Surrender with Meher Baba By Laurent Weichberger (Nov. 5, 2017)
Through unfathomable ways, I lead you to liberation. Accept My rhythm, come in tune with it without reservations. My rhythm of Truth shall redeem you; It will open your heart, it will give you new love.1 ~ Avatar Meher Baba
PREAMBLE2: During 2017, my wife Vanessa and I were in a “Discourses” meeting at the Meher Spiritual Center. Somehow the issue of surrender was raised, and we had a brief exchange with the entire reading group. A female participant said somewhat dramatically, “I surrender… I just give up.” Laurent offered a gentle reminder from his perspective regarding “Passive Surrender” vs. “Active Surrender” and how the “I just give up” statement sounded a bit passive. What he believes Baba is asking for from us seems more like an active type of surrender. The participant asked – “Well, what is that?” Laurent responded that it must have something to do with, “Giving over my self-will, or my wants and desires, in exchange for God’s Wish and Will – what He wants for me.” Of course, this is not so easy. Ultimately, the group decided not to continue this conversation, as it was a side topic from the discourse we were discussing. Later, privately, the participant continued sharing and asked, “Can we have a whole seminar dedicated to surrender?” This article is based on Laurent’s research for and the results of that first surrender seminar which took place in the Fall of 2017. DEFINITION OF SURRENDER3: Transitive verb . to yield to the power, control, or possession of another upon compulsion or demand . to give up completely or agree to forgo especially in favor of another . to give (oneself) over to something (such as an influence) Intransitive verb . to give oneself up into the power of another MY EARLY EXPERIENCES OF SURRENDER Here are some of my experiences around the topic of surrender, from my many travels, and lastly a personal prayer I sometimes say. New York City: My first remembrance of surrenderance with Meher Baba was in the Spring 1986. I had written my first letter (there was no email back then) to the Meher Spiritual Center to request a personal retreat. I received a very loving response from David Silverman. In his response, David enclosed a Meher Baba card.
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I loved the photo of Baba, and the quote below it read, “If you make Me your real Father, all differences and contentions between you, and all personal problems in connection with your lives, will become dissolved in the Ocean of My Love.”4 I vividly remember where I was standing in my Manhattan bedroom, and what I did immediately after reading this Baba card. I had just recently lost my birth-father to suicide. I looked at the card and said out loud, “Baba, I am making you My Real Father.” I felt Baba’s acceptance of me. looking back with thirty years of hindsight, I believe that this was my first active surrender to Baba. My life completely changed for the best after that experience. Southern Arizona: Shortly after leaving New York in 1991, I found myself married (and with a young daughter) now living in Flagstaff, Arizona. For some time, I had a job which required me to travel around the entire state of Arizona! During one of my road-trips for work, I walked into a café for a meal. It was one of those restaurants with lots of signs, antiques and “chachkas.” Decorations of all kinds everywhere. The hostess brought me through what seemed like the entire restaurant to a table which had this sign hanging over it on the wall: “Half my suffering comes from wanting things my way, and the other half comes from getting them my way.” There was no attribution, but I knew instantly that Baba wanted me to see it. It stuck with me, and almost twenty years later it is still true. Sussex, England: While living in England and working with Don E. Stevens on his biography and other projects, I had a few intuitive insights that came suddenly, like a flash-of-knowing quite unexpectedly. One of these I titled, “Why we don’t surrender.” The gist of it was this: Throughout the extremely long process of evolution of consciousness, which according to Baba includes association with forms of stone > metal > vegetable > worm > fish > bird > animal > and lastly human, we have a deeply