WATCH WITHOUT REACTING -- ACCEPT
Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi
Alibag, India 17 December 1989 (Excerpt)

In the West we have become very speedy, no doubt, and to bring down this speed we have to use meditative process, that we feel our peace within ourselves.

Also the thoughts are bombarding our minds and we react very fast to others and to these thoughts. So one has to be aware, one has to be knowing what is happening within yourself: That the thoughts are bombarding you. You are trying to ascend. And you find it very difficult to get rid of the thoughts.

The thought process can start by your conditioning or by your ego—only two problems. And you are the one who is under the challenge.

You have got these simple people in the village who start watching everything, but they do not react. If you do not react, then your thoughts will give up.

The first thing should be to watch yourself, that you are not reacting, but you are experiencing and enjoying the silence, the subtleties, the beauty, the glory of your being, as well as whatever is around you.

You don’t have to force yourself to break this habit. But just to be on the watch-out. It’s not necessary to talk too much about it, also. Nor is it necessary to think about anything.

Because supposing you see a tree. So it’s a tree only. What are we going to think about it? And whatever we may think about it, it’s going to be the tree. So there’s no harm in appearing little bit stupid, doesn’t matter. But this is the basic thing, that when we start analyzing we are breaking our own nerves and poisoning our own mind and brain.

So to watch something without analysis, without thinking about it, is reality. If you can achieve that point, where you watch every­thing without reacting, you are in reality.

And then only the penetration into the subtleties of your surroundings, of your relationships, your friendships—the whole universe—dawns upon you.

So, to judge others, to think of others, what they are doing, what’s wrong with them, about any­thing whatsoever you may think is wrong, is not going to be corrected.

Like I know some people who are bureaucrats. They are travelling, supposing, by car. Then they will say, “I think this road should have gone this way.” Or, “I think it would have been nice if this house was facing the other way.” But it’s not, you see. It is not going to face. It is going to be the way it is. So what is the use of wasting your brain, your mind, your thought, in suggesting something which doesn’t work out? Never going to work out, either.

So when we start like, “I think these trees should have been little taller.” But they are not. “I think that the crows should stop their noise.” They will not.

So just accept it. Acceptance is the way we are going to enjoy. But acceptance doesn’t mean tolerance, because tolerance means you have to work very hard to accept that the trees are of the same height. They can’t grow. It’s too much for you. When you say, “I have to tolerate it, because my mind doesn’t accept.”

So, acceptance, as it is, whatever you see, acceptance. And that is how people grow, I have seen, those who start accepting. That’s the sign. That’s the sign of their strength and their depth, like the propensity of this Mother Earth. She is what she is. And she bears whatever is there. If you put a heavy thing on her, she’ll put equal and opposite force and bear it. She doesn’t say, “I’m tolerating it. I’m exerting any pressure.” She’s just accepting.

The witnessing and awareness develops when we start just accepting things as they are.

“I think—” doesn’t work out. “I think it would have been better like this” doesn’t work out.