Ayyappan deeksha and God

QUESTION: Hi Swami,

I have found some solace and peace of mind after stumbling upon your postings on brahmacharya. In relation, I have 3 qns which I humbly request your replies:

1) I have recently finished my sabarimala yatra for the 2nd time and am still wearing my maala. Also, I have been having a very bad habit of self masturbation since age of 13. I am 28 now.Ayyappa deeksha enabled me to maintain brahmacharya for close to 55 days thus far.

However, I can deeply feel that my mind is already calculating what fantasies to indulge in and masturbate after removing my maala. Only when wearing maala I am able to sustain long periods of brahmacharya and from fear of ayyappan.However,when I remove maala, I have limited will power.

Is there no escape from this cycle where I practise brahmacharya when I have ayyappa deeksha and revert to pornography and masturbation after removing maala? What is wrong with me? I can be a saint and yet so quick to become a lustful man?

As of now, I have at the very least pledged that every Saturday, I will take vegeterian, meditate and chant saranams for Lord Ayyappa.

In my case what more can be done to reduce the intensity of the mind to seek pleasure from masturbation? Will ayyappa be angry with me?

2) If Atman is God, why are We(the God) not having the infinite powers and bliss and have to suffer in samsara? In another words, if we are to be God in the first place, why did we forgot our true nature and drowned in Samsara? If we are God to begin with, why were we not able to find fulfillment within ourselves and had to be bound by maya? Isn't that illogical?

3) In this human body, we are able to conceive Almighty, know him to be great and all powerful and know that all our desires will be fulfilled when we attain him. However, when we merge in god, how can we feel any bliss or sense of immortality when we are everything. There won't be a me as now to perceive the almighty isn't it? In another words, sugar is sweet only when I am able to taste it. What happiness can there be if I become sugar and there is no tasting. I would not be able to experience any sweetness isn't it?

My questions are not to mock at vedanta but are truly asked out of my own desire to fully grasp and understand the essense of vedanta. I hope you would not construe any of my questions as a joke or mockery. Thanks alot swami.

Saranam Ayyappa.

ANSWER: 1. Wearing a maala and worshiping Lord Ayyappa with the required discipline is a symbol of showing one's devotion and focus towards the Almighty. It is meant to bring the common man who has forgotten his state of divinity back into the realm of Godliness. By setting aside a few days for Ayyappa pooja, the devotee gets a chance to unwind from the world of materialism and focus his energies on the Supreme. The common man wearing a maala does this for a certain period and then reverts to his usual ways. The wise man takes the essence of this worship and continues this mode of life even later, for ever. He is forever in 'maala' in the real and genuine sense though he may not outwardly wear a maala or walk barefooted. This is then real pooja (worship), for this discipline has become a part of his lifestyle and is not limited to an annual occurance. He becomes the greatest and most loved devotee of Lord Ayyappa. There is none dearer to the Lord Ayyappa than such a rare devotee. He will receive the choicest of the Lord's blessings without doubt. Such a man is always devoted to the Supreme, be it through Ayyappa or any other God which appeals to him, for God is one while his names are many.

Take a pledge on the name of Lord Ayyappa to be true and sincere as regards the practice of Yoga and Brahmacharya. Take a vow on his name that henceforth you will lead a strict life of virtue and Godliness through Brahmacharya, that you will not yield to temptation. If you were able to practice Brahmacharya for two months, it can be practiced for four months, for one year and for life. Brahmacharya is one's default state of being. It is not alien or seperate from one's true self. It is the state of sexuality for recreation that is a disease and unnatural. We have forgotten this reality and have made sexuality into our default state of thought and action. The avidya (ignorance) around the Atman (soul) made you behave differently all these days. Now the Lord has shown his grace. You have started educating yourself on Godliness and Brahmacharya. This is the first step. If efforts are put in the right direction and with the right perspective, you can overcome and get free from this disease of the mind. You can work successfully at annuling the layers of ignorance around the Atman which are the cause behind the disease.

Go through each and every past answer and get clear with the means that are to be employed to achieve the same. Strive for purity with honesty and devotion to the Almighty Lord. Wake up everyday at 4.00 A.M and indulge in Yogic practice of Asana, Bandha, Nadi Shodhana, Pranayama and meditation. Within a year, there will not be the least trace for masturbation. Distaste and dispassion will develop at the very thought of ejaculating semen for recreation. You will experience real strength, real confidence and real freedom. You will be happy without a reason through getting closer to the Atman. Then, real living starts. This is the truth and beyond doubt. Life without Brahmacharya and spirituality is not life. It is slow, painful death. Practice a life of spirituality and God devotion through Yoga and Brahmacharya and know the results through first hand experience.

