Master Course recording. Chapter 1. Gurudeva defines who is a mystic and what awareness is. Gurudeva elaborates on 5 states of mind, Self Realization, darshan.

Dedication:

This course is dedicated to all people, for each of us is all of us.We, all of us, seek in our own time and in our own way for the Absolute, for our true nature, only to suddenly realize one day that we are That which we seek. There is none other.

Study Guide The Master Course is a beautiful garden you are about to cultivate.Give it care and attention and it will produce abundantly.The fewer distractions you have, the easier it will be to attune yourself with Master's voice.A headset with two earphones is best.If you have only one earphone,m put it on the right ear.Enjoy sides one and two at least three times this week.Remember to use the log section to keep track and review your understanding in the question and answer section.By removing the black plastic binder, you can place these pages in a three-ring binder.The spine is the powerhouse of the body.Sit erect as you listen each week, spine straight and head balanced at the top.The great energy within the nerve system will flood through you.

Notes on the Master Course

The year's third pilgrimage, a nine day retreat held in December, was surprisingly productive. The 22 students attending spent time at Sivashram on Kauai and at retreat locations on the islands of Maui and Oahu also. Gurudeva spoke to them for hours each day, capsulizing the better part of the Master Course lessons they were then studying and adding new material. From these many hours of inspired talks later came the twelve hours of cassette tape lessons that constituted the sixth edition of the Master Course, one of the most popular editions ever done. An 804 page transcript of the tapes and other study material was beautifully printed and bound by the monastics.

Unedited Transcript:

The average person, who is not a mystic, lives two-thirds in the external area of the mind and one-third within himself. And the within of himself can be, and sometimes is, very foreboding; he doesn't understand it, little bit afraid of it and prefers to involve himself with external things. Possibly, he's had some inner experiences, some emotional unhappinesses and he shuns anything that is inner. The mystic lives, and is taught to live, two-thirds within himself and only one-third in the external. In learning how to do this, the mystic is taught to become consciously conscious, or aware that he is aware. He learns to separate awareness from that which he is aware of. The person who is not a mystic, living two-thirds in the external mind, he says, "I am happy. I am aware of a state of mind called happiness and I'm in that state, so that is me." Or, "I am unhappy. Unhappiness is me." The mystic living two-thirds within, he says to himself, "I am flowing through the area of the mind that's always unhappy." He doesn't change. He is a pure state of awareness.

Visualize a little ball of light and we'll call that man's individual awareness. And that light's shining right out from his eyes. And this little ball of light is going through the mind. It's going through the area of the mind that's always unhappy. It's going through the area of that's always dreaming, the area of the mind that's delightfully happy, the area of the mind that's in absolute bliss, the area of the mind that's absolutely in jealousy all the time, the area that's in fear all the time--many people live there, it's quite crowded, lots of balls of light there--the area of the mind that's in resentment. It's like a churning ocean, the delightful place to be in, especially if you're a little ball, you get bounced all around. The area of the mind that is completely peaceful, always has been peaceful, nothing's ever been in it to ruffle it, because that's the peaceful area of the mind.

Man's individual awareness is just like this little ball of light and it's like a camera: it photographs, it registers, it understands, it's pure intelligence. Man knows where he is but, the first step in awakening on the path of enlightenment is to separate awareness from that which it is aware of. We say, "I am sick." In the English language that means, "My body is sick," or "I am aware of this body not a being in a perfect state of health." The mystic knows he is not this body. He can even remember dropping off the body many, many different times, getting new bodies through the processes of reincarnation. We are not what we are aware of, we're separate from that which we are aware of. We're only flowing through these areas of the mind. If we live in San Francisco, we're not San Francisco. If we live in unhappiness, we're not unhappiness. That's only one of the cities of the mind. This is a great meditation and you grasp this awakening in 30 seconds. You can grasp this awakening in 30 hours, 30 minutes. You can grasp this awakening and have it come to you vibrantly in 30 weeks, 30 months or 30 years or 30 lifetimes. It just depends upon your willpower.

