When the heart is full of innocence, we as individuals become absent. In that state, only Love is present and we become one with the Lord. We become childlike. When a child offers something, it cannot be rejected because a child’s love is untainted and pure. In true love, there are no dual feelings like pure or impure, good or bad.

Love makes one accept anything and everything. We can see this even in ordinary love. When love is sincere, the lover will even jump from the top of a three-story building if the beloved asks him to. When one really loves, one stops thinking. No thoughts, no mind, nothing. Only love remains. This ‘forgetting-all-else’ kind of love culminates in innocence.

God’s nature is like that of a child. To some He will give. To some others He will not give. Arguing or blaming Him will not help to make Him change His spontaneous reactions. Goodness inherited from the previous birth should be present to become a worthy vessel for Him. A Mahatma (illumined Master) is capable of seeing these subtle aspects which others cannot. God will become the servant of one who has innocence. However much they pay attention, no further progress will be there for those who do not have this innocence.

While a child’s innocence lasts only for a short period, a Mahatma is eternally innocent. The child has not realised this innocence in itself, whereas the Mahatma has full realisation of his innocent and pure nature. One can get a glimpse of God in a child, but the child is not God. A Mahatma is God. A Mahatma lives in Supreme Consciousness. He is beyond the cycle of birth and death. He has the strength and support of his own realisation. He is wide-awake, fully aware and conscious of his realised state. A child is not wakeful to consciousness and has no realisation of its pure nature. It is still fast asleep to that state. The Self-realised state of the Mahatma is conscious innocence.

Due to this state of total innocence, ‘undivided’ people such as an illumined Master, are always strangers to this world. Ordinary people will not let them live freely to speak the truth. They will try to bind them or put chains on them. But we cannot bind them nor can we chain them down. The world cannot understand great Masters. Whatever is not understood, is beyond the ordinary intellect, we want to destroy. We consider it strange, unreasonable and illogical. Our individuality (ego) cannot bear it. Not having an ego is unknown to us; therefore, we want to get rid of such egoless phenomena. Whether we know it or not, we want the ego and the world to exist forever, for without them, we cannot possess, acquire, enjoy and indulge. For some of us, life is for indulgences, not for becoming free of the individuality. Know that the Mahatmas are not here to destroy anything for us but to create – to create a positive, healthy and intelligent attitude about life.

Sometimes people become confused at what Swami says or at Swami’s actions. People may feel that Swami plays tricks on them, or that He is doing something, which is either bad or wrong. Swami’s ‘tricks’ are not to gain anything for Himself but to make us gain something. Swami plays ‘tricks’ only when there is ego and selfishness. He flows to where there is innocence and surrender. Give a little space for God; a little is enough. He will flow into you. Nowadays, we are now completely closed up; not even a hair’s breadth of a crevice is there for God to peep in.

Spiritual effort is mainly the effort to still the concepts created by the mind. The mind should, figuratively speaking, disappear from its old patterns. We should become ‘no-mind’ or ‘die-mind,’ as Swami often says, free of opinions and imaginary concepts. An ordinary person contains very little else but his own imagination and concepts. A person who is in the state of ‘no-mind’ might dwell in the world of diversity, but in reality, he is in God. You might see him act or speak, but he does neither. He is actionless and has no speech; he is still and silent in all circumstances. But our mind will impose a mind onto him. Our mind will impose a body, speech and action onto him. We ourselves are divided; therefore, it is natural that we will try to make him divided also. We have no experience of anything else, less anything greater and purer, so naturally our interpretations are limited.

Ordinary people crave name and fame; therefore, they feel it a threat when this tendency of theirs is not encouraged or fed and they want to fight against anything obstructing it. For this reason, some who are established in the state of Self-realisation and who choose to remain in the body will reflect a self-created ego with which to ‘fight back’. But this kind of ego is only a shadow ego. If we observe closely, we can see that there is no ego in them. It is only pretence. Within them is the power of the whole universe. Is it not amusing to believe that one who contains the power of the universe, is weak to the senses, may be failing, may have attractions, and may not know what he is doing and so forth? With immense powers at his disposal, we still feel he must be, after all, like ourselves…

Krishna pretended, more than anyone else, to have an individuality of His own. This is what is meant by the word leela (divine play). The whole world is a leela of God. Krishna kept the pretended ego until the end. He wanted it so that He could live in the midst of vagabonds and wicked people. Whenever it was needed, He used it as a weapon to strike back. Otherwise, how could He fulfil the great cause of restoring the declining righteousness? How could He remain unconquerable, succeed in all deeds yet ‘die’ from a single arrow from a simple hunter? Even His endeavours at peace making were opposed due to the unshakeable egos of a blind king and his sons. Therefore, to teach the world, to discipline people and to put things on the right track, the great Masters have to create an apparent ego. However, they are far beyond. Deep down they are untouched, pure, innocent and silent.