DHYANA VAHINI
(Stream of Meditation)
by
Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba
SRI SATHYA SAI BOOKS & PUBLICATIONS TRUST
Prasanthi Nilayam - 515 134
Anantapur District, Andhra Pradesh, India.
Grams: BOOKTRUST STD: 08555 ISD: 91-8555
Phone: 287375 Fax: 287236
PRASANTHI NILAYAM
ªÂSri Sathya Sai Books and Publications Trust, Prasanthi Nilayam
P.O. 515 134, Anantapur District, (A.P.) India
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Sai Books and Publications Trust, Prasanthi Nilayam (India).
 International Standard Book Number  81-7208-345-9
 Revised Enlarged Edition : April 2003
Published by:
The Convener, Sri Sathya Sai Books & Publications Trust
Prasanthi Nilayam, India - Pin Code 515 134
STD: 08555 ISD: 91-8555 Grams: BOOKTRUST
Phone: 287375 Fax: 287236
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PUBLISHER?S NOTE

This edition of the Dhyana Vahini is an attempt
to improve upon the previous edition. Some
grammatical errors and typos have been
corrected, and some sentences have been modified to smooth
and clarify the presentation ? of course, without disturbing
the original meaning. So also long paragraphs have been
split into two where it made sense and provided easier
reading.
The earlier version of Dhyana Vahini had no
Chapterwise or Sectionwise titles. Now subtitles have been
inserted in appropriate places in order to make it more
accessible to the reader. The subtitles appear in the Table of
Contents too.
Sanskrit words have been replaced by their English
equivalents. However, most of the Sanskrit words have been
retained (in parentheses, following their English
replacements). Many Sanskrit words have to exact English
equivalents; and retaining the Sanskrit as it is keeps the
edition accurate.
It is a well known fact that several Sanskrit words have
made their way into the English language and can be found
in most dictionaries - e.g. dharma, guru, yoga and moksha.
These words are mostly used without translation, although
their meanings appear in the Glossary at the end of the book.
A large format is another speciality of this edition. It
is hoped that the computerized typesetting, using a larger
size and a different font, will provide more comfortable
reading.
With these changes, the revised Dhyana Vahini is being
presented to the readers with the hope that it will benefit all
earnest seekers in the spiritual realm.
Convener
Sri Sathya Sai Books and Publications Trust
Prasanthi Nilayam, Pin 515 134, (India)


PREFACE

To be living as a contemporary of Bhagawan Sri
Sathya Sai Baba is itself a unique chance, for
His is the authentic voice of the Lord Himself;
and He is easily accessible and eager to receive pious souls
and persons afflicted with physical handicaps or spiritual
confusion. His advent itself is to restore Dharma in human
relationships and instill courage in the hearts of sadhakas
and purity in the ranks of sadhus. He began this mission at
the tender age of fourteen, when He announced Himself as
the Saint of Shirdi, Sri Sai Baba come again, according to
the promise the saint had made that He would reappear to
complete His work eight years after His Mahasamadhi.
Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba unostentatiously proclaims
His divinity by a continuous manifestation of miracles
beyond the reach of the laws of science. He counsels,
consoles and confers boons; and, above all, encourages the
faltering aspirants to march forward towards Him; for He is
the Absolute, the Goal. Every word of His, spoken or written,
is a Mahavakya; for He has the authority to make it so.
This book is the translation into English of His
invaluable advice to all sadhakas, which was first published
in the ?Sanathana Sarathi? as a series of articles in Telugu
by Him. Baba?s Telugu is sweet and simple and goes straight
to the heart. To translate it into English is indeed to squeeze
out much of its native nectarous taste. But for those
unacquainted with Telugu, this is the best means of listening
to His directions and so this book is presented to all such
aspirants. May success come to all who read and follow the
teachings of Baba and may they be led to His Holy Presence
by His Grace.
N. Kasturi


CONTENTS

Publisher?s Note .............................................................. i
Preface............................................................................. iii
Chapter I The Power of Meditation ..............................1
Binding actions and liberating actions; taming the mind and
the intelligence; one-pointedness and concentration; the
value of chanting the divine name and meditation; the
method of meditation.
