A Common Meditation Mistake Holding You Back
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In this episode, Chandresh shares a common meditation mistake that may be holding back a lot of seekers. This is especially important for those students of meditation who have been experimenting and exploring different schools and modalities of meditation and not going anywhere or experiencing any deeper transformation. This episode also addresses a major question- can two different schools of meditation help you achieve the same results or the experience of spirituality that you are seeking? This episode is highly recommended for those who have been experimenting, trying to learn, or trying to expand their consciousness.
Have any questions or curiosities about your spiritual journey? Email Chandresh at askcb@leelagurukul.com.
Episode Transcript
In the path of meditation, we don't move from imperfection to perfection. We move from perfection to perfection. You are where you need to be. You are enough, a 1,000 times enough. Take a deep breath, relax, feel the heartbeats, and ask yourself, "Do I feel home? Do I feel safe? Do I feel connected to myself?" Each one of us is trying to find our true home. I often tell people, "Come back to your home, come back to your solitude," but everyone is searching, hustling, trying really hard. Of course, it's the truth that the true home is inside you. The true home is your heart, your soul, your consciousness, but it's also the truth that sometimes the home is in the winds. Sometimes the full moon is your home. Sometimes a warm hug from someone is your home. Sometimes great food cooked by someone who loves you, that's your home. The homes change, the homes move, but ultimately, if you know the language of your awareness, you instantly know that this is home. This is safe. This is beautiful. I am Chandresh Bhardwaj, And this is Leela Gurukul.
Recently, a student asked me, "Can two different meditation schools help me reach the same experience? Is it possible that two different philosophies of meditation can help me reach the same experience?" The simple answer is yes, and yet it doesn't work out that simply for any seeker. The problem is we approach everything from the lens of mind. And the mind works really amazing if you have to use it for business or material stuff, buying a property, selling something, buying a new t-shirt. For material stuff, mind is okay. You can use it. But when it comes to your spiritual path, when it comes to the growth of your life, when it comes to your healing, the mind becomes an obstacle. And mind loves to calculate, compete, compare, and overanalyze everything that's showing up. So it's not a surprise that one of the biggest struggle for the spiritual students today is to find that meditation school or meditation philosophy that they want to or deeper into. There is countless supply when it comes to meditation teachings, and that has become the biggest barrier. That has become the biggest problem.
And if you ask me if there are countless schools or philosophies of meditation, are they different from each other? It's like asking, we all are breathing. Is our breath different? The answer is not really. We all have this life energy within us. We all have this consciousness. We are conscious beings. So you cannot say my consciousness is yellow in color and yours is red in color. Or my consciousness is this way or yours is that way. We are connected to a collective consciousness. And yet there are subtle differences in how the conscious being in us shows up. And when it comes to meditation, the root philosophy is the same. The end result is also the same.
The problem is what you are seeing around are not different philosophies of meditation. What you're seeing around are different brands of meditation. A brand is not the philosophy. If you have to talk about philosophy or science of meditation, we can talk about yoga, Tantra, Vedanta, Zen, Tao, kundalini. And when you explore each one of these names I mentioned, you'll find a significant difference in how they approach meditation. And yet, the end result is the same. And masters really worked hard and created these powerful sciences of meditation, healing because they understood that some people will need the path of yoga. For some people, it would be tantra. But now, as we are approaching or not approaching, we are in the age of commercialism. Everything is commercial. Everything is run by marketing. So what you are seeing around is not something that's created by masters, but it's created by marketing minds. That's all. That's the truth.
The kundalini you see out there is not the kundalini that it is in actual. The yoga, the tantra you see out there are not how they were conceived. What you're seeing out there is a butchered concept of all of these teachings. And this is why we get confused. And then we start to question if I joined this or that, what would work well for me? Because all of these so called modern meditations claim to be unique, different. How can you be different? Did you invent something new? You did not.
And I know teachers, particularly one teacher's coming to my mind who was selling meditation as a way to perform, as a way to enhance the sexual performance. And they ran their meditation successfully for many years, until it started to get some attention and people started questioning that, "Is it going to only enhance my sexual performance? Is it not going to help me in so and so?" So they realized they need to expand their customer base. So they started adding more benefits, and it wasn't just for sex anymore. And they made huge money because sex always sells.
The point is do not be confused when you come across a brand of meditation. Do not confuse the brand with the science of meditation because I have come across plenty of students who have been confused, who have been confused whether this is a brand, a science, a philosophy, or whether I need to join three different schools of meditation so that I can finally experience my truth. Such confusions can damage students. They damage the work. They damage the energy they're putting in. They damage their confidence. And many students feel so hurt that they never come back to the path of meditation ever again because they feel this is what it's all about, selling, selling, and more selling because each one out there is claiming my meditation is the best.
