Saravsar Upanishad #7

The first body is gross, physical, annamaya.
The second body is pranamaya, the energy-body. We spoke of these two in the morning.
Whoever purifies the energy-body, the pranamaya kosha, becomes able to awaken to the third body... when one layer becomes transparent, the next begins to glimmer through.
As we understood, the first body is formed from food; the second is fashioned by the life-breath; the third body is shaped by the waves of thought. Thought, too, is food. Thought, too, is a thing. Thought, too, is a power.
Buddha has said: as you think, so you shall become; or, that which you have become is the very result of your thinking.
Up to the mind this is true... up to the Manomaya Kosha this is true. And Buddha’s statement is true; because those to whom he spoke knew nothing beyond the mind. But we never understand thought as nourishment, that thought too is food; and that thought, entering within, constructs a body. If we understand this a little, it will come into view.
In Calcutta, around 1900, a child was lost. Some seven years later it was discovered that the child was in the forest, and a hunter brought him back. A wolf had carried the child off. Much effort was made to make that child human again; it proved very difficult. He walked on all fours, like wolves; he made sounds like wolves. He had become as ferocious as a wolf. He could run with equal swiftness, but to make him stand upright on the spine proved difficult. His mind had not developed, because the mind had received no food. In the midst of much endeavor that child died.
This has happened three or four times. Some ten years ago, again in Uttar Pradesh, a fourteen-year-old boy was brought back from among wolves. Fourteen years is a considerable age. Yet he could not utter even a single word. After six months of effort, he could only be taught to say his name—"Ram." They had given him the name Ram; after six months of effort only this single sound could be taught. That child too died. He was brought back in good health, all arrangements made, and yet he could not be kept alive, because to generate a mind in him now proved so arduous, to become human so difficult, because the Manomaya Kosha had not developed at all.
You speak one language; that is the food that has been given to you since childhood. Had you grown up in another home, you would speak another language. A deep layer is formed.
One of my friends was in Germany for twenty years. He left India at a very young age. His mother tongue is Marathi; he forgot it. After twenty years of speaking German, he had no recall of Marathi—could neither read it, nor speak it, nor understand it.
Then suddenly an accident happened and he fell ill. His brother went from here to Germany. In the hospital where he had been admitted, the staff requested his brother to remain at night; ordinarily the hospital did not allow anyone to stay overnight, but they said he would have to stay, because whenever his brother spoke in unconsciousness, it was in some unknown language; when he was conscious, he spoke in German. The brother was amazed. When his brother spoke in unconsciousness, he spoke in Marathi. In consciousness, Marathi did not make sense to him; in unconsciousness he spoke only Marathi, he could not speak German. In unconsciousness, he could not even understand German.
The first layer of the Manomaya Kosha, formed from that original nourishment, is deep. That is why a person may learn any other language, yet the depth of a mother tongue is never attained. It is impossible; there is no way. Because the layer that formed first in the Manomaya Kosha will remain the first; all other layers will be constructed only after it.
Language, words, thoughts—by these a body is constructed within us. The more cultured and educated a person is, the larger his mental body. Yet this body does not appear to us as a body; and therefore, without any concern we go on putting anything whatsoever into the Manomaya Kosha.
A man reads a newspaper from morning—he has no idea that this newspaper too will construct his mental body. He reads posters on the walls along the road—he has no idea that the words going within are also constructing his mind.
We are so inattentive in the construction of our mind that our life becomes a chaos. If we were equally careless in the construction of the physical body, the body too would become a chaos. We do not eat pebbles and stones; but when it comes to the mind, we eat things even more useless than pebbles and stones; and all of that constructs our mind. Known or unknown to us, whatever enters the mind becomes part of it.
Yet we have no awareness at all that the mental body is being constructed moment to moment—what we hear, what we read, what we think, whatever word resounds within, all of it constructs the Manomaya Kosha. If your neighbor is saying anything to you, you never say to him, "Do not pour this nonsense into me." Whether you notice it or not, taking it in is easy; to take it out is very difficult.
If I put a single word inside you, to take it out is not so easy. Try and you will find out. I say to you "Ram"—try all night to take it out, you will not be able to; rather it will settle within more deeply. Because the more you try to remove it, the more you will have to remember it. That which we want to forget, to forget it we have to remember it. And each remembrance strengthens it.
That is why in this world, when someone wants to forget someone, forgetting becomes impossible. If someone forgets, that is a different matter; but to make oneself forget is very difficult. And even what is forgotten is only forgotten on the surface; within it does not erase. Chitta loses nothing; chitta is a great collector. This Manomaya Kosha collects the subtlest. Through births upon births, whatever it has received as waves of thought, it has gathered up.
To understand this body rightly is necessary; only then can one go beyond it.
Two more points are necessary to note here.
First I said to you: the gross body is our physical body; in between the two is the vital body, the prana-body; and behind is the mind-body.
The bridge between mind and body is the prana-kaya. The bridge that connects the two is prana. Therefore, if breath stops, the body lies here, and the Manomaya Kosha sets out on a new journey.
