Living his life was probably a piece of cake. I mean how difficult is it to sleep at 3 am and be awake and about at 5:30 am. It's only a matter of timing right?
Putting half your body to sleep whilst the other half keeps awake. I guess that's arithmetic right? Just a matter a division.
Remembering what 50,000 people came to meet you for and their thoughts and appeals, recollecting and solving their problems. I mean how difficult can that it. It's merely action replay right?
The Angle of Difficulty of being him is worth a suno, so suno.
Gurudevonline.com presents the pods of enlightenment, an audio biography of one of history's greatest saints. 'The Guru of Gurus' podcast series is comprised of 24 podcasts that present aspects of the mahaguru's life, philosophy, supernature, and mentorship.
Make some aspects of his biography into aspects of your biography.
If you have a question related to this podcast or need spiritual guidance, write to us at answers@gurudevonline.com. You can also read about Gurudev's life and philosophy on his website - www.gurudevonline.com
Living his life was probably a piece of cake. I mean how difficult is it to sleep at 3 am and be awake and about at 5:30 am. It's only a matter of timing right?
Putting half your body to sleep whilst the other half keeps awake. I guess that's arithmetic right? Just a matter a division.
Remembering what 50,000 people came to meet you for and their thoughts and appeals, recollecting and solving their problems. I mean how difficult can that it. It's merely action replay right?
The Angle of Difficulty of being him is worth a suno, so suno.
Gurudevonline.com presents the pods of enlightenment, an audio biography of one of history's greatest saints. 'The Guru of Gurus' podcast series is comprised of 24 podcasts that present aspects of the mahaguru's life, philosophy, supernature, and mentorship.
Make some aspects of his biography into aspects of your biography.
If you have a question related to this podcast or need spiritual guidance, write to us at answers@gurudevonline.com. You can also read about Gurudev's life and philosophy on his website - www.gurudevonline.com
A family man, an office employee, a healer, a spiritual savant, a Guru, a mahaguru--these roles were not easy to multitask. Being him was a spiritual lottery but also physical hell.
THE ANGLE OF DIFFICULTY OF BEING HIM
People had an image of Gurudev that formed due to word-of-mouth conversations. They had expectations when they came to meet him. Naturally, these were spiritual expectations of help, healing, altering circumstances etc. which needed the use of his spiritual power to be solved; power that needed to be earned and sustained.
Initially, the diseases and problems would partially manifest in the body and aura of the healer and he had to deal with this, and absorb the negativity. Further, he saw people only for a few seconds at public events and had to solve the riddle of how to remember all of them. 30 to 40% of these people, he would never meet in person as they visited the sthans he had set up in different cities across the world. He had to either see them through his disciples’ eyes or travel astrally to acquaint himself with their prayers and solve their problems. Astral travel was like business travel for him. In fact, if you like we can coin a new term - spiritual tourism!
At the peak, he probably dealt with hundred thousand or more people every month across the board. Hotels, hospitals, and institutions calculate the number of people per square foot in terms of visitors. He had to see close to 50,000 people on some days in hardly 600 ft.². That is about 80 to 90 people per square foot per day. And our lack of admin skills compounded matters!
Plus, the powers that be had to be manipulated because often there was no forthcoming consent. There were negative powers that would pose obstacles and he had to surmount them. These negative energies could be spirit attacks, black magic, annoyed gurus and the like.
He played the part of defence attorney to the aatma or spirit of the diseased and the planets plus their rays to win his case and point. He often did so by making people wait in line, come to the sthan for treatment multiple times, and that is how he balanced out people’s destinies. This waiting he would count as tapasya or atonement. Can you believe it?
One million people would pray to his photograph and answer their prayers he had to, at least most of the time and sometimes in parts. These words are easily written, the actions were not so easily done!
The oregano on the pizza was that he had to live a very middle-class life financially, report to office daily, be at the camps for half the year, indulge his family and a live a life of perceived normalcy.
