Deepak Chopra Live: Critical Mass Meditation for Peace & Joy – June 20th

0:03 you like. Yeah, perfect. So, I hope you can all see me right now. This is our first experience with the new YouTube subscribers. Thank you all for joining me today and uh I'm very excited that we're going to be doing this regularly at least once a month for all of you who are subscribers but maybe even more. You know, we'll do whatever you want. If you want Q&As's, we can do that. You can also give me suggestions on what topic you would like to address. you can u send an email

0:51 there's going to be a link before to me and uh that will help me uh decide what I want to do in the future and uh we can do sat songs we can do meditations on any topic that you want and we can right now I think we're embarking on a new adventure uh together and we'll explore the unknown and perhaps even delve a little further than the unknown into the un so-called unknowable. But uh today I want to share with you uh a seinal idea and that is 40 years ago I

1:39 thought to myself uh what's my vision how can I serve best and 40 years ago the vision was that we need to reach a critical mass of consciousness for a more peaceful just sustainable, healthier and joyful world. I can't uh repeat that enough. A critical mass of consciousness for a more peaceful, just, sustainable, healthier and joyful world. And uh there is no we can do that. There is no way we can do that unless each of us becomes the change we want to see in the

2:25 world. So are we experiencing a peaceful life? Number one, do we experience justice in all our interactions? Are we examples of that? Social justice, gender justice, economic justice, racial justice, all of that. Are we living that life sustainable? Are we living a biology that is sustainable? Because we are part of the biosphere and our own biology when it is sustainable is perfectly healthy. It is self-regulating and perfectly healthy. That's the meaning of sustainability.

3:11 Homeostasis, same thing. Homeostasis is the dynamic non-change in the midst of change. Your blood pressure remains within a certain range. Your heart rate remains within a certain range. Your immune system remains within a certain range. Your hormones remain within a certain range. Everything. So that is self-regulation. Homeostasis sustainability is our body mind sustainable in the direction of homeostasis and are we healthy? But most importantly, are we experiencing lightness of being, joy, lightness of spirit? Because ultimately

3:57 that's the experience of flow. So recently I've been examining the stages of uh let's say well-being um and incorporating some ideas from the west but also from the east. And so right now, let me share with you what these stages of well-being in my mind are and how together we can take a journey expanding our awareness so we can experience the ultimate state of well-being which is awakening to our true self, freedom from all suffering. So here are the stages as I see them. We start with survival and safety number

4:43 one. Number two, success in all its forms. I define success as the progressive realization of worthy goals, the ability to love and have compassion, the ability to connect with your spiritual center, pure consciousness and ultimately total freedom. So number one survival and safety number two success and then you know once you have success you have to adapt for higher consciousness. So adaptation would be third. Fourth would be thriving. Fifth would be flourishing.

5:28 Sixth would be flow. No resistance to existence. And then finally seventh would be um awakening. Okay. Awakening to our true self. Atman is Brahman. The self of the individual which is the self of the universe. So with that I thought I'll give you one more summary and then we can do a meditation and maybe even a few questions answers so that we can uh have a good start. As they say well begun is half done. Here's one thing that I want to base everything on and that is

6:15 you as a person. You as a person is not the real you. You and the universe are awareness. You and the universe are fluctuations of awareness. In yoga that's called britis fluctuations. So everything that we call the universe, the Milky Way, galaxy, the sun, moon, stars, all of that, the earth, planet, rocks, plants, animals, people, deities. Look at these deities behind me. Symbolic expressions of the infinite. All of that is fluctuations of awareness. Fluctuations. The

7:00 fluctuations come and go. They also change. And they are the basis of our identity as a person. The basis the conditioned mind or the egoic mind which is not to be diminished because without the conditioned mind you wouldn't have this body. But behind all this is a field of awareness literally a field of awareness which is our true self. That field of awareness is called Brahma. the cosmic consciousness and you and Brahman are identical. You as a field of awareness is called atman. Atman is Brahman. The self of the

7:47 individual is the self of the universe. Now this self of the universe non-local self which is formless. are two identities without form and it has no borders because it has no form. It has no borders and so it's infinite. Infinite. Your true self, formless self is infinite, borderless, timeless, spaceless, irreducible. Irreducible means there's nothing behind it. It's the ground of all existence. irreducible, incomprehensible, unimaginable,

8:34 nonperceivable, without cause, can't be conceptualized, but it is the basis of all existence. It modifies itself as the ja which is the individual soul. Okay? Ja is the individual soul that has within it the seeds of memory, the seeds of desire, the seeds of past experiences which we call karma. And this modifies itself as mind, intellect, ego which is also called the subtle body. The subtle body modifies itself as the five senses, sensory organs. Think of

