Heart Knowledge - 17th November 2025

So it is said that God either calms the storm or calms us in the middle of the storm. So if you've truly lived in God's presence, if you're truly living in God's presence, one of these two things more and more starts to happen naturally: that either the situations themselves go away or, in spite of those situations, we are in that calmness, you see. But we can't do it then, you see; the mind will also come and tell us, 'See, then what do I do at that point?' No, it is the rest of the 99.9% of the time.

What is it? You see, it feels a bit—it feels sat. Yes, I'm not sure if you understood the context, which is that many times you cross through in this light and then the traffic light outside and then you feel like should I go up? No traffic. You know, you're waiting in a traffic light a lot of times, you know, you're thinking about your email when you little check box in your head. Okay, I myself feels at least in my mind there is a thought that also very, very—

That's a very, very good question because it is so subtle, so subtle. So many times what also happens is because we speak of empty, let's be open and empty, so we become—I don't know how to put it in words—like empty but with that tiniest notion that 'I am being empty' instead of just empty. So, so that is the trick: that when we are being empty, we're not really empty. When I am in the present, then I'm not in the present. When I'm absent of any conclusions or any—it doesn't exert an influence on me, the mind's judgment of my emptiness or full of presence. You see, if I think I'm full of presence, then I'm not full of presence, and if I think I'm now empty, then we are neither in the now nor empty. So just like a little child is not thinking about being empty, they're just empty and we're just responding, you see, without picking up till they're two, two and a half. Apparently, till then you're like that in the natural way, naturalness.

So, how am I really? It is impossible to conceptually judge. But what starts to happen is that in our true emptiness, the photosynthesis in the heart is happening. You see, so somewhere, you know, like we talked about progress, which is the transforming of our heart from being a tiny bud to a flower. Although we are not able to perceive this in any way, we are without doubt full of any perceptual ideas of change or transformation. We can allow the people around us to tell us that. Unfortunately, in the first few years, what happens is that the people around us will tell us just the opposite for Maya to pull us in, but a credible report is that if your friends tell you, 'You're much more peaceful now, what happened?' So rather than the mind's judgment, better to stay with that. But then that does not mean there is no way to know whether I'm on the right track. We feel so worthlessly in our heart. This life, we feel affection or love for our parents. We know we love them. We don't have to remind ourselves. We don't need conceptual ideas. We just have a sense. So in our heart, we have this sense that God is pulling us in closer, that I am on the right track. Although these words may rarely come because the words are very tiny compared to what you're actually finding.

That is why we can never judge what happens in our sadhana. In fact, many times when we take our sadhana to be a great sadhana, you see that—no, there's no bad sadhana. But when we say, 'Really bad today, was full of distraction, full of distraction, felt like a fight,' you see, because this thought of this particular thing kept bothering me, and then that fight may be very useful because you turned to God 100 times. Some days are beautiful, that you just turn to God, say one hour deeply in your heart. Everybody will say, 'This is beautiful, textbook sadhana.' But the other day is when something happened at work or something happened with your partner or children or something and you're just—so you're lost for five minutes. I'm sitting down to pray. In that one hour, many such battles happen, and this builds up our muscles to deal with them.

So in life, constantly these things are happening. So the mistaken idea is that when our focused prayer stops or focused inquiry stops, it is a mistaken idea that our spiritual sadhana is done for the day. Those are just the vitamins we have to take to live the rest of the day spiritually. Unless we had those vitamins, we will not have the strength to fight these things when somebody's being obnoxious in front of us, being prideful, being whatever. Then we have to be able to practice that muscle, that same thing of returning to God's presence. So if you've not done it with eyes closed in a focused way, you'll not be able to do it with eyes open. So that bodybuilding sadhana is also very important.

Now what happens—that's why we cannot judge what is the better prayer. Okay, then what happens? We come to the edge of our perceptual ability and we rest over here. Is it? Now we are only dependent on faith. And remember that faith is not a blind belief. It is something deeper which tells you intuitively something good is happening. 'I can't see, so the mind is a complete waste of time. I seem to be sitting in an absence of perceptual knowledge and yet I can confirm the light of the Atma.' How I confirm, I don't know. That is why some sages call it a dazzling darkness. Yeah. It doesn't mean it is a dark circle, the halo. It just means that this light of the Atma is both perceivable and unperceivable. So we can say neither perceivable nor unperceivable. Language meets its boundary over there. But to sit there is when this holy light, which is beyond the realm of perception, is transforming our Antahkarana, our soul, and making it one with the Atma itself.

If you take all the fertile ground, which is faith, patience, humility—all of these things are the fertile ground. But what is the only currency we seem to have to increase this light of presence, to fill it up, fill our insides completely? And the only currency we have is time. So it's very important to give it time. We want to carry the weight of the world or throw away the weight of the world. We need to be able to say, 'Okay, it's time to love God with all our hearts.' And what is almost the same, just about the same but not exactly the same at the same level? What is that? And all that is useful for us to love God in this way. The only other thing that comes almost close but not quite, and yet most important, is to love our brothers and sisters. The same. We're not sitting there conditionally because even if the idea is 'I'm sitting there,' we are not sitting there. So we have to use the inquiry, the name of God, the prayer, so as to become empty even of the notion of empty, or praying beyond the notion of praying, inquiring without inquiring.

