Buddha poornima

…contd…

Usually depending upon the intent, prarabdha (destiny) and attitude, he may also simultaneously find a Guru who would give him a technique to speedup his healing of karma and working on his tendencies, attitudes and character.

Basic level: They are people with some know-how in some healing techniques – mind you I said “some know-how” not complete know-how. They come as yoga masters, Reiki masters and teachers of various other healing techniques. Most at this level are themselves struggling with their deficiencies and are good only with the ‘little know-how’ of the technique that they have learnt.

They are like peep-holes into spiritual world. This is more than enough for ‘ready learners’. They outgrow these masters in no time and enjoy the journey even on their own many times. But, the important thing is the technique. If I repeat, if it is ‘transferred’ properly and learnt correctly, then any student with sincere practice itself can grow leaps and bounds in spiritual field. Ekalavya is a classic example of this type of student – the self-help ones. But such students are far in between.

These masers deserve all the respect just for introducing one to the world of healing self.

Many of the masters unfortunately get drunk by the adulation of their students and tend to believe themselves to be as developed as presumed by their ignorant students. Such masters end up faking words and new techniques in a bid to woo more students and to retain the old ones. These desperate actions bring about the downfall in their attitude and thereby in their character.

Next comes a person or persons who have had some spiritual insights knows from experiences and not just in theory the spiritual Truths, can heal disciples’ karma too by taking it on himself and one who knows to transmute negativities and can do  many more levels of healing. He knows past of himself and also his student and can see through the veil of time. These people are far advanced by way of sadhan in their spiritual journey. Many times, their sadhan runs through janmas and hence their present elevated state of knowing and being. Blessed are the students who get to be students of such ‘Gurus’. They may be in the guise of simple orators, masters of yoga, Reiki and such healing techniques or even simple house-holders doing their daily pooja.

When a student gets such a Guru, he has a spiritual experience which seems unreal and mystical but in his ignorance he may take it to be some coincidence, hallucination or even considers it as result of his own Sadhan. These Gurus will not establish their greatness by disclosing their acts and the way they go about healing and protecting their students. Reasons are best known to them and left to them.

....contd.....

Buddha poornima

…contd…

In this spiritual level again, there are different levels of Gurus.

Preachers: These are the people who preach people on ‘the right way of living’. They usually quote some scriptures and give discourses that give an understanding of right way of living. They are highly revered by their disciples as they consider them to be highly knowledgeable persons and ‘knowledge’ of few scriptures and some language is always considered to be special and a rare skill. So many people especially over Tv are well known to do a wonderful job of this.  

People who become Gurus as they give discourses: This, I am sure you all are aware of. I mean the Gurus who give just discourses and are considered ‘Gurus’ by their cult devotees and disciples. These people or Gurus are very important in this world, infact I would say they the most important type of Gurus in this world because they reach out to maximum number of people and generate that ‘desire’ to walk the path of spirituality and inquisitiveness of being with God, knowing God or for that matter about after life.

The seed sown by previous types Gurus is watered by these Gurus and ‘tendencies’ to reach out to Guru is made strong by these Gurus. These Gurus usually are religious and sometimes very fanatic too. But still just the fact that the thought of ‘higher being’ and ‘Supreme’ is established in ‘human mind’ is enough to thank these people for 1000 janmas. 

The soul at the start of spiritual of it's journey has to first meet lots of such ‘gurus interact with them, get knowledge from them, sit on their thoughts and then ingest it in his character before becoming eligible to receive the next level of Guru.

The first three levels of Gurus proficiency doesn’t get affected by their personal character. Their knowledge in their field of mastery like dance, archery etc doesn’t demean their ability to teach their art. But unfortunately for them and fortunately for us, in spiritual field character of the master is so very important in the quality of his growth and knowledge. And hence the master who thinks he is great and rubs the same assumption onto his students falls into the quagmire of negative qualities like lies, hypocrisy, manipulation, ego, greed, envy, anger and what not. No doubt he becomes bad to worst over the years. And to follow such a master taking him for a Guru, well, God save such a student.

From here, Guru takes a different ‘connotation’. Guru now becomes a ‘ship’ that takes you across the ocean of life and death. He becomes a ‘fire’ that burns all your karmic imprints and your tendencies. He is the ‘mirror’ who shows you your ‘true self’. He is the ‘beacon of light’ that lights your path. He doesn’t walk it for you but yes he lights it for you.

As written in Guru Granth Sahib "What's in your destiny no body can take it away from you, but what is not written is also got by Guru's grace"
 

With this explanation it becomes self-evident as to the qualities of the Guru from this level.

...contd...

