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Omkarananda AshramDiary 2007Sayings ofSwami Omkaranandafor Every Week of The YearEvery speck of space in which we draw our daily, hourly, every moment's breath, is rich with the inexhaustible abundance of Goodness, of Godliness, of Beauty.
1st week Not
only is suffering not something permanent in your nature,
but there is another factor that is permanent in you: that
is bliss, delight or happiness. Endless peace, endless
wisdom, endless life, these are permanent features of our
inner soul and consciousness. It is because there is latent
in man this infinite happiness, man is seeking for happiness
on earth. If there were not happiness in him, then there
would be no call for happiness.
The
emphasis on sorrow and suffering hinders us from progressing
quickly. Mind has a tendency to get caught up in what it is
thinking of. If you think more of the sufferings and
imperfections of your life, the more difficult it is to
conquer them. The more attention you give to the
imperfections, sufferings and unhappiness, the stronger they
become. The best thing is to leave negative things as they
are and always proceed towards achievement of something
positive.
2nd week Let
us not stop and contemplate upon our suffering,
imperfection, weakness, difficulties and deficiencies. This
way we are only wasting our precious time and also our more
precious energy. And, what is worse, we strengthen our
difficulties, deficiencies, suffering and unhappiness.
The wisest and the best thing for us would be to go on concentrating upon, and pursuing happiness, purity, goodness, greatness, nobility, holiness and divinity. Always move towards the positive, and the negative will die a natural death and in your life there shall be no more imperfection and no more suffering.
Though
we are seated here in a room, let our thoughts and feelings
rise and envelop the entire world in love. Let the power of
love and vibrations of that power circle round the earth,
reach the universes themselves, and reach the heart of the
Divine.
3rd week However
difficult it may be to remain positive when we are deeply
suffering, try it. What happens? We will not succeed because
the suffering, the sorrow is so great. It does not matter,
try again and try for the third time. Try twenty times.
Slowly a little strength comes. Try for the hundredth time,
more strength comes, at hundred and first time it becomes
very natural and spontaneous for you to be positive. Not
only this: if you don't want to be positive, what other way
is there of escape from the suffering?
We
are not bound for misery and unhappiness or limited power,
limited knowledge, or limited life and happiness. The very
genius of the evolutionary nature in you which is every day
pushing you forward to acquire more power, more pleasure,
more happiness, more peace, that will take you closer to an
experience of unlimited happiness, peace,
perfection.
4th week In
truth, in fact and in reality what is, is that infinite
Consciousness of endless wonders and splendours. The
limitations, the misery and also the limited happiness that
we experience are our mental constructions and creations.
They are the products of ignorance. In contra-distinction to
this ignorance, when we awaken and arouse the omniscience in
our inner being into activity, what do we experience? We
experience nothing but God, God, God here, there,
everywhere. And what are we in God? In God we have endless
creative power. In God we can work endless wonders, miracles
and marvels, because the divine Consciousness knows no
limits. And our peace, perfection and power will be
altogether unlimited and infinite.
Develop
your talents, see God in everything, serve God in all, try
to grow by every hour and every second. Address yourself to
the divine Presence which you don't see now, but which is
seeing you. 5th week We
have to be universal in our nature and love. The adoration
of the Divine must come to us automatically, instinctively.
We must be in a position to shake hands even with the empty
space, because what our senses report as an empty space is
in fact full of the endless wonders of divine Consciousness.
Infinite strength, power and consciousness are not only in
us but also in every speck of space, in each leaf. It was
not the privilege of Mira alone, and the thousands of saints
who have gone before her and came after her, to enjoy God's
consciousness, to express God's perfection. This is your
privilege, your right and your prerogative.
The
divine Being is infinite reality, infinite knowledge,
infinite consciousness, is also infinite love and infinite
beauty. It is conscious of each of us at all times and in
all places. It knows the past and the future. That is the
marvellous reality, the wonder of all wonders. 6th week Let
us remember the simple fact that the greatest, mightiest,
almighty power is God Himself. All powers in the world, all
the forces and energies in the universe are subject to the
central power of the Infinite. It is good for us to go on
generating noble thoughts, great thoughts, positive
thoughts, but this is not sufficient. Our own strength is
inadequate. Let us add the power of God to our will-power or
thought-power. Then we will be in the best position to drive
away all the negative thoughts or the influence of bad evil
forces by not only generating noblest, holiest, divine
thoughts, but also by constantly loving God and asking God
to give us more and more grace. All
the happiness in the whole world, if you sum it up and
squeeze it into a cup, in comparison to the happiness of the
mere thought of the Divine, is pain. All beauty in nature in
comparison to the beauty of the Divine is mere darkness,
limitation and ugliness.
