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Memories of our Divine Mother: 23. SHE TEACHES US ABOUT EVERYTHING 1) Pat Anslow said: You try to educate them In Bath we wandered around shopping and there was this street artist trying to draw Mother. She sat down and he tried to draw Her and couldn't. And he complained that Her face kept changing. "Stop smiling at me. Your face keeps changing." Pat Anslow 2) Kevin Anslow said: The artist had incredible problems trying to draw Her. The end result didn't look anything like Mother at all. But She asked me a question at one stage and I can't remember why it was. She said to me, did I know what mammals were. And I said that I thought they were furry or something like that. And She said that the way you tell a mammal is that they suckle their young. And I have no idea why She asked me that or why She told me that, but She did. It seems almost like a little kind of if you have a child, you try to educate them or see what they know. Kevin Anslow 3) Felicity Payment said: She knows everything about everything We were standing with Shri Mataji in the knave of this beautiful 13th century limestone abbey in Sherbourne, Dorset [England]. We had just had the puja the day before at Mill Farm and, as was Her custom, Shri Mataji was visiting the local area to spread vibrations everywhere. She looked way up at the limestone ceiling full of vaulted buttresses and said, "How do you think they made those arches?" gesturing with Her hand, as if wondering to Herself, yet asking us. I was clutching a guidebook and started flipping through the pages saying, "Maybe it will tell us in here." But before I could find anything, Shri Mataji launched into a complete architectural explanation, as if She knew the answer all along. Later Djamel said that he had had a conversation with Shri Mataji about aerodynamics and She had talked with him about very technical aerodynamic concepts. It was this incident that made me realize that Shri Mataji, of course, is the pure source of all knowledge. She knows everything about everything. Felicity Payment 4) Linda Williams said: Fanaticism is out I had been a vegetarian for twenty years before coming to Sahaja Yoga because I erroneously assumed it would be good for the spirit. Mother had suggested that it would be a good idea to eat fish and chicken and I took Her advice, but I was still a bit fanatic and didn't want to eat red meat. One day, some months after I had been given Realization, Shri Mataji took me out with Her for some reason, maybe shopping or looking for a house to buy as an ashram or for Her. We had been out in the car and arrived back at Mother's flat late for lunch. Mother asked me to get some McDonald's from the fast food place just down the road in Victoria Street. When I returned, we realized we didn't have the keys to Mother's flat and the other set were with Sir CP at his office up the other end of London. The car driver went off to the office and Mother and I waited outside Her flat, which was on the top floor of the block. There was a flight of stairs outside the flat and we sat on the stairs and waited. After some time, the bag of McDonald's was beginning to get cold. Mother suggested that we eat our food and I looked in the bag. There were two beefburgers and a fishburger. I thought, "There is no way Mother can eat the beefburger, so I will give Her the fishburger and that leaves me with a beefburger." I looked, a bit too long, wondering what to do. Then I gave the bag to Mother. Mother took the beefburger out of the bag and said, "Eat it. It is the prasad of the Goddess." That was the last time I was fanatic about food. Even though, in general, Mother has told us not to eat beef and said She will never eat beef, I realized that there are always exceptions to every rule and the important lesson was that fanaticism is out, out, out for Sahaja Yogis. Linda Williams 5) Marilyn Leate said: When vegetarians came to the programs, generally catching on the left, She would recommend them to eat a Macdonalds hamburger, as much to break the conditions as anything else. She called Macdonalds "Macdougles." Marilyn Leate 6) Ray Harris said: Mother would give liqueur chocolates when we'd been drinkers or, if you were worried about food, She'd give you McDonald's. She was in Brompton Square doing that and Ashley Gardens, as well. There was a time when we'd all been fasting. Our livers were seriously out and some Sahaj Yogis had been having corn flakes and water. This was in Surbiton — that sort of time — Nightingale Lane, `81. We were told to do that. It was official, no milk, nothing. We went round to Mother's house and She offered us tea and stuff and brought it out to where we'd been working and She said, "Would you like chocolate?" Somebody said, "Oh, no, no, Shri Mataji. We're on a diet. We can't. Anyway, it's got alcohol in it." So She said, "First of all, if I offer you something, it's all right. There's not