Sometimes on a spiritual path, it can feel like certain steps open up only when we’re ready for them. Things don’t always move on our timeline – some doors stay closed for a while, others open unexpectedly – and over time we may see how that supported our growth. In this video, Sadhguru shares one way of looking at how a guru guides a seeker’s journey.
Sadhguru: “These things are constantly happening in your lives. Always people are asking, “Okay, somebody else is like that. Why not me? What about me?” If things come to you before you are ready for it, it will not be a blessing. Best things, I’m talking about. If the best things happen to you before you are ready for it, it will not be a blessing in your experience. It’ll become a great difficulty – you will not be able to handle it. Whether it is material well-being or spiritual well-being or great experiences or whatever, unless you evolve yourself into a certain stage which will anyway happen… Your business on the spiritual path is just to keep yourself receptive, not expect or demand as to what should happen. I’m not that kind of yogi – I won’t do anything before time. But if something comes to you before your time, it will not be a blessing. So the best thing is always just to keep yourself receptive and do what you have to do. What has to happen will anyway happen.
“In India we have this practice. Especially if you plant a mango tree, the second year itself mango tree will flower. If you let it be, it’ll become full of fruit – the plant will be only this much. By end of January, February, it’ll be full of flower. If you let it be, lot of fruit will come. If you do that, if you allow the fruit to come, the plant will be ruined – it will not grow properly. So the second year when the mango flower comes, we pluck off all the flowers; we won’t let it fruit. Next year mango flower comes, we’ll pluck off everything. Only fourth, fifth year, we will allow it to happen. That too, fourth year we will pluck off half of it and leave half. After fifth year we will let it fruit. If you let it fruit in the second year itself, that tree will never grow to its full size. Any number of wild trees, mango trees, you see they never grew to full size because nobody did this plucking job. It’s destructive at that point, but that’s needed; otherwise, what needs to happen will not happen.
“This misplaced… You know, people who are loaded with morality? Some of you, you have too much of misplaced compassion. Many years ago when I was in the farm… So I had these two bulls. And if you treat them well and if you take care of them, they really are good, you know. They act like your friends and they are very responsive; you can have a certain kind of rapport and relationship with them. Like people have very close and dear relationship with dogs, similarly, people have very close relationships with cows and bulls. So these two bulls are good, and they are handsome young men, you know. So periodically you have to do the… You know, like you have the horseshoe for the horses? Similarly a similar shoe, actually a horseshoe of a slightly different size, also goes into the bull’s toes. The way it is done, with the horses you can do it – have the horses standing and do it. With the bulls, it’s not possible to do that. They have to put the bulls down on the floor, and it’s quite a terrible affair when it’s being done. I just saw this whole…
“A couple of times this guy came and did it and the way he was doing it, l thought where is it needed? I have stopped using the cart, my bulls won’t go on the road. It only walks on the, you know, unpaved surfaces. So I thought don’t want this horseshoe for my bull. There’s no bull-shoe, okay. Because they looked so sad and painful when they were put down, and they’re being nailed – looked like crucifixion. So this particular shoe wore out and I refused to put the thing. That guy comes periodically once in two months, he wants to put a new shoe – that’s his livelihood. He came again and again. I said, “No shoes.” He said, “It’s not good.” I said, “It doesn’t matter.” Then I found after eight months my bulls were in such a bad state; their toes spread out like that, and they were really suffering because I had not put the shoe. Then I thought what happened to my sense – you know, misplaced compassion. If these shoes were there, even if it goes through half an hour of pain, then they will be fine. Now to avoid that half an hour of pain, now they are all the time painful. It took lot of work, and in many ways this decision curtailed their life itself.
“So, on the spiritual path, saints are very compassionate – gurus are just brutal. Saints just bless and say, “Let everything happen to you,” or, you know, “Let the best happen to you.” A guru is brutal; he will only let those things that need to happen, happen – rest of it he won’t let it happen. And ultimately it’ll pay. Ultimately, it’ll definitely pay. So those of you who are wondering and struggling, comparing yourself to somebody else, that’s not how it is.”
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