Monthly Archives: December 2010

Heart Wisdom from Teachers of Amma, the Indian “Hugging Saint”


by Rev. Scott Ufford

An Introduction:

Many of us in the West haven’t heard of her. But Sri Mata Amritanandamayi, beloved by over a billion spiritual seekers as Amma, the Hugging Saint, might be one of the most brilliant women to walk the Earth.

I say “brilliant” meaning that in every sense of the words “spiritual”, “intellectual”, “ethical” and “humanitarian”, Amma grasps the needs of her fellow humans. She reacts with decisive kindness.

Are you surprised that the objective of her multifaceted brilliance could be a soft-hearted quality like “kindness”?

Please understand, Amma has inspired legions of volunteers to help bring practical charitable assistance to millions of people worldwide. For people caught in an array of troubles we might justly call “monumental” or “catastrophic”.

Amma has shared her loving wisdom in speeches at the United Nations and the Parliament of the World’s Religions. She champions The International Day of Peace, also known as World Peace Day (November 17th each year). She’s received The Gandhi-King Award for Nonviolence and numerous other honors.

Anyone else in her position of international acclaim, however much deserved–and for her it appears fully deserved–could be expected to glory a little in her accomplishments. To indulge her ego once in awhile. To cast a blind eye on her own faults.

Or, even to slow down on the exhausting job of caring for the endless streams of needy–or wounded–or curious–or faithful–that awash her at every public appearance.

But the truth is, that’s not what Amma’s all about.

Amma has given her heart, soul and life to the most simple task of healing, through hugging, every single person who asks.

Whether for solace, for guidance or for a blessing. Whether yearning for a lost mother’s kiss never given or for a flash of love seemingly poured out from an unlimited Open Loving Heart, they come to Amma.

Crowds of those humblest. Those weakest. Those youngest. Those poorest.

Those close to death. Those broken of spirit. Those broken by material cares or worries. Those tormented by what they could have done, could have been–or by what they have done.

Those yearning to feel the touch of true caring without judgment or rejection.

Those desiring to feel precious moments in the arms of a spiritually awakened master.

…We all have our private stories to cleanse and purge and understand, and overcome and embrace and release–so we can start to live again, better than before.

We all have our secret sacred little ways to find answers, to reach out for help, to gain the strength to help others. Ways to jump-start our untrusting, hoping hearts.

Over seven million seekers, 7,000,000 people just like you and me–or, people completely different on the outside yet strikingly like us on the inside, in their hidden soul needs, fears, tests and aspirations–have found their way to Amma’s motherly embrace.

This alone seems like an unbelievable miracle:

Never has a single one of those seven million-plus souls–no matter how lost, how destitute, how self-destructive or self-inflated or ignorant–never has a single one, from the lowest to the highest, ever seen Amma shake her head “no.” Or been rejected by Amma out of stress, dislike, fatigue…

She welcomes everyone. With a simplicity and mastery of the heart’s unspoken needs.

I, too, gladly received a hug and blessing–called “darshan”, in Hindu–from Amma. Beforehand, she didn’t ask about my religion. Or ask me to “follow” her, or worship her, or pay her. Or in any way, do anything except feel her Divinely inspired love pouring down.

She made me feel as if I, too, was a natural part of that love and could receive and give a bit of that love.

Her hug felt like a lightning-bolt.

But she hadn’t asked me to come to her. I just felt naturally drawn.

As Amma says, “Take one step towards God, and God takes one hundred steps towards you.”

Isn’t that what we really hope is true?

I know you’ll enjoy Amma’s soul-filled website at http://amritapuri.org. Here, Amma’s profoundly moving life story is revealed. She shares sweet spiritual insights as if crystalline waters freely drawn from the purest well.

In the New Year ahead, to maybe help you find your own unique steps, I’ll share valuable, never-before-heard excerpts of talks channeled from “Teachers of Amma”.

Please note:
I’m a messenger, not the source. I don’t claim here or in any writings, private counselings or church services, to have any special spiritual heights or virtues. Instead, I’ve been gifted with sometimes hearing, and sharing, wisdom from spiritual titans and teachers whose consciousness dwells a thousand fathoms over my head.

