Shri Mataji
Shri Mataji
Meditation is the only way you can grow. There’s no other way out. Because when you meditate you are in silence; you are in thoughtless awareness. Then the growth of awareness takes place; then it opens out. But if you are thinking – supposing there is a lake and the lake is completely in a turmoil. Nothing can grow. But supposing it is silent, then lotuses can grow; anything can grow in it. In the same way, if your mind is agitated and your growth is not yet fully expressing itself, then it’s such a vicious circle that you are agitated and your growth is hindered. Again you are agitated; your growth is hindered.
So the best way is to take to meditation. When you take to meditation this turmoil will settle down. And when it will settle down, your growth will take place. After meditation you’ll feel definitely that you have come out very well; you have grown very well. But for that one has to be very honest. You cannot force people to be honest. That’s one thing you can’t do. You have to be honest yourself. You are not to be hypocrite. You have to see for yourself that whatever you are doing is for your benevolence, is for your good, and that you have to do it because it is good for you, to begin with. And then for the good of the humanity. You are doing for the good of the humanity.
Now some people who come for the first time will have lots of doubts because of ego. They have lots of doubts because of ego. “How can that be? How can this be? How?” I mean, all kinds of things they ask. Now, you have to say that first of all you develop your insight. You develop your enlightenment. Your light is not sufficient. In the light only there are no doubts. Supposing in darkness you think that this table has no cover. Is all right. You can think whatever you like, but when there is light you see for yourself there is a beautiful cover on top of this table.
In the same way, it happens to us that we have to achieve a state. And once we achieve that state then there’s no question, there’s no doubt, there’s nothing, and you become so empowered. It is such a simultaneous thing. It works. As soon as you achieve something, it works. When it works, then you are convinced. It’s a, I’d say, is a very beautiful new chain starts within yourself and then you really starts enjoying your joy of your Self.
Shri Mataji, New York, 27 July, 1988
Shri Mataji
Such a tremendous power, so alert, so affectionate, so kind is there – and a Mother, who is your teacher. Mother teaches children with love.
Not only that, but you never even felt how I taught you Sahaja Yoga. You just learnt it like that. It’s a child’s play for you. It’s such a difficult and subtle subject. You picked it up without any difficulties. So artfully it was done. Beautifully it was done, built within you.
Now you know, “This is Sahaja Yoga; this is not Sahaja Yoga.”
All this knowledge came to you so sweetly.
Shri Mataji, 23 September 1990, Geneva, Switzerland
Shri Mataji
By integration, you get the power to do what you understand and you have the power to feel happy with what you understand.
So you come to a stage where you develop this Nirananda [joy]. And this Niranand you develop when you are absolutely the spirit. In the Nirananda state there is no duality left… It is one personality. That is, you are completely integrated and the joy is not any more dented. It is complete. It hasn’t got a happiness and a sorrow aspect, but is just joy.
The joy is not that you laugh loud. The joy is not that you are always smiling. It is the stillness, the quietude within yourself, the peace of your being, of your spirit that asserts itself into vibrations which you feel.
When you feel that peace, you feel like the light of the sun, the whole rays of that beauty spreading.
But first of all, we are curbed down by our own personal, selfish, stupid ideas. Throw them away. We have them because we are insecure, because we have wrong ideas. Throw them away. Just stand alone, one with God, and you will find all these fears were useless.
Shri Mataji, Delhi, 4 February 1983.
Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi
Purity is your Mother’s name [1]. You know that my name is purity. And this purity is such that it purifies everything. It just purifies. The purity should be such that it should purify; otherwise that purity has no meaning.
For example, a soap purifies, but you don’t purify the soap … Water is the purifier. Water purifies us physically. And also all our poisons are driven out of our liver by water. Water is a very great element in removing all problems [2]. You use water for so many things. You know how it works out.
So this Lakshmi [3], which is purification, was born out of water. That’s why she was called as Mary [4]. And I’m also called Nira [5], meaning “born out of water”.
So one has to understand … that we inculcate purity. We should not cheat ourselves. It is easy to cheat, but we should inculcate purity within ourselves as a matter of our own maturity, as our own decoration, as our own beauty and not just because it’s a laborious thing or it is a very hard thing. It is not like that. It should be achieved with great pleasure and happiness…
We like to have a bath or to be clean and to be presentable. In the same way, we should try to clean our thoughts. Just by paying attention to them, we can clean them. Thoughts must be made clean. First of all, why have thoughts at all? But even if you have, have clean and pure thoughts. Even if you have to have, don’t have thoughts full of arrogance, aggression or of fear…
Our purification of our mind comes through certain methods of understanding. First of the understandings one has to have is that we are born in a family, born in a society … So all these fixations have put into us a certain amount of impurities, which may give us ego, superego. Anything it might give us. So to keep it pure and simple, take to the water element [5] as much as you can. It helps both ways. It helps the ego. It helps the superego. Take to the water element. And that is what Lakshmi is…
Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi, Diwali Puja, 1981
Notes:
1. Shri Mataji’s name, “Nirmala”, means “pure”.
2. The element of water is used in simple cleansing practices in Sahaja Yoga.
3. The Goddess, Lakshmi, is worshipped at the time of Diwali Puja. Lakshmi was born out of the sea.
4. The name, “Mary”, comes from the Latin word for sea.
5. “Nira” comes from Shri Mataji’s name, “Nirmala”.