Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi
How does a devotee get advice from a Guru?
Day by Day with Bhagavan
Diary of Devaraja Mudaliar
23-8-45 Morning 10 a.m.
Mr. Kundanlal Mahatani, of Karachi, who has been staying here for about eight months, asked Bhagavan for direct upadesa. He urged that all the books emphasize that nothing can be achieved by anybody except with the help of upadesa from a Guru. He said that though he has read all the directions given by Bhagavan for Self-Enquiry and attaining stillness of mind where God can be realized as ‘I’, he still did not know what was the best method for him individually.
This was not the first time he had made such a request. At least twice before, once in June and again in July, he had done so. Neither then nor now did Bhagavan make any reply. The gentleman was very much dejected. He was worried whether he was not fit to receive any reply, and whether he had committed any offence on account of which Bhagavan was not pleased to reply.
Later in the day, in the evening, Bhagavan in connection with some other matter referred to a Tamil poem. To look at a translation of it, Mr. Mahatani borrowed my note book. As often happens to devotees, who indirectly receive necessary instructions, Mr. Mahatani found in the note book instructions which suited him. Further, on the 25th about 2 p.m., when he was having a nap, he had a vision in his dream. Bhagavan appeared in that dream and quoted a Sanskrit sloka and interpreted it as meaning, ‘There is no better karma or bhakti than enquiry into the Self’. He was greatly delighted, and later in the same dream another devotee put the same question to Bhagavan and Mahatani repeated the above answer to him and laughed heartily.
All this was reported to Bhagavan on the 25th by Mr. Mahatani.
