Hello, my friends. Today, a very deep thought came to me, I was experiencing that for a long time; so I thought I would share that with you. I’m quoting an old story and a very relevant story for our times and all times.
A very successful, rich and generous king was cursed, or he went through misfortune, and he became the keeper of a graveyard. Sometimes, misfortune strikes people so bad that a king can become a pauper. This happened to him. And this particular incident, which I’m talking is from the place where he was the keeper of the graveyard, and he was walking around the cremation ground where they have burned many bodies over time. There are many bones, including skulls lying around. So he picked up one skull. And he looks at it, and he thinks to himself, “This graveyard is the real school. Look here now; this skull belonged to a head, which somebody would have taken care of with a lot of attention by applying pastes and ointments to keep itself beautiful; to preserve the face, to remove the wrinkles of the face. And this is the same skull which was talking various great things to the world, and this is the skull, which carried great hair/mane which was probably brushed, washed and kept beautifully. The skull belonged to a young person or an old man or an old woman, a young woman, it doesn’t matter; it’s just a skull lying around in the burial ground. The owner of that skull might have spent hours maintaining it and finally discarded.”
This was the skull, which once roamed the world, to conquer the world, using his skills and intelligence. It was on a winning spree, or probably trying to conquer many aspects of the world, foolishly believing that everything will belong to him one day. And he may not have waited to know that nothing can belong to him. So, the King says, “Oh, my dear skull, I don’t know who you were when you were alive. But I understand all your aspirations have become ashes and you just became a skull.”
It’s a very relevant truth that we must ponder. We only have this time on Earth, just this time; we do not have another time. We don’t know whether we will be alive. And instead of pursuing glories, accolades, appreciation, so many different things which you can probably put on the wall or shelves; if we think, “I know my life is limited. I don’t know how many more breaths I will have. So, why not I give something to this Earth at this time.” This is the only time that we have. We have not seen the future, and we don’t have the past. It’s done. This thought should happen. We must make ourselves as beautiful, as handsome as possible so that we can communicate what we have to communicate to the world. Life is the message; life is the lesson. Life is the only expression possible.
Whatever we do, or whatever we perform during our waking hours, defines us, that tells the world who we are. We all have our individuality, our presence, power, purpose while being alive. Once we become the skull, we become another skull. Numerous skulls have merged with the Earth; Earth is a huge graveyard. And once we are gone, nothing ever matters.
So, we need to think now, is it worth criticizing, judging, comparing, gossiping, maligning the spaces, people’s reputations, all those things, is it really worth it? Live and let live because it’s a short life anyway. Sooner or later, we will all become those skulls. No glory, nothing, what will remain? Just what we have done, or we have delivered to the world, which has consistent value over generations. That’s why we remember Shirdi Sai Baba, Jesus, Krishna, Buddha, Mahavira and people like Nikola Tesla, Albert Einstein, and numerous other people who have given something new and original to this world, even years after they died. What they delivered to the world was something which was beyond time. Otherwise, whatever time has created, the time has also dissolved, time creates and uncreates in time. So, where is the room for pride and ego, and ownership of action, craving and attachment for possessions and positions, ownership over people, me and mine? I hope you’re able to see the foolishness behind all these while being alive. After death, it’s all gone. You don’t have them; everything vanishes, we become completely nullified.
I leave you with this thought. And I would just utter the lines from this poem about this King called Harishchandra. You can read about Harishchandra, through Google, you can search and find, and that tells the story. How a king became a pauper, and then, later on, he regained everything. He was tested, very, very bad. But he survived his test because of his honesty and truth. He never complained when he had to serve in the graveyard. He served as he would have served in the palace. That’s a story, but that you can read, I’m not explaining. I’m just explaining the foolishness of our daily life, where we are proud of our possessions and positions, our accolades, and our appreciations that we receive, disappointments when we don’t get it, all those things are absolutely silly. I just wanted to give you this thought. We’ll talk further. Let me know if you have a question connected to this and we discuss further. In Malayalam, this song was very popular at one time; it’s many, many years ago, almost eighty years ago probably.
Thilakam chaarthee – that means adorning vermillion or sandalwood paste on the forehead.
Cheekiyumaazhakaay – that means well combed and well-groomed hair.
Palanaal pottiya punnya sirasse, – Oh sacred head, which was well kept and well cared for many days.
Ulakam vellaaan uzhariyanee yo, vilapidiyathoru thalayodaaayi – that means, are you the same face which was at one-time running and trying to conquer this world? Oh, you have become just an unwanted skull now. Are you the same face, which was a world conqueror at one time? But now you have become a useless skull, which nobody wants.
We have been witnessing the developments in the world. We have seen the economic meltdown taking root, taking its shape. We have seen how countries react. We have seen how people react and how depressing it is to be uncertain about anything. We are seeing all this. Are you witnessing this drama unfolding? Witness! It’s interesting to watch. It is also interesting to see what happens inside us.
