Don’t Light the Fire with a Firefly

There is an ancient story about a monkey. The monkey was feeling very cold in the tree and wanted some heat.  A firefly was flying in the sky.  The monkey caught the firefly, put some dry leaves down and started blowing to try and make a fire.  A bird who was also sitting in the tree, and watching this show, said to the monkey, “Look, it doesn’t have any fire. You cannot light a fire with a firefly!”.  The monkey said, “Go away, I know my job!”.  The bird kept quiet.  Again the monkey blew and blew over the firefly and leaves. Still nothing happened. Again the bird said, “Look this is foolish, you cannot light the fire with a firefly!”.  So each time, the bird would tell the monkey the same thing, and the monkey became more and more upset, not because of his failure, but because he refused to accept the wrongness of his action.  He refused to accept that he was not doing the right thing. Finally, the monkey caught the bird and killed it.  What is the meaning of this story?  The Masters have always been telling people, “Look here, don’t try to light a fire with a firefly”.  What do the people do? They kill the Master. No generation is any different.  The same thing happened to Jesus, the same thing happened to Socrates, Naneshwara and Osho.  This is the world we live in.  We would rather continue to remain within our frames and believe in them, than take a Master’s words of wisdom and transform ourselves. We don’t do that.  So what is the solution?  Our own karma will destroy us.  There is nothing anybody can do.  It is then recycled back to the Golden Age where there are very few people, all are enlightened beings, higher masters, and where there is no duality. Then 1.7 billion years pass and the level of consciousness comes down again. This cycle has been going on for some time, even for the Gods and Deities connected to this era.  This set of eras will get recycled. Please understand that this is not just about the Earth. It also applies to all the planes connected to Earth or connected to this substratum.  The whole substratum changes, so it is not just a polar shift on Earth. There are various, more subtle layers connected to this sphere.

Those who are eligible, meaning those who are empty, receptive and flexible enough to go to the next plane, will automatically get elevated because they are already detached from this life. For them detachment from everything is not a big deal. However, those who are ownership oriented and bound, those who are focused on the Me, the Mine, and who are selfish and greedy, will have to be annihilated.  In the bargain a lot of other destruction will happen. 

Now, in this situation, what is the main deciding factor which creates all this unrest?  Have you ever thought about it?  Time.  Time is the factor which is creating this.  By the time we wake up, it is already night.  We are moving at full speed in a time where we are not allowed to use our intellect.  Everything is continuously on an emotional plane. It is even more challenging now to use our intellect, and transcend being merely emotional and unconscious.

Last week, a boy wrote to me and said he wanted to place one message on his wall, something beautiful, something which would remind him of what he needs to do every day.   So I told him, “WAKE UP!”.  Write it in big letters, “Wake up!”  In order to become something, the first step you need to take is to wake up!  We have not woken up.  We are sleeping.  How do we become something, or move along further, if we have not woken up?

Q:   How to Let Go?

A: In the first instance, you have to accept yourself and you need to know what you are accepting.  You need to know what you are accepting, and to do this you need to know what you are.  As I said yesterday, “You need to shake hands with yourself”. You need to address and accept all your strengths and weaknesses alike.  Once you do that, then you know what the blocking factors are. 

Secondly, you should accept the environment you find yourself in, and which you chose before taking birth.  The environment includes your relatives, your parents, your children and your family. They are all part of the environment you chose before you took this birth.  This is exactly the expression that you wanted to have in this life, so stop resisting it.  Do not resist your environment.  Accept yourself and accept the environment.  When you accept yourself and you accept your environment, you automatically start releasing emotions. Resistance retains emotions. Acceptance, releases emotions.  When you constantly accept the environment, yourself, and move without resistance, then karma gets diluted.

When you are operating in the current moment, with what is available, you will automatically release all your concepts as well.   When you operate in the present, with full acceptance of yourself, knowing and accepting your capacity and operating to your full potential, this is the time when you are actually free.  When in that mode, write down whatever you see as a blocking factor on paper.  What are the blocking factors, the factors which are blocking you from accepting yourself as you are?  What are the factors which make you compare yourself with other people?  You cannot be another person, because that person is already taken. What are the factors which make you angry and upset with life?  What are the factors which make you sick and what are the factors which make you happy? This requires meditation and internalization.  When you look within, you will see everything.  When you see yourself, you see the whole universe. Everything is interconnected.  Life becomes easy.

Know Where Your Feet Should Be And Where Your Head Should Be

Earlier, to attain something, we used to do penance, deep penance, for years in isolation in the forests.  Now, if you close your mind and connect, you can get there, you can get it.   Thus, time is helping you in another way.   The main challenge is, how do we extract ourselves from social movements, such as emotional movements? An example is Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky.  For how many hours did we watch television to know who slept with who? Is it a serious matter at all?  Do we really care who Bill Clinton sleeps with?  This is exactly where we stand. Degeneration is at its height.

