Communication (almost definitely talk!:))

Salento - Fairy Tree Close to My House

"Communication is not only in the present. Much of our communication is meant for the future. I mean, if we had only to communicate here and now it would be very easy. But it is implicit, and it should be implicit in any communication that is made by us (verbal, non-verbal, anything), that the bulk of it is meant to go beyond the recipient of that message here.

(...) It is an important part of communication to understand that we disregard communication deliberately; because when we receive a message it casts upon us a responsibility to act on that. So communication is not very easy, for the simple reason that we don’t want to hear. And progressively when we disregard these messages we lose the ability to receive communication. Physically, we can become deaf. Mentally, we can become something which does not understand even its own language. Spiritually, we are dead, even though we are alive here.

(...) Having heard, you have to act. Human beings have no individual responsibility or choice of deciding what is their responsibility. If you would but remember that all communication is received only for you to act upon. No communication is given to you which you don’t need to act upon. But when you are receiving it, and have received it, you must understand that it is a communication meant for me, not just to hear and file, but to hear and act upon. That is wisdom. That is duty. That is freedom. That is ultimately liberation. Because having done what I can, what I could have, I am freed of that responsibility. If I don’t, Nature says, “Well, you know, I sent him message after message. He disregarded, I’ll find another avenue,” for Nature’s resources are infinite.
You are chosen because at that moment you are fit. But by disregarding, you have become unfit. By ignoring, you have become culpable. By not acting, you have become disobedient. Nature does not tolerate these things. Nature says, “Remove him from the line of evolution.” That is hell, to my understanding.

(...) You see a human being—you want to avoid, you don’t like to meet him, especially if they come towards you with a look of happiness, expectation on their faces. We know all about body language, language of the face, emotion, et cetera, et cetera. We know all of it, it’s inbuilt. The tragedy is we ignore—“Oh, he’s coming with a look of expectation, he wants something from me. What does he want from me? Will I be able to do it? Do I want to give? No.” You just ignore him and walk on. He feels hurt. He came as a friend. You have lost a friend, perhaps much more than that.
All our misunderstanding, unwillingness to contact, to communicate, is wilful. There is no ignorance behind refusing to contact. There is only selfishness, fear of what he will communicate to me, fear of what I will have to listen to, fear of what I will have to do. You understand?
So communication is not that simple, you know, that we just listen and see the gestures and look at the face. Every animal knows these things. And I am sure we know it much better than all the animals put together. Even though in biology, zoology, they say eagles have better eyesight than we have. Dogs hear much better than we can ever hear. So, what God gave to animals was perfection in one direction each. What God gave to human beings is a sum total of that perfection—balanced. And for a purpose.
God has not given me the sense of touch to admire some velvet or some polished stone. He has not given me eyesight only to see what is beautiful according to my understanding of what is beauty. I have to look at the ugly, too, sympathize, admire. If it needs setting right, set it right. My eyes are not there only to see the big limousines that presidents of United States use. I have to see a cart, a bullock cart, a ghoda cart, you know, horse-driven cart, use them when necessary with the same grace, with the same gratitude that I feel when I am in a limo.
Here I open my heart. I get much more by opening my heart than by opening my purse. Because when I open my purse I get a few pennies if at all.
When I open my heart, I receive infinite knowledge of the whole spectrum of human existence: what is pleasure about, what is pain about, what is transitory, what is useful.

(...) Communication is the art of giving rest to the soul. We only give rest to the body. We smoothen the brow of somebody sick, put wet cloth, say sweet words which mean nothing. “Honey, I am here. Why are you afraid?” And the sick fellow laughs within himself, “‘I am here.’ Who are you to be here? What are you going to do for me if I am faced with the ultimate dilemma of life or death? Are you here really, with your heart for me? If it is, I should feel it.”
Communication should be felt, not seen and understood. It should be felt. When a mother tells her child, “I love you,” the child feels it.
We tell lies all the time. “How was the soup?” You know, I understand that it really asks for my opinion and I say, “Well, no different from anything else I’ve eaten,” and they get upset. Or you say, “Oh, great, great.” They are happy; that’s what they want to hear. They don’t know how it was great, why it was great, why I felt it to be great, a foreigner; they are not interested. They just want sensory satisfaction that we have responded with a good response.
So communication has been cheapened, belittled. We have been taught to lie, to hide our emotions, to hide our feelings.

(...) I have found the difficulty of communicating because of a concatenation of factors. People don’t want to hear—the truth. People don’t want to feel—the real. People don’t want to see—what is reality. They don’t want to face reality, about themselves, about this world.
Therefore that episode in Chicago where a young man wanted to give money to a spiritual guide and the spiritual guide said, “I can’t take money for spirituality.” And that American boy said, “How can you give liberation for free?” You have to pay for it; this is the modern, you know, ethos, psyche that, “If I don’t pay for it, I ain’t got nothing.” If you get it for free, you throw it away because you are suspicious.
So you see, love is something to suspect. You don’t think that he could have given you something for nothing because he loved you from his soul; not from his mind, not from his other things, you see, which is all that you understand nowadays.

(...) So until we learn to accept the truth about ourselves, and to understand that what I see is what I see in my inside, there is nothing outside which I can see, unless it is inside me. I cannot see beauty outside, unless it is inside me. I cannot see love outside, if it’s not inside me. So the art of communication must begin with communication with myself. They see best, they hear best, they speak best, they feel best, they touch best who have touched themselves with their own sense organs, you know, all crystallized into one faculty of introspection. If you have done that, sympathy is automatic. I have seen suffering inside me; I see suffering outside, I sympathize.

(...) But the most important communication is what we convey by our own lives. If people don’t see you doing things which you tell others to do... "

(Closing Talk given by Rev. Master at the second CREST seminar on 28th December 2006 at Bangalore, India)