Can ‘Only Grace’ Play Role In Attaining Enlightenment? What Are Qualities Of A Spiritual Seeker?

Music Grace is like the sunshine.

It is equally on a terrorist as much as it is on a very good human being.

Okay.

And the terrorist refuses that grace.

So grace is there equally on all.

It is not the grace.

It is the pathrita of the individual.

Pathrita?

How much their individuals?

It totally depends on your thirst.

Okay.

On the path of Advaita,

They say only certain people can progress higher.

Who are these people and what are their qualities?

So it is mentioned the first step or the first quality.

These qualities increase progressively in you.

Okay.

So you can take them as steps from one step you go to the next,

To the next,

To the next.

Some people,

Lucky people are blessed with a little bit of each already.

So there are different perspectives of looking at it.

I'll just tell you the steps.

Step one is the power of discriminating that I am lost in this material world and there has to be something about me that is more than just food,

Sex,

Money,

Relationships,

Everything that belongs to this material world.

There has to be something more to me,

To who I am.

This discrimination,

Not just as a glimpse,

But as a very strong thirst starts happening to the individual at step one.

This is called Viveka.

I'm telling you completely Advaita Vedanta.

Okay.

This is called Viveka,

The power of discrimination.

Now he starts saying there has to be something more to me than just this body and just this mind.

This power of discrimination is like a blossoming flower.

It keeps blossoming little by little,

Petal by petal,

Petal by petal.

So it's not that when I go to stage two to explain stage two to you that stage one is over.

It's not over.

The next petal flowers slowly as we go.

So you understand though I'm explaining in one,

Two,

Three,

Four,

It is just to help us understand.

Okay.

Now second,

What happens is a natural dispassion starts happening towards the material world and a person starts really feeling that this thirst to know myself is so intense that automatically this is priority.

It's not that he's not taking care of his child or doing his job or owning his money.

He might be a stock trader continuously surrounded by money,

Money,

Money in thought,

In action all the time probably.

But such a person also is doing all that as just to bring food to the table to move on with the karma of this body.

It's not his first priority anymore.

His first priority has now become the search for who really am I?

There has to be something.

So you see from one at one he has this distinction between the outside world and this inside thirst of who am I?

And in two,

Here it becomes a little less important and this becomes more important.

So that's how it's going.

Now at stage three he starts blossoming into his body mind complex gets recharged with this new energy because now obviously he's not just interested.

He's picking up books.

He's going to this teacher.

He's going to that teacher.

He's really working hard to figure it out.

Yeah he's meditating.

So all this is happening on the side.

So at stage three now his mind starts becoming calmer,

Quieter.

This becomes a natural phenomena in a person who is not always thinking about grasping and greedy for the world all the time.

I mean that is also there when he is at work.

He's doing his things.

He is greedy.

He's doing those things.

He has still not become a yogi.

Yeah but there is this stronger thirst that is helping him become calmer and so this greed is reducing automatically.

Yeah a little bit of calmness is required for a person to go into meditation even to start meditating.

An extremely rajasic person with lots of thoughts,

Lots of restlessness cannot even sit down and close his eyes.

So third level is where there is an initial level of calmness that comes into this person.

It's not a complete calmness yet where he's become a yogi.

Yeah just an initial level which helps a person sit down and meditate which helps a person pick up a spiritual book and focus on it for some time and absorb the knowledge which helps the person listen to a teacher with full focus and absorb that knowledge.

Clear?

Stage three clear?

Calmness of very calmness is also very big word.

I would say just simple quietness of the mind.

Initial quietness of the mind.

Now because of this initial quietness of the mind he progresses to stage four where now his senses that were very interested in going out all the time.

The eyes were very interested in going out.

The ears want to continuously listen to music,

Be in noise.

Now start preferring a little silence.

The eyes are okay with just being in.

Yeah you know what I'm saying?

The senses have now started listening to this person or the senses themselves have started becoming quieter and calmer.

Yeah so the senses becoming calmer is stage four.

Then this stage five a higher level where the mind starts listening to me.

Yeah till now I didn't even know that I'm different from the mind so I was the slave of the mind.

The mind took me here took me there all day into this thought that feeling continuously kept kicking me around.

Suddenly there is a distinction a little distinction and the mind has started listening to me.

So it's not just initial calmness.

It's not just the senses listening to me but the mind overall which means even the memory has now become quieter.

I'm not saying it does not bring up past but now you don't get so involved.

Yeah thoughts do come up but then you know it's pointless.

It's the past so now you don't indulge in the past thoughts as you used to before.

So you understand what I mean by mind also listening to you and becoming calmer.

This progresses into a higher stage.

Stage number six where along with the quietness of the body along with the mind listening to you a strong determination comes in you if you decide that I have to do trekking this Sunday and come what me I'm going to climb this mountain.

You know how you go with full energy you take your backpack everything is ready well equipped and you start climbing with a determination that kind of energy comes for walking the spiritual path and not just one day in a year.

It's a continuous determination that is there now.

Everything is going on in my world.

Family is there,

Job is there,

Career is there,

Money is there,

Relationships blah blah blah everything is there but this determination keeps my spiritual progress up number one and this is all going on.

This is when the mind gets tired of this because the mind has a capacity the intellect has a capacity of focusing on something then I do this do this take care of this do this finish this finish this now I've got a break doing all this and come back here but on a daily basis yes and sometimes multiple times a day I'm back here I'm back here either in the form of reading a scripture or listening to a talk or meditating or contemplating on what I heard from a teacher or read from a teacher.

Now because of so much determination because of everything working in line with you you will get a glimpse of the knowingness a taste of the knowingness so we have so many people join us for this Advaita retreat 150 people join yeah not everybody would have got the taste of that knowingness the people who got a glimpse got a taste had accumulated all this wealth I call it the inner wealth it's not outside this is all the inner wealth so that brings another encouragement ah yes I am so close this is what I call Shraddha Shraddha is that which comes from me tasting even if I'm getting just one drop of that nectar it gives me a kind of proof that yes the ocean is not far away but it Shraddha is not believing it just because she said so or Shraddha is not believing that scripture so even when you were reading the scripture through all these stages to number seven there was still no Shraddha there were lots of doubts there were lots of things that you wanted to clarify wanted to define wanted to challenge but now at seven there is no more doubt that enlightenment is real yes and when you reach this this taste then only can number eight happen which is Samadha or contentment yeah finding that last step now going from seven to eight can happen in a weekend in one session and for some people going from seven to eight can take lifetimes yeah totally depends on again how much intensity how much of one to seven they keep applying keep applying keep applying how much is their thirst clear if you're ready to die for it it will come to you nothing short of that will work huh hi