ARE YOU READY TO CLIMB THE MOUNTAIN

Every moment spent in the company of the master, the Awakened One is blessedness – remember this. You have to be aware of this – then it will benefit you. But if you were to only take it for granted, you will be the loser. Any wood placed near sandalwood takes on the smell and the fragrance of the sandalwood – so it is.

The master can be your friend. But have you the capacity to receive him in that way? Can you provide for that kind of dignity? When the master is your friend he dignifies you. But in the bargain do not indignify him! Buddha says that one moment of reverence to the Enlightened One is worth a hundred years of meditation.

And what blessedness that that Enlightened One could be your friend! But are you ready to receive him? Or is it only a momentary fancy that this moment it is fanciful to receive him and next moment he is to be disregarded? I suppose this is how one is ordinarily, too. Is there no depth, or is everything just mere convenience to be taken for granted, utilized and then thrown away?

You have to earn the friendship of the master. When you indignify the master, you commit yourself to great indignity – and to the detriment of your own soul, for the Master is your own self – True Self. There is no place for arrogance in that relationship. There is no place for egoism, reactions, and impurities in that relationship. There is no place for irresponsible behaviour in that relationship. There is no pampering of the ego in that relationship. You will be made to look at yourself all the time.

Feel the blessedness of that relationship. Do not dump it in the garbage – when you do that you only indignify yourself. So look within yourself, reflect on your being, reach into the depths of your being and see what changes and transformations are required, and what alterations. Do not be lazy and say this is your temperament, which is just an excuse to continue in the same way, making justifications. And do not make excuses: if you think you are weak you will be weak, if you think you are strong, you will be strong. Let sympathies be deserved, do not seek a pampering.

And do not waste the time of the master. He has put himself and his life with you, for your sake, and for the sake of what is to be. So there is no room for arrogance – none whatsoever. When a diamond is gifted to you in your hands, do not throw it away – you will be the loser. But maybe the diamond is given too easily, so you value it not.

If the master has given you a position, feel blessed about it. In no way see it in arrogance; you have to earn it for your own sake. Otherwise it breeds arrogance, if you do not earn it. The master will create opportunities; place you in different positions to show you your own face and your faces – the different parts of your being, and your behaviour in different situations. It is all for your growth. Are you ready to climb the mountain?

The master will wake you up from your lethargy, the lethargy of habitual behaviour, which you call ‘yourself’. Even place himself in the garbage so that you may be able to see! Hopefully you are not so lethargic and blind that you cannot see! That would be to your loss.

If the master can place himself close to you, he can also take himself away. For you have not given due worth to that relationship. This is how you may have carried on in the world, out there. This is not how you would carry on out here. It will do you no good. It will harm you instead.

So stand up in your noble Self and appreciate the diamond in your hand – do not throw it away in the garbage. Learn to follow before you can lead. Just because the master places himself close to you, opens himself to you, does not mean you throw garbage all over him! Even so on each other. Have you no mastery over yourself?

Learn about sacredness and reverence. If you cannot have reverence for the master, how will you have reverence for each other – even so for yourself? If you cannot even consider the sacredness of the relationship with the master, how can you look at your relationships – your friendships with things, with your work, with yourself with sacredness? Take away such ego; it will be harmful to you.

You are here to learn about these things, not to carry on in the same way as you have done out there in the world. The master will point this out to you, in spite of all the garbage that you throw on him. Initially of course for the master it is quite a shock. But after a while he gets used to it. Maybe he has to learn to take garbage also!!!

Consider it to be a privilege that the master may place himself as a friend to you; there is no room for garbage in that relationship; not even in the other relationships, how much more not so in such a relationship?

If the master places you in a certain position, do not take it for granted – you will be the loser. Rise to that position; raise yourself in your soul, in your being. Not out of the ego, not out of arrogance, but out of dignity and love. It is you who will be benefited by that. Do not be irresponsible, and then make excuses and justifications! The master does not ask for excuses and justifications; he seeks for change in you – to be able to see this and make the changes.

