Master: Keeper of the Key
Beloved Master,
You say that your mission is to transform the individual. You have said that transformation of the individual is the greatest miracle a master can perform. Can you elaborate on this please?
In a university, a competition was organized on the subject of 'What would you do if you were the last person on earth?'
Students and teachers came up with many creative and many crazy ideas.
One said, 'Now I have the whole world to myself, that is what I wanted all the time. I will have no one to bother me; not my parents, not my siblings, not my friends. I will enjoy life to the hilt.'
Another said, 'I have always wanted to travel. Now I shall take my time and travel, enjoying what the world has to offer.'
A young man said that he would kill himself as he could not bear to be alone.
A young woman said, 'If I had even a little advance notice that I would be the last person, I would get myself pregnant so that the human race has the potential to continue.'
She won the competition.
The human race is based on survival. It is based on continuity. It is based on connectivity.
None of you is an isolated individual. You are all connected. You are all not individual novels disconnected from one another. You are all chapters in one novel.
The great philosopher John Dunne once said, 'No man is an island.' Nor is a woman an island!
You may think you are unique, and you are indeed unique. God is an artist not a machine operator. He creates each of you as a unique individual entity, each in a different mould. Yet, He builds within all of us connectivity with Him that is forever.
God, Universe, Existence, Nature and by whatever name you wish to call that Cosmic Intelligence that operates our planet Earth, our Solar System, our Milky Way and our Universe as we know it is an integral part of each of us. He is like a hologram and we are part of the hologram. When a hologram is broken, each tiny bit carries the entire image of that hologram within it, unlike in an ordinary photograph. With that one piece, however small it may be, you can recreate the entire model.
So it is with us and Nature. However small the individual beings are, each being carries within it the imprint of the same holographic image of Existence.
We indeed are cast in the mould of the cosmic intelligence and linked permanently with that intelligence.
The problem, however, is, that we lose the awareness of this connection. We forget the master image we came from and we forget our interconnectivity. This lack of awareness is the root cause of all our suffering and violence. When a man or woman forgets that he or she is an integral part of every other man and woman, they cause suffering to others in the belief that they are gaining something, and in the process they are harming themselves.
We all say with great ease that we love humanity. Yet, we find it difficult to love our neighbor. The problem is in loving your neighbor with whom you share an identity, a relationship. It is easy to love a faceless, intangible and disconnected human race with whom you have no established identity. You need to drop your ego to love your neighbor.
Mulla Nasruddin was riding on a donkey. The donkey did not want to go further and was trying to throw him off. Nasruddin was angry and started beating the donkey.
His neighbors gathered around him and advised him, 'Nasruddin, the poor donkey is tired. Let it eat and rest. Don't bear the poor animal unnecessarily.'
Nasruddin exclaimed in disgust, 'I didn't know that my donkey had so many relatives here to care of him. Let me go elsewhere.'
Education fosters your ego. Rene Descartes once said, 'I think, therefore I am.' Western education focuses on the thinking man and the external world. This education is ruled by intellect, not intelligence. Intellect is a product of your mind, limited by your mind, whereas intelligence is a gift from the cosmos.
The more educated you are, the less tuned to Nature you become and the more disillusioned with life you become. Life ceases to have definition and your own existence ceases to have a meaning. You don't understand who you are and why you are here. Depression is the result.
Western science has accelerated this process of forgetfulness and unawareness. It has created in us an obsessive fixation on external world and the material world. The belief that only what we can touch, feel and externally experience is real, has created around us a false sense of reality. It is only recently that scientists engaged in Quantum Physics have discovered that subatomic particles behave differently depending on who is viewing them when and how!
In that sense, nothing is absolute, nothing is real.
Many thousand years ago, the great sages of Bharat, the rishis, experienced what these scientists have discovered only now. They experienced that the external world is unreal by looking inward. These sages were inner scientists and they developed an inner science that raised one's awareness of our connectivity with the cosmic intelligence and therefore with one another.
Unlike Rene Descartes, these rishis claimed that when you stop thinking you become aware of who you are.
They showed that it is only when your mind stops and you stop thinking, that you discover your true nature. This true nature is one with Existence.
This awareness created a deep sense of happiness within oneself; a sense of bliss that no longer depended on what we experienced externally, but totally on one's inner experience of awareness.
When we focus on external objects, events and persons for our happiness, we lose touch with ourselves. More we enjoy, less joy we get; we need more and more to give us less and less joy. Science that focuses on the outer world has not been able to address this problem that I call depression of success. This is the greatest malady of modern age, especially of the civilized world.
More I see of the Western way of living, more I realize how much men and women are out of tune with Nature and themselves. They chase happiness, because they are so unhappy. They change cars every year, homes every 2 years and spouses every 3 years in the hope that in the next car, home and spouse they will find happiness. They chase a mirage that keeps eluding them.