rooted fear. That fear is, what is trying to eat me, and a constant sense of – looking over one’s shoulder, to not be consumed by another. Now, once we land in the human form, we are no longer so easily eaten, however there is a deeply seated sense of fight or flight that can be triggered based on that past storehouse of survival impressions. This is can be triggered quite profoundly when the human being comes into contact with a Perfected Spiritual Master or the Avatar (Christ) because such a Perfect Master can consume the spiritual aspirant, not physically of course, but energetically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. In other words, the Master is one of the only beings capable of consuming even the spiritually minded human, and this ancient fear makes it quite difficult for the aspirant to completely surrender. Salem, Massachusetts: During my work with Don Stevens, at one point he said to me, if you are in Massachusetts you must go to Salem and meet Cynthia and Richard Griffin. Don had never led me astray, so as fate would have it I was sent to Massachusetts for work, and I called them up. I told them I had to visit them and meet them because Don told me to, and they laughed and knew exactly what I meant, and lovingly welcomed me. It was the first of many such visits at their home, and on one 2
visit with them, I happened to glance over at their refrigerator and observed what appeared to be Mani’s handwriting on a note with a magnet sticking it to the fridge. I walked over and sure enough it was Mani’s writing, and it read5: “Baba said to us: ‘You either want what you want OR you want what I want. You can't want both.’” This quote seemed directly related to the Arizona café quote, and I loved it instantly. I asked Cynthia if she would please make a copy for me, which she immediately did, and I glued it into my diary for that entry that day. This choice, to either want what I want, or want what Baba wants, must be directly linked to the issue of my surrender to Him. If I am wanting what I want, I am not surrendered, and I am on my way to that Ego-centric place I know so well. Whereas if I want what Baba wants, it is at least a partial surrender, and I am on my way back to Him. Meher Spiritual Center, Myrtle Beach: During 2017, I had the good fortune to hear Bill LePage speak many times at Meher Baba’s “Home in the West” the Meher Spiritual Center. Bill is over 90 years old now, and still sharp as a tack, and able to get around on his own. At a talk which he gave in the Original Kitchen (August 30, 2017), Bill delved deeply into the topic of “Harmony,” and he shared6: “It would seem that harmony in any sphere rests on harmony within oneself; and harmony within means an absence of inner conflict – basically that which surges between the mind and the heart. Gradually as the heart acquires control over the mind with greater and greater surrender to the will of Beloved Meher Baba, so harmony, certainty of direction of one’s life, quietness of being, develops.” LAURENT’S PERSONAL PRAYER: When asked about my personal experience regarding surrender with Meher Baba, I start by saying that I am no expert in this subject, just a spiritual brother on my way home like you. If I have any experience at all, it is based on my prayers to Beloved Avatar Meher Baba, and a few experiences of Him responding in daily life. When I pray, I usually say something that sounds – at least in part – like this: “Beloved Baba, please help all my friends and family, and all to whom I am connected, to know You, to see You to feel You and to become You. Please help them all to feel Your love and Your grace and your peace and your presence in their lives more and more… { Then I say some personal prayers for those I feel need it most … } “Please help me to know You, to see You, to feel You and to become You. I re-dedicate myself to You. I re-surrender myself to You. I give You my heart and my mind, my soul and my energy and my body, I give You the work of my head and my heart and my hands. I give You all I was, all I am and all I will be. I give You the richest blood in my body. “Please do with me as You wish. Please help me to become an instrument of Your love, and Your grace and Your peace and Your presence in this world. Jai Baba. Om. Shalom. Amen.”