So this is what we are practicing: letting go of the mind and remaining with the spirit, with the now. As we bring this into practice into our day-to-day life, every opportunity that we turn away from hate, anger, separation, and dunk it in love—or even if it doesn't feel like love, at least a neutrality—that is also to deepen our spiritual life. So love God with all that we have and then love our brothers and sisters also in the same way. So the world gives us opportunity to get pulled in, for Maya to take ourselves to be separate, or the opportunity to remain in love with God. The second usually does not happen without the first, but the more we exercise the second, the better we will come back to the first. So don't try to be or any of these. And the Satguru told us, if you can kill someone with your angry words, then use them only if you have the power to bring them back to life like he did. Otherwise, you have no right to use it. Why? Because of this. What is the project of our life? You all have been given what is the right container. You've been given a lamp. Say a lamp.

To remain in love with... Second, not usually does not happen without, but the more we exercise the second, the better we will come back. So don't try to be any of these. And told us if you can kill someone with your angry words, then use them only if you have the power to bring them back to life like he did. Otherwise, you have no right to use it. Why? Because of this. What is the project of our life? You all have been given what is the right container. You've been given a lamp. Say, a lamp. Now that lamp can be full of God's love and can be lit by the light of the Atma. Now, do you want this lamp to die without coming to that possibility, without coming to that reality of that possibility which has been given to all of us? The count.

So if you read Ram's lamentation in the second chapter, first chapter or second chapter, or you read the Ecclesiastes where the recognition is clear that if you really look for it, we find no meaning in this life and the only meaning is found in Atma. Now, has anybody told you that Atma is not possible for you? If they have, they are missed. All those who say that enlightenment is only for the rare few, they're just talking about statistically what may be happening, but that one in a hundred, one in a million is you. The possibility is as much in you as anyone else, you see. So don't get into this mistaken idea that Atma is not for me, I just want a peaceful life. A peaceful life is not possible without Atma. As much as people may pose, as long as there's misidentification, there is going to be suffering.

And whether we come to our true recognition through the love for God or through the inquiry into the nature of who we are, we come to the same point. Either through prayerful contemplation, we come to the edge of our perception and we look at this which is beyond explanation, or through our inquiry, we come to the same point. So it is not that you will solve 'Who am I?' saying, 'Okay, what is seven to the power of seventy-seven?' If you think about it like that and keep it in your mind and collect a system, then an answer may come. But this 'Who am I?' is not to be solved in that instrument. The 'Who am I?' is meant to put a pause into the mechanism of thinking, of intellectualizing. So you come to the holy place where the Atma within shows us the reality of its own source.

So when Nisargadatta Maharaj, the Guru, said, 'Stay with the sense I am,' that's what he was doing to the Atma within. And Maharaj said, 'Just three years I stayed with the sense of being, the sense I am, and I realized who I was.' He didn't say, 'I solved it' or 'I figured it out.' It's more of a staying than a doing. Where do we have to stay? Same place as the orina where we meditate on the words and then we pray and contemplate. Or I read the Sufis where they say that we get the aim of something and then we come to the same deeper regulation which we have, which is the mental path. We love, we say we can divide into religion, but we cannot change our inner path to be. So how to come to self-knowledge is by staying there, staying in the holy place. What is the best method for you? Whatever brings you to that point.

It's not easy in the world to stay empty. It's not easy in the world to stay. So if 'Who am I?' works, use that. My only concern as your teacher is that I may say all of this for like ten years, twenty years, and you may not get a sense of what I'm really saying because that's how Maya works. Are you getting the oneness of all spiritual practices? It is to come to that conceptual emptiness, full-heartedness, surrender of will. I found this very beautiful. That's why I posted also on the group today that these three are the essential components of spirituality: Empty conceptually—not taking yourself to be anything at all, not creating a mental relationship with anything at all. Empty. Heart open and receptive, which is also called loving. And a sense of individual doership—the idea of the individual. As you practice this more and more in a focused way, this is the eating part. This is the eating part. The cooking part is what gets us here.

So is it self-inquiry? Is it prayer? Is it reading a spiritual book? Is it listening to a Bible? Whatever method gets us here. But remember not to just go and leave. Unfortunately, that's what's happening in most of the world. Spiritual practice is just cooking and leaving. If cooking is happening at all, it's important to be. Don't be scared to be empty. What is the problem in meaning? Basically, that we are scared. Like the mind produces some fear saying, 'You know, now it's time for something else,' or some excuse or the other. Or even if it sounds like a temptation, it's still a fear that I will miss out on this opportunity. See, I was on this particular thing: Stay. Why do you leave? Why do you leave? Have you ever looked at that? You need your mind to make a decision. What would happen if I, like, if I'm talking and I really have no clue to think before I can do an action or speak?

