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The
Disappearance of the Questioner
The dramatic
period of his physiological transformation began on his
forty-ninth birthday. He was asking himself about the nature of
the references he was using to locate and experience himself.
I was sitting
on a bench under a tree overlooking one of the most beautiful
spots in the whole world; the whole of my being was that question:
"How do I know that I am in that state? There is some kind
of peculiar division inside of me: there is somebody who knows
that he is in that state. The knowledge of that state -- what I
have read, what I have experienced, what they have talked about --
it is this knowledge that is looking at that state, so it is only
this knowledge that has projected that state.”
I said to
myself "Look here, old chap, after forty years you have not moved
one step; you are there in square number one. It is the same
knowledge that projected your mind there when you asked this
question. You are in the same situation asking the same question,
"How do I know?" because it is this knowledge, the description of
the state by those people, that has created this state for you.
You are kidding yourself. You are a damned fool. So, nothing. But
still there was some kind of a peculiar feeling that this was the
state.
UG was under the
impression that an experience of God is something supernatural and
he has come to the realization that whatever experience he finds
himself in at the moment is an experience of God. (God is the mind
with which I think.)
The second
question "How do I know that this is the state?" -- I didn't have
any answer for that question -- it was like a question in a
whirlpool -- it went on and on and on. Then suddenly the question
disappeared. Nothing happened; the question just disappeared. I
didn't say to myself "Oh, my God! Now I have found the answer."
Even that state disappeared -- the state I thought I was in, the
state of Buddha, Jesus -- even that has disappeared. The question
has disappeared. The whole thing is finished for me, and that's
all, you see. From then on, never did I say to myself "Now I have
the answer to all those questions." That state of which I had said
"This is the state" -- that state disappeared. The question
disappeared. Finished, you see. It is not emptiness, it is not
blankness, it is not the void, it is not any of those things; the
question disappeared suddenly, and that is all.
The Physical Transformation
The disappearance
of this fundamental question, on discovering that it had no
answer, was a physiological phenomenon, UG says, "a sudden
'explosion' inside, blasting, as it were, every cell, every nerve
and every gland in my body." And with that 'explosion', the
illusion that there is continuity of thought, that there is a
center, an “I” linking up the thoughts, was not there anymore.
Then thought
cannot link up. The linking gets broken, and once it is broken it
is finished. Then it is not once that thought explodes; every time
a thought arises, it explodes. So, this continuity comes to an
end, and thought falls into its natural rhythm. Since then I have
no questions of any kind, because the questions cannot stay there
any more. The only questions I have are very simple questions
("How do I go to Hyderabad?" for example) to function in this
world -- and people have answers for these questions. For
those questions, (How do I know that I am in that state? etc)
nobody has any answers -- so there are no questions any more.
Everything in
the head has tightened there was no room for anything there inside
of my brain. For the first time I became conscious of my head with
everything 'tight' inside of it. So, these vasanas (past
impressions) or whatever you call them -- they do try to show
their heads sometimes, but then the brain cells are so 'tight'
that it has no opportunity to fool around there any more. The
division cannot stay there -- it's a physical impossibility; you
don't have to do a thing about it, you see, That is why I say that
when this 'explosion' takes place (I use the word 'explosion'
because it's like a nuclear explosion) it leaves behind chain-
reactions. Every cell in your body, the cells in the very marrow
of your bones, have to undergo this 'change' I don't want to use
that word it's an irreversible change. There's no question of
your going back. there's no question of a 'fall' for this man at
all. Irreversible: an alchemy of some sort.
It is like a
nuclear explosion, you see -- it shatters the whole body. It is
not an easy thing; it is the end of the man - such a shattering
thing that it blasts every cell, every nerve in your body. I went
through terrible physical torture at that moment. Not that you
experience the 'explosion'; you can't experience the 'explosion'
-- but it's after-effects, the 'fall-out', is the thing that
changes the whole chemistry of your body.
You see, there
is one very strange thing that happens as a result of this
'explosion' or whatever you want to call it: at no time does the
thought that I am different from you come into this consciousness.
Never. Never does that thought come into my consciousness and tell
me that you are different from me or I am different from you,
because there is no point here, there is no center here. Only with
reference to this center do you create all the other points.
(Fragmentation is the inevitable result of location.)
