When Sri Swamiji was sixteen, he found a tantric yogini, who initiated him in the arts of kundalini, chakras, yoga, Vedanta and other spiritual systems. She said, ‘I can only give you so much experience. I can only take you so far. To explore your energy and discover your destiny, you have to find a guru.’ This yogini was there for two years. She was a wandering yogini and used to come and go. She would come from time to time to his place, and spend one month, two months or three months. During that period, she would teach this young person everything that she knew about spiritual life.
After she told him that only a guru could explode and reveal his future and destiny, Sri Swamiji went to his parents and took permission. His father told him, ‘You are leaving the home for a different purpose, a different mission, a different goal – don’t look back again. If you fail in your aspirations and efforts, don’t come back home again. If you succeed in your aspirations, don’t come back home again, because the path you are taking is different to the path that people in society live.’ Paramahamsaji in later years used to say, ‘When I left my home, I never looked back or thought about it. When I left my guru’s ashram with his mandate, I did not go back, or even think about it. When I left Munger, I did not go back, and I am not thinking about it. And when I leave this place, Rikhia, and my body, I will not look back, nor even think about it.’
This was the samskara, the idea, the imprint given to him, by his father.
In the first part of his life, three incidents are important. One incident is him experiencing a state of samadhi from the age of six until the age of sixteen. The second incident is imbibing the spiritual disciplines, philosophies and understandings, which stabilized his own inner experiences. The unconsciousness did not come again, because the energy became stable with his sadhana and the training which he received from the yogini. The third incident was that he knew he had to find a guru. When he found his guru, and when his guru initiated him, he asked Swami Sivanandaji, ‘What am I supposed to do?’ Swami Sivanandaji said one sentence, ‘We will continue to work as per the plan made earlier.’
All this indicates that Sri Swamiji was not a person who was born for worldly experience, but had a purpose and a mission. We can even infer and say that he was a yogi from the past life, who continued to experience the state of samadhi in this life, at a very young age. The house became a place from where he learnt the spiritual sciences, traditions, practices, philosophies and understandings. This is an important part of his life, because a person who is in samadhi indicates that there is no conditioning of the mind. There is no nirbeej, there is no sabeej, there is no savikapla, there is no nirvikalpa, nothing. There was no with seed or without seed, no with thought or without thought; everything was clean.
It seems that he had cleaned himself in his last life, for in this life too, at the end of his days, he used to say, ‘Don’t mind if I don’t recognize you, because I am cleaning my slate. If your face gets wiped out, I will not remember you.’ He used to say quite emphatically, ‘I am cleaning my slate of all the things I have accumulated in this life.’ All the pratyayas, everything was cleaned by him, including memories, names and faces of people. That was a conscious act. Not the forgetfulness of old age, but the conscious act of a yogi. The question now is, what was there that was not in him before? What did he clean at the end of his days? The answer is simple – conditionings and impressions.
We collect impressions all the time, and our mind is always cluttered by what other people have put in. That is one aspect of the mind, being cluttered by what other people have put in. The second aspect of the mind is that it is totally discoloured, due to the six different colours which are vying for prominence, the colours of kama, passion; krodha, aggression; lobha, greed; moha, infatuation; mada, arrogance; matsarya, envy. This is a powerful factor. It is as strong as the colours of our body. Can I change the colour of my skin? Can you change the colour of your skin? Can anybody change the colour of their skin, in a natural manner? No. In the same manner, as the colour is engrained in the body, the amount of pigmentation that comes out is defined. In different climates, conditions and places, so much will be released, and you will be like that.
In the same manner, the shat ripus or six conditions are also as strong as the colours of the body. They will never change until you make a conscious effort to change them. You can see how a person without a pratyaya conditioning, and how a person with pratyaya conditionings lives. See the difference. If somebody would invite Paramahamsaji and say, ‘Come to our home for lunch or dinner,’ he would say, “I will be there at this time. My dinner will be at this time. I will be there fifteen minutes before, and I will leave by this time. I will not come alone. I will come with a group of so many people.” Everything used to be ready. He used to come, sit down, eat whatever was served, get up and leave. Many times we used to tell people outside, ‘Don’t serve this, don’t serve that.’ He never objected to what was served. He would eat whatever was given to him and never say it was good or bad. He used to enjoy everything, whether it was burnt or cooked perfectly. You could never tell from his face that he was eating a burnt chapati or he was eating a good buttered chapati. For him, both were the same, and he gave no more thought to it.
Other people go for enjoyment and they say, ‘I am coming for lunch to your place and will have my dinner at that place. I eat like this and like this, with so much oil, so much namak, so much masala.’ They give instructions on what they are going to eat to the person who is inviting them. That is their pratyaya, their conditioning, because they want to eat good food. Paramahamsaji would eat what was given to him.
I am using this small example to bring your attention to a finer point: conditioning and no conditioning, pratyaya and no pratyaya, impression and no impression. If Paramahamsaji’s mind had pratyayas, he would say, ‘Make this and this and this.’ There were no pratyayas. He never said I want to eat this. He never said I will not eat this. He never rejected any food. I remember a time when somebody served him chicken in America. People who were with me were agitated. Paramahamsaji said, ‘Shut up. He is giving what he has.’ He ate, then went to the bathroom, did vyaghra kriya and brought it all out. In front of his host, he did not say, ‘I will not eat this food.’ In front of his host, he ate and later went to the bathroom and brought it all out. When the host asked, he said, ‘Beautiful taste.’ He never negated the gift of other people, according to what they felt. We demand, he never demanded. That is the main difference of pratyaya.
