The Mother's four gifts

There was once a very great spiritual Mother who had hundreds of spiritual children. She was extremely kind, compassionate, and forgiving to these children, and they loved her most devotedly and soulfully. The very name of their Mother was, for some of them, enough to make them feel boundless ecstasy. They recognised that in comparison to her, their human mothers showed them scarcely any affection, concern, love, or sympathy. They got everything — love, concern, joy, and all that could nourish and fulfil a human being — in boundless measure from their beloved spiritual Mother.

One Mother's Day, about four hundred disciples gathered together to honour their spiritual Mother. They brought hundreds of gifts of money and other material things to her. These they placed at the feet of the Mother, and in soulful gratitude they offered her their love, devotion, and surrender.

Now, because it was Mother's Day, the Mother was all compassion, all concern, all love, all joy, all pride for her spiritual children. From among the four hundred disciples gathered there, she pointed out four men who were most developed spiritually, and asked them to come and stand in front of her. To one she said, "Your name is Simplicity." To the second she said, "Your name is Sincerity." To the third she said, "Your name is Purity." To the fourth she said, "Your name is Humility."

"All the rest of my disciples have all these qualities: simplicity, sincerity, purity, and humility, but these four have these qualities in abundant measure. That is why I have singled them out.

To the one who was named Simplicity, she said, "Any boon you want from me I will grant to you today. Your simplicity has pleased me immensely. Anything you want from me, any boon, I shall grant you.

With folded hands, Simplicity said, "Mother, I want your constant concern for me. I want you to be concerned all the time about me — not only about my inner life, but about my outer life as well. If you are pleased with me, this is what I want most — I want your concern."

The Mother blessed him and said, "Certainly, my child, you shall have all my concern."

To Sincerity she said, "Now, what do you want from me?"

Sincerity replied, "Mother, I need your love. If I get love from you, I can try with utmost sincerity to realise God with your help. If you just give me your love, if I feel your constant love in my heart during all my activities, I will feel that I will be able to fulfil you. So I need your love, your real love. I need your constant love."

The Mother said, "Certainly, I will give you all my love. I am most pleased with your sincerity. You have all my love."

Then she said, "Purity, what do you want?"

"Mother, I want to have constant assurance from you that you will always be mine and I will always be yours. I shall realise God with your boundless compassion. My pure heart is a gift of yours, and I want to have the assurance from you that you will take this pure heart to God. I need only your real assurance that you will take me to the Highest. The Highest is inside you. I want you to take me there. This is the gift that I would like to have from you.

The Mother said, "Certainly, I shall give you this. I give you my inner assurance that I will lead you to your destined goal. I give you my soul's promise and my soulful assurance."

Then the Mother turned to the fourth, Humility, and asked him, What would you like to have from me?"

He replied, "Mother, Mother Divine, I would like to feel your heart all the time inside my heart. I do not want anything else. I only wish to feel your heart in the very depth of my heart. Since you have given me the name Humility, I wish you to give me this boon — that I shall be able to feel your divine feet at every moment in my heart. I want, I beg, to be purified at every moment by the touch of your divine feet."

The Mother said, "Certainly, I shall give you this. I shall place my feet inside your heart. At every moment you will feel my divine feet blessing you, purifying you — blessing your aspiration, and purifying your lower vital, your lower life."

Then the spiritual Mother said to them, "I am most pleased with your prayers. The things that you four wanted to have from me are most significant, most valuable for your inner realisation and perfection. I am extremely pleased with your aspiration. I am so pleased with you that I want to give you four more boons."

She said to Simplicity, "My child, I am pleased with you. In your life of aspiration I wish to offer you a straight path — a path that will be absolutely free of zig-zags and complications. You will run along a straight path."

To Sincerity she said, "Your sincerity has touched the depths of my heart. Because you are so sincere, I shall shorten your path. In addition to being straight, your path will be short."

Turning to the third, Purity, the Mother said, "I shall make your path sunlit. There will be no darkness, no obscurity. It will be extremely easy for you to run toward your goal on the sunlit path which is already straight and short."

To Humility she said, "I shall give you total protection. I am making your path full of protection by giving you my soul's umbrella and my life's shoes. You will hold the umbrella as you run, and you will be protected from above. Nothing from above will be able to destroy you. If the hostile cosmic forces, the undivine forces, want to attack you, my umbrella will be there, and they will not be able to pierce through its protection. I am also offering you my life's fastest shoes. You will wear them when you run, and you will be able to run the fastest because they will give you comfort and protection. You will have protection above and below, and you will be able to run the fastest. Your path, in addition to being straight, short, and sunlit, will also have all protection."

Each individual seeker has to cultivate simplicity, sincerity, purity, and humility, step by step. With simplicity we start the race. With sincerity we run fast; with purity we run faster; with humility we run the fastest.