- Eknath Easwaran

Repetition of a mantram is the silent repetition in the mind of a hallowed name or phrase from one of the world’s great religions. It can be practiced whenever possible throughout the day or night. Click here for instructions on repeating the mantram.

Click here for a list of mantrams recommended by Easwaran.

We hope you have enjoyed this series of audio talks. We will begin re-posting these talks, starting with Talk 1, on May 28, 2012.

Note that all of the talks in this series are available for download from our store. The series is described on this page.

Here is an excerpt from the beginning of the talk:

“The keynote of this chapter is it is much better for us to suffer ourselves than to cause suffering to others. It is very easy to bear the sufferings of others, but it’s rather difficult for us to suffer. And it is in choosing to suffer ourselves rather than contribute to the suffering of others that joy comes, security comes, and wisdom comes.

“When we inflict sorrow on others, the great mystics say, that sorrow is always going to come back to us, and when we contribute to the joy of others, that joy also is always going to come to us. So when there are occasions, particularly when we live in the bosom of the family, where somebody who is dear to us does something in a way which provokes us, it is not easy to refrain from resentment. It is not easy to feel not agitated.

“But it is easy to repeat the holy name, the mantram, go for a walk repeating Jesus Jesus Jesus, Rama Rama Rama. It is in this way that we gradually learn not to have resentful thoughts, and the power of the holy name can be experienced by all of us when in our anger we call upon him to extinguish it, in our fear we call upon him to dispel it.”

For previous talks, see Easwaran on Thomas a Kempis, under Categories.

Our presentations are led by experienced passage meditators. You will hear how ordinary people in different contexts are practicing passage meditation in their daily lives, and how it is helping them in their relationships, home, and workplace.

If you would like to attend, please arrive promptly (or even a few minutes early) at the starting time given above. For further information, email us at BMCM.Retreats@easwaran.org or call us at 800.475.2369.

We look forward to seeing you!

In Oakland, California:

Date: Thursday, June 14, 2012
Time: 3:30 to 5:00 p.m.
Location: AgeSong at Lake Merritt
Landmark Room
1800 Madison Street
Oakland, California 94612

Street parking is available.

This talk references Shankara (c. 788–820), a seminal figure of the Hindu tradition, who was born in Kerala state, south India, and entered monastic life as a teenager.

(Transcript follows below.)

TRANSCRIPT
This is exactly what the spiritual teacher does. Over a long period of sadhana, reminding us in so many different ways, through his own personal life, through the practice of meditation, through the self­less service we are all able to render, until the great day comes, as it came to Gandhi, to Teresa, Eckhart, to the Buddha, when we shed our false identity. It takes many, many years. And when we shed our false identity, we discover, exactly as Eckhart says, “The pauper discovers that he is a prince; the pauper discovers that she is a princess.”

Shankara, who comes from my native state of Kerala, who is probably one of the most towering figures in the spir­i­tual world, he has a beautiful — we can almost call — gypsy song.

[San­skrit recitation]

Shankara, who discovered his identity very early in life, he is again narrating the same story with which I began. Manobuddhyahankara chittani na aham. Aham — I. Na — no. “I am not.” Mana, “I am not my mind.” He is telling us on the basis of his personal experience, though it contradicts all our beliefs, Na aham manah buddhi — “I am not my intel­lect.” Manobuddh ahankara — “I am not my I.”

Then he goes on into details, and concludes by saying chidanandarupa. After I shed this false iden­tity, I have discovered I am chid, I am pure awareness, which has no sex, no color, no race, no form. That’s why, in the world in which I live, I don’t have any shad­ows of the competition between man and woman at all. That’s why I am able to draw men, I am able to draw women, draw chil­dren equally well, because this is a false identity that I have shed, about color, race.

And Shankara is now telling us, in very beautiful lan­guage, we are all pure aware­ness. In pure awareness there are no divi­sions. If you ask me, “Is pure awareness many?” I’ll say, “No.” If you ask me, “Is pure awareness one?” I’ll say, “No.” These don’t apply. There is only pure awareness here. And, pure awareness, Shankara says, is ananda. It is untold joy, infinite love. That is what pure awareness is.

This is what meditation, supported by all the disciplines, can lead everyone to. It doesn’t matter from which country you come, which religion you profess, which stratum of society you belong to, which sex you belong to; all these [are just] conditioning.