Yeah, it will come.

That's all. That interaction with Papaji where this man says, 'Papaji, at your feet everything is just so good, but when I go into the marketplace of the world, then it gets to me, then I lose it.' And Papaji said something very beautiful. He said, 'Why do you leave?' Is he talking about the physical Satsang? Physical Satsang everybody has to leave. Even Papaji, he's not in that hall all day. But what is he talking about? He's talking about this place inside, the holy place. Why do we leave? And the sages have reminded us over and over that everything in your life can unfold, just you stay there.

So what is the number one reason for leaving? Even for those who know this, what is the main reason for leaving this place? That although we also know conceptually everything will happen by His will, we want to do it my way. And to do it my way, you have to leave that place. Is it a fair exchange? What are we leaving for? What? So basically we live in a constant form. The better you become, try staying there and allow it to unfold from there. But you cannot stay there and allow it to unfold from there unless you have practiced staying there for a fair amount of time.

So now, who doesn't know that God is beating our hearts? He's doing the millions of processes in our bodies. Everything, it's everything God is doing. So who doesn't know actually that our life also He is living and He can live very beautifully? We know this at least conceptually. Yeah, we know this at least conceptually. So when the mind comes and says, 'No, no, but you have to do this, enough of your prayer or whatever, done for today,' then we go with this because we wanted it only that way which is defined by the mind. We must have faith in God. Then if I stay in the heart and allow His presence to move my body, to move my mouth, to move my hands, whatever actions need to happen as His instrument will continue to happen.

So no matter what is happening on the outside, from there you'll be able to live with patience and love. Even on the outside there, you will not pick up grievances and resentment. You will not pick up the notion of a brother or sister being a sinner. There we are so immersed in His love that all that we are trying to do forcibly—remain as a witness, you know, just observe—all those things possibly don't have to be done forcibly. You just, like in your school when you first fell in love, you were still sitting in class and making your own, but you were in some other world. His love becomes like that, much more than that. You like... sorry, one thing which is that what is the point of... I have no time to waste in judging my brother or sister, just so immersed in loving Him. See?

Can you... yes, still can't hear me. Yeah. Can you hear me, please? Uh, I need help. I need translation. Can I have... yes. Yeah. Can I ask to translate for me because I don't speak English, please? Yes. So, uh, Father, sorry, my mic, is it working now? You can hear me. Thank you. When you... so, Gabriela is saying when you're saying staying with God, uh, there is a great fear about it and I feel that this fear is here for many, many lives and it keeps repeating. And yeah, I don't want to have it like this anymore. Uh, can you help me, please? Please, can you help me somehow? Yes. There is no trust in God, but my heart wanted... Master said my heart, yeah, my whole heart is yearning for God.

Very good. So let me clarify one thing. When you are facing inwards into that infinite vastness, is that when the fear comes or just the idea of turning inwards is given?

Uh, the idea. The idea of it.

But when you do try, then what happens?

Um, yeah, it's not possible right now because the fear is so great, it seems.

Yes. But even if not now, what is your experience in the past?

Maybe I keep... yeah.

So, don't worry about anything for a moment. Just close your eyes and if it's too scary, just open them back. But as long as it's manageable, just keep them closed. If you're observing some sensations and calling them fear, just try to be empty of the label first and try to notice where are those sensations appearing, in which space are these sensations appearing.

So, yeah, the feelings are in the body.

Is that your experience when your eyes are closed, that the sensations are in the body or are they in some space which is indefinable?

Say it, feel it. It used to be in the body and all around.

But the body is now what? Another sensation, isn't it? Or a set of sensations. Sorry, maybe if you can repeat, please.

How is the body itself experienced when your eyes are closed? In what way is it experienced?

Yes. Body is here.

In what is it? Like a sensation, a set of sensations.

I don't understand. Can you translate? Sorry. Maybe it's best, Father, if you can again repeat and I translate to Gabriela.

The question is that when our eyes are closed, then there is no visual perception of the body. In that case, how is the experience of our body of the moment? The architecture of that moment.

In that moment, there's no experience of the body.

So let's take that to be true for a moment. Now let's answer the question again. Where is the sensation which we are calling fear experienced?

In my head.

Yes. Look again and just tell me from what you see. Is there a feeling of contraction that we usually call fear?

Yes.

That feeling of contraction. What is around it? This is the fear not to be. Let me ask again. So there's a feeling like a sensation of contraction.

Yes.

What physically surrounds this? Let me ask in another way. Gently just poke your hand.

Yes.

Exactly. Now the feeling of that sensation, where is that arising? What is it surrounded by?

I feel love.

Yes. So that's a good answer for now. But do you notice that there is no individual there to experience the sensation? There is no Gabriela or Ananta or any who is experiencing any of these sensations. And they appear in a space of all perception. In that space, there is nobody who can be attacked or hurt by the sensation. So this fear is a pulsation, like a vibration which is appearing in the space of your consciousness. Consciousness cannot be hurt by it. So the one that can be hurt by it or is affected by it is only a figment of our imagination.

