Man is ‘I’. God is ‘We’. Similarly, the ego is ‘I’; the soul is ‘We’. On the strength of its absolute oneness with God, the soul feels the entire universe as its very own. The soul knows and feels the omniscient, omnipresent and omnipotent God is within us. The soul sees and feels that it can sooner or later manifest the infinite Truth here on earth.
The ego does not see the truth; it does not feel the truth. The ego binds. The ego separates. The ego casts asunder the wisdom in us. When the ego expresses itself through self-delusion, it tells us that we can do nothing. Again, before we have achieved our soul’s liberation and perfection, the same ego tells us we are everything, we can do everything.
Ego is selfishness. He is lucky indeed who has freed himself from selfishness. God is in self-dedication, in selfless service. At the same time, he is blessed who sees God emerging from selfishness itself. In the process of evolution we have to go beyond selfishness, beyond the ego. But we have no right to deny the existence of God in the ego. Even in the ego God abides. He also abides in doubt, in fear, in ignorance and in bondage, but that does not mean that we will cherish fear, doubt, ignorance and bondage. No, God’s Consciousness in these things is extremely limited. We have to transcend our limitations. Today’s achievements are not enough. We are the children of tomorrow. There is no end to our progress. There is no end to our soul’s journey. We are running towards Infinity, and the shore of Infinity always transcends itself. There is no limit to our realisation.
No doubt we are infinitely superior to the wild beasts. Yet we consciously drink two bottles of ignorance-wine. One is the bottle of ego. The other is the bottle of self-doubt. Self-doubt has to be transcended. Ego has to be transcended. Man uses the terms ‘I’ and ‘mine’ because he feels that these things constantly feed him. But the real God-lover wants to be fed by God’s Grace and God’s Compassion. A true seeker of God, a true lover of God, will use the terms ‘Thou’ and ‘Thine’. He dines with illumination and God’s Compassion. He drinks the nectar of divine delight. He enjoys the bliss of oneness.
There are many thieves, but the worst of all these thieves is undoubtedly our ego. This thief can steal away all our divinity. Not only are our experiences afraid of this ego-thief, but even our realisation, our partial realisation, is afraid of it. We have to be very careful of this ego-thief.
Our human ego wants to do something great, grand and magnificent. But this unique thing need not be the thing that God wants us to do. It is always nice to be able to do great things, but perhaps God has not chosen us to do that particular thing. God may have chosen us to do something insignificant in the outer world. In the Eye of God, he is the greatest devotee who performs his God-ordained duty soulfully and devotedly, no matter how insignificant it may seem. Each man is a chosen child of God. Similarly, each man is destined to play a significant part in God’s divine Game. But each person has to know what God wants from him. When one becomes aware of God’s plan for him, then he abides by God’s decision. When God sees that particular person performing the role that He chose for him, then only will God be filled with divine Pride. Our ego will try to achieve and to perform great things, but in God’s Eye we can never be great unless and until we do what God wants us to do.
Ego comes to us in the form of self-flattery. When we remove the mirror of self-flattery from our eyes and in its place we hold the mirror of truth, what do we see? We see that we are nothing but semi-animals. We are afraid of seeing the truth face-to-face. Truth seems painful. But the ultimate Truth is not painful. It is our ego, our doubt and our self-styled pride that make the truth painful. The truth seems destructive, but that is not the real truth. Truth is sweet. Truth is harmonious. Truth is all-fulfilling. But we do not see truth the way truth has to be seen. We see truth according to our self-conceived ideas. Truth has to be seen in its own way.
The ordinary, common human ego feels that it has achieved everything and that it knows everything. This reminds me of an anecdote which Swami Vivekananda related to the Parliament of Religions in Chicago in 1893. It is called “The frog in the well”. It happened that a frog was born and brought up in a well. One day a frog from the field jumped into the well. The first frog said to the other, “Where do you come from?”
The second frog said, “I come from the field.”
“Field? How big is it?” said the first frog.
“Oh, it is very big,” said the second.
So the frog from the well stretched its legs and said, “Is it as big as this?”
“No, bigger! Much bigger!” said the frog from the field.
The other frog jumped from one end of the well to the other and said, “This must be as big as the length of a field.”
The second frog said, “No, the field is infinitely vaster.”
“You are a liar!” said the first frog. “I am throwing you out of here.”
This kind of thing is also the tendency of our human ego. Great spiritual Masters and sages speak of Infinity, Eternity and Immortality. The beginner who is just starting his spiritual life will immediately doubt. “Is Infinity a little larger than the sky?” he will ask. The sage will say, “No, Infinity is infinitely larger than your imagination, larger than your conception.” Immediately the sage will be criticised and will become an object of ridicule, because our ego binds us and makes us feel that what we have seen and what we have realised can never be surpassed by the realisation and experience of others. The ego does not like to feel that someone else has more capacity or that someone else can do something which it cannot do.
I am sure all of you have heard of Shankara, the great Vedantin. A Vedantin is one who follows the truths embodied in the Vedas or the Upanishads and who has realised the Vedic Law, the Vedic Truth. The great Vedantin Shankara, after a bath in the Ganges, was walking home along the street. It happened that a butcher carrying a piece of meat brushed against him. Shankara became furious and said, “I am a Brahmin! How dare you touch me! I am absolutely pure!”
The butcher said, “O Shankara, you are the Self, I am the Self. The Self does not touch anybody, and at the same time the Self is not touched by anybody.” Shankara came back to his senses.