7th week Life
is slowly leading you towards this grand experience of the
divine. We will have no real peace, happiness, power and
immortality unless and until we set our whole being in
continued God-consciousness. And therefore we will have to
develop the whole of our nature, exalt all of our being. Our
eyes must be charged with love of God. With every breath let
us draw into ourselves something of the power and strength
of God. Therefore
by not fighting the evil forces but by preserving yourself
in the centre of your devotion to the all-seeing,
all-responding divine Presence, you will be in a position
not merely to dispel the evil forces but also to cause in
yourself a great and tremendous invincible power.
8th week What
is more powerful is not evil, but goodness. Therefore so
long as you are pursuing the good alone exclusively and
concentratedly, be sure that the evil will never attack you
and what is most powerful, and more powerful than goodness
itself, is love of God and God Himself. After
all we are not living in a mechanical, material world of
maps, walls, automobiles, trains, electric lights and
bricks, we are living in a world of universal forces,
universal energies, universal powers. Therefore the thoughts
and feelings of each individual are more valuable and more
powerful in determining the destiny of humanity than what
they are attempting to do with their hands and
feet.
9th week This
love has its own power, this sweetness has its own power.
The power of love and sweetness are far greater than the
power of power. The power of power can only break, it can be
crude, it can be harsh, - but the power in love is
all-conquering, sweet, calm, serene, divine, all-effective,
all-conquering, all-victorious, all-harmonising. Nature
is aware of what I am, because nature is not set in the
limitations in which the human mind finds itself. Nature is
pure and is worked by the mind of the Divine, and therefore
is in a position to reflect the whole of our inner
being. The
greater the concentration, and the more we are with only one
thing, the more is the intelligence and the richer it is,
though it seems to be always empty, luminous. So, go on
repeating the mantra always, control the mind, bring it back
again and again to the Divine.
10th week Reason
brings you a powerful experience of the Divine. If you are
merely told "There is a God, please believe in him!" then it
is only a mere faith, a mere belief which is constantly
broken down. The students say that there is no God. The
professor says that it is stupid and primitive to believe in
God, and the faith breaks. Anything can break the faith.
Reason on the other hand strengthens real faith in the
Divine. If there is only one Truth, one Reality (as reason
has discovered) then that Reality is everywhere. If it is
everywhere it can be contacted anywhere, at any time - in
the table, in space, in the air, in the body, everywhere, in
all places, in all beings, at all times, in all
circumstances. It can be experienced, it can be perceived,
it can be known and its peace enjoyed, its happiness shared.
11th week Mind
is a Principle that operates in the world of dualities. Mind
is something that tells you it is night now, something that
tells you it is cold now, something that tells you that
there is the tape-recorder. Something that gives you
understanding that the person next to you is your enemy,
something that makes you feel that the person opposite to
you is your best friend. So mind is the creator of this
world of limitations, of oppositions. It is a Principle that
functions in time and space, whereas the divine
Consciousness in you is beyond time and space, the divine
Consciousness in you is timeless, spaceless, infinite and
unlimited. That is God in you. If
someone somewhere has devotion and faith, this divine
Principle which is nameless, timeless, spaceless and which
is knowing everything, at once understands the demand of the
heart of the devotee, the faithful heart of the human
individual, and responds to the demand.
12th week Is
love a characteristic, a quality of matter? Certainly not,
it is a characteristic, a quality of the spirit of God in
us. It is because the spirit of God is in us that we have
larger impulses, wider views, greater thoughts, faith in the
divine. And a readiness to do everything in order to follow
the footsteps of the great Lord who leads us into salvation.
Because there is the spirit of God in each of us, constantly
there arise spiritual aspirations in us, constantly there
springs up a mood to pray, constantly there arises a demand
to know God, to feel Him, to recognize Him.
Our
inability to perceive God should not give us any stupid
courage to deny the existence of God. Your inability to see
your own intelligence does not empower you to deny the
existence of your intelligence. More so the denial of the
Divine becomes impossible.
13th week Today
I think it is not the East but the West which is in search
of higher values and an earnest demand for God and
God-experience. This is a natural consequence of the
material opulence that Western humanity has built up for
itself. Today the Western mind at its best, and in its
cultural sensitivity, is deeply conscious of the limitations
of a purely materialistic life. People are growing
increasingly conscious of the limitations, short-comings and
inadequacies of a purely economically self-sufficient and
materially well-furnished life. By
your own power, strength and wisdom you cannot conquer
negative emotions such as anger. A power higher than your
own, a will other than your own must also be brought into
play in order that your conquest may be perfect and
immediate.
14th week There
are so many Saints who did not have masters. How did they
achieve perfection and God within? So, God does provide us
with the help within us or from outside. But it is a great
blessing if we have an external master. But I pray to you,
don't accept false masters. Try, examine, cross-examine the
master first. Wait and see if he is always good, always
pure. Wait and see if he is the person for you. Be calm, be gentle, and go on thinking about it and let your inner heart, your conscience disclose to you if he is the right person.
