happens, means when the mind becomes totally silent, as it starts becoming silent and silent and silent, it starts going towards its origin which we recognize as Divinity or the Self or Ultimate Truth, Tatva, this or that, anything; all these terminologies suits that One.  It starts paying attention.  So, slowly it comes closer and closer, then that “I am” thought also disappears, then it becomes one with the Self.  That is the Ultimate Truth.  That is the Divine, Divinity.  You can become one with that One.  That’s when you are totally liberated, and you are… just before final, more deeply to merge with it, this consciousness of existence will be there.

Question:   So, Baba, what happens to mind as attention and imaginations at that point once the merger happens?

Babaji Maharaj:   Mind is there, but because all thoughts and visions all have dissolved, means disappeared, it’s not there anymore.  Then it becomes Pure Consciousness.  That is the nearest word we can use.  Consciousness means you are conscious of yourself.  You are conscious of this world.  So, attention shifts to itself, then the consciousness is conscious of Itself.  It is not paying attention to anywhere else, but it is just in Itself.  So that’s what happens.  This is known as the Pure Consciousness.  Though the identity of the Ultimate is beyond any identities, attributeless, is totally beyond, but just for sake of understanding, we try to give a clue to the student so that they pick up the thread that they have to become silent mentally.  That the mind itself has to understand.  “It’s enough Shaolin.  I need to go back home.  I need to become quiet to go back home.”  That’s all.

Question:   Now Baba, You’ve said that once it sees That, once it goes back to Itself, it won’t leave again.  It can’t be drawn back into the illusion.  Is that correct?

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah, definitely.  But as long as the body is alive, he will have to use his consciousness to imagine so that he can imagine the nearest terminology to give the right to clue so that the understanding shall strike the mind of the student properly;  “Ah, this is what has to happen.”  Then it becomes easy what to do.  Once they understood, “My mind has to become quiet.  I have to become quiet.”  Then you practice to remain quiet mentally.  So that’s what it is.  That’s the Pure Consciousness.  Then once further merger happens, everything finishes.  No consciousness, no name, and no wanting to know, no knowing anything, no awareness, no Self, no this or that.  Everything disappears.

Means, imagine one time, all of you.  Suddenly if you become space, what happens?  You won’t know anything about yourself.  You are the space.  You don’t think, you don’t imagine, you don’t feel anything.  You are beyond all attributions.  So that’s what is the beauty.  Like yesterday’s Zoom class also we were discussing space as the void place.  That is why the matter can pass through its surface.  I said, “Instead of telling this in a negative way, why can’t we recognize space as the Divinity has a special quality that it allows all matter to pass through its surface, and also all matter to exist in its surface.”  So, that is the beauty of the space.  Space has allowed everything to exist in its…  It is like we have taken some time and space on lease from the space, so that we need to exist in this body.  That’s why we requested.  The space has provided the Earth, the Sun, the Moon, all these things for us.  So, like that it happens.  But once that final thing happens, everything disappears.  When everything disappears, means everything disappears.

Question:   That doesn’t sound very interesting?

Babaji Maharaj:   That interesting thing also will disappear.

Question:   So, Baba, what’s the purpose of existence, of a human existence?

Babaji Maharaj:   Human existence is that you have a well-developed brain through which you can discriminate, understand certain facts so that you put an effort and go back to your real Self.  Here, if we want to go back to real Self means it is not hiding anywhere behind the Moon or Jupiter or Neptune; it is you who is here.  So, like that you have to analyze and understand.  This brain helps in thinking.  Once you slowly start meditating, then your understanding will come from within.  So, that is the purpose of the human.  Once in a life cycle opportunity is there, so that you can realize your real Self, you can pay attention to your real Self as the eternal entity, and you can remain in yourself at peace.  Because you will also realize, that You that is the Ultimate Truth does not need anything for its existence, does not need anything for its Supreme Peace.  It itself is the Peace.  So, does not need anything for its operations, nothing.  Whereas you see, the moment we are born in this body, we need everything; we need oxygen, we need some milk, we need to be fed.  Like that throughout, and seventy years still we are struggling; we need to feed this body.  Needs are there for the body.  The maximum also if I have renounced, still it is not possible to renounce the food taking, not possible to renounce the body itself, then I won’t be able to teach.  It will go one day, but we don’t have to worry.  But whereas the real Self, no such things, no need of anything and nobody’s certificate is needed for that also.  It simply exists in Itself.