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When He responds, it is rarely in words, but most often it is in feelings, or life-events which he helps me to recognize as “from Him.” This is a long way of saying that my life with Baba is filled with many moments of give and take, and one of the few things He allows me to give Him is my surrender. CONCLUSION: Based on the dictionary definition of surrender and my own personal experience, I can honestly say that “Surrender with Meher Baba” means to me to give up completely what I want (desire)—to forgo my plan for my life – in favor of what my Spiritual Master, Meher Baba, wants for me, and has planned for me. In other words, if I am attached to what I want, I don’t leave room for him to guide me to what is best for me. And ultimately what is best for me is Selfrealization, and this is the path he has laid out for me, step by step. So, I can either walk my own path, that is the path of self-will and ego-centric desires, or I can walk the spiritual path of self-effacement, self-giving love, God’s wish and will for me, and what He wants. This is most likely the single most difficult thing I can aspire to as a human being, as it goes against the very grain of all that I have been taught in this world, and it is antithetical to my inheritance of lustanger-greed based on countless sub-human forms in my journey of evolution of consciousness. Whew! One day while discussing all this with Vanessa, she eloquently shared her perspective with me: “Surrender is a conscious journey, you are given one circumstance after another in which you realize the deep need to surrender to – or let go of – an identification with a place or being. We are on this journey of letting go of one thing or another, because the whole journey is really from – ‘Who am I?’ – to finding the true self. “Awareness goes hand in hand with surrender, that’s why it is so special to be a human being. Because, we as human beings have the capacity to take the opportunity to let go of who we think we are and find out who we really are. I think surrender is a direct function of involution, and as we progress towards God (Baba) we are asked to step from one surrender to a greater surrender, until we have surrendered every inch of our entire being.” I agree with her. When I can voluntarily and joyfully surrender into His Love, His Knowledge, His Grace, His Power, and His Guidance, day by day, I am walking that spiritual path with Baba and to Baba, which I aim to walk. Recently I had an equally confirming conversation with my new friend in Oregon, Miriam Rose, M.D. We discussed surrender with Meher Baba from her point of view. She is a doctor, wise woman, and a midwife. Over coffee at her home one morning she said to me: “We all start off unfolding from the first cell that is us. Because there is a Divine Underlying Blueprint, that’s oriented towards God – or the Breath of Life – that is in all of us from the getgo, and all through our lives it is there. As the embryo grows and changes shape, there’s no resistance to that underlying plan, there is inherent surrender to the process of life. It’s such a
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fluid process – there are no doubts, no hardness, or holding back – like water into water. There is no self-assertion of, “I want to do it my way.” The embryo just flows into form and life.7 SOME MESSAGES FROM AVATAR MEHER BABA: Here is a sample of what my research on surrender with Meher Baba brought to light. I have been asked to intersperse my personal commentary, along with Baba’s quotes, to share my best understanding of what Baba was communicating: 1. From the message, The Seven Realities.8 “The only Real Surrender is that in which poise is undisturbed by any adverse circumstance, and the individual, amidst every kind of hardship, is resigned with perfect calm to the will of God.” Many people seem to really love this quote. While it does paint a bit of a black and white picture, it certainly leaves the reader with clarity about the meaning of Real Surrender. Apparently, it is something to strive to attain. It also raises the question – what is the will of God exactly? 2. From the message, Twelve Ways of Realizing Me.9 “SURRENDERANCE. If your surrenderance to me is as whole-hearted as that of one who, suffering from insomnia, surrenders to sudden sleep without fear of being lost, then you have me.” Some people seem to find this one confusing, because of the grammar – It appears Baba is saying that someone who has insomnia may fear being lost when sleep finally arrives. It wasn’t until after the seminar, and I got some sleep that I awoke one morning with clarity on this quote. When Baba says, “without fear of being lost” I realized he meant that when surrendering, we can feel fear, that Baba will take us somewhere we don’t know, or like, and we may feel that we are suddenly out of control and lost. I believe his message is – at least in part – saying… If you surrender to Me, I won’t let you down, I won’t disappoint you, trust Me. Perhaps the way in which this message was given by Baba and transcribed by a disciple causes some confusion to enter into it? I am not certain. 3. From The Dynamics of Spiritual Advancement10: “Progress from one surrender to greater surrender is a progression from a minor conquest to a major one. The more complete forms of surrenderance represent the higher states of consciousness since they secure greater harmony between the aspirant and the Master. Thus the infinite life of the Master can flow through the aspirant in more abundant measure. Spiritual advancement is a succession of one surrender after another until the goal of the final surrenderance of the separate ego-life is completely achieved. The last surrender is the only complete surrenderance. It is the reverse side of the final union in which the aspirant becomes one with the Master. Therefore, in a sense, the most complete surrenderance to the Master is equivalent to the attainment of the Truth, which is the ultimate goal of all spiritual advancement.”
