Understanding

It was a beautiful evening, cold and crisp and the sun had just gone down behind the hills. November in southern Spain is an extremely beautiful month and we were savourmg the lovely view from the farm house as the Austrian Jewish couple looked at each other, and she said, “We would like to tell you about our son. He is seventeen and when he came home from school at the commencement of the last vacation we met him at the airport. His father looked at the boy and told him that he could either go to a barber’s saloon and cut his newly grown long hair and then come home, or else catch a plane to school. The boy cut his hair, much against his inclination. He has just written aletter, asking us to try and understand that he cannot help but be himself. He wants us to know that he loves us, but that he still wishes to be able to decide largely in life how he is to live. What should we do?”

What does one tell a couple like this? The bird sitting on the branch of a tree singing, sleeping, eating fruit and flying from tree to tree, at every given moment, is behaving completely and totally in accord with its nature. We are not angry with the bird if it eats the ripe fruit that we might want later to pluck; we understand. We are not upset by a cat that we pick up when it scratches us, for we know that its purrs and its scratches are only in accord with its nature. We are not bitter with ants when they make a stream across our lawn and up the walls of our house, and we are not annoyed by caterpillars, mosquitoes and other insects for being themselves. Can we not see that hatred and anger destroy him who hates and who is angry and not the object of the hatred and anger? We understand that the trees that yield heavily are no more to be praised than those which do not yield at all, for we know that helplessly they are manifesting life, in accord with their essential nature at every given moment. This couple was willing to understand that a man from a far off country could have thoughts and ideas quite different to their own. They could recognise that his thinking and talking were only in accord with his nature. If we can recognise that animals, birds, insects, plants and every living thing cannot but be and function according to their nature, can we not extend this recognition to understand that the same principle holds true for man also? When we see the reasonableness, logic and rationality of the acceptance of this view, then does this also not bold true for us, ourselves? When we accept ourselves as we are, without question, without judgment, but with a clarity of awareness, then and only then do we begin to understand ourselves and what makes us tick. It is then that we understand at there is no blame to be attached to the snake when it tries to bite us, just as much as there is no blame to be attached to us when we kill it. In that sense, even Hitler is not to be blamed, for he lived like all of us do, according to his nature. “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do,” then only has this meaning. It is only when we understand this, can that much bandied word, Love, begins to have any meaning. To love is to understand and accept all else, he, she or it, as each one of them is. It is not out of place to repeat that this can only be possible when one accepts oneself, as one is. Love thyself at all times and understand that all else is thyself. With that understanding blossoms love. With love the meaning of that much abused word, God, begins to enter our consciousness. We begin to understand that there is no God apart from the universe who first created this universe and then man, to be the master and enjoy and rule. Rather, understanding dawns that there is no God outside of this universe who created it and created man. God, the universe, and man are one indissoluble whole; a composite, eternal, ever-changing existence. There is only THIS if we can put it in capitals. Everything that appears, whatsoever it be, as an individual entity or a phenomenon, is but a temporary manifestation of This in form; every activity and occurrence that takes place be it labelled good or bad, wanted or unwanted, can only be but a temporary manifestation of This in activity. Each of us is but a minute portion of This, call it God or anything else, and when we manifest, perform our function, we then pass away to be transformed into another wonderful manifestation. This is the law of etarnal change, perfectly orderly, perfectly beautiful and perfectly marvelous. Is it difficult to understand and accept that every manifestation is as it ought to be, perfect unto itself? Jesus is no more perfect than Judas, Rama than Ravana, Gandhi than Hitler. Of course, all of this cannot be reasoned about intellectually. Through an innate intutive wisdom that is intrinsic to all men, it has to be experienced, it has to be realized; then only is it Lived and not merely understood intellectually.

All phenomenal existence is inexorably bound by the most beautiful certainty of an inevitable and eternal law of cause and effect. No effect, no event, no occurrence can ever take place except that orderly causes have been responsible for its manifestation. What does it matter if we cannot always trace this wonderful cause effect relationship? That which we sow, we reap, and we reap this at every given moment of our existence. When we understand this and when we fully realise that our lives are the result of what we did and do, that we and we alone are the architects of our lives, then we are free of two of the most debasing emotions that shatter our peace. The first is self-pity, that ignoble emotion which fills us when things don’t go the way we want and, when we experience the pain that we so richly deserve and bring on ourselves. The second is pride and arrogance when things do go the way we want. If only we understand ‘this shall also pass’, then there is really no room for despondency and dejection or elation and arrogance. There should only be constant awareness, and the recognition of the fact that in this ever-changing life, we have received, are receiving, and always will receive only that which we richly deserve. What is the use in being angry with a coconut which falls on our head when we stand under a coconut palm. Is it not better to understand that the coconut is the instrument through which we receive what we deserve? Is there any point in being dejected, annoyed or angry with the horseshoe that flattens our tyre and causes us to miss an aeroplane, or a looked-forward to appointment? We get what we deserve and we should try and understand that the coconut and the horseshoe are but instruments in this wonderful orderly world of cause and effect, by which we are receiving our just, but due deserts. This was the reason why Jesus said, ‘show thy left cheek when thou hast been struck across the right’, for the striker is but the instrument, and we cannot receive one iota more or less than what we deserve. This is what Ramana Maharishi showed us when he stood still when attacked by wasps and allowed them to sting him for as long as they wished, though, it would have been equally correct for him if he had run, or even if he had swatted them. He understood that they were but instruments through which he was receiving the fruits of his own creation. With this understanding only do we get an inkling into the realisation that there is only action and no actor. When we understand, and not merely pay lip service, but have this understanding deep within us at every given moment, then we do not label anything and anyone by the pairs of opposites such as good or bad, but understand that all Are and cannot help but Be, and this includes ourselves. We know that we receive only that which we deserve and are then at peace with all and everything. Then and only then do we find that this world is indeed a wonderful world, full of beauty and love and fine people, and we bow our heads in reverence and are filled with a sense of awe and joy.

Why not write to your son and tell him that when he comes home, he will be welcome whether his head is shaven, as it was when he went, or with long flowing locks? Why not tell him that he will always be your son, no matter what?