In our day-to-day life, each human being feels that he is purer than others. He may do absurd things, he may be the prince of emotional affairs, but still he feels that he is superior to others in the realm of purity. Now, who is responsible for his foolishness? It is again his ego. If we live in the soul, we do not have problems of superiority or inferiority because the soul immediately makes us feel that we are one, absolutely one with the entire world.
Brahmosmi means in Sanskrit, “I am the Brahman.” It is the expression of the soul which has attained conscious oneness with the Absolute. But the tricky ego sometimes makes us say, “I am God.” Shankara had a disciple who used to imitate him in every way. When Shankara realised God, the absolute Brahman, he started saying, “I am the Brahman.” So this disciple also used to say, “I am the Brahman.” All the other disciples used to mock and scold him. “You must not dare to say that you are the Brahman,” they said. “Master Shankara can say this, for he has realised God, but you must not.” But the disciple would say that he wanted to imitate his Master in every way. One day Shankara asked this disciple to follow him. They came to a foundry and Shankara took a lump of molten gold and devoured it. Then he told his disciple, “Since you imitate me in everything, you should imitate me in this, too.” The disciple was scared to death and left the place. The other disciples then knew that they had been right, and they must never utter the word Brahmosmi unless and until they had actually attained that conscious and inseparable oneness. When that disciple transcended his ego and his emotions, he became a real, intimate devotee of Shankara. But first he had to get rid of the ordinary human ego and enter sincerely into the world of aspiration and realisation.
If we try to imitate the words and actions of the great Masters while we are still immersed in the ordinary life, it will be sheer foolishness. We have to grow in the field of spirituality first. This field is full of experiences. After that we can enter into the field of realisation. Then we will also be able to say, “God and I are one.” Right now we are not one with God consciously. In the realm of the soul we are one, but not in our day-to-day life. In our daily life we feel that God is somebody separate from us. Eventually we are bound to discover that this very God is inside us. One day we will be able to realise Him; we will be able to see Him and feel Him constantly. It is sheer foolishness and stupidity on our part to say that we are one with God while we remain in utter ignorance. We have to come out of ignorance and soulfully and devotedly become one with God. Then, if it is the Will of God, in order to teach humanity, in order to arouse humanity from its age-long slumber of ignorance, we can proclaim that we are one with God, that we are God’s chosen children, here on earth to fulfil God in His own Way.
At one time ego will make us feel that we are nothing and at another time ego will make us feel that we are everything. We have to be very careful of both our feelings of importance and our feelings of unimportance. We have to say that if God wants us to be nothing, then we will gladly be nothing and if God wants us to be everything, we will be everything gladly. We have to surrender unconditionally and cheerfully to the Will of God.
If the ego tells us that we are only God’s slaves, this also has to be renounced. We have only to pray to God to make us what He wants. If He wants us to be His peers, we shall be. If He wants us to be His slaves, we shall be. If He wants us to be His true representatives on earth, we shall be. “Let Thy Will be done.” This is the greatest prayer that we can offer to God. In the sincere depths of this prayer is the extinction or transformation of ego.
TDB 1. 26 January 1969↩
Ego is separativity and individuality. Separativity and human individuality cannot live in the sea of oneness and universality. If we want to maintain our separate individuality, our life will end in destruction. A drop, before entering the ocean, says, “Oh, I will be totally lost, I will be totally lost! Here is the mighty ocean, the vast ocean. When I enter into it I will be totally lost, I will be totally destroyed, I will have no existence!” But this is the wrong way of thinking. The drop should be spiritually wise. It should feel, “When I enter into this vast sea my existence will merge with it inseparably. Then I will be able to claim the infinite ocean as part of myself.” Who can deny this? The moment the drop enters into the ocean it becomes one with the ocean; it becomes part and parcel of the ocean; it becomes the ocean itself. At that time, who can separate the consciousness of the drop from the consciousness of the entire vast ocean?”
The human ego is constantly bothering us. But if we have the divine ego which makes us feel, “I am God’s son, I am God’s daughter,” we will not tend to separate our existence from the rest of God’s creation. God is omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent. If He is all, if He is everywhere and if I am His son, how can I be limited to one particular place? This divine ego or divine pride is absolutely necessary. “I cannot wallow in the pleasures of ignorance. I am God’s child. To realise Him, to discover Him in myself and in everyone is my birthright. He is my Father. If He can be so divine, then what is wrong with me? I came from Him, from the Absolute, from the Supreme; therefore, I should be divine too.” This kind of divine pride has to come forward. The ordinary ego that binds us constantly has to be transformed. The divine ego, the divine pride which claims the universe as its very own, should be our only choice.
The ego deals only with the person and his possessions. If we deal with the universal Consciousness, we become the entire universe. In this consciousness we do not act like a tiny individual who can only claim himself and feel, “This is my property. This is my capacity. This is my individuality. This is my achievement.” No, at that time we will say, “All achievements are mine. There is nothing that I cannot claim as my very own.”
In the spiritual life the easiest way to conquer ego is to offer gratitude to God for five minutes daily. If you cannot offer gratitude for five minutes, then offer it for one minute. Offer your gratitude to God. Then you will feel that inside you a sweet, fragrant and beautiful flower is growing. That is the flower of humility. When you offer Him your gratitude, God gives you something most beautiful, which is humility. When you discover the flower of humility inside you, you will feel that your consciousness has covered the length and breadth of the universe. Think of the blade of grass and immediately you will feel humility. We trample upon grass, but it never complains or revolts. If we walk gently on grass, we can get the sense of oneness with Mother Earth and with the infinite Vast. We touch the heart of the Mother Earth and we feel the heart of Heaven in our joy, for when we touch the heart of Mother Earth, Father Heaven immediately responds with joy. In the spiritual life we grow humility through conscious gratitude. Once it has seen the flower of humility, the ego goes away because it feels that it can become something better: the universal oneness.
