Amma went inside from the hall. That very moment, (a visitor) Reddy from Nellore arrived along with his wife.
Amma finished her bath and returned to the hall. Worship and the giving of Prasad etc., were over. Then Amma asked the couple to go and have their meal. Reddy, however, said; “Amma! I have a small doubt”.
Amma: Do ask, dear.
Reddy: Why does a person commit a mistake, in spite of knowing that it is wrong?
Amma: Because, it is inescapable.
Reddy: Does any blemish (dosha) attach to that?
Amma: I don’t have any.
Reddy: What does one gain by satisfying oneself in that manner?
Amma: But, he is not satisfied!
Reddy: One cannot satisfy oneself like that because one assumes that one has one’s own volition with the ability to try.
Amma: Yes. He can attempt to do that. But that feeling cannot be there, unless it is given. The power that makes you commit a mistake is the same power which prevents one from committing that error. It appears as if you have your own will (and the ability to carry out what it wills). But, in terms of experience, it is nonexistent. Your legs walk but you think I am walking. The fact is; there is the power which makes walking possible. It is Power’s creation. Then, if you believe that that power does everything, you cannot do anything. You won’t have the feeling of satisfaction (fulfillment). Until the time is ripe, you won’t understand this. Till that moment (this power) does not permit you to believe what you have heard. Nor does it allow you to believe what you yourself see. It gets understood naturally, when the appropriate time arrives. On its own. You may struggle and struggle but nothing happens. Equally, in another context, it happens. Equally, in another context, it happens unexpectedly. We say it is “God’s mystery” that’s all. Our effort appears to be there. Truly there’s nothing that’s truly ours.
Reddy Amma! Is there no scope that, on my own effort, I can’t improve myself? Will that moment arrive when this kind of tract leaves me?
Amma: Certainly, it does. The very power itself, which created that tendency will remove it?
Reddy: “That’s” enough!” (Conversation Amma No. 98)
The most important clue to the fact that that power which creates and cancels the persistent feeling of “Our doership”, is Mother herself comes in the gentle unobtrusive way she says; “I don’t have any” feelings of “doership” and hence any” blemish” – to the visitor’s query. “I” – Naku-” is unmistakable. This is very reassuring. But then there is a catch: we may fall into the trap that “Amma does everything and therefore I can do anything”. It is, we may delude ourselves, that SHE is doing everything.
Then why not go ahead, without any conscience or after thought? Do everything that we like? Yes, we can. Until she decides to make us realize that we are displacing Mother’s will and place in it our own unregenerate ego’s impulsive behavior. Then how do we know when and in what context, Mother’s will is working?
It struck me that even as I started and completed this installment, Amma was gently teaching: when Kamaraju garu rang me to ask whether this installment for our journal is ready, I told him “I am feeling feverish! Just give me a day! I shall complete it.” He graciously agreed. Then there was an insistent feeling which cropped up.” Are you really feverish are you so feverish that you cannot undertake this at all?” I couldn’t decide but, I don’t understand what happened “I took out the Telugu volume, leafed through it and selected this passage. I set to work, and completed it joyfully. Perhaps, I now think, the very Power Amma- which made me feel feverish (real or imagined) made me gently free myself from that feeling. Kamaraju garu said.” “We are troubling you!” “No, Amma is troubling me!” I replied. And the trouble turned out to be not just an exercise in translating Amma’s words but a glimpse into her gentle ways of polishing the pebble of my ego to acquire at least tentatively an insight into the serene light of which radiates from that eternal Mother of All. Indeed, nothing is mine / ours. Trouble is always a treasure.