Another thing:
the chemistry has changed -- I can say that because unless that
alchemy or change in the whole chemistry takes place, there is no
way of freeing this organism from thought, from the continuity of
thought. So, since there is no continuity of thought, you can very
easily say that something has happened, but what actually has
happened? I have no way of experiencing this at all.
I really don't
know what has happened to me. What I am telling you is the way I
am functioning. There seems to be some difference between the way
you are functioning and the way I am functioning, but basically
there can't be any difference. How can there be any difference
between you and me? There can't be; but from the way we are trying
to express ourselves, there seems to be. I have the feeling that
there is some difference, and what that difference is, is all that
I am trying to understand. So, this is the way I am functioning.
UG noticed, during
the week following the 'explosion', fundamental changes in the
functioning of his senses. On the last day his body went through
'a process of physical death' (Nirvikalpa samadhi), and
the changes became permanent features.
Then began the
changes -- from the next day onwards, for seven days -- every day
one change. First I discovered the softness of the skin, the
blinking of the eyes stopped, and then changes in taste, smell and
hearing -- these five changes I noticed. Maybe they were there
even before, and I only noticed them for the first time.
(On the first day)
I noticed that my skin was soft like silk and had a peculiar
kind of glow, a golden color. I was shaving, and each time I tried
to shave, the razor slipped. I changed blades, but it was no use.
I touched my face. My sense of touch was different, you see, also
the way I held the razor. Especially my skin -- my skin was soft
as silk and had this golden glow. I didn't relate this to anything
at all; I just observed it.
(On the second
day) I became aware for the first time that my mind was in
what I call a 'declutched state'. I was upstairs in the kitchen
and Valentine had prepared tomato soup. I looked at it, and I
didn't know what it was. She told me it was tomato soup, and I
tasted it, and I recognized "This is how tomato soup tastes." Then
I swallowed the soup, and then I returned to this odd frame of
mind -- though 'frame of mind' is not the word for it; it was a
frame of 'not mind' -- in which I forgot again. I asked again
"What is that?" Again she said it was tomato soup. Again I tasted
it. Again I swallowed and forgot. I played with this for some
time. It was such a funny business for me then, this 'declutched
state'; now it has become normal. I no longer spend time in
reverie, worry, conceptualization and the other kinds of thinking
that most people do when they're alone. My mind is only
engaged when it's needed, for instance when you ask questions, or
when I have to fix the tape-recorder or something like that. The
rest of the time my mind is in the 'declutched state'. Of course
now I have my memory back -- I lost it at first, but now I have it
back -- but my memory is in the background and only comes into
play when it's needed, automatically. When it's not needed, there
is no mind here, there is no thought, there is only life.
(On the third day)
some friends invited themselves over for dinner, and I
said "All right, I'll prepare something." But somehow I couldn't
smell or taste properly. I became gradually aware that these two
senses had been transformed. Every time some odor entered my
nostrils it irritated my olfactory center in just about the same
way -- whether it came from the most expensive scent or from cow
dung, it was the same irritation. And then, every time I tasted
something, I tasted the dominant ingredient only -- the taste of
the other ingredients came slowly after. From that moment perfume
made no sense to me, and spicy food had no appeal for me. I could
taste only the dominant spice, the chili or whatever it was.
(On the fourth day)
something happened to the eyes. We were sitting in the 'Rialto'
restaurant, and I became aware of a tremendous sort of 'vistavision',
like a concave mirror. Things coming towards me, moved into me, as
it were; and things going away from me, seemed to move from inside
me. It was such a puzzle to me -- it was as if my eyes were a
gigantic camera, changing focus without my doing anything. Now I
am used to the puzzle. Nowadays that is how I see. When you drive
me around in your Mini, I am like a cameraman dallying along, and
the cars in the other direction go into me, and the cars that pass
us come out of me, and when my eyes fix on something they fix on
it with total attention, like a camera. Another thing about my
eyes: when we came back from the restaurant I came home and looked
in the mirror to see what was odd about my eyes, to see how they
were 'fixed'. I looked in the mirror for a long time, and then I
observed that my eyelids were not blinking. For half an hour or
forty-five minutes I looked into the mirror -- still no blinking
of the eyes. Instinctive blinking was over for me, and it still
is.
(On the fifth
day) I noticed a change in hearing. When I heard the
barking of a dog, the barking originated inside me. And the same
with the mooing of the cow, the whistle of the train -- suddenly
all sounds originated inside me, as it were - coming from within,
and not from outside -- they still do.
