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57 matches for: happiness
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Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas: A Danavira Mela Considerationvideo
poster: AdiDaUpClose
length: 03:49
date added: December 23, 2023
language: English
views: 542; views this month: 68; views this week: 14
CHRIS TONG: Happy Danavira Mela to everyone!

I’ve sung Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas to Beloved Adi Da many times over the years — at the Manner of Flowers, at Adi Da Samrajashram, at First People / Great Food Dish, etc. (as one of a small group of singers, and usually also as the keyboardist) — and I’m singing it to Him again (and all of you!) here. It is one of my favorite songs at this time of year.

For me (starting with Judy Garland's original film version), it has always been an emotion-filled song, by turns joyful, playful, nostalgic, and wistful — so that is how I sing it here.

This song as a bridge to God. In Beloved Adi Da’s Company, everything (from Mickey Mouse to cookie-making) becomes “a bridge to God”.

ADI DA: “You must Awaken and discover the Divine World wherein everything is a bridge to the Infinite, One Being.”

And so for me, the words of this song have always taken on a significance beyond the usual secular understanding of the song. They lead me through a consideration that I’ll share with you here.

Have yourself
a merry little Christmas
Let your heart be light
From now on our troubles
will be out of sight

Have yourself
a merry little Christmas
Make the Yuletide gay
From now on our troubles
will be miles away.

Here we are as in olden days
Happy golden days of yore
Faithful friends who are dear to us
Gather near to us once more

Through the years
we all will be together
If the fates allow
Hang a shining star
upon the highest bough
And have yourself
a merry little Christmas now.

That wistfulness: Raymond’s problem. On the surface, the words of Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas are purely joyful — "faithful friends" coming together each year in a joyous Christmas celebration. And yet, one of the emotions I feel when I sing this song is wistfulness. So where is the wistfulness coming from? It's that big "IF" in the song: "if the fates allow". In fact, as every one of us knows (more and more, with each passing year), fate (conditional existence) only allows such reunions for a limited number of years. As I sing, I have a vision of a photograph of a gathering of friends, from a Christmas or Danavira Mela many years ago, and, in this vision, each face in the photograph — one by one over the years — turns "ghostly", either through our circumstances (high school, college, living near each other) no longer being shared, or life paths that have moved in different directions, or the passing on of that person. My awareness of that inevitable reality is the source of the wistfulness and nostalgia. The inevitable disappearance of the (mortal) loved one is “Raymond’s problem”, a phrase Adi Da uses, based on the central character of The Mummery Book.

Danavira Mela: A Divine Celebration in the midst of a conditional universe. The joy and playfulness of the song comes from the celebration we can still have together, even in the midst of an ever-changing, conditional universe. One of my (and many other devotees’) favorite quotes of Beloved Adi Da has always been this extraordinary prayer, from “Death is a Perfect Insult” in The Enlightenment of the Whole Body:

“Let us surrender into Infinity with all our friends and hold on to no thing or condition that ever appears. Let us forget all things in present Happiness, and so forgive the universe for all its playful changes. Let us always love one another, and so forgive one another for appearing, for changing, and for passing out of present sight. So be it.”

When I sing this song, I hear it giving further guidance for just how to do this.

The line, “Hang a shining star upon the highest bough”, is a call to a sacred puja, that “surrender into Infinity” of the separate self. The “highest bough” is like the reference to a “Higher Power” in the AA tradition: however you understand God or what is greater than you, surrender yourself to That, commune with That, and allow that Communion to transform you into a “shining star”, a radiant light that you share with others during this season. For devotees of Adi Da, of course, that “highest bough” is the Very Divine, in the human form of Beloved Adi Da.

Just as the word “light” has two senses, so the admonition, “Let your heart be light”, has two meanings.

The first meaning is: “Be light-hearted”. This is a call to self-understanding, released of the primary knot of self at the heart, and so free of all sense of dilemma. “Our troubles will be out of sight”: the dilemma we thought we were in vanishes when the heart is unknotted.

The second meaning is: “Let your heart be Light”. This is a call to the heart to commune with the Divine, and so be heart-awakened by the Divine, and thereby serve as a “shining star”, a “light”, a radiant beacon of light and love for all, through feeling to Infinity, feeling to, through and beyond the changing (including all the mortal beloveds) to the Changeless (the Immortal Beloved who is all of us), in all directions in every moment — the call to serve the awakening of Light in everybody.

And so it is in this spirit that I sing this song and this wish for all my friends: “Have yourself a merry little Christmas”!

ADI DA: Know that I Bless you through and beyond time and space. Live a life of celebration. True life, ego-transcending life, is a celebration, a joyous occasion of meeting with others in the universal circumstance of prior unity and in the joy of Communion with the Indivisible Divine Reality.

That is why I look forward to this season every year. It is the greatest season of the year. It is a marvelous season. I hope it is a happy time for you and for all of your friends.
tags:
Danavira Mela  

El proceso espiritual siempre se havivido en tiempos difícilesvideo
poster: Videos de Adi Da - Español
length: 10:16
date added: September 19, 2022
event date: November 28, 1981
language: Spanish
views: 666; views this month: 24; views this week: 1
[Contains Spanish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]

This is a video excerpt from Adi Da's classic talk, "The Bodily Location of Happiness", which He gave on November 28, 1981. This talk was originally published in the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness. The full talk is available on DVD and on CD, and as an online transcript.

