My journal: my age-old teacher

July 5, 2009

AUM SAI RAM Dear Saibandhu, Humble Pranams at the Lotus Feet of BHAGAWAN, Sai Ram. Very glad to read your write-up " My journal: my age-old teacher " . You are right in stating that your inner knowledge, knowledge of Atman or God, is steadily growing; because i have observed the growth, since i started reading your writings sometimes back , comparing your earliest write-up with the latest write-up. As a result of the growth of the inner knowledge, it can be seen that your confidence is flourishing.

As you have mentioned, the people with whom you have talked to, who always talk about a golden period----not of the future or not of the present----, talk of the golden period of the Past only. Unfortunately such expression is natural for majority of the people. There are mainly three kinds of people. 1. People of Pessimistic. 2. People of Optimistic. 3. People of Reality.

People of pessimistic talk only about the beautiful things experienced in the past. For them, past experience is an end in itself. They do not hope that it can be repeated. Hence they do not even put an effort. Then how to live? only by bringing the past happiness to memory. They have reached the dead end. They are the lazy people. This is a psychological suicide of oneself. Simply wasting the life gifted by God which can be bracketed as sin.

Optimistic people, though may talk about the past good days, are hopeful that such good days or even better days may occur in the future, so put their effort in that direction. They are energetic people. But they are not satisfied with the success, presently achieved as a result of their effort, because their expectation of happiness is very high, and the result is unhappiness.They can't enjoy the present moment, because a very simple manthra that " Satisfaction leads to happiness and unsatisfaction leads to unhappiness " is not understood by them.

Realistic people, may sometimes talk about old golden days and to further achieve them will put effort in that direction, and they know well that , it is immaterial whether golden days happened in the past or would happen in the future. They know well that " Golden days really exist in the Present moment only. " Hence whatever they possess in the present, and in whatever position they are in the present , find satisfaction and happiness in the present. Means they live in the present. Real happiness is achieved, when one lives in the present. Even if it appears that the days in the present are not so good, the realistic people attribute them to the merits and demerits of karma and karmaphalas of previous lives and live in detachment and contentment. Thus they live in real spirituality.

Another valid point enumerated by you is about self-confidence. Yes, one hundred percent self- confidence cannot be imparted by friends and people around. True, they can keep one's hopes alive, during tough times, but it is limited. Even guru or god may not give one hundred percent self-confidence, when one feels them outside. As the name itself indicates, self-confidence comes from the self-within. When guru or god is felt inside or when they work from inside by becoming constant companion( as you have stated), one hundred percent self-confidence comes.

Your last paragraph, that your inner knowledge steadily grows sans bookish knowledge is an icing on the cake, fantastic! Right!, bookish knowledge is not exactly a knowledge, it is only informations gathered and collected from outside and stored in the brain cells as memory and reproduced when required. Such knowledge cannot make one to grow independently to uncover ajnana,illusion,Maya; but grows in dependency still covered with ajnana,illusion,Maya; it can not make one perfectionist. It requires chewing of the mind frequently to remember the stored knowledge or else one may forget most of the stored matters.

To obtain the unforgettable real knowledge, inner knowledge, Atmic knowledge or knowledge of Self, it requires to forget the polluted knowledge and belief got from books; and only the sadhana, meditation, deep enquiry of Atman will impart fresh knowledge which finally culminates in the WISDOM, when the grace of the Guru descends on the sadhaka. Yes, rightly God listens to the prayers and whispers to the Sadhaka in his conscience, and surely no proof is required to furnish to others; when the sadhaka feels that god listens to and He is all there is , when his mind becomes still , eyes get moistened, heart overflows with love, body mildly shivers and hairs stand on their ends with the madhura bhava, itself is the proof that God has arrived.

Sai Ram.

Your's Saibandhu,

Ranganatha.Rao.

On Sat, Jul 4, 2009 at 6:57 AM, Sai Sravanthi <sai_sravanthi_999 wrote:

I've had many, many teachers over the years - books, friends, failures, family, etc. over the years, but my one constant teacher has been my age. It never gives up on me - every second of my life, I grow, grow, grow - and never backwards. After all these years, my reverence for it only grows.

It's funny to me when I see commercials, products, media and society deplore and disrespect age, and instead try to promote getting younger. Advertisers only employ young women and men to sell their products, which promise to make me younger, smooth out my wrinkles, color in my grey. Men and women fall for them, and hanker after a youth that they've already lived through and will never have again. Just because they lie about their age doesn't mean they're younger.

When I talk to people, they always talk about a golden period in the past when they were younger. But for me, I've never had a period in my life I wanted to go back to - not once. Each period, each year, each minute I step into is brand new, and golden - I learn something new everyday. So why would I want to go back to days when I was innocent and ignorant?

Wisdom is a gift my age gives me - I'm wiser today than I was yesterday; wiser now than I was 5 years ago. Wisdom is the hindsight and experience and maturity of learning from my failures, stumbles and missteps. If I knew then what I know now, I'd never have made some of the decisions and choices I made along the way. But the paradox here is that the only way I know now, and am wiser now, is because of making those missteps along the way.

Self confidence is another gift of my age. Gone are the days when I depended on the validation of friends and people around me to make me feel right. Now my confidence comes from within - from my own Self - my own constant companion.

Another golden gift of my age is inner knowledge that's steadily growing. This is not bookish knowledge or a general knowledge about world politics, sciences and trivia, but a quiet confident knowledge about God and what He means to me, His omnipresence and His power. I don't need proofs or prayers to know that He's listening. I just know that He is all there is. There is no world, no universe, no me. He is ALL there is, and I KNOW it.

Sai Ram and Love

sai_sravanthi_999