But the Love that Swami talks about is not the love that we typically feel. Our love is based on attachment. Our love can be selfish and can expect things from others, and it can vanish in a split-second if our expectations are not met. Once, in an interview, Swami suddenly asked me how my wife was (she was sitting next to me). Without thinking, I blurted out, “I love her very much.” Swami wiggled his finger at me and replied, “Not all the time.”
Swami’s Love is spiritual Love. In characterizing spiritual Love, Swami has said that, Love seeks nothing from anyone. It bears no ill-will toward anyone. It is utterly selfless and pure. Only God’s love is totally free from the taint of selfishness.
We aspire to experience this totally selfless Love, but we have difficulty in understanding and experiencing it. And if you think about it, you will see why. If God and Love are synonymous, and we don’t really understand God, we can’t understand Love either. In fact, Swami has said that it is impossible to understand God. We shouldn’t even try. Instead, we should simply work at cultivating that expansive, spiritual Love.
Emulate Swami!
Of course, cultivating Love takes effort. One of the best ways, I find, is to take Swami as the example and try to emulate Him: watch how He lives His Life and try to follow His example. His whole Life is an outpouring of Love. Put simply, Swami is a fountain of Love, and this Love expresses itself in so many ways. Let us look at a few of them.
Do you have difficulty being patient? Then look at how lovingly patient Swami is with all of us. Year in, year out, we go to Prasanthi Nilayam and listen to His teachings. Even though we don’t follow His teachings very well, He continues to teach us lovingly and patiently. As a teacher myself, I have been impatient having to tell a student something three times. But thinking of Swami and the way He repeats things a thousand times for us can quieten my impatience.
Do you have difficulty with anger? Then contemplate on the fact that Swami is never angry. He may appear angry for a moment, but it is out of love and is, as He puts it, an act. I have seen Him scold a person firmly, with a look that frightened all of us, but in the next split-second, He was talking to someone else - or even the same person - with a smile on His face.
Do you have difficulty with moods? Are you sad, or depressed, or lonely? Then look to Swami, the Embodiment of Equanimity. Have you ever seen him sad? Have you ever seen Him depressed? Swami has said that, “Above all, it is best that the spiritual seeker should be joyful, smiling, and enthusiastic under all circumstances; even more than devotion to God and spiritual wisdom, this pure attitude is desirable”. Try to cultivate a feeling of happiness and live with it all the time.
Do you have negative thoughts when asked to serve? Look at how Swami lives His life. He spends every waking minute serving others - and this means 24 hours a day, because He says that He never sleeps. Look at His daily schedule, from Darshan in the morning to the end of Bhajans in the evening, He showers selfless service on us in hundreds of different ways.
Naturally, we must have a balance in our lives, and this means having time for recreation, to recreate ourselves. But if we look to Swami as our example, less time will be spent idly. A spiritually wise man, Swami has said, will be unperturbed and peaceful, even if he works twenty-four hours of the day; but an ignorant person, even if he has no work at all and is able to enjoy leisure for the whole day, will look very troubled and ruffled.
A Chancellor like no other
First, let me tell you that this university is different from all others. Character is indeed the prime objective of education in this university, as Swami has said, and I see it every time I visit. And because of this objective, right from the top, the university is run differently.
Swami is the Chancellor of this University, Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher Learning. Most chancellors or university presidents rarely see students. Instead, they spend their time in administrative meetings, on fund-raising trips, and so on. There will be occasional lunches or breakfasts with a few students, speeches at award ceremonies, and so on, but the students rarely have one-on-one contact with the chancellor or president.
But this Chancellor is different! Students see Swami every day in the afternoon Darshan, and he may sit for up to an hour in Sai Kulwant Hall, talking to the faculty and students nearby, asking some students to come up and talk to him, listening to their Vedic chanting, and so on. I have also pleasurable remembrances of the sessions with students and faculty in Trayee Brindavan after evening bhajans in the 1990s - as a visiting teacher, I could take part. Swami would sit at the end of the hall, with several hundred students and teachers pressing as close as possible. Sometimes, Swami would talk, or he would ask a teacher, a visitor, or a student to say a few words. One time, we sang Bhajans in tens of different languages - Swami would ask for students who knew another language to sing. Another time, new students who wanted to be Bhajan leaders were given “tryouts”.
The Love that Swami has for these students was palpable, and just as palpable was the devotion of the students for Swami. Some new students are not devotees - that is not a requirement for the admission. But after spending so much time in His presence and learning His teachings, they become devotees!
Prof. David Gries with Sri Sathya Sai
Once, Swami asked me to talk about my experiences as a teacher there. I said that when I had first seen this Institute, I didn’t see how the students could match western students because they didn’t have as much time to study. There was always something in the way - Darshan, preparing for a festival, practicing Bhajans, a service project, chores in the student's hostel, and so on. But I began thinking about western students. When not studying, they may spend time watching television, listening to rock music, drinking beer, having parties - and Swami chimed in, “and dancing” - and so on. Western students may spend their time rather idly, and even in negative activities, while Swami’s students spend their time in good activities that help them grow spiritually. So, these students and western students will spend the same time studying, but these students spend their other time in much more wholesome and spiritual pursuits!
Please don’t take these comments above as a condemnation of all western students! It is a generalization. I just presented the awards at our computer-science graduation ceremony at Cornell, and I was amazed at what some of the students had accomplished. One student had spent 2 hours a day in service activities of one kind or another. Another student received a double major, in computer science and philosophy, while spending a great deal of time in service to others - mentoring younger students, advising, tutoring, as head facilitator in special classes, and so on. There is much good in western education and western students – but more attention to character building is necessary.
The Students as Inspiration
I enjoy teaching in Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher Learning because the students and teachers are such an inspiration for me. As Swami has said, the students are like diamonds. They are creative in their thinking and hardworking in their studies. They are attentive, respectful, and disciplined. If they have to miss a class, they apologetically ask permission beforehand. It is a pleasure to be around them and the faculty, and I learn so much from them.
Sai Students leaving from Hostel for College
Why are the students this way? It is a combination of things - the daily Bhajans before class, the weekly spiritual session in the auditorium, the attention to selfless service activities, spiritual readings, and studies on character, spirituality and the world’s religions. But more than that, it is the treatment of the students by the faculty. They are shining examples for the students to follow. Swami has introduced the word Educare as the process of bringing out human values that are already inside us. We don’t put values into students; we work at letting the values already in them shine forth. A primary means for accomplishing this is by example. The faculty at the Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher Learning know this and do their best to be examples for the students. And of course, there is Swami, the Best Example of all for students to emulate.
Seeing the world in a Tennis match
Let me end with a remark about the game of tennis as a microcosm of the world. What is the score at the beginning of a tennis match? Love All. And what does the referee say? Serve. Not serve all but simply serve. So one of the players serves, and the ball goes back and forth in a fierce battle, a competition between two people. Finally, one person wins the point. The winner of the point no longer has Love. The score is now 15-Love.
Wouldn’t it be better to play the game this way: The referee says, Love All, Serve All, both players serve, and the aim is to keep two tennis balls going as long as possible. The goal is no longer to beat the other player but to help the other player keep two balls in motion as long as possible. Don’t we all tend to play the game of life like a tennis match, trying to beat others, trying to win, trying to get ahead, trying to rise to the top? Instead of that, let us concentrate on Love All, Serve All and spend our lives helping all to attain a better and more spiritual life. Emulating Swami, that Fountain of Love, can help us in reaching this goal.
About the Author
Source: Sai Sparshan 2005 (80th Birthday Offering)
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