Conversations about Meher Baba

We have some informal chat after every arti, the "post-arti party"! But once a week, Jeff Wolverton joins us for some serious mining of the spiritual depths. Join us for conversation, more readings, songs, quotes - you never know what treasures will be uncovered!

Topic: Inner Freedom

Dear folks of Baba,

We have an inherent longing to be free. Prophet Mohammed once spoke about a newborn child, “This child may cry out in its helplessness, but it doesn’t want to go back to the darkness of the womb. And so it is with your soul when it leaves the nest and flies into the sky over the wide plain of a new life. You would not trade that freedom for the warmth of where it was. Let loving lead your soul. Make it a place to retire to, a kind of monastery cave, a retreat for the deepest core of your being. Then build a road from there to God, your Beloved.”

Darwin Shaw would give the metaphor of the unlimited world of awareness (or consciousness) on the one side and the limited world of our thoughts, emotions, desires and deeper feelings on the other. Our awareness is like an octopus whose tentacles are always trawling for something in this limited world, getting enmeshed in thoughts, emotions, desires and even our deeper feelings. Our consciousness is always bound by this activity, and we do not enjoy that inner freedom which is our birthright. Darwin would say: what we have to do is withdraw our tentacles of awareness from being enmeshed in the limited world of our sanskaras (impressions) and turn toward the unlimited realm of our soul, Baba Himself. We need to become detached from our thoughts of right and wrong, good and bad, gain and loss, and become deeply aware but not enmeshed in our emotions, desires and feelings which continually pull us into the racing river of our sanskaras. We cannot capture the soul in the net of these experiences. It is not so much willpower, but love, that helps us to withdraw our tentacles so we can live in our soul. Some of this detachment can be helped by psychological methods, but in the end the shortest path is by bringing love into all that we do, infused with Baba's love, and in doing so, we will enjoy the intrinsic freedom of our soul.

One day Baba conveyed these words to me here at the Center that defined freedom in a most surprising and seemingly paradoxical way: "Freedom is having no choice but to love.” When we are prompted by love, there is a feeling of freedom in spite of our having no choice. Reflecting Baba’s words to me, Eruch would often say, “I exercised my free will to become His slave.” At the deepest level, it is not what we want, but what love prompts us to do that matters. Ideally, this requires the incredible patience and inner surrender to wait until love inspires us, rather than being prompted by good, or right or duty—the infinite variety of “shoulds". Unfortunately, we often don’t have the luxury to wait for love to be the doer; but eventually and gradually, with Baba’s grace, love will win out. Freedom is the capacity to respond wholeheartedly to the unpleasant demands that life often places on us. It is about wholeness and self-acceptance, and the loss of freedom is wanting something different from what is.

What has been your experience of withdrawing from identification with thoughts, desires and emotions? What pulls you most powerfully into the world of Illusion? It could be, for example, something like demanding what we think of as justice and fairness. Darwin would talk about creating inner space by giving the contents of our heart to Baba, to make room for Him to live in us. He would say, “The deeper the feeling, the deeper the healing.” Through this inner work, we can enjoy greater freedom in this moment without always being lured into the finite world. It is possible to be fully aware of the world of time and space, everyday life, without being enmeshed in it. This is real freedom!

In His love, Jeff

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Once a week, Jeff Wolverton joins us for some serious mining of the spiritual depths. Join us for conversation, more readings, songs, quotes - you never know what treasures will be uncovered!

Dear folks of Baba,

From time to time, Darwin Shaw would say that we are embodiments of Baba’s Divine Love in every moment, and we are meant to flow with that love. It is our living potential and our destiny. Unfortunately, our reactions to others, to ourselves and to the world repeatedly impede the flow of Baba’s love emanating through us. One of the major obstructions to this flow is our mind with its notions of right and wrong, good and bad, appropriate and inappropriate, loving and unloving. We release or withhold this love according to what our mind deems worthy. As Baba says, for many people, certain conditions have to be met before there is a release of love. We require that the object of our love must be deserving. Our love is rarely unconditional, even sometimes with parents for their kids. We let our reactions block the flow of love, even though it is possible to react negatively to someone or to some circumstance and simultaneously send love. We can walk and chew gum at the same time.

I witnessed Dr. Harry Kenmore, one of the mandali, react powerfully many times to others, even seemingly in a negative way, and yet a powerful flow of love was emanating from him at the same time. I used to say, he could flow through the Himalayas, so powerful was the flow of his love. Obstacles were simply blown away in its current. On an overcast day, the sun is still radiating its light; it is the cloudy weather condition that is resisting the sun’s rays. Likewise, Baba’s Divine Love is always emanating from us in every moment, but it is the many veils of the ego that are continually diffusing its radiance.