As soon as we can understand awareness detached from that which it is aware of, we have a vibrant energy, a tremendous drive. A tremendous willpower is released and we live with the feeling that we can do anything that we want to do, almost as quickly as we want to do it. We want things to happen now for we vividly see the area where they already exist within the forcefields of the mind itself. How do we live our life from this point? We begin to apply this philosophy in every department of our life. There are some habit patterns in our subconscious mind that have not caught up with this new perspective as yet. And you'll be running up against them. As soon as you find awareness totally identified with a subconscious area that has become conscious, immediately turn inward. Detach awareness from that which it is aware of and just be pure energy. You can expect a beautiful life, a beautiful relationship with the being of yourself. Claim the being of yourself as you. You have enough knowledge now. You don't have to discover the being of yourself and keep looking for it. Just be the being of yourself and travel through the mind as the traveller travels around the globe. A wonderful story of awareness. I could go on and on talking about it because it's so very basic and so very, very important. This then makes everyone an infinite intelligence and everyone the same, only they're living in different areas of the mind, or different houses.

Have you ever had someone come to you and tell you all of their problems? What did they do? As a pure state of awareness, they came to you as a pure state of awareness. You were not identified in the area of the mind that they're living in. So they come to you because they want to get out of the area of the mind that they're living in. They've been living in it so long, they think they are that area of the mind--like somebody's been living in a house so long and so attached to it that they'd rather die than move from the house--so then they come to you and they start telling all the problems. First they start with little ones, then they start with big ones and all of their complaints and heartaches and everything that that area of the mind involves in. Now you can do one or two things: you can gently talk with them and bring them out of that area of the mind into your area of the mind or they can move your awareness right into that area of the mind too and they go away and you're feeling terrible. You're feeling just awful.

You've gone to a movie. The movie screen is just a screen. The film is just film. And the light is just light. And yet the combination of the three can move your awareness into areas of the mind that can upset your nerve system, make you cry, make you laugh, make you have bad dreams for a week, change your whole perspective of life, these three combinations of physical elements, if it can attract your attention. Now if you were sitting in the movie and we are realizing that we're going through these moods and emotions but we are not the moods and emotions that we're going through--all we are doing is being entertained by our senses--then that's the mystic. He's enjoying life and what life has to offer. He's even remembering in past lives when he has had similar experiences that the players are portraying on the screen. And he has empathy with them. He is living a full and a vibrant life and yet when he walks out of the movie house, he's forgotten the whole thing, he doesn't carry it with him. His awareness is then, immediately right where he is currently. That's the power of the great eternity of the moment.

Living two-thirds within oneself and one-third in the external world: how do we do it? As soon, generally, we live within ourselves we become conscious of all of our various, secret thoughts, all of our various emotions that we would just as soon be without. Therefore, we distract ourselves and endeavor to live two-thirds in the external world and one-third within ourselves. And that is how the average man lives his life. But aspirants on the path, you have to live your life two-thirds within yourself. When you are conscious of the thoughts that you don't want to think, the emotions that you don't want to feel, go deep within where they don't exist. Take awareness to the central source of energy right within the spine itself. Feel that energy flowing through the body, moving the muscles, enlivening the cells. Then you're two-thirds within yourself and the world looks bright and cheery all the time. The sun is always shining.

Immediately when we begin to identify totally with our thoughts, then we begin to make mistakes; we're living two-thirds in the external world. How to strike the balance? Regulate the breath throughout the day, keep the spine always straight, always sit up straight. As soon as the spine is bent, awareness is externalized; we're living two-thirds out, and one-third in. Soon as the spine is straight, our awareness is internalized; we're living two-thirds within and one-third out. What's the biggest barrier? Fear. Afraid of our secret thoughts. Afraid of our secret feelings. What's the biggest escape from fear? Go to the center where energy exists. The energy that moves the life through the body. The simplest way is move your spine back and forth, feel the power that moves that spine back and forth. Feel that energy going out through the physical body. Open your eyes and look at the world and you'll it bright and shiny; you're two-thirds in and one-third out in awareness. You're balanced.