In death the gross body is destroyed; the mind-body is not destroyed. The mind-body is destroyed only in one established in Samadhi. When a man dies, his mind does not die, only the body dies; and that mind sets out on a new journey, carrying all the old samskaras. That mind again adopts a new body, and practically on the same mold as before reconstructs itself—again it finds a new body, again it takes a new womb.
The connection between these two is prana. Therefore, if a man becomes unconscious, we do not say he has died; if he enters a coma and lies for months, we still do not say he has died. But if breath stops, we say he has died; because with the breath the connection of body and mind breaks.
And note also that with the breath the relationship of body and mind changes moment to moment. When you are angry, the rhythm of breath changes... instantly; when you are filled with lust, the rhythm of breath changes... instantly; when you are quiet, the rhythm of breath changes... instantly. If the mind is restless, the rhythm of breath changes; if the body is uneasy, the rhythm of breath changes. The rhythm of breath keeps changing all the time, because if the body changes here, the mind changes there. Those who understand the rhythm of breath, who grasp the cadence of breath, come to a deep mastery over mind and body.
In Japan, little children are taught that whenever anger arises, make your breath calm—not the anger; because no one can directly make anger calm. You can suppress it, but you cannot make it calm. And suppressed anger will erupt again tomorrow—perhaps even more poisonous. In Japan they tell the children: when anger arises, make the breath calm; because as soon as the breath becomes calm, anger arises in the mind but cannot reach the body; for without the bridge of breath it is impossible to reach the body. And as long as it does not reach the body, there is no need to suppress it and no need to express it. If it remains only at the level of mind it dissolves; if it reaches the body, it goes beyond your capacity. There are ways for it to evaporate directly from the mind; but the body is very gross. Once something grips the body, then either express it or suppress it. If you express it, there is trouble; if you suppress it, glands—knots—are formed in the body.
A very remarkable American psychologist died some time ago—his name was Wilhelm Reich. From a lifetime of experiments on patients, he said that when a man suppresses his anger, the anger settles in the body as knots. And the astonishing thing: by pressing those knots he could make the man angry again. By studying patients’ bodies throughout his life... if he sensed that a patient’s illness was the suppression of anger, he would press hard the parts of the body where he thought anger was stored; immediately the man would fill with anger. Another man, pressed at the same place, would not fill with anger—only that particular man. And he would at once begin to burn with anger, without any cause, because there was no present reason.
If you suppress, then glands—complexes—are created in the body. Ninety out of a hundred diseases are the result of those repressed energies hidden in the body. Therefore physicians only shift them, they do not cure. Today it is one illness; the physician gives a medicine, blocks it there; tomorrow the illness starts somewhere else. The physician only transfers illnesses. Some relief comes. You are freed from one illness; it takes a little time for the next to manifest.
The knots accumulated within, the subtle poison that has accumulated and become glandular, must come out. But if it does not reach the body, there are methods for it to evaporate directly from the mind.
Breath is the bridge. Therefore whatever is conveyed is conveyed through the breath. If you are filled with lust and the breath simply remains calm, it is difficult to deliver that lust to the body; it will reach the body only through the breath.
There was a very remarkable film director in Russia—the most thoughtful film director of this century—Stanislavski. He made the deepest researches on acting. Those researches are very useful... useful for every man. His deepest discovery was this: he taught his actors the rhythms of breath. He would say, when you need to bring anger, do not worry about anger; create this rhythm of breath, and anger will come. When you need to express love, do not try to express love; because in the attempt to express love the artificiality that enters destroys the acting. He would say, set this arrangement of breath within; breathe at this pace, and soon love will glow on your face. And that glow will be very close to the real; it will not look like acting.
Stanislavski used to say: the actor must be the master of his body and vital body—"He must be a master of his vital body particularly"—only then can he be skillful in acting; otherwise he cannot.
There was a German dancer, Nijinsky. When he danced, everyone felt an illusion—an illusion partly true—that though there were many great dancers in the world to rival him, it was said there had never been a dancer like Nijinsky, and perhaps never would be again. And the marvel was this: when he leapt from the ground, he took longer to return. No other dancer could take that much time. As if gravitation affected him less, as if the pull of the earth worked less upon him. Once he rose, it seemed as if he were floating in the air; and in returning he took more time. A man who had leaped along with him would already have reached the ground, but Nijinsky would still be descending.
Much searching was done to find the secret. From all sides investigation revealed only one thing: the uniqueness lay in his rhythm of breath; his rhythm was very different, not ordinary. And in the last fifty years, news has reached regarding people who can rise above the ground—like a woman in Bolivia who sometimes, two or four times a year, rises four feet above the ground. She has undergone scientific tests, films have been made; all effort made, no room for doubt remains. But her rhythm is the same as Nijinsky’s; her rhythm of breath is the same.
In pranayama, and in the science of prana, many rhythms of breath were discovered. With those rhythms, changes take place in both body and mind. Breath is the bridge of the prana-body. On this side is the body of matter; on that side is the body of thought.
