21 November 2001, 02:48am IST
Swami Durgananda.
A disciple once asked his master how to realise god. taking him to a nearby river the master kept the disciple’s head submerged till the disciple was gasping for air. when asked what he was thinking about when his head was under water, the disciple said, ‘‘thinking? i wasn’t thinking, my entire being was screaming, ‘‘air, air, air’’. the guru remarked, ‘‘when you want god as desperately as you wanted air, god will reveal himself to you’’. the intensity of our longing for god accomplishes the work, said kabir. how much we long for the truth is the key, because in sadhana many boons arrive unsought, but not the ultimate goal we wish to attain, which our heart pines for. so powerful can this yearning be that even a drop of it can alter our lives. the power of will or desire is a tremendous force which sustains all life. it works with equal force wherever focused. as material and emotional desires never satisfy fully, the same desires, when focused on higher goals, impel us to excel in whatever we do. and when focused on the self, they eventually consume all lesser desires — which can distract us from the path of our sadhana. seekers desperate for the truth become completely magnetised by this desire. akkamahadevi wrote of her longing thus, ‘‘i lie lost, sick for you night and day, o lord, white as jasmine. since love was planted in my heart, i have forgotten hunger and thirst’’. such passionate desire ultimately remoulds the entire being of the seeker. love changes a person into that which he loves. through longing we become one with the object of our longing such that no difference between seeker and the sought remains. this is a state where the seeker identifies himself with his goal, which is the discovery of the divine element in him. when jesus said, ‘‘seek and ye shall find, knock and it shall be opened to you’’, he was voicing the implicit promise god makes to the devotee, that when the longing is great enough, it will, through grace, bear fruit. in truth god longs for us much more than we long for him; our desire for god draws us to the guru’s grace, by which we are able to realise god within us. yearning for god is not merely a human longing. it is the guru’s grace which compels us to seek, which inflames the heart with love, in order to draw us to the path of god. what in us can compel us to long for god except god’s own urge for reunion? longing for god taking the form of longing to experience the guru’s love, or the guru’s state, teaches us the power of spiritual desire, showing how completely the guru and god respond to our needs. once i was experiencing an intense longing for swami muktananda of gurudev siddha peeth, until suddenly he stood before me, made of light. seeing this inner darshan gave me a satisfaction far deeper than any i had experienced before, seeing him in ‘body’. narada describes the pain of separation from god as the highest form of devotion. lord krishna teaches arjuna saying, ‘‘fix your mind on me, make offerings to me and i will liberate you of all obstacles’’. this is difficult to achieve, unless we have within us the desire for contact with the beloved, bringing about intense experience, otherwise impossible. on this my guru, gurumayi chidvilasananda, successor of swami muktananda, says, ‘‘you have to have the aspiration, the interest to stay focused. if you don’t have the aspiration what can the guru give you?’’ sufi poets are the greatest spokesmen for the sadhana of longing. bulleh shah, having been thrown out by his guru, was so seized with painful yearning that he wandered like a madman till his guru’s compassionate forgiveness drew him back, and gave him the permanent experience of oneness with god. prayer, spiritual practices and contemplation of the guru strengthen the longing; the guru’s grace and blessings kindle the longing. as spirituality makes our minds pure we gain glimpses of the state beyond sorrow, the state of the self — its splendour, its freedom, its radiance and its love. this connection with the self and the guru becomes our aspiration. we must cling to this spark of longing, whatever be our other attainments. valuing the ache in the heart we should allow the guru to take us to the highest level which alone satisfies this longing — the vision of god, the state of oneness with god. (swami durgananda is a monk with gurudev siddha peeth, ganeshpuri)
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