Wailua University of Contemplative Arts is organized--I have organized it--in the same way that I was trained as I came along in my inner training year after year after year after year. And I take the students through the inner training, as far as they can go in the very same way that I was trained, in the very same routine in which I was trained. This inner training is very different than outer training. When a student starts studying with me I'm not interested that he read other books--I'm not against reading other books--but I'd rather, during the time that he's studying with me, that he doesn't. Because there's a certain power in studying with me, I start at a very young age and it's been building and growing through the years and, to me, it's a spiritual power for this teaching is not an intellectual teaching, it is a projected teaching. The teaching is transmitted from one person to another on a beam, shall we say, in the very same way someone can sit next to you and make you feel happy and have happy thoughts, or be with you and talk to you and make you feel sad and be in a dark mood. The same way someone who is a mystic can be with you and take you within if you're ready to go within. And in this way, all of this teaching begins to make sense from within you from the inside out. Because our individual awareness, our pure, intelligent faculty of man, is the same in everybody. My individual awareness is the same as yours. My ears and eyes and nose, they're all the same. We all have the same faculties. No one is different from another except the training that they go through makes one different than another. A musician could come in here now and have much to offer us if they had been trained from a little child on up. They'd have that training in the very cells of their body.

I have the Wailua University operating in the same way that I was trained: with catalysts. And a catalyst is like a professor but he doesn't teach from his intellectual mind. He inspires, he's an example. He tries to motivate the student to work with himself inwardly. He presents instruction and he represents a challenge to the student though he might not say anything, a catalyst is always there with you working, ready to help you in any way. Then we have our, our ministers, or our swamis, who are working with the more inner people, people who are more dedicated, the devotees who have their shoulder to the inner wheel and they're pushing it along. The swamis have had more training of an inner nature and a little more unfoldment than the catalysts and they're working with the inner people. Then we have our priests who work with the swamis and the catalysts and they work completely within the University. And this is the way I was brought along in my training which happened very, very naturally. The University I established to perpetuate these teachings in the West so that the work would go on and on and on and on and on in a very dynamic way so that the New Age beings that are being born today--and even now they're being born--very, very great souls will have a systematic, comprehensive approach to the inner life. You have all read all the books of mysticism. That's the first thing everyone does. And all the magazines and all the brochures from the numerous schools; listen to the different swamis and mystics talk. Then the big question is where to start? How do you apply it to yourself? You have to choose one system out of it all. And then step-by-step, you go from one teacher to another. You go from a catalyst to a swami to a priest to a guru and little by little you unfold like a bud unfolding into a flower. This is the way the inner teachings work.

Most mystical work is done from the inside out. And very little is done on the physical plane itself because man living two-thirds within himself is therefore more active within himself than he is outside in the exterior world. Now that's hard to believe but a mystic doesn't do much in the exterior world at all. What he does is work totally within himself therefore he is then working within the inner self of those who are studying with him. That is the way the teachings are developed and projected from one person to another.

For an aspirant coming along the path, the guru plays the part, first, as a guide. He picks up where the parents left off in the second phase of the relationship with the student. But at first, he's a guide. The aspirant has read a lot of books. He knows the philosophy but he has philosophical loopholes because he didn't know what to study or how to approach the study. Most aspirants start on their own. The guru provides a comprehensive step-by-step study which fills in those gaps for the aspirant. And fills them in a very dynamic way because the guru insists that he begin to put the teaching into action in his own life. And this constant, silent insistence--guru might not say anything--just this silent insistence and the example that the other students and natye show to the newer aspirant coming along begins to catalyze the teachings into action in his own life. Then the guru plays another part. He picks up where the mother and father left off in the emotional training of the student. Sometimes he has to go back quite a way: 8 years old, 9 years old, 16 years old, 18 years old. And the various traits begin to come up in the student as the guru observes the nature unfolding. The spiritual being, of course, is mature and perfect. The emotional unit of the individual student is not necessarily that mature. Therefore the student finds that he has problems with his own emotion on the reaction to his meditations.

