The first time I met Jivanjili was at the wedding of two of our Sangha members. A big wedding cake was standing on a table, and the bride asked the guests: “Who will cut the cake?” Without further ado, a woman stepped forward and started to divide the cake into equal pieces. She did it easily.
This is a good example of the way I often perceive Jivanjili, just doing what has to be done, without hesitating.

Throughout her life Jivanjili has been confronted with great challenges, finding her way, her wisdom and living life as it comes in each moment.
I asked her to explain how she was able to cut that wedding cake so accurately.

Jivanjili: Yes, I remember that day. I didn’t know anyone in the wedding party, and I hadn’t really looked around and seen how many people were present.
How was it possible to cut the cake into the exact number of parts? The bottom line is that I don’t know. There was just a wedding cake that needed to be cut.

So I stood up, took the knife and started cutting the cake. I remember that I was cutting many pieces, someone was holding a cake plate where piece after piece was placed and handed out to the guests.
When I was nearly finished, I suddenly realized what I was doing. I thought: “Oh my God, how many people are here?” When I handed over the last piece of cake, someone said: “This piece is for you, everyone is served now.”
It was completely intuitively right.

It is my experience that when “I” need to know or “do” something, the action that is required reveals itself naturally. On the other hand, when I doubt that “I know”, or I doubt that my skill on a “personal” level is lacking, I find myself confused and inhibited and this is very stressful. This indicates result-oriented attitudes: How should I behave? What will they think of me? Will they approve? Such attitudes are futile, as one person may find a certain behavior charming, while another finds the same behavior irritating ad infinitum.

S: Can you say that living intuitively surpasses all other strategies?
Yes, in a way we could say that. Events have occurred so quickly in this lifetime, that I have never really had the time to look for what was “right” or “wrong”, logical or illogical.

S: One might say today that in a way this has been a benediction.
Yes, in a way it has been. You know when the fire burns you have to find the exit. It has always been so in my life. I once asked an astrologer: “What did I do in other lifetimes in order to have this kind of life?” He said - whether it is true or not, I don’t know, but the concept appealed to me - “You have been so dedicated to burn through in this lifetime, that you took five karmas at once. You found a place to be born where you could not sit one second safely in one spot”. Always throughout my life, from childhood on, as soon I started to relax, something devastating happened and the entire situation shifted. The illusion of finding stability anywhere never got the chance to root. (smile) So I knew at an early age very quickly that everything comes and goes. I learned that I could be very wrong in one moment, or very right in another, depending on the dominant opinion or mood. In any event, it became clear to me that it was impossible to please everyone, especially my mother.
So I had to look inward for integrity in the heart.

S: Did you ever feel overwhelmed by your life situation or think you were a victim?
No, I didn’t. Although I have three sisters and a brother, I think I have been in the frontline. My family was not an average family. I don’t know if the average family exists. I don’t think so. When you use the word “average”, a comparison is immediately implied. My parents have not been able to protect and nourish us; they were preoccupied by their own lives.

I was brought up in a home where we learned that ‘the show must go on’, and when something fell apart, I seemed to be the only one that took responsibility and made it possible for the ‘show to go on’. Maybe that’s what made me stand up that day and cut the wedding cake. It had to be done, so I did it.

S: As a child you acquired the ability to be without knowing what would happen the next moment. This now appears to be a very useful tool.
Yes, very much so. I could never plan what I was going to do or count on anything happening because my mother always interfered. She could not stand us being at ease for a while. I think she had to break in; this is mind control. Harmony implies freedom of mind and she was very afraid of that. As children we were not allowed to talk to each other; we were not allowed to go to our own rooms because she couldn’t control us there.

S: Would you say you were a challenge for your mother?
Yes, very much so and there is a beautiful gem in that. Although she counted on my presence much of the time, she also said it was a big mistake that I had been born. She said it was my duty to go about without being noticed. She said she didn’t want to be reminded of my existence in any way, shape or form. There is beauty in this, because it brings the presence completely into focus and in the moment. There was danger all the time. I had to be alert, to know where she was at all times and take care that I was not there. No wavering of the mind was allowed.

I once read stories about Zen masters. I read about how the monks would be sleeping in the night and the Master could come into their room and a sword would come swooping down on their pillows. If your head was not gone in a second, it was cut off. In the same way my mother has perhaps been a most compassionate Zen Master for me.

