Sri Sri’s talk on Guru Poornima.
Montreal, July 15:
Life and Guru are inseparable. Your life is the Guru tatva(principle). Throw light on your own life. The wisdom that shines through your life - you need to honor, that is honoring the Guru. See, life has taught you so many things - what you did wrong and what you did right, and if you don’t throw light on your own life, then the Guru is absent. So reflect on your own life and honor the wisdom that life has offered you. That is honoring the Guru. Are you with me? It is serious stuff.
Life and Guru are inseparable. When you throw light on life, and when the wisdom is there, honor the wisdom. Wisdom is the Guru tatva, Guru principle. So, within you the Guru Principle is there, wisdom is there. In each and every one there is wisdom. Throw light on that.In life wisdom dawns; wisdom has come; honor wisdom. When we stop honoring wisdom that is when darkness takes over, that is when the full moon is not there, no moon is there. Moon is the mind and when it is brimming, full of wisdom, that is Guru Poornima. So everyday could be Guru Poornima in your life when you honor what life has taught you.
Many times we turn our face the other way around, close our eyes and gallop on our desires. I want this, this, this and this - you gallop on the desires dishonoring the wisdom. See, the giver has given anyway, he has given you a lot. The first thing is honoring the wisdom, the second thing you need to take up on this Guru Poornima is utilize the gift you have been given. You have been given, bestowed with so many blessings. Use the blessings that have come your way and you will get more. The giver is tirelessly giving and does not even want any recognition from you and makes you feel that it is your own. The giver gives you and makes you feel that it is your own achievement. The giver has no end, is not tired of giving, the giver gives; the infinity keeps giving you plenty, in abundance, and what we have got we need to put that into good use, better use.
You have been given good speech; put it into good use. Don’t use your speech blaming, complaining, you know, saying bad things. You have been given a brilliant intellect, use the intellect. I don’t know why many are so stingy in using their intellect. You know wine, the older it becomes, it becomes more expensive and better. I have heard so, never had wine. Like that the more you use your intellect the better it becomes. The more we put it into good use, sharper and more brilliant it becomes. Don’t worry. Don’t think you will lose your intellect by using it. By not using it, you lose it. Put your intellect to good use. You have a melodious voice, put it to good use. You have strength in the body, do seva. So all that we have been given, we should put into good use. When I say good use, it is not for yourself, use for the society, for the world. The Divinity lives in the world. So serving the world is doingpooja to the Divine.
And honoring wisdom your life gets elevated. And when you realize these two, you become so grateful, and when you are so grateful, full of so much of that emotion, full of love and devotion, it is so pleasing to the infinity. That is it!
Know there is a Guru hiding in each one of you and throw the light of wisdom, do aarthi there, to the Guru inside. Doing aarthi means what? Ecstasy, getting into such ecstasy with wisdom, throwing light on what life had brought to us. What is real and what is unreal? What is right and what is not right? Why we chose that which is not right, what tempted us to do that and what is right and what is wrong? This you don’t have to ask somebody. Something inside you tells you, isn’t it? Something inside you tells this is right, something inside pricks, no this is wrong. Honor that, honor that! Are you all listening? Everybody?
It is so simple, utterly simple,yet so profound.
You know, another beautiful thing is being righteous and not asserting your righteousness. Suppose someone gives you a gift and they make you feel like they have given you a gift, is that a gift? Look I am giving you a gift, I am giving you a gift. Ten times someone says and gives you a toffee in your hand, what do you say? Keep it to yourself, I don’t need it. In the same way when we are righteous, do not assert the righteousness; I am right, I am right. You know asserting the righteousness brings anger, brings frustration and makes you wrong in some other sense. In one sense, you may be right. In another sense, you are wrong. Are you with me? Does it make sense? Being right and not asserting righteousness, being pure and not being proud of purity, being generous and not showcasing your generosity - do you see what I am saying? Being wise and not blowing your own trumpet, ‘Look I am so wise, so wise’ - that takes the juice out of it, right, what do you say? Being wise and being natural, absolutely natural, simple, simplicity; ready to be a fool also sometimes. It is such beautiful wisdom. Your life brings this up on you and is reflecting on it. Reflect on life again and again and again and again and again and again and again. Very good!