The more we give, the more we are appreciated. Think of a growing tree. A tree has flowers, fruits, leaves, branches and a trunk. But the tree gets real satisfaction not by possessing its capacity but by offering its capacity. Only in self-giving does it get satisfaction. When it offers its fruit to the world it bows down with utmost humility. When it offers shade or protection, it offers them to everyone without regard for wealth or rank or capacity. We also get real satisfaction by self-giving and not by keeping everything for our own use. The ego always tries to possess things for itself. But when we transcend ego we try to give everything for God’s Satisfaction, for the world’s satisfaction and for our soul’s satisfaction. On the human level the ego tries to get satisfaction by using things for its own purpose. In the spiritual life, we transcend the human ego and then we use those things for a divine purpose, for the satisfaction of the entire world.Why do we enter into the spiritual life? We enter into the spiritual life in order to give God what we have and to become what He is. What we have is ignorance. If we can gladly give it to Him, then He can deal with our ignorance. If we try to deal with our ignorance ourselves, then we will have no chance of coming out of ignorance.
Let us all try to feel that He is the eternal Doer, the supreme Doer, and we are the instruments. In us the Infinite plays through the finite. Here we have the greatest opportunity. He is infinite in every way. He acts through us, the finite individuals, although He has the capacity, being infinite, to play His cosmic Game in any way He wants.
God is really great. He can do the greatest things and He can do the smallest things. He deals with His omnipotent Power, yet He takes the trouble to create the tiniest insect. He is infinite, yet He is acting through the finite, through imperfect and limited human beings. But He gives the finite the message of salvation, liberation and realisation. He transforms the finite into the Infinite. Because He can do this, He is absolute, He is omnipotent, and He is the only Doer. He compels the Infinite to act in and through the finite, and He transforms the finite into the Infinite.Now suppose you have done something wrong and I scold you. At that time you will be feeding your ego if you try to distribute the blame. Do not think, “Oh, this mistake everybody makes. It is not only I who have done it, everybody does it. I am not the only person who makes this kind of mistake, so this scolding is of no particular value to me.” If you take it in that way, again you are feeding your human ego. You should feel that you have done something wrong, and for your own good your Master is scolding you because he feels that this is the only way in which you can make progress. At that time others have to feel that your mistake was made by them as well, that they are also responsible for it. They must not separate themselves from you at that time. But it is not your business to put the blame on them.
When you do something good, others will identify themselves with you and you will also identify with them. When you do something wrong, if they dissociate themselves from you, then they are making a mistake. They have to feel, “Inwardly, perhaps we did the same thing. Perhaps we cherished some wrong thought and it has taken form in his life.” It is their business to identify with you at that time for their own inner humility. But if you try to identify with them with the feeling that everybody makes this kind of mistake, so it is not really serious, then you will only enter into the world of self-justification, and you will make no progress. You have to feel sorry, you have to feel responsible and you have to feel that you need not and will not make the same mistake again. If you have done something wrong and I have found fault with you, then you have to feel that I scold you for your own good, for your own progress, for your own perfection.
In this way you can always keep the ego under control. When you have done something right, something good, something appreciable, then feel that others equally deserve the appreciation. When you do something wrong, it is up to others to feel that they are equally responsible for your wrong deed. But you have to feel that you alone are the one through whom the manifestation has taken place. If you get some form of outer punishment, you have to feel that this is also the right thing for your own progress. And when you make progress, when you become more divine, then feel that the others, whom you claim to be your very own and who claim you as their very own, have also become more divine.If we receive even an iota of inner peace or bliss, we will feel that life on earth is fulfilling. Whatever else we have or we are is absolutely worthless in God’s Eye. Only if mental brilliance, material wealth and physical power are placed in the service of the Divine do they become meaningful. The divine light gives them a new life. Without spiritual wealth, outer wealth is totally useless.
So let us be very humble in our spiritual life and give utmost importance to the spiritual treasures: purity, love, devotion and surrender. Only when we have these can our outer wealth and power be utilised in a divine way.How can we get rid of this ego? There are two paths which we can follow in our lives. One is the path of desire, and the other is the path of aspiration. If we follow the path of desire, we can never free ourselves from the snares of ego. But if we walk along the path of aspiration, then sooner or later we will definitely free ourselves from the limitations of ego.
What are we aspiring for? We are aspiring for Infinity, Eternity and Immortality. When our earth-bound consciousness enters into the infinite, eternal and immortal Consciousness, naturally our ego has to leave us for good. If we practise meditation and self-discipline, and if we live the inner life, slowly, steadily and unerringly we can transform our ego. There is no other way to get rid of ego than to launch into the sea of spirituality.
Dive deep, deeper, deepest into the sea of spirituality. There, there alone, will you be able to discover your true self. When you discover yourself, you will see that self-discovery and God-discovery, self-realisation and God-realisation, are one and the same. In your self-discovery and God-realisation, ego, with all its limitations, cannot breathe. Ego will have to go somewhere else, and you will be free from it for Eternity.The ego, which is the little ‘I’ is constantly seeking for something other than itself because it is limited. The very nature of the ego is to be dissatisfied and displeased. It is never satisfied with what it has and what it is because the truth is always somewhere else. The truth is far away from the ego, but the ego thinks it is just around the corner, near at hand, within its easy reach. Wherever the ego is, it seems to be standing on one shore of a river and seeing that truth is on the other shore. Then, when it goes to that shore; it discovers that truth is somewhere else after all. But the small ‘I’ is always enamoured of its own conception of truth. On the one hand it is walking in the field of discouraging experiences, and on the other hand it feels that it is about to enter into the field of encouraging and satisfying experiences.
