HOW MANY 2x4'S
TO REACH THE SAHASRARA?

Photo © Rasa Von Werder

 

OR, WOULD YOU LIKE TO LIE ON MY BED OF NAILS?

Been talking to one of my beloved devotees by phone and we are getting close. Sharing lives. On my side, loneliness, isolation, betrayal and rejection.

 

Beloved devotee warmly welcomes me. Come live by her. Her family is mine. Warmth, support, love. Sounds good to me.

 

But a question rises. It is about wounds. It is about the Light that comes out of those wounds, which are Sacred. Shall one take away those wounds that led to Sahasrara, Heaven, God and Bliss? What were those wounds for me?

 

Loneliness, isolation, betrayal and rejection.

 

I told my beloved devotee how I prayed for ten years for a friend, and each year at Christmas, God denied my request. In fact, a couple times, God sent me rebukes for asking. Finally, I gave up. My prayer was,

 

'Give me the ability to live without friendship.'

 

That was answered. That was the transition God was trying to take me into.

 

As I look back upon my life of pain (and so much of it is voluntary! I assure you cry no tears here as I gladly gave up the pleasures and comforts of the world for God!) it is the classic path of spirituality: Via Negativa toward Fulfillment. Become Nothing so God can fill you up. Be poor so you can be fruitful. Give up, renounce all things for the Kingdom of God! This path, this principle is the same for Yoga and Christianity. It is no different when yogis say give up ego, and Christians say give up sin. You cannot sin when you have no ego, and when you give up sin, you give up ego. (Because we sin out of ego) (Of course, I am no fanatic...we all have some ego when we come out of samadhi, but it won't take us to perdition, fear not.)

 

And so I am back to square one. I gave up friendship - to live without it. Now my devotee says I have a friend, I have a family. And again, those Wounds of Light. How I worshipped the Wounds of Jesus, including the one on His Shoulder, where the Wood of the Cross as He carried it on an already battered and bruised body, bore right through to the bone. I worshipped His wounds daily. When Sept. 14, Triumph of the Cross came around, I confidently stood up to carry the elements (bread and wine) up to the priest - no one had the confidence I had that one had been there, done that.

 

I finally transited to live without family and friends, and now will I regain that which I gave up? (To be answered further down)

 

And what of the Wounds? The Wounds I worshipped, which I myself had, do I go backward and renounce the suffering - go back in time and erase it? Indeed not, I told myself looking back upon my life, I shall worship my own wounds the same way I worshipped those of Jesus. A new respect for the brokenness, the total despair of my physical life. It led to something. It led to That - Sat Chit Ananda. The Resurrection Power of Jesus Christ. Would Jesus and I go back now, and erase the Passion, Death on the Cross? (I must add here that I do have the Divine Stigmata, which is Martyrdom so I do have some claim to total Oneness with GuruJesus....we do have great suffering and death with each transition, and some are more striking blows than others...each transition requires death, sacrifice, loss, and then higher levels of fulfillment...it is a fact, though, that martyrdom/stigmata/Passion/Death is the ultimate of all those losses and transitions.)

 

Now I am saying: After having been rejected by family, society, and without intimate friendship, now that I am guru, do I sink back down to the dependence and need of *human* family, *human* society, and intimate *human* friendship? Here I think you can see the logic that it has to be NO! Does an alcoholic, once dried out, go back to alcohol? Does a 'sexpot', having given up sex, start doing it again? Does a addict return after reformation?

 

Muktananda said,

'A man offered to be my brother...I gave up my brothers to search for God...'

 

Muktananda is saying you can't go home. You can't go back to the thing you gave up to get what you have now. So where does that put me with my beloved disciple? With all my internet friends?

 

When my devotee reminded me we had met near Christmas this year I said nothing. I had no answer formulated in my mind. Now I know the answer. It is this:

 

I am the woman of God, not your human friend. We relate in the realm of God first and foremost. (This is not to say there is no human angle or perspective here, we are all Divine and Dirt, Clouds and Clay, Other World and This World.) However, I can by no means sink back into the realm of HUMAN DEPENDENCY. I cannot stay on the chakra of base instincts, or dependency. I became free by giving up, and I must stay free. (Oh, God, how difficult the 2x4 of family love was! I had to give up all hope of my family loving me, I had to stop caring, and basically forget them forever, even when some of them are now being rather nice to me!...and the 2x4 sex and intimacy, how long that took to take hold!...and the 2x4 of not having a friend, how perplexing it was that God would choose me not to have a friend! That was the last and most recent 2x4, about two years ago. Now I was really ready to become guru!)