Chapter II Chanting God?s Name and Meditation .....  11
Gauge meditation by its inner impact; the three paths of
meditation; the need for bodily and mental training;
everyone has the right to spiritual success.
Chapter III The Goal of Meditation ............................19
Control the temper of the mind; concentration and
one-pointedness are the keys; yearn for the right thing;
reaching the goal through meditation; gain inward vision.
Chapter IV Promote the Welfare of All Beings ..........27
Eschew the tenfold ?sins?; be unaffected by illusion; first,
good qualities, later, the absence of qualities; the placid,
calm, unruffled character wins out; meditation is the basis
of spiritual experience.
Chapter V Cultivate The Blissful Atmic Experience ..35
The primary qualifications; lead a dharmic life; the eight
gates; wish versus will; take it step by step; no past or
future; clean and feed the mind.
Chapter VI Meditation Reveals the Eternal
and Non-Eternal ..........................................................43
The Lord?s grace is needed to cross the sea; why worry
over short-lived attachments? we are actors in the Lord?s
play.
Chapter VII Remember God and Meditate ................ 51
All religions remember the Lord?s name; crave the Lord?s
name rather than the form; do not discuss the path with
everyone; repeating the name is safest and easiest.
Chapter VIII One-pointedness Attention is
Essential for Meditation ..............................................57
Avoid no-pointedness and many-pointedness; stick to one
name and form; stick to the task of taming the mind;
everything is pure, everything is God; do not reject Him,
cultivate love for Him.
Chapter IX Spiritual Development .............................65
Three stages of growth; discuss the good in others, not the
bad; the Lord assumes the yearned-for form; seek company
of the good and avoid company of the bad.
Chapter X Innocence, Purity, and Humility ................73
Be ever joyful and sweet; have contentment and desire only
the Lord.
Chapter XI Liberation: the Goal of Meditation ..........81
The beneficent and maleficent impulses; destroy ignorance;
uproot the impulses that make up the mind and the mind is
no more; success in meditation from uprooting impulses;
the Atma is free of everything.
Chapter XII Do not be a Slave to Impulses.................89
Seeking praise and blaming others are impulses; mere
reading without practice is impure; master the wayward
mind through meditation; do not lose heart, but keep up the
practice.
Chapter XIII Developing One-pointedness .................97
Monkey meditation: harmful to spiritual progress; force the
mind to be one-pointed; the inert mind reflects the
intelligence; control the senses as well as the mind;
cultivate good habits before concentration; make slow but
steady progress.
Chapter XIV Remove Defects in Character..............105
Eliminate pride; follow Krishna?s advice and meditate; the
three guards: peace, contentment, discrimination; be
comfortable in all environments; concluding admonitions.
Glossary .................................................................... 115
Index .........................................................................127


Chapter I

The Power of Meditation
Binding actions and liberating actions
People have to be doing some action (karma) or
other from the moment of waking to the
moment of sleeping ?that is to say, from birth
to death. They cannot sit quietly without doing action. No
one can avoid this predicament! But each one has to
understand clearly which kind of action to be engaged in.
There are only two types: (1) sensory or binding actions
(vishaya karmas) and (2) actions that liberate (sreyo
karmas).
The acts that bind have increased beyond control; as a
result, sorrow, and confusion have increased. Through these,
no happiness and peace of mind can be gained.
On the other hand, the actions that liberate yield
progressive joy and auspiciousness with each single act.
They give bliss to the Self (Atma-ananda) and are not
concerned with mere external joy! Though the acts may be
external, the attraction is all towards the internal. This is
the right path, the true path.
Actions that bind include all activity in relation to
exterior objects. Such actions are usually resorted to with a
desire for the result. This craving for the results leads one
to the morass of ?I? and ?Mine? and the demon of lust and
greed. If one follows this path, there will be sudden flares,
as when clarified butter (ghee) is poured in the sacrificial
fire! Assigning priority to sense objects (vishaya) is the same
as assigning importance to poison (visha)!
But while engaged in those activities and in those sense
objects, if one has no interest in the result or consequence,
then not only can one be victorious over the feelings of ?I?
and ?mine?, greed and lust, one can also be far away from
all such traits. One will never be troubled by such traits.
