SIGNS-The guiding stars for a seeker

SIGNS- An object or event whose presence or occurrence signifies the probable presence or occurrence of something else. 
They are very powerful tool to move forward irrespective of physical, mental or spiritual world. They are the essential mode for us to grasp  and learn from them, whether they are traffic signs or some other. 

They are omnipresent in our lives and we have made a unconscious habit to follow them or rather taught to follow them, here I am taking up signs as a whole whether presents in the house or outside. e.g. a swollen face indicates a person is hurt or angry, and will not take more nonsense from you, even a small child can read this sign. And likewise stepping out side the house, we start following them e.g. road signs, traffic signs and so on so forth. They give us direction to move forward in this worldly jungle or complex enigma called life.

I think we can say that signs are intimation, mark, manifestation or demonstration.

They had made presence in our lives once we take birth on this planet in the shape of Zodiac signs and their traits. our whole lives or future is bounded by them, and believe me it is not an easy task to break free from them. We cannot escape from their repercussions, whether we like it or not but their presence is imitable.

Who can forget blockbuster Hollywood movie Signs:-

Signs is a 2002 American science fiction thriller film written and directed by Night Shyamalan.

Even I have seen this movie and truthfully, I was bit scared at that time and did not believed much of its credentials, I mean aliens and all sounded very imaginary at that time but not now. As we grow older our horizon  expands, I am not sure about the mental capabilities but certainly our experiences and wisdom does improve with time.

Only today priest told me that they have 24*7 lamp burning in the temple and they are very very careful about it that it wont get extinguish or whether oil is enough for the whole night, but if by chance it does, they get dream that it has got subdued.

Strange isn't it? No scientific logic can explain this phenomena. as priests rooms are outside the main sanctum sanatorium and the doors are closed after the night prayers.

But some higher entity or God (as I am talking about temple here) must be sending signal to them.
 Faith and beliefs are mandatory to have commune with God or we can say higher authority, atheist have tremendous problem with acknowledging it and interestingly they cites all the scientific reasons to made their flimsy point and eventually forgetting that science itself is an offshoot of knowledge bestowed by higher authority to maintain life. And in a no way different than religion, metaphysics, or physics. And there is very thin line between them, interestingly they cry horse to prove God's authenticity. Isn't it like seeing a child, and denying the existence of its parents?
Well it is their problem and not mine.

I am an ardent believer and believes that God gives signals or signs to his devotees.
I have plenty of examples to cite from my own life, and sometimes they are amazing just out of this world, like some force is leading me, and how much I try to do otherwise would always be discouraged or failed to accomplished it. So I have made it a habit to follow 'signs' unconsciously, but that again is very catch 22 situation, what explanation, could I give to maintain my stance and most of the times, end up hearing that I am very orthodox or unnecessary skeptical or in plain words "superstitious", but now these comments does not bothers me any longer. Rather I feel privileged to have signs from God.
 Though, lately I have been trying hard to dissociate myself too much indulging into this habit, in my day to day routine. Only a  few years back I used to have clear vision that one saintly person is taking stroll in the forest among'st wild vegetation and then suddenly he bends and pluck one wild flower and then I would wake up, this dream kept on coming repeatedly for days, I was certain that this must be having some message for me, and then one morning it dawned upon me, that wild flower (weed) was none other than me. After my this inference or conclusion that signal disappeared totally.
I tried to explain bit of this "sign"phenomena in my post -
Living in fools paradise.
Gratitude to all the Gurus in our lives part 1
Gratitude to all the gurus in  part 2
I believe you could acquire most of the worldly knowledge from books, teachers and lectures but the spiritual knowledge evades you unless you are in the patronage of a spiritual Guru, only he can make you understand how to decode that particular sign. When Guru says it is very dark, he is not referring the physical darkness or absence of light, what he meant here that your soul is covered by the dark clouds of ill thoughts, of envy, greed and revenge, which are blocking the shining light of Supreme entity. And another interesting sign was Guruji  introducing me in a big gathering as a "Writer". This surprised me lot as before that writing  a single page used to be an ordeal for me. And remarkable one, was some force leading to a specific section of books in Huston book store, where my son gifted me two most precious books. And both of these books are essential for physical and spiritual life.