I know sincere students who have spent all their life, lot of money, lot of energy in learning meditation, but the problem is they were learning from multiple sources. They have three certificates, subscription to different websites, and at the end of the day, it's not helping. It's not transforming them. The anxiety is still there. The feeling of getting stuck is still there. They're still feeling lost in spite of having access to so many YouTube channels, podcast, membership schools. And at the end of their life, they know little bit about various schools of meditation, but they're master of none. Can you relate to it? Do you feel attracted toward different pages of meditation on Instagram? Are you subscribed to too many YouTube channels? Are you on a paid subscription form to these meditation schools?
This is the reason why I'm not fan of this statement, "take what resonates with you" because if you are a student who's feeling lost, stuck in their meditation path, that student will only pick what's resonating with their fearful mind. That student will only pick what resonating with their anxiety. The mind has created all the troubles. So you are letting the mind pick what it resonates with it. We love our comfort zones, and these comfort zones keep the truth far, far away. I shared with you once that the most profound advice I received from my teacher, he says, "Spiritual truth is not cheap. You cannot light one incense and a candle, breathe in, breathe out for five minutes, and then hope that you'll be enlightened or hope that you are above the circumstances now."
This is why the journey of teachers like Buddha is so important because truth did not happen in a cheap way to them. And by cheap way, I'm talking about the casual, easy ways we all want to opt for. It implies to all those impulsive methods that we go for. That TikTok spirituality is fun to watch, but it's not something that you should be depending on for your spiritual path. A very wise person once told me, he said, "People won't join you unless it's a cool or a popular thing to join you. They won't support you unless it's a trendy thing to support you." And he shared this many years ago when the trends or all of this hashtag stuff, all of where we are today wasn't even in existence. And I have seen this pattern with everything. The point is, are you choosing your meditation path or your spiritual teacher or your therapist based on the coolness, the popularity? Because that will, of course, keep you away.
I think about the gurukuls, the ancient spiritual schools in India. It used to be such a big deal to be accepted in those schools. The teachers will make you wait. They'll give you assignments for months, for years. Even in Zen traditions, even in Tao traditions, yoga traditions, it's always so normal and relevant that you have to earn your space in a spiritual path. You don't tell them I can only join this for three weeks and only weekends. Spiritual path demands you in your complete courage, vulnerability. It doesn't want you to be perfect. It doesn't want you to be so called "qualified" for it. The only qualification is, as long as you are breathing, you are qualified to go deeper into that path. The point is choose one and choose soon. Do not do window shopping. Do not get so caught up in reading, browsing, and moving on to different accounts, different pages too quickly that you miss out the point, ultimately. Spirituality is not complicated. The truth has already been shared.
So now everybody, including me, we are paraphrasing, rephrasing it. What's needed to be said has been said. You do not need 10 books. You don't need to subscribe to five different YouTube channels or 50 channels. One is enough. One will solve all your problems. And of course, if you are only going into one source, you'll start to feel bored. And the breaking users, it's all right to be bored. We are being wired so systematically that we don't know how to be bored any longer. The moment you feel bored, you pick up the phone and you just open your favorite app, and the rest is history. When you surrender to one teacher or one form of school, there will be boredom, there will be anger, there will be uneasiness because you're stuck with one person now. But if being stuck there is helping you expand, it's challenging your belief systems, it's pushing you to do the right work, then my friend, you are in the right space.
Nobody wants to be bored. And that's why nobody wants to commit. And this is why we are losing this opportunity. The problem is we think we have time, but we don't have time. Our time here is limited and we got to make the most of this conscious opportunity. Different schools or brands of meditation don't matter. Consistency with one matters. Choose one and choose soon. That's all I would say. And I hope Leela Gurukul is inspiring you, challenging you, and helping you to lead a journey of consciousness to make conscious choices.
And those who have been asking, the waitlist is currently open for the next cohort of the Leela Gurukul School. And I'm going to suggest to you before you apply for Leela School, listen to this episode again because I don't want you to apply for Leela and six different schools. Apply for any school you want to, but stay surrendered. Stay loyal to that one. And if you happen to choose Leela School, I'll be honored. I'll be grateful that we get to experience the most beautiful, powerful journey that I have been able to create through this beautiful platform of Leela. Be safe, guys. Be well. I'll speak to you next week.
May the teachings of tantra continue to guide you and heal you. And I hope Leela Gurukul helps you to unlearn the old and embrace the unknown mystical possibility unfolding for you. To support this podcast, share it among the seekers who are ready for the next step in their spiritual path.
Useful Links
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