Class-Compassion

*Sat is an abbreviation for Sathyam.

Summary: In this DVD, Sat talks in depth about compassion, what true compassion and the ultimate understanding are all about. She also talks about how waking up is the only solution and presents the tools for that.

Sathyam begins by saying: Let’s truly dive into our inner silence.

Meditation takes place for a few minutes.

She continues: Tonight, I would like to talk about compassion. What does compassion mean to you? (Sathyam asks one of the men in the class.)
A man says: For me, it means to have understanding for another person’s condition.
Another man says: For me, compassion is to be a loving individual. To reach out and help when there is a need.
A woman says: There is a lot of love and understanding that comes up, when I hear that word.
Sathyam: Does anyone disagree with that?
Another woman says: I don’t disagree with it, but for me, I think you have to reach inside yourself, to find a place where there is maybe some understanding.

Sathyam: This morning I had a dream, and I wondered why I was having such a dream, and now I know it was a demonstration for tonight’s topic. I had a dream that I had intimate relations with someone who had HIV, but I did not learn of his illness until afterwards. In the dream, I immediately closed My eyes to meditate and find out if I really have a problem. As I went “in,” I woke up, and as I woke up, there was no one there, no disease, and no need for a solution. Upon waking up from the dream, the entire story was gone.
The highest solution in My dream was to go “in” and I don’t know how I remembered to go in, meditate and find a solution for this problem in the dream, although it wasn’t actually needed. Since I had been so involved with the dream, when I woke up, I did not really know where I was. Then I asked Myself, “Are you kidding Me? All along I have been lying in this bed …” And this is the story of this life!
The biggest form of compassion is to wake up and to wake up another who may be having a problem. In the dream, we are born and in the dream we appear to be dying, or to be dead. The whole story vanishes when who we really are is realized. Then, there won’t be any question of having a problem, solving it, or even experiencing any disease.
This is because people who are awakened in “this” story, in this manifested story which some call creation and I call illusion, are those who walk unaffected [by it]. Why is it that the awakened ones walk unaffected through this dream? It is because they know it is a dream.
The word “compassion” is therefore very misleading. I said that to someone a few years ago and they nearly killed Me. They were too attached to their compassion and the nobility of being an understanding person, to see any other perspective or possibility. But what is so understanding about admitting that someone is miserable? Will that help that person? Will it cure them? Or should My knowledge of who that person really is wake them up to the degree that they are ready to be woken up? So the solution always lies in going back to the Source, and not this manifestation, which I call the dream.
Although compassion is a noble characteristic, knowing the truth is even more noble. Compassion is good for someone who is just beginning to turn to love, rather than hate. For such a person, compassion is wonderful and they should develop this characteristic.
Currently, My brother is not feeling well, so My first reaction is to have compassion for him, to feel sorry for him, and to try to help him. But believe Me, the biggest help that My love can offer him is for Me to be consciously awakened, so if he is receptive, in a moment of receptivity, he can save himself from this nightmare.
You cannot however wake someone up from a deep sleep. Even if they can hear you, they will tell you to leave them alone and go right back to sleep. There has to be receptivity to hear it and to somehow wake up.
Outside these rooms, we put our shoes on and we pick up our stories. You all have a story from the time you were born, but it is just a story. We can identify with our story and continuously ride this roller coaster, or we can be where we are, half-asleep and half-awake, saying “God, I just want to get up.” At that time, the whole manifestation will help to bring you to places and provide you with things to help you wake up.
Love is wonderful and compassion is extraordinarily great, but they are still happening in the dream. I do not mean to be harsh. I am a very loving person; if I was not, I would not show up here week after week, but that is not enough! A lot of people are loving, but they actually do more damage out of their love.
For example, I had a friend some years back who kept dragging My husband and I to Virginia Lake to feed the ducks and geese. I kept telling her that it was not a good idea, but she called us stone-hearted. Now look at Virginia Lake; there are so many ducks and geese that they are working to get rid of them.
I will tell you another story: there was a very compassionate man who lived in the mountains. A friend took him to the ocean, and the water was very cold. He felt such compassion for the fish that he caught one, and took it home, and covered it with a blanket to keep it warm. When the fish died, his friend said to him, “You are such an idiot, why did you do that?” He responded, “I did it because I had so much compassion.”
I am trying to say that when our actions become spontaneous, unbeknown to the planning of the mind, logic and reason, it is a divine act. It is a perfect act and how does this happen? It happens to the extent that we let go of this dream, and we are aware of what is beyond the dream.
Now, we do not have to accept what is being said tonight; it is just an invitation to a place that is not of this world. Many good doers are very, very unhappy; many criminals are more peaceful than the good doers are. There is no justice then, because being good is so much better than not being good. So what is it then? Neither one of them is the truth, neither is the loving person good, nor is the unloving person bad. What should we look into then? We should look into who we really are; who we really are is beyond the duality, it is nothing but peace and intoxicating contentment- intoxicating contentment! Where is this found? It is so near, that there is no word for its nearness; it is too near to even call it near.
