The Ocean of Grace
All of us have recently experienced the excitement and joy of having so many initiators in Denver. Seeking out as many as I could I asked this question: "What was your time like at 'Malibu between festivals?" A beautiful service for an aspirant.
"Everything was so amazing. Everything. Inside, outside, just being with Maharaj Ji, seeing Durga Ji, seeing the children, seeing the house, everything was just so much. I felt like I was going home. Maharaj Ji made me feel so welcome. It was like I had been away at school and now I was coming home for a vacation.
It was better than I had ever experienced it before in my life, because I could do something there. Maharaj Ji gave 'is an opportunity to service. And you know, once you do service, once you participate, once you involve yourself in the place you're in, suddenly it becomes home for you.
What I saw so clearly was how each person has their own individual, special relationship with Guru Maharaj Ji. For ten hours each day we had satsang, satsang, satsang. Each person would get up and express their experience of this Knowledge, express how they felt about Guru Maharaj Ji. Each person would be really different. After a while you would say, 'Oh that person is so devoted to Guru Maharaj Ji, Oh that person loves Guru Maharaj Ji so much, Oh I am so small, I am so nothing, what is my devotion, what is my love?' And then when you'd get up there to give satsang everyone else would be feeling the same things: 'Oh that person loves Guru Maharaj Ji so much, Oh that person is so devoted!' Until we got to a point where we could see that one experience didn't negate another experience. Every experience a premie has just enhances the greatness and glory of Guru Maharaj Ji.
One day Maharaj Ji invited us to come to the sound room. It was really fun because he was fixing the amplifier, taking two wires and soldering them together. There we all were packed into this little room watching him do this. And that's exactly what we had been feeling, that Maharaj Ji was soldering us together. He put on a record and it said 'Wherever we are we are bound together.' Everything from the music, to what he was doing to us, just let us know that there was an unshakeable, unbreakable permanent bond Guru Maharaj Ji was establishing with each of us.
Afterwards we all went upstairs to share satsang with each other and it was incredible. Each person was sitting in a different part of the room. It was almost like we all had a different perspective of Guru Maharaj Ji. We all saw something different. Guru Maharaj Ji was doing so much with each one of us. I really just got blown away. I saw that it was some-thin that transcended all culture, all country, every situation, everything.
Each of us has our own particular personal relationship with Guru Maharaj Ji. There is one thing that brings us together and that is Guru Maharaj Ji himself. But what we bring to it is different for all of us, because we've all had different lives, we've had so many different experiences. Our openness is different, our commitment is different. But there's one place that's in focus, there's one place we long to be, home for all of us. And so in that way there's just so
much that we can share with one another. As Maharaj Ji said in Portland, each person is in a car and that car has one seat and there can only be one person in each car. This path seems very, very, very wide, and all these one-seater cars are on this path, all going in the same direction, and it's very beautiful."
Barbara Kolodny
"It was really beautiful out there. We just had satsang the whole time. We were with Guru Maharaj Ji physically, having satsang every day. Maharaj Ji was really working with us, really working on us, really trying to work with us through the satsang everyone was giving. He said when you listen to the satsang, really confront yourself, be right there. It was so beautiful because everyone was completely into satsang. It was so concentrated. It was just so high. It was just so cleansing, so uplifting, so good for each one of us. Sometimes he would give us. satsang and sometimes he would be outside doing something and we could simply stand around and watch. This whole experience really re-enforced what I feel -- that you have to be connected inside with Guru Maharaj Ji before you can ever enjoy watching him do something or hear him give you satsang. If you weren't meditating, if you weren't practicing Knowledge, if you weren't already with him inside then even when you were with him physically you would have been lonely for him, you wouldn't have really been with him. It showed me again and again how much of an internal experience this is."
Eliot Brye
"If I were to sum the whole thing up I would say, there are two ways of approaching our life on this path of Knowledge. We can take one approach and say: I, and then go ahead: lam going to fight and I am going to realize this Knowledge, I am going to eliminate my mind, I am going to fight and I am going to go all the way. Or, a person can turn to Guru Maharaj Ji and say "Guru Maharaj Ji, please by your grace take care of me, please help me." When Guru Maharaj Ji's grace is there it's so easy to proceed on this path because nothing takes place without Guru Maharaj Ji's grace. This is the biggest realization that you have to have, that it is only by Guru Maharaj Ji's grace that we can even experience Knowledge, that our mind slows down for even the slightest bit so that some of that experience can pour into it. And when we have full faith in Guru Maharaj Ji as our Master, that he's the one who is going to take care of the mind and the problems, then we can just proceed very, very easily. When we focus ourself on him by his grace he'll eliminate the mind. We don't have to struggle with the mind, with all its impurities and craziness that we have built up in our life. All we have to do is stay centered on him"
Ira Woods
"We have so many types of experience offered to us on this path, like the experience of Knowledge, like the experience of satsang, like the experience of service, like the experience of Guru Maharaj Ji. And while we were in Malibu we were able to directly and very intensely experience deeply the whole range of these experiences that are offered to us in Guru Maharaj Ji's world.
But to me the most incredible experience I had at that time is the experience of Guru Maharaj Ji. I can't even talk about it because . .(begins to cry) You know, if you want my opinion, for me, it's by far the most outstanding experience in Guru Maharaj Ji's world.
Those moments with Guru Maharaj Ji, when he was just obviously giving love to us personally, were definitely the highest and most outstanding experience of my life. In my life he is the most important thing because it gives me the most clear, intense understanding and experience of what this life is all about.