Those who acknowledged him, owned him. But how easy can that be? Truly, I guess he was lucky to be him and I am lucky to not be him. I would not survive.
Nitin Gadekar comments.
Do you think Gurudev's life was an easy life to live?
Nitin ji: No, certainly not. I think with so many people making so many demands, calls, troubling him all the time, it is impossible to lead any, you know, it needs to be a sadhu with enormous calmness. I mean, you have to be really a guru of the highest order to be able to be at the beck and call of hundreds of people who sometimes ask you that their television is not working or sometimes, you know how people were, asking him things as ridiculous as that. So, what do you do with this? Still Guruji used to be calm and say, “Son, son” and listen to the whole world. I don't think it was an easy job. This is how I have thought about it and I think--when he was in office, it would help him to forget all these things. So, it was like a holiday for him, that office.
Gurudev’s piggybank had many holes. Junior staff at the office would partially empty it on salary day. In the early years, his roommates Dwarkanath ji and Nagpal ji had to bear the brunt of his generosity. And what was strange was that even though every ask was not genuine, and he knew that, he still gave away part of his salary every month.
Later, seva and feeding his new disciples would drain some more resources. His own family added to the cost because he would not allow their personal expenses to be borne from the contribution of his disciples.
He earned within measure but spent without fear! Ordinarily, this would have been termed reckless -a case of “Amdhani athani, kharcha rupaiya”. And yet the two ends met. God knows how but God knows it did.
His approach to money was non-partisan. No significance attached. He always fell short but never fell flat. The goddess of wealth supported him in a task that was humongous and he squeezed his way through.
Mataji had learnt to spend with frugality and care and felt she was never wanting for money. Though he did distribute some of his salary, he did bring back some as well. And, of course, later the disciples ganged up and made sure that his salary came directly to Mataji and that all he could do was see it flying from the ex-chequer to the wife.
Over to Mataji.
I hear about his salary and his lifestyle-there must have been a shortage of money all the time?
Mataji: I never felt so. Whatever salary he got, I tried to live within those means. Even when there was shortage, he never let me feel so. He always gave me money. I do not know from where he got it, but I always got the money.
You also used to work a job as well?
Mataji: Yes, I used to work. But I never thought of keeping our salaries separate. The salary used to come to me but I never separated it.
Why do people say that instructions were left in the office that his salary be handed to you?
Mataji: That was because whenever he got his salary, people used to come and tell him they wanted all sorts of things, and he gave them money. He never refused anyone. Even if someone asked for Rs 100-200, he would give it to them. He would not think of taking the entire salary home. Never. Whoever would ask, he would give it to them. Then people started saying, “Since Mataji is responsible for the household expenses, the salary should be handed to her. We will not let it reach you, Guruji. We will hand it to her.”
The disciples said this?
Mataji: Yes
Naubat Ram ji was Gurudev’s neighbour when he shifted to Gurgaon. He answers.
When Gurudev used to live in Shivpuri, did he face a lot of difficulties?
Naubatram ji: He used to live in rented house with two rooms.
Did a lot of people come to meet him there?
Naubatram ji: Yes, at the time many people would come to meet him there.
So, did he face difficulties due to this?
Naubatram ji: They did face problems but by the grace of God, he never felt it.
He never felt it. So, was he always smiling and laughing?
Naubatram ji: Yes.
Travelling from Shivpuri to Delhi - was that easy? No, not at all.
Family life combined with spiritual life-was that easy? Not at all.
Expenses of a dual lifestyle were not easy either.
Then how did he always wear a smile and keep his sense of humour alive? That is a secret to learn. I find humour keeps sadness and self-pity at bay. I recommend his example and my experience to all the listeners of this podcast. I truly believe that he or she who smiles and laughs, walks taller. Try it!
Before Gurudev became a mahaguru, he had to overcome many obstacles in his path and pass many a test. Pehelwan ji shares excerpts of a conversation he had with Gurudev.