ADI DA: Life is foolishness. This is no time, in any case, to be tolerant of foolishness. The world is mad, and these are dreadful times. Things are not going to be easier in the years ahead. The spiritual process has always been lived in difficult times. Therefore, the spiritual process tolerates no fool. The spiritual process itself will spit you out. It is not an easy attainment, but a profoundly difficult affair. Even what you have listened to today has been heard by only a fraction of the human race in all of history. The opportunity to practice is extremely rare, and the fulfillment of practice is practically unknown.

In some sense you could say this life is hell. . . The nature of this hell is that we are self-possessed. We are born in un-Happiness and we do not transcend it readily. We constantly pursue Happiness through all kinds of incredibly complex means, and we never attain It. . .

If Spiritual Realizers did not turn about and Teach, this would truly be a hell instead of being like a hell. It would truly be a hell if there were no possibility of Enlightenment, if there were no Teaching, no Spiritual Masters, no sacred Way, no sacred community, no capacity for understanding or self-transcendence.
tags:
Spanish   CD   DVD  

La Ubicación Corporal de la Felicidadvideo
poster: Videos de Adi Da - Español
length: 12:23
date added: May 16, 2022
event date: November 28, 1981
language: Spanish
views: 656; views this month: 27; views this week: 2
Contains Spanish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]

Un discurso clásico dado por Avatar Adi Da en 1981 sobre la naturaleza de la Verdadera Felicidad y cómo puede ser Realizada momento a momento, pero no a través de su búsqueda.

This is a video excerpt from Adi Da's classic talk, "The Bodily Location of Happiness", which He gave on November 28, 1981. This talk was originally published in the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness. The full talk is available on DVD and on CD, and as an online transcript.

ADI DA: Life is foolishness. This is no time, in any case, to be tolerant of foolishness. The world is mad, and these are dreadful times. Things are not going to be easier in the years ahead. The spiritual process has always been lived in difficult times. Therefore, the spiritual process tolerates no fool. The spiritual process itself will spit you out. It is not an easy attainment, but a profoundly difficult affair. Even what you have listened to today has been heard by only a fraction of the human race in all of history. The opportunity to practice is extremely rare, and the fulfillment of practice is practically unknown.

In some sense you could say this life is hell. . . The nature of this hell is that we are self-possessed. We are born in un-Happiness and we do not transcend it readily. We constantly pursue Happiness through all kinds of incredibly complex means, and we never attain It. . .

If Spiritual Realizers did not turn about and Teach, this would truly be a hell instead of being like a hell. It would truly be a hell if there were no possibility of Enlightenment, if there were no Teaching, no Spiritual Masters, no sacred Way, no sacred community, no capacity for understanding or self-transcendence.
tags:
CD   DVD   Spanish  

I Am Herevideo
poster: AdiDaUpClose
length: 06:27
date added: December 12, 2021
event date: December 1993
language: English
views: 886; views this month: 20; views this week: 2
words: Avatar Adi Da Samraj
music: Chris Tong
sung by: the Adidam New England Choir
(with all devotees joining in)
choir members:
Chris Tong, Paul Caswell, Patricia Rydle, Lisa Alexandra Fry
pianist / choir director: Chris Tong
date: Danavira Mela, 1993

CHRIS: I just ran across an old audio tape with this recording. The quality is not the best, and the choir is not professional, but there is so much heart-feeling in devotees’ singing, and our Beloved Heart-Master’s Words are so beautiful and heart-moving, that I felt compelled to share this for Danavira Mela.


————————————————————
I AM HERE

I Am here.
And that is all you need to feel.
I am your hungry heart’s Full Meal.
Touch My Heart
and all My Secrets
are Revealed.

I am most accessible.
You’re the one
who hides your heart.
I am always waiting
for your heart to find Me.
Fall in love with only Me.
Be, by that act,
Consciousness,
And be
the mindless Feeling
Of Happiness.
————————————————————

I drew Adi Da's words from many sources. For example, "Fall in love with only Me" is drawn from “My Most Secret Revelation of Only and Absolute Adherence To Me” in Always Enact Fidelity To Me:

ADI DA: I Am The Only Lover In The Cosmic Domain.

If You Do Not Yet Love Only Me, You Are “Narcissistically” Luxuriating In Being With Me — Until You Truly Wake Up To Me.

I Am Jealous For My Devotee’s attention To Me.

Whenever It Is That You Truly Find Me, You Will Spend Only a little time With Me here In this place. The Great “Time” You Must Spend With Me Is Beyond this place.

That Great "Time" Is Eternal, and That Great "Place" Is Boundless — Without perimeter or parameter, Non-conditional, Beyond psyche and thought.

I Am That One.

