Only Clouds

Atma is all, isn't it? I was looking at the beautiful clouds this morning. The sun was beginning to rise and touched these huge clouds with its pink glow turning them into masterpieces in a rosy hue. They looked like castles and palaces and monuments. It was prayer time time and I was feeling devotion for my little icons, Ganesha and Bala Devi upon whom I lavish fragrant oils and vibhuti, as I salutat their names and forms.

I knew that Swami would pull me up short on these rituals because of course it is duality and I worship God as the absulute, mostly. This morning I was able to actually feel the love for my Ganapathi as being the same as that seemingly solid cloud bank. Now I am typing this blog but if I glanced out the window at those clouds I am sure they would have disappeared. ok, I just did and, there were different clouds. Maya, illusion. is always there for us to see as solid forms with important names, but it is always changing. Only God doesn't change. Only that feeling of love I have in my heart for Ganesha and for Swami, doesn't change. Oh sometimes it is more and sometimes less but the love is solid. The clouds look solid and very beautiful but they come and go, like maya. Swami often described our troubles as passing clouds that come and go.

I took my wicker basket of icons to a table across the room. For along time I have slept with them, liking to have them near. When I got my dog they were in danger of being stepped on so I brought them close for prayers and then returned them to a table top. This morning I arranged them permanently on the table across the room. I can still see them and I can love them as I say the mantras but as the pink clouds diminished so did my need to hold them so close. t least for now. You see, I have a baby crawling Ganesha which has been with me for at least twenty years. When I took taxis back and forth to Puttaparthi and Bangalore, He would sit on my knee, saving me from many an accident. He even wears a 'good conduct' medal for one bad encounter with a lorry. Will He be happy across the room not sitting in my lap? But, isn't He the same Ganesha who multiplies on Chaturti and goes to thousands of lakes and bays for immersion? Isn't He the same as my Swami? He is the same as my icon of the Buddha. Oh God I know, I know they are the same, they are only one. We are all only one. I am God, Swami says so.

Actually I was thinking about all this just the other day. I was wondering if maybe one of the reasons for Swami's perhaps early departure, (though early can be debated) was because most of us have difficulty seeing that Swami isn't just that form and has many more names than just Sai Baba. He has said many times that He is all forms and has all names and yet, we cling to that beautiful form. So He took I away. It wasn't any more solid than those pink clouds that looked like castles. How on earth can we ever figure out that we are God if we cling to that face which is now only a photo or a memory. Alright Miss Dream smasher, Miss heartless bringer of bad tidings, but those pink clouds were also the Atma weren't they? Swami's face and form were the highest form of Atma. Everything is Atma including the clouds, so there.