Hari Bolo Hari Bol #9

He is not really troubled about mankind; what has he to do with mankind! Essentially he is asking about himself: “My mind refuses to accept that I am entirely wrong. At least a little must be right.” But understand my difficulty too: either one is wholly right or wholly wrong. There is nothing in between. No one has ever existed in the middle. Truth does not come in degrees—someone fifty percent, someone sixty, someone ten, someone five. Truth is indivisible.

Have you not heard? The scriptures have been crying for centuries that Truth is indivisible. It cannot be broken into pieces. Either Truth is with you, or it is not—there is no third possibility. You cannot say, “I have a little truth.” The ego, of course, wants to believe: “Maybe I don’t have the whole truth, but I do have some.” That would mean truth comes in quantities—“I have a little.” Truth cannot be portioned or cut. Either you are alive or you are dead—there is nothing like being partly alive, partly dead. But our language is such, our ways of speaking are such. We even say to each other, “I love you very much”—as if love had measures: much, little. Either there is love or there is not. “Much, little”—what nonsense! Can love ever have a quantity? Is there a scale on which you will weigh it—one kilo or half a kilo?

God is not something of which you can run away with a rag—“I’ve got a small piece of the Divine.” Spare a thought for Him too! As if you had snatched one of His thousand hands, or torn off one of His four heads.

When the Divine descends into life, He descends totally. Which means that until the Divine descends, you are in total darkness and totally wrong.

Understand it this way: we heat water; at one hundred degrees it becomes steam. Do you think at ninety a little steam forms, at eighty a bit less, at ninety-five a bit more, at ninety-nine even more? No. Only at one hundred does it become steam. If there is even a slight shortfall from one hundred, there is no steam. Hot water is not steam. It may be good hot water, but it is not steam. Steam is only at one hundred degrees. Exactly so here.

Yet disciples come with precisely this notion. People come to me and say, “We have already practiced everything—yoga, meditation. If some small deficiency remains, please complete it.” A “small deficiency”! They come presuming they have done it all; only little odds and ends remain to be fixed. And when I begin to break, naturally it pains them. The greater the ego, the greater the pain.

Have you heard the story of the musician? There was a great master. He had a strange rule. If a complete novice came—someone who knew nothing at all—he took half fees. If someone had practiced music for a few years and knew something, he charged double. After twenty years of practice, a man came to him and said, “This rule is absurd, contrary to logic. Those who come trained should pay less; I have spent twenty years! How can you charge the untrained half, and the trained double? What arithmetic is this?” The master said, “I will have to work much harder with you, because first I must erase what you have learned. That is why I charge double. The new one’s slate is clean; straight handwriting will take. You have come with pages full of scribble—who will do the cleaning?”

It is often seen that the so-called experienced do not last long with a master, because their experience feels threatened. They have done practices, prayers, worship. For years they have rung temple bells, recited Hanuman Chalisa. Today they are not ready to let go of all that; it becomes a great obstacle. But unless the master breaks you completely, reduces you to pieces, you cannot be rebuilt. So very often you make a mistake: if you are a Hindu or a Muslim, you sit clutching your own grip tightly. The master will snatch away your Hinduism and your Islam too. If you think he is against Islam or against Hinduism, you have judged wrongly. He is against no one—he is only engaged in erasing the disciple. Whatever your conditioning, that is what he will break.

One morning a man asked Buddha, “Is there a God?” Buddha looked at him and said, “No, absolutely not.” At noon another man asked the same question. Buddha said, “Yes, certainly.” In the evening a third man asked, “Is there a God?” Buddha closed his eyes and remained silent. His disciple Ananda witnessed all three events. He was in great difficulty. Those three are fine—they each heard only one answer and may never meet. But what about Ananda who hears all day—first “No,” then “Yes,” then silence? At night, as Buddha lay down to sleep, Ananda said, “I cannot sleep until you clear my mind. You have put me in a quandary. Have some consideration for me too! To one you said, ‘There is no God, absolutely none’; to another, ‘Yes, certainly’; and to the third, you remained silent.”

Buddha said, “The man to whom I said ‘There is no God’ was a theist—his theism had to be broken. The one to whom I said ‘There is a God’ was an atheist—his atheism had to be broken. The third was neither theist nor atheist; he needed the lesson of silence: don’t ask, become quiet. As I am silent, you be silent. In silence you will know. They were three different kinds of people, so I had to give three different answers.”