Find Me Out.
tags:
music  

La Locazione Fisica della Felicitàvideo
poster: Video di Adi Da, Canale italiano
length: 12:23
date added: September 28, 2021
event date: November 28, 1981
language: Italian
views: 1076; views this month: 35; views this week: 1
[Contains Italian subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]

This is a video excerpt from Adi Da's classic talk, "The Bodily Location of Happiness", which He gave on November 28, 1981. This talk was originally published in the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness. The full talk is available on CD and on a new DVD, The Location Of Happiness.

The talk communicates several core insights:

1. Everybody is intuitively familiar with happiness. You don't have to be a devotee of Adi Da! This was part of the reason Adi Da chose "happiness" as the focus of this Teaching period: because the subject was so accessible. Everyone knows what it's like to be happy (at least a little). It's just that most people are not aware that Perfect, Eternal Happiness is possible and Realizable. (And it certainly isn't, through ordinary human means.) Adi Da: "All beings are always already Happy. You always know, at this very moment you know exactly, what it would be to look and feel and be and act completely Happy." The esoteric reason everyone is familiar with happiness is because everyone is always, already happy. And the esoteric reason everyone yearns for complete happiness is because complete happiness is realizable — and everyone's heart knows that.

2. Adi Da's "Lesson of Life":"You can't become happy; you can only be (already) happy." People are always seeking for happiness. The "pursuit of happiness" (not happiness itself!) is even enshrined as an "unalienable right" (alongside life and liberty) in the preamble of the United States Declaration of Independence. Its author, Thomas Jefferson, knew better than to think a government could guarantee happiness itself — hence only the guarantee of "pursuing happiness". Only a Divine Incarnation can guarantee Happiness Itself.

Adi Da reveals that happiness is the native state of beings. It is already the case. Every attempt to seek for it (or mis-identify the source of happiness as some object or other) in fact serves to dissociate one from it. Adi Da: "You think that you can seek Happiness and find it. Your search for Happiness is itself a confession of un-Happiness. You cannot realize Happiness by persisting in un-Happiness, persisting in the method of un-Happiness. All seeking is an expression of un-Happiness, all seeking is the method of un-Happiness, the practice of un-Happiness. This must be understood. It is not merely true — it must be understood."

Self-understanding allows one to get this point. Based on self-understanding, one can devote oneself to Happiness rather than to seeking for It and settling for the little bit of Infinite Happiness that "bleeds through" the clench of ego into conditions. This ultimately enables the Eternal Realization of Infinite, Perfect Happiness. Adi Da: "Understand your un-Happiness. Then you will be capable of locating Happiness, and, having located Happiness, you will be capable of practicing the Way of Adidam, which is nothing but the devotion of life to Happiness."

3. The Transmission of the Divine Guru is How One Locates Happiness. The subtitle of the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness, is: "On the Incarnation of the Divine Person and the Transmission of Love-Bliss". In other words, you can't apply "The Lesson of Life" by somehow "locating" happiness directly, by yourself (or in yourself). Happiness is our native state, but that doesn't mean it can be located by an egoic, "do it yourself" process. We locate happiness directly as a Grace-given Gift, through devotion to the Transcendental Spiritual Transmission of Adi Da. Adi Da: "Happiness is presently the case. In this moment you are already Happy. Sitting with Me, locate this Happiness." We locate our "Native State" by recognizing and submitting to our "Native Person" — our Very Self appearing here in bodily (human) form.

4. It is a Process of Whole Bodily Location. "The bodily location of Happiness" is not primarily a reference to some place where Happiness resides in the body (although Adi Da teases His listeners with this idea: "Look for it in your toes, in your fingers, in your shirt, in your head"). It refers to a process ("the bodily location of Happiness" = "the locating of Happiness with the whole body-mind") that involves the surrender and transformation of every aspect of the body-mind, immersed in the Perfectly Happy State of the Divine Guru, through recognition of Him as the Divine in every moment. Then the secondary and supportive practices of the Way of Adidam become means for staying immersed in that Divine State in every moment: "Having located Happiness [having recognized Adi Da as the Divine], you will be capable of practicing the Way of Adidam, which is nothing but the devotion of life to Happiness [Adi Da, recognized as the Divine]. The practices of this Way are not methods for attaining Happiness, but they are the expressions of Happiness. The disciplines of money, food, and sex are not a way to become Happy. Discipline is difficult enough — why should we also burden it with the obligation to make us Happy!"
tags:
CD   DVD   Italian  

Hengellistä prosessia on aina eletty vaikeina aikoinavideo
poster: Adi Da Videot Suomi
length: 10:16
date added: August 3, 2021
event date: November 28, 1981
language: Finnish
views: 767; views this month: 29; views this week: 5
[Contains Finnish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]

Tämä on ote Adi Dan puheesta "Ilon ruumiillinen sijainti", jonka Hän antoi 28. marraskuuta 1981.

This is a video excerpt from Adi Da's classic talk, "The Bodily Location of Happiness", which He gave on November 28, 1981. This talk was originally published in the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness. The full talk is available on DVD and on CD, and as an online transcript.