Freud said that the Nature of man is unhappiness. The problem is Freud studied only those who were unbalanced and came to this conclusion. He did not meet enlightened masters. He did not meet the great rishis of the ancient world. We can prove that the nature of man is bliss.
I experienced this inner bliss of ultimate consciousness of bliss through a deep study of these ancient Hindu Vedic practices. From the age of 3, I studied and practiced Ashtanga Yoga. Till the age of 7, I stood in awe of the wonders of Nature around me, curious and keen to learn. From then till 12, I played with methods of meditation that gave me my first spiritual experience.
From 12, I experimented upon myself, often rigorously using techniques that these great ancient masters had developed. At 22, I experienced the state of eternal bliss firsthand. I later realized that this process could have been much faster had I allowed Existence to guide me rather than my trying so hard.
As I tell my disciples, I experimented with many keys to open a lock with one key. I now have that key to offer and to share so that others who are seekers do not have to try as hard! Over the next 3 years, I worked upon this technology of inner science to replicate this experience on others. Since then I have been working on people all over the world using this inner science-based technique of meditation to help people become aware and experience the same bliss that I do.
I have now succeeded in this transfer.
This is what I call transformation of the individual. All of us are part of the cosmic intelligence. We are by nature, divine. We need not do anything or go anywhere to make us divine, we already are.
You just have to understand, accept, believe and realize that you are divine just like you believe is.
There are only two types of human beings. One, gods who are aware they are gods; others, gods who are as yet not aware they are gods. That's all.
That is why time and again, I exhort my disciples, 'my mission is not to prove that I am God; my mission is to prove to you that you are God'.
Many who come to me have been skeptics like many of you readers, intellectually curious and wanting everything to be verified by the touchstone of science and rationalism. Bliss and consciousness sound highly intangible; you cannot easily accept that these are real.
I can help you understand how you too can reach this state of bliss.
We have now written down my experiences and my realization in a form that would help everyone to understand and practice.
The content of my teachings and the philosophy behind them is being written down in a much more detailed way in the form of scriptures. We call it Nithyananda Sruti. Sruti is something that is heard and transmitted and is eternally true. These are truths that I have experienced. There is no voice that came from heaven that gave me this wisdom.
Existence in its compassion opened itself to me as a seeker to reveal these truths. I have no copyright over these. These truths have been expressed by other great masters for thousands of years. I may express them differently, the way Parashakti, the divine energy has programmed me. That's all the difference.
On the first of January 2000, when I was exactly 22, I realized that I was one with the universe. Everything around me was part of me. There was a deep calmness within me. I knew without a doubt that I had found what I was seeking so far.
In the next few years, I put together these truths in a manner that others too could understand. I then started training others who could convey these in spoken and written words. I have conveyed these truths in many of the programs that my ordained teachers, acharyas, now teach across the world.
These truths will make you understand who you are, why you are here, what your purpose is and what path you need to follow to achieve that purpose.
Following the Sruti are the techniques, the practical guidelines that will help you travel that path to your destination. These are the Nithyananda Smruti, rules, regulations and guidelines. These combine to form the key that I struggled to discover to open the lock to the door of bliss.
With the Sruti and Smruti that combine to form my philosophy of Nithyanandam, I hand over to you this gift of transformation, the key to the kingdom of awareness.
This transformation is the greatest miracle that any master can perform.
Many masters may be able to grant you boons and produce material as if from nowhere, I too can. Those are mere powers that we may exhibit to demonstrate the limitless bounty of Nature.
However, the transformation of the individual being which leads him to understand his true nature is the greatest of all such powers; it truly is a miracle; it is the only miracle.
All of us are focused all the time in proving how right we are and we try to persuade others to see our point of view. Many of us take pride in the fact that we are helping to transform other people through counseling, through example, through guidance or through mentoring.
Please understand this: all this is a waste of time and a pure expression of your own ego. None of us has the capability to transform someone else; even an enlightened master can only show the way. If the individual refuses to follow the path, even Buddha can do nothing much.
A small story:
A disciple of Buddha who had benefited much from his master's teachings implored Buddha to propagate enlightenment. 'This is the need of the hour', the disciple cried, 'What you have, can transform the lives of millions. Please teach people how to be enlightened.'
Buddha smiled and said, 'So be it. Why don't you go and find out how many people are interested in getting enlightened?'
The disciple was overjoyed. He knew that there were many people who had been healed and touched by Buddha and he was sure that all these people would be keen to follow Buddha's path of enlightenment.
He traveled around the countryside and returned to Buddha a week later.
'Well', asked Buddha, 'How many people have you brought?'
