Spotless Sky

Read Gita as if Krishna
Read Gospels as if Yeshua
- The Sages

"I remember this girl and that small boy who was always dressed up like a girl. I played a lot with the girl; we ran and ran and laughed a lot. We were probably of the same age and we were living in a valley where there were lots of hills around. We ran along the streams and then there was this bridge over a stream; we used to go below the bridge and play.

One day we were running around completely naked, splashing water in the stream which was rather shallow. All this never made any sense then but still it was a carefree life with great fun and there were no demands or desires whatsoever. Once while running around the lanes on the small hillocks that were closer to us, we encountered a not very old man strolling around in a pyjama-kurta and a jacket.

He gazed at us intensely and then gave a broad smile, just patted our heads and went on. Then there was this large banyan tree where lots and lots people used to come and make a lot of noise. When we went there these people would catch us, cuddle us, kiss us and there was a lot of laughter. I used to go to a hall where other children came as well. A dark, bald man in a white lungi and shirt used to take us to the banks of small streams and tell us to gather pebbles of different shapes. A fat lady was in charge of serving food to us in a dining hall that was behind our house. Large groups of us children were taken to the top of a hill and made to watch the sunset in complete silence, here sometimes

I again saw the same pleasant looking not so old man whom we had met on the hillocks. His silence appeared quite different and he was unusually calm. I remember once, the girl and I managed to enter a big hall where a lot of people were listening to a man who was talking softly on the platform. We were very restless and began fidgeting, giggling and creating quite a commotion. I ran towards the man and stood looking at him; the girl poking me from behind made me laugh. The audience was distracted, the talk disturbed, and there was an Englishman in the front row who glared at us annoyedly.

Just then, quite suddenly the man caught hold of me and sat me up in his lap, I became absolutely still, calm and quiet, he then continued with his talk. I very distinctly remember that python in the cage and the rabbits next door and how the python swallowed one of the rabbits by wriggling through a hole between the cages. I also remember how the villagers had brought the python tied to a large pole which was held by two of them at the two ends....

I came across a book, I Am That based on the talks of Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj. As I began going through it, I just could not put it down. ‘This is dynamite!’ That is the immediate feeling I had. By the time I finished the book I knew that the summit was not far, and in all probability this would be the last camp...

"I found the talks with Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj to be highly penetrating and many things that were usually vague became quite clear. It was just like the clouds clearing away leaving a perfectly blue spotless sky."
-- Pradeep Apte