Alibaba, the bridge maker

Satyanand was a studious and mild-mannered young man. He was courteous, kind, and well behaved. He need not be the center of the attention. He neither cared for the worldly matters nor did he deny them. He kept things to himself. He minded his own business. He would find himself lost in books for hours at time way past midnight into morning hours.

            Satyanand lived in a small house with his brother, Kubergrahi and his wife, Kaveri. The brother and his wife liked having him around as Satyanand helped them out with house chores and never gave them any reason to be mad at him. Kaveri treated him as her own son as they didn’t have any children of their own. They somehow made ends meet but it was tough.

            One day Satyanand went to visit his friend in the next town. On his way home, he met a sadhu who was passing through the area. He told sadhu about the hardships his family was going through and how he felt like he was a burden on his brother and his wife. The sadhu gave him a mantra and said if you chant this mantra 100,000 times, you will be rich. However the sadhu warned him that unless he used his wealth to help others, it would be taken away from him. Satyanand didn’t quite understand what the crazy mystic said, but he thought he might as well try the mantra to help out his family. One year passed. Satyanand lost the count but he figured he must have repeated the mantra 500,000 times.

            One day, Satyanand heard a commotion outside of his room. As he peeped outside, he noticed his brother was angrily fighting and yelling at his wife. The wife was also arguing with him and shouting back. Then as he was about to go to sleep he saw that his brother’s father-in-law was sleeping in the back yard on a make-shift bed.

            Satyanand came out of his room next day and found out that the old man had lung disease (TB) and that he was going to die soon. He had 5 children to take care of with 6^th and the eldest being the daughter. His second wife or Kaveri’s step-mother had recently died and there was no one else to take care of the old man. He had no option but to sell off two of his children and the other three…Satyanand could not find out what really happened to them. He tried to ask his sister-in-law but every time he asked, the woman shed tears. Satyanand understood how bad the whole situation had become.

            Albeit of the terrible situation that the old man was in, Kubergrahi was ruthless towards his father-in-law. The father-in-law stayed with them an entire year during which Kubergrahi would repeatedly insult him and would leave no excuse to belittle him. He picked up fights with his wife for no fault of hers; he even fought with Satyanand. Satyanand felt terrible that he couldn’t earn more living to help his brother and sister-in-law. Satyanand became very timid and more introverted. He decided to help out the brother by repeating the old mantra with greater vehemence as if it was a matter of life and death. Pretty soon all his thoughts distilled on a single mantra and he became focused on obtaining money through mantra.

            His inner vision became sharper and his tapasya earned him visions of great wealth stored in a dark room. Little did he know that the wealth and riches he was seeing in his inner visions were in etheric space. They were mainly spiritual in nature as the mantra was meant to help a soul progress by attracting things, people and situations in which money flowed flawlessly and by being unattached to it.  

            One day, the old man spat blood as he coughed incessantly during the night. The sight of blood made Satyanand sick.

            As the sun was about to come up, the old man asked for water. No one else was around except Satyanand who ran up to him with a cup of water and held it close to the old man’s throat. Because of the old man’s poor health, he had not been able to see much. He felt the human touch after a very long time and took Satyanand’s hand in his hand while he grasped for fresh air. Satyanand became petrified and was grounded on his feet. He realized that the old man did not have much time to live. He thought he should run and get his brother and sister-in-law.

            Then something extraordinary happened. The old man slipped into a sickness driven frenzy.  In between the fits, the old man channelized the spiritual energy that Satynanand had gathered through his mantra, albeit of the reasons behind it, and saw the same dark room filled with riches and gold. The room looked very much like the room in the house they were in as Satyanand had projected that image inward. The old man was familiar with the house as he built it himself and gave it to his daughter and son-in-law after their marriage as the wedding gift. The old man, also not realizing that the vision he was seeing was not in a physical plane but held firm to his belief that Satyanand and Kubergrahi had kept the gold and jewels stashed away from him. The old man got up in the morbidly sick state and started off into the wilderness. He felt angry, humiliated and betrayed. He could not fathom how can the two brothers let him and his children die without proper care when they had so much money. He spat on the ground and cursed them. He yelled at Satyanand that he will loose his money and that his brother will suffer for eternity.