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This is one of my favorite quotes ever from Baba, and it ties into what He says in God Speaks as well. In that book, he equates the spiritual path with a series of surrenders, know to the Sufis as Fana (or annihilation). These fanas culminate in the final-fana (fana-fillah) which is the sense of separateness, the Limited Ego itself. This “separate ego-life” is not so easily given up, thus the need for the series of smaller surrenders leading up to the final giant surrender which results in Oneness with God. 4. From The Removal of Sanskaras: III11: “… when self-surrender is thorough, the responsibility for your release from sanskaras is devolved upon the Master, and under this new condition the Master annihilates all your sanskaras in no time.” This quote is great for those spiritual aspirants who are still wondering – Why should I surrender? Not in the spirit of bargain, but with the knowledge that surrender is the doorway to absolute freedom, Baba encourages us to surrender. 5. From The Nature of the Ego and its Termination12: o “In most cases it is only when the aspirant is driven to realise the futility of all his efforts that he approaches the Master. By himself he can make no headway towards the goal which he dimly sights and seeks. The stubborn persistence of the ego exasperates him, and in this clear perception of helplessness he surrenders to the Master as his last and only resort. The self-surrender amounts to an open admission that the aspirant now has given up all hope of tackling the problems of the ego by himself and that he relies solely upon the Master. It is like saying, “I am unable to end the wretched existence of this ego. I therefore look to you to intervene and slay it.” o “When a person comes into contact with the Master and recognises him as having the state of egoless perfection, he voluntarily surrenders himself to the Master, because he perceives the ego to be a source of perpetual ignorance, restlessness and conflict and also recognises his own inability to terminate it. But this self-surrender should be carefully distinguished from the inferiority complex, because it is accompanied by awareness that the Master is his ideal and as such has a basic unity with the disciple. Such self-surrender is in no way an expression of loss of confidence. On the contrary it is an expression of confidence in the final overcoming of all obstacles through the help of the Master. The appreciation of the divinity of the Master is the manner in which the higher Self of the disciple is expressing its sense of dignity.” These two above are closely related, and show the futility of the spiritual aspirant trying to tackle the problem of separation from God without surrender. Baba has said elsewhere the spiritual path is like this – A disciple’s mouth has to eat their own entire body, and then the mouth has to eat itself. How is this even possible. It is not, thus the need to surrender… Elsewhere Baba said it is possible to make great progress on one’s own, but that is a path that is 6
quite long and dangerous, whereas the path of surrender is faster and safer. Daniel Stone encouraged me add one fine point explained to us by Baba that while progress can be made up to a point, without surrender, it is essential for making the leap, from the sixth plane (of feeling) to the seventh plane of Reality. 6. From Maya: II13: “Man cherishes false belief because he relishes it. Throughout his long life as an individual soul he has clung fondly to the false idea of his separate existence. All his thoughts and emotions and activities have repeatedly assumed and confirmed but one affirmation, viz., the existence of the separate “I.” To surrender the false belief that he is the ego-mind is to surrender all that has seemed to constitute his very existence. In surrendering the false belief that he is his physical or subtle body it is necessary to surrender various desires and attachments. It is a giving up of something one has had for a long time. In surrendering the false belief that he is his ego-mind, he is called upon to surrender the very core of what he has thought himself to be. To shed this last vestige of falsehood is, therefore, the most difficult thing.” Here we see Baba explaining just how difficult complete surrender actually is, and why it is hard to let go of the sense of false self, ego-driven self and desires. These are old patterns and they won’t die just from wishing. 