MYSTERIES OF
THE PATH
A short compilation from some of the talks given by Dr N H Chandrashekar Swami to seekers are presented below to provide insights into the mysteries of the path. Dr Chandrashekar was a traditional Agam Sadhaka linked to Nipani Math, Karnataka, who was pulled to Kashi and initiated by his Guru Pt Gopinath Kavirajji on the Path divine.
SADHANA
After all, by whatever names you call
it, Prakriti or whatever, the
consciousness is, and we have conditioned it. That is our nature. But the
question is that the efforts which you would like to do through experiences,
they are only to understand exactly our consciousness. And that consciousness
is not static. It is not like a stone, a lifeless but that consciousness is
full of joy, bliss and infinite conscious movement.
And there is will, Icha shakti, there is understanding, Jyana shakti, and there is action, Kriya shakti. These things are there. Now we have to understand how
far they are expanded. We can expand them. How far they are exactly limitless?
And we will understand exactly, that is realization.
Why do we have to do the mechanical
activities? To become free from the mechanical activities. Mechanical activities which you do in sadhana , for example, exhale and
inhale……why I have to do? Because you cannot get observation immediately. So
the basic principle of movement of mind is related with our exhale and inhale.
So, it is not a practice to condition you. What we call practice, conditions
your mind, but the practice which I say, is not a practice actually, it is to
uncondition. You have to make your own effort. For that, I can only help you.
This help is called instruction.
And when you do these things, it is not a mechanical action, or it is not any ordinary thing, but to understand, or to make your mind more clear, and to study. Not just to study, but to observe, and to see inwardly , which mechanism is going on. When you understand this, you are free from it. If you have not understood your mechanism, you are not free from it.
So the most important aspect in doing sadhana is : not to blindly follow the
steps, not to condition and not to make a mechanical habit. If you do anything
as a mechanical habit, then it will loose your consciousness. Because
mechanical habit means unawareness. When there is no awareness, that becomes a
mechanical habit. Have you seen many people who take beads e.g rudraksha mala , they go on repeating
and their mind is not at all tuned with that. Neither it has tuned with those
words. So normally, reaction is going on.
So, why do we condemn practices? Because
after a particular period, they become mechanical actions. Although, these actions also have their own
role, but they are not linked with any consciousness or understanding. And we
have to actually practice in the beginning. Why? To uncondition. But
contrarily, our intellect is so shrewd. It conditions everything.
If I say : God is all pervading, God is
sat-chit-ananda, then your mind conditions with sat-chit-ananda, even though it
does not know the meaning of it. It only accumulates the information i.e God is
sat-chit–ananda , and it always says that. But it does not know : what is sat ,
what is chit , what is ananda ! If you
say : “It is experience”, then he also talks : “Oh , you have to experience
it”. That is all. It is like a tape recorder which takes the information and
reproduces. Such information will never help. So your mechanical practices will
never help to your wisdom. And this is, because they are based on mechanical
phenomenon.
Your master who is with joy and bliss, he talks to make you understand. Apart from giving some process, he guides, he gives a touch of the inner master and makes you free. A master understands your problems, because he has already muddled in these problems, and now he has awakened. So, he will love you.
He will try to understand and he will
make you understand. He tries to nullify your intellect, and to bring in the
wisdom. When he becomes successful in bringing the wisdom, his efforts are not
much required. Because when you tune your wisdom with master, then you are free
from him. And wisdom is innate thing, which will carry you actually. Master is
a very pure conception- the guru.
WORSHIP
OF SHAKTI
I have explained the principles of
physical worship and the psychological state of subtle worship. There, I told
you that the matrkas, are the
component entities, and they denote a particular sound.
When I make a particular sound i.e
“Am”, that time I use my Iccha. Now if, my Prana and iccha and the word “Am” join
together, they produce energy. Again you try to understand it. Prana, vaka
and mana, through my iccha come in
a particular orbit or range, and
immediately they convert into energy.
Prana, speech and mana are different things. By observation , when I use the things in a particular rythm, mind is related with prana, and now I use mantra(vak). When I use it, there is a particular rythm ; when it will run in a particular rythm , what happens? When they join together, I immediately identify with the deity. At that time, I forget all time and space consciousness. I am full of joy, and that joy or ananda works as energy in us, and actually that is the exact approach for life. If you get that thing your life becomes dynamic, and the inner master makes you to awake inside, and you always feel vibrations after vibrations of joy and happiness. Such a state will come inside. It is experience which man gets.
There are five types of pranas : pran ,
apan, saman, udan and vyan. Pran means exhaling and inhaling. I breathe in air,
and I breathe out. But when I become
conscious of inhaling and exhaling the air, I become the observer. First, I think that I take and leave it
through my effort. But this not an observation of the pran. But you have to
become observer on one side and on the other side, to go on taking the air. You
maintain your observing consciousness also, and you take and leave. For
pranayam, there should be both. Otherwise your pran will not become correct.
The observer’s consciousness should be there and when you become the observer,
that time your mind cannot hide from you. It is an invisible conspirator which
was doing some conspiracy. When you become the observer, immediately it says:
“Oh, excuse me”. It becomes transparent before you. When you observe your pran
and as it is linked to mana, mana will also move in the same way.
And then what you will do? The power which you have got through your master, you go on repeating it . That is mantra. Mantra will transform on one side mana, and on the other side, prana. And when you will get a particular rythym or harmony, it will go on working. That time, immediately you will forget. That time, you are only an observer. The working is no more with you. This work is inside, and this is actual worship. And then, whatever you get, the experience or other things, you have to offer to deity or master. What does it mean? “Oh , Its your grace. What I have got is not mine”. On one side mana will say it is your acquisition, but you have to say” It is not my acquisition. It is because of grace, that is has come to me”. This is called subtle worship.
And there are three things :
intellectual tune, emotional line( bhava and mahabhav) and the yoga line of
prana and manas. All are joined together in the Tantric way. Most
scientifically, Tantriks have joined all these things for the development of
your inward consciousness, and this is related to Ananda. You should get inward
pleasure, Ananda, which is not dependent on any objects. And that Ananda is called shakti.
Inward simplicity is very important in spiritual line. We have to always try to remember the Divine Mother: “Oh , Its her grace”. You always say” I am only an apparatus of my divine mother and my master, & I am nothing”. If I think , I am doing something, it means I am filled with ego. Then my work will not be proper & I cannot be happy. So it is all the inward psychological understanding. Inward worship is to handle mind, pran and vak and this leads to ananda. And that anand shakti when it develops more, that becomes sat-chit-ananda. Kriya changes to kriya shakti, jyana changes to gyan shakti and icch achange sto iccha shakti. Ananda is on one side chaitanya and other side it is Prema. Both are there working together.
So when you get this thing, first you
find a wonderful type of exhale and inhale within yourself. You get a
particular movement. If you are conscious of the movement, immediately you
forget time and space inside : the first subtle movement of consciousness. That
has been explained by Abhnavagupta in his tantra . He says : when I become the
all pervading consciousness, and I feel that all universe is myself, I am
identified. That time I am absolutely like Ishwara. That time you see all
creation is going within yourself, inside you, and all manifestation is within
you and you are creating yourself. And that self is not ahamkara, because you
do not remember the time and space consciousness.
In all your lower abilities, that time,
when you feel something good for the world, that is iccha shakti. Not to have
your individual things or personal things. And then this anand shakti becomes
iccha shakti. And that iccha shakti is called the first spanda, first
vibration. The vibration which is first means that it has got no time and space
consciousness, and you find that “I am that existence”. That is called adya
spanda. It is a movement within yourself.
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