Let’s close with these honest, direct words of Amma:
“Children, sing from the depths of your hearts.
Let the heart melt in prayer.
Leave aside all shyness and open your hearts to God.”

Thank you for listening to your own heart’s new birth.
It’s happening.

Rev. Scott Ufford Copyright 2010

Revolutionary Spiritual Facts according to Jesus Christ & Mahatma

Recorded by Rev. Scott Ufford

Together Jesus and another Great Soul identified only as Mahatma, spoke these revolutionary facts which cut to the essential truths of our spiritual reality.

Maybe you never thought of your inner relationship with God/ Higher Greater Source in this clear, focused way. If so, you’re in for an eye-opener that can help you disintegrate your fears:

I.

“Fear is a form of worship.

Love is a form of equality.

A true love drives out the desire to fear and replaces it with the pleasure of healthy respect. Whether you like or care to associate further with that respected thing, or not.

You cannot respect any thing simply by observing its outside. By knowing that within this thing is actually some form and reality of godcreation, you move past fearing its outside.

Seeing only its outside can lead you to fear its unknown potential to harm you or to deny you your rightful loving experiences.

The aspect or quality of any thing which induces your fear is an aspect which you believe to be lacking or imbalanced within yourself.

What you fear encountering in yourself, you fear encountering in the world.

Since the world is physically much larger and more capable than your self, you can only remove your fear of the seen world by entering into awareness of the unseen world and the true, unseen reality within all things.

You cannot glimpse these fear-destroying laws of inner reality unless you believe that some wise and capable Source exists, greater than your current awareness of your self.

This Source must at heart be as actively motivated for your well being as It is for any other thing’s well being. The law of innate equality and value must exist for your self as well as for that feared thing.

All inequality is only the result of fear and misunderstanding of the real nature of oneself, as well as of the other.

II.

If you believe that you are meant to remain limited and suffering from the greater aspects of other things, you will experience this until you stop enslaving your self to these fears.

The knowledge that:

You consciously exist, for infinity, in some way;

No physical self destruction can remove this eternal consciousness from you;

Consciousness by definition is always growing and changing and experiencing; and so

Your experience of that helpful, Greater Source self is also infinite;

leads to the constant capability for the progressive removal of your fears of your self, of other things and of that Greater Source.

As all things ease into realizing that everything simply IS, the removal of fear removes all reasons for physical sensations of fearful aggression and fearful victimhood.

The removal of supposed reasons for fears allows your own strengths to emerge from within your hidden unacknowledged self.

As you see and remove your fears, you acknowledge that your help in doing this comes from that Greater Source which is forever available to your self as well as to all others.

As you grow, you stop fearing the fact that you have fears about any given thing, including Greater Source and your self.

You do not need to compete for, qualify for or fear the lack of that help from that Higher Greater Source, since It has no fears of you whatsoever. It sees you perfectly clearly, or at least thinks It does.

III.

You are free to continue seeing and experiencing a clearer and more helpful relationship with that Higher Source.

Any aspect of Higher Source which seems to mirror any of your fearful or unkind or blind characteristics is an aspect which you are free to see past.

Any aspect of Higher Source which seems unwilling to help or to understand, or to behave charitably towards your self, must be encouraged to behave towards your self and Itself in a way more like An Even Higher Source.

{This means you are free to talk to any aspect of higher reality which seems to fail to see you clearly or charitably.}

You are free to reach past these limiting aspects of Higher Source up to that which is good for you.

This way, whether those limiting aspects of Higher Source are only products of your own limited perception or are of Higher Source Itself, your respectful exploration of fear removal puts you in a growing state of awareness and into an inner reality of happiness and strength.

This state will manifest in your physical surroundings to some degree because a realized truth is realized everywhere in your existence.

You will learn to appreciate and enjoy the degree to which inner reality manifests in your outer life. This experience is another form of the loving respect, or at least respect, for your self and for all things—because this verifies that your fear removal is real and working for you.