Question:   So, Baba, spirituality then is basically trying to discover, move beyond the world of dualities, the world of our mind which is always going to be either peace and happiness or fear and suffering.  So, the idea, maybe when it is peace and happiness you are not so interested in moving beyond, but if there is peace and happiness today, sooner or later it is going to be suffering; there is awful lot of suffering in the world.  But what You are talking about, spirituality is just a virtue that you can arise above that, that you in fact are above that, but somehow you have your head in the clouds and you don’t see it.

Babaji Maharaj:   Exactly, it alerts you cannot depend on this world or your body because it is all impermanent for your peace and happiness.  A certain thing which is impermanent, how can it give you a permanent happiness?  That is all.  If you depend on this body, today I can give you some teaching, tomorrow this body may not be there to give any teaching.  So that side by side, like the gallery and the speaker go side by side some time, the same way you have to meditate also, go on meditating so that you also achieve one day.  “Before the body shall go,” that is what Krishna tells. “Arjuna, before death shall claim thee, there is one opportunity.  Go to the knowers of truth.  With all humility, paying reverence, sit at Their lotus feet, seeking Their permission.”  All protocols are also explained.  Not that you just go to a Realized person and ask Him to tell you about everything, not that way.  There needs to be some humility, need to have reverence, protocol.  Like if you go to meet an emperor or a prime minister or a president, you may have to follow such protocol.  The same way you go to the Guru, sitting at the lotus feet, seeking the permission of the Master, then ask with intelligent questions.  Then when the Master teaches you, adopting such methods, achieve that truth to yourself.

Question:   So, Baba, I want to jump back to the idea of the Self.  I was kind of jokingly said it didn’t look very appealing to be Self-realized.  But You have said that that state is aware –  there is no thought, but it is infinite; it is such fullness.  But you are aware of that fullness, is that correct? There is some awareness of something?

Babaji Maharaj:   We can tell, until this body exists, the Self-realized soul also has the total awareness.  But only when the body drops only, finally merges hundred percent, and everything is over, finished.  Don’t ask anything else after that.  [laughs] Like that.

Question:   Okay.  Alright.  Baba, a yogi’s body is subject to same afflictions that any other human body is subject to.  How does a yogi rise above suffering?

Babaji Maharaj:   Because He is totally aware of the Self and the consciousness which often can be becoming a mind; the yogi does not allow it to happen in His own consciousness.  Even if like a little bit, like today if I am talking and answering your question, I had to apply my consciousness to brain; that automatically happens, then with the reflection the mind is able to answer your questions.  But finally, everything is over.  So, till then, the yogi also uses the imagination.  But what the benefit is, we do not allow the consciousness to go further into thought after thought, thought after thought.  After one thought, we stop it.  After one glass of water, we stop it.  Not that we go on drinking until we don’t die.  Anything.  You eat one ice cream, two ice cream, how much you are going to eat?  Like that you have to stop somewhere.  So that stops here also, here.  Until then, once you understand, you become aware.  So, until the body is dropped, we keep quiet.  We don’t talk or think too much more than necessarily.  One thought is enough to answer your question.  And that thought also, I don’t have to imagine.  Spontaneously it comes, then I tell.  So, that is how a yogi after Realization waits for the body to come to an end.  Still, there is no anxiousness because it will be over one day; it will go.  Even if I jump or dance or hit, bang on the wall, it will die one day.  I don’t have to worry about it.  Nothing.  As long as it is there, we keep teaching others.  Whoever come, we try to teach, “O meditate.  You do this one, you do this one, do you meditate,” answer your questions.  Like, that we keep doing.   One day [clicks tongue] Babaji attained Mahasamadhi.  “Where do we have to make His samadhi?” Like that, that thing comes.  It’s over.

Question:   So, Baba, even, while a yogi is behaving in the world, answering questions, He’s always aware that He’s really the Unbounded Awareness.

