We all have our detractors and those who slander us. And I am sure we slander many people too or slander one person many times. Yes, this is shameful. Not when somebody slanders us but when we resort to slandering somebody else, that is disgraceful on our part. We need to put an end to it. Let the world go about its malicious dance of ranting about in circles or spitting in the wind, but if we resort to spreading gossip and lies and slandering then are we any better than a swine who eats what it defecates? I do not think so.

So first and foremost we need to stop this shameful act of spreading lies, giving credence to rumours and most importantly demeaning somebody else to elevate one’s own self. We truly shame our Master when we resort to this most dangerous, least spoken about, self defeating act of darkness.

But the question to ask is not why would somebody who we barely know or not have heard off malign us, but as to why should we stoop to their level by either getting angry, hurt or worse spending our time maligning them. Trust me in their own way they cleanse our karma and push us to be better versions of ourselves.

We should not consider these folks as enemies but our friends in disguise. Imagine, we must mean so much to them that they spend so much energy, time and their very spiritual foundation on us. They do not mind messing up their karmas in a momentous manner by slandering us, I am sure, with the noble intention that their maligning us will make us better human beings. Thus, they are willing to bugger their karma to put us on the right path.

Or the other way of looking at all this is that if they are maligning us it means we occupy a lot of real estate of their very conscious and sub conscious mind; in other words we are a part of their very soul. Thinking about us. Hating us. Envying us. Jealous of us. We must be truly important to these people. Also we must be on the right path. We must be doing something right for somebody to want to disrespect us and tarnish our image and be threatened by our very presence. Which means we must be of some importance for such important folk to spend their valued time disparaging us.

They are not our enemies. They are our well-wishers.

Baba Sai in channeling has often revealed that those who spread lies, try to harm our image, and dishonour us, should be respected. If they are telling the truth then we shouldn’t feel bad. We should in fact improve on ourselves and get our act together. If they are spreading lies, then it shouldn’t matter at all, and we should further improve on ourselves making it certain that we never lead a life to ever give credence to their lies. Both ways they help us grow.

So they are not our enemies.

Then who are our enemies. All prayers of various religions have prayers to protect us from our enemies or to strike our enemies down. It is as though those folks should be wiped out. Annihilated. Struck down. Done away with. ShatruNaashKijiye Maharani (Destroy our enemies my Goddess) is a line in the most Divine prayer called the Durga Chalisa, an ode to the Goddess. A prayer which describes the various attributes of the Divine Goddess in all Her Maha Avatars or Divine Forms. But even in this most blissful of prayers, there is a line where we appeal to our Mother to annihilate our enemies. In Zoroastrian prayers the stuff to be done to the enemies is described in greater detail. But in Skanda Kavacham, another Power House of a prayer, which creates a protective aura and shield around us and our loved ones, the prayer to Lord Skanda/Lord Kartikeya/Lord Murgan, the Sson of Maa Parvati and Lord Shiva, the Brother of Lord Ganesha, the way to annihilate the enemy is described in truly great splendour and detail. Lord Skanda’s Protective Veil and Vel (the weapon blessed with the Goddesses Divine Power), goes into great detailing of what we would want Lord Skanda to do to our enemies.

But once again, who is one’s real enemy? For me, anybody who tries to take us away from the Path of Oneness is our enemy. Anybody who tries to take us away from the Path of self realisation is our enemy. The dork who tries to take us away from our centeredness and from our goodness is our enemy. The rooster who tries to take us away from the best version of ourselves is our enemy. Anybody who takes us away from Light into darkness is our enemy. In black magic the insomniac charlie who only operates through the night and can cast spells where we are taken away from our own true selves and all the noble stuff we stand for is our enemy. Those who through deceit lead us into false thoughts, words, deeds and those who take us away from the path of prayers, compassion, generosity, are the worst enemies of ours.

