What Is the Difference Between a Teacher and a Guru? - 13th July, Guru Purnima, 2022

The rest of it we'll do playfully. Playfully, it's okay. I may get... I don't know about the plan, I may get like a foot pedicure or something, but that is just so funny. I mean, I understand the love and devotion behind that and I respect that and I love that. But primarily it should... if all of this is a reminder about something, it must be a reminder to that Divinity which is always available to us. And the greatest gift it has for us is that which you cannot perceive but you can find, which is your own Self. Yeah. May you all always enjoy this discovery. May you all always enjoy the inquiry. May you always enjoy your own being, your presence. May the mind's tools of boredom and frustration and progress or the lack of progress or doubt—may those not hold any strength for you. May those not hold any strength. You want the highest. If you were to want something, you want the highest. Don't settle for anything else. Highest is to not want at all. Highest is to not want at all. But if you are going to want, then want the highest.

So all blessings, all full... not just blessing, but prediction. Full prediction that all those who are truly longing for this highest in their heart, may their longing be their living insight. May that intuitive insight become so apparent that no doubt can come close to your discovery. And may you not want anything else. You're saying, what is the difference between a guru and a teacher? With the teacher, the teacher expects you to understand. The teacher wants you to hear the words, put it in the same conceptual framework that the teacher has, and accept that with your belief to be true. The teacher has a conceptual framework; he proposes that conceptual framework to you and expects you to use your belief to make that your conceptual framework. And that is how the belief system grows, like a religion. What is the difference between spirituality and that? Between a guru and a teacher like that? A guru is shining light in an impossible place. That's why Guru is the greatest absurdity there is in this universe. Because what is the Guru shining light on? That which is not perceivable, you see. That is yourself. It cannot be put in any quality, in any shape, any size.

And yet I have not met one who has come to this clear recognition, true insight about themselves, without the aid of a guru, at least of some sort. And at least from whatever I've seen. Of course, everything is possible in Consciousness, so it is possible. I am just saying I have not come across one without the grace of a Master. Like here I was, spiritual shopping, jumping from place to place, understanding so much. I could write many books based on the spiritual concepts I gathered. But till I met my Master, I did not value the insight. I did not recognize that this is the insight, this is already it. So the dissolution of the false happened in that way. And today we celebrate that aspect of your being which we call the Guru, which is pointing you to your own source. So everybody is showing you things about the world, about the phenomenal. What can show you that which is beyond phenomena, before 'I am'?

And what does it take to look? It takes a moment of being empty. Immediately, without time. All it takes is looking. But look without judgment. Look without sight. These things are impossibility for the mind. It can sound like, 'What is he saying? Look without sight. Look inside. Witness without perception.' You see, without bothering about what is being perceived. So who can share these absurdities with you? And you have to trust them enough that you hear these absurdities. That is the Guru. And you cannot hear it unless there is that trust, unless there is... imagine if you went to a seminar and the speaker in the seminar was talking like this. You'd say, 'What is this?' But you come here and something in your heart holds you here. Many of you will come and your heart has held you here, you see. And you've created different reasons, like one child created a reason saying, 'Oh, the boys in satsang are so handsome, so I just come every day because I'll get to meet these boys.' But actually it's not true, you see. It was because we need a reason for everything. We can't understand why our heart is bringing us back to satsang, you see. But we need to find the reasoning, so we say, 'Okay, it must be this,' because his words I can't understand. But the Master is saying that I can't understand, but something brings me here. So that is the first test of intuition, you see. Something brings you here, but you can't fathom why. You can't fathom.

And what happens is that if you came with a preconceived idea about what it is going to be like, most often it is blown apart because the Master doesn't dance to the tunes of anybody's projections or things like that. Even if it happens in the short term, it doesn't last. So this is the absurd thing that we celebrate today on Guru Purnima: shining light on that which cannot be seen. Shining a light on that which cannot be seen. Which mind can understand that? No mind. That is the no-mind which is being pointed to. It has to be met in a place which is beyond all conceptualization, beyond all interpretation, beyond all evaluation. And that is a big ask. So at one level I can say that the Master doesn't want anything from you, and at another level the Master wants everything from you because it's a big ask.

And this struggle—and why the relationship can seem many times like Guruji says, between the snake and the mongoose, both of equal size and therefore then stuck—is because we may have enough reverence or devotion to the Master, but also enough reverence for our notions. Then it can seem like the battle lasts long and maybe stalemate comes. But if you are truly empty, you don't value any belief. You don't value any belief. The discovery of God, the discovery of the Self, is immediate. More than immediate. Without any working, without any process of thinking. And it has always been there. This is the absurdity also. What will you discover? That which you already know, always knew, but you did not value. And that is the way we use the term recognition. Like saying that you have spent your whole life looking for a long-lost sibling, you know, but your roommate was your long-lost sibling. Like the plot of every 80s Hindi movie, you know? And then at the end what happened? You recognize your best friend is already your sibling. So what did you get? Something new? No, you just...