Good bye friends
I will share more on this topic, if allowed to do so by almighty:)

pics from web store.

Dilemma of a seeker

 A religious seeker: a pilgrim, or one who aspires to enlightenment, nirvana, salvation or God Realization.

A seeker is like a half baked cake.

One can not make something else out of this uninviting looking soft sticky dough.
 It is neither in molten stage, where it can still be used in making milk shake and nor fully baked into an aromatic, sweet smelling, mouth watering hot cake. But something in- between, where the old stage is lost and another one is far fetched.

One cannot retrieved it to initial stage of separated raw materials, so that something else can be made out of this.
This phenomena is absolutely like a seeker, he has collected and added laboriously all the requisite ingredients, which I have already mentioned many times in my previous posts:
1)Commencing the important task.
2)Road to self enhancement.
3)Under the patronage of guru.

Strangely, all the essential ingredients are added in appropriate proportion and has been churned ferociously to make a nice even fluffy dough, but sadly left aside by Almighty, the ultimate baker, for some unfathomable reason before the final stage of full baking (self realization).
That's the dilemma of a seeker. He feels lost that what went missing, he tried his level best, walked the treacherous path with the constant fear of falling down, because it is very much possible in the spiritual pursuit, one mistake and you are back to initial stage. It is called adhogati ", descending opposite to ascending or pragati
 Essential virtues for a seeker are truth, morality, honesty, charity, humbleness, and compassion. To adept them in one's life, or to live with them, believe me is not an easy task. I can say that because I have been struggling with these issues for the last fifteen years. Sometimes I feel totally lost.
For example, let us start with truth, nobody, absolutely nobody wants to hear and speak it, and if you are doing it, they will automatically came to conclusion that you are lying. And you are left with no option but to keep on justifying your stance. And believe me it is quite painful.
Sometimes it becomes so tiring when you see disbelieve in their eyes, because how much you can argue, it is not going to change their perspective. Either you have to withdraw your point and let the lies wins or keep mum or just ignore and stay hurt. (now the choice is yours). And most of the times the later one wins. "Hurt stays".
I was just like a normal teenager in my youth, felling in and out of love or infatuation.
Then a big change (marriage) happened and I realized that there is nothing like true love or love at first sight, or even compassion in relationships, only the barter system works.
But I do believe in "hate at first sight". No, no my dear, I am not joking, it is very much possible and prevalent in almost every house hold. My experiences are very limited, only to Indian families and as much I have gathered from Pakistani plays that is more found there, poor girls, they are always living in fear and sycophancy.
Only the God knows why there is an eternal tussle to win over the "boy" between bride and grooms's mother, and they leave no stone upturned to win. Here since I had very little armors ( lies, back-lashing, and hypocrisy). My defeat was certain, so I withdrew myself from that war. I do not know why people thinks that "everything is fair in love and war". The only blunder I did was to open my heart or pain in front of every sympathetic ears. I know now, that was really bad and nobody really helped me, to lessen my pain. Here, I do admit, that I blundered and pushed onto the downward path, and unfortunately, I suffered a lot, because those two sympathetic ears which (at least) I thought, turned out to be more vicious and opportunist, so the net result was I was more pained. I think that is what is mentioned in religious books that a person is put into the "boiling oil" in hell. I think to listened to your own insults constantly on your face is nothing less than that. Well I was young and full of bollywood dreams, which were badly and miserably shaken something like 'nailed down on the alter'.
Looking back, I think I can call it churning process as I did not compromised on truth and morality (virtues) against vices of outside world or within family.
At that time, I thought nobody is really worth it, that one should deviate from one's chosen path for them.
But here I am again proven wrong, as there is no duality in this universe: good/bad, truth/lies,honesty/dishonesty so on and so forth, everything is just a part of this whole universe.
 Now, again I feel stuck, like a dough in the pan and waiting anxiously for divine's next sign.
'Signs" are very important for a seeker they are like a guiding star in the total darkness of ignorance.




Good bye friends,
I will be writing my next post on SIGNS.




pics from web.

