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Milestones in Progress
External outlook: Do your sadhana without fail. The
abhyasi is not supposed to judge his own progress. I know, because many
people have asked Master, "What is your condition?" and Master
said, "Only Lalaji knows." If the Master could not know His
condition, I am sure we are not going to know our condition. Let us
leave it to our betters, our preceptors, to decide what is our condition,
whether we are progressing or not. The second biggest I should say,
breach of faith, lack of faith is to question the idea of progress:
"Am I progressing?" It is a question, "Is Master worthy
of being called a Master or not?" How on earth can He be a Master
and you not progress? Every time an abhyasi asks, "Sir, am I progressing?"
he is exhibiting his lack of faith in the Master.
You see, take a train. Trains may stop at stations, trains may stop
for the engine to take water. We don't know about all these - why is
the train stopping? Will I reach the destination? You have got into
the train; leave it to the administration to take you to the destination.
Secondly, if you are concerned only with your progress, it means you
have no love for the Master: you are still wedded to your self - my
progress, my evolution, my realization, my spiritualization. He who
loves the Master does not think of progress.
Instead of asking your preceptors for your progress, blaming them for
the lack of it, you should look into yourself. "Am I practicing
correctly?" Can I feel changes in myself ? If there is a diary
by which I can refer to this to see that I am progressing; because the
diary shows so many changes over the period of a year.
As we develop, the ideas of parents, of society, of life itself change.
Life was brilliant, life was enjoyable as children; we had so much fun,
so much joy, so much happiness, showering kids with love, with something
new every birthday. But as we grow, we tend to harden. Because we know
there are responsibilities cast upon us - responsibilities to be faced;
we cannot avoid these things. In one way or the other, we have to live,
we have to exist with responsibilities, with duties to be fulfilled.
This means, what we think of as restrictions are only rules for our
guidance. So, our attitude to these things changes. Our understanding
of these things changes. Our appreciation of these things changes. It
is the teaching of my Master that even god is not something fixed. He
may be whatever He is in His Absolute sense. But to the evolving human
being, He is what we have achieved in our understanding at that moment.
Evolution cannot come to a particular point and then say, "Yes,
this is final." Therefore it means that as we evolve, our ideas
of Divinity must continue to change.
The Master is something which is of eternal verity. So the Master can
never appear smaller as we grow bigger. But here is the miracle, you
see: that as we grow bigger He must appear to us greater and greater.
And if you see Him as the same Babuji that you saw Him twenty five years
back when you commenced sadhana, then there is something very wrong
with your sadhana, with your course of development. It is the only thing
which can grow as you grow. Not because it grows in itself but because
you see more and more of it, more and more of Him, more and more of
His greatness, of His ultimacy, of His illimitableness, of His absoluteness,
of His Divinity!
So an abhyasi who sees the same Master every time he sees Him, is in
some way fixed. He is not growing, you see. "No, no Sir, I have
seen him twenty years back. Today also I see Him. He is the same person,
same kindness." That means you are looking at the superficialities
of His character - His kindness, His lovingness. What have you seen
of the inner things of His Divinity? So, our growth must be reflected
in our actually seeing the Master as something grander and grander.
Every time we look, we must be awed, we must be stunned. "What
is this? I thought Him only this! Now I see He is this!!" And this
the Gita puts very beautifully, you see -'Ascharyavatpasyati.'
There is no other word except to say 'Wonder!' Wonder pervades - "Is
this the Babuji I saw yesterday?" Yes, He was that too, but He
is this today. Three years hence you see Him again - "Is this the
Master that I saw three years back?" As that, yes, He was that
but He is this too.
So this is like a reverse possibility of the Christmas present where
you get a small carton to start with, you open it and there is a bigger
carton inside and you are wondering how a big carton can come out of
a small carton, you see! Then you open it, there is another carton inside
you take it out, it is bigger than the second and you go on taking out,
and it is never ending! It is like a seed producing a tree. This is
the miracle. To me at least it has always appeared that the Babuji I
saw in 1964 March when I first came to Him was the seed that was placed
before me and in that seed progressively His mercy, His grace, His love
made it possible for me to see the unfolding of the Master into ever
greater and ever greater significance, ever greater and ever greater
capacity, power, love. And that was because of two things - my growth,
and His merciful attitude - "See me as I can be, as I am that which
I have not revealed myself yet to you!"
So this is the need you see, to assess our spiritual growth. It is very
easy. People say, "How to know I am growing?" Very often people
come to us, "Sir, how to know I am growing?" What do you think
of the Master today, what did you think of Him yesterday? Is there a
change? Is He appearing to you more Divine? More great? If yes, then
you are growing. Is He appearing to you smaller, more foolish, more
stupid, even less educated than you thought He was? God forbid, you
are falling. He is what He is, He is Eternal, for Him there is no growth,
no contraction, no expansion, no nothing, you see. But it is for us
to expand progressively, stage by stage and as we expand, we see more
and more. It is like when you go on the road, in a bus, your vision
is always limited to what you can see. The horizon for you is about
thirty feet. You sit on the sea shore, the horizon they say, is about
thirty miles. But even there if a ship goes below the horizon, you don't
see it anymore. But if you fly, every foot you fly reveals more and
more to you, until the very world can become like a ball hanging before
you!
Internal growth: People often ask, "How
to know whether we are developing?" This is one aspect: Has your
mind stopped wandering? Has it stopped prodding you into unnecessary
activities? Has it stopped sort of pestering you to undertake adventures
outside yourself? Whenever we go out and wander and try to see things
and admire them, we are only projecting an inner desire upon these objects,
and venerating them or admiring them or criticizing them or hating them.
Now that tendency has to be overcome.
Sir, what are the signs of progress?
Master: You will know it as you progress. The general signs are peace,
shanti and a lessening of the intricacies of the mind.
But Sir, to use an illustration, when we travel from here to Bombay
by train, we get various stations. Is there something similar by which
we can judge our spiritual progress?
Master: As I have already told you, you will feel peace, shanti.
Ishwar Sahai: Yes, but you need not travel by train, you can fly to
Bombay!
When a man goes from one condition to another, he develops a feeling
of stagnation. It can be understood thus: A man is standing on the bank
of a river. In order to reach the other bank, it is necessary for him
to cross the river. First of all he will need a boat for this. When
he sits in the boat he will not feel that speed with which he came running
up to the bank. This is called a buffer which comes at every stage in
our system of sadhana. Some are able to cross this river immediately,
which they do not even feel. There are others who take time. However,
if faith is firm, and love for the Master increases day by day, one
is bound to reach the destination some day or the other. There are innumerable
secrets along this path. To a true seeker, whatever comes along the
way is encouraging. His progress will be to the extent of his
love and faith in the Master. The same holds good about spiritual
stages. Suppose a person reaches from A to B, he may not have the same
experience which another person has while travelling between the same
two points. So far as reaching the destination is concerned, both have
reached it. The best method is to leave everything to Master. Secondly,
one should take everything, whether good or bad, as coming from Master.
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