But now comes the real issue. Most of the times keeping the above paragraph in mind, I feel that in reality each one of us is our own greatest enemy. At some time of the other we all harbour the dark energies of anger, lust, envy, slander, sloth, violence, pride, all emotions and tendencies which takes one away from our true self, takes us away from spreading the Light, takes us away from prayers, compassion and eventually from The One too. Thus, very often when I am chanting prayers where it is mentioned about destroying my enemies, I sort of wince with discomfort, as I wonder, whether I am praying for my own destruction, as there is no greater enemy of each one, than one’s own self. That is why when we pray we should beseech our Goddess, God, Guru, that it would make perfect sense that rather destroy and annihilate our enemies, if it is possible and They don’t mind, could They just remove the enemies from our orbit.

I do believe that most often there is no greater enemy of ours than our own self.

We stand as obstructions to our own growth. We cut our own feet with our tongue or our ego. With words we destroy lifetimes of well earned karma. We are led forward either by ego or an esteemed unmentionable part of our anatomy. We react faster than the speed of light and are slower than a tortoise with bowel issues when it comes to operating from calmness. We resort to slander. We lie. We get distracted from our Path. We sort of live the worst version of ourselves. More than often we are oblivious to our flaws and our heads are in our esteemed anatomical opening when it comes to facing our character defects and flaws and immaturity.

So logically we are our worst enemy. Anybody who takes us away from our true self is our greatest enemy and more often than not, we lead ourselves into this pit through one’s stupidity, haste, ego, greed or hormones. So I wonder whether we should be praying rather passionately about destroying our enemies, as enemy number one of ours, is our own self.

Yes, there are certain people who play the role of our enemies. They can be tiring, mean, horrible, petty, cheap, a physical version of Satan himself. They seem like the very scum of Creation. But then one needs to understand that Karma is a great leveler of one and all. As one has sown one has to reap. So before we go ballistic, we need to understand this inevitable law of cause and effect and thus go into battle not with hate and anger but with the calm belief that one has to stand up against a tyrant, a bully and an enemy but also with the realisation that we are not truly aware of the reason behind the enmity, which could have begun from this life time but often the genesis or seeds have been sown in past lifetimes, and thus dislike and disapprove not the person but the energy driving that person to behave like a scum and a worm.

Yes, of course, our enemy may not be coming from the Karmic balance sheet but our enemy is like herpes gone nuts, using his or her free will to create hell in our lives and it has nothing to do with us going through our lot and Karma but this is about the fight between good and evil, and our Master using us for some reason which His or Her Wisdom deems best. Once again we need to face these people calmly, intelligently and without resorting to hate as when we hate we stoop down to their level and one may be right about everything but when we come from hate we have already become wrong. When we react we have stooped down to a new low.

So first and foremost those who malign us are not our enemies. They are folks who need to get a life and stop lusting after us and not envying us but they are not our enemies. Demented friends in disguise. A Sinus doesn’t necessitate the cutting off our nose. In fact these worms teach us to be careful where we tread.

Our real enemies more often than not are within our selves, so we need to be truly careful about what we are praying and at least make an attempt not to have an army of enemies going ballistic within us.

Our external enemies are of two kind; Karmic…Free Will. Thus, may be because of issues in past lifetimes the enmity in the present lifetime is nothing but Karmic retribution and balancing and if we behave in a centered manner then it’s a matter of cleansing too.

Our external enemies could be just greedy, sick, demented turds who are operating from Free Will gone to the dogs. But the good Lord on roller skates, how on Earth are we ever going to know which idiot comes forth from Karma and which orangutan with prolonged gonorrhea comes from Free Will? Thus, we have no option but to handle ourselves with grace and calmness.

In this journey of ours if we are going to lose the plot to those who are consumed by pettiness and meanness or from greed, ego and lust, whether external or internal, it is a sad moment not only for us and our loved ones but a moment of great heartbreak for our very Master.

Our enemy is clever. Our enemy is a coward. Very often our enemy is the one looking back at us from the mirror; our own reflection. But in this battle of good versus the nuisance, if we are filled with Radiance due to the devices of those who want to harm us then our very detractors and enemies have helped us climb the mountain higher, nudged us to shine brighter, made us see more clearer. Then how can they not be our greatest well-wishers.

This Path that we have chosen is slippery, narrow and a blasted nuisance. Tread with caution.

Be blessed always.

JAI BABA