Now you will be in trouble: how will you decide whether Buddha believes in God or not? What Buddha believes cannot be known without becoming a Buddha. Yes, what he says to disciples is available—but those are a thousand statements, each spoken to suit a different disciple.

One stone must be struck from the north, one from the east, one from below, one from above. One is rough in the middle, another at the base. Stones differ—but all must be broken.

A master needs great patience. Disciples will run, dodge, look for devices and shields to save themselves. The master will strike; they will absorb the blows on their shields.

The most difficult creative work in the world is the master’s, because the medium he works upon is a living human being.

“Steadfast, unshakable.” The master is unwavering. Unwavering—this is his mastery. The flame of consciousness in him has become steady. What Krishna called sthitaprajna, steady in wisdom. The flame of his awareness does not flicker, even if storms arise. We are trembling; therefore we cannot see truth.

Imagine a camera in your hands while your hands shake—and you take a picture. What truth will appear? Try one day: run while taking a photograph. To take a clear picture, the camera must be still. The more still the camera, the clearer the image.

When a lake is calm, the moon’s reflection is whole. When the lake is rippled, the moon is fragmented across it. It becomes hard to know what the moon is like. Our mind is a mirror. Truth is all around, but our mind is trembling, quivering, full of waves. How will you know the Divine in this state?

People come to me and say, “Where is God? Show Him to us.” I say, “I can show you; there is no obstacle to showing God, for there is nothing but God—existence is brimming with Him. But become unwavering…”

People want to see God without meditation. They say, “We will meditate only after we have seen God.” They have set an impossible condition, because God is seen through meditation. They say, “We will meditate when we have a firm proof that God exists—when the eyes can say, ‘Yes, there is God.’” The eyes will surely say so, but let the consciousness behind the eyes become still.

The one whose consciousness has become still is the true master, self-governed. The one who has known himself as other than body and senses—that separation is victory. Understand this: do not try to become “master of the senses” by effort. Whoever tries only becomes repressed; life turns into disease. There is no need to suppress any sense. Suppression brings no freedom—what you suppress will return again and again. Suppression is a path to neurosis, not to liberation. Avoid repression.

People have taken “mastery of the senses” to mean: conquer the senses so the tongue loses taste. They devise strange methods to kill taste.

Mahatma Gandhi used to eat neem chutney with his meals. Neem chutney is a way to assault the tongue, because “tastelessness” was a prime rule in his ashram. But is this any way to achieve tastelessness? If you insist, go to a surgeon for a little plastic surgery: the tongue’s capacity for taste sits in a thin layer—remove that layer and you will taste nothing—neither sweet nor bitter. Or if you deeply crave bitterness, keep only the back part of the tongue and peel off the rest, because different parts of the tongue register different tastes; bitterness is at the very back. Keep a few points there, then you won’t need neem: any chutney will taste like neem!

But by killing the tongue, will tastelessness happen? This is a deception. What is real tastelessness? To know “I am not the tongue.” To know that the taste arising on the tongue is not me—I am the aware witness. I see bitterness on the tongue; I see sweetness; I see salt. Bitter or sweet or pungent—I am the witness. You don’t practice bitterness against sweetness; you transcend all tastes. You bring the witness.

If you want freedom from sound, victory over ears, will you sit in the marketplace listening to noise? Will that grant victory? No. People think so. If you wear rough cloth, will you conquer the sense of touch? No.

There is only one victory over the senses: the awakening of the witness—knowing “I am only the seer; all else happens around me; it does not happen to me. I stand apart and see.”

Try a small experiment today while eating. These things can only be understood by experiment. As taste arises, look within: is the taste separate from me, or am I one with it? You will find you are separate—because you are. The marvel is only how you ever took yourself to be one with it. You are a great magician; you have deceived yourself well! But a deception is a deception. The day you awaken, the spell breaks. This spell can be broken. There is no need to fight the senses, to harm the body. One who tortures the body is psychologically ill, not healthy.

A healthy person knows simply: I am not the body, I am not the senses. My tastes are not me. I am beyond, distinct, standing afar, a spotless mirror.

