Sri Sathya Sai International Organization

Be reasonable, considerate, sympathetic, full of toleration of the other points of view. Improve yourselves day by day in these matters. That is My Blessing for you today.

God is not far from you, or away in some distant place. He is within you, in your own inner altar. Man suffers because he is unable to discover Him there, and draw peace and joy from that discovery. Of course, you have to be in the world, but you need not be of it. The attention has to be fixed on God, the God within. Man must keep the Goal of God-realisation before him, while engaged in the noisy, hilarious procession of life.

However much a man may possess, if he has not cultivated detachment, it is but arid waste. Detachment from sensual pleasures and objective pursuits helps the growth of Love towards God and the Godly.

Spiritual wisdom cannot be won without a pure mind. He must discover who he is, before he ventures upon the inquiry, ""Who is God?"" Once he has discovered who he is, there is no need to know who is God, for, both are the same.

Do not grieve, nor be the cause of grief. The very embodiment of Bliss (God) is in you, as in others, as in all else. In spite of a multiplicity of containers, the contained is the same. That is the principle of Being, Awareness, Bliss (Sat, Chit and Ananda). The minutest atom, the mightiest star, both are basically one. All are, in Truth, Brahman, Divine.

The wrong notion that the world is real and that you are the body has been so deeply implanted in you through birth after birth, that it can be removed only by means of a very potent medicine, administered continuously. The medicine, God's Name (Ram Ram Ram), is to be swallowed and assimilated ad infinitum. Its curative essence will travel into every limb, every sense, every nerve and every drop of blood. Every particle of you will be transmuted into Ram.

Be convinced that there is a God, guiding and guarding us. Remember Him with gratitude. Pray to Him to render you pure. Love all; serve all. Join good company. Visit temples and holy men.

Conquer inner foes; triumph over your ego. That is the Victory for which you deserve congratulations, not the others. That is what I referred to as True Freedom (Swaaraajya).

You sit in meditation for ten minutes, after the evening devotional chanting sessions; so far, so good. But, let me ask, when you rise after the ten minutes and move about, do you see every one in a clearer light, as endowed with Divinity? If not, meditation is a waste of time. Do you love more, do you talk less, do you serve others, more earnestly? These are the signs of success in meditation.

Meditation must transmute your attitude towards beings and things; else it is a hoax. Even a boulder will, through the action of sun and rain, heat and cold, disintegrate into mud and become food for a tree. Even the hardest heart can be softened so that the Divine can sprout therein.

See Him in all, worship Him through all, for He is all. Engage in activity, but, fill the activity with devotion: it is the devotion that sanctifies.

The Path of Worship (Bhakti marga) is the name given to the path of surrender to the Lord's Will, the merging of the individual Will in the Will of the Universal.

Performing work as worship is also tantamount to meditation. You must perform all actions as offering to God.

When you have the feeling that Divinity is within you, you will not think, see, hear, talk or do any evil.

Having complete faith in the Divinity within is self-confidence. This is the foundation on which the walls of self-satisfaction have to be raised and the roof of self-sacrifice laid, so that the mansion of Self-Realisation is complete.

Do not look on, when you find some one in pain or grief. As far as possible, relieve the pain, console the grief-stricken.

Mind control, restraining the senses, transcending the worldly dualities, forbearance, unwavering faith, and equanimity are the primary virtues that must exist in a true spiritual aspirant. In addition, there must be an intense longing for liberation (Moksha).

Moksha can come only from the conquest of ignorance. A person might master all the scriptures along with all the learned commentaries written on them by experts, or propitiate all the gods by performing the prescribed modes of worship and ceremonies. But this cannot grant the boon of liberation.

You must carefully think over the consequences of whatever you do, talk, or execute. In whatever way you want others to honour you, or to love you, or to behave with you, in the same way you should first behave with others, and love and honour them. Then only will those honour you.

Above all, it is best that the spiritual aspirant under all circumstances should be joyful, smiling and enthusiastic. Even more than Devotion and Wisdom (Bhakthi and Jnana), this pure attitude is desirable. Those who have acquired it deserve to reach the goal first. This quality of joy at all times is the fruit of the good done in past births. When a person is ever worried, depressed and doubting, he can never attain bliss, whatever spiritual practices one may undertake.

The first task of a spiritual aspirant is the cultivation of enthusiasm. Through that enthusiasm, he can derive any variety of joy. Never get inflated when you are praised; never get deflated when you are blamed. Be a spiritual lion, regardless of both. One must analyse and correct one's faults on his own; this is most important.

There is no penance higher than fortitude, no happiness greater than contentment, no good deed holier than mercy, no weapon more effective than patience.

Even if you don’t attain liberation as a consequence of taking up the Lord’s name, one of these four gates will be open to you: Company of the virtuous, truth, contentment and control of the senses. Anyone who enters through any one of these gates will certainly attain the Lord without fail.

Irrespective of whatever inconveniences you may encounter, you must continue your spiritual practices with the same discipline. The remembrance of the Name of the Lord you cherish should go on.

Take all worldly losses, sufferings, and worries as merely temporal and transitory, and realise that repetition of the Name and meditation is only to overcome such grief. You must understand that loss, suffering, and worry are external, they belong to this world, while repetition of the Name and meditation are internal, they belong to the realm of the love for the Lord.

The wise one (Jnani) is ever happy and this happiness does not depend on objects outside. You may wonder how; it is because such people are content with whatever happens to them, well or ill, as they are convinced that the Lord's will must prevail.

People render their inner consciousness impure by ignorantly dwelling on the objective world. They take delight in mere sound, taste, smell, etc. When they seek objective pleasure they are tempted to secure the objects that give pleasure; foiled in the attempt, they get restless, hateful and afraid. Fear robs one of his mental resources. It creates anger that cannot be easily pacified. Thus desire, anger and fear are aroused one after the other and these three must be removed to realize the Lord.

Every thought, word, and deed has to come from an enlightened consciousness. Do not let your mind wander; let it dwell constantly in the inner world. This is the inward quest, and meditation (Dhyana) is the most important instrument needed for this.