Glory to My Spiritual Surgeon

Only a few flowers in this world are offered at the Lotus Feet of God. Only some rays of sunlight touch the walls of the temple. Similarly, few people in the world get the opportunity to know an Enlightened Master. I can say with great joy that I have been blessed with such a Master in my life. My experience with my Sadgurudev is a journey whereby my negativities are diminishing and the positives are multiplying.

My divine love story with Bapaji started after I got engaged to Tina. She knew Bapaji since His childhood. In May 1985, I first met Him in the evening hours at His residence in Manju Apartments. While doing the arti, I started singing with Bapaji and Tina. He was relieved to see me singing which showed I was interested in bhakti. His entry in my life has changed the way I think and respond.

Jalaluddin Rumi, a Sufi saint, was deeply in love with his Master – Shams. I fantasize myself as Rumi and would like to describe my feelings in 4 sections classified by the Sufi terminology Shukran, Aafreen, Sukun and Fannah.

Shukran – Thanksgiving

I bow down at the Lotus Feet of Bhagwan Mahavir and Param Krupalu Dev for blessing my life with Bapaji’s presence. I was graced with Bapaji’s proximity after marrying Tina. He once mentioned that if both husband and wife are equally devoted to a Higher Being then marriage becomes blissful and happy. We have experienced this in abundance. Not only us but our son Aditya has received His love and guidance from his birth. Once on our wedding anniversary we went to Deolali for Bapaji’s darshan. He said, “Though both of you took the long route to meet me, actually you have taken a shortcut to moksh.” We were on seventh heaven that day and actually had a wonderful anniversary gift from Bapaji. At every important occasion, He has added the flavour of bhakti in our lives.

He once shared that a cardiac surgeon came to meet Him and said that as surgeons we face situations where the patient is bleeding excessively and we struggle to take the right stitch to control the bleeding. Suddenly with one stitch the patient’s life is saved. This one stitch is taken by God’s invisible hand. I too have felt this in my surgical career. His grace has pushed me to handle the most difficult and complex cases. And it is His sheer grace that I can attend almost all the shibirs. Once I asked for an exemption from swadhyay and exams. He immediately gave a stern reply saying, “If you take exemption in sadhana you will be spiritually zero.” He thus outlined the steps of achieving spiritual growth in my life by sticking to the path of regular swadhyay and following ajna. I thank Bapaji for His divine intervention.

Aafreen – Charming Affection

All love starts with an attraction to the qualities of the loved one. As I think more and more about Bapaji, I get more and more charmed and attracted to Him. His single pointed focus towards Param Krupalu Dev yokes me to go to higher levels of spiritual growth.

Once I got an opportunity to travel with Bapaji to Udaipur. During this trip, He discussed the existence of the Soul and its immortality with me, knowing well that I had a problem accepting the concept of the Soul. An idea of something beyond the physical body was arbitrary and imaginative for me at that point in time. Bapaji systematically showed me the flaws in my thinking in a long debate.

For me, the strongest reason to believe the existence of the Soul comes from the life of Param Krupalu Dev and Bapaji. How can anyone write such a profound scripture like Mokshmala at the age of sixteen years? Only an Enlightened Soul with knowledge of past lives can do things beyond logic and comprehension.

Watching someone who has no attachment to the body is the rarest of rare experiences in this world. I treat so many patients and all of them suffer from pain and anxiety. But I have never seen anxiety in Bapaji in all these years. Once I was with Him on a cruise and Bapaji got injured with the sudden bursting of a glass panel. His entire body was impregnated with pieces of glass. The doctor on board removed the glass pieces without any anaesthesia. Bapaji was quiet and unaffected. I saw Him lying majestically on the operation table and allowing the doctor to do his job. One of the glass pieces had penetrated deeply into the sole of His Foot. The doctor missed this piece during the process of removal. Bapaji continued with His dharmayatra, ignoring His injury and finally that glass piece was removed in Dharampur.

In another instance, Bapaji was injured in a car accident and had sustained a vertebral fracture. He continued His journey with that severe injury and came for the pravachan within three days of the accident. Normally patients with this kind of injury cannot get up from the bed for 3 to 6 weeks. However, His physical pain does not come in the way of His dharmaprabhavna. These events and many more have established my conviction of His state beyond the physical being and I cannot but believe in the existence and power of the Soul. In fact every time I go to see Him for His ailments, I return with the feeling that He did not need me; rather He called me to cure me.

Sukun – State of Happiness and Security

Life in a Sadguru’s presence is blessed with happiness and fearlessness. My family has experienced several crisis and we have derived strength from Bapaji on every occasion. He has always been by our side. One such event was the death of my elder brother, Harshad on December 30, 2001. Bapaji was in Dharampur for the year end shibir. He came to Mumbai to meet all of us and went back for the akhand ratribhakti of December 31. He went out of His way to support my grieving family. Over the years Bapaji has taken care of each and every member of our family. Why is He doing this? All I can say is because He loves us unconditionally.

He recently blessed me to sit on the stage during pravachans and the sight of seeing Him so close has been a tantalising experience and has exploded me completely. His one look and one word gives me enough signals for future actions.

Each moment spent in His company is a celebration. There is never a moment of dullness as there is continuous inspiration to progress.

Fannah – Dissolving in His Devotion

He has injected the right dose of seva in both Tina and me. Being doctors, it is of paramount importance to be compassionate and carry out our professional work in a selfless manner. We experienced this while treating the poorest of poor tribal patients at Shrimad Rajchandra Hospital and Shrimad Rajchandra Viklang Centre in Dharampur. This seva has transformed our outlook towards life from caring about ourselves to extending to others. The smile of mothers in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) is a priceless gift for us. Saving the life of the only earning member of a poor family and many other such joyous acts have become possible only with Bapaji’s inspiration.

In the end I want to reiterate that He has showered love and grace in abundance and given a new life to me. I was born with ignorance but may not die with it. I am living in a paradise created by Him. The thoughts in my mind are resonating with His teachings. The strength in the feet to walk close to Him is generated by His love. All worldly desires are fading away and only one paramount thought of doing something unusual in this life is catching up with me. This metamorphosis is the result of the precise surgery by my beloved Bapaji. I thank my dear Bapaji for all the beautiful experiences. Like Rumi I wish to dissolve in His persona and whirl around Him.