Many of have this question and many at times we have asked this question to ourselves and people around us. Most of the times, we go & asked our so called "Granthi or Gyanis or Bhai of a gurudwara" and all would guide us towards "SGGS"... or would tell us "Guru granth sada pita, paramatma te Akalpurakh hai". This has been going for hundreds of years and from generations to generations.We all are put on the path of "rituals & reading the bani". We have been doing this for hundreds of years and from generations to generations. And if someone tell us this is not the right path, we give example of "My great grand father was doing it, my grand father was following it, my father taught me this and now I am teaching this to my son". We argue that "Everyone can't be wrong"
Let's ask SGGS and hear what bani has to say on this. According to SGGS "Roop, Rang ne Rekh kich, Treh gun to the prabh bhin, Tisse bhujaaye Naneka, jiss hove suparsan".
The bani is very clear about waheguru (akal purakah), who is beyound 3 qualities, which are ROOP (HE is not beautiful nor Ugly), RANG (HE is not black or white or any other color) & RAIKH (HE is beyond any shape)...... before we go into any further details of these 3 qualities we must clarify one thing in our mind... Waheguru is either full of 3 qualities or have NONE of these qualities. Don't understand this? I know this sounds a little absurd but here we are talking about WAHEGURU, who is everywhere and HE is nowhere similarly HE is full of these 3 qualities and HE does not have any of these 3 qualities.
So, if god is beyond these 3 qualities than our "imagination" of waheguru, whom we believe is in a kind of HUMAN shape with certain features becomes invalid. A lot of people believe that a SIKH means a certain "characteristics" of a human. Let's ask SGGS what our gurus have to say about this. According to SGGS "Chodo vais baikh chaturayee, dubidha eh, fal nahi jiyo".. Guru is very clear that any OUTSIDE characteristics or "VAIS" that we wear is going to create a lot of doubts in our minds and in the end we will be tied with "VAIS" only and forget what is the real meaning of a "SIKH"
The other very important point that about "WAHEGURU". We all have formed an illusive image of Waheguru in our minds, which is that "I must do THIS" (could be anything like rituals, recitation of bani or charity or anything) else "HE" would not be "Happy" with me or "Punish" me. Let's ask SGGS and hear what guru has to say about WAHEGURU (Akalpurakh). According to SGGS "Mith bolada ji, harr sajjan soami mora. Haon sammal thakki ji, Ou kade naa bole Kauda".
So if the guru is saying that I have tried everything and in the end I have realised that Akalpurakh knows only ONE thing, which is LOVE, HE does not (it does not matter how bad we are) know how to speak or do anything BAD to his children (like a father, who does not know how to be bad to his kids).
But I guess the problem is that we FEAR because we don't realize that HE is our father. We treat him like a "Head Master" of a school, who only knows how to teach discipline to the children. Whereas Father knows how to teach HIS children the etiquettes (how to be a good SIKH) but with LOVE.
In order to understand this relationship of Waheguru (akalpurakh) and a Sikh (children), we need to understand the relationship between Father & children. Let's ask what SGGS has to say on this. According to SGGS "Jaisa balak bhaay subhai, lakh aapradh kamaave, kar updesh childke bahun bhanti, bahud pita gall laave" means as a we children only know (as the habit of children) to do silly mistakes but the father would some time shout at you but in the end would give you guidance and would hug you & praise you so you do good next time. Do we have such relationship with WAHEGURU (our father)?
Do we trust our father? What is the trust of children on their father? For example my son asked me for Rs. 100/- to buy something for his needs. I without any hesitation gave him the money but that made me realise something, which is the trust of a child on his father, which is that his current need was only Rs. 100 and he asked me for that only because he has a trust on me that if he needs more tomorrow, he can certainly ask me again. But do we do that with our father??? On the contrary what we do? We don't trust HIM, we want to have everything "TODAY". It seems we don't have a trust that our "FATHER" may not grant our "wishes' tomorrow.
How do we treat Waheguru? We treat him like a "superman", who can solve all our problems, who has a solution for everything. Yes, this is right but we need to understand that HE is NOT a superMAN. He does not need things or so called "rishvat" (bribes) from us to grant us favors. We treat him like a human. We go to gurudawara and present a few rupees (without realizing that it is HIS money and in reality they are some mere papers) or some flowers (without "realizing that they are from HIS garden, called planet earth which is created by HIM) and want HIM to grant all our wishes in exchange. We do charity like an investment in the hope of GOOD RETURNS. We don't do it for HIS love.
My dear veers & sisters, we need to open our eyes & hearts and look for Waheguru outside our "Beliefs" & "Thoughts". HE is not OUTSIDE, HE is INSIDE and we can only find HIM with LOVE. We can find him with love in "BANI" (we have to read Bani to find him or connect to him and not do it like a duty a few times a day), with love in "PEOPLE" around us (because HE is in everyone..) and most importantly with love for HIM in "US"...
Stay blessed!