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

by Sister Gargi

  Me: Did his mind turn away because his work was done, or because of suffering—or both?

  Swami: Both.

  8

  WHEW!

  In December or early January, the birthday of Sri Sarada Devi (Holy Mother) is celebrated annually with great devotion at Vedanta centers around the world. Sri Sarada Devi (1853–1920) was the wife of Sri Ramakrishna, his spiritual consort, of whom even the great Swami Vivekananda and other direct monas-tic disciples of Sri Ramakrishna were in supreme awe. Swami Ashokananda had paid his first visit to Holy Mother in 1913 when he was a college student.

  January 6, 1957

  Swami: When Holy Mother blessed a person, no obstacle in the whole universe could obstruct his progress. She herself said so.

  Me: My! How lucky the people were who knew her.

  Swami: Yes, but that power still exists. That love is always there. Only now one has to know how to find it. Holy Mother came to prove that there was such a protective power that one could call on.

  January 7, 1957

  Swami: Without real spiritual power, do you think religion will prevail against what is going on in the world? Bunk! This is the tragic part of it. The whole meaning of religion is understood differently in the West than in India.

  My conclusion is that freedom of the practice of religion is full of snares. It should be based on a deep respect for all religions. The world is such that unless people become deeply spiritual, life will become hellfire. People will be forced to become spiritual. We don’t have to do anything about it. If they want to be Christian, they will have to be deeply Christian.

  January 8, 1957

  Swami Gambhirananda wrote from Advaita Ashrama to Swami Ashokananda that the proposed length of New Discoveries had frightened him—“It must not be over 500 pages.” Nor, he added, can they make the list of corrections that we had sent.

  I drafted a letter of reply to Swami Gambhirananda and showed it to Swami Ashokananda.

  Swami: Just imagine it! They are thinking only of the financial side. They are, of course, worried about paying their bills. They probably put aside $10,000 and now it looks as if this book will come to $15,000 or so.

  Me: I understand their worry.

  Swami: No. Everything we want to do is difficult. I had such a hard struggle, for instance, printing Romain Rolland’s book.

  January 9, 1957

  Swami: No one can do good to the whole world. A little is all anyone can do; but a little, if it goes deep, does a lot of good. Yet in the mind there is infinite knowledge and infinite ability. If you rub it and rub it, it will all come out. Ponder over things and the answer will come.

  January 11, 1957

  Swami (laughing): Smokers will probably go to Smoke Loka [smokers’ heaven], but it won’t be what they think. God answers desires, but He always puts a sting in it. America has settled down to enjoy—everyone can drink and smoke and have a fine time. Perhaps there is a meaning in it; in their next lives, people will be jaded with all that, satiated, and will want to progress. At other times, though, pleasure-seeking seems meaningless. A river will take many turns, running here and there, then back upon itself, and all the time it is going to the ocean. It could just go just straight (shooting his arm out straight)—that is what spiritual life is. One learns to avoid all the unnecessary turns.

  January 12, 1957

  Swami is feeling depressed and seems hurt at the reaction in India to the length of the book. He had so hoped they would appreciate it. He told me to pray every day to Sri Ramakrishna that they will publish it.

  January 13, 1957

  I am working with Swami to polish the reflective essay on Swami Vivekananda for the fourth chapter of New Discoveries before its final typing.

  Swami: You have worked so hard, but all this work will go for nothing. They [the publishers] will hack it up.

  Me: In any case, it won’t have gone for nothing [meaning I have gained much from doing it], but I think they will publish it. (We go on with the work.)

  January 15, 1957

  Swami: Self-doubt is the beginning of wisdom; cock-sureness is the beginning of downfall. (This was about my need to check and recheck the facts in the manuscript.)

  January 17, 1957

  Me: I have trouble with self-consciousness when I meditate.

  Swami: Pray to Sri Ramakrishna. Willpower or effort won’t help. Pray to him during your meditation, without interrupting it too long, that you may have his vision.