Babaji Maharaj:   He is acting in a drama on the stage.  He acts so beautifully.  Nobody can make out that He is the actor.  They will start thinking He seems to be real, whether evil, good or bad or not anything.  But He is well aware, “I’m only acting, I’m not actually evil.”  The moment the drama is over, He comes out of the stage and He is aware of Himself.  Like that that all the time that awareness is there.  Even when I’m imagining, I am imagining only for sake of communication and understanding.  More than this, there is no need to go on thinking.  I don’t become excited.  Like when a question comes, like I answer.  Afterwards, I don’t become excited.  I don’t go on thinking.  “What else I can tell Agastya?   What else I can tell Agastya?  What else I can tell?”   To your question, that spontaneously came then done – until you don’t ask the next question.

Question:   So, the way the yogi is different – first of all, He’s always aware that He’s Infinite.  Secondly, when a question comes up, the mind will come up with the answer spontaneously, not with a lot of deliberation.  We all notice that Your answers always just come instantly.  There’s not a lot of deliberation about it.  So, the answer comes spontaneously and as soon as it’s done, mind goes back to silence.  Our minds are constantly thinking – even if we are idle.  Even if we’re idle, maybe we’re not trying to think of anything, if we are just sitting, the mind, even if we’re not paying attention to what’s in the mind, it’s still got stories going on, memories, imaginations, things that happened when I was two years old, things that are going to happen tomorrow.  Those things are going on, then the attention might go to one of them and start building, putting life into that and imagining that and you get off in that dream.  It’s just one story after the other.

Babaji Maharaj:   That’s what we tell.  It has become habitual – acquired habits of the mind.  That needs to be stopped.

Question:   So, in Your mind, for You Baba, You don’t have that.  It goes into just peace, stillness?

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah.  Once I answer or once this session is over, I’m at peace.  It doesn’t go into thinking, thinking, thinking again and again.  And it does not imagine further of any such answers, then it will end up in imagination only.  Not the spontaneous truth.  The spontaneous thing is the truth is coming out.

Question:   Right.  Baba, You’ve said that the mind cannot give us the truth.  Anything the mind creates is not the truth.  So, how do we know the truth of our existence?

Babaji Maharaj:   See now, all humanity, all of the students, all of you there understand that the mind imagines.  Thoughts and visions are there.  That is the quality that the mind is imagining.  And you understand.  As long as the imagination goes, it cannot become silent.  It has to think.  Because the mind is imagining, that imagination – how can it be the truth?  You can be creative.  You can create beautiful things.  That is a different thing.  But how can that be the truth?  A truth cannot be created.  It cannot be cooked up.  That’s what generally when a person tells a lie, it is said “he is cooking up a lie.”  Here, it cannot happen.  The truth is different.  Otherwise, the mind keeps cooking stories.  One after another, it tells this answer, it tells this answer.  If we imagine “What shall I tell Agastya?  Let me make it a little more colorful.  Let me talk all these mythical things.”  And it ends up talking mythical things.  “My consciousness came out and it hit the wall and again it came back”, that type of answers will come.  If you imagine [laughs]. You got it.

Question:   Baba, just as an example, let’s say that you look at a car and say that is a white 57 Ford.  Well, the truth is, it is a white 57 Ford.  There is some kind of relative truth there, so what kind of truth are You talking about?

Babaji Maharaj:   At this point, it is very important to understand – it is white because you have learned to recognize it as white.  Nobody knows what it is.  But you will tell it is white in color because you have become habitual.  You have learnt it somewhere.  Maybe the teacher said, or somebody, elder said, parent told, something they said. Entire world, every terminology –  it’s imagination.  It appears to be white simply because you are imagining it to be white.  All the people here will appear as evil because I am thinking them to be evil.  Otherwise, nobody knows.  I don’t know what they are actually.  Whether they are human beings, whether they are anything else, whether they are this or that.  Nobody knows. But yet if we imagine, “This is Geordie and this is somebody else, that is somebody else”, we go on telling the name, so they appear to be so. Geordie appears to be Geordie because I have imagined him to be Geordie.  And we all have accepted him to be Geordie, coincidence.  That’s why he is Geordie.  But what is Geordie really?  Who is Geordie?  Where is he?  Means about the Self.  I am just giving an example.  That Self, that is the real.  So that can be revealed only when your consciousness is not into any type of imagination.

