From the head to the heart🔗

The very nature of true love is unconditional. It is directed to no one and nothing. It simply flows for no reason. It is an overflowing because you feel the deep connection between you and Existence. Until this happens, your love is always directed to a particular thing and this cannot be called love at all.

When you take dheeksha - initiation - from the Master, you are agreeing to allow him to flow through you and transform you. And the moment you become an ashramite, you not only commit yourself to your own enlightenment, but you also commit to another beautiful thing and that is the Master's mission. You commit to serving the mission which is nothing but the enlightenment of you and millions of other seekers like you.

But in order to carry the Master's profound message, you should have experienced and understood it yourself. You should feel the bliss; only then can you spread it. If you do not feel the conviction yourself and you try to spread bliss, you will be giving the people only blisters, not bliss!

You always radiate only what you have. So you cannot just imagine being blissful and try to spread it to others. What you spread is nothing but what you are overflowing with. Then, it will show in your very body language, in your words, in your face. Actually, if you observe the walk of a person who has known bliss, you will feel as if his feet are not even touching the ground. He will appear to be gliding over the ground. This is because all the extra, unnecessary weight of the mind and ego has disappeared! He is just an emptiness through which Existence flows...

Even a glimpse is enough to catch on. But do not stop there! There is so much more honey; more honey to taste; more honey to experience.

It is like this: I have dipped my finger in honey and then practically taken every bit off. Then I have wiped my finger with my kerchief. It is this finger which I have put into your mouth. For this you are saying, 'It is so sweet, so beautiful!'

Yes it may be sweet, but there is so much more to taste! Remember that!

Other than the Master, we have had so many relationships where we have loved someone. It could be our parents, our friends, our children, our husband or wife. But in these types of love, there is need for attention from the other person. There is a compulsion to possess the other person. This is what you have known, to be love. This is what you have always felt love to be.

And then what do you do when you come to me? Because you think this is the way to love, you will start trying all this with me also. You will become possessive and crave attention. Actually, all these emotions have nothing to do with love. They are just concepts of love built over time. In real love, there are no expectations. In real love, the two persons involved will simply disappear. Just the beautiful energy called love will remain. There will be no need for attention or for possessing the other. When this happens, there will not even be the need for the physical presence of the other person.

I am not saying that all your other relationships are wrong. I am saying that they are illusions. Even that is perfectly alright because the only way to get past an illusion is to go through it.

But when you come to me, you will think that I will simply support these illusions. There starts the problem! Of course initially, when I see someone - who needs me to support their illusions, I will support them and if I see that someone has the maturity to handle the truth, I will simply shake all these illusions away! Either way, once the operation starts, the illusions will have to be broken.

In a discourse, a newcomer says, 'I feel as if I am too dependent on all the people whom I love.'

First thing, love is always expressed as seeking attention from others. Actually, your attention need is very intense, but you seek it in the name of love. This is where all the problems start, the problems of so-called love. When you seek attention, you become dependent on the other person from whom you are seeking. But because you do not want to be dependent on someone else, you begin to pull away. Then once you have moved away, you feel as if your needs are unfulfilled and then you want to come close again!

This is what you are doing. You come close, then you move away, then you come close again. If you watch a husband and wife together, you will see what a love-hate relationship it is. If you keep them separate, they will want the other in the name of love. If you keep them together, they will fight!

As of now, you are trying to change your relationships in order to attain fulfillment in love. It is not possible to do that. Whatever is happening is not because of the other person in the relationship, but because of you, of your mental setup. If you internalize these ideas, slowly your mind will dissolve and you will fall deeper into real love.

Do some awareness meditation to dissolve your mind. Do the breath watch meditation. Simply watch every breath that goes in and every breath that goes out. You see, breath is the basic life force. It is the bridge between you and Existence. If you can become aware of it, you will be able to move in awareness all the time. Become aware of the breath that goes in and the breath that comes out. In between the two, there is a U-turn. Become aware of this turn also.

You go through many different phases with the Master. When you first come to me, you are very open. But then after sometime, you become closed. After some time, the openness will happen again.

In the beginning when you felt open, it was only your imagination. But later, it becomes reality. And there is nothing wrong with the closed feeling also. Almost everyone goes through it. It will pass. Once you fall more and more in tune, it will pass. And then when the openness comes, it will stay.

Openness comes only with awareness.

The army of a conquering General was ravaging the country. When it came to a little village, the General saw that everybody except an old monk in a monastery had run away. The angry General rushed into the monastery and shouted, 'Don't you know who I am? I can simply draw my sword and cut you into two without blinking an eyelid.'

The old monk smiled and said gently, 'Don't you know who I am? I can stand here without blinking an eyelid while watching you draw your sword and cut me in two.'

The general was ashamed. He simply dropped his sword and fell at the monk's feet.

When a disciple comes to the Master, his energy shifts from his head to his heart. The same energy that was used in logic will now be used in love.

And as long as the head is filled with logic, authentic love cannot show itself. To live a life without love is to live a life without life in it. Life will just seem dead, not alive.

The moment you experience love, you will be transformed.

‘Some days, the feeling to leave is just so intense that I don’t know what to do,’ says an ashramite ‘and then on other days, the pull to remain here is even stronger!’

There will always be a pull to remain here because the pull is from your being. Life with a Master is ecstatic and a challenge! Not everyone can handle it.

Being here makes you vulnerable; it makes you insecure. There will be many ego blasts and you need the courage and maturity to handle it.

When your ego just cannot handle it, it simply wants to run away. And then on the other hand, your being feels the pull. So naturally, you will be confused. You will be unsure of which voice to listen to because both will seem authentic.

You have known the ego for much longer. This is why many times the ego will appear correct. But then if you look within yourself, you become clear of what you want. Then there will be no confusion. But again after some time, you will be pulled by the mind.

The next time you feel some pull towards or away, look within yourself; see from where exactly the thought or impulse is coming. You will be able to sense whether it is authentic.

If you feel the pull, that is more than enough. The fact that you have become sensitive enough to feel the pull is more than enough. If you have not felt the pull, then it is a different thing. But you have felt it; that is more than enough.

Then you have already stepped inside. Then you have already begun to fall in tune.