S: How were you able to handle this? Many people in that situation would have gone crazy.
I believed my mother when she made me out to be so bad or even disgusting, but I also looked inside myself to see how bad I really was, and the deeper I searched, the lesser I found. So I learned at an early age that there is something inside of me that cannot be owned and cannot be destroyed, something profound. I learned she could not really destroy me and I soon started to feel compassion for her, because I saw that she was in so much pain. I also told her that I loved her and this frightened her very much.
It is possible that my indestructibility may have incited her to be on my back all the time. It was an intense training, day and night!

A boundless peaceful place
S: What events, or stepping stones, brought you to be the one you are here and now?
I cannot omit anything; it maybe eating a hard-boiled egg, but I know what you mean. Before I answer your question, I would like to state once more that I have never been a victim. I have nothing to complain about.
One of the first events I can remember very vividly has to do with my mother’s desperation; she was deeply troubled.
When I was about three years old, she pushed me under water. At first I fought against her and then I remember coming into a boundless peaceful space, into stillness. I felt complete freedom. When she pulled me up, I was grasping for air. This is just a physical reflex. I remember that my first feeling on coming up for air had been of loosing that freedom. The wonder of that experience and the desire to know more about that boundless space have awakened in me forever more a deep longing and urge to continue the search. It marked the birth of “homesickness”, as I used to call it.

Universal sound
Another event that stands out in these early memories concerns my dolls. I lovingly cared for my dolls and communicated with them. One doll was called Roosje, means little Rose, and another one, Olof, a little rubber doll. I gave them all my attention. One night my mother entered my room and took one doll away. She put it way up on a cupboard. I screamed so loudly and would not stop. I remember being aware of the power of the sound and of listening to myself…the sound seemed to come from somewhere beyond me. My mother came towards me and shouted: “What is it? “And I screamed: “You wouldn’t want to sit all night long on that cupboard, would you?” She gave me my doll back! She told me later: “There was such power in your screaming that it frightened me. I had to give you back your doll”. She had been touched by this, as I was. I have never forgotten that there is a power that surpasses all boundaries…. And it does not “belong” to anyone in particular.

As in a dream
I have vivid memories of the next event. It was a profound experience. I must have been about 5 years old. I was looking at the wall, as I laid in bed in complete darkness. I saw little lights moving in many colours, passing like trains. When I tried to follow one…it disappeared in a random manner. I could not find a beginning or an end to the moving garlands of colorful lights. I also noticed that there the darkness had depth, like a void. I realized that when I touched the wall, there was not really a sense of depth. As I observed the wall night after night I thought: “Maybe the boundless void I am longing for has no depth, not even a millimeter. My senses report depth while there is none. Maybe nothing exists really, maybe it is as in a dream. Adults must know about this and they can teach me”.

S: Where was I before I was born?
When I was six years old, it was time for me to go to school. I expected to learn about life. It was not the case: we were taught a.b.c.’s and other things, not what I was looking for.

My father was a physician in the village and after I started school, many children wanted to come home with me on the first few days of the new term. I thought these children liked me very much and were my friends. My mother told me that the children were not coming for me; she said they came because their parents had told them that in the doctor’s house babies were waiting lined up in the basement. This was the local story about where children come from. My mother, however, told me how babies grow in a woman’s body, and how I was born from her womb and therefore became her daughter. I looked at her and said: “This cannot be. I cannot be your child. Where was I before I was born?” I simply knew of an endless beginning in me. She didn’t understand what I was asking, she probably didn’t even hear it and said: “Oh…God knows.”

The house of God
The village where my family lived was very religious in a dogmatic and rigid way. Some people didn’t even want to be treated by my father, because our family did not attend the church. Yet, somewhere I had learned that the church was the house where God lived. So, one Sunday morning I decided to go to church by myself. At age 6, I sneaked out of the house and went. I was eager to find my answers from God, since no one seemed to be able to tell me what I wanted to know. In church I only found people with serious long faces, all dressed in black. Nothing was as I expected… after a while I felt that church was not the place to get answers… silently I sneaked out again. I have never told this to anyone. That day I understood that I was alone.

Meditation in the graveyard
I started to seek the silence of the graveyard. I would sit for hours…with the feeling that I was very close to home…. I have spent hours and hours quenching my “homesickness” in the stillness of cemeteries. In retrospect, this must have been a kind of spontaneous Vipassana.
I now understood that something was really “off” with me. (smile)

“Studying life”
I never gave up the search for answers. When I was ten years old I asked for a medical encyclopedia for my birthday, thinking that I could get answers by studying the cells of the body. I got the ten volumes and I read them all. But understanding the mystery of life still eluded me.