Yes. Yes.

So then we just have to allow it to happen, knowing in our heart that nothing can happen to me in this narrative of us not being able to meet God in the heart. Surrender, allowing of all these sensations to play out is easy because I am not getting hurt by any sensation.

But only, only I feel that I have to let go of the thought that there is some 'but'.

But you have to let go of everything. So the invitation to ask that was just to prevent you leaving any doubt about this. Maybe there is some 'but', but I don't know what 'but' it is. And it's not... you don't know, it's not okay. The trouble is only in the knowing. I don't have to know. I don't have to know to be what I am. I don't have to know. You don't have to know. Or let me put it another way.

Only I feel that I have to let go of the thought that there is some 'but'...

You have to let go of everything. So the invitation to ask that was just to leave any doubt about this. Maybe there is some 'but' but I don't know what 'but' it is. And it's not—you don't know, it's not. The trouble is only in the knowing. Mhm. Yeah. I don't have to know. I don't have to know. Yes. To be what I am, I don't have to know. You don't have to know. Or let me put it another way. This English you understand? Not every word, but something translate if you can. We can say to really know who I am, I don't have to know.

Another way of saying that is that there are three ways of knowing. The first way of knowing is through perception. The second way of knowing is that I have an idea of it or a thought about it—a concept. Maybe I have a concept about God. Yes. So in both of these ways of knowing, the truth cannot be known. I understand. Now there is a third way of knowing. That third way of knowing is called Atma Gyan, which is translated roughly into self-knowledge. This knowing can simply be known as heart knowledge.

So just like you know love in your heart and you don't need a thought to confirm it, in the same way, your heart will know who you are and what is true. This is called auto-intuitive insight. This is the true way of Capital K. All that is important, all that has any value is love, beauty, truth, God's will, God's presence, the unperceivable light of the spirit. All of this is known without knowing in our senses or in our conceptual understanding—the presence of God.

Thank you, Father. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you.

What spirituality is about is relying on this knowledge alone, the true knowledge from the presence of God. Sages tell us that we must look now only from the eyes of the heart. When you look from the eyes of God, you see only oneness. You see only love. But if you look from the eyes of the world, these worldly eyes, then it is suffering and problems everywhere. This is the skill we have to learn. We have to learn to live in our heart, to live from there. Live in that submarine inside. Stay there and then just through the periscope you see what is happening in the world, but don't leave that submarine. You want to make friends with the dog film? Stop it. You want to catch that fish? Stop it. Please don't leave the submarine of your heart.

So again, I invite you all that your life has a great possibility. This possibility is that you become the instrument of the Atma itself. There is no possibility which is worthwhile other than this. All other possibilities are in the realm of Maya, the realm of coming and going. Know how to live. When you're by yourself, love God with all your heart. When you're with your brother and sister, love God with all your heart and also love them the same. All right. Without trying in a focused way every day, that time will be difficult for it. So you have to take out that time to love God in a focused way. Otherwise, our spirituality will remain lip service. I'm talking about spirituality where you can talk about a lot of big, big things, but it has to translate into your lived life. It's not some speculation like politics. Some worldly speculation is not what we are designed for. Atma Darshan is what we are designed for. Maya is designed to keep us away. Between these two, we are living this life.

What is more natural? More natural has to be what? So more natural is that which happens when we let ourselves go. We let ourselves go, then we gravitate towards the presence of God in our heart. That is actually simpler. But our habit has become like an addiction to the mind. We come to Satsang as a rehab from that addiction so that we can return to our natural state. We ate the poison apple and now we are in Satsang to vomit it out. How many of you feel like Atma Darshan is not at all possible for you in your life? You raise your hand. Okay, good. So, how many of you feel like you intend to make this the main project of your life? All of you intend to, or hopefully you will intend to.

What is the next step after the intention? You have to apply it. The tools are available. The pathway has been shown to you. You have to give your time. I say this almost in every Satsang. Kabir Ji has told us Maya is the Mahati, the greatest con artist. What is she going to take away from you? Are you realizing the trick every day when you have something that keeps you away from God? It must be Maya. You realizing it or no? Are we still making justifications for Maya? The day we stop making justifications for Maya and we say, 'Bhagavan come, I belong to God,' then its snares will stop working or they will reduce at least the intensity. But if you belong to yourself, you will not be free. Surrender yourself like a little baby to God's lap.

What stops you from being ripped off? Even if you can't do it while you're eating, you can say His name mentally. Say His name mentally. Or if you say it, when it deepens, it just happens naturally in your heart. You just have to sit in that temple while all these holy activities happen. Watch the mind. So you have to make yourself stationary in God's temple. The body can move around where it wants, but you are stationary in God's temple. It moves around where it wants. It is fed by the world. It is taken care of by the world. It is taken care of by the body itself. It breathes itself. It takes care of itself. What you have to do? You have to stay there. I don't know. You just have to stay there. I just have to stay there.