Human greed or human selfishness has divided the world so much in the name of religion, in the name of language, in the name of so many other factors. But many of these divisions did not give any value to human existence, this is what I feel. I strongly feel that. Humanity has not improved over the years, in the last 50 years, hundred years, 150 years, or 200 years. We have over emphasized on religions, religious divisions and finally, we ended up looking at people in terms of religions, not humans, not a species. Essentially, we need to look at everything as one. Every species has its own value. Every human being is from one species – human species. So, what should be the right operating method? What should be the religion? Humanity! What is the right sign of refinement? Kindness, compassion, selflessness. So, if selfishness has divided the world, it takes selflessness to unite the world. This is a great time and opportunity to unite the world through selflessness, through goodness, through kindness, through unconditional love, through compassion. It is a very good opportunity.
Today, I heard that all the shopping malls are closed, all the film, movie theatres are closed, all the swimming pools and gyms are closed, and airports are almost closed with very few flights. When all these things are happening, it means most of our public, social gathering, locations and occasions are taken away.
How do we feel?
We feel bottled up. We feel suffocated. This feeling of suffocation should be used in a positive way.
Number one is Introspection. What in us is reacting to what? What is bothering us, what is affecting us?
Secondly, even if you have money, you do not know, you do not have avenues for spending it. This is suffocation. You may have many things to do but you can’t do it because transportation is affected, offices are closed. Communication systems are still working, but we do not know whether there will be a shutdown in communication systems also. I heard in some countries, there has been overwhelming communication and the systems got shut down, just crashed temporarily but that is suffocation. That is also suffocation.
Today fortunately, we can talk. I’m talking and you can listen, we are discussing. We are lucky to have that. But we do not know for how long. 100 years ago or 200 years ago, it was not possible to talk and feel each other so freely. Today we have it. But at the same time, we have all been gadget-oriented since the last 50 years. We have been depending on gadgets or gadgets have been ruling us, which accented our insensitivity, which accented our ability to be humans because we don’t have to meet people. We don’t need eye contacts. We don’t need to feel people’s emotions, how they feel. Instead, we are only focused on opinions and concepts – concepts of people, opinions of people. So, we eclipsed the truth with all these opinions and concepts; or opinions and concepts eclipsed the real reality – the truth, but we bought it. We bought what the social media is talking; we bought what the mainstream media is talking. We bought or we consumed, what the politicians are speaking, or the religious leaders are speaking. Most of these talks had a profit motive. There is a reason for those talks. That’s not probably benevolent for humanity, in the sense, that if divisions are happening with these conversations, they’re not benevolent for humanity. Selfishness causes divisions. It takes selflessness to cause unification and this is the time for unification.
One virus has actually put a question mark in front of our eyes. What are you? What is life? Every animal on this earth has been asking humans this question all the time, non-verbally because they can’t talk. If any of the animals can talk, the stories they would say would literally shake us. We haven’t thought about that. The torture and the suffering of all the beings, even human beings for that matter, has been a cause for concern. Definitely.
And with this new economic meltdown, people are scrambling or the governments are scrambling to amass whatever they can hold on and help stabilize the economies. I believe that they will think twice before waging wars, otherwise, wars were rampant. There have been too many wars, too many complications. Too many things which were not good for humanity has been happening all the time. We have been quite insensitive about it. We’ve been quite unconcerned about it. We never cared about it.
So, this is indeed the time when you need to think. Introspect. Connect to yourself, feel yourself, ask questions to yourself, as to you versus this world that we use for our experiences. We are using this platform called world for our own experiences. We are using this unconsciously, almost taken it for granted. We never really cared how the earth feels because we are walking on it. It is time. It’s really time to think. It’s time to think beyond caste, country, culture, colour, community and religion. It is time. It is time to reconsider non-violence – Ahimsa – in thoughts, words, and actions. It’s time. That lifestyle of love, compassion, kindness is essential today. This is needed for the future of earth and the future of man on earth, future of human beings on earth because we never cared about forests. We never cared about ecology. We never actually built anything positive from this whole lifestyle. Instead, we have been demanding more and more. We have been screaming for rights, while we never talked about responsibilities.
It is our responsibility to take care of the nature. It is our responsibility to care about the human species. It’s our responsibility to care about all the species because we are supposedly a refined species. How do we know we are refined? If our attitude is that of unconscious insensitivity, we are not refined. Refinement should be visible through kindness, compassion and we should unite the world through love. Love is a very powerful tool. You can never underestimate it. Today, we cannot even hug a person or shake hands with a person. We can’t express humanity in this condition of virus. Look at what we have seen and what we are experiencing, right now. These are all warning bells. These are warning signs, signs of times. These are signs of times.
