Evolution of Love 2

Ma-My Sadguru

From my very childhood, I was prone to adore Sakti as my cherished deity (Ishta).The world itself appeared to me as the manifestation of God's omnipotence, the translation of His divine vigour. The popular idea, that Siva remains merely a Sava, (corpse) without Sakti, was also patent enough to make me aware of the supremacy of Sakti over other forms (swarupas) of the Lord Almighty.
This worship of Sakti on my part went on with a strong urge to find Her in a human form having a definite Personality. That longing within me grew deeper and deeper and I got firm on realizing Her through Sakama bhakti and seeing my ailing husband recovered through Her grace.
It was in the year 1949 that one fine morning I was told to have Ma Anandmayi's darsana. The very idea of seeing a woman saint thrilled me to the core of my heart. As a girl of fifteen, my innocence was beaming to bow down at Mother's feet. At the first blush, I had a wonderful expe rience of seeing Ma surrounded by Her sevikas and devotees all with their eyes fixed at Her face. It was as if I had been caught up in the spell of Her eternal serenity shining on Her face and I felt as if Her one glance had blessed me to the point of becoming desireless. Ignorant as I was I had, that moment, nothing to offer at Her lotus feet except a garland. Ma accepted that humble gift of mine and blessed me as my Sadguru with Her kind and compassionate look. I then experienced that She had given me graciously what I needed most in life by purging me of my past vikaras. I recalled again and again the lines.

Tulsidas Pattrain JalasyaChulukenava,
Vikrinetai Swamātmānam Bhagwana Bhakta vatsalah

(God who loves His devotees sells Himself for only a tulsi-leaf and a handful of water.)

Bhakta vatsala Ma, my Sadguru, blessed me by giving Her dariana at a time when I was pining to see Sakti face to face. This is how Ma Anandamayi fulfills Her bhaktas desires.
Ma does, many a time, advise us to become desire through our sustained sädhana, since desires are the cause of the cycle of births and deaths.
However, human nature is such that one cannot easily be free from desires, even if one grapples with them con stantly. It is by the Sadguru's Kripa (Grace) that One begins to feel the simplification of one's needs. Lord Krishna says in the Gita :

Dhyayato visayan pumsah sangastesupajāyate.
Sangat sanjayata kamaḥ kämätkrodhobhijayate. Krodhatbhavati sammohaḥ sammohat smritivibhramah. Smritibhramsätbuddhinaso buddhi näsät pranasyati.

(When a man thinks of the objects of sense, attachment for them arises; from attachment desire is born; from desire anger arises.
From anger comes delusion; from delusion loss of memory; from loss of memory the destruction of discrimination; from destruction of discrimination he perishes)
Hence the key to eternal bliss lies in the elimination of desire. In this humdrum of temporal life, none can make us free from desires except a Sadguru like Mataji. Two or three personal experiences will reveal how Ma has graced me by fulfilling my desires to the point of rendering me a sharanagata, surrendered at her lotusfeet.
My husband's weak health was a matter of constant worry to me. With a view to invoking Her grace, I used to worship Her day and night for my husband's speedy recovery. In the meantime I was asked by someone to pray directly before Mataji for his health. It was in the year 1959 that I made up my mind to beg of Mataji to cure my husband..
Luckily, Mataji came to Etawah in February 1960 and I decided to go and see Her there. It was my first private visit to Mataji. I quietly approached Her as a petitioner; but no sooner did I enter the room, than what I had to say and how I had to say it completely vanished from my mind. To my utter surprise, I found that the mental fog, in which I had been enveloped, dissolved at the sunny smile of Ma. On Her asking me about my problem I found myself speechless. Somehow, I regained my original self and told her that I wanted to see my husband cured of the serious disease he was suffering from, upon which Ma with Her usual ineffable sweet voice advised me to have faith in God and pray to Him for my husband. Although there was nothing new in Her advice, yet Her words were spoken in such a sympathetic tone that I had the experience of drinking in Mother's infinite compas sion oozing out of Her lustrous eyes. Soon I reached the state of empathy, the state of oneness where Ma was mine and I was Hers completely. It made me feel as if Mataji had yielded to my wish and my husband was completely cured. Thereafter I would go nowhere else for his treatment. This is how Ma, my Sadguru, infused me with the spirit of welcoming the impending misery in the shape of my husband's prolonged ailment and made me content with my lot.
Mataji offers us many an opportunity to wash away the dirt of our samsakäras collected in countless former lives. She always asks us to welcome temptations and dis tractions and to look upon them as God-given opportunities for our advance and to turn our eyes inwards.
Even our good deeds make us egoistic unless we offer them to the Creator of the world. Man feels himself to the doer . Thus he is liable to be caught in the clutches of his ego. Being ego-ridden, I was proud of my services rendered to my husband during the period of his illness. As a result I used to feel that my beloved was not subject to decay and that I was chaste enough to obstruct the speed of Time and Death, and to fight even with Death like Savitri, if some misfortune came my way.
With this intensity of delusion I continued to serve my husband, feeling that I was the doer. This had wrapped. me in the veil of moha (attachment ). Then it happened that the tidal wave of the inscrutable Will struck hard and deprived me of my husband's company forever, in May 1963. The blow was terrible for me. As the attachment was intense, the grief was equally intense. My vision became clouded, my senses paralyzed and I remained unconscious for three days. It was on the fourth day that I recovered from that state of torpor and started uttering: "Ma, Ma, Ma, Ananda mayi Ma, Dayamayi Ma !" My eyes closed again and to my consolation, I saw Ma in Her very subtle form consoling me with Her benign touch. I cried:" Ma! You have desert ed me. I have lost my life's joy forever." I still remember the wonderful experience when Ma took me in Her affection ate embrace and said: "Your husband was not yours alone. He was God's first, yours afterwards. He needed Him more than you. As regards your life, you have other duties to perform. Now look after your children as you used to look after their father". The vision had faded away. The next moment, I opened my eyes and felt I was a differ ent person altogether. The grief had subsided and the state of normalcy returned. Since then, my tears disappeared and with a calm mind I began to console those who came to mourn my husband's death. I encouraged them to read the Gita and Ramayana for the benefit of the departed soul. His loss made me feel that the services rendered to him egoistically had been insufficient to satisfy his Maker. I, then, understood the meaning of Milton's famous lines:

"God doth not need
Either man's work, or His own gifts:
Who best bear His mild yoke,
They serve Him best."

Who else can give me such insight except Ma, my Sadguru ?
Ever since, I have endeavoured to act as Mother's instrument and carry out Her commands as best as I can. My salutations again and again to the Goddess who resides in all beings as 'Mother' and shows them light as Sadguru in the moments of gloom.