No time for love
After high school I went to nursing school hoping for an understanding of the mystery of life through the births and deaths one could glimpse at a hospital. But I did not find anything resembling the love that I wished to give. I remember hearing a doctor tell a patient that she had cancer. He gave her the information and then left almost immediately. She was frightened and wept, so I went to sit with her a moment, exchanging a few words. Just then the head nurse came in and said: “Oh, I see you have nothing to do; don’t waste your time, go help somewhere else.” Being human was called doing nothing, a waste of time.
My nursing career was short lived after this incident.
By this time I was cured of many illusions: not this – not that.

The organizer
By grace I got a very good job as a manager for a film company. We were responsible for the organization of a big annual international film festival, which was attended by thousands of people and which involved the whole city centre. It was like the birthday cake, I just accepted the job and did it without ever asking myself if I was capable of doing it. When I look back on this period of my life, I cannot say how it happened. Ideas just came to me, took form and were executed. Through this experience I learned that when the question is there, the answer must also be there. It has nothing to do with how much one knows. I understood that there is a quality in action that is beyond evaluation on a “personal” level.

Walking on the edge supported only by intuition, one does not always know.
Consciousness is a complete and spontaneous occurrence; you can never really know anything or control an outcome. My experience is that freedom from premeditated results and the fear of failure, or striving for success, makes for the emergence of just action. Being free from those mental burdens brings clarity and capability far beyond what we might possibly imagine from a more limited perspective.
Action that comes from intuition is authentic and carefree, yet this does not at all imply acting carelessly. The contrary is even true…

S: What other major stepping stone do you wish to evoke for us?
Marriage and the amazing experience of giving birth. I have three daughters. With the conception of each child, I thought that while life is growing inside me and when I give birth, I would surely know something that cannot be known from books alone. Some of the mystery might be revealed in this profound experience of existence. smile)
And indeed, motherhood has been rich and intense. In giving birth, I experienced pain from a plane that matched the universal power that I had seen as a child. I also experienced a deep joy that can only be called universal and which is indescribable. When I held my first baby in my arms, I looked into her eyes and said: “Your name is Sacha”. This was very profound and spontaneous. I looked in her little eyes and I saw nothing and said to her: ”Your name is Sacha. I can never own you, you only came into my arms to be supported and guided on your unknown path, until you can walk without my hands behind your little butt.”

In a way, all eyes show emptiness and energy; the way I look in them can be a little different, showing a big secret.
Yes it is amazing! Emptiness is potential and completely impersonal. You can see it. I have looked into eyes many times, I was and still am fascinated! I have looked into the eyes of sheep- horses- cows- birds- flowers… I continued looking all the way until I could see only One eye! I was also amazed by the way puppies looked up into my eyes after opening their eyes ten days after birth. I wondered how it was possible, my eyes were so small from their perspective and yet they sought mine and we melted into each other. The light is just upon the light. My greatest wish is that one day we may all look at each other with empty eyes, with eyes of pure love. In this way everything can be reflected just as it is without evaluation or invalidation.

Looking with empty eyes is unconditional love. All details are completely irrelevant in that perspective.

No social butterfly
After the birth of our three children, my husband graduated and specialized in radiology. He was quite successful and was invited to seminars all over the world. For a period of one year the University of California at Davis invited us to come to the US with the whole family. On our second day in California I was invited to a tea party for wives of faculty members. The party was held in ‘Alice in Wonderland’ style. I was pinned with a badge with a green frame, which meant ‘newcomer’. Everyone approached me with a big smile. All said the same greeting: “Where are you from?” And before I could answer their question, they were already gone. One woman came up to me and I heard her say: “Look, how cute she is, now she is going to be a social butterfly.” I smiled, took my children and left the ‘party’. When my husband came home, I asked him if it would be important for his career for me to attend these parties. He said “No”, which was a mistake I think, but he didn’t realize it at the time. Freed of social obligations, I went to art school and began ballet classes again. There I met someone who told me about a communication course in scientology. I was immediately attracted by it. I went to the course and got a book by L. Ron Hubbard. All the domino pieces seemed to fall into place on reading that book. I had finally stumbled upon information that resonated deeply inside me, something I felt I knew. Everything I studied could be applied to life and this appealed to me very much. It was not a theory and I was completely taken by this approach. I went so fast through the study materials that I obtained a scholarship from the scientology organization. Scientology courses are quite expensive, and I was thus able to study later in Amsterdam nearly for free. I studied everything I could lay my hands on. I got never “glued” to the church of scientology, as it is called. It is impossible for me to be a “member” of anything. The whole study has been one great recognition and a joy for a thirsty heart.