Liberating action is pure, faultless, unselfish, and
unswerving. Its characteristic is the importance given to
the idea of action without any desire of the fruits thereof
(nishkama karma), which was elaborated in the Gita. The
practice of this discipline involves the development of truth,
righteousness, peace, and love (sathya, dharma, santhi, and
prema). While on this path, if one also takes up the discipline
of remembering the name of the Lord, where else can one
acquire more joy and bliss? It will give the fullest
satisfaction.
If one treads this holy path, the Lord Himself will
bestow all that is needed, all that is deserved, and all that
will give peace of mind. Offer everything to the Lord without
any desire for the result; that indeed yields full joy; that is
indeed the easiest.
While it is very difficult to speak untruth and act against
dharma, it is very easy to utter the truth and walk in the
path of dharma. It is a very pleasant task to speak out the
thing just as it is; one need not spend a moment of thought
upon it. To speak of what is not, one has to create the non-
existent! That plunges one into fear and fantasy, in an
atmosphere of restlessness and worry.
So, instead of following sensory actions (vishaya
karma), which offer all these troubles and complications,
follow actions that liberate (sreyo karma), the path of Atmic
bliss (Atma-ananda marga), which is true, eternal, and holy.
The best means for following liberating actions is
meditation (dhyana). Today, people with new fangled ideas
argue how meditation is to be done and even why it should
be done. But they know neither its taste nor its purity. That
is why there is so much criticism and cynical laughter. My
present intention is to instruct such people. Therefore, I am
revealing this.
Taming the mind and the intelligence
See! Everyone in the world has the nature of behaving
and acting in two different ways: one outside and another
inside. This is known to all, though generally people do not
show this publicly. Just as people lose even the little joy
that they have worrying over the factions they may have in
their family, so they lose their internal peace when faced
with physical obstacles and troubles.
For example, consider a cart. It cannot move by itself,
can it? It can move only when two bullocks are yoked to it.
And the cart can move safely only when the bullocks are
trained to pull carts and when they are used to the road on
which they have to walk. Instead, if they are ignorant of the
process of pulling carts, if they have not walked on the road,
if they have never stepped out of their shed, or if they have
always moved only round and round the post to which they
have been tied, in their own mire, the journey cannot
proceed! And the cart will itself face danger!
So also, the inner consciousness (anthah-karana)
cannot move of itself; it must be attached to the externally
related bullocks, the intelligence (buddhi) and mind
(manas). Then only can it move forward, following the
bullocks? tracks.
So, earlier than the journey, the bullocks ?intelligence
and mind? should be conversant with the road to the village
that the inner senses are eager to reach. They must be trained
to proceed in that direction. If this is done, the journey will
be easy and safe.
Instead, if the draught animals have no knowledge of
the pathways of truth, righteousness, peace, and love
(sathya, dharma, santhi, and prema), and if they have never
once trodden that path, the cart, the inner senses themselves,
might come to grief! Even if they are prodded to proceed,
they will only drag the cart to the familiar post and the
accustomed mire of confusion, injustice, cruelty,
indiscipline, and falsehood! What then of the journey? When
is the arrival to be?
Therefore, intelligence and mind (buddhi and manas)
have to be taught the art of pulling the cart and moving
steadily along the road. This has to be done by repetition of
the Lord?s name (japa) and meditation (dhyana).
One-pointedness and concentration
People are suffering despair and defeat on account of
the waywardness and unsteadiness of the inner senses. This
is the result of inability to control and guide the bullocks of
intelligence and mind, unused as they are to meditation and
repetition of the divine name to the extent of even stepping
along that path! At such a time, the conflicting desires
infecting the mind have to be quenched and controlled. The
mind has to be focussed in one direction. People must walk
determinedly, using all their effort for the purpose of the
aim and achievement they have set before themselves. If
this is done, no force can pull them back; they can attain the
position that is their due.
Plunge the wayward mind, which is fleeing in all
directions, in contemplation of the name of the Lord; the
effect will be like concentrating the rays of the sun through
a piece of magnifying glass. The scattered rays develop the
power of a flame to burn and consume. So too, when the
waves of intellect and the feelings of mind get one-
pointedness through the converging lens of the Atma, they
manifest as the universal divine splendour that can scorch
evil and illumine joy.
