Swami teaches... Part 3. Do Your Duty as Dedication to the Divine

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Light and Love Swami teaches...

Part 3. Do Your Duty as Dedication to the Divine

 

There are four yugas (aeons), Kritha Yuga, Thretha Yuga, Dwapara Yuga and Kali Yuga. The aeons are only measurement of time. This world is termed as Jagam. The last means that the world is a place where beings are born and die. In this changing world, Brahman (God, Cosmic Consciousness, Atma) is the changeless entity.

Without Time, there is no world. Without the world there is no creation, without creation there is nothing. Every created thing is born of Time. God is the inner motivator of all, the Director of this Play called Life.

One should understand the value of time, each moment of which vanishes faster than lighting.

An enormous quantity of precious time is being frittered away now, by human in wasteful, even damaging, task. People find time to queue up for hours before cinema booking booths or waiting for a bus to take them there. They have time to play cards and sit at the club table, chatting on trivialities for hours together. This is because people live only on the surface or bottom of things, they are either froth or dregs. They shirkresponsibilities. They do not introspect, or think calmly of the end for which they are struggling frantically and flippantly.

 

Spiritual pursuit is the right way of making use of time and pictorially dedicating this time back to the Divine, to the Source. Through good thoughts and good kindly actions, the heart gets pure and holy. It calls for numbing good feelings and doing good deeds without selfish motive, extending love and compassion towards all beings. This is real sadhana. ('Sa' means Atma and 'dhana' means wealth. By utilising your time in spiritual pursuits, you can enjoy spiritual wealth).

 

However, this is the Age of Kali, which is often described as Kalaha Yuga, the age of discord, in which there will be misunderstanding and quarrels between husband and wife, father and son, preceptor and disciple. Today many people indulging in creel deeds, devoid of even a trace of compassion, and behaving worse than birds and beasts. They are attached to their bodies and spend their energy and time to provide comforts for the body.

How long will the body last? It is a bundle of diseases, a repository of filth and foul excreta. It cannot help one to cross the ocean of Samsara (worldly life). It is subject to changes such as childhood, adolescence, youth, adulthood, old age and finally death. One does not know when, where and how death will occur.

 

Certainly the body has to be maintained in good condition, for it is only when embodied in this human tabernacle that human can realise God. The body is either strong or weal an efficient instrument or an inefficient one, according to the food, recreations and habits of one's parents.

The body too should be regarded as the abode of the spirit and cared for as such. (To ensure perfect health, it is essential to get rid of internal impurities and take in only wholesome food).

In the journey of life, the body is like a cart and the heart is like a horse. Unless you feed the heart well, the journey cannot proceed properly. The heart has to be fed with good fodder in the form of good company, good conduct, and good thoughts. And whatever is done should be an offering to God.

 

Both inner and outer purity are essential for human's physical and mental health. Most people are concerned about external physical cleanliness. (People tend to ignore inner cleanliness in the belief that the heart and mind are not visible to others).

 

Examine this question, for example: Is human enslaved by external objects and the attraction they exercise over him/her, or, is it some inner impulse that urges person forward to shackle him/herself to sorrow?

 

The circumstances of one's birth are a result of past actions. Karma (action), janma (birth), dharma (righteousness) and the marma (secret of life) are all connected with Brahman. They are like the four walls of a building. The first wall is karma (action). One should not act as fancies dictate. Before doing anything, one should consider whether it is proper or improper. Nothing should be done in haste on the impulse of the moment. Only then will one's actions be sathwic and free from rajasic and tamasic stains.

 

Good actions earn good returns. Bad actions result in bad consequences. That is why the Lord is described as Karmaphala pradhaata (the dispenser of the fruits of action).

For example, when Duryodhana (the eldest of the evil-minded sons of Dhritharashtra, father of Kauravas) sought to disrobe Draupadi, the consort of Pandavas, she prayed to Krishna in various ways. Although Krishna heard her prayers, he could not respond immediately to her calls for help. (The reason is the stem law of Nature. This universal law operates always at all places and at all times. For instance, if a stone is thrown up, it comes down. These are the results of the law of gravitation).

 

Hearing Draupadi's prayers, Krishna thought for a moment whether she had done any action in the past which entitled her to secure protection in Duryodhana's assembly hall. To merit Divine help one must have offered something or the other to God - a leaf, a flower, or a little sacred water. At the mundane level there is a simple role of give-and-take in daily life. Krishna remembered something that Draupadi had done years ago. Krishna suffered a cut in His little finger while handling sugarcane. Immediately Rukmini sent a maid to fetch bandage cloth. Sathyabhama rushed to bring some cloth to bind the wounded finger. Draupadi who was standing by, without hesitation, tore a piece of cloth of her sari and immediately bandaged Krishna's finger. Although what she gave was only a small bit of her sari, it was a spontaneous act of love and devotion. Krishna decided to make that little piece of cloth an endless sari. He uttered the word "Akshayam" (may it be unending) and Draupadi's sari became endless.

 

Very often people who experience troubles in life complain: "Why is the Lord subjecting me to trials like these?" The truth is, the Lord neither punishes nor rewards anyone. The devotee has only to do the duty and leave the results to God. If the actions are good, the fruits will also be good. If the actions are bad, the results will be equally bad.