Darwin would talk about this love as an invisible current emanating at the heart level in each of us. For most people, he would say that this invisible current flows toward themselves, toward “I, my, me and mine,” and often stops there. This current needs to be reversed so that it simultaneously flows out to the world and to Baba within. It is a fusion of our love and vitality, a vibrational flow, that emanates from the heart center, and not from the head with all its thinking. Another way of putting it, this flow might be described as the natural generosity of the spirit. If we let this current flow toward Baba, which is the best thing we can do, it is His joy to return it transformed and, as Darwin has said, “it flows back into us where it can be expressed in the world of forms as a giving energy.”

How do we know that there is such a current? Suppose you are in an expansive mood among friends when someone enters the room with whom you’ve had a very painful past experience. Suddenly, the expansive current stops; the heart pulls back and constricts in a tangible way. From this, it is clear, then, that there had been a flowing and expansive current before the person entered the room. Darwin would say that this is where the internal work begins: in this moment, by tuning into Baba’s warm expansiveness and then flowing out toward that person at an inner level in spite of our initial negative reaction, it is possible to flow through the reaction. Love is on a different and higher track altogether. And when we don’t flow toward a particular person or situation, we diminish ourselves by that much. We become smaller. For example, if I find children noisy and unruly, very demanding, I may unwittingly block the flow to a profound part of my inner life, the child in me. The same is so true with many things we reject: we shut down.

This is not to say that this flowing current must always be expressed outwardly. Sometimes it is wise to let the flow remain invisible, with no outer expression, such as in cases where someone might respond to your warmth the wrong way and take advantage of you. Sometimes we have to love from a distance, while still remaining in a flowing state.

Do your reactions sometimes make it impossible for you to respond at the same time with the flow of love? What type of emotional reactions most often tend to break your flow of love? Are you able to experience that the flow of love is on a higher and different track in you than the lower emotional or desire track? Do you experience substantial fluctuations of expansiveness in your response to others and the situations in your life? Can you feel that blocking the flow of your love leaves you feeling diminished in a subtle way?

In His love, Jeff

To join the email list for Late Night Chats, contact Angela

This event was recorded live. To be first to be notified of a new video on this channel, please hit the red subscribe button, then the notifications bell. To join future live events, see www.babazoom.net. Please join our Facebook group: www.facebook.com/groups/meherbabafamily

We have some informal chat after every arti, the "post-arti party"! But once a week, Jeff Wolverton joins us for some serious mining of the spiritual depths. Join us for conversation, more readings, songs, quotes - you never know what treasures will be uncovered!

Dear folks of Baba,

We have had a few guest speakers from the younger generations, including Laurent Weichberger, Sevn McAuley and Margi Connor. Laura Smith, our guest for this Sunday, is between my generation and Margi’s. She grew up here in Myrtle Beach and was a bright, joyous, fun-loving and carefree presence on the Center. Her parents, Craig and Louise, moved here in 1971 to be near the Center and be a part of the Baba community. They had the great good fortune, to attend the ’69 Darshan in India, but Laura was not yet born. In her teenage years, Laura was an enthusiastic participant in the Youth Sahavas and then went off to college where she faced some of the temptations that many from our generation dealt with. She speaks very openly about her college struggles and Baba’s help during that period of her life. You will find her perspective unique and refreshing. As many of you know, she works at Sheriar Books as a most welcoming manager, along with her genial sidekick, Sheila Gambill, and a trip to the Center often includes a delightful Baba-filled visit to the bookstore! Baba is Laura's everything, and she speaks very frankly and openly about her struggles and the breakthroughs in her life with Him and also Mehera.

In His love, Jeff

To join the email list for Late Night Chats, contact Angela

This event was recorded live. To be first to be notified of a new video on this channel, please hit the red subscribe button, then the notifications bell. To join future live events, see www.babazoom.net. Please join our Facebook group: www.facebook.com/groups/meherbabafamily

We have some informal chat after every arti, the "post-arti party"! But once a week, Jeff Wolverton joins us for some serious mining of the spiritual depths. Join us for conversation, more readings, songs, quotes - you never know what treasures will be uncovered!

Topic: Irwin Luck’s Baba Story

Dear folks of Baba,

Again we are having as our guest speaker, Irwin Luck, one of the few in our country still living who met Baba. I tell him that he is on the "endangered species list!" He first met Baba in 1960 when he was just in his early 20s and he shares a very intimate perspective of Baba’s human side. Baba was so natural and loving with him and delighted in this boy's great enthusiasm for Him. He asked Baba many questions which Baba welcomed, and he had the good fortune of driving around in the car with Baba visiting places in Pune. He was with Baba at other times during the 1960s, including the East-West Gathering at Guruprasad in 1962, and he was in Meherabad when Baba was being lowered in His grave on the 7th of February, 1969.