7. From True Discipleship14: “If the disciple is to be free from all weaknesses and attain incorruptible and infinite purity, he has to dedicate his life to the Master without any reservations or provisions. He must offer his weaknesses as well as his vices, his merits as well as his sins. There should be no “if’s” and “but’s” about his offering. His selfsurrender must be so complete as to allow no room in his mind for even a shadow of any secret self desire. Complete self-surrender and unquestioning love become possible when the disciple achieves unswerving faith in the Master.” This is an amazing quote, because in these words Baba links surrender with faith in the Master. How can anyone surrender to another in whom they have little or no faith. It may be that the reason it is difficult for many to surrender is that they simply still lack faith in the Master and this faith becomes a prerequisite to surrender. 8. From The New Humanity15: “A real merging of the limited self in the ocean of universal life involves complete surrender of separative existence in all its forms.” 9. Meher Baba said (during January 1954)16: “Emancipation from the grip of Life and freedom from the labyrinths of actions is made possible for all and attained by a few when a Perfect Master, Sadguru or Qutub is approached and his grace and guidance are invoked. The Perfect Master's invariable counsel is complete surrender to him. Those few who do surrender their all — mind, body, possessions — so that with their complete surrender they also surrender consciously their own "self" to the Perfect Master, have their very being left conscious to commit actions, but activated now only by the dictates of the Master. Such actions, after the surrender of one's "self," are no 7
longer one's own actions. Therefore, these actions are capable of uprooting all other actions which feed and sustain Life. Life then becomes gradually lifeless and eventually succumbs, by the grace of the Perfect Master, to its final death. Life, which once debarred the persevering aspirant from realizing Perpetual Existence, can now no longer work its own deception. I have emphasized in the past, I tell you now, and I shall age after age forevermore repeat that you shed your cloak of Life and realize Existence which is eternally yours. To realize this Truth of unchangeable, indivisible, all-pervading Existence, the simplest way is to surrender to me completely, so completely that you are not even conscious of your surrender, but conscious only to obey me and to act as and when I order you. If you seek to live perpetually, then crave for the death of your "deceptive self" at the hands of "complete surrender" to me. This yoga is the Essence of all yogas in one.” This is one of those blockbuster quotes that stops the whole show. Here also Baba links surrender to obedience, showing how enmeshed they are. One who obeys is in the process of surrender, and one who surrenders is obedient to act on Beloved Baba’s dictates. Then the process becomes to listen more and more to His voice within. 10. Meher Baba said (during 1965)17, “In the silence of your perfect surrender, my love which is always silent can flow to you — to be yours always to keep and to share with those who seek me. When the Word of my love breaks out of its silence and speaks in your hearts, telling you who I really am, you will know that that is the Real Word you have been always longing to hear.” This is another amazing statement from Baba, in which he says that surrender is a channel through which His Love flows to the surrendered one. Wow! How can it get any better than this? Further, He states that we can share this love with others (He seems to encourage us to do so). Lastly He brings into the mix His Word of Love, and His Silence which word, once heard helps us to know Him as He really is. Bliss. 11. Baba also explained,18 “The easiest and safest way to lose one’s finite ego is by surrendering completely to the Perfect Master or to the God-man (Avatar), who is consciously one with truth. In them the past, present and future of the individual are drowned and during his implicit obedience to the master he is no longer bound by those actions, good and bad. Such complete surrenderance is in itself complete freedom… “Complete surrenderance to the God-man is not possible for one and all. When this is not possible, the other high roads which can eventually win the Grace of God are: 1. Loving obedience to and remembrance of the God-man to the best of one’s ability; 2. Love for God and intense longing to see Him and be united with Him; 3. Being in constant company with the saints and lovers of God and rendering them wholehearted service;
