- The mind, in the initial stage, is like a young tree on the footpath; it may be eaten by goats or cows. A fence is needed to protect it. When, however, the trunk grows big and strong, no fence is needed. Then even an elephant tied to the trunk will not harm it.
- Take to spiritual practice and go forward. As you practice and advance further, you will come to know in the end that God is the only Reality and all else is unreal – and that the aim of life, truly, is to realize God.
- What will you learn of God by reading books? Until you have reached the marketplace, you only hear noises in the distance. It is quite different when you reach the market. Then you see clearly, you hear clearly: ‘Take these potatoes. Pay for them.’
- The almanac says that it will rain twenty adas, but squeeze the almanac and not a drop will come out. Not a single drop!
- You’ve been born in this world to worship God. Try to gain love and devotion for His lotus feet! Why bother with other things? What will you gain by philosophizing? Look, you can get drunk with only a little wine. Why do you have to know how many measures of wine there are in the wine shop.
- You can’t get high even if you rub hemp-paste on your body. You have to eat some. Which is number 41 grade yarn and which is number 40? You can’t tell unless you work in the yarn trade. So I say, practice some spiritual disciplines. Then you will know it all – the gross, the subtle, the causal and the Great Cause.
- Tantra talks of sadhana in the company of women. It is not a good path. It is very difficult and often brings about the downfall of the aspirant. Spiritual disciplines can be practiced with the attitude of a hero, a maidservant, or even the attitude of a mother to a child. I have the attitude of a child to his mother. The attitude of a maidservant is also good. The path of sadhana with the attitude of a hero is very difficult. The attitude of a child is very pure.
- Sadhana (practice of spiritual disciplines) is essential. Why will you not succeed if you practice sadhana? If you have genuine faith, you don’t have to work too hard.
- The sadhaka (aspirant) must be very cautious. He should remain far away from women. He should not associate frequently even with a woman of great devotion. When you are climbing up onto the roof, you must not sway. If you are unsteady, there is a danger of falling. The weak should hold onto a support when they climb.
- Some sadhana (spiritual practice) is essential. When you perform sadhana, you gradually feel joy in it. If there is a pot of treasure buried very deep in the ground and one wants to possess it, one has to work hard to dig it out. One perspires, but if the spade touches the pot while digging, one hears its metallic sound and feels joy. The louder it sounds, the more joy.
- “Sir, can one know the Lord’s attributes through knowledge?” Thakur says, “Not through ordinary knowledge. You cannot know Him by that. You need to practice spiritual disciplines. And you must adhere to one attitude, for instance that of a servant. The rishis have the shanta bhava (of peace and serenity). Do you know the attitude of the jnani? To meditate on one’s own real Self.
- Go deeper! You will get sandalwood. Go deeper still and you will come upon a silver mine! Yes, deeper still and you shall come upon a gold mine! Move on still further and you shall be placed in the midst of diamonds, rubies and sapphires! Yes, go forward!
- In the beginning you must be up and doing, but you don’t have to work so hard later on. As long as there are storms, tempests and rough water, the boat has to be steered along zigzag routes; so long does the boatman stand and hold the rudder – but he no longer does so when he is past them. When the boat rounds a bend and a favourable wind blows, he can sit down and relax and just touch the rudder. Then he prepares to hoist the sail and sits down for a smoke. There is peace when the storm and tempest of ‘lust and greed’ pass.
- The fact is that you need to practice spiritual disciplines to understand. If you want to take jewels from a locked room, you have to make some effort to find the key to open the lock. Then you can remove the jewels from it. If you just stand before a locked room thinking, ‘I have now opened the door, now broken the strong-box and now taken the jewels out’ – such reflection is of no avail. One must practice spiritual disciplines.
- Spiritual practice is needed. It is essential that an aspirant live in solitude in the initial stages of practice. When an Ashwattha tree is only a plant, it must be fenced, otherwise a goat or a cow may eat it. But when it grows a thick trunk, the fence can be removed. Then even if an elephant is tied to it, no harm can be done to the tree.
- In the early stage of spiritual life, one must go away and live in solitude from time to time. Spiritual discipline is needed. One wants to eat rice. Is it possible to get cooked rice by just saying there is fire in the wood and rice is cooked over this fire? Fire is produced when one rubs one piece of wood against another.
