Connect easily to a living master

Aug 4, 2009, 12.00am IST
BHANUMATI NARASIMHAN.

The guru is an embodiment of wisdom, and love. In Sanskrit, the word for gravity is gurutvakarshan.

The earth holds on to us with the force of gravity. Without this attraction or love, we would not have a base. Similarly, gurutva is the basis of our life. The guru is the guiding light who removes the darkness of ignorance and shows the path to wonderment.

A teacher can give knowledge, but the master brings a heightened awareness. A teacher can give information but the master awakens intelligence.

One day, while Lord Shiva was performing a puja , his consort Parvati sees him bowing his head in reverence. Seeing this, she asks: "You are the Supreme Consciousness, the substratum of entire Creation. Who is it that you bow down to?"

Shiva replied: "Dear Parvati, for the benefit of all humanity, I will answer your question. It is to the all-pervading guru tatva that I bow down to." In the many beautiful verses that followed called the Guru Gita, Shiva explains the guru principle, and says how fortunate one is to have a living master in his life.

The guru in the physical form is called pratyaksh . In the presence of the master, our enthusiasm and spirit are in an elevated state. Our sorrows diminish, joy wells up, there is contentment, knowledge is nourished and protected, and talent blossoms.

India honours a tradition of masters who have protected, and given this knowledge to us, generation after generation, according to the need of the age and times.

When a drop feels connected to the ocean, it feels the strength of the ocean. When we are connected to this tradition, we feel the strength and protection of all the masters. All these masters are an expression of the same Infinite, Undivided, Supreme and Pure Consciousness.

The guru is a tatva an omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent principle. Establishing connection with this tatva is a source of great strength. We know we have forefathers, great-grandparents and so on. Yet we feel most attached and connected to our parents or grandparents because they are with us. Similarly, we have many gurus in our tradition, but when we come in the presence of a living master, the connection is established immediately. The entire knowledge from time immemorial is made available to us.

Guru Purnima is a time to feel grateful. The more grateful we are, the more grace flows into our lives. On Guru Purnima, we remember all the masters who were, who are and who will be in the future. We feel gratitude towards the master who moves us from a limited understanding and pride of ''I know everything" to "I am everything".

A disciple seeks knowledge. A devotee seeks nothing. A devotee is soaked in love and devotion. Guru Purnima is a special day of the devotee as well. When a river meets the ocean, the river no longer remains a river. It becomes the ocean. It is the same when the devotee meets the Divine. Only Divinity remains. The individual 'i' dissolves in the One Divinity.

When we look at the world through the eyes of the master, the world will look so much more beautiful a place filled with love, joy, compassion and virtues. The master's presence is one that is unlimited, vast, infinite and all-inclusive. The presence of the master in one's life brings fulfilment in all other relationships.

To that one, eternal, pure, unbounded embodiment of knowledge and absolute bliss, to the lotus feet of my master, I bow down with respect and gratitude.

(The writer is director, women and child welfare programmes, the Art of Living Foundation. Today is Guru Purnima.)

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Secular governance and a spiritual culture

Aug 12, 2009, 12.00am IST
S RADHAKRISHNAN.


S Abid Husain in his 'Indian Nationhood and National Culture' indicates the central characteristic of Indian culture as it has grown from its beginning to its present position...

He argues that there has been a common spiritual outlook on life, to which various races and religions have made contributions. "India's cultural history of several thousand years shows that the subtle but strong thread of unity which runs through the infinite multiplicity of her life, was not woven by stress or pressure of power groups but the vision of seers, the vigil of saints, the speculation of philosophers, and the imagination of the poets and artists and that these are the only means which can be used to make this national unity wider, stronger and more lasting."

