Misery (Continued)
Bangalore Ashram, India,
27th November, 1997
Chapter 1 - The You That You Want To Change
Day 25 - Misery (Continued)
Your attraction or craving can exist only as long as you think someone is “other”. When you think they are a part of you or your self, then the attraction dies out. That is why a husband or a wife may not be attracted to their partner but to someone else, because their partner has already become a part of them.
When you realise everyone is part of your self, you enjoy the whole world without a sense of craving. When ashaucha happens, quickly come back to shaucha. Suppose you feel drowned in any worldly event, just know this is ashaucha - “That is why I am miserable”. Then come back to shaucha.
Your practices, meditation, Sudarshan Kriya, service, and Satsang will all help you. When you share your misery, it does not reduce. When you do not share your joy, it reduces. Share your problems only with the Divine, not with anyone else, as that will only increase the problems. Share your joy with everyone.
Question - How do we help people who share their misery with us?
Gurudev - I have a thousand and one ways. Often it happens that when they share their problem with me, it is immediately resolved. Other times it requires some patience. Just know that all will be taken care of.
Listen to others, yet do not listen. If your mind gets stuck in
their problems, not only are they miserable, but you also become miserable. Be caring and share with them the knowledge. The mind lives on “more”. Misery starts with “more and more” and misery makes you dense and gross. The self is subtle.
To go from gross to subtle, you must go through the finest level of the relative, the atom. To overcome aversion, hatred, jealousy, attraction or entanglements, you have to take yourself to the atom. Taking yourself to the atom means accepting a tiny bit of all of this. It may be difficult to accept something you do not like but you can definitely accept a tiny bit of itan atom.
The moment you accept that
one atom, you will see change occur but this must be done ina meditative state. Suppose you love someone. You want more and more of them, yet there is no fulfilment. In anuvrat, the vow of an atom, you take just one atom of that person and that is enough to bring fulfilment to you.
Though the river is vast, a little sip quenches your thirst. Though the earth has so much food, just a small bite satisfies your hunger. All that you need are tiny bits. Accept a tiny bit of everything in life, that will bring you fulfilment.
Question - What about trouble?
Gurudev - There is so much trouble in the world, you can accept just a tiny part of it. Tonight go to bed feeling that you are satisfied, taking a tiny part of divinity with you. Satisfaction comes from the subtle and not from “more and more”.
Question - What about giving?
Gurudev - You take a tiny part, and the rest you give away. Each experience completes. Completion means being led to void or nothing. In the progression of life, you will leave behind every experience saying, “This is nothing”. Anything that is completed loses its importance.
It leads you to void, it is nothing. A sign of intelligence is how soon you arrive at this understanding. Examine everything in life and say, “This is nothing and what remains is love, and that is everything. When” this is nothing” does not come out of knowledge, it will come out of misery.
Either through knowledge or through misery, you come to the point of “this is nothing, this is nothing”. The choice of how you come to that point is yours. If you got this, it is really nothing. If you did not get this, never mind, this is nothing.