Shri Ganesha Puja, “Ekakarita,” Cabella Ligure (Italy), 5 September 1998

Today we are going to worship Shri Ganesh.

I think I have told you a lot about Him and His nature, but still so many of us have not yet realized what are His powers, and what He wants.

The first and foremost thing is that to respect Shri Ganesha is to understand the importance of chastity. Chastity is not only for the women; it is more for the men to observe. If you have self-respect, in the real sense of the word, you will take to chastity without any difficulties. But if you have no self-respect, then you run after something which is very low, of a very degrading quality.

So it’s very important that chastity must be respected, must be understood, and must be imbibed. This habit of not observing the proper protocol of the chastity develops from childhood. And we have to be very careful, when we are in a Ganesha state, we should not take to such horrible things. I don’t know from where people get the ideas.

As you see today, in the whole world there’s a crisis of chastity. In the West, especially, we have heard of so many cases of child abuse. In a temple of God one should not even take the name of this dirty disease which has grabbed the people. But in India we have never heard of it, we don’t know. Of course, some of the men are very, very ruined people and they can’t help it unless and until they are put into jail.

But for a Sahaja Yogi, it is very important to look after our chastity. As I told you yesterday, it is not necessary to find a girl for yourself or a boy for yourself. It’s also against the rules of chastity. I’m not saying that you should allow only your parents to decide, but let the Sahaja Yoga decide, because you are Sahajis. You are born after the image of Ganesha, who ultimately becomes Christ.

So what should be your attitude towards chastity is very important. The most important thing [is] that if we get ruined on our chastity level, then Sahaja Yoga is very, very difficult, and it doesn’t give you that blessing as you should have.

You saw yesterday people from Romania and also from Ukraine were singing so beautifully. One of the reasons is that basically they are very, very humble people. They are humbled down, so much so that they have given up nonsensical ideas about sex life and all that. So the humility will teach you that you are not having your self-respect.

In the Islam they have stressed a very big importance on chastity. Very much. And this was gone to such an extent that Mohammed Sahib said that you can have five wives or four wives, but you don’t have women who are prostitutes. Once this chastity starts leaving us, we don’t mind anything under the sun.

We have seen the results of that working out in many people who are very highly placed. And these highly placed people think that they are something great and they can overcome the binding of Jesus Christ and they can do what they like, go on misbehaving with women who are under them. They may do it secretly, they may do it any way, but Ganesha watches that. And He punishes them for what they are doing. It’s a terrible thing to go into these kinds of ventures which are not the field of Sahaja Yogis.

Sahaja Yogis have to first of all steady their eyes, because it is concerned with the power of Jesus Christ. But in all the Christian nations, I have seen people have wandering eyes. Very surprising: when Christ is their leader, they worship Christ, go to church, sing the praise of Christ, and they have wandering eyes all over. These wandering eyes cannot be representative of the chastity of Christ.

Now the second point is that the power of Ganesha can only be manifested if you are wise, because He is the giver of wisdom. Now people don’t understand what wisdom is – this is the big problem. Intelligence, so-called, is not wisdom. It can make you a very cunning, very aggressive, and sometimes very subtle person who can go on deceiving people, telling lies, doing all kinds of things, and believing in themselves that they are very, very successful.

Success is never the criteria of a Sahaja Yogi. Success in Sahaja Yoga means very subtle surrendering of oneself to Sahaja Yoga. That is seldom to be found unless and until you meditate every day. It’s very important that you must meditate. Those who do not meditate will be lost to Sahaja Yoga, because wisdom can only grow through your inner inspiration. You can have this inner inspiration only if the power of Shri Ganesha manifests. He is the giver of your wisdom. In the wisdom, what you do is to find solutions, solutions which are peaceful, which are satisfying, which are soothing.

He is the one who takes you to task also. Like yesterday I was told there was a whirlwind, and many people had to suffer a little bit because of the wind that came and blew off your tents. There’s no need to have tents in this climate; what is the need? I don’t understand. But they cannot live without a tent, you see. I can sleep outside very nicely, on the street also. 

So there’s no need to sort of fuss about all these things and bring the whole household here. There’s no need. We should not be afraid of discomfort. If you want to have a very comfortable life and you can’t suffer any discomfort, you are no good for Sahaja Yoga.

