The Birth Of Consciousness

Hi,

This is Dhyansi and you're listening to Dhyansi Meditation Podcast.

This session is about the birth of consciousness,

Given in Basel on 30th of July 2018.

Good evening everyone.

A very warm welcome to all of you in this Monday evening meditation session with me,

Dhyansi,

Which is happening every Monday from 7 to 8 p.

M.

I see some of you are coming regularly.

There are some new faces as well.

So welcome to all of you.

I'm happy that you're here to learn meditation,

To practice meditation,

To do some introspection despite having such great weather outside.

And take this moment from your busy lives,

Be here with me in this meditation session.

In every session we have a different theme,

But the intention of all these themes in each of these sessions is to not promote any religion,

Is not promote any belief system or any culti associations.

I myself not associated with any institution,

With any religious or culti backgrounds.

I have been a meditator like you all having a normal life,

But also with the practice of meditation for the last 20-25 years.

And at some point of time I thought of sharing this art of meditation with you so that you can also integrate this into your daily normal life,

Which is not of amount,

Which is not of a particular lineage or a particular system.

For today's session,

It's my birthday,

So I thought of having the theme of the session as birth,

As the day of the birth.

And I would like to start the session with asking you all a question,

What is the significance of birthday?

Why do we celebrate birthdays?

Anybody?

Or you don't celebrate birthdays at all anymore?

It's the day we were created,

The beginning of our life.

Okay.

Yes.

So it's a reminder that we are given this life,

Which is very short,

Which starts and very fast,

Ends.

And every year we get this reminder that we have this life,

Let's live it as much as possible.

So it's this birth which is every time when we remind ourselves,

We give ourselves this chance to tune back to life,

To tune back to what it actually means to be alive and not just get carried away with random mundane things of life.

You know,

Another thing is that this birth that we get from what our parents had some fun and we came into this world,

This is the first birth that we take.

We are given the body,

We are so small,

When we are born,

Few grams,

And then we become into several kilograms,

We get a mind which is completely clean,

Which has almost no ability to process even a language of A,

B,

C,

D.

And now we use it in such a sophisticated way,

In such an amazing way that it's just unimaginable.

So from this first birth we get the body,

We get the mind,

And we are set into life to live happily ever after.

But are we living happily ever after?

No.

Sometimes,

Yes.

Sometimes,

No.

There is something that is missing in this first birth that we get with this biological birth,

With this body,

With this mind,

There is something missing.

Can anybody guess what that is?

Or there is nothing missing maybe.

In my understanding,

What is missing is self-awareness,

Consciousness.

Because if this first birth with the body and mind was enough,

Everything would be all right.

But there are lots of challenges that we face in our life,

There are lots of miseries that we go through.

We do not know how to handle them,

There is no education for that.

And in order to address that,

We need a kind of a second birth,

Which is the birth of self-awareness,

The birth of consciousness.

Listen to what I'm saying,

Not just with the mind,

But with also an open heart.

Because with that you can see what I mean by the second birth,

What is the sense of this self-awareness,

What is the meaning of consciousness,

And why is this important in our life.

Have you seen this life cycle of a butterfly?

Has anybody ever actually seen a butterfly growing from the egg to the caterpillar,

The worm,

Then the pupa,

And then the butterfly in itself?

Has anyone actually in real life noticed or observed the process?

Anybody raise your hands,

Anybody?

Then you must be knowing how beautiful and amazing this process is.

When I say the first birth,

It means from the egg to the caterpillar,

To the stage where the worm exists,

It survives,

It does everything everybody else does.

But then a very amazing thing happens,

Incredible thing happens,

That is,

It goes into a certain transformation,

It goes into this stage of pupa where it stays in for days,

For months,

And for some species,

Years,

To completely transform,

To take a completely new birth as a butterfly.

A worm is not beautiful,

It's on the ground crawling.

A butterfly,

If you look at it,

It's so beautiful,

It has all the aesthetics of nature,

And it is free flying in the sky.

It's a completely different dimension,

It's a completely different jump of evolution from being a worm to flying like a butterfly.

