Power of Love (Deccan Herald)

[Guest guest]

>From May 1 edition of the Deccan Herald

 

http://www.deccanherald.com/deccanherald/may12005/sundayherald1612272005428.asp

 

Power of love

 

To devotees, Amma is the embodiment of love. She takes

their sorrow and gives back love such as no one else

wants to give. Kala Krishnan Ramesh tries to

understand what makes Mata Amritanandamayi tick and

finds herself transformed in the process.

 

I kept the Hindutva question for last because this

wasn’t about Hindutva; it was about love, devotion and

hard work and how when Mata Amritanandamayi took

people into her embrace, all three come together

filling them with purpose, meaning and will.

 

It was also about trying to understand this love,

about getting closer and feeling nearer to Mata

Amritanandamayi over several years. About hearing of

her miraculous embrace and becoming fascinated by

peoples’ testimonies of Mata Amritanandamayi’s

astounding interventions in their lives – children for

the childless, answers for the confused, direction for

the lost, cure for the diseased, but above all else,

unqualified love for everyone.

 

For devotees, Amma is the embodiment of love, and she

takes their sorrow and pain and gives back love such

as no one else wants to give. “Even our parents will

withdraw their love if we don’t do as they expect,”

says Chandrika. “Amma just loves us. And her love is

useful for everyday living. It’s a guiding love.”

 

Mata Amritanandamayi is reputed to be a practical,

sensible person, whose advice to devotees who come

crying about impending court cases, family splits or

alcoholic husbands, takes the form of precise

instructions on what to do, with the added advice to

do it with faith in God.

 

“If I ask her a question, she won’t give me an

abstract answer, she’ll give me a practical answer

which will solve my problem,” as Chandrika says.

 

Mata Amritanandamayi’s solutions to problems take many

shapes – from working with scientists to research

tsunamis, organising pension schemes for needy women,

setting up an AIDS hospice, orphanages, hospitals,

building houses for the homeless, to making

arrangements to address the current ills of society.

 

In the course of our conversation, Amma said, “I don’t

think of myself as doing things for people, I am not

separate, I am like the limbs of the body, if I come

to the aid of the unfortunate, it’s really like one

hand caressing the other when it hurts. I teach my

children to be prepared to do anything.”

 

Her ‘children’ are her many disciples, and the course

of life with Amma has taught them to work hard. Amma

herself is always engaged in work of some sort or the

other, and she will not brook slothfulness.

 

“We must be prepared to do anything, and we must do

according to the occasion. When we act, we express to

different levels, the head is used by a porter to

carry loads, a scientist uses the same head in a

different way. Some can give light up to 100 watts,

some to a 1000, but everybody can give light. We must

work and be humble, that’s what I teach my children;

when I do, they also do.”

 

I asked Amma, “You are playing two very important

roles - that of guru and mother - is there any tension

between them?”

 

“A mother is the best guru, the true guru. I don’t

feel any difference in the two roles. A mother teaches

her children through love, but she can also discipline

them, at least good mothers do. The teacher has to

come to the level of the student; it’s like setting a

thief to catch a thief, you become like the child, be

a friend. My own real bhavas are sakhya and matrbhava

– the bhava of a friend and mother.”

 

The notion of “motherhood” has a central place in Mata

Amritanandamayi’s vision for life, not in giving birth

but in feeling that everything in the universe is

bound by this “motherly” love.

 

She stresses women’s role, as it is and as it ought to

be; she not only emphasises that women are the equals

of men, but also that the circumstances which chain

women down can be reversed, as in her example of

investing women as priests in the math’s temples.

 

The world places great importance on Mata

Amritanandamayi’s role as a woman spiritual-religious

‘leader’ and there is the feeling that she can lead

the people of the world.

 

Amma has been invited to present her vision to the

world at large on several occasions: The Parliament of

the World’s Religions (1993); the 50th Anniversary of

the United Nations (1995;) the Millennium World Peace

Summit of Religious and Spiritual Leaders (2000); The

Global Peace Initiative of Women religious and

Spiritual Leaders (2002); the Parliament of the

World’s Religions (2004).

 

I ask, “Is it impossible for people in today’s world

to know bhakti? Without spiritual leaders like you as

a medium, has this experience become impossible?”

 

“It’s the way the world has changed, it’s the values

that children learn. Today’s children are burdened,

not only in learning but also in play. Earlier playing

was carefree, joyous, today it is about competition

and all the tension comes from the over-emphasis on

competition. And as we grow this sense of competition

grows with us and so does all the tension. We don’t

have time for spiritual things, simple things like

lighting a lamp, praying together… how will bhakti

come?”

 

When disciples come together in your presence are they

not subconsciously trying to create an alternative

community animated by love and sharing?

 

“I don’t know. Is it possible? Can it happen? Maybe it

could, but it’s difficult. If we have three people, we

have three islands. And it’s all about ‘I’ and about

‘Take’. We should learn to look for the goodness in

everyone and draw it out and impart values that will

stress this. Maybe we can. But it’s difficult.”

