Amma Bhagavan about "Desires"
Sri Amma Bhagavan (Kalki) Speaks - Messages by Sri Bhagavan

Question: Many traditions, including Buddhism and Hinduism, says one should not have desires; you should be content with what you have, desires are the root of suffering, have very little desires and only then you will be happy etc. You say to enjoy life fully, the pleasures as well as pain. There seems to be a contradiction here, could you please explain?

Answer: Yes! Now who put the desire in you? As far as I am concerned it is nature, God or whatever you want to call it. That only is responsible for having put the desire into you. You did not have yourself conceived! You were conceived, all things were put into you, you were brought up in the womb. You did not design yourself. So how can you be held responsible?

The desire is what I call swadharma. It is there and I don’t see anything wrong with desire. The Buddha himself did not say “Be free of desire”. He said, “Be free of craving”. The unfortunate English translation from Pali made it into ‘desire’. The Buddha had normal desires but was free from craving.

Say you want to have a good house, car, go for a good drive… marry a wonderful man or woman… what’s wrong with that? I don’t see anything wrong in desire, as long it doesn’t hurt anyone. But if it causes pain to somebody, then the society has the right to punish you. People sometimes come and ask me about marrying a person. I first ask them to tell me if there are any negative consequence, if there aren’t any, I bless them. After sometime you automatically grow beyond all this. Don’t you see with normal food also, after sometime you get satiated? How many desires can you have? How long will you go on with your desires? At some point it finally becomes a desire for freedom or liberation.

How can we talk about all this with someone who is hungry and want food? I can’t tell them, ’come, I’ll give you mukti and moksha!!!’. That is why we do annadhanam, I bless them to fulfill their desires, do samskarashuddi that changes their thinking patterns which would affect in the external world.

To me Dharma is something that is coming very naturally to you. It’s like the river automatically flowing to the ocean. Of course if your desire is out of comparison, jealousy or hatred, then it causes pain to others and you. So, there’s noting wrong in having desires. On the other hand, do you think it is easy to suppress your desires? No! For many people who come to samskarashuddhi, we find that the problems they face is because they have suppressed their
desires. Like a couple have a bad relationship, we find out it is because he wanted to work with computers but has become a doctor as his father wanted. This suppression continues through out your life, spoiling your relationships etc. It will produce all kinds of problems, like violence etc…

Though some people attack me ’why do you tell people to ask for desires?’. My thing is if I am going to help you in your desires you are also going to be enlightened next. I see very often failures telling that they are contented with what they have. What kind of contentment is that? Just because you have failed you built up a theory of contentment. According to me everyone can succeed in their own capacities. If someone is a failure that means something is seriously wrong.

And this can be set right through samskarashuddi where I give Grace to change the script of the person. Buddha said, ”Be a light onto oneself”. But I tell, you require grace in life and things have to be given to you including enlightenment. You cannot make it on your own. To understand this it has to be directly experienced. I say that anything must be tested. I don’t believe just like that. That’s why you find atheists and communists in this movement. If we were to talk about a God or something, we would not like to give it to you as a belief. You have to discover that there is a God, which means you must be able to talk to him and he must be able to talk to you. Otherwise how would you expect a rational person to believe in God? Belief is not through induction, it must be a living experience. That’s why in dharma we say, the days of belief has gone. Now, it’s the age of discovery. Belief is a terrible burden on the mind. Man has lost touch with the inner core and Amma and I are here to put Man back in touch with Her/His Higher sacred self.