The large ‘I’ is beyond our definition. It is beyond all action and beyond all experience. In our limited consciousness we cannot bind the truth. The truth is this, and the next moment it is something totally different. If something is moving, then we say that the truth is that it is moving. But our Upanishads say, and our realisation describes the truth in this way: “That moves, and that moves not; that is far and the same is near.” The truth is here, there, everywhere and at the same time it is beyond time and place. We cannot define the immortal Self with our mind’s thoughts. It is beyond, far beyond definition. With the mind we cannot think of the Absolute. We can only realise it on the strength of our aspiration. This ‘I’, the Self, is not seeking for anything. It embodies everything within itself. It is all the time transcending and transcending; transcending its own highest Height.
The little ‘I’ is always dissatisfied. It cries here and there for its satisfaction because it has not seen the truth. At the same time, it does not want to see the truth the way the truth has to be seen — that is, through the conscious awareness of the soul. It does not want even a little light. It wants to starve the possibility and the manifestation of the soul. The large ‘I’ is always satisfied. It is growing, expanding and fulfilling. It has no necessity to search anywhere for fulfilment, for it embodies the highest fulfilment.When you accept the spiritual life, your own inner light should separate you from that person’s longing for false wisdom. You know that what that person is doing is wrong, but at the same time, if you mix with him too much, you will also want to do the same. If you are given the opportunity, you will also try to impose your supremacy on others. If you follow the spiritual path, once you know that what he is doing is wrong, you must say, “I know he is doing something wrong. I will not do the same wrong thing. I know I won’t be satisfied by doing what he is doing, so let me take a different path.” The different path is the path of oneness.
Where does this oneness come from? From aspiration. Aspiration means the inner cry that goes up high, higher, highest. When we don’t consciously aspire to go high, higher, highest, what happens? Automatically the law of gravity pulls us down. We see that those who are not aspiring are constantly staying at one level. Every day they are caught by endless desires. They are at the mercy of desire. But if you aspire, it is just the opposite. Today you have a little feeling of aspiration, a little feeling of a good quality inside you. Tomorrow when you meditate this good quality will increase. The day after tomorrow it will become very vast. The following day it will become infinite. When you start with one desire, the next day you have a stronger desire and the following day the strongest desire. Each day desire is binding you, grabbing you, strangling you. But when you start with aspiration, each day aspiration frees you, liberates you, immortalises you.
Ego can be conquered only through conscious aspiration. And this aspiration comes only when you have a path, a Master and spiritual company. You need spiritual people around you to inspire you continuously. Unspiritual people will ruin your aspiration if you stay with them too much. You have to follow a path so that you will travel steadily in the direction of the goal. A path without a goal is impossible. A path will always take you to some destination, although that destination need not be your goal. You can take any road, but if you want to go to a particular place, you have to take the proper road. If you don’t take the proper road, you will not reach your goal. Any road you choose will take you somewhere. There is always an end to the road, but that end need not be your destination. That is why a specific path is necessary: the path that will lead you to your goal, which is God-realisation.
If you aim for the Highest, you must pay attention to transcending the ego. Otherwise, if one person exercises his ego on you, you will exercise your ego on someone else and he will do the same on somebody else. This is a contagious disease. One has to be cured. Two sick persons remaining together cannot cure each other. No matter how many sick persons stay together they are not going to strengthen themselves. On the contrary, each may catch the other’s disease since they are already weak, and then there is every possibility that both of them will die. One strong person has to be there to cure the weak ones. In the spiritual life, if you mix with weak people you are weakening yourself. Only if you mix with spiritual people are you strengthening yourself. Then your own power of inner light will be able to stand against someone with a strong ego. Once you can conquer his ego’s strength with your inner light, then his strength will be divinised strength, and he will fight on your side against ignorance.Our ego has created a separation, but God is our highest Self. We are now abnormal, but when we are normal, we will know that we are one with God. He is our highest illumined Self. We are not aware of this because our body-consciousness has limited us, so we think that we are separate from Him.
The ego does not live in the soul. The vital does not live in the soul. The mind does not live in the soul. But only the soul is aware of the Source right now. When we enter into the soul, we enter into the universal Consciousness where everything is one. When we live in the soul we will no longer be separated from our Creator.Never give any importance to the ego that wants to compete with others. You have to feel your oneness with everybody. When you do, immediately you will expand your consciousness. If someone does something well, immediately you have to feel that it is you who have done it. He should also do the same thing when you do something significant. Whenever any individual does something very well, others have to feel that it is their conscious inspiration and aspiration that have enabled that individual to achieve this success. If we always have an attitude of team-work, then we will be able to conquer the ego.
Another form of ego is a kind of divine pride. We think, “I am God’s son. How can I be so bad? How can I tell a lie? How can I be insincere with my inner self and with others? If I have to meditate at six-thirty, then how can I actually get up at seven or eight o’clock? I have made a promise to my soul, to my Guru, to God, that at six-thirty I will get up and meditate. If I don’t do it, then I will feel miserable that I am disappointing my divine Father, who is all Love and Concern for me, and who expects and needs my help for His divine manifestation on earth. I am God’s instrument. I am God’s representative on earth. How can I do this kind of thing? I am not keeping to my own promise. How can I stoop to this level of ignorance?” This is also a type of ego, but this ego is not the challenging and destructive ego that makes us want to defeat everyone by hook or by crook and lord it over the whole world with our invincible superiority. This divine ego comes from our divinised consciousness, from our divine birthright.