As always, Irwin welcomes any questions and gives a broad perspective of Baba as the Avatar and what it means to live for Him. Irwin lives in Myrtle Beach and is a delight to be around, entertaining in so many ways. Over the years, he has written many poems which he posts regularly that give valuable insights into the life with Baba, and he has worked tirelessly for Baba for over sixty years. Come and enjoy his great sense of humor, and bring questions. Let’s see if we can ask him a question he can’t answer! That would be a first!!

In His love, Jeff

To join the email list for Late Night Chats, contact Angela

This event was recorded live. To be first to be notified of a new video on this channel, please hit the red subscribe button, then the notifications bell. To join future live events, see www.babazoom.net. Please join our Facebook group: www.facebook.com/groups/meherbabafamily

We have some informal chat after every arti, the "post-arti party"! But once a week, Jeff Wolverton joins us for some serious mining of the spiritual depths. Join us for conversation, more readings, songs, quotes - you never know what treasures will be uncovered!

Topic: Controlling Anger

Dear folks of Baba,

One of the greatest challenges facing us in our life with Baba is acquiring a natural control of anger, without repressing it. Baba has said that it is possible through great effort to rise above putting lust into action (an entanglement with the gross sphere) and greed (an entanglement with the subtle sphere). However, the root of anger is embedded in the mental sphere, which is at a much deeper level. He says that to control anger requires the intervention and grace of a Perfect Master or the Avatar. Therefore, we are faced with a Herculean task and have to turn to Baba for help.

Baba has said that anger is used for domination and aggression. It is used for getting our own way, and sometimes if we don’t get our own way, we get even angrier. One of the insidious forms of anger is embedded in our values and beliefs which we sometimes think of as sacrosanct. We think that no one should violate our sacred beliefs! People sometimes feel that their values are the true and correct ones and should prevail with others (including with their children) and the world around them. When they are not respected, a "righteous anger" is often aroused. Because the root of our values and beliefs are on the mental level, it is no small achievement to root out their domination and avoid forcing our values and beliefs on others.

Anger takes many other forms, from rage in extreme cases to its hidden form of resentment to its more subtle forms of annoyance, irritability, sarcasm, disapproval and impatience. I don’t think it will be possible to gain control of anger without dealing with these more subtle forms.

There are two insights from Eruch that have been extremely helpful for me in dealing with anger. If you express anger toward someone, he said, see that you apologize to them afterwards. Naturally, this can often be very humiliating, a blow to the ego and an admission that our behavior has been inappropriate. And the humiliation of knowing we will have to apologize afterwards acts as a deterrent to expressing anger in the first place! We are not dealing here with anger when it is used to protect or defend oneself, which is another topic entirely. Anger is an impediment to the soul’s growth when it is used for the ego, but not when it is expressed in the cause of love and truth.

Another invaluable insight I learned from Eruch is how to express mock anger, that is, expressing anger without really being angry. It can get the job done without really hurting others. For example, suppose I am rooming with a couple of guys in college, and neither does much of anything to clean up after themselves, such as doing the dishes or cleaning the bathroom. If I don’t say anything and just let it happen, months can go by and naturally a resentment begins to build. When I finally speak up, there is a tremendous anger that comes through that can be hurtful and alienating. But if at the very beginning I express mock anger such as, “Hey you guys, am I supposed to be your mother and clean up after you! Let’s share in keeping this place clean." The effect is not as insulting and shaming. Rather than there being a hurtful barb in the anger, there is a softness in the intensity that makes its point clearly and without hurt.

Controlling anger is a massive challenge, and I’ve only touched on a few aspects. I think it would be very interesting and informative to hear different ways of approaching it from all of you.

In His love, Jeff

To join the email list for Late Night Chats, contact Angela

This event was recorded live. To be first to be notified of a new video on this channel, please hit the red subscribe button, then the notifications bell. To join future live events, see www.babazoom.net. Please join our Facebook group: www.facebook.com/groups/meherbabafamily

Late night chat centered around our Beloved. A sharing of hearts.

Hi everyone! Jai Baba!

Bif Soper will be joining us once again to tell some stories of Mehera and working in Meherazad when the women mandali were still there. For those of you who don't know or remember Bif from a few months ago, he is a longtime Baba lover and Meherabad resident. He has been in India without leaving for almost 30 years. Bif came to Baba with the rest of the hippies in the early days and has spent his life devoted to Baba. If you would like to hear his Baba story, it is available on Youtube.