9:20 your sensory organs as as literally sensors. Just like the sensors I'm wearing, your sensory organs are sensors of experience. Then you have motor organs which are what responds to the senses of experience. Motor organs, you know, just like we have the five sensory organs, sound, touch, sight, taste, and smell. We have the motor organs. And this includes of course the motor organs for you know our body um movement, speech um evacuation, the motor organs for movement, hands, feet etc. And there are

10:05 subtle motor organs too. So this is the feedback loop for self- reggulation for health for homeostasis. You feel hunger that's a sensory experience. Then the desire to drink from that thirst that's sorry the desire to eat hunger is through a motor organ similarly you feel thirst the desire to drink is a motor activity but this is happening at a subtle level everywhere in your body. Okay, the senses are perceiving subtle information and then the motor organs are actually acting to bring about self-regulation and healing or what you call self regulation

10:53 homeostasis which is another word for the dynamic non-change within change that we see. So your mind, intellect and ego modify as sensory and motor organs and then that's modified into the physical body and it's energy which is energetic. So physical body is mass and energy subtle bodies mind, intellect and ego. the interfaces, the sensory organs, the motor organs, both gross and subtle. And then behind mind, intellect and ego is your soul. And behind that is your true self. And behind that is cosmic

11:38 consciousness. This is how pure consciousness modifies itself into a unified experience of mind, body, intellect, ego, senses, motor organs, physical body, physical energy and the universe all as a unified process. If we understand this then we slowly move through these stages you know that I mentioned survival, safety you know success, material success, adaptation, thriving, flourishing, flowing, awakening. Awakening is liberation and finding your true identity and experiencing yourself as that which is

12:26 timeless, spaceless, beyond death. So the essential spiritual experience is three things. Finding your true self beyond spacetime. Number one, the spontaneous emergence of platonic values like truth, goodness, beauty, harmony, love, compassion, joy, equinimity, and finally the loss of the fear of death. I'll repeat that. Finding your true self number one beyond space and time, which is without cause. It's irreducible. Number one, the emergence of platonic values. Platonic means as in Plato, but

13:11 these are natural values that we have which are truth, goodness, beauty, harmony, love, compassion, joy, equinimity. And number three, loss of the fear of death. Because that which is without cause outside of spaceime does not experience birth or death. Everything else revolves around that, recycles around that and evolves around that. So with that, I'd like to actually u I'd like to actually start with uh uh with uh a meditation. So wherever you are

13:57 in this fabric of spacetime, I see some people are here from Australia, some are from in India, some are from the Middle East, some are from the United States. It's really so much fun to actually now see that we are all together all together embarking on a meditation together. By the way, this evening I will also be doing a meditation at the United Nations uh for global peace. And uh uh if you check out the United Nations website or I don't know where

14:43 you'll get it from but I'll be speaking on that med I'll be doing a meditation u on world peace tonight and this evening at the UN. So there seems to be something in the air right now. We are in a strange place where on the one place we see you know all kinds of disasters. We see climate change if you believe in it, social economic injustice, war, terrorism, chronic disease, absence of joy. We also see the opposite. So as humanity we are at the crossroads right now and we need to now together choose the road less traveled. So together we

15:31 can be the change we want to see in the world. Okay. So wherever you are sit comfortably. Keep your feet firmly planted on the ground separate. Don't cross your legs. Keep your hands open in your lap and let's begin today. And remember, you know, we'll do a very basic uh meditation today which will include some self inquiry. Self inquiry is called atma var. Okay. Questioning the soul, questioning the self. We'll also do a little bit of mindfulness or a better word awarefulness which is more clumsy but more accurate and then

16:19 we'll do a little bit of transcendence and then resting in our true self. Okay. So with your eyes closed observe your breath. This was the first vipasana. Vipasa means insight meditation. Today's term mindfulness observing the breath without controlling it. And the first insight that came to the Buddha when he observed his breath is there's no effort in breathing unless you have a disease. There's no effort in breathing. It's spontaneous. It's

17:04 effortless. Number one. Number two, it's a sensation. So all life is like that. It's effortless if you're connected with our true self. And our experience of existence is sensations like sense, perceptions, sound, touch, sight, taste, smell, imagination, feelings, emotions, thoughts. They're just like the breath. They're sensations. They arise. They subside. And in between you experience them. Just like the breath arises, you experience it subsides. This is also called the law of impermanence.