            Satyanand stood aghast at the horrid scene that just unfolded. As he came to his senses he realized what had happened and ran after the old man. He finally caught up to him. The old man had fallen down and was gasping for his last breaths. Satyanand cried and asked for his forgiveness. He tried to explain and apologized that he should have said the mantra for the well being of the others like the old man. He sobbed and told the old man that he finally had understood what the sadhu had meant. The old man put his hand on Satyanand’s head and said, he shouldn’t worry too much because one day he will gain it all back.  The sun finally came up and the old man soon died while dreaming of the riches that he had just seen and desired badly to have them for himself and his children. His last desire was to know the mantra that can make him rich…

            And thus, the old man died with the burning desire which led the Goddess to give him another befitting role on earth. This time, she put him in an oasis in the Arabian Desert. To complete the unfinished lessons, Satyanand and his brother were also reborn in the same region. Eventually their destinies intermingled as follows.

            Satyanand was reborn as Alibaba. His brother was reborn as Alibaba’s elder brother. The brother had earned a lot of wealth by wrong means and had become the chief of the local tribe. Alibaba had absolutely no money, no camels, no land, no orchards, and no permanent home. He took up odd jobs such as camel guide, date collector, chief of security for the tribal council, and even private eye. As the Goddess decided, one day Alibaba came upon the sufi fakir while grazing his goats in the outskirts. The sufi fakir was the same sadhu who recognized him instantaneously, and smiled and gave him another mantra after hearing his story of poverty. The fakir gave him the same advice as before and told him to use the wealth for the benefit of others. Only this time, he changed the nature of the wealth, i.e. from spiritual to physical. The fakir told him that Alibaba was the bridge-maker and that he came from the same family in the stars as the old fakir. He told Alibaba that they were all bridge-makers and that he should fulfill his destiny by using this mantra every day before going to bed.

Given the past life impressions, experiences, and unresolved desires we each devise our life stories in ways that help us get rid of those unresolved desires. The Divine simply makes them available to us by creating the best befitting scenarios and persons to whom we owe our karmic debt while simultaneously fulfilling their unresolved desires.

And so it happened that one day, a well known bandit of that region, changed his looks and came to oasis to find shelter. The neighboring tribes warned the elders of the local tribe that they should be careful and not anyone unfamiliar stay in until the bandit is caught and hanged. The bandit had shaved his beard, changed his appearance and behavior. Soon his old nature surfaced as he saw how he could take advantage of the people of this oasis. 

The oasis was growing every day as it had become very fruitful land and attracted many trading partners from everywhere.  The bandit found it easier to blend in. Slowly he started to rob the rich and poor alike and became a legend. He created a veil of appearances such as the trading merchant of dry fruits, barley, and sheep skins. By night, he became a hounding scoundrel that preyed on the rich, middle and poor class people alike. He also expanded his regime to other tribes. He bought very fast camels and horses and carried the sharpesy swords.  He felt that he should find a place other than his house to store all of his stolen goods. The bandit was none other than the old man of the previous story.

One day he came past a house on the outskirts. The house was teetering away. There was no sign of any crops. This must be the poorest place in town, the bandit thought.  Alibaba appeared on the steps of the house. He tied his last goat on the porch, petted her on the head, and stepped inside for the evening. The bandit decided to break the journey by staying with Alibaba because he knew he had nothing to loose.

Alibaba welcomed the bandit and gave him water as that is all he had to give. As they slept in the one room cottage, the bandit overheard Alibaba recite the mantra that the sufi fakir had given him in his sleep. The bandit wrote the mantra down and put it in a necklace and wore it on his neck. Soon he left the shack and went out to the desert looking for a perfect spot to hide his spoils. He found another oasis, which was deserted, and found hundred or so palms towering over several underground caves. He soon found an appropriate tunnel to get to the innermost cave where fresh underground water stream flowed. Behind the rocks, he dug another tunnel and soon he found a way out from the back.

  The bandit then loaded all of his loot on his camels and took the caravan back to the special cave. He then unloaded all of his stuff, killed all the camels and waited for few days for the footprints of the camels to drift away by desert sand storms. He came out of the back door and headed towards the town. He made it a habit to travel only at night. As he was resting by camp fire that night, he accidentally rubbed the necklace he was wearing. Recalling the mantra that was written in it, he repeated it several times. He then scoffed at the necklace, tore it away from his neck and threw it in the sand. Lying on his back, he fell asleep while watching the stars. Next day he made it back to the town on foot, and told his friends and family that he was attacked by a band of bandits on the outskirts and that he was robbed of all his animals and cargo. He then collected money from the insurance agents for the supposed robbery. He bought a few camels and horses, and pocketed the rest of the money.

