I think it is now quite clear that different people were hearing/accepting different messages from the wide and often contradictory messages being given in satsang by both the LOTU, his closer personal message bearers (initiators), those premies who one thought were "experiencing Knowledge" deeply and sundry others.In the late 70's I'm not sure how different it was for those in the ashrams because it seemed to me that "surrender" and dedication to M&K seemed to be transcending whether or not you were in the ashram especially as many of the earlier ashram premies had got married and had children when the ashrams were first closed and couldn't return therein.
The following satsang which I was reading recently is typical of late 70's satsang. You can take it as being heavy and be upset or concerned or you can take it as basically saying "Don't worry, be happy" and that's how I took it and I disagree: enjoying Knowledge was the directive and I certainly was happy during that time and if some other premies were pretending due to the power of conformity then they have my sympathy. I can remember premies who openly stated they didn't enjoy meditation, who fried in satsang but who were devoted to "Maharaji' and that was accepted as well as those who were having fun. Gopi, enjoyer or struggler were all part of the mix and that acceptance was part of the magic.
I'm quite sure I could find Rawat's satsang of the times which explicitly stated that you could tell you were on the right path if you were enjoying knowledge. But then to me it wasn't about listening to the satsang and thinking about it, it was listening, concentrating and meditating. That's what I had been taught and I found it very enjoyable. Of course none of this discussion is meant to validate "Knowledge" in any way.
"And so what remains in our lives? What remains in this whole, entire world to do? And like I was saying, where does Mr. Mind take you and put you every time? Where does that mind place you? It places you every time at a place that has nothing to do with outrageous, has nothing to do with beautiful, has nothing to do with incredible, has nothing to do with anybody except darkness, darkness, darkness, darkness, darkness, darkness, darkness. And this is where your mind puts you.
And yet, 24 hours a day we stay slaves of this mind, follow this mind. And I guess it's just a habit that we form. As soon as we can comprehend things, this mind starts to get looser and looser and looser and looser. And the more concepts that can be created, the more concepts that can be put in front, the more of a web this mind can weave, and give us the better changes of getting tangled up in that web.
Because I've seen just the way the mind works. And I've seen it in a lot of people. They're there and everything is working okay for them. Everything is working just fine for them. And then all of a sudden the mind comes in and just says, "Do you understand what's going on? Because if you don't, you should try harder."
"Do you really, do you really feel Guru Maharaj Ji in your life? Because anything that you feel is not sufficient enough. You have to feel him more. Do you feel meditation in your life? Any amount of meditation you do is not enough."
And it just takes you through all this cobwebbing, all this weaving. And it just says, "No, this is not good enough and this is not good enough." It's based on what the satsang is, because that's the way the satsang is given: that we can never do enough meditation, we can never do enough service, we can never do enough satsang, we can never have enough satsang."