Now let us look at the other aspect, the shat ripus, the six components. Somebody needs to look at their mind and discover what their nature is. That can be seen by a response, by other people, not by the person himself. If there is hate in you, you will be projecting, living and expressing that hate in your thought, behaviour and action. At that time, saint or sinner, there is no difference. If there is anger in you, you will let it rip. You won’t care if guru, god or a donkey is in front of you, as these are things that highlight and control the behaviour of an individual. There are people who have challenged me, threatened me that they would leave the place if I did not change. I said, ‘Fine, I am not going to change. You are free to leave.’ Then they leave, for that aggression is so powerful that it does not allow the wisdom to kick in. Later they say sorry, yet at that time, their misbehaviour is the product of one of the friends they have identified with. It happens to everyone A sannyasi has to work to remove the pratyayas; the conditioning has to change and that is the spiritual sadhana.
Otherwise, why would Swami Sivanandaji spend so much of time asking us to change the negative into positive? Then simply meditate, go into a flight of fantasy, see angels, god, heaven, be happy and yet be cantankerous, angry, hateful, jealous and critical on the outside. That is what everyone has done so far. Nobody has been strong enough to challenge their mind, asking, ‘How can you behave like this?’ Everybody is strong enough to challenge and criticize other people. That is the influence of the six conditions.
How you behave, how you speak is a reflection of the six conditionings which you are unaware of. To counter this effect of negativity, Swami Sivanandaji did not propagate meditation, ritual or a philosophy. He emphasized, ‘Be aware of the negative and change that into a positive strength. Practise pratipaksha bhavana.’ Meditation has no meaning for anyone in this life. After all, all the meditation you have done so far, what has it led you to? Has it improved your behaviour? Has it reduced the aggression? Has it given you more peace? Has it given you more creativity? More wisdom? More positivity towards life? What are you meditating about?
To change the quality of the mind is foremost. Yoga says that this is the purpose of yoga, not asana. Asana is not the purpose of yoga, pranayama is not the purpose of yoga, they are the tools of yoga to still the mind. How to still the mind? Two things: the conditioning of the six friends who are with you 24/7/365 has to change and the pratyayas, the impressions, have to be seen in a different manner.
Today I am emphasizing the first part of Sri Swamiji’s life which is a clean slate, like Swami Sivanandaji. In the later part of his life, you will never find anything which reflects any connection, association or reflection of his previous life before sannyasa. What we know of Swami Satyananda today is his life after sannyasa. He has said it clearly, ‘Everything that has helped me in this life, I have learned in my guru’s ashram. What I learned in schools and colleges has not helped me.’ He meant not only the skills of administration, printing, publishing or kitchen. That is the outer dimension. There is another dimension as well, the inner one.
Sri Swamiji had difficulties with his anger, that was one colour in his head. It was anger of a different type, not the anger that you face. If somebody would speak ill about the ashram or about his guru, his anger used to come out and it used to end in a boxing bout beside the river Ganga. After somebody fell, the fight would be over, again they would be friends and go laughing together with an understanding and a promise that no one would speak against the ashram or the guru. Swami Sivanandaji helped him manage his anger. After a couple of bouts, he said, ‘Do shashankasana, control the flow of adrenaline, the flow of activating hormones, reduce your anger through hard work and shashankasana.’ With this simple instruction, Swamiji changed his anger into acceptance of other people; and that was the end of it.
His anger was against the people who spoke ill of Swami Sivananda or the institution. I find that today people get angry with their guru and the institution, despite the guru and institution helping them all the time. They support outsiders who have no relevance to the greater vision and mission of the master. It is our arrogance, mada, one of the six conditions, that says, ‘In the ashram, they have done things like this. The guru has done this.’ That is mada, arrogance. If Swami Satyananda was here in his first form, there would be a bout near Ganga.
This is the character of people today who need to go through anger management. They cannot control the distractions, ambitions, the dwesha and raga of their own mind. They project themselves to be sadhus of the highest category. That is another example of pratyaya, a conditioning, that is for and against what you believe in and what you don’t believe. Paramahamsaji has said many times, ‘If you can help, help, but don’t become an obstruction. If you are an obstruction, leave.’ This was the statement of Paramahamsaji, he was very clear.
If we cannot look at ourselves and correct what is wrong, how can we advance on the spiritual path? For you, yoga may be teaching asana and pranayama; for me, yoga is the example of the lives that have been lived by Swami Sivananda and Swami Satyananda. Their real teaching is of how to manage the mind and not how to do wrist rotations. You focus on the wrist rotation and not on how to manage the mind, and therefore you have not been successful.
You have enjoyed your yoga, yet you have not advanced in spiritual life; the pratyayas which you exhibited ten years earlier are the same pratyayas you are exhibiting today. The pratyayas which you exhibited twenty years earlier are the same pratyayas you are exhibiting today. ‘What are you mediating for?’ Learn to look at yourself differently and then maybe you can look at others differently too. The focus and the message of this Symposium is to realize the pratyayas and the shat ripus, which you exhibit in your daily behaviour, and to transform them.
4 November 2023, Munger Yoga Symposium II, Ganga Darshan, Munger