17:50 Okay? You can't hold on to your breath. If you hold on to your breath, you'll suffocate. Similarly, you can't hold on to any experience including this one. It's arising, subsiding. You'll remember it and that will become part of your chit. Chit means your conditioned mind and beyond that the residues of memory. It'll become part of your soul. So choose your experiences very carefully because they are the seeds of future experiences in any way. Okay. So now just observe your breath. The breath connects us. There's only one breath. Through the breath we exchange molecules. So there's only one body. The body is

18:38 connected to the mind. In the deeper reality our minds are entangled, our bodies are entangled. Our breath is entangled. And of course in the deeper deeper realm in the matrix of conscious beings our souls are entangled. But beyond that is the ultimate reality. which gives rise to this entanglement. Entangle means entangle means inseparably interconnected. As uh Tiknadhan the great Buddhist teacher said we are inter beings that inter arise in the interess just by observing the breath.

19:25 Now move your awareness to your heart right in the middle of your chest and mentally ask the question who am I? What am I? Go a little deeper. Am I the changing body or am I the awareness in which the body is constantly recycling and evolving and changing? Am I that change or am I the awareness in which that change is happening? Recycling of the body and evolution of the body. Don't try to answer it. See what comes up. Who am I? What am I? Am I the

20:12 changing mind? which means thoughts and emotions and feelings or am I the awareness in which the mind comes and goes you know remember when you're sleeping the mind goes to sleep too but there is awareness in which that mind is coming and going so ask yourself who am I am I the body am I the mind or am I the awareness that is watching The show, the body, mind and world show. What am I? What am I? Pause there.

21:00 Now ask yourself the second question. Ask yourself, not your mind. Okay? You're asking yourself, your soul. Second question, what do I want? What is my deepest desire? Again, don't try to answer it. Just be aware of any sensations, images, feelings, thoughts that may come and go. What do I want? What is my deepest desire?

21:52 Now go to the third question. What is my purpose? How can I serve? Once again, not uh not trying to answer the question. Okay. allowing any sensation, any image, any feeling, any thought that comes and goes. And then the fourth and final question, what am I grateful for? Gratitude opens the door to abundance consciousness, generosity of spirit. No matter what is

22:38 going on in my life, what am I grateful for? Open the door to your soul. Allowing any sensation, any feeling, any image, any thought that may come to you. What am I grateful for? Okay, now we're done with atma vijar. Now let's practice a little bit of mindfulness. Okay, so start listening to my voice or any other sound that's around you. So right now listen to the sound of my voice and along with that any sounds that come

23:27 and go. Notice sounds are like thoughts like u any experience. They're sensations in your consciousness. They arise they're there then they're gone. You can't hold on to these sounds that I'm I'm producing. So, gently remind yourself, I'm the awareness in which sounds come and go. I am the awareness in which sounds come and go. Now shift your awareness to sensations.

24:14 Now any sensation is good but one way to do it is feel the sensations in your body from the inside out. Abdomen, sensation of your lungs expanding and contracting. If you want sensation of your heart beating, put your awareness there. You'll feel it sensation of your skin touching your clothes. And notice once again, sensations are intermittent. They arise and subside. Mentally remind yourself, I'm the awareness in which sensations come and go.

25:02 Now, we can do this with mental experiences, too. So close your eyes and let's create forms. So in your mind, in your imagination, create the image of uh anything. Let's start with create the image of your own house. create the image of um the moon, starllet sky. Create the image of snowclad mountains, of rainbows,

25:49 of roses. See those images also come and go. They flicker in and out. Gently remind yourself I'm the awareness in which images arise and subside. We can now turn to emotions. So think of someone you love. Bring their awareness here in your heart. And now experience that emotion that we call love. Feel it. I'm the awareness in which emotions arise and subside. And notice you can choose the emotion you want,

26:35 right? You could decide to have the image of somebody that you dislike. And the emotion that would arise could be, you know, whatever distress that person gives you. There could be jealousy, anger, hostility, guilt, shame, anxiety, fear. Notice you choose the emotions. Gently remind yourself, I'm the awareness in which emotions arise and subside. Emotions

27:23 So now you can expand your awareness outside the boundaries of your skin. Expand it as much as you want. Your city, your country, planet Earth, all the continents, the oceans. Let it expand beyond the solar system all the way engulfing the Milky Way galaxy and the universe if you want. And as you do that, see there are images that arise, feelings that arise, thoughts that arise. Gently remind yourself I'm the awareness in which the whole universe arises,

28:10 subsides, recycles, evolves in me. I am the awareness in which the whole universe arises and subsides as my own sensations, images, feelings, and thoughts. And now let go of all that. Just remind yourself now of your name. So you could say mentally to yourself if you want. Mentally to yourself, I'm Deepa. I'm Judy. I'm Maya. I'm Sunonny. I am Melissa.