Thought, in our experience, is the most subtle of things. Yet thought also "is." And what was thought till now—that thought has no material existence—has proved wrong. Thought too has a material existence.
Eddington has written in his autobiography—then it was only a conjecture—he wrote that he was often overwhelmed by the idea: "Thoughts are things." But there was then no proof; now there are many scientific proofs.
In the last ten years, instruments have been developed that are affected by your waves of thought. If you stand before such an instrument and concentrate intensely, the instrument reports that this man is becoming concentrated—merely by your standing in front of it, as if you stood before an X-ray machine. If you relax yourself and let thought loosen, the instrument reports that this man’s thoughts have loosened.
There is a man in America: Ted Serios. Perhaps the greatest proof in today’s world that thoughts are also matter is this man, Ted Serios. In him, a special power began to manifest accidentally. By meditating on any thought, Ted Serios could become so concentrated that the image of that thought would appear in his eye; and that image could be taken by a camera. If Ted Serios sat quietly and thought of the Taj Mahal, the picture of the Taj Mahal would arise upon his eye—the Taj Mahal he had never even seen. And it did not arise only in his imagination; it could be photographed by an external camera.
Around ten thousand photographs of Ted Serios were taken. Many delightful experiments occurred; his photographs have now been published. Hundreds of scientists worked hard by various techniques to see if there was any deception—there was no way of deception. Because the scientist too could see the Taj Mahal in his eye. Perhaps a scientist can be deceived, but to deceive a camera is very difficult. And what does the picture caught by the camera say? It says that if thought, becoming dense, can form the Taj Mahal in the eye, then thought is not just thought; thought is also a thing, material, substantial; because only matter can be photographed—how can thoughts be photographed! Photographs can be taken only of matter. That which can be photographed is sufficiently substantial; sufficiently material.
And many times very amusing events happened. Ted Serios tries to bring the Taj Mahal into his eye; suddenly he closes his eye and says, "All right, the Taj is caught, get the camera ready." He opens his eye, the click happens, and then Ted Serios says, "Pardon me, you missed; Hilton Hotel came—inside my thought changed. Forgive me." And the delightful thing is, the camera does not catch the Taj Mahal; it catches the Hilton Hotel. And many times both were caught—the Hilton superimposed upon the Taj; the Taj was going, the Hilton was coming.
Thought too is objective, extremely subtle. But we are feeding on it as well. Moment to moment we carry thought within. That thought is constructing a body within us; a body is being fashioned. It is a house built with bricks of thought. That is why the kind of thoughts you carry within will shape your mental body accordingly.
Man is very unsafe in this respect. In this century, especially unsafe. Radio pours thoughts, newspapers pour thoughts, leaders pour thoughts, advertisers pour thoughts—from all sides thoughts are being poured into man; and many times you think that you are deciding—you are in a great mistake.
Vance Packard wrote a book: "The Hidden Persuaders." You think... you go to a shop and say, "Give me Berkeley cigarettes." You think you have chosen; you are in a great mistake. There are hidden persuaders all around you. The newspaper tells you: buy Berkeley cigarettes. Signs are on shopfronts, on walls; the name is written; you go to a film, there is Berkeley; you listen to the radio, there is Berkeley... wherever you look there is Berkeley; it has been put into your brain.
American advertisers say that in whatever a man purchases, ninety percent we make him purchase; the ten percent that he buys himself is not his skill—it is only that the art of advertising is not yet fully mature; as we develop it, one hundred percent—we know what we can make a man buy; what he will buy.
Some care must be taken to be free of this; otherwise you are not free. If others are constructing your mind, you are not free. Your parents give you religion, your teachers in school give you knowledge, then the newspapers and advertisers and the marketplace give you suggestions of things to buy; and then around these you spend your entire life.
Now in America, more cars are being produced than there are buyers, because everyone has a car already. So the sellers are worried—what now? For the last five years a new idea is being promoted: a rich man is one who has two cars. Now people have begun to keep two cars. One car is proof of poverty. You have only one car! That is proof of poverty. Once poverty and one car are joined, then life cannot go on with only one car. A rich man must have at least two houses—one in the city, one at the beach or in the mountains. A poor man has only one house. It is only a matter of getting a thought inside; then you begin to be obsessed... and you keep thinking that it is you who is thinking—there is the deception.
The mental body is fashioned by words. All of us have heard much about nama-japa, name-repetition, and have seen people doing it; but you may not know: "It is simply a protective method and nothing else." Name-japa is a method of protection. If a person passes along the road repeating "Ram, Ram" within, other words cannot enter him; because for words to enter there must be a gap, an empty space.
If a man keeps repeating "Ram" within for twenty-four hours—sweeping with a broom, within Ram-Ram going; eating, within Ram-Ram going; going to the shop, within Ram-Ram going; even speaking with someone, within Ram-Ram going—he has erected a protective measure; now you cannot pour anything and everything into him. A dense layer has arisen within—a wall of Ram. To cross this wall of Ram is not easy. That man is trying to give a particular form and shape to his mental body.