Question:   So, Baba, we come to You, the enlightened ones to learn about that Truth which is permanent and not changing.  Because these relative truths that we live in day to day in our mind, those are all… basically we have given definitions to everything.  The mind has had experiences.  Like when we were a year and a half old, maybe we didn’t have any words yet.  But the brain developed and we started applying words and meanings to everything.  And we have built this whole reality and continued to build that.  And it is built out of all these words and ideas that we have accepted and that we call that reality.  So, if it looks like that, it is a white car.  So, when we see something that looks like that, we have given it the name ‘white.’  We have given it the name ‘car.’

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah, that’s why it appears to be so. And often we use another relative existence to name it or to understand or call it.  Like, “This car is milky-white.”  Just like the milk is white.  Same whiteness is here.  So, this is why it is milky-white.  Like that we have imagined.  And this imagination is coming since time immemorial.  So, all of us in the world have forgotten that everything we are simply imagining.  None of us know what the truth is.

Question:   Imagining and defining – we are giving definitions to everything.

Babaji Maharaj:   Everything we give definition.  So before, you were named as Charles Seward when you were born, what were you?  You don’t even remember, probably.  Did you ever have any other physical body?  This is the body which has come and that identification because the parent first wanted to call you as Charles.  Then they gave the name.  Everybody started calling “Hi Charles, hi Charles.”  That is what happened.  The airline also calls you “Charles Seward” and then you rush to the aircraft. [laughs]

Question:   You have seen that a lot, haven’t You?

Babaji Maharaj:   Suddenly, that joke came to mind. [laughs] So, all is imagination really – in science, in technology, in spirituality, everywhere to communicate a certain extent.  But if it is a yogi, skillfully He uses only a minimum imagination that is required.  And He tries to induce the meaning into the mind of the student so that he can get the right clue.  “Divinity means this.  Anything else cannot be Divine.  It will disappear.”  So, the student gets the right thing.  “O, this is what I am supposed to do.”  Otherwise, if he is not understanding it becomes so difficult to achieve the silence also.

Question:   What we imagine is important, Baba.  It can make our life miserable or it can make it better.

Babaji Maharaj:   Exactly.  If the mind was possible for everybody to all the time imagine happiness and in everything see only happiness, then the problem wouldn’t have been there.  But it doesn’t happen like that because the mind develops likes and dislikes.  “I like this.  I don’t like this.  If I don’t like this, this is wrong.  This is not giving happiness.  This is giving unhappiness.”  So, like that we imagine.  If only everything – somebody slaps, “Oh, I am very happy,” somebody praises, “I am very happy” – if that can happen, then you can imagine.  But you have to imagine all the time that you are happy.  But you end up imagining unhappiness also.  That’s how stress comes.

Question:   Yes.  Okay, Baba one more question and we’ll take people’s questions.  A couple people have given me questions to ask.  Some of them I’ve asked.  So, attention in the moment – what is the relation between attention and the moment?  The here and now, the present moment and attention, is there a relationship there?

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah, we do tell that when you practice meditation, it neutralizes the mind into the present, drawing it back, otherwise it is brooding about the past or is anxious about the future.  So, when in the present, then after sometime it is always in the present, then everything disappears.  All attributions, all good or bad, anything recognized, right or wrong, everything disappears.  Such a person, if they can be all the time in the present, is just present that is all, nothing else.  Just the existence.  That is what one can experience by coming into this creation like this and becoming a human being.  This is possible because once one single Self remains, there is nothing to experience.

Question:   So, Baba, when you become totally in the present, that means that I guess you’re not remembering any of your impressions and imaginations, they all disappear.

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah, that’s what the clue I was trying to tell. Present has nothing to say.  Simply it is peace and contentment, those are the nearest words.  Because it will not search for anything else when the mind is in the present.  It doesn’t need anything else.  It’s always happy, at peace.

