Gift of a bowl

[Candice Wilmore]

(from a recent magazine article)

In a world where disasters and disappointments are inevitable, the best practice is to listen to "a simple call of the heart" that beckons to a world of peace and clarity within, says Maharaji, (Prem Rawat) who has been urging people to follow that call since he was a little boy.

Maharaji said someone in Sri Lanka whose home and goods were swept away by the tsunami a few years back sent him a gift of a bowl.

"A few days before the tsunami actually hit," he said, "this person decided to clean this bowl, which had been in the family for many years. So they shined it and made it really beautiful.

"Then the tsunami hit, and everything they had was washed out to sea. The next day, this person went searching for anything they owned amid all the garbage that had floated up.

"All of a sudden, this person's eye went towards something that was shining. It was that bowl, shining in the sun. The ocean somehow had given it back."

Maharaji drew a parallel between the shining bowl and life itself.

"Why is this story important?" he asked. "This is your life. This is your existence. This is your time. Shine it. Impeccably shine it, because you never know when that tsunami is going to hit. It's not a question of whether it's going to hit or not. It is going to hit. And when it hits, so much that we pride ourselves on, that we have stamped as ours, is lost."

Instead of putting so much effort into accomplishments that are easily destroyed, Maharaji urges people to focus on "life—the very thing that facilitates the agenda we have made. Without life, there is no agenda.

"In the analogy of the bowl, I see the contrast so beautifully. In the middle of devastation, in the middle of all the destruction, a bowl is shining. It's shining, not hiding itself. And it's shining bright, because somebody took the time to polish it, to clean it.

"Each one of us is a bowl. We need to ask ourselves whether this bowl is shining or not. Is it tarnished by all the problems that come? Is it tarnished by all our ideas?

"Shine this bowl, so that it may reflect back with clarity what it means to live."

Maharaji offers his assistance in helping people discover a place of peace and clarity within that isn't affected by external events. While the rewards of the world are elusive and temporary, he says, the rewards of focusing on an internal experience of peace are immediate—and can last a lifetime, regardless of what may happen on the outside.

"The challenge of the world is how much you can accomplish," Maharaji says. "The challenge of the heart is, how much joy can you withstand? How much of it can you take? How much can you be fulfilled?"

To those who think finding fulfillment within must be a difficult task, Maharaji responds, "I'll tell you what is difficult: ignoring the call of this heart. That is difficult. Yet this is what we do, and that's why everything seems so difficult."

The first step, he says, is to accept the possibility of living in the joy he talks about.

"This life is beautiful," he says. "That's why it has been given to you. Its beauty only begins to be appreciated the day you begin to accept it, not question it or challenge it.

"Let your life be like that bowl that shone so brightly even the tsunami could not take it away. Let it sparkle. This is the possibility: Peace, joy, fulfillment. Accept that in your life, because it's what we are here for."