Monica Bose-Growing up in the Grace of Bhagavan - 7

[Guest guest]

 

 

The first time that I came to the Ashram I wore a European style dress and did so on our daily visits to the Ashram until I was in my teens. One day I shyly appeared dressed in a saree. Bhagavan, who never commented on anyone's attire, said most unexpectedly that I should always ware a saree. This was not a banal remark, none of the Sage's remarks were. For I had come to India when I was already too old to learn any of its arts or pick up an Indian language properly. It seemed to me that in India I was a misfit. In effect Bhagavan was telling me to assume an Indian identity. Which I did. Indeed, when my mother took me straight to Bhagavan on our arrival from abroad, she led me to what was the most precious in the Indian heritage, the tradition of the ancient seeres and their intuitive discrimination of Reality from falsehood. That tradition was inclusive for it excluded no-one from seeking the ultimate truth oh himself or herself. The Maharshi's reply taught me how Self-enquiry was to begin for me, which was to first establish who I was in this world. The Maharshi's teaching was very lofty and sublime, yet just as a mountain rises from the ground, it never lost touch with the earthly reality, in which the individual lives, grows, and strives to reach the heights.

 

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to be continued

 

 

 

 

from The Mountain Path - Jayanti 2004