  The bandit finally became influential figure in the town. He didn’t give up his bad habits as he was addicted to stealing. He provided political protection to those he favored. Soon he started getting involved in the local tribal politics. He became close friends with tribal members and took over the council. When the tribal chief, Alibaba’s brother Abdul, tried to oppose him, he accused him of theft, captured him and took him away to the same spot.  He killed Abdul and cut up his body into forty pieces. When he was about to throw the pieces in fire, the sufi fakir appeared out of thin air. He grabbed his hand and said that Salem had not only misused his powers but that he will soon find himself being outwitted by someone he never would have thought was clever enough. To this revelation, Salem simply laughed. He woke up next day and brushed away the vision of the fakir as desert fever. He flew towards his cave on his horse.

Salem counted all of his coins and the stolen wealth. He knew exactly what he had before and found four additional barrels. He knew that one else had been here or else he would have seen the tracks. He knew that he was the only one who knew the entrance to the cave. Perplexed, he was glad that he had more than before. Doubtful, he didn’t know how it got there. Salem finally went back to his favorite spot underneath the stars. As he lit up the fire and drank the palm liquor, he came to realize that Alibaba’s mantra must have been true because he said it four times that one night and he found exactly four additional barrels.

He recited loud the mantra 100 times. On his 101^st mantra, his throat became parched and he had to stop. All of a sudden, a log in the fire cracked, and he once again saw the old fakir appear from behind the fire. This time the fakir went straight for his jugular with a sharp nail. He whispered into Salem’s ears, ‘For all the sins you have committed and will commit, I give you forty companions equal in strength and shrewdness from whom you shall forever be bound. You will struggle to keep your wealth hidden and it will be stolen just as you stole it from others. Unless you clean up your acts in this life and subsequent lives, you will forever be buried underneath the weight of the wealth.’

 Once again Salem brushed the vision off as the effect of the liquor and fatigue due to the travel.

 What Salem didn’t know was that after he had cut off the 40 pieces and thrown them in the fire, there was a minor thunderstorm. The rain had washed away the ashes and the run off water seeped into the baby palms. The grazing sheep next day ate some of these baby palms. Exactly 40 of these sheep were killed as food in next 12 months and thereby 40 pregnant women ate these 40 sheep on separate occasions. As destiny would have it, these 40 mothers gave birth to 40 boys who eventually ended up in the same oasis as Salem’s.  Salem had long forgotten about that fateful day. He became the chief of the local tribe. Whenever he needed money for one selfish reason or another, he would materialize it by repeating the mantra. Sure enough, he would find another barrel waiting for him in the cave the next day.

 Salem eventually trained and garnered the same 40 boys to be his bodyguards and elite army. Salem finally took them to his secret cave. The guards found the wealth unbearable and proclaimed their own rights over the stolen goods. Salem made sure that they had all plenty of barrels fully of gems, golden trinkets, and rare metals. Meanwhile, the guards secretly plotted against him and against each other to take over the network of caves, which were filled with hundreds of barrels. Salem soon employed a black magi who taught him how to control the minds of his guards. Salem gave them mantra to open and close the secret caves.  In reality, the guards simply stood in front of the caves and said the verse, ‘open, O sesame’. Little did they know that he caves never had any doors; they were always open.  Salem controlled their minds to keep them from fighting with each other and turn against him. All they did after entering the cave was daydream and count the barrels and the coins etc.  They never took any more than a single barrel each.

Meanwhile Alibaba came upon the caves one day while grazing his goats. The astute reader is referred to the story of Alibaba and forty thieves…

Finally, Alibaba became the local tribal leader. By performing good deeds and helping others, he fulfilled his destiny. Although Ali baba was the richest man in the town, he lived a simple and peaceful life bereft of any material desires. On his deathbed, he was blessed with the vision of the fakir/sadhu who smiled at him and waived his hand over his palm and told him to look carefully. As Alibaba/Satyanand looked on, he saw his secret cave filled with riches. The sadhu/fakir waved his hand again and Alibaba observed that all of it had turned into light and then into nothingness. Alibaba opened his hands far wide and smiled and continued his journey after taking one last breath in that body.

