Into a new reality...

One morning I ventured out alone when my mother wasn’t looking.  We were living in a small hut at that time, just at the edge of the forest. The long winding path led me deep into the woods somewhere I hadn’t been before. Amidst soothing sounds of chirping birds, morning sunlight filtering down through the rustling leaves and a gentle breeze, what I remember most is that I wasn’t scared. For a seven year old kid, alone in the middle of a dense forest inhabited by wild animals, this comes across a striking, but no, I felt no fear, just an insatiable curiosity and an itch to explore. Then there, in the middle of nowhere stood the ruins of an old building.

Who would build such a structure right in the middle of a jungle? And why is it abandoned and falling in places? I wasn’t thinking these but trying to get in when I spotted a flight of stairs winding down into an underground cellar. I stepped down and walked into the basement. On either sides of a narrow hallway, there were small cave-like structures. And there I saw him! A very young man, with long flowing hair, in deep meditations. His body shone with a bright golden hue. He had the most divine smile on his calm face.

‘Come here,’ he gestured after opening his eyes. I walked towards him, as if drawn by a magnet and sat close by. He was tall, incredibly tall, even while sitting. ‘What are you doing here?’ he asked gently and I mumbled something. His face, his skin and that golden colour—I was mesmerised. ‘What’s your name?’ I asked him. He said his name, a very familiar one. Then he asked, ‘do you want to stay with me?’ I nodded. He closed his eyes and went back into his deep state.

I was back home before mother could notice. Barely able to conceal my excitement at the morning’s adventure, I tiptoed into the kitchen where she was busy with her work. ‘Where were you?’ She had noticed after all. I blurted out everything, not forgetting to mention that there were two playful dogs with that young man in the jungle. Then I said, ‘I’m going away, to stay with that tapasvi.’ 

Before feeding and putting me to bed at night, she gave me the scolding of my life. I was her only son after all, so why wouldn’t she be upset. But I was determined. Before drifting off into sleep, I noticed the blanket that mother had pulled over me. It was shining with a golden hue… the same colour of that young man’s skin!

***

What differentiates a dream from ‘reality’ is something up for debate. All dreams aren’t just chemical reactions inside your brain where your daily life is mixed and mashed randomly. And some say, your reality is nothing but one continuous dream but you’re unaware because you’re inside it, just like you wouldn’t recognise a dream as long as you’re inside the dream. Maybe it takes something like ‘stepping out’ to realize the dream like quality of our everyday reality. Memory doesn’t distinguish between the two. It takes both and puts them in the same storage place and retrieves it when you ask for it.

2012 ended like a dream and we stand on the threshold of a new year. Prophesies failed; the prophets passed over, as if to remind that no prophesy can withstand the super dynamism of the future. It’s tempting to make fun of all the failed projections, the visions of earth-standing-still, of people dying in the grand alignments, of a New Age starting right off the bat, of shifting into higher dimensions and Light bodies! Maybe the Rishis and God are rolling on the floor, laughing their guts out. Maybe Existence itself is suppressing a good laugh after tickling us with promises of apocalyptic, enlightenmentalism!  

Personally, I feel we’re at the beginning of an abundance! Both individually as well as at the societal and global levels too. Donno how this abundance will manifest and play out but I feel it’ll be beautiful, easy flowing and soothing. There’s darkness yet to reconcile to, anger yet to sublimate and wickedness still lurking within. But these shall vanish like evaporating mist when the Sun rises. We will receive the opportunities which elevate each one of us into the truly divine beings that we are. There will be newer realities and brighter playgrounds for us to indulge in to our hearts content. Light shall manifest in its highest glory on this Planet and we shall witness it, in our very lifetimes.

Here’s wishing everyone an abundant 2013! May this be the start of our unfolding divinity and magnificence. May we be guided to discover our purpose and also be blessed with the passion to pursue that purpose. And may we all come together, in our own small ways, to share our gifts, love and happiness.

May the Light shine and radiate through each one of us!

Cometh the Moment...

..and it’s gone even before you blink. Like a whisper, a dew drop, a thin veil of mist and a fragrance. A thing of extraordinary beauty, yet so fragile. As captured by the poet when he sang, ‘Aanewala pal jaanewala hai’ (a moment that is yet to arrive is also about to depart).

No matter what happens or doesn’t, one thing is for sure. In two days, 21^st December 2012 will be history! Gone! Cholegache. The world may be better off, or worse, but it won't remain the same. It’ll be poorer without this spectacle, this magical date which kept us enthralled all these years.

In the midst of every despair, we at least had this solace and hope—an apocalyptic, mystical date is over there, just a few years away. It’ll end the misery. It'll blow up this world and begin a new one.

Now? What do we have? That comforting solace will be gone forever.  Like a childhood friend who goes off, never to return, leaving you a shade lonelier. Leaving you with memories--bitter and sweet. Now, what do you look forward to? Which is the next date? And will it be as powerful and magnificent as this one?

 As our Planet hurtles into the core of the photon belt, while simultaneously stepping into the Mother of all alignments on the December Solstice, as the Mayan calendar ends  and a 26000-year Solar cycle completes…. and as you open that door and step into Dec 21st….remember this! You were right here, on this planet, in this space-time, inside this small piece of history when a grand synchronicity happened, when the Gods smiled, when the Cosmos converged to cuddle you, when the heart of the Universe skipped a beat….you were right here in this moment! Along with 7 billion Souls and all life! Blessing this moment with your Presence! Carrying Light in your heart as you walked through that door!

