A Disciple's Journal: In the Company of Swami Ashokananda

by Sister Gargi

  April 23, 1953

  The May issue of the trial magazine was offered in the shrine. That evening, in Swami’s office, many devotees were present.

  Swami (glancing through the trial magazine): It could be published now if we wanted to be premature. Maybe it could be printed in India cheaply.

  Sri Ramakrishna and Swamiji are behind you. If you sincerely want the magazine, they will help. If you don’t want to do it, Sri Ramakrishna will say, “All right, all right.” (Swami raised his hand as though comforting a child.) You have to show your desire to do it. A man came to a crossroads and asked directions of a sage who was sitting there. He received no answer. He asked several times—silence. Then he chose one road and started off. At this, the holy man opened his eyes and gave him the directions. The man asked, “Why didn’t you tell me before?” And the sage replied, “I wanted to be sure you really intended to go.”

  April 26, 1953

  A large group of devotees was in the back office after the Sunday morning lecture.

  Swami (to me upon my arrival): Oh, are you just coming to the lecture, Mrs. Burke?

  Me: I am sorry, Swami.

  Swami (sternly): If you had any honor you would not come to my lectures at all. You think so little of them and of me that you cannot come on time? What was the matter? Did you sleep all morning?

  Me: No. I really had no idea there was this daylight saving. Nobody told me.

  Swami: Nobody told you! Does anyone owe it to you to tell you?

  Me: No.

  Swami: Do you want a servant? Perhaps you would like a personal secretary, some miserable companion. “Nobody told me”—that is the most hateful sentence I have ever heard.

  (To Sally Martin) He who burns for knowledge is an ascetic. Hunger burns—it is like a fire, burning away all dross. That is asceticism.

  May 3, 1953

  Swami (in answer to Phiana, a devotee from Sacramento): The mind should not be tense, but it should not sag. Tell the mind when to rest. The mind should not do as it pleases. In that way you bring it under control. Give work your full attention when you are working. Then turn to something else. Go from one thing to another so that the mind never has time to think wrong thoughts. Everything should be done at the right time. I have no use for people who neglect their duties because they want to talk about God instead of cooking dinner; that is not spiritual. Fight with the mind, wrestle with it. In that way you become strong and gain self-confidence, not only within yourself but also outside.

  May 5, 1953

  Swami (to me, sternly): How many cigarettes do you smoke?

  Me: I don’t keep track.

  Swami: Keep track. Tell me how many.

  Me: At least a pack.

  Swami: You are to cut them out altogether. You cannot afford to smoke. There has been a lot written about smoking causing cancer. You have to stay healthy for the magazine. It was because of Florence Wenner’s illness that the magazine was stopped before.

  Me: What is the best way to stop—all at once, or petering off? (Swami’s tone was nothing to argue with.)

  Swami: You can peter off. Smoke three a day for a few days.

  Me: Can this be six a day to start? (Ediben intervened on my behalf, so that six was the number for the time being.)

  May 6, 1953

  Jackson arrived in San Francisco without warning. He wants a divorce—granted.

  May 16, 1953

  Swami talked to me or just sat quietly with me for a long time, in case I was upset by Jackson’s decision. (“You will be upset,” Swami had said earlier. “That is only natural after so many years of marriage.”) If I was disturbed, the condition vanished and never returned. Perhaps that was because he reached into my mind with his healing thought and squashed whatever seeds of regret or depression may have been there waiting to sprout. At one point he said, laughing, “It is ludicrous that losing cigarettes and losing a husband are about on a par.” Actually, losing cigarettes was at the time far more agonizing.

  Swami’s office, 1:30 p.m., May 19, 1953

  Swami: Come in for a minute. (I went in and sat down.) When do you have to appear in court?

  Me: I don’t think I have to at all.

  Swami (sharply): You live in a fool’s paradise. You will have to. Find out about it.