Part One: Cowboy and the Waterwheel

Once there was a cowboy named, Leland. He was a farmhand and ranchman in rural Montana.

                                      

During winter he would leave his family of four and travel down south to Carson City, Nevada. There he would work in paper mill and sawmill. Thanks to the newly established logging laws, which pretty much guaranteed unlimited access to the lower Sierra Nevada forestlands deep into Indian Country, the seasonal work was always plenty. Leland worked hard but resented the life he led.

                                    

One day, Leland went looking for a prospective mining area that his employer recently bought from the Indian Chief. After long negotiations, several boxes of faulty rifles and whiskies were exchanged for this lucrative land southeast of Carson City. The employer almost fell off his chair when the Indian Chief showed him how much land he had and how much he was willing to give away. The Chief told him that the land that he is giving away has absolutely no value to him and his tribe and that it is ‘poisoned’. The employer did not understand the Indian expression and negotiated further to acquire even more of the ‘poisoned’ land. Leland patiently watched the negotiations taking place way into the night. His employer respected Leland’s opinion, as he was calmer and more mature than the young kids who just wasted their hard earned money on prostitutes and alcohol.  Finally, the two parties agreed and they smoked sacred pipe as they shook hands with each other. The Indian Chief looked at Leland and winked as he helped him carry the boxes of whiskey and rifles out.

“Well, I will be damned. Leland, today is our lucky day”, the employer, a rotund bug eyed middle-aged man, said. “We got our selves so much land that me and my great grand children will live happily ever after”.

“How do you know if that darn Indian didn’t sell you a damn piece of coal instead of gold? ”Leland asked.

 “That’s where you come in! And hold that thought about gold because I got a big assignment for you! How would you like to move all your family and kin down here and be a caretaker of this land? I mean, you work for me, but you get to keep few hundred acres yourself. I only have one condition. You oughta find me some gold! Nuggets, dust, gold look-alike, I don’t care! Just get me some gold. And you get to keep any piece of land you want. Besides the one with gold in it, of course… Har, har, har, har…”

 “I suppose I can do it. How much you gonna pay? Do I get to keep the horses? And what about help? I am gonna need me one more body to help out. Hell, I don’t even know where to start…”

 “Don’t you worry. I got just the man for the job. Take my nephew, Clifton. He is good with horses and gold. He can get carried away with his tongue but he is a good kid. I oughta run these mills myself or I would go along with you two. And listen, don’t take any of these rifles, them ones over there are the Winchesters that I bought for you from a Britishman in Calgary. Take as many as you want, take two horses each. Don’t worry about your family. I will send them a cheque that will take care of ‘em boys and pretty wife of yours for a year.”

 “Okay then.” Leland replied.

 And so Leland was out in the country looking for gold with Clifton. Clifton was young and ran his mouth when he wasn’t running his horse. Clifton was a good tracker and often spotted deer and raccoon tracks more than he spotted gold. Leland traversed from North to South and from East to West. There were few creeks, hills, and sparse forest patches in the land. Most of the land though, was very dry and parched for miles and miles.

                      

He spent two years charting the area and making note of major spots that can potentially have gold. He knew he was wasting his time but his family was being taken care of and he was not sniffing sawdust. And so, he got used to that life.

Three more years passed. Every time Leland asked his employer to reconsider the possibility of gold, he would balk at the idea and tell him to look harder. The employer always quoted latest news about gold being found in California and Nevada not too far from there. Leland stopped asking questions and kept looking for gold with Clifton.

One day, they ran into a local Indian tribe. The tribe was on the move. The guards who were assigned the duty to defend the weak, women and children spotted Leland with red shirt and Clifton with this ten gallon hat more than two miles away. They decided to attack the white men to send message to the rest of the white men who never seemed to stop multiplying. The Indians managed to damage the horses and lead an all out attack on them. In order to defend them, Leland put his hand in between only to have it pierced. The Indians took away most of their food and supplies. They dragged Clifton upside down and tied him to a tree.

                    

 When Leland finally came to his senses, he found his friend’s body charred and torn to pieces. The Indians had burned the body. Leland approached the black body and brought it down on the ground. He was about to bury the body and the eye slightly moved. Clifton waived at him and asked for water and fell unconscious. Leland sat there waiting. Just when he was finally about to give him water, he noticed that Clifton wore a gold tooth inside his lower left jaw. Surprised, angry, and dispassionate towards Clifton’s dying condition, Leland sat there looking at the tooth. Clifton opened his eyes and asked for more water. Leland felt cheated and hurt. He felt he had wasted last five years of his life away from family and home and gotten a very sour deal. He was left with nothing and Clifton having found the gold had packed most of the profits.