This is true for the infinity that you and all things exist.

No saint or sage has found clear enlightenment within his fears. The light lurks around, beyond and before his fears. The trail of his fears is a trail of tears in the process of drying up and transmuting into tears of laughter.

You are free to emerge from fear, and so from worship, into love, which is a state of happy equality.

You are free to do this in your own time, at your own healthy pace, in your own unique and necessary way, without any fear of judgment.

All of the results of your efforts combine with all of the results of every other being’s efforts.

Together, you are changing your world and your reality in good ways.

This spiritual evolution is an absolute and revolutionary fact.”

—Jesus Christ / The Mahatma

recorded by Rev. Scott Ufford, 7-15-1997
Copyright 1997, 2010 Scott Ufford
http://www.scottufford.com

Your Intense Q&A Session with Jesus Christ

by Rev. Scott Ufford

You say you’ve never had a real conversation with Jesus Christ?

Relax: what’s mine is yours too. As you’ll see in a minute.

Here’s my Letter to Jesus Christ, written in meditation during a time of intense turmoil–and His profound response:

I would like to be at peace with you. I would like to know you better. I would like to know, in my heart, why you are here.

What is your real role in All This? Are you important? What are you doing here? What are you in relation to other spiritual leaders, now and in the past? To ETs? To Moslems and Buddhists?

I would know these answers and have peace at heart.

Jesus’ calm psychic reply, as recorded:

“You are never alone. You are always with me. You are my son, as much as any. As prodigal, as any. My enemy, as much as you believe only. My friend, more than you could possibly believe. My worshiper, my doubter, my ally, my press agent. My insignificant speck and my gem on the finger that marvels every eye.

You are my son and my daughter and my estranged widow. You are my Doubting Thomas extraordinaire and my eager acolyte.

You are my humorous source of laughter and my irate child. You are within me, within you within yourself, within the world. You are outside and beyond fear.

You are the trembling in the knees when looking in the face of the beloved suitor.

You are the wind that blows ill and good, that listeth where it lieth, that sneezeth when it prayeth–and spits, or harrumphs, when it would better listen–and shuts up, holds its tongue, when its lies, once spoken, would uncover self deception.

Speak your lies. Speak your ill untruths. Do not hide your hatreds and your fears under a bushel basket.

From where, then, will shine the light to burn those fears away?

…The nonsense of the ordered life when the soul screams to breathe. The folly of conformity when you would dance with two left legs, but dance with honest joy. The pangs caused by fears held precious, made subservient to a clawing need for sanity as a rigid imposition rather than as a joyful in-breath of God…

These, and all things other, you are to breathe through, work through, live INTO.

Do not worry who am I. Who are you? Do you have cause to worry? The Father has given you life, the Mother sustaineth you, and I am your challenge, your tormentor and your best friend.

You are millions of doubts to be subsided into a sea of harmony. You are the fish of a man, arms crossed, shaking your head “no” at the vile prospect of having to leap deep back into the sea. “It isn’t my home,” you declare–even as your gills flex and pant for the comforts of the deep blue.

Abandon your scales of judgment of self. Abandon your hatreds nurtured into such green-gray gardens. Give yourself unto the lust for life, the living of the moment, the deep gulping in-breath of love and the out-breath of sharing. Give yourself with abandon into your heart.

Abandon your pretenses and back away from the precipice of self destruction.

I speak to you as one man to one other man. I speak to you as one heart of billions, for all are one great heart of humanity.

Abandon your faith that man is evil. Know your evil, that you may abandon it. Give yourself into the holy sacred heart of the present, of the presence of knowledge within you.

Know that you are every man, cumulative, yet all are unique in the extreme.

Give yourself unto your heart. Give no thought to doctrines. The Word is printed in the heart of every man and woman.

Do not worry–give yourself to your heart and you will have come unto me.

Signed,
Josephus, Scribe Aspect of Jesus Christ”

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Copyright 1995, 2010 Rev. Scott Ufford