ADI DA: Elämä on typeryyttä. Nyt ei ole muutenkaan aika suvaita typeryyttä. Maailma on hullu, ja nämä ovat karmeita aikoja. Asiat eivät helpotu tulevina vuosina. Hengellistä prosessia on aina eletty vaikeina aikoina. Hengellinen prosessi ei siis suvaitse typerystä. Hengellinen prosessi sylkäisee sinut ulos. Se ei ole helppo saavutus, vaan syvästi vaikea koettamus. Jopa se, mitä tänään kuulitte on vain ihmiskunnan murto-osan kuulemaa kautta historian. Mahdollisuus harjoittaa hengellistä prosessia on erittäin harvinainen, ja sen täyttymys on\Nkäytännössä tuntematon.

Jossain mielessä voisi sanoa, että tämä on elämä on helvettiä. Uskonnollisella kielellämme puhumme siitä, mitä voi tapahtua kuoleman jälkeen. Voit joko nousta taivaaseen tai joutua puhdistautumaan kiirastuleen, tai voit joutua helvettiin. Ja sitten ehkä joudut kiirastuleen tai tilapäiseen helvettiin, mutta ehkä sinulla on riittävästi hyvää onnea syntyä ihmiseksi, jotta voit omistautua hengelliselle prosessille. Tämän helvetin luonne on, että olemme itseemme käpertyneitä. Synnymme ilottomuudessa emmekä helposti pääse tämän ilottomuuden yli. Tavoittelemme iloa jatkuvasti kaikenlaisin uskomattoman monimutkaisin keinoin emmekä ikinä saavuta sitä.

Jos Hengelliset Mestarit eivät olisi alkaneet opettamaan, tämä todellakin olisi helvetti eikä vain helvetin kaltainen. Tämä todellakin olisi helvetti jos täällä ei olisi Valaistuksen mahdollisuutta, jos täällä ei olisi Opetusta, ei Hengellisiä Mestareita, ei Pyhää Tietä, ei Pyhää yhteisöä, ei kykyä ymmärtää tai ylittää itseään.

ADI DA: Life is foolishness. This is no time, in any case, to be tolerant of foolishness. The world is mad, and these are dreadful times. Things are not going to be easier in the years ahead. The spiritual process has always been lived in difficult times. Therefore, the spiritual process tolerates no fool. The spiritual process itself will spit you out. It is not an easy attainment, but a profoundly difficult affair. Even what you have listened to today has been heard by only a fraction of the human race in all of history. The opportunity to practice is extremely rare, and the fulfillment of practice is practically unknown.

In some sense you could say this life is hell. . . The nature of this hell is that we are self-possessed. We are born in un-Happiness and we do not transcend it readily. We constantly pursue Happiness through all kinds of incredibly complex means, and we never attain It. . .

If Spiritual Realizers did not turn about and Teach, this would truly be a hell instead of being like a hell. It would truly be a hell if there were no possibility of Enlightenment, if there were no Teaching, no Spiritual Masters, no sacred Way, no sacred community, no capacity for understanding or self-transcendence.
tags:
Finnish   CD   DVD  

La Desilusión Positivavideo
poster: Videos de Adi Da - Español
length: 19:38
date added: July 4, 2021
language: Spanish
views: 565; views this month: 7; views this week: 1
[Contains Spanish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]

In this excerpt from an Avataric Discourse, Adi Da speaks about the necessity to become disillusined with mortal life in a positive sense. Positive disillusionment is emerging when one begins to understand and relinquish the stressful and ultimately futile search for personal survival, worldly happiness, and ultimate life fulfillment. Only then can one be drawn into recognizing, learning about, and ecstatically participating in Reality Itself, in relationship to a True Realizer.

ADI DA: The teaching of Truth is for those who are disillusioned in the positive sense, who have been sobered in their lives by grasping the nature of existence and being cured of search.
tags:
Avataric Discourse   Spanish  

Il Processo Spirituale prende semprevita in momenti difficilivideo
poster: Video di Adi Da, Canale italiano
length: 10:16
date added: January 11, 2021
event date: November 28, 1981
language: Italian
views: 845; views this month: 18; views this week: 3
[Contains Italian subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]

This is a video excerpt from Adi Da's classic talk, "The Bodily Location of Happiness", which He gave on November 28, 1981. This talk was originally published in the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness. The full talk is available on DVD and on CD, and as an online transcript.

ADI DA: Life is foolishness. This is no time, in any case, to be tolerant of foolishness. The world is mad, and these are dreadful times. Things are not going to be easier in the years ahead. The spiritual process has always been lived in difficult times. Therefore, the spiritual process tolerates no fool. The spiritual process itself will spit you out. It is not an easy attainment, but a profoundly difficult affair. Even what you have listened to today has been heard by only a fraction of the human race in all of history. The opportunity to practice is extremely rare, and the fulfillment of practice is practically unknown.

In some sense you could say this life is hell. . . The nature of this hell is that we are self-possessed. We are born in un-Happiness and we do not transcend it readily. We constantly pursue Happiness through all kinds of incredibly complex means, and we never attain It. . .

