No excuses allowed here!
Words of wisdom from Param Pujya Ammaji
A pillar of Swamiji’s teachings is: “Absolutely no excuses allowed here!”
If Dharma called, you did it, no matter if a cyclone was raging round you, if the earth was cracking open or the sky was falling. Just do it! And Do It Now!
But… But… But we would sputter… I am not well… the bicycle had a flat tire…. The shop opened late… the train did not arrive…. “No excuses,” he would roar. “Just do it!” and strangely enough, those who loved the teachings flowing through him….. Did It!
We surprised even ourselves when we allowed ourselves, no excuses. We were able to “Do anything and everything!”
The key was commitment. Commitment is another name for Dharma. Dharma is a gigantic stretchable word that can expand itself to mean “almost everything and anything”!
“Without fulfilling your Dharma, you cannot enter Yoga,” Swamiji said “So! Do your Dharma, fulfill your commitment, come hell or high water”.
Yes! We often had to face the flames of hell, in order to fulfill our commitment!
Rising at 4:30am after a sleepless night of high fever, facing the fiery, unreasonable anger of a fellow student who was burning out Karma and trying to incinerate everyone around him/her too; feeling the “fire in the belly” of hunger and craving on the third day of the water fast….
But! No excuses! We walked on fire and fulfilled our commitment. Oddly enough, however, when we analyzed the situation, we discovered that the “flames” were only cardboard… they were not real (like Nachiketa in the Kathopanished we discovered our “suffering” was only in our imagination. It was “not real!”)
As John Milton said 400 years ago “The mind is its own place and can make a hell of heaven and a heaven of hell!”
No Excuses! Karma Yoga tasks must be done!
No excuses! We must be on time for classes and meals!
No excuses! We must attend every class!
No excuses! We must practice our techniques!
No excuses! We must see ourselves…. Without running away…
This “No Excuse Policy” was the “weight lifting” which built our spiritual muscles.
Yes! We can! We will! We are able!
No weak victims here. We are the captains of our souls; we are the masters of our fate. We have none to blame for our miseries or failures but ourselves!
The “Buck Stops Here” (as Harry Truman, President of the USA, famously proclaimed with that sign on his desk!) Truman was a bold man who realized as President of USA, he had to take the Ultimate Responsibility for whatever happened in his country. And if he could not do that… If he made excuses for problems and failures… why the Guru would have told him, “If the fire is too hot, get out of the kitchen!”
If we cannot stand the heat, we can never transform ourselves! No excuses allowed!
To adopt this attitude of “do or die” we must want passionately more than anything else, to grow spiritually, to evolve to higher realms of consciousness! When our only aim is to grow in spirit, then we will allow ourselves “No excuses!”
When we do not want to evolve or grow spiritually, when all we want is comfort, pleasure, ease ego — fattening… Then any excuse will be sufficient to avoid doing our Dharma or fulfilling our commitments!
I had glimpsed this “No Excuse Policy” from another angle several years before I met Swamiji while I was traveling in Europe.
As young travelers many persons tried to take advantage of my girlfriend and I in many ways. One day I stumbled on a Sufi story which helped frame the proper attitude toward such people. The story went like this!
Naszaruddin had an obnoxious neighbour who was constantly borrowing household items and never returning them. One day the neighbour asked Naszaruddin if he could borrow his clothesline. “No, you can’t!” the Sufi said. “Why not?” asked the neighbour, offended. “Because I am drying minutes on it!” replied the Sufi. “How can you dry minutes on a clothes line?” the neighbour complained. “Any excuse is good enough when I don’t want to lend you my clothesline,” the master said!
Well! The crux of the matter is this! When we don’t want to do something, any excuse is good enough! When we don’t want to grow spiritually, any excuse is good enough to over sleep, over eat, watch too much television, waste time in gossip, not do our duty, break our commitments.
Once the passion to evolve consciously takes firm hold, then we will recognize our excuses for what they are: red herrings the ego has placed across the path of spiritual growth to throw us off the track.
Then, we will understand the Master’s Dictum!
