FROM THE BOOK: Happy For No Good Reason
By Swami Shankarananda

Introduction:

MY SECOND EDUCATION

Aim for heaven and you will get earth thrown in.
Aim at earth and you will get neither.

C.S. Lewis

WE ARE THE MOST educated and affluent people in human history, the most literate, the most technologically proficient. We can replace one person’s heart with another’s, we can fly people to other planets, and we can send tiny cameras into people’s organs to inspect them from within. We are able, or will be able, to do almost anything in the physical world. However, we find this world stressful and demanding. We have trouble motivating our teenagers and keeping them away from negative influences. We find it difficult to control anger, fear or depression. We are confused by the world within ourselves.

Our situation becomes intelligible if we recognize that we actually live in two different worlds simultaneously. One is the outer world of people and objects and the other is the inner world of thoughts and feelings. Each has its own laws and each has its own form of education. We have explored the outer world in detail, however we have neglected the inner world.

In my early life I was an academic, deeply involved in Western education. I call this form of conventional education First Education or the “knowledge” tradition. The focus of First Education is the outer world, on science and technology, facts, events and history. This knowledge education embellishes us but does not transform us. We can acquire more and more information and still have the emotional sulks and tantrums of a child.

Over the past 30 years I have been involved with what I call Second Education, or the “wisdom” tradition. Second Education says that true happiness lies not in the outer world but within each of us. Not only that, it can be realized. The process of awakening to Second Education is called inner work. In all my years involved with institutions of higher learning, both as a student and a teacher, no one had ever spoken about conquering depression, overcoming fear and anger and attaining happiness and self-mastery. I learned so much about history and the stuff of the external world, but almost nothing about myself.

By contrast Second Education works on “being.” It does not give much information in the usual sense, but it empowers us. It turns a weak person into a strong one, an unhappy person into a happy one, a confused person into a person of clarity and wisdom. Only through work on our being can such alchemy take place. Meditation is the bedrock of such change.

MY SECOND EDUCATION

I grew up in Brooklyn, New York, surrounded by loving family and friends. My father was a well-known artist and my mother a high school teacher. Every few years I have occasion to visit New York. When I do I usually meet some of my high school friends for lunch. One of them is a CPA. Another is a wealthy entrepreneur. Another is a professional bookie. Another is a doctor, and another owns a grocery store. In those days piano lessons were de rigueur. Arthur, the CPA, and I took lessons from Mrs. Bloom. I found them discouraging and soon quit because Mrs. Bloom would tell me: “Barry plays so beautiful!” I knew Barry -- he went to school with me and lived in Arthur’s building -- Barry Manilow.

I was a good student and I am listed in my high school yearbook as “most likely to succeed”. It makes me smile to remember that, and it is difficult to evaluate it without being overcome by delicious ironies. It is certain, however, that I am the only one in my neighborhood who became a swami.

During the late ‘60s I was living on the Lower East Side of New York, studying for my PhD in English literature. On weekends I enjoyed walking over to the Fillmore East to listen to the great bands of the time—the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Janis Joplin, Ten Years After and so many others. One day some friends and I dropped in on another friend while on the way to a party. We were sitting chatting when there was a knock on the door. Being closest to it I went to answer it. I had then what you could call “a New York moment.” I opened the door to a gun in my face. I instantly became present. I looked down the gun barrel and could clearly see the bullets in the chambers. Years later, while being shown a gun collection, I identified it as a .38.

I felt no fear but two powerful thoughts came into my mind. The first was: “This is it, I’m going to die, what a waste of all that education.” The second thought was: “What’s it all about if it can end so abruptly?”

The gunman told us to lie down. He searched for and then checked our identification. He told us he was looking for someone who had “burned me for two hundred dollars in a drug deal”. When he discovered that none of us was the person he cordially said: “I’ve got to apologize to you guys”, and left. That was a lot of money in those days, so I didn’t point out that he was overreacting.

Looking back I recognize that that encounter awakened the spiritual seeker in me, the quest for Second Education. I began to search for explanations, for personal growth and wisdom. My search was intellectual and personal. Intellectually I began to read widely, outside my field. I investigated Western philosophy, anthropology and psychology. At this point I knew nothing about Eastern thought and had something of an aversion to it. A friend called me a “quintessentially rational man” and, although he underestimated my emotional nature, I thought of myself as firmly standing in the Western rational tradition. I was particularly interested in the evolution of culture and how technology impacted awareness. Not surprisingly, Marshall McLuhan was one of my heroes.