 ‘I don’t believe this’... Leland thought.

  He got angry and walked away from the half conscious/charred body and climbed a small hill away from the one where Clifton laid half dead. He finally sat up and looked at Clifton with an immense sense of being duped and swindled. 

 Clifton asked for water again and this time he grasped his last breath; he died with his eyes transfixed on Leland’s eyes. Leland came back to the body. He thought for a moment and then put his hand in the Clifton’s mouth. The body was still warm. He used an old knife and a stone and started digging deeper into the mouth. He finally got the tooth out which he kept in his pocket.

 Leland finally moved back to Montana sold the gold tooth and acquired large piece land. He started a farm and watermill. He built the watermill himself.

                                                   

He spent rest of his years raising children and finally his grandchildren. Often he would sit next to the watermill in summer afternoons and would watch it in action while contemplating upon the last few moments/days he spent in Nevada. Pretty soon he forgot about the fateful day… and finally passed away on a warm summer afternoon next to the watermill while watching his grandchildren play.

Part Two: Midori and the Waterwheel

Now the cowboy was reborn as Midori and was very selfish by nature. She became an orphan at an early age. Soon she was passed on to an artisan who passed her on to a wealth merchant’s mistress in Kyoto. Mistress (Indian Chief) finally sent her to Maiko school in Gion district to be trained as Geiko (Geisha). Midori wore finest green silk imported from China, wore ivory powder imported from Africa and doused herself in perfume imported from France. Her voice was hoarse and harsh but she made up for it in remarkable movements during the dance. She devised a way to compensate for the voice by adding elegant moves. She soon became the center of attention. Her clients included warlords, merchants, and rich men from all walks of the life. Some of her clients came to see her dance all the way from Tokyo. 

                                                     

One day an attractive young bodyguard of a nobleman from Tokyo arrived in Gion. Young Maikos and old Geikos all flocked to see the young man. Midori decided that she wanted him at no cost and created an elaborate song and dance play out of a Japanese classic in front of the nobleman’s group. Eventually she got close to the bodyguard (the employer) and lured him into her chamber.

            She eventually had an infant child whom she did love much. She was a selfish mother who did not care of any other kids but her own child. As fate would have it, Midori was soon kicked out of the Gieko school. After drifting between friends, she found work at a farm in the southwestern Kyoto for planting and collecting rice. This was an arduous work and Midori lived on a miserly sum. The owner of the farm (one of her grandchildren from cowboy lifetime), a widow, hired her on seasonal basis; she took pity on her and let her live for free during the rest of the year next to the family shrine towards the mountain. Midori cleaned the shrine during the day, fed the ducks in the nearby pond, and played with her baby. Soon she fell into the routine and started liking her new life. She attracted attention of few young farm hands nearby but she did not lead them on and kept it to herself.

                                  

            One day Midori left the baby next to the shrine and walked towards the back to collect the fall leaves. A snake wiggled passed the baby and baby stepped on its tail. The infant died immediately after the snake-bite and turned blue soon. When Midori found the baby, she fell into a shock. She became recluse and stopped going out of the house. A whole month passed and no one saw her except the farm owner who fed her every day and combed her hair. She made sure that Midori was taken good care of.  She would bring her baby boy to her and would encourage her to play with him and tell her to her all about his activities. One day, in the early Spring, while it was still snowing, Midori’s friend took off to a nearby town to look for farm equipment and strike a good deal before the planting season began. Soon after coming back home, she fell sick and took to the bed for several days. Her condition deteriorated further. She knew she was drawing close to her death and called on Midori one last time. She grabbed Midori’s hand, and with pool of tears, she asked her to take care of the baby. Midori hesitated but finally gave her word.  Soon her friend passed away and told her that she is leaving the farm and the farm hands to Midori and that she had signed the papers and kept them next to the baby’s crib. Midori, in her characteristic nonchalant manner, arranged for the cremation and had the farm hands carry out the ashes and bury them next to the farm. She gave them instructions to clean up the farm for the planting and to arrange for a sculptor to create a headstone for the urn as per the custom.

