Satsang
Healing must be in tune with your own vibrations, your Spirit. Your whole being has to be in it, integrated, moving in one direction.
You have a doctor within you, if you can come in touch with it. This is not simply blind faith; healing power is within each of us. Some may say that medicine is the only cure, that trust or faith is superstition. Those who have faith, however, who believe in a higher Reality, to them the outer agency is more first-aid than a cure. It depends on one’s perspective.
Does healing come from within you or outside you? Herbs, nature’s medicine, are created by God, but the question is, do they heal you or you heal yourself? If we feel that healing comes from elsewhere, it is only because we have joined our inner force with it—our inner healing power—through conviction.
There has to be conviction and faith for any healing to occur, whether physical, mental or spiritual. Trust is a must. Doubt is a disease itself. Mistrust denies communication, and when communication is denied or blurred, a cure will not come soon; if you analyze intricately, you will find that doubt inhibits the cure. Somehow that person must be feeling they will not be cured, that they must suffer, or some kind of helplessness. That lack of conviction is what determines whether one is cured or not. It is not magic, it works for all. What works for all is Truth; what works for some and not for others is not the Truth.
The same principle applies to spirituality. It is not by hard labor—meditation, yoga—that God appears to us. It is by faith. Why do doctors sometimes give a placebo without telling the patient? Just to maintain trust between patient and doctor. Faith and trust establish the communication that makes the cure possible. This applies to the Guru-disciple relationship as well. It is not alone by saying that you have faith but your inner faith that is important. It is what someone actually means that counts. That is what God hears, or you, yourself hear. Your own truth—not dishonesty—will establish what you want. This applies on all levels: physical, mental and spiritual.
Deep within, you know what you are more clearly than that which your mind projects. It is what you are inside that is important, your intentions. Your innermost spirit knows, regardless of what you think. If you feel you believe in God but inside believe only in yourself, God will not come to you. What you believe in is what you see, but the question is, with what level of consciousness do you see, with your physical eyes, your inner eye or your innermost eye? You see according to your reality.
The common sense definition of Reality is: what exists permanently. Therefore, what does not exist permanently is unreal. Everything exists for some time, but since it doesn’t exist permanently, it is unreal. To depend upon what is unreal is to be deceived, since it is not real. If you take the chaff for the grain, you are deceived. The power of conscience decides what is real and what is not real. If you know the nature of a thing, that it doesn’t exist permanently, and you rely on it only up to that point, there is nothing wrong in that. Whatever is impermanent may be used— lived with or played with—if you are aware that is it unreal. The wise man lives and moves in that way in the world.
We have been given intellect for this purpose: to determine or discriminate the Truth. When the heart with conviction joins the intellect with determination, faith is born. This union of heart and head is very necessary for acquiring full-fledged faith. With determination there is no scope for doubt or re-analysis. If doubts again surface, then it was not faith. If you follow the intellect only, or the heart only, your faith will always be imperfect. This union of head and heart—the fourth and sixth chakras—is essential in order to reach the seventh chakra. This is what is meant by straightforwardness, in which the head and heart—thoughts and feelings—unite.
Your whole being has to be united. Body, mind and soul have to converge into one rhythm, one tune. Now compare that with your present condition: your mind says one thing, or many things, and your heart says another. Where does that leave you? You do not realize how much this bifurcation and complexity affects your integration and attunement. When you become wholly in tune, like an instrument, you play beautiful music. When your mind, thoughts and feelings all merge toward one Goal, you are blessed.
Simplicity is straight, not arrogant or blunt in the modern sense, but concentrated, one-pointed. Truth is One. Stay on that. Focus on your God or Goal. Everything else will follow. You will see with wonder what unfolds. Have faith. It is not necessary to analyze so much. Somewhere it is necessary to renounce thinking. This doesn’t mean being thoughtless or insensible. Just realize that you have been thinking too much. Have trust and follow; it will shorten your path by making it straight. Tension and thoughts make the way crooked, revolving round and round, trying to see various possibilities. If you are trying to make the impermanent into the permanent you will not reach the Truth.
Communication between the Lord and devotee, the Guru and disciple, has to be an honest connection—loyal, sincere and reliable. It has to be one-pointed devotion and dedication. Such focus creates the pipeline through which you receive. It is not by explaining and discussing that you receive. If you have doubts and hide them, it affects communication. You cannot bypass these requirements. There is no other channel except through you. However, if it is blocked with mud, cobwebs, or even pleasant sensations, that is what you experience. What is needed is to clean the pipeline through honesty of purpose, loyalty, faith and trust in the Real.
Have faith and focus and see how your life becomes sublime. Maya, the illusory force of nature, is changeful no doubt, and transitory, but it can be fun up to a point. If you can catch the reality behind the illusion, you will experience that fun to the utmost. That realistic backbone, the staff in your hand, is the straightness of faith. With that understanding you will see how all the temporary phenomena revolve around it very nicely. You will not fear death—or life. The majority are unnecessarily fearful. Lack of faith makes you afraid. We aspire for freedom, not fear.
