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States of consciousness

A spiritual discourse on consciousness, reality, and the journey of the self.

"Neither the dream is a reality, nor is this world a reality. The reality is this: the one who knows both, who is present in both types."

"It is funny that the self is searching for the self. It is still very interesting that you are the self and still you are searching for yourself."

The speaker explores the nature of consciousness through the states of waking, dreaming, and deep sleep, positing the inner self as the only constant reality. He describes the individual's journey through the universe, the temporary nature of worldly relations, and the principle of balance, concluding that yoga is the divine consciousness that maintains this cosmic equilibrium.

Recording location: Australia, Adelaide, Australian Tour

How do we transition from the waking state into sleep? How do we fall asleep? And when and how does your consciousness shift from sleep into the dream state? We know that we are dreaming, but this is the space in between. If you know this, you have mastered many, many things. And how do you come back, enjoy a little sleep, and then enter into the next dream? We only know that we are dreaming, that's all. And when we come back to the normal waking state, then we say, "Oh, I was dreaming." What I want to convey with this is that it doesn't matter what kind of changes take place, you are always there. What is the reality? Is this world a reality? Or is the dream a reality? Neither the dream is a reality, nor is this world a reality. The reality is this: the one who knows both, who is present in both types—the one who knows "I was dreaming, now I am awake, now I am only sleeping"—the one who knows these three levels of consciousness is your inner self. That self never sleeps. That is the ever and ever-awakened divine consciousness. That is part of God consciousness. Realization, self-realization, or God-realization takes place at that time when you cross all the borders and become aware of your real self. It is funny that the self is searching for the self. It is still very interesting that you are the self and still you are searching for yourself. You are standing in this room and you want to know, "Where am I? Who am I?" You go to your mother and say, "Mother, where am I? Who am I?" Mother will say, "You are my child, so and so, beautiful one, sit down. Tomorrow we will go to the doctor, a psychiatrist. We will have a consultation, we will see, everything will be okay, my child, don't worry, you see." Immediately they will say that we are mentally not in order. But it is the truth that the self is searching for the self. And unless the self will not find the self, or one will not become conscious and aware of the self, this individual will suffer throughout the whole universe. The individual is fluttering on the waves of time, of space, from space to light and darkness, experiencing pleasant and unpleasant things in the world or somewhere in space. The individual is like a little boat lying on the beach, and every wave comes and hits it. So it's getting the heat from each wave, rolling here and there, falling here and there, it's nowhere. Similarly, we come to this physical world. You are a traveler, you are a seeker, you are traveling throughout the whole universe, and suddenly you came here and you stopped for a while. When we stop somewhere, we begin to collect qualities, we begin to collect relations, we begin to collect many, many experiences. Suddenly we got this physical body, we got the relations, we are playing a beautiful game of parents, children, brothers, sisters, friends, relatives, colleagues, and so on. This is just relations coming together. One day again, your inner self will decide to go further on the journey. All these relations will remain here. They will follow us. They will follow us for a while. You know when you bake the cheese and then you cut it, the cheese is like rubber, it expands but becomes thinner and thinner and thinner. And so when someone dies in the family, then you are very sad, very sad, but day by day the distance takes place, day by day, from your memory, not from your heart. And the heart is still intense. But the heart is depending on your memory. So day by day the memory is becoming less and less and less. That individual is continuing the journey throughout the universe. And you also have your way. There are certain relations. They are such intensive relations, so strong relations. Sometimes, somewhere, again it will bring you together. You don't know with physical consciousness, but with your inner consciousness you know. Now, all these things which happen in the individual phenomenon and in the cosmic phenomenon have some principles. The first of these is that there is a balance. When there is an imbalance, then there will be suffering, distress, accident, something like what we call earthquake, drought, hurricanes, fire, flood, diseases, epidemics, many, many things. These are some imbalances, and imbalance is caused by certain elements which create a negative, polluted environment. Imbalance takes place. So yoga is that energy, that śakti, that principle, that power, that consciousness which keeps the balance in the universe. With the realization of this divine principle, the yogīs, through meditation, brought this science, this information, into the human mind and gave this wonderful divine technique. Recording location: Australia, Adelaide, Australian Tour

This text is transcribed and grammar corrected by AI. If in doubt, what was actually said in the recording, use the transcript to double click the desired cue. This will position the recording in most cases just before the sentence is uttered.

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