Question:   I think Baba, meditators, regular meditators, people who have been meditating a long time, they do experience that, that they’re much more in the present moment.  They are not thinking, they’re just not interested, or not thinking about all the other things that are stirring, the mind’s stirring.

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah, I have heard several serious meditators who have learned from us telling, “Just I have peace, that is all.  I don’t know anything else.  I have the peace.”

Question:   Patience, this is a question somebody asked, “Baba, could You discuss the importance of patience?”  It’s one of your three important things, dedication, discipline and patience.  But could You discuss more about patience.  Patience that we have to have with ourselves, patience with others, and also the patience that You must have to have with us.  We’re pretty slow.

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah, you see, about the patience, if you lose patience, you become confused, stressful, and you don’t know what to do.  You might end up doing something else other than what was needed to be done.  All these things can happen if you don’t have the patience.  If you have the patience, like you are trying to meditate, and the meditation is not coming, that’s because you are not understanding that you need to watch, and then you lose patience, you will feel like banging your head onto the wall.  “Why is it not coming, the Self-realization?”  Hundred thousand times we tell, many we come across, they still expect that “The Master should keep their hand on the head and I become Realized”.  You just have to become quiet.  No power by keeping your hand on your head can make you quiet.  You have to practice to remain quiet.  That’s what a real yogi teaches.  A real Master never tells, “I will do it for you, I can silence your mind.”  Nobody has told, nobody has done it.  So, you have to practice that one.  So, that’s what a Master tells; that is the truth.  That’s in the presence, you bring it to the presence.  If you practice that well, and you can silence the mind, then you will see the wonders that happen, then the secrets are revealed.

Question:   But Baba, people can get those inspirational moments like where you see some truth, or you feel some peace, or suddenly you have a quiet, expanded moment.  It may not be permanent, but it gives you inspiration and fortitude to keep going forward.  Can a Guru do that?  Gurus do do that.

Babaji Maharaj:   See, even in the midst of a war field, war, or any other confused states, if you can have patience, you will feel relaxed.  Relax.  The sky is not going to fall on our head.  Don’t have to worry that much.  Relax.  Then you will get time to think and sort out things.  Come out of the confusion is possible.  Say you are meditating, that meditation is not coming.  You need to have patience.  “This is very infinite.  I cannot tie.  Simply I have to become quiet.  I’m not quiet – I am analyzing, thought appearing, I am analyzing, thought appearing.”  Slowly, when you learn, and then you develop more patience; when you develop more patience, you will learn more.  So that is the essence of patience, is very, very important.  Because this is the most infinite thing.  Mind or Self cannot be tied with a rope, you know? Mind has to become quiet.  “Tie it with the rope, it will become quiet” –  there is no such answer for mind becoming quiet.  Simply mind has to become quiet.  How?  By remaining quiet it will become quiet.  But how this is possible is the puzzle.  Simply you watch.  Thus, you can become… you are quiet.  Let thoughts are coming, anything coming, it will all dissolve and disappear.  One day you will see, you are unable to think anything, imagine anything.  You have lost all imagination.  It is there.  It’s all over.  It is not bothering you anymore.

Question:   Yes, it is hard to stop thinking to try to solve the problem.

Babaji Maharaj:   Like somebody blames me; that person blaming me will not be troublesome.  It will not give me any stress.  But if I entertain a thought that he is blaming me, that can become painful.  This is the importance of imagination and not imagining.  That person blamed me.  That’s no problem.  If I don’t take it to the mind seriously, it doesn’t come to the mind,  I am unaffected.  But if I start imagining, “O, he is blaming me.  O, he is blaming me.  I am hurt.  I am troubled.  I am losing my peace.”  That’s when it happens.  So, you lose the patience.  So, if you have that patience – “No problem.  He has lost his senses.  That’s why he is trying to do this thing.  He has become a monkey like that.  Let him do it.  It’s no problem. Just by him blaming me  I am not becoming that thing, what he is accusing me.”  So, this patience gives this type of wisdom applications properly.  Often, ninety-nine percent we can see, unnecessarily we keep arguing.  We keep talking, we keep thinking, we lose temper.  Ninety-nine percent we can keep ourselves free.  Just like in one terabyte, ninety-nine percent if you keep it as free space, how much you can work in the hard drive.  [laughs] So, here is the hard drive, brain also.  If you lessen that one, you can do wonderful things.  Wonderful truths get revealed.  Say, about the world, you have understood now, you are talking – everything; white car is white because we have imagined it to be white.  This understanding is not an ordinary thing for anybody.