2. The Sun is a hundred odd times the size of the Earth. His light, heat and power are virtually immeasurable and almost infinite. Yet a small cloud a few hundred meters wide blocks his rays from reaching us on a cloudy day. The whole area becomes dark and dull and cold. Does this mean that the Sun is powerless? As soon as the cloud showers into rain or is blown far away by wind, the rays of the Sun manifest themselves in all splendor. We the (Atman) are the Sun and the Avidya (ignorance) surrounding us are the clouds. When these clouds of ignorance are melted and blown away through the heat and winds of Gnyana (knowledge), the Sun (Atman) becomes capable of projecting his rays in full power and splendor without obstruction. Till then, even the rays of the mighty Sun appear to be powerless against the onslaught of the petty clouds of ignorance. It appears as though these small clouds are greater than the mighty Sun, for they have successfully blocked his glory. The reality of course remains that the clouds are of no match to the mighty Sun. It is our human duty to dissolve these clouds and reclaim our true state of Godliness. This is the purpose of the human birth and the reason why we are born. He who strives to achieve this and wins is the greatest human being, the method used to achieve this is the greatest religion and the resulting state of purity that comes further to self-realization makes that man on par with the Almighty himself and no less. He becomes fit to occupy that lofty state through merger.

The incidence of the Jivatma considering itself to be separate from the Brahman (Almighty) and eventually forgetting its true nature leading to ignorance & sorrow is a part of the Leela (divine play) of the Almighty Lord. It is an illusion that is enacted by HIM. Just as a piece of gold remains the same internally despite being covered by mud externally, the Atman (soul) is not really affected but thinks himself to be, further to the effect of Maya (illusion). Why the Lord enacts this Leela is a question whose answer will become clear after we merge into HIM through self-realization. For now, it is beyond the purview of our limited intellect.

3. Does the man who has tasted freshly prepared, tasty food crave for stale, rotten and spoiled food? No. But to one who has never been fed with fresh food since birth, the concept of fresh food does not exist. He knows no better. To him, the only food is rotten food, for his knowledge ends there. The concept of desire, pleasure and happiness that we know of in this degenerated state of body consciousness stemming from Avidya (ignorance) is akin to the taste of such spoiled food through life long conditioning. We do not know better. We think these finite pleasures of the senses to be penultimate, while the reality is something else. We think this world to be real, while it is not so in reality. It is only when we work at unwinding these layers of ignorance around our true self (Atman) does the possibility of knowing that which is real bliss and joy occur.

It is stated in the scriptures that the final state of self-realization through merger with the Almighty leads to the experiencing of such bliss and indescribable joy that words fail to do justice. Shri. Ramakrishna Paramahansa, the self-realized sage while trying to describe this experience to the layman compared it to be a constant, eternal stream of bliss equal to the sum total of a million sexual orgasms taking place all at once and continuously unto eternity. This, the scriptures call 'Paramananda' or 'Satchitananda'. Like how the man conditioned on stale food since birth will never revert to it on tasting fresh food, the Jivatma (embodied soul) which has started to taste this nectar of bliss which starts trickling in through spiritual progress will gradually develop distaste for worldly sense pleasures & never ever look to worldly pleasures and attainments on realizing its true nature. This taste of divine Ananda (bliss) is of that order. One has to experience it in reality to know it truly. It cannot be explained or described. It is to be experienced.

One who has experienced it loses all interest in earthly pleasures of the senses which have a beginning and an end. Which eventually bring sorrow and pain. Which make man suffer in agony. It is to be known. It is to be experienced, this Ananda (bliss) of the Atman no different from that of the Almighty.