  January 19, 1957

  A few days ago I realized that I had lost my fountain pen, the green pen that Swami had given to me and that was identical with the one he had at Lake Tahoe, which I had admired. When I discovered this loss I raised a hue and cry, searching everywhere and asking everyone. I even asked Swami if he had my pen. He laughed heartily.

  Swami: You are careless with your things, and then you accuse people of stealing them.

  Me: Not of stealing, of just taking by mistake.

  Swami: Oh yes, you are too much of a lady to say anyone stole. Well, things are mortal; they come easily, go easily. (I searched further.)

  Today, after having scolded me severely for not working with enough urgency, Swami asked me if I had found my pen. I said no, disconsolately. He reached into his pocket and drew out a pen. “Does this look like your pen?” he asked, smiling like an indulgent father.

  Me: Oh, yes!

  Swami (smiling more): Does it write like your pen?

  I tried it. The cartridge was empty. I had another and Swami, with some trouble, put it in. I wrote with it. Was it his pen that he gave me to take the place of mine, or mine that he had found lying around and picked up to teach me a lesson? I don’t know. I think it was his. In fact, I know it was his. The old cartridge that came out of it was his kind of ink. Of course it was his!

  Me: It is better—for having been in your pocket.

  Swami: Now take care of it; I don’t trust you.

  Me: Oh yes, I will take care of it.

  January 29, 1957

  A letter finally arrived from Swami Gambhirananda. It appears that he will print the entire manuscript after all.

  January 30, 1957

  Swami: Those who serve God are very, very fortunate. It is a great good luck to be allowed to serve Him. It is not a question of just wanting to do it. Many people cry their hearts out and yet they cannot serve Him.

  February 1, 1957

  At last, Miriam Kennedy and I airmailed the last pieces of the New Discoveries book to India—the essay for the end of chapter 4 and the epilogue. I have worked on the essay since late July, steadily and painfully. Whew!

  When I put it in its envelope, Swami said to it lovingly, “Goodbye, goodbye. Have a good trip.” And he touched it to his head. “Pray that they won’t hack it to pieces.”

  Through our months of mailing manuscripts to India, Miriam Kennedy had not been able to learn from the post office officials the details of the mailing system. Not that she hadn’t tried. Swami said to her, “A monument to your inefficiency,” but to me he blamed the post office officials for their ineptness. Still, Miriam bore the brunt of his immovable, penetrating stare, his look of utter contempt, and his cold, sarcastic “yes” in reply to her every explanation.

  February 3, 1957

  Swami (speaking of Bobbie Day, the only non-Vedantic friend I have kept): She is not even on the fence. (Laughing) She is sitting on her side of the fence and talking over the other side—but she is a very good person. Every soul has periods of rest, periods in which everything suits them. It is as though a traveler had walked enough for one day. He finds a nice spot and rests in it. He is content so he doesn’t feel any need to go on for that day. In the morning he becomes restless again and must walk on. It is just like that. After a while, conditions will no longer satisfy the soul; it be-comes restless. People can reach a high state and rest there also.
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br />   Me: Once one has started on a spiritual life, how can one find rest again in the world?

  Swami: This world has produced Buddhas and Sri Ramakrishnas. One can find the highest in it. A person can be spiritual, can have advanced in spiritual life, and can find everything wonderful. He doesn’t feel like going on. He has a fine time. He likes everyone.

  Me: Couldn’t he slip back?

  Swami: Yes, there is that danger. He can get caught again in the world. Then he is spurred on to greater effort. Through the early practice of vairagya [renunciation] one avoids that state. Vairagya pushes one on. That is why one should practice it from the beginning—to form a habit of mind, even though one does not seem ready for it. One cannot acquire it in that state of rest.

  That evening

  Jo, Dorothy Madison, Kathleen, and Mara were sitting in the back office. Dorothy said she was confused by the morning’s lecture; she couldn’t understand why one should worship God as man on the one hand, if, on the other hand, form did not exist.