 This is a once-in-a-several-lifetimes moment. Embrace it as it departs!

Guruji Krishnananda...Finger pointing to the Moon

One evening, not so long ago, we were talking and I asked him matter-of-factly, “After you, what’ll happen here? Who’ll take care of things and guide...?”

 He smiled and said something but what’s amazing is my total insensitivity and stupidity in asking someone about his own death! No doubt, I was dumb but it hardly mattered because he took no offense. With him, it was okay to be dumb and stupid. Emotional and Open. He spoke warmly as ever about many other things.

The warmth of that moment still lingers on. And those were blissful days. We were young, idealistic, thirsty for new spiritual knowledge and madly enthusiastic about bringing the heavens down to Earth—a small group of focussed youngsters who gelled together with an amazing rapport. And we had Guruji as our guide and mentor—a wise, old man weathered in the ways of the world and seasoned in the mystical realms. The scene looked straight out of mythology. Take any episode from the epics/myths, where a rag-tag bunch of nobodies are taking on the might of an empire, with nothing but their raw, honest energy and an experienced elder’s guidance to fall back on. We all would perfectly fit in there!

No, we never thought that the old man wouldn’t be amidst us. Although I asked a hypothetical question-‘who after him’, there wasn’t an ‘after him’ thing. There wasn’t a life imagined without him. Neither was there a life imagined without the company of that group. We were bonded for life—that’s what we thought.

First, the group frittered away. It took something like his Death to bring most of us back together, briefly.

***

‘The past is another country, things happen differently there,’ who said this, donno. But yeah, the past is a crazy different place. So many things happened in the last decade, and the one before that. I almost died and came back to life. Lost hope and found a purpose. Made great friends and lost a few. Put anchor into life, caught hold of a dream and before long, woke up from the dream world.

Guruji gave us that dream. And we embraced it and held it close to our hearts. For me, who had just come out of days of despair and aimlessness, the dream became my purpose.

It was simple. Just wake up. Find spiritual light, not away from life but right there, in the middle of it all. Experience Spiritual enlightenment. Open up your dormant faculties. Establish contacts with the mystical realms. Travel astrally. Become capable of bringing down new knowledge and energies from the higher realms. Commune with the Highest Reality. Most importantly, transform into a better human being, slowly, step by step. Be in the thick of life and find God. Just awesome!

The second part of the dream was equally spectacular. Be a part of a commune. A place to share your gifts, knowledge, love and presence. A place full of unconditional love and freedom, free from judgement and all vices. A self-sufficient community of enlightened individuals, living a righteous life of the New Age, in total harmony and balance. The first citizens of an entirely new World! Nothing less than another Shangri-la!

I am not kidding. Think Christ and his disciples at the beginning of 2000 years of history. We were staring at something more magnificent. And the seeds were beginning to sprout—we could feel it. The awakening had begun. There were transformations--subtle and also profound. And the bonding and camaraderie we felt in that group... perfect for a budding commune

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Then we woke up, one by one.

They say ‘you never know the twilight zone between dream and reality.’ But when the dream started turning sour, I heard this...

Things fall apart
the center cannot hold
Mere anarchy is loosend upon the world
The blood dimm'd tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
are full of passionate intensity
-W B Yeats

How could Yeats guess our disillusionment, predicament and sorrow?

***

There are innumerable memories of the times spent with Guruji and others. One, I gotta jot down, because it's important.

One day, in a volunteer’s meeting, someone asked him: ‘Now, you can contact the Higher realms and bring down knowledge, guide us etc? When will we too become capable of doing this? How long it takes?’

Guruji pointed towards a girl and said: ‘She too can do it. All of you will be able to. It’s just a matter of time. Until then, take my guidance. Or you can refer to her and seek guidance’.

Suddenly, there was a gush of hitherto unknown knowledge. There were fantastic revelations. Guruji wrote a very interesting book ‘Beyond 2012’ which had many fascinating facts. An unstoppable enthusiasm began surging through us. The spectacle of 2012 was looming right in front, just a few years away. We were all geared up, gung-ho, ready for big, mad sacrifices.

Most of this new knowledge and revelations came from that girl. After quitting, she and her brother launched a website called VishwaAmara

***

Why does it matter, after all? It matters. Because you stagnate if you hold on to what’s handed down to you. To stay alive, you need to move on. Gather new knowledge and energies according to the changing times. Find your own light and direction, right at your core. And if you’re guided to do so, point the way for others.

That was what was expected. And these two youngsters did it with Vishwa Amara, even when Guruji was very much alive. The dream hadn’t perished! Although he didn’t express much, heart of hearts, he must’ve felt proud and ecstatic. Because he knew that...

...the dream didn’t come from him. It came through him, he was just a conduit. And the source was something beyond. This subtle difference between ‘from’ and ‘through’ is what differentiates a ‘devotee’ and a ‘disciple’. A Devotee latches on to ‘from’, worships the master and finally destroys His message. The Disciple recognises the ‘through’ factor and goes beyond.

That’s the imagery of the finger pointing to the moon. ‘Look at the Moon’, says the master, ‘not at my finger’. That’s what he meant when he said once, ‘I want disciples here, not devotees’.

It’s easy to worship and sit pretty. But to transcend and go beyond... it takes balls. Pure balls.

That balls gives you the ability to channel this knowledge, at critical times like the present.