Jai Sai Master, Babu garu..
Jai Sai Master, Sai Bandhus..
Dear Ajay, Jai Sai Master!
Here's a part of a private message given to me by Babu garu. I, kinda feel, that it applies universally to many situations, yours being the current one, especially your no. 1 point.
This is all too common a predicament that many are facing these days. The world is trying to give you a picture of insecurity and inadequacy just to keep you in the 'i am a slave' syndrome that many people are retiring to. Just remember one thing. You've got a brain. Youve learnt many things in life already. You can sure learn anything right now! What is the problem with 'I dont know enough'?? Just dont let that bother you.
And really Ajay, that is so true. People want to see others in the light where, if something is NOT wrong with you, then there is something wrong with you. You see my paradox? That's exactly what Babu garu addressed in many levels (according to our own understanding) at many places in the forum.
I guess it all boils down to how confident we are in ourselves to answer those who try to draw us out for a round of discussion. But again, you see, 99 out of 100 people are out there to comment, but NEVER to discuss, or atleast NEVER to ARGUE. Heck, I would go to the extent of saying, that they would not even try to argue with a closed mind. All they want to do is, comment and move on. And the remaining 1% of people, they do draw you out, discuss with you, argue with you, and in many cases, you and that person might hurt each other with unnecessary comments. All this happen, I beleive, because we are not properly ready. Not ready to discuss. And why not? Because I believe, that we have not started on our journey as shown by Master/Baba. Atleast, that's what I think about myself. When I am convinced that I can break any misconceptions into pieces, whether it is my misconception (of what I thikn I know) or whether it is others' misconception (of what they think is correct...and they think you are wrong). That conviction can happen if we go the whole 9 yards. Until then, we will feel threatned, we will feel helpless, we will feel the hurt, we will feel anger, and possibly we will feel hatred also, towards that person who thinks that we are some religious nuts.
So, for your no.1 point, first of all, as Babu garu pointed out, don't give in to their picture of insecurity. Infact, they want you to to feel insecure so that they can associate with you. How can you be so happy, with no concerns in life? no worries in life? no tensions in life? Common! there should be something that you feel unhappy about. you cannot be happy and be religious or spiritual!! :-)
On this note, ALSO, I wanted to share or recollect one more hard-breaking, no-nonsense lessons/lectures given by Babu garu on the eve of 2010 new year. That struck my heart for a long time. PAth is difficult but worth trying. The gist of it all is..
1. Read Mahatma's teachings.
2. Understand them.
3. Follow them.
4. Tell others
5. Invite others to discuss what we read and strengthen our undestanding of those readings!
and finally and most importantly,
6. If someone teaches the society in a wrong way, either through Radio or Internet or TV or on a stage, go to them, slap their face left and right. Tell them that they are doing it wrong, and tell them that Sai Baba, Ramana Maharshi, Vivekananda, Master...they all taught something and you are teaching something else. Either prove me wrong or you prove yourself right.
Well, obviously, we cannot do the 6th one, which brings me back to question our conviction. Until it is steadfast, we really cannot perform the 6th one. And so, till tha ttime, Babu gari words copied and pasted above (about insecurity) gets useful for us.
Just thought I should share this with you.
As for your 2nd point (young lads), even I am waiting for a proper way to talk to them, so I really cannot comment on that. and the 3rd point (old people), I believe, we can mould old people easier than young lads. But the easiest of them all is young kids. I guess, with the old people, we can always bring into consideration, Gita, Ramayana, and Bhagavatam and equate that to Sai Leelamrutam and other Mahatma's life histories. Somehow, we gotta derive some common ground, dig out Master's pearls from all those books, all His audio lessons etc. Derive the common ground, get them to the neutral stage (mentally speaking) and then we can discuss which also enables us to understand and question our own understanding. isn't it?
Hope I did not write something silly.
Best Regards to all,
Jai Sai Master!
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