enough alcohol in it to get a fly drunk anyway." Ray Harris 7) Marilyn Leate said: She often broke Her own rules, giving gifts of black trousers to women, advising a yogini to wear high heels and fancy stockings, chocolates to children, coffee beans given to an ashram, etc. She breaks any fanaticism, which attaches itself to Her advice. Marilyn Leate 8) Ruth Flint said: How to cook rice She told me how to cook rice. Unfortunately, I forgot it immediately, but it was just so fantastic to have Adi Shakti telling you how to cook rice. Ruth Flint 9) Meenakshi Murdoch said: My blessings are always with you When I was doing my GCSE [General Certificate of Secondary Education] as they say over here, and SSA in India, I rang Mother up and I said, "I want Your blessing because I'm going for my exams." And Mother said, "Don't worry! My blessings are always with you." And She spoke to me on the phone Herself. I passed. I did quite well actually. Meenakshi Murdoch 10) Ruth Flint said: A marvellous moment of intimacy It was in India, in January `82. I had been in Sahaja Yoga something like six months. Shri Mataji had sent for me after a program or after a havan and She took me along to sleep with Her. It was in this village in Maharastra, in a little house. I found myself in the same room as Her. There were two beds, She in one and I in the other one and a bathroom en-suite. In the morning I saw Her putting on Her sari. I suppose that I should have turned my eyes away to respect Her privacy, but I looked. I was so fascinated because She put it on so fast and in such a deft way. So I told Her, "Oh, Shri Mataji, it's fantastic to see the way you're putting a sari on." She showed me how to fold the old sari She had taken off, putting both extremities together, to fold it in two and then again folding it in two and again folding it in two. And it was just such a marvellous moment of intimacy. Ruth Flint 11) Marilyn Leate said: She was thanking me One morning at Shudy Camps [in England] I was in such a hurry to serve Shri Mataji that I threw my sari on wrongly and couldn't even see that I had done so. Here I must add that left Vishuddhi has not always been my strongest point and Mother has always seemed to counter-balance this. Upon entering Her bedroom, I found Shri Mataji out of bed and seated upon an armchair close to one of the windows overlooking the garden. She said, "Ah, Marilyn, what a lovely sari you're wearing. It suits you so well. You're wearing it the wrong way round." Somehow She was so gracious that I didn't feel silly. She then stood up and proceeded to remove my sari and then put it on again properly, circling me, tucking it in all around, pleating it and all the time saying to me. "I don't know how to thank you. You've done so much for Me." Imagine! She was thanking me. How gently the Adi Shakti works out our Nabhi and Vishuddhi. Marilyn Leate 12) Shailaja Glover said: It was like walking on a tightrope When I came to Sahaja Yoga in `80-'81 in India, there wasn't much chance to get closer to Mother because there was already a very large collective. So when I came to England in `85, since then I was fortunate to spend time with Mother. She asked me a few times at Shudy Camps to help to do some cooking and that. And in the beginning I was afraid that I would make mistakes and Mother would be afraid. I used to drop things. And Shri Mataji said, "What is the matter? Why are you so afraid?" So I said, "I am not used to serving You. I don't know how to do." And I got confident after a few days. She used to say, "No, no, you don't do that way. You do it this way." I was listening to Her instructions and it was like walking on a tightrope. You have to watch yourself all the time that you don't get caught up and all that. Once me and another Sahaja Yogini were trying to tidy Her bed. And whatever we did we couldn't get it right. And She came in and She said, "What are you doing? No, no, you don't do that. Do it this way." And even little things you do every day, sometimes when you are with Her, you need instructions for little things like that. Shailaja Glover 13) Pamela Bromley said: You can't see in the dark yet Mother was sleeping in this bed and I usually slept at the bottom of the bed and She asked me if I had turned the light out, so I did so and then went stumbling back to bed. And Mother said, "What are you doing? Oh, you can't see in the dark yet, can you?" Pamela Bromley 14) John Glover said: One day you will know When Mother first came to Sheffield it was then that She asked me about myself and some of the deepest conversations seemed to be associated with radio and things like that. Mother said, "How have you come to be so much in the left?" In those days, we used to think of people as right or left-sided and the question was almost as though She was reading into me and saying that it was not natural that I am not a left-sided person. Then Mother said, "One day you will know all about the