Question: On your posting at www.dadashri.org/experiences4.html [you can also see it here] you write how you initially experienced emptiness in everything. Do you still experience this and could you elaborate a bit on that experience?
Jan: Initially i saw Self as a so called no-thing-ness, as emptiness. Today I regret using that expression, because it is total fullness. Shortly after I got it, I sat there at an informal meeting and looked at all these people talking and interacting, and I saw absolute nothingness. I was amazed. I kept wondering how pure nothing could talk, act, think, and so forth. Or you could say I saw people acting and was amazed how they could do so when in reality they were pure nothing. How does nothing become something? I have no idea! It amazed me and I wondered about it every day. Today i see it as the throb of Shakti.
Q: So you still see this nothingness in everything?
J: Yes. All the time. But now I see it as the divine love-bliss of vibrating Shakti.
Q: So you see it in yourself also? If so, could you not look inside and see the answer to how nothing becomes something? How you as nothing act?
J: I don't see it in me, I am that nothingness-love-bliss, to be sure. So are you! And yes, as I just said, I see it as Shakti manifesting.
Q: What about emotions, thoughts and ideas? I create my own thoughts and ideas.
J: Thoughts and emotions come and go automatically. I don't create the thought. The thought is not mine. The thought happens in a mind that I happen to be associated with right now. The same is true for you, though you don't see it. As with everything else in creation, that is just a phenomena in space and time, it has nothing to do with me. It's like the cells of the body: every minute cells are created and cells are discarded, but you are not the creator or the owner of them. Likewise thoughts are the cells of the mind: they come and go in accordance with the nature of the mind and its interaction with the surroundings. This is not special for me, it's just the way things are. Similarly your thoughts are not yours, they just happen in your mind and you experience them. The difference between you and I is you are identified with the mind-stuff. I lost that identification two months ago. I can see in you, that this notion, that your thoughts are neither you nor yours somehow provokes you.
Q: Of course it is provoking. We are used to considering ourselves as our thoughts and feelings. And to claim authorship and ownership to our thoughts.
J: Try this for a moment: pay attention to your thoughts and see how they arise automatically ... Relax ... Now mentally begin slowly counting. One ... two ... three ... Count slower ... Now while you continue counting, put your entire attention on the silence between two numbers ... That's the nothing I am talking about. It is who you really are. You are not your thoughts, nor the thinking. Thoughts arise automatically, so you are not the author of them.
Q: I experience nothing between the counting. It is not beingness or anything special. It's just, well nothing.
J: Exactly. Be that nothing ... Try it now.
Q: As I do that, the nothing does change it's quality, it does get a feeling of beingness. It feels both very peaceful and very pleasant.
J: Yes. As the experience gets deeper, you will find it is what is really real, and that the thinker is really unreal. But for now be content with the peace. You should practice this regularly. Be aware that since you are totally identified with the mind, this no-thing-ness may sometimes be scary to the mind. But with time it will reveal itself as joy or bliss.
Q: You said you initially saw it as nothingness, but that it has changed. In what way has it changed?
J: The experience has deepened, or changed, since my initial write-up. It's far from just nothingness anymore. It is still no-thing, of course, but not only do I experience it manifesting as love-bliss, I also experience it as a throbbing pulse in beingness, that's Shakti. There are no more periods of just plain no-thing-ness. Usually the whole body is burning with bliss. In sanskrit this is known as Ananda.
Q: Don't you loose your grounding, when this happens? I mean, when I get ecstatic, I am not grounded anymore.
J: No, it does not destroy grounding. It is such a physical thing, Ananda. It is something that transforms matter, so you move into prescence, not out of it. It is the essence of grounding. But you should understand, that I am not talking about ecstasy at all. Ecstasy is an exalted, restless state. Ananda is peaceful, despite it being of such tremendous energy.
Q: So nothingness is not nothing, it is bliss and energy?
J: Yes, exactly, but that comes later or it comes in glimpses. To have it permanently, you first need to get anchored in the nothingness of the Self. It is not possible any other way, because that would only generate a disturbed ecstasy. Glimpses of ananda before Selfrealization give rise to excitement in the mind and ecstatic joy. After Selfrealization, when ananda comes, it comes with great peace and a still, unmoving throbbing feeling og supreme love-energy in your beingness.
Q: So you are a happy man?
