Q: Why does a human being deserve a Master to be sent by God?
PR: This is like why a mother should have compassion on her child. Because after all, you see, there are two points. One is, we say that God is love, God is everything. But I think the more important thing is that God is inside His creation as well as outside His creation. That is why all mysticism says, God is in our heart, too. So when we suffer, in some way God suffers with us. It is in the same way that we suffer, when our children suffer, because we are part of our children, they are part of us. That is why it is so easy to suffer when our children suffer, but we don't suffer for neighbours' children.
So, in a philosophic sense we can say all suffering is because of the suffering the self undergoes as part of the other person. One of our Upanishads says — you know that is called the Prahadarnya Upanishad, it is the most famous Upanishad — a rishi is telling his wife, "Not for the sake of the wife is the wife dear to the husband, my dear, it is for the sake of the self in the wife that the wife is dear to the husband," you see.
Now this is why, as long as this idea of 'I' and 'mine' persists, we suffer for all that which is mine, like our business, our house. If my house burns down, I suffer, but I don't suffer if my neighbour's house burns down, because part of me is not in that house. I have not put anything into it, you understand? Now comes a very important point: that if a man is dehumanized out of this feeling of 'I' and 'mine', he becomes compassion-less, sympathy-less. But when you are in a right mystic path, and you are progressively becoming divinised as we say, there is more and more of yourself in everything else, not just in your family, not just in your house, but in the whole universe at one stage. Because instead of just one wife being mine and five children being mine and one house being mine, we begin to feel that all humanity is our brothers and sisters, that everywhere whatever exists is ours. Because part of us is in everything. So what happens is that instead of becoming dehumanized, as it has happened in some systems, we become super-humanized. So, what happens is — now I come to this young lady's, my sister's question — now what happens is, his compassion extends to everything in the universe, his love extends to everything in the universe.
What it really means is, there is no question of deservingness. He comes where he is needed, we don't have to deserve it. And that is the greatest mercy of divinity. Because if we would have to wait till we become deserving, he would never come to us.
Guilt
Q: 1) Sometimes abhyasis go through what one might call a dark period. Knowing our behavior is not appropriate, we develop a tendency to avoid the Master because of our feelings of shame. What is the best way to deal with such guilt feelings?
2) In Ram Chandra's autobiography volume two, reference is sometimes made to Master cutting off the abhyasis' connection to the Divine on Lalaji's instructions. What can make an abhyasi so guilty as to merit this? Can one become guilty by the weight of one's samskaras, or can one only be guilty because it is an act of free will?
PR: Should we again have a psychologist to try and answer this question? No? There is a saying in English, "Where ignorance is bliss, it is folly to be wise." It's a problem. There is also the state of innocence as they call it, before the Garden of Eden in the Christian tradition. If we relate these two ideas, we can perhaps come to the conclusion that knowledge is what brings guilt into the picture. Knowledge of what? Knowledge of what we should do and what we should not do.
It is a significant thing that when the fall of Adam and Eve came about, it was because they ate of the fruit of the tree of knowledge. And I think this knowledge was precisely the knowledge of guilt. Before they ate the fruit they were perfectly happy, they were doing the same things, but they were totally innocent of what they were doing. But the moment they had the knowledge of what they could and could not do, or should and should not do, they became culpable.
We can condense this idea and say that one of the prices we have to pay for knowledge is guilt. When we are children we have no guilt because we still don't know what is right and what is wrong. We just live, we just exist. That is why the stage of childhood is called the stage of innocence. But when you grow up, and the knowledge of what is right and what is wrong is acquired by us, the feeling of guilt or its contrary, the feeling of having done one's duty, both come to us. So we can conclude that there is a sense of guilt only when we do wrong knowingly. I don't think anybody felt guilty about doing something wrong without knowing that it is wrong. It never happens. We may feel embarrassed, we may feel even angry with ourselves, but we don't feel guilty.
Now, when we have done something knowing that it is wrong to do it, and when it is that knowledge that it is wrong that has given us the feeling of guilt, who is to be blamed except ourselves? We have to correct ourselves.
