Attunement is the most important aspect of the path. Without attunement to the guru and the divine, we can’t discriminate our way out of delusion. It’s easy to fall out of attunement without even realizing it. Thus, we need to continuously check ourselves and rest in the flow of divine grace.
Often we don’t realize when we’re in the sacred presence of the Guru’s vibration. And when we do realise it, we are barely aware of its magical and subtle ephemeral quality.
Just as a miracle seems perfectly natural after the fact, except for its quality of being unexpected or unusual, similarly, when living in the vibration of God-consciousness, we are not aware of what a blessed and charmed existence it is.
It’s only when we fall out of the vibration that you realise you had been living your life as within in a holy spell.
I learned the hard way that it is easy to fall away from your chosen and beloved path without even realizing it. I thought to share my experience on this point in case it helps others because it takes a huge effort to get back. There is an illusion of connectedness that persists and the connection slowly and silently becomes only a shell, without the magnetic vibration of a real guru-disciple relationship.
Ever since I came to Ananda, I’d willingly been doing Guru seva, service to the Gurus, in one way or another. Sometimes I’d help decorate the altar, chant at the satsang, share teachings with newcomers, or teach others how to chant. Whatever the seva was, I carried the consciousness that I was serving the Masters and my fellow beings. While serving, I remained aware of the flow of Divine Grace–which seva brings.
Then at some point, I felt a bit weak and low on energy. I thought I was in need of rest and slowing down, and that I should perhaps withdraw from seva a little in order to come back to serve with more energy. One thing led to another, and withdrawal from seva also meant I spent less time in the ashram. With less energy at my disposal, the demands of my worldly duties felt unrelenting. I found myself being strongly and compulsively drawn into the whirlpool of official and domestic duties which I wasn’t able to avoid or delegate. As a result, although I felt I had been in need of rest, I was working at home and at the office all the time.
While God and Gurus in their benevolence “released me” of any seva duties, I, on the other hand, separated myself from being open to their regular flow of magnetism and divine grace. Withdrawal from seva did not help me to recharge myself. But I somehow had cut myself off from the one major source of good, loving, recharging energy that I had come to cherish.
Next, I found my physical condition deteriorating. Nameless and numerous mysterious troubles seemed to beset me. No doctor could diagnose my illness or give me medicine that would restore me to health. I did learn that when we are well, sickness seems far away. When we are ill and the illness persists, is non-diagnosable, non-treatable, we are as if in a whirlpool getting sucked into the thought that we might not ever get well. This thought is very powerful. My health seemed to be a thing of the past, unlikely ever to return. Wellness seemed a distant dream. Friends seemed to be moving away, and friendships seemed to be falling apart. I felt like I was in a desert, having lost my way, with only my illness as a reference point for the company. That is the time when I realised I needed to work very hard to get back into the consciousness of the love, wisdom, and energy of God and Gurus—which I knew to be my true home.
I felt I was in a difficult situation, and I looked for solutions everywhere. I even looked at Astrology. A study of my astrological period, subperiods and transit gave me a feeling of uncanny resonance with my seeming separation from the Gurus. I was going through a Guru Dasha, and propitiation of the Guru planet, or Jupiter, came to me as the astrological remedy to be adopted for a solution to this problem.
I immediately realized that for various reasons and compulsions, I had not rendered any service to my Gurus for some time. That was roughly the same length of time that I was suffering from poor health. So here was the solution, and the reason behind the problem.
I was out of tune with my natural connection with my Gurus, and I attracted the illness as part of the lesson –to get back into their vibration.
Understanding a problem and knowing its solution is one thing. Acting and carrying out the solution and getting positive results is another. Yet I had a strong, persistent desire and commitment, and soon I found myself engaging in seva once again. I was back on the road to mental and physical well-being. Faith and hope were reawakened in my heart – and I believed I would be well.
Like a torrent of water from an outlet from which a block has just been removed, so many ways to recover started to reveal themselves to me. I took action on them and started to feel my strength returning. I felt as though the sun was coming out after a long, cloudy, rainy, dark winter.
Why do I feel like sharing?
Because after being so strongly attuned, I could still fall out of attunement and suffer so much. Having found the answer, I feel that the lesson that came to me should be shared with the world so that others too might benefit.
I believe more than ever that service to God and Gurus, and our fellow beings, is the sure and certain way to enter into and live the flow of Divine grace. As Paramhansa Yogananda said, “Divine grace is always there, the blessings of the Gurus are always there, but our effort too is needed.”
A memory might at times fool us into thinking that we are experiencing true communion when we are not. We might be out of the divine flow without realising it. But God will bring us back and is always with us.