It sometimes takes time to make the connection between that what you already know and the concepts that are used to describe these experiences.
I fully agree. I was born in 1945. For instance, nowadays the word ‘meditation’ is known everywhere. I began to hear about Krishnamurti, Da Free John, the Masters of the East, and I was very touched and impressed. Being introduced to the concept of “enlightenment” seemed to be the ultimate crescendo of possibility for the mind in the human species. My heart’s True Quest was finally catching the scent of “home”. I was surprised to find that I could not share these things at all with my husband or with our friends. They were all intellectuals; I thought their intelligence would make them want to learn about life’s dynamics and beyond. Who cannot be amazed looking up in the stars at night? Who cannot be amazed feeling one’s own heartbeat? But they were more interested in Beaujolais Primeur wine than in what I had to say. So I felt lonely and suffocated. This situation finally ended in divorce, leaving me with only my three daughters and the scriptures.
This was a huge stepping stone to leave behind. New beginnings once more…

Meeting Osho
Osho came in my life through a video of him that touched me very deeply. Speaking of empty eyes…….. oh….
This transparent being radiated such an empty potency. I felt deep love for Osho and bowed down to his feet. I wrote Osho telling him that I had studied all scientology materials in awe and wonder, but that now I felt like a walking encyclopedia while my heart felt like dancing in love. He gave me the name Prem Savaab, which means ‘Love is reality’. This is a stepping stone isn’t it? I finally found the True Master!

A confirmation.
Yes. And then the next stepping stone appeared when I heard that Osho had left his body. That was a very profound moment for me. I didn’t know that he was leaving his body. I was in Holland, but I remember that someone was sitting with me on the couch and suddenly it felt like my skull was opening and I was simply lifted out of my body. Just completely in transparent boundlessness, like in the drowning situation I experienced as a child. The one who was sitting next to me got so scared and grabbed me. A few hours later we heard that Osho had died. I wept and at the same time I felt that he could not really leave. I understood at a profound level that awareness is not dependent on anything, not even a body! I had realized that inside and outside do not really exist.

The last meditation method that Osho left us was called ‘Mystic Rose Meditation’. The method consists of one week of laughing for three hours a day, one week of weeping for three hours a day and one week of silent meditation for three hours a day. I went to India to give prânam to Osho’s Maha Samadhi and signed up for the meditation course. The last week, the week of silent meditation, had been in the air-conditioned glass corridor in Osho’s garden. As I was sitting there in deep peaceful silence, a swan came up to the glass, right in front of me. Spreading his wings wide open, I heard a loud and clear male voice inside saying: “This is the quality of your being! Don’t settle for less.” I knew right away that I was not going to ignore that voice; the time of compromise and negotiation was over! Back in Holland, I remember sitting at my table with empty hands in all possible ways and said: “God, okay I am dead and done even when it brings me water and bread, now You tell me what to do.” From there on people came to me to talk about their lives, and meditation groups were started, and although I didn’t “do” anything, this just happened. It felt like this no-work, was really Osho’s work, and through the refined atmosphere of the whisper of love I experienced His guidance.