  Swami: When you worship God in man you must take the whole man. You don’t analyze. Love never analyzes. You don’t worship God and at the same time tear Him to pieces. To analyze is all right, but that is a different practice—jnana [knowledge]. The same person can practice both bhakti [devotion] and jnana, but not at the same time. Love does not question.

  Swamiji was a jnani, but he was also a great bhakta. Swamiji and Buddha were both jnanis, but they both had infinite love and compassion. When Swamiji came down from the experience of unity it would seem to him as though Brahman were caught in a net. His heart would break. In that lower state there is a sense of individuality.

  Such compassion can only be known after the knowledge of unity, after one has known what man really is. Sri Ramakrishna wanted to be kept in that [lower] state so he could serve man. Swamiji is still at Belur Math now. People have seen him. He lives there. Swami Shivananda confirmed it.

  February 7, 1957

  Swami (referring to me): She thinks life is a long vacation. When one doesn’t work, one deteriorates. The sixteen or eighteen hours of waking life should be filled. One should go from one thing to another. Then the mind has no chance to dwell on wrong things. Those things become starved out; the mind becomes pure. One should not, on the other hand, have to drive oneself. If there must be rest—say at three o’clock—then rest. Do nothing but rest at that time.

  Me: Well, I will go home to work.

  Swami (laughing): You can stay a little longer.

  February 8, 1957

  After Swami’s class today, Ediben was signing invitations to Sri Ramakrishna’s birthday in the back office. Other devotees were discussing the possibility of using a rubber stamp for her signature. Swami came in after a while and sat in his chair. There was general conversation, in which Ediben joined, continuing to sign invitations.

  Swami (suddenly turning on Ediben very vehemently): You are inviting devotees to Sri Ramakrishna’s birthday. When you do that, give your whole heart and soul to it! If you want to talk, put them away.

  (Ediben stopped signing the invitations.)

  February 16, 1957

  Devotee: Does one become free from karma when the level of the throat chakra is reached?

  Swami: Yes. One pays a token karma—one cent on the dollar.

  Me: Yet even in the beginning of spiritual life, when one has taken refuge in Sri Ramakrishna, as you said, then doesn’t one become a little free from karma?

  Swami: At first spiritual life is only sentiment, like a flower stuck in the ground. That is not enough. It must take root; then wonderful blooms come.

  February 17, 1957

  Swami (about my habitually forgetting to buy food): You will pay the consequences. Someone will come along and live with you to buy food for you. Do you want to fall into that trap?

  One must have the creature comforts—good food, good clothes, a house, warmth. Otherwise, the mind will think this is no kind of life; it will turn to domesticity. That is why extreme austerity is not good. It can have the opposite effect. It can turn the mind back to the world.

  February 18, 1957

  Swami: Never think whether your meditation is good or bad. You would call a person morbid if he fussed about the weather all the time. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s bad. Just go on. All the emotions that are considered romantic in worldly life have no place at all in spiritual life—despair, regret, repentance—that is all self-indulgence. Whatever the poets write about is all wrong. Those things are dissipation.

  Me: I do not always become despairing over a poor meditation.

  Swami: Once is enough to set you back. If a child sets fire to a house, will it do any good for him to say, “I don’t always put a match to the house”? Never analyze your meditation; you only block it. Of course you can have good meditation! Of course you are pure! Swamiji said the life of a devotee is a “purity-drilling machine.” You will be scraped clean.

  April 4, 1957

  Many devotees assembled in the back office were talking about the coming arrival of Swami Shraddhananda, who was on his way from India to be Swami Ashokananda’s assistant. Luke said, “This place will be full of lions” (meaning three swamis, counting Swami Shantaswarupananda, then at the Berkeley center).

  I was sitting next to Luke. I turned to her and said in a low voice, “One lion and two lion cubs.” Swami heard, and I received the first full and unbuffered blast of my life.