Question:   Thank You, Baba.  There is a question in the chat.  If the mind is not Self-realized, what happens when the body ends?

Babaji Maharaj:   It will assume next incarnation because it is visualizing.  It is not quiet.  So, based on the visualization, the intensity of thoughts are formed and once the brain completely dies the mind gets detached and assumes next birth.  So, never-ending – again and again you are born, again and again you have to die.  You are born, you die, you are born.  Until you don’t cleanse your mind totally once for all.  Then the mind that is the Pure Consciousness simply remains in Itself, merges. It has no rebirth.

Question:   Hi Babaji, it’s Chris.  Thank You for talking to us.  In Your book You talked about in deep meditation You achieved complete absolute attention on the Self.  I think You already answered my question.  It’s about patience, which was great that You mentioned it.  I had an experience when I was in high school.  I came home from a game and it was snowing out and I got out of the car and the snow was so silent and so peaceful.  I think that was my first experience with meditation in this lifetime.  I was totally taken care of, I wasn’t Chris,  I was just absorbed in the moment.  So, my question is how do I get back to that?  I know I need to practice and have patience, but it was so deep that I never got back to that deep state of peace.  Thank You.

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah, true. You are answering and you are questioning.  Everything is there.  That’s so wonderful, a profound experience you had.  So that has led you towards spirituality, and now no shortcut.  You have to work out with meditation.  Practice remaining quiet in meditation.  Practice just watching, means just remaining quiet.  So, anyway, anywhere anything, while you are active in the world you just don’t bother about the result do it as a duty.  At least eighty percent of the thoughts will disappear.  It will not be bothering you anymore.  Or in meditation, totally you become silent – practice like that.  This is a practice you have to achieve.  Nobody else can achieve that practice for yourself.

Same Questioner:   Great.  Thank You so much.

Babaji Maharaj:   We will be there to inspire you.  Bless you.  Pray for you.

Same Questioner:   Thank You so much.  Thank You.

Question:   Pranaams Baba, it is Nick.  I just wanted to see if I could understand this a little bit better in my mind.  So, when we’re speaking of the eternal Self as Brahman, are You saying that Brahman does not witness the worlds because the worlds don’t exist.  The worlds are only being created by individual minds and Brahman is not a part of that?  So, it doesn’t in fact witness the worlds?

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah, the Ultimate Truth, Brahman what you are talking, it simply exists in itself.  That is known as the Mahasamadhi.  Maha is like a Supreme samadhi.  It’s totally unaware so much is happening due to that Brahman.

Same Questioner:   So, when we speak of the Self as an eternal witness, what is the witness factor?  What does it witness?

Babaji Maharaj:   You see, when a person becomes realized while alive in the body, this body witnesses this world, the appearance.  He witnesses means, he does not get involved into this world with thoughts or with visualizing.  He won’t get involved.  He’s just quiet.  In this body that’s just there, that’s all. That is what the witness means.

Same Questioner:   Okay.  And so that’s why it disappears once the body is gone.  That’s what You meant by saying it all disappears and just merges back for a Realized soul.

Babaji Maharaj:   Definitely, yes.

Same Questioner:   Okay.  Thank You so much, Baba.

Question:   Baba is ‘witness’ the right word because it implies that there’s somebody watching, that there’s an ‘I.’  I can imagine the ‘I am’ witnessing. but I can’t imagine Pure Awareness witnessing anything.

Babaji Maharaj:   You see, generally like in the languages of court, ‘witness’ means that person was not involved in the murder, but he witnessed the murder.  That type of understanding.  That’s what the witness means.  I am watching this world but I am not involving.  I’m only a witness.  I’m not taking sides.

Question:   Yes, that ‘I’ thing though.