Pehelwanji: He said, "Son, there were times I had 20 stitches where my clothes were torn". Do you understand? He would gather the cloth and sew it together. Sometimes, a hole in the cloth would be sewn with 20 stitches. He said, “I took your sisters and Mataji to the market. The younger one was in the lap. Renu, being older, held my finger. She pointed to a sweet shop as she wanted to drink milk. She had 2 glasses of milk. He came home and asked Mataji "Master, don’t you give milk to her?" He used to call Mataji. She replied, "How will I give them milk as there is no money left?" So, he told me about the difficulties that he went through. He said he was upset and could not sleep the whole night as he had to take a decision of whether to continue the spiritual path or not. He spent the whole night thinking. At the end he said, "Lord, I will follow this path come what may, no matter what my circumstance."
Money is one aspect where most spiritualists are intensely tested and tempted! There are those who succumb and luxuriate, and others who withhold and frugalize. Even a man with so much power had to be tested for grit and determination. The fact that he waivered ever so slightly shows how like us, he was human too, and needed deep resolve to overcome such trials just like we need to. His story demonstrates human capability to overcome the counter balance of temptation to waiver from the path.
Gurudev was under constant observation by his ethereal trainers, other allies, deities, and also normal people. His example of not allowing donations and gifts was hard to believe but easy to respect.
Navigating through circumstances was not easy and posed a huge angle of difficulty. Initially, he did seva at other people’s homes and outside the tea stall situated below his office. He was literally like a saint off the street. Later, he leveraged his workplace and did seva wherever his job took him. Or was it the other way around?
A one liner from Gaggu, a very nice man who was part of the mahaguru’s coterie, is coming through.
Gaggu ji: The people who would come to meet him, he was responsible for them. Being their Guru, their responsibility was on him.
The ability to read other people’s thoughts sounds exciting but makes the incline of the treadmill far steeper for it is so difficult to pretend to not know. Naturally, faith is not a capsule you can buy at a medical store. All of this was made more difficult given the way he dressed like everybody else; and the way he talked like everybody else! Could it have been easy to have faith in someone who seemed like everybody else?
And yet, in a round or two, most people developed faith and became his admirers. It was the way he lived and the radiation of his aura that impacted people’s minds.
A keen observation from Nikku, who was Mataji’s nephew and another member of the coterie I have dubbed as the four musketeers, follows.
What was a day in his life like because you have lived there in his house for so many years, tell us how was a regular day in his life when he was staying in his home? How would he spend that day?
Nikku ji: Irrespective of whether he would sleep at 2 am or 3 am, he would wake up at 5.30 am or 6 am. I have never seen Gurudev sleeping till 9 to 10 am throughout his life, never, maximum to maximum 6 am. By 5.30 am or 6 am, he would get up. By 7, 7.30, max 8 am he would be off. He’d reach his office by 9 am or 9.30 am. Firstly, reaching office was a chore. They would be people outside the main gate of the house from 8 am. He would get late for work. Sometimes he would leave from the back.
What do you mean?
Nikku ji: When the wall was low so he would climb that wall and leave. Later, when a sliding door was installed, he would leave from there. He would ask someone to get the car behind the house so he could leave quietly. He wanted to reach office on time.
Right.
If there were fewer people, then he would bless them and leave. He would follow his routine life in the office. He used to meet few people in the office too. If he came back home by around 2 or 3 or even 4 pm, he would go to the farm and take care of the cows, do farming. He used to love all this.
What time did he finally call it a day? What time did he sleep?
Nikku ji: Normally, he would sleep 2.30 or 3 am. I have never seen him sleep at 11 pm or 11.30 pm in my life. Never. Not before 2 am.
What was he doing till 2.30 at night?
Nikku ji: People would wait to meet him till 12 am or 1 am. After that if any disciples were waiting… Why are you asking me all this? You also did the same thing.
Yes.
He used to discuss something with you. After 1 am, the disciples met him after he had finished meeting people, then they would leave around 2 am. He had his food after they left. We used to eat together. So, you will know what he would be doing till 2 am better than me.