These stories are perhaps entertaining, but I tell them for another reason also. While I was in high school and college, if I could have glimpsed the future course of my life I would not have believed it. Maybe I could have become a physicist or an academic—possibly a writer, a poet—all right, but a swami? A meditation teacher was not in the realm of the possible. But I think that large historical and evolutionary forces, of which I had no awareness, were at play. They make my story not so much the quirky individual history of a fellow who was “too smart for his own good” (as some of my old friends surely believe), but a story that illustrates my belief that wisdom education is entering our culture.

In my 25 years of teaching meditation my audience has changed from groups of fringe, bohemian, artistic people to mum and dad, sister and uncle. Everyone is meditating now or intends to learn one day. Medical science has established the value of meditation for health as well as stress reduction. I get referrals from many medical doctors and psychologists. What was a trickle in 1970 is a flood today. Further, inner transformation has become big business. My story is a single instance of a cultural and spiritual phenomenon that includes many lives. The signs of a “new age” are everywhere. Recently I saw meditation instructions written on the back of a box of Kellog’s Special K. It said: “Meditation is a deeply relaxing state that helps relieve stress and promotes self-esteem. It can help slow down your breathing and calm your mind.”

My own search led me towards humanistic psychology—the work of Fritz Perls, Rollo May and Carl Rogers. I joined a group in Chicago, near the university where I was teaching Shakespeare and Humanities, and began to investigate the swirling mysterious world of emotion and personal motivation. The process of my awakening was exciting but frustrating. None of my friends or associates had any idea of what I was talking about when I made comments like: “Everything we do is tied to ego. It is time for a new truth. It is possible to live beyond ego. Such a life would be a constant ecstasy.” In fact, I had little idea what was happening to me. I felt like a solitary explorer in an uncharted land. I did not know then that my world was about to change forever.

On February 20, 1970 I was invited to a small dinner party held by the head of my group in his luxurious apartment in a high rise on Lake Michigan’s gold coast. The guest of honor was an emerging superstar of the consciousness movement, a former Harvard psychologist named Richard Alpert, now known as Ram Dass.

We were asked to shed our clothing and wear Japanese kimonos. I was seated on the floor at a low table next to Ram Dass. He was dressed in white, had a long beard and was serene and friendly. I spoke easily to him. Within five minutes of talking with him I realized that far from being a voyager where no man had previously gone, I was just qualifying for kindergarten in the inner path of yoga.

I told Ram Dass that I had been speculating about states of consciousness and that I thought a highly evolved person would have his awareness totally in the present. I asked him: “How would such a person cross a street? Would he not get run over? How could he function?”

“A being who is present,” replied Ram Dass, “plans for the future in the present.”

His answer, as banal as it looks today, had a remarkable effect on me. I was overwhelmed by a certainty that he was in touch with higher wisdom. I knew that I would go to India and I also knew that forever hence I would divide my life into two parts: before that question and after that question. Something had shifted within me. I had discovered the path.

He told me that thousands—millions—had walked that path and had left profound records and detailed maps. Most exciting, Ram Dass told me that there were beings alive today, who had walked the path to the end and who had attained Self-realization. And, he knew and had studied with some of them.

By November of 1970 I was in India. India welcomed me by magically creating situations that enabled me to meet a number of great beings. I met Ananda Mayi Ma, the bliss-filled mother, India’s greatest woman saint. She was nearing the end of her life but exuded an otherworldly sweetness that was palpable.

I met and studied with Hari Dass Baba, a teacher of hatha yoga, who had been silent for 20 years. I lived with him for several months and he taught me physical postures, breath exercises and yogic esoterica like swallowing a 24-foot long bandage-like cloth and then pulling it up to help digestion.

I studied with Sri Goenka, the leading guru of Vipassana, Buddhist meditation. In a humble apartment in Bombay I met Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, the great jnani (exponent of the path of wisdom). He was a man of love as well as wisdom.

I spent time with the mysterious saint Neemkaroli Baba. Wrapped in a blanket he seemed like a child, even though he must have been in his 70s. He radiated love and some of the things he said to me still have impact.

And, I met Swami Muktananda, the most remarkable of all. Equal to the rest in love and wisdom, he also radiated spiritual power, Shakti, to a most extraordinary degree. Seekers regularly had spontaneous meditation experiences in his presence and sometimes became grabbed by the inner power—the Kundalini. His ashram near Bombay was a model of disciplined regularity—a laboratory of inner growth.