Then what is one to do when our family is not feeling well? To privately and publicly tell that person who they really are, for whatever extent of time their body appears to be here. We are not so concerned about the length; it is the quality that we are concerned with. There are people who are here on earth for only 24 hours; holy men who were asked about that said that was the only time they needed to be here for.
We can of course sit here every Tuesday night and try to solve the problems of the world. We can go on like that for years and years and none of us will ever be completely problem-free. Believe Me, we become so good at solving problems that we even attract problems to ourselves. It is as if we say “I am good at this. Logically, emotionally and mentally- bring it on!”
No, this is not where we stand; there are many places that we can go to learn the art of solving problems. Or we can wake up and realize that there is no problem, like the HIV that I was supposed to have in My dream this morning. Believe Me, it was quite a nightmare and thank God I remembered to meditate in the dream to solve that problem. So, when loved ones appear to be having a nightmare, wake them up!
This type of contemplation, this type of stimulation to the inner eyes and ears, as well as the six senses, takes us from a three dimensional human-hood to a place that is beyond the beyond. Can all go there? All are already there, but what good is it if they don’t know it?
So when we gather together here or any other place where they reveal the Truth, it is not that they tell you where to go to get it, but rather they point you to yourself, which takes you beyond religion, beyond beliefs and beyond all the things that are causing trouble for us in the world.
My Teacher in India says “There is only one religion, the religion of love. There is only one language, the language of the heart. There is only one caste, the caste of humanity. There is only one God and He is Omnipresent.” There is only One.
We teach ourselves and our children to be this or that, to do this or that, to be here, to not be here, etc. The fundamental question of “Who am I?” is completely missed in “Who I should be!” Then we wonder why we are not happy!
Was the fish happy under the blanket?
I would like to give you another example. In My other class, there is a 14-year-old girl who has been with us now for the past month. The first time she came I told her where “Home” is, which we also talk about here every week. When she came back the following week, she told me she has been spending a lot of time at her new “Home.” She said that instead of watching a lot of TV, she gets involved in sports and other activities that are much more productive. She also reported that her confidence has been going up. She came to class last week and told Me that her brother had been criticizing her and giving her a hard time. She said, “I used to get really mad at him for doing that, but now I look at him and say “You don’t know who I am, do you? What you say cannot affect me, because you don’t even have a clue about who I am!” I laughed so hard when she said that because she was so ready, all we had to do was hit it once, and the whole dam broke. (Laughs)
I don’t know if any of you were here about a year ago, when we talked about a vision I had had about a masquerade ball. At this party all the guests had different masks on. One had come as a doctor, wearing a lab coat. Another had come as a beggar, one as a king, one as a thief, one as a killer and one as a priest, etc. There was even a person posing as a limping patient with pain in his leg. The patient would act as though he was in pain and the doctor would work on alleviating his pain, while the beggar would be asking the king for money. These scenes continued on and on, as the vision was very elaborate.
A young boy comes in, looks around at what is happening and begins to laugh hysterically, so much so that his mother and father, who were also playing their roles, ask him “What is wrong with you?” He says, “I know who all of you are, you are all my family. Drop this silly act.” And it was a good thing he said that, because this masquerade had been going on long enough to make everyone believe that one was sick and one was able to provide a cure, etc.
So it is with us, we are at a Universal masquerade. When life gets too serious, we should remember to drop the mask [that we are wearing]. Then we would start laughing really loudly, just like that boy.
What was said tonight, did it tickle or thrill your heart?
By having your heart tickled, I mean for no apparent reason at all, did it make you feel lighter, happier, or a little bit more expanded? It is just a tickle; I am not asking for understanding. A heart reaches another heart, so that is why I don’t care if someone understood it or not, as long as their heart was tickled, because right now My heart is tickled. (Laughs)
I have to tell you guys something else that tickled My heart recently. Prior to coming here, I had put a cake in the oven, which I kept checking on. The TV was on in the background as I took care of different things around the house. The Ellen Show was on and she was at a mall, at a store called, Remembrance. She had bought a sculpture and asked them to engrave something on it. And then being the funny TV host that she is, she kept making fun of the name of the store, and would say things like, “Make sure to remember to call me when this engraving is done, and also make sure to remember to call to tell me that my cake is about to burn.” I ran inside the kitchen upon hearing that, because it was the exact time that I needed to take My cake out of the oven. Had it been one minute later, My cake would have burnt! I screamed “YES” to Myself, because this sign was so out of the blue but the timing was perfect.
I would like us to go into silence together and meditate and ask ourselves “What is the source of happiness and where is the source of happiness?” Do not even bother to ask this question unless you are silent.