In olden days, people used to go to Himalayas, stand on one leg, pray to God, and they didn’t give realization, they couldn’t get realization – while you all have got realization. So one should not try to make oneself a very sort of a lordly person. There is no need to care for comfort. I can live in comfort and I can live in any way, at this age also.

So what you have to do is to – not to practise, I say, asceticism but to become an ascetic. Practising means trouble. But if you just become an ascetic from within, then you don’t bother about these little, little things here and there. But our style is still molded by the outside world. We haven’t got our own world, then we are going as the fashion is. And once you start going with the fashion, the wisdom disappears.

I never tell anybody that you don’t have this fashion or that fashion or anything. It’s your wisdom which will teach you. Wisdom will teach you how to regulate yourself, because you have come here to ascend, to achieve a great, special place in the realm of spirituality.

I must stress again on the power of wisdom. Before doing anything, you should just appeal to your wisdom and find out if it is wise to be like that. With this practice, you will reduce your temper, absolutely. You’ll reduce your lust, you’ll reduce your guilt very much, because once you start understanding that there’s no wisdom in feeling guilty, your guilt will disappear.

Also the worst thing is that we have a great desire to have this, have that, and to indulge into all kinds of greed. This greed becomes zero as soon as you understand wisely that there’s no need. Otherwise, all the time you’ll be thinking about yourself, about your health, about your children, about your house – whatever is supposed to be yours. 

But the death proves that nothing belongs to you. You have come alone, and you have to go alone. This is the wisdom which is to be imbibed. You cannot practise it, you cannot force it, but it’s to be imbibed through your spirituality.

Then the greatest thing that happens is the joy, joy of the dancing of Shri Ganesh. Like a child you see Him dancing, how joyous He feels, and you also feel. In the same way, a little child [is] being born within you, and you start behaving like a small child. Normally it has no sense of lust, greed, nothing. It knows how to share.

So this is the position, we say, that you become a gana—the army of Shri Ganesh, they are ganas, and they are very powerful. And they do all the work of the world, they live in this world, but all their source of energy is from the Divine.

So Shri Ganesha is an Omkara. He is the first Deity created by the Goddess, because He is auspiciousness. So, first auspiciousness is created for our good. We are auspicious because of Shri Ganesha.

Some people, if they are in the house they create problems. They are always creating problems out of nothing. They are not auspicious people. Those who are peacemakers, those who are loving are the ones who are blessed by Shri Ganesh. What is the wisdom in fighting? You should find out: what is the wisdom in fighting? Why are you fighting, for what things? For small, small things, things that you can yourself correct? Why should you fight? If you have a fighting nature, that means Ganesha is against you, [that] your Ganesha is sleeping; that power is not with you. There is no wisdom in it.

In this world, all those great people who have been respected since centuries have been very, very wise people. Not hot-tempered, not people who were quarrelling, not people who were having lust as the aim of their life; such people will be never remembered by the progeny.

But that’s not so important, as you as Sahaja Yogis are very important. You are here on this earth to emancipate the whole of humanity. So, what should be the aim of your life is to go deep into your spirituality. This aim of getting into spirituality, I think you all know, you see, but you do not work out. I have told you last time that your attention has to be inside, not outside, and you should not react.

All these procedures help you to be wise, to be sensible. But the sensible person who is just sensible as far as his own comforts are concerned, money is concerned, or his own health is concerned – everything encompassing him – is not a wise person. He is not wise.

If you see a little child, who is properly brought up of course, he will always bother about other people. He’ll find out what others need, what can make them happy. He’ll list all the simple methods. He will try to please others, but not to gain any favour or to show off that he is very generous, but in the real sense of the word, that gives him joy. That is the collectivity.

Today I am going to tell you something more about this collective nature that comes to you through Shri Ganesha’s efforts, or we can say His powers. Somebody told Me that Einstein has already made a story like that, is a discovery that if you all become cool, that is under the Shri Ganesha’s blessings, then we all become one. That’s his theory, but we also had Phil Ward here who established that when you cool down the helium gas, all the molecules, or you can call them atoms, they start moving in a collective way. Otherwise they are hitting each other, they are beating each other, and they are running helter and skelter.

In the same way, when we have Shri Ganesha’s blessings within us in the real sense of the word, with our wisdom, then what happens [is that] we become very much evolved Sahaja Yogis. “Evolved Sahaja Yogis” means they have become one. “One” means what? “One” means they all live for each other, they enjoy each other, they see [to] the comfort of each other.