And a very curious thing: once this wall of Ram is established, even if something does enter, it will be only that which can harmonize with the conception of Ram; otherwise it will not enter. If there is an affinity it will pass within. If someone shouts "Ravana" at such a man, the word will collide with the wall and return; if someone says "Sita," it will pass within. This layer will now give passage to what is congenial to it, and stop what is contrary. And the person will begin to be, in a sense, the master of his mental body—he will give entrance to whom he will; and deny it to whom he will.
And if we are not even the masters of our own mind, then what can we be masters of? This mind of ours is almost deranged, because we are carrying in it opposing things—innumerable opposing things! People say, the mind is very restless, in confusion, confused. It is a great surprise that they take this as some illness to be cured! This is your sadhana; you are practicing it twenty-four hours; you are taking into yourself all kinds of opposing thoughts. You put one thought inside, and you also put in its opposite; there is restlessness in both. There is a polarity, a dual tension; they fight with each other and you are caught in the conflict.
You are not in conflict; the thoughts within you are in conflict. And there are countless thoughts within, and countless conflicts among them. One wants to go east, one wants to go west, one does not want to go anywhere; a massive conflict—your condition is just like a bullock cart in which we have tied bulls on all four sides. Sometimes the cart moves two inches east, sometimes four inches west—whichever bull becomes a little stronger, or whichever bull becomes a little lazy... the tug continues and the cart reaches nowhere. In the end, its frame will scatter to pieces and nothing will come of it. We are all in such a condition. There is an inner contradiction, an inner irony.
A person came to me recently and said, "I want contentment in life... contentment. But I cannot trust anyone. So I have come to you; I have absolutely no trust in you. Please show a path to contentment." I said to him: I can show a path, but you will not be able to trust it! I told him: stop seeking contentment. You are seeking discontentment; because one who says, "I cannot trust anyone," cannot be content; because one who has to remain distrustful must always be alert, fearful, anxious—he is always in danger; for around him there are only those on whom there is distrust, there is no trust anywhere. If such a person develops that distrust fully, he will not be able to sit even inside a house, because who knows when the house may collapse; he cannot stand outside, because who knows what accident may happen. If such a person keeps nourishing distrust, he will not be able to trust even himself.
I know a very intelligent university professor whose final condition became that he could not trust himself. He could not keep a knife or such things in his room at night, because who knows when he might pick it up and stab his own chest—he had no trust in himself. Either someone had to stay in his room at night—but even in that person he had no trust—or if he stayed alone, nothing sharp could remain, for he had no trust in himself. In fact the one who trusts no one, a day comes when he cannot trust himself either. In truth he cannot trust at all—that is the real issue... not himself or others. Then there is no possibility of contentment.
Contentment fructifies only for the person who can trust even when there is no ground for trust.
A little child is walking holding his father’s hand. His contentment knows no bounds, although it is not certain that the father will not let him fall; not certain that the father himself will not fall; nothing is certain—perhaps the father is gripping the boy’s hand with equal force to take support. Yet the child is content.
I have heard, Mulla Nasruddin put his little boy—eight or ten years old—up on a ladder. Standing below with open arms he said, "Son, jump." The boy said, "What if I fall?" Nasruddin said, "Fool! I am your father standing to catch you; why would you fall?" He said, "I feel very afraid." Nasruddin said, "When I am standing here, what need is there to fear?" The boy hesitated much; but when his father did not relent, he jumped. Nasruddin stepped aside and let him fall. He hit the ground, his knees were broken; the boy said, "What have you done?" Nasruddin said, "I gave you the lesson of life: don’t trust even your father. In this world never trust; there is no one but deceivers."
If such a mental climate enters within, contentment is not possible.
Contentment is possible in a certain arrangement—of trust. Discontent is an arrangement of doubt. If you want both together, difficulty arises.
A friend came; he said, "I have great fear of death, and I cannot settle into even a little faith that the soul exists." I said to him: if the Atman does not exist at all, what need is there to fear death? You are already dead; what is left to die? And if there is faith in the Atman, then also there is no need to fear death, because it will not die. Decide upon one of the two. If it is absolutely certain to you that there is no Atman, then fear of death is madness—what that is not will die how? You are only a composite; you will scatter. And when the composite scatters, who is going to feel pain? No one. When we dismantle a clock, who suffers? Nothing—only a join was there, it broke. No one remains behind to feel pain. Be certain that there is nothing like the soul; then you have no reason at all to fear death.
He said: "And if the soul is?"
If...! If the soul is—this "if" has no meaning. It means you want to preserve your fear of death. If the soul is... his meaning was: the fear of death is anyway here. If fear cannot be preserved by denying the soul, then we are ready even to accept that there is a soul—but what to do with fear? I told him: if the soul is, then there is no need for fear, because the meaning of soul is exactly that there is no death.
But what is their trouble? Their trouble is, somewhere deep they want to survive, to live forever; and yet they cannot trust that eternal living is possible. There are voices within opposing each other. Such a person cuts himself to pieces.
Mind becomes an entanglement because we collect opposing thoughts. If the mental body is to be purified, there is only one way: thoughts need a kind of harmony, a musicality, a unison, a harmony; then the mental body becomes pure, and one enters within.