Five senses
changed in five days, and on the sixth day I was lying down
on a sofa - Valentine was there in the kitchen - and suddenly my
body disappeared. There was no body there. I looked at my hand.
(Crazy thing - you would certainly put me in the mental hospital.)
I looked at it - "Is this my hand?" There was no questioning here,
but the whole situation was like that - that is all I am
describing. So I touched this body - nothing - I didn't feel there
was anything there except the touch, you see, the point of
contact. Then I called Valentine: "Do you see my body on this
sofa? Nothing inside of me says that this is my body." She touched
it - "This is your body." And yet that assurance didn't give me
any comfort or satisfaction - "What is this funny business? My
body is missing." My body had gone away, and it has never come
back. The points of contact are all that is there for the body -
nothing else is there for me - because the seeing is altogether
independent of the sense of touch here. So it is not possible for
me to create a complete image of my body even, because where
there's no sense of touch there are missing points here in the
consciousness.
(On the seventh
day) I was again lying on the same sofa, relaxing, enjoying
the 'declutched state'. Valentine would come in, I would recognize
her as Valentine; she would go out of the room -- finish, blank,
no Valentine -- "What is this? I can't even imagine what Valentine
looks like." I would listen to the sounds coming from inside me?"
I could not relate. I had discovered that all my senses were
without any coordinating thing inside: the coordinator was
missing.
I felt
something happening inside of me: the life energy drawing to a
focal point from different parts of my body. I said to myself "Now
you have come to the end of your life. You are going to die." Then
I called Valentine and said "I am going to die, Valentine, and you
will have to do something with this body. Hand it over to the
doctors -- maybe they will use it. I don't believe in burning or
burial or any of those things. In your own interest you have to
dispose of this body -- one day it will stink -- so, why not give
it away?" She said "You are a foreigner. The Swiss government
won't take your body. Forget about it," then she went away. And
then this whole business of the frightening movement of the life
force coming to a point, as it were. I was lying down on the sofa.
Her bed was empty, so I moved over to that bed and stretched
myself, getting ready.
She ignored me
and went away. She said "One day you say this thing has changed,
another day this thing has changed, a third day this thing has
changed. What is this whole business?" She was not interested in
any of those things - never was she interested in any of these
religious matters - never heard of those things. "You say you are
going to die. You are not going to die. You are all right, hale
and healthy." She went away.
Then I
stretched myself, and this was going on and on and on. The whole
life energy was moving to some focal point - where it was, I don't
know. Then a point arrived where the whole thing looked as if the
aperture of a camera was trying to close itself. (It is the only
simile that I can think of. The way I am describing this is quite
different from the way things happened at that time, because there
was nobody there thinking in such terms. All this was part of my
experience; otherwise I wouldn't be able to talk about it.) So,
the aperture was trying to close itself, and something was there
trying to keep it open. Then after a while there was no will to do
anything, not even to prevent the aperture closing itself.
Suddenly, as it were, it closed. I don't know what happened after
that.
This process
lasted for forty-nine minutes -- this process of dying. It was
like a physical death, you see. Even now it happens to me: the
hands and feet become so cold, the body becomes stiff, the
heartbeat slows down, the breathing slows down, and then there is
a gasping for breath. Up to a point you are there, you breathe
your last breath, as it were, and then you are finished. What
happens after that, nobody knows.
When I came out
of that, somebody said there was a telephone call for me. I came
out and went downstairs to answer it. I was in a daze. I didn't
know what had happened. It was a physical death. What brought me
back to life, I don't know. How long it lasted, I don't know. I
can't say anything about that, because the experiencer was
finished: there was nobody to experience that death at all.... So,
that was the end of it. I got up.
I didn't feel
that I was a new-born baby -- no question of enlightenment at all
- but the things that had astonished me that week, the changes in
taste, seeing and so on, had become permanent fixtures. I call all
these events the 'calamity'. I call it the 'calamity' because from
the point of view of one who thinks this is something fantastic,
blissful, full of beatitude, love, ecstasy and all that kind of a
thing, this is physical torture - this is a calamity from that
point of view. Not a calamity to me, but a calamity to those who
have an image that something marvelous is going to happen. It's
something like: you imagine New York; you dream about it, you want
to be there. When you are actually there, nothing of it is there;
it is a godforsaken place, and even the devils have probably
forsaken that place. It's not the thing that you had sought
after and wanted so much, but totally different. What is
there, you really don't know -- you have no way of knowing
anything about that -- there is no image here. In that sense I can
never tell myself or anybody "I'm an enlightened man, a liberated
man, a free man; I'm going to liberate mankind." Free from what?