For example, the people who are very rich, people who are very poor, people who are sick, people who are healthy, all of them combine together as one. In Sanskrit it is called ekakarita: they become one. And this oneness shows in your celebrations. When you all come here you try to help each other all the time, I’ve seen – nobody minds helping each other. I have seen people enjoying each other. They do not want to hurt anyone; on the contrary, they want to be helpful and sensible with each other.

Most of your leaders I have chosen who are very wise, who avoid problems, who do not get into panics. Most of them, I should say. And when, you see, even you people try to destroy Sahaja Yoga, they know you are doing it.

So to find out this ekakarita, you have to go deep down into yourself, by which you will feel that you are all one. Whether you are here or you are in Japan or in America – anywhere – you all think the same way, you all help the same cause, and you try to be the same style. I have seen people when they come for the pujas, so many of them, how they enjoy each other’s company, how they try to help each other.

Somebody who is, say, in Russia or say, in Bulgaria, anywhere, he will write to Me about the problem he has, something. So somebody from America – without [Me] telling him, without [Me] informing him, without any information – immediately writes to Me: “Mother, such and such a person is there in Russia. Will You be able to send that person to America?” Most of the time it happens like this.

But I don’t tell them. I never ask them. Even if I ask, suddenly there will be a response from so many people, from so many countries: “Mother, this is the problem? All right, we’ll go and do it.”

For that, I must say Austrians are very sensitive people in this respect, in this ekakarita. They went all the way to Jerusalem, you know, to help the people, to get them realized. I wanted to go to Jerusalem, but this bombing business may not allow Me to go. But the Jerusalem people, I found them to be much more collective, because they came to Egypt. I said, “Why have you come here?” “To make friends with the Muslims of Egypt.”

Just imagine! I was surprised. How could they come here? “No, just to make friends. They are Muslims, so we want to make friends with them.” So making friendship without any ulterior motive, without any gain, is one of the signs of your ekakarita. Not only that you are satisfied with other Sahaja Yogis, but you want to bring other Sahaja Yogis in. So many have done that. This is something so nourishing.

Now, as you are being enlightened, you get another person who is enlightened. It’s very great joy-giving: If you give realization to one person, you feel very happy. I mean, so many write to Me: “Mother, now we have got thirty persons, twenty persons,” and they are very happy about it, that we have got so many Sahaja Yogis.

But doing that, one should not develop the ego – then again you go against Ganesha, because Christ, you know, He doesn’t like it. Egoistical people He doesn’t like, and He is Shri Ganesh. So He doesn’t like such people who out of their ego want to create an organization of their own, and try to dominate others. This kind of people They don’t like. Both of Them are the same, there is complete ekakarita between Them. In the same way, we too develop that special quality of ekakarita.

We forget about so-called religions that we have. See now, how they are fighting. All the religions which are outside are fighting among themselves. They are dishonest, they are doing all kinds of wrong things – you know it very well. Every day it’s in the newspaper that you hear about what wrong they are doing. They are a little bit successful, but not for a long time, because they’ll be exposed. This is the time of exposure, that they will lose that great faith on which they have been working out.

All these will have to just disappear, these false ideas about superiority of any religion. How can a religion be superior to another one which is created by the effort of Shri Ganesha’s auspiciousness? It’s not auspicious at all that you fight another religion or you fight another creed, or you say that this is a lesser race, or we are a higher race. All these false ideas, they drop out. This doesn’t remain anymore, because all these ideas have created problems.

Say, in America, they first hated the Blacks, so now the Blacks are hating the whites. It’s a big turmoil going on, you see. Then we have, also in India we had people who were supposed to be untouchables. They were tortured, they were troubled, and they did a lot of wrong things which they should have never done, which is not written in the shastras. Because of that, now they are acting against the so-called “touchables” and putting them right in their own places. So this brings in conflict.

Shri Ganesha is the one, when He gives you wisdom, you understand that nobody is superior to another person. You are all made by God, and whatever is made by God is auspicious and beautiful. Once you start understanding that, this ekakarita spreads outside also. It spreads to other people. It’s not just because of a certain social understanding and a social upliftment [that] you try to be good to others – no. It is from inside; inside you do it.

This ekakarita first must work in the family. It’s very important. The family which is disturbed all the time cannot create children who are in the state of ekakarita. That’s why I always tell them that, don’t fight. If in the family they are fighting, they cannot be Sahaja Yogis. If there is such a fight it’s better to get out of such a family.