In the months between meeting Ram Dass and going to India I read avidly in spiritual literature. One book that fascinated me was P.D. Ouspensky’s In Search of the Miraculous, a history of his days with the great teacher G.I. Gurdjieff. Ouspensky had been searching in the East for “mystery schools,” as he put it. These were hidden monasteries in which the esoteric mystical knowledge, the wisdom education of mankind, was still a living tradition handed down orally from teacher to student. Muktananda’s ashram was an overwhelming experience. It was the first true “school” I had encountered. I stayed there for three years.

The surface of life in the ashram was extremely regular. Every day was exactly the same—wake up bell at 3:30 a.m. and a packed succession of meditation, chanting, ashram work, an after lunch rest and study period and more chanting and meditation until lights out at 9:00 p.m. But underneath the surface everyone was on the boil.

I faced every demon in my past, opened every door in my psyche. I had a constant flow of illuminations and new understandings about myself and about life. I saw a thread ran through my life: I had always been looking for happiness, for truth and meaning. I would pin my hopes on something—a career or a person—only to be disappointed. That disappointment would spur me on.

I had had occasional intimations of higher Consciousness—earliest watching my father paint. He could be as complex and petty as the next person in ordinary circumstances. But poised, brush in hand before a canvas, he became transfigured. Then he would be childlike with an excitement and joy that spread to anyone who was watching.

Later I had experiences listening to music that must have approached Pop’s state. Several times the music spoke to me in abstract terms, giving me exquisite wisdom too perfect for ordinary language. Meditation showed me that these fleeting experiences were moments of access to the deepest part of me, the inner Self.

The Self is eternally present within each of us, yet we lack the means of access. Occasionally something works—my father’s painting, great music—and an opening occurs. We think “what great music” but the truth is that the greatness of the experience is always within us; it is us.

In my years at Muktananda’s ashram my inner being woke up. I had spiritual experiences—energy rushing through me, the vision of lights and high beings, out of the body experiences and glimpses of states of perfect peace and freedom. Most significantly, the experience of the Self became more and more my daily and normal experience. I felt anchored in a part of myself that I had previously scarcely known. I accompanied my teacher on his second world tour in 1974 and later that year he sent me away to teach and develop an ashram in Ann Arbor, Michigan. From an educator in the knowledge tradition I became an educator in the wisdom tradition. A long, winding road led me back to Australia in 1991 and the founding of the Shiva School of Meditation.

It is not that knowledge education should be replaced by wisdom education. In fact, the two complement each other. The lack of the latter constitutes a shocking gap in our culture, and we pay the price for that. How good it would be if young people learned meditation and Self-inquiry!

I vividly remember one Year 12 Psychology class I spoke to a while ago. I led them through the same Chakra Meditation you will be doing in this book. There were about 20 in the class and 16 or 17 of them felt a block in the throat chakra. This was an extremely interesting and revealing result. A block in the area of communication epitomizes teenage angst. Teenagers often feel misunderstood by parents and teachers and anxious about their image and personality with peers.

I worked with several of them on specific issues. One girl’s block was related to her mother. She found “angry words” in her throat and because they were angry she could not speak them. Investigation separated the true content of what she wanted to say to her mother from the anger and the block left her throat. She knew what she wanted to say to her mother and how to say it with love.

Such work is as rewarding to the meditation teacher as it is to the student. Greater Self-knowledge and better communication would be of enormous benefit to children. It is my conviction that meditation—in non-sectarian form—should be taught from the earliest years of our schooling. Wisdom must be joined to knowledge.

Nonetheless for us, although we may have missed the meditation boat in our earliest training, it is not too late to begin. Meditation allows each of us to explore our own Consciousness and discover the joy that is inherent within us. It is an inner journey, and a marvellous quest. The investigation of the inner Self is a process of endless unfolding. It gives wisdom and peace and it also enhances the quality of our ordinary life. Following the techniques given in this book and doing the practice, you will become a skilled meditator.

ABOUT THIS BOOK

In the years that I lived with Muktananda I would hear him lecture almost every night. He always taught essentially the same thing, though he found creative ways to say it. The substance of his message was: meditate on the Self, God dwells within you as you. He also told his audience to see God in each other, to welcome others with love and respect. Though he repeated his message I always felt uplifted by it.

In this book, also, the argument is simple. I talk about the mind and I talk about the Self. I give three main techniques of meditation and subsidiary contemplations. About the mind I say that it can be positive and reflect the light, or negative and reflect darkness. A positive mind can lead us beyond the mind to the inner Self, which is the goal of meditation. We have to make effort to quieten the mind and educate it to move in positive grooves. I go back and forth over this ground, looking at it in many ways from many perspectives.