'Well, master', the disciple looked sheepish, 'Actually, none.'
'So, no one was interested in getting enlightened?' asked Buddha.
'No, master', said the disciple, 'Actually there were two people in a far away village who were very keen.'
'Then?' asked Buddha.
'It was difficult for them to travel all the way to you. They wanted to know if you could send the enlightenment kit through me to them, so that it would be easy!'
That is how it is. If I can send transformation through courier, preferably freight prepaid, there may be a few who may be interested. Such is life.
I come across literally hundreds of thousands of people. The number of people who are willing to work on their personal transformation is a very small percentage. Many come to be healed. Many come because the physicians of all medical streams have given them up as lost causes, and they come to me as a last resort. Even if they are helped and healed, in most cases, it is business as usual for them. Their life style does not change. Whatever energy blocks created the illnesses, continues, and they do not like to change.
In Western countries, people come for intellectual reasons. They suffer from what I call 'Depression of Success'. They have succeeded in achieving everything and yet are unhappy. As I said earlier, they need to change everything every year or every second year hoping that the change will bring them happiness. Sadly, it does not.
There are a few who are seekers, many amongst them professional seekers, who collect masters and techniques. They will go from ashram to ashram, take down copious notes, so that if nothing works, they can at least write a book and make money. They get attracted to these masters easily, because each master has something important to say. But, when the time comes for the master to take them seriously, when he demands their attention, they find it difficult.
As long as the master gives them a long rope and they can choose what they wish, it is fine. The moment the master gets serious, it is time to leave.
My disciples know this only too well. I tell all of them this, right from the beginning. If you wish to sit at a distance and have eye and ear candy, be my guest, no problem at all. I will smile at you and you can smile back. But, if you decide that you want to be my disciple, then you make me responsible for your spiritual journey. I then burn you.
I burn your negativities, I burn your ego, I dissolve your samskara, your embedded memories; your conditioning.
Please understand this clearly: The master is a surgeon. He is there to remove your ego, because that is the only way you can reach your own Self. The process can be painful. So, you need to think carefully before you embark on this mission to adopt a master, because that is what happens in this age.
Masters are plenty, disciples are few. Masters have to wait for disciples.
The closer you get to the master, the more painful it can be. Those of you in doubt, ask my disciples. Why do they then stay with me? Or why do other disciples stay with other masters when the journey can be so arduous?
It is simply because these disciples have had a glimpse of what lies beyond, and there is nothing that will stop them from reaching there. They know that the master is their only hope to reach there.
The master is your bridge to God. Without him you will find it difficult to cross the gap.
As I said before, I had to try ten thousand keys before I found one that fitted. You do not have to do it. I offer you the key that fits. All you really need to do is to take that key and fit it to the door and turn.
That's why Jesus said, 'Knock and it shall open.' In this case, you do not even need to knock. You already have the key; you have the authority. Go in and take a look; have a glimpse.
What is that glimpse that changes you so?
Vivekananda has this beautiful story to tell:
Once upon a time, a pregnant lioness went hunting. She pounced on a herd of sheep, slipped and was fatally injured. However, before she died, she gave birth to a cub. The lioness had died far from her pride and the cub was alone and helpless.
The cub struggled to get up and walk around. Some sheep pitied the cub and adopted it. The cub grew up with the sheep. He played with them, drank sheep milk, fed on grass and other vegetable matter and even learnt to bleat. At this point, he was no longer a lion. He was another sheep in the herd. He was quite content eating grass and happily bleating along with the other sheep.
One day a lion preyed on this herd of sheep. This lion was shocked to find a lion cub in the herd. He wanted to learn more about this lion cub who had become a part a sheep herd. He gave up all thoughts of hunting that day.
The next day, the lion came by and waited until the cub came out from the herd. He quickly pounced on the cub and carried him by his throat. The cub nearly died of fear!
The lion waited until the cub calmed down. Then, he put him down and told him, 'You are not a sheep. You are a lion, really!'
The cub didn't understand the lion. All his life, he had heard that he was a sheep and a lion was his mortal enemy.
The cub bleated, 'Let me go. Please…'
The elder lion was wise and patient. He released the cub. Still shaking in fright, the cub joined the herd of sheep.
The lion was clever and determined. He returned everyday, for many days, and picked up the cub. Each day he told the cub, 'You are a lion. You are not a sheep.'
The cub didn't understand what the lion spoke. Yet, by now, the cub realized that the lion meant no harm. He allowed the elder lion to carry him. Occasionally, the cub got scared and pleaded with the lion to let him go. Sometimes, he simply ran away. The lion would always pick him up and talk to him again about his true nature.
