Dear Brothers and Sisters,

I am very happy to be with you all here in Raipur today on this most auspicious, blessed day, when I have felt the presence of the entire hierarchy of Sahaj Marg Masters coming here to see the foundation stone for yet another ashram of the Mission being laid in Their presence, under Their blessings, with Their love. The presence of one guru is not enough for us. He is only the tail-end of a hierarchy where the brain, the heart and everything else is up There. I do not know how many of you felt this spiritual presence, whether you even know that it exists, and if you are aware of all these things, you will permit yourself to be influenced by their messages, live accordingly, act accordingly, and go to Their feet eventually when our life on earth is over.

Our life on earth as human beings is a matter of boundless grace, mostly acquired through our own past karma. However, without their blessing nothing can happen. Adi Shankaracharya, the revered giant of the past eras of India, has said that it is a great boon to be born a human being. The second great boon is to be born at the same time as a guru is present (a guru of that calibre). And the highest boon is to be able to meet with him, contact him, become his disciple and benefit by his presence. It is obvious that we have all benefited from all these three boons. It would be a shame now if we deny ourselves this opportunity of going directly to Them when our time here ends.

Our time here must end. One who is born must die. In between birth and death, this opportunity is given to us to reach Them. According to my Master's teaching, human life has no other purpose. All that we do to earn money, to fulfil our desires, to maintain our health, is only to keep body and soul together for as long as it is necessary for us to emancipate the soul when leaving the body behind. Leaving the body behind-we have no choice. It is not a matter of choice or of will; it happens. But when it happens, we must make sure that the soul does not remain with it here. This is the greatest duty a human being owes to himself or herself. We don't owe any duty to our guru or to our teachers or to our dharma, or even to this world. If I cannot fulfil my duty to myself, I have betrayed the will of God; I have betrayed the destiny that has been reserved for me in making me come here when my great Master was on earth; I have betrayed the opportunity that was given to me when I was made to go to him, clutch his feet and say, "Master, take me unto Yourself."

It is a very solemn existence that we must lead. As Babuji Maharaj, in some of his messages, says, this does not mean that life is not to be lived happily. Because in several messages he says that a true spiritual practicant, an abhyasi, is known by the cheerfulness that is always his, under all circumstances. He who is happy under all circumstances is the truly happy person. If you are saying, "No, no, if such and such a thing was or had [happened], I would be happy," you are not happy; the circumstance is happy. So make yourself such that (the body may suffer, the body may enjoy) the soul is blissfully, eternally in contact with the divinity that is its birthright, because it has been a part of the Divine and has come off as a spark of the Divine. This spark is to unite with the origin, what Babuji calls our original home, where we belong. That is why we have moments of sorrow when we wish - what do we wish? - kaash, ham yahaan na hote (Gosh! I wish I were not here). But where do you want to be? The soul knows; this stupid head does not know. The soul says: What are you doing here? This is not your place. "No, no, but I was born here." The soul says: Idiot! This kaaya (this body) was born here; not you. You only came into it because you have to live this life happily under all circumstances; live this life productively in a spiritual sense, acquire all that is good, reject all that is bad - which is called the wisdom of the swan: Paramahamsa. The swan is supposed to have the capacity that it can take only milk from a mixture of milk and water. We have to be like that. That is why great saints like Swami Ramakrishna Paramahamsa were called Paramahamsa.

The world is full of duality: there is good, there is bad; there is light, there is darkness; there is life, there is death; there is vice, there is virtue. The wise man takes all that is good, rejecting all that is bad. Every woman knows when she buys rice, she picks out all the stones and throws them away. Isn't it? The body knows because when we eat, the body retains what is good for it, and rejects everything else. Natural systems are wise, but this fool of a man, the moment he thinks he is intelligent, vaigyaanik [scientific] - "I know." The moment I say "I know," I am doomed. The soul says: What have you to do with knowledge? You are not here to know. You are not here to become wise. You are here to achieve the purpose, your goal of human life, to go back to your original home and progressively become what He is, until one day you have the grand merger of the two, which is the ultimate goal of human life.