This mouth is moving. I'm also hearing. You're also hearing all this. But if I make a 'me' out of it—no. Please understand what I am trying to tell you. It is important for me for you to get this. It's too 'me' infected. Then I'm not sitting there. So what if the body needs to work for maintenance? The temple has to be cleaned, to do the activities to keep the temple clean. But you are not to waste your time. All of you have one topic on which you can base this whole day today, isn't it? Is there anyone who has no such topic? It takes only ten seconds of thinking. Find a topic which you can think about and waste your whole day. This is the play of Maya. Every day is like that. So let the topics unfold on their own. Let them be resolved on their own. Let the body flow with God's will. You are not doing anything about it anymore.

We are made to enjoy God's love. It is God enjoying Himself in this field. We are made to enjoy God's presence. God is experiencing Himself in this field. It's very easy for the mind to make you leave. Be very quick to pick up arms. You don't have to do anything. Let Krishna say in your heart, 'Arjuna, pick up the arms,' and the body will pick them up and then it'll fight for us to do. So, I first shared this with some of you that are in Bangalore and the initial reaction was just like too intimidating, just too 'I can't be the one.' Then I said that for the rest of the day can you be? And even that was too intimidating in the world. So many of us said, 'Can we be for the next five minutes just God-obsessed, loving God the most?' Can we be for the next one minute crazy lovers of God, just crazy? Can we be for one minute?

What happens? Our self-consciousness starts to come. 'Oh, image, what will I look like? What will my face be like? Let me be composed.' All this nonsense gets in the way. You see? But for one minute be an Avadhuta, a crazy sadhu who doesn't care about the world. Just love God. Let the world manage itself. You don't have to prove anything to anyone. You don't have to look a certain way. You don't have to be proper. You don't have to be anything at all. Just crazy about God. Yeah. Just like that. Just like that. Don't be scared of being mad. And if this possibility is there in this moment, this possibility is there in every moment. To love God, to be empty for God. That is what we are designed for. And both are not different.

Can you surrender your lives in all these problems you think you have? Okay. Come. Yes. The life is all of you. I surrender with no 'buts.' No 'but.' I see some 'but' on your faces. One, one. Okay, this one. No. Hand it over. Hand it over. Empty. Empty. Empty. It's a relief. It's a relief for all of you. If you were to do this, you just hand it over. Do you all understand? Because I know the Satsang sound was not clear. Let me ask some of the main questions which is: when I say go and rest at the edge of your perception, can you experientially tell me if it resonates? You come to the boundary of what can be perceived and there's no longer anything more to perceive. There's zero response in the room to anything. Okay, let me put it another way.

Our attention can bring us a lot of color, light, sound. Yes, that's one end of the spectrum. On the other end, there is like a dark, empty place. Now, have we noticed being at the very edge of that dark, empty place where even the dark empty is not so visible or apparent? Yes. Experiment with this, that where your attention is now fully immersed into your being. So it doesn't seem to have an outer modality of perception, only very subtle. I'll probably share a group where you can just read that. So all this kind of stuff in this mumbly voice with bad sound is probably not helpful. There is no understanding possible there.

Even if that aliveness is not perceivable, how is that known? Because we already said no understanding is possible. Exactly. And yet we know that this is the most alive I've been. How do we know that? Most nourished? Exactly. Yeah.

We cannot understand. So we must start to love this absence of conceptual understanding. And once all these topics that we burden ourselves with constantly, they have to be left behind. Thank you that you can. But when you turn inwards, this is how we naturally find ourselves. The light source and ourselves just coming into a closer relationship. So know that all of Maya is designed for you to turn like that. Spirituality is designed to turn you in like that. Start to love the loving magnetism from God's light that pulls you in. You see? And don't be scared. Okay. Some big situation? Exactly what we started also, that we can't do anything really about those times. No, but it's about the rest of your day.

So suppose you had a bad event for, what, half an hour? Suppose three hours. Then the rest of the day of waking state is twelve. So then how quickly we recover and get back to God is the key. So suppose like I don't feel like there's any three-hour bad event—like even in a seeming bad event you have reprieves and there are moments where you can return to God. But the remaining twelve is what is important because if you spend as much of the remaining twelve in your heart, then next time when the same stimulus comes, that three hours will become two hours, one hour, two minutes. We focus prayer so that we can lead a spiritual life. Exactly. No, me too. I'm just hearing myself over and over trying to learn. How fast do we recover from a punch from life?

Father, can I ask you something? Because I was actually reflecting on this over the weekend. Sorry. Look, it took me probably a long time. But one of the things I realized is that the event itself, thinking about it as a punch, is going to give you a punch in a way, or it's going to increase the effect of it and just perpetuate it. So I was going to ask you because generally what I see with my head is that it's the same topology. It's not necessarily different. So it's the same sort of victim thought and it might be an energy that—and I feel also the manifest, like the 3D environment comes and tests you because you might think, 'Oh, I've overcome that, I'm not thinking about it,' and then someone comes and just presents that to you. And even if in that very moment you're neutral and your response to that is sattvic somehow, a bit of...

