One of the great things I noticed about Swami while he bestowed on me the chance to live with him in the Poorna Chandra (PC) was His ability to simultaneously have a Heart to Heart relationship with a number of people at the same time. A single act of HIS would mean specific things to so many people at the same time. It is only the person and Swami who would know what was happening and why it was happening. The subtlety and the casualness with which Swami would assure you or cajole you (or reprimand you) really seemed to conceal His Omniscience. 

When I was in the PC, everyday there used to be a huge amount of mail received from all quarters of the world, addressed to Swami. Hundreds of letters, books dedicated to him, paintings, poems, CDs, cassettes of songs…. anything that devotees deemed fit as an offering to their Loving God. One day, I stumbled upon a CD made by a western devotee (I don’t remember exactly the details), as on offering to God. It contained a technique called ‘Visualization’ as a spiritual practice. It went something like this: There was beautiful music and a voice in the background guided you to imagine that you are going along a forest, reached a pure serene lake and then you take bath and purify yourself and pray to God to descend and implore HIM to take you by your hand to the great spiritual heights, to His abode of Peace. And you were asked to actually imagine that God indeed came and took you into the heavens holding your hand. 

It was made wonderfully and that night, sleeping downstairs in the PC, I played the CD in the earphones and went through the whole thing….I of course imagined as the voice guided me and that Swami came down from the Heavens, took my hand and held it tightly and off we flew into the skies….’Swami! Please hold my hand and take me forward…’ was the semi-conscious thought before I slipped into a deep sleep .

The next morning, it was time for Darshan. Brother P and I, who used to accompany Swami were waiting near the Golf Cart, on which Swami used to go around for Darshan those days. Every day, Swami would come to the Golf cart and would take the support of Brother P’s hand and climb the steps of the Golf cart. This was the routine. I would stand on the other side of the Golf cart and go along with it. That morning, as usual, Swami had come to the Golf cart and even before Brother P could extend his hand, Swami had motioned me to come forward. I went forward, thinking that Swami would say something to me. Instead, He said ‘Cheyyi ivvu’, ‘Give me your Hand’…he said it so low that only I could hear it. As I extended my right palm, He held it with His right hand firmly for a few seconds and with a twinkle in his eye, alighted the golf cart taking my support.

Apart from feeling special and blessed, my mind made the connection instantly…Here was Swami directly, subtly and so casually responding to an almost subconscious thought I had the previous night that no one in the world knew except me! It was exactly what I had visualized the previous night – Swami Holding my hand firmly and taking me forward! Everything happened in a few seconds and so casually. No one around could even know what transpired and it might not have been so important to them. But it meant a world to me. 

And Swami never spoke about it or said ‘Lo and Behold. This is what you thought yesterday…and here I am responding to your prayers’. He did it with such subtlety and Love that simply drove the message to my Heart from His Heart. 

In his own words, Swami once quoted the description of God as ‘Neela Thoyada madhyastaad Vidyullekheva Bhaasvara’…like the lightning streak latent in a Dark Blue Cloud, God is latent in the hearts of all beings. How else could we explain this heart to heart connection?

Arun Kharidehal MBA, 1999 – 2001, Prasanthi Nilayam. Currently Senior Director at Cerner Corporation, which is the world’s largest health information technology firm, headquartered at Kansas City, USA. He had the privilege to accompany Bhagawan during Darshan and render personal service to Him for many years.