The
cosmos is not great, the mountains are high for the ordinary
person, but they are a tiny pin-point for the spiritual
heart which is wider than the skies. All the cosmos is like
a small carpet for the soul that has expanded in
God-consciousness.
15th week When
we become pure more pure and full of love of God, naturally
something of the Omniscience of God slips into our heads.
The past and future is disclosed to us, as an open book. Not
only see what has happened 10,000 years ago, but also the
inner consciousness is in a position to see what is going to
happen 10,000 years later. All these are unbelievable to the
scientific mind, to the human mind, but they are everyday
experiences of the inner mind, our mind.
Our
hatred, evil forces, bad thoughts and bad ways release
forces which must find some expression somewhere. And this
unfortunately affects the elements and the elements react in
that manner which results in the natural
calamities.
16th week But
there are also several other truths operating simultaneously
with this truth. It is not necessary that a human body
should be subjected to periodical sickness or bodily
difficulties in order that it may remain in harmony, that
necessity arises only when we have violated one or two
health Principles, and natural rules of life. Even so, the
calamities that visit humanity are not inevitable or very
necessary, but they become necessary when humanity in the
years past has consistently been on the wrong path.
It
is possible and also inevitable that you should constantly
seek to widen your wisdom and deepen your love. Ultimately
and in the final analysis there is no force, no power, no
circumstance in life, no situation which you cannot master
by your love for God and by your approach to the divine
Grace. God is not someone who is far away from us, but a
power and a presence available to us here and
now.
17th week The
divine consciousness is unaffected by whatever is happening
on earth or in the universal systems. Not one atom-bomb and
one nuclear weapon, but 10,000 atom-bombs and nuclear
weapons cannot affect the inner soul. The nuclear weapons
can destroy only what is perishable, not what is
imperishable. In the vast universal system such explosions
are constant, thousands of worlds are being destroyed and
recreated with every second. Humanity cannot create one
life, but God is unlimited in His capacity for creating
millions of people within the twinkling of an eye. Our small
little earth is but a speck of dust in the universal system,
and the entire universal system is nothing for God. He can
simply roll it up like a small mattress. So, atomic bombs
and nuclear weapons can frighten the small hearts, but do
not move the hearts that are reposed in
God-Consciousness.
18th week There
are about one hundred types of meditation. I personally feel
that all these types of meditation are not generally
directed towards God-experience. They are employed for
purposes of relaxation, finding some kind of mental passing
peace, for quieting the nerves, and for some other similar
purposes and aims. If our aim is approaching the heart of
meditation, as all of us are seekers of the Divine, our goal
is God Himself.
The
Self we are required to realize is not the psychological
Self, not the emotional, weak-willed, sinful little personal
self, it is the Godhead in us. It is the pure self-luminous,
self-contained, immortal Principle in us. It is the pure and
all-perfect Kingdom of God within us. Therefore anyone who
is seeking for an experience of God is also seeking for an
experience of the Self, because the Self is God,and God is
the Self.
19th week Ancient
minds have tumbled upon some invisible reality as the basis
of all life. Man in ancient times raised a specific
fundamental question concerning life, having observed nature
in its action and self-expression with a keen intelligence.
He had sought to unfold some of the higher powers of his
heart and mind, and sought an answer to the question whether
or not there is a God. The results of his best efforts are
with us as an ancient legacy. Therefore we have the richest
legacy with us, come down to us from ancient times
concerning the existence and nature of God. The search for
knowledge of God by the ancient man has been
successful.
Some
prayers, though they are extremely worldly are also
answered, because the praying mind in its attempt to pray
for a split second forgets its wordliness and is conscious
of the Divine. That split-second is enough - the prayer is
answered. The praying mind has been touched by the
all-wondrous Divine Grace and presence.
20th week Now,
among the forms of prayer there are some which confine
themselves exclusively to asking of God worldly gifts. There
is nothing wrong in such approach to the Divine. Every child
of God, everyone born on earth has a right to ask from God
everything that is essential for a happy, progressing
evolving life. So we might go to God even for worldly gifts.
But it would be wisdom on our part to go to God for grace,
for light, for knowledge, for more faith, for we know from
our experience in life that though we have all the gifts,
and all the essentials of life - all that we think is
necessary and needed for a decent and happy comfortable life
- yet we are unhappy. Mysterious
is the creation of the Divine. All the mysteries are
resolved when the human heart deeply loves the Divine. One's
own being stands fully illuminated by the divine knowledge.
That is the final fruit of devotion, of divine
love.