The fourth body is the "Vijnanamaya Kosha."
The third body is constructed from thoughts; the fourth body is constructed from consciousness, from awareness, from bodha; it is the body of knowing. When we become capable of knowing the very process of thought, when we can see thought as a man sees clouds drifting across the sky, when we can see thought as a row of cranes flying across the sky... when, in the sky of our consciousness, we can watch thought flying—standing a little apart—then the fourth body becomes known.
But we are so bound to the first body that we do not even glimpse the second. Then we become so engrossed in the third—so drowned in the mind—that we cannot even conceive that we can be beyond the mind.
Bodhidharma went to China some fourteen hundred years ago. Emperor Wu said to him: "My mind is very restless... a path?" Bodhidharma said: "You say your mind is very restless—have you ever known any quiet mind?" Wu was astonished. He said, "I have never known a quiet mind." Then Bodhidharma said, "Why do you say restless mind? The truth is: restlessness is the name of mind. Restless mind! Why use duplications? Restlessness is the very name of mind, and you set out to make the mind quiet? You will go mad; the mind will never be quiet."
Wu said, "Then must I die in such restlessness?"
Bodhidharma said, "No; but you can go beyond the mind. And what is beyond the mind is quiet. You cannot make the mind quiet; but if you go beyond mind, what is there is quiet; and when that is found, the mind too becomes quiet.
In fact, the mind vanishes." As soon as the fourth body develops, the third begins to fall apart. And as soon as the fourth body becomes developed, the third body remains only utilitarian.
One who has developed the fourth body is not surrounded by thoughts; when he needs them, he uses them—just as when there is need we walk with the legs. You do not say, "I will sit on the chair, but I will keep moving my legs." Some people do keep moving! They do... the reason is only this: "If we don’t move the legs now, what will we do when it’s time to walk? We must keep the practice going!" Or they don’t even know... more likely they don’t know their legs are moving. There is no master; how could they know? If the legs have to move, they move; if the head has to shake, it shakes—whoever has to do whatever, is doing it; all are slaves and there is no master. And no one is ready to obey or listen to anyone else.
Precisely so with thoughts: when the fourth body is experienced, thoughts remain only a utility—when needed, you think; when not needed, you do not. If you think when there is no need, it is very difficult for you to know the fourth body. It will not come to your notice, because thoughts will keep moving—no matter how much you say, "Stop," they will not stop. There is a reason. You may not have noticed that when you try to say to thought, "Stop, be still, be quiet," it does not happen. You do not know that the one who is saying, "Stop!" is itself a thought; otherwise they would stop instantly. And one thought cannot stop another thought; they are of equal strength. In fact, when one thought says, "Stop," the other thought runs faster: "Who are you to stop us?" One slave tells another, "Stop!" and the other says, "We will run! Who are you? I am the master!" All your effort to make thought quiet—this is all thought. One thought cannot stop another thought.
An order works only when it comes from a higher plane; otherwise it cannot work. When the order comes from the Vijnanamaya body—"Stop"—no thought has the status to move an inch. It stops right there. But an order is always obeyed from above; orders on the same level are ineffective.
This is the fourth body. If we develop it a little, it will come to our understanding. And then there is no need to be bothered—"Thought, stop"—this is no issue at all. It is exactly like the master has returned; all the slaves quickly fall at his feet in salute—each stands in his place: "Command!" All of them, a moment before, were saying, "I am the master!" The master returns; all stand with folded hands: "Command."
Precisely as soon as the Vijnanamaya Kosha develops, thoughts stand like slaves—use them when there is need, otherwise set them aside; they remain in the storehouse of memory, but they no longer keep you mad for twenty-four hours... at night you say, "Forgive me, let me sleep a little, stop moving," but they do not listen. You are not yet; there is as yet no one to listen to. You come into being the day you begin to glimpse the Vijnanamaya Kosha.
If you wish to go beyond mind, do not try to stop mind—you cannot; but you can make mind harmonious, musical. Because the mind itself is troubled. It is in your hands; you can make it healthy. But as soon as the mind becomes healthy, the layer behind begins to be visible—or else, try to give birth to the layer behind. Do not tell the mind, "Stop thoughts"—do something by which thoughts stop on their own.
Meditation is the method to awaken the fourth body—because meditation augments consciousness; meditation augments vijnana; meditation awakens bodha. So meditation is the nourishment of the fourth body.
I have said to you: the fourth body is Vijnanamaya; meditation is its food. Thought is the food of the third body; meditation is the food of the fourth body.
Meditation too is energy; meditation too is power; and meditation is a power like any other... supremely subtle. Try it a little and you will see. Measure your pulse; check how it is beating. Then, with closed eyes for five minutes, attend to the pulse—just attend; just be aware—and then measure again. You will find the pulse is different; it is not beating as before. What did meditation do? The energy of meditation flowed toward the pulse and its rate changed.
Meditation is an energy.
