Tuesday, October 29, 2019
Monday, October 28, 2019
Sri Maharaja's Pravachan in English- Oct.28
GOD RESIDES IN OUR HEART.
A subordinate merely obeys his superior and is absolved of all personal responsibility of doer-ship. This freedom everyone can enjoy by putting his faith in the sadguru. The profit and loss due to any action are left to God, and are the responsibility of the sadguru. Since he prompts us in everything, including the sadhana, whatever comes brings credit or discredit to him. Whatever the disciple does then becomes service to the sadguru. The important thing is that there must be the firm faith that God resides in our heart, that we, too, are part of Him, that we and He, indeed, are identical. As an intermediate stage, we may cultivate the idea that God is present everywhere, at all times, and is watching us and all our activities.may not destroy pride totally, but will at least prevent us from doing undesirable things.
A sacred place owes its sanctity to our own feeling regarding it; else, it has only ordinary water and a sculptured stone, the idol. 'Kashi,' 'Ganga' and such other words raise holy thoughts in our minds, but many local residents look upon them as just ordinary streams of water, and do not take a dip for years on end. They therefore seem to hold no special regard for it.
A holy place is thus holy only because we think it so. If after all, it is a matter of our sentiment, can we not create it, imagine it, even in the home? Of course, it demands a forceful conviction. If we do not have such convictions, and also lack the means to go to a place known as holy, we should at least repeat the pious wish to visit such a place, so that holy thoughts occupy the mind.
Similarly, though God is omnipresent, we have to realize Him by strength of sentiment. Prahlad and Draupadi did have that conviction in their heart, so God had to manifest Himself in concrete form for them. Similarly, if you have the conviction that your sadguru does exist and help you, he will have to run to your help.It is entirely up to you to have proof of this.
To be free of all doubt of the existence of God is true knowledge; this knowledge is easily obtained by one who lives in constant consciousness of Him.
Sunday, October 27, 2019
Sri Maharaj's Pravachan-Oct.27
Ascribe Doership to God and Anxiety will Vanish
Our doership is only partial, only slight, only nominal. Real doership rests fully with God. So the resultant pleasure or pain should not affect us; it may, if at all, affect God! We should therefore carry the conviction that it is God who does everything, we are only His instrument. We, however, assume doership; at the commencement of a job, we are beset with anxiety; during the execution of the job, we feel anxious because of diffidence about the outcome; and we feel disappointment at the final result. So throughout life, the man who is afflicted with anxiety never gets happiness and contentment. Anxiety is like white ants; its depredation is unnoticed, and becomes apparent only from the ruin wrought by it. Similarly, anxiety in an unnoticed way eats into faith, but only when faith is thoroughly undermined do we come to realize it.
If anxiety is to be thrown overboard, today is the auspicious day, and this moment the most auspicious! It's now or never. In the Mahabharata war, Lord Shrikrishna became Arjuna's charioteer and guided his position in battle, and Arjuna only discharged arrows towards the target. In short, Arjuna handed over the reins to God, and worked as little more than an arrow-flinging machine. Let us similarly become a machine in the hands of God, for He is the prime mover. Let us deliver ourselves to Him, trust in Him, and live chanting nama.
Let us give all doership to God, to whom it truly belongs; thereby we can get free from all anxiety, and live always in joy and happiness. In everything that happens, maintain the feeling and the awareness that it is God who is doing it, and therefore must be in our ultimate interest. What do we lose, and what is the difficulty, in maintaining this feeling? In practical life we should not spare effort, put in the maximum. But have an innermost conviction that its success or failure is in the hands of God, and is in our ultimate interest. With such conviction, where is the cause for anxiety of any kind? And once we get rid of anxiety, what remains is our natural heritage, the natural state, of bliss. This joy does not have to be obtained from anywhere, it is only overshadowed by anxiety. The sadhaka should unshackle himself from anxiety, and what remains is sheer freedom, sheer joy.
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