28:58 And now as you repeat a name of course that name is associated with lots of stories and it's not you. So just mentally tell yourself that's my name. It's not me. And now drop your name and just say I am. I am mentally without moving your lips or your tongue. Now replace that with the mantra aham. It is the universal mantra. I am existence

29:45 the vibration of the universe. The mantra here. Ah, excuse me. Ah. Ah. Without moving your lips or your tongue. Let's keep this going now for a minute. Okay. So, I'm going to tell you when to shift, but right now just repeat the mantra. Uh-huh. Mentally, let's do it for at least a minute. Okay? I'll I'll guide you from there. I'll join you.

31:12 And now release the mantra. Let it go. What's left? You the self awareness. That's who we are. This awareness has no shape, no sound, no texture, no image. It is who we are. Infinite, formless, irreducible, spaceless, timeless, non-local, outside of spaceime. Awareness has no shape, no form. There's nothing behind it. It's the ground of all experience,

31:59 including your own body, your own mind, and the universe. So now rest in this awareness. Rest in your own presence. Your being the self that is you as a body, mind and experience but also the self of the universe. Formless being without which there is neither form nor phenomena.

32:46 eternal and timeless. As the Upnishad said, this is the real you. Water cannot wet it, wind cannot dry it, weapons cannot shatter it, fire cannot burn it. You are the eternal timeless being without which there is no time bound experience. So rest in your own presence. Slowly relax your body

33:32 and take half a minute to open your eyes. So we've been together now for well we've been together for since ancient times. We're on this program uh for 30 minutes. Uh let's see if you have uh any questions and if I can see them somewhere I'll do my best to answer at least a few. Okay. I also uh want to share with you that I'm planning with your help to start creating a

34:21 global movement called the pandemic of love. And if we create that, that will be the ultimate solution to all the problems we have in the world. The most creative solution will be love as the ultimate healer. And we'll create programs around that. I'm creating programs for you right now for advanced meditations for the siddhis or extra sensory perceptions etc. So there's a question here. Is it common to experience emotions while in awareness? Yes. And all you do is watch them,

35:06 observe them, and when you do them, then you'll see they self-regulate. Uh there's another question here. What do you see synchronicities as? If I'm experiencing them all the time, what does that mean to you? Okay. So synchronicity has two components. Synchronos means synchronized in time. So that's non-local correlation. It's also called entanglement. It's also called entanglement. It's also called a causal non-local quantum mechanical interrelatedness.

35:51 Meaningful coincidences. Good luck. God's grace and uh basically connection to the divine. So what does it mean? If you're experiencing synchronicities or good luck or grace that you're connected to source. In fact, the more you experience them, the more it'll reinforce you that you're part of the divine matrix. Let me see what other questions are there. Well, somebody says, "Hi from Turkey." Turkey, we're with you in these times. And everybody is saying, "We need the meditation more than ever." Of course, that's the goal. And

36:39 what else? I'm just looking here if there are any questions more that I need to address. So also I just want to tell you that I'm opening a studio in New York called the uh Chopra House and if you want uh by being a member of this you'll have access to the studio as well and we'll have an app that will give you all the information but I will be um speaking to people who have had neardeath or after death experiences we already started that but great luminaries in the field of mind body spiritual well-being

37:24 sirill says hi from Belgium hi sirill so many wonderful people all from this conversation okay I think I I'm going to say goodbye now with deep gratitude to all of you. And one more question. How can world leaders be like this aware and let go of their ego and conflict? We don't depend on them. We're going to create uh our own ecosystem of leadership and that's the

38:09 only way we can do this. How does identity relate to true self? We have we have two identities. A provisional changing self and an absolute non-changing universal self. As a chopra meditation instructor, I teach this in a leadership development program. It's a game changer. Keep doing it, Tracy. Well, I think I shall conclude today, okay? With just four intentions. Just uh feel your body right now and seed it with the intention. Joyful,

38:55 energetic body. Bring your awareness to your heart. Seed it with the intention. Loving, compassionate heart. Bring your awareness to the third eye. Seed it with the intention. Quiet creative mind. Expand your awareness outside the boundaries of the skin. And the intention lightness of being, lightness of spirit, lightness as space, lighter than the wind. So we are going to create this global movement. Okay. love. And I'm going to do a whole series

39:42 on love, personal love, the stages of love, universal love, romantic love, love of God, love of others, love as the ultimate truth at the heart of creation. Thank you and see you next time.