Being All-In

In Las Vegas, Macau, and Monte Carlo…there is a concept in betting called: “Being All-In”. Mostly it refers to poker, but with other betting games as well. Someone is all-in when they place a bet putting all their money on the table; They’re willing to risk everything in order to win everything.

Mystics tend to be all-in when it comes to spirituality…Here’s a sample of what they say: Guru Arjun (5th Sikh Guru) said:

Standing, sitting, sleeping or awake,
We should meditate on him every moment of our lives.¹

Christ in the Bible said:

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.²

And, Baba Ji, in one of his very first Satsangs 25 years ago, said:

You have to live Sant Mat, you have to imbibe Sant Mat with every breath. Living and walking Sant Mat with every breath – that is the right spirit.³

There is no hedging their bets with any of these mystics.

When we are at the Dera, it doesn’t feel so difficult to be all-in on spirituality: We are mostly cut off from the crazy world we live in; Our access to the Great Distractor (our cell phone) is limited; We get to listen to satsang every day (sometimes twice); And there is no reason for us not to devote as much time and effort as we physically can to our meditation practice.

However, when we go back to the outside world, the illusion quickly takes over again: The balance between living in this world and attending to our spiritual duties starts shifting again. Being all-in on spirituality becomes more difficult.

Many religions, including some that originate with the mystics we often read, tend to dilute their teachings over time. Humans, being what we are, and our mind, being what it is, we adopt a much more relaxed approach to spirituality.

We promise ourselves that if we do a few things every week, we will be taken care of at the time of our death. If we go to church every Sunday, that should be good enough. If we follow the Ten Commandments, this set of behaviors; we should have nothing to worry about.

Of course, these are all very good things. Sant Mat also has guidelines we must follow and weekly meetings we can attend.

However, this light touch spirituality can lead us to view religion, spirituality, or even this path, as an insurance policy. Something that we do “just in case” or something we keep in our back pocket, as a precaution. Sort of like putting only a few chips on the table, while keeping our mind on the stack in our hands.

There is something called “Pascal’s Wager.” Pascal was a French mathematician and philosopher. He looked at spirituality in a very simple, binary fashion.

He proposed only 2 options: we can either believe in God, or not. If we believe in God, then we have to behave in a certain way: regular prayer, restraint from certain behaviors, and a higher moral compass to guide our life. If we don’t believe in God, then we are free to do as we please.

Pascal’s wager was that we should behave as if we believed in God, even if we deem this probability very low. His rationale was that the cost of behaving this way is very little, when compared to the tremendous upside, if God and the afterlife do exist.

Another way of looking at this is that if we behave like there is no God, but it turns out that there is a God, then the ultimate cost could be very high. Some religions talk about eternal damnation for non-believers. Or for those who believe in karma, being stuck in this world for many lifetimes.

Pascal looked at everything from a probabilistic perspective. To him, believing in God was like an insurance policy. Something you do just in case, to protect yourself.

A few generations ago, Roman Catholic families in Quebec that had only six children were considered small. Most families had between eight and twelve children. In these families, it was customary to have one boy become a priest. The thinking, in many families, was that having a spiritual person in the family was good for everyone in the family. In many cases, like Pascal, parents viewed this as an insurance policy for the whole family. Just in case…

Most of the time, we buy insurance in case some rare unfortunate event happens. We buy insurance on our house, in case our house burns down. For most of us, our house will never burn down. We will never get a payoff from that insurance. The premium is a sunk cost we pay every year, because it gives us peace of mind.

The problem with this approach and spirituality is that death is not a rare unfortunate event. It is 100% guaranteed to happen. We will all die at some point. We don’t know when or how, but we know it will happen for sure. There is no just in case.

Seneca, the Greek stoic philosopher famously said:

We are dying every day.⁴

And isn’t that true? As soon as we hit middle age, our body starts slowly breaking down. Every day, we die just a little more, until one day, the process is complete, and our soul has no choice but to leave our body.

Mystics tell us that since we are dying a little every day, we should practice dying every day. They tell us that spirituality is not an insurance policy, but a way of life.