The guru provides ukanuhshum, or sadhana, for the student. The guru gives a specific assignment for the student to conquer. It may be simple, it may be complex but the student is to work on that assignment until it is complete to the satisfaction of himself and to the satisfaction of the guru. In working on one single assignment, all of the emotion, character traits, habit patterns within the student come up from within himself and, of course, he has the philosophical knowledge and the techniques of flowing awareness through the mind to handle them within himself. The guru insists that he work out these various character traits within himself and bring the external form of himself as completely near to the spiritual being of himself as possible. And then, of course, the guru goes on and plays other parts in the student's life as the student unfolds more and more and more.

I'm going to begin with a vast subject matter and that's the inner mind of man as well as the outer mind of man because I don't look at the mind or the spiritual forces of the inner states of mind as one being different than the other. We hear nowadays that we have an external mind to be shunned and an inner being to be reached. I look at it all as one. One integrated whole, one totality of mind, man, spirit, spiritual forces and the teachings that I have learned through the years have proven that out in my very personal life. The inner universe of the mind is tremendous, it's much larger, much more complex, better organized than any of the universes we can see with our two physical eyes. Basically, more advanced than the world itself. Take the world for instance, or this planet. It started out very simply and man has made it very complex. He has done this right out of himself. He has added all of the buildings, all of the systems, all of the laws, the citites, the countries, the states, the hierarchy of controlling elements called people--which are the powers that govern other people--man has done this all himself. I always humorously say that God created Heaven and Earth and man decorated it. Now man is discovering new things within the sea, new things in outer space but all of these discoveries are being registered within him. And he is the one that, his inner area of the mind, is the part of him that makes sense out of it all. If he's not developed spiritually, or not inwardly awake, he becomes confused by his discoveries. If he's inwardly awake, vibrant, alive, has the desire to know and to make something out of what he has found, he becomes more content with the more he knows the more he discovers because he can pass it on to the present generation and pass it on to the next generation in a very systematic and organized way as many people on the earth are doing today. One does not have to be mystically inclined in order to do this.

A mystic is a person who lives two-thirds within himself and one-third in the external mind. This is getting into the classification of people. Someone who is not a mystic lives two-thirds in the external mind and one-third within himself. That third that experiences within himself could be a delightful inner world or it could be a very tragic one depending on what areas of the inner mind he penetrates and becomes aware of. The mind itself is vast and complicated. Through all of my studies, I have found it to be in three basic phases. The instinctive areas of the mind we become aware of and we experience, these are the impulses of our physical body, our cravings, our desires, our digestive system and all of the mechanism that works the physical body. The system of elimination, of the heart beat, of the circulation of the blood. All of this works fairly automatically and is governed by what is called the instinctive mind. The instinctive mind is as much alive in the animal kingdom as it is in the human kingdom. The next area of the mind is the intellectual area. And this man makes up pretty much as he goes along to suit himself. The intellectual mind has come along with man.

It's a mixture of his instinctive desires and cravings and drives with his intuitive discoveries, his inner, spiritual feelings, his insights and his perceptions. Then man's memory of those and his organization of this vast amount of knowledge he begins to accumulate in himself, through himself and also from the outside of himself, from other people, makes what is called the intellectual mind. It can consume all of man's time and usually does lifetime after lifetime. And the next phase of the mind is the superconscious, even more complex, more organized, more refined than the instinctive and the intellectual mind: superconscious mind known as the mind of light. When one is in a superconscious state, he sees light within his body if his inner sight is developed. If his inner sight is not developed, when he's in his superconscious mind, he just feels good all over. He has intuitive flashes, he knows the next thing to be done. He's extremely perceptive and tremendously creative. Knowledge comes to him from the inside out, spontaneously. And, of course, that is true creativity.

The mind is, also, broken down in five states. The conscious mind, that is the area of the mind that we live in going through our daily routines. When we're in the conscious mind, we're totally externalized. We're listening to other people, we're taking in from newspapers, magazines, radios, television, we're recording, we're remembering; these are all functions of the conscious mind. We're in the conscious mind when we wake up in the morning until we go to bed at night unless we are mystically inclined and know how to be consciously aware of some of these other states of mind.