If the master sees you becoming lax, he will pull up the slack and tighten it up for your own benefit. It may hurt your ego, but it is to your benefit.

So are you ready to climb the mountain with the master? He is not here for your tantrums; he is here for your awakening. He is not here to pamper you; he is here to bring you to liberation from your own self that can become your enemy – from your own pettiness. Do not be petty, small – be large, big hearted. Be able to climb any mountain, how else will you climb the inner mountain otherwise? Turn the difficult into the easy; this is the art of living. Do not make the easy difficult, this is the usual trend, and then seek pampering – there is no room for this in the company of the master. Do you want to grow or do you want to remain where you are? And even worse, to gather friends for such false sympathy, and such friends only harm you, because they want ‘company’ to continue in the same boat that gets nowhere.

You have taken to a journey; you have to remember this constantly. You will be tested through fire and you cannot even manage a little spark. When you turn your back to the master you turn your back to your own awakening, do you realize this? How unaware can you be, and then to seek enlightenment?  If you do not know how to be, then ask, learn from the master, do not turn your back to him. And then to make excuses and justifications!

You can hide the falseness of yourself in the world, but here you cannot, it will all stand exposed. You can hide the shallowness of your being out there in the world, in the façade of sophistication and external charm but you cannot do so over here, it will stand exposed. Of course your ego will not like it and therefore you will not like this place, but I am not here to pamper your egos, I am here to expose yourself to yourself and see what you can make of it. If you learn from it, it is you who will benefit, not me; I stand alone in myself, not because of you but because of me and what I am.

So if I put my hand out to you, do not strike it away, you will be the loser. Pray that that moment never comes that this hand is never put out to you. If you are a shallow being, a shallow soul, then this will not bother you; you will carry on as you are, as you have always been. But if there is some depth in you, you will feel as to how much of a loss that would be.

We are not here to play with marbles; we are here to play with our lives. And the master has offered his life for that. Do not consider his life to be a marble. Just because you want something does not mean you are ready for it. Look at yourself; are you ready for it? Question yourself, reflect upon yourself, and then you will learn to value the valuable when it comes your way, when they come your way. Otherwise because you do not know how, you will throw it away to your own detriment, to your own loss.

Are you strong enough to walk this journey? Do not be a dead weight; you will never get anywhere.

Howsoever you shall look upon the master so shall you look upon yourself. If you ridicule the master, you ridicule yourself; if you revere the master, you revere yourself. If you love the master you love your own Self. If you disregard, disrespect the master you do so to your own Self, remember this. If you hide from the master, you hide your own Self from yourself. Are you ready to receive the master? Are you ready to climb the mountain?

And do not be in competition with the master – you will lose. It just shows your immaturity. For the master is in no competition with you. There is no competition – although in fun and play he will compete with you to build up something in yourself. But in your immaturity do not take it for real…

Do not try to teach the master – he has no need of your teaching. You are in need of the teaching – in spite of yourself, who refuses to learn and only seeks for justifications and excuses. It is nothing but ego, pampering of the ego.

Feel blessed that you are walking with the master, even if you are to pass through difficulties in the walk.

If the master places some thing or things in your hands, consider it a special privilege. If he offers you something, do not belittle it because when the master places something in your hand he places something more than what you see.

The East knows of this; the West does not. The West has to learn this.

In your arrogance do not lose out – receive it with reverence. This is all part of your growth, in appreciation of what is. If you disregard what has been placed in your hand by the master, you disregard your own self, your own greater self.

Do not refuse the hand of help the master puts out on the journey. It just shows your smallness – for you may never receive that help again.

Being close to the master is being close to your own awakening – do not take it for granted. Are you ready for it?

It shows your pettiness, smallness, and your waywardness of character. It shows that you do not value what you are seeking.

So look within yourself as to how much you value all this – or is it just a momentary fancy to enjoy one moment and to abuse the next? When you abuse the master you abuse yourself a hundred times; you denigrate your own soul.