In our life,

When we are given the first birth,

That is the body,

The mind,

The identity,

The everything that comes along with the first birth is the caterpillar,

And that is something,

It's a possibility of life,

And if we add the dimension of self-awareness,

Of consciousness,

We actually start living it,

We actually start creating the life the way we want it.

Let's understand the difference between the first birth and the second birth a bit more in detail.

The first birth is biological,

So it's on the level of biology,

You have the body,

You have the mind,

The second birth is on the level of consciousness,

It's the growth of your consciousness.

The first birth is an unconscious decision,

It's not your choice,

You don't know why you are here.

The second birth is your conscious choice,

You take that birth consciously,

You decide to say I'm going to evolve,

I'm going to work on my self-awareness,

I'm going to evolve into a better consciousness,

Into a more expanded consciousness.

The first birth takes,

You know,

For it to happen nine months,

Roughly nine months,

For the second birth it can happen in an instant,

It can happen in minutes,

It can happen in hours,

Months,

Years,

Totally depends on your state of being,

Your commitment to what you're doing here,

Not in just in this session but as a meditation practice in general.

For the first birth the womb is the mother's womb,

For the second birth meditation is the womb,

The silence of meditation,

The more silent you are,

The more introspective you are is the womb of this second birth.

The first birth it is given for everyone but the second birth is not given for everyone,

It doesn't happen unless you want it,

Unless you work for it.

So my urge to you is that use the meditation session to introspect,

To explore what this second birth means to you,

It might mean that you don't relate to it,

It doesn't make any sense to you,

Fine,

But if it resonates something in you even a little bit,

Take the session,

Take the moment today to try to understand what does it mean to have the second birth,

What does it mean to become self-aware,

What does it mean to become more conscious.

I'll guide you through this session as a meditation,

We will start the meditation with first of all establishing and understanding what this first birth is,

How we separate ourselves even for few minutes from everything that this first birth has given.

This first birth has given us the body,

It has given us the mind,

It has given us the identity,

The name,

You know your nationality,

Your descriptions,

Your titles,

Everything that comes along with this first birth.

We will try to bring a certain distance from it,

Just for 30 minutes in your entire life do this as one experiment,

See if you like it,

See if you don't like it,

Just all the effort would be to drop everything that comes along with this first birth.

For 30 minutes you'll forget about your name,

Your body,

Your mind,

All your thoughts,

Emotions,

Connections,

Everything that is descriptive of you which you know comes out of the first birth that you will put aside for few minutes and allow yourself to be in a state which is formless,

Shapeless,

Definitionless and only simply just pure awareness and try to stay in that space of silence,

Of self-awareness and go deeper into it,

Allow yourself to go as deep and immersive into this state,

Into this womb of silence,

Into this pure awareness as possible.

This first birth is the meeting of the male and the female,

The sperm and the egg,

The second birth is the meeting of silence and awareness.

Remember these two words,

Silence and awareness,

When you're silent and you're aware this is the right space,

When you know somehow inside that you are in this,

You're tuned to this space of more silence,

More awareness,

Allow it to happen,

Allow it to expand,

Let it just be in that as long as you want,

Forget everything else for that moment and just be in it.

Any questions before we start the session today?

One request I have which I see every session,

Some of you are struggling with the posture,

Today we try to sit a bit longer in silence,

So if you know that you are not able to sit for very long with your back straight,

Just sit next to the wall,

Take a position which is comfortable to you,

It does not matter how it is,

Don't fall asleep,

That's the only requirement,

So sit next to the wall,

That's absolutely fine,

Yes,

Just like that.

And when you sit next to the wall,

Try not to touch your head with the wall,

Because when you do that,

You'll naturally fall asleep.

