2. Stages of master-disciple relationship
There are many levels in the master-disciple relationship. The first is purely at the intellectual level, based on doubt more than anything else. Numerous doubts keep coming up all the time. You think, 'Eh! He seems to be hardly thirty years of age. How can he be a master? He doesn't seem to be highly educated or qualified. How does he get thousands of people to listen to him?' You have your doubts, you are cynical. In the zone of pure intellect the relationship never happens.
The next step is from intellect to intelligence. From the negativity of doubt you move to, 'Why not attend this program and see what this person is really doing?' Instead of remaining with 'What can he do?' you move to 'I think he means something. But I neither believe nor disbelieve. Ok, let me see.' The intellect starts to become intelligence.
Then next, if you continue to look in, you move from intelligence to intelligence with emotion like 60% intelligence, 40% emotion. You feel that the master is a good friend. You think, 'He can guide me a little bit here and there, wherever I need guidance. I have an idea of how my life should be, so he doesn't have to teach me everything, but wherever I need to make some decisions, I can take his help.' This is looking at the master as a friend. That's what we call sakha bhava, the friendly attitude.
This is like using a stick to walk with. You use the stick when there are ups and downs. After that, by and by, slowly, when you go through some serious problems like depression and low mood, when you are not able to help yourself with his words, you ask him, 'Your teachings are great but at this moment I am not able to follow them. What do I do?' Then he supports you mentally, psychologically also. Then you realize that the stick alone may not be enough, that you need more support. Then you reach out for his hand and with his help you start walking again. The gratitude towards him increases while holding his hand.
If you have only the stick, then it is a friendly attitude, the intelligent emotion. If you start holding his hand, he will start lifting you, then slowly it becomes emotion-intelligence. In this stage you move from intelligence to 'intelligence with emotion' like 60% intelligence and 40% emotion. This attitude is what I call feeling the master like a father or mother.
From being a friend he becomes a father or mother. Slowly, very slowly, the relationship deepens. You settle down and think, 'He is not just a friend. He is not just a person who gives me suggestions and ideas. He takes me out of my problems also.'
Then slowly, again and again when you are helped every moment beyond your expectation, the feeling within you toward him becomes pure emotion. He fills you, he fills your heart. You have a problem forgetting him. That is the moment you feel like bowing down to him like a servant, not with shame but with revered humility that you have found someone to surrender all your problems to. This was how Hanuman felt towards his master Rama in the Hindu epic Ramayana. He was completely devoted to Rama. A deep connection of high emotion happens with this kind of relationship. This attitude is much more emotional than the earlier one. It is a mix of 60% emotion and 40% intelligence.
Then, by and by, you move in deeper emotionally and you become protective of the master. Instead of asking attention from him and taking help from him, you want to support him, love him and attend to him. Your attitude becomes that of a nurturing mother. This is a state of pure emotion. It is the primal need of a mother to ensure the wellbeing of her child.
In these four states of intelligence, intelligence-emotion, emotion-intelligence and pure emotion, your life is separate and independent from the master's life. You just take help from him to help your life, to enrich your life, that's all.
When the emotional attitude ripens, you start feeling that your life is no longer separate from his. You then move from the emotional level to the being level. You feel like sacrificing yourself to take care of him and dedicating your life to him. There is a merger at the being level, even stronger than the emotional connection of a mother and child. It is a connection of deep love, without any gender consciousness. This is what is called madhura bhava, an intense mix of emotional and being level attitude.
When the madhura bhava becomes intense, suddenly you experience that there is no 'he' and 'you'. There are no two different beings. You and he are one and the same. You start experiencing the maha bhava, experiencing you as the master. You experience the ultimate, tat tvam asi - That art Thou.
First intellect, then intelligence, then 60% intelligence and 40% emotion, then 60% emotion and 40% intelligence, then 100% emotion, then 60% emotion and 40% being, then pure 100% being.
This is how step by step you start experiencing and growing in the master-disciple relationship. But at any time, any one attitude may be more prominent than the others.
Everyone grows collectively in energy, yet each one's relationship with the master is unique. That is the beauty of it! Be it dasa bhava, the master-servant relationship as existed between Rama and Hanuman, or vatsalya bhava, mother's love*, as between Yashoda and Krishna, or sakha bhava, friendship, as between Krishna and Arjuna, or matru bhava, child's love for mother as between Ramakrishna and Mother Kali, or madhura bhava*, love of the beloved, as was between Radha and Krishna - each bhava, the attitude, is unique to that relationship, between that disciple and the master. Each disciple progresses with the master in search of his reality in the path that is best for him to progress.
2.1 How to be with the master – be open
When you are with the master, be completely open. Don't be frozen. Understand that life is a lot more than logic. Let go of your logic and be completely open and aware.
When you let go and are open, the master is such a live energy that you will be transformed. You will be a new being, you will be a new energy and you will be a new consciousness.
I can say it in just one statement: you will be new! You will be 'new' and 'clear', you will be 'nuclear'!
You will feel lighter. You would have lost the weight of the 'tumors' you were carrying but that were not part of you, that were a disturbance in you. Something that is supposed to be an inherent part of you can never be a disturbance to you. If it is a disturb-ance, it was never meant to be a part of you. So just be open so the 'master surgeon' can remove these tumors you have been carrying for life over life.
