Sai Baba Gita – Part VII – Answers for all questions

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Om Sri Sai Ram

SAI BABA GITA – Part VII – Answers for all questions

The Way to Self-Realization and Liberation in this

Age

Part One

VIII. You can reach God through Love alone

The Lord declared in the Gita, "When you constantly

think of me

with love, I will bless you with the gift of spiritual

discrimination. This will lead you to permanent union

with me. I

promise this to you."

Embodiments of Love,

The Buddhi is the discriminating faculty through

which you can

separate that which is real from that which is unreal,

that which is

permanent from that which is changing. This power of

spiritual

discernment becomes available only to people who have

developed

sacred devotion and are filled with love for God.

Devotion is the

royal road to attaining the highest wisdom. In truth,

it is the only

path leading to self-knowledge. Devotion evokes the

grace of God. The

Lord proclaimed in the twelfth chapter of the Gita,

"The one who is

devoted to me is very dear to me."

Devotion

What is devotion? It is the steady flow of love

towards God. When

your love flows towards individuals or towards

transient, worldly

things it cannot be called devotion; it is really only

a form of

attachment. But when your love flows unceasingly

towards God, the one

unchanging principle behind this world of change, then

your love

becomes devotion.

Initially, you develop your devotion by turning

towards God and

approaching him. Then, you strengthen your love for

God by

cultivating the attitude that you are his devotee or

his servant and

you surrender yourself to his will. As your love for

God deepens, you

progress to the stage where you feel an intimate

closeness to God and

experience his presence continuously. Finally, you

reach the

consummation of your spiritual journey when you fully

realize the

truth, "I am God. God and I are one."

In practice, devotion takes two forms. First, there

is the type of

devotion which involves various devotional practices

and rituals

engaged in by devotees, such as the traditional

practice of

worshipping the Lord with ritual offerings, making

pilgrimages to

spiritual centers and attending spiritual functions,

singing

devotional songs and studying devotional literature,

and so on. These

are the ordinary types of devotion. In the Gita the

Lord taught that

these various practices can be considered to be of a

lower type. But,

when your worship expands into a total absorption in

God, when your

love for God enters into every activity of your daily

life and you

develop a flawless, sacred character, then you are

expressing the

higher devotion which very much pleases the Lord.

There is a clear distinction, therefore, between

this devotion

which is particularly dear to the Lord and the more

ordinary type of

devotion. The latter uses the things of the phenomenal

world to

worship the Lord, such as flowers, for example. Where

have these

articles come from? Have you been able to manufacture

them? Have you

created these flowers? No. They have all been created

by the Lord.

Where, then, is the sacrifice in offering to the Lord

things which he

himself has created? Such offerings will not get you

very far on your

spiritual path. But to offer to the Lord the sacred

flowers of your

heart, which are not related to the world, and to

offer these in

loving worship to the one who is seated in your heart,

that is the

highest form of devotion. That is the devotion you

should aspire for.

Meditation and Devotion are One and the Same

Another way of thinking of this highest form of

devotion is as the

uninterrupted meditation on God alone. In the popular

understanding

of the word, meditation refers to concentrating on an

object, and

through that object reaching a higher state of

consciousness. But

this is not the correct approach to meditation. True

meditation is

meditation on God, and only on God. Therefore,

meditation and

devotion are really the same; both are the process of

concentrating

on God to the exclusion of everything else, thinking

only of him.

Without such meditation or devotion it is impossible

to realize the

constant presence of God everywhere, in everything,

and thereby, gain

true spiritual knowledge.

You long to enjoy the fruit, but you will not be

able to get it

without first having the flower. First comes the

blossom, then comes

the fruit. Devotion is like the flower. Without first

developing the

flower of unshakable love for God and allowing it to

blossom forth,

it will be impossible for you to acquire the fruit of

spiritual

wisdom. This flower of love may express itself in

different ways as

the following example shows.

The Householder and the Monk

There were two devotees who both had an

all-consuming love for God.

One was a householder leading a family life and the

other was a

renunciate monk. The family man felt himself to be the

servant of the

Lord and always practiced the principle of total

surrender to God.

The great virtue of the servant stage is that through

the practice of

humility and surrender, the ego quickly disappears. As

long as you

have egoism, you will not be able to gain the sacred

knowledge of the

supreme self.