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4. Avoiding lust, greed, anger, hatred and the temptations of power, fame and faultfinding; 5. Leaving everyone and everything in complete external renunciation and, in solitude, devoting oneself to fasting, prayer, and meditation; 6. Carrying on all worldly duties with a pure heart and clean mind and with equal acceptance of success or failure, while remaining detached in the midst of intense activity; and 7. Selfless service of humanity, without thought of gain or reward.” When Baba says here that “complete surrenderance … is not possible for one and all” it is clear to me that he is indicating this journey of Love > Obedience > Surrender is a process, which may in fact span multiple lifetimes. Therefore, the alternative “high roads” are quite practical and useful during this process, perhaps to help prepare us for the greater surrender. The tone with Baba speaks about all of this seems to indicate that Surrender is the most difficult, and that in preparation we can focus on for example, “Loving obedience to and remembrance of the Godman to the best of one’s ability.” We can see from Baba’s quote this progression: “Love is a gift from God to man. A Perfect Master never gives the gift of love. Obedience is the gift from Master to man. Surrender is the gift of man to the Master.”19 It is so compassionate of Beloved Baba to give us seven options – of other high roads, when we are struggling to achieve complete surrenderance. Perhaps there is some psychology at play here, whereby we need not feel inferior, or unworthy, for after all, at any point in time all we can do is our very best. GROUP EXERCISES IN SURRENDER: We used some of the seminar time to have “surrender exercises” which according to the feedback I received from the attendees was quite fruitful for them. I tend to work best with questions, so I asked them a few questions, and broke the large group of people into selforganizing groups of two or more. Feel free to try these at home: Exercise 1: Baba said: “The only Real Surrender is that in which poise is undisturbed by any adverse circumstance, and the individual, amidst every kind of hardship, is resigned with perfect calm to the will of God.” A) How do you relate to the Seventh Reality of Meher Baba about Surrender? B) What is your experience of the Will of God? Exercise 2: Baba stated, “Complete surrenderance to the God-man is not possible for one and all…” and then goes on to list seven “high roads” which can win the Grace of God. Two questions: A) Are you prepared to completely surrender to Meher Baba? If not, feel free to share. B) If you are honestly not prepared to surrender, do any of the “high roads” given by Baba appeal to you, or deeply resonate with you? Why?
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END NOTES: 1. From the booklet, Meher Baba’s Call, copyright © 1964 Avatar Meher Baba Trust, India. 2. This article is based on my research for a seminar we conducted at the home of Jennifer Tinsman and Paul DiStefano for the Meher Baba group in Myrtle Beach, SC (Saturday Sept. 23, 2017). It was co-facilitated by Laurent Weichberger and Daniel Stone. Daniel covered the subject of “obedience” in the morning session, and Laurent took on the subject of “surrender,” that afternoon. 3. See: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/surrender) 4. Meher Baba, from My Dear Workers message, 1962. 5. As seen in Mani’s handwriting on a paper stuck on the refrigerator of the Griffin home, source unknown. Cynthia Griffin further shared, “Meher Baba’s twin nephews came to our house and they stated it was given (written) to them by Mani.” She confirmed the content of the quote, via email September 7, 2017. 6. From the talk on “Harmony” by Bill LePage (8-30-17). Bill agreed to share a four-page printed copy with me. 7. From my notes October 18, 2017 which I asked Dr. Rose to review and correct. 8. In Discourses by Meher Baba (6th Edition), this is item seven of the seven realities. 9. Ibid, this is item number eleven of the twelve ways. Note, the editors of Discourses wrote to Merriam-Webster that a word Baba used: “surrenderance” is not in the dictionary, and is it a word? They wrote back that Baba has a good word, even though not in the dictionary, and to use it. 10. Ibid, Vol. II, p. 183. 11. Ibid, Vol. I, p. 89. 12. Ibid, Vol. II, p. 74 & p. 78. 13. Ibid, Vol. III, p. 145. 14. Ibid, Vol. II, p. 45. 15. Ibid, Vol. I, p. 23. 16. Meher Prabhu: Lord Meher, by V.S. Bhau Kalchuri p. 3427 (on-line here: http://www.lordmeher.org/rev/index.jsp?pageBase=page.jsp&nextPage=3427) 17. Ibid, p. 5142 on-line here: http://www.lordmeher.org/rev/index.jsp?pageBase=page.jsp&nextPage=5142 18. In the book Listen, Humanity by Meher Baba, edited by Don Stevens (Crossroads Edition, pp. 163-165). 19. Meher Baba, in Lord Meher p. 3818 on-line here: http://www.lordmeher.org/rev/index.jsp?pageBase=page.jsp&nextPage=3818
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