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Questions and answers
Sant Ajaib Singh Ji
This question and answer session was given December 4, 1981,
at Sant Bani Ashram, Village 16 PS, Rajasthan, India.
Master, in a married couple of initiates who do not have any children, is it a good idea to abstain ftom having any children, or is it all right to have them?
The Power which has created this Creation creates the desire within us for having children if we are married. And it is natural for married couples to have a desire for children if they don't have any.
But Saints and Mahatmas do not tell us that we should have children, and They don't even say that we should not have children. It is completely up to us. They tell us that if you can take care of the children, if you can carry the burden of the children, then you may have them. If you cannot take care of them, then it is better not to have them. It is completely up to the desire of the husband and wife.
But I would like to tell you that one American lady came to see me at the Ashram in 77 RB. She asked me if the desire which she had of having more and more children was okay or not. I told her, "What can I say? You will know by yourself" I saw her the next year when I went to America. By that time she had given birth to twins. She came to see me and she told me that it was very difficult for her to take care of them, and she told me that if she gets twins every time, it will be difficult for her to take care of them.
We cannot get more children just by thinking about having them. That is why instead of thinking about having more children, we should think about doing Simran. And we should know that we will get children only if it is written in our karmas and only if we have karmas to finish off with any soul. If we are married, and if we have a real desire for children, and if our past karmas allow that, we will definitely have children.
If we give a donation while having some desire to be fulfilled, or if we do the devotion of God having some desire which we want to be fulfilled, we will have to come back in this world to get those desires fulfilled. So that is why Saints always tell us not to give a donation while having desires, and not to do the devotion of the Lord in order to fulfill your desires. You should always do both these things selflessly.
Mahatma Trilochan was a great meditator Mahatma. He said that with whatever desire we die, we have to come back to fulfill that desire. He said that if we always think about having children all our life, then at the time of our death again we will have the same desire, the same thought. So in order to fulfill that desire we will come back in the body of a pig - because the pig is the animal which gives birth to many children. Since I don't have the complete knowledge about that animal, I cannot tell you for sure, but I have heard that she gives birth to twelve piglets at one time, and she gives birth three or four times a year.
Then He said that if anyone dies with the desire of indulging in worldly pleasures, he will come back in the body of a prostitute. If a man has these unchaste thoughts about indulging with women all his life, and if he dies with that thought, or if a woman dies with the thought of indulging with her husband or another man, then they will come back in the body of a prostitute, and they will never get satisfied, even after indulging with so many people.
If anyone worries about making many big buildings and big houses, and if at the time of death he has the same thoughts, then he will come in the body of a ghost and will live in those buildings.
Those who remember maya or worldly wealth at the time of their death, and those who die worrying that they didn't collect enough wealth, they will come back in the body of a snake.
Those who remember Almighty Lord at the time of their death, Trilochan says that God gets manifested within them and they go to the Real Home.
Saints and Mahatmas lovingly explain to us that long before our body was created, our pralabdha karmas, our fate karmas, were written down. All the events of our life - whether we would get richness or poverty, sickness or good health, happiness or pains - all these things were written in our fate. We have come into this world to suffer the consequences of our past karmas. Whatever we are going to get in this life - whether it is loss or profit in our business, whether it is name and fame or hatred in our society, the number of children we have - all these things are written in our fate, and we will get them according to that. Since there is no way to change our fate karma, why not do the meditation so that we may receive all that we have come to suffer for without complaining, and we may not make any new karmas?
Tulsi Das said that first our pralabdha karmas were made, then our body was made. Tulsi said that this creation is incredible, but the mind does not want to believe in it.
Master, if it is with that karma we come into the world, why do we continue to make negative karmas in ignorance? And why is it that there are persons who are privileged and they are born Masters like You?
This is because when we get the human birth, we create more new karmas than we suffer the consequences of our old karmas. That is why at the end of every birth, a great amount of karmas still remain there without being paid, and in order to pay them off, we again come back.
Saints know that the souls are ignorant, and that they are making the karmas in ignorance, but at least the souls know that whatever they sow, they will have to reap that. We all know at least this principle, that if we sow chiles, we cannot harvest sugar cane. That is why Masters always tell us that whatever karmas you are doing, be very careful in doing them, because you are the one who is going to suffer the consequences.