            She came back inside the house and put the baby’s crib next to her bed. The baby (Clifton) cried vehemently. Midori perfectly knowing that the baby needed food and closeness of his mother blatantly ignored him. She simply kept the baby next to her bed and starred at her. The day passed; the baby went hungry and cried all night and finally fell asleep. Next morning, most of the snow melted and it turned into a small spring next to the waterwheel. The sun came out and shone against the last bit of snow on top of the inactive waterwheel.  Baby woke up and opened his big eyes and fixed them on Midori. Midori looked out at the glitter of the snow on the waterwheel in the sunshine. She fell into a trance, and faintly recalled how she remembered it from very far land in very far time. She could not bring the baby up to her breast knowing the baby needed her milk. All the while during her emotional turmoil, the baby kept looking into her eyes. She recognized him and remembered more of their last time together.

                                     

 She finally opened herself and gave up the fight. She fed the baby and love flowed from her for the first time in this and other lifetime personalities which were always at odds with the baby’s personalities. She felt so happy and satisfied at the selfless service she provided. She became elated and took very good care of the baby just like her own.

                                                        

She began to understand the meaning of service to others. Her voice got lighter and sweeter. Her farms grew new grains of rice which became popular. She took the profits and started an orphanage in the countryside where she lived. Her beauty, charm, and kindness was known all over the countryside. However none of that popularity was important to her. Her priority is her child as was the orphanage and the farm. She felt happy from inside.

                                                        

Ardhakatya: The Dispassionate One

Ardhakatya was an unassuming man. He wore torn up clothes, had long flowing unkept hair and his feet had big callouses. He had no special traits or talents. He owned no worldly treasures or possessions. He lived his sordid existence on the outskirts of the city, in a shabby quarter next to Sundarbans, the dreaded, infested marshy jungles with eerily floating roots and shadows.

Unknown dangerous, creepy and poisonous snakes, insects and beasts dwelled in there. Ardhakatya knew no fear. He had seen enough misery and pain in his life to feel any fear. He had a strange job. He looked for dead bodies of people who had drowned or were caught in the quicksand or bitten by snakes, lost or half eaten by animals or the unfortunate souls who chose to commit suicide there. He would fish out the dead rotting corpses in the dead of the night, carry them on his back out of the marshes and cremate them.

He did that for most of his adult life. No call of the hyenas, hissing snakes, strange whispers and shadows, nothing scared him ever. But one night as he scavenged for the dead, a glowing apparition of a woman appeared out of nowhere. Dressed in beautiful clothes and precious pearls, she mockingly said to him, ‘wont you take me out, Rajan? Won't you pull me out and cremate me?’

Ardhakatya knew nothing about the terror that he was capable of feeling. He ran for his life completely terrorized. He collapsed on the banks where the forest ended. As his consciousness waned, a memory surfaced from the past when he was a heartless king.

He was hardheaded and unforgiving. Any soldier, spy or an official who was suspected to be disloyal was tied with heavy stones and was thrown into the river as a punishment. He conducted this torture in secret; the kingdom dreaded him. One day one of his favorite head servants saw him giving orders to punish an old accountant on charges of stealing money. The old man begged him for mercy and pleaded innocence. But the heartless king did not hear a word. Aparajita, the head servant saw everything in a horrified state. To her dismay, king saw her. He had no choice but to drown her too to keep his secret. Another innocent life was taken away, mercilessly. Ardhakatya woke up next morning with a strange realization.

His entire life flashed before him as an act of repentance…fishing out the bodies of those he had drowned centuries ago and giving them proper cremation. His lonely, hollow and emotionless existence suddenly made sense to him now. This life was nothing but a painful repayment of his past Karma. He begged to the memory of the apparition for forgiveness and for the first time he felt trapped in his emotionless, strange life.

One night the apparition spoke to him again and said, ‘Nature will have mercy on you. On the next full moon you will die of a snake bite and be released from this imprisoned existence’. And so it happened, he died drowning in heavy muddy waters.

What gruesome painful death but he welcomed it. He saw liberation in the most agonizing moments of his life. The shackles of his past deeds were broken and his soul soared to freedom again.

Tilottama’s Orchard

Tilottama had the  most beautiful orchard in the Srivelliput, a small village along the lagoons on the south Indian coast. She grew all sorts of vegetables, fruits, herbs in her orchard. People came to her for medicines that she made with those plants and gave them away for free. Flowers, fruits, vegetables, green leaves, wood, herbs –all were freely available to all the visitors. All they had to do was to ask.

