This golden body and gold
dwell in the world of mortals

Death of the body is certain

AUGHAR VANI, Avadhuta's Wisdom

Aghoreshwar
Baba Bhagwan Ramji

Happily Sail through The Bazaar of Life

Addressing the devotees assembled to listen to his words, Aghoreshwar Baba Bhagwan Ramji said in his blessings,

Every week we try to fuel the fire of curiosity for knowledge that we have. Because if this fire goes out many important aspects of human life also come to an end. In such a state, already tattered fabric of humanness of a person turns into something else. His inclinations take such a turn that one cannot even call him a beast. Many of his actions become violent. Despite remaining in once place, he does not remain there, his inner being keeps running here and there. He becomes like a ghost: despite seeing everything, he cannot get rid of his desires.

The thirst for knowledge that is seen in human life ends when it gets tied up in too many knots. These knots make the human being very weak, and he becomes unable to take any action. He is not able to decide what to do, and what not to do. Guided by his ephemeral personal desires he begins to destroy the society by this mentality, and his mind remains always unfocused. Because of this contamination of the mind he remains deprived of that one thing that cannot be bought at any price -- peace, that supreme peace. Every good thing then appears poisonous to him, and bad things begin to allure him. He becomes very conscious of listening and viewing wicked things. By his unforesighted spurious talk and venom spitting he makes his pure life poisonous, and poisons others' lives too.

As an arrow that leaves the bow cannot be returned, whatever we end up saying cannot be undone despite making a million efforts. It is not possible to improve upon that. Therefore, before saying anything we must pay attention to its good or bad results. We would be very kind to ourselves if we thus save our life from becoming poisoned. A person acting on the contrary, betrays himself and can never forgive himself again. God and Guru might forgive him, but he cannot forgive himself.

A Guru is not like an ordinary teacher. A Guru will talk to you about things that are likely to happen in your daily life. But a teacher can say even those things that you can never do, never see in practice, and in the given social environment, cannot accept in your behavior. You can learn a lot of things from good people, saints, great souls even by sitting quietly with them. Even if they don't say anything to you, you can draw inspiration from their character and behavior, and make your own life worthwhile. One who is unable to do this, is unable to mould his behavior on the model of his guru or divine inspiration and repents at his inability. He becomes direction-less in life. The rogues within him loot him.

Can we protect ourselves from ourselves? This is a strange but crucial question that rises here. We have nice families, food, and the rest of material conveniences that people desire, yet we are not satisfied, we do not have peace. Our ego forces us to believe that all these conveniences and apparent happiness are a result of our own labors. It is not so, my friends. If it was just a result of hard labor, then many people have ended their lives working very hard, they could not do anything. On the other hand, there are many people who, without hard work, are savoring all the material conveniences. Yet, these things that they are enjoying are nothing but physical entrapments. And even that they are not really able to enjoy while spending the limited moments of their life.

Our life is being spent very fast. It is not going to come back to us. Everything is changing, and is changing everyday. Our body, dress, style of living, everything is changing, it is not going to return back. In such a situation if we do not pay attention to ourselves, keep betraying ourselves, then we will never be able to forgive ourselves. We will repent a lot. Therefore, with concentration, we should try to calm our mind through meditation.

Dear friends, quiet down the many currents that keep rising in your mind, experience that solitude. Without letting your inner being be distracted, meditate seriously, many knots that your life is tied into will begin to open. You will pass through your life without being swayed by the unbearable pain of death and disease that you experience. You will remain untouched by the fair and foul that you see all around. On the contrary if you keep doing petty things, you will never profit from them and wealth that you have, the wealth of life, would be lost.

Once this wealth is lost, your own senses, or all that you call your own, will turn against you. They will become the worst enemies and haunt you like ghosts. Instead of saying nice things, they will pierce you with the arrows of their words. It would appear that their nasty words are cutting you into pieces like knives and swords. That hurts a lot and you become frustrated. In that frustration you also loosens the arrows of your words, and the result is an explosive one. The situation becomes similar to that of lighting a matchstick by abrasive friction against the matchbox. We are all carrying our matches with us. If we keep striking it unnecessarily, the heap of many wants and desires lying as hay will light up and burn down whatever good thoughts, deeds and behaviors we have, and will poison our life. If you can save yourselves from it, do so.

