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Guru Sisters
Swamiji was asked whether it was more difficult, or any different for a woman to become a yogi. His response was none at all. So he was asked why there were fewer women yogis. “There are many in India today. In history it has been more difficult because of marriage. Men have held women down and prevented them from engaging in spiritual practices.”
Shivabalayogi
has many women who are advanced disciples. The difference, compared to
men, is that women do not seek the same attention. Particularly in a traditional culture such
as in India, women generally prefer to avoid public life, and a woman
is still dependent upon her husband’s and her family’s protection.
Swamiji was more blunt. He said that men tie down their wives and daughters to household duties.
One husband was overwhelmed by Swamiji’s darshan, but he tried to keep his wife from seeing Swamiji. When she did, she got bhava. Each day at home she was pulled into bhava samadhi and deep meditation, but her husband and family would not let her meditate. They forcibly made her get up to cook and clean the house.
This is the usual story. A young woman has darshan, gets bhava samadhi, and is pulled into meditation. Her parents or an uncle want her to get married, and she is afraid of what her husband and his family will think. The woman wants the experiences and power taken away. Swamiji would encourage her to pursue meditation, even tapas, but he will not force anyone. He pulls back the power.
The woman may have children and she knows that she needs to be there for her children until they are grown up. That is a different situation. In other cases, the woman is forced against her will. Again, Swamiji pulls back his powers.
“No matter where I was I would do a lot of meditation, whether in the house or in a temple or some other place. I would start meditation in the house at two in the morning. There were times when I would continue the meditation through the day until early evening, around six or seven. That used to trouble the family a lot. There were instances when my in-laws would pinch and pull me by the arms. My sons and husband would sometimes force me to get up and do some work. But I wouldn’t be willing to speak to anyone at all. Sometimes they would just leave me alone, and there were times when I was dragged out of the house and thrown onto the road.”
“My grandmother wanted to see Swamiji. By then she had realized that Swamiji loved me very much, so she took me with her to Bangalore. At that time I was about ten years old.”
“There, Swamiji sent me and my grandmother along with a businessman to Mysore, and he took us to a Krishna temple. As we entered the temple people were doing bhajans. After a while, one of the people there got trance and started crying very much. He was wailing, ‘Amma, Amma!’ Nobody understood what was happening except my grandmother who immediately recognized that this person was in trance and that he could be Swamiji speaking. Grandmother went forward thinking that it was she who was being addressed as ‘Amma’ (mother). Swamiji in trance said, ‘Not you. The girl.’ ”
“Then she understood and turned to me and said, ‘It’s not me he is calling. It’s you.’ ”
“Swamiji got hold of my feet and continued sobbing, ‘Amma, Amma, you should not leave me. Be with me all the time.’ ”
“My grandmother got a little worried and said, ‘No, no. Swamiji we are your devotees. You should not be holding our feet. We should be praying to you.’ But Swamiji continued to hold my feet. Then my grandmother assured Swamiji, ‘This girl will always be with you. She cannot go away from you. We will take care of that. I will always bring her to you.’ ”
“Then he said to my grandmother, ‘You should serve my mother and thus be liberated.’ ”
“She did not understand what this was about, but she promised, ‘Yes Swamiji. It is a boon to us that your mother is born in our
family. Certainly we will take care of her. We will serve her, we promise.’ ”
“Then Swamiji got a little pacified. They did arthi to him and my grandmother applied vibhuti to the man’s forehead to bring him out of trance. As soon as that happened, the man started asking what had happened. This entire conversation had been in Telugu. The language spoken in Mysore is Kannada. The man who had been in trance admitted that he did not know even a word of Telugu, yet whatever had been said in trance through him was in Telugu.”
“Needless to say, all the people in that temple were completely shocked and confused as to what had happened. My grandmother had to explain that we were devotees of Shivabalayogi and he had sent us to that place. She told them that they had seen a phenomenon called trance and that it had been our Swamiji speaking through the man.”
“The next evening, at the Bangalore ashram, Swamiji made everybody who was with him sit in meditation in the ashram. After everybody else was sitting in meditation, he called me beside him and made me just stand there. He did not make me sit in meditation. Somebody asked, ‘Swamiji, you have made everybody here sit in meditation but not this girl. Why?’ ”
“Swamiji told him, ‘If I make this girl sit in meditation, she won’t get up.’ ”