She considered her orchard to be santum sanctorium of her temple. She had no children, sibling, or relatives. Only the orchard, and a house that her husband left for her. She looked after the orchard with love and great care. She talked to plants and always took permission from them before using any parts for herself or the villagers. Taking permission from Tilottama before taking anything from the orchard was an unwritten rule. For Tilottama those plants and herbs and even a tiny blade of grass represented god in living form.

One day a local tradesman was passing by. His elephant was thirsty. He knew Tilottama wouldn’t mind if elephants drank from her pond. The elephant quenched his thirst and moved on to ravage the cluster of ripe bananas hanging in the thicket next to the pond. Before the tradesman could stop the elephant, he had destroyed the cluster and started devouring the bananas. Tilottama was in her prayer room. At once she understood something was wrong. She rushed out to see the elephant happily munching the bananas and an uneasy tradesman sitting on the elephant’s back with an apologetic grin. Tilottama’s anger grew thousand fold when she saw how savagely the banana trees were ambushed by the elephant. Ignoring the subtle rule of asking the plants and causing the minimum harm while removing the fruits, instead, these two not only blatantly broke the rule of the nature but also the sanctity of the holy orchard.

Anger diminished her reasoning and compassion. She cursed the tradesman and the elephant to get sick and die for their heinous acts. Tradesman begged and pleaded but Tilottama was beyond reproach. That very night elephant had severe pain due to indigestion and collapsed by the next morning. The tradesman in attempt to help the elephant cracked and broke his back. Now there was nothing that could be done to reverse the damage. An innocent animal had died and the man turned into an invalid because of her curse. No amount of wishing to undo her curse and to change the outcome would work. She lamented her self for days but she found no respite from her overbearing guilt. Finally, she went to tradesman’s place and brought the invalid in her own house to look after him.

The tradesman did not protest because he had no one to look after him. But he never spoke to her; she fed, washed, bathed and kept him clean. She took every bit of care. But tradesman only saw guilt behind her acts. He talked to her in a rude manner and nods. He looked at her with anger and contempt. Tilottama felt she deserved his wrath; she quietly looked after him and silently begged him to forgive her.

One day tradesman got really sick and was breathing his last breath. Tilottama rushed in; it had been 20 years since the incident. She genuinely cared for him. She went close to hold his hand but he snatched it away and told her, ‘you are not forgiven; you are the cause of my suffering.’ And he passed away. Tilottama felt sad but she knew she made a grave mistake but her repentance was sincere. She calmly went on with her life. In subsequent lifetimes, Tilottama’s being endured pain and hardship as repentance for killing an innocent animal. But Tilottama and tradesman met again many centuries later in different lifetimes as relatives.

The tradesman’s being was still constantly angry at her and he still treated her wrathfully. He felt the urge to hurt her for no apparent reason. On the other hand, Tilottama carried no guilt on her being because of her sincere repentance. She silently endured tradesman’s misgivings and finally distanced herself and moved on to new experiences. Tradesman in several subsequent lives suffered from the poison that brewed from the hatred and anger stored in the core of his being.

Ratnawali- The Enchantress

Ratnawali was a beautiful courtesan who danced like the waves of the ocean. There was such fluidity in her moves that the people who watched her remained mesmerized by her. Her talent coupled by her tremendous beauty, she became an object of great beauty, desire and envy for the princes' from the surrounding kingdoms. Raja Agrasen however felt great pride in having a gem like her in his court. One day right before her performance in the court, a haggard looking old man with blisters and boils all over his body, dirty skin and matted hair stepped in to the royal court. His body emitted a foul smell and flies circled around him. Raja was a wise old man who immediately recognized his kulguru, Hari Singh. He met him with great reverence and welcomed him warmly without disclosing his identity. He sat right next to the king.

As the performance began, Ratnawali noticed guru Hari Singh. A wave of aversion and disgust ran over her watching the filthy man sitting next to the king. Soon she was overcome by repulsion and disgust. She felt distracted by the thought that 'how such an ugly filthy man is allowed to watch someone as beautiful as her dance'. During the course of the performance, something dramatic happened.