The second state is the subconscious mind. That is the grand computer of man. It registers everything that passes through the conscious mind and, whether right or wrong, whether the programming is put in, in a positive way or whether it's not put in in a positive way, the subconscious mind takes up all of this information and acts and reacts accordingly. The sub of the subconscious mind is a conglomeration of various actions or reactions that we go through. We have an experience, we react to it. We have another similar experience and we react to it. The two reactions mix and merge in the sub of the subconscious and cause a different type of reaction that could live with us for many years. This causes our complexes, our neuroses, our psychological behavior to a great extent and it makes one person extremely different from another. It's called the sub of the subconscious mind.

Coming into more powerful and rarefied areas of the mind, we come into the subsuperconscious area. This area of the mind is a powerful area; it filters intuitive flashes from the superconscious itself in through the subconscious--and we've all used that area of the mind from time to time. You wanted to know something, to get a clear answer. Being in the conscious mind, predominantly, we are cut off from our superconscious, inner knowing so we ask the question to the subconscious. The subconscious, like a good computer, searches through for the right answer from the superconscious and then all of a sudden we know the answer, it's clear to us from our head to our toes, from the inside out. That's one of the functions of the subsuperconscious area of the mind.

Then the fifth state of mind is the superconscious itself. Within it is one world within another world within another world and yet another. All phenomena, religious experience, religious happenings that man relates as spiritual experiences come from the superconscious area of the mind. It is commonly known as the mind of light. It's a beautiful area and when one is superconsciously alive, he feels good all over on the inside. New energies work through his nerve system. The superconscious area of the mind is available to all.

As we begin to learn to identify the various states of mind: conscious mind, subconscious mind, sub of the subconscious, subsuperconscious and superconscious mind, it's not unlike the artist who begins to observe depth, color and dimensions within a beautiful picture; the sense of enjoyment is better. Whereas the average man simply sees the picture. He has no consciousness of the intricacies of the color unless he trains his powers of awareness in that way. In the very same way, the average man is having daily subsuperconscious experiences, experiencing his subconscious mind and having superconscious flashes. However, not being able to identify one from another, his awareness not attuned to knowing the intricacies of the workings of his own mind, his sense of enjoyment is less. He may harbor awareness deep in his subconscious state of internal suffering for long periods of time and completely ignore the superconscious flashes which would lift awareness out of those states of mind into more blissful and refined areas. But without knowing, or being able to astutely pinpoint these superconscious areas and distinguish them quite um- dramatically, I would say, from the subconscious areas or from just plain being in the external, conscious mind, all of this enjoyment or inner faculties, the exercising of the inner faculty, is completely lost. There are many, many mystics who have had no formal training and therefore seem to unfold very rapidly on the path simply by learning the five states of mind and how to move awareness within them consciously and systematically as well as being able to immediately distinguish one from another. This, then, are some of the benefits of being able to experience, step-by-step, through direct cognition these five states mind: conscious mind, subconscious mind, sub of the subconscious, subsuperconscious, and superconscious states.

Then we have force centers within us. These force centers are great, shall we say, energy dynamos ever vibrant within us controlling the functions of memory, our functions of reason, our ability to use our willpower, the ability to cognize, to look through, perceive, to understand from an inner sight. Then our ability to love, to forgive, to see in and through everything and everyone and see the essence of All in everything and everyone, that pure essence, that pure, one spirit. Then our psychic faculties of being able to look into the inner planes of superconsciousness and see the beautiful colors there, the sounds, even superconscious beings living in those realms. And then, lastly, our greatest energy center, our faculty which gives us liberation from births on this planet. And this we'll study.

