Guruma Guru Poornima 2020 Day 1 Speech Summary

Guruma, of Samarpan Meditation, enchants us with her many tales of wisdom and guides us to what's important.

1. Guruma’s 2020 Gurupoornima Speech Summary Day 1

My greetings to all gathered souls.
We will start with an inspirational tale about a big industrialist from India. There was an industrialist
who lived on rent and was very punctual on his payments. One day he returned home to find his
landlord at the door. He was surprised at seeing him because the landlord didn’t live there. The landlord
then said to him, “How are you today? Normally, you pay it on time. It seems you have forgotten to pay
the rent this time. Is everything okay?”
Looking at him, the industrialist remembered all of a sudden that he forgot to pay the rent. The
industrialist then gave it and the landlord took it. The landlord then asked him, “ You have so many
factories which are doing well. Why do you live on rent?” The industrialist answered, “It’s not important
what I am. It’s important how I am.” He then gave the landlord some tea and then the landlord
proceeded out. The industrialist’s driver overheard all this.
One day, there was a lot of rush in Mumbai with people waiting in long queues. Seeing this, the
industrialist thought how much must people rush to be at the office on time? Seeing a couple of elderly
people struggling with public transportation, the industrialist decided to give him a ride to the office. He
then thought ‘Geesh, my car is empty. Why don’t I make a ritual of helping people everyday like this
with whosoever should need the help at the given time?
During another instance, the industrialist went to the airport to line up to buy a plane ticket. Online
purchases weren’t available back then. One of the staff at the airport recognized him. He asked, “Why
are you in the line up? Come and sit on the sofa and I will get you your ticket.” The industrialist argued
it didn’t matter who he was but how he was. He insisted on lining up like everyone else and bought the
ticket and flew off. The industrialist’s driver overheard this. He then wondered why his boss keeps
saying these very lines about it doesn’t matter who he is but how he is. He thought maybe one day
when the industrialist is a bit free, he will ask about this.
Subsequently, at one point, the driver and the industrialist were chatting and the industrialist realized
he had paid the driver later than he should because the driver’s son’s school fee payments were due but
the driver hadn’t said anything about the inconveniences of being paid late. The industrialist then said
“Let me know when your son’s fees are due so they can be paid for on time from now on.”
At this moment, the driver decided to ask the industrialist about why he always says it doesn’t matter
who he is but how he is. The industrialist answered that people always connect him with the factories
he owns. But in his mind, it shouldn’t be about who he is or what he has. What should matter is how he
is. He went on to narrate how when he was young, he had a nanny who would care for him. He was very
stubborn, aggressive and a picky eater. “One day the nanny gave me something to eat but I refused to
eat. She pleaded with me 3 times. At this point, I became angry with her asking me to eat. I then pushed
her with my legs. My father, who was passing by, saw this and spanked me and got mad at me. Now I
had misbehaved like this before because it was like a routine for me. But this time my father saw me. He
then said to me, ‘Son, it doesn’t matter who or what you are. It’s how you are. That’s what’s most
important and can dictate your surrounding circumstances. Remember this. Others are people like you

2. are.’ I paid heed to this advice from that day onwards. I tried to improve upon this point as I grew up. I
was always grounded because of what my father taught me that day.”
So kids, don’t let the respect people give you swell up your head. Surrender your deeds to your parents
or guru or God or circumstances due to which you are getting the accolades. Remember the one in front
of you is human like you are. The industrialist in this story was Ratan Tata of Tata Industries. So be good
and be humble. Ratan Tata’s perspective had been “I got what I did because my father was an
industrialist. So being an industrialist could not be my focus per se. I just made modifications with the
factories as per the time or situation’s demands or expanded on the work he did.”
Ratan Tata is a very well-known person. He is known for his very nice personality, manners and good
deeds. Note the things for which people have gotten ahead and take inspiration from them. You may
have days where you will have either good or hard circumstances. So these are things to keep in mind.
The day precedes the night and the night follows the day. We have much to learn from nature. The
moon shrinks over a given period till it reaches no moon day and then it grows after. Light reflects on us
according to the moon size so sometimes we may see less light while on other times it will be more light.
The same goes for our seasons. (I.e. Spring comes after winter or Fall comes after the rainy season in
India etc.)
Do you recognize flowers or do you know the name of only famous or trendy ones like roses or
orchids? Learn about flowers. (Guruma lists some flowers) Do you how nice and fragrant Jasmine
flowers are. I tend to take some of the Jasmine from the garden and sometimes I put it in my hair. I just
take a little bit as we should leave the flowers for bees and other creatures need to have some flowers
too. I just sometimes take a handful and wash it under the sink to keep the flowers fresh longer. I love
smelling my palms after. The fragrance which comes out from this leaves a bit of an after effect. You can
try this with many other kinds of flowers be it plumeria, the chameli type of jasmine, tuberose etc. Put
these in a bowl of water somewhere. It will leave a fragrance in the area.
Just as these flowers leave a fragrance behind, our good feelings leave their impact on us. The same
goes for when we have bad feelings. We get distressed when we see two people fight. Or we feel bad
when someone says something bad to us. We become disturbed at that moment. After doing certain
kinds of work or duty, we wash our hands. When there’s a bad feeling inside us, we need to clean it up.
Leave aside our shoes when we first feel bad. If we are not in the space to do so, stare at the sky or
plant-like items and get absorbed by it. Stare at anything except people or buildings. Stare at any
essence of nature. Even creatures like cows, dogs or cats will do. Or pray to God to please remove these
feelings or shoo them away. This is your instant santizer. Close your eyes as you do so and you’ll feel
peaceful. Or stare into things like the sky or the earth. If the earth is your mother, the sky is your father.
Swing your arms up towards the sky and release those feelings if it is not possible for you to get
absorbed by the earth.
If you are in a locked room, you can remember a time when you were in nature such as when you
visited the ashram. Imagine yourself there. You’ll grasp the energy of the space then. And then pray.
This advice is in response to meditators saying we live in crowded and congested spaces. What should
we do? When we can’t reach a place by our body, we can reach it through our imagination. We can
imagine waterfalls, rivers, jungles or trees. If nothing else, we can imagine intense heat as through heat
we sweat and that releases a lot of toxicity. The circumstances are not important. If we need to go in