Celebrating "Ganesha Chaturthi" in Mumbai

Siddhivinayak temple

The best place to celebrate Lord Ganesha's birthday is in Siddhivinayak temple Mumbai, and that too especially on his birthday (Ganesh Chaturthi). This year I was fortunate enough to visit this divine place on this auspicious day. The program was very sudden, as I happened to be at my brother's place on 4th of September. My niece was supposed to fly there next day, she asked me and I just could not resist it. From that point onward everything fell into places, I got the air tickets of same flight, and interestingly found my identity card in my purse (which is mandatory). It was very unsusal as I generally do not carry my important documents with me. I took it as a divine sign and thought of to get along with the program. During our two hours flight, I just could not believe that, I am really going.
We were picked from the Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport  around 9.45 a.m and our host friend of my niece, was very jovial and fun loving, full of humor with his apt one liners, a rare quality, otherwise these days people are obsessed with their problems and possessed with jealousy and anger.

Road map 

Modakam 

There was an aura of festivity in the air and one could see group of people dancing on the drum beats, in front of their dear lord to give him warm welcome. It is customary to have your own idol of Lord Ganesha either in your house or in your society.
 There were an elaborate rituals associated with this function, prayers and special bhog called Modakam was offered to the deity. It was difficult for me to abstain from this caravan of celebrations. We had a great darshan in  the SiddhiVinayak temple our first stop.

Main entrance of temple

DecorateD with blue flowers.

The whole temple was decorated with flowers from entrance gate to main hall, which looked absolutely loaded with blooming flowers of every color giving it a very surreal  look.  After having a great darshan and paying obeisance to our dear lord, we wanted to eat and chill around. Our host made it a point to show us all the major roads and interesting points. We had a very nice breakfast of "missal pav and vada pav" in the typical mumbai style "maska mar ke" means full of butter. After having sumputious breakfast, we were out on the road again, shopping, sight seeing and appreciating new bridge. Bombay (Mumbai) is famous for its tall buildings, which looked spectacular against vast body of water. We also saw high tides in the slumbering Arabian sea in the hot afternoon.

Sea shore laced with high rising buildings.

   

New bridge

Lord Ganesha is the elder son of first mythological couple Lord Shiva and Goddess Parvati epitomized by Purush and Prakiti (nature), sometimes shown as half man and half woman embodied together in one form depicting the presence of innate energy in all the materials forms, in this universe.
Lord Ganesha is the God of arts and wisdom. He is honored at the start of every ritual and ceremony, as he is considered to be the remover of obstacles. He is widely loved among-st hindu community all over the world. It is customary to seek his blessing before starting of any new venture.

Lord shiva made with flowers.

 It was an amazing trip for me as I had good darshan, had eaten tasty street food and done shopping, all in a single day and that too without getting tired. It must have been due to the benevolence of God Ganesha.
I had poured all my feelings, acquired knowledge and my beliefs in my blog "Travelers views", had emptied my mind and soul in that and left with nothing more to share. And then this visit to the sacred temple happened, which seems like a new beginning.
Lord Ganesha was always there for me, being born as a Hindu, he has been the integral part of my everyday prayer since childhood.
In the end all I can say is, thank you my dear lord, for blessing me in your own special way by rejuvenating me.

Marine drive view in night.

Good bye Mumbai, I am not sure when I will come here again.

Happy Guru Purnima to all...

On this auspicious day of Guru Purnima

I want to extend my hearty congratulations to all the devotees, who are very fortunate to have enigma called GURU in their lives. I am one of the lucky ones to be bestowed by God, who is kind enough to send one of his Masiha in my life.
I have heard from saints that our this life is just an outcome of our karmas of past lives, but we have to live it, otherwise these karmic burden keeps on piling up birth after birth or I can say as in karmic cycle. People can argue with me endlessly over this theory, as it sounds little fatalism, a sort of resignation to the inevitable. They can question that why we should be doing anything, and why not to accept whatever life is offering us. But we all know that it is not possible, as we would be wasting one golden chance to rectify our deeds. Now at this confusing state of mind GURU helps us a lot, by showing us the right path, otherwise we will be lost in the abyss of desires and our actions and then their reactions.
I have already written so much about "Enigma", called Guru and his importance in our lives, so I would prefer to only give links to those posts dedicated to Guru. 

Integration of mind is only possible with guru's kirpa.