“Steadfast, unshakable, self-governed—he has grasped immaculate knowing, eternal and firm.” And when this happens, pure knowing arises. Pure knowing is another name for witnessing. Why “pure” added? What you presently “know” is not pure; your knowing is a mere pretense—borrowed, stale, from others. Pure knowing means that which is born within, arising out of inner clarity and innocence. Your knowing is like a mirror covered with dust. Pure knowing is when the dust is wiped away and the mirror’s freshness appears.

From witnessing, pure knowledge is born. And then that which has always been true is known—“pure knowing has grasped what is firm from the beginning”: that which is true from the very beginning.

This is crucial: Truth is not to be made; it already is. Only recognition is needed. Let it reflect within. “From the beginning true, and to the end true.” Truth is just truth. Only you are untrue; hence you cannot relate to it.

And the greatest cause of your untruth is your knowledge. This will sound upside-down: the biggest obstacle to knowing is your knowledge—your scriptures, your words. You have amassed junk.

Joshua Liebman, a Jewish sage, wrote in his memoirs: In the exuberance of youth I made a list of all desirable things—health, love, beauty, talent, wealth, fame, and many more that make life complete. Proudly I showed the list to an elderly friend whom I regarded as a guide in spiritual matters—perhaps wishing to impress him with my precocity and wide interests. A smile flickered at the corners of his eyes. He said, “Excellent list—well thought-out and well written. But you have left out one thing, without which all these become an unbearable burden.” “What is that?” I asked. Drawing a line through the entire list, he wrote: “Peace of mind.”

Knowledge that comes from outside increases your mental restlessness; it does not reduce it. A pundit grows more agitated—more thoughts swirl within, more crowds gather, more webs of logic ensnare him. Scriptures create great noise inside.

The essential thing is not borrowed knowledge—it is silence of mind: a thoughtless mind. In that thoughtless mind, true knowing is born. Then you need not go searching in Krishna’s Gita—Krishna’s Gita begins to be born within you. And then, if you read the Gita, you will understand; not before. Before that, you will only understand what you are able to understand—not what Krishna is saying.

Each person has his own language.

I have heard: A servant is trying to wake his master. Morning has come; the master still snores. The servant rouses him in the master’s own idiom:
“Wake up, my lord,
It is morning!
Like prices falling in a bad market,
The moon has dropped low.
The pebbles you had mixed
Into the sacks of rice—
Those countless—stars—
Are sinking one by one.
The light, like cheap hair oil
With a mustard scent,
Thin and reddish,
Is spreading across the east.
The early breeze
Carries the fleeting fragrance
Of the incense sticks
That fetch a high price at our shop.
The uproar last time
From those who took rotten flour
From our store—
In just such commotion
The night’s silence has drowned.
As our town crier on a rickshaw
Proclaims the excellence of our goods
Circling the city,
So the birds are chirping—
And above all,
Like prices rising after a slump,
The round sun is climbing.
There is freshness everywhere in nature,
Brand new!
Rise, my merchant, it is morning.”

People have their languages. You will read the Gita—won’t you be the one reading? You will project your meanings. You will read the Quran—whose consciousness will read it? Those meanings descended through Mohammed’s consciousness; only if you have a similar consciousness will you know them.

I also say: read the scriptures—but when the mind is pure. Then an amazing thing happens: every scripture testifies to your experience, becomes your witness, validates your truth—every scripture. Then no division remains—Gita and Quran and Bible are all your corroborators. When Truth is with you, all the world’s scriptures will bear witness. Until then, you will see contradictions and disputes among them, because you lack the very thread that unites them. You have the beads of the mala, but not the thread to string them into one.

“Steadfast, unshakable, self-governed—pure knowing grasped what is firm from the beginning.
Morality, contentment, forgiveness cling to whose vessel; within him the unstruck sound resounds.”

And in one whose inner knowing awakens, the unstruck sound begins to sing; Om arises within. He needs no mantra to recite; mantras chant within him—and he is a witness even to that. This world appears in unprecedented beauty, music, and light—and he is a witness even to that; he is not deluded by it, nor does he identify with it. Morality, contentment, forgiveness arise in him of their own accord; they do not have to be cultivated.