I will explore the practice and philosophy of meditation and the traditional meditation techniques of mantra (the repetition of a phrase) and witness-consciousness (watching the thoughts). Other topics include the emotions and “tearing thoughts.” You will also learn a technique of Self-inquiry. It is a method of meditation that directs the mind to the power and wisdom of the inner Self. In the latter part of the book I emphasize active meditation, or meditation in life, a 24 hours-a-day awareness.

I think you will be able to tell that I love meditation. I also have great faith in the inherent wisdom of the inner Self. If we learn to hear it, the Self provides us with wisdom-in-the-moment to meet situations as they arise. Rather than a consistent theory, I would like meditators to have a quiver full of possible responses to meet each moment freshly. Hence the “arsenal approach” of this book suggests many meditative possibilities

This book is first and foremost a meditation and Self-inquiry manual cum workbook. But, it is also a textbook of Second Education. The reader will not fail to notice a very large number of stories. I have culled these from Yoga, Zen, Tibetan Buddhism, Sufism, and other sources including Western ones. Some I have come across in my reading, but mostly I have heard them directly from spiritual teachers, especially, my own.

Teaching stories and parables are the lingua franca of spiritual teaching. Many dramatize a teaching given by a guru to a disciple. The wisdom tradition is based on the guru-disciple archetype. I have also included a number of vignettes from my own relationship with my teacher.

Most people do not have the opportunity actually to sit “at the feet” of a spiritual teacher. In general our culture is suspicious of gurus, perhaps with good reason. Nonetheless, we continue to be fascinated and touched by the mentor archetype: the man (or woman) of wisdom and experience who imparts the truth to the young aspirant seeking relief from ignorance and suffering. Think of Jesus, the Buddha, Don Juan, Socrates, Obe Wan Kinobe, Black Elk, the Dalai Lama and numberless other sages, seers, Boddhisattvas and realized beings.

I have always been moved by this archetype in all its forms, even the Hollywood version where an old gunslinger teaches an impetuous youth the wisdom of the violent frontier and how to shoot a gun. The presence of the mentor archetype tells us that we are encountering Second Education. Sometimes in First Education an encounter with a great teacher engages us emotionally in an unusual way. In such cases First Education is moving towards Second Education. The ideal student is open, earnest, eager to learn and respectful. His heart swells with admiration and love for his teacher. He is willing to follow and not argue with the teaching. On his side the teacher is moved by the student’s love. Compassion and spontaneous wisdom flow from him, as much to his surprise and delight as the student’s. Openness and love are the context of transmission in Second Education.

USING THIS BOOK WITH THE CD

The compact disc that accompanies this book is called the Chakra Meditation. It has four tracks to help you establish your meditation practice. The first two tracks taken together form the heart of your practice. When I refer to the Chakra Meditation I mean these two tracks. They help you move your mind from the outer world to the inner world. I will explain the other tracks later.

In the book I will suggest a number of ways to make the best use of the techniques on the CD. Of course, you will also learn to meditate “on your own”—that is without the CD. However, most important is your commitment to practise. Try to use the CD every day. Every spiritual effort reaps large rewards. Give meditation at least 20 minutes a day and I guarantee that your life will become calmer and more peaceful.

Read the whole book, then go back and do each chapter one at a time. Do the practices accompanying some of the chapters. Let them work in you. Contemplate the teachings. Think about them. Explore their effect on you. If you feel uncomfortable with a teaching, put it aside. Use the teachings that uplift and expand your awareness. When you feel ready, move on to the next.

Once a day meditate with the first two tracks on the CD. You can begin immediately. Later you can experiment with the other practices as they are described. For more detailed instructions refer to chapter two.

USING THE BOOK WITHOUT THE CD

Because many things happen in the course of the life of a book, it may be that the book has been separated from the CD. Do not panic! Every time the text tells you to meditate with the CD follow the meditation outlined in the appendix on Page 217.

Great beings of all traditions have walked the inner path. Let us set out in their company, with the Buddha, with Jesus, with Sri Ramakrishna, with Bhagawan Nityananda and with my teacher, Swami Muktananda. Their blessings are with us.

KEY IDEAS OF THE INTRODUCTION

• We live in two worlds simultaneously: the outer world of people and objects and the inner world of thoughts and feelings.

• First Education is the knowledge tradition. It focuses on facts and information.

• Second Education is the wisdom tradition. It works on being and empowers us.

• The wisdom tradition is based on the mentor archetype.

• The essential practice in this book is the Chakra Meditation (see Chapter two: Your First Meditation).

• Two other important meditative techniques taught are mantra and
witness-consciousness (the breath meditation).

• There are contemplations that help expand your understanding of meditation