Firstly, I witnessed Guru's enigmatic nature in metamorphosis in Mount Abu 
Then introduced to Guru's blessings in Traveler became seeker.
I looked beyond mundane to understand guru's divinity.
After this I came under the patronage of Guru to become a disciple.
Guru taught me what is true love or spiritual love. I have written a post about it in let's learn to love.
I had written about spiritual knowledge, which is not possible without Guru.
After this Gratitude to all the guru's in our live part-1.
And after that Gratitude to all the guru's part-2. happened.

Guru's feet are like lotus, which can give everything from material to mental peace and spiritual enlightenment to a devotee.
One must pay obeisance to them.
Once again happy Guru puja to all the devotees.

Yellowstone National park: the story of two picture post cards.

Dear readers,
My this post would be like a letter or picture post card.
I would love to narrate the story of two picture post cards received by me from persons very very close to my heart. Interestingly both are from same place "Yellowstone National Park", but with huge span of time in between or maybe four to five decades. First card I received was from my father in late sixties, when he visited USA. At that time a very few people used to go there, a far- off land  with seven seas to cross. Only a very few very rich industrialist or the high profile Govt. officials had the privilege to visit "The Great America". And truthfully rest would satiate their desire by seeing it on the round globe, which was a must have on the study tables, when I was growing-up. A time of no emails, no cell phones or even telephones, only letters used to travel, which hopefully would reach after a month or maybe twenty days. I hope you can imagine, how precious those letters would be for the receivers. During that time one day I received a picture post card from my father, who visited Yellowstone national park. With picture of "bears" on it and a very sweet message, as he used to call me "Bhallu" lovingly, a Hindi name for bear. The message was that he had came to this park and missing us all.
How the time has evaporated with twist and turns of life  and what remains are the sweet and sour memories.

Now the second card is from my son, who had visited this place recently, with a very sweet message, he has explained the park:  This park is magnificent. There are rivers, snaking the landscape, with pristine water, beautiful pools of colorful water, geysers shooting hundreds of feet into the air. There were deep canyons, mountains, lakes. There are many animals here like buffalo, bears, wolves, deer, and moose.

The morning glory pool.

I am not sure when I will see it, but I am certainly appreciating this gesture of sending me picture card.
Thank you dear

  P.S
I think we should continue the art of writing letters, if not possible in this fast paced world, then at least picture card once a while. And believe me you will just love it, otherwise e-mails are basically lost in the overloaded mailboxes.

 I have added a few more to show the beauty of wilderness.

pics :-
courtsyTarun Wadhawan

LIVING IN FOOL'S PARADISE.

A State of happiness based on false hope.

Where most of us love to reside.
This is the most comfortable situation that
we just do not like to be awakened.

Fool's PARADISE means: 
"To be happy because you do not know or will not accept how bad a situation really is". 
A very strange phenomena indeed, that we are not ready to accept the gory reality, and kept on living in a state of  euphoria, which our imagination weaves.
"Where ignorance is bliss tis folly to be wise". 
How true, our world of imagination, with us as a central character would dwindle if we know the reality. 
Now what is reality? 
It is a very, very strange and complex question, having multiple answers, which all can be proven true, somewhat paradoxical, depending upon the situations, space, time or even our mental state, (I mean it subject to change according to place we reside and in the century we are living). A common man's definition will certainly be different from the privileged one. And all the more different criteria would be given by a materialistic and spiritualists, the seers and seekers alike. And they all can be proven correct from their perspectives. 
Now back to the most consuming question here is, "what is reality", which can be feasible for all, atleast for most of us. As far as I know, we all want answer to this question, as nobody wants to be lost in maze and in this context wants to solve the riddle called "the truth of life", which has perplexed all of us at some point in our lives.  
In my opinion, reality is what we see around us or grasp with our sense organs, analyze with our mental faculties and intelligence and in the end, it got imprinted in our memories for future references. These are all the essential tools to grasp any knowledge. 
Since I had privilege to stay in Ashrams, for a few days in the holy and spiritual environment of Haridwar and Mount Abu. As I was quite naive about the ways of saints and their thought process, so got surprised, that most of the things, which consume us for the whole days in our whole lives, does not even exist for them. We spend our whole day in completing our desires including tasks, which are again off- shoots of our materialistic needs. Contemplating upon future and regretting past does not exist for them. It is a very difficult for  us to forgive ourselves and others for misdeeds, and eventually we spend quite a lot of our valuable time and energy to overcome that. I have seen we are so venerable that anybody can disturb us with their words or actions, and truthfully it turned out to be, as if we are living on their whims, where as saints either overlook such petty things, or do not pay any heed to them, for them this is just a residue of our karmas.
   A Guru played a pivotal role in the upliftment of a seeker. As I have mentioned, in my post - Under the patronage of Guru. The Guru raises the consciousnesses of a disciple to a certain level and then integrated mind with him/her, so for now, words has little or no meaning for the onward journey, and only "signs"  remains.

