Autobiography of a Yogi
revered him. I daresay Sri Yukteswar would have been the most
soughtafter guru in India had his words not been so candid and so
censorious.
“I am hard on those who come for my training,” he admitted to me.
“That is my way; take it or leave it. I will never compromise. But
you will be much kinder to your disciples; that is your way. I try
to purify only in the fires of severity, searing beyond the average
toleration. The gentle approach of love is also transfiguring. The
inflexible and the yielding methods are equally effective if applied
with wisdom. You will go to foreign lands, where blunt assaults
on the ego are not appreciated. A teacher could not spread India’s
message in the West without an ample fund of accommodative patience
and forbearance.” I refuse to state the amount of truth I later
came to find in Master’s words!
Though Sri Yukteswar’s undissembling speech prevented a large
following during his years on earth, nevertheless his living spirit
manifests today over the world, through sincere students of his
KRIYA YOGA and other teachings. He has further dominion in men’s
souls than ever Alexander dreamed of in the soil.
Father arrived one day to pay his respects to Sri Yukteswar. My
parent expected, very likely, to hear some words in my praise. He
was shocked to be given a long account of my imperfections. It was
Master’s practice to recount simple, negligible shortcomings with
an air of portentous gravity. Father rushed to see me. “From your
guru’s remarks I thought to find you a complete wreck!” My parent
was between tears and laughter.
The only cause of Sri Yukteswar’s displeasure at the time was that
I had been trying, against his gentle hint, to convert a certain
man to the spiritual path.
With indignant speed I sought out my guru. He received me with
downcast eyes, as though conscious of guilt. It was the only time
I ever saw the divine lion meek before me. The unique moment was
savored to the full.
“Sir, why did you judge me so mercilessly before my astounded
father? Was that just?”
“I will not do it again.” Master’s tone was apologetic.
Instantly I was disarmed. How readily the great man admitted his
fault! Though he never again upset Father’s peace of mind, Master
relentlessly continued to dissect me whenever and wherever he chose.
New disciples often joined Sri Yukteswar in exhaustive criticism
of others. Wise like the guru! Models of flawless discrimination!
But he who takes the offensive must not be defenseless. The same
carping students fled precipitantly as soon as Master publicly
unloosed in their direction a few shafts from his analytical quiver.
“Tender inner weaknesses, revolting at mild touches of censure,
are like diseased parts of the body, recoiling before even delicate
handling.” This was Sri Yukteswar’s amused comment on the flighty
ones.
There are disciples who seek a guru made in their own image. Such
students often complained that they did not understand Sri Yukteswar.
“Neither do you comprehend God!” I retorted on one occasion. “When
a saint is clear to you, you will be one.” Among the trillion
mysteries, breathing every second the inexplicable air, who may
venture to ask that the fathomless nature of a master be instantly
grasped?
Students came, and generally went. Those who craved a path of
oily sympathy and comfortable recognitions did not find it at the
hermitage. Master offered shelter and shepherding for the aeons,
but many disciples miserly demanded ego-balm as well. They departed,
preferring life’s countless humiliations before any humility.
Master’s blazing rays, the open penetrating sunshine of his wisdom,
were too powerful for their spiritual sickness. They sought some
lesser teacher who, shading them with flattery, permitted the fitful
sleep of ignorance.
During my early months with Master, I had experienced a sensitive
fear of his reprimands. These were reserved, I soon saw, for disciples
who had asked for his verbal vivisection. If any writhing student
made a protest, Sri Yukteswar would become unoffendedly silent.
His words were never wrathful, but impersonal with wisdom.
Master’s insight was not for the unprepared ears of casual visitors; he
seldom remarked on their defects, even if conspicuous. But toward
students who sought his counsel, Sri Yukteswar felt a serious
responsibility. Brave indeed is the guru who undertakes to transform
the crude ore of ego-permeated humanity! A saint’s courage roots
in his compassion for the stumbling eyeless of this world.
When I had abandoned underlying resentment, I found a marked decrease
in my chastisement. In a very subtle way, Master melted into
comparative clemency. In time I demolished every wall of rationalization
and subconscious reservation behind which the human personality
generally shields itself. {FN12-17} The reward was an effortless
harmony with my guru. I discovered him then to be trusting, considerate,
and silently loving. Undemonstrative, however, he bestowed no word
of affection.
My own temperament is principally devotional. It was disconcerting
at first to find that my guru, saturated with JNANA but seemingly
dry of BHAKTI, {FN12-18} expressed himself only in terms of
cold spiritual mathematics. But as I tuned myself to his nature,
I discovered no diminution but rather increase in my devotional
approach to God. A self-realized master is fully able to guide his
various disciples along natural lines of their essential bias.
My relationship with Sri Yukteswar, somewhat inarticulate, nonetheless
possessed all eloquence. Often I found his silent signature on my
thoughts, rendering speech inutile. Quietly sitting beside him, I
felt his bounty pouring peacefully over my being.
Sri Yukteswar’s impartial justice was notably demonstrated during
the summer vacation of my first college year. I welcomed the opportunity
to spend uninterrupted months at Serampore with my guru.
“You may be in charge of the hermitage.” Master was pleased over
my enthusiastic arrival. “Your duties will be the reception of
guests, and supervision of the work of the other disciples.”