Saints and Mahatmas, those Who come from the highest planes, do not have any connections or any give-and-take in this world. That is why They don't have any karmas which can keep Them in the body. The veil of maya is on Them also for some time, but when the appropriate time comes, with a little effort, that veil of maya is lifted up. But They are not affected by the maya.
The Gurumukh and manmukh cannot get along with each other because their paths are different, like water and oil. They are like two sons of the same father, one who passes the examination and the other who fails the examination.
The God of the Saint is the same as the God of the satsangis. The only difference is that Saints do not do any bad karmas while God is watching, and They appreciate God, whereas the satsangis do not appreciate God, and they are not afraid of God even as much as they are afraid of a ten year old boy. And even though God is watching over them, they do not hesitate to do any bad karma.
When I went to Baba Bishan Das, in my innocence I asked Him, "Is God really within me?" At that time Baba Bishan Das changed my name and He told me, "Ajaib Singh, He Who is speaking through you, ask Him Who He is."
Master, if the Masters do not come into the world with any karma, why do They work so much in meditation ?
They do this to give a demonstration to the people of the world. If They do not meditate, how can They demonstrate to us? He who does not work himself, how can he teach others to work?
Saints and Mahatmas do not tell us to sit idle. They tell us to work hard, because those who work hard always get success.
Kabir Sahib was a Param Sant and He was the first Saint to come into this world. Even though He was a perfect Master from birth, when He came into this world He worked very hard, and He even maintained the reputation of taking someone as His Master. He took Ramananda as His Master. No doubt, Ramananda was not perfect and he was really liberated by Kabir Sahib, but still, to maintain the reputation, Kabir took Ramananda as His Master.
Read the history of any Mahatma Who has achieved the highest status and you will find that all of Them worked very hard in meditation. Guru Nanak Sahib used to sit on stones and pebbles; He worked very hard for eleven years in meditation. In the same way, Swami Ji Maharaj meditated for seventeen or eighteen years, sitting in a dark, small, room. In the same way, Baba Jaimal Singh and our Masters Sawan Singh and Kirpal Singh also worked very hard in meditation.
Master, is it a good idea for initiated persons to meditate with persons who are not initiated, or those who practice other techniques of meditation ?
Well, the non-initiates should know what practices you are doing and they should keep quiet and not disturb you while you are meditating. Because you know that when you are meditating, if somebody is sitting there disturbing you - if he is coughing or creating other noises - then it will disturb your meditation. If the non-initiates can sit there quietly or do their practices without disturbing you, or without making any noises, then it is all right.
Master, can we reduce the karmas that are assigned to us through meditating with the help of the Master?
Yes. Many of our karmas get finished off by doing the meditation, and moreover, our soul gets the strength to bear the sufferings of our past karmas. The satsangi meditators do not get excited when they are having the happiness, nor do they become sad when they have to suffer. They do not forget their Master in any case. And when they are suffering, they understand that those moments are better than the moments of happiness, because in the moments of suffering they are paying off their karmas.
I have had the opportunity to visit many satsangis at the time of death. At the time of his death, when you ask a satsangi who has done a lot of meditation if he needs anything of the world, or if he has any desire, he will say, "No," he does not have any difficulty and he does not want anything of the world. He will express his happiness, because then he knows that he is going back to his Home.
Master, could You explain more about free will and being under the Master's will? [Sant Ji asks for clarification.] If at any time I'm going to make a decision and I have placed my life at the feet of the Master, He will force me to make the decision that is correct, so that I will be under His will. While if I am under free will it will be my decision, not the Master's decision.
The satsangi who surrenders himself to the Master does not have any free will of himself.
The satsangis know that from the time of Initiation the Master is within us. But we have come from very far away for the Master's darshan. What effect does the Master's darshan have on our soul?
The poor satsangis do not know the importance of having the physical darshan of the Master, or the benefit of having the darshan of the body of the Master.