If someone is walking on the road, walk behind him; fix both your eyes upon the back of his head, upon the neck—do nothing else—only attend upon the bone at the back of the neck. In a second or two you will find the man is becoming restless. Ninety times out of a hundred he will turn within two minutes. You did nothing, only attention... and a very subtle energy from your body began to touch that man.
Meditation is a supremely subtle energy.
And now, in Russia, they are having to take meditation seriously, because as space travel advances, they must take meditation seriously for scientific reasons; because instruments are not reliable.
Recently, some astronauts died. Instruments are not reliable. If a radio unit fails, we will receive no news from them, nor can we send any. And if their spaceship is lost in the vastness, we will not even know where it has gone; whether they are alive or not—we will not be able to say anything about them.
An American insurance company announced that it would insure astronauts, but would pay only when definite news is received that they are dead. Otherwise they may be lost anywhere and remain alive! Definite proof is needed that they have died, then we will pay. But if a spaceship is lost and the radio fails, whether the astronauts live or not, or where they go, or what happened—we will have no news.
So, along with instruments, something else must be joined—as a substitute measure. For this, Russia is working hard on meditation. And the attempt is being made, with some success, that when the radio fails, one astronaut should be adept in meditation who can transmit messages only by the energy of meditation. Considerable success has been achieved; messages can be transmitted by the energy of meditation. And the great wonder is: if they can be transmitted, then they can be transmitted one hundred percent—there will be no error; if they cannot, they will not.
Meditation too is an energy—the subtlest, perhaps. Not only physiologists or psychologists, even physicists are now feeling that meditation must be energy; because the idea is becoming clearer that if we look at an object with attention, by looking alone transformations occur in the object—also in the object!
If we observe the atom, after observation the atom’s behavior is not the same as it is when it is not observed. Observation brings some difference. Just as a man walking alone on a road walks one way; suddenly another man appears on the same road, and his gait becomes different—however subtle the difference, it comes at once. You are bathing in your bathroom; you are one way. Suddenly you find someone is peeping through the keyhole... what happens?
In man, it can be understood; but now scientists say that in the object too there is a difference: the object too becomes a little different. At the Delabar laboratory in Oxford, experiments were made on flowers and attention. One person attends lovingly to a flower, and another flower—exactly the same—receives no attention; both are given water, sunlight, the same arrangements are made; but the flower upon which attention is given grows bigger; the flower without attention remains small. Seeds sown with attention sprout sooner; those sown without attention sprout later. Does any difference arise in the seed? Do flowers too become affected by the energy of attention? No energy seems to go back and forth, yet some energy certainly works.
This meditation is the food of the fourth body. So the meditation we are doing is also an effort to awaken this fourth body.
Beyond these four koshas is the fifth body; the rishis have called it the "Anandamaya Kosha"—the bliss body.
When one stands in the Vijnanamaya Kosha and purifies it—fills it with meditation—the most transparent body is born.
The gross body can never become so transparent, because the very matter of which it is made—rub it as much as you wish—it never becomes completely transparent; it is its nature. Prana-energy becomes more transparent than matter, but still not perfectly so. The mind becomes yet more transparent, but still not perfectly. The most transparent is the vijnana-body... it becomes utterly transparent—so transparent that you cannot merely see through it, you can pass through it; so transparent that there is no resistance at all; no opposition remains.
The purest energy is meditation—the most purified energy possible. If you pass through it, there is no bump anywhere, no bruise... you will not even notice it. If you stand in the purest energy of vijnana, you will not even know that the fourth body is. Therefore a curious thing happens: the very moment one stands in the vijnana-body, he does not come to know the vijnana-body, he comes to know the bliss-body.
Understand this rightly.
Because the fourth body is so utterly pure that there it does not appear that there is a fourth. As if glass is utterly pure—it will not be seen. If it is seen, it means a little impurity is present. If glass does not appear at all, only then is it pure. But glass is still matter... it may not be seen by the eye, the eye may not be hindered; but if you go, you will bump. But vijnana-energy is the purest energy known so far. The subtlest power that yoga or science has reached is meditation, vijnana. Hence, as soon as a man becomes perfectly aware, he does not feel, "I am aware"; he feels, "I am filled with bliss." The body behind it—the bliss-body—shines; that is what appears.
This fifth is the bliss-body; yet even this the rishis call a body; they do not call it the Atman. Bliss too is a body. The rishis say: bliss too is a body.
Note a few points about this; only then will it be understood.
One: as I said to you, the fourth body is the purest; but the fourth body can be impure as well—the purest, yet it can be impure. As impure as it is with us now. It becomes pure by meditation; it becomes impure by negligence. By awareness it is purified; by unconsciousness it becomes impure. Therefore all intoxicants primarily damage the vijnana-body; whatever damage they do to any other body is secondary. It can even happen that they benefit another body—but the vijnana-body they surely damage. Alcohol may benefit the physical body in some dosage. It can also happen—and it does happen—that upon taking alcohol your prana-energy manifests very swiftly. That is why one often feels a rush of vigor. This is experienced in the prana-energy.