So I pray for all of you. I pray for myself too, that having got this golden opportunity of life on earth as a human being, the great gift of being born in the time of Babuji Maharaj, Lalaji Maharaj as the case may have been, and the ultimate gift of having been accepted by them as abhyasis, we don't falter, we don't look here or there. You know every ghoda gaadi [horse-drawn carriage] in Uttar Pradesh, or Madhya Pradesh, they have these blinkers so that the horse cannot look this side or that side. Unfortunately God did not put blinkers on our eyes! He made us free - we can turn our heads, we can look here and there, look up, and look down. In giving us this freedom, we have destroyed our purpose in life.

We have these five senses called panchendriyas. They are meant merely to guide us: go left, go right, avoid danger, go back. Touch - this is hot, reject. Taste - it's poison, throw it out. But we have converted our senses into pleasure seeking instruments, and therein lies the fall of mankind. The fall of Adam and Eve was not pleasure. It was knowledge! If you read carefully, you will know why they were evicted from the Garden of Eden. Because they ate of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. The moment we started distinguishing good and evil in God's creation, we have betrayed God in the sense that God created no evil - we have created evil. Therefore we are punished; therefore we are condemned until we can again come to a state, spiritual state, a state of existence where there is no more either good or bad. Sukhaduhkha same krutvaa - make both pleasure and pain the same.

For you there is nothing good, nothing bad. There is only the straight path on which you go, following the footsteps of your guru who is going ahead of you, and reaching the goal not by your effort, but by merely following. This should not be difficult. If you are asked to find out the way, to avoid the thorns, all that sort of nonsense, you are put to test. "Which is my way? There are so many ways. Raah dikhao prabhu, nainheen ko raah dikhao prabhu. [O Lord, show this blind man the way.]" A song I heard in Soordas long ago, when I was a schoolboy in Jabalpur. Ham na nainheen hain - we are not blind. Nor are we mleccha [outcast] - we have a guru. Keval hamen aankhen isliye dee gayi hain [We have been given eyes solely for this purpose] - I see the guru, my ears are given to me to listen to the guru, and my feet are given to me to walk behind him. I pray for you all and for myself that, may this be our last life on earth, however long it may last. Because I find that as I grow [older] day by day, I wish I had not lived so long, and that I did not have to live longer.

I told Babuji one day in Shahjahanpur, I think it was in 1968 or '69. He congratulated me and said, "Now you are liberated." I said, "Babuji, why don't you take me up immediately, simultaneously?" He said, "Why do you ask for that?" I said, "The longer I live, the more I am subject to temptation, and the possibility of fall." You see, life is a danger. Every day you live longer, there is the renewed danger of a fall: some temptation here, some stupidity there, some lack of faith. Somebody has something at home; "Oh, how can your Master allow this to happen? Why is your Master so cruel?"

We do not know that the play of life and death is in Divine hands. Yeh drama hai [This is a drama]. But we go and we have [conditional] faith; we say, "Only as long as things are good for us..." Child married-God is great. Son promoted-God is great. Bahurani aa gayi bade khaandaan se [A daughter-in-law has come from a wealthy family]-God is even greater. Baccha paida hua aur voh bhi baalak? Arre vaah! Kaise khuda hamare. Nahin? [A child has been born, and that too, a boy? Wonderful! What a great God we have. Isn't it?] And suddenly some bad news: that compound wall toot gaya makaan ka. Arre bhai, yeh kaise ho sakta hai? Kaise mumkin hai ki jub ham shishya kain unke, ham itni bhakti rakhte hain unke prati, shraddha rakhte hain. Yeh kaisa mumkin hai? Guru mein kucch na kucch truti hai. Chhod do, chalo aur anya sanstha mein chalte hain. [The compound wall of our house has broken. Oh, how could this have happened? How is it possible when I am his disciple, and I have so much faith and devotion for him? There is some shortcoming in the guru. Leave him. Let us join a different system.] I have heard this a thousand times. [It's] something bad in their opinion. You see, suppose you eat useless stuff at night, next morning you are going to have stomach trouble. "Nahin, nahin [No, no], if God is great, why should I have trouble? He only created it." "Arre, daaru peeke aaye… [But you drank alcohol…]" "But God only created all these beautiful things for our enjoyment." All right, try it. God can wait.