past and the future, but for now stay in the present. John Glover 15) Michael Petrunia said: I could see the forgiveness One Shri Krishna Puja in New York, a young Sahaja Yogini came up to Shri Mataji and was preparing Her Feet with the swastikas on. Apparently she made a mistake and the swastika did not come out properly. So the first reaction of the Sahaja Yogini was to put her finger in her mouth and to clear out the mess. This was to the horror of all the Sahaja Yogis. We would never do this to Shri Mataji's Feet consciously. Shri Mataji realized what was happening and just put Her hand out and said to us, "Take it easy. Don't react to it. She is doing it properly because I gave her the permission." So the girl proceeded without knowing what she did, put the spit on her finger and wiped Shri Mataji's Feet with it. And Shri Mataji was just as joyful to see that. So I could see the forgiveness and the acceptance of tolerating our mistakes. So as we say at the beginning of the puja, "Please accept this puja with our mistakes that we put into it." And it happens. Michael Petrunia 16) Ruth Flint said: You see Sahaja Yoga is something very subtle It was the first time Shri Mataji went to Vienna, probably in the autumn of 1982. She stayed at Gregoire's home. At that time in Vienna, as Sahaja Yogis, there was only Gregoire's family because he had just arrived there. And She came for this first series of programs. Some Sahaja Yogis from abroad came to help. We were a little group from Italy, also Guido who had come to cook for Shri Mataji. Before the first public program, there was a Shri Durga puja in Gregoire's flat. I was sitting in the back, but Gregoire told me to sit in the front in order to translate Shri Mataji's words in Italian. When Shri Mataji arrived, She told me to go and sit in the back. So I went back and felt a little bit mortified. In the evening there was the public program and maybe I had to drive Shri Mataji there or I was in the same car as Her. Shri Mataji was waiting behind the curtain on the stage that Gregoire would finish the introduction and I was waiting, alone with her. She told me, "You see, Ruth, I want to explain to you because of this morning." I said, "Oh, Shri Mataji, I felt so embarrassed because at first I was in the back and Gregoire told me to go to the front to translate. It was a mistake and I'm sorry, but it is so difficult to do things right and so easy to make mistakes." I was trying to give explanations . She said, "You see, Ruth, Sahaja Yoga is something very subtle. It is as if you are walking on the crest of a mountain and on the right you have a ravine and on the left a precipice and if you make one step wrong, then you fall either to the right or to the left. And so you see, it is very subtle and you must always keep to the central path." And that was just so beautiful when She spoke about this subtlety. This is a lesson that I have tried to remember for myself or when talking with people. Ruth Flint 17) Raolbai said: It is the duty of the Mother Mother would say that She scolds us because She was our Mother and "it is the duty of the Mother to correct the children if they make a mistake. You people should not feel bad, as it is My love that I scold you." I never felt bad and Mother would tell others that "Look at Raolbai. She never reacts to any of My scoldings." Raolbai 18) Bala Kanayson said: To feel inside what is the correct thing This is a little bit about Derby ashram [in England]. Shri Mataji asked us to start an ashram there, which She said would be run according to Her instructions. And it was supposed to be a model ashram. And when we started it, we were supposed to do certain things like wake up at four in the morning and do our shoebeating and have a full puja before going off to work and, in the evenings, everyone had to sit and meditate and sing the aarti and go through mantras. It had a tremendous effect on us because, when you walked into that ashram, you just had a wonderful feeling, like you were in Mother's physical presence. And everyone who came and stayed there would carry on this state of meditation even when they went to work. And Shri Mataji came and used that ashram and used it as a base for Her when She was doing a tour of the Midlands. And She stayed there for a week. We had a great meditation room there, which no one was allowed to do anything else in there except meditate, sit and say mantras and do a puja. Now one thing that Mother did in that meditation room is really interesting. The ladies had cooked an elaborate meal for Her, but of course, in the way Mother is, She decided to go out and get fish and chips. And we had this lovely dining room all set up for Her, but no, Mother went and sat in the meditation room, where no one was allowed to eat and drink and had us all sitting around Her eating fish and chips. So it was another of those incidents where Mother is trying to show you not to be conditioned and