Swami Muktananda Quotes

How did we change? Every one of us has become one thing or another, according to our own understanding. We believe ourselves to be men or women, rich people or poor people. We believe that we are teachers, soldiers, psychiatrists. We believe that we are young or old, fat or thin, happy or miserable... Americans or Indians, Russians or Arabs, Hindus or Christians, Muslims or Jews.

A human being has the freedom to become anything. By his own power he can make his life sublime or wretched. By his own power he can reach the heavens or descend to the depths.

In such a world there is only one thing we need, and that is the true understanding of humanity. Yet that is exactly what we lack.

In the Kena Upanishad there is a statement: "That which is not thought about by the mind but by which the mind thinks-- know that as the Absolute." It takes a very subtle intellect to grasp this but if you understand it you will not have to make an effort to mediate. You will simply be aware of that which is meditation on you.

Not everyone is able to still the mind all at once, and therefore the sages have prescribed different techniques of meditation, according to people’s capacities.

Why does he live with enmity and competition instead of a feeling of brotherhood? He does these things because he lacks true understanding about himself. He does not know the greatness that lies within the human heart.

Meditation is a natural sadhana, and it has been recognized bv all the saints and sages as the most direct means of perceiving the Self.

Through meditation we become aware of our fundamental unity with all things. We cannot attain that awareness by reading books or listening to lectures. We can attain it only through direct experience. To have that experience we must pass from one state of awareness to another, moving gradually to deeper and deeper levels of our being.

Your true relationship is not with the mind, but with the Self. Therefore, understand what the Self is. Find this out: Are you supposed to know the Self, or is the Self the knower of everything? Are you supposed to meditate on the Self, or is the Self the one who is meditating on you?

Lovers meditate on one another. A mother meditates on her child. Whatever we accomplish in this world we accomplish through the power of concentration, which is nothing but meditation.

We know only the ordinary states of consciousness in which we live; we do not have complete knowledge of reality. When we are awake, we are totally immersed in our waking world. When we dream, our activities, our world, and our understanding are completely different from when we are awake. When we go into the state of deep sleep, we lose consciousness altogether.

If everyone could experience that inner Truth, if everyone could understand his real nature, there would no longer be enmity among people, but only friendliness, affection, and the feeling of universal brotherhood... When we look at ourselves with the true awareness of humanity, we will see that same humanity in everyone else, and then we will realize that everyone in this world is a child of God.

The human body is a temple within which God dwells in the form of the Self. However, to know this, you must turn within through meditation. In your present state, you have only partial awareness.

If we could only penetrate beneath these roles to our own divinity, then once again we would all know that we are God.

Within the human heart dwells a shimmering effulgence whose brilliance surpasses even that of the sun. This inner Consciousness is the same as that which creates and animates the entire universe. But we are not aware of this. Even though we have come from this Consciousness, we have changed our understanding about ourselves.