WHY FEAR DEATH?
DEATH IS ONE OF THE FINEST EXPERIENCES MAN CAN EVER HAVE
This one man who turned a hundred was interviewed on television, and the interviewer asked him, “What is the secret of this long life.” So, this man of a hundred answers, “That is straightforward; I just keep breathing!” This other guy who turned a hundred was asked, “What is your secret? And this is that, and that?” they had a long chat about it. So, the interviewer tells him, “Well, happy birthday to you, sir, and I expect to see you at the same place next year,” the old man replies, “Well, I see no reason why we should not. You look healthy enough.”
There have been books written like “Life After Death” and “Life After Life” and things like that, with research done by doctors. I am sure some of you might have read those books. There were a few articles in the Observer, a two-part series on the same subject. They stress that a light comes to meet you when a person dies. That is an untruth. This is evidence they got from people who were just about passing over and recovered again. No light comes to meet you, but you will see your light, your spiritual light within you. After discarding the physical body and having the finer mind left, you recognise that light and feel that you are meeting this light. In the other dimension, those little bulbs have no time to march forward to you.
Death is one of the finest experiences man can ever have. I have died many, many times, at will, where you can send your soul out of the body and re-enter the body. You project it out, which some people call out-of-the-body experiences, but that is a misnomer. That does not happen. The occultists, who use the word “astral body,” say that your astral body leaves your body. No. It does not leave the body. The astral self, or the subtle body, is projected out of your physical body, and you have a dual consciousness. So, half your consciousness is contained in the subtle body, and half is contained in the physical body or the grosser level of the mind so that recognition can occur. If you are thinking of America, you are in America, and then you will remember it afterwards because part of your consciousness remains behind. If there were a total severance, then you would be dead.
HAVING SHED THE ENCUMBRANCE OF THE PHYSICAL BODY, YOU FEEL SO FREE
At the time of death, ninety-nine point nine per cent of people lose consciousness, and in the process of losing that consciousness, they feel they are going through a tunnel and on the other end is the light. But that is not the way to die. Why must you die being unconscious? The natural way to die is in full consciousness, and that can be achieved through our practices, where you are fully conscious of leaving the physical body. It is such a beautiful, ecstatic experience that is indescribable in words. There is no suffering at all. People fear because it is the unknown, but those who know it do not fear. It is very beautiful. When a person in old age perhaps has cancer or some other kind of disease, remember it is the conscious mind that is suffering while they are still alive. Only the subtle levels of the mind go ahead, so when the conscious mind is deadened, suffering does not linger. Having shed that part of the analytical mind, having shed the encumbrance of this physical frame, you feel such a beautiful sense of freedom. You feel so free. You feel free because you are now away from a grosser environment into a much finer environment, a more subtle environment, and there, the samskaric body, which we call the soul, feels as light as air.
IN THE AFTERLIFE, YOU WILL BE BUSY FORMULATING YOUR NEXT BIRTH
That part of the soul, the subtle body, also has powers of thought but on a subtle level, not like the conscious mind, and with that power of thought, you can call forth anyone you desire to meet because in that dimension, there is no space, there is no time. When we hear people saying, “Oh, I will meet you on the other side,” a lover speaking to his beloved, “I will meet you on the other side,” or a friend saying that to a friend, that is possible. When you die, if your thought forces are strong enough and you say, “I want to meet such and such a person,” you can meet him in his astral or subtle body. You can do that. But there will be no shape at all. Mary will not look like Mary, and Amantha will not look like Amantha, and Jean will not look like Jean, but the recognition is there that “Ah, this is Jean, this is Joan, and this is Jack.” Communication takes place there without words. Feelings are exchanged, and one could discuss things, but you cannot necessarily help each other because those souls are busy working out, formulating the process, formulating the basis of their next birth. They are evaluating and trying to find the vehicles through which they could be born again.