21st week The
wisdom in us, our love for God, must persuade us to seek
from the Infinite the materials of the kingdom of heaven,
not materials for a world we wish to build. Science and
technology have answered our needs for making a heaven
around us by improving agriculture, increasing our
life-span, fighting against diseases, and placing almost
superhuman powers in our hands. In an hour we can cross
thousands of miles, we are masters of nature, of land,
water, sea and air. But if we are as unhappy, as restless as
the man thousands of years ago, it is not an act of wisdom
to ask from God just those very conditions and materials
which have failed and are continuing to fail in their
promises of giving us peace, joy and happiness. Every
second must be used to its full capacities. Time is very
precious, every second must be fully utilized, all the
capacities of the mind and heart and will must function to
their full capacity.
22nd week There
is no prayer that God does not hear, he is an all-hearing
ear. He is an allseeing eye. We are not in a material world,
we are beings in His all-sensitive heart. Every movement of
our hand receives a response from the Divine, and every
prayer arising from the love of a heart, from the faith of a
soul, and from the knowledge of a purified mind is answered.
God is always hearing. We have not developed the capacity to
hear Him. God
is always seeing us, we have not yet opened our eyes to see
Him. God is always feeling for us and pouring His infinite
love into us. By our ignorance, egoism, vanity and conceit,
we have not yet learned to open the doors in order that His
love, light and grace might flood us.
23rd week The
whole life could be made a life of prayer. To render the
life a life of prayer is very essential. Everything in life
must remind us of God. The burning candle must at once tune
us to the Infinite Light everywhere. The beauty in nature at
once elevates our minds to an experience of the ineffable,
infinite beauty of the Godhead. The tenderness and the
affection in our mothers must at once make us intensively
conscious of the all-merciful, all-loving nature of God.
Whatever we see, it must at once remind us of God. Every
circumstance and impact of life must put us in tune with the
infinite Divine Consciousness. Offer
to the Divine the whole cosmos, everything wonderful,
everything beautiful, and also the powers of your
intelligence, your will, your heart, your life and all your
possessions. This is the way to prosper
immensely.
24th week God
is a river of all-purifying, all-transforming, all-healing
waters. There is no use of standing on the bank of this
river, reciting a few prayers, crying, "Lord, Lord!" Such a
prayer is of no consequence. If the prayer has to be
effective, the praying person must step into this river,
take a dip in these waters. Such a prayer alone is the most
fruitful prayer. That drenches us in the waters of
all-purifying, all-transforming, all-healing
God-consciousness.
Prayer
is the greatest need of the soul in us, it is a tremendous
power that alone can break all the human chains, bondages
and limitations. Man as he is, is a finite individual,
exposed to every kind of misery, trial and tragedy from
every side. Man is never safe on earth: the only way out for
him is somehow to touch the Infinite, somehow to associate
himself with this absolute divine Consciousness, to call
upon this Godhead within him, around him, everywhere;
somehow to attune himself with the Infinite. That 'somehow'
is prayer.
25th week Prayer
is something that is required of us, not by superstition,
not by a blind belief, not so much by the religion into
which we are born, or even by the very trials we face and
encounter in daily life, but by the very nature of our inner
being. We have to get back to the source of infinite power,
of God-consciousness; and therefore no man on earth will
ever escape the need for prayer. Millions who do not pray
today are numbered among those who are to pray tomorrow. If
it is not knowledge and goodness that drives them to prayer,
at least the hand of suffering will. Blessed are those few
individuals whose hearts are pure, and therefore without any
external pressure or trial in life, are responsive to the
divine Presence, and by such very responsiveness are in a
condition of prayer.
26th week Prayer
in this sense is a wonderful art of growing into Godhood. It
is a magnificent process of transforming ourselves into
divine nature. Since in the condition of prayer the whole
heart, mind and soul of man arise and sense, feel, know and
experience the Divine, we should say that prayer transforms
human emotions, exalts all that is divine in our being,
liberates us from human limitations and releases us into a
world of indescribable peace, joy and strength, into a world
of knowledge, light and creative consciousness.
Every
prayer must be a kind of spiritual experience for us. And
therefore we have to go to God with a heart full of love,
trust and confidence, with a self that is surrendered to
Him, and a nature that is submissive to Him. So that through
that very submissiveness it may absorb into itself the
strength, the light, the grace of God.
27th week Man
is like a drop, and God is the ocean. If in self-conceit or
egoism the drop isolates itself from the ocean, if it seeks
to remain apart and separate from the ocean, it perpetually
lives under the threat of being dried up. But the moment the
drop sinks into the ocean through the power of prayer, it at
once acquires the illimitable strength and proportions of
the ocean, all the vastness and grandeur of the ocean. The
moment man, through the power of prayer, sinks into the
ocean of God-Consciousness, he becomes a super-human
individual, he grows conscious of the infinite strength,
power and vastness of the inner Consciousness. It is then
that he is conscious of his intimate relations with the
Godhead, the Father in Heaven. It is from then on that his
attempt at being as perfect as the Father in heaven begins.
