I have always been a deep skeptic in spiritual matters. Nevertheless, I am curious and ceaselessly search for genuine spiritual books and spiritual leaders. Approaching spiritual institutions with a barren mind can be dangerous. It can be worse than drug addiction. In the latter, a therapy may save you while in the former, a late realization of futility can snap your senses. As Schopenhauer says-If you approach any new idea or ideology with a vacuum mind, it gets sucked into you. So one needs to have certain degree of exposure to spiritual thoughts before seeking a spiritual guru.

A former colleague of mine – a brilliant chemical engineer – had a fabulous academic track record and was a rank holder in the state level SSLC Examination. But his exposure to philosophy, ideologies ethics, literature and spiritual matters was scanty. One day, he visited the ashram of Karunakara Guru in Kollam. The ‘Fuga Vaccui’ (Vacuum suction) acted and he simply sucked his ideology and became an instant innocent victim of that Institution. After his visits, he kept on lecturing about Karunakara Guru and his colleagues pitied him. Slowly his personality was annihilated as his thoughts veered into a single track, often on an irrational plane. The same story was repeated in the case of another colleague where the entire family was sold out to the institution of Mata Amritanandamayi. There are umpteen similar examples of spiritual exploitation by many institutions operated by folks like Sathya Sai Baba and Ravi Shankar, another clever profit-minded gurus of recent times.

I have thought about the psyche behind succumbing to godmen. I feel that people who have no eclectic tastes, people in difficult and sad circumstances, people who pose no criticisms to life , whose minds are incarcerated, who seldom interact with people and surroundings, who remain as frozen frogs in a well and have no exposure to the ideas and philosophies that have shaped humanity become easy targets of these godmen. They later become extremists of a sober brand or ambassadors of that cult. Full Article