3. crowds, we can imagine spaces where we can meditate. If you haven’t learned meditation, no worries.
The 5 elements balance us with the sky and the earth being the biggest balancers.
We think meditation is a big deal and how can kids do it but meditation is easy for kids. Kids are the
ones to do it most easily because they have the least baggage. They don’t need tantras, mantras or tools
to aid them. Pray to mother earth by saying “Mother earth, please relieve my flaws” three times. In
order to have a thought free state, one needs to remove such flaws (or baggage as I would call it for
feelings like anger, sadness etc.)
You say to your mom, cook this or make that and your mom makes it for you. Mother Earth is just like
your mom and does as you ask. The father protects us from bad things and makes us tough. So pray to
the sky, please take away my flaws.
If the body is still then in a matter of time, meditation will happen to the person. Try meditating for 10
to 15 minutes in the morning and 10-15 minutes at dusk till anytime before 10 pm. As you being to do
so, you will keep moving forward like Ratan Tata. Sometimes you kids insist you will eat this or that
particular thing. The Bharat Health Dept. surveyed kids health and you know what’s strange? 20-30
years ago, circumstances were different. Most people had less education and earnings relative to now
where the percentage of people with access to both on a higher level is greater. For instance, 40 years
ago people were graduates or post-graduates. (Bachelors and Masters). Today, there are many more
professions. Today money is not as great an issue for people relative to before. Yet youth health is not
as it should be. More youngsters are becoming overweight or obese. This is owing to the lifestyle. For
example, what are your favorite games?
If you’re wondering how to answer me when you are not in front of me, think of the answer with your
heart and the answer will reach me. And no computer games or video games are included for the
answer. It can be things you play in the fields or gardens. What do you play? Do you sweat after running
around? You should. It’s a way to cleanse yourself. It keeps skin, heart and lungs healthy. We used to
play the game Out pe Out. It used to be fun to tag people and made us alert. We would also play Hide
and Seek. We would run around and hide on the tree and behind it. Or we would switch sashes around
so the people tagging couldn’t tell who it was they were tagging. We used to also play Langdi Tang or
Lame Foot. Or the circle and ball game. These things made us healthy. You cry when you fall but then
you dust your bum off and get up.
I would go to my bua’s or aunt’s place and play hide and seek. I would hide behind plat pots or pillars.
Once there were 9 steps where I thought there were 3 and I jumped so hard and slipped I got a hairline
fracture. I loved climbing trees. After I finished my B.Ed., I taught between 9nth to 11nth standards or
grade students. We once went on a picnic where there was a mango garden and a natural lake. Kids
lined up. We were the last batch in the line up. I looked around to make sure no one was looking. Note: I
was working at a convent school back then. So as I was ensuring no one was there, I urged everyone
else to go ahead. I then climbed the tree and enjoyed myself so much. After some time, a nun saw me
on the tree and said, “Miss, you climbed the tree. Come down.”
Kids, you should try it. The day I stopped doing these kinds of things, I got bigger built. You guys are
skinny. Go for it. As we fall, we get encouraged to rise on our own and innovate as we must. So parents,
don’t make them such lallus (or don’t over baby your kids). Let them climb trees or play in the dirt. Or
make organic statues of Ganpati ( elephant-headed God Ganesh). POP causes harm. Mom and Dad can