So we have sanctioned also a divorce. Any man who is flirting with other women or doing wrong things, we have asked him to get out of Sahaja Yoga. The reason is, one bad apple can spoil many apples. So such a man or such a woman should be kept out of Sahaja Yoga completely so that there is a better family relationship, which is very important in Sahaja Yoga.

Your family relationships should be absolutely perfect. But I can’t understand: if you can’t enjoy the company of your wife, then what are you going to enjoy in this world? If you cannot enjoy the bliss of your family life, you cannot enjoy anything else.

This very close relationship of husband and wife is thrown apart because of Ganesha problem only. If the Ganesha was all right, there would have been a perfect union, perfect understanding between husband and wife. But if that fails, that means there’s definitely something wrong with the Shri Ganesha. Try to correct your own Shri Ganesh than to see to others.

You have to meditate, and meditate on Shri Ganesh, to sit on the ground and meditate. Now when we run away from the Mother Earth and we don’t touch Her, we don’t respect Her, in a way we don’t respect Shri Ganesha. He was made out of the Mother Earth, and He controls the Mother Earth. He controls all the five elements. Not only that, but He controls you.

I liked the film yesterday where they showed a Ganesha walking about with another person, who was telling, “Don’t do this, and don’t do this.” It’s a very, very beautiful film because it suggests that Ganesha is always there to tell you not to do it. But if you do it, then you develop all kinds of horrible diseases, all kinds of horrible faces, all kinds of family problems. Also you can develop national problems.

So this is so important to understand, that such a feeling of, I should say, very inauspicious character is to be avoided. I can’t understand: how can people feel so bad about small, small children, some two-year-old child, some five-year-old child? If you see a child, even a photograph of a child, you feel like loving that, you feel like kissing that child.

If the children cannot be respected, how can you understand the value of Shri Ganesha? See how sweet they are, how sweetly they behave. And they understand! They understand you, they understand Me. I know, even the small children, those who are very small, newly-born children understand Me. So there’s innately within them, is built in, a kind of a feeling of understanding the love.

To understand the love also is very difficult for egoistical people, because they love themselves, they don’t love anybody else. Or if they love somebody it is out of lust, maybe greed, maybe some sort of an association. But love for love’s sake is only possible if your Shri Ganesha is properly cleaned out and kept.

We have come so far, and we have so many Sahaja Yogis all over the world. Of course I have worked very hard, I must say, but you also have supported Me very much. I am thankful to you. It’s not possible in this Western world especially, where there’s no consideration of Ganesha’s Principle, that you people should come out so well and accept Sahaja Yoga as a life for yourself.

In Sahaja Yog the most important thing is to worship Shri Ganesha within you, and the quality of Shri Ganesha within you. It’s very soothing, it’s very peace-giving, it’s a very secure . . . security-creating power. If your Ganesha is all right, nobody can touch you, nobody can destroy you, nobody can upset you, because He is the one who is the giver of peace.

The world peace is disturbed because we have not worshipped Shri Ganesha. I’ve seen people in very big positions, in charge of military, in charge of that, in charge – not in charge of themselves. Their Ganesha is absolutely ruined and finished. All such people are such leaders of nations, and people try to follow them in their own way.

Though they may do something secretly, it doesn’t matter; people know about it. Because in auspiciousness if you are losing, then the whole world comes to know, somehow. It will all be exposed, because Satya Yuga has come. In this new Yuga, there’s light of the truth within us, and this truth can expose all that is nonsensical [that] we have been doing.

Now truth is the quality of Shri Ganesh Himself. He is the one who is giving us truth. In our brain, it comes to us through Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ has worked so much, He’s done so much. But look at the condition of the people who are supposed to be following Him. Look at the way they are behaving.

Let us at least show that if you follow Ganesha and Jesus Christ, you are in the image of that personality which is something so very spiritual. Spiritual life is the giver of joy. You cannot get joy out of anything else but spirituality. You can get some satisfaction, you can get some ego, you might feel that you are something great, but the only way you can get the inner peace and joy is Shri Ganesha’s manifestation in all the chakras.

He manifests in all the chakras, which when you are in a proper state on those chakras, you get the joy. And that joy comes to you through Shri Ganesh.