This concept of the body consciousness leading to considering ourselves as the body and not the Atman and the resulting Ahamkara (ego) which thereby blossoms leading to the concept of 'Me', 'Mine' is the thief which is robbing us and preventing us experience our inherant Ananda (bliss). We cannot conceive the Almighty as long as we are in the realm of the ignorance of 'me', 'mine'. We cannot conceive what the Almighty is as long as we consider ourselves to be the body. To conceive HIM, we have to raise above the body, mind, ego and emotional consciousness. Till then, like the man who has known only stale food, we cannot know what it is to experience HIM. In other words, we cannot understand or fathom the self-experience in terms of the Atman. When we experience HIM, we realize who we truly are and when we truly realize  who we are, we experience HIM. Both are one and the same. So we should work for the same and not limit ourselves to this life of oscillating emotions that are inevitable in this degraded state of body and mind consciousness.

Where are we becoming sugar through self-realization? we are not becoming sugar but are becoming the BLISS PRESENT IN THE TASTE OF SUGAR. We have no need of the physical aspect of sugar anymore. Earlier, we encountered the bliss of sugar while tasting. We had to take the effort to savor the bliss of sugar. We had to eat a few grains of sugar and experience the bliss of sweetness. There was the need for an effort (beginning) enjoyment (middle) and end (more craving). We could not go on eating sugar to prolong this bliss, for that would not be practical. So we had to become dependent and enslave ourselves to sugar to enjoy bliss. This was the case as we were different from the bliss present in sugar. There was duality. There were two concepts: US and the BLISS OF SUGAR. To enjoy, we had to eat sugar and MERGE WITH THAT BLISS OF SUGAR through effort.

Further to self-realization, an entirely different thing has taken place. By merging ourselves with the Almighty who is in the nature of bliss itself, We ourselves have become BLISS (not sugar). Now there aren't two concepts any more. No more US and BLISS. There is only BLISS. One single entity forever. It is eternal and permanent unlike the need to repeat sense pleasures. It is continuous, unending and complete unlike body or mind experiences which start and then end, which increase and decrease, which are to be repeated every now and then and cause agitation and unrest inbetween. So this state of self-realization is something very different and unique. We have experienced nothing of the sort till now. There, we are in continuous bliss in our own self, through our own self and with our own self forever without the need of anything external. Now imagine how intense and indescribable that feeling would be to not be the body, not be the mind, not be the ego, not be the emotions but ONLY BE BLISS in completeness and entirety for ever! It cannot be described. It cannot be imagined. It should be experienced. It is SAT-CHITH-ANANDA (knowledge-existence-bliss) say the Upanishads. It is of the nature of the Parabrahman (Almighty Lord). It is our true state of being. The whole aim of Yoga and Brahmacharya is to help us reach this state of union with the Almighty.

ॐ तत् सत्
(That Supreme being is the absolute truth)

[an error occurred while processing this directive]---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Swami, I really appreciate your well written replies which enabled me to understand the concepts. In addition, I have the following related qns.

1) Even after close to 2 months of brahmacharya, I am still getting depressed and crying spells over my life due to romantic rejections and not being lucky in getting dates to find a life partner. Personally, I have been a reject from many gals all my life and this had caused me to indulge in porn more and create my own fantasy world.It has go on for 15 years already. Somehow rather, when I was extremely depressed and was on the verge of committing suicide, out of nowhere I stumbled on swami sivananda website and have been reading on spirituality. For someone like me who had been a reject from gals and had been depressed for most part of my youth because of those rejections, swami sivananda's articles gave me some hope. However, I was still indulging in porn and masturbation side by side with spirituality.

Meeting friends who already have gfs and wife is a pain. Seeing ppl my age already having created a family is a pain. I am not jealous of them but despite being materially quite successful,I am angry god did not gave me a gal to love.

For my case, I feel brahmacharya helped me to some extent but my depression and crying spells do occur whenever I think that I am not even fit enough to get a girlfriend/wife.

What can be done in my case? Is there any hope for me? Or will I end up committing suicide? Why even after ayyappa deeksha I do not feel confident,blissful and brave ? (although I can feel a small difference).

FYI, despite having ayyappa deeksha, I did not or rather was not able to wake up at 4am due to late night work. I prayed twice a day chanting the 108 saranams. I followed vegeterian diet but DID not exercise, meditate, do pranayama, bandha nor asana.

I am approaching my 30 and the depression of not getting a gal is there and has been there for 10 over years already. I do not know where my life is going though I have a good career. I seriously do not have any hope and everyday is like a pain to me.

In this state of despair, where it is even difficult to wake up at 4am, meditate or even attempt any asanas, what can be done?

Pls guide me.

Swami saranam ayyappa.