 

Now then some more thoughts about rising into Sahasrara Freedom and Love. What takes us there? The awful 2x4's of life. How many does one need to get to the summit, and how big do they have to be? The two ways of getting us to a goal - to train us - are the carrot and the stick. We have to be hungry enough for the carrot, and fearful enough of the stick. We all have both.

 

Recently I took note that one of my devotees is quite young to have reached the Sahasrara. (Could I have made a mistake in thinking she was there?) I was in wonder until I heard this: she had not long ago lost two next of kin in a tragic accident. Then I understood. The huge 2X4, imposed upon a soul with a heart of gold, together with a good guru, sends one right into the Sahasrara. Who would ask for such a tragedy? No one. And yet, look how God makes up for what we have lost. People do not want those 2x4's, but without them, we cannot get there fast. It takes say 30 years to get to a place that God could put us, in one minute, with a big 2x4.

 

 

HOW DID THE GURU GET TO BE A GURU?
WHAT DO I (DEVOTEE) GET OUT OF THIS?

 

Suppose you must get a high academic degree? Or the achievement thereof, the knowledge. You can do it two ways. Study on your own, figuring out all the books, and reading them, and thinking about them. Or you can go to a school and study under professors who have already learned, and be guided by them. Under the professors you can achieve the maximum level of knowledge much faster and surer than on your own. All these professors worked their way through the subject at hand, already did the work, and have it in a ready form, a condensed form, to deliver to the students, without beating about the bush or meandering down the wrong roads. It is there, it is direct. It is not hit or miss.

 

You, the student, come into the class. You have not been through this course. The professor speaks, you listen. When in doubt, you ask questions. The professor questions you and gives you tests to prove that you really know what has been delivered.

 

THE PROFESSOR IS THE GURU. In this case, to become a guru, to deliver shakti or faith healing, the guru has been through all the steps. (More steps than you could count or remember!) And the guru has more than one thing to deliver. The guru gives you Power - which is God, Kundalini, the way Mother gives you Milk. Or the way God gives you Creativity.

 

Secondly, the guru also has KNOWLEDGE. The guru, having been through all the steps and transitions, has answers for you. Even with the BODY AND BLOOD OF THE GURU/GOD you will still have doubts, fears and perplexities. You will not be transported into eternity by the shakti, you will have your feet on the ground, and that means - problems. The world never ceases to bring us bewildering questions. These enigmas will be on all levels, but the highest level you want to tackle here will be the state of your soul, its condition. In that, the guru is the master professor and can give you intelligent, experienced answers.

 

The professor has already been whacked with all the 2x4's necessary to be a guru. (You will automatically resist the 2x4's and will tend to grudgingly accept those thrust upon you...the guru will encourage you to accept the 2x4's with love, and not only that, to move forward toward God NO MATTER WHAT THE COST, INCLUDING MORE *HUMAN* PAIN. It gets rough. But we are talking Green Berets here!)

 

The next thing the guru gives you is logical answers from all the practical experience and studies she has ascertained. You will be pleased to know that when you ask a question of the guru, it does not mean you are stupid. The high level devotees are all saints and geniuses. (Certainly in this church I am in a state of wonder at the caliber we have collected in a short time. We have about ten souls close to the Sahasrara or already in it! (And these appeared and transited within the last two and a half months!) This is the highest level of achievement and usually when someone gets anywhere near this level - they have already become gurus...but our standard is so high, apparently, we will bring these souls to a level of such achievement and ability, that it will be like Jesus and His disciples, or Buddah and His Enlightened ones, or Ramakrishna and His dear saints...these Avatars came to change the world! Apparently, this is the mission God has put before us! (This mission cannot be achieved by one lonely woman, without the POWERFUL SAINTS surrounding her!)

 

So here we are, back to the beginning, on the bed of nails but in the Sahasrara!

