Why do we need a Guru? | Mohanji
Why do we need gurus? For the same reason as we need a teacher in a school or a GPS while we are driving, the navigation that we are using when we are driving a car, or the navigation panel or navigator that a ship uses to reach its destination. We usually have only a partial view of our life. We don’t know why certain things happen, and many times in our life, we waste by searching for the reason for an incident in our life. There are numerous incidents in our life, and many times, we are searching for the reason.
A reason has to be there for everything in our life. There’s a reason for taking birth. There’s a specific reason to be born in a particular place, at a particular time to a particular set of parents. There’s a particular reason for every incident of life, every meeting, every parting, and every experience there are reasons for. Each of these reasons has its past, its present, which means the experience, and also its future – everything. Even we have a past, a present, and a future.
So, these reasons that we ask or we seek are always there, but we waste a lot of time asking “why.” When there’s somebody who has gone through it or who can see more around you with you, it helps. You don’t have to call something necessarily a guru. It’s somebody who guides you, somebody who gives you that larger picture. That larger picture will definitely help. It’ll give you more awareness and more stability, or at least if somebody is walking with you holding your hand, you’ll be more confident you’ll not fall.
You’ll also be confident that you’ll not deviate from the original path. This is very important to understand. We should understand that life is not just a unit-based existence; it’s a collaboration. Many, many people are participating in our life. We know this already. I don’t need to tell you, but there are a lot of people participating in our life. We are all coming together in a particular place or a space for our own experience.
So, life is a collaborative movement in which there are parents, there are brothers and sisters, and there are so many different types of people coming to give you different types of experiences. The only income from life is our experiences; there’s no other income. We think that money is the income.
In life, time is the income; time is the money, not the physical money. Do you know what money is in life? Time. Very precious, very, very precious. We don’t have even one breath more than what we originally chose. It’s almost like taking a rent-a-car. You choose to rent a car for a particular time, and then after the time is over, you got to return it back.
Likewise, we’ve chosen a particular time of existence, i.e. this time. That’s why we are here, and we have an expiry date. That’s pretty much static. You cannot take it further. Everything in life, if you look, is a collaboration. We are working together with numerous people for our set of experiences. The experiences are different for individuals.
Imagine there’s a buffet on the table. First of all, each person will take the food which he likes or chooses or what he desires to eat. It may not be the same. Secondly, the capacity, or how much you take, also depends on individuals. Some people may take more food; some people take less food. Then thirdly, the experience of the food also depends on the current situation of that person. If he’s very hungry, he may enjoy more food. If he’s not at all hungry, he may not enjoy that food.
So, every situation – take all situations; everything is 100% individualistic, but totally in a collaborated level with various situations, various times in various ways, various people. Life is like that, in which if there are people amongst us who’ve walked this path before or who’ve recognized certain realities, and if they guide, it helps. So, you don’t have to really consider or think like a Guru and a disciple – not in strict terms. It’s more like a guide, a helping hand, and support for our journey.
Transcribed by Ulla Bernholdt
Proofread by Yogesh Pandit