When you are with the master, be total. It is not a question of whether you agree or disagree with what the master tells you. You have to go beyond agreement and disagreement. When you see the sun rise, can you say you agree or disagree with it? No! It is, that's all. In the same way, the master is, that's all. Once that feeling becomes a part of you, nothing more needs to be done from your side. Then you have given the master the permission to reveal yourself to you.
To be a disciple means to be completely open to the master, not afraid in any way, not hiding yourself in any way, being totally authentic to the core.
Then the master can do his work on you. He will push you in directions you would never have thought you are capable of handling. He will inspire you into moments and situations you would have been otherwise afraid of. He will expand your boundaries continuously till you ultimately realize there are no boundaries, there are no limits. Then you also become like him. You too become a completely free, limitless Paramahamsa!
All you need to do is be open to the master, to Existence. When you are open, you are expressing your trust in the master. This trust is all that is needed to form the beautiful bridge between you and Existence.
A small story:
A disciple fell into the river Ganga. His master was sitting on the banks of the Ganga. On seeing him the disciple shouted, 'Save me! Save me! God, save me! Master, save me!'
The master replied, 'Fool! Stand up. Save yourself.' The disciple shouted back, 'Teach me your philosophy later. First save me. My life is in danger. Just save me!'
The master did not even move. He repeated, 'Fool! Save yourself! Stand up.' The disciple cried out, 'I thought you were my master. Save me, save me!' Now the master shouted in a loud voice, 'Idiot! Stand up!'
The disciple got frightened and stood up… and saw that the water was only up to his waist!
You also struggle because you have 'fallen into water' but do not realize it is only up to your waist! It is only when you listen to the master and stand up do you realize the water just reaches your waist and you can simply relax. All the worries that you thought were destroying your life don't really exist in reality. They are mostly only in your imagination. They never come out true.
So understand, when I say 'I will take care', I am actually giving you the stick with which to stand up. When the master says, 'I will take care', if you doubt it, you simply miss an opportunity to stand up.
2.2 Burn your samskaras in the master's presence
A beautiful incident from the enlightened master, Ramana Maharishi's life:
There was a disciple who was writing the Ramana Purana , verses in praise of Ramana Maharishi. But he had what you call the 'writer's block' and he was stuck at one point. Somehow, whenever you write with ego, the 'writer's block' will happen. Anyhow, that disciple came to Ramana Maharishi and said, 'Bhagavan , I am not able to write further, please help me.' Bhagavan said, 'Put that paper down and leave. I will talk to you later.'
The disciple put the paper down and went out. The next day when he came back, he saw that the whole poem had been completed! Ramana Maharishi had written 300 lines himself. When the book was printed, the writer enclosed those 300 lines within quotes and below he put a footnote, 'These 300 lines were written by Bhagavan Himself.'
Bhagavan saw the book and asked, 'Oh! So then, the other lines are written by you? Alright!'
The disciple later says, 'Something simply broke in me when he said that. Tears rolled down, and I just dropped at the feet of Bhagavan and never got up again.'
Just that one comment was enough for this disciple, Muruganar to become enlightened!
Understand, just like Muruganar's one engram or engraved memory of writer's ego, you also carry many engrams. When you are caught in an engram, just be in the master's presence. You will be completely healed of it.
The big problem is that the engram will not allow you to acknow-ledge that you even have an engram. It will justify itself because it is a question of survival for itself.
That is why I always tell people, when you are caught in engrams, when you are overwhelmed by these powerful unconscious drivers of anger, lust, greed, fear, depression or jealousy, never make a major decision. Just be in the master's presence. Never miss that wonderful opportunity. You will be completely healed and you will be able to come out of it. Never escape from the master when you are caught by engrams.
Whenever somebody is depressed and he leaves me, I feel so much for him. It is not because I have one person less in the mission. No! It is because he left me at the time of depression. If this same person leaves me when he is happy, it is alright. It is a normal relationship. He will carry me in him wherever he goes. But if he is in a depressed state, not only will he not grow, but he will never come out of that engram also. It will become a serious wound in him like a cat that is burnt by hot milk. It will never again go near milk.
Never decide on anything when you are in the low mood. The low mood will naturally itself distort the facts for you. It is not the right condition to take any big decision. You have to wait to swing to a good mood when things will be clearer. Always take a big decision only when you are in a cheerful mood, when you are in a positive state of mind. Just like how you decide anything in the light of day when you are awake and not in the dead of the night when you are asleep, in the same way decide this too when you are in awareness and not when in turmoil.
Be very clear, the low also will pass just like the high mood passed. That is the very nature of the mind, it is like a wheel. What is down has to come up. Neither the 'up' nor the 'down' can be said to be more real than the other. They are both there, that's all. Trusting the positive more is a choice that you have.
If someone decides to leave when they are in depression or low mood, the problem is his mind will come back to a high and when that happens he will repent his decision. Then it will be difficult to come back because he will be caught in guilt and will not feel qualified to come back.
I always tell people, never leave when you are depressed. If you are depressed, that is the right time to be around me. Trying to move away from me when you are caught in engrams is just as if you are sick and you do not want to be with a doctor! This is actually the right time to be with a doctor!