How can I liberate somebody else? There's no question of
liberating anybody. For that, I must have an image that I am a
free man, you understand?
(Then, (on the
eighth day) I was sitting on the sofa and suddenly there
was an outburst of tremendous energy -- tremendous energy shaking
the whole body, and along with the body, the sofa, the chalet and
the whole universe, as it were -- shaking, vibrating. You can't
create that movement at all. It was sudden. Whether it was coming
from outside or inside, from below or above, I don't know -- I
couldn't locate the spot; it was all over. It lasted for hours and
hours. I couldn't bear it but there was nothing I could do to stop
it; there was a total helplessness. This went on and on, day after
day, day after day. Whenever I sat it started -- this vibration
like an epileptic fit or something. Not even an epileptic fit; it
went on for days and days.
For three days UG
lay on his bed, his body contorted with pain - it was, he says, as
if he felt pain in every cell of his body, one after the other.
Similar outbursts of energy occurred intermittently throughout the
next six months, whenever he lay down or relaxed.
The body feels
the pain. That's a very painful process. Very painful. It is a
physical pain because the body has limitations -- it has a form, a
shape of its own, so when there is an outburst of energy, which is
not your energy or my energy or God's (or call it by any name you
like), it is like a river in spate. The energy that is operating
there does not feel the limitations of the body; it is not
interested; it has its own momentum. It is a very painful thing.
It is not that ecstatic, blissful beatitude and all that rubbish
-- stuff and nonsense! --- it is really a painful thing. Oh, I
suffered for months and months after that; before that too.
Everybody has. Even Ramana Maharshi suffered after that.
A great cascade
-- not one, but thousands of cascades -- it went on and on and on
for months and months. It's a very painful experience -- painful
in the sense that the energy has a peculiar operation of its own.
There is an atom: lines going like that. (UG
demonstrates.) It is clockwise, anticlockwise, and then it is
this way and then this way and then this way. Like an atom it
moves inside -- not in one part of your body; the whole body. It
is as if a wet towel were being wrung to get rid of the water --
it is like that, the whole of our body -- it's such a painful
thing. It goes on even now. You can't invite it; you can't ask it
to come; you can't do anything. It gives you the feeling that it
is enveloping you, that it is descending on you. Descending from
where? Where is it coming from? How is it coming? Every time it is
new -- very strange -- every time it comes in a different way, so
you don't know what is happening. You lie down on your bed, and
suddenly it begins -- it begins to move slowly like ants. I'd
think there were bugs in my bed, jump out, and look -- (Laughs no
bugs -- then I'd go back -- then again.... The hairs are
electrified, so it slowly moves.
There were
pains all over the body. Thought has controlled this body to such
an extent that when that loosens, the whole metabolism is agog.
The whole thing was changing in its own way without my doing
anything. And then the movement of the hands changed. Usually your
hands turn this way. (UG demonstrates.) Here, this wrist
joint had terrible pains for six months until it turned itself,
and all the movements are now like this. That is why they say my
movements are mudras (mystical gestures). The movements of the
hands are quite different now than before. Then there were pains
in the marrow of the bones. Every cell started changing, and it
went on and on for six months.
And then the
sex hormones started changing. I didn't know whether I was a man
or a woman -- What is this business?" -- suddenly there was a
breast on the left-hand side. All kinds of things -- I don't want
to go into details -- there is a complete record of all these
things. It went on and on and on. It took three years for this
body to fall into a new rhythm of its own.
You can read a
description of the events of my life, that's all. One day, around
my forty- ninth birthday something stopped; another day another
sense changed; the third day something else changed.... There is a
record of the way the things happened tome. What value has that to
you? It has no value at all. On the other hand it's very dangerous
because you try to simulate the outward manifestations. People
simulate these things and believe that something is happening --
that's what these people do. I behaved normally. I didn't know
what was happening. It was a strange situation. there is no point
in leaving any record -- people will only simulate these things.
The state is something natural.