  Later that day

  Talking with a group of us, Swami said that those who are not anchored in God drift on and on, around and around. They may seem for a time to find an anchor, but it is only temporary. They cut loose again, like a leaf on a stream; sometimes it catches against a rock or a stick, but the current is too strong, so it is only a matter of time before it is dislodged and swept on again. “I hope you people know how lucky you are. You have Sri Ramakrishna and Swamiji.”

  Swami (to me): Become a scholar. Grow up!

  Me: How can I grow up?

  Swami: Up, up. Think of Sri Ramakrishna. Pray to him. (Very softly) Pray to him.

  May 20, 1953

  Swami: Convince yourself that you are of the nature of Spirit, and then practice devotion. That is all. That strength and devotion is what I felt in Swamiji’s arati [music composed by Swami Vivekananda for evening vespers] when I first heard it at Belur Math—strength, no fear.

  May 31, 1953

  After his Sunday evening lecture in the Berkeley Temple, Swami was scolding the devotees. Even in the scolding there was an indescribable tenderness and sweetness—a kind of liquid radiance that shone through his eyes. (How can one ever write about Swami?)

  Swami: Give up smallness. You all cling to smallness—“This one said that, and that one said the other thing. She was given this to do, and I wasn’t.” Where there is smallness, God cannot come; God is great. Maybe it is because I am getting old and tired, but to see smallness is unbearable. Vedanta, my eye! As long as you are small, you cannot know God.

  June 2, 1953

  Swami: It is a nice day. Why don’t you take your car and sit at the Marina. Go on. You can take your work. You can watch the water and the hills, but not the people—people are God, but worldly people are poison to you.

  Me: The fault probably is in me, because I see the poison and not the God.

  Swami: You have to take a practical, human view if you want to talk sensibly. You wouldn’t drink ditch water and argue that it is really pure and only poisonous because your stomach is so weak. But it is also good to remember that what you say is true. Vedantists keep the real truth in the back of their minds and act according to the present state of their mind. That is realistic.

  Me: Is it all right to watch people on television?

  Swami (on the way upstairs): Not too good. Why?

  Me: My sister asked me to watch the coronation of Elizabeth II. I don’t especially care about it.

  Swami: Yes. You can go. See what Nehru does and report to me. See if he bows and scrapes.

  June 10, 1953

  Swami gave a small tea party in the library for Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, whom he had known in India.

  July 22, 1953

  Edna, Kathleen, Mara, Jeanette, and others were in the back office after the Wednesday evening lecture. Someone asked if the devotees would have to clean the new temple.

  Swami: I think it will be too much for them. We will have to get a man to come in.

  Devotee: Will there be a daily worship?

  Swami: Yes.

  Kathleen: Who will do it, the monastic caretaker?

  Swami: The caretaker will be taking care. (A gleam came into his eye.) If I find the caretaker not in his rooms, I will hang him upside down from the rafter until all the blood rushes into his head. In fact, if I find any sloppiness, I will hang you all from the rafters by your feet. And if there is still sloppiness, you will be thrown out into the cold. There will be other workers.

  (More seriously) You people are getting sloppy. You will have to run the new
place yourselves. I won’t be there. I cannot keep running back and forth from here to there. I won’t be prodding this one and that one. But I will not tolerate sloppiness. I will stand like the angel Gabriel. (He sat up straight and majestic, looking like the angel Gabriel.) Didn’t Gabriel stand before the Lord? No one will get by me. The Lord has to be comfortable and happy there.

  Edna: What will make Him comfortable and happy?

  Swami: Devotion. Sri Ramakrishna couldn’t stand dissension. He wanted harmony and peace. Then he was happy. Why should there be any dissension? No one should do any shouting but me. Your devotion is the strength of the movement. People will come and say, “Yes! This is what we want.” They will find serenity, depth, and forbearance. Why should there be jealousies?

  Sri Ramakrishna told Holy Mother about Uncle Moon. He is reflected equally in each pool. Each one’s relationship with Him is complete. There is just you and God. There is no third person. Although on the outside it is necessary to cooperate with others in your work, still each one works directly for God, and He receives that work. You will have to learn to work directly for God. Here you are always waylaid by the swami.