It has always been there. This is the absurdity also. What will you discover? That which you already know, always knew, but you did not value. And that is the way we use the term recognition. Like saying that you have spent your whole life looking for a long-lost sibling, you know, but your roommate was your long-lost sibling. Like the plot of every 80s Hindi movie, you know? And then at the end, what happened? You know, you recognize your best friend is already your sibling. So what did you get? Something new? No, you just recognized that which you already have and have always known, but you had not valued. So these kind of absurd things are on offer here.

So the Self is not a new attainment. The Self is not something new. You will recognize that which you will recognize in your heart to be your true Self. You say, 'Ah, what I took to be false, that he's my roommate, actually he turned out to be my brother.' Or what I took to be false, that I am this individual entity, the body-mind organism—actually I'm not that. And that pure awareness which is witnessing even the presence and absence of being itself, you already know this. If you did not know this in your heart, I could never show it to you because it's undescribable, indescribable. How could I show you if you did not have that knowledge already? I cannot show you the unperceivable, the indescribable, the qualityless, Nirguna. How could I show you? So I'm just showing you what you already know. That's why I don't charge. You already know it. One day you'll ask for a refund. I just want everything exactly.

This is the most absurd definition of Guru Purnima. So don't fear that which you don't know. Fear the mystery. If you run away from the mystery of your own Self, which you can never squeeze into your head, so you will never crack this mystery in your head... wait for the mystery to reveal itself and yet get deeper and deeper and, like Kabir Ji says, sweeter and sweeter. Don't know so much. Don't value the false because it seems like something you can hold on to. The truth feels like I have no legs to stand on. It can seem like a very scary thing to not know. And definitely don't know spirituality. That's the worst knowledge. Don't know spirituality. Know spirituality, you don't know your Self, because that knowledge becomes oppressive.

So many children are coming, you know, from that context. 'I have been so long in spirituality, I know so much spirituality, why is it not working? Why is it not working?' This is why it is not working. There should be no spirituality. What are the qualifications? Look at one of the greatest Gurus we've been blessed with, Nisargadatta Maharaj. What qualification? He didn't go to school a lot, yes, but he went to his Master and trusted. And that lack of conceptual knowledge probably helped.

Last tip, the last episode: don't try to frame spirituality in your way. Don't try to frame your spirituality in your way because eventually the truth of what you are will be recognized without a way. There's no way in this. Before the click, what shall be our tactic? What's your plan? What's your type of spirituality? Everybody recognizes that Self in the same way. It doesn't matter whether you've done this brand of spirituality, that brand of spirituality, how many years you've done it, what you've assimilated, not assimilated. It doesn't matter because the recognition of the Self, whichever path you may be on, whichever religion you may be on, is always the same. You see, you cannot recognize the unperceivable in two different ways. Cannot recognize the unperceivable in two different ways.

So ultimately the way is only one. There may be a million different ways to get to that way, but that doesn't matter. So remember that there are no two different ways to recognize the unperceivable. It's just not possible because then it would have to have a quality, isn't it? You see this? Or just, I'm being very academic. So that insight about yourself is the unperceivable one. Are you aware now? That 'you' which is unperceivable yet apparent as you is the only Self-recognition there is. The question, the pointer, the trigger may be different. Every Master is not going to say, 'Are you aware now?' So the trigger point may be different, and sometimes you don't even need a trigger point or a word, but the recognition is always the same. The same awareness which you are recognizing will be recognized. There is nothing else. That is the only unperceivable reality, and all perceptions, they come and go. All belief systems, don't value them so much.

And one deal I made with one of my children was that we will never suffer on behalf of that one that we cannot find. Don't suffer on behalf of the one that you cannot find. And this child, you know what he said? He said, 'But what if one day we do find that?' I say, 'Okay, from that day, suffer.' Isn't that fair? Like, why suffer on the presumed notion that one day we may realize it is true? Okay? And I love to hear it because I spent 10 years sharing this, and I must be speaking nonsense, and so like, I don't want to spend the rest of my life sharing this thing if the person actually exists, isn't it? So then you better come and tell me.

So can we, as the parting words, make this deal, all of us? No suffering on behalf of the one that we can't find. Yes? Deal? Only if you can locate the one, then suffer on their behalf. Yes.