You came from God unconsciously and you are here to realise God consciously. You are also here to reveal God and manifest God consciously. If you have the feeling that in you is the Divine, that you are of the Divine, and that you are for the manifestation of the Divine, then that feeling comes from your inner oneness with God. In an ordinary way you may feel that this is a kind of ego. But it is not ego at all. The knowledge of your inner divinity which makes you feel that it is impossible for you to enter into ignorance is the kind of feeling you should always cherish.
If you cannot have that type of feeling because you know you have done many things wrong and you are continuing to do many things wrong, if you do not have the inner conviction that you are of the Divine and for the Divine all the time, then you have to accept the spiritual life. Spiritual life means the conscious acceptance of the path of light and total dedication to the path and to the Master. When you dedicate yourself consciously, constantly and soulfully, you become one with your Master, with your Guru. If you take a tiny grain of sand, you will see that it is not pure. But if you just throw that grain of sand into the ocean, it will be all washed away. The grain of sand will lose its unlit quality, its impure quality, and become totally lost in the vast ocean. What has happened? Transformation has taken place. The impure grain of sand has become absorbed by the infinite purity of the entire ocean and has become one with purity itself.
When you offer your dedicated service to your Master’s manifestation, it is an expression of your conscious oneness with him. Then your individuality enters into the cosmic Consciousness which is embodied in his consciousness. You still have ego when you act independently, as a limited existence. But when, with that limited existence, you consciously enter into the vast consciousness of your Master, you automatically become vast. The tiny drop or the grain of sand, when they enter into the ocean, lose their individual identity. They lose their very existence. Then what happens? They lose their tiny existence, but they become the vast ocean itself. This happens only through self-offering. When self-offering comes first and foremost, in spite of all imperfection, impurity, obscurity, then the limited and undivine ego vanishes, while its divine potentiality immediately expands. The undivine in the drop is gone or transformed. The divine in the drop is expanded and enlarged.
When the Christ said, “I and my Father are one,” he was absolutely right. Now why can’t you say this? Just because it is not yet true in your case. Christ was great. No one can deny his greatness. He was God’s son. He felt it, he realised it and then he said it. In your spiritual life also, you have to feel that you are God’s chosen instrument. If you feel in a divine way that you are God’s chosen instrument, then there can be no undivine ego in your life. But you have to feel this inwardly. Then in your actions you have to manifest it.
So whenever somebody else does something good, please feel that it is you who have done it. This is not wrong at all. You are not fooling yourself. Do not think, “Oh, I have not done it. My name is not so and so.” Your name is in the universal Consciousness. There is only one Being and that is the infinite and all-pervading ‘I’. So when any inhabitant of the universe achieves something, you can easily and most legitimately claim that you have achieved it, if you just identify yourself with the universal Consciousness.
My disciples accomplish many things on the physical plane which outwardly I have never done. But I immediately feel that it is I who have done these things, on the strength of my sincere and total identification with my disciples. When they do physical work or mental work, they accomplish so many things. At that time I give them credit. I appreciate them, I thank them and I offer my heart’s sincere gratitude to them. But in my inner being I immediately feel that it is I who have done it with an extended part of my consciousness. These are my spiritual children. Naturally, whatever my children have done is also my achievement. Then again, on the spiritual level, when I bring down Peace, Light and Bliss from above, my children have every right to feel that it is with their conscious effort and their conscious aspiration that I was able to bring these things down. It is not that they have nothing to do with it. They are not just passive recipients. If they feel that together we have brought down this Peace, Light and Bliss, if they feel that when I do something they have done it, then I will give them all the credit because of their supreme discovery of truth.
When you do something on the physical plane I appreciate and admire it. But I feel that it is the expansion of my consciousness and the enlarged part of my being that has done it. You can also have the same feeling about my inner achievements. Ego comes from separativity; therefore, how can there be any ego when we feel our true inner oneness? Where is the consciousness of ‘I’ if, when I do something, you can claim it? Where is the consciousness of ‘you’ if, when you do something, I can claim it? Where is the ego? It is gone; vanished within our mutual, divine and universal feeling of oneness.
Our ego is conquered in these two ways. When we identify ourselves with other human beings, at that time we feel our oneness with them and the competitive spirit disappears from our life. Then there can be no ego. If we can feel that we have come from God, we are in God, we are for God and we are of God, that is another way to conquer human ego and transform it into divine pride. How can we be undivine, how can we be limited? We cannot do anything wrong when we are conscious all the time of our Source. Let us try these two methods.Has doubt ever helped us in any way? No. Doubt has only made a fool of us inwardly and outwardly. Suppose someone has done something. If I doubt his achievement, I gain nothing and he loses nothing. But although I gain nothing by doubt, I may lose everything. If you have achieved something and I doubt your achievement, then I will not be able to benefit from it at all. My doubt will poison my receptivity. My only satisfaction will be in knowing that I was right, which is a negative way of dealing with the truth. Instead I should try to enter into myself and collect my own inner wealth. By trying to see how much sincerity you have, I will never get abiding satisfaction. I will only waste my time. But if I go deep within, I will go right to the source of my own inner wealth and get real satisfaction.
