One Day You Will Be Grateful For This

[Ani]

One Day You Will Be Grateful For This

 

Wrapped up in my own personal grief, with bowed head, I walked up and down the cement platform in front of the Master's stairway.

 

I wanted the Master to come down, to smile at me and to tell me that THIS question will be settled well. But he did not come.

 

The sun had set. The birds stopped singing and dozed in their nests, the flowers in the garden closed their coloured calyxes and slept, dreaming of the sun. Only my heart could not sleep. My only hope was the Master. I looked up at his window and thought: The Master solves correctly all problems, he is my shore of safety .. .

 

An hour and perhaps two passed. Not heeding that the Master might perceive my thoughts, I continued to talk mentally with him, marching back and forth on the platform in front of the stairs leading to his bedroom.

 

At last the door opened, the wooden stairs creaked and the Master, very serious, stood before me. I looked at him timidly because of my audacity to trouble him at such a late hour. And not waiting for me to say a word, he spoke out strictly:

 

"Listen to me now, you are not going to marry D."

 

"But, Master, why? In your lectures you say that when a person loves someone long enough, he will come to be loved by that 'someone'."

 

"I said to you: you had the task of restoring to D. his faith in women after the severe unfaithfulness he went through, and you did that for him. You uplifted the image of woman in his eyes. You have lost nothing by this love, you both have gained by it. You love him and he loves you and will love you. But this does not mean that you have to get married."

 

"But, Master, why? I love him and wish to be constantly with him!"

 

"If you insist, you might succeed, but in this way the problem will be solved in a human way. Listen, love is one thing and marriage-another. On earth you have a karmic tie only with your father. If you wish to be a pupil, don't create for yourself new ties and new karma. A marriage is binding, it gives complications and hinders the freedom of the soul. Sometimes people marry to settle their karma and such a marriage is correct, it is in the path of those souls for the liquidating of their karma. But most often people marry because of the intensity of their feelings, because of material benefit or just out of ambition. Then both husband and wife and children suffer. Thus I say unto you: love, but do not bind yourself; one day you will be grateful for this.

 

I listened and looked at the Master and could not understand.

 

Emotions overflowed my mind and I could not think soberly.

 

"Every experience is a lesson. You will understand later. Give food to the hungry and not to the one that is filled already. That is enough ..."

 

"That is enough"-the words echoed within me.

 

The Master climbed back to his room and I walked thoughtfully back home.

 

Years passed. I continued to love and suffer for D. I was his spiritual friend, "my talisman" as he called me. He didn't share my beliefs and my way of life, but we talked for hours together and still had something to say to each other.

 

Often when talking with the Master he asked me about D. Then I told him in detail how he had looked at me, what I had said to him and so on and on. The Master listened to me with attention and sometimes laughed loudly at my naive chatter. His asking about D. made me very happy and I shared with him every incident between us.

 

In December 1944 the Master passed beyond the threshold. And henceforth nobody asked me about D. Years passed and I began praying to the Master to help me stop thinking about D. I had understood that I was feeding one who is already satiated-had learned that the man had one, very intimate, woman friend. I received the help and stopped seeing D. and thinking about him.

 

Two or three years later we met once on the street.

 

"Why have you stopped loving me?" he asked of me with emotion.

 

"That is enough!" I replied quietly, using the words that the Master had told me years ago.

 

We said good-bye and each went in the opposite direction — opposite were our ways of life, too.

 

Walking down the street I was filled with gratitude that I had remained free, and in this way had no ill feeling now towards this sould. The Master was right.