Importance of a Guru
“A Guru has already climbed the Ladder to Heaven.
If we sincerely follow him,
there are good chances that we too will get there.”
I was fortunate to find a Guru when I was 25 years old. A Guru is one who takes his disciple from 'Gu' to 'Ru' – from darkness to light. If one is on a Spiritual journey and one is climbing the Ladder to Heaven, one needs a Spiritual coach. Just like we need a coach to teach us anything important in life, it is impossible to evolve Spiritually without a Guru. This is because the subject of God and heaven is not easy to understand. Only a genuine Guru can lead us forward.
How does one find a Guru? When a true believer loves God, the grace of the Divine leads him to a Spiritual Master, a Guru. Age does not matter, and somebody may find a Guru when they are a teenager, and somebody else when they are over 80. It is a well-known saying that 'when the disciple is ready, the Guru will appear'. However, the disciple must be ready in all aspects to find a Guru. Not everybody is fortunate to find a Guru in their lifetime. A Guru is a manifestation of the Divine. He is God on earth. In the ancient days, there were genuine Gurus. But in today's world, anybody may appoint themselves to be a self- proclaimed Guru. One must be very careful not to find a wrong Guru because this may lead them to their Spiritual downfall.
What is the difference between a Guru and a 'genuine' Guru? A genuine Guru seeks nothing from us. He only wants to lead us forward on the Spiritual path. He has himself climbed the Ladder and has realized the Truth. Normally, a true Guru would himself have a Spiritual Master who has coached him to realize the Truth.
My Master was God's greatest gift to me. His name was J.P. Vaswani, but we used to fondly call him Dada. After traversing the earth for about 100 years, in July 2018, just 20 days before he could turn 100, he left his human form.
Dada coached me for over 25 years. He came into my life while I was busy making money and was a staunch believer in Lord Shiva. He encouraged my faith and helped me grow my relationship with God. For the first 10 years, he guided me on how to live life as an ethical human being, helping me build my belief, my faith, and my hope. Then he encouraged me on my journey of doing humanitarian, inspirational, and religious work. Whenever I had a problem, I would take it to him. To me, he was not just a Spiritual Master but also my life coach. He had a solution to all my problems. Then, one day, he advised me to shut down my business and to move forward in my Spiritual life. I was shocked at first. But I thank God that I followed my mentor's advice. I shut shop and started doing Humanitarian, Inspirational, and Spiritual work that I was passionate about.
Years passed and I lived a blissful life. When my Guru saw that I was happy and content, he provoked me one day and asked me, “Are you just going to live till you die? Or are you going to go on a quest and find out who you are and why you are here? What is your purpose of life?” I was shaken with my Guru's provocation. For 20 years, he had not pushed me to do anything. It was the first time that he had asked me to go on a quest. He called it a Talaash. I did not even know the meaning of realization. I had no clue that I was living in ignorance. I was 46 years old and my life had evolved with belief and I had grown with prayer, faith, hope, and trust. When I started my business, there was enthusiasm. It was only when I was 46, that my Master pushed me to go on a quest. He was the one who taught me the importance of silence.
My Guru made me realize that we human beings live in ignorance. While less than 1% of the world is visually blind, 99% of the world is Spiritually blind. He introduced me to the concept of Maya, illusion and made me understand that all that was happening around us was nothing but a big Cosmic Drama. Little did I know that finding a Guru is an important step on the Ladder to Heaven. It is a Guru who takes us to the 11th step of overcoming ignorance. Without my Guru, I would have just lived and died. I would have never climbed a Ladder that would take me to God. I would have lived believing in the mythology of religion, and never discovered the truth about who God is, where God is and what God is. One day, when I questioned my Guru about why he never stopped me from praying to Lord Shiva and why he prayed to his Guru, although he believed that God is formless, God is not a statue or a saint, he gave me a profound answer. He said, “I do not pray to my Guru, I pray through my Guru. You too,” he said, “must pray through Lord Shiva.” God is omnipresent – present everywhere, omnipotent – all-powerful and omniscient – knows everything. We must learn to surrender to the Divine.
My Guru was an epitome of humility. He used to always say, “We are nothing. God is everything.” It is because of him that I was inspired to start the ultimate journey of Spirituality. Without him, I wouldn't be able to write this book, 'The Ladder to Heaven'. At most, I would be able to write about the power of faith and hope.
My mentor opened the door for me to a Spiritual life. For 46 years, I was religious. He made me graduate in Spirituality. His pushing me to go on a quest for the truth, was his greatest gift to me. For 2 years, I left all my work and went into the mountains, spending time in silence and contemplation and scanning all the possible books that I could lay my hands on. I believed it was both the grace of the Guru and the blessings of the Divine, that by the time I was 48 years old, I realized the Truth. These two years in retreat, in the mountains, made me overcome the ignorance that I lived with and started my 'real' ascent to heaven. Not a heaven in the skies, but the 'real' heaven that I discovered within the temple of my heart. I call this the 11th step on the Ladder to Heaven - Overcoming Ignorance.
Importance of a Guru
TAKEAWAYS