So I was going to ask you, because generally what I see with my head is that it's the same topology. It's not necessarily different. So it's the same sort of victim thought, and it might be an energy. And I feel also the manifest, like the 3D environment, comes and tests you because you might think, 'Oh, I overcame that, I'm not thinking about it,' and then someone comes and just presents that to you. And even if in that very moment you're neutral and your response to that is sattvic, somehow a bit of energy or a seed or something kicks in and then you have this, 'Oh, why did I spend my time involved in this?' or 'That was not such a great idea.' And then this actually perpetuates the same Maya story which comes. I was trying to do self-inquiry because this picks up on this identity, the personal 'I' who wants to achieve something in itself and creates this story over again, which generally is the same and it comes on the same maybe fear. And then somehow you have this attempt—the Satguru has this metaphor, be like a fish out of the water. So you have this attempt and desperateness: 'So I need to pray. Let's listen to satsang. Let's inquire. Let's go to the temple. Let's do something about it.' But this is also the identity that drives, and at some point in time it kind of exhausts itself and you're free again.

Does it? I don't know if... maybe you give me some... you shed some light on the mechanism of it and how to actually pick it up quicker. If it exhausts itself or we get exhausted by it, something gets exhausted. That's true. I like the way you said for the manifest, you said manifest. So the manifest is basically a manifest right now. It's true. It's all about money. Yeah. Right about the two-punch. The second punch is like, 'I shouldn't have done that. I was meant to remain in my heart about who I was.' So we perpetuate the same problem.

Yeah. We perpetuate the problem of thinking and we think we are resolving it with more thinking, and that is what the question is about. How fast is our recovery time? Means we've fallen onto the ground of this boxing match. So we fallen for our thinking. How fast do we snap out of it or do we keep lamenting our thinking with more thinking? You see, many times also that lamentation happens in the form of sort of like a thought-oriented realization of what I do over and over again. So I say, you know, every time I fall, this is what I do. I don't actually get up and then it just happens that something has to pull me up. All of that is a perpetuation of that, of the same story.

Yeah. And what kept my attention, I guess, or awareness on this was because previously I asked you in a satsang, I think something, and then you said to me exactly this.

So say that one thing I wanted to say which I forgotten. Sorry. No, no, no. Um, what we can do is once we recover, you see, if some insight is coming from the heart to share which is helpful for everyone else to recover as well, then that we can share. You see, otherwise just sharing the diagnosis report of the false doctor who never existed... you see, so all the other false doctors can also try and make sense of it is really of no purpose. You see, so what I'm simply saying is that our mind makes us not love God as much as we could in this moment. And our mind also gives a report about why we don't love God as much as we should in the moment. Instead of that, we should just first return to loving God fully and then if God wants to say something from there, then we can let him. Yes. Yes to God. Stay there. Just stay there.

Father, can I ask you something about this? Yes. Um, it's about maybe a confusion because somehow...

Will you forget your question if we take a slight digression? If we take a little detour? No, no, no, no, no. Let's see. Let's see. I want us to analyze for a moment what a confusion is. You see, and then maybe we see that confusion is not such a bad thing. You see, what is a confusion? Can you see this? You've seen. Okay, let me give you all the answers to what do we call a confusion? Getting a sense? So confusion in my saying is that when two opposing notions seem equally valid, that's what becomes a confusion. So my intellect is unsettled. What can I stuff into my head more? This side of it or this side of it? And when we don't know what to plug into the narrative more, then we feel a bit helpless and we say that we are confused.

You see, is it more true like this or is it more true like that? It's more true like this, more true like that. But in either, the truth cannot be held, you see. At best they can be pointers to a deeper insight. So what I'm really trying to say is that because you're transcending the intellect now and learning to live in a newer home, then the poking of incoherent concepts coexisting together in the intellect starts to bother us less and less. And when it starts to bother us less and less, we become strangely more loving in our lives. What is the correlation? The correlation is that we don't need it to be only one way and not the other. We don't need it to be either Jnana or Bhakti. We don't need it to be man or woman. We don't need it to be right or wrong. We don't need it to be better or worse. You see, and when we don't need it to be this way or that way, then just naturally the source from which all of this comes from, that love starts to shine through more and more.

So don't... you can still ask the rest of your question, but confusion is very good if it makes us transcend our intellect and live in our heart. That's why the entirety of one's spiritual power is built on confusion. Do you know which one that is? Huh? Well, kind of. But one of Zen is built on providing instructions which are meant to be inherently confusing. Why? It's not that those sages were trying to make us fully miserable. It is only so that in trying to resolve this confusion, we see that it cannot be resolved at the level at which the confusion exists, but it has to be transcended to a deeper truth. You see, where the one-handed clap is very possible. You see, it can be heard. The goose can escape the vase while remaining in the vase. The idea is not just to come to conceptual acceptance. The idea is to come to a transcendence which makes us head empty and heart full.