Everyone is able to gain success in his profession or
occupation only through one-pointed attention. Even the
pettiest of tasks needs the quality of concentration for its
fulfilment. And even the toughest problem yields before
unswerving endeavour.
The value of chanting the
divine name and meditation
People are endowed with unlimited powers. Not a
single person is without them! But the road is missed when
one is unaware of this truth. To gain awareness of this power,
one must join the company of the holy, one must strive in
spiritual practice (sadhana), and one must practise repetition
of the divine name and meditation.
Of what avail is it, even though you have each item of
provision in plenty, when you do not know how to cook
them into palatable food? Similarly, people have in
themselves all the provisions needed for their upkeep and
progress, but they discard them lightly and leave them
unused because they are ignorant of the process of benefiting
by them. People must seek to see and understand the
Universal Power (sakthi), the One without a second, which
is the basis of all the multifarious manifestations of name
and form in the world.
The mind flies at a tangent all the time. Meditation
(dhyana) is the process by which it is trained to acquire
concentration. As a result of meditation on the highest Atma
(Paramatma), the mind will withdraw from sense objects
and the sensory world. Just at that time, the intellect (buddhi)
must assert its authority and command the mind (manas)
not to entertain any feeling except the thought of the
Fundamental Basis.
When its basic truth is known, the mind will not be
deluded by the evanescent, the untrue, and the unblissful.
Instead, it will welcome the blossoming of joy, happiness,
and truth, and it will not be affected by sorrow and grief.
Nature (prakriti) and the life-force (prana) are
indestructible, right? So, everything that is the product of
the mingling of these two has a new value inherent in it.
One?s life also assumes a new splendour when one
visualises and realises bliss in the awareness of the Supreme
Reality (satchidananda) through a mind and intellect (manas
and buddhi) that is purified and transformed by means of
meditation (dhyana). The taste of the fruit is evident when
one sees the whole of it is eaten with no portion left behind.
So too, when the taste of meditation is once discovered,
one will discard all doubt and discussion thereon and engage
oneself fully in it. Therefore, begin meditation, each one of
you, from today ?even from this moment!
Meditation should be performed enthusiastically, with
full faith and care, and strictly according to the disciplines
laid down. If this is done, it will bestow not only all
happiness and all victory but even the vision of the Lord.
This is bound to the science of Supreme Spirituality
(Vedanta) and also to the science of nature (prakriti). These
two are different in only one respect. The students of nature
(prakriti) are immersed in the objects of life; the students
of Vedanta are immersed in the basic truth of life. And people
are bound to both of them! Nature is related to sense objects
(vishaya); Vedanta is related to one?s Self-reality (swa-rupa).
If people desire to transform their lives, internal as well as
external, into one of splendour, meditation is the best
spiritual discipline (sadhana) they can adopt.
The method of meditation
The place for meditation should be a little elevated ?
an inch or two? from the ground. Place a mat of dharbha
grass (a matty, long grass grown in India) on it, spread a
deer-skin on the mat, and lay a thin white cloth on the skin.
Sit on it in the lotus posture (padmasana). The right foot
must be above the left and the left foot above the right. The
fingers of the hand must be in close touch with one another
and the hands should be placed in front. The eyes must be
either half open or fully closed.
Then, by means of mental massage, relax the neck,
shoulders, hands, chest, teeth, stomach, fingers, back, thighs,
knees, calves, and feet. After this, one has to meditate on
one?s own favourite name and form, with Om added. When
this is being done, there should be no mental wanderings;
one must be stable and quiet. No thought of past events, no
trace of anger or hatred, and no memory of sorrow should
be allowed to interfere. Even if they intrude, they should
not be considered at all; to counteract them, entertain
thoughts that will feed one?s enthusiasm for meditation. Of
course, this may appear difficult, at first.
The best time for meditation is the quiet hours before
dawn, between 3 and 5 a.m. One can awake, say, at 4 a.m.
First of all, sleep has to be subdued. This is very necessary.