Raja Janak was a self realized king.

Ashtavark
Name given to him because he had eight deformities.

The signs plays an important role, all your actions even talks are minutely scrutinized, any evil actions or even loose talks are accessed, and duly be given 'signs' that whether you should repeat it in future or shy away from it. I am not in position to tell you more but I can explain it in simple language, that for an example, if you are remotely jealous of somebody or something, you will be see as if you are burning, or if one is indulged in back- biting, he will be shown that he is eating garbage. (These are all very elementary signs for a seeker), It is like warnings, that "where one is going". These signs comes in a stage of half- sleepiness called (sapshupti)  I think nearest English word would be "slumber"for this stage between awareness and deep sleep. A disciple knows it in his/her heart, what Guru wants or what and how he is showing him the path. A very individualistic experience, where no two person can have the same signs. Or maybe, they have. A seeker is strictly prohibited from talking much about it. 

Since, I am talking about a different topic here -reality, I think I need to narrate a story, as done by our Guruji in his book (Ati ki aur) "Towards Ecstasy" . He narrated a story about a mighty king Janak, who was self- realized person, one night he had a vivid dream that he had lost his empire, wealth and so on, so much so that he had nothing to eat, and was begging out side some temple, this indeed was very scary for a king, who had abundant wealth of each and every kind, with army of servants and soldiers. Suddenly he saw that one rich man was distributing rice, he rushed towards him to get it, but by the time he reached there, it was over, he started crying as hunger pangs became unbearable him, and then he saw a stray dog was licking some earthen pot with few rice in it. He rushed towards it to get it. He was totally blinded by the thirst and hunger. And sadly, he could not even get near it, as pot got broken by dog. Then he could not have it more, he started crying and howling, that was the point his hand got hit by bedside, and he just got woken up. To his shock he saw that he was sleeping on his gold bed, with  servants around it, but the dream was so vivid that he just could not shake it away. This whole experience sadden him a lot. He kept on thinking, was this a premonition or a message or may be a reality (as he lived it with full awareness). He was in a dilemma, what is truth, this life or that one, which he has just experienced. So much so that he lost his interest in everything, including his kingdom affairs, eventually his Guru was called to solve this riddle, which was consuming him day and night. His Guru Ashtavark  explained him that neither this world or that dream world is true, the truth or reality is totally different than these two worldly experiences, and now he should aspire to know "the ultimate reality". 
The most important aspect is that, the Guru can show you only the path, as it is your journey, so you have to tread it alone, but his presence will always be there with you like a "Guiding Star."

.

I will elaborate more on this subject in my next post...

pics from web.

LURED BY LEH

 LURED BY LEH

Awesome view of lake at the background of snow covered mountains.

This is the first time I am writing about a place without actually visiting it. But I had to write about it, 

I have heard so much about its serene beauty from my nephew, who is an Air Force personnel and is holidaying in Delhi for few days. 

Every family has certain traditions for get-together, with birthdays and festivals, we had 26th January to celebrate with fervor. 

My kids were always used to look forward for this national holiday, to visit maternal grandparents, where the pinnacle of their visit used to be to witness the fly-past by Indian Air-Force, which comprised of  the first fighter formation, comprising five Jaguar aircraft in the shape of an Arrowhead, followed by five MiG-29 upgrade aircraft in similar formation. The Sukhoi formation comprising three Su-30 MKI aircraft will fly in the last phase. The end of the parade will be marked by a single Su-30 MKI aircraft, pulling up vertically in front of the dais and carrying out the signature ‘Vertical Charlie’ rolls. It used to be such a grand treat for   everybody, age no bar, that you would always be left wanting for more. And during one such occasion, my young nephew, who was totally taken by this national pride moment, declared that "I want to be an Air Force pilot." This statement from young lad of less than ten years became the dream project for his parents. 