Now it is a common human tendency to blame everything else for our problems. Even when we eat something and we know it is not good to eat it, and then we fall sick, we blame everything else. And that we do because we don't want to feel guilty. And I think it is related to the ego, and the ego does not want to accept anything against itself. In a sense, I may say that a sense of guilt or a feeling of guilt is the strongest attack
against our own egos. And therefore, there is a very strong reaction against feelings of guilt.
Now what happens in the case of abhyasis? Like everybody, when we are children we live in a state of natural innocence. Then it is possible we live for some years in a state of ignorance, not so much innocence, but ignorance. Then comes the stage in which we cannot be ignorant any longer, but we become wise, and then comes the feeling of guilt. And in abhyasis who have been conditioned by social conditions to accept what they are doing is right, the feeling of guilt comes, when they know it was wrong and it could never have been right. That is the moment when we understand that society does not give us the permission to behave as we choose, it is our conscience which has to give us this permission. And depending on what we have done, the feeling of guilt may be weak, may be very strong, may be unbearable.
Now it is a fortunate thing that one can feel guilty only about what has happened. So here is where the mercy of the Master comes and he says, "Don't worry about what has happened, this is in the past, you cannot possibly correct it or change it now. But you can certainly make amends for it, repent for it, by correcting yourself now." And Babuji adds the very, very important advice that if you go on dwelling on your guilt, you are deepening the impressions of what you have already done and making stronger and stronger samskaras. So, Babuji says, "Repent for what you have done." And a true repentance consists not in saying "I repent! I repent!" a thousand times, but in determining once and for all not to commit the mistakes again. And what about removing the effects of the thing we have done? That is taken care of in the cleaning. So, in our system of Sahaj Marg, we have a very healthy way of handling guilt, and it is not only healthy, it is the most effective.
Now we come to one interesting point. In our groups all over Europe and in the West, there are many people who have come out of the Christian tradition. The interesting thing is that all of them left the church because of the fact or because of their feeling that the church made them feel guilty. Now I was not only amused but astonished at the immense capacity of the human mind to transfer its own guilt to something else. I think this begins with our youth, when we cross the age of three and a half or four, that this capacity develops in us to transfer the blame to somebody or something else. From the time we are little boys or girls this starts, always the blame is on somebody else, it's not ours. Now this is not a very wonderful discovery, we all know it, but what is interesting about it is that the very people who left the church, because of feelings of guilt are unable to leave Sahaj Marg because of these feelings of guilt. Do you know why? It is because a church is a mindless, soulless organization, and it is easy to blame such an organization and get away with it. In effect we are blaming God.
But when we come to Sahaj Marg, and we are taught and we believe and we accept the teaching that it is our samskaras which make us responsible for our existence, then we have to face the blame very squarely for the first time ourselves. Therefore, the feelings of guilt are much more terrible in a spiritual system. Why? Because we cannot possibly
run away from ourselves. It is easy to run away from the home or from the church or even from your country, but where can you run away from yourself?
So, that is as far as the situation is concerned. How to change it? We know very well, you see. Do the cleaning better, forget the feeling of guilt and deposit even that feeling with the Master. And then take the next very important, but more difficult step of changing your way of life, so that in the future there should be no guilt. The way is: right thought, leading to right action, leading to feelings of satisfaction, achievement and ability to face the self and say, "Yes, you are good," and then progress.
Now, of course, in religion they also have tried this, especially in the Catholic tradition, by this confession — you know, when you go to a priest and confess. I believe it has not worked out for several reasons. The first reason is that you feel that when you have confessed you are free to do all the things all over again and make a confession next week. The second reason is more important. It makes us feel ashamed of ourselves; we have to talk about what we have done to somebody else. So, in that tradition, the confession adds instead of removing our guilt. It adds a sense of freedom to repeat your own mistakes again and adds to the burden of shame, and nothing is removed. Those of you who have read Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment will be familiar with the way he has treated this psychological problem.
Now, what is the beauty of our system? Because it is beautiful, it is glorious, and it is the most compassionate system, if you will understand how it works. There is no need of any confession here. The Master does not wish to know any details of what we have done. On the contrary, without knowing anything, he gives us a blank cheque. "Anything you may have done does not matter, I shall take care of it. But in future, you have to be correct." What it amounts to is that in one grand act of compassion he removes all the effects of the past and opens up a future for you.