In order to keep the hours unchanged, one may set the alarm
clock for 4 a.m. and rise. Even then, if sleep continues to
bother, its effect can be overcome by means of a bath in
cold water. Not that it is essential to bathe; it is needed only
when sleep gives much trouble.
If in this manner the path of meditation (dhyana) is
rigorously followed, it is possible for one to win the grace
of the Lord very quickly.


Chapter II

Chanting God?s Name
and Meditation
Spiritual aspirants (sadhakas) all over the world
will naturally be engaged in repetition of the
name (japa) and meditation, but first one has to
be clear about the purpose of repeating the name and
meditation. Without this knowledge, people believe them
to be related to the objective world, capable of satisfying
worldly desires, and hope to demonstrate their value by
means of sensory gains! This is a grave error.
Repetition of God?s name and meditation are for
acquiring one-pointed attention on the Lord, for casting off
sensory attachments, and for attaining the joy derived from
the basis of all sensory objects. The mind should not be
wandering in all directions, indiscriminately, like the fly.
The fly dwells in the sweetmeat shop and runs after the
rubbish carts; the fly that has such a mind has to be taught
to understand the sweetness of the first place and the
impurity of the second place, so that it may not desert the
sweetmeat shop and pursue the rubbish cart. When such
teaching is imparted to the mind, it is called meditation!
Look at the other type, the bee! It has contact only
with sweetness; it approaches only flowers that possess
nectar; it is not attracted to other places; it does not proceed
there at all. Similarly, one has to give up all inclinations
towards sensory attraction, towards the rubbish cart of the
untrue and the impermanent. As far as possible, one has to
direct the mind to all holy things, which yield sweetness
and the joy associated with the Lord. To attain these, time is
needed, of course. How long that time will be depends on
the activities of thought, word, and deed as well as on the
motives that impel those actions.
Gauge meditation by its inner impact
The main things to be considered are not at what
expense one has prayed to the Lord, nor the number of years
one has been engaged in it, nor the rules and regulations
one has followed, nor even the number of times one has
prayed over. The main considerations are: with what mind
one has prayed, with what degree of patience one has been
awaiting the result, and with what single-mindedness one
has craved for Godly bliss, regardless of worldly happiness
and delay, with no lassitude and with constant attention to
oneself, one?s meditation, and one?s task.
If one examines deeply the success in getting rid of all
idea of self, one can oneself gauge the progress made.
Instead, if one is engaged in counting the rules and adding
up the time spent and the expense incurred, such meditation
can belong only to the objective world; it can never come
into the subjective and spiritual fields.
Repetition of God?s name and meditation (Japam
Dhyanam) should never be judged on mere external
standards; they are to be judged by their inner effects. Their
essence is their relationship to the Atma. The immortal Atmic
experience should never be mixed up with low activities of
the temporal world. Such activities deserve to be avoided.
If room is given for them, and if one sways between
impatience and sloth, and if one always worries oneself,
feeling, ?Why has it not come yet? Why is it still far away??
then it all becomes simply repeating the name and meditation
done with intent to gain, with an eye on the fruit thereof.
The single fruit of repetition of divine names and
meditation is this: the conversion of the out-faced into the
in-faced; the turning inward of one?s eye, the inward eye
seeing the reality of Atmic bliss. For this transformation,
one has to be always active and hopeful, regardless of the
time taken and the difficulties encountered. One should not
count the cost, the time, or the trouble. One should await
the descent of the Lord?s grace. This patient waiting is itself
part of the austerity (tapas) of meditation. Sticking
unfalteringly to the vow is the austerity.
The three paths of meditation
There are three ways by which aspirants try to enter
the path of meditation: the path of truth (sathwika-marga),
the path of passion and emotion (rajasika-marga) and the
path of ignorance (thamasika-marga).
The pure, serene (sathwic) path. On this path, one
considers repetition of the name and meditation as a duty
and suffers any amount of trouble for its sake; one is fully
convinced that all this is just an illusion, so one does only
good under all conditions and at all times. One desires only
the good of all and is always loving towards all; one spends
time uninterruptedly in the remembrance and meditation of
the Lord. One does not crave even the fruit of repeating the
name and meditation; one leaves it all to the Lord.