Meditation takes place for about 3 minutes.

Sathyam continues: Slowly open your eyes. How was it for you? (She asks one of the men.)
He replies: I got the answer that I always get, that it is within me.
Sathyam nods and says: Don’t even force the answer.
Anything worthwhile and lasting cannot be understood by logic and the mind. It has to be understood by the heart. You cannot know God logically; you cannot sort Him out in your mind. This is because the mind was born out of the incapability to understand what is greater than itself. It would be like asking a small child to climb a mountain. But the key to understanding and the secret lies through the doorway of the heart. And what is that heart? It is not the organ that pumps blood throughout the body. It is an unseen Center, in which all is known as Omnipresent, Omnipotent and Omniscient. When this Center is stimulated, for some unknown reason, you are pulled into places that will give it more nourishment. Before that, you would go to places that would feed you mentally, logically and intellectually. Until you get to the gateway of the heart, being intellectual, being logical, and having common sense, all have a huge purpose. When you get to the kingdom of God or the gateway of the heart, they are useless and futile. This is because the Truth cannot be understood with those faculties and it is best to put them behind you.
A woman says: It is hard for me to separate understanding from the heart, and the understanding from the mind.
Sathyam: The thing is that when the heart is open, you do not have to separate them. When the heart is open, the mind is not and when the mind is open, the heart is not. Therefore, they cannot coexist. On the appearance level, for some unknown reason, it seems to be easier and more natural for females. I guess it is the faculty or the way in which they came into this picture. Nevertheless, it is accessible to all.
Does anyone have any questions or does anyone want to share what they got on happiness when they went in and asked that question?
One of the women says: There is an artist that makes blank dog sculptures and you can color them however you want. During the meditation, I kept thinking that we are all like those blank sculptures. If you knew that you are blank, no matter what anyone wrote on you, it would not affect you.
Sathyam responds excitedly: That is it! You are cooking! That is right, and you are “blank.” It is like what you said, if we allow it, we have allowed it; if we believe it, we have believed it. And then it becomes more and more mumbo-jumbo. Many people have a lot of mumbo-jumbo. I know I had a lot of it.
What we feel here is our Home. What we are feeling is our Self; that is what I mean by Home. We did not feel Home simply because we are here in this room, it is because we allowed the gateway to the heart to open a little bit wider. That is it!
-After a few minutes of remaining in silence, Sathyam sings the following devotional song:
Only one life will soon be past
Only what’s done for thee will last
For me to live is in Christ,
Jesu Pita, Jesu Pita, Jesu Pita, my Lord
Open my heart, open my heart, open my heart, receive me
Only one life will soon be past
Only what’s done for thee will last
For me to live is in Truth,
For me to live is in Love

-One of the men talks about a story he had read about how generals would celebrate a victory in the Roman Empire. In those days, whenever a general would have a victory, he would walk through town as part of a procession. But the general would always have an old man walking behind him and his chariot to remind everyone that all glory is fleeting.
Sathyam laughs wholeheartedly and says: We all have an old man sitting behind our ear. It just depends on whether we want to hear him or throw him out of the chariot.
My Teacher, Sai Baba, says that when you are on your deathbed, there are three friends to consider. One of them does not even leave the house with you when you leave your body. This refers to your belongings that you spent your entire life gathering and being attached to. One accompanies you to the grave, but cannot follow you beyond that. This one refers to your friends and family. And the third, which goes beyond the grave, is your awakening, your noble character.
“Noble character” has a deeper definition than just being good; it is the ultimate understanding. I say “ultimate” because understanding can be fogged by who we like and who we don’t like. It is hard to give understanding to someone that you really hate. So we are talking about the ultimate understanding here- which follows us eternally.
NAMASTE


Class Compassion
August 3, 2004