One day, the lion took the cub to a stream. The cub saw his reflection in the water for the first time. To his shock, he saw was a lion staring back at him. Bewildered and terrified, the cub bleated in fear. He ran for his life.
Gently, the lion brought him back to the water. The cub stared at his reflection. Then, he looked around to check if anyone else was around him. No, it was his reflection. And, yes, he looked very much like the elder lion.
The lion told the cub, 'You are a lion, not a sheep.'
The lion then gave the cub a piece of meat to eat.
The cub ate it and instantly liked it.
The cub realized his true nature and roared.
Instantly, he too became a lion!
Like this lion cub, you too are unaware of your true nature and your true potential.
A master appears and tells you who you are. You run away frightened, because your present identity is too comfortable to give up. Yet, you come back to the master, attracted by a strange but powerful inner desire. The master does not give up. Eventually, you may see that reflection of your true nature.
This is the story of all true disciples. They do not realize their potential as lions and live like sheep amongst sheep. The master comes to them and in some way they get attracted to him. The fear of letting go their sheep nature makes them run away. Finally, when he deems the timing right, the master pounces and makes them realize that they are indeed lions.
The role of the master is to help you realize who you are. His compassion for the disciple is infinite. He can wait for as long as it takes. He will do anything to help them realize that potential. I tell people who come to me that once they have crossed the gates of my ashram, it will be difficult for them to move away because I am a reminder of their true Self. Those who find it difficult for one reason or another, ask me if I get upset when they leave. Of course not. They ask me if I will curse them if they leave.
Please understand this clearly: no enlightened master can curse someone. They are full of compassion. If some one does, please be sure that the person is not a master. Words of such a person will have no effect on you. So, you don't have to worry.
When I find someone who becomes a disciple with desperation at the being level and he suddenly moves away because of some play of the mind, it causes real concern to me. That spirit, that being, has been in search of a master for many lives. This was a great opportunity for it to hold on to the master and realize itself and be freed. When for one reason or another that does not happen, I do feel concern.
My disciples know that my spirit energy separates from its mind–body system every night as it rests. For it to return to the mind–body system, certain precautions need to be taken. But, most importantly, the spirit must have a reason to come back. It needs a mission to come back.
Once my close disciples at the ashram asked me what the most important reason was for the spirit to return. They knew that I had no identity of my own. They knew that I had no free will of my own. Every single thing that I did was at the behest of the Existential energy. I cannot move even my little finger on my own. It moves as the universal energy dictates. They were curious what it was that drove the spirit back into the mind–body system which I have told them is like a cage for me.
I had to think a bit to answer this question. I had never seriously analyzed this. I was given the mission to start the spiritual center Dhyanapeetam as the transformational tool of individuals through meditation, as if in a vision. I was directed to Bidadi, near Bangalore, and was instructed to establish this Dhyanapeetam at the site of a banyan tree. However, never had I a clear answer to why I was here and what makes me stay.
The answer that I had for them was that it was the remembrance of all those who waited for me in my ashrams, my disciples and their needs that brings me back. That was about the closest I could think of for an answer.
A disciple is one who shares my pain all the time; the pain of not being able to help in this transformation fast enough and spread the message far enough. They know how impatient I am to get the mission I have been entrusted with as far and as wide, as soon as possible.
I say often that a devotee is one who brings his pain to me and expects me to share it and heal him. A devotee transfers his burden on to me. That is fair enough as a devotee feels that I am capable of handling all that pain, without the suffering that he or she has.
A disciple on the other hand rarely brings his or her problems to me or their pain. On the other hand, they share my burden and my pain. When I say pain, I don't mean real pain. I mean the compassion that oozes out toward humanity to transform individuals as quickly as possible into leading a blissful life.
Devotees are happy and comfortable hearing my words and being in my presence. The words and the presence mean a lot to them and they feel energized and healed. My contract with them stops there.
My disciples, whether they are in my ashrams or outside, whether they are healers, organizers, acharyas, brahmacharis or sannyasis, have no need for my presence. They follow my formless energy. What sustains them is the service they do for the mission. They follow Buddha, the master, by forming the sangha, the community, and by following the Dhamma, the master's teachings.
I tell them that once they are in my service, they have no need to physically follow me or chase me as my devotees do.
I chase those who serve my mission; I follow them and I stay in their hearts.
Many times, new comers ask me how they can make out that I am their Master. They ask, 'How do we remember you?' I tell them the truth: If I am your master, your problem will not be in remembering me but in forgetting me! I stay fixed in your heart. Ask my disciples; they will tell you.
It is no accident that brings this book to those of you who have not heard me talk. Everything that happens to you is an incident that has been programmed by cosmic intelligence. You may not be aware of this, but this is the truth.
Let you all benefit from this gift of nithyanandam, eternal bliss.