Come brothers, let us experience the meditation for a moment; empty your mind, lighten your heart, loosen your body, focus your gaze between the eye-brows, and stop the breath wherever it is for a brief moment. Practice Pranau (resonating with the seed mantras) before and after this act.

(Baba had the assembled people meditate in this way for three minutes and then explained some mysteries of the breath): To have constantly long breaths is not good. You should measure your breath by observing it. The breath that measures four inches calms your mind. The breath that measures eight inches would be seen more in people beset by sensual desires. Those whose life becomes very less, their breath begins to go up to twelve inches, and they breathe very fast. They begin to show signs of leaving this earth (to measure the length of your breath you can put your palms below your nose and see how far the breath leaving your nostril goes). If you are constantly aware of how long your breath is, and how long it should be, then you will constantly be conscious of yourself. Similarly, to ascertain the success or failure of a task you are about to undertake, if you find that your right nostril is breathing prominently, you can be sure you will be successful. If that is not the case, your right nostril is closed, and it is the left nostril that is breathing prominently, it denotes that all your hard labor will be wasted and your task will not be successful.

These are little things that you should learn. Sitting in solitude, emptying your mind, observe your breath. During worship or Japa (recitation of the mantra) the breath emanates smoke like forms. You should observe that form to see if it is that of the image you are meditating upon, is it yours, or is it that of an event supposed to happen later on. You will know exactly what your breath is trying to tell you. It requires only practice. With practice it becomes very simple. It maybe a little hard if you have not practiced it. But if you are really curious and practice it, it is not difficult at all.

He who tries to do this understands everything, and with practice, knows everything. He will also be able to control his senses much better. Brothers, the way to the Divine, passes through the dwellings of those who remain silent and meditate within themselves. If you go to a saint, he will not say anything to you. But you can measure him by his behavior and practice. If you observe closely his expressions, stance, what is he doing at what point of time, how is he at certain points of time, and if you measure yourself by his measure, then only can you understand him. But if our standard of measure is not the saint but some person of questionable character, then we will not be able to understand him. Usually we are too busy keeping ourselves in the dark and in denouncing others. If you can save yourselves from these things, you will find your life to be very fruitful. It will be beneficial in this life and beyond also.

Friends, we lose a lot because of our excessive cunning. In a sense, we were better when we were ignorant. Neither we deceive anybody, nor were we deceived by anyone. Since the time we became wise we have begun to cover up our faults. When we could not see our faults in this way, we used to live in joy. We used to roam in naked abandon. That time is not going to come again. It is gone. Now it is the beasts that roam. Dressed up in all sorts of nice covers, we are worse than animals because at least animals adhere to the regularity and frequency of things determined by nature. Instead of giving birth to valuable children we just breed. The offspring so born makes us sad, and soon as it finds its wings, flies away. Animals despite being naked, are self-controlled. Human beings, having covered everything still do not have self-control.

Because of this we cannot forgive ourselves for what we end up doing. Only those who are wise and who understand, are the ones who are curious and have a thirst for knowledge. Meditating on God, they become just like God. And then there are those human beings who live like four-legged beings. Even amongst those, a saint, like a tiger lives in the jungle freely and is respected for that. There are other animals that remain chained to a home post, and suffer. To alleviate such miseries of life, you should go to saints, great souls, ashrams and true temples to draw inspiration from there. Try to avoid a life of insult and frustration. I hope you will understand these things because you are all very wise. And then, it is also possible that you may not understand. With these words I bow to the Goddess within you and take leave from you.

Ashram News

Navaratri was observed at the ashram with much sincerity and devotion from Sept 21 through Sept 29th. Many local as well as out of town participants took part in this special celebration of deepening one's sadhana. Every evening after puja, Baba Harihar Ramji gave discourses on different aspects of the Divine Mother and sadhana. Those discourses will be appearing in future issues of the Times.

Daily scheduled activities at the ashram