Egoism can be found everywhere. Even Arjuna, whom

Krishna

befriended for so long, and to whom Krishna gave so

much

encouragement, was riddled with egoistic feelings

throughout his

life. It was only after Arjuna threw down his bow and

surrendered

himself completely to the Lord, saying, "Command me, O

Lord, I will

do whatever you say," that Krishna taught him the

highest wisdom of

the Gita.

So, the householder started from the very humble

beginning which is

associated with "I am your servant, O Lord, I am your

instrument",

and he expressed his unshakable love for God that way.

On the other

hand, the monk, expressed his love for God by seeking

God everywhere

he went, in everyone and in everything he encountered.

He would

constantly repeat, "Everywhere I look I find only God.

Everything I

see is created by God and imbued with God. Everyone I

meet is but

God. I too am truly God."

Because of the different circumstances of their

lives, these two

individuals adopted different paths to overcome the

power of

illusion. The householder, by following the path of a

servant became

smaller and smaller, until he became so small that he

slipped through

the clutches of that fierce tiger maya, the terrible

power of

illusion, which had held him in its claws. By losing

his ego he

became free. For the monk, the shackles of illusion

which had been

binding him were broken to pieces when he transcended

his ego

limitations by absorbing himself in the conviction

"Everywhere there

is only God. All is God. I too am God. I am God."

Through their deep

love of God, each in his own way was able to transcend

the power of

illusion.

I Am God

If you develop within yourself the sacred and lofty

idea, "I am

God", you will not be bothered by anything; nothing

can come in your

way. Of course, it is of no use to merely utter these

words. You must

first overcome your body consciousness and maintain a

firm control

over your senses. At the same time, you must develop

an intense love

for God and live it by continuously identifying

yourself with the

divine. This will lead you to the supreme wisdom. Or,

you can express

your love for God by following the path of the

servant. This will

quickly remove the egoism from your heart and fill you

with bliss.

There are three successive stages on the way to

God-realization. In

the very beginning you will declare, "I am a devotee

of God." Here

there are two entities, one is God and the other is

you, the devotee.

God is believed to be away somewhere, and your

approach will be to

try to find God, to get closer to him, and become very

near to him.

Gradually you progress along this path and, in time,

you will come

face to face with God. Then you say to him, "Dear

Lord, I belong to

you." In this second stage, you stand erect before God

and declare

yourself as his own, very close to him. Then in the

third stage you

know yourself to be one with God and you state, "You

and I are one."

The first stage, which is characterized by the

declaration, "I am

the servant of God," and where God is cognized as a

faraway form, is

dualism. The second stage, where you say directly to

God, "O Lord, I

am your devotee", and feel him inside your heart, is

the stage of

qualified non-dualism. The third stage, in which the

ultimate truth

dawns within you and you say to God, "I am you and you

are me", is

non-dualism. At that point there is no distinction

between you and

God.

From the Form to the Formless

You commence your journey from the stage of dualism

and finally end

up in the stage of non-dualism. You start your

spiritual practice

with the very ordinary type of devotion, worshipping

God with form

and attributes and using rituals and external forms of

worship. But

then you quickly progress onto the formless, the

absolute aspect of

the Divinity. In this way, you initially develop

yourself spiritually

by being a servant of God, but eventually you become

fully identified

with God.

Consider, for a moment, a very big circle, and

consider that just

by its side and separate from it there is another

circle, one which

is very much smaller. The big circle may be thought of

as God, the

small one as the individual soul. Here the individual

is different

and distinct from God; this is dualism. When you bring

the smaller

circle in so that it lies within the bigger circle,

you have

qualified non-dualism; now the individual is part of

the Divinity, he

exists in God. What then is the meaning of the

individual becoming

totally merged in God? The small circle has to broaden

itself and

grow bigger and bigger until it has fully expanded to

the size of the

big circle. At that point the two circles are

indistinguishable and

man has merged himself into God. This is complete

non-dualism.

Surrender to the Divinity within You

On the path of devotion it is absolute surrender

which makes the

individual soul expand and become merged with God. It

is when you

relinquish your limited individuality by surrendering

yourself to the

divinity inherent within you that all your weaknesses

will leave you

and you will develop the broadness of mind that

finally culminates in

your mergence with God. How can you gain this

understanding of your

divine nature? How can you recognize the divinity

within you so that

you can follow its directions? It is only through

steady practice

that you will acquire this realization.

To acquire even the smallest skills in the world,

you have to

constantly practice, be it reading, writing, walking

or talking. All

of these are developed through practice alone. If you

start your

practice at the first step then eventually you will be

able to reach

the last step. In this case, the last step means

acquiring the

supreme knowledge that makes you free.