He broke my heart again … because he gave me so much love. It's just too powerful. I don't know how to explain the experience of someone who's just been shot with Guru Maharaj Ji's love. It just takes possession of you. I don't know how to explain that expression, "it broke my heart" other than that he has it, he takes possession of it, he can squeeze it, he can do anything with it because it's his. He can make me feel whatever he wants me to feel. And right now he's making me feel this, about him. I can't explain it, but it's the most important thing in my life, that's for sure."
Joan Apter
"I'm realizing that Guru Maharaj Ji is the Supreme Giver. Our hearts are not big enough to receive everything he is prepared to give us.
Guru Maharaj Ji shows us practical things and then he says 'now you go away and share this experience with people.' Maharaj Ji is more important on this path than the Knowledge itself because he is the source. And when around him, he is a very bright light. It was very intense being in Malibu because you have not only your light but you also have Maharaj Ji's light shining about you and you have to see yourself and confront yourself in the clarity of the consciousness he gives us. It was very beautiful.
One time Maharaj Ji called us to the backyard of his house to show us the clouds which were close by. He said the only thing above the clouds is the residence of Guru Maharaj Ji. We realized that the only safe place was to be in his abode. And I am sure that he wants to share this with each of his friends, each of them."
Celso Lousadas
"It was totally amazing to me just to be there. Just going to Maharaj Ji's residence is something so incredible. While I was there, I couldn't believe Maharaj Ji's love, it was so strofstrong
I had that connection, I experienced Guru Maharaj Ji inside. When I was in Philadelphia Guru Maharaj Ji was on the other side of the United States. I sort of felt: does he really know I'm here? In a sense I knew he knew, but there's always that little bit of doubt. But when I was in Malibu I just knew he knows. He knows about every single premie. He has that connection with every single premie. And he just wants to share that connection with every single premie. Thinking of surrendering to Guru Maharaj Ji is almost a joke to me, because I can't think of how I'm surrendering. All I'm doing is being given something by Guru Maharaj Ji. If we take one step towards him, he'll cross the universe for us.
I know it'd true. The satsang he gave us was just so beautiful. And then he gave us a Knowledge review. He had about 9 of us in his office. I felt like even in my fondest dreams I could never imagine Guru Maharaj Ji doing a Knowledge review with me. When I was in the room, I felt the power of Maharaj Ji. The love of Guru Maharaj jI is just so much. I felt like just anybody else would probably feel: 'I don't deserve to be in this room. I don't deserve to be here in the residence, I don't deserve any of this stuff.' And still, he was doing it, he was giving that Knowledge review to us. He had so much live, so much concern, he was taking so much care just to show us how much he really loves us. I try and put it in words, but every time I try it falls so short because his love is just beyond words. I can't think of any particular incident to tell you because there were so many little incidents. And yet at the same time there was just that one thing that was always there. Some days all that would happen is you'd see Guru Maharaj Ji just for a second and that would make the whole day.
At one point in the knowledge review I felt completely enveloped with Guru Maharaj Ji, just connected with Guru Maharaj Ji. Then, just as I was saying to myself, "Man I'm so lucky to be in this room," Guru Maharaj Ji says, 'You people don't know how lucky you are, to be here.' When he said that it took me about 10,0000 levels deeper.
When you know something and then Guru Maharaj Ji tells you that same
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INITIATORS continued …
thing, it takes you even deeper than the realization you had when you were just inside yourself. It's just like someone was saying tonight, it's not that we're doing some great thing by surrendering, but it's our fortune. I saw so much while I was out there, God, Guru Maharaj Ji has got so much force."
Rich Neale
"I just experience such a close connection with Guru Maharaj Ji and see that the whole thing is based on love for Maharaj Ji. If I don't have that connection of love and devotion to Guru Maharaj Ji, I cannot practice Knowledge and I couldn't do the service that Guru Maharaj Ji has given me to do. If I arn'in that love for Maharaj Ji there's no problem. If I trust him I'll do anything he's telling me to do. There are difficulties sometimes, some obstacles, or he might send you to a place which doesn't appeal to you. But because you love him, because you trust him, you are willing to do anything for him. To me that's the main thing. I have experienced so much lately that automatically I am attracted to meditation. I know that if I didn't have Guru Maharaj Ji in my life, I couldn't practice Knowledge, even though I have Knowledge (and we think Knowledge is everything). To me, Guru Maharaj Ji is everything because I couldn't have Knowledge without Guru Maharaj Ji and I'll tell you frankly, I wouldn't be able to practice it. Really I wouldn't. The fact that I have Guru Maharaj Ji in my life, that I can feel that love for him, to me is a gift. If he were not there it would be dry. I would not be motivated to do it. For instance, the reason why I applied to do the service of initiator was because I really didn't feel I had a choice. There was absolutely no thing else to get into, there was absolutely nothing else to do.
I was doing all right. I was doing satsang, service, meditation. I was doing it, but I felt I could do more, I could give myself completely. So this opportunity came and I thought yes, I should make myself available to Guru Maharaj Ji, because I want to give myself more. And I don't even want to give myself more. I want to give myself completely, because there is nothing else. I want to be fulfilled in my life, I want to feel that love, and that's the only way, by just giving myself, and just being used by Guru Maharaj Ji in whatever way. Being in Malibu with Guru Maharaj Ji, I couldn't relate to the service of initiator and I still can't relate to the service, but one thing I can relate to is that love that I experience for Guru Maharaj Ji and that love he gave me. This I could experience. To feel, to experience love, I would do anything. I'd just do anything that Maharaj Ji want me to do. I really feel that I am a beggar, a beggar for love, because that's what I need. I don't need anything else."
Claire Tremblay