“Morality, contentment, forgiveness—these spring from his inner vessel.
Within him abides the unstruck sound.”
Within, around the clock—sitting, rising, waking, eating, walking, speaking, hearing—every moment, a soundless sound hums. The Divine’s fingers have touched his vina.

But make your vina fit to be played by God. Tune it, prepare the instrument.

“No costume, no party—unceasing, only one aim; beyond dispute.”
There, there is no sect—“I belong to this sect or that.” No party—no this side or that. There is only one unbroken aim: the One Divine. No debate, no polemics—there is silence; and within that silence, the unstruck sound.

“These are the signs by which one knows: in whose heart the Beautiful dwells is Guru Dadu.”
Remember: these are signs, not practices. When the Divine descends within, these symptoms appear. When spring comes, flowers bloom. When dawn arrives, birds sing. Don’t invert it. Don’t think that if we teach birds to sing at midnight, morning will come. No. You can teach birds to sing at night; you can hang market-bought flowers on trees. Whom will you fool? Spring will not arrive.

When spring comes, flowers blossom.
When dawn comes, birds sing. These are signs. You cannot produce the root by imitating the signs; from the root, the signs arise by themselves. Keep this priceless point in mind.

We saw in Mahavira the supreme nonviolence. That is only a symptom—the fruit of samadhi. The monks who followed thought it was the cause: “If we cultivate nonviolence, samadhi will come.” You are mistaken. Nonviolence can be cultivated: drink strained water, don’t eat at night, walk carefully so no ant is crushed, do not kill, avoid meat. These can be done. Many people have cultivated such nonviolence—but where is samadhi? You taught birds to sing at midnight; they sing, but dawn does not break. You laden trees with plastic flowers—spring does not come. In Mahavira, inner samadhi flowered; the unstruck sound arose. From that came nonviolence. Nonviolence is a symptom, not the cause; a result. Those who looked from outside could not see samadhi—it is an inner experience, invisible from outside. They saw the symptoms: careful walking, no food at night, strained water, avoiding killing. They thought, “We will do likewise, then we will have the experience of Mahavira.” They have been doing it for centuries, yet no experience comes—because they grasped the wrong end. The symptoms are visible; the root is not. The root is the real thing.

“These are the signs by which one knows: in whose heart the Beautiful dwells is Guru Dadu.”
Such are the signs—Dadu abides in Sundardas’ heart; he is Sundardas’ guru.

To be a disciple means to accept with joy your defeat before someone. See this secret: there is a victory that comes by winning, and a victory that comes by surrender. The second is priceless by comparison. Winning by winning is never complete, because the defeated keeps preparing to take revenge. Another is the victory of love: you lose yourself before someone and win him forever.

“Why fear love’s defeat? Love’s defeat too is victory, beloved.
Even in a broken heart’s pangs there is a sweet song, beloved...”
To seat Dadu in the heart—do you understand its meaning? It means placing your head at Dadu’s feet and being defeated. The disciple who is defeated by the master has set out on the path of victory. “Disciple” means: “I am fortunate to have found one before whom I am ready to lose; one with whom losing is joy.”

“Some enthrone Gorakh as guru, some Dattatreya, some the naked Adinath,
Some Kanthar, some Bhartrhari, some Kabir—some keep the Sound itself.”
“Some say, ‘Haridas is ours,’ all set for disputes.”
Beautiful lines. People choose various gurus—Gorakh, Dattatreya, Adinath, Kanthar, Bhartrhari, Kabir—different for different people.
“Some say, ‘Haridas is ours’—and then they take up debate.”
And there is the fun: they set themselves for polemics—that is where the slip happens.

Once the guru is found, what debate remains? Who has leisure for dispute then? If, even after finding the guru, debate continues, it only means you have found in the guru a fresh pretext for arguing and nothing more. You remain the same old person, the same head full of ideas, the same disturbance. You have discovered a new trick for your old mischief—still you fight. Before, you fought for politics; now for religion. No difference. Once you waved political flags—“May our banner fly high!” Now you wave religious flags. The flags may change; the stick in your hand has not. This be mindful of: man changes with great difficulty. He changes everything—and remains the same. He may renounce wealth, but the ego that came with wealth now stands up in renunciation: “I have renounced so much. Who is my equal?” First he said, “Who is as rich as I?” now, “Who is as renounced as I?” From the outside, much seems to have changed; look within—nothing has changed.