He is one of the best storytellers I know. Jeff and he should go toe to toe one day. Bif has so much first hand intimate experience with mandali and even helped to take care of Mohammed the mast when he was still alive, so his stories are rich and rare.

Looking forward to seeing you all on Thursday evening.

In His Love,

Margi

To join the email list for Late Night Chats, please contact Angela

This event was recorded live. To be first to be notified of a new video on this channel, please hit the red subscribe button, then the notifications bell. To join future live events, see www.babazoom.net. Please join our Facebook group: www.facebook.com/groups/meherbabafamily

We have some informal chat after every arti, the "post-arti party"! But once a week, Jeff Wolverton joins us for some serious mining of the spiritual depths. Join us for conversation, more readings, songs, quotes - you never know what treasures will be uncovered!

Dear folks of Baba,

We have all had many precious and intimate moments with Baba throughout our lives, moments when He has let us know He and His intimate love are here with us. It might be our first moment of hearing about Him, or at our first Baba meeting, His reassuring voice heard within at a very low point in our lives, or an instance of Baba’s matchless humor that has his undeniable signature! It might have been a time when we experienced Him taking over in a most difficult situation that was impossible for us to face alone. It might have been a time when one of the mandali shared something life-changing with us, inspired by Baba. It may have been an unexpected intuition that enabled us to avoid a dangerous situation. All these interventions and visitations from our Beloved prove that He is intimately involved in our lives whether we are aware of it or not.

There was one Baba person who found herself in a mental hospital in the worst condition of her life. Her condition was so severe that one of the older inmates held her in her arms like a young child. This situation went on for weeks. One day in her lowest moment of darkest despair, she called out to Baba in desperation. And deep within, she heard Him say, “This is hurting Me more than it is hurting you.” His clear words gave her the supreme assurance that she was not alone, that He was there, and this gave her the confidence that He would help her climb out of her deep despair. This was life-changing and has brought in her a lifelong gratitude to Baba. Baba has said, “When everything goes wrong, the mind becomes helpless, and it has to rely entirely on the heart. These are the moments when you resign to my will and so rely solely on my help. When you leave all to me, I dare not care not, and you are relieved from the predicament.”

What you share needn’t be your most vulnerable moment. There are many moments, large and small, that show how our Beloved enters our lives. We know what it means to us, but think what it means to Baba to see us deeply touched by His love and our spontaneous gratitude! Please come and share some of His sweet, poignant interventions in your life. We are sharing past moments with Baba, yet we know there are always many precious moments to come.

In His love, Jeff

To join the email list for Late Night Chats, contact Angela

This event was recorded live. To be first to be notified of a new video on this channel, please hit the red subscribe button, then the notifications bell. To join future live events, see www.babazoom.net. Please join our Facebook group: www.facebook.com/groups/meherbabafamily

We have some informal chat after every arti, the "post-arti party"! But once a week, Jeff Wolverton joins us for some serious mining of the spiritual depths. Join us for conversation, more readings, songs, quotes - you never know what treasures will be uncovered!

Topic: Overcoming Weaknesses with Baba

Dear folks of Baba,

Most of us, though not all, enjoyed an initial joyous honeymoon with Baba, which sometimes lasted for weeks or months, and then Baba began His work of drawing out our strengths and tackling our weaknesses. The struggle with overcoming our weaknesses, our topic, can be painful but thankfully there is a sense of growing inner freedom which is a comforting compensation. In many ways, our weaknesses can give us a feeling of unworthiness, and we can become obsessed with thinking that the whole spiritual journey is about overcoming all our weaknesses. That is not really true. Our aim is to become detached from our weaknesses and not let worrying about them take over our lives. In what may seem paradoxical, Realization comes in the midst of our strengths and weaknesses, not when we’re finally free of weaknesses. In one of Mehera’s favorite quotes of Baba, He says, “Seeds germinate in soft soil. I plant my seed of love, not in your strengths, but your weaknesses.” In other words, weaknesses have a place in our growing love and are not as bad as we might think. Mani, Baba’s sister, who spent most of her life next to Baba, used to quote this line, “I prayed to you for strength to carry out your work. You gave me weakness so I would depend on You.” In my experience, rather than my weaknesses contributing to a low self-esteem, Baba has converted them into empathy and compassion for others, and that has always been an unexpected benefit.