Tell your mind to relax—you will get the answers. Be quiet and calm—the solution is already there. Just have patience and trust. Things will become crystal clear. You will find that you have little to worry about. Relaxing may not yield the results you want all of a sudden however, since action has been thrown into motion in the past. It has to stop somewhere. Wait for that moment. Keep quiet while it enters the stillness. Had you been relaxed and wise at the time, whatever problems you are now facing would not have come about, whether it is health, money, relationships or your own weirdness. These things are plain and simple and apply to everyone’s life situation.
You can have faith and trust in only one real truth. This is not being dogmatic or orthodox. What it means is that you can only have complete trust in that which is Truth; it cannot be many. Truth is one and Universal. It may come from any quarter. It is everywhere. Wisdom may come to you from a Realized Soul; that doesn’t mean He or She is the only embodiment of wisdom. It is in everyone. Truth may come to us from various sources but it belongs to all. God may appear at a certain place on the Earth, but He belongs to all, the whole Earth and beyond.
Focusing on one Goal is real sadhana (spiritual practice). Sadhana makes you Siddha, Perfected. Focus, see the results, and relax—God will act through you, Spirit will move through you. It is not that God will do everything and you will do nothing. He does things through you by making you do them. He knows what He is doing; you do not. Therefore, when God does through you, you have no problem. You see clearly and that will heal you on all levels. Whether a sinner or virtuous or in-between, believe that all have this capacity to be healed.
According to yoga, there are three kinds or levels of suffering called taapa in Sanskrit, “fire.” The suffering or miseries which torment you inside create the heat or radiance of fear, a kind of “mental fever.” The three taapas or afflictions are: on the physical level, disease; on the mental level, insomnia, worry, anxiety, sadness, depression, psychological problems, insanity; on the spiritual level, the misery of ignorance. Spiritual affliction we see the least only because it is so deeply embedded. It is so one with us that we are unconscious of it, though it is the first and foremost disease from which all other diseases manifest.
Normally we start from the opposite end, curing physical disease, then the mind, then the spirit, and it doesn’t work. If we do not change the mind, diseases continue to crop up in one or the other way. The mind goes on creating on the physical level, alternating between pleasure and pain, always stuck between the two. The answer to this dilemma has been given by the rishis or sages: because your unconsciousness is still rampantly existent, it is impossible to convert your negativities into positive qualities. What has been referred to as “sin” is actually disease. The root sin is spiritual ignorance or unconsciousness.
Unconscious living is seeing, hearing, procreating and dying without awareness of what is Real and what is not. Not only are you habituated in this way, but it has become so much your nature, your life fabric, that you do not even see it. It is as if you are within the bedsheets trying to see the cotton and every time you see only the sheets. Unconsciously you see bedsheets; consciously you would see cotton. The whole play of Maya or illusion is that through unconsciousness it always eludes us. Knowing this, the sages have advised that ignorance will not leave you unless you yourself surrender to the Lord, let go.
Efforts cannot eradicate unconsciousness because the very efforts are born of unconsciousness. If you are conscious, you do not put in efforts; you live spontaneously and creatively. To become totally free from unconsciousness, you have to dissolve yourself. But because ego wants to defend itself, to exist, unconsciousness, the basic disease, remains. That is why healing does not occur. Every time you want to be healed, you hardly remember your Spirit; you run to whatever outside agencies, but they cannot cure you without your own cooperation. Healing must be in tune with your own vibrations, your Spirit and being. When you come in tune with your own rhythm, herbs or therapies have an immediate effect. It works wonders.
Do not keep God or your Spirit pending, thinking you have too many things to attend to. That is selfishness and does not work. Did the mind create the body or the body create the mind? As we know, mind creates the body, therefore the body has to be in tune with the mind. Does the mind create Spirit or Spirit create the mind? Spirit creates the mind, so mind should obey Spirit. All too often, mind tries to make the Spirit obey it, putting the cart before the horse.
See that you inner and outer selves are the same. “I want to...” is not the answer. Somewhere inside, you have become a split personality, meaning: complex. If you are simple, problems do not exist. Focus on the Goal and problems will vanish. Initially when you begin to do this, the Goal itself becomes elusive; the mind wavers and wanders; it has too many jobs to finish and problems go on increasing. When things go smoothly, your mind is in tune with the circumstances, with nature. But again, restlessness comes in, and things go wrong. Why? Because you are out of tune with your Spirit, with God. When you are out of touch with your Spirit, even if everything else seems alright, it is not. Things can go wrong tomorrow because the very basis of contact is lost. Things may look okay—friends calling, money coming in, boss is fine, children are okay. Even so, something is missing. You must be out of tune with your Self. That is the greatest loss.
