When the expectation is false, disappointment is

natural. To expect a glass of cold water in the Sahara

desert would mean sure disappointment. Life is

miserable because our expectation is false. The

fundamental mistake of everyone is that we wish to be

permanently happy in this world of continuous change.

The world is nothing but a play of pairs of opposites.

If heat is there, cold must be there. Joy has meaning

only with relationship to sorrow. Darkness and light,

pain and pleasure, all of them are unavoidable - like

the poles of a magnet – inseparable.

"I want only the north pole". Try cutting off the

south pole of the magnet! Where it was cut, there is

another south pole. Cut it smaller, and still smaller.

As long as the magnet exists, the two poles are there.

It is unavoidable. The great masters understood and

remained unperturbed.

But in the heart of the magnet is the soft iron piece

that has neither the north pole nor the south pole. It

neither attracts nor repels. DROP the magnetism of the

ego – the attraction and repulsion of the raaga and

dwesha (likes and dislikes) in you.

An iron piece, when rubbed against a magnet, becomes a

magnet with two poles. To remove the magnetism, drop

it on the ground again and again: the magnetism is

lost. When we transact with the world through the ego

and egocentric desires, the magnetism of the ego

increases. The consequent likes and dislikes create

joy and sorrow.

Do not run away. Face the world and get hit by the

world. Let the world drop you again and again. It is

the means to destroy the ego. "Turn towards Me and

fight," is the call of the Bhagawad Geeta.

The magnetism is lost; the pure soft iron remains.

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