I would like to repeat a story I have repeated so many times about a young man who came to see Dr. Varadachari. The young man was weeping very much, you see, very bitterly. "What is the matter with you?" The boy came and fell down before Dr. Varadachari and said, "I have sinned, please help me." Dr. Varadachari became very angry. He said, "Sinned? What sin have you committed? Have you eaten some meat or drunk a bottle of wine or gone with some girl? Which fool has not done these things? What is it that you have done which is so wonderful that you have to weep over it? Come to me when you have done something original." You see, the wisdom of how he handled that young man, because he gave him the feeling that what he had done was not something wonderful, everybody is doing it. But don't continue to do it.
Now this is something very important we have to understand: that as far as the Master in Sahaj Marg is concerned, He has no concern with our past. He has the immense capacity to remove every bit of samskara from us in one second. But Babuji always insisted that once you have come, now you have to follow and obey a certain way of living, if you are interested in your own future. So he gives us the freedom of deciding whether we want to change, and if we want to change, he is willing to assist us, but on
condition that we follow what he says we should do. And he made it very clear several times, "I have nothing to do with what you have already done, but I have everything to do with what you have to do. And therefore, whatever I say must be done, you see, in your own interest, please remember this."
This is the most important thing we have to remember, we come here for our benefit, and if we are sincerely interested in our own future, we have to conform to certain things. Now I would like to draw your attention to one of the most remarkable features of Sahaj Marg. It is the Ten Maxims of Sahaj Marg. When you compare it with other systems, you find its immense wisdom, its immense generosity, its immense compassion. Why? Because it tells you what to do, and not what not to do. And its compassion lies in the fact that it gives you a set of norms by which to live, which if you are not able to do, there's no feeling of guilt attached to it. So that is a master-stroke of the Master, you see. That he could give us a code of conduct which would never make us feel guilty, even if you could not achieve it. And what is its wisdom? It tells you exactly what should be done, there is no confusion.
So this is the greatness of the Sahaj Marg system, that it links a wise way of teaching with a compassionate way of dealing with us, with the ultimate promise of the highest goal of achievement that can be available to us. And my Master has assured me many times that when the abhyasi tries his best, he's always taken up, irrespective of the result he achieves. And that is an act of love. Because what it amounts to is that he tells us, "You do it, I'll give you the results." So to put it in a very trite way, we are even relieved of the responsibility of the result for our actions. That is why I always say, no, we have no miracles in Sahaj Marg, the progress of every abhyasi is a miracle. Because what we do, even the most willing of us, it's so little, and what we get is so tremendously enormous. So that is the answer to the question about guilt, very long, but I like to explain so many things which involves Sahaj Marg in giving an answer, you see.
Now the second question was something to do with Babuji cutting off the connection of abhyasis on the instructions of Lalaji. That is something I cannot explain now. Except to say one thing, and that is, that when the need to do such a thing arises, the most anguished person is the Master Himself. And if an abhyasi claims to love his Master, the minimum thing he can do is to conduct himself in such a way that he would never give the Master this anguish of cutting him away, you see. Also it is morbid to think of the negative side. So let us think of the positive, the glorious ... how we can be eternally connected with the Master, how we can enjoy his eternal beneficence, how we can enjoy his eternal love. Why should we think about a connection which can be cut? Because we are not, I'm sure, thinking of behaving in such a way that he's going to cut us off.
Only one concluding remark ... that abhyasis show fear of such things only when they are not able to change themselves or are not willing to change themselves. This attitude we should give up. You know, we are all citizens of this world. We don't go around asking, "Can I be jailed? Can I be put in jail?" We don't ask. It is a matter of simple psychology. Suppose I'm at the airport in Munich, and I like a chair, and I ask you, "If I take away this chair, can I be put in jail?" It means I'm thinking of taking it away, you
see. Therefore, whenever I see somebody who is afraid of any specified consequence, it is a clear indication he is proposing to do it, and therefore he is afraid of the consequence. It is a hint to the preceptors, that on such occasions they should do intensive cleaning of such abhyasis. Thank you.