Just by asking to be close it does not happen, and even if it be given to you before – you have to earn the closeness. For anything that is given easily gets abused – by immature minds, by wayward hearts.

So do not give in to the pettiness of your soul. Dignify your soul – that is why the master places himself close to you. By dignifying him you dignify yourself. In your immaturity, in your ego, in indignifying him you indignify yourself – you risk this. So you are your own enemy and you are your own friend – know this. One, who starts to see this, reflects upon this, will continue to move on and grow. He or she will arrive at wisdom, will arrive at bliss – will arrive at freedom. The rest will continue to remain where they are – seeking sympathies of like-minded petty beings.

Seek the company of the master, not of petty minds. You will become as your company is, like the wood that is placed among sandalwood takes on the fragrance and the smell of sandalwood. And yet there is a wood that does not take on the fragrance, the smell of sandalwood – I hope you are not that kind of wood. However close you place that wood among sandalwood, it does not take on its fragrance. So it remains forever in the same way – convinced of its ‘own greatness’!! It is nothing but ego – the ego wood!

Look at the limitations of your self, your being. Look at your weaknesses; look at your waywardness – alter it, change it, do not pamper it by saying this is your temperament; this is how you are! Are you a master or a slave to your temperament? Are you seeking mastery or a slavery?

The diamond is offered only once because it is so obvious it is a diamond! If you cannot regard it that once, how can you regard it the next moment – how can you have a second chance? If you disregard what is obviously so valuable, it means you are not ready for it! It cannot be given again and again to be disregarded.

Reflect upon this. See if you can change. See if you feel there is any requirement for change, if this makes sense… You have your choice. The master will give you an opportunity. If you make the right choice you will gain from it. And if in your old ways, in your immaturity you continue as you are, then you remain where you are.

And it is heaven then that has fallen away from you – for you are not meant to receive the heaven, which was so easily being given to you. It shows the immaturity and pettiness of the mind. Then one wonders whether you are really seeking heaven or want to remain wherever you are.

To offer a diamond to one who has no value for diamonds is to indignify the diamond – and then the diamond is taken away.

So remember, in your moments of arrogance, in your moments of immaturity you do not get so blinded that if the diamond comes your way you disregard it and indignify it, for the loss will be yours.

So do not be a slave to your temperament, do not be immature – you harm your own soul and you may lose out on the greatest gift that may come your way. You may lose it forever – for sometimes these gifts come only once in a lifetime – nay, in many lifetimes!

Since they are made in Eternity and they are of Eternity, it is not just by speaking words that you become Eternity – it is by being ready for it, keeping yourself ready for it all the time.

When you yourself have dried out all the water, how can you then claim for water? And if you were to be given the water again, the diamond again, how does one know that the same thing will not happen again, that the next time the diamond and the water will not be thrown in the garbage again?

So reflect within your own selves – are you qualified to receive? Are you ready and qualified to climb the mountain with the master, or are you going to repeat the same? And then to claim sympathy, pampering…

So seek deep within your being for answers. Hopefully you will find the right ones. Then maybe the diamond might come your way again. And if it did not, then anyway it is not a great loss to you, for you valued it not – it is of no value to you, so you will not feel a great loss. But it is a great loss…

This is like in the Indian saying, ‘to strike at your own feet with the axe.’ You are your own enemy – and yet you always see enemies outside. There is an enemy within yourself – your own self.

So the master is ready to walk with you every step – but, are you ready? Do you want to?

And beauty is not just skin-deep – real beauty is of the soul. You may be ugly of face but beautiful of the soul – that is beautiful. You may be beautiful of the face, but ugly of the soul – that is ugliness.

That is the world – which considers the beauty of the face and not of the soul. Live in that world that considers the beauty of the soul, and then it will come shining through your body too, through your face – but it will be of a different kind altogether.

So be beautiful, and do not give your soul to the Devil. You are the Devil and you are the God – there is no other Devil. Your own soul is your own enemy; your own soul is your friend. There is no other enemy and there is no other friend. All friends in the outside follow from this and so too enemies.

 

Arya Vihar

5 October 1999