I know that.
Nikku ji: So, you tell me that what he used to do till 2 am?
He used to talk about spirituality. So, the man worked from 5.30 in the morning to 2.30at night except for a break for out of the body paath?
Nikku ji: Yes. That is not always. It was only if he doing his paath that he would take a break or else you can say for he was busy for 20 hours.
Wow! I would not be able to live a life like that. Would you?
Nikku ji: No, we cannot.
Besides healing and helping, Gurudev made each visitor feel that he was focused on him or her. Giving each visitor the feeling of significance was no easy task as Nikku ji explains.
Was he a very funny person considering you lived in that house for so many years? So, what was his nature? Was he jolly? Was he funny? Was he serious? What was he like?
Nikku ji: When he was in mood for seva, he used to be very serious. He will meet the people with patience and love. The best thing about Guruji was that if one lakh people have met him and left, all these people would feel Guruji is sitting here only for me. He used to give people that feeling. Whereas we cannot give this feeling to our 2 kids. If any person -you see it is very difficult, I have witnessed – In the Guru roop, he knew that a person has come with negative vibes toward him and all of us. But when he would come inside to take blessings, Guruji will never think that this person has come with negative vibes so I will not solve his problem. He would solve his problems and bless him. I think this is the most difficult task. If a person abuses us, as a common man we will retaliate the very next moment.
What Nikku ji did not know was Gurudev was following Buddhe Baba’s instructions. He had been strictly told that he had to serve without favour or value judgement.
Bittu, a youngster at that time, got to look at the mahaguru with fresh eyes. He had no background in spirituality, just gratitude towards the man who had healed him.
Bittu ji: We would share personal information with Guruji – our sorrow, joy, mistakes and more. Sometimes not physically, but we would stand at the sthan and would share our mistake. He would hear everything but never share with anyone that Bittu is saying this, or you father was saying this or Bittu has done wrong. He would digest everything and he could do so because he was a ‘Neelkanth’. That’s why he is a Guru and God. He could consume the darkest of poisons. To become that capable, you need to put in a lot of hard work and sacrifice a lot. For a man to become a guru, his must scorch his needs and desires. He must put others needs before his own. He must have a certain empathy for mankind. Why would we come to meet Guruji? If Guruji was not around, we would miss him. He had that magnetism which I don’t have.
Keeping secrets is a huge burden and imagine the number of secrets he had to keep? Literally, he would never let his left hand know what the right hand was doing. People would continuously observe his behaviour and attitudes to define credibility. It was never easy to live in a glass house but that was his destiny.
If the visitors were hard to deal with, the disciples were tougher. He had to play the role of Mr Indulgence himself. He had to satisfy the need for attention of his disciples, family, visitors, and colleagues, amongst all else. For a man who had to give so much attention, how could he stand at ease?
I am embarrassed that I would manipulate as much time as I could with him, not conscious that I was being inconsiderate. He aroused a kind of madness in us and became a common obsession. Most people serve the guru but we victimised him.
Bindu Lalwani supports my viewpoint.
So, he had time for everyone at any time.
Bindu ji: Oh yes! He had time for everybody and he was very approachable.
Vishwa Mitra ji from Mukerian, Punjab, is a quiet and reserved person. His viewpoint on Gurudev’s angle of difficulty is brief but wise.
According to you was Gurudev’s life was full of challenges or an easy one? What kind of challenges did you see in his life?
Vishwamitra ji: Gurudev had a tough life.
Yes, I do agree with you. Tell me more.
Vishwamitra ji: Gurudev would take care of numerous people, meet people with problems and help solve them, and remember each one even if he had met them just once. He would remember everyone. This is difficult. People like us tend to forget others after meeting them once.
That is true. What other kind of challenges did you see Gurudev dealing with?
Vishwamitra ji: Gurudev would hardly rest during the day or sleep at night. He worked very hard for people, for the well-being of others.