Up and down his
torso, neck and head, at those points which Indian holy men call
chakras, his friends observed swellings of various shapes
and colors, which came and went at intervals. On his lower abdomen
the swellings were horizontal, cigar-shaped bands. Above the navel
was a hard, almond-shaped swelling. A hard, blue swelling, like a
large medallion, in the middle of his chest was surmounted by
another smaller, brownish-red, medallion-shaped swelling at the
base of his throat. These two 'medallions' were as though
suspended from a varicolored, swollen ring -- blue, brownish and
light yellow -- around his neck, as in pictures of the Hindu gods.
There were also other similarities between the swellings and the
depictions of Indian religious art: his throat was swollen to a
shape that made his chin seem to rest on the head of a cobra, as
in the traditional images of Siva; just above the bridge of the
nose was a white lotus-shaped swelling; all over the head the
small blood vessels expanded, forming patterns like the stylized
lumps on the heads of Buddha statues. Like the horns of Moses and
the Taoist mystics, two large, hard swellings periodically came
and went. The arteries in his neck expanded and rose, blue and
snake-like, into his head.
I do not want
to be an exhibitionist, but you are doctors. There is something to
the symbolism they have in India -- the cobra. Do you see the
swellings here? -- they take the shape of a cobra. Yesterday was
the new moon. The body is affected by everything that is happening
around you; it is not separate from what is happening around you.
Whatever is happening there, is also happening here -- there is
only the physical response. This is affection. Your body is
affected by everything that is happening around you; and you can't
prevent this, for the simple reason that the armor that you have
built around yourself is destroyed, so it is very vulnerable to
everything that is happening there. With the phases of the moon --
full moon, half moon, quarter moon -- these swellings here take
the shape of a cobra. Maybe that is the reason why some people
have created all these images -- Siva and all those kinds of
things. But why should it take the shape of a cobra? I have asked
many doctors why this swelling is here, but nobody could give me a
satisfactory answer. I don't know if there are any glands or
anything here.
There are
certain glands ... This I have discussed so many times with
doctors who are doing research into the ductless glands. Those
glands are what the Hindus call "chakras." These ductless glands
are located in exactly the same spots where the Hindus speculated
the chakras are. There is one gland here which is called the
'thymus gland'. That is very active when you are a child -- very
active -- they have feelings, extraordinary feelings. When you
reach the age of puberty it becomes dormant -- that's what they
say. When again this kind of a thing happens, when you are reborn
again, that gland is automatically activated, so all the feelings
are there. Feelings are not thoughts, not emotions; you feel for
somebody. If somebody hurts himself there, that hurt is felt here
--not as a pain, but there is a feeling, you see -- you
automatically say "Ah!"
This actually
happened to me when I was staying in a coffee plantation: a mother
started beating a child, a little child, you know. She was mad,
hopping mad, and she hit the child so hard, the child almost
turned blue. And somebody asked me "Why did you not interfere and
stop her?" I was standing there -- I was so puzzled, you see. "Who
should I take pity on, the mother or the child?" -- that was my
answer -- "Who is responsible?" Both were in a ridiculous
situation: the mother could not control her anger, and the child
was so helpless and innocent. This went on -- it was moving from
one to the other -- and then I found all those things (marks) on
my back. So I was also part of that. (I am not saying this just to
claim something.) That is possible because consciousness cannot be
divided. Anything that is happening there is affecting you -- this
is affection, you understand? There is no question of your sitting
in judgment on anybody; the situation happens to be that, so you
are affected by that. You are affected by everything that is
happening there.
Anything that
is happening within your field of consciousness. Consciousness is,
of course, not limited. If he is hurt there, you also are hurt
here. If you are hurt, there is an immediate response there. I
can't say about the universe, the whole universe, but in your
field of consciousness, in the limited field in which you are
operating at that particular moment, you are responding -- not
that you are responding.
And all the
other glands also here.... There are so many glands here; for
example, the pituitary -- 'third eye', 'ajña chakra', they call it. When once the interference of
thought is finished, it is taken over by this gland: it is this
gland that gives the instructions or orders to the body; not
thought any more; thought cannot interfere. (That is why they call
it that*, probably. I'm not interpreting or any such thing;
perhaps this gives you an idea.) But you have built an armor,
created an armor with this thought, and you don't allow yourself
to be affected by things. (* The literal meaning "ajña" is
"command.)