There are two types of knowledge. One refers to

spiritual

knowledge, the other to knowledge of the physical

world. Inquiring

into the various properties of an object is the

ordinary knowledge

associated with the world. But understanding the inner

principle, the

underlying basis and purpose of every object that has

ever existed in

the world, is spiritual knowledge; that is what can be

called wisdom.

This is a very important quality to cultivate. Even

for understanding

the world in its deeper aspects, you first have to

acquire spiritual

wisdom.

To gain spiritual wisdom you must use your body

wisely and have

your mind and your senses under control. Without the

body it is not

possible to perform any activity. For all types of

work and

activities, the body is needed; it is the basis for

all practices.

Use your body for the purpose of reaching your goal

and in performing

activities which will be useful to others. Here is a

small example.

Transforming Desires into Wisdom

Consider for a moment that you have gone on a picnic

to a forest,

and that you have taken along all the articles

necessary for cooking

and preparing your food. Just before you start your

meal

preparations, you gather up three stones and arrange

them as a base

for the cooking vessels. Next you put some water in

the vessel and

then you add the rice. Underneath the vessel, in

between the stones,

you make a fire.

What is the purpose of the fire beneath the vessel?

It is through

the heat of the fire that you can cook the rice which

is in the

vessel. Without the vessel, if the rice were to be put

straight into

the fire, you would not be able to get the food that

you want. The

heat of the fire gets transmitted to the vessel, and

on from the

vessel to the water, and finally from the water to the

rice. In this

way the rice gets cooked and you enjoy your meal.

In this forest of life, you are searching for bliss,

which can be

compared to the food that you prepare. The three

stones are the three

basic qualities of inertia, activity and purity,

underlying all

natural phenomena and human activities. Your body may

be considered

the vessel. Your feelings and desires are the water,

and your

spiritual yearnings and aspirations are the rice. The

fire which you

have put between these three stones is the purifying

practice which

is used to acquire wisdom. This purifying fire which

must continue

for some time, has to be applied to the body, and

through the body to

the feelings and desires; these in turn will be cooked

and transmuted

into the highest spiritual yearnings. Finally, this

process results

in the cooked product, the spiritual food, the

knowledge of the true

self, which you have been aspiring for. This knowledge

grants eternal

bliss.

It would not be possible for you to realize such

spiritual wisdom

directly in your heart, straight off, without first

going through the

cooking process. Through the body and your good

actions you have to

burn up your desires, transform them into spiritual

yearnings; this

will then lead to the realization of the highest

knowledge.

Renouncing the Fruits of your Labor

The correct application of the practice of

meditation is the

gradual, slow and steady control of all desires

through the constant

practice of love for God. By controlling the sense

organs and

controlling your desires it will become possible to

carry on all your

activities in a totally natural and spontaneous way,

without

expecting to reap any fruits from your labors.

Actually, it is

impossible to have work without fruits. Whenever you

engage in an

activity there will necessarily follow some

consequence or result;

this is the fruit of that action. So, it is not that

there are no

fruits, but the Gita teaches that you should give up

interest in the

fruits. The fruits will always be there, but do not

work for the

purpose of obtaining these fruits. Work only because

it is your duty

to work, because it is God's will.

While discharging your duty there will incidentally

be some desires

and there will also be some results, in other words,

some fruits.

There is no harm in that. Just continue doing your

duty. Gita has not

taught that actions will be without fruits. People who

have not

correctly understood the meaning of sacrificing the

fruits of action

are giving up the action itself. But actions must be

engaged in. What

the Gita stresses is renunciation in action and not

renunciation of

action. Until the food is cooked there is need for the

fire. Until

you understand the inner secret of work, and that of

sacrificing the

fruits of work, you will have to continue to engage in

activities and

discharge your duties.

Love is the Root of all Spiritual Practices

A noble character and good behavior announces the

inner truth of a

person; this truth is based on love. Whether you are

engaged in

sacrificing the fruits of your actions, or

contemplating on the

omnipresent Lord, or practicing inner inquiry and

aspiring to gain

wisdom, the root of all these spiritual exercises is

love. There are

five major human values that distinguish a noble human

being. These

are truth, righteousness, peace, love and nonviolence.

But they do

not exist separately. They are all essentially

dependent on one of

these five, which is the primary value. That is love.

When love enters the thoughts it becomes truth. When

love manifest

itself in the form of action it becomes righteousness.

