Miracles of nature effortlessly unfold around us day after day. Sunflowers look to the sun, happily nod and bloom. Birds sing, chirp and warble joyfully! Flowers blossom, grass grows, hearts beat, children laugh. Caught up in the nitty-gritties of living, we miss these pulsating expressions of love. Therefore we have dedicated just one day of the year to ‘love’ as we know it. What about the rest?? So what is love? Revered master Anandmurti Gurumaa in her thought-provoking talk on ‘Divine Love’ pithily puts it, “If love is not playing its music in your heart, you don’t know what living is.”
Gurumaa makes us question our beliefs about this universally used yet much misunderstood, overused and even abused word. Worldly love is about infatuation, attraction, attachment. It involves relationships, obligations and responsibilities. Yet in an ever-changing world, relationships break at the drop of a hat, obligations are forgotten and responsibilities are neglected. One becomes a beggar for love, wanting it from friends, family member, strangers and even pets but worldly love always falls short of our expectations. So is there ‘other-worldly’ love, which we know nothing about?? Indeed there is - divine love.
The mystic Bulleh Shah says in one of his much-loved poems: you may pour over holy books till pages tear, wear out your rosary beads or thresholds of worship, yet divine love may not grace your heart. One ponders – if it really exists, then how does one experience it? Mystics tell us that before life ebbs away, find a master who will show you how to love, for she or he has trodden the path and knows what the journey entails. Revered master Anandmurti Gurumaa makes us realise that our heart is indeed a precious possession, and if we wish to be happy, fulfilled, then we need to be wise, to discriminate as to whom we will give ours – the world or the Lord.
With the grace of the master, realisation dawns that the ephemeral cannot ever know the eternal. Then one turns within, passionately seeking the Beloved, offering the lotus of the heart at the feet of the master, for only the Lord, the master, loves unconditionally. One prays whole-heartedly for this benediction to fill one’s being. Describing this state, a poet poignantly appeals, “Oh breath, flow gently, your movement disturbs my prayer...”
Ones who have drunk the wine divine are fortunate indeed, for they become love itself - radiant, splendorous, luminous. Every breath imbued with the love of the Beloved, their heart joyfully sings its song, sharing its melody with one and all.
