11 Feb, 2014

Fremont Jayanti

Today we are celebrating Bhagavan Sri Ramana’s 134th birth anniversary. This was first celebrated in 1912 at the Virupaksha Cave on the Arunachala Mountain on his 33rd birthday. Last year was the 100th anniversary of celebrating his birth and now we stepped into the second hundred-year-Jayanti-celebration cycle.

But his disciples prevailed and the Jayanti continues to be celebrated to this day. If anything at all, this anniversary of our Guru Ramana's birth should instill in us greater devotion and determination to experience the truth of these two verses. This is how he wishes us to celebrate it.

Kavyakantha Ganapati Muni knew that Bhagavan Ramana's fame would stretch way beyond his earthly existence, that he would be remembered, worshiped and continue to be Jagadguru for centuries to come. His place in the spiritual heritage of India was revealed to Ganapati Muni as early as 1908 when he wrote:

“The throne of the Teacher of all the denizens of earth, once mounted by Vyasa, whose intellect saw the other shore of the Vedas, and later by Sankara who removed all doubts and drove way the darkness of ignorance with a fragment of his illumination, now awaits you, commander-in-chief of gods, God embodied in a human form!”

Throughout the many years of my stay in His Ashrams in New York, Nova Scotia and India, Bhagavan in his mercy has simplified for me the path he taught and lived. There are a few guidelines that I try my best follow and would like to share with you, my friends, brothers and sisters in Bhagavan.

Faith. First of all I find it helpful and necessary to have unquestioning faith in His teachings. We must believe that the teachings he has given us are the TRUTH, whether or not we have experienced them or even understand them clearly. When he said that we are the Self, nothing but the Self. We must believe it as truth. When he said that all that is to happen to us in our physical existence in this life is already written at the time of our birth, we have to believe it. Because we are ego-centered we may not believe it so. We may believe that what successes or failures we experience in life are solely due to our own effort or lack of it.

But when we fully accept his teaching that all the events of our life are preordained, when, sometimes, in spite of all our strenuous efforts we fail, then we come to realize that a Higher Power is in control and dictates the destinies of all beings. We begin to understand that the ultimate purpose of life is not the outward fulfillment of our desires but rather to extinguish all desires and live spontaneously in the present with our ego dissolved into the pure awareness of Being, in the Heart. Only then do we fully experience that it is the Higher Power behind all that takes place in our lives and in all existence. Then our life flows on like a fresh clear stream untroubled by the twist and turns of destiny.

Detachment. This is the second element of our spiritual life that must infiltrate every aspect of our character. Without true detachment we will never have peace. And to the extent we are detached from all things the greater is our peace and inner experience.

A truly detached person is always happy, always content under any circumstances. He or she does not depend on outer circumstances or the fulfillment of desires for the source of happiness.

No doubt it may be difficult to practice detachment when one has children, a home, a job with friends and relatives all around. One simple way to achieve perfect detachment in this situation is to look upon yourself as a simple servant of God’s creation. Perform your duties with attention, kindness and love, but know in your heart of hearts that all is His alone and He alone is all. Do what is required, do it diligently with sincerity, but know that He, Bhagavan, alone is the real Doer and we are the instruments of His will. If we nurture this attitude until it becomes firm and spontaneous, the walls of separation between the jiva and Siva will crumble down and the ego-sense will be eradicated.

Spiritual Practice. If we are firmly established with rock-solid faith and perfect detachment in all things, the practice of deep and continuous meditation will come naturally. I am not saying that you should wait until your faith and detachment matures before you begin to meditate. No. That would be a mistake. Daily meditation in the manner taught by Bhagavan will undoubtedly produce the necessary detachment and faith. But these three – Faith, Detachment and Spiritual Practice — must go on simultaneously until one experiences the effortless state. In that state, no effort can be made, for the doer, the meditator, has dissolved into the ocean of Pure Awareness and bliss.

However, if we experience any doubts about how to proceed in any of these aspects of spiritual life, or if we feel that our effort is not bearing fruit, we should not hesitate to pray to our Guru, Bhagavan Ramana. If we do this with utter sincerity and intensity, He will surely guide us and extend His Grace. He is our Source and our Goal and He knows what is best for us and when and how to do it.

If we surrender to Him, follow His teachings with childlike faith, detach ourselves from all things, and still the mind by steady practice, we can live our lives with freedom and joy and shine in this world as a light of love and goodness.

Lastly, once again, I would like to humbly apologize for not being physically present here today to share these few words with you on this special occasion. It is certainly my loss. I know that I do not deserve all the kindness and affection I have received from all of you over many years. But true to Bhagavan’s nature, I have found that His devotees give kindness and love even when it is undeserved. So, I take it all as His blessings — His blessings upon all of us to remember Him and seek His grace on this special Jayanti Day.