Class 10: Self Study

Most of us spend plenty of time judging what is wrong or what is right about others. A closer look at what makes one truly happy is another story. If we think one is happy who has just purchased a new Mercedes Benz and then his Mercedes is taken away and he becomes angry or depressed, then that person was not truly happy.

We have spent a considerable amount of time looking at temporary happiness and we have looked at the difference between those actions and the ones that bring about lasting happiness. The search for happiness not followed by unhappiness is the search for the true self. It is what we are after.

Who am I? Why am I here? To answer these questions we must develop a higher level of consciousness. However, the experience of higher tiers of consciousness can never come through pure logic or intelligence. It comes only through intuition. Fortunately the topmost scientists in the world have recognized that human reason has limitations and we cannot go beyond these limits.

If we recognize the limitations of human reason then we can begin to think like a true scientist and say, perhaps this phenomena (Agnihotra) does not make sense to me but it can’t harm me so I will conduct an experiment and find out for myself if it works. Then if it works and there is an improvement in my health and mental well being and/or a benefit to mankind, then it does not matter if it makes any sense or not. Three hundred years ago it did not make sense that man would ride in horseless carriages or that man would fly inside of big silver winged birds and it sure as hell did not make any sense that man could go to the moon and back. It made no sense at all that man would be dumb enough to poison the air he breathes and the water he drinks, but mankind has done all those things.

How to make sense of it all? How to figure out why we are here in the first place. How to determine what will give us relief from pain and misery. What will give us happiness that is not followed by a ton of unhappiness. The search for the answers to these questions begins with the search for your true self.

Our addictions cover over who we really are. We make up who we think we would like to be, we act like other people. We act like the kind of person we think will impress someone. We act and we act and we act.

Chances are we are probably perfectly fine people without the act. Chances are we will be liked anyhow. Chances are if we did not spend so much time worrying about what everyone else is thinking about us that we could turn the lights in to discover our true self.

From the cradle to the grave

man is working, but how much time is spent working on Who am I??

I can say I am my body because I am one with it. I know when it’s cold I try to warm it and when it’s hot I cool it. Unfortunately, however much I look after my body, I know that I can still be perfectly miserable. So I look to the mind for happiness. If I observe my mind I see it flitting about and jumping around from one worry to the next. I find that if I can alter that state of mind, even temporarily, I can become happy or relieved momentarily from the worry, so when my mind jumps into that desire, for some instant relief, I just let it stay there. And like a good servant I do whatever it wants and I satisfy that desire for the sake of my mind, but not for the sake of myself, because I am not my mind. The search for a way to naturally alter our state of mind to become happy seems beyond our grasp. It seems beyond reason. But then again we already know that man has limitations when it comes to reason. What seems to make sense and what is reality are often very different. For example: If I hold two pistols in each hand at the same level and simultaneously I fire straight ahead the one bullet from the pistol in my right hand, while in the left hand I merely drop a bullet, certainly it might seem that the bullet I drop is going to reach the ground long before the one fired straight ahead, but regardless of what I think, the bullets will reach the ground at the same time. This is the law of gravity. If I climb to the top of a giant skyscraper and drop a pillow and a stone to the ground at the same time I must think the stone is going to reach the ground before the pillow, but it doesn’t. They reach the ground at the same time because that is the law of gravity. If this makes no sense to you then you can study the laws of physics to find out why, or you can go climb a tall tree and drop a stone and a pillow to find out for yourself.

The bottom line is: The law of gravity works whether you believe in it or not.

If I were to tell Tarzan that by swallowing a little pill he could feel like he was swinging through the trees without leaving his tree house, he’d think I was crazy, but we all know that it’s possible because we’ve been there. If I were to tell you that you can go beyond the drug experience by performing Agnihotra and implementing the biopsychological techniques given in this mind training program–what would you say? You might say, if I do not have to believe anything and if all I have to do is make this effort at sunrise and sunset then, what the Hell, I’ll give it a shot and find out for myself if the results are the same for me as they have been for thousands of others.

The whole idea of self study is to investigate and to look inward.

What is IT that tells me I have a mind?

Just a little investigation into the Vedas will reveal that the terminology, IT, used in asking the question (“What is IT that tells me I have a mind?”), is also referred to as THAT.

Words cannot limit IT; hence, IT could only be described as “not this, not this”.

THAT is only perceived when I get the mind under control. So, back to Who am I??

We have asked the scientists of the world to investigate the results of Agnihotra and have asked them, as well you, not to believe, but to experience. If we investigate, that doesn’t mean we believe. Investigation of the Vedas is not enough to achieve what we need to achieve. However, an open mind to research what has been said is part of self study and therefore, part of the mind training program. Vedas means knowledge. Vedas were revealed in Sanskrit. Sanskrit contains no words from any other language.

Earlier in the mind training program we refer to the energy that pulsates through the universe and connects us to the cosmos. We mentioned how science has begun to study man on a “subhuman level” and we talked about Kirlian photography which is actually documentation by photography of the energy field that surrounds all living things. Taking this a step further might lead us to ask, what is this energy? What is “IT” that allows the universe to stay so perfectly well in order. A look at science will reveal that the scientists, medical professionals and psychologists are all veering towards a holistic approach in thinking. “The science of physics generally leads the way. However, the quantum leap taken by physics is not yet manifest in other sciences. When the physicist started talking about an observer-dependent universe he started (without knowing it) toward the science of the Vedas.

• The scientist exploring the theories about creation and the functioning of the universe may not be able to explain phenomenological experience in what he would think of as scientific terms. If you wish to study science and not theory or superstition, which rules today, then Vedas is the standard reference.
• Vedas designates the “IT” or “THAT” we have referred to as the Supreme Spirit. Vedas is not a religion.

When we use the word spirit or spiritual we wish to make it clear that this is something different from what might commonly be understood as ‘religious’. The so called religious aspect of man may differ from person to person but the spiritual makeup of all mankind is the same. No one can lay exclusive claim to Vedic knowledge. It is the common inheritance of all mankind. Anyone who wishes may use this knowledge to benefit himself and his environment. All Divine Messengers that have graced this planet have all delivered the same message in the language suited to the conditions of the times. That message is “Love your neighbor as yourself’. To know yourself is self study. Most of the scriptures from different religions state the same messages. Again in a different way, but the messages are all the same.

• “It was stated in Kenupanishad I:5,6,7,8, “The supreme spirit is not a concept that can be conceived by the mind. It is that by which mind conceives and thinks. It is that which enables the eye to see, the ear to hear and the breath to move.
• “Intellect is beyond the senses of the mind but THAT is beyond intellect.”
• Bhagavat Geeta 3:42
• “We may intellectually understand by reading all the scriptures that Almighty Power is ever present but our intellect will never be able to lay its grasp on IT. These are the intrinsic limitations of the intellect.”
• “Through freedom you achieve tranquility, happiness and realize the Supreme self. Swadhyaya is the intellectual understanding of the truth that makes us free.”
• Ten Commandments of Parama Sadguru
• “In the beginning was the Word.
• John 1:1

Vedas call it Shabda in Sanskrit. It is sometimes described as Nada. How could this vast universe with tangible objects be based on an integrated vibration? Discoveries in pure physics are a pointer in this direction. Can we establish communion with this WORD?