Now when I saw him yesterday, I thought what a great joint effort by the parents and the Air-Force officers, who had chiseled a  gallant officer from a young lad, whose eyes used to sparkle with dreams to fly, and that too for Indian Army. His dreams also got settled in the aging grand parent's trembling hands, folded in silent prayers and in the best wishes of near and dears. My father always used to remind me after every Flypast ritual that one day you will see that my grandson will be doing it. I used to say, "yes daddy I know."  And every time that day used to get culminated with all kids chasing each other and running through the corridors, 

Shanti Stupa

shouting and giggling and me doing hush hush to them, and my brother making huge club sandwiches, which were served with huge portion of potato chips to go along with cold drinks. 

"How the time has changed, and now the kids are chasing their higher dreams and we as parents are chasing sweet memories."

As he has now been posted in Leh and extended me an open invitation to visit it. Since I have not visited it, I had to gather information from wikipedia, and this is what I have gathered:

"Leh was the capital of the Himalayan kingdom of Ladakh, and now the district of Leh in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. Leh district, with an area of 45,110 km2, is the second largest district in the country, after Kutch, Gujarat (in terms of area). The town is dominated by the ruined Leh Palace, the former mansion of the royal family of Ladakh, built in the same style and about the same time as the Potala Palace-the chief residence of the Dalai Lama until the 14th Dalai Lama fled to Dharamsala, India, during the 1959 Tibetan uprising. Leh situated at an altitude of 3524 metres (11,562 ft), and connects via National Highway 1D to Srinagar in the southwest and to Manali in the south via the Leh-Manali Highway.

Leh was an important stopover on trade routes along the Indus Valley between Tibet to the east, Kashmir to the west and also between India and China for centuries. The main goods carried were salt, grain, pashm or cashmere wool, charas or cannabis resin from the Tarim Basin, indigo, silk yarn and Banaras brocade.

Now Leh has become a very popular and most sought after tourist destination. It has everything to satiate  their passions from trekking to  huge monasteries to awesome lakes. 

I think some of the most beautiful places on the face of earth are in the mighty Himalayas,which has stood as sentienal since ages providing beauty and cementing faith in God.

Lets see friends when I will visit this place, then I will be writing more about it.

Pangong lake

Thiksay monastery

This pic is from a Times world travel magazine.contributed by Archit Kapur.







Pic from web and inputs from wiki.

Impressions along the way

Impressions...

Impressions, Sunrise port of Le Havre 

Oscar-Claude Monet (1840-1926) was a famous French painter and one of the founders of the 'Impressionism movement' along with his friends Renoir, Sisley and Bazille.

Monet rejected the traditional approach to landscape painting and instead of copying old masters, he learned from his friends and the nature itself. Monet observed variations of color and light caused by the daily or seasonal changes. 

Claude Monet's painting of sunrise at Le havre port near his house had started a whole new form of art. This painting is so beautiful and genuine that I could not resist posting it. Monet must have been witnessing it everyday, and must be so obsessed with its sheer beauty that he reproduced it in oil, and certainly felt like sharing it with others. And I think that's what every artist, painters, writers, including photographer are aspiring for. We all want to share our feelings or work with others. That is what I am doing, sharing my thoughts, observations, experiences and my spiritual journey through my blog. 

