Some Feelings..Some Words...From The Heart...

It’s May 1 st , most of you know that it’s the day of our family Annual Program in the memory of my mom who left us on this date several years back when I was in the last year of my college.   We have been holding this annual function since the last 20 years at Prempuri Ashram, Babulnath. We have to skip it or postpone it this year. In this journey, for the first 11 years, my Guru Haribhai Kothari gave his 1- hour discourse personally on varied topics. He left His body to reside in my heart thereafter. Since then, for the last 9 years we have Him speak to us through the large video screen – one of his huge collection of recorded talks/discourses of more than 55 years of His life. I have no hesitation in stating that I owe my very existence today to my Guru. Had Haribhai not been there, perhaps I wouldn’t have been there today writing this article. As with many folks, my personal life too had its own roller-coaster ride – many unrelenting emotional setbacks, shattered emotions,...

A close friend called me up and said "Why have you been silent about what is happening today? What is your 'God' doing to us and why?" She was obviously letting out her frustration about being homebound. I had a long chat with her about the lessons the virus has come to teach mankind who has refused to listen otherwise to all sane and saintly suggestions for course correction. May I share a few points of that call in brief.  1. It seems that the virus originated from a human who ate a bat. So lesson one was that we have wrongly interpreted that the entire life on the earth is just for our consumption and joy. We have abused the concept of co-existence and 'live and let live' to a point of fault.  2. Mankind (should we really use the word kind with a man) was under an illusion that it can conquer nature (Prakruti) and then abuse it for his own insatiable thirst for materialism in which there was a mad race in all fields of life and living. The virus made ...

Is this world of objects/beings a source of our happiness/sorrow? How can our intellect accept that there is no happiness or sorrow in the world, when we do experience them as it were. If any object itself contains happiness/sorrow, then everyone should get them from it. Also, that happiness should be permanent, and undiminishing and same to all. But is this so? I read an interesting philosophical example on this from a book by Jagatguru Krupalu Maharaj. A man suddenly died. On hearing this news, his wife fainted due to overpowering sorrow. His son cried bitterly. His friend shed a few tears. His servant did not cry, but was sad. His neighbour felt bad, but experienced neither sorrow nor shock. He continued doing his work. A dishonest debtor experienced a feeling of relief internally, some unshowable happiness. If this man was to come back to life, then all the above would experience the same degree of opposite feelings - sorrow, indifference, happiness. The varied degree of these fe...