 If she has had a child, the actual process of childbirth is perhaps the most powerful ego-breaking exercise she will experience in her life. Namaskar. My question is referring to relationships. Yes. I fully agree that we don't know how to love. Yet, we have relationships with other people. And I agree also that it's a good way to break down the ego when you're in a relationship. It's very easy. How about when we have children and ego is there? Most of the times that's the case anywhere in the world. And they have to suffer. I mean, they come, as you say, in our meditation, like pure beings, only so. And then everything is imposed. Let's say me, even to my partner or even worse to a child, out of ignorance, I make all these mistakes and then the child has to carry them out throughout the life, like I did, like all of us did. Then how to deal when someone wants to make a family and have children and it's still on the road. Like it does not know how to love because that's what children made, I think. Yes, love. That's it. But we are incapable of that. There's so much violence, so much in all kinds of violence and so much suffering from that. And it takes an entire life to get rid of that. I would like to hear what you want to share with us about this subject, especially children. Personally, I don't have children and it is a decision I made because I know, I'm incapable of giving this life what it needs, really what it needs, because I'm not there yet. I am not. That can be seen as a cop out in a way because when you have children, you also learn to love in the process of raising a child. Your statement that we don't know how to love, it's not true. We do know how to love. Many people know how to love. It is simply about keeping oneself in a state of loving from moment to moment to moment. The world isn't quite as horrible a place as it sounds sometimes. There is love in this world. When you see a mother feeding her child, even if it's for those few minutes in a day, or when she's just smiling at her child or the child is smiling at her or even fathers, there is love and love grows through the responsibility of looking after a child as well. I feel that the approach that one doesn't have children until one is perfect would mean that only, I guess, Jesus would be having children and then we would have a problem, I think. So the approach cannot be this self-believing, self-flagellation. You know what I mean? A spiritual journey is not about looking at what's wrong with oneself and what doesn't work. It's always and exclusively about the eye focusing on what is the truth of this being, the soul, the presence and how this is impulsing you to act. So it's a form of ego to say, I'm not good enough to have children. I mean, it's not just a form of ego. It's a nice, healthy, welfare ego that would say that. It is also in most cases, I mean, there are exceptions, but it's an escape from the responsibility of taking care of a life. We see that a lot now in Europe. The excuses they give themselves for it are actually all based on the same thing. I'm not ready. It's too complicated. It's not so simple. I don't feel I can give something. But if you don't feel you can give something and I'm not speaking about you now, this is a general statement. How are you supposed to learn how to give when you've decided not to give? And if we take children as an example, if a child cannot evoke the giving in you, then how is something else going to evoke that giving? You know what I mean? The child is also a part of the processes of the learning of the parents. It's not so simple, oh, I'm not going to put a child in this world now because then I'll make mistakes. But the mistakes you'll make if you don't put that child in the world are perhaps even bigger. A lot of the spiritual masters, these neo-advaithin spiritual masters, especially the Western ones, they tend to create an ecosystem around them with single people all bowing down to them and each one on their own little ego trip and refusing to make children because they want to dedicate to the sangha and to the master. This is not how spirituality works out in life. When a person is actually dedicated to a spiritual path and simply does not feel capable or able to have children, that is an exception. That is not considered to be something to support and encourage. And this is encouraged and supported because it supports the sangha. If people don't have families to deal with, they have time to invest in the sangha and bend down to the master and kiss her feet or his feet or God knows what other body parts. This is not what it's about. So the idea that you are not good enough is first ego at play. You are good enough. You are a source of love. It is simply the connect that has to be made and a child's presence will support that connect more than it won't, especially in the case of a seeker. I've seen that with students of mine who did not have children and I was very, very supportive that they have children. See some of those children and see how the parents have grown and evolved. Have any of you here seen one of the children or some of my students, anyone? What do you say about those kids? I mean, if they're not special kids? They're just unbelievable. They're very different and confident. Confident, defined, contoured, bright, present. So bright. So then how did they get the chance? How did they have that chance? So if you would have a child, that child has a better chance in this life than someone else on the street has a child who's not concerned with self-realization. You should see some of those children. They are just, I mean, they're very wild and that's how it's supposed to be. But the parents have grown tremendously because of the children. And the children have, they are, as she's saying, they're just really extra-ordinarily