How Do I Look at Swamiji?

In May 2015, when I first visited Swamiji in this body in ashram, on the second evening, while I was seated in front of the Garb Griha railing, a thought came in my mind: if he’s my Guru then I should get some feeling. It was based on something I had read somewhere. As Swamiji came in front – inside the railing, I experienced a spontaneous and distinct feeling of a contraction of muscle in the middle of the chest. (In devotion, if you get surge of bhav (emotion), you experience something like this.)

Clearly, my soul accepted him as my Guru. Though the mind had raise doubts once in a while, each such time I just asked it to shut up. As Swamiji says about mind, “Ghrinit se ghrinit vichar bhi man mein aa sakta hai (the most despicable thought can also come to one’s mind)”

In July 2016, a friend/colleague accompanied me to the ashram. It was his first visit. He had his doubts which only aggravated due to certain events happening around – our first discourse of that visit was the intense one in which Swamiji spoke about those events.

On the eve of Hare Krishna Kirtan, a sand mountain of doubts he had just got washed away with a gentle tied of divine grace. He has the right to share his experience in detail. The only thing I can tell is that, his soul recognized Swamiji as Sri Hari.

After that, that feeling, that recognition has stood with him during all these years – regardless of the life’s challenges, of which there was no dearth in both his personal and professional lives. I had in my mind his real experience mentioned above, when I wrote in Beware Of God:

Unless you’ve distinctly and spontaneously felt God-like emotion for a human being, do not take him or her as your personal God or Goddess.

Btw, that visit was really special. I discovered a form of my Lord within soon after the visit.

By that time, I had already read Om Swami As We Know Him, in which Sadhviji has mentioned the following:

Swami appears to you in the sentiment in which you revere Him. If He’s merely a guru to you, then He’ll play out the role most beautifully, but if He’s your God, only then and then alone will you experience His mystical and divine side. He’s all pervading.

Somewhere I felt I’d be missing out if I just took Swamiji as my Guru. Here there were multiple folks – my friend and Sadhviji – who had experienced and took him as divine. So, in my subsequent visit in late August, I had following conversation with Swamiji on the same (paraphrased as I recall):

Swamiji mei aapko Bhagavan ki tarah nahi dekhta, jaise aur log dekhte hain. (I don’t see you as Bhagavan, like others do.)

ham mein Ishwar ko dekh sakte ho, haina? (You can see God in me, right?)

Par Swamiji, fir meri progress kaise hogi? (How will I progress then?)

Balki usse to progress ruk jaati hain. Kyonki Aapko lagega ki bas ye to mil gaya hain. Hame ek ache Sant ke roop mein dekh sakte ho. (Actually, that halts the progress because then you think that I’ve found God as him. Just see me as a good saint.)

There’s no doubt that Swamiji is a divine being. As I’ve accepted him as my Guru, his words are the truth for me. He has himself said that he comes and leaves by his own will. And that’s the difference between a human being and a divine being that the former come by the force of his desires and not by his will.

Also, Swamiji has already revealed that Brahma, Vishnu and Mahesh are all positions – different individual souls who have realized/attained Ishwara tatva – occupy these positions at different point in time. Swamiji has also realized the same eternal Ishwara tatva, so if he turns out to be a direct avatara of Lord Vishnu of this universe, I wouldn’t be surprised.

So, this might get confusing at times as we don’t have the level of sight to perceive and grasp the divine play. That’s why the most important and easiest way in my opinion and understanding is:

Listen to your heart and soul and find out your truth as to how you should see him. Then, nurture that feeling and stick to it.

For me it was to accept him as my Gurudeva, and we both love that relationship.

Sriman Narayan

This post is inspired by this question, and wrote originally for the same. I’ve expanded the answer further as a post here.