The fruit is ripe
This went all on for a couple of years, until there came a moment that I started to be frightened and doubts arose about my activities. After all I didn’t really know what I was doing, and more and more people seemed to surrender at my feet. I saw that people “loved” me and I couldn’t really see any reality in the one they took for real. I could not find a “me” for a long time. What was I doing with those people? It felt even like a sin to work in the position that I found myself in…I felt that I might be even fooling people. I was desperate and called out to the sky: “Osho, please speak to me with a loud real voice for once!” A friend who found me in that desperate condition proposed to drive to the Osho center in Amsterdam to take a break from what I was doing. Arriving there, we sat in the big room all by ourselves until a sannyasin came in with the request to leave because the space was rented out that night. I didn’t feel like moving one inch and stayed. Some more people came in and sat… and then a woman stepped in. I just saw her big toe entering the space and I got a shock: I saw myself. She took place in front of the audience and began speaking. She entered my subject immediately without me speaking a word! I felt such an utter completion, that I didn’t even hear words, all went blank. The only words that came after a while were: “I am seeing myself in you”. And I didn’t utter them, didn’t even move….I was speechless. After everyone left, I still didn’t move and when someone who knew me, came to me, I could only mumble: “Who is that woman?” He said: “Her name is ShantiMayi and she is an enlightened Master. Her domicile is Rishikesh, India, in the winter time”. I just knew she was my Master. So I booked a ticket to visit her in India; I wanted to speak to her, to tell her that she is my Master, although Osho is my Master; now what was I to do? Somehow I knew that Osho gave me the greatest gift he could give and that was ShantiMayi. The day after my arrival I was able to have an appointment with ShantiMayi. I kneeled down at her feet and said: “You are my Master!” “Yes”, she replied and our eyes touched as One. It has all been so obvious and strong, that I have not second guessed for a moment, ever! In Rishikesh, I also heard for the first time that the name ‘Sacha’ was the name of the lineage of ShantiMayi. In the first conversation I had with ShantiMayi, I told her that I had given this name to my eldest daughter. She said: “It is all much bigger than you think”. Again immediately I understood that one cannot conceptualize the depth of the heart. This is truly beautiful to realize.
A few months later a postcard from Her arrived in the mail. I received it on my birthday! She wrote:
“It is our turn in consciousness to lead humanity back to humanness. All we have to give is Love, to those who are undeserving as well. This makes love more precious. If you would ask for a name, the name I would give you is Jivanjili. It means: My life is an offering to the Self within, and a prayer as well. Live and Love, ShantiMayi.”
My heart rejoiced in gratitude and bliss. The name Jivanjili carries the finest resonance.

So this are my stepping-stones roughly.
And there will be always stepping-stones…. Utterly empty and eternal. This is the meaning of the mantra Gaté gaté paragaté parasamgaté bodhi svaha.

S: Did you ask her about feeling that you were fooling people in your work?
Yes, something was still lingering from my childhood, the idea that I was so bad and a born sinner by definition… (smile) I remember saying to Her: “I want to be very honest with you. I am not real and in fact I do not even exist. I am afraid that I am in fact crazy… I am neither this not that.”
And she looked deeply into my eyes and said: “You are on the right track.” And at the same moment I knew she was right, although I did not have an explanation. I felt so completely lost. She was my saviour. The first satsang after this meeting, she was throwing oranges as prasad… she threw one right into my hands, exclaiming: “The fruit is ripe!” I pretended not to have heard this. I would rather miss it for lifetimes rather than ‘understand’ something one second too early.

S: My conditioning was to think I could comprehend a lot. I wasted much time, lovely in a way also, to try to comprehend that which cannot be comprehended. It is a paradox, because it also has something to do with comprehension and at the same time it was impossible to get it.
Yes, you can come a long way with comprehension. The deeper the understanding, the vaster the love… until there is only One, only Love. We can go a long, long way with investigating and understanding…down the molecules…Let’s make it very simple: As soon as you search for the root of the potato on your plate…its origin, you see it never ends, rests, and you are lost in understanding very quickly. How could we ever understand the wetness in the water, or vice versa? No beginning, no end…all disappears in the One….in None. This is the name ShantiMayi gave to our humble center…One in None Sacha Center.

S: In a way this is a different kind of understanding, I wanted to get it, I wanted to fix clarity in a ‘deep’ concept, I wanted to know who I am and I couldn’t. Like you wanted to find yourself as a child.
Yes, but then there arises another understanding, a notion of oneness, of a potential beyond all appearances. I want to make a distinction between intellectual understanding and intelligence. The intelligence the Gayatri Mantra is calling upon is a kind of intuitive understanding and the deeper this goes, the more transparent everything becomes. The heart is a wide open sky, getting more and more clear, because it goes hand in hand, intuitive understanding and ‘the way’ of the heart. This is why it is so important for the student to pick up the key that the Master offers and to apply it. It brings refinement upon refinement. Picking up the tools that are offered by the Master without analysing is the most delicious gift one can give to the heart. The heart delights in this bending and yielding quality, as it is boundless by nature. In this receptive and fluid dance, True Nature reveals itself without questioning logic or illogic. You cannot be fooled by someone who understands on an intellectual, learned level: just look how one is doing in life. Anyone can say anything, you just see how someone pours a cup of tea. That says it all.