– Eknath Easwaran

Putting others first means gaining freedom from selfishness and separateness, and finding joy in helping others.

Click here for basic instructions on putting others first.

“All of us have wings, though we do not suspect it because they are so tightly tied. We are not meant to stay on the ground and peck at crumbs of personal pleasure and profit. We are meant to soar – to give our time and love freely to everyone around us. That is the essence of spiritual growth, and the whole purpose of meditation and the other skills of spiritual living is to free our wings and allow us to fly high.

“In India’s mystical literature, the ties that keep us earthbound are called ‘knots that strangle the heart’ because they constrict our capacity to love. There are millions of these ties, but perhaps the easiest to see are what I call personal attachments: possessions and activities we cling to that claim our time and attention at the expense of those around us.

“Many of these attachments are material. Most of us have accumulated things that tie us down one way or another, often because we think they add to our status or prestige. Other attachments might be activities we enjoy that benefit no one, including ourselves. Whatever it is, we can’t imagine doing without it. That is the hallmark of an attachment.

“These ties might seem gossamer, but they add up. They can bind us so tightly that we can scarcely move beyond the limited circle of our personal likes and dislikes. Imagine if your favorite possessions were actually attached to you. How difficult it would be to drag them around even for a day! Yet the mental load we carry is no less burdensome. Shedding even a little of that load leaves us feeling as light and free as if we really did have wings.”

Read the rest of this article

“But this becomes yoga only when it is selfless: when we forget ourselves in that work and desire nothing from it for ourselves, not even recognition or appreciation. When we learn to act in this way, egotism shrinks and separateness gradually dissolves.

“Such selfless service is rare. Much more common — among those who help the world at all — are those who do good but need some kind of recognition or reward. Such people have benefited the world enormously, so these words are not meant at their expense. The question is simply what effect this work has on them. If it loosens egotism, pride, and the bonds of separateness, it can be called karma yoga, but not if it is making these bonds stronger.”

- Eknath Easwaran from Essence of the Bhagavad Gita, page 120.

The transcript for this talk is included below.

TRANSCRIPT: So I’m answering that question of how we came to have all these obstacles, serious obstacles — anger, lust, fear — which prevent us totally from waking up to the indivisible unity of life.

This is our legacy through millions, millions of years of evolution, and in the Hindu scriptures they use a very picturesque term: adyaropa. Whatever the misadventures that we have gone through in our animal stages, or even in our cave man stages, we superimpose them on our self, we attribute the characteristics of the body — because that’s what the tiger identifies with, the crocodile identifies with — totally, total identification with the body.

But when we come into the human context we have the choice: Shall I now identify myself totally with the urges of the body, with the demands of the body, or shall I begin to rise above the flux by putting love first, the welfare of those around me first, and giving to the world rather than grabbing from it first?

In adyaropa, which is often translated as superimposition, we superimpose the characteristics of the container on the contained. I’ll take one or two absurd examples. Take milk. What would you say if somebody told you the characteristics of the milk are the characteristics of the bottle; they say milk is made of glass, you can see through it, if you try to break and drink it it’ll hurt your mouth. You’ll find it very ridiculous.

This is exactly what we do every day when we yield to the primordial urges of the physical body. And it is this superimposition that we have to break through in order to become aware of the unity of life, which is the divine ground of existence.

- Eknath Easwaran

Slowing down means setting priorities and reducing the stress and friction caused by hurry. Click here for basic instructions on slowing down.

This excerpt is from the beginning of the talk.

“When we used to travel by bus on the Blue Mountain in South India, sometimes we would see a man or woman carrying a heavy basket of vegetables or fruits on the head, seated on the bus with the basket of fruits and vegetables on the head.

“So I think on one occasion, I said, ‘Why don’t you just get rid of this weight by putting it down on the floor?’ This thought had never struck him at all.

“When we choose to groan under our burdens, we are just in the position of the villager, carrying the basket of sorrow on our head. when we might as well put it down on the divine ground.

“In the practice of meditation, one of the great developments that take place is that, when we have sorrow and heartbreak, which come to all in life, instead of resisting them and rebelling against them, which makes the load only heavier, we can so go about it that the burden of sorrow or heartbreak or even illness can be laid at the feet of the Lord as an offering.”

For previous talks, see Easwaran on Thomas a Kempis, under Categories.

Note that all of the talks in this series are available for download from our store. The series is described on this page.