The passionate, restless (rajasic) path. Here, one
craves for the fruit of one?s act at every step. If the fruit is
not available, then, gradually, laxity and disgust overpower
the spiritual aspirant and the repetition of the name and
meditation slowly dry up.
The ignorant (thamasic) path. This path is even
worse. The Lord will come into the memory only in times
of danger or acute suffering or when one is the victim of
loss or pain. At such times, such a person prays and vows to
arrange this worship (puja), offer this particular food, or
build this kind of temple to the Lord. One will be calculating
the quantity of food placed before the Lord, the tribute
offered at His feet, the number of prostrations performed,
and the number of times the shrine was circled ?and ask
for proportionate awards! For those who adopt this attitude
in meditation, the mind and intellect can never be pure.
Most people now follow only the passionate, restless
(rajasic) and dull, ignorant (thamasic) paths in repeating
the divine name and meditation. However, the very intention
of repeating the divine name and meditation is to purify the
mind and the intellect. In order to achieve this, the first path
is best: pure, serene (sathwic) meditation. When the mind
and the intellect become pure, they will shine with the
splendour of the understanding of the Atma. He in whom
this understanding shines fully is called a sage (rishi).
The knower of Atma becomes the Atma itself
(Brahmavid Brahmaiva bhavathi). The goal of life, that
which makes life worthwhile, is the understanding of the
Atma or, in other words, the basis of the individual soul
(jiva).
The need for bodily and mental training
There is a close mutual relationship between the
attitudes of the body and the attitudes of the mind. So,
people?s inner feelings will be evident from their physical
bodies. The stance and the appearance of the body help us
to discover these feelings. Take one example. With the loins
girded, the sleeves of the shirt rolled, and the palms rounded
into fists, it is not possible to exhibit love or devotion. With
bended knees, the eyes half-closed, and the hands raised up
over the head with the palms joined, is it possible to show
one?s anger or hatred or cruelty? That is why the ancient
sages (rishis) used to tell the spiritual aspirant that it is
necessary during prayer and meditation to adopt the
appropriate bodily pose. They saw that it is possible to
control the waywardness of the mind by this means.
Of course, for the expert spiritual aspirant, meditation
is easy in any pose; but for the novice, such physical means
are essential. This bodily and mental training must be
undergone only to be later discarded as but a means to attain
the true and eternal Atma. Until this is realised, spiritual
discipline has to be consistently practised.
Until the goal of meditation is achieved, the well-
established discipline of sitting postures (asanas) has to be
followed. The curriculum has to be adhered to till then. After
attainment of the goal ?that is, after the mind (manas) and
the intellect (buddhi) have been conquered and brought
under control? one can be immersed in meditation
wherever one finds oneself: on the bed, in the chair, on a
rock, or in a cart.
Once you learn to ride a motorcycle, you can ride on
any road and under all conditions. But when you are just
learning to ride, for your own safety and for the safety of
those around you, you have to select an open parade ground.
And you have to follow certain principles of balance; this
is essential. So too, those who engage in meditational
practice (sadhana) have to follow a certain course of
training. No change can be made in this. So, the passionate,
restless (rajasic) and the dull, ignorant (thamasic) forms
can never be considered meditation. If the spiritual practice
becomes fully pure and serene (sathwic), that is best.
To describe anything in words is difficult; it might even
cause boredom. But to demonstrate it by deed is easier and
more pleasant! To make people understand by doing
meditation is better than by talking about it! My writing on
it and your reading it will not make it easy.
Through meditation, people reach the divine
experience of realising the Atma within themselves. Through
meditation, spiritual aspirants are able to cast off sheaths of
ignorance, layer after layer. They withdraw their sense
perceptions from contact with worldly objective
experiences. The process that aims at this holy
consummation deserves to be called meditation.
For this process, one must be equipped with good
habits, discipline, and high ideals. One must be full of
renunciation towards worldly things and their attractions.
Whatever the situation, one should conduct oneself with
enthusiasm and joy. Whatever is done must be dedicated
not for the eking out of a livelihood but for earning Atmic
bliss (Atma-ananda). One should train oneself to adopt a
good sitting pose (asana), to avoid tension of the body, and
to ease the mind from the weight and pressure of the body.
