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730. College Pupil Leader

Every man has the higher impulse. It springs from the deeply hidden Spirit. He gives expression to it in rare moments of tranquillity or serenity. His life is one of lower impulses. He lives that way. He is in his elements when the lower impulses are fully expressed. Still, the higher moments always return as a lightening flash. Neither the low are devoid of noble instincts nor the high of base motives. Man is a mixture of both. What is on the surface at a given moment decides the outcome of his actions at that moment.

A graduate from Kerala came to Sri Ramanashram. After a short stay, he decided to continue there. His stay there lasted ten full years. From there he moved to Sri Aurobindo Ashram where he stayed for one year. Perhaps his spiritual urges were spent by that time. He tried his hand at teaching as an untrained teacher for several years. Now it was time for him to settle down. He joined the Teachers College so that the rest of his life could be in a secure job. As he was 40 years old by that time, he became at once a popular student. His pleasant manners endeared him to all. He was unanimously elected the College Pupil Leader, a rare honour in student life. During the Christmas holidays he did not choose to travel back to his native home in Kerala and stayed in the hostel along with a few other students. His own particular friends with whom he enjoyed city life had returned home. Now his spiritual urges were dormant, the human instincts were active. One day he saw a friend leaving the hostel very early and came to know he was on his way to a lecture by J. Krishnamurthy, the world Teacher.

Joining him, he attended the lecture. His own dormant knowledge came to the surface. The Spirit in him had another lease of life. The lectures continued. He attended a number of them and felt rewarded. He could explain to his friend who was listening with interest, but with no understanding, the intricate points of the lecture. A day before the reopening of college, his own friends arrived. The College Pupil Leader forgot J. Krishnamurthy, went to the city with his friends and returned expansively. On his way he met the friend who had attended the lectures with him and said, "Today I feel in my elements. My enthusiasm has come back. You took me to Krishnamurthy's lectures. That did something to me. I lost all life while I attended those lectures. Only today after my friends arrived has life come back." Man is a strange creature. He enjoys what is human in him even when something has taken him to spiritual centres and kept him there for eleven long years. The human choice is of paramount importance. It is not true we are without spiritual promptings. The Person in us makes a choice every time. The choice decides. We choose to call it fate, karma, or destiny.



story | by Dr. Radut