Why is it that the vast majority of us live perpetually in fear of something or the other? Perhaps, one reason is that we are lonely. The deepest tragedy of the modern man is his loneliness.
Yes, if we will confess the truth to ourselves, we will not deny that we feel lonely. We lack the security of protection. We are like the child who, taken to a fair, lost his mother in the crowd.
I can never forget the serene face of a child when I was on board the S. S. Versova. Suddenly, a terrible storm arose. All the passengers were filled with terror. We felt sure we were doomed to a watery grave. In the midst of this sorrowful scene sat a little child, — barely six years old — calm, serene, undisturbed by the shrieking storm and the rolling wave.
I marvelled at this child’s unruffled serenity in the face of death. I said to him: “The steamer is about to sink; are you not afraid?”
With a cherubic smile he answered: “What have I to fear when my mother is so near?”
I can never forget these words. When in the depths of despair and sorrow I have repeated these words to myself, I have felt relieved: “What have I to fear when my Mother is so near?”
Our Mother — the Mother Divine — is so near to each one of us. We have lost the child-like spirit. To be child-like is to share all we have with all men, is to love and laugh. We need to become children again, friendly and loving towards all —not critical, not fearful. We need to contact the Mother. This is done through meditation and prayer and constant repetition of the Mother’s Name. One blessed day you lose yourself: you find the Mother!
Then it is that fear vanishes from our life as mist before the morning sun. And we move through life trusting every ray of the sun and every drop of rain, every rose and every thorn, every river and every rock, trusting the sun and moon and stars, trusting thunder and storm, trusting everything and everyone, giving the service of love to all.
(Dada J P Vaswani was a humanitarian, philosopher, educator, acclaimed writer, powerful orator, messiah of ahimsa, and non-sectarian spiritual leader.)
