By: Dr. Devika Ravindra
My window overlooks a small children’s playground in our apartment complex, and watching children interact – helping, bossing, bullying, comforting each other — is often engaging. I also eavesdrop on conversations, and one that always touches me if it happens is a little one saying to another, ‘Will you be my friend?’
There’s a lot implied in that one question, including pacts like – ‘Will you take my side in a fight?’ ‘Will you choose me for your team?’ even ‘Will you also stop talking to the one I’m mad with?’ All you grown-ups know what I’m saying here because a lot of this continues as we grow up! They all address me ‘Sai Ram aunty’ for my devotion to Sai Maharaj.
But what captivates me is that first step; the courage it needs to ask to be friends, openly, directly. We, adults, don’t do that, except maybe at a distance – say in Satsangs like Sai Bhajans, Sai Satsang, and some social functions is a strong possibility anyway, but finding real friendship is worth it which is common in Sai families.
While it’s true that we often use the term ‘Sai Brother or Sai Sister’ very loosely even for newfound acquaintances or persons we don’t know too well, these days offering a ‘friendly’ chat in the name of Sai Baba or hand is a gift we all can give
This thought had me reflect on a call I recently made to someone I knew, to ask how she was doing in these crazy times. I was shocked when she burst into tears, imagining I’d hear about a loved one’s illness or even death – after all, it is so common these days. But no, she was crying because I was the first person who recently called to ask after her. “No one has cared!” she wept.
Later in the chat, I asked if she had called on any of her friends and she said she hadn’t. It was not important to go into the whys of it, so I gently suggested, when she said I had made her happy that she make some others happy this way too.
My Guru Sri Radhakrishna Swamiji told a story to his devotees, a tale I find so insightful comes to mind:
A man went to see the Wise One, hoping for advice that would help him come out of what he saw as a bad time in his life. She listened patiently, and when he finished his narration, she directed him home through a particular path in the forest, saying, “The creatures you see will provide your future direction.”
A short way ahead, he came upon a small red fox and thinking perhaps this was one of the creatures the Wise One had spoken of, stopped to watch it from a distance. He noticed that the fox had lost two of its legs, perhaps in a cruel trap laid out by poachers in the forest. The man stopped and stared, wondering how it ate and survived, and as he wondered, a tiger came along with fresh game he had killed. He ate his share,
then dragged the rest towards the fox, who ate the rest.
Amazed by what he saw, the man exclaimed: “I have my answer! All I need to do is to sit quietly in a corner, and Lord Sainath will see to it that I am provided with whatever I need.”
So he sat still doing nothing for a day, several days, several weeks, a whole month. Nothing happened. Nothing in his circumstances changed.
Angrily he approached the Wise One once more. She listened to his story, she smiled her gentle smile and simply asked him one question: “Did you ever for a moment pause to think that your lesson perhaps was to stop imitating the disabled fox and to follow the example of the tiger?”
Sri Radhakrishna Swamiji advised us to have Lord Sainath close behind our thoughts and He is our Guide.
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