Ego is very subtle, its entries very fine: drive it out one door, it slips in another. Walk carefully, or you will carry all your disturbances into the realm of religion. The same quarrels of the marketplace move into temple and mosque. What then has happened?

“Some say, ‘Haridas is ours,’—and then they take up disputes.”
Sundardas says: If Kabir has found me, what dispute is left? Drink! Dance! Celebrate! If Bhartrhari has found you, or Adinath—why be embroiled? Temples throw their strength against mosques; mosques against temples. When will you dance? When will you pray? Abuses continue. Those lips that hurl abuses—how will prayer come to them? Those lips have become unfit for prayer.

Sundardas says:
“And yet, all saints are above my head,”
“My salutations to them; they are my venerables. But my door opened through Dadu:
“In Sundar’s heart the master is Dadu.”
Understand the difference—this is not a dispute. He does not say, “Kabir is wrong.” He says, “My salutations to him.” But as for me, Dadu united me with the Divine—this is my door. Those for whom Kabir is the door—blessed are they; let them enter through that door. For me it was the temple, or the mosque, or the gurdwara—wherever one finds, that is the truth. That alone matters. No disputation.

The sign of a saintly mind is the absence of dispute.
“All saints are above my head, but in Sundar’s heart, the master is Dadu.”
Let me add only this much: my head bows to all, but as for my heart—there Dadu abides. And when Dadu abides, all abide in him—Nanak, Kabir, Krishna, Christ—for while their outer styles differ, their mastery is one, their inner glory one. To know one is to know all.

Form a living bond with one true master and you have been bonded to all true masters. Then dispute is impossible. Who has the leisure to quarrel? When energy has turned to dancing, when spring has arrived—who debates?

What is the purpose of a master? Why seek one? Why enthrone someone in your heart, and bow your head at someone’s feet?

“Heads higher than the mountains,
Chests broader than the plains,
Lineages loftier than the sky
Are born, will be born, will keep being born.
Mountains stand for this,
Plains stretch for this,
The sky each night is studded
With blue stars for this—
That against these high, broad, lofty supports
We may measure our own resolve,
And yet remain
Natural and simple,
Placing ourselves on the vast canvas—
And let the Vast remain astonished
That even having grown great,
We long to remain ordinary.”
What does it mean to relate to a master? That our eyes lift a little towards the sky, towards the vast. One in whose courtyard the vast has descended—let us be linked to him a little, so that along with him we flutter our wings a bit, fly a little, touch a few heights.

“So that against these high, broad, lofty supports
We may measure our resolve…”
We measure our resolve by looking at the master: how far are we still? How much distance remains?

“And yet remain natural and simple…”
The second thing is as necessary: a true master is needed so that even if we become extraordinary, we do not lose our ordinariness. We may touch life’s summit, yet ego does not sit arrogantly on the throne.

With a true master, first our eyes rise to the sky; second, our feet remain rooted in the earth. The master gives us both roots and wings—roots so we never lose the ground, never feel special, never let ego in; and wings to fly in the sky. These are the two reasons to be with a true master.

“Govind created the living beings—and they are headed for the abyss.
By the guru’s instruction they are freed from the noose of death.”
Astonishing words! Sundardas says:
“Govind created the beings—and they go to hell.
By the Guru’s teaching they are freed from Yama’s snare.”

“Those made by Govind fall under the sway of karma;
Those graced by the Guru roam free.”
God created the beings—and they got entangled in karma, in desires, in senses, in a thousand prisons. But the one the master rescues moves free—freedom blossoms.

Don’t think Sundardas is denigrating God. He speaks sweetly; grasp his depth. God gives freedom—that is His gift. Freedom includes the freedom to be bad; otherwise it is not freedom but bondage—and bondage cannot be good. The master gives something different. God grants you the freedom to be whatever you wish. He leaves your book blank—write what you will. Sin if you choose, merit if you choose. You are utterly free.

Naturally, going down is easier than climbing up; people descend—into sin. Sin attracts because it seems easy. God gave freedom; the result is people became slaves of desires and the world.

