Rameshvaram

So, recently I was trying to figure out,
“How did I ever get myself into this situation?”

My situation?
Well, the tether broke some time ago. (see, here, I say.)
And I have been swept up in forces Way Beyond my control.
Or perhaps, was it a conscious choice…
Yes.

I let go about the time I recalled
A story Maharishi told us many years ago.
He told us how once he had been bothered by a reoccurring thought.
Finally he had been told,
“It’s time you get rid of this thought.”

So, I thought it might be nice to share the story.
An illustration of the second kind of “I don’t know.”
A thought that comes from the Silence deep inside.


In 1953, when Maharishi’s master died, “it was if a magnet had been turned off.” So he retired to the silent caves of Uttar Kashi in the Valley of the Saints, deep in the Himalayas.
After two years, he began to have a faint idea, a thought of going to Rameshvaram a temple in the extreme south of India.

"I quite remember, there was absolutely no purpose attached to this thought of Rameshvaram. I didn't know myself why this thought was coming up."

But the thought kept coming to his mind — go to Rameshvaram, go to Rameshvaram. And this was not a polite thought to be harboring.
For, to the yogis dwelling in the Valley of the Saints, merely mentioning the south of India was somewhat akin to speaking in obscenities.

But, acceptable or not, the thought kept coming.

Finally, another yogi of his acquaintance offered an opinion.
He said, “It’s time you get rid of this thought.”

So, Maharishi (he was simply Mahesh, then) did the only thing he could.
Mahesh made the long journey from the Himalayas to the southern tip of India.
After three weeks at Rameshvaram a new idea began to take form in his mind:

"Coming from the Himalayas, I had the thought—it was very fresh in my mind—that it is not necessary for man to suffer. The Vedas say, ‘All this is bliss. I am bliss, infinite, unbounded, eternal, non-changing.’ But where is the reality of this in the day-to-day life of the people? The natural feeling that was deep in my mind was that something should be done so that people don't suffer, because there is no reason to suffer."

This too was just a thought.
Then, just as he was preparing to return to the Himalayas, Mahesh was approached by a man in the streets.
The man asked him, "Do you speak?" Or had he taken a vow of silence?
Mahesh said, "I do, but do you mean lecturing? I don't."
The man said, "You seem to be from the north. Where are you staying?"
Mahesh told him, and about three o'clock that afternoon the man knocked on Mahesh’s door.

"The knock at the door surprised me. Who can that be? And here was that man. I opened the door. He said, 'Seven lectures have been prepared for you.' I had absolutely no idea of lecturing or lectures or anything. Then he wouldn't wait for my reaction. He continued to say, 'Now I have to give them the seven titles on which you'll be speaking. And this will be a one-week program.' It was strange. Absolutely strange, completely out of the blue it came. It just came like a very natural flow, one step after the other. I dictated to him seven topics, not knowing what I was going to speak on the topics. He started to go, and I said, 'Leave a copy with me.'

"So I went and sat there and talked to the people. The press caught the whole thing up. Every day the audience doubled. I was completely unaffected by anything, because this was sort of passing time before I was to go. The whole thing was so gentle and gradual and automatic, completely automatic—just as the river flows, and it doesn't have to make an effort to flow because the slope is already available to the flow. It flows just like that, effortless flow of life."

And this is how Maharishi started teaching meditation
Over fifty years ago.
There never was any grand plan.

If was more like a river flowing...
It was simply time to “get rid of a thought.”

If you'd like to read about the prayer flags go here.