In this life, everything depends on love. Unfortunately, some people love doubt. Outwardly they say they hate it, but inwardly, unconsciously or consciously, they cherish it. They feel that if they do not doubt, they are not wise. In order to doubt we have to become a judge. When the mind doubts someone, it feels great satisfaction in becoming the judge. The moment we doubt someone, we feel that we are a step higher than they are. This is absolutely wrong. In the spiritual life nobody is superior and nobody is inferior. We are all instruments manifesting different aspects of God’s multiplicity. In the Heart of the Supreme we are all one.
Very often a disciple will doubt his spiritual Master. He will doubt whether the Master has actually realised God. When he doubts the Master, who is the loser, the Master or the disciple? The spiritual Master, if he is a real one, has his own realisation. If he has realisation, then he is infinitely far above anyone’s suspicion and doubt. No matter what kind of blighted doubt a disciple cherishes in the inmost recesses of his heart, the spiritual Master will never be affected. The disciple alone will be the loser.
Why do we doubt? Doubt enters into us because we are not certain of our achievements, of our accomplishments, or of what we will do in the near and distant future. If we doubt others, then we are not doing something really harmful. But if we doubt ourselves, then we are doing something most damaging. The moment we doubt ourselves we weaken our possibility and ruin our potentiality. The tree which we can become will die while it is still a plant from lack of nourishment. We have just entered into the inner life, into the world of aspiration. We are now only a tiny plant. Each moment that we doubt we have to feel that we are stepping on this tiny plant with all our weight. When we doubt our inner capacity, we are doubting our very existence, the very life-breath of the seed within us. The Divine says, “I have come to fulfil you, to bring you closer to God, and you are doubting. Since you are so ungrateful when I offer this gift to your soul, your seed will not be able to germinate.”
When we doubt we have to feel that we are harbouring a serious type of disease, a fatal disease. If we don’t conquer doubt, what will happen? We have to feel that we will die. Our aspiration will not only starve, but it will die. There is death in front of us and there is Immortality in front of us. It is we who have to make the choice. If we feel that we want Immortality and not death, then we must give all importance to our spiritual life and conquer doubt with our inner cry and our inner indomitable will.
If we feel that we have a serious disease, what will we do? We will go to a doctor so that we can get an immediate cure. What is the cure for doubt? It is inner cry, aspiration. Only the divine doctor within us, aspiration, can cure us of doubt. We know that there are many things we have done which are absolutely wrong. We try to do the right thing, but we cannot always do it. Why is it not possible for us to do the right thing? It is because we are wanting in determination. We can get this determination only from our inner aspiration. Real determination, the inner, soul’s determination and aspiration are the same thing. If we have determination, automatically aspiration comes forward. And if we have aspiration, determination will be born inside that aspiration.
Doubt will leave us only when we feel that we are destined to do something for God. We get tremendous power from the word ‘destined’. This word brings boundless courage to the fore. Even if somebody is weak by nature, if someone says that he is destined to work for God, then immediately, from the inner world, heroism comes forward. He will fight against doubt and against any obstruction with a strength and inner determination that will surprise him. Obstructions may come to him in the form of impurity, obscurity, jealousy, fear and doubt, but the word ‘destined’ will smash the pride of all the negative forces. Anything that is undivine will have to surrender to this word. So if we have the kind of inner and outer conviction that tells us we are destined to serve God, then the goal can unmistakably be reached.
But when we feel that we are going to do something for God, let us not use the term ‘great’. Sometimes when our human mind hears this term, a feeling of competition enters into us. I feel that I am great; you feel that you are great. Then the question arises of who is the greater of the two. Instead, we should simply say that we are both destined to do something for God, and our task will be whatever He assigns to us. There is only one God, but each person thinks of God differently. You are pleasing and fulfilling God in your way and I am pleasing and fulfilling God in my way. If we both feel that we are doing the task that is allotted to us by Him, if we do not enter into each other’s territory with our competitive spirit, then we will both feel joy because we will both feel that we are fulfilling God in God’s own Way.There is a weapon to conquer doubt, and that is faith. Our faith is infinitely more powerful than doubt, and God has given us this faith in abundant measure. Faith is within us but we do not allow our faith to come to the fore. Instead, we allow strangers who are not actually ours to come into our lives. These strangers are fear, doubt, anxiety and other undivine forces. We know that fear does not belong to us — that doubt is a thief. We know we should not allow intruders or thieves to enter us. But the one that is our very own, the faith-child, we do not allow to come to the fore and transform our life.
In the spiritual life there is only one rule, and that is to have faith. Faith is like a muscle: it can be developed. As we develop our muscles if we exercise regularly, we can also exercise and increase our inner capacity. God does not bring anybody into the world without giving him capacity. Through regular practice we can become inwardly strong. If we concentrate and meditate soulfully and sincerely each morning, then doubt cannot play its destructive role in us. As we become stronger in our inner life we will be able to say, “Let doubt attack me. I shall be able to maintain my perfect faith.”
Negative forces, like everything else have pride. Very soon doubt will feel that it is beneath its dignity to be constantly rejected and denied. Doubt will soon leave us if we do not welcome it. If we ignore doubt, if we treat it as a stranger or a foreigner, its pride will be hurt and it will leave us for good. By meditating regularly and devotedly we can protect ourselves from the entrance of doubt.