Meanwhile, organized crime is happening on a large scale and various organizations are money laundering.  The forests are being destroyed for the sake of cattle farms. There are a lot of animals. A lot of vaccines have been created. These vaccines are killing children. Yet we are not worried about this. Cattle farms are increasing the temperature of the Earth, producing biogases in the air.  The oil wells are causing pollution. Yet none of these things are creating any discussion or outrage.  Instead, we are interested in knowing with whom Bill Clinton sleeps with!  This is exactly the degeneration that I am talking about. Does it matter? These are very small things compared to the Earth, which is getting destroyed. These are clear signs of degeneration.   We are more interested in voting over the phone so that someone wins. It is glorified begging. We all vote, the person wins and he gets his money! We spend a lot of time on matters that are not really needed. I am not saying that you should bore yourself to death, that is not the point. However, it is important to understand where our feet should be and where our head should be.

Q:  When Can We Expect The Golden Age?

A: The same question was asked to Sathya Sai Baba. Somebody asked “When can we expect the Golden Age?” and he said “Now! Wake up and then it is the Golden Age!” (to cheers, laughter and applause).

Q: How Do You Know You Are Living The Truth?

A: You know you are living your truth when you are relaxed about what you are doing, and when you are peaceful about it.

Q: Sometimes I wake up and feel everything is okay, but tomorrow I might wake up and I just don’t see the point.

A:  That is the way the mind works. Everybody’s mind is the same.  You cannot have consistency with the fluctuating mind. It’s not just you. 7 billion people are also affected. What they call “a bad hair day” is for everybody’s sake.  Some days are like that. It never styles or sits properly!

However, it is easy to know if we are in the right activity, because we feel good about it.  The difference is between doing what you have to do, versus what you love to do.  If you do not have a choice between what you have to do and what you love to do, then start a hobby and do what you love to do.  I will give you an example. Say you are a bank clerk, but your passion is singing.  Definitely do your banking job so you have your income and support, but do also have a hobby on the side of singing somewhere, so that there is always a balance between what you have to do, and what you love to do.

Q:  What about the time factor?  If you are a bank officer, you may not have the time.

A:  You cannot sing at the bank and also do the banking job. (laughter) Time management is something you really have to consider.

Q: I feel unhappy all the time doing my job for income. I do it 8 hours a day. Is this okay?

A:  No, this is not okay. This is pressure. You are doing something for the sake of income. It is forced and there is no satisfaction. If it is a compulsory activity that you cannot change or leave for whatever reason, then you must have something else that will compensate for the stress here.  Also, if your hobby is exhausting, then understand that it is not a hobby.

Q:  What if you are just exhausted?

A: If you like what you do, then you are never exhausted. How many hours do I work every day? I never get exhausted.

Q: If you have a job you don’t like maybe?

A:  Sometimes you cannot cut off a certain source of income, because there is no other source. You have to continue, and go through it.  At the same time, however, do something which brightens you up, something which lights the lamp within you. This should also happen on the side.   At some point in time, you should then decide okay now this is enough. That call to change things will come from within.  Nobody else can tell you. That call will come from within you.

Another point is, do not try and do everything yourself.  It is very important to connect to people who have the same tastes as you.   I like to say, find your own blood, meaning find the people who have the same tastes or aspirations, and the same hobby as you. Conglomerate, and then express yourself as a group.  Most music bands are simply a conglomeration of people coming together for the sake of expression.

Do you know why people get stuck in certain situations for a long time?  It is due to the fear of failure.  The fear of failure is very, very strong.  The fear of success is okay, it is manageable! (laughter).  However, when we have a fear of failure, it almost paralyzes us.  I say to people, why do we think everything should be successful? In my experience, those who have failed many times are often very successful later on. I have found this to be true especially with those who are non-educated, illiterate. I worked for many years in Dubai. Some people arrive there on a visitor visa, not even an employment visa.  Some of them are unskilled. They don’t even know what 2+2 is, but they are ready to work. What happens is that they will scratch somebody’s back, get some piecemeal job and then it will catch on and on.  Finally they get an employment visa and then again they will connect with someone else.  Again, you scratch my back and I scratch yours, and after some time they have something of their own. I have seen that happen. What most people do however, is sit near the swimming pool and put their finger in the water, wondering whether the water is hot or cold, and they never take a dip!   A decision is never made, and that is why nothing ever happens in their life! I say fail for some time, no problem. It cannot rain every day. There has to be sunshine on some days!  Take the walk. These kind of people talk about various aspirations, “I want to go here, I want to build this, I want to do that”, and alas they do this until retirement and maybe even until death, but ultimately they have nothing of their own in their pocket.  It’s an utter waste of time! Run away from such people. Those who are realistic, will not talk much but they will do more.  This is good company. They know what to do. They will not talk much and they can be trusted. They are active.

This reminds me of a joke. A man comes home from work and he hears the children crying and shouting.  He asks his wife, “Why are these children crying? I have tremendous stress at the office, and I have to come home to all this noise!  I cannot even enter the house!”. She replies, “They are crying because they want to watch the National Geographic Channel and see the animals”. He says, “Then why don’t you switch on the TV and show them the channel?”.  She says, “I have been telling you to pay the bill for the last month and a half, and now they have cut that channel.  There is nothing on the television”.  He could not blame anybody else. He went to the toilet, and when he returned the children were calm and had stopped crying. He asked his wife, “How did you manage to pacify them?”.  She said, “I gave them our wedding album and they are looking at the pictures of your relatives!”

Transcribed by a volunteer in the UK