If Spiritual Realizers did not turn about and Teach, this would truly be a hell instead of being like a hell. It would truly be a hell if there were no possibility of Enlightenment, if there were no Teaching, no Spiritual Masters, no sacred Way, no sacred community, no capacity for understanding or self-transcendence.
tags:
CD   DVD   Italian  

Hengellisen mestarin jalkojen juurella – Gerald Sheinfeldvideo
poster: Adi Da Videot Suomi
speaker: Gerald Sheinfeld
length: 10:53
date added: December 31, 2020
language: Finnish
views: 971; views this month: 23; views this week: 4
[Contains Finnish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]

Gerald Sheinfeld, joka on omistautunut Avatar Adi Dalle 1970-luvun alusta saakka, kertoo tarinan Gurunsa löytämisestä, ja siitä, miten hän välittömästi tunnisti Avatar Adi Dan ainutlaatuisen olotilan, joka viestii vapautta, iloa ja vapautusta. Gerald selittää, miten tuon kaltainen tunnistus Adi Dan olotilasta herkistää yksilön Aiemman Ykseyden asemaan.

Gerald Sheinfeld, a devotee of Avatar Adi Da since the early 1970's, tells a wonderful story about how he found his Guru, Adi Da Samraj and his immediate recognition of Adi Da's unique state of Freedom, Happiness, and Liberation. Gerald speaks about how that recognition of Adi Da has the capacity to awaken others to that state of Prior Unity.
tags:
Finnish  

De deugd van positieve desillusievideo
poster: AdiDaVideosNL
length: 19:38
date added: December 13, 2020
language: Dutch
views: 773; views this month: 17; views this week: 2
[Contains Dutch subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]

In dit fragment van een nooit eerder gepubliceerde toespraak, spreekt Adi Da over de noodzaak in positieve zin gedesillusioneerd te raken met het sterfelijke bestaan. Positieve desillusie ontstaat als je het stressvolle en uiteindelijk futiele zoeken naar persoonlijk overleven, werelds plezier en ultieme levensvervulling begint te begrijpen en los te laten. Alleen dan kun je aangetrokken worden tot het herkennen, leren over en extatisch deelnemen in de Werkelijkheid Zelf in relatie met een Werkelijk Verlichte.

In this excerpt from an Avataric Discourse, Adi Da speaks about the necessity to become disillusioned with mortal life in a positive sense. Positive disillusionment is emerging when one begins to understand and relinquish the stressful and ultimately futile search for personal survival, worldly happiness, and ultimate life fulfillment. Only then can one be drawn into recognizing, learning about, and ecstatically participating in Reality Itself, in relationship to a True Realizer.

ADI DA: The teaching of Truth is for those who are disillusioned in the positive sense, who have been sobered in their lives by grasping the nature of existence and being cured of search.
tags:
Avataric Discourse   Dutch  

Ilon ruumiillinen sijaintivideo
poster: Adi Da Videot Suomi
length: 12:23
date added: September 30, 2020
event date: November 28, 1981
language: Finnish
views: 1519; views this month: 49; views this week: 10
[Contains Finnish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]

Avatar Adi Dan antama puhe vuodelta 1981, joka käsittelee Aidon Ilon luonnetta ja sen Toteutusta hetkestä hetkeen, joka ei onnistu sitä etsimällä.

This is a video excerpt from Adi Da's classic talk, "The Bodily Location of Happiness", which He gave on November 28, 1981. This talk was originally published in the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness. The full talk is available on CD and on a new DVD, The Location Of Happiness.

The talk communicates several core insights:

1. Everybody is intuitively familiar with happiness. You don't have to be a devotee of Adi Da! This was part of the reason Adi Da chose "happiness" as the focus of this Teaching period: because the subject was so accessible. Everyone knows what it's like to be happy (at least a little). It's just that most people are not aware that Perfect, Eternal Happiness is possible and Realizable. (And it certainly isn't, through ordinary human means.) Adi Da: "All beings are always already Happy. You always know, at this very moment you know exactly, what it would be to look and feel and be and act completely Happy." The esoteric reason everyone is familiar with happiness is because everyone is always, already happy. And the esoteric reason everyone yearns for complete happiness is because complete happiness is realizable — and everyone's heart knows that.

2. Adi Da's "Lesson of Life":"You can't become happy; you can only be (already) happy." People are always seeking for happiness. The "pursuit of happiness" (not happiness itself!) is even enshrined as an "unalienable right" (alongside life and liberty) in the preamble of the United States Declaration of Independence. Its author, Thomas Jefferson, knew better than to think a government could guarantee happiness itself — hence only the guarantee of "pursuing happiness". Only a Divine Incarnation can guarantee Happiness Itself.

Adi Da reveals that happiness is the native state of beings. It is already the case. Every attempt to seek for it (or mis-identify the source of happiness as some object or other) in fact serves to dissociate one from it. Adi Da: "You think that you can seek Happiness and find it. Your search for Happiness is itself a confession of un-Happiness. You cannot realize Happiness by persisting in un-Happiness, persisting in the method of un-Happiness. All seeking is an expression of un-Happiness, all seeking is the method of un-Happiness, the practice of un-Happiness. This must be understood. It is not merely true — it must be understood."

Self-understanding allows one to get this point. Based on self-understanding, one can devote oneself to Happiness rather than to seeking for It and settling for the little bit of Infinite Happiness that "bleeds through" the clench of ego into conditions. This ultimately enables the Eternal Realization of Infinite, Perfect Happiness. Adi Da: "Understand your un-Happiness. Then you will be capable of locating Happiness, and, having located Happiness, you will be capable of practicing the Way of Adidam, which is nothing but the devotion of life to Happiness."