Faith is our most powerful weapon. If we want and need faith we have to cultivate the inner soil. How do we cultivate the inner soil? What is the plough? It is aspiration. When we cultivate we need the seed, we need water and we need the sun. Aspiration embodies the seed; the water and the sun in the spiritual life. In aspiration there is everything. So if we have sincere aspiration, sincere inner cry, then doubt cannot last in us.If a child who is in kindergarten doubts the knowledge of someone who is completing his Master’s degree, who will be the loser? The one who is getting his Master’s degree will still get his degree, but the one who is doubting will not be able to learn anything from him. In a few years the little one who is doubting will also have the capacity to attend a university and get his degree, but right now, by doubting his older brother he will not gain anything. If he were wise he would try to identify with his brother’s achievement and become totally one with him.
Similarly, doubt often comes to the beginning seeker in the spiritual life. But instead of doubting, if the beginner identifies with someone who is advanced in the spiritual life, if he establishes his oneness with the aspiration of someone who is much more developed, then immediately he gets tremendous confidence and inspiration in his inner life.
When we doubt God we do not gain anything. When we doubt a spiritual Master we do not gain anything. But when we doubt ourselves we lose everything. If we have to doubt, let us doubt God. We can doubt God every second, and He will not lose anything. On the contrary, God, with his infinite Compassion, will forgive us. But when we doubt ourselves, our soul will not forgive us. The moment we start doubting ourselves, all our good qualities will be lost. If we have love or joy it will all be lost. Our self-doubt will destroy our inner possibilities. It is best not to doubt anybody, whether it is God or ourselves. But if we have to make a choice, if we are helpless, then let us doubt God. He will show us Compassion, but we will never be able to forgive ourselves.
Seekers who have spiritual Masters must not doubt themselves. When a seeker who has accepted the spiritual path doubts himself, he is deliberately insulting the capacity of his Master. He accepted the Master because he felt that the Master had capacity. If he starts doubting himself after having accepted a real spiritual Master, that means he is doubting the acceptance, confidence and promise the Master has given him. When a spiritual Master accepts someone as his own disciple, he gives that person the inner promise that one day, at God’s choice Hour, he will take the disciple to God. If the seeker did not have faith in the Master, he should not have accepted the Master as his own. But because he felt and saw something in the Master, because he had confidence that the Master could take him to his goal, he accepted the Master. Once a seeker accepts a Master, his part should be over. He is no longer responsible for reaching the goal. He is responsible only to surrender his life to the Master. If doubt comes, he should surrender it to the Master. If he doubts, he is not only belittling his own inner potentiality, but he is deliberately rejecting his Master’s self-offering. The Master is offering his service totally and unreservedly to help the disciple. If the disciple doubts himself, he will be incapable of receiving the Master’s Love and Concern. In this way he is not only hurting himself but also wasting his Master’s precious Concern and boundless spiritual energy.But very often when the spiritual Master enters into the very breath of ignorance, ignorance makes the unrealised being feel that the Master, even a spiritual giant, is also of ignorance. If the person were sincerely aspiring, then he would know that although a Master has descended into the world of ignorance he can always remain in his highest consciousness. He has descended into ignorance but at the same time he is in constant communication with the Highest, the Supreme. Instead, the seeker doubts the Master and feels that he is also vulnerable. He feels that the Master is also of his own standard; that the Master is no better than he.
The Master enters into ignorance and plays the game of ignorance with his disciples. Then after a while, when the time has come to take them beyond the sea of ignorance, at God’s choice Hour, he takes them to the Golden Shore of the transcendental Beyond.
Naturally the disciples want the Master to take them. But even before the Master can start playing his role fully, they start doubting him. They see that he is also a human being. He is a victim to sickness, cold, hunger and other earthly things. They feel that he is not always in his highest mood; therefore, he is not always divine.
The problem of doubt comes because the disciples try to judge the Master from their own level. Their judgement is inevitably wrong. Reality has to be seen on its own level. When the disciple is able to enter into his Master’s consciousness, then he becomes a competent judge of his Master’s spiritual height and capacity. But if the disciple looks from even one inch below that reality, then he cannot become the adequate judge of that reality.
If the disciples could see the Master on his own level, if their achievements matched his standard, then there could be no doubt. But if the Master always remained at the top of the tree, then the disciples would have to remain always at the foot of the tree because they do not know how to climb. The Master is more than willing to come down to the foot of the tree. He puts the disciples on his shoulders and then carries them up to the topmost boughs. But when he comes down to the foot of the tree, the disciples misunderstand him. They say, “Oh, he has fallen! He himself will not be able to climb up the tree again. How is he going to lift me up?”
When the Master sees that the disciples are doubting him, naturally he can simply go back to his own highest consciousness. There he can remain in the perfect Peace of transcendental Liberation, where there is no ignorance, no duality, no imperfection, but only infinite Bliss, infinite Light, and infinite Freedom. This he will do if his disciples continue to doubt him constantly and incessantly. At the same time, he knows that there is not a single disciple who has never had the misfortune to doubt his Master, so he uses his divine quality of forgiveness again and again.
Disciples who leave the Master because of doubt and then come back to him think that it is they who come back to the Master and it is they who forgive the Master. But it is actually the Master who forgives the disciples and allows them to return to his boat, for he knows that if he does not forgive them, the disciples will have nowhere else to go. They will be like lost souls. But it is much easier for the disciples to doubt the Master, leave him and then come back again into the spiritual life than it is for the Master to forgive them and accept them again. The poor Master first has to suffer their doubt in him and then he has to forgive the disciples and take them back with all their undivine forces newly acquired from the outer world. In both ways he is caught. Yet the Master takes his imprisonment as the greatest joy, since he is serving his supreme Father in this way. He will let the disciples kick him and doubt him as long as he receives the Command from the Supreme to be of service to them and to humanity at large.It often happens that when one is on the verge of realisation, doubt comes, even though perhaps twenty years previously the seeker had conquered doubt. Perhaps for twenty years one has had no doubts at all. These years have been so happy for him. But just when he is about to realise God very often the darkest hostile forces will attack him at that time in the form of doubt or temptation. In Christ’s case, Satan came. In Buddha’s case, Mara came.