EVOLUTION IS ALWAYS PROGRESSIVE
Some Hindus believe that if you live a terrible life, you will be born a cat, or a dog or a cow, or whatever. That is rubbish. I tell them that evolution is always progressive. Once you reach the human kingdom, you will never return to the animal kingdom. But there is one thing that could happen. If you have evolved into the top of the human kingdom and perform some not-good actions, you could come down to a lower level but remain in that kingdom. That could happen. But you would never become a cow or a donkey.
At the moment of death, it is nice to die consciously; it is an ecstatic experience. Most people become unconscious and do not notice that beautiful transference of oneself into another dimension. But even when one wakes up from unconsciousness, one thing happens. In a flash of a second, your entire life is reviewed, and everything that has occurred since birth. You will see the entirety in a flash and start judging yourself. No guy is sitting on a throne, judging you, or turning over the pages of his books. You are seeing it all there in a flash.
You will say, “Ah, I did not do this right,” or “This was okay.” that will be the basis of you going still further into other lifetimes and thereby seeing the entirety of your existence since the primal atom, to the stage of man at whichever evolutionary stage you are, in the kingdom of man.
It happens so fast. Two kinds of people take a long time to be reborn again: a very highly spiritual man and a very evil man. The highly spiritual man takes a very long time to be reborn because finding a suitable vehicle to be born is difficult. We choose our parents; our parents do not choose us. So, the highly evolved man will take a long time to be born again, and the very evil man will take a long time to be born again because he might not find people wicked enough to be born through.
Hitler went to a fortune teller and wanted to know, “When will I die?” So, the fortune teller looked into his crystal—his crystal rubbish—and said, “You will die on a Jewish Holiday.” So, Hitler asks, “Why on a Jewish Holiday?” So, the fortune teller says, “The day you die, it will be a Jewish Holiday!”
ONE SHOULD NEVER FEAR DEATH IT IS A BEAUTIFUL JOURNEY
In reality, there is no death. The spirit within is eternal, but we face the problem of this transition, going from one room into the other, which we call death, and even that transition holds no fear. It is your mind fearing because it is the unknown. At the highest level of meditation, you are dead because you are in the land of the unknown, and when a man reaches that highest peak of Nirvikalpa Samadhi, he experiences that death, and that is the same experience he will have when he discards this physical body. That is to die consciously and still be aware of the transition. Very few people reach that kind of meditation, and very few reach Nirvikalpa Samadhi. It is a Sanskrit word, Nirvikalpa Samadhi, a meditation that is totally without form.
So, to repeat, there is no fear. One should never fear death, never, never fear death because even if you have reached that height, even if you die consciously or unconsciously, it remains a very ecstatic, exhilarating experience. You feel so much freedom and do not have the conscious mind to block you. That cunning animal is left behind, and in that proper evaluation of yourself, you find that I know that the wrongs I have done were wrong. At the same time, the solution is how to make it right. So do not fear; it is a beautiful journey, and you will find whatever you want according to your conception. The Islamic religion, for example, forbids you to drink wine, but they do promise you that after you die, there will be Houris, you know, those pretty damsels, any amount of them looking after you. There will be rivers of wine and gardens, all those beautiful things. A devout Muslim who believes in this will experience it. So, what is going to happen in the hereafter is determined by the belief that you have now. It could be a true belief, or it could be an erroneous belief. But that will happen. It is sure to happen. So, if we have the belief, faith, or knowingness through our meditational practices that there is joy on the other side, we will find joy, and there is. I tell you of personal experience; there is nothing else but joy.
THE SUFFERING IS OF THE GROSSER MIND ONLY, AND IT IS LEFT BEHIND
A person could be afflicted with physical diseases or mental diseases on this planet, but being of the grosser mind and body, those things are left behind. They are not taken with you. Only the finer self of yourself goes. There is no Heaven, and there is no Hell. It is all here and now. But if you believe there is someone up there with a tail, a trident, and a fire, and what have you, you will experience that because your mind is experiencing that. Your mind is creating that; the entire universe is created by thought and thought becomes concretised. So, it becomes a reality for you.