So prayer is something that intimately binds us to the
vastness, the power, the nature, the grandeur of
Godhead.
28th week Prayer
is a mode of talking with God, it is a way of walking with
God. Prayer is any condition of our inner consciousness in
which we are intensively aware of God's presence and power.
Prayer is a way of communing with God. It is the art of
elevating our mind and staying it upon the divine
Consciousness. It is a kind of fellowship with God. It is a
recovering in our experience of our intimate and dynamic
relations with the Infinite. There are many ways by which we
can pray, there are many forms of prayer. As a matter of
fact, each individual soul has its own peculiar and
individual way of approach to the Divine.
Consciousness
was in the beginning. From consciousness has emerged matter,
and all nature is founded upon matter. In nature there is
life-phenomena. In life-phenomena there is something called
the operation of mind.
29th week Now
we understand another secret that all of us are one. Where?
Not in our bodies, not even in our minds. One mind is more
educated, another mind is less educated. One mind is more
cultured, another mind is less cultured. One mind is
idiotic, and another mind is brilliant. So we are not one in
our minds, nor are we one in our hearts. One heart is full
of love and mercy, another heart is now loving, now hating.
So we are not identical with each other, either in our
hearts, or in our minds, or in our bodies. Where are we one
with each other? In that divine Consciousness. The divine
Consciousness in me and the divine Consciousness in Mrs. X
is one and the same. Whatever may be her relations with her
body to her children, she is part and parcel of my inner
divine heart, in her inner divine Consciousness.
30th week We
have been living in a profound ignorance concerning our
relations with the Divine. Therefore we have behaved as
human beings and have accomplished only human pain and
pleasures, human love and hate, human frustrations and
attainments. There
is a happiness which is independent of all these - a
happiness which is natural to us, a happiness which does not
depend on anything, a happiness which is entirely divine;
and this happiness is the characteristic nature and feature
of the divine Principle in us, which is imperishable and
immortal. Greatest men of mystical experiences, wisest men
who have obtained highest heights of spiritual development,
are in constant and continuous possession of this
independent, imperishable, permanent, happiness. This
knowledge or happiness emerges from a dynamic experience of
the divine Consciousness.
31st week There
are many types of pleasure and forms of happiness, but none
of these are lasting. None of these forms of happiness are
independent - the happiness of the philosopher is dependent
upon his philosophic activity, the happiness of the sensuous
person is dependent upon his senses and his sense-objects,
the happiness of the philanthropic, humanitarian, moral
individual is dependent upon his acts of service,
selflessness and his spirit of sacrifice. Mind
is simply magical in its manifestations. But this power that
is called mind is itself a negative shadow, a nothing
projected by the divine Consciousness which is all-luminous,
all light. When such a negative force as mind is capable of
such marvels, how many more indescribable marvels is not the
inner Consciousness within you capable of?
32nd week I
do give common mantras to people, but these also will lead
to the same goal, but it takes time. Where the mystical
mantras are imparted the pupil himself will have supernormal
consciousness after constant practice under the right
conditions. That supernormal consciousness will enable him
to establish continuous contact with the master, he need not
have to be in my physical presence in order to exchange
ideas. The contact he establishes is through consciousness.
In this case, supposing he dies at this stage, in the next
life he will continue just from where he left. Even when he
is at the age of seven, a master comes and initiates him
into the same mantra. That master could be the same master,
or it could be that Divinity of that mantra - for the
Divinity, the mantra and the master are one in the inner
divine Consciousness.
33rd week If
that person begins to talk of his divine experiences
Divinity will turn its back on him, and he shall no more
have any divine experience for several years to come. So, in
this way there are many things concerning the life of that
person which cannot be disclosed and which are not a matter
for publication or for the public; but the master who is
initiating or giving a mantra to that person is himself one
who has experienced the final results of the mystical
mantra.
A
master in this field is not bound by the physical body and
its limitations. The inner being compounded of divine
Consciousness and light can be withdrawn and can move about
anywhere, can manifest itself in hundreds of places around
the world.
34th week Take
the instance of Einstein: shifting his attention from
physical things and the physical world to the stellar
regions, when he observes the wonders and wondrous activity
of the universes beyond, he is drawn to the conclusion
within himself that it is all governed by some universal,
infinite Intelligence. In his own heart he is bound to
conclude that there is some infinite consciousness or
intelligence operating in the universal processes. At this
stage the universe is being explained, and accounted for, in
terms of infinite intelligence. Here the approach to the
experience, to the nature of the universe is not in terms of
matter, of motion, of blind universal infinite energy or
force, but in terms of an infinite all-conscient
Intelligence.