- There are the Vedas and other scriptures. But unless one practices spiritual disciplines and austerities, it is not possible to realize God. One cannot see God in the six systems of philosophy, or in the Vedas, or the Tantras. Higher than reading is hearing and higher than hearing is seeing. One internalizes more when one hears from the lips of the guru, or from a holy man. Then one doesn’t have to think about the nonessential part of the scriptures.
- The almanac forecasts twenty measures of rainfall. But squeeze the almanac and not a single drop of water falls out. Not even one drop falls.
- There are three classes – sattvic, rajasic and tamasic. In the sattvic practices, one calls upon Him with intense yearning, or simply repeats His sacred name without expecting any result. In rajasic disciplines one practices various kinds of exercises – purascharana, visits to places of pilgrimage, a certain duration of panchatapa, worship with sixteen articles, and so forth. The aspirant who practices tamasic sadhana takes recourse to the qualities of tamas. Such an aspirant calls out, ‘Victory to Kali! Why will You not grant me Your vision? I’ll cut my throat with a knife if You do not reveal Yourself to me!’ The last kind of discipline is not morally pure – it is like the practices prescribed in the Tantra.
- As long as we practice spiritual disciplines, we should call Him compassionate. But when one has realized God, one rightly feels that He is one’s own Father or Mother. As long as one has not realized God, one feels distant from Him – like somebody else’s child.
Path
- One can reach God through various paths. But as long as one retains the ego, it is easier and more straightforward to follow the path of love and devotion.
- I had to practice disciplines of all the religions: Hinduism, Islam and Christianity. I also followed the paths of the Shaktas, Vaishnavas, Vedantists and other sects. I saw that it was the same Lord toward whom everybody was moving. Only their paths were different.
- Both Vaishnavas and Shaktas have the same goal. It is only their paths that are different. True Vaishnavas do not run down Shakti.
- There are so many views. Every belief is a path to reach God. But everybody thinks that only his belief is right, that only his watch is giving the right time. Even so, howsoever the watches may give incorrect time, the sun always moves correctly. One should match the time of the watch with the sun.
Spiritually Perfect
- There are two classes of perfect souls: one is sadhanasiddha (perfected by spiritual disciplines) and the other kripasiddha (perfected by the grace of God). Some people go to great trouble to bring water to their fields for a good harvest. Others don’t have to struggle at all; rainwater fills their fields. One has to practice sadhana rigorously to save oneself from maya. He who is a kripasiddha doesn’t have to struggle. But there are only one or two such people.
- The Vaishnavas say there are stages on the path to the realization of the Lord. There are beginners, aspirants, perfected ones and the most perfect of the perfected.
- There is yet another class, that of the most perfect of the perfect. It is another state to have an intimate acquaintance with the gentleman – to become intimately acquainted with the Lord through love and devotion.
- The perfect has no doubt attained the Lord, but the most perfect of the perfect has become intimately acquainted with Him.
Ever-perfect Souls
- And then there are the nityasiddhas (ever-perfect ones). They are already spiritually awakened in every life. Take the example of a plugged fountain. The plumber, while doing something else, accidentally removes the obstruction and lo! water gushes forth from the fountain. When they see the love for God in an everperfect person express itself for the first time, people are amazed. They wonder where such bhakti, such nonattachment and such intense love came from.
- The nityasiddhas (ever-perfect ones) have no fear of the world. Worldly life is like a game of chess for them; as in the game, they do not fear what the next move will bring.
- The nityasiddha may live a worldly life if he so desires. Some people can wield two swords at the same time. They become such an expert that if a sword strikes against a stone, the latter flies away at its blow.
- The nityasiddha is of an altogether different class. He is, for instance, like tinder stick. Rub it a little and it produces fire. Even without rubbing, it gives fire. The nityasiddha realizes God with very little spiritual disciplines, sometimes without performing any spiritual practices at all.
- However, the nityasiddha, does practice spiritual disciplines after attaining God. He is like the pumpkin or the gourd plants which first bear fruit, and then flowers.
- The nityasiddha is like the homa bird. Its mother soars high up in the sky. When the chick is born, it falls toward the earth. It grows wings and opens its eyes during the fall – but before striking the ground and hurting itself, it rushes up toward its mother, screaming, ‘Where are you mother, where?’