Excerpts from 'Meditation as Spiritual Culmination' by Swami Sarvagatananda, pp. 117-127

It takes a lot of time and a lot of struggle to free yourself from your own thoughts -- mind that, they belong to nobody else, they are your own. At one particular time, or at various times, you brought them all inside -- you piled them in -- or they came of their own accord. You allowed them to come in and now they create trouble...One negative thought upon coming in does not disturb you, you unconsciously add to it many others. For example, suppose somebody does something wrong to you, you don't stop there once you think he is doing something wrong; immediately you bring to mind all the bad things that he has done to you -- or what he has done to others. These are all brought up, you magnify the picture: "Oh, I knew he was like that from the very beginning," and you draw a conclusion. Just think about it. If that man was so bad from the very beginning, why did you accept him? You don't analyze. Our mind is such, all negative thoughts come up suddenly, pile up, magnify the picture, and the man is condemned. This is what is happening to many of us, we don’t know how subtly the thoughts come up. The mind has the capacity to search for the good thoughts and for the negative thoughts also. Somebody does some good thing and we forget all the bad things he has done; for the time being we exaggerate the good act, we search out from our thoughts all the positive things, overlook everything else. It is likewise with bad thoughts. Swami Brahmananda once said: “If you do some good to someone throughout your life, that is all right with him. Suppose someday you have to say “no” to that person, he remembers only the “no”, he forgets whatever good you have done for him; he does not even think about the good.”

When somebody complained to Holy Mother about a person, saying that he was no good, Holy Mother asked him: “Did he ever do any good to you or to anybody? Just think about it.” “Well, he did.” Then she said: “Remember that, forget about the rest.” To remember the good is very difficult, our mind invents a logic to support its opinion. All the thoughts are there, it is left for you to discriminate and say: “no, I know what you are thinking, O’ mind!” Have the ability to detect the thoughts, then silence them: “Nothing doing, I am not going to be influenced by all these things. Let a thousand things happen. I shall be free from the influence of these thoughts.” Saying this is very difficult, that is why we need the teachings of the great souls, the Ten Commandments, the Beatitudes, Buddha’s teachings, the Gita, the Yoga teachings. When you remember them, immediately you say to yourself: “No, do not follow the negative method, follow the positive method.” The positive method is to bring something spiritual, some spiritual images, to the mind, then you slowly bring the mind away from the negative thoughts….
Before you realize the Truth you are to turn all the pages of the book of mind-stuff, the entire contents must be brought out. When you bleach the cloth, “everything comes out in the wash.” Every spot must come out, all impressions must come out. In the process they float before the mental horizon, you begin to feel what you passed through, you are not frightened. You take a good look at them but you are not bewildered. They are all there, they all come up, all must come out…They come up because you keep at it; suppose you stop, then whatever is left creates trouble…All must get out…The mind must be absolutely pure, then only illumination takes place….Put off all negative thoughts if you want to have clear perception, true understanding – and then gradually put off the positive also. Positive thoughts are also dirt to the mind, because they are foreign to the mind….Harinath, later Swami Turiyananda, asked Shri Ramakrishna how to destroy all the passions…He was told that one cannot destroy them. Then what is to be done? Turn the course of the mind [Godward]. Then what happens? The thoughts become ineffective.

Thoughts become powerful because of two factors – you are interested in them, you pay attention to them. If you go on pondering over them, entertaining them, they become very powerful. If you are not interested, if you don’t pay attention, gradually they lie down. They then become unmanifested impressions; they are all submerged, they do not manifest; they are still there, you cannot destroy them. You can neither destroy nor forget any thought. The more you try to forget a thought, the more you remember it. Never try to forget a thought, instead be detached. On appraisal say: “It is not to be entertained.” Look at it clearly and know that it is not to be harboured, not to be entertained. Don’t try to forget; the more you try to forget, the more they come up. Suppression or repression doesn’t help. You have to resolve them: silence them by becoming aware, by knowing the tendencies; then the mind-stuff retains the impressions only in the unmanifested form. Due to the constant practice of cessation of mental activity, in the final stage all the impressions remain down and you see nothing there.

It is just as if all the creatures in the water are down below, you see nothing moving on or in the water; the ocean is calm and quiet, they are all down, they create no waves, the water is clear, clean and calm – but throw in a bait and again the creatures come up and disturb the waters. Likewise the thoughts are all down in the mind-stuff, inactive. It is said that one must be very careful until the end. Never take it for granted: “Oh, I am quite alright.” Some people think: “Oh I have attained this, I am safe now.” Until you are absolutely merged in the last stage you are never safe. Until you reach that stage you can be disturbed at any time, the thoughts are ready. It is said in the Gita (II.59): A struggling soul, getting away from all external things, is free from everything but not the ideas; the ideas remain, but even ideas fall off when he is illumined. When he sees the Supreme, then they are gone. Suppose you are in an airplane in a storm, you tighten all the windows; everything is calm and quiet inside, but still you are in the storm. A little leakage anywhere, and the wind and rain will come in; you must keep everything tight. Suppose you fly higher, to thirty-five thousand feet, there the storm does not rage, for you have gone above the storm. Likewise in spiritual life the storm is there; you don’t destroy the storm, instead you go away, you transcend.

Transcendence means you rise above the thoughts; you don’t destroy them, you don’t remove them. They are all there waiting for you, you must be very careful. That is why it is said: “When should you praise the monk? When the monk dies, when the body is done to ashes, when you blow the ashes away, then you praise him.” Not until then. Even the bones may be vicious, I tell you. You don’t know, that is the idea. Until then there is no cessation of this, all tendencies are there. Shri Ramakrishna used to say: “You rascal mind!” How many times he used rough language against his own mind. He sang: “Let us go for a walk to the Mother’s feet, Oh mind, you don’t know what you are doing.” Another song he sang was, “Oh Mother, what can I do? I want to lead a good life; these, my enemies, the negative forces, pull me down. Please save me from them.”…Shri Ramakrishna said: “Be careful, never trust your own mind until you see the Light.” When the mind is absolutely “no mind”, when the ego is lost, then only can you say: “I’m safe,” not until then….

…all the great souls declared: “Not I but Thou.” Jesus plainly said: “Not me, but the Father in me, is to be glorified.” Mohammed said: “Don’t mention my name, Allah is everything.” Shri Ramakrishna said: “I am nothing, I am a child of the Divine Mother, She is everything.” These people denied themselves completely. Buddha said, “Not I but nirvana, the Light of Truth.” All of them proclaimed with one voice the denying of this ego. Even after realization they retained that egolessness. That is why it is said that you must be like a child to enter to enter into the Kingdom of God.

A child has no ego, it doesn’t know what is what. Just like that they must possess a pure mind…

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