Since there is nobody who uses this thought as a
self-protective mechanism, it burns itself up. Thought undergoes
combustion, ionization (if I may use your scientific term).
Thought is, after all, vibration. So, when this kind of ionization
of thought takes place, it throws out, sometimes it covers the
whole body with, an ash-like substance. Your body is covered with
that when there is no need for thought at all. When you don't use
it, what happens to that thought? It burns itself out -- that is
the energy -- it's a combustion. The body gets heated, you know.
There is tremendous heat in the body as a result of this, and so
the skin is covered -- your face, your feet, everything -- with
this ash-like substance.
That's one of
the reasons why I express it in pure and simple physical and
physiological terms. It has no psychological content at all, it
has no mystical content, it has no religious overtones at all, as
I see it. I am bound to say that, and I don't care whether you
accept it or not, it is of no importance to me.
This kind of a
thing must have happened to so many people. I say this happens to
one in a billion, and you are that one in a billion. It is not
something that one is specially prepared for. There are no
purificatory methods necessary, there is no
sadhana necessary
for this kind of a thing to happen -- no preparation of any kind.
The consciousness is so pure that whatever you are doing in the
direction of purifying that consciousness is adding impurity to
it.
Consciousness
has to flush itself out: it has to purge itself of every trace of
holiness, every trace of unholiness, everything. Even what you
consider 'sacred and holy' is a contamination in that
consciousness. It is not through any volition of yours; when once
the frontiers are broken -- not through any effort of yours, not
through any volition of yours -- then the floodgates are open and
everything goes out. In that process of flushing out, you have all
these visions. It's not a vision outside there or inside of you;
suddenly you yourself, the whole consciousness, takes the shape of
Buddha, Jesus, Mahavira, Mohammed, Socrates -- only those people
who have come into this state; not great men, not the leaders of
mankind -- it is very strange -- but only those people to whom
this kind of a thing happened. One of them was a colored man (not
exactly a colored man), and during that time I could tell people
how he looked. Then some woman with breasts, flowing hair --
naked. I was told that there were two saints here in India --
Akkamahadevi and Lalleswari -- they were women, naked
women. Suddenly you have these two breasts, the flowing hair --
even the organs change into female organs.
But still there
is a division there -- you, and the form the consciousness has
assumed, the form of Buddha, say, or Jesus Christ or God knows
what -- the same situation: "How do I know I am in that state?"
But that division cannot stay long; it disappears and something
else comes. Hundreds of people -- probably something happened to
so many hundreds of people. This is part of history -- so many
rishis, some Westerners, monks, so many women, and sometimes very
strange things. You see, all that people have experienced before
you is part of your consciousness. I use the expression "the
saints go marching out"; in Christianity they have a hymn "When
the Saints Go Marching In." They run out of your consciousness
because they cannot stay there any more, because all that is
impurity, a contamination there.
You can say (I
can't make any definite statement) probably it is because of the
impact on the human consciousness of the 'explosions' of all those
saints, sages and saviors of mankind that there is this
dissatisfaction in you, that whatever is there is all the time
trying to burst out, as it were. Maybe that is so -- I can't say
anything about it. You can say that they are there because they
are pushing you to this point, and once the purpose is achieved
they have finished their job and they go way -- that is only
speculation on my part. But this flushing out of everything good
and bad, holy and unholy, sacred and profane has got to happen,
otherwise your consciousness is still contaminated, still impure.
During that time it goes on and on and on -- there are hundreds
and thousands of them -- then, you see, you are put back into that
primeval, primordial state of consciousness. Once it has become
pure, of and by itself, then nothing can touch it, nothing can
contaminate that any more. All the past up to that point is there,
but it cannot influence your actions any more.
All these
visions and everything were happening for three years after the
"calamity." Now the whole thing is finished. The divided state of
consciousness cannot function at all any more; it is always in the
undivided state of consciousness -- nothing can touch that.
Anything can happen -- the thought can be a good thought, a bad
thought. It doesn't matter what comes there -- good, bad, holy,
unholy. Who is there to say "This is good; that is bad?" -- the
whole thing is finished. That is why I have to use the phrase
'religious experience' (not in the sense in which you use the word
'religion'): it puts you back to the source. You are back in that
primeval, primordial, pure state of consciousness --call it
'awareness' or whatever you like. In that state things are
happening, and there is nobody who is interested, nobody who is
looking at them. They come and go in their own way, like the
Ganges water flowing: the sewerage water comes in, half-burnt
corpses, both good things and bad things -- everything -- but that
water is always pure.
