When you are in a harmonious environment your mind picks up any excuse to be in conflict. Often, small things are often enough to create a big turmoil. When your survival is at stake, you do not complain that nobody loves you. But when you are safe and secure you start demanding attention. Many people create conflict in order to get attention.
Ask yourself this question: Do you seek harmony in every situation or do you seek to widen the differences and prove your righteousness? The seed of negativity and the tendency for conflict in you can only be annihilated by sadhana- spiritual practices.
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
November 14, 1996
Only speak knowledge. Do not repeat anything bad that someone tells you about someone else. When someone comes to tell you negative things, discourage them. Do not believe it.
If someone blames you directly, do not believe it. Just know that they are taking away your bad karma and let it go. If you are one of the master’s close ones, you will take all the blame of the world with a smile. When you blame someone, you take on their bad karma; When you praise someone, you take on their good karma; Surrender both good and bad karma to the Divine – and be free. Conflict is the nature of the world; comfort is the nature of the Self. Amidst conflict, find the comfort. When you are tired of conflicts and the games of the world, get into the comforts of the Self. When you are bored with comfort, get into the games of the world. If you are one of the Master’s close ones, you do both simultaneously.
People who love peace do not want to fight, and those who fight do not have peace. What is needed is to be peaceful within and then fight. Just trying to end a conflict only prolongs it. Instead, face the conflict while seeking the comfort of the Self. This is the whole message of the Bhagavad Gita: Krishna tells Arjuna to be centred in peace and to fight at the same time.
God is alive in the world and has been putting up with all conflicts throughout the ages. If God can put up with all these conflicts, you can too. And the moment you agree to be with a conflict, it no longer appears as a conflict to you. The nature of this world is that once you resolve one conflict, another arises. For example, Russia is solved and then Bosnia is in trouble. Or you get a cold, then you get better – then your back hurts, then it gets better. And when your body is fine, then the mind goes. Things in this world run this way, don’t they? Without any intention, misunderstandings simply happen and conflicts arise. It’s not up to you to resolve them. Just be with them and be alive!
Toronto, Ottawa, Canada