 

Relax! It isn't all bad. Once you get to the Sahasrara it will soon be time to end the extraordinary sufferings that led you there. (Unless you go for Stigmata/Martyrdom, which I do not impose or ask anyone to endure...but that is up to you! I put no limitations on anyone! I once despaired of finding anyone on the highest level, and now I have ten! So who am I to say no one else could receive the Divine Stigmata? If I got it, why couldn 't they?)

 

I must say that I have entered into the Nirvikalpa Sahaj Samadhi state, otherwise known as Nirvana or Moksha or by other names. It is also Resurrection Power of Jesus Christ. This was entered into by the urging of Swami G, who has been in that state since the year 2000. The yoga saints were trying to get me into this, but I didn't get it. I was stuck on the redemptive sufferings of Our Lord, and did not know how else to serve God. Finally, one last bang from the SatGuru Swami G 2x4 changed me. I made a decision. That decision was to end spiritual strivings and let the power of God flow however it may. It was like CHANGING THE SETTINGS. I now realized that to suffer or not to suffer (as a participant in Redemptive Passion) is changing the settings in the brain. These sort of pains are voluntary, and when it is time to end, you can end them without losing any merit. (Conscious merit, rituals, is a tool you must use much of your spiritual life, but it does end!) The Satguru Swami G swatted me until I made the decision to let go. Nityananda and Ramana Maharshi had been trying to get me there, but I could not understand. It is like this: God does not do it - YOU have to! I kept saying to God,

'OK, if I am to stop suffering, make it stop! Put me into Bliss!'

 

What I could not see was that it was not the OUTSIDE but the INSIDE SETTINGS that continued the sufferings. I was also perplexed by the tradition of the Catholic saints (as there was no Catholic saint I knew that had ever entered a state called Nirvana or Sahaj, and I did not see how to get around this template.)

 

I now had to make a difficult decision. I was to turn my back on a lifelong tradition, and switch to yoga (so it seemed.) But very quickly, I reasoned that this was, indeed, what Jesus taught, but He had to die before it was practiced: His Resurrection Power and Glory!

 

Had I not broke through this level, I would not have as full an experience and teaching to give my devotees!

 

Now here is our last question. How to receive this Grace, this Power, this Knowledge of Professor Guru. Is there a big stipend? Tuition and all that? Big loans to be taken out to be paid back over many years?

 

Rest assured. You have a scholarship. Every bit of your 'payments' (the grace of God) were made by Richard Von Werder - late husband of Rasa. And now, Rasa can teach you without any stress whatsoever either way. No money need change hands unless you decide this is something you want to do (and of course there are many blessings from giving!) It is all free.

 

The joy here is that we concentrate on God, and God concentrates on us!

 

I would like to use the model of Jesus. Imagine Jesus charging tuition? Courses for meditation? LOL. Price for Shakti or Enlightenment? Jesus worked as a carpenter and yes, later, they did get donations when He walked through Galilee preaching. One is not avers to donations, but they come when needed - probably the next step, when we get the disciples together and work as a corporate team. Then, you have a Work in Progress that everyone can see, and they can see where the support is going.

On that note, one of the benefactors of Jesus' mission was Mary Magdalene, owner of the city of Magdala, the daughter of a Roman Prince and Hebrew mother...she was equivalent to a millionaire....also the wife of the chief steward of Herod, Chusanna, was a big donor. This came after Jesus set up the disciples and started to work. He did not charge the disciples as He gathered them. LOL. (He had enough trouble as it was, imagine making these guys, who were so confused at first, give Him money to teach them what He had to? No, indeed, they learned by doing, as they went along. They learned by WATCHING Jesus work and by LISTENING to Him preach. What a great ECONOMY in this plan!) I have a feeling our church is going to be like that. The disciples, by following me, will learn, and some day they will be ME. Already the shakti is in them, and there is more to come.

 

 

CONCLUSION

 

The 2x4's come by both normal and supernatural consequences of life. As you follow the guru, you will learn to lie on the 'bed of nails' without being hurt. You will have conquered the world!

Oh, what a great beginning we have here! What Glory is coming to us from God! I can't wait to see what tomorrow brings our church!

 

 

Infinite Love, Rasa Von Werder February 5, 2006

 

 

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