  Swami (fiercely): I will come to hate you for fanatical talk like that. Do you want me to associate you with fanaticism? I hate that kind of thing from the bottom of my soul. What do you expect to gain by that kind of talk? What good does it do you or me or anyone? Why must you make comparisons? Let me tell you that I sincerely feel that the two swamis here are superior to me. I appreciate your feeling for me. But you should keep it within. Why must you parade it publicly?

  There was more, all delivered with such tremendous power and fury that it had me paralyzed. When it began, I had been sitting in a rather nonchalant position—legs crossed, my arm dangling over the back of the chair, turned sideways. I could not move out of that position. Naturally, I could not speak. Dorothy Madison broke the tension somewhat by saying, “But Swami, I don’t understand what you are scolding her for.” (Dorothy had not been around the San Francisco Temple for long.)

  Swami: You don’t have to understand. Am I scolding you?

  Dorothy: No, thank God. (Laughter.)

  Swami: She understands. (I understood all right.)

  The rest of the evening I spent alternating between hot and cold and trying not to cry. Swami was nice to me afterward, but I continued to lick my wounds. At one point he said tenderly, “Don’t feel bad,” and then resumed the general conversation.

  Swami: Swami Brahmananda said that the vision Swamiji had as a boy was of Shankara, but Swamiji himself said he felt it was of Buddha. I would be inclined to give more credit to what Swamiji felt about it.

  Me (trying to act natural): On what grounds did Swami Brahmananda think it was Shankara?

  Swami: What a question to ask!

  Me (half laughing, half hurt): I guess I should go home.

  Swami (more gently): Well, it is all right to ask that question. But do you think I inquired into it in those days? I wasn’t writing a book. You have been writing a book. You want to check up on everything. Swami Brahmananda also said that when Swamiji died he had entered into nirvikalpa samadhi and couldn’t return, yet there is evidence that Swamiji knew when he would die.

  Dorothy Madison (suddenly changing the subject): Swami, is it true that in order to realize God, one has to sing?

  Swami: Yes, that is true—sing to Him with your heart. Singing and worship are very necessary; the mind dwells on God.

  Mara: If one offers incense, is that enough?

  Swami: How long does it take to offer incense? What will yo
u do with the rest of the time?

  Me: What if one can’t sing?

  Swami: That is just an excuse. What you mean is that you don’t want to sing. (To others) She is perfectly happy as she is. She is just content to float along.

  (After I had gone home, Swami phoned me.)

  Swami: Well, are you moping?

  Me: No—well, a little bit. I have been thinking that you said I was complacent.

  Swami: I ask you to sing. You make up all kinds of excuses.

  Me: Do you really want me to sing?

  Swami: Yes, surely you should sing—hum.

  Me: I did not think you would ever hate me.

  Swami: Did I say I will hate you?

  Me: Yes.

  Swami: No, I never will. I will hate your fanaticism.

  April 5, 1957

  Swami: Whatever I say to you, I say for your own good. You must just swallow it. I am your teacher. But you are not forced to do anything; you came here of your own accord. I will get so that I will be afraid to tell you anything. I don’t want to hurt you, and I don’t want to be put on the defensive. I don’t have to explain everything I say. We are human here. Do you want to be one of those people I am afraid to say things to? There are some people like that. Years have gone by and I haven’t told them anything; but I guess God will take care of them.

  April 7, 1957

  This evening, Jo, Kathleen, and Dorothy Madison were talking with Swami in the back office.

  Dorothy: Jo had on such a beautiful hat this morning. (A night or so before, Dorothy had also spoken enthusiastically of Kathleen’s skin, which was as smooth as a young girl’s.)

  Swami: That is new kind of talk here. That is the talk of a worldly person. Why must you give so much attention to superficial things like skin, clothes, and hair?

  Dorothy: I can’t help observing, Swamiji.