Doubt has come to many spiritual Masters who were on the verge of realisation or liberation. This is the last test. When illumination is about to take place, they see there is a vast gap between their present aspiration — even though it is of the highest order — and the attainment of illumination. At this last moment some may doubt their own aspiration and fall. So even great seekers who would soon have become Masters, not to speak of ordinary seekers, have suffered from tremendous doubt. At this last stroke, many fall before they realise God. Then it may take them twenty years, forty years or even another incarnation to regain their height. The student has studied his lessons well for ten years but something goes wrong at the last moment and he fails his test. God will give him another chance after some time, in the next year, or after ten years or in the next incarnation.
When I was a young boy I had a mentor whose Guru had been on the verge of realisation. But the day before this Guru would have realised God, he was attacked by doubt and he fell. Then what did he do? He became disgusted with the spiritual life altogether. He felt that spirituality had disappointed him. So the following morning after having been on the verge of realisation, he went back to his wife and started learning science. He became a professor of science at a university, and in that position his life ended.
This man could easily have realised God. Before that time he had worked so hard for many incarnations. He had practised meditation in the Himalayas and led such an austere life. He was on the verge of realisation, and there are people who would have believed that he had realised God from seeing his face, although he was sincere enough to say he had not. But when doubt comes, its last attack is like a volcano. Naturally the seeker will fall if he is not prepared. All his work will be swept away. This man’s own Master had also had the same attack, but his Master had passed. He said the doubt he had faced was like a tidal wave. The current was so powerful that only God’s Grace had saved him.
But it is not absolutely necessary for a seeker to go through this. In some cases the last temptation does not come. In my case, I was lucky and nothing came to disturb me. But if somebody does go to the goal safely, you cannot say because there were no thorns on his path that the goal is not real. Some Masters go through constant doubt, but it is only when their doubts leave them that they realise God. Their path is full of thorns, unfortunately. Again, there are some fortunate aspirants who do not doubt either themselves or their Master right from the beginning. It is not because they are fools with no brain or sense of judgement that they do not doubt. On the contrary, they are clever. They feel that by doubting whether someone is good or bad or has a certain quality or capacity they are gaining nothing. They feel that the time they would spend in doubting others can be better used in cultivating their own inner soil, their own inner aspiration. If they sincerely aspire and they do not doubt, then their progress will undoubtedly be fast.Before we entered the spiritual life we were all unconscious; the tiger in us was sleeping. But when the tiger sees that we are trying to leave its domain it says, “Where are you going? What right have you to leave me? I will devour you before you leave me.” As long as the doubt-tiger is confident enough that you will stay with it all the time, it does not feel the necessity to threaten or frighten you. But when you start trying to come out of your bondage-cage, the ignorance-tiger tries to prevent you. It attacks you most vehemently with doubts and other undivine forces as soon as it feels that you are threatening to leave it. That is why you are attacked as soon as you come to the Centre to meditate. That is where the divine forces are strongest, so that is where the ignorance-tiger feels threatened by you.
Do not think that weaknesses and imperfections are coming to the fore in you just because you have accepted the spiritual life. On the contrary, they were there before, but they were hidden. You should be grateful to your spiritual life for bringing your imperfections to the fore. The sooner your imperfections come to the fore, the sooner you will be able to face them and conquer them. So when doubt and other imperfections attack you, you should say, “You have come. Now let me conquer you once and for all. Then I will be free.”
Many disciples are perfect when they are at home, but the moment they come to the Centre, they become jealous or they start doubting themselves or their minds are filled with undivine thoughts. As soon as they look at me, inwardly they say, “Oh, I am cherishing such undivine thoughts!” They are afraid that I will see their undivine thoughts so they try to hide them, like a thief. But they should try to act like a child and not like a thief. The child is not ashamed when he is dirty. He just runs to his mother and she cleans him.
You are my spiritual children so you have to consciously throw your jealousy and undivine thoughts into me. Instead, you mistakenly say, “If I can hide my undivine thoughts, he won’t see them. The next time I come perhaps they will be gone.” This is absolutely absurd. Whenever you have wrong thoughts, try to empty them into me. If you think, “Oh, he is seeing how undivine I am,” and you keep your garbage inside, how can I help you? I am ready to take your undivine thoughts. Just throw the ignorance-garbage into me. Unfortunately there are many disciples who come in front of me and struggle or try to hide. Don’t struggle, don’t hide. That is your best opportunity to throw these problems into me.
It is quite possible for a disciple to give up fear, doubt and jealousy all at once. Many people have done it. You simply have to know what you are going to get when you conquer these undivine qualities. Feel that you are going to get infinite Peace, Light and Bliss. Make this feeling a reality. Feel that you are rejecting one thing, and accepting something else. Say to yourself, “If I conquer my doubt, jealousy and insecurity, I will get everything in boundless measure.” Naturally, you will try to get the thing which is most fulfilling, the thing you are crying for in your life of aspiration.From:Sri Chinmoy,Two devouring brothers: doubt and ego, Agni Press, 1974
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