The guru’s work is exactly the opposite: he gives discipline. He gives you a way, a style of living. He is a law-giver; he gives a structure to your life, shapes your rough stone. Outwardly it looks as if those who go to the guru become slaves—for now they live as the guru says. His gesture becomes their life. They walk with his support, travel in his boat, accept his terms, surrender to him.

So there is a paradox: God gives freedom, and the result is that all become enslaved. The guru gives discipline, and the result is freedom—because as discipline arises, as order and awareness grow in your life, a new dimension of freedom opens—authentic freedom.

Do not confuse “freedom” with licentiousness. “Swachchhandata”—true freedom—means your inner rhythm has awakened, your inner song has come alive: you become capable of singing the very song for which God sent you. You had gone astray under a thousand attractions, without awareness.

Think of a small child given a priceless book—he only scribbles. He does not yet know how to write. Something meaningful can be written only after passing through the guru’s process, a school. Then the very scribbling becomes writing—still scribbling in one sense, but now it carries meaning and feeling. That scribbling takes form; a great poem may be born of it.

We have come with a song hidden in our souls—a song to be sung without which we cannot be fulfilled. When you sing it, there is contentment. That singing is what we call nirvana, moksha. Listen to the cuckoo calling “koo-hoo”—that is her life-song. Blossoms on trees are their songs. In man too a song is hidden. When it is sung, fulfillment rains, contentment spreads; then there is joy and only joy.

Look at a tree in spring, laden with flowers—that is the state of the enlightened. You cannot see his flowers with outer eyes; you need inner eyes. You have perhaps felt the fragrance of a springing tree; your nostrils function. If you have a cold, you won’t sense it. The tree may be covered with blossoms; if you are blind, you won’t see.

Within, we are blind and deaf; our heart lacks the capacity to feel. That is why, on coming to a master, you do not at once understand what has happened. But this is what happens: spring has come; flowers have bloomed; fragrance is in the air. Those who come close, give their hand into his—slowly those waves will wash over them; that intoxication will fill their eyes. It is contagious—this ecstasy. They too begin to swoon.

A relationship with the master will give you discipline, meditation, love, the methods of inner journeying. God gave freedom; the result is slavery. The master seems to impose a kind of slavery; the result is freedom. Such is the paradox.

“Govind created beings, and they go to the abyss;
By the Guru’s teaching they are freed from Yama’s snare.
Govind’s creatures fall into karma’s net;
Those the Guru graces wander free.”

“Govind’s creatures drown in the ocean of becoming;
Sundar says: the Guru pulls them out of sorrow and duality.”
He lifts you beyond duality. Sorrow and duality are synonymous. You are in sorrow because you are two. While you are two, there is tension—inner/outer, this/that, earth/sky—constant choosing, tug-of-war. When only One remains—either I or Thou—then all duality and sorrow vanish; there is repose and rest.

“Govind’s creatures drown in the ocean of becoming;
Sundar says: the Guru pulls them out of sorrow and duality.
What more can one say with the mouth?
The Guru’s glory is greater than Govind’s.”

Sundardas says: It is hard—the more I want to say, the less it is enough. How can I praise the master? My speech is not capable. The master’s glory is greater than God’s. That is why those who saw the master in Mahavira called him Bhagwan; those who saw the master in Buddha called him Bhagwan, though Buddha did not admit God, Mahavira denied any God. Yet the disciple could not help calling them “Bhagwan.” Understand the disciple’s predicament: God’s creation—me—was wandering in darkness and sorrow; the master extended his hand and rescued me—this hand is the first proof that there is God.

Kabir says:
“Guru and Govind both stand—whose feet do I touch?
Blessed is the Guru—who showed me Govind.”
A tough situation: both master and God stand before me—whose feet first? If I touch the master first, might I disrespect God? But how can I touch God first—without the master, where was God?

Kabir says: Blessed is the master—he immediately gestured towards Govind. The whole of the master is a gesture towards God. His every act—sitting, rising, speaking, silence, sternness or compassion—has one vast design: that you awaken and see the Divine.

Hence Sundardas says,
“The Guru’s glory is greater than Govind’s.”
In this world, whoever has found the master has found God. The master found, God is not far. You have reached the temple door; how far is the temple now? Recognising the master, you recognise that the world is not exhausted by matter; in the earthen, consciousness also dwells; in the mortal, immortality resides. To recognise the master is to launch the arrow towards the target; once released, it will strike. The essential thing is that the arrow leave the bow.