  There was discussion as to when the new temple would be ready and if enough money would come. Kathleen started playing with the pendulum she and I had made out of my ring and a piece of string before Swami came into the back office.

  Kathleen: It is swinging to yes.

  Swami: She is in her dotage. (Kathleen continued with the pendulum.) Stop that! The older you people get, the more infantile. (Swami spoke of how tired he was.)

  Mara: My brother said he did not see how you could give interviews after such a lecture.

  Swami: Well, I had forgotten all about those people. They came all the way from San Jose to see me. They were an awfully nice couple. (He had talked with them until nearly eleven o’clock.)

  July 26, 1953

  I came to the Temple around 8:00 p.m. I felt I should not be there at that hour, but nothing was said; so I sat on a chair with Mara and listened to Swami talk.

  Swami: In the Himalayas there are fierce bears. The swamis at Mayavati had to kill several of them.

  Kathleen: It seems horrible how one thing has to kill another.

  Swami: What is horrible about it? It is nature. It is only horrible when you see it from a small viewpoint. Don’t get addle-brained about nonviolence. Think deeper. Pacifism is very good if it is the doctrine of a few. In that way the ideal that one should not kill is held before man. But if the majority takes it up, the country becomes a prey to aggressive nations. It will be subjugated, the worse degradation possible.

  Look at India. Centuries of pacifism weakened her. She became nothing. Now she is divided into three parts. She didn’t know how to prevent it. She was too weak-willed to stand up to the Muslims.

  Life is sacred, but there are more precious things than life. If you cannot protect them, it is cowardice. The Hindus make a virtue out of cowardice. I do not say you should kill, but when it is one’s duty to kill, one should do it. Be strong! That is what Sri Krishna taught Arjuna in the Gita: do your duty with the knowledge that the Self slays not nor is slain. Be strong and be soft. That is Swamiji’s way. This is the age of man, not animals. You know the vision Sri Ramakrishna had of a pregnant woman who gave birth to a child and then ate the child? That is nature. Go deeper.

  July 27, 1953

  Me: Professor Spiegelberg is giving a course on the recent works of Carl Jung at the American Academy of Asian Studies. Shall I take it? It starts tonight. It is a sort of discussion course.

  Swami: Very good. Yes, you can go, but you will have to give me a report of it.

  July 29, 1953

  I was sitting in the library. Swami was having an appointment in his office. Soon he accompanied his visitor to the front door.

  Swami (seeing me): Hello. What are you doing?

  Me (as I followed him down the hall to his office): I am reading Carl Jung.

  Swami: There was another lecture last night?

  Me (in his office now): No, it is tonight, but I don’t like to miss your lecture.

  Swami: You have heard so many of my lectures.

  Me: They are always new.

  Swami: That must be because your memory is poor.

  That evening

  I came to the Temple from Professor Spiegelberg’s class. Swami Aseshananda, the head of the Vedanta Society of Portland, Oregon, had stopped in on his way from Yellowstone National Park with two students and was talking to a group in the library.

  Swami Aseshananda (to me): How are you? I remember you drove me all around last time. I cannot forget that; it was very nice. You and Mrs. Vollmer. (To Anna Webster) How is the truck driver? I saw you driving at Olema better than any man.

  Swami Ashokananda (trying not to smile): Don’t praise her.

  Anna: Oh, Swami, I can bear with praise.

  Swami Ashokananda: You horrify me! You do your work as an offering to Sri Ramakrishna.

  August 2, 1953

  After the Sunday lecture, in the back office, Miriam King asked about the theory of teaching through love and gentleness.