different. And why is that? Because the parents are conscious. They're taught to be conscious and not to spend their lives in a sort of bubble of delusion about spirituality. First step is to say, I'm good enough, I'm great, I'm wonderful and I know how to love. You have to say that even if you feel doubts about it. You are a source of love. The soul within you is the master of your being. That is the source of love to which you surrender and when you surrender to love, you are able to love in return. I've never said that you can't love or you're not able to. When I look at you to me, you look like a loving person so I don't know what you're talking about. I think I'm a very loving person, you are right. And because I took care of my brother and my father when my mother passed away for many years, I was like a mother. It was too big I think because I was 15 and I took care of them. But I'm sorry to insist. I've seen, in the Girivallam we've done, I've seen the kids of your students and they were amazing and smiling. And of course, my friends, kids also, they smile, da-da-da. Da-da-da, it's not da-da-da, it's actually, it's very, very hard to raise these kids so that they're always, you know, joyous. The thing is that most of my friends are divorced by now, their kids are suffering and even here I've spoken with women, they suffer from violence inside the house, their kids are violated by their father. You mean in the, my student? Not here, in the, in India, I mean, in India. I've now, I'm traveling and I talk with women. I must say most of them, when I hear I'm single, most of them, they say, ah, I get married. Some of them, that they are young, they say, never get married. It's a prison, it's horrible. Don't. I see suffering everywhere and the family that you described is maybe, for me, I think, beautiful, ideal. It's not what is happening in the world. If you look at the world around you and you're saying there's so much suffering, so there is, let's say, a lady out there who's not a spiritual seeker, who's making a child and there's you not making a child. You who's definitely far, far, far more sensitive and far more aware of that child than she is. So that's why the world is what it is because the spiritual seekers maybe should be making more children, don't you think? Okay, let me put it in another way. Since years I've been pushing people to have children who are seekers because of many reasons. One is, I've seen how they grow in their own self-realization processes when they are with children, when they're raising children. I've seen how children profit from parents like that. Those children are just different and not just students of mine. Even those who are not students of mine who have other gurus but have come and we've spoken about it and I've said, move, do it. It'll be all right. You'll be okay. Have faith in yourself, all of that, you know. And then they've taken the step and it's just, it's tough but it's also amazing how happy they are and how grateful they are that you pushed us to do this. Pushed, I don't push but I vigorously suggest, you know. If you are living in society and part of society and your contribution to society, especially as a spiritual seeker is to raise children because then you're raising more conscious children. Spiritual seekers, their contribution to this world is actually the children. And we can see that in our Sangha that it's a very floaty Sangha. There's no real contours to it but the children are really different. I mean, they just simply are. They are more aware of themselves. They're more conscious. They are more aware of the other because their parents are more aware. So are we supposed to now run this world with children like that or children like your child or that lady's child out there? That's the question. It is a matter of taking responsibility. The other thing is also that some people, rare individuals are not meant to have children. And as far as divorce and so is concerned, so amongst my students, the battle is always to keep them together till the child is at least 18. And it is difficult when two human beings have to live with each other. And it's a male and a female. It's not two males or two females. That would be easy. They have to, the ego has to adjust and break down and this and that and fight until they adjust to each other and they understand that it's for the children that they have to hold together and understand each other and so on. So to brush away the idea of having children as being something which you are not good enough for is actually, unless it's a very special circumstance where you really are not meant for it and you really get a clear answer from the source, not for you. Otherwise it's the ego telling you all of that, isn't it? Rhetorical question, hoping for an answer. Okay, my question in my head is still, okay, I agree. Why make children and not adapt so many that they're alone without parents? Is there a difference there? Somehow, at least in my continent, they wanna have their own. This for me sounds like ego, in a way. There are so many souls out there that they have no one. My friends so eagerly wanted around 30 something want, I wanna be a mother, I wanna be a mother. Just found someone and they did it and then they got divorced. So simple. None of them thought about adopting a child and not having their own. Is this ego? For a female, the material physical giving birth to a child in a natural childbirth is very directly connected with her spiritual awakening and I'll tell you precisely what I mean by that. When a female has not had a child, then there are another set of processes which apply to her but if she has had a child, the actual process of childbirth is perhaps the most powerful ego breaking exercise she will experience in her life. The actual childbirth when it