3. The Transmission of the Divine Guru is How One Locates Happiness. The subtitle of the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness, is: "On the Incarnation of the Divine Person and the Transmission of Love-Bliss". In other words, you can't apply "The Lesson of Life" by somehow "locating" happiness directly, by yourself (or in yourself). Happiness is our native state, but that doesn't mean it can be located by an egoic, "do it yourself" process. We locate happiness directly as a Grace-given Gift, through devotion to the Transcendental Spiritual Transmission of Adi Da. Adi Da: "Happiness is presently the case. In this moment you are already Happy. Sitting with Me, locate this Happiness." We locate our "Native State" by recognizing and submitting to our "Native Person" — our Very Self appearing here in bodily (human) form.

4. It is a Process of Whole Bodily Location. "The bodily location of Happiness" is not primarily a reference to some place where Happiness resides in the body (although Adi Da teases His listeners with this idea: "Look for it in your toes, in your fingers, in your shirt, in your head"). It refers to a process ("the bodily location of Happiness" = "the locating of Happiness with the whole body-mind") that involves the surrender and transformation of every aspect of the body-mind, immersed in the Perfectly Happy State of the Divine Guru, through recognition of Him as the Divine in every moment. Then the secondary and supportive practices of the Way of Adidam become means for staying immersed in that Divine State in every moment: "Having located Happiness [having recognized Adi Da as the Divine], you will be capable of practicing the Way of Adidam, which is nothing but the devotion of life to Happiness [Adi Da, recognized as the Divine]. The practices of this Way are not methods for attaining Happiness, but they are the expressions of Happiness. The disciplines of money, food, and sex are not a way to become Happy. Discipline is difficult enough — why should we also burden it with the obligation to make us Happy!"
tags:
CD   DVD   Finnish  

Duchowy Proces w trudnych czasachvideo
poster: Adi Da Video Polska
length: 10:16
date added: September 20, 2020
event date: November 28, 1981
language: Polish
views: 1016; views this month: 33; views this week: 5
[Contains Polish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]

Oto fragment rozmowy Adi Da, "Gdzie w ciele jest szczęście?", którą wygłosił 28 listopada 1981 roku. Poniżej publikujemy fragment tekstu z tego nagrania.

"Duchowy Proces w trudnych czasach" ("The Spiritual Process in Troubled Times") is a video excerpt from Adi Da's classic talk, "The Bodily Location of Happiness", which He gave on November 28, 1981. This talk was originally published in the book, The Bodily Location Of Happiness. The full talk is available on DVD and on CD, and as an online transcript.

ADI DA: Życie jest głupotą, ale to nie są czasy na tolerowanie głupoty. Świat jest szalony, to straszne czasy, a w nadchodzących latach wcale nie będzie łatwiej. Proces duchowy zawsze przeżywano w trudnych czasach. Dlatego proces duchowy nie toleruje głupca. Sam Proces Duchowy pokona cię. Nie jest to łatwe osiągnięcie, to nieprawdopodobnie trudna sprawa. Nawet to, czego dzisiaj słuchaliście, zostało wysłuchane tylko przez ułamek rodzaju ludzkiego w całej jego historii. Możliwość praktyki jest niezwykle rzadka, a spełnienie jej jest praktycznie nieznane.

W pewnym sensie można powiedzieć, że to życie jest piekłem. W naszym języku religijnym mówimy o tym, co może się z tobą stać po śmierci. Cóż, można iść do nieba, można iść do czyśćca żeby się oczyścić lub można iść do piekła. A potem być może udasz się do czyśćca czy tymczasowego piekła, i może będziesz miał szczęście urodzić się jako istota ludzka i poświęcić się duchowemu procesowi. Natura tego piekła polega na tym, że jesteśmy opętani sami sobą. Rodzimy się w nie-Szczęściu i nie przekraczamy go łatwo. Nieustannie dążymy do szczęścia poprzez wszelkiego rodzaju niezwykle złożone środki i nigdy go nie osiągamy.

Gdyby Urzeczywistnieni Adepci nie wracali by nauczać, to tutaj byłoby naprawdę piekło, a nie coś podobnego do piekła. Gdyby nie było możliwości Oświecenia, gdyby nie był Nauk, nie było Boskiego Prawa, Adeptów, Świętej Drogi, Świętej wspólnoty, ani możliwości samo-transcendencji, to tutaj byłoby naprawdę piekło.

ADI DA: Life is foolishness. This is no time, in any case, to be tolerant of foolishness. The world is mad, and these are dreadful times. Things are not going to be easier in the years ahead. The spiritual process has always been lived in difficult times. Therefore, the spiritual process tolerates no fool. The spiritual process itself will spit you out. It is not an easy attainment, but a profoundly difficult affair. Even what you have listened to today has been heard by only a fraction of the human race in all of history. The opportunity to practice is extremely rare, and the fulfillment of practice is practically unknown.