Alcohol can benefit the thought-body in some sense. People who live by thought alone—poets, writers, painters, sculptors, those who give shape to thought—often find alcohol favorable. In some measure it may benefit. But it invariably harms the fourth body; under no condition does it help; for for the fourth body, stupor is impurity, and awareness is purity. Any kind of stupefaction harms. The fourth body can be the purest, but it can be impure as well—both possibilities are in it.
The fifth body has one specialty: it is pure only. It cannot be impure. That is why we have no opposite word for "ananda." Opposite to happiness is sorrow; opposite to peace is unrest; opposite to love is hate; opposite to consciousness is stupor; but we have no opposite to bliss. Bliss is the only word without an opposite. And if someone says "nir-ananda," it only indicates absence, not an opposite. Nirananda is no state; it is only the absence of bliss. Nirananda has no form; no place, no existence.
There is no energy opposite to bliss. Therefore the fifth body is pure. And therefore nothing needs to be done with regard to the fifth; do something with the fourth, and the fifth becomes available. The fifth is always present. And that is why every man feels as if bliss is his birthright, that bliss must be attained; so we seek bliss. No one asks, "Why do you seek bliss? What is the need?" Every other search can be asked, "Why?" but bliss alone is such a search that asking "why" seems utterly pointless.
If you come to me, people ask me: why should we seek God? Why should we seek Truth? What is the purpose of life? But no one comes and asks me: why should we seek bliss? What is the purpose of bliss? Bliss is accepted. Therefore even if God is sought, man seeks him for bliss; for what else? Even if Truth is sought, it is sought for bliss. If you are assured that by attaining Truth there will be no bliss at all, that you will be submerged in supreme sorrow, you will at once stop seeking Truth—what business would you have with such a search!
Nietzsche has raised a question. And Nietzsche sometimes raises very deep questions that would put even a Buddha in difficulty to answer. Nietzsche says: if bliss is the goal of life, and if falsehood gives bliss, then what is wrong with falsehood? If bliss is the goal, and if bliss is obtained in dreams, then what need is there to seek truth? If bliss is the goal, then drop Brahman. If bliss is obtained in maya, what is there to worry? Settle one thing: if bliss alone is the goal... The moralist, the theologian, fear to answer Nietzsche—what answer can they give? Nietzsche says: are you certain that truth will not bring sorrow? How have you decided that truth will not bring sorrow? Because he says, experience shows that truth is very bitter and gives much sorrow. Are you certain that imagination brings only sorrow? Experience shows that imagination becomes very pleasant. And why are you after people to break their dreams? Dreams are sometimes beautiful and delightful. Yes, there are bad dreams too, nightmares. Do only this much: get rid of bad dreams, and let beautiful dreams become eternal, never break—then what need is there to seek anything else?
The theologian gets into difficulty—the theologian, not the knower. The knower says: a dream is precisely that which cannot be made eternal. The knower says: that in which you get happiness—precisely because there is misery in it; otherwise there would be no happiness. The knower says: if ever you feel happiness in falsehood, it is because falsehood deceives you as truth; otherwise you would not. If the shadow ever delights you, it is because the shadow claims to be the substance. That is why no liar claims to be a liar; the claim is always to be truthful. In truth, it is the liar who claims to be truthful; the truthful needs no claim.
Even for untruth to function, it must borrow truth’s legs. Even for dreams to live, they must deceive you that they are not dreams, that they are truth; only then can they live.
Bliss is not pleasure, because pleasure is bound to pain. Bliss is not dream, because dream is bound to break. And a bliss that breaks is not bliss; because there is nothing opposite to bliss that could break it. That which is bliss is nondual, solitary. And the search for bliss is because it is our ultimate body—yet still a body; that is the wonder. The rishis’ search is so subtle there is no measure for it! Even bliss they call a body... why? Because they say: as long as you come to know that bliss is, you have not yet found that which is to be found; for as long as knowing remains, duality remains. The knower is separate from that which is known.
You say, "So much bliss is coming"—two things are clear: there is someone to whom it is coming, and there is something that is coming. So this bliss too is a sheath around you; and at its center there still stands one who knows that bliss is coming.
As soon as this awakening also happens... and this awakening is far subtler and far more difficult than the previous one. We said: in the Vijnanamaya body meditation is the food; with awareness, one is freed from mind. If awareness arises even towards the Anandamaya body, one transcends bliss as well—and then the person attains that which is worth attaining. That is then not a body; that is Atman.
But awakening towards the mind is very easy—I said very difficult; but in this comparison it is easy. Awakening towards bliss carries an intrinsic difficulty: we do not want to awaken from bliss at all... intrinsic difficulty. Who would want to awake from bliss? Bliss has been the search all through life—through births. Who will drop it? An iron chain one wants to drop; a golden chain one does not feel like dropping. It does not seem like a chain; it seems like ornament—studded with diamonds and jewels. But the rishis say: that too is a chain. And remember: an iron chain is not as great a chain as a golden chain studded with jewels; because now the prisoner himself does not want to drop it. This deepens the bondage.