Impressions are very important for everybody, for the person who is perceiving and at the same time, who or which, is being perceived. Or in other words for subject and object alike. The whole marketing strategy is playing with this "impression" nuance. We all generally talk about "first impression is the last impression". But is it really true?  I think, people, places or things starts unfolding their true nature after some time, so it is not very wise to judge at the first impression. Though it is so common practice, that we all fall pray to it. People with huge houses, designer clothes, big cars or I can say people flaunting their money have more admirers than the less fortunate ones. Nobody really cares how you have horded the wealth, (all that matters is wealth), and in respect to this, a honest person is at loss. This phenomena always saddens me, I do not know why, I think I need to narrate one small story here:

The Story of Bhai Lalo and Malik Bhago

One day Guru Nanak Dev ( sikh saint) reached a place named Mardana. There, a poor carpenter lived named Bhai Lalo. He invited Guru Nanak Dev to lunch. Guru Nanak Dev agreed for he had never differentiated between rich and poor, high and low caste or Hindus and Muslims, etc.On the other hand, Malik Bhago, who was a rich landlord of the village, also sent Guru Nanak Dev an invitation for lunch.

Guru Nanakdevji.

Malik Bhago had got various tasty dishes prepared for Guru Nanak Dev. Guru Nanak Dev sent a message to Bhai Lalo to join him at Malik Bhago’s residence. So Guru Nanak Dev went to Malik Bhago’s residence. There Malik Bhago served a large array of food for Guru Nanak Dev. Just then Bhai Lalo arrived there with two makki rotis. Guru Nanak Dev took the makki roti and started eating them. Malik Bhago saw this and asked, Guruji, I have served such a grand feast for you, yet you are eating this simple food from poor person's hands. "Have I done something wrong?” Hearing this Nanak Dev took a piece of poori from Malik Bhago’s dish in one hand and a piece of Bhai Lab’s makki roti in the other hand. Then he squeezed the food in this palms. Everyone saw that drops of blood flowed from the hand which had Malik Bhago’s poori and drops of milk flowed from the other palm having the makki roti. Everyone was surprised.

Then Guru Nanak Dev smiled and said, “Malik Bhago, you exploit and torture the labourers who work and earn for you. You eat of their blood. It’s their blood that is flowing here. Bhai Lalo works hard and eats his own labour, thus milk flows from his food.  Only saints can have such vision and perception.  So in my opinion it is not good to pass judgement on others at the first meeting or get enchanted by their flimsy material wealth, which would disappear anyway with passing time. As everybody knows that we cannot take anything from this world along with us. 

* Do not get me wrong material is also very important, but don't give it undue importance, that you have to compromised on morality to hoard it or never let it win over relations. Because at the end of day, what matters most is your near and dears and certainly peace of mind.

 Along the way through my life journey, I have also gathered a few "Impressions", which I have shared with readers in my travelogue. 

"Don't ever think, work should/could, be done by hook or crook and impressions does not matter, people forget. 

Because my dear, "impression does matters or only thing that matters is impressions you are leaving behind and people do not forget." 

My special regards to great impressionist french painter Oscar-Claude Monet. Lately I have acquired a strange habit of getting lured or I can say mesmerized by the geniuses, in any field.  All those known or unknown people, who lived or are living, left their imprints or impressions on the sands of time, and became immortal.

My humble obeisance to all of them, and I feel privileged to know them through their work. The list is too long but I would love to share a few names with my readers- Vincent Van Gogh, Thomas Hardy, Charles Dickens, Agatha Chirstie, Somerset Maugham, Jane Austen, Alex Haley, Ayn Rand the list is too long, and they all had left deep imprints on me and the millions of readers alike. I had lived their books through their characters.

Last but not the least is our lovable Ruskin Bond. 

Thank you all.

pic web.

Gratitude to all the Gurus in our lives-2

Living with spiritual knowledge.                         I will continue this post from my previous one:

Buddha the enlightened one.
who lived with spiritual knowledge and became a legend.

Gratitude to all the Gurus in our lives-1.

I will be writing about the glory of spiritual Guru in this post.
Only Guru, "a spiritual Guru" can teach how to live in accordance with the spiritual knowledge. It is a rare and very important aspect of life. 

Gathering this knowledge is tough, but to live with this is all the more tedious task. Only the enlightened one can show us the way, as we human are very vulnerable to all the temptations and deceits and always ready to fall pray to deviousness of bluffers. 

There are ample of stories (teachings) of Buddha "the enlightened one and his disciple on this subject", on internet. 

 Guru who has realized the Truth, is accomplished to impart the supreme knowledge. So one must try to please guru in every possible way.  Lord Shiva (one of the God in trinity) admonished, “If I am angry, guru can save you but if Guru is angry, than no God, not even I can save you.” 