 

And yet thousands, millions come together, swept up

out of the struggle and rush, filled with the

conviction that Amma’s love can steer their lives into

a better way of being.

 

And people like me come to understand how it works;

for sometime we are self-conscious and try and merge

into the crowd, but before long we too are in the

lines snaking towards her embrace. The third time I

was going, I wanted to try and interview Amma; several

helpful people reached me to her, she hugged me and

said with a smile that there was no time now. I got to

sit near her onstage for some time, witnessing the

faces of devotees blossom under her gaze.

 

Swami Ramakrishna, one of Amma’s closest disciples

told me, “Next year email me early.I will try and

arrange something” I did, but no response.

 

In the meantime, one heard and read many things. They

passed through the mind like clouds in the sky.

 

On the morning of the 9th, which was the day Amma was

arriving in Bangalore, my phone rang and a voice said,

“Namah Shivaya, this is Swami Ramakrishna. I just

happened to look into my email now and saw your

message. I am sorry I’ve been so caught up in the

tsunami relief that I have had no time. Now it’s too

late, Amma’s appointments are fixed. But let me try.”

 

I thought, Okay, next year. However, a little later,

my phone rings and Swami Ramakrishna says, “Namah

Shivaya, Can you be here by 11.30?”

 

I was. Nervous, self-conscious, anxious. What would I

find? Would this be disappointing? How much time would

they give me? 10 minutes? Would they ask for a list of

questions before I went in? What did I want to ask

her? Whether there was a RSS connection?

 

As it turned out, it wasn’t 10 but 45 or more. Amma

spoke at length in her very colloquial Malayalam,

spiritedly, smilingly, jokingly, naughtily; she often

laughed aloud.

 

She spoke of things too numerous to report here in

entirety. But at the end I did ask the Hindutva

question, “Is Amma’s movement in risk of being

swallowed up by Hindutva?” And she said, “That’s the

same word the other child used, he argued with me for

a long time. Sanatana dharma cannot be contained

within a box and a single key cannot open all boxes!

For me, the whole world is one. I accept everything.

My Hindutva is for all Indians coming together,

accepting each other. The problem is if someone

insists on saying ‘My mother is good, your mother is a

prostitute.’ One must want to see the good in

everything, one must have the bhava of acceptance.”

 

What did I make of the whole experience, people ask

me. Had I been transformed? Has my life turned into

some trajectory I do not yet know? Despite being

conscious of not wanting to think like that, I have to

admit that several surprising things happened. Like a

sudden rush of water in congested karmic pipes.

 

Perhaps it’s the miracle of love.

 

Amritapuri

 

A devotee explained the difference between Amma’s

ashrams and others: “If you see the male conductors in

a bus, more often than not, they are loud, aggressive,

and push the passengers around unnecessarily, they

swear, sweat and rush around as if the job were

extraordinarily difficult. But women conductors do the

same job coolly, easily, without straining themselves

and also putting passengers at ease. This is what you

experience in Amma’s ashrams. It is surely the

‘motherly’ touch.”

 

At Amritapuri, the headquarters of the Amritanandamayi

Math, everything runs smoothly, visitors are treated

with humble courtesy and minute details for everyday

discipline are followed - lines for crowds, tokens for

darshan and meals.

 

Inmates have a rigorous daily routine which includes a

stream of activities both physical and for the inner

being. Amma can come down very hard on anybody found

shirking work of either kind and she herself is a hard

worker. When the tsunami struck and water began to

rush into the ashram at Amritapuri, Amma changed into

a lungi and shirt, ready to wade out if necessary.

 

She was at the helm of activities, directing

everything, and waited up all night watching the sea.

 

Visitors are encouraged to participate in the daily

chores and activities of the ashram as well as to use

simple clothing and follow other ashram routines.

 

As one regular visitor put it, “You don’t feel

stressed, you don’t feel that you don’t fit in, you

don’t get rushed around and there are things that you

can do without getting in the way. On the whole, you

feel good about being there.”

 

For the visitor, it is difficult not to be swept up in

the atmosphere of Amritapuri, with the sea as a

backdrop, its towering gopuram, its elephants, and the

endless chanting and homams and Amma’s presence which

exudes love, light and compassion, not to mention good

humour, jollity and laughter. Everywhere, there is the

eager anticipation of being blessed by her and this

creates a sense of community amongst the thousands who

pass through Amritapuri every day.

 

The Math’s website gives all the necessary details for

contact as well as a constantly updated schedule of

Amma’s activities and travel.

 

Mata Amritanandamayi Math

 

Amritapuri, Kollam,

 

Kerala, India

 

Tel: (91-476)-896 179,896 272, 896 399,897 578

Website: http://www.amritapuri.org; E-mail:

MAM