So when you're confused, just leave that playground. Why does the confusion bother us? Should I go left or should I go right? I go to the hall. I go straight in. That's the end of decision making. Should I go left? Should I go left? I go with Him. Should I take this job? Should I quit it? I go to my true job. Should I marry or not marry? I marry God. If you make Him the primary, then we don't really need to understand too much. So use confusion. Don't be scared of it. Don't try to resolve it. Use it to return to the true home. When confusion is bothering you, know that you're in the wrong playground. So it becomes, 'Oh, I'm so confused. I'm so confused. Is it two? Oh, I'm so confused.' Why should confusion kill us like that? Make us suffer so much?

But there is because um, we or 'I' is this one who needs to know what to do. I've seen very clearly yesterday this, that I'm not the one who needs to know what to do.

You saw this one. Say again. It's good. I was saying that I saw that I am not that one. Yeah. I mean, it plays in language; it always plays in that one. When something makes no sense to this simple child—a lot doesn't make sense these days—then there's reliance on faith to allow the nonsense to end because we don't know which side of it is nonsense anyway. And all turns out usually okay; it's quite miraculous. I try to understand too much. Okay, let's see if he has the rest of his question. What if you could... sorry. What if we could celebrate confusion? Huh? Too much. Okay.

Till now it was fine. Easy for you to say. I have to decide whether to get married or not. I have to decide whether to quit my job and celebrate. But for me, when you said confusion, somehow it meant separation.

Separation, right? That's very confusing. Is that good news or bad news? Wait, this confusion over this, like not even like either concept doesn't weigh an atom also, but it oppresses us. Yes. Because we think we need to understand, as if we have ever understood anything at all. Yeah. Yeah. She is having a great time. You know, when we are in satsang, you have a very good student. She is. She is. She is. I don't want to say hello here. Exactly. The most smiling, unconfused student. Thank you so much. Okay. Let's see. This time I won't.

No, but I know what you mean. I'm just joking. But um, maybe I just want to share a little bit just to... because I've been seeing more and more that I've been searching for a feeling better. No, I was trying to use your teachings or whatever to feel better somehow. No. And then somehow I've been turning a little bit more into the experience and into also what you can say like bad feelings and staying there, you know, just not escaping feelings. Because I saw that I was using my ideas of spirituality to escape somehow. No. And then I find myself right now that somehow I'm also escaping like the warmth, the love of God or something, because I feel that it's somehow another way to escape. I don't know if this is the confusion somehow. I don't know if it's clear, sorry. What you say about confusion is true. It really resonated, but yeah, I wanted to still share. Maybe it's confusing also what I said, sorry.

Yeah, so let me see if I frame your question. You say that for a long time you tried to use spiritual bypassing to not feel your feelings and try to use your spirituality to just feel good or feel better. You're confused whether you can use the love of God also as a method to do this sort of spiritual bypassing or Advaita bypassing or something like that. So it is not possible for us to feel the love of God or for God without us being fully open. And you must experiment with this. You see that unless we fully open to everything that our life is bringing to us, we cannot feel the love of God. And that is true for all spirituality including Advaita as well.

But unfortunately in the modern world, Advaita has become conceptual and conceptually you can just say, 'I'm not this, I am not this.' You see, but the only way it becomes lived spirituality or lived 'I am not this' is when we are fully open to everything first. So to experience everything fully is a prerequisite to both Advaita and to Bhakti, and in this way also they are fully the same. You see, we cannot have like a defense of not meeting a particular aspect of our insides and want our insights to be full of love for God. In the same way, we cannot defend one aspect of ourselves and come to the true recognition of the Self. In either of these paths, become fully open first. We don't resist any feeling, any event, anything that happens. All the defenses have to be let go of first.

So don't worry. In your attempt to love God, all that needs to be cleaned up will be cleaned up. And as you love God more and more, you will see that all your resistances will be vomited out, cleaned up, cried out. And all these transformative mechanisms come into play when you deepen in your love for God. But to remain empty in loving God truly, not just conceptually... like Advaita can be conceptually done, even Bhakti can be conceptually done. But true love for God comes in the meeting of everything. All the garbage that we've stored up over the years, all the fears that we've resisted meeting, all the muck inside us comes out to the surface and we are cleaned up from the inside.

And all these transformative mechanisms come into play when you deepen in your love for God. But to remain empty in loving God truly, not just conceptually—like Advaita can be conceptually done. Even Bhakti can be conceptually done. But true love for God comes in the meeting of everything. All the garbage that we've stored up over the years, all the fears that we've resisted meeting, all the muck inside us comes out to the surface and we are cleaned up from the inside. So you have nothing to worry about except just a conceptual narrative. It's not just a spirituality in our heads. All spirituality opens us up to everything about ourselves.