S: The offering of tea
ShantiMayi has sanctified you to give satsang. Can you say something about that?
Yes, I certainly can and at the same time I cannot really speak of it. The whole subject remains in the unspeakable realm in the widest sense. But I can tell you how it went. In the summer of 2001, ShantiMayi invited three of her disciples to come to Terre de Sacha, our ashram in the French Pyrenees; these were Amitabha, Susan and myself. Susan and I traveled together, and as we did not know each other so very well, we shared a rare common destiny on this journey, that is certain.

ShantiMayi invited the three of us to take tea. This was set in Her backyard under the one tree that always calls in a whisper to take place underneath it. We were offered tea in little cups and ShantiMayi handed these with a grace and a simplicity that can only be defined as Pure Loving Light. Time after time our cups were refilled…. while we were laughing and talking about all kinds of cheerful subjects; nothing special… and yet… oh…!
We did not get any specific assignments… we were offered tea.
The tea of Bodhidharma poured in a cup that nobody can hold on to…
What a profound teaching…. it still brings tears to my eyes when I recall this silken touch of Her hand offering the cup of tea…. while talking and laughing was going on. All is HERE at once.

S: Differences dissolve in One heart
Holland and India are very different in culture and approach of spiritual subjects. You are part of a lineage that is rooted in India; how do you express this in Holland with your students?
When one recognizes, by grace, one’s teacher, the whole universe rejoices in that very moment. There is a profound and impersonal alchemy in such a meeting, a true mystery. How could we speak therein of East and West? How could we speak of a tradition that is separate from anything? Picture yourself in the farthest galaxy, beyond space and time, and see where East and West are located, try to see if you can detect a confined tradition. Meeting one’s Master is nor beyond logic, neither is it illogical… it is a meeting in the ONE heart, and beyond. The closest analogy would be to imagine the iron that is helplessly attracted to the magnet. Could the iron consider or care about the shape of that magnet? This is awe, wonder and beauty. It implies immediate freedom from choice or choicelessness. East and West, tradition of whatever kind… it vanishes in such recognition.

The Sacha lineage carries the Gayatri Mantra dear to the heart. We chant the mantra for the awakening of all sentient beings. It is my experience that on hearing the mantra, the students are immediately drawn to Her resonance. It is the resonance of Savitur, the Sun… the Sun that shines on East and West equally; the Sun does not know any distinction. It is called unconditional love and by the word “unconditional” is meant “inclusive”, without any condition or exclusion. The student feels “HOME” in this light. This home, this heart, does not experience an opposition.

Through my website, I have students all over the world…East and West and I cannot remember this has ever been an issue.

On visiting the Dalai Lama a few years ago, I heard him say: “ There are many Dharma Doors; the essence is the same.” Om Mani Padme Hum: the jewel is in the lotus of the heart.

Inspiration
S: What inspires you now?
What it is that inspires me I cannot really define. It is as mysterious as the Guru-disciple relation… I am living in complete neutrality and in fact I feel most of the time “blank”. Yet, I have seen that this implies openness without boundaries… Inspiration occurs herein in unknowable spontaneity and is surprisingly fresh and enthusiastic. So, when you ask me, I must answer that I do not feel much of a “drive” that can be defined. I used to think that something should occur like: “OH, I wish to live for the awakening of all sentient beings!” The vow of the Bodhisattva, which I have taken, speaks in these words. Yet I have not been able to find such a sentiment that I could call “mine”. The word “enthusiasm” means “living in God” (Theos means God) , and this can be very subtle and barely detectable if at all……. this inspires me, as it cuts right through any notion of “me” and makes one live with the head bowed down and ever empty hands! Now I can say that I am simply breathing and open and willing to be a simple servant of a lofty concept “Waking Up to Sacha Consciousness”, yet the sweetness of my heart calls it ShantiMayi, just because this brings a nectar on the tongue that cannot be limited by anything. It is She who speaks the satsang in this light.

I have observed that a spontaneous freshness brings about the greatest enthusiasm when students come with a thirsty heart and expose a certain ripeness and eagerness to come along on the journey to look through error and false notion. When students feel so inclined to formulate a sharp question and are willing to investigate truthfully, it feels so utterly vibrant and there is such aliveness when one meets an eager heart. I just love the word “tapasia”; it means the heart’s desire. There is nothing sweeter under the Sun than to see students opening like the lotus flower and to witness their diamond heart revealing itself. There is nothing sweeter for the Heart than to see itself dis-covering upon itself the quality of boundless empty flexibility. And yet, I cannot see a constricted inspiration and the moment is eternal… all seasons are inspired to be exactly what they are in that moment. This is the awe and wonder beyond comprehension, so rich, and yet completely empty.