This is what deserves to be called pure meditational practice
(sathwika dhyana sadhana). Discipline is very necessary
for this.
Everyone has the right to spiritual success
The troubles and tribulations that come in the wake of
an attempt to destroy the undesirable activities of the mind
will disappear through the strict course and rules described
above. What remains is only putting them into actual practice
by the spiritual aspirant. Even the most powerful drug cannot
effect a cure when it is brought to the bedside of the patient.
The sufferer has to take it in, little by little, as per schedule,
with all the attendant care, and try to assimilate it into the
system. The healing principle of the drug must pervade the
entire body; the body must be suffused with the drug.
Similarly, the authoritative texts (siddhanthas) and the
Vedanta have no power to destroy individual faults and
weaknesses.
If full results are wanted, then one must give up all
false and low feelings and act according to the true teachings
of the Vedanta and the siddhanthas. If one does, one will
attain the fruit. The secret of success in meditation lies in
the purity of the inner life of the spiritual aspirant. The
success is proportionate to the importance the spiritual
aspirant gives to right conduct (san-marga).
Everyone has the right to achieve this high degree of
success. I do not say this in just a quiet tone; I declare this
loud enough for all quarters to hear. Knowing this, meditate
and advance! Do meditation and progress! Realise the Atma!


Chapter III

The Goal of Meditation
Living is either pleasant or unpleasant, depending
upon one?s basic attitude towards life. See how
the same object becomes pleasant once and
unpleasant on another occasion! The thing welcomed with
great fondness at one time becomes hateful at another time
and there is not even the desire to see it. The condition of
the mind at those times is the cause of this state. Therefore,
it is necessary to train the mind to be always pleasant.
Control the temper of the mind
The waters of a river leap from mountains, fall into
valleys, and rush through gorges; tributaries join at various
stages, and the waters become turbid and unclean. So too,
in the flood of human life, speed and power increase and
decrease. These ups and downs might happen at any moment
during life. No one can escape them. They may come at the
beginning of life, at the end, or perhaps in the middle. So,
one has to convince oneself firmly that life is necessarily
full of ups and downs and that, far from being afraid and
worried over them, one should welcome them as adding to
one?s experience. One should not only feel like this, but
one should be happy and glad whatever happens! Then, all
troubles, whatever their nature, will pass away lightly and
quickly. For this, the temper of the mind is essential.
Concentration and one-pointedness are the keys
Every minute, from inside and outside, promptings and
temptations arise and accumulate in people. One cannot
attend to all of them at the same time, so one fixes attention
on only the most important one. This is called concentration
(avadhana). Concentration is needed to grasp any subject
well. Purposefully directing attention on a subject and fixing
it there is one-pointedness (ekagratha). This is also a
condition of the mind. Concentration and onepointedness
help to focus effort on any selected task.
Concentration is essential for all. It is the foundation
of all successful endeavour. It is needed not only for
meditation but even for worldly affairs and ordinary living.
Whatever the task one is engaged in, doing it with
concentration will develop both self-confidence and self-
respect, for they are the result of the attitude of one?s own
mind. The mind may lean on either the bad or the good, and
concentrated attention must be employed to keep the mind
attached only to good prompting. Success or failure in the
good task depends upon one-pointedness.
One-pointedness will increase power and skill. But it
cannot be won without conquering the worldly cravings that
distract the mind. This one-pointedness, this conquest of
the mind, is acquired by the exercise of meditation.
Yearn for the right thing!
There are two types of people: one set on accusing
themselves as sinners and the other flattering themselves as
great. Both types are being worried by their own mental
aberrations! What they both need is mental satisfaction, and
this can be obtained by meditation. Through meditation,
understanding will increase and wisdom will grow.
For this, a person should develop interest in and a taste
for meditation ?that is to say, a yearning that admits of no
other step and that will not tolerate any obstacle. Of course,
one may yearn to hear music and derive joy therefrom, or
see the bodies of near relatives who have died and derive
sorrow therefrom! Yearning may thus have pleasant or even
unpleasant consequences! Yearning must have the strength
to inspire endeavour. In fact, yearning is but dormant
endeavour; endeavour is yearning in action. When yearning
is weak, endeavour declines; when one is strong, the other
is also active.
