Interview with Dr. Vijai S Shankar MD.PhD.
by Dr. Jan Kersschot
Jodoigne (Belgium): May 2000
The Noumenon Journal
Editor: Mr. Kriben Pillay, South Africa
January Issue
Belgium Interview
JK: You used to work in the medical science before traveling around the world. I have been told that indeed you had another life before you decided to go around to give people what they want to hear. You give talks to people in Holland, Sweden, Germany, Belgium, and so on. What is, if I can put it that way, your message? What is the message of Dr. Vijai Shankar when he is talking to people?
VS: You know, you made a mistake. What you just said, those are your conclusions. They are entirely yours: you said it. I did not say those things, you assumed.
JK: Yes.
VS: Such is life: we assume things in life. Let me make this clear: I have no message to give to anybody. Not a single one. You have enough of it already.
JK: I see.
VS: Absolutely no message at all. At all. One day, people think that I am a doctor, that I am a scientist. Other people say so, and so I am what other people think what I am. These days this [pointing at his body] is not in the science, it is doing something else now. Nobody is deciding anything. Are you with me so far?
JK [nodding]: Mm.
VS: So, I presume you have to ask me another question.
JK: Well, maybe it is not a matter of asking questions and giving answers. Maybe it’s more about sharing something with people…
VS: Why do you say I am not giving an answer?
JK: Well, maybe it is about something which we share, something which can not be talked about … something which is here and at the same time has no specific qualities
VS: Again, those are your conclusions.
JK: I know.
VS: You said it cannot be said by words.
JK: That’s why silence may be the best way of expressing it.
VS: No, you are wrong again! Even that silence is a ripple in your mind. That there should be silence, that too is a thought. You could get stuck there. One, they understand that the words are nothing. Two, they understand there is no meaning to words. Three, they understand that they have to remain silent. They say, “I know that I don’t know.” And they think they are divine: they’re stuck there. It’s easy to say, “I have no thought.” But he’s got a thought that he has no thought. And that is the biggest thought. By saying that, you can only deceive yourself.
JK: So how does it …
VS: It will be a happening… and once it happened, you have landed in silence. Before, you were making noise, now you don’t make noise. You don’t practice it to not make noise. It is a happening once in a lifetime.
JK: I see.
VS: All interviews, every autobiography, is nonsense. But that doesn’t mean that I am going to sabotage your interview. I go along with you [laughing]. I allow you to speak and I shall speak, too.
JK: It looks like a kind of game: Consciousness talking through you to me and through me to you. Making the illusions look real.
VS: Yes, the illusion happens. You think that you are speaking, that you are a speaker. You know so many things, so many external things. Wanting to know things, there is no limit to it. “I want to know what is medicine, I want to know what is molecular science, I want to know what is genetics, I want to know what is biology, microbiology.”
JK: It’s endless.
VS: Who is the guy who wants to know all these external things? No matter how intelligent they are, look at their life. They are neurotics. Still the same fear, no love. Still the doubts, no trust. After all that knowledge? You follow what I am saying?
JK: Yes, I am.
VS: It should be reversal. First, get to that state where all the childishness disappears.
JK: Mm.
VS [slowly]: And a childlike innocence comes into you. A child in a grown up man. This man values his innocence. First you lose it, then you want it back. Paradise regained.
JK: What do you mean?
VS: By innocence, I mean: not to superimpose language onto life. A child has no language. With language, identification begins, seeing stops. Child sees, but doesn’t think. Adults think, but they don’t see. That’s the difference. You don’t see things, you think you see them. When you see, there is no thinking.
JK: Mm.
VS: But it is not a gradual process. Knowledge comes step by step, you gradually grow into it, that’s why they call you a graduate. But it doesn’t happen like that in your being. [snaps his fingers] It happens like that … snap … You follow?
JK: Mm.
VS: Good. No-mind state is a universe. All the minds … is a multi-verse.
JK: I see.
VS: I only make it clear to those who come and listen. Examine your mind and be very sure what you are carrying in your mind. Has it brought any validity or not? Check it out! When you are very alert and very awake to the moment, you are not bothering about what is gone. And you are not bothering about the moment to come. One must melt into the moment, and then that moment becomes eternal. No gap between a moment gone and a moment to come. The apparent past and the apparent future will be squeezed in the now. Like a thread going through all the pearls of a necklace. Each bead is a moment. A moment. A moment. A moment. A moment.