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah.  I don’t have partiality “Let me bless only this person, not this person.”  I’m not taking sides.  I’m only a witness.  One may have faith.  Another may not be able to have a faith.  I witness that.  But I’m not getting involved.  I’m teaching every day, “You need to have faith.  You need to have faith.”  One might pick up my teachings.  Another may not be able to pick up the teachings.  I’m just witnessing that.  I don’t get excited with the person who picks up.  I don’t go into depression with the person who doesn’t pick up.  My practice is perfect.

Question:   So, that’s really kind of explaining the condition when you’ve become the Parabrahman.  You’re not involved.  There’s not really a witness.  You’re witnessing.  Meaning they’re not involved.  But it’s not like “I am watching.”

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah, that’s what I was trying to explain.  A witness is only in duality.  This body, this body watching this world.  Both are two different entities.  That is the witness.  But yet when this body watches the world, the mind doesn’t go into spinning.  No imagination occurs.

Question:   Pranaams Babaji.  Are presence and watching the same thing?

Babaji Maharaj:   By watching, you bring the mind into the present.

Same Questioner:   So, the watching facilitates the presence.

Babaji Maharaj:   Definitely.  Yes, exactly.

Same Questioner:   Can I ask another quick question?

Babaji Maharaj:   Yes.

Same Questioner:   Visions and thoughts are made up of analyzing and judging and also ego, my idea of who I am and all those different attachments?

Babaji Maharaj:   Exactly.  You’re right.  That’s how it is made.  Once this is removed, everything disappears.

Question:   Babaji, You have given the nearest clue by using the analogy – when the self through silence, the individual self merges and it becomes very similar to being a part of the space and there is nothing else to measure.  So, that means there is no contrast.  There’s no duality, in essence.  Is it similar to a white spot on a white background or a white canvas?  There’s no contrast.  When the white spot merges, it blends.  So, there is nothing else, in a non-dual state?

Babaji Maharaj:   For understanding we can take it for a while, but yet, white belongs to this world.  Other imaginations may come.  But this Ultimate Truth does not have any relative existence.  That’s why it is almost impossible to tell exactly what it is.  However, see our ancient great teachers, they used the nearest imagination to give you the clue about the truth.  So, when I answer, I am giving you a clue about the truth, not the actual truth.  For the actual truth, I am advocating, trying to inspire that you go for that.  You, yourself experience and you will know what it is.

Same Questioner:   So, by thinking it’s a white spot, like the earlier example You said, white car, that itself is subjective and an adjective that can create more confusion.

Babaji Maharaj:   Yeah, though for a while, white spot is used generally when it is pure.  There is no defection or any such thing.  So, that is the basic idea to understand.  So, here, the Mind itself is the Purest Consciousness.  That means Supreme, Purest Consciousness is the Divine.

Same Questioner:   Thank You Babaji.

Question:   Thank You, Baba.  Just a quick follow up on the concept of attention that we’ve been discussing.  So, when your attention goes stronger and stronger towards the Self, if there are loud disturbing sounds like a motorcycle or pain in the body, it becomes so strong on the self, do you just forget or not notice that or do those sort of disappear? I’m even thinking like into a state of samadhi.

Babaji Maharaj:   See, the pain in the body will not disappear like that by meditating, but your consciousness when it has turned to itself very deeply, very deeply, it won’t notice the pain.  Just like you take a pain killer, pain is there, but you don’t notice the pain because it suppresses the brain’s reflections.  So that’s what happens.  So, in the same way, meditation also, you become one with the real Self, but the pain will be there; you need to attend to that pain separately.  You need to attend to the body needs separately.  In that state, you may not feel like having a food also, but this body needs food, for that you have to attend to that one.  So that’s what always one needs to importantly understand.  We need to keep differently physical body and the consciousness.  They cannot become together always.  They will be different.  Body is the matter; it will behave accordingly.  Even if it’s a yogi, if food is not given, it will die.  There is no such special arrangement that because of the yogi, even if he doesn’t eat…   Many people claim; they are all mythical and liars.  Nothing happens like that one.  The body has to be given some food.  So, that’s what it is.  Simply, you will not notice even if you are hungry.  In the same way, there will be pain, but you may not notice when your attention is turned to your Self.

Same Questioner:   Thank You very much.