not to be too set in your ways, but to go with the flow and to go with the vibrations. And that's the key thing, to feel inside on your chakras and in your heart what is the correct thing to do and not go with rituals and any set steps or methods. Bala Kanayson 19) Alan Pereira said: These problems they just go away I went to Easter Puja in Turkey [in 2000] and again had the fortune of sitting in front of Mother and She was quite perturbed about the Catholic religion and the pope and Catholicism and how they were attacking us in Sahaja Yoga and Sahaja Yogis and particularly the property in France. And She said what you should do is, if you ever have a problem, is to meditate on it and She said, "We should just now meditate on the Catholic Church." And then She said, "But before we do that, we should give them a reverse bandhan." And She did this amazing reverse bandhan. I've never seen anything like it, sort of an anti-clockwise movement on Her hand after She had asked us to write the Catholic Church on our hand. She then did an anti-clockwise circle and then, at the end of it, produced a little flick, almost like to flick the negativity away. She did that several times and then She asked Engelbert [Oman] to massage Her left foot. Then She put Her attention on the Catholic Church and asked us to do that. We did that. As soon as She closed Her eyes, there was this silence that descended on the room and it was quite incredible because we knew that when She shut Her eyes we all had to go into meditation and we automatically did it. I felt this tremendous heat going through my body. I don't know if it is because I am a Catholic or not — a tremendous heat going through my body — and I felt really uncomfortable, but I tried to meditate and Engelbert, I watched him, and he sweated so profusely massaging Mother's Feet. He told me at the end, "I think I sweated the Catholic Church out of my body." He said he was so hot as well. At the end of this Mother suddenly came out of this meditation, as quickly as She went into it, and She said, "See? Put you attention on these problems. It helps. They just go away." Alan Pereira 20) Ruth Flint said: You needed to laugh There was this puja in Dourdan [near Paris in 1986]. My daughter, Radhika, was six months old and I was quite tired between the baby and working. I don't know how, but we were with my husband Kingsley in Shri Mataji's room. There were Gregoire, Engelbert Oman and a few other yogis. We were maybe seven or eight. Shri Mataji started saying these hilarious stories and at first I was very shy, impressed to be in Shri Mataji's room and then slowly I relaxed. At the end I was laughing completely. And then Shri Mataji said at some point, "Ah, now you've cleared, you see. You needed to laugh in order to clear." Ruth Flint 21) Vicky Halperin said: Picking up on the right protocols I've thought of something else, when at Brompton Square, how diplomatically Shri Mataji teaches you things. She told me one day to tell the servant, the girl who was in the kitchen, that she would get into difficulties if she didn't touch Shri Mataji's Feet each morning. I was just prior to that in this quandary as to whether or not it was protocol to go to Mother's Feet or not. The last thing you want to do is in Her own home to behave inappropriately and it was a question. I didn't know what to do. So there I had my answer. I was to tell the servant she was to touch Mother's Feet each day and clearly that was for me as well. So I took the cue and the next morning greeted Mother in the morning and touched Her Feet and that was clearly the right thing. Then at some point when it was appropriate for me to leave or not to touch Her Feet anymore, it also became very obvious that it was no longer the thing to do. Just a very indirect way of picking up on the right protocols. Vicky Halperin 22) Richard Payment said: Sometimes She just wants to teach us the balance In the summer of 1995 Shri Mataji was in Brussels and while there She gave a press conference. I was standing outside on the front steps with my son, waiting for Shri Mataji to leave the building. My son was about three years old and I hung onto his hand tightly, as I could feel the underground train rumbling beneath us. I didn't want to lose him in the crowd. When Shri Mataji came out, She saw us and said to me, "Don't hang on to him so tight. Children need a bit of freedom." Just a few days later we were at an airport in Holland. Shri Mataji and a large group of Sahaja Yogis were walking across an open pedestrian area. My son was running freely, enjoying the excitement. "Catch him," She said. "You don't want him to get hurt." Sometimes Shri Mataji just wants to teach us the balance between the two extremes. Richard Payment 23) Raolbai said: To be polite and loving I was very dominant and always nagged people to do as I would want. I would get very angry, as my family members would not meditate and give attention to