Iron and the Magnet

During our question-and-answer sessions with the Masters, past and present, the majority of questions – or rather complaints – by far are that after so many years of meditation, there’s no sign whatsoever of any progress. Most concerns are focused on the difficulty we have with raising our attention to the eye centre and going within.

Not so very long ago Baba Ji countered just such a complaint by explaining that what prevents the attention from rising is the multitude of karmas that are still weighing us down, karmas that can be worked away by our meditation. He recalled the example given by Maharaj Charan Singh that as long as a piece of iron is held down by a heavy weight, it cannot be attracted to a magnet. But once the weight is lifted, the iron will fly automatically to the magnet. In other words, when the karmas have been wiped out, the attention will rise automatically to where our Master awaits us at the eye centre.

Maharaj Charan Singh told us more than once that our meditation is not intended to bring us results in the form of light or sound. By far the greater part of our effort is to evoke his grace, through which we will make more effort. But we forget this. We keep looking for results, and when they don’t come, we get anxious or depressed and we see ourselves as failures.

But our Master doesn’t see us as failures. In fact, he doesn’t ever judge us. After all, he knows us – he knew what we were, with all our karmas, when he initiated us. And he took us on anyway. He never asks that we produce so-called results in our meditation; he asks only that we try, and keep on doing so – to the time of our death.

In With the Three Masters a previous Master, Maharaj Jagat Singh, is quoted as having said:

If the disciple’s veil is still not lifted, it does not mean that he should give up meditation or think that he has not made any progress. It is just that his pralabdh [fate] karmas are getting in the way.… At the time of the disciple’s death, when his pralabdh karmas are exhausted, the Saints give him back the spiritual wealth he has earned and his veil is lifted. All disciples should therefore continue in their efforts at meditation, irrespective of whether the veil is lifted or not.

The truth is that we should be doing our meditation simply as an act of devotion, a way of showing our Master that we love him, want to please him, and are grateful for what he is doing for us. We should trust that he loves us and wants only the best for us.

We might view our efforts as weak or inadequate, but he has told us that not a single moment of meditation goes to waste. He is using it to take care of our karma, collected over many lifetimes. Maharaj Charan Singh has also told us:

Do not mind whether you see any light within or not, or whether the sound is audible. You simply do your duty and leave the results to the Master.… He alone knows what is good for us and when it is to be given. He will pay in abundance. Have faith in him.
_{Divine Light}

He tells us repeatedly not to “judge” our meditation, whether it is good or bad. We are to just “do it”. He explains that a positive result of our meditation is that it is helping to crush our stubborn egos and create in us some sense of humility. Our very helplessness to do better can only make us realize how utterly dependent we are on him and prepare us to surrender to him, to leave ourselves completely in his hands. Hazur Maharaj Ji has in fact stated that we have to surrender to the Master by getting rid of any idea that we can achieve anything by ourselves. And this surrender can come about only through meditation.

In the first volume of Spiritual Perspectives Hazur makes it clear that without becoming humble by getting rid of the ego there can be no merging back into the Lord. “When humility comes in its place,” he said, “we merge into the Lord and inherit the kingdom of heaven.”