In some sense you could say this life is hell. . . The nature of this hell is that we are self-possessed. We are born in un-Happiness and we do not transcend it readily. We constantly pursue Happiness through all kinds of incredibly complex means, and we never attain It. . .

If Spiritual Realizers did not turn about and Teach, this would truly be a hell instead of being like a hell. It would truly be a hell if there were no possibility of Enlightenment, if there were no Teaching, no Spiritual Masters, no sacred Way, no sacred community, no capacity for understanding or self-transcendence.
tags:
Polish   DVD   CD  

Vapaus on ainoa lakivideo
poster: Adi Da Videot Suomi
length: 04:13
date added: August 12, 2020
language: Finnish
views: 1193; views this month: 25; views this week: 7
[Contains Finnish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]

Sanat kuten "vapaus" ja "rakkaus" määritetään yleisesssä maallikkoympäristössä erittäin rajoitetusti. Tässä Adi Dan esseen lausunnassa hän avaa näiden sanojen aitoa merkitystä.

Slides from a Darshan occasion of Avatar Adi Da at Adi Da Samrajashram.

The audio recording is an excerpt from a recitation of Adi Da's essay, "Freedom Is The Only Law and Happiness Is The Only Reality". This is the Epilogue from Adi Da's book, The Truly Human New World-Culture of Unbroken Real-God-Man, which was originally written in 2001, and updated on November 13, 2019. The essay is read by a student of Adi Da. In the secular world, words like "freedom" and " love" are given a very limited definition. In this essay, Adi Da expands the true meaning of both of these words.

ADI DA: I Am here to Divinely Liberate all beings.

I Am here to Grant True Freedom to every one.

“Freedom” is one of the principal words associated with the politics of this “late-time”. The general trend toward the democratization of the entire world carries with it an intensified interest in the concept of freedom and in the pursuit of freedom. However, in the context and circumstance of this “late-time”, the word “freedom” is used in such a way that the true import of the word is lost, and its meaning is transformed, and even vulgarized.

The same process of vulgarization has also occurred in the case of other words, such as (for example) the word “love”. The word “love” represents a profound concept and reality, but the word itself tends to be used very casually. People commonly say that they “love” this or that, meaning something quite different from what the word “love” rightly and truly signifies.

“Love” is a word that rightly refers to the universal Sacrifice of ego-“self”. Real love is a matter of transcending “self” (or going beyond your limitations in relation to others)—but, in the “late-time” circumstance of vulgarized culture, the word “love” has come to be used in relation to whatever satisfies your inclinations, or fulfills your desires, or (otherwise) somehow compensates for limitations in your life by pleasing you and (thereby) supporting your egoic disposition. None of that has anything to do with real love.

So it also is with the word “freedom”, and the notion of freedom. The world-culture of this “late-time” is essentially an ego-culture associated with complications in the first three stages of life. It is essentially an adolescent culture. And it is in the context of that culture that great words like “love” and “freedom” become vulgarized. In the adolescent disposition, the word “freedom”, like the word “love”, is reduced to an egoic meaning. People say they want to be “free”, or want to act “freely”, or want to be “free” to do this or that—but what they actually mean is that they want to be able to fulfill their desires without limitation. An adolescent reacting to parental authority or parental expectations regards any such authority or expectations to be oppressive or limiting. Therefore, such adolescents say that they want to be “free” to do whatever they please. And that is, in general, what is meant in this “late-time” by the word “freedom”. Even in the larger political sphere, the word “freedom” is used to express the (personal, and also collective) intent to be able to fulfill desires—and those desires are (necessarily) fundamentally ego-based.

What does the fulfillment of desires have to do with true freedom? Rightly, the word “freedom” is synonymous with the word “liberation”. To “be free”, or to “be liberated”, means to “go beyond bondage”. The opposite of “freedom” is “bondage”. If one is truly moved to be truly free, one is moved to relinquish (and go beyond) bondage. Such is the true Wisdom-understanding of freedom.

Neither true freedom, nor real love, nor any other great concept is rightly understood via the words and concepts of adolescents. There must be human maturity (and, therefore, growth in Wisdom) for the great meanings underlying these concepts to be understood and actually lived.

Be moved toward real love, without limit. Be moved toward real happiness, without limit.

Be moved toward true freedom, without limit. You should (and, ultimately, must) be so moved. But to actually realize love (or real happiness, or true freedom) without limit, you must deal with yourself most profoundly. You cannot merely be reactive, like an adolescent or a worldly person.

If you want to be truly free, you must first understand that you are bound, and you must understand how you are bound, and then you must do something about that. If, on the other hand, you are merely reactively inclined to fulfill desires, and you want to be (so-called) “free” to do so, then you are not examining your bondage—what its roots are, what its signs are, what its characteristics are—and, if you are not examining your bondage with real discriminative intelligence, you are also not doing what you must do in order to be truly free.
tags:
Finnish  

Das große Geheimnisvideo
poster: Adi Da Videos Deutschland
length: 06:08
date added: April 19, 2020
event date: 1988
language: German
views: 1333; views this month: 22; views this week: 3
[Contains German subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]

This video excerpt, "Das große Geheimnis" ("The Great Secret") is from the DVD, The Great Secret, which is Volume 3 of the 20th Anniversary Series.