Yes. Okay. Because somehow, an idea was that also to feel fully and see that there is, I don't know, a lot of fear and a lot of shame, a lot of stuff that comes up. There was this idea that that wasn't spiritual. Do you understand? And so, but right now it's like it is accepted. This seems a way to go to God, or it seems a truer way. Yeah, I don't know.

What seems true for us may change from time to time, but whatever feels true for us in our heart, we must follow that from our heart. So, very good. Remember that if you all remember that spirituality is when we are with spirit, then all the false spirituality will be chopped away, you see? Because you cannot be with spirit unless we offer everything that we have to the spirit. Yeah. So, whichever path there is, we cannot meet spirit if our spirituality just becomes conceptual. For us to remember the simple fact that lunch means eating food; in the same way, spirituality is to be with spirit.

Strangely enough, this has been forgotten in most of modern spirituality. If we hold on to this, then all the confusion about whether we are on the right track or the wrong track will be taken away. Whatever helps us be with spirit is spirituality. Whatever keeps us in our head is not spirituality. And you cannot go to spirit with clenched fists because it's safe that life has to bring to us, and in the pathway to the spirit itself, we become open. And that is why for the last three or four years, I have been ranting against a lip-service conceptual spirituality where all of us are able to say, 'I am not this' or 'I am Brahman itself,' but we just say it from a conceptual place instead of really opening our lives up, opening our hearts up fully.

Many of our brothers and sisters still believe that the more convincing they are or they sound to others about how they are Brahman is how deeply spiritual they are, not having done any of the work of opening themselves up, meeting all the repression, all the feelings, all those things which start to show up when we look inside. Even Father Richard called it a wild monster or something like that, I forgot. So when we turn within, all this has to be met. But it's more convenient today to not turn within and just say that 'I understand.' So I'm so glad that you see the avoidance which happens in a conceptual spirituality and you're moving towards a truer spirituality.

Okay. My computer is almost dead. Is this what you said? To be in spirit, we have to offer everything to spirit?

Yes, we have to in our endeavor to be with the Atma. It opens us up. We become like the coconut is opened up and the soft insides have to start showing up. We cannot keep our defenses alive now at this place. Okay, my computer is threatening to shut down, but we'll hear from someone here.

Hello, Father. Um, can we love God together right now? Both of us? No, we can't pass. I'm continuously trying to purify myself, Father.

To purify myself?

Purify. Yeah. Purify. Because I'm continuously disturbed. I'm continuously... sometimes it's easy, but when you say 'Can we love God?' I feel like first I need to purify myself.

I know.

Because this is what I'm continuously doing and it's tiring.

Just love God first. He will purify us.

I don't know how to love Him. I don't know.

Just remember Him. In His remembrance, we love Him. And the beautiful tip is how to love God: allow Him to love you. We make a barrier without realizing. We just have to allow Him to love us. That is how you become irresistible to God. Just offer your heart on a plate. See if it doesn't come.

May I ask how? Is it, Father, is it just intent? No. I just want to hear because it can be easy for you, but it's not easy for me, okay, in general. So how? Today I just want to ask what's that, because I'm just continuously in work, Father, and I'm just so tired. I'm always trying to purify myself, always trying to do something and always just facing with things, and I don't know how to just... you are saying very easily, but it's not easy for me. So I just want to hear how. Yeah. Thank you.

What does the baby have to do to be picked up by the mother?

What I'm doing now.

And that's fine. If that's what you were doing, that is fine. So the baby does not need to go for a shower before the mother picks the baby up. In fact, it is the mother's job to give the baby a shower. But you don't say in general like this.

I do say in general like this only. What else do I... well, I say all kinds of things to be honest. Thank you for coming back, Father. But you have to try and just lift your hands up like that, like a baby. Expect that He will pick you. Don't have any doubt about that. But do it actually. Lift your hands up like a baby. Come on, both of us. I'm holding the phone, but just lift up your hands like a baby saying, 'Mother, pick me up,' and then expect that it's true. Just have faith it's true. It just works. It is our innocence that He wants, not our sophistication. More innocent you can become, the easier this path.

Is it come? I don't know.

Let's try again.

No, like my seeing of His coming. If I feel pure in body, energetically, if I am pure, then I will take it as He's come. I'm just... it's not addiction. What's the word? I'm crazy about this purification thing. Father, I don't know.

Don't be crazy about purification. Be crazy about God, not about purification.

Did I say about purification? Huh? Did I say about purification? Anything?

No. But for me, it's same with God. So, it's same. What's same? Same with God. God. Yes, for me. I can't repeat. Yeah, it's so sweet. He does not put any condition except that He does not force Himself on us. So if you consent to be loved by Him, He has to respond.

Father, um, may I share something with you? Yeah. Um, I feel like I have this connection with God always. I'm crying. He comes. There's no doubt. He always comes. It's okay. Um, it's okay.

So, but He only comes when you cry, huh? He only comes if you're crying?

No, when I don't cry, He is with me. When I feel breaking, they don't have this for me or for everyone.