  Swami: Of course, love. But there is a point where the guru watches the disciple closely. Sri Ramakrishna did that. He noticed everything. Otherwise, the mind has a tendency to slide back into its old ways. You think, “Oh, what does it matter?” Soon you become submerged under the old habits. The guru is always alert to every little thing. It is not really painful; but because of its intensity, it becomes unendurable. Even grown-up, strong men will howl crying, but I have noticed that whenever I have watched anyone that closely, they have benefited and deepened. Do you think you can grow if you are not thrashed? On the other hand, Vedanta never asks that the disciple accept everything about the guru. There is always a great deal of individual freedom.

  Later that day

  Mara: What is the benefit of worshiping in a congregation? I mean what is the sense of worshiping with a group, as they do in the [Hollywood] center?

  Swami: Why do you feel you are worshiping with a group? You go to the Temple to worship individually—what if there are a few other people there?

  Mara: Then why not worship at one’s own shrine?

  Swami: What is your own small shrine? How much devotion have you that you should have created any atmosphere in your own shrine? You people have a little bit of devotion, and you want the big thing! Be realistic. Where the Lord is worshiped by many devotees for years, an atmosphere is built up. You can benefit from that. It is also good to be with others who are thinking good thoughts. The mind is collective. My idea is that one should meditate once a day in one’s own shrine—that is also beneficial—and once a day in a temple, where the presence of the Lord is strong. Only a fool and an egotist wouldn’t go to a public shrine; the Lord is there! Even after years you can build up only a small thing in your own shrine.

  Mara: But often you speak disparagingly of “bell-ringing” [a traditional part of Hindu ritualistic worship].

  Swami: You are only trying to rationalize your own laziness. You know that we have daily worship upstairs in the monastery. How can you think I disparage bell-ringing? Lazy people!

  That evening

  The conversation turned to the belief prevalent in India that when a person dies in Benares he or she is liberated—that is to say, illumined.

  Me: Why doesn’t everyone in India go to Benares and shoot themselves?

  Swami: Why don’t you?

  Me: I haven’t the faith.

  Swami: Oh, in India they have the faith, but they don’t want liberation. They think, “By and by. Right now I have my wife and mother-in-law and cousin and aunt to take care of. Later, perhaps, but not now.”

  Mara: But would suicide work as well?

  Swami: Yes, that would be all right. You people should buy a house in Benares and go and live
there. Be sure the house is within the limits of Benares on the right bank.

  Mara: But if Sri Ramakrishna has promised to come for us when we die, why do we have to go to Benares?

  Kathleen: Isn’t that the same as liberation?

  Swami: Sri Ramakrishna will help you. It will certainly mean a great deal.

  Jo: Swami Yatiswarananda [who had visited San Francisco in 1941 and 1942] said not to count on Sri Ramakrishna coming or on seeing the great ones.

  Swami (seriously): You can count on it. It is the word of Holy Mother. He will come to you at the time of death.

  Me: And then what?

  Swami (sternly, as though it were a flippant question): You will have to make a contract with Sri Ramakrishna.

  Me: I mean—will he stay?

  Swami (more gently): Yes, he will guide you. (Suddenly very stern) Go home. It is eleven-thirty. Go home, lazy people! You don’t want to do anything but sit around listening to stories.

  (On my way out, I saluted Swami from the doorway.)

  Swami (to Jo, who was in his office): She has heard how they take the dust of Swami Prabhavananda’s feet in the south. Now she does that (putting his palms together) as the next best thing.

  Me (protesting): No, I have always done that. I would like to take the dust of your feet, but I know you wouldn’t permit it.

  Swami: No! Don’t do that! You are an American.

  August 6, 1953

  Swami was discussing plans for the temple with Helen (Jo, Mara, and I were spectators). A discussion followed about the coat that I bought and did not like.

  Swami (to me): Shopping has become the main meaning of your life?

  Me: Since I cannot smoke, I have taken to shopping.

  Swami (not smiling at all): Isn’t it time you started to work on the magazine? Or have you forgotten all about that?

  Me: No, Swami. I haven’t forgotten.

  Swami: Very good.

  August 8, 1953

  I went home to clean my house and returned around seven. Swami was in the library with Helen and Kathleen, working over the color scheme for the interior of the new temple.