Q: In some of his books Master refers to meditation on the form of the Master and how beneficial it is. As we are told to meditate on divine light in the heart, this leads to confusion sometimes...?
PR: Master has written in his books it was for himself alone, if I remember right. And subsequently he has clarified in many places that we should follow the practice prescribed. And the prescribed practice is meditation on light in the heart. Subsequently he also clarifies that when the devotion for the Master is so great that the form of the Master appears in the heart, then it is the right time to meditate on the form of the Master. If we start meditating on the form before the form appears itself, by itself, naturally, then it becomes artificial. What it really means is that the Master must become the light of our life, then we find Him instead of the light; then is the appropriate time.
The second thing is when the form appears, we must meditate on the full form, not just on the face. That is from the foot up to the top of the head, everything must be there. Now when it is artificial, and people take the form of the Master for meditation, they take only the face. For the Master Babuji it was possible, because the moment he saw Him he developed a hundred per cent devotion for Him. Therefore he could start to do meditation on the form of his Master. It doesn't apply for all of us.
Then once I discussed with Master, there is a third stage. And that is when the form also disappears from the heart. And I think we come to the stage which Master calls light without luminosity. So we have the first stage which is light in the heart, when people sometimes see the light itself as a luminous thing. As we advance it becomes light without any features, just the idea of light is there.
So in the first stage we have a sort of refinement from the grosser light to the subtle light. Then the idea of devotion brings the Master into the heart. And for most, if not all abhyasis it stops with that. I mean the idea of the Master in the heart; the presence of the Master goes on and on, you see.
The third stage, when the form also disappears, there is nothing in the heart, no light, no form, nothing. That I think is a very difficult and very rare condition. It is also very difficult, because to have to meditate on nothing or nothingness is almost impossible. The other difficulty is we become attached in an emotional way to the form of the Master, and we are not willing to give it up. I think the third stage is possible only when we can love the Master without loving his form itself. I would suggest that that is the requirement of all love; that the love of the form is transferred to the love of the essence which has no form.
Jealousy
Q: Which is the root for jealousy? How can we co-operate with the Master to let this jealousy drop away?
PR: I think we should call Dorothea to answer this question. Psychologist ... Yes, really, I would like to know what you think about it.
DOROTHEA: I do believe that if a little child cannot establish a relationship towards her or his mother, then a certain psychological disturbance can arise in the little child which prevents the child really from being able to communicate later on with other persons. And this child has a deficit, it lacks something. Now, under such circumstances, the child feels the need to compete with other persons and needs confirmation, confirmation from the outside. There is no assurance for that child to be loved by the outside world. There are further stages of evolution of this phenomenon which is called jealousy, and there is one when the child is about three or four years old. And then something will happen, I think. Now, at the age of three or four, the child has to learn that there is essentially from that age on a triangular relationship between the child and the mother and the father, and no longer the bilateral relationship which has existed until then between the child and the mother. And many people do appear to get stuck on that level of evolution, to stay at the evolution of three or four years. (That is really, in terms of not being able to tolerate triangular relationships, that the person gets stuck emotionally, in terms of emotional maturity. But otherwise the person evolves.)
Now this concerns the origin or the roots of that feeling or that negative emotion which is called jealousy.
PR: What about the remedy? [laughter] Why do we get stuck at the age of three or four? I agree, we have to get used to a triangular relationship, and we don't want that. But surely, when we become adult, this should drop off?
DOROTHEA: Now, this has to do with the parental relationship. If one part of the parents, either the mother or the father, tries to take possession of the child, if either the father or the mother really binds the child in order to establish a bilateral and exclusive relationship, then ex definitione, the child is unable to develop the capacity of a triangular relationship.
PR: I agree. [laughter] But that is not the entire solution, you see. One of the intentions of growing up — I'm not saying that we grow up intentionally, but we do grow up — and one of the intentions or the aims of growing up is to forget these traumas of childhood. Generally, in India we believe that when the first child is followed by the second child, then the second child gets all the attention of the mother. So the first child gets jealous. I think that is what happens here in the Mission also. Because once we have the first group of abhyasis, let us say in a particular city X. This group has a sort of a group
identity, it is as if it is one individual, and there are not many problems between the members of that group. But when a second group starts forming, the members of the first group become jealous of the members of the second group. This is my observation. And what happens is, some of the members of the newer group are absorbed into the first group, and they start becoming jealous of the remainder of the second group, you see. So, my impression is — I mean, I'm not a psychologist, but this is based on observation — my impression is that when your identity is threatened then you become jealous of that which is the threat to your identity. And this is strengthened when the preceptor or the Master gives more attention to the new members than to the older members. It is necessary to give that attention. And I think it is a sign of maturity that a senior or an advanced member should recognize that the new person needs more attention, therefore he is getting more attention. It is a sign of the abhyasi's maturity. So, my observation is that jealousy is not because of not getting something tangible like progress, it is a craving for attention.
That is a sufficient answer for that question, because if you go further, it is becoming psychological, analytical; it's not necessary.
At the root of that need for attention is always insecurity. Now, when we come to a spiritual system like Sahaj Marg, this insecurity should not remain. Because we talk so much of the Master and what he is doing for us, how he looks after us in a total way. So, like almost all beliefs, these beliefs are with the intellect and not with the heart. And therefore, these negative things persist even after years of abhyas. So, jealousy, if it is there in an advanced level, it only shows lack of faith in the Master. It is rather unfortunate, because it also shows that they are not aware of what they have got. Because if they could see their inner condition, the spiritual condition, they would understand what the Master has already done for them. And that would surely remove all feelings of insecurity and therefore jealousy.
So, there is one very definite way of progressing out of this rather childish emotion, and that is to try and maintain a diary, so that you know what you are getting, how much you are developing, how much you are progressing. And that will help us to separate the attention that we get from the progress that is given to us.
I often give the example of a doctor coming to a neighbour's house every day, you see, and you are jealous that the doctor is coming to him, but not to us. But when we understand that the doctor's attention is needed there because somebody is sick, then we are relieved that the doctor is not coming to us.
So, what it really means is, there are two aspects to the preceptor's or the Master's work: one is the attention that they give to the abhyasi to remove the effects, to remove grossness and to bring them up to a certain level; the second is the progress that everybody gets — deserving or undeserving — because that is by the grace of the Master. So, if we attend to our progress, we will not be attentive to his attention to others. And only at that stage this problem goes, finally. That's all.