JK: Mm.
VS: Everybody thinks. Everybody thinks, “I am the doer, I am in control.” If everybody would be the doer, there would be chaos. International chaos. You see, everybody’s life is one singular event. It is happening. You follow? To understand that life is just singular, to understand that life is happening, in a passive manner, by living it, not thinking about it, you come Home. You real destination is inside you, all the rest is just compartments, like railway stations.
JK: It looks like that. It looks like that as long as you live.
VS: Death will take you. [snaps his fingers] Before death comes and gets you, you should get death. And realise once and for all that you have never died. Who dies? The body is already dead, it will be the same five elements. Yes or no?
JK: Depends how you look at it.
VS: What do you mean, how you look at it?
JK: It is a thought. People think they are alive because….
VS: Ah! It’s a belief. It’s a thought. People believe they are alive. They are already dead. The body has no sensations at all, doctor. The body is insentient. Absolutely dead. Find out: what is sentient in this insentient body?
JK: Consciousness.
VS: Exactly. Through the mind.
JK: I see.
VS: This body is dead, and Consciousness is dead-less. Who dies?
JK: Nobody dies. Like the sandcastles in the beach, going back to sand.
VS: All are castles in the air. Everything disappears.
JK: All is thought form.
VS: Where is this house when nobody has a single thought about this house?
JK: It evaporates.
VS: It is a thought form. Every object is a thought form. So, too, the body is a thought form.
JK: Mind the mind.
VS: But with what will you mind the mind? With the mind only.
JK: Like a self hypnosis.
VS: You know where the word ‘hypnosis’ comes from?
JK: No.
VS: It means ‘deep sleep.’ Everybody is in deep sleep. Speaking can not happen in the present. Have you worked that out? Where does it happen?
JK: What I could say is that Consciousness is everywhere. It is here, it is there [pointing at a table beside him], it is everywhere…
VS: No. You didn’t work it out. It’s not like that. No. That’s abstract. That’s playing games. [shouting] Bondage!
JK: Mm.
VS [whispering]: It is happening somewhere. Find out where. [shouting]: Be precise! When you say “it is all Consciousness,” that is rubbish. A tree is a tree, it is consciousness, it is not aware. They don’t have a mind. It is just energy, nothing else. You are aware, that is the difference between you and the tree. A bird has no mind, it flies around.
JK: Mm.
VS: Don’t think you are getting anything. You are superimposing an illusion. You lose it so that you can regain it again. You follow?
JK: You think you lose it, then you try to get it again, that’s the game?
VS: It’s not a game, it’s a play. It’s not a game, it’s a play. A play.
JK: What’s the difference?
VS: A play is just a play. When a game comes in, it is about goals, about victory, fruits, money, ambition, competition. A play is love. You play because you want to play. Children play the same game a hundred times. They have become play. They are not playing, they are play. And they enjoy it. Enjoy the play.
JK: Do you sometimes see ‘resonance’ happening between your dead body and another dead body?
VS: There are no other bodies, my son. There is no you, there is no ‘I’ around. There are no demarcation lines. When you have no neighbours, where would you put the fences around your house? You see what I mean? Your boundaries depend upon them. As long as they are there, you are there. You follow? When you are lost, when nobody is there, there is no other person, too.
JK: What do you mean?
VS: Find out. If a man digs a hole in the ground, the water comes by itself. He didn’t pull the water out, did he? The water came by itself. You make a hole, you make it ‘empty,’ and the water came. You don’t need anyone to come and put water into it. People wait for water to be poured into them. They are like a glass that is turned upside down. How can you put water in that? [whispering] Be alert… Leave the mind alone .. embrace life without the mind… there is love in the moment … there is aliveness in the moment … When you are in the mind, you cannot embrace life, you cannot celebrate life. You follow?
JK: Yes.
VS: Perfect. Good for you.
JK: Thank you.
VS: You’re welcome. Thank you for coming, doctor.
JK: You’re welcome.