When your

feelings become saturated with love you become peace

itself. The very

meaning of the word peace is love. When you fill your

understanding

with love it is nonviolence. For all these noble human

qualities it

is love which flows as the undercurrent.

Another way of saying this is when you saturate

every thought of

yours with love then you are immersed in truth. When

you practice

love in your daily life it is dharma or righteous

living. When you

feel love all the time you are established in abiding

peace. And when

you have a deep understanding of the divine principle

of love you

become steeped in nonviolence. In the Gita, in the

chapter on

devotion, it says, "Fill yourself with love and use

this love to

reach me. In that way, you will develop both nearness

and dearness to

me."

Dear devotee. Your hands are very small but with

these little hands

you are trying to serve me. Your eyes are very small

but with these

two little eyes you are trying to see my infinite

vastness. Your ears

are very small but with these two little ears you are

trying to

follow my sacred words. With your two little feet you

are attempting

to come towards me.

But merely serving me with your two little hands

will not achieve

very much. Merely looking at my infinite form with

your two little

eyes will also not be of much use. Merely listening to

my divine

words through your two little ears will not get you

very far. And

merely coming into my presence with your two little

feet will not

serve you so strongly. But there is one thing you can

do which will

have a great impact, which will produce a truly

significant effect.

That is: Install me permanently in your heart! Once

you bring me into

your heart then all these other activities will no

longer appear very

important.

Whatever worship you have been engaged in, using

your eyes and your

ears and your hands and your feet, has only served to

control your

mind. But when you invite the Lord to enter your

heart, then control

of the mind and the senses becomes very easy. The mind

and senses

will become still on their own. There will be no need

for any special

effort to be made for sacrificing the fruits of your

actions. Krishna

said, "Once you start thinking only of me, and keeping

your thoughts

constantly fixed on me, then I will automatically take

care of all

the rest." To achieve this state of total one-pointed

focus on the

Lord, you must develop a firm resolve and an

unshakable faith that

the Lord is ever-present in your own heart. Your heart

is his

residence.

Fill your Heart with Love and Faith

God is always full and complete; to reach such

infinite fullness

you must have full faith. When God is full and

complete and you are

not full and complete, there cannot develop the

necessary binding

force that will hold you and God together. To reach

the full and

complete love that is God, you must also have a full

heart, full of

love and faith. If, instead, you are filled with

doubts, you will

undermine this pure principle of love which is your

true nature; your

doubts will blemish your heart and distance you from

the omniscient,

omnipotent and omnipresent Lord, who is aware of your

every thought.

Whatever thoughts you have, fill them with him.

Think of him with a

full heart saturated with love and faith; then you

will certainly

reach him. In the Gita, He said that you will become

dear to him when

you worship him fully with all your heart. That means

seeing him

everywhere, in everything. The Gita proclaimed, in all

of the

creation do not hate anyone or anything, for he is in

every name and

form. When you have the feeling of love permeating

your whole being,

you become very dear to him.

All the noble human qualities are already there in

their fullness

in every human being, but very few people are making

any effort to

become aware of them. They are wasting their time in

pursuing only

outer activities in the world. But you must also

engage in inner

activities which will help you to reach your goal. For

example, you

perform your worship using external rituals, but you

must perform

your worship internally, as well, offering God the

flowers of your

heart. Then there will be unity and harmony in your

life. Once you

achieve such unity in all your activities, both inner

and outer, your

life becomes sanctified and you will experience

fulfillment in

whatever you do.

Love is the most important of all Human Qualities

In the path of devotion, it has been taught that

love is the basis

of everything. It is the single most important quality

that has to be

developed. All your thoughts must become immersed in

this quality of

love... then truth will naturally establish itself in

your heart. All

your acts must be saturated with love... then

righteousness will

naturally manifest itself in all your undertakings.

All your feelings

must be soaked in love... then you will be able to

enjoy immense

peace. And all your understanding must be filled with

love... then

you cannot hate or hurt anything. Therefore, love is

the very basis

of peace of mind. Love is the very birthplace of

truth. Love is the

very foundation of righteousness and nonviolence. That

is why Baba

has so often said, "Love is God. God is love."

The essence of the teaching of the path of devotion

is to develop

and practice this selfless love. Then you will become

broadminded

and, in that way, fully develop all the greatness that

is inherent

within you.

 

TO BE CONTINUED

 

Source:

http://laluni.helloyou.ws/askbaba/saibabagita/