Buddha Poornima

…contd…

How namskara is beneficial over ‘hi/hello’:

When you say hi,hello (please observe yourself from now on when you say hi.hello) the body is erect and it is more a formality and some times with a plastic smile, that hides ‘not so good emotions behind it; unless ofcourse, we meet our long lost friend or dear one, we don’t experience happiness when uttering hi,hello. But, when we salute (by bending and touching their feet) we are doing an asana which is beneficial for our spine.

Secondly, when we bend, our ‘ego’ does take a back seat, if not completely atleast a little. This is a good exercise to curb our ‘ego’ effortlessly. You may be just in your 20s but when your niece or nephew when on a festival day come running and fall at your feet and say “bless me”, remember the smile/laugh that you let out spontaneously and you lifted them and hugged them with tons of love. That energy of love ‘automatically’ becomes their blessing and shield.  Remember it’s the transfer of energy and what you receive you give and what you give you receive. So, elders though angry when you seek their blessings atleast for few moments feel the warmth of affection and touch your head then the transfer of energy happens. That is your ‘earnings’ and more you have that, more you are happy, safe, peaceful and successful.

There is a more scientific reason behind my persistence to do the same. The elders/Guru connected to the Divine are receiving energy directly from the Source and it enters through their ‘Brahmarandrum’ i.e., head and flows downwards through 3^rd eye chakra, throat and fills their heart and flows through the hands and when this hand is placed on the head of the person who is bowing in front of them , then the transfer of that Divine energy happens and the person seeking blessings ‘actually’ does in the form of ‘divine energy’. The energy is transferred from the hands of the elder/Guru on to the head of the student and his gets energized.

Other alternative way of greeting: If for some reason you can't bend (say for reasons like health) then greet with a 'namasthe' the classical way of folding both palms and greeting with 'namasthe'. This also has almost the same benefit but directly from above as seen in the above picture. and namasthe means 'may you and I meet in the space of emptiness i.e., egolessness' where one palm represents us and the other the other person. 

So go out and earn your brownie points from today onwards.

All the above three variety of Gurus mostly help us in teaching and guiding through this world and worldly affairs. They are instrumental either directly or indirectly in our materialistic success and benefits that we enjoy. And to them we owe a lot and more!

Now what to say of Gurus who guide us to step into the spiritual world, who tempt us with their stories, discourses, explanations, examples, scriptural interpretation and experiences to want us to become spiritual. They with their words, actions and techniques help us to outgrow our tendencies to work towards our highest potential.

...contd... 

Guru poornima

…contd….

 

Guru Drona taught both Pandavas and Kauravas and after completion of their education, when they asked him as to what he wanted as Guru Dakshina he said ‘Get Drupada as a war prisoner to me’. Read the link for the story of Drupada "http://kantipadam.blogspot.in/search?q=draupadi-mahabharat and if you want all posts about  Draupadi then go to http://kantipadam.blogspot.in/search?q=draupadi&max-results=20&by-date=true.

(If story of Drupada is still unclear then write about it and i'll write complete story)

None of them questioned their Guru on his request. They felt it was their duty to avenge his ‘insult’ and went to wage wars on Drupad. No ‘dakshina’ is big enough to give to your Guru. Many years after completion of education Krishna brought back Guru’s son to him as a form of ‘gratitude’ which in India we term as ‘Guru Dakshina’.

How many of us go back to greet our school and college teachers and pay our respects? Please do atleast this sep 5^th – on the Teachers day. Visit your school (those who are in the city where you completed your education) and college and bend down and touch your teacher’s feet and seek their blessings. Don’t say ‘hi maam’, ‘hello maam’, or shake hands with them.

Madhuri Dixit on National Tv touched her Guru Birju Maharaj’s feet and sought his blessings. No doubt, his blessings has given her name, fame, success. We are not bigger achievers than her. We can bend and touch our Guru’s feet. Trust me; their blessings go a long way in your well-being. I can vouch for it with my personal experience. Their blessings are the reason I received all good things that came my way. Whatever little sense I have I credit it all to my Guru’s who taught me in my school. And please don’t go empty handed. Take some flowers, fruits, sweets and if your heart permits even a simple saree would do. But they deserve it. And not only on teacher’s day, on and off if you can go and meet them, they really will be happy.

We are used to teasing our teachers and name calling them. Discourage your kids and kids of your family from doing that. Agreed teachers now-a-days are bad in their language, have odd mannerisms but yet teach children to respect their teachers.

Respecting Guru’s is one quality that should be imbibed in a child at a very young age and this forms the basis of his character and destiny. If Ekalavya can give his future away to please his Guru by gifting him his Thumb – especially that Guru who didn’t even teach him in person, we can atleast give basic ‘respect’ to our teachers for the effort they take to teach us/our kids.

...contd....