And while we are doing this meditation,

When everybody else is silent,

Let's try to maintain that silence,

Not try to disturb others,

And if we are done with meditation,

If we cannot close our eyes anymore for some reason,

Just open them up or lay down,

Be quiet,

Do not disturb others,

And try to maintain this environment,

This energy that we will create in the next 30 minutes of silence,

And enjoy this energy,

This silence in your own ways,

If you want to just sit next to the wall or you want to continue meditating,

And afterwards we will spend 5-10 minutes taking any questions that you have,

Anything that came up during the meditation session in your experience.

Is it clear how we are going to do that?

Alright then,

Let's start.

Close your eyes.

Take a nice deep breath,

Inhale from the nose,

And also exhale from the nose.

Another deep breath,

Inhale,

And exhale.

Keep your back straight,

Shoulders relaxed,

Face relaxed.

No tension on your face,

Your eyes.

Keep on breathing naturally in a smooth rhythm as you always do.

Amen.

Become aware of your body,

Make sure that you have All the sensations in your body,

Become aware of them.

All the sensations in your body,

Become aware of them.

For the next minutes,

Remain dissociated with your body.

Whatever is happening in your body,

Just ignore.

Remain separate from your body.

Let your body be at rest,

And do whatever it wants.

Simply ignore the body.

Don't fight with the body.

Don't try to control the body.

Just let it be on its own.

Let it be on its own.

Let it be on its own.

You are not the body.

You are not the body.

You are not the body.

You are not the body.

Take your awareness to your mind.

Silence.

Silently observe all the thoughts that are floating in your mind.

Silence.

Just observe your thoughts without touching them.

Without getting involved,

Just observe all the thoughts,

Voices,

Images.

Without getting involved.

Without getting involved.

Now slowly distance yourself from these thoughts.

Let them be.

If they are there,

Let them be.

You are separate from your thoughts.

Silence.

You are not your thoughts.

Silence.

Allow your awareness to remain shapeless.

You have no shape.

Allow your awareness to remain formless.

Silence.

You have no form.

Allow your awareness to remain nameless.

You have no name.

Allow your awareness to remain descriptionless.

You are not any description.

You are not any description.

One more silent.

Rest in the silence.

Silence.

Remain shapeless.

Formless.

Nameless.

Just silent and aware.

Untouched by everything.

Completely disconnected from everything.

Allow yourself to settle and rest in this silent awareness.

And awareness.

Drop everything that comes to your attention.

Just simply remain silent and aware.

Let yourself go in this silence.

Silence.

Silence.

Silence.

Allow yourself to go deeper.

No more movement.

For the next minutes,

Just stay like that.

Silence.

Remain untouched by everything.

Stay like this.

Stay like this.

Silence.

Stay like this.

Silence.

Silence.

Silence.

Bring your awareness back to your breath and breathe very normally.

Slowly and gently,

You may open your eyes.

Now you may move your body.

If it's paining,

Just stretch yourself a little bit.

It was very nice of you all that you were very,

Very silent,

Even if it was maybe uncomforting for some of you.

The session was very powerful.

I don't know about you,

But I was somewhere else.

I enjoyed it thoroughly.

I hope some of you also enjoyed what we did in the last,

I think,

35 minutes.

I don't know if you guys,

When you sit at home,

If you're sitting that long for meditation.

Any questions,

Anything that went through your mind which was difficult to do or you did not understand during the session?

There was one question I had received as an email from the last session that the person was saying that in the session I'm trying to control my thoughts,

My mind,

But it's not working out and I get all these thoughts and I try to control them.

What should I do?

And I think this is a very,

Very common question which we all face as meditators.

The answer to this is that you should never control your thoughts.

You should never try to control your thoughts when you are meditating,

When you are sitting in silence.

Because the more you try to control them,

The more stronger the wrestle becomes and you never win in this wrestle.

So what you need to do is let the thoughts do what they want to do.

You try to dissociate yourself.

Try not to give thoughts too much involvement.

Try to remain passive.

Try to remain on the back foot.

And you will see with a little more patience that those thoughts start to lose energy and they will go away.

That state where there are less and less and less thoughts and eventually no thoughts happen on its own accord.

It happens to every person who is meditating,

But it takes time.

And the more you disturb this natural process of thoughts to calm down,

The longer it will take for you to reach to that point where nothing is disturbing you.

