I am in the middle of a change. Change is never pleasant, no matter how positive it is. Throughout my life, there have been times when I was heading in a particular direction, only to find I was being guided to a place I had never thought about. So periodically I reach a place where I say I want to quit, I give up. From there, I then see that I have no idea where I am going. Here I am in the midst of a change. Surrendering, accepting, going down the road to the next way station, with no idea what it will look like.
Clues? Only what I know I have to leave behind. I know I have to let something go; it has to happen. I do not know where I am going, but I trust it will be better than what I am leaving, no matter how good it may be. Having been through this so many times, I know the steps and know that the outcome will be good. I just have to be willing to go down the path set out not by me but by God and Guru.
Have any of you ever been coached? Been on a team or somewhere where you have had to surrender to authority? By the time I got to Baba I had been coached by so many people. They helped me see my good qualities and flaws, and they gave me tools for discerning these traits and correcting them where necessary. My teachers and coaches have been straight, sharp, kind, direct and for the most part available. Baba had those traits heightened to a supreme degree. I did not always like the way they spoke to me, but I hung in there and found they were almost always right. So one thing I learned was not to jump to the conclusion that I was good and they were wrong. With Baba, he never missed. He was always there, loving me enough to scold me instead of coddling me. He continued to give me what I had asked for: the Truth.
I was not always so surrendered; it took me a while to learn to discern good authority. I stood up in my sixth grade class, told my teacher, a former Marine, that I had had enough, and walked out, going straight to the principal’s office. Years later, this teacher said I was the most independent student he had ever taught. So I was not a pushover, obeying everyone who was given a position of authority. I learned to respond and relate with authority figures, and seek out the most competent in the field I was entering. If we want to function at a high level, we need not to relate with authority as if we were two years old.
My job was and is to receive whatever is given and learn. My early coaches and teachers shone a light on my small self; they did that so “I” would not get in the way of the activity we were pursuing. I wanted to be successful, so eventually I gave in and won. This prepared me for mundane life and, more importantly, readied me so that when I got to Baba he could do more advanced surgery. Each of my coaches and teachers yelled and berated. Each of them helped me get a little more distance. They did so in order that I not think that my small self was so special and worthy of being adored. I learned to laugh at my small self, to have a sense of humor about the character I am playing this lifetime and not be so attached. If I was identified with my small self and having “good self-esteem”, then everything was personal and humorless. Not much fun.
Humor, then, was and is so important. Baba was great that way; he would laugh. We laugh at all kinds of things; why can’t we laugh at ourselves? Without this kind of humor that is able to put some distance between us and the small self, we get nowhere. Baba would laugh, and hopefully we could join in. If we refuse to laugh, then we are uncoachable.
I am still Rohini the meanie, a phrase I coined in a talk I gave in Miami while with Baba in 1980. I was sharing how I had gotten to where I was at that point. I was and am direct and straight. My “part “was formed in Boston, where flinty is normal. I do not coddle or stroke; I respect you too much. But that means if you have no distance you will see me as harsh and judgmental. In reality, I am harsh and judgmental when it comes to your small self. So you are correct in calling me that if you are identified with your small self. I can be harsh when I see refusing to learn. Trash the authority if you must, but first look at why the authority is so mean. Look at your actions. Ask questions; reflect on your choices first. Then see whether the tools I’ve used are the only ones that will cut through the resistance and the only way you might listen. Without Baba’s uncompromising directness, I know I would not be where I am today.
Whether I accept it or go kicking and screaming, the change will come, because I want it. My sadhana is not abstract; it is alive in everything I do. God is not isolated to corners of my day; I know God informs all of my day to a greater or lesser degree depending on my veils.
I will continue to do my work, focusing on God and Guru. Both will guide me through this change to a manifestation I do not know. But I trust my authority figures to wake me up, berate me, laugh at and with me, and guide me to the goal of Love, which is where they come from.
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