Any
limitation is an unfortunate condition. To exceed the
limitations is the primary function of the Truth, and its
attributes. Harmony , beauty and love are also attributes of
Truth. Through all these one exceeds the limitations of
life.
35th week Some
scientists restrict their study to accounting for experience
and the universal phenomena in terms of vibrations. In the
same way psychologists could also speak of vibrations. They
could say every thought is a vibration, they could say that
every feeling is a vibration: anger is a vibration, love is
a vibration, your experience of the world is a vibration,
your breath is a vibration. The spiritualists and the
occultists can account for the world in terms of vibrations.
They could say when you are in love with God you release
creative, beneficent, marvellous vibrations; when you hate
someone or are full of jealousy, your vibrations are
destructive and so on. So, it is true but this is one way of
explaining experience and the world.
The
disciplines essential for the realization of every power and
nature of Godhead are purely disciplines of mind and heart.
External physical disciplines might help the internal
disciplines, but by themselves they have no
virtue.
36th week If
you are given endless youthhood, and this world is converted
into a paradise for you, and if you do not taste the
pleasure of this eternal youthhood and the paradise; or if
you are placed right in the heart of hell where you see
ghostly, horrifying figures and you are presented with
sights of terrifying, heart-breaking sufferings, and if
nothing in you is touched by sorrow or unhappiness, if you
are in the same state of consciousness of infinite joy,
peace and perfection, - then you are in cosmic
Consciousness. No
poet can compose any wonderful piece of poetry without
entering into a high state of inspiration. Therefore the
poet struggles hard to elevate himself to an inspired
condition. Only in an inspired condition can he receive new
knowledge, perceptions, ideas and images. So, only in a
condition of inspiration does the spiritual aspirant
perceive the Divine and receive new divine revelations. It
is only in a higher state of consciousness that there is the
possibility of perception of the Divine.
37th week By
constant repetition of the mantras all the invisible worlds
are touched. The divine Reality, which is pervading
everything, is touched. You need not have to go to the
distant star and touch it; you have only to repeat the
mantra, and automatically you touch the star. You need not
struggle hard to see the invisible worlds, you have only to
repeat the mantra and automatically you are put in touch
with the invisible worlds. Thus the mantra is the wonder of
wonders, it is the Reality Itself, the Divinity Itself, it
is boundless, illimitable, the essence of everything,
subtler than space, present everywhere - within space and
'outside' space. It is the wonder of wonders. Though the
ignorant man thinks nothing is happening when the mantra is
being repeated, there are a million changes that are taking
place with every repetition.
38th week All
great things are perceived inwardly - beautiful ideas of the
poet, the beautiful palace of the architect, the face of the
divine in the saintly person or a new truth of the cosmos in
the scientist. All these are perceived inwardly, they are
not seen externally. Externally one sees only what is
physical, changing, perishing. It is through the inner
consciousness that all these persons see higher realities.
Though sometimes the physical eyes are employed by the inner
perceiving consciousness, yet the inner perceiving
consciousness is independent of the physical eyes; therefore
it can see even without physical eyes. So mantra opens this
inner perception.
To
sleep a little more is easy, natural, everybody does that, -
but to sacrifice a little of that sleep for studies or
meditation is difficult. To do the difficult things is to be
purified. Purity comes as the result of doing difficult,
impossible things.
39th week Spiritual
aspirants are the daring spirits on earth. Their whole inner
being is aflame with a knowledge which is fundamental. They
are satisfied with nothing in life, except endless
knowledge, endless illumination, endless peace and joy,
endless power and consciousness. Wealth, however great,
holds no temptation for them. Pleasures of life, however
great, do not tie them to the earth. Nothing in the world
can detain them or attract their attention. They are men of
vision, of faith, of tremendous intelligence. They are
governed by discrimination and a restless pursuit of higher
knowledge, a knowledge beyond the best books in our
libraries.
Concentration
is the secret of genius, the secret of unending happiness,
peace, stillness and creative consciousness. Where there is
concentration there is genius, there is highest saintliness,
there is experience of the one thing.
40th week Man's
strength does not lie in millions, in the possessions of the
kingdoms, nor in the possession of scientific genius, in
being world-famous, nor in any of the things of the earth.
The strength of man lies in Godhead. The strength, power,
glory and happiness of man consist in his intimate relations
with the Infinite. As a finite being, as a mortal, as a
human individual there is no access open to him to endless
peace, happiness, power or endless life. Unless he
transcends the limitations of the human personality, unless
he ceases to be one object among the millions of objects
that animate the universe, unless he regains the
God-consciousness which is already in him and becomes the
king of the Kingdom of God within himself, he cannot have
the peace that passeth understanding, he can have no
perfection that is really perfect, and he cannot have the
power that is unlimited and therefore all-complete. This
made Buddha renounce his kingdom and family, and go about
the world as a beggar, into the forest in search of
enlightenment. In this, what method of God-realization do we
discover? In this we find a grand detachment from earthly
things.