They tell us that spirituality should not be something we focus on only once a year, for a few weeks, when we go to the Dera; Nor something we think about only once or twice a week when we go to Satsang; Nor something we think about only once a day, when we sit for our meditation.

Mystics tell us that if we want to progress on this path, we must make spirituality an integral part of every aspect of our life. We have to be all-in.

Baba Ji often tells us that if we want to reach the North Pole, walking north for two or three hours a day is not sufficient. If we turn around and head south for the rest of the day, we will never reach our destination. We will never achieve our objective.

Maharaj Jagat Singh Ji explained this as follows:

One does not become a Satsangi simply by being initiated. One must mold his life in accordance with the principles of Satsang. Every thought, speech and action must conform to them. Actions speak louder than words. Thoughts are even more potent. A Satsangi’s daily conduct must bear the hallmark of excellence and must reveal that he is a follower of a true Master.⁵

How do we go about doing this? Mystics explain that we can only be serious about something we truly believe.

If we look at our work life, we know with certainty that if we work 40 hours a week, we will get paid. Because of this certainty, that faith, that conviction, we don’t miss one hour of work. Even if we are ill, we put in the hours.

Do we have the same conviction about this path and our Master? If we truly believed the mystics when they talk about the infinite value of meditation, would we not practice our meditation diligently every day, without fail?

If we look back to the gambler’s analogy, he will only go all-in when he has 100% conviction.

Hazur Maharaj Ji explains this concept of faith with a driving analogy (this was before Google Maps). He says that when driving from New York to Washington, if we have faith in the directions, then we will drive at the maximum allowed speed, maybe even faster. No hesitation whatsoever.

If we are uncertain of the directions and the path, then we will slow down. Or we might not even take the trip at all.

Huzur Maharaj Ji continues this analogy in more detail:

Faith doesn’t take you to the destination, but faith will make you practice. Without faith, you can’t practice. You will not be able to drive at full speed without faith. Full speed will take you to the destination, but faith is helping you to drive at full speed. Similarly, love and devotion is to have faith in the path and the Master. Then we practice [also], and then we get the results from the practice.⁶

What leads to faith on this spiritual path?

In the example of the car, Huzur Maharaj Ji goes on to explain elsewhere that as we start seeing more signs that we are on the right road, our faith increases, and we can drive faster. And these signs might occur during our meditation, but also, in our life generally, as our meditation slowly transforms us into better human beings.

More faith leads us to more meditation, and more meditation leads us to more faith. It becomes a virtuous circle that self-reinforces itself over time.

Elsewhere Huzur Maharaj Ji talks about the same virtuous circle, but with our hunger to meditate:

Your hunger will increase when you give your time to meditation. …and without meditation, you won’t be able to increase your hunger.⁷

He and all mystics talk about this virtuous circle between meditation and these positive qualities of the mind: Love, Devotion, Effort; All of these qualities that are necessary to progress on this path. We could substitute any of these qualities in the virtuous circle with the same effect. More love, more meditation, more meditation, more love. As each increases, our meditation becomes stronger, easier and more enjoyable.

Mystics tell us that eventually, this circle turns into a growing spiral that leads us upwards, back to our true home.

To summarize, mystics tell us that over time, we have to eventually be all-in if we want to reach our spiritual objective. This path is not an insurance policy, nor is it something we do just in case. It has to become a way of life. The only way we will actually do something well is if we believe in it, if we have faith in it. And as always, meditation is both what helps build that Faith and what benefits the most from that faith. That is the virtuous circle of meditation.

Huzur Maharaj Ji summarizes the importance of being all-in better than anyone can:

The Master and the Path should always be kept in view, and meditation must become our primary concern in this life. Our every action should reflect the teachings and build that holy atmosphere in which we attend to meditation, and become receptive to His bounty and grace. To this end, we must adjust our entire life, for success requires a complete transformation of the disciple. We should keep a balance, and meet our worldly duties and responsibilities, but our spiritual duty to the Master is foremost. We learn to live on the edge of this world as spectators, and do not allow ourselves to be drowned in its sensual pleasures. We learn to be in this world, but not of it, by vigilantly keeping our attention directed towards our goal.⁸