घाट-घाट राम बसत हैं भाई, बिन ज्ञान नहीं देत दिखाई

This morning I was just listening to this Bhajan:

मेरा आपकी कृपा से सब काम हो रहा है,

करते हो तुम कन्हैया, मेरा नाम हो रहा है।

I wondered whose work is getting done. Is it truly surrender to the divine will, or just using the divine to get whatever the ego wants? What if things don't happen the way we want them to? What if we get a disease, or there is the death of a close family member, or we get trouble in our career, or we face a crisis in a relationship? Will we still say, "With your blessings, my work is happening"?

The moment I think about "my work", the ego is the centre of our existence. It's very difficult to understand the game ego plays with us. It keeps playing in many different forms, and spirituality and surrender are among its ugliest plays. When somebody suffers from blood cancer, the problem is that whenever doctors transfuse blood into their body, the healthy blood also turns into the same cancerous blood. Whatever volume of healthy blood you transfuse into the patient's body, the cancer cells convert it into cancerous blood. The healthy blood becomes the food of the cancerous cells. Who is the patient fighting against? His own body? The same thing happens in autoimmune disorders. The body's immunity becomes overactive and starts killing healthy cells. If doctors suppress the immune system, other bacteria and viruses can make their way into the body; if they don't, the healthy cells are killed. 

The ego works the same way in the human body. Years of conditioning around "I" and "mine". We look at every event and everything with the same thoughts. "What is there in it for me?" The "me" is limited, and that's why it rejects anything it doesn't find interesting. The "me" will not like to read the warning on the packet of cigarettes or the warning about the harm done by alcohol. It will not like to see what "greed" is doing to "me". Like a stubborn child hell-bent on getting the chocolate, "me" will close its eyes to the damage being done to the teeth. "Me" will close its eyes to the wastage of life in the pursuit of targets and goals. "Me" cannot see that what is considered responsibility comes from a deep desire for social validation. The "me" fails to see the cost of social validation. It fails to look at the possibilities. The stubborn child will not see the healthy food because his mind is fixated on the chocolate.

How do you remove the cancerous cells from the body and make it healthy? I think that is the most difficult puzzle scientists are struggling to solve. I don't have an answer. However, sanity demands that we make efforts to keep it away. When we know ego-driven ignorance is so difficult to cure, why don't we stay aware in the first place? Why don't we stay aware in our day-to-day life? When the mind starts making stories and meanings about different things, why don't we see? When our parents tell us that we need to find a match in the same community, why don't we challenge it? Why don't we ask questions about what marriage means? Is marriage about finding a partner who befits the standards of society and family, or is it about companionship? If it is about companionship, what does caste have to do with that? 

Why don't we ask ourselves questions when we set "money" at the centre of life? Last time we went abroad and spent money, how much time did that pleasure last? How many times will we keep repeating the same? Why don't we ask very fundamental questions? How long can we avoid old age? How long can we avoid death? Can we ever be completely safe? Can we ever be fully comfortable? Don't we see the irritation on the faces of people who always live in AC rooms whenever they have to face the heat? The ICU of a hospital does not distinguish between the powerful and the powerless. Both have to go through the same pain. 

If we ask even one of these questions, we will never be blinded by ego. We will always be able to see the genesis of ego-centric thoughts. The most wonderful thing about darkness is: it looks very dangerous, and the fearful mind creates millions of stories; it feels frightened and powerless when it is surrounded by darkness. However, even one ray of light is sufficient to destroy that fear. The moment we ask the right questions, they work as rays of light, and the darkness disappears. Even the worst of fears disappear with self-enquiry. 

Kabir Das ji says:

"सबमें रमै रमावै जोई, ताकर नाम राम अस होई।
घाट-घाट राम बसत हैं भाई, बिन ज्ञान नहीं देत दिखाई॥"