There is a great Secret that has been known since before recorded history to those who are most serious about Spiritual life. It is the Secret of Liberation from the dead-end of seeking and a life of unhappiness. To discover this Secret is the true heart-desire of every being.

Avatar Adi Da Samraj describes the Realization of Truth and Its necessary practical foundation in these excerpts from Discourses given in 1988 at the Mountain Of Attention Sanctuary in northern California and at Adi Da Samrajashram Hermitage in Fiji.

ADI DA: Since the ancient days it has been said that if Real-God-Realization, Liberation, or Enlightenment is the purpose of your life, the best thing you can do is spend your time in the Company of a Realizer. It is by sympathetic association with the Realizer, Communion with the Realizer, that Realization is accomplished, and not by "self"-effort.
tags:
German   DVD  

Freedom Is The Only Lawvideo
poster: AdiDaVideos
length: 04:13
date added: January 17, 2020
language: English
views: 1158; views this month: 22; views this week: 3
Slides from a Darshan occasion of Avatar Adi Da at Adi Da Samrajashram.

The audio recording is an excerpt from a recitation of Adi Da's essay, "Freedom Is The Only Law and Happiness Is The Only Reality". This is the Epilogue from Adi Da's book, The Truly Human New World-Culture of Unbroken Real-God-Man, which was originally written in 2001, and updated on November 13, 2019. The essay is read by a student of Adi Da. In the secular world, words like "freedom" and " love" are given a very limited definition. In this essay, Adi Da expands the true meaning of both of these words.

ADI DA: I Am here to Divinely Liberate all beings.

I Am here to Grant True Freedom to every one.

“Freedom” is one of the principal words associated with the politics of this “late-time”. The general trend toward the democratization of the entire world carries with it an intensified interest in the concept of freedom and in the pursuit of freedom. However, in the context and circumstance of this “late-time”, the word “freedom” is used in such a way that the true import of the word is lost, and its meaning is transformed, and even vulgarized.

The same process of vulgarization has also occurred in the case of other words, such as (for example) the word “love”. The word “love” represents a profound concept and reality, but the word itself tends to be used very casually. People commonly say that they “love” this or that, meaning something quite different from what the word “love” rightly and truly signifies.

“Love” is a word that rightly refers to the universal Sacrifice of ego-“self”. Real love is a matter of transcending “self” (or going beyond your limitations in relation to others)—but, in the “late-time” circumstance of vulgarized culture, the word “love” has come to be used in relation to whatever satisfies your inclinations, or fulfills your desires, or (otherwise) somehow compensates for limitations in your life by pleasing you and (thereby) supporting your egoic disposition. None of that has anything to do with real love.

So it also is with the word “freedom”, and the notion of freedom. The world-culture of this “late-time” is essentially an ego-culture associated with complications in the first three stages of life. It is essentially an adolescent culture. And it is in the context of that culture that great words like “love” and “freedom” become vulgarized. In the adolescent disposition, the word “freedom”, like the word “love”, is reduced to an egoic meaning. People say they want to be “free”, or want to act “freely”, or want to be “free” to do this or that—but what they actually mean is that they want to be able to fulfill their desires without limitation. An adolescent reacting to parental authority or parental expectations regards any such authority or expectations to be oppressive or limiting. Therefore, such adolescents say that they want to be “free” to do whatever they please. And that is, in general, what is meant in this “late-time” by the word “freedom”. Even in the larger political sphere, the word “freedom” is used to express the (personal, and also collective) intent to be able to fulfill desires—and those desires are (necessarily) fundamentally ego-based.

What does the fulfillment of desires have to do with true freedom? Rightly, the word “freedom” is synonymous with the word “liberation”. To “be free”, or to “be liberated”, means to “go beyond bondage”. The opposite of “freedom” is “bondage”. If one is truly moved to be truly free, one is moved to relinquish (and go beyond) bondage. Such is the true Wisdom-understanding of freedom.

Neither true freedom, nor real love, nor any other great concept is rightly understood via the words and concepts of adolescents. There must be human maturity (and, therefore, growth in Wisdom) for the great meanings underlying these concepts to be understood and actually lived.

Be moved toward real love, without limit. Be moved toward real happiness, without limit.

Be moved toward true freedom, without limit. You should (and, ultimately, must) be so moved. But to actually realize love (or real happiness, or true freedom) without limit, you must deal with yourself most profoundly. You cannot merely be reactive, like an adolescent or a worldly person.

If you want to be truly free, you must first understand that you are bound, and you must understand how you are bound, and then you must do something about that. If, on the other hand, you are merely reactively inclined to fulfill desires, and you want to be (so-called) “free” to do so, then you are not examining your bondage—what its roots are, what its signs are, what its characteristics are—and, if you are not examining your bondage with real discriminative intelligence, you are also not doing what you must do in order to be truly free.
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Thanks to the many videographers who took the footage, to the many editors who created these videos and audios, and to the 131 people and organizations who posted these videos and audios on YouTube and other places on the Web. Special thanks to Lynne Thompson, who did a lot of the data entry for our audio/video database.


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