Finding the Master

There was a mystic Master and he lived on top of the hill, but he had one follower. The follower cooks food for him and would bring it to the hill, and he used to live five miles away from the hill. And unless the Master ate, he would sit there and wait – and the Master was a crazy man. Sometimes he would eat in the morning, sometimes in the afternoon, sometimes in the evening, sometimes in the night, and the disciple would wait and he would not eat till the Master had eaten. So sometimes he had to remain hungry the whole day.And by the time he reached home he was so tired that he would think, ”Tomorrow, now who wants to prepare food again?” He would fall asleep hungry.

One day the Master said, ”Listen, you need not come so far. I can come there myself, so tomorrow you prepare the food and I will come. It is too hot to come, and then sometimes you have to wait the whole day – change it now. You are ready: I will come.”

The next day he prepared delicious food for the Master because he was to come for the first time.
He was thrilled. This was grace: his Master is coming to his home! He decorated the house, he threw flowers on the path… but nobody turned up, only a dog. He chased the dog out because the dog wanted to cat, and he chased and the dog would come back and would try to snatch food. He had seen many dogs, but this dog was strange. He beat the dog but he still came. He really gave him a good beating, then he saw tears coming out of the dog’s eyes. And then he disappeared.

Till evening he waited, and then he thought, ”This man is crazy – he may have forgotten.” So he took the food, went to the mosque – and he saw tears in the eyes of the Master. The SAME kind of tears!
He was puzzled and he said, ”Why are you crying?”
And he said, ”Why shouldn’t I? You have beaten me so much!”
And the disciple said, ”What are you talking about? I and I can beat you? And you never came and you had promised!”
And the Master said, ”I came – and not only once. At least twelve times!”
Then the disciple remembered the dog – exactly twelve times the dog had tried to enter.
And the Master said, ”You have to be capable of seeing the formless now. Don’t be too much attached to the form. Why should I be thought of only in this form, in this body? Why can’t you find me in other forms?”