The most
puzzling and bewildering part of the whole thing was when the
sensory activities began their independent careers. There was no
coordinator linking the senses, so we had terrible problems -
Valentine had to go through the whole business. We'd go for a
walk, and I'd look at a flower and ask "What is that?" She'd say
"That is a flower." I'd take a few more steps, look at a cow and
ask "What is that?" Like a baby, I had to relearn everything all
over (not actually relearn, but all the knowledge was in the
background and never came to the forefront, you see). It started
-- the whole business -- "What is this crazy business?" I have to
put it in words; not that I felt I was in a crazy state. I was a
very sane man, acting sanely, everything going on, and yet this
ridiculous business of asking about everything "What is this? What
is that?" That's all; no other questions.
Valentine also
didn't know what to make out of the whole business. She even went
to a leading psychiatrist in Geneva. She rushed to him -- she
wanted to understand, but at the same time she felt that there was
nothing crazy about me. If I'd done one crazy thing she would have
left me. Never; only strange things, you see. "What is that?"
"That is a cow." "What is that?" "That is that." It went on and on
and on, and it was too much for her and too much for me. When she
met the psychiatrist, he said "Unless we see the person, we can't
tell anything. Bring him." But I knew that something really
fantastic had happened inside -- what it was, I didn't know, but
that didn't bother me. "Why ask if that's a cow? What's the
difference whether it is a cow, a donkey or a horse?" -- that
bewildering situation continued for a long time -- all the
knowledge was in the background. It's the same situation even now,
but I don't ask those questions any more. When I am looking at
something, I really don't know what I'm looking at -- that is why
I say it is a state of not knowing. I really don't know. That is
why I say that once you are there, through some luck, some strange
chance, from then on everything happens in its own way. You are
always in a state of samadhi; there is no question of going in and
out of it; you are always there. I don't want to use that word, so
I say it is a state of not knowing. You really don't know what you
are looking at.
I can't do
anything about it -- there is no question of my going back or
anything; it is all finished -- it is operating and functioning in
a different way. (I have to use the words 'different way' to give
you a feel about it.)
There seems to
be some difference. You see, my difficulty with the people who
come to see me is this: they don't seem to be able to understand
the way I am functioning, and I don't seem to be able to
understand the way they are functioning. How can we carry on a
dialogue? Both of us have to stop. How can there be a dialogue
between us both? I am talking like a raving maniac. All my talking
totally unrelated, just like a maniac's -- the difference is only
a hair's breadth -- that is why I say you either flip or fly at
that moment.
There is no
difference, absolutely no difference. Somehow, you see, by some
luck, by some strange chance, this kind of thing happens (I have
to use the word 'happens' to give you a feel about that) and the
whole thing is finished for you.
The experience of ‘karmic cleansing’ that
occurs in the transformation is eased considerably by the mind
training of the Course in Miracles that precedes and
accompanies the process of awakening. It is reasonable to posit
the idea that ‘the vaults of the body’s history’ are opened and
dissolved in the light through willingness and defenselessness.
There is no order of difficulty in miracles. The promise that
Jesus makes that you will not be hurled abruptly into Heaven and
that time will keep gentle pace with your awakening seems
to be the answer to the sudden (and not always welcome) onset of
these symptoms of kundalini awakening.
My own experience included a number of
phenomena only one of which I could describe as painful. Other
symptoms were at times inconvenient or uncomfortable but never
painful. The Course offers a frame of reference that takes one
out of the body identity so that the process is not physically
traumatic unless one insists in being in observation of it.
Increasingly I marvel and appreciate the
sublime gift the Course and my Teacher represent in this
impossible dream. The mind training process develops acceptance
and patience, allowing for the enactment of scenarios of
forgiveness and conversion which although emotionally challenging,
do leave the body identity free to heal itself of the nonsense
that the mind has released.
At the point of integration when one is able
to say “I loose the world from all I thought it was” comes the
revelation that the Father and Son are One. From that moment on –
it is possible to live at the end of time, ‘a way of being in the
world that is not here although it seems to be’; because the world
holds nothing that I want.
Jane Wiltshire
gonehome@hotmail.com |