41st week Constantly
withdraw your mental consciousness from this world of time,
space and causation, by a continuous reflection upon the
nature of the timeless, spaceless, causeless Godhead within
you, around you, and everywhere. While all the time the
physical eyes report the diversity of the universe, the
manyness and the multiplicity in the world, put the eye of
the mind, of the consciousness forward, and see everywhere
the same substance, the same power, the same light,
animating, throbbing, ruling. You have to be yourself
infinite if you wish to know and experience the Infinite.
Godward-movement
is not the physical movement of the body towards some
destination. It is a movement of our inner being. It is a
growth in our love and knowledge, it is a development in our
faith and vision. Spiritual unfoldment means the unfoldment
of the highest divine consciousness in us. The science of
divine perfection is essentially a science of
consciousness.
42nd week With
the constant singing of the mantra the spiritual heart finds
the whole world filled with the light and beauty of the
Divine. Everywhere there seems to be the presence of the
all-beautiful, all-blessing, all-protecting divinity. As the
mantra is being repeated, the consciousness expands and
everywhere the light and the beauty of the Divine is
visible. A new world is entered, a world of the wonders of
the divine Consciousness. The Divine is present here and
there, everywhere. One becomes a cosmic personality, one is
filled with the joy that is derived from the largest and the
holiest and most divine thoughts and feelings. While
repeating the mantra the centre of the consciousness has to
be focussed on the Divine, something in the background must
occupy itself with the Divine, with every repetition of the
mantra, though all works are being conducted with the
marginal consciousness.
43rd week True
spiritual life is a flower of God. It is most wonderful. It
knows peace, it is treasured by God Himself, it is a wonder.
Thus the spiritual heart lives here on earth as an
ambassador of God sent into this difficult world in order
that he may quickly accomplish many good works. The secret
of this intense and absorbing work is that it lifts you
above your limitations. One idle moment is sufficient to
introduce doubts and difficulties, depressions and problems,
comparisons and worries - all kinds of difficulties. So long
as you are occupied and absorbed in doing something good,
you are liberated. You are free from all
limitations. Life
is a challenging circumstance calling each individual to
rise up to a constant and permanent experience of this
abiding beauty of the divine Presence. The meaning and
central hidden aim of the art of an artist and a sculptor
like Herr Cobé lies in going beyond this external art
into the heart of infinite divine beauty.
44th week So
pure is the heart of the spiritual aspirant that it speaks
the truth, and if somebody asks, "What is your name?"
inwardly his heart answers, "My name is infinite happiness,
divine joy, continuous unbroken spiritual happiness." When
asked "From whom have you descended?" He does not say the
usual answer like other people. In his heart he knows he is
descended from the Divine, and the highest sages and saints
are his forefathers. All the world is for him his home,
secretly he loves everyone as dear to him as the Divine. He
is secretly serving others, he is always engaged in works
for others, and he has always has the feeling that he is in
the highest heaven.
All
artistic works and all musical phenomena are only a
springboard in order that we may plunge ourselves into the
ocean of delight, beauty and perfection. It is a mere school
which leads us to something beyond itself, and that which we
are led to is the divine Reality. If you know the Divine you
will know everything else.
45th week As
you repeat the mantras, repeat with all the strength of your
heart, will, mind, spirit and faith. Every time you repeat
the mantra it must explode into the whole cosmos, it must
penetrate into all matter - into the astral world, the
psychic world, the spiritual world, into all worlds, into
the air, space, everywhere. Let it penetrate everything, and
produce for you the divine light, presence, grace, beauty,
peace, strength and happiness.
Cultivate
a wonderful nature and see that God's own light, grace and
intelligence will express itself through you. Mentally fall
at the feet of everyone whom you have disliked or you are
jealous of. Thus wash away some bad karma and try to cling
to the mantra, and do all your works with joy, cheerfulness
and enthusiasm. The more difficult the work is, the more you
are blessed. Anybody can do easy work. To do the difficult
work cheerfully, that is greatness. That is godliness, that
is the way to progress.
