" The Lakshmi came out of the sea; that is the wealth that has come out of the sea. But the wealth has to be like a Lakshmi. The Lakshmi has a motherly nature. She’s a mother. She’s a mother. She is standing on a lotus. That means She does not throw her weight anywhere. Like people go and occupy other territories and use them for their own purpose will never give them Lakshmi principle. Only thing that may happen to them is to get some money for the time being. But they say Lakshmi is chanchal; means She is all the time shifting and she shifts. Such a Lakshmi is chanchal, is shifting.
Lakshmi has got one hand which is giving, like this. Another hand She has got by which She protects people. In two hands She has got pink lotuses. The pink lotus suggests the warmth. A person who has got Lakshmi has to have warmth in his household. He must have in his heart warmth to receive people. A lotus flower receives even a horrible beetle, black beetle which has got all kinds of thorns in it and allows it to sleep overnight as a nice guest. In the corona of the lotus there is beautiful spread of the yellow coloured pollen on which this beetle rolls and enjoys the comfort.
And the lotus watches the enjoyment of the beetle. It does not get disturbed. It does not get upset and when the lotus opens out, the beetle just goes away. And the lotus still grows, it doesn’t die out.
In modern life, we don’t want guests and if some guests come in the house they dare not even spoil the carpet. We clean the house; we polish all our silver and all our brass, but we don’t want even a little rat to come inside. For whom are we doing all this work? There are no children in the house and the old people are in the old house. Children are in the hostels. And the husband, wife are in the divorce case. But they are very particular about their brass being polished. So the whole polish has come outside.
So the beauty of lotus flower is that it is all embracing. It’s a very motherly principle. It tolerates any type of nonsense from the beetle. So, one of the aspects of Mahalakshmi is Gruhalakshmi: is the one who is the housewife. And if this aspect is spoiled, then we cannot have Lakshmi in our house; we cannot have wealth in our house. The Lakshmi will disappear from all such houses where the housewife is not respected or the housewife is not respectable. "
Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi, Belgium. 21st Sept, 1986