Kumar, a young villager from east Bengal, was accepted a fortnight
later for hermitage training. Remarkably intelligent, he quickly
won Sri Yukteswar’s affection. For some unfathomable reason, Master
was very lenient to the new resident.
“Mukunda, let Kumar assume your duties. Employ your own time in
sweeping and cooking.” Master issued these instructions after the
new boy had been with us for a month.
Exalted to leadership, Kumar exercised a petty household tyranny.
In silent mutiny, the other disciples continued to seek me out for
daily counsel.
“Mukunda is impossible! You made me supervisor, yet the others go
to him and obey him.” Three weeks later Kumar was complaining to
our guru. I overheard him from an adjoining room.
“That’s why I assigned him to the kitchen and you to the parlor.”
Sri Yukteswar’s withering tones were new to Kumar. “In this way you
have come to realize that a worthy leader has the desire to serve,
and not to dominate. You wanted Mukunda’s position, but could not
maintain it by merit. Return now to your earlier work as cook’s
assistant.”
After this humbling incident, Master resumed toward Kumar a former
attitude of unwonted indulgence. Who can solve the mystery of
attraction? In Kumar our guru discovered a charming fount which
did not spurt for the fellow disciples. Though the new boy was
obviously Sri Yukteswar’s favorite, I felt no dismay. Personal
idiosyncrasies, possessed even by masters, lend a rich complexity
to the pattern of life. My nature is seldom commandeered by a detail;
I was seeking from Sri Yukteswar a more inaccessible benefit than
an outward praise.
Kumar spoke venomously to me one day without reason; I was deeply
hurt.
“Your head is swelling to the bursting point!” I added a warning
whose truth I felt intuitively: “Unless you mend your ways, someday
you will be asked to leave this ashram.”
Laughing sarcastically, Kumar repeated my remark to our guru, who
had just entered the room. Fully expecting to be scolded, I retired
meekly to a corner.
“Maybe Mukunda is right.” Master’s reply to the boy came with
unusual coldness. I escaped without castigation.
A year later, Kumar set out for a visit to his childhood home.
He ignored the quiet disapproval of Sri Yukteswar, who never
authoritatively controlled his disciples’ movements. On the boy’s
return to Serampore in a few months, a change was unpleasantly
apparent. Gone was the stately Kumar with serenely glowing face.
Only an undistinguished peasant stood before us, one who had lately
acquired a number of evil habits.
Master summoned me and brokenheartedly discussed the fact that the
boy was now unsuited to the monastic hermitage life.
“Mukunda, I will leave it to you to instruct Kumar to leave the
ashram tomorrow; I can’t do it!” Tears stood in Sri Yukteswar’s
eyes, but he controlled himself quickly. “The boy would never have
fallen to these depths had he listened to me and not gone away to
mix with undesirable companions. He has rejected my protection;
the callous world must be his guru still.”
Kumar’s departure brought me no elation; sadly I wondered how one
with power to win a master’s love could ever respond to cheaper
allures. Enjoyment of wine and sex are rooted in the natural man,
and require no delicacies of perception for their appreciation.
Sense wiles are comparable to the evergreen oleander, fragrant with
its multicolored flowers: every part of the plant is poisonous. The
land of healing lies within, radiant with that happiness blindly
sought in a thousand misdirections. {FN12-19}
“Keen intelligence is two-edged,” Master once remarked in reference
to Kumar’s brilliant mind. “It may be used constructively or
destructively like a knife, either to cut the boil of ignorance,
or to decapitate one’s self. Intelligence is rightly guided only
after the mind has acknowledged the inescapability of spiritual
law.”
My guru mixed freely with men and women disciples, treating
all as his children. Perceiving their soul equality, he showed no
distinction or partiality.
“In sleep, you do not know whether you are a man or a woman,” he
said. “Just as a man, impersonating a woman, does not become one,
so the soul, impersonating both man and woman, has no sex. The soul
is the pure, changeless image of God.”
Sri Yukteswar never avoided or blamed women as objects of seduction.
Men, he said, were also a temptation to women. I once inquired of
my guru why a great ancient saint had called women “the door to
hell.”
“A girl must have proved very troublesome to his peace of mind in
his early life,” my guru answered causticly. “Otherwise he would have
denounced, not woman, but some imperfection in his own self-control.”
If a visitor dared to relate a suggestive story in the hermitage,
Master would maintain an unresponsive silence. “Do not allow yourself
to be thrashed by the provoking whip of a beautiful face,” he told
the disciples. “How can sense slaves enjoy the world? Its subtle
flavors escape them while they grovel in primal mud. All nice
discriminations are lost to the man of elemental lusts.”
Students seeking to escape from the dualistic MAYA delusion received
from Sri Yukteswar patient and understanding counsel.
“Just as the purpose of eating is to satisfy hunger, not greed,
so the sex instinct is designed for the propagation of the species
according to natural law, never for the kindling of insatiable
longings,” he said. “Destroy wrong desires now; otherwise they
will follow you after the astral body is torn from its physical
casing. Even when the flesh is weak, the mind should be constantly
resistant. If temptation assails you with cruel force, overcome it