Question:   So, the question is, there is no question.  But the challenge is being fully present, watching, witnessing is extremely easy when in presence of truth, You speaking in moment.  The challenge is leaving and being in the world and walking in the world.  Baba, if I go out of the moment and out of the presence, out of the watching while I am walking in the world as my eyes are seeing and I see the story come up and I can drop it.  However, when we can’t drop it or the mind doesn’t drop it, the challenge is, here’s the question and the answer.  See, I have the answer, which is come back to moment.  Come back to breath, come back to presence, but it’s extremely challenging to be such an empath to feel the entire world.

Babaji Maharaj:   I understand your question, I know what you mean.  We all know it is the most difficult thing.  Simply, you have to assure yourself, though it is very, very, very, very difficult, it’s not impossible.  Slowly, slowly, slowly, today I’m learning, learning, little, little learning.  Always be ready to learn.  Like that, go on doing; one day it will come.  Don’t try to think of that one day now itself; that can be really discouraging.  You go on doing.  Fifty years ago, sixty years ago, we were simply doing without getting discouraged.  It was not coming easily.  We were on the devotional path, remembering God, chanting mantras, chanting praises, everything we were doing and meditation also we were trying to do, trying to do.  So, it took this much of time.  In spite of the fact that I was luckiest to be born seventy years ago in such places where we did not get exposed too much to the world; we didn’t have to go to the world too much.  That way I was lucky.  If you have to go too much to the world, that is a challenge definitely.  Understanding you fully, once again I advise the same thing, never give up the practice.  If it is not coming, don’t worry.  Because the greatest worry comes if it is not coming, if it is not happening.  If it is not happening, “Whenever it has to happen, it will happen. Why should I bother?  It is for the Divine to bother, for my Guru to bother.  Let me simply keep watching.”  That’s it.  With that simple thinking, assure yourself, be positive.  Try again.  Try again.  Never give up.

Same Questioner:   Thank You.

Question:   Baba, it occurred to me, your childhood is very simple and today you don’t have to even leave your home because of the internet.  Life has become so complex for people.  It is probably overwhelming if you are on your internet very long,  you are just being bombarded with ideas and opinions and concepts and conflicting ideas, what is true, what is not true,  who is telling the truth, “That’s just your opinion, how do you know” –  The mind is like on overload all the time for people it seems today.

Babaji Maharaj:   One important thing also, by becoming more curious and inquisitive, you can be putting yourself into a bigger trouble unnecessarily.  If you can overcome… You see, try to understand all of you, analyze, even when you go back home also, everybody.  The less we know about the world, we are more happy, less trouble is there.  We become upset sometimes, “O, that person did not tell me that he was going to go to Washington.”  Why should we be upset?  He wanted to go to Washington, let him go.  It is good he did not tell me.  I am peacefully at my home.  Otherwise, that friend would have dragged me also.  This phenomenon, if possible, for any human being…  Daily, I take up the newspaper.  But quick glances, I go into it, “This is not needed, this is not needed.”  I have watched, surprised that ninety-nine percent was not at all needed for us to know for any beneficial thing.  Simply, entertainment, nonsense things, so many imaginations, this thing.  I become surprised, “Are these the news items that people become so interested and curious, want to know?  Want to know which film actress is bathing in which ocean?  Is this a news that we want to know?” That type of thing comes in the newspaper, national newspapers, very important newspapers.  It might appear as a joke, but that is the thing.  They are going in the airport and photo is taken.  The front page it is printed.  Do we need to know them moving in the airport?  But people are crazy and they get into trouble.

See, we used to see the example of small flies which gets attracted to the light.  It gets attracted to the light and there it goes and it gets killed.  It dies there.  It cannot survive.  That is the inquisitiveness, curiosity.  We may need to know very few in this world.  If we can stick to that thing, not bother too much about knowing this world, we will have more peace.  But today, devils are in the hands.  Social media, everything they want to know, what is happening there, what type of dress my friend was wearing today, what type of hat he is taking.  Why do we need all this.  So, if we try to think, we will understand ninety-nine percent all I was doing was nonsense.  The day I realized I felt like having come out of a mental asylum.