The work of overcoming our weaknesses goes on and on with Baba, struggling to rise above such weaknesses as anger, lust, wanting, backbiting, dishonesty, possessiveness and worry, and we are humbled in the process, for sure. It is an integral part of our obeying Baba. Eruch used to share with us Baba’s method: “Two steps forward, one step back.” When asked why one step back, Baba said that in this way our “pride” of progress is being annihilated as we go along. This is by way of a long introduction to our topic this Sunday: Is there a weakness, large or small, that Baba has helped you work to overcome eventually or at least come to a manageable place with your weakness? To give several examples: has Baba helped you overcome excessive worry about your children, fear of being fired from work, anxiety about public speaking, addiction to alcohol, managing your financial affairs, discomfort in being with large numbers of people, worry about health, a feeling of unworthiness about yourself, loneliness, backbiting, boredom, procrastination, white lies—there are innumerable weaknesses! The weakness you choose need not be large and consuming, and you needn’t share a weakness that makes you feel too vulnerable. What is most helpful is to hear how Baba intervenes in His very personal way in our lives. What we share is always interesting and informative to all of us.

The mandali used to give this analogy of the Master’s work with his disciple: in shaping a clay pot, the potter with one hand strikes the outside of the spinning pot with a flat mallet while his other hand is on the inside supporting the pot’s fragile wall. We are always being supported by Baba’s inner help in the process of dealing with our weaknesses.

In His love, Jeff

To join the email list for Late Night Chats, contact Angela

This event was recorded live. To be first to be notified of a new video on this channel, please hit the red subscribe button, then the notifications bell. To join future live events, see www.babazoom.net. Please join our Facebook group: www.facebook.com/groups/meherbabafamily

We have some informal chat after every arti, the "post-arti party"! But once a week, Jeff Wolverton joins us for some serious mining of the spiritual depths. Join us for conversation, more readings, songs, quotes - you never know what treasures will be uncovered!

Jim Oppenheim shares his Baba story.

To join the email list for Late Night Chats, contact Angela

This event was recorded live. To be first to be notified of a new video on this channel, please hit the red subscribe button, then the notifications bell. To join future live events, see www.babazoom.net. Please join our Facebook group: www.facebook.com/groups/meherbabafamily

We have some informal chat after every arti, the "post-arti party"! But once a week, Jeff Wolverton joins us for some serious mining of the spiritual depths. Join us for conversation, more readings, songs, quotes - you never know what treasures will be uncovered!

The Topic: Entertaining Baba

Dear Folks of Baba,

I thought this Sunday we would have a change of pace from our usual sessions: We have a program at the Center titled, "In Celebration of the Divine,” in which guests bring something to share for entertaining Baba and those gathered. It could be a favorite quote of Baba’s or maybe a mystical Sufi poem, a touching, humorous or colorful story from our life with Baba, an exchange with one of the mandali, a song, or even a joke.

Entertaining Baba reminds me of an incident from my own life that was pivotal in my work at the Center. Back in the late 1980s or early 1990s, I was just beginning the long and arduous job of cleaning all the windows and screens of the Original and Lakeview Kitchens. Altogether this involves 47 windows, some of which have as many as 12 panes. And then there are the screens! It is a long, often uninspired journey into the realm of cleaning.

Starting at window 47, I had made my way to window number 41, with rags and Windex on the step ladder, when I heard a clear, authoritative voice within say, “Is this work entertaining to Baba?” Without hesitation, I found myself saying, “No!” I thought, Baba has to watch me all day, all of us in fact, and I am approaching this window cleaning with an unenthusiastic check-list mentality: 41 done, 40 done, 39 done… I thought of one of those poor security guards somewhere in a small room in a shopping mall, watching a whole bank of TV monitors aimed out at the extensive parking lots to make sure nothing untoward is happening. What if some shopper were to do a little dance toward one of the unseen cameras. Wouldn’t that make the guard's day!

There has to be a better way to clean windows. One of the ways I came up with of entertaining Baba was to get some of the kids on the Center to help, supplying them with rags and Windex, and let them go ahead of me. We would work for a while, and then go into the kitchen and have some treats, maybe ice cream on a hot day, and enjoy ourselves. Or I might ask someone who might need to talk about something difficult they’re going through, and we can work while delving into the issue. Or another way is to think of Baba, His life, sing a song, or do a super window cleaning job for Him. I learned how to be more resourceful and creative and not let the window cleaning become my usual uninspired routine. And make it more fun for Baba. Now if I can only do my danged taxes in the same spirit!

In His love, Jeff

To join the email list for Late Night Chats, contact Angela

This event was recorded live. To be first to be notified of a new video on this channel, please hit the red subscribe button, then the notifications bell. To join future live events, see www.babazoom.net. Please join our Facebook group: www.facebook.com/groups/meherbabafamily