When I was young and living in India, I was meditating every moment I could. I was so in love with my inner Guru, Baba, that nothing of this world drew me. But after some time I became very ill. I was taken to the hospital and I was so sick I began to think I would die. In this state I reached within to my Baba for guidance and for the first time, he was not there! I could not contact him.
The experience was shocking. It was a wake up call. He could not have shouted louder than his complete silence did. The message was loud and clear, he did not approve. If I killed this body in my spiritual zeal, he would not be there. I could not come close to him by rejecting the world.
So I came home to America and put the full force of my efforts into getting well. I realized that if I were to thrive in this body, I would need to form attachments to hold me in the world..
Though I had great passion for my Divine Beloved, to please him I needed to ground my being in the world. So I set the intention to try to find connection to the world of forms.
Well, one thing lead to another and before I knew it I was married, went back to school for my PhD, had children, worked in the world as a psychologist and was starting a spiritual community. All the while my relationship to my Divine Beloved remained and guided my life.
It has been rough at times but I have learned something through this journey of detachment and attachment. I have learned that the Divine Self lives in every living being, in every form, in every experience from the most difficult to the most sublime.
If you really open up to it, the duality of the world and worldly life on one side and the bliss of Divine love on the other falls away and then there is only the Divine.
I have learned in glimpses of truth, that there is no duality, no world apart from the Beloved. There is only one continual flow of Divine presence manifesting in countless forms and experiences.
For those who have eyes to see, there is only the Beloved. He/she is everywhere in all people, in everything. Eyes open or eyes closed in deep meditation, it is the same. All is the Beloved, the Self of all beings. This has perhaps been the biggest teaching of my life - that this world and all its joys and sorrows, attachments, loves and losses is simply the form of the Beloved.