Mr Das explains how Gurudev was aware of each visitor’s thoughts, feelings, and attitudes which in turn helped him make quick-fire assessments.
I am talking to Das Saab from Chandigarh who has been known to Gurudev during his lifetime and spent some time with him. Das Saab, I have a question that people have asked me very often and that is how did Gurudev remember so many faces and people who used to come to meet him on a Bada Guruvaar which could number anything from 40-50 thousand?
Das Saab: I asked Guruji, “How can you do this?” So, guruji told me that, “There is a screen in front of me which is visible to me only. And the people standing in the queue, everybody, every individual person - how he came, how much shraddha he has, how much vishwaas he has got, with what type of money they have come here; whether they have come with shraddha and vishwaas or they have come just for fun, everything comes on that screen. And within, before a second, I decide what relief they require and what relief to give them.”
Healing people is not wishful thinking. It involves a lot of energy investment and he had to use most of his spiritual powers to sustain this. With the help of his spiritual allies, he had to ensure that there was enough power to serve and continue to serve.
Would it be humorous to call this sustainable energy? I guess!
What we say may sound easy but not even one in a billion have achieved what he did. I have spent years in his presence but find his life hard to believe and even harder to emulate.
One of his main agendas was the training and upliftment of his disciples and other elevated spirits. Because most of the disciples were non-conformists and not spiritually inclined, his job was twice as hard.
People like Sant Lal ji, Choudhary Saab, Krishan Mohan ji, Captain Sharma, Uddhav, yours truly, and several others came from the monster’s club and had invisible horns. Senior-most disciples Malhotra ji and Bade Jain Saheb were no exceptions.
Jesus didn’t, but he did practice carpentry. Reshaping, sanding, and polishing were the processes involved. We needed to and were reinvented.
For the sake of continuity, he had to teach us how to train others. We encroached on his free and family time. Fortunately, his wife was not a unionist and she joined him in his indulgence of us. Her angle of difficulty was steep. She had to share her husband with not only visitors and disciples but cows and monkeys too. What a life!
The person we will talk to next is Uma Prabhu. She and her husband, Suresh Prabhu, have been very closely connected to the mahaguru. Being a journalist by profession, Uma’s views are pragmatic and straightforward.
At the physical level, I want you to imagine yourself that if you had to lead his life, would it have been an easy life for you to lead?
Uma ji: Suppose, if I were him, the life that he led, is a very, very, difficult life. It was not an easy life. He was an ocean absorbing all the negativity. If I were him, I do not know how he looked at it, but if I was him, it would not have been easy for me.
Listening to the problems of millions, absorbing and treating negative energies all the time, helping people with their spiritual growth plans, justified Uma’s statement of him being an ocean absorbing negativity.
A chameleon changes colours in minutes. He had to do that in seconds. People would come to share their happiness with him. When some of the prayers that they had made were fulfilled, they would come share their happiness, and conversely when something negative happened, they would come to off load their grief. It was not easy to change moods every few seconds but he had to.
Another issue that would crop up was that people had heard stories of others getting relief in very short periods of time, and so, expected the same for themselves. Often, he would need to make them come repeatedly and heal them slowly. He would make people wait in long queues for hours and use this as a justification when asking the powers to compensate them for their patience and faith. Most of us who spent a lot of time with him will speak in one voice to say his was no easy task. It was almost impossible.
Climbing mountains is no mean feat. It requires effort and dispatch. It creates strain and involves physical endeavour. It is a sweat by the step concept. But once you have ascended, you can get an overview, rub shoulders with the mighty. You can savour the fact that the torture was worth it. That though the roots were bitter, the fruit was sweet.
Zindagi ki asli udaan abhi baaki hai
Manzil ke kai imtihaan abhi baaki hain
Abhi toh naapi hai mutthi bhar zameen hamne
Abhi toh saara asmaan baaki hai
Abhi toh saara asmaan baaki hai