Within our human complex is a consciousness which is life. Even while living, if you are unconscious, you are not truly alive. Things may feel pleasant but you will never be totally satisfied or fulfilled. Outer darkness you can see with your eyes, but inner darkness you cannot see; it has to be felt deeply within. Insight and concentration give you the capacity to see the darkness of ego. The shadow of Maya cannot be grasped with your mind. You can perceive it fleetingly, but you cannot do anything about it. But bring the Light—it’s gone. So, it is not through efforts that you become Enlightened. On the contrary, when you have given up all efforts—not through laziness—and come in tune, in rhythm with nature, the cosmos and your Self, you are healed.
Light is the source of all healing, whether mental, physical or spiritual. Drive away your ignorance and come to Light— your worries, sadness or depression will vanish. Once the mind is crystal clear, it becomes a perfect instrument of the Light. Spirit, mind and body are not separate, they are interconnected, one within the other: mind within the body, Spirit within the mind, just as cotton pervades a cloth or clay pervades a pot. Your Spirit or Light are all-pervading, everywhere.
Make your focus singular. That is your cure. If your mind is on God, even if your body suffers, it will not trouble you much. But the mind generally comes back to the body, identifying with diseases, and so you suffer. “I have a headache. I am in pain. I am miserable. I am depressed...” The mind identifies with the problem only because you have lost your focus. This is called the fall: when you lose your concentration on your true identity and get identified with other things, whether painful or pleasant. In pleasure, the mind also gets identified: “I am happy. I want this. I really like this....”
Whatever distracts you, whether it is pain, or pleasure or something in between, leads you away from the Goal. You cannot pray to God, “Just allow me to enjoy one thing. Take away all others.” It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle does not refer to wealth alone, but whatever you are holding on to in the mind. It means that you have to be one-pointed, tender, flexible, genuine, gentle, truthful, simple and giving to reach the kingdom of heaven. In other words, you have to be so pure and melting that when God pushes you through the eye of a needle, you flash through like lightning.
Healing has to be whole, what nowadays is called holistic. Your whole being has to be in it, integrated, moving in one direction. Truth is what will release you. When you find your true identity, you will have love, joy and freedom without interruption. You will be conscious all the time, Sat Chit Ananda. Sat: Truth, existence, permanency; Chit: Consciousness, wisdom; Ananda: bliss. Joy will be the proof that you are That. You will see love flowing and solutions happening. It will be spontaneous, creative living. It will clear your entire nervous system and your immune system. We have that consciousness built in. It is everywhere.
Life should be giving unto others rather than grabbing and snatching for oneself. Those who are giving never lose. Giving and receiving is the secret of energy. The whole flow of energy occurs in this way. It comes into you and goes out of you, as through a channel. If you try to hold on to it for “me” and “mine,” you close the in-flowing energy and cause stagnation. This is how ignorance and unconsciousness become established—the freshness of life ceases to flow. Tensions and worries begin and health is affected. If we allow energy to come and go from us, we will be always refreshed and never lose. That is the way the entire cosmos works.
Once we understand that things are not ours—they merely move through us as a pipeline or an instrument—we will see that there is nothing to possess, no need to be selfish. Rely upon one healer, God. Make yourself His channel: “God, not me but Thee. Everything is Thine, not mine. Let me be Thy instrument.” When the mind becomes an open and clear pipeline, the Light shinesthrough it and it becomes a perfect instrument. This brings harmony and the body responds and becomes healthier. We carry not only the seeds of karmas from previous births but the seeds of disease also. If you are not cured now, you will take it with you to the next birth, whether it is physical or mental.
The whole purpose of life is to come out of unconsciousness into Consciousness; to know the unreal from the Real; from darkness to reach the Light. Whether you pray to God or contemplate within, you want to come out of the unreal, from death to immortality. This healing process between you and your Spirit is within everyone. By all means go to a doctor, take herbs and medicines, but believe in the power of healing within you. Believe that you can drive away your unconsciousness, if you mean to, if you focus on That. Surrender everything unto God. Meditate. Give yourself up to Him. It will heal your ignorance. That is the way to truly become well.
Edited from a Satsang given on April 27, 1986 entitled Faith, Focus and Healing, available on audio cassette.
Reprinted with the kind permission of Truth Consciousness.
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© 2008 by Truth Consciousness. Teaching from the basis of eternal Truth, the message of Swami Amar Jyoti’s Satsangs (Sanskrit: communion with Truth) is one of deep spiritual unity. His way is not to espouse a particular creed but to impart a spiritual way of life. He spent four decades (1961-2001) awakening and uplifting countless souls around the world to God Consciousness and disseminating the timeless Truth underlying all traditions and faiths. Prabhushri Swamiji is the author of several books; over seven hundred of His oral discourses, illuminating the classical path for modern times, are available on CD and audiocassette. This Satsang is edited from Meditation and the Simple Life (I-15). A full catalog of Satsangs by Swami Amar Jyoti in audio format is available at truthconsciousness.org, or call us at 520-743-8821 for a free copy by mail. Please see page 66 of this issue for further information. Photo on Page 3: Swami Amar Jyoti at Jyoti Ashram, Pune, India, 1998.
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