The bliss-body is the last point. Therefore when people asked Buddha: "What will be in Nirvana? Bliss will remain, won’t it?" Buddha would say: "If you will not remain, how will bliss remain? Neither you will be, nor will bliss be."
This is a very strange thing: to know bliss, duality is needed—someone inside, and bliss as experience. All experience is outer—every experience! Experience as such is of the without; the experiencer is within. But when even bliss does not remain, shall we call him an experiencer? When no experience remains, what meaning is there in calling him an experiencer! Therefore Buddha says: both will be lost—something will be, but you will not be; something will be, but bliss will not be.
If the bliss-body remains, a person is born in supreme ecstasy—but he is born; life does not end. He is born—in supreme ecstasy—but birth remains. His life is a dance; his life is bliss upon bliss, and yet it is life.
Only when the bliss-body breaks is Nirvana.
How to awaken even towards bliss? For now we have no sign at all of bliss. To speak of dropping what we do not have will be hard to understand. It is like telling a beggar to renounce the throne—it will be good. The beggar will say, "But where is that throne which I can renounce? Tell me first where it is. Let me first sit upon it."
Yet this talk of renunciation in advance is useful in one sense, because if this remembrance remains—even before attaining the throne—that it too is to be dropped, then perhaps the throne will not become a hypnosis; perhaps the remembrance will remain: this too is to be dropped.
There was a Sufi fakir, Bayazid. He used to tell his disciples one mantra to remember always: whatever experience comes to you, remember, this too is to be dropped... whatever! So Bayazid’s disciple Hasan asked him: "If the experience of God happens?" Bayazid said: "That too... remember to drop it." Continue dropping until there is nothing left to drop; stop only where nothing remains to be dropped. Because I tell you, God is there where nothing remains to be dropped. Before that, all your Gods will be your own constructs; keep dropping them.
As long as there is experience, there is the world. Whatever the experience—even the subtlest, it is world. The experience of bliss too is world.
Therefore the rishis have used very astonishing words. And sometimes the mind is amazed: such courageous people must have been! They said such revolutionary things; and around them an astonishing event happened: non-revolutionary people gathered. It seems they could not even understand. They have said:
"With these four koshas the Atman... like the banyan tree in the seed... abides in its causal ignorance."
This too is ignorance—and the basic ignorance. "Causal ignorance." The foundational ignorance. And that causal ignorance is called the Anandamaya Kosha. They have called this the basic ignorance. As the banyan tree is hidden in the seed, and until the seed breaks the banyan cannot be born, so the very first layer around the Atman, the deepest and closest to the Atman, is the Anandamaya Kosha. But these are astonishing people. They say: "It abides in its causal ignorance; that is called the Anandamaya Kosha." That Anandamaya Kosha is the shell of the Atman—like the seed. And until bliss breaks, it is not attained; because until the seed breaks, where is the tree?
Those who have thought that the seers of India seek only bliss, have deeply misunderstood. The seers of India seek that state where bliss too is thrown away like a worthless coin; the search is for that state where bliss too becomes unnecessary. As long as bliss is necessary, you are poor. Only he is emperor who drops bliss also, like a seed drops its husk.
These are the five koshas.
Standing in the fifth is itself transcendence; because as soon as you reach the fifth, you are so close to God that you are pulled. No, nothing needs to be done—exactly as a whirlpool is forming in water, and you float a flower upon the water; it can float, but as it nears the whirlpool... nearer... nearer... as soon as it touches the first circle of the whirlpool, it is drawn in—goes within and sinks.
Up to the fifth body, man’s effort is necessary; beyond the fifth, no effort is needed. And therefore one who has kept the remembrance, while striving up to the fifth, that the Lord’s compassion—his kindness, his grace—will pull one in, when he reaches the fifth, that remembrance will function. But if someone, in striving through the five, forgets and keeps going in the pride that "I will do it, I will do it," then first it is difficult to reach the fifth; and it may happen that he stands upon the fifth with this conceit, that "I have done it, so I will leap beyond the fifth as well; when I have come this far, what need is there of the Lord’s grace?" It may happen that he simply stands on the shore and gravitation does not work... that pull does not work; because for that pull to work your receptivity is an essential part—you must be ready to be drawn; only then can it act.
That is why we have not called it "pull"—we have called it prasada, grace. There are reasons. Because pull is a mechanical thing; attraction is mechanical. Whether the little magnet is ready or not, the big magnet will pull it. There is no need of its readiness. And whether the stone wants to fall or not, if you throw it up, the earth will pull it down. This is not needing any preparedness. We call it prasada because it is not a mechanical event. To receive this prasada requires preparation too... the hands must be outstretched... then this prasada can be received.
The awareness of prasada is the key to going beyond the fifth body—to entering the bodiless.
Enough for today.
Now let us make the effort to reach the fifth. And keep remembrance of the Lord’s grace. It may happen: we may fall within the circle of the pull and be drawn in.
Those who are ready to work fast should come up; those who wish to go a little slowly should stand below at the sides. No sluggish person should stand above. If you wish to go even a little slow, stand below at the edges....