Last night I received a voice message from a devotee residing in a foreign country with his new family. After having to go through much, he told me that he decided to take a break from devoting his time to God. I replied to him "So be it". He was disappointed that he had lived by the book but yet nothing took place in his favor. Moments ago I was moved to relay to him asking him to take one thing at a time. If we were to see the whole picture it surely would be scary and give us the jitters. If we were to take small steps each day eventually we would arrive somewhere. All things shall come to pass. Just as nothing is forever or permanent be it our properties, relationships, or life itself, so too the pleasures of life, happiness, and suffering being momentary shall fade away. He needs to be strong and stay strong. I told him not to throw Agathiyar out but to let him stay in a corner of his heart.
I am midway through watching the movie "Srikanth". I paused the movie to write this post. When with all our senses intact we still think twice and often back off from a venture, here we have a visually impaired kid wishing to become the first-ever visually challenged President of India. I was reminded in this movie not to lose the people close to us in chasing our dreams. I am reminded too that if we lose our self-respect we will never gain it again and never be able to rise up again. I now understand why gurus too get caught in sexual misconduct, sex scandals, and pornography and slip and fall flat on their faces, having their names smeared and tarnished. With energies swirling within, the sexual urges run high and drive us to lose our hold on our senses. The spiritual path is akin to walking on a razor's edge. If many have fallen in their prime and the height of their spiritual career, the vigil and strong survived these onslaughts. Ramalinga Adigal sings of the Sakthis or energies that tried to lure him off the path as he began to travel to the kingdom of Siva. But he ignored them. Vishvamitra and Buddha too were tempted by Menaka and Mara respectively with the intent to have them fall from grace. If Buddha with his determination to pursue the course or path, did not succumb to it, the former fell for it.
As the about-to-be Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama, sat in meditation, Mara brought his most beautiful daughters to seduce Siddhartha. Siddhartha, however, remained in meditation. Then Mara sent vast armies of monsters to attack him. Yet Siddhartha sat still and untouched.
Mara claimed that the seat of enlightenment rightfully belonged to him and not to the mortal Siddhartha. Mara's monstrous soldiers cried out together, "I am his witness!" Mara challenged Siddhartha, who will speak for you?
Then Siddhartha reached out his right hand to touch the earth, and the earth itself spoke: "I bear you witness!" Mara disappeared. And as the morning star rose in the sky, Siddhartha Gautama realized enlightenment and became a Buddha.
(Source: The Demon Mara, Who Challenged the Buddha (learnreligions.com))
Due to his penance and the power he achieved through it, Vishvamitra frightened the gods and even tried to create another heaven. Indra, frightened by Vishvamitra's powers, sent Menaka from heaven to earth to lure him and break his meditation. Menaka successfully incited Vishvamitra's lust and passion. She succeeded in breaking the meditation of Vishvamitra. However, she fell in genuine love with him and a girl was born to them who later grew in Sage Kanva's ashram and came to be called Shakuntala.
(Source: Vishvamitra - Wikipedia)
Maya was at work in me too. I too was put to the test on several occasions by Agathiyar and Lord Murugan and later by Agathiyar and Lord Shiva roping in Indra to lure me into a state of confusion created by the invisible and invincible hand of Maya. I guess I came through unscathed, able to distinguish the real from the false. After eradicating all past karma by doing remedies and carrying out noble acts and service to offset and balance the scoresheet of merits and demerits; dropping personal likes and desires and taking on the desires of the divine instead and seeing them through; learning to drop my hold on all things gathered be it property or fame, position, and authority, etc, and even those that the divine desired for me; walking into the last phase of the journey I arrived at the state of acknowledging that all these is the creation and work of Maya; where after dismissing them as Maya, I stepped onto the battleground now facing the enemies within, that is my weaknesses that shall bring disgrace and dishonor if I lose my guard. This is the reason Ramalinga Adigal advocated the way of love and compassion. Only this shall bring us to sail these rapids at the tail end of our journey. Agathiyar having completed all the Tapas and Tavam was told by Lord Shiva that he had yet one task awaiting him to make him complete or gain the state of "Paripuranam". Lord Shiva asked him to get betrothed to Lobama. I guess this was the reason, Agathiyar briefly left my home for the homes of several devotees before returning with Lobama to keep us company at AVM. When a sudden fear came over me it made me pace the floor in the middle of the night for 3 consecutive days. It left the moment I embraced my wife. Nothing else worked. Not even sitting in the prayer room and chanting. We are safe as long as we are with our wives. I guess Maya shall stay away when we are in the company and in the arms of our wives and vice versa. So now we understand why holy men and gurus betroth and settle with a wife after fairing well as a mendicant. I guess this is the reason Agathiyar has asked that I be betrothed again to my wife this coming Guru Purnima. He has asked me to start doing puja daily until Guru Purnima when he shall come.