Interview with Dirk van Wijngaard
The Awakening Times (TAT): Can you share your opinion on “guru hoppers”?
Dirk van de Wijngaard (DW): The teaching of Shirdi Baba and Sai Baba is to always stick to one guru. Otherwise, you get completely confused, especially in the beginning. It also depends on your frequency, your understanding: Are you shopping for a luxury guru? In Holland, for example, all the artists like this one sex guru from Asia; all wear orange clothes and take condoms and they can have as much sex as they want. This guru had a lot of Rolls Royces, security guards, TV and film stars like him too. AIDS became rampant and he also took all their money. So, for someone who has a little understanding and a slightly higher frequency, he can easily fool others.
TAT: Is there a misconception about the importance of the role of the guru in one’s life?
DW: When the guru is pure, like Mohanji is, he’s not interested in millions of followers, he is interested in believers who first investigate him, inquire and meditate, and become active, and get the feeling. When a seeker is in the first class of the great frequency he will help them. Like a little child of 11 months; the Guru is always behind, and will help even when the child tries to fail, but when they go shopping and hopping and thinking that the guru is Santa Claus, or that the guru is a donkey upon whom they can put all of their problems, and sit on him as if he will do all the work.
TAT: So, insincere seekers?
DW: Yes that’s correct. A nun, she feels that the world is too loud, too much loud noise; it keeps her away from her silence, from her concentration, her discipline. She decides to go into a monastery. But Swami Mohanji has come to say, “Come out of your caves, come out of your monasteries, give helping hands, helping hands are better than praying lips. It’s okay if you do morning introspection: Why was I jealous? Why was I angry? why? Why do I like this person? Why don’t I like this or that? All this: you have to inquire into yourself to become a better person. When you become pure and if you feel that volcano which we call Mohanji, who has for many, many lives resided in your pure hearts. If you give him one simple, childlike, sincere prayer, one time; immediately that Volcano will heat you up. He’s ready. He’s waiting for you.
TAT: For a sincere seeker how do you recognize the genuine article?
DW: A sincere seeker actually does not have to find the Guru. The Guru will find the serious seeker. He is like the volcano in your heart, in all these lives, but when the seeker is fed up with the circus of life, mostly because of pain, I am an example of that: My father was an alcoholic and my mother was murdered when I was eight. I lost my wife, she went with my best friend, and then I was an alcoholic for 5 years. Then the guru appeared to me, and he said, “Now the time has come to tell you about love of life and the life of love. Come to Me”
When your time has come you will feel restless. It is like you’re in the fairy tale woods, and you don’t know where to go anymore in this life. We come on a away with left, straight, back; you don’t know what the way is. The wife will not make me happy. Nothing will make me happy… If you come to that stage, and you start to get the feeling that this is not life: Who am I? Where am I going? What is the use of this life? Then you come to understand that there is something deep inside of you, which loves you. When you reach that level, then that guru inside of you, that love inside of you, that God inside of you, that light inside of you, call it whatever you like. That spark is already inside of you. And when you start to believe in yourself, the Guru will come; in the form of a book, or a documentary, or you hear something in the news, it will come to you in one way or another. Mostly you’re not aware of it; I think I got 20 phone calls, “Dirk, have you heard about Mohanji?” I said, “I’m not interested in these Gurus.” Then 20 times they have to call before I start doing a little education on Google on who Mohanji is. I already have a Guru, what to do with this one?
I went to see Sai Baba with a group of 12 Dutch people. Swami promised me that he will give the group an interview. I told them to be patient. They came for about three weeks and on day 19 they said, “Only two more days. We never got our interview.” They lost trust. 3 stayed and the other 8 went away. They went to meet another Guru; shopping, like you said. I was with four and Swami said, “Okay, let them come.” We went inside and a lady said, “Hey brother, do you know where Lucas is?” Swami looked at her and said, “Yes, that group of seven, they went to another guru, because they want help from somebody and they think Swami cannot help, they had no patience to stay, although Swami promised to give them an interview. They think that Swami is not a good mother to them. They went to another mother.” He said it very sorrowfully as if he felt cheated. So if you have a mother, Divine Mother, why go to somebody else?
TAT: Mohanji mentioned many times that if you shift from one guru to another, then you are no one’s responsibility.
DW: Yes, no one’s the possibility anymore, because all masters will not like you anymore, because if this guru hopping. If you stick on to one and you put into practice, at least one of his teachings, that is better than discussing 1000s of teachings, then not only Mohanji, but all the Masters will support you. You must have patience and you have to be sincere and childlike in your prayer and in your thoughts, words, and actions. We shouldn’t think: “Oh, I have Mohanji. He will do this for me…” You can do 1008 times the prayer: “I want the motorbikes. I need the motorbikes…” He’s not the ATM. You cannot put there, the credit card with 1008 prayers and say, “Where’s my motorbike?” You have to do your homework. If you are just talking in front of the class and you don’t come inside, what will you learn? You’re just like a frog talking about the lotus flower next to him, and talking loudly. The people, who have no experience within, will shop around and believe all the quacks, the fakes. They’re waiting for you. At your weakest moments, they will brainwash you. They are waiting for the world, and 99% of the world is fake, because it has nothing to offer you.