The truth is that the Master has a physical body only to explain things to us. Only through His physical body He tells us, "I am sitting within you in this Form, and when you go within you will find me in this same Form." If we do not have the physical form of the Master, we cannot decide our goal in the within, and we can never go within and see Him in His Form there. Right now, because we are functioning through the physical body, that is why we see Master in His physical form. But when we go in our astral body, we start seeing the Master in His astral Form. When we go to Brahm, we see Him in the Form of the Shabd. When we go to Par Brahm, we see Him in the Form of the pure and clear Shabd. And in Sach Khand, we see Him in the Form of Total, Complete, Pure Light. When we see the Master in His inner Forms, only then we realize the importance of having the darshan of the physical form of the Master. Only then do we realize that if we did not have the privilege of having the darshan of the physical form of the Master, we would never have been able to go within and see Him in His different Forms.
Guru Arjan Dev Ji Maharaj said, "I am not satisfied even after looking at the physical form of the Master for many times."
When Guru Nanak Sahib left the physical body, Guru Angad Dev, Who later on guided the sangat, said, "It is better to die before the Beloved One. Curse on the life which is lived after the departure of the Beloved."
When the Master of Hazrat Bahu left this world, He said, "0 Bahu, I will always have this pain of separation, and I will die in this pain."
In the same way, when Master Sawan Singh's Master, Baba Jaimal Singh, left the body, one day in the Satsang Master Sawan Singh remembered Him a lot and wept a lot in His remembrance. He was ready to sacrifice all that He had [for His darshan.]
[There was a break in the tape at this point.] [When Baba Sawan Singh, Kirpal Singh's Master, left the body] in the separation Kirpal left everything, and went into the forest of Rishikesh.
In the same way, I cannot describe what happened to me when Master Kirpal left the body. You already know what happened to me. Leaving everything, and with torn clothes, I was wandering here and there like a madman. When Pathi Ji found me, and he brought me to 77 RB, I told him that I would come only on one condition - that nobody should come and bother me. I told him that nobody from the West or the East should come and see me, and I would meet all the villagers only for one hour a day.
I didn't know the world, I didn't know Delhi, and I had not known anybody. I didn't even know Pappu and his family. I didn't know anyone from the West, because Kirpal had closed my eyes in respect to the world and He had opened my eyes to the within; and I had spent my time sitting in the underground room.
Dr. Molina, a meditator from your country [Colombia], is sitting right here and you can ask him lovingly if he had heard about me or known about me outwardly, or if he had seen me in Delhi or in any other place. When Russell Perkins came to see me, only he knows how pleased or displeased I was by his coming. I did not want to come [out] in this world, because I was thinking, "Now what is left with me when my Beloved has left the body?" I used to think that since my Master had left the body, Who will make me sit in His lap, Who will put His hand on my head, and Who will give me food to eat?
I am the person Who didn't close my eyes when Master told people to close their eyes if they wanted to see God. Everybody closed their eyes, but I didn't. One dear one complained to Master that I was not closing my eyes. When Master asked me, I told Him, "Why should I close my eyes when, in front of me, I see my Lord Who is six feet tall, and Who I see moving and talking to people?"
You can come from far away, and you can spend a lot of money, and you are still able to see me physically. But look at me: no matter how much money I spend, no matter how much I travel, I will never be able to see my Lord Kirpal in His physical form. And I feel this pain all the time.
It does not mean that Master Kirpal is far away from me. He is within me, and He is listening to my every plea, and He is giving me everything I need. But the thing is that I cannot see Him moving and walking and talking. I cannot sit in His lap, and I cannot do all the things which I used to do when He was in His physical form.
On the thirteenth of October I had a very serious accident. It was not our fault because we were driving on our side, and we even left fifteen feet of the road for the other people, but still some farmers came and they hit our car with their tractor. Even though nobody was hurt in that accident, I became unconscious, and when I came back to my consciousness, my heart was broken and I felt so sorry. When I looked at the world, I thought, "Why didn't Master Kirpal keep me with Him in the inner planes? Why did He send me [back] into this world?"
You are the fortunate ones because you can have the darshan of your Master by spending a lot of money and traveling so far. But I am an unfortunate one because I cannot have the privilege of the darshan of the Master. I was worriless when He was living in this world, but now when I cannot see Him physically I have so many worries.
Friends, do not ask about my pains and wounds, because Kirpal has given me this pain of separation, and He has left me weeping.
All the souls who do the meditation and who have gone in their within know the importance of the physical form of the Master. Only they know what benefit they get from the darshan of the Master. We worldly people do not know the importance of the darshan of the Master.