breaks through is very similar in its impact on the system as it is for a man when his Kundalini pushes through and breaks open the skull. What is called the Kapala Bhedana which is actually an opening out into the, into the supreme consciousness or the opening of doors for merging with the man. If that happens up until the skull and doesn't pierce through completely, then it renders him very, very powerful because he has that entire energy within the system. For a female who has had that childbirth experience, it is such an ego breaking experience that she will suffer less in her life in other areas because the ego gets broken so badly over there in a natural childbirth. Because she's rendered that helpless that at one point she's basically ready to bend to anything and whatever is around as long as that pain would stop. So this is from a strictly spiritual point of view a pro reason for a female to have a child of her own. In the event of women who don't have that, they do have more challenges in breaking down the ego and surrendering. This is also surely very possible, no question about it. But that process of surrender is something which does not then have to be repeated because it does cause a permanent change in her perception of the world around her and in how she actually treats the other. Because in that moment of helplessness, it's just that extreme that she bends. For those who from an egoistic standpoint push through to have a child, it is because there is that impulse of course within that wants this system to experience those processes because they do, without a doubt, they do contribute to increased surrender in the system. For example, the patience required for breastfeeding. I mean most mothers by the time six months are over, they just want to scream every time. But the patience required to breastfeed, the patience required to even allow this body to do what it's doing is all ego-breaking exercises. So it works advantageously for a female to actually have the physical process of having a child. And if she has crossed an age where she cannot have children anymore, then she has to take up other processes to break down the ego because otherwise life will be painful. And women, for example, not just one or two but many, tell me why did you not force us to have a child? They've crossed 45 and 15 years ago I was pleading with them, find a man, bend down, surrender a little bit, it'll be fine at least. But it was like, no, no, no, no, no. And now they've crossed 45 and they are just blaming me because they feel that I have not somehow pushed them hard enough at that time. So we need to really consider if we are still in the age of childbearing, we need to rethink very, very strongly. The pain is pretty extreme afterwards. So then if one can have a child, it is all right to take that up. The question about they just find somebody, they have a child and then they get divorced. Even if they adopt a child, it'll be the same thing. So adopting or not adopting is an individual decision. The issue I think that you came here with was not so much about adopting but more about the importance at all of having a child under the circumstances that we are all in today. Isn't that more your question? It's almost. Because adopting, I mean, if you adopt a child, you still have to look after it, you still have to feed it, you still have to clothe it, you have to do everything and you still can divorce the father. And the trauma to the child is perhaps even more, we don't know. So I think that the issue here is more about the individual taking up the decision to take responsibility for another life, whether adopted or one's own. And that is the crucial discourse. Because increasing numbers of people are like, I don't know what I'm on my trip, I need to know myself. I can't raise a child if I don't know myself. And they just don't have children. And the thing is that a child also contributes to the breaking down of the ego of the parent. When you have a child, you're sitting nicely there at your laptop, it comes and pees on your laptop. And then you just have to wake up, you know. Yes, but at what cost for the child? If the parent is more coming to self-realization, and what about the child? If it is a person who is spiritually inclined, it is still better that the earth sees a child from that person than from the other person. It is also a social function. And isn't it better that you and she and she that you bring children to this world? You're sitting in a satsang. Why are you sitting in a satsang? Because you are sensitive enough and loving enough that you are ready to actually take the time to know yourself. Then isn't it better that you have a child than the one on the street who has no idea about anything. And that that child that has to take birth anyway takes birth in a home where the parents at least spent three and a half seconds a day thinking about something more than just which is the latest television they're going to buy. One has to look at that discourse relatively and seen from the point of view of the children. It is rather they take birth as her child than as a child of some strange woman who's basically just interested in getting her next refrigerator or a better car and doesn't care at all about the child. So seen from that point of view it makes more sense for a spiritual seeker to have children and more children than someone who isn't or even a religious person. You know how many people have come to satsangs and then have heard me say this and have actually taken that step and they've always come and said thank you so much for having said this because many spiritual teachers don't advise that even it's insanity for a spiritual master to advise their students not to have children unless they are really really really deeply deeply sure about it