J: I think Jan can be happy or unhappy, just as before. Well, in fact I am not sure that is so. Time will show. Thinking about it, I have not been really unhappy since the awakening. But remember, I am not Jan, I just have to live with him. Jan's mind is strange, it is very brilliant and very dark at the same time. It's not an easy mind to live with. Jan can be frustrated about something in life, while I may be blissfull.
Q: So you can be unhappy and blissful at the same time? Isn't bliss happiness?
J: Bliss is not happiness. Happiness is a state of mind, bliss is the nature of the Self. Of course, when bliss is there, it is difficult to be unhappy. I guess impossible. Yet it is my experience, that you can be in a state of bliss at the same time as the mind is frustrated by some circumstance in life. That's just how the mind works, and this frustration is unhappiness in any person, whether he is Selfrealized or not. Only later will unhappiness go away entirely, when the ego and mind get reduced more and more, and the bliss becomes more and more permanent and all pervading, as well as stronger. This process goes on very rapidly after Selfrealization. It is not a steady linear growth. It goes up and down, so there are periods of bliss and no unhappiness, then there can be periods of no bliss and frustration. But continuously you are not the frustration, not Jan, you are nothingness-beingness-love-bliss witnessing it all without getting entangled in any of it. Of course, when the bliss goes away, you miss the bliss and that frustrates the mind; you are just as human as you ever were. As time goes on, it becomes more and more permanent, and this process is very rapid.
Q: In the name of enlightenment, many seekers go to workshops to get a happy mind. What do you think of that?
J: As far as getting Selfrealized, it is a waste of time. Therapy, or any kind of working on the mind or psyche can be nice, but it will not bring you one bit closer to Self-realization or enlightenment.
Q: Why not?
J: I think I have just explained that. In short: You are not the mind. Whether the mind is fucked up or clear and happy makes absolutely no difference to your potential for getting Selfrealized. In fact those with a happy mind often have a harder time getting Selfrealized than those with an unhappy one. The reason for this is that the unhappy ones want to get out of the mind, the happy ones want to get more identified with it.
Q: How can we get closer, then?
J: Find a master who can give it to you. Get your kundalini awakened and work with it. That's how I reached it, so that's what I recommend.
Q Many new age teachers tell you to stay away from kundalini. And to support their view, they tell you scary stories. You seem to disagree?
J: Kundalini is entirely benign; kundalini is Shakti and Shakti is of course the divine energy of love-bliss. Shakti is the love of my life. Like any love affair, there are ups and down, but don't dismiss the benefits on account of a few crises. It is a myth among new age "masters" that kundalini is the source of all spiritual problems. Don't believe them. Kundalini is the source of all enlightenment and all ananda. Without kundalini, there can be no true bliss, no true enlightenment. Selfrealization as pure no-thing-ness, without any love-bliss, is possible without an awakened kundalini, but if you want to go beyond that and get the love-bliss, you need to awaken kundalini.
Q. How do you experience kundalini?
J: As immense bliss filling every pore of the body, it is divine beyond description. In everyday life kundalini simply manifests uncaused joy in me; since Self-realization this has been fairly permanent. Before that it was only occasional. To begin with, the immense bliss was occasional, but now it is permanent.
Q: You say the other thing to do is to find a master, that can give it to you. Can you give it to others? If not, who can?
J: I don't think I can give it. I got it from Deepakbhai, but I am sure there are others who can give it. Mind you, I looked for a master who could give it for 25 years and found none before I met Deepakbhai.
Q: I have heard you can awaken kundalini in others. This is called shaktipat, I believe.
J: Yes. I have done that successfully several times. But I merely act as a channel. I can't decide if this or that person should have it. I sense if someone is ready to receive it or not, and then I might pass it on. If you want to get in contact with a master, who gives it, then get in contact with Anandi Ma at www.dyc.org. I don't have the shakti she has.
Q: How would you recommend we meditate in order to integrate all this?
J: I can tell you how I have meditated for years. Sit comfortably and follow your breath. Then as you breathe in, remember the word "Shakti". As you breathe out, remember the word "Om". "Shakti Om" is our mantra. Then as you breathe in and remember the word "Shakti" imagine you are drawing energy up the spine. As you breathe out and remember the word "Om" imagine the crown chakra opening and a radiance from the top of the head. Do this for at least half an hour twice daily and you will soon experience bliss. The stronger you can feel drawing up energy, and the effulgence at the top of the head, the better.
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