So don't test God or the guru. Don't evaluate your faith. Don't pretend to know what their love is by what happens to you. But always know that their love for you, your faith in them, is for a particular purpose and that only - to reach them. And if that is going on step by step, you must never falter in your faith, never doubt their love, or be unsure of their grace. This is the only way of testing your relationship with your guru. Am I one step ahead? "No, no, I want to be one mile…" Well, that depends on you, you see. "If I could be stronger…" We do not prepare people here for the marathon, and the decathlon, and for Everest.

Babuji determines what should be our pace: "Yeh chaal kaafi hai tumhaare liye. Ham aage aage chal rahe hain, tum peeche peeche chalo. [This pace is enough for you. I will go ahead, and you follow.] Just follow me. That you want to go faster, does it mean I must run?" Babuji asks. "Nahin, nahin, Babuji. Please aap apne rate pe chaliye." "To phir tum pareshaan kyon hote ho? Kyon mujhe bhagaate ho, ki tum bhi saath saath bhaage? Main bhaag sakta hoon kya, yeh aisi baat nahin hai. Main ek chhalaang maarunga to Himalaya ke us taraf bhi pahunch sakta hoon. Tum pahunch sakte ho saath saath? To mera chaal usi gati par hai jisme aaplog santushti ke saath, bina pareshaani, bina koi khatra, aap hamare saath chal sakte hain. ["No, no, Babuji. Please go at your pace." "Then why are you worried? Why are you trying to hasten me? It is not a question of whether I can run; with one leap I can cross the Himalayas. Can you follow along? So, my pace is such that you can follow along satisfied, without worry, without danger."] The guru's pace is adjusted to our ability to keep pace with him, not the other way around.

And inevitably, even when we are a big group, he has to look after the least capable. Isn't it? Like you walk with the baccha [child]. Husband walks - "Chale chal chal!" "Bacche aap sambhaal rahe hain kya?" ["Walk quickly." "Are you taking care of the children?]" Yeh to hota hai hur parivaar mein. "Bacche bhi main le loon. Handbag bhi sambhaaloon, purse bhi main rakhoon, aur aap chalte jaayiye. Kaise mard hain aap?" yeh koi poochti nahin hai aurat. Mard ka farz hai ki voh soche ki meri biwi kahaan hai? Saath chal rahi hai ki nahin, saath chal sakti hai ki nahin, aur apni gati, apni chaal uske saath, uske anusaar adjust karte jaye. Nahin karte hamare mard log. "Chalegi voh!" Nahin, yeh mazaak ke taur se keh rahen hain kyonki kuch hansi bhi ho jaaye saath saath. Lekin hamara purpose bahut hi serious hai. Yeh purpose ham haath se nikaal dein, chhod dein, to hamari jaan kya, hamari zindagi kya, hamara bhavishya khatre mein hai. [This happens in every family. "I take care of the children. I hold the handbag and the purse, and you keep going forward. What kind of man are you?" - this no woman asks. It is the man's duty to look out for his wife: Where is she? Is she coming along with me or not? Is she able to come with me or not? And accordingly, adjust his pace to hers. Our men don't do this. "She will come!" I am saying this in jest so that we have a few laughs alongside, but our purpose is a very serious one. If we lose sight of this purpose, not only our life but our future is in jeopardy.]

Bus, itna hi hamein kehna tha. Aap log sune, iske liye ham bahut prasanna hein. Aashirvaad. [That is all I wished to say. I am happy that you all listened. My blessings.]