Seeing some people moving at the far end of the room, Sri Sri said:
There are some people who are going up and down several times, they don’t know where to get in or what to do. This is where we need a guide, a Guru, some people are walking the same road up and down, up and down, not knowing where the door is, where to enter. See observing little things all around can give you so many lessons.
There is a story about one saint; I think it is Saint Ramdas. He was walking early morning in a village and a lady, outside her hut, she was cleaning the house in front, and she said, ‘Hey Rama wake up, how long are you going to sleep?’, she called her son who was sleeping inside the house. A young boy, his name was also Rama. When the saint heard that, his name was also Rama, he suddenly said, ‘Oh, somebody is telling me to wake up’. It said that moment he really woke up. Said ‘Wah!’, really he became so fired up and charged. He said, ‘After that I never slept, I got so charged, all fired up because my mind was going all in the past and the future’.
Nobody told him you should do this, you should do that and the mind can take you to such a trip. Our mind creates its own maya, manages its own world, its own bubble and we keep going around in our own bubble. We see the whole world through our own glasses and assume everything is that way. This is called Vipararya.
Vipararya means colored vision, not the right vision. So it is the Guru tatva or the light on the wisdom in life that makes you wake up and see - oh that is how it is!
Tell me, how many of you often have felt your judgments were wrong?
Look at that, most of the time your judgments were all wrong but while you were in judgment, you think that is how things are - that is the bubble we are in. Guru tatvais coming out of that bubble, throwing light on your life, throwing light on the wisdom life has offered to you. See that. Then we see that the judgments become more and more correct. Now 90 percent of judgments are wrong, maybe 10 percent right, this should reverse actually. 90 percent should be right and 10 percent should be wrong, it is okay to have 2 percent or 3 percent or 10 percent wrong.
1. Your own life is your Guru
2. Life and Guru are inseparable. It is not like a nursery school teacher - you learn something and you go away and then that’s it, but life and Guru are inseparable.
3. Wisdom in your life is the Guru. Throw light on your life and that is how the wisdom comes.
4. The giver has given you in abundance and the giver keeps giving you, put good use of it. The better use we make of our abilities and of whatever we have, the more we get.
5. Honor the wisdom. You know, the wisdom, honor it because the Guru and wisdom are inseparable and life and wisdom should be inseparable. Sometimes we live our life without wisdom. Then there is no Guru tatva. You are not honoring the Guru. Got it? That is Satguru.
6. Be righteous and do not assert your righteousness. Asserting righteousness only makes you wrong in some other way and brings anger and frustration in you. Same with being good. If you think I am so good then you think others are bad, you have to make others bad. ‘I am so good’ then that brings you sadness. People who think they are too good are unhappier than those who think they are bad. Some people who think they are bad, they don’t care, but if someone thinks ‘I am so good’,then they think, ‘What is happening to me’. So if I think, ‘I am so good’, asserting my goodness make me sad and miserable. Asserting my righteousness make me angry. So be good and don’t assert your goodness. Let others speak about it; don’t blow your own trumpet. Be generous and don’t show off your generosity
This is what we have to do - again and again and again recollect these things, recollect and the intellect has to soak in it again and again and again. This is satsang. Satsang is the company of the truth, the company of the wise, the company of wisdom within you. You shake hands with the truth inside of you, that is satsang, got it?
The giver is not tired of giving. He is never tired and he makes you feel it is yours. His generosity is so much; the giver gives you and makes you feel proud of it, ‘Oh look, this is mine’. Really, nothing is yours. But the giver gives you in such a way that you don’t even feel you have taken. What? The giver gives you in such a way he makes you feel that it is your own, you have not even taken, that is the greatness, and that is the beauty.
So like that, the lady’s shouting at her own son could make a saint wake up and become enlightened, so that was it - a lady said: ‘Rama how long are you going to sleep, wake up, how long are you going to sleep?’, that’s it, it triggered. So the natures gives you abundant signs for you to wake up my dear, how long are you going to sleep, how long are you going to use your mind, why, why, why, why. A complaining, wailing and waning mind, WAKE UP, life is so short. In this short duration of life, honor life! It is so precious. Put good use of the talents and the resources that has come to your hand, your doorstep. Make good use of all that you posses, your voice, yourintellect. Use your intellect. Sing whether somebody recognizes it or not.
© The Art of Living Foundation
