There are times when life seems to fall into place, a synchronicity of sorts appearing to pervade all of our thoughts and actions and ‘efficiency in action,’ the synthesis of yoga, becomes our modus operandi.
Then there are those seemingly more frequent occasions when the level playing field feels to be at a severe angle, when computers crash, cellphones go wonky, and we as well as our colleagues seem off kilter. Then what?
This is where the rubber meets the road, where the professionals earn their room and board.
The spiritual path is rarely ‘convenient.’ Scaling Mount Everest would not be called convenient.
Marathons are several things, but convenient is not one of them. It’s just not the way it is.
So, if we are to use our daily lives as manifestation of surrendering to the Divine, it’s best that it be an unconditional surrender. The many inevitable tests that come upon us are meant to separate the men from the boys, the women from the girls, the truly devoted warriors from the summertime soldiers.
In the course of doing our work, if a short temper is one of our shortcomings, rest assured situations will unfold that will test us and ‘help’ us avoid being angry.
If lust is a problem for us, do not be surprised if we are called upon to interact with persons much more likely than not to test us in this regard.
If jealousy bugs us, no doubt persons luckier, more attractive or better off financially than we will appear in our lives. If handled properly, we can certainly test our mettle in such situations.
Then there is attachment, one of the ‘six crocodiles’ snapping at our inner and outer peace that all of us are prone to at times. If I may indulge in a personal experience with attachment:
From the age of 9 to 19, I used to work at Washington Redskins football games two Sundays a month during the season. For that reason and my natural interest in sports, a strong attachment developed. During the years I worked there, the Redskins were not a very good team. A championship?
Forget it.
Then I went off the India for Fivefold Path related study and work in the 1980s and lo and behold, the Redskins became good. So good, in fact, were they that they went to and won a Super Bowl, the results of which I learned quite a few days later (the internet having not become a reality yet).
Just in case my attachment had not been broken, a couple of years later, I had a chance to close the deal. I had returned to the Washington, D.C. area and here was a real, live Super Bowl getting ready to happen for my team. I got seriously ready to have my own private party where I would ensconce myself in front of the TV set and root my team on.
Then the phone call came. Shree Vasant needed a ride to West Virginia to meet with Peter Tompkins, co-author of The Secret Life of Plants, who was planning a new book, which became Secrets of the Soil. As I was accustomed to driving Shree Vasant here and there, I was being asked, and the timing overlapped exactly with game time.
At least, I thought, I could listen to the game on the car radio. Alas, driving through the mountains to get to West Virginia proved too much for radio reception and I was left with nothing but my imagination.
The Redskins won by the largest margin in the history of Super Bowls and from that day on, my very
serious attachment to the Washington Redskins was broken. (For years, I used to go into a two-day
depression if they lost.)
Furthermore, the meeting with Mr. Tompkins proved pivotal, as the 17 pages he wrote about Agnihotra and Homa Organic Farms to this day attracts new people to our work.
So was it ‘convenient’ for me that particular day to go to West Virginia? I should say not. But I did it, the work got done and I personally was helped in my development.
A brilliant description of Light Workers came across my desk this week. It spoke to how such persons think of how to serve others and the planet BEFORE they think of themselves. Are they aware that great blessings come to themselves doing the work? Certainly. We have not been asked to be martyrs. Far from it.
We serve, and in so doing, derive benefits for ourselves and our loved ones. That may not be our goal. We may simply be drawn to service. But we ultimately become aware of how the universe works in these respects.
And it gives us strength, especially at ‘inconvenient’ times!