He who bows at the master’s feet, bows indirectly at God’s feet. The master is a device, a pretext.

Wherever you find a living person in whose presence you feel peace, fragrance, love—the alchemy to transform you—then do not hesitate. Do not stop out of fear. Be courageous: bow down, stake everything.

Remember: there is no other test for recognising a master—your heart will tell you. The intellect asks for criteria; the heart knows instantly. Put the intellect aside—your heart has never erred. The heart is like a compass that always points east, where the sun rises. The heart always points toward the Divine—but you do not listen to it; you listen to the intellect. Listening to intellect, you fall into confusion.

Truth is, as long as you listen to intellect, you will not find the master; those you find will be counterfeit. The counterfeit master will please your intellect, because he exists to please. He becomes exactly what you want: naked if you expect it, eyes closed if you expect it, fasting if you expect it, lying on thorns if you expect it. He has decided to become your guru—but he is, in a deep sense, only a politician.

The politician’s art is to see where people wish to go, then quickly leap ahead of them. He is skilled who senses the wind’s shift before it changes. If people move east, he says, “We must go east.” If they turn west, “I have always said we must go west.” People don’t see that he is reading their moods, the wind’s direction, and loudly proclaiming exactly what they want to hear—so they think, “He will fulfill our desires.” No one has ever fulfilled anyone’s desires.

A true master does not fulfill your mental desires—he dissolves the mind. How can he fulfill mind’s desires? He cannot go by you; he goes by the Divine—by his own being. With him, only the one who is ready must conform—he will not conform to you. Understand: the one who agrees with you cannot change you. Would you go to a doctor who agrees with you? You say, “I have TB,” he says, “Yes, you do.” You say, “Write this sweet medicine,” he says, “I was going to anyway.” Will such a doctor cure you? You are sick and your doctor is a hypocrite. However much you insist, if he is a physician he will say, “Not that medicine—the one I prescribe.” Sweetness is not the point; however bitter, if it works you must take it. A physician cannot walk by your say—only then can he help you.

So keep one thing in mind: the intellect has no way to examine a true master. Whenever intellect examines, it chooses the false—intellect is a process of ignorance. Put it aside; let the heart speak. You will be amazed: in the presence of the one who is your master, the strings of your heart will begin to hum, something clicks into harmony, a scale strikes, your feet feel like dancing, a subtle trembling enters you.

Being with a master is an energy relationship, a linkage of forces. For one who can set intellect aside, it is not at all difficult to find the master.

Also remember: the one who is a true master for you need not be a master for all; and the one who is master for another need not be master for you. People differ; their needs differ; different music appeals to different hearts. The Divine appears in many forms.

That is why Sundardas says, “All saints are above my head.” Do not think that because you have chosen a master, all others must be wrong. Say only, “All saints are above my head; in Sundar’s heart, the master is Dadu.” Say only: my heart was dyed here; to all other saints my salutations. If someone else’s heart was dyed elsewhere—that too is blessed. The heart must be dyed. May the Divine’s color fall on all and all be dyed—what does it matter at whose dye-house? The color is His. Never fall into the mistake of thinking, “My master must be everyone’s master.” From this arise disputes, sects, violence, enmity. From religion, only love should arise; if anything else arises, religion has turned into politics.

Set aside intellect; let the heart speak. The heart always speaks truth. Walk by the heart. May such a sunrise happen in your life.

“On the soil of knowing,
Watered with devotion and practice,
Manured with feeling,
Sowing, in season, a few seeds of love—
Tomorrow—
Tender shoots will sprout,
Writhing to break
The fresh, fragrant crust of the earth.
The sun will give them new form,
Clouds will gather dense and rain,
Soaking them to the root.
Fragrance will burst and spread,
Village and forest will laugh,
Homes new will rise from ruins,
Breath will meet breath,
Freedom will touch every particle.
By autumn’s moist winds,
New leaves, new buds, new blossoms will open,
Colors will burst across the earth,
A rainbow—
The garden will be scented without end.
Labor never goes to waste—
It is my unshakable trust that the fruits and flowers
Of peace, of joy, of bliss
Will certainly be ours.”

That’s all for today.