And that makes the whole difference. The Guru won't let you fall into abyss of immorality. A spiritual awareness is needed in every aspect of life. 

 Only the Guru can impart the spiritual knowledge. I have already mentioned this in my previous post: Understanding divinity on earth. 

The Guru raises his disciple's consciousness to a certain level and then passes over the spiritual knowledge through integration of mind, and in turn the disciple surrenders totally to Guru and becomes one with him.  The Guru leads him onto the path of ultimate reality with the help of  Spiritual knowledge.

To explain how to live with this knowledge, I have to narrate one story about Raja Janaka, (as Guruji did in his book).

Raja Janaka was a Self-Realized King. His life taught us to have detachment in any circumstances and have a pure attention based on dharma (inner religion and moral conduct.

 King Janaka was called ‘Vidheha’ (means also ‘dead’ or liberated from the body’).

 The Milk Story or Lesson about Detachment. Great sage Narada asked him one day, ‘ Revered Sir, how are you called as Vidheha, you live in this world, how can you be a Vidheha?’ Raja Janaka said,’this is very simple. I will tell you about it in the evening. Now, please do this little job for me. There is milk in this bowl. You take this bowl & come along with me. Please see that not a single drop of milk is spilled on the Earth. Then only I will tell you why I am called Vidheha’. Narada took the bowl & followed Janaka everywhere. He had to be very careful because the bowl was such that by the slightest movement the milk might have spilled. He got very tired. When they returned in the evening,

Narada asked ‘Please tell me now, I am quite fed up with carrying this bowl & following you everywhere at the same time.`

Raja Janaka said, `First of all tell me what you have seen?’

Narada, `Nothing except this bowl of milk so that it won’t spill.`

Raja Janaka, “Didn’t you see, there was a big procession in my honour, then there was a court wherein, there was programme of dancing? Didn’t you see anything?

Narada said, “No sir, I have not seen anything”.

Raja Janaka, `My child, likewise with Me, I also see nothing. All the time, I just watch my attention. Where is it going? Making sure that it won’t spill away like the milk.`

“This sort of attention one has to develop: chitta nirod’. Nirod means the saving of your attention, so your attention should not be on saving money & worldly things and all that, but attention itself must be saved. As you watch your money, as you watch your road when you drive, as you watch your child, when it is growing, as you watch the beauty of your wife, or the care of your husband, all put together you watch yourself – your attention.”

With spiritual knowledge comes a whole new understanding of eternal/non- eternal and real/non- real, moreover one stop identifying oneself with the objects of external world including one’s own body. Non-attachment to this mundane world is the immediate outcome of spiritual knowledge.

According to Vedas - the  knowledge, worldly or spiritual is in the human mind and in many cases it is not being discovered, but remains covered, but when the covering is being slowly taken off, we say "We are learning," and the advancement of knowledge is made by the advancement in the process of uncovering. They maintained that knowledge is inherent in man, no knowledge comes from outside; it is all inside our mind.

    The religion and spirituality acknowledged ‘intuition’ a direct source of knowledge, they maintained “Chetna” consciousness as the highest source of knowledge, and all scientific ways of gathering knowledge come as secondary to it. They believed that knowledge acquired by the cognitive method is only partial and thus cannot be foolproof, and to prove their point cites the classic example of mistaken identity of rope as a snake. We might misjudge rope as a snake in dark light and then automatically our first instinct would be of fear and panic, we would either run away from it or would try to kill it, and both are wrong as they are based on the wrong perception. And this proved that we should not totally rely on our sense organs, our inferences and most importantly on our limited faculties of reasoning.

On a lighter note/mode, I think I must acknowledge modern day father/ Guru "wikipedia", without which, we are in lurch. Just at a click of mouse, a whole lot knowledge becomes handy. 

And I think I should call "youtube" as a foster mother rearing her millions of children and teaching them from cooking classes to grooming to etc, etc... well anything under the sun. 

We are privileged people to born in this century of booming social media. 
Now if our father, and mother are from social media then I think, facebook, twitter, instagram, and linkin are our siblings and they are the only few I know, but there could be more step ones also... who knows:)
Enjoy the modern day huge family. 

 Pic and inputs from web.