It may appear somewhat strange that our government should be a secular one while our culture is rooted in spiritual values. Secularism here does not mean irreligion or atheism or even stress on material comforts. It proclaims that it lays stress on the university of spiritual values that may be attained by a variety of ways.
Religion is a transforming experience. It is not a theory of God. It is spiritual consciousness. Belief and conduct, rites and ceremonies, dogmas and authorities are subordinate to the art of self-discovery and contact with the Divine. When the individual withdraws his soul from all outward events, gathers himself together inwardly, strives with concentration, there breaks upon him an experience, sacred, strange, wondrous, which quickens within him, lays hold on him, becomes his very being.
Even those who are the children of science and reason must submit to the fact of spiritual experience that is primary and positive. We may dispute theologies but we cannot deny facts. The fire of life in its visible burning compels assent, though not the fumbling speculation of smokers sitting around the fire. While realisation is a fact, the theory of reality is an inference. There is difference between contact with reality and opinion about it, between the mystery of godliness and belief in God. This is the meaning of a secular conception of the State though it is not generally understood.


This view is in consonance with the Indian tradition. The seer of the Rig Veda affirms that the Real is one while the learned speak of it variously. Asoka in his Rock Edict XII proclaims: "One who reverences one's own religion and disparages that of another from devotion to one's own religion and to glorify it over all other religions does injure one's own religion most certainly. It is verily concord of religions that is meritorious."
Centuries later Akbar affirms: "The various religious communities are divine treasuries entrusted to us by God. We must love them as such. It should be our firm faith that He blesses every religion. The Eternal King showers His favours on all men without distinction." This very principle is incorporated in our Constitution that gives full freedom to all to profess and practise their religious beliefs and rites so long as they are not repugnant to our ethical sense. We recognise the common ground on which different religious traditions rest. This common ground belongs of right to all of us as it has its source in the Eternal.
The philosopher-writer was president of India. Excerpted from his book, Faith Renewed.

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Learn to accept what you can't change

Aug 29, 2009, 12.00am IST
DEEPAK RANADE.

As intellectually evolved beings, we constantly analyse all events and endeavour to identify the underlying likely cause. This obsession for a cause extends even to actions or events of a past birth.


It compels us to look into outer space and implicate the movement of celestial bodies like stars and planets to serve as plausible causes.
Science has, to a large extent, been able to explain physical phenomena. But finding a cause for every mundane facile event might be taking things a bit too far. When the cause of suffering is diagnosed to be a person, it leaves one with a sense of victimhood. And along with it come anguish, resentment and a deep desire for retribution. This process continues unabated and over time becomes a stockpile of hate.

The feeling of hate, initially restricted to the individual, tends to be highly contagious and one day it could acquire epidemic proportions. All violence, racial discord and inter-personal strife are just manifestations of this perceived 'victimisation' that is derived from our obsession to somehow fix the blame.


Can our intellect be diverted towards fixing the problem? Can we, at the apex of the evolutionary pyramid, be redeemed from the curse of this blame game? Can't we accept events as just a pattern emerging in the kaleidoscope of life, the pattern which has no bias or machinations towards any individual being? In reacting lies a sense of insecurity, a sense of threat perception and inevitably a sense of being a victim of conspiracy. This approach only leads to further suffering. Constant threat perception is the genesis of insecurity. Over a period this induces metabolic changes in the body leading to a host of ailments.


We have the choice of continuously resenting whatever comes our way or equanimously accepting the same. Liberation is when we intelligently accept people and circumstances as they come. A state of zero resentment. Rather than asking 'why' it would be more prudent to question ourselves 'how'. How do i fix the problem?

The conspiracy theorists are also egotists because they believe that they are the obsession of the conspirators. Every person is leading his own life and solving his own problems. No one really has the time to target another individual to the exclusion of other activities.


Harbouring bitterness makes the person an eternal sceptic. Regret and unconditional apologies from the perceived perpetrator are celluloid events far from reality. What can be set right is neither the circumstances nor the other person but our (mis)understanding.
Memory is recorded in the dominant temporal lobe, which also houses the limbic system. The limbic system is one of the oldest neurological constructs and is responsible for all interactive behaviour by the organism. It is intricately interwoven with survival and procreation.

The limbic system is responsible for emotional templates as well. So it is possible that every byte of data stored is coupled with an emotional pixel as well. It may have its origins in survival mechanisms. Every person or object is recorded with an element of pleasure or pain to help the organism in future interactions. But then evolution of the frontal lobes in humans makes for finer data processing. It provides for intelligent acceptance of the vagaries of persons and events beyond the binary code of either pleasure or pain.

The writer is a neurosurgeon. E-mail deepakranade@hotmail.com

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