This chap who believed in the pearly gates died in hospital; on the other side, he approached the pearly gates, and St. Peter was there. So, St. Peter looked up his list, and he said, “Oh, you are not due for today.” So, this man says, “No, St. Peter, I have lived such a good life; I have been charitable, I have been kind, I have been helpful, I did so many good things, and I am sure my place is here. Please do me a favour, St Peter. Will you run my name through the computer again?” So, being a good guy, St Peter ran the name through the giant computer again. He says, “Ah, here it is; we have your name here, but you are only due here after three years. But anyway, who was your doctor?”
There is nothing to fear. It is just joy, and it is a pleasure. When a person dies, for example, in an accident, you wonder what great suffering is. No, there is no suffering. They become unconscious, and off you go, trotting along. There is no pain. The pain that man suffers is just his illness while he is here in the physical. You will find Yogis in India. This has happened in the past, and it can be done when you sit down in Samadhi, release yourself from your body and discard it. It can be done by will. It is not suicide. It is a conscious going away from this body into another dimension. They would not do it if there was fear or suffering involved. So, it is so easy. Beautiful, lovely. And I say to all the older adults everywhere, do not fear it. It is a lovely experience.
AT THE TIME WE FEEL IT IS TIME TO GO, IT IS VERY GOOD TO USE OUR MANTRA
When we feel it is time to go, we can use our mantra. The whole idea of a guru giving you a mantra is that the mantra represents you. If there was a machine or some device whereby your body, mind, and Spirit could be pulverised, liquidised, or whatever into sound, your mantra would be the sound that would be heard.
In the state of Samadhi, the true guru goes deeply into a person’s physical, mental and spiritual makeup and conceives of that sound. The true guru picks up the sound at the very subtle high level where your totality exists as an individual. Then, because that sound is inaudible to ordinary ears and not pronounceable or speakable, the guru has to take that subtle sound and bring it to a grosser equivalent so that you can speak and hear it. It is like an ice cream cone, to be brought from the thin end to the broader end. That is how it is given to you.
As one progresses in meditation, one will experience the subtlety and the more significant subtleties of the mantra so that afterwards, the entire mantra disappears, and only the impulse remains. You have become the mantra when you reach that stage of the impulse of your original sound. At the highest level of meditation, you do not need to use your mantra anymore. You become the mantra; you are the Mantra. For people who have not reached that stage and have been meditating for some while, it is very, very good to repeat the mantra in their mind when you feel yourself sinking away. Sink away in your Mantra. I will be watching.
THE SPIRITUAL FORCE IMPARTED THROUGH THE MANTRA IS THE IMPORTANT PART
The mantra is given from that subtle level and is not mechanical. I often have to sit with a form on so many sessions until I make contact. You do not know what frame of mind you are in at that time and where contact becomes accessible. Therefore, I initiate when you are asleep. The best time is when you are sleeping, and your conscious mind is quietened; that is how contact is made with the inner Self.
The day your Mantra is conceived is when you are initiated because the contact has been made from your Spirit to my Spirit. Afterwards, it is sent to the teachers, who will teach it to you, with a little sacred ceremony. It is the greatest gift a man could ever have. The critical part of the Mantra that is given to you is that all the spiritual strength and force the instrument represents is sent forth with that Mantra. That is why it works so effectively. In the Sanskrit literature written thousands and thousands of years ago, they say that without the guru, actual spiritual knowledge cannot come, and the reason is straightforward: by expertise, we do not mean theory and the talks we have. What we mean here is the Spiritual Force that is imparted through the guru to the initiate, and that is the Force and the Power that transforms people’s lives. Many times, there could be a lot of dirt and trash that has to be cleared away, cleaned away, and dissolved. But finally, when a more significant amount of clarity comes, then you start living. Now you are dead.
… Gururaj Ananda Yogi: Satsang UK 1982 – 06