Sahaja Yoga. Mother taught me to be polite and loving to my family members and She personally spoke to my family members and, with love, persuaded them. This taught me to be very patient and loving and helped me to get rid of my anger. Raolbai 24) Ruth Flint said: Do you know who gave Me My hair? Shri Mataji came to Rome for this series of programs [in the spring of 1982] and I was in Her bedroom. She was getting ready to go shopping or to go to the program. And She started asking me, "So, Ruth, do you know who gave Me My hair?" I answered "Yes, Shri Mataji, Shri Yama." And She said, "And do you know who gave Me My nose?" "Yes, Shri Mataji, Shri Kubera." And She said, "Very well, very well." And then She went on talking about other things. I understood afterwards that She was checking if I was ready to take care of a group of Sahaja Yogis and to teach them a certain number of things. Ruth Flint 25) Phil Trumbo said: She organizes every aspect I was never a very good driver of cars. I never had a bad accident, but I would make people really nervous and I never really drove very well at all. And in 1986, for some reason, someone thought that it was a good idea when Shri Mataji was visiting New York that I drive Her car around. I was to be the chauffeur. I was delighted and terrified at the same time because this was a great honour and a big responsibility and I obviously didn't want to cause any problems, but I couldn't turn it down. So I was driving something big, like a Lincoln Town Car around Manhattan. And we were going to all different parts of town to buy Indian things and to look for appliances for the kids' school in Italy and basically do lots of different missions all around. And I got us lost, really properly, a couple of different times. We ended up going to one place, being so-called lost, which was actually a block from where an ashram was established later on. And we spent some time getting these appliances and things and there was just this one moment, this one really sweet moment, when the other folks, who were the organizers and things, had gone in to look for some appliances in these Indian stores and I was left alone just driving Shri Mataji around in this car. It was very hot. It was in the summertime and She was in the back and I just looked back and realized how much effort She put in to all this activity. She organizes every aspect and I just looked back and said, "Shri Mataji, I just can't tell you how much we appreciate what You do." And She just sort of smiled and wiped the sweat off Her brow and we kind of went on. But the remarkable thing was, from my standpoint was, from that point on, I became a very good driver. Literally, the next day I became a much, much more competent, really reasonable, very good driver. So who knows what happened in that car, that one moment, but for me it was a miracle — from being a terrible nervous driver, who drove people crazy, to someone who was pretty competent. So there's a small miracle for you. Phil Trumbo 26) Michael Petrunia said: She teaches you with sweetness On my first two weeks experience of Shri Mataji, She was giving programs in New York in 1981, September. I began to see so many things around Her. And you can't imagine the auras that She has around Her. The halos and all these huge lights and all the deities that She talks about that She has around Her. I didn't know what it was to begin with, but now I know what they are. So eventually, I approached Shri Mataji and I explained to Her that I see all these things with Her, around Her and on Her. She said, "From this moment on you will no longer see them." And She approached me and touched my Agnya and I was so disappointed then that I never saw those things again. But this situation gave me a perspective that, although there are a lot of tests and trials with the collective and the yogis around, I knew who She was. The supraconscious had given me an insight, at least brief, and I could not be deviated from the path eventually. So that was an interesting tool for me that kept me going to this day, that no obstacle could dissuade me from Her. She is my goal and She was revealed to me in my own cognitive way for me to understand Her. And that is the way it goes. They say that every seeker has to get to see his guru and I had to get to see my Guru Mata, which is the best of all gurus, because She teaches you with sweetness and not with the whip. Michael Petrunia

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www.adishakti.org/
www.al-qiyamah.org/
www.adi-shakti.org/  — Divine Feminine (Hinduism)
www.holyspirit-shekinah.org/  — Divine Feminine (Christianity)
www.ruach-elohim.org/  — Divine Feminine (Judaism)
www.ruh-allah.org/  — Divine Feminine (Islam)
www.tao-mother.org/  — Divine Feminine (Taoism)
www.prajnaaparamita.org/  — Divine Feminine (Buddhism)
www.aykaa-mayee.org/  — Divine Feminine (Sikhism)
www.great-spirit-mother.org/  — Divine Feminine (Native Traditions)