So, we all should reach out to all whom we can and spread the positivity. Bring the unity, bring humanity to life. Human beings should bring humanity. The right religion for human beings is humanity. You can worship any way you like, based on your gunas. How is your disposition? How is your orientation? How is your inclination? You can worship any God, any religion, doesn’t matter; but humanity first, beyond religions. Religions cannot save you in these kinds of times, humanity can. Humanity should be expressed through no wars, no discord, no division; this is important.
Now again, we are experiencing a few days of isolation. We are experiencing restrictions. We are experiencing so many things which should give us a good amount of realization. It should lead to transformation.
In my life, I have never told anybody that I’m enlightened. I have never told anybody I am their guru or I am the master or I am a great personality or I have any greatness. All of us have greatness. All of us have realizations sitting in us but it needs an environment, a kind of silence, a kind of stability, to awaken it. And this is the time when you’re getting it.
First and foremost, you as a human being versus the world is the first level of realization. How much of dependency we have on materials, people, relations, locations, time, spaces, and activities. Look at the levels of dependency! That’s reflected in the levels of suffocation, when it’s not accessible. This is the first point.
Second point – look within and see what’s getting affected within you, because of non-availability of many of these things.
The third point is – are you affected the same way when you are sleeping, when you are dreaming, etc. So, this is only during the waking state when your identifications are strong.
Human beings have three predominant energy disposition or energy expressions. It’s called Iccha Shakti, Jnana Shakti, and Kriya Shakti. Iccha Shakti is willpower. Jnana Shakti is the power of knowledge and Kriya Shakti is the power of action. If these are balanced, your life is effective. When I say effective life, it is the life where you live as a human being, an epitome of kindness and compassion, unconditional love, selflessness, living for the world. That is what I say effective life. It is not living for oneself – eating, drinking, sleeping, procrastinating, asking more and more from Earth, talking or shouting rights and having no responsibilities. That is not human existence. I do not call that a refined existence.
So, Iccha Shakti is the power of will. Its source is vision. Kriya Shakti is the power of action. Its source is faith, belief. If you do not have faith and belief in your action, it is weak action. Likewise, if you do not have power of will – will power combined with the will for action, the actions are not effective. We have power of knowledge that has to come from truth, the source is truth. So, source is truth for the knowledge, while source is belief, faith for action.
Root yourself in some faith – one faith – one particular thing which you really trust to have faith, whichever, it doesn’t matter. You are comfortable; you should be feeling good with it. Root yourself there. When you root yourself on one particular belief system – belief, faith – that will strengthen your will for action. Whenever we say, “Oh, I’m not feeling like doing it, I have inertia, I can’t do it,” it’s a sign that there is no belief, proper root belief, well rooted belief, that is a sign. So, it is time you rooted yourself on proper, effective belief system. You can have a belief in one man whom you want to trust as a person who’s stable, or a system, or yourself. You should have faith in something. That’s your choice. You can choose. Nobody is higher, nobody is lower. Nobody is equal. Everybody is unique. Please remember, we are master material. We have Iccha Shakti, Jnana Shakti and Kriya Shakti; power of knowledge, power of will and power of action. This is in us. If there is imbalance, we are ineffective in this world. So, truth is the root or the cause or the source for the power of knowledge. Vision is the source for the power of will. You should have a proper vision, higher vision, larger vision and that vision will help you in your journey further because you have clarity. If vision is perfect, clarity is sure. This will happen. And then Kriya Shakti, believe in your vision, trust it and act on it. Just think because your heart is beating, you will make many hearts happy without expectation, without prejudice. You have no enemies. Enmity is an aberration. It is a perversion. We always look at enemies. That’s a perversion. That’s not true. Just because we disagree, are they enemies? If somebody hates you, is that your problem? That’s something sitting in them. We should not be worried about enemies. We should not be worried about obstacles. We should always look at purpose. What is the purpose, the highest good for the world, the goodness factor that you can give into this world? That’s your purpose. That should be the purpose of humankind. That is humanity.
If you have that vision, if you believe in that vision, if you source from the truth of selflessness, truth which is selflessness, compassion, kindness, unconditional love, that’s the reflection of the truth. God, whichever form you are worshiping, doesn’t matter; God is truth. God is omnipresent. God needs nothing from you. God does not punish. We should never fear God. We should love God and express godliness through kindness, compassion, unconditional love, forgiveness; letting go of the past, letting go of bad emotions, letting go of everything negative. Focus on positive. Focus on truth. Act, act right now. Tomorrow, we do not know. All you have is today; this time, this space, this opportunity. We have never seen tomorrow. Nobody has seen tomorrow. Tomorrow will happen, that time you realize it is happening.
So come on, get on, and rejuvenate people. As Vivekananda said, awake. Arise. Get on with your right action. I love you. I’m with you.
Thus Spake Mohanji 