TAT: How to distinguish the real from the fake?
DW: If a man is very nice to his ladies and then later starts beating them, they will feel automatically that this is not good. The conscience will speak; the conscience will tell them that this is not good. But, perhaps because they have some kind of lust, or egoistic feelings, or jealousy, they stay on for a while, but if they come to understand their nature, they feel they will leave.
TAT: There are cases where people have had multiple gurus and still walked truly on the path. You have also had multiple gurus. So, when is it right?
DW: It is right when you get to contact from within. If the contact from within tells you, and you have done your investigation; you’ve seen what Mohanji has done these last 10 years, see if you can trap him on some fault or some mistake, see all the documents. If in all that, you can find one sentence that is not good, then don’t believe him. But you will not find, because he’s truth and righteousness. That is why all masters asked him to restore Sanatana Dharma in this world, and to bring back the lost children of God. So you will feel it; is a feeling. First people have to get through the bad experience to come to the right, and it can take lives, because we’re living in Maya.
There was a lady and the hospital said she can never have a child anymore because her womb is not good. On her first Meeting with Mohanji he said, “I grant you a daughter. Don’t worry.” The daughter is now about 10 years old, but she has forgotten Mohanji, because people in our village spoke in ill faith and she kept quiet about Mohanji out of shame. She lost her confidence. But, when she read the article about Sai Baba’s Boy, she called me in Holland, and he cried her heart out: “Now I only understand. I ran away. I’m so sorry!” Now as you see she understands. She said, “Dirk, now I understand that he is Krishna, he is Shiva, he is Sai Baba, behind the mask. I can feel it now.” So, you can see how strong Maya is, and Maya is not negative, Maya just executes the test; tests you to go from class one to class two.
TAT: Some spiritual texts like Srimad Bhagavatam, mention that some individuals have multiple gurus for their spiritual progress, so that’s allowed. I wanted to know from your perspective, having been a disciple of Sai Baba and now Mohanji’s disciple, when is it allowed to shift from one guru to another? Is it only when your first guru dies? Or when you finish that grade, then you get a better teacher for the next grade?
DW: You have to investigate many, many hours and many days and weeks, whether Mohanji is real. Don’t blindly accept, he doesn’t want that either. He’s not waiting for shoppers; he’s looking for active people; Jesus only found 12 and Buddha only 5. Your conscience will tell you. From within you will feel that Swami wants you to be with him, to bring the children back. “Follow his feet, his feet are my feet.” That is what I felt. I deeply, deeply recognize our Sai Baba in Mohanji. I’m 100% sure that when Mohanji leaves the body he will say, “My father and I are one.” You only come to know who is behind the mask if you go deep inside, and your hands should be in service. Duty, discipline, devotion: do your duty; become a better husband, become a better wife. Be disciplined; start non-violence in words, thoughts and deeds, not killing animals, no eating animals… Your cocoon will fall off, you will fly, you’ll feel free: “I’m no longer alone.” That loneliness feeling, everybody can talk about. That’s why so many people go into alcohol.
TAT: Our last question: If you deviate from your path, or you disconnect from your guru, on hop to another, what do you lose? What is at stake?
DW: You miss your life. You have to come back again, because of your patterns and your non-belief in the purity of your soul. You do not understand who is running the show inside of you. You think you’re breathing? It’s all an understanding: You have to understand that God is your true living and loving, Heavenly Father and Mother who was always there for you. You went to the circus, many lives in the circus and you believe all this fake stuff; you believe in jealousy, ego, lust, you become like a robot, you do not care for animals, you don’t care for the trees that let you breathe. I’m grateful to God that he breathes through me; I cannot think every time I have to breathe, so who is running the show?
If you have the feeling, the happiness of knowing that you can help, then there is no need for anything else. We think we need a lot of things. Actually, we need nothing. We only need the love of God. To get that feeling of love inside of us, we have to go deep inside ourselves. There is the real Guru.
Also if Mohanji asks you if you want Self Realization and you say that you want Mohanji, then even Mohanji will tell you that’s nonsense: “Like a captain on a ship. I’ve been there. You come with me. You clean the deck, you clean the toilets. You do this, you do that. When we reach there, I give you myself, so that you realize yourself, not me. I have nothing to do with you.” He’s like a witness. That is the real Guru, he does not want anything from you, except your love, if you help others, he will be very happy.
Always be connected; never lose that radio FM universal love connection with your Guru. Never let your mind come in between. Mind is just a dramatic play that is cheating you, but when you have it under control, it can help you. You have to master the mind. You have to be determined, and you will be free, you won’t need anybody anymore. God is with you.