 Ratnawali started developing wrinkly dark skin with boils and pimples all over her body. Her perfect ivory teeth became yellow and jagged. Her smooth silky hair turned matted. The onlookers were horrified and stunned to see something opposite happening to the begger sitting next to the King. 

His skin became clearer,  clean radiant golden color, with flowing white beard and hair. He looked every part the mahaguru Hari Singh. Ratnawali could not bear the foul stench emanating from her body. She collapsed on the floor as she realized what had happened to her. She cried and begged the guru to forgive her behavior and reverse the transformation.

The guru Hari Singh calmly said to her, ‘ you will have to earn your beauty back, Ratnawali. Any good deed that you do will cure you inch by inch at a time. That’s the only way it is possible for you to regain your beauty.’ Ratnawali rushed out crying…men who looked at her with immense desire, turned their faces away in aversion. She started her repentance by giving food and money to the poor and every day she saw her body heal inch by inch. She wanted faster results so she started feeding the incapacitated with her own hands. She carried the invalids around, dressing the wounds of the leppers, giving medicines to the sick and bandaging the wounds of the injured. She was driven so passionately by her goal that she did not realize her skin, hair and body had almost cleared up. She was regaining her beauty.

A year passed. She devoted her self day and night to serving the poor and needy. Not only her beauty  returned back but she also started to develop a beautiful radiance about her. By this time, she derived such contentment and inner peace with what she was doing- something she never felt when she received the accolades when she was a royal dancer.  Her being was bursting with joy and bliss; she no longer worked for the purpose of regaining her beauty. She did it for the bliss it brought her.

One day, unexpectedly guru Hari Singh showed up at her door. One look and he understood. He blessed her and said, ‘Ratnawali, you have earned both inner and outer beauty again. Now you deserve to get beyond both.’ Saying that he touched her forehead and transported her to the world of Supreme Bliss.

A Beautiful Bride

Anukriti was a daughter of a noble man. She was talented, smart, and absolutely child-like. Her purity was such that whenever she laughed bright dust of precious gold danced and rained around her face and fell on the ground. People loved her child like laughter. It took away their worries and pain. The servants made her laugh more often to gather the gold dust from around her.

 When she grew up, a young man saw her laugh with child-like mirth. He instantly fell in love with her. Her father saw that this was a good match and agreed to the young man’s marriage proposal.

Anukriti and Shailesh were soon married but the moment she set foot in her husband’s small province, she saw desert, drought and hunger-deaths all around. It depressed her to learn that the draught had persisted for nearly a decade. Her depression grew deeper every day. Witnessing more poverty and sadness filled her eyes with tears. Her tears created thorns and cacti and shrubs wherever they fell.

Shailash grew concerned about it when he noticed that the regal gardens were slowly turning into thorny shrubs. He sought the help of his family guru who lived by the stony mountains. When he narrated his story, the guru gave him a red thread and sword to be placed under her pillow. Next morning, the depressed wife who by now had lost all her vigor, started shedding tears of sadness. But this time instead of thorny plants, streams of water started to flow wherever her tears fell. 

At first he was sad to see her cry, but Shailash also found relief because the incessant flow of water started helping the people in his province. He tried to pacify her by showing her all the greenery around. But by then, Anukriti was beyond solace. One night, she cried incessantly. The rivulets swelled into streams, streams into rising rivers. Shailesh ran to his guru and asked for his help. Guru gave him a sad look and said, “when you saw her laughing in pure mirth, you coveted her beauty. When you saw the thorns, you wanted a remedy. And now when your province in the peril of being drowned in your wife’s tears, you came back to me for help. When was it that you ever genuinely cared about her? This problem would only be fixed when you will shed tears for your wife or you are doomed to drown.”

 Shailash came home to find his wife’s beautiful face covered with shadows of darkness and pain. His heart twisted in pain and remorse. He felt responsible for her plight. He tried cheering her and trying to make her laugh. When all attempts failed, he looked up to the sky and prayed on his wife’s beautiful face again. Sad tears of repentance rolled out of his eyes. He forgot all about it till a few days later he found Anukriti in the garden smiling faintly looking at a pair of parrots. 

Fragrant flower petals danced around her face as she smiled; soon spring came. One day watching their little one play, she laughed playfully. Strands of silver danced around her and fell on the ground. One day just like that, the house of Shailesh was filled with her child-like laughter again and servants chasing her to collect to all the gold from the ground.