Suppose this is
the Infinite Ocean. It is full of drops. Each drop is the ocean as long
as it is not separate. So there are innumerable drops in the ocean. One
says: "I am stone." Another says: "I am man, I am woman;
I am this, I am that." Suppose there are three drops whose Real
Self is removed and God remains, but the individuality is there. So
Purdom [one drop] says: "I am God," and his experience of his
own Ocean of Bliss is continuous, without a break. Another drop called
Lud is from the same Ocean. Its Real Self is removed, individuality
remains, and he says the same thing: "I am God." Beryl says:
"I am God." Three drops of the Ocean say the same thing, but
the experience is individual. It is so easy to understand, so difficult
to attain!
So, when you are pushed into the
seventh plane, what happens? You drop your false self and also your Real
Self and, instantaneously, you experience yourself as God.1
Baba signaled for a
break. Some remained clustered around his chair, especially the
children.
On resumption, he asked, "Have you all heard of Saint
Mira? In India, everyone knows her. People sing the bhajans sung by her
in praise of Krishna."
Eruch gave a
brief account of Mira's life:
Mira was
a very beautiful girl. She was the wife of a royal prince of a wealthy
family in North India, who later became king. She loved Krishna with all
her heart, but did not live at the time of Krishna, who lived 5,000
years before. Mira lived about two or three hundred years ago. Her
husband did not like the way she was going about in the streets, for she
was the queen, and queens did not mix with the crowd.2 She
would enter the huts of the poor with the name of Krishna on her lips as
she sang. She suffered many trials and threats to test her love for
Krishna. She was locked up in a room, her food was poisoned, a cobra was
concealed in a bouquet of flowers. She accepted all as the gift of her
Lord Krishna, and nothing happened. Krishna protected her. She refused
to have anything to do with anyone but her Lord Krishna.
Finally, the king drove her away into exile. She
said: "If the king drives me out, I have a place. But if the Lord
of the universe is displeased, I have no place." The people, too,
turned against her.
Footnotes
- 1.In other explanations and discourses, Meher Baba uses "Real Self" to refer to the God who is at the core of every individuality.
- 2.Scholars estimate that Mira lived from around 1498 until 1547. Most accounts state that Mira's husband was killed in a battle circa 1527, and her brother-in-law became king.