and are clearly on the path of service to Sangha without any call for procreation anywhere in their system any single cell of their body there are exceptions like that we have them here and there but not so many to give a child the chance to be mothered by you is something quite beautiful to do and sometimes it's not that important the father is like this he has to have this much money he has to be a doctor he has to have a swimming pool he has to be this we have always long lists of what we expect from the other person I'm not saying you but I'm saying in general and sometimes it's alright to bend that list a little bit and say well if it's somewhat someone kind of okay you know I'll also bend a little bit and there's no need to think of marriage and parenting for a whole lifetime think of just 18 years till the child is 18 and then after that you can see if you want to look here or there it's also okay you cannot be damned to a whole lifetime with one person it's taking the responsibility for the time that the child is not yet conceptually completed as an 18 year old after that and that too mainly the first child unless there's a big gap and then one flows with that story what happens after that what I've seen quite interesting is that those people who go into their relationship with the idea okay we'll stay together for 18 years and then we'll see about experimenting most of the time after that they don't want to experiment because they are free they have the freedom and when they have the freedom they don't want to run away because there's no prison you would be an amazing mother amazing the sheep has sailed already maybe so maybe there's a maybe there maybe it hasn't as far as I'm concerned I'm not willing to do a child without the father I would like someone to be like father yes but how will you find a father for your children if you're not open to it at all yes that's what I'm saying so that's why I say the sheep has sailed I think I have to say this because I don't want you to tell me in five years why didn't you tell me so you have not been open to a partner deep down inside because you know that if a partner turns up you would be wanting actually to have a child and you're not sure if you want that whole drama so you are not open to a partner in the first place it's not that the partner hasn't turned up that's why you're not having the child you are not open to it could be it is like that not could be that's why I'm sitting here because I can sense it and why not now you can maybe think about what I'm saying you can go and think because if you open up he will turn up and you don't open up to the partner you open up to the soul to the thing which is love within the being and you open up to that that which is meant to be with you will come it's no doubt about it but the readiness to take the responsibility for a child and to raise a child it is a very very tough challenge but it is your contribution to society because as a spiritual seeker and finder you are you're more equipped than anybody else to actually raise children let me see just be open don't be afraid so many people raise children in this world they all survive it let me see I'm not forcing you I'm just saying I don't want to take the karma of not having pushed hard with you it has nothing to do with you it's a personal responsibility to take up or not it has to do with me if I'm sitting here and you're sitting here as long as you're sitting here and I'm sitting here in this in this framework in this room it has everything to do with me so I have to say it and it is out of love that I say it I'm not pushing an agenda through it's love for you because I know that you would be an amazing mother and it would fulfill you which doesn't mean that it has to be that way any idea in your head that you might not be able to love the child and all is nonsense love is being in surrender mode I'm not trying to force you into anything but I'm trying to make it clear that if there is anything in your system which is resisting having a child that in your case for sure it's coming from the ego that much I have to tell you because that's why I'm sitting here not to be nice to you that there are other people one can go and listen but the fact is that the ego is something very very what's the English word for Haim Turkish anyone speaks German here German, no Haim Turkish English word is difficult but it's a very nice word for it means it's it's very sly the ego is very sly always convince us that what we think and we opinionate about that's the right way and this is the thing for me but it's not the thing for you if you quiet down and find out you'll find out it's not the thing unless there's a very very deep conviction born out of the impulse of truth because no you are not to have a child which I doubt very much will be the case in your case because there is that ability in you to give to love you know it's true and why refute it because you started out your question by saying I know that I'm not capable of loving that was what you said at the beginning of this talk you said I know we are not capable of loving that's what you said you said we but you were referring to yourself right but you are capable because there is fear that's why I said yes and I know that fear is ego but sometimes fear protects us from our faults indeed fear mainly protects on the physical level there is absolute material fear than we know there's something going on which we are not capable of actually sensing through the other senses but generally any kind of conceptual fear is emerging in ego when it's a conceptual fear when it's thought it's emerging in ego most of the time this is a very tough topic and a lot of women get very angry when I speak like this and I'm just saying that it is tough I will not budge on this position I will not