46th week Let
God rise from your eyes, from your hairs, from your body,
from all around you. See only God, feel only God, express
only God. Work for God, live for God, breathe for God, eat
for God, do everything for God. Be inseparable from God as
the shadow is inseparable from the person who is walking in
the sunshine. How
intensely does a man meditate on the Divine, a person on his
death-bed who knows that in half an hour he has to die? So
intensively meditate intensely on the Divine. Let the face
of the Divine with the brilliance of a hundred suns shine
before you. Intensely concentrate on the beauty of the face
of the Divine, the beauty which makes you happier than if
you look at the most beautiful person in the whole world, a
beauty beyond description. Let that beautiful face of the
Divine haunt you. Let the light of a hundred suns from the
face of the Divine shine in your body and render your world
brilliant. As you repeat the mantra, find the Divinity
rising from every point of space, from every wall, from
every person, out of everything. Intensely concentrate on
the Divine.
47th week One
little meditation in a pure place where the people do not
eat meat, where the people do not subsist on killing an
animal and eating its flesh; one minute of meditation where
the people are constantly thinking of God, where the people
serve God for God's own sake and not for money's sake; one
minute of meditation where the lights are burning all the 24
hours, where the names of God are being uttered all the 24
hours; one minute of meditation in a place from where
strength, light, peace, and joy are conveyed to the world
through words of divine wisdom; one minute of meditation
amidst ten or twenty people whose hearts and minds are
centered on the Divine, - is infinitely more valuable than
all the pleasures of the world. One minute of meditation in
such a place is infinitely more valuable than all the
treasures of the world. Therefore, in this meditation
concentrate all your attention on the Divine.
48th week There
is the Divine in man. The human individual's greatest
delusion is that while God is everywhere man does not seem
to find Him anywhere; that while the Divine is constantly
living in and by and around him, he does not know it. We are
generally so preoccupied with many things that we are not
conscious that we are breathing and that we subsist on the
breath. Even so all the time God is walking with you as you
walk, sitting with you as you sit, watching you all the
time, and you do not know it, even as you do not know that
you are breathing. You are so preoccupied with other things,
things other than the Divine, that you do not know that God
IS at all. This delusion has to be broken by constant
spiritual inner practices.
49th week Instead
of a monkey trying to find its expression through our
intelligence, will and actions, we must permit the knowledge
of the Divine to express itself through our intelligence. We
must permit the impulses of the universal and boundless
spiritual love to find their expression through our heart.
We must express a divine character, we must know that we are
infinitely more than what we are in the body. In our
consciousness of the Divine and our inner oneness with the
Divine we are timeless, spaceless, beauty, love, perfection,
and grace. These must be expressed.
Not
only are we descendants from the heavenly kingdom, but we
bear the whole of the kingdom in ourselves. We are shrines
of God-consciousness. We are points and centres of an
infinite, divine Being. There is in us an illimitable joy,
peace, perfection and light. 50th week Yes,
there is much that the human individual shares with the
monkey. But this is only a superficial thing, it can be
outgrown. Man has higher capacities, he has faith in the
Divine, he can love the beautiful, he can pursue higher
divine knowledge. He can transform himself, he can gain
divine grace and liberate himself from all human weaknesses.
He can become one with the heart of the Divine and, sharing
the perfection of the Divine, consciously experience
immortality and divine perfection. These higher capacities
distinguish man from the rest of the animal kingdom. These
must constantly express themselves in our lives. We have to
execute our daily works with a spiritual attitude, and with
surrender to the all-seeing, all-blessing, omnipresent,
all-loving Divinity. 51st week Within
this body and psychological complex there is the supreme
Principle. By its very Presence it inspires the highest
creative activity and greatest aspirations in the human
individual, because it is itself the greatest thing. It is
infinite beauty, absolute reason, harmony, peace and
happiness. It is a condition of indescribable and infinite
perfection. That is God, that is the supreme Principle. The
outer manifestation is a limited condition, and can find no
real rest until it reverts back to its infinite condition of
infinite perfection. And therefore we find everything that
is manifest, being bound in limitations, tend towards That
which is unmanifest, That which is all-perfect, That which
is full of knowledge, peace, joy, power, and perfection in
life. The
extent of creation, visible and invisible, baffles the human
intelligence, so grand is the creation; and more grand is
the creative divine Presence and Intelligence. Relate
yourself with that Intelligence, depend on the Divine,
increase your knowledge of the Divine. 52nd week So
long as we are completely dominated by the knowledge and the
experience of the body and the psychological entity, this
divine Reality, - the supreme Principle, to which we have a
greater access and an easier access than to the space, -
this has to be reflected upon. It has to be understood, it
has to be known. Yet, unless our intelligence is highly
developed we are not in a position to conduct an independent
inquiry into the nature of the divine Principle in
ourselves. Therefore we need the aid of the experience and
the knowledge gathered by the greatest minds in the world
who have dedicated their lives to the discovery and
knowledge of this supreme Principle. Here the great thoughts
of the greatest philosophers would constitute a valuable
aid. If you understand those thoughts, reflect upon them,
you find that your own intelligence becomes more luminous
and clear.
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