These days people are writing horrible books, horrible things. Also there are some who are trying to write very sweet things about Shri Ganesha’s principle of understanding, principle of His auspiciousness. Very sweetly. I’ve seen some people have written some very, very sweet stories about Him. It’s not only the love stories; up to a point, all right, they created so many love stories, love stories, love stories. Now something beyond that, one has to know. And beyond that is this Ganesha Principle, which is of complete peace, of complete joy, and of understanding of love, the value of pure love—of giving, and also of taking it. Anyone who gives you the pure love should be understood in the right way.

Yesterday I knew that Shri Ganesha has gone off a little bit. I don’t know why He was like that, but one has to understand that there must be some people within us who do not follow the Principle of Shri Ganesh, and that’s why these troubles are there.

So with a sincere heart and a sincere mind, if you ask the blessings of Shri Ganesh, He is always ready to give you. But if you don’t listen to Him and if you destroy your chastity in any way, He will punish you. He’ll not spare you. He doesn’t have the idea of sparing.

At the level of Christ only, He thought of forgiving, of forgiving you. But forgiving doesn’t mean that any, any sin can be forgiven – no. It’s like a kind of a controlling power. Christ has said that you’ll be forgiven, but Shri Ganesha at a point, when He sees people are forgiven, He tries to punish you. That’s the limiting point where He thinks it’s not proper to forgive such and such person. So for Christ, to forgive is all right, but for Ganesha, He has to expose and punish the person.

So in a way, you have to know that Christ is very great, because He gives us the forgiving power job, and Shri Ganesha is very powerful because He limits our forgiving power. You may forgive anyone, you may say that, “I would like to forgive,” but we don’t know if Shri Ganesh will allow to that extent. And Christ accepts that. Because They are the same, They are like the two sides of one coin.

So we cannot depend too much on the forgiveness power of Christ, because there is Ganesha always sitting there and He has in His hand, you have seen, a very powerful weapon. He is the one who is just peace, who is coolness, who gives you coolness after realization. You get the cool breeze because of Shri Ganesh. Because it is Brahmachaitanya, no doubt, but the one who emits it is Shri Ganesha.

He cools you down. He brings you down to a very cool, satisfied, and a person with complete calmness. With that calmness, you become all one. This ekakarita is established, oneness is established. Whatever country you may be believing in, whatever country you may be proud of, you will see the bad things in that country and you will try to improve that. You will not be identified with the bad. 

This is the greatest thing of the Satya Yuga, that it exposes, and you do not support something that is wrong, which is being done as an aggression – you don’t accept. And once you don’t accept that, then you start becoming one with the people who are one with you. And they all believe in the same thing, their ideas are the same, their thinking is the same, their joy is the same, and they enjoy each other very much.

They become one, and this oneness has to be established fully in Sahaja Yoga. Some people who are only interested in making money, who are interested in getting a good crowd or some sort of a thing of a very low level, cannot. Those who are in Sahaja Yoga to find wives for themselves or husbands for themselves, are not.

This spirituality grows with humility. And the humility of Ganesha is told by His venture once, when His Mother asked Him that, “The one who will go round the Earth three times, I’ll give Him a present.” So Ganesha thought, “Who is greater than My Mother? Not this Earth.” He had a small little rat on which He used to travel. This shows that He was so humble: on a rat He could travel, no pressure on the rat. While His brother Kartikeya had a peacock which could fly, so He knew He cannot go round the world and win over His brother. So He just went round His Mother three times, and He got the present.

This shows one thing, that speed is not the way of success. You have to slow down your speed. Apart from that, you have to understand what is the most important thing, as He understood: the most important thing is to love your Mother, to respect your Mother, and know that She is the highest, She is the greatest. And that is how He has been expressed within ourselves. Once that happens, your spirituality grows.

I hope you will work it out this way now, Shri Ganesha, and start an ekakarita.

I don’t like people writing letters against their leaders, against this man, against that man. That’s not good. There’s no need. If you just can be forgiving, and keeping one with each other. Try to get more people, and more people. You cannot separate anyone as saying that they are condemned, they are no good. Try to get them. With your forgiveness, with your sense of chastity, things will improve.

So this exclusiveness also should be given up, which perhaps comes from a kind of a sense of insecurity, I think. It is Shri Ganesha! If they are the wrong type of people, He drives them out. So don’t get frightened of them, and don’t get upset with them. Try to be one, one, and try to be more attracting people to yourself, keeping them to you, trying to manage them, and look after them.

I hope you will all meditate now after this to develop your Ganesha qualities, and develop that power of chastity, and also of peace and security.

May God bless you.