Then we have another look at man himself as a tremendous state of being as a center of the universe itself, radiating out of energy in four different ways. Man radiates out energy that can be felt by other people as well as himself from his physical body, that is one state of being. The next state of being: man radiates energy and power from his emotional and intellectual bodies. That is his second state of being. Then man radiates out energy and spiritual power that can be felt by others from his soul, his psyche--psyche, of course means 'soul'. And one who is psychic is one who has the inner faculties of the soul awakened and can use them. And these vibrations emanate out from man and can be felt by others. And then, lastly, the ultimate state of being is after man has attained his ultimate goal, Self Realization. A new state of being begins to develop because his point of reference and how he sees himself in the world about him, how he experiences inner things, has completely changed. So man has four different, dramatic states of being.

Man has many bodies. Man has his physical body and in this body he does physical things. But when he's not using his body, physically, he's using his other bodies. He has his emotional body. This has an energy form just like the physical body has. It's commonly called the astral body. At night when man goes to sleep he can leave his physical body and travel in another world in his astral body. It's a world that's more refined than this world; the astral body's more refined than this physical body and he can use, and motivate, live in that body. He also has his intellectual body and he can travel in his intellectual body too. He does this either through deep thought, through meditation or conversations with other people. You've had conversations with people about another country that they had been in, that you had never visited. By the end of the conversation you felt that you had been there. They had taken you to that country through the mental body. And you had seen the various things that they talked and explained to you through their mind; you travelled in your mental body.

And then, most important, we have the body of the soul. This is the spiritual body. It's made up of, and fabricated of, light. And this body is the body that man meditates in. When man meditates, he doesn't meditate in his physical body because the physical body is used for physical things. When man meditates, he does not meditate in his astral body or his emotional body because that is used for emotional things. When man meditates, he doesn't meditate in his mental body because that's used for mental gymnastics. When man meditates, he has to meditate in his psyche, his soul body. That's the body that is used for going within oneself to the superconscious mind because this body is the body of the superconscious mind itself. The astral body is the body of the instinctive, intellectual area of the mind. The mental body is the body strictly of the intellectual area of the mind. And, of course, the physical body is a body strictly of the instinctive area of the mind.

In our physical body and our emotional body we work in two realms: one of memory and one of reason. In our intellectual body we work in three realms: one of memory, one of reason and one of willpower because we are using a higher vibratory rate from the central source of energy. In our body of the soul, we work in the realms of cognition, universal love, the psychic faculties of man, and even deeper in the inner realms of superconsciousness. The ultimate goal, that simplifies all of this, brings it all together so it's understandable is: that burning desire, that insatiable desire for the realization of the Self God within. Now the Self, or God, within man, is actually what everyone is looking for whether they know it or not.

The intellectual mind can read and study about the quest for Self Realization. The intellectual mind cannot realize the Self because the Self is not in the intellectual mind. The superconscious knows about the Self, about God within man; superconscious mind can't realize it because it's not in the superconscious mind. It's beyond the mind itself. You could visualize a man in outer space and he's there all alone, all by himself. And we'll call the outer space area the superconscious mind and we'll call the man, the individual intelligence, flowing through that superconscious mind. The man in outer space, through his superconscious mind, knows that within that outer space there's something else that's greater than space itself, greater than himself. While he's there, he runs through all of his thoughts about his instinctive life on Earth, his intellectual life on Earth, his desires, his patterns, everything come before his vision and then the man dissolves into the very essence of his own energy, light and life which is greater than space itself. When he comes out of that samadhi, when he comes out of Self Realization, he has a new point of reference. He no longer sees himself as an individual lost in a multitude of other individuals. He no longer sees himself as a person who identifies the body as himself, the emotions as himself, or the intellect as himself. He sees himself as the ultimate realization of everyone and he comes out of that realization--as an actor would enter a stage--into the superconscious body of the soul. He goes back to home base: the ultimate realization. He comes out into the emotional mind, the astral plane, he comes out to physical consciousness and he snaps back like you snap a rubber band back to its very natural, simple condition. To attain Self Realization you have to be very, very astute, very simple. For it's a simple expression. It's a simple experience. However, you have to not be afraid of any other experience that might happen to you or be reacting to any experience that has happened to you because then that divides your awareness and you're not one-pointed enough to attain Self Realization.