4. join them and try making these. You can use food color. Decorate it. Ganpati is the God of contentment.
The statue that gets created will manifest from the kind of feelings you put into making it. Let your kids
get hurt. Just clean and dress the injury kids or dry it and put turmeric paste on it. Or put an anti-septic
like Dettol on it or dress it. Never leave behind running, dangling or climbing. My parents are my
inspiration for how I am.
Nowadays parents say exams are on so no playing. But studies are knowledge. Evaluate are you doing
things for knowledge or marks? Parents sometimes say why did you only get x amount of marks?
Instead ask do you understand the material? So kids, study such that you understand the material. It’s
about understanding rather than memorizing. Today’s kids don’t even share notes forget other things.
Some kids argue I got these notes from my coaching classes so I am not going to share these. But notes
have knowledge. Trade subjects to learn from one another. There must be something the both of you
are weak in.
We don’t learn when we study. We learn when we explain things to others. Concepts become clear.
You can explain the knowledge you learned in your own words. So when you write answers on the exam
paper, the answers will be unique. When the examiner looks at the answers, many times he/she can
infer the similarity of noting answers is coming from supplement books. They can note it from the order
of the lines and sequences and the teacher may nod their head and say, okay, this has been memorized
from the supplement. So no surprises. But if you answer it in your own unique way, the examiner will
give more marks.
Marks aren’t written on your forehead. If you didn’t get admission into a particular school, it means
God had other plans for you. My younger sister had a school friend who were both very good students
and were both toppers (or those who top the class). Now my younger sister is a gold medallist engineer.
I was a very average student and worked harder but she had a high level of retention and didn’t need to
study as much. For the grade 12 results, people used to have to go and check their results by going to
the school to see who came in first. So my sister went and found she was first and thought her friend
was second but she didn’t see her friend anywhere. She then wondered what happened and went over
to her friend’s place. She said to her friend’s mother that she came to have sweets (a treat to have when
you have done something in the Indian culture). But the friend’s mother looked sad. My sister
wondered why and learned it was because her friend failed. Apparently, she got 2% in biology. My sister
was in shock because a topper failing was shocking. We were then transferred out of this town where
all this happened. Two to three years later, we found out this friend selected fine arts and went on to
pursue it further. She turned out to be a very nice artist. So some things need to be left on God. Accept
it as a token from God and move forward. Today there is a lot of demand for fine arts.
Earlier, people would say I want to become a doctor, engineer or scientist. I would then say I wanted to
become a teacher. People would stare at me questioningly. Now my dad didn’t oppose me. He would
say it’s a noble profession. But make sure you try to become the best teacher. My students gave me
great love. That’s why kids are dear to me. Don’t think of death. Death is not a solution. It’s like if a store
closed and you didn’t get the item you needed. You can always go for the second professional option
store. You don’t need to die over this. You need to wait for a second professional option store to open
up.
Two friends can play tennis. Or they can play table tennis or carom board if they are indoors to use
their fingers instead of using your fingers for gadgets. Use your fingers for carom boards and not

5. gadgets. The body can become ill. Spare yourself from becoming overweight. Eat good food. Eat sweets.
I use to love boondi ke laddoo. When a wedding would happen when I was young, the cook would leave
out a big tray of the cooked gram flour and sugar mixture for us to roll into balls. When we would peek
to see that no one was looking around, we would gobble up like 8 to 10 of them and then would get
back to work with some ladies to make the rest of the laddoos. We would have laddoo competitions to
see who could eat the most. Once I ate 18 laddoos. When I was 18, I wished to donate blood to the Red
Cross. They checked my weight and wished me a happy birthday. I was about 48 kilos then. They said I
weighed half a kilo less. But I was determined to donate blood and said let me drink 2-3 glasses of water
and my weight will be right. Sure enough, it was.
Today’s notion for sweets are different. You guys like chocolate right? Well, let me tell u a story about
chocolate. Chocolate is made from cocoa when it is fermented. The International Standards for Food
says that no matter how hard chocolate makers try, it’s hard for them to keep cockroaches from
infiltrating into the chocolate. So they therein created a minimal standard for what’s acceptable for
chocolate. So if there’s less than 4% infiltration or 4 gm/100 gm of chocolate, it is considered eatable.
You are potentially then eating 15-16 cockroaches. Now you decide what to eat. Eat sweets which the
cook or sweet maker or your mom makes or get it from a reputed store. We tend to like to eat what we
grow up eating. Try sweets with milk or all purpose flour. There’s a lot of nutrition in there. Chocolate
has less of it. Indian sweets tend to have natural calcium, vitamin A and D, and clarified butter which
acts as a digestive aid.
Mom and Dad adjust so much for you. They have tried to grant your every wish and do everything they
can for you. Should you not try to not hurt them? Keep teachers or elders in mind before you do
something.
Consider tree planting. Consider the tree you are planting like a little brother. Will you not like to give it
food? Or how about giving a space for cows and goats? Or dump the left over water from your thermos
onto your garden near your home. Do something good everyday. Feed animals around you. As for
plastic and disposable use, try using less of it. Now if you are going to argue, we can’t carry the
disposable home then try taking a steel glass with you or keep water in a thermos. Or try eating on
banana leaves like South Indians or Maharashtrians do on occasions. People were healthier earlier
because of such a lifestyle.
(Guruma summarized major points from her lecture which I didn’t catch to scribe but it’s all here).
Respect and care for parents and help them. Learn patience from them. It will come in handy
throughout your life. Remember the point about chocolate. Climb trees. Be very happy. Help friends.
Share notes. Learn from them. Even if they don’t share with you. You will remember the pieces of
knowledge and they will stay with you. May you be in peace and reach the summit of spirituality and
make the world one family. Jai baba swami.