Satyopanisad

[Guest guest]

Swami! We visit temples religiously. We go on pilgrimage once in a while. We

continue to do our rituals and religious acts. But there is no cognisable change

in our life-pattern. Why is this so, Swami?

 

Worship, penance, meditation, bhajan, etc., are sacred activities that make your

life meaningful, purposeful and useful. But you can't brand them as spiritual.

All these are good actions and help you to spend time in a sacred way. Anything

that you do with your mind (ego, `I- ness') can't be spiritual. The true

spiritual path is atmavicara , self­-enquiry.

 

The seeker should know that he is not the deha, body, the manas, mind, or the

buddhi, intellect and that his atma, true self, is beyond time and space. The

self is not a ndma, name, or a rupa, form with which it is identified in this

transient world. Atma is eternal, pure and nondual. True spirituality is the

awareness of atma. This is Brahman, the divinity which is spread all over in all

creatures according to the scripture which says eko vasi sarvabhutantaratma.

True spirituality alone can make you experience this awareness. But you find

many forms of religious practice in the name of spirituality. The prasadam or

sacrificial food offered to God is actually eaten by the devotees. They just

show it to a picture or an image of God and the whole lot of it is eaten by them

only (cupulu and mepulu, in Telugu). If God really starts taking anything

offered to Him, I am sure, no one would offer Him anything.

 

Always remember that tyaga, sacrifice, is the highest and the best form of

sadhana. You have to sacrifice your time, money, resources and energy. You

should at least offer a tulasi leaf to God in worship. So, tyagenaike amr

tatvamanasuh. Sacrifice makes you attain immortality. Tyaga is yoga, spiritual

exercise.

 

Love expresses itself as sacrifice. Love without sacrifice is meaningless and

totally selfish. You have to sacrifice the body feeling or attachment to the

body. You have to sacrifice your wicked thoughts and bad feelings. Sacrifice is

your true nature. Sacrifice is a divine quality gifted to man. In fact, you are

not doing anything great and special by sacrifice. You are doing it for your own

self.

 

A yogi noticed a cow struggling for life in a river. He went and rescued it.

Someone asked him, " Why did you save the cow? " The yogi replied, " I saved the

cow for my, own happiness. I couldn't see the cow struggling and suffering. "

Many might have passed that way and noticed the cow in its miserable plight But

none did a thing to save it. Therefore, sacrifice is an opportunity given to

man.

 

There is another small story. A householder one day wanted to serve food to a

Brahmin as part of a ritual he was performing. He could get one poor old Brahmin

who agreed to dine at his house. The Brahmin came and hurriedly started eating

the food placed before him. The householder felt like this: " What a Brahmin is

he? He didn't even take his bath and do any puja before taking the food. It is

not pun ya , meritorious to feed such a man " . He grew so angry with the old

Brahmin that he beat him with a stick and drove him out holding him tight at the

neck. On that day when the householder was asleep, he had a dream in which God

appeared and said to him " Why did you invite the old Brahmin for food and beat

him? Why did you turn him out wringing his neck? After all, you could not feed

him even for one day while I have been giving him food all these eighty years!

What a shame! "

 

Tyaga is above any restrictions and stipulations. A mother is ready to sacrifice

her life for her child. Why? It is only love that makes her sacrifice. Trees

sacrifice fruits so that you may eat them. No tree takes its own fruits. Rivers

flow and sacrifice water to quench your thirst. The cow yields milk and

sacrifices it for all of you to drink and nurture your body. Your body too is

intended for sacrifice,

 

paropakarardhamidam s'ariram.

 

Worship, bhajan and such other external activities are less than seva and

sacrifice. The hands that serve are holier than the lips that pray. Love of God

is devotion, which has to be expressed as sacrifice. Love is sacrifice.

Sacrifice is prema yoga, the path of love to God. Sacrifice is yoga. Be that

this faith, devotion and steadfastness would get, strengthened and deep rooted.

Through the path of jnana, which is self-enquiry, proceed to atmavicara , follow

and experience God. It is said, jnanadeva to kaivalyam, the practical wisdom

obtained from tyaga is the only way to kaivalyam, liberation. This is a process

beyond the mind and the activity performed by the body. Then only will you

achieve the expected results and attain ananda.