Going Home

In the following poem, Rumi urges us to turn homeward:

The soul is a stranger trying to find a home
Somewhere that is not a where.
Why keep grazing, why?
Good falcon soul,
You have flown around foraging long enough.
Swing back now toward the emperor’s whistling.
_{Coleman Barks, tr., Rumi: The Big Red Book}

Our goal on the spiritual path is to lift ourselves out of this world of illusion, to raise and cleanse our perception so that we can find our way to our true spiritual nature.

When we focus on the material world of the senses, we cannot see the subtle worlds of spirit, or even mind. Rumi says we have been foraging too long and are bogged down by external phenomena. He highlights our dilemma of being caught between two worlds.

Baba Ji has suggested we examine what it is we truly want. We claim to want liberation, truth, love and union with the inner Master, and yet most of our energy is directed into the outside phenomenal world. Saints teach that our attachment to this world is due to the mind being addicted to stimulation, and is thus enslaved by the senses. These are in turn driven by desire, ego, greed, lust and anger, which divert the soul’s yearning for liberation.

We need to turn our attention in the right direction. Our minds, being consumed by the worldly circumstances of our lives, are enslaved by external pursuits. Like the falcon in the poem being called to return by the emperor’s whistling, we need to turn our attention inward, back to the Lord.

Grief and hardship are great gifts on the spiritual path. They make us turn around and re-evaluate our standing and priorities in the world. They turn us inward. What is the point of this continual foraging and grazing in the outside world? Rather, follow the sound of the emperor’s whistling, the holy sound, which is heard within. It is calling us home.

Mystics teach that having wandered through the cycle of life and death and of transmigration in countless lives, it is in this physical human form that the soul can find its way out of the world of illusion and its karmic bondage to the world. Liberation can happen when we are graced with initiation by a true living master, who knows the way and has been given the mandate by the Lord to take us home.

It is not enough, however, just to be initiated. Having heard the inner call of the emperor’s whistling, we have to respond accordingly. If we only pay lip service to the teachings and the thrust of our heart is still toward the world, the soul will continue to roam as a stranger here. We have to do the spiritual practice so that we can be pulled inward by the Sound Current, the Shabd, the purifying, sustaining life force within us.

The path is internal. If we want to experience something more than our habitual external programming, we need to look inward rather than outward. Masters teach that the human form is a microcosm of the entire universe, that the Creator and the creation are contained within the body. If we wish to find God we have to look within. Masters give us simran, which is designed to draw the soul currents up and out of the body to the eye centre by constant repetition of these holy words. With focused concentration and inner listening we can hear the Shabd, catch on to it and be transported out of this material world into the highest region where God resides.

With our inner devotion to the Lord and the mind clear of worldly distractions, our simran can become truly effective. We need to focus solely on the simran and not allow our thoughts to intrude. As he told us in Spiritual Perspectives: “You should be in those words. And not somewhere away from them.”

Rabia of Basra, an 8th-century Sufi mystic, points out in her poem “Doorkeeper of the Heart” that it is the heart that is the seat of the Beloved. Our Master tells us that the heart Sufi mystics refer to is the spiritual heart, which is the eye centre. It is the seat of love and devotion, and this where we must focus our thought, energy and attention. Doing our spiritual practice with obedience, devotion and love will lead to concentration.

The true form of the Master is Shabd, the audible life stream, and that is also love, which is in all living beings. We are connected to Shabd at the time of initiation. The Master has accepted responsibility for leading us out of the domain of mind.

It is our karmic load that keeps us bound to this world. We do not know what lies in our storehouse of karma, called sinchit karma. Together with our destiny for this life and our current actions, these three types of karma are a burden on the soul. We must go through our destiny and do our part, by abiding by the principles of Sant Mat to lighten our karmic load going forward and by attending to our meditation, which gives us strength to face our current karmas. In the meantime, the Master is guiding us from within.

Maharaj Charan Singh taught that we should never try to calculate in meditation: how much karma has been cleared, and how much more meditation we need to do to clear more karma. We have to leave this to the Lord. Our goal must be to meditate simply because we are in love with him and we want to become one with him, to merge into his Radiant Form.

Love is the greatest mystery and miracle of having a master. It is through his mercy and grace that love begins to grow in our hearts, healing our desecrated lives. As our longing for love grows stronger, our worldly busyness diminishes and simran takes hold of the mind. We begin to lead a more balanced life.

Saints tell us that by being born into a human body we have the opportunity to go back to the Father. We’re told that if we withdraw our consciousness to the eye centre and become one with that spirit, that holy light within ourself, we will be able to discharge our worldly duties better and go back to the Father. This is keeping a balance in the world.

Clearly many of us have a long way to go to achieve this balance and not be overwhelmed by our destiny. However, there is no need to despair. We have been initiated by a true Saint. He has assured us that all he wants is our best effort, then we can leave the rest to him. If we can do this we may not experience light and sound within, but we will feel the yearning of our heart. We will then find ourselves leaning within, remembering the Master and feeling his presence. Our desire to please and serve our Master will grow and we will want to sit in meditation.

With our growing longing for union comes gratitude, trust and humility, as we realize that the privilege of initiation is due only to his grace and love for us. We need only turn to the direction of love, to where we hear the emperor’s whistling, as Rumi says, to where the inner sky opens wide. Then at last we can be transplanted from the world of phenomena to the inner world of spirit and union with the inner Shabd, the true form of our Master.