Without examining the nature of one's actions, there is no meaning in blaming God for what one experiences. What we witness today is the tendency to forget one's faults and go about blaming God for one's sufferings. Every action, however small or trivial, has its reaction. Nothing happens without a cause. Every object has its reflection.

One devotee has said to have exclaimed, “Oh Lord! Among the millions of people howwill your eyes fall on me? You are not looking at me at all. Won't you see me?" The devotee heard a voice saying: “You are immersed in so many activities that you have hardly set your eyes upon Me. You have hardly devoted any thought to Me. Who, then, has forgotten whom? Is it you or me?"

 

People feel happy when someone gives them something. But they don't feel equally happy in giving to others. People desire the fruits of good actions, but will not do good actions. They wish to be saved from the consequences of evil deeds, but will not refrain from bad actions. As you sow, so shall you reap, is a relentless law. You cannot escape from the consequences of your actions, whether good or bad.

People usually are involved in mundane concerns and are deeply immersed in worldly activities and are forgot the about dedication their duties to the Divine. They worry about some relation or friend in some distant corner of the world, but cannot think of God who is so near to them.

Ask any one the following question. How do you provide for yourself in your old age? The answer will be, "My my children are well placed; I get the interest on my deposits; I have a pension; I have lands from which I can draw what I need," etc. But, no one answers, "I rely on God!" Without faith in God, without the Divine help, how can any of these give succour during the stormy voyage through life's declining years? Faith in God is the secure foundation on which hope has to be built.

An another example from daily life.

 

When two people meet, it is considered good manners that each should inquire about the health of the other. This is true of the peoples of both East and West. You ask each other, "How do you do?" (regardless of the fact, that both are every moment approaching death, nearer and nearer). With each exhalation of breath, a fraction of life-span escapes from our hold. So, each should warn the other, remind the other, instruct the other, to use the available present for realising the God within the Universe and within oneself.

 

Contemplate the unchanging Glory of God; then, the desire for the transient baubles of the Earth will fade and you can be free. Prakrithi is Dharaa (Earth, Creation). Think of it always. Long for it. Pine for Dharaa, Dharaa, Dharaa and you find you are pining for Radha, Radha. So, Radha is the Becoming and Krishna is the Being; the desire of the Being to become, the longing of the Becomed for the being - this is the Radha-Krishna relationship, which has been sung by seers and poets, calumnied and caricatured by ignorant critics, appreciated and apprehended by aspirants, analysed and realised by sincere scholars of spiritual lore.

You are the image of the Supreme Atma, the image that is reflected in the body that is part of Prakrithi (Nature). Your body is kith and kin of all the objects that surround you in nature; your body is an object among so many. The original Divine Spirit, the individualised spirit, which is the image, and the objective world of which the body is a part are three entities called Iswara (Eeshvara)-Jivi-Prakrithi.

 

Success in sadhana is won the moment you are able to either deny the objective world as a delusion or recognise it as nothing but the Supreme Spirit itself.

In ordinary day-to-day arithmetic, three minus one is equal to two; but, in the arithmetic of the Atma the three (Iswara-Jivi-Prakrithi) minus one (Prakrithi) is equal to not two, but one (Iswara) for, when the mirror (the Prakrithi) goes, the image (Jivi) also disappears.

When the mirror is eliminated, two entities disappear, the mirror and the reflection it can cast. And you merge in the Divine.

When you see the idol as God, you transmute the stone out of which it is calved, of which it is composed, out of existence; the stone has been eliminated, when you see only God in the shrine.

Purify and cleanse the mind so that wherever you turn, not only in the shrine, not only in the idol, but, in everything, at all times, you will cognise only God; then, the mind becomes your best friend, your most efficient instrument of liberation.

(The mind projects on others its own defects and deficiencies. The mind plays infinite pranks, and so, it is labelled as an ape. The mind also is referred to as a snake. For, it does not move straight. It sizzles over the earth, in a zig-zag course. The mind delights in crooked stratagems, and clever contrivances. It avoids the straight path of veracity and sincerity. Again the snake injects poison, and grabs living beings that come in its way.

But, the mind-snake can be charmed into innocence. The snake charmer uses the naadhaswara instrument and when he blows music out of it, the snake swaysits hood entranced; so too, the mind will sway in unison with the music that emanates from the Nama-smarana (Naama-smarana), the recitation of the Name of God).

On spiritual journey never allow yourself for a moment to believe that you will fail. Say to yourself that he has already succeeded in receiving it. Do not allow yourself to become flustered, or worried or anxious. Start the day with love. Fill the day with love and end the day with love. (Reet's compilation from, Sathya Sai Speaks. Vol. 3. "Thamo gunam, thapo gunam," Chapter 22; Sathya Sai Speaks. Vol. 7. "The miracle of love," Chapter 32 and "The windows of the mind," Chapter 36; Sathya Sai Speaks. Vol.10."Beside, behind, before," Chapter 10; Sathya Sai Speaks. Vol. 20. "The Lord and the Devotee," Chapter 9; Sathya Sai Speaks. Vol.27. "Time is God: make best use of it," Chapter 11).

 

Namaste - Reet