In
Celebration of Yogi Bhajan
In
Memory of His Passing
From Ek Ong Kaar Kaur Khalsa
Wahe Guru Ji Ka Khalsa, Wahe Guru Ji Ki Fateh.
Sat Nam.
In the days since Yogi Bhajan, also known as the Siri Singh
Sahib, left his body, I've watched our community struggle
and grow into the responsibility that he left on our shoulders
collectively. It has and continues to be a very human process.
Each person sorting through their own memories of him and
the teachings he left behind, striving to come to some conclusions
about what we are without his physical presence here to guide
us. And what we can reasonably expect to become.
Out of love, devotion and reverence for the amazing gift that
he was to us, I have often heard in the last few years, "There
will never be another person like him." "We'll have
to collectively become 10 times greater than him - no one
person will be able to do what he did." "How can
there ever be another?" And in those voices, I hear the
grief and the longing. Students honoring a unique soul - a
Powerful Light - who came to the earth for such a brief period
of time and who spread the technology of Kundalini Yoga and
the practice of Sikh Dharma to every continent in the world.
Yet, as a student, it has not sat well with me - these protestations.
I remember the Siri Singh Sahib saying over and over again
that the minimum requirement of a student was to become ten
times greater than the teacher. He never said "collectively."
He said, "minimum requirement." And in the private
conversations that have no public record, the memory of how
great he was, has perhaps, created in us a fear. A fear of
how daunting it would be to even try to become ten times greater.
And how easy it is to resort to the human habit of looking
at a great soul as some kind of god, as some kind of deity
- who was special, who was different, and who no one else
could ever hope to match.
It is, in its own way, a challenge to our psyche as we cross
this thresh-hold from Pisces to Aquarius. That we in our grief
and mourning deify the man, and proclaim that there shall
never be another equal to him. Even though it goes against
the very grain of his teachings. Where he said that he was
not special, that he was not different, that any of us
could realize what he realized. That it was our destiny to
become that great. And in retrospect, when we honor him by
saying, "No one will ever match him," somewhere
deep inside my heart I wonder if in reality that's not the
greatest insult, the greatest slap in the face we could give?
1000 days after his passing, in my meditation this morning,
something opened up and I saw the trick behind it. The rub,
as Shakespeare would say. It's difficult sometimes to put
these visions into words. But in honor of him, let me have
at least a little bit of courage to try.
I remember the Siri Singh Sahib saying so many times that
whatever he did had nothing to do with him at all. It wasn't
by his own will or his own ego, by his own machinations or
own desires that he became what he became. He gave himself
to the Divine - and that Divine Hand took his life and created
something magnificent out of it. Something awe-inspiring and
wonderful. All he had to do was to surrender to it - and keep
surrendering, stay surrendered and allow that Power to guide
and create it all.
The Guru says that the Divine has no limits. So when we say
there will never be another like him, we are really cursing
ourselves. Saying that the Divine has a limit. That the Divine
could never do better than him. That the Divine could only
make a life like that once a century or once an Age.
But Guru says the Divine has no limits. So if we in purity
of heart - each one of us - give ourselves to the Divine completely
in that same state of surrender; if we follow the words of
the Guru, "Mind, body and earthly possessions they all
belong to Thee," then what limit is there in what the
Creator can create with our lives?
What limit is there in what we can each of us become individually?
Why not collectively be a billion times greater than him?
Why are we limiting that Unlimited God - when everything he
taught us, everything he sacrificed in order to teach us -
was to give us the chance to realize that Unlimited God within
ourselves?
It isn't that by our own ego we can become anything. Or by
our own manipulations and machinations we can achieve anything.
We can't. But we can surrender ourselves completely to the
Unlimited One and in that way - 100 people, 1000 people, a
million people could become 10 times, 100 times, a billion
times greater than him. In the Will of the Divine.
Isn't that what's needed right now in the world? A nation
of people who can do what he did - and more?
It's the prayer I hold for all of us as we cross this threshold
of the 1000 days. That we experience and realize the Unlimited
One within ourselves and within each other. That we let ourselves
speak, project, pray, act and serve so that we do not live
in the shadow of a memory of a great man. But rather - like
a million suns, trust the Guru's teachings and burst into
the experience of our own Light - to be a guiding force for
love, healing and peace in a dark and frightening world.
May you find the Unlimited One within your own heart and allow
it to create you to become whatever It chooses you to become.
All Love in the Divine,
SS Ek Ong Kaar Kaur Khalsa
July 2, 2007
Click
here for the, 'How To Become 10 Times Greater,' video.
"Synergy:
When 1 plus 1 equals 11." -- Hari Singh
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Early
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Kundalini
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