Another look at Self Realization is: that before man who is striving to realize the Self God. He is striving to go within himself. He actually sees himself outside his physical body and he's striving to go within. He's all tangled up in his emotions. He sits down and meditate and he tries to untangle his awareness out of his emotional nature and go deep within the superconscious. He succeeds a little bit and he comes out into physical consciousness, he gets hungry. Then he comes out into worldly involvement and then each time he tries to go in and he comes back to the way he was before he started. Basically, that is, a mister or a missus from some family, from some race from somewhere who is doing something because his subconscious has been programmed by somebody else or by himself to do that and that is his individual identity in this life. The mystic is not satisfied with that. The mystic wants to go into himself, find, attack the ultimate goal and change his perspective of life itself entirely.

Man goes within himself from the instinctive mind to the superconscious, back out into the intellect. He thinks about his experiences, formulates a philosophy. The intellectual mind then holds his awareness because he becomes a teacher and tells his philosophy to everybody; he has no more time for the superconscious. Finally, he wrenches his awareness away from the intellectual mind and back into superconsciousness, always seeking the very core of his existence and always being pulled back by some attachment to family, friends, uh- job, former commitments, emotional entanglements which use up his valuable time on this planet. Fortunately, we have reincarnation which gives a second chance. Finally, one day, he becomes inwardly powerful enough, the body of the soul has become developed and unfolded enough that he goes within and becomes the Self which everyone is seeking. Then he has hit home base. Then he comes out into the intellectual mind back to the Self. Then he comes out into the emotional area of the instinctive mind and back to the Self. Then he comes out into the superconscious and back to the Self. His entire perspective and nature has changed. Rishis have said man can go in to Self Realization a fool and come out a wise man. After Self Realization, man speaks superconsciously because the superconscious mind, the conscious mind, the subconscious mind all begin to blend as one unit. It's the great story of awareness.

Awareness is man's spiritual connection through all states of mind. I look at the mind as complete. It is totally created at all states of manifestation. Man's individual awareness, which we could say: that's that light behind his eyes, that's that life within his body, that pure intelligence which gives understanding that you feel from your head to your toes to your fingertips, that pure awareness flows through the mind like the traveller travels around the Earth visiting different countries, visiting different cities. If he finds himself in a place that's distasteful to him, he simply gets a conveyance, moves to another place that he likes much better. Same with man. The mystic sees himself as the free traveller within the mind, living two-thirds within himself and only one-third in the external mind, practicing meditation regularly through the control of breath. Awareness can be moved from one area of the mind to another at will. Through the control of perfect posture, we can short-circuit the instinctive functions of the physical body and that area of the mind itself and throw all of that energy into superconsciousness. The breath and perfect posture are two keys for moving awareness into superconsciousness.

When one goes within himself, he begins to change the inside of himself. He, in a sense, breaks various seals, various psychic seals within the inner bodies of himself thus releasing certain kinds of energy. These energies flow out through his aura. The darshan that is felt from an unfolded soul, when you are in his presence, can even become so intense that it would break these psychic seals within the students just by their sitting in his presence--doesn't have to say a word--just by being in the presence of an unfolded soul. In the East, darshan is considered one of the most precious of all spiritual gifts that man can have on the path. An unfolded soul, a great soul, is usually judged according to how the people feel after they leave his presence. That is- gives the full effect of the darshan. You have to be open to approach a soul of that nature you-, to bring a little flower, a piece of fruit. Open yourself and open that individual to you. Then the darshan begins to pour out.

Does an unfolded soul always give darshan? Yes, just like a flower always gives perfume but you have to be there to smell it. You can't come with a stuffy nose. Can darshan be experienced by listening to tape recordings of the guru? Yes, of course it can for darshan is a vibration emanating out from the guru himself. If you were to hear a tape recording and be in tune with the tones of the voice, you would then automatically be in tune with the vibratory rate of the guru in his physical presence wherever the guru might be. You'd have to work with yourself to observe the tones, to ride awareness right in the tones of his voice, to experience this darshan. The real answer to this question is: experience it. Or try to experience it and find out if one can receive darshan through the tones of the voice of an unfolded soul.