Second thing,

Maybe noises from outside,

From the child crying or the trance.

When you notice that,

Just let it come in your awareness if it has come and then let it go.

Don't get involved too much.

Don't process it.

The lesser you process it,

The lesser you just ignore it,

Let it flow.

You will see that slowly it would not matter where you are sitting,

How loud is it outside,

What kind of environment you are in.

You can sit in the middle of the train station and still be in your center,

In your silence.

And this silence,

This womb is what you can always create for yourself wherever you are.

And when you enter this and come out of it,

This birth happens every time that you sit in silence.

This is the taste of meditation.

Everything starts from here.

All the self-awareness,

All the consciousness,

Everything arises out of this.

And as a very simple taste,

It's relaxing.

So with that,

I have no more questions unless you guys have.

Any questions from the session?

Last one minute.

Yes.

As you answered this question in the case of me,

How do you know that meditation is successful?

What are the sensations in your mind?

How does it feel after that?

That's a good question.

So how do you know your meditation is good,

Is successful?

But before that,

There is a pre-question.

And that pre-question is what do you want out of it?

If you know that,

Because sometimes what we do is we have a presumption about it.

We say meditation means we are in that particular state.

We imagine a certain state and then we are trying to achieve that.

We are trying to reach that state.

If we try to do that,

We will fail.

We will never achieve what we are trying to achieve from meditation.

And I can give you a very truthful answer which will not be satisfying to your mind.

The truthful answer is you will know.

Because the moment you settle in,

The moment you become centered,

You know that you are there.

So that is the ultimate parameter.

The other parameter is you will notice that your body is much more relaxed.

It's not bothering you that much.

You will see that your breath has become more shallow,

More silent.

There comes a point where you are actually almost not breathing anymore.

If you sit in for longer,

Right now we are sitting in for 35 minutes.

We will stretch this slowly to 45 minutes,

50 minutes and then you will see that your breath has become completely silent,

Completely shallow.

Which means you are almost not breathing.

You are so still,

You are so silent.

That could be a parameter.

What else can I tell you as an indicator?

Are you looking for something specific?

No,

I am just trying to open my eyes and sometimes I speak from my own.

That's also another part of every session.

Because every day is different,

Our body and mind is going through a different scheme of things every different day.

So sometimes you are more aware,

Sometimes you are less aware,

Sometimes you feel really really good in meditation.

Sometimes you feel that it was just superficial,

You could not settle in.

It's all fine,

It's part of the game.

You have to keep on practicing every day.

I mean there are so many parameters involved,

External parameters,

Internal parameters.

I mean even think about the moon,

Which we never would assume to play a role in our life,

Plays a significant role in how your sense of awareness is.

But this is a theoretical topic and we would not go deep into it.

But some people feel that very very strongly.

If there is full moon,

They are much more feeling the awareness.

When there is no moon,

They are more unaware.

Then there are biological processes,

Especially as a female.

Sometimes it brings more unawareness in some phases.

So many parameters,

Just keep on doing it every time and you will get a sense of if you are going on the right track or if you are not going on the right track.

This is very interesting for me to say and I just want to add that from my experience,

The afternoon may take you for a bath.

I know,

Searching,

Going to the bath,

There is everything.

It's never the same.

It's not the same as sitting,

It's the same as the previous one.

I mean I sat this morning and it was different to now.

It could be different from what this is just so perfectly okay.

So there is not.

There is kind of a development.

I don't know whether you learn a language or start practicing which is completely different.

It's different every day but it becomes a need.

And there is just one small comment before we end it in the next 30 seconds.

But it's still a journey.

Every session is different but there is still a direction.

There is still a growth.

There is still everything is moving towards something.

And that line where it's moving towards,

It's self-awareness,

It's becoming more conscious of oneself,

It's becoming more of who we actually are.

As simple as that.

Thank you very much.

Have a very nice lovely evening,

Lovely week ahead and see you next Monday.

Have a nice day.

Thank you.

Thank you.