Group meditation
Dearest disciples, with your kind permission I wish to say that all of you have come to our Centre meetings to aspire, to think of God, to meditate on God, but what happens unfortunately is that some disciples often do not meditate at all. A disciple may think that his brother or sister disciple who is sitting beside him is having a wonderful meditation. He thinks, “If I do not aspire, no harm. When Guru looks at the group in general, he will see how wonderfully we are aspiring. If I am now thinking of my friends and relatives or my family problems, I will not be caught because the one who is beside me has such wonderful aspiration.” But the one he thinks is having such a wonderful meditation is actually cherishing the same kind of thoughts. That person is thinking, “Oh, he is having a wonderful meditation, so let me live just for today. Let me enjoy my worldly thoughts.”I can tell you a story. Once there was king who had a special desire to have a milk pond instead of a water pond. He had the pond drained of water. Then he ordered all of his subjects to come the following morning and bring a very small quantity of milk to pour into the pond.
Everybody is wise in this world; everybody is clever. A brilliant idea flashed across the mind of each subject. What was the divine idea? Each subject thought, “If I bring just a small quantity of water and pour it in instead of milk, nobody will be able to know that I brought water, because thousands and thousands of other people will be bringing milk.” But since this idea unfortunately, or fortunately, entered into the minds of everybody, the following morning everybody brought water instead of milk and filled the pond with water. In the evening the king said to his queen, “By this time they have filled my pond with milk. Let us go and see.” They went and to his utter disgust he saw that it was all water and not milk.
In this way many disciples play this kind of divine trick during our collective meditations. I don’t say that everybody here does this. I am luckier than the king in that respect. But there are people here who enjoy mundane thoughts and think about family problems when they should be meditating. They think that others are having a wonderful meditation, so their Guru will not catch them. But this Guru has an occult vision and it is very, very effective. It works even more powerfully than a king’s army.
Some of you feel that you meditate well at home or elsewhere, at unexpected hours, but you do not meditate well at meetings in front of me. Some disciples feel that they can’t meditate when they come in front of me. Why is this? It is because they have fear. But why should there be fear? I am not a tiger or a snake or an elephant. You should not be afraid of me; but what actually happens is that when there are other people around, you automatically try — let me be very nice and say unconsciously, not consciously — to imagine what they are thinking of you and what I am thinking of you. But this is wrong. I am not thinking anything of you. I am only standing in front of you with my spiritual love, light and concern.
When you come in front of me, try to feel that I am an X-ray machine which will let you see what you are doing in your spiritual life. Are you aspiring or not? Are you meditating or not? In this way, when you stand in front of me, you will be able to see your own reflection. But instead you think, “Is the Master pleased with me?” I shall be pleased with you only if you show me what you truly are and not if you are trying to make me feel or believe you are something else. This is the mistake that some of you make. When you come in front of me, you try to make me feel that you are this, or that, but I know what you truly are. I know the mark you are going to get. But by trying to impress me with your aspiration, you only lose whatever aspiration you have. You throw away your own aspiration by imposing something on me: that I have to feel you are good, you are nice, you are aspiring. When you have that kind of idea, your real aspiration disappears.
So when you look at me, try to think that whatever you have come with will be seen. Good thoughts will immediately be reflected: joy, love, gratitude, everything divine will come forward; so will bad thoughts. After meditation when you become your normal self, if you feel that you have been absolutely sincere about what you have given to me, at that time I can give you much more. If you give me one cent of gratitude, at that time I will give you my boundless Compassion. If you give one cent of joy, then you will get much, much more in return. So when you stand in front of me, at that time do not try to deceive me. Even if you come with one cent of aspiration, give the one cent that you have brought with utmost sincerity. But if you try to convince me that you have come with ten thousand dollars of aspiration, I will see through it.