Meditation gives concentration and success in all tasks.
Through meditation alone, great personages and sages
(rishis) have controlled their mental activities, directed them
towards the pure (sathwic) path, established themselves at
all times in contemplation of the Lord, and finally succeeded
in achieving union with the Godhead. First, yearning, then
selection of the goal, then concentration, and, through the
discipline, conquest of the mind ?that is the object of
meditation.
One must give up the craving for material comfort and
the attachment to sense objects. One must direct the false
fears, the absurd desires, the sorrow, the worries, and the
artificial pleasures that now fill mind. That is to say, one
must discriminate and train oneself to realise that everything
is as illusory as the ghost in the well! Everyone needs this
self-education. The pathetic condition of everyone is due
to its absence. Meditation is the remedy for this state of
mind.
Reaching the goal through meditation
Through meditation, it is possible to bring into memory
the paradise that is one?s empire, discarding the transitory
creations of the mind as a dream and a delusion. By engaging
oneself systematically and calmly in meditation, meditation
can be made effective and tranquil. Thus, the road towards
the highest experience is laid. A new understanding dawns,
clear and unruffled. When the heights of meditation are
reached, this understanding becomes so strong that one?s
lower nature is destroyed and burned to ashes! Then, only
?You? remain! The entire creation is a delusion of your
mind! One alone IS truth (sathya), the Lord, Being-
Awareness-Bliss (satchidananda), the highest Atma; the
ONE is the Self (Shivoham).
The truth (sathya) is so subtle and so soothing. Once
it is reached, there is no meditation and no meditator; all
merge into One. That is the fixed, illumined experience.
Exulting within that one is pure knowledge, the wise one
(jnani) will be aware only of Atmic bliss (Atma-anubhava).
That is the goal, the fruit of immortality. Attaining this
transcendent experience, the yogi finishes meditation and
moves among people resplendent with divinity! In the yogi,
the Vedas find fulfilment. The yogi is transformed into a
pure being. Only meditation has the capacity to make one
transcend the vicissitudes of time and space and make one
ever the same equanimous individual, as if one is another
Creator himself.
Once the individual (jivi) is on the way towards the
goal, the individual will derive full contentment from
himself and discover within himself the source of bliss. The
cravings and ambitions, delusions and falsehoods, and
animal needs and antics that were worrying the individual
till then all vanish. Since the Atma pervades all, equally
and steadily, the individual also loses the ?I-ness? and gets
immersed in its inherent divine status. Such a person is the
real great soul (mahatma), a liberated soul (jivan-muktha).
Fullness is bliss (ananda); bliss is peace (santhi).
Those who do not give up the path of discrimination
(vichara marga) receive the grace of the Lord, and they
also realise the Atma. They will always be seeking the eternal
truth that lies behind the dream-like illusions of this world.
Control the senses (jnanendriyas), which run helter-
skelter; then, the origins of the disease will be destroyed.
Let the mind keep a watch over its gymnastics; dam up the
mad flood of thoughts and plans and schemes; then there
will be no room for worries and anxieties in the mind. To
diminish the wanderings of your thoughts, repeat the name
of the Lord; that will keep out your sorrows and troubles.
Without the effacement of the mind, spiritual wisdom
(jnana) cannot dawn. The full person is one who has
succeeded in this.
Gain inward vision
The spiritual aspirant (sadhaka) must first learn the
secret of the ?inward sight?, the ?vision directed inward?,
and take his attention away from the exterior. You have heard
so far little about the inner world, but divine life is nothing
but this method of ?inward living?. Just as the baby, after
learning to watch and understands, tries to toddle here and
there at home, so also the spiritual aspirant learns to toddle
in the inner world and understands it. A healthy baby in the
cradle waves its arms and legs in glee and lisps in joy,
watching the lamp on the wall. Similarly, the spiritual
aspirant, also healthy in body, mind, and soul, lying in the
cradle of life, watches the inner world and claps the hands
ceaselessly in great glee at that inner joy. This has to be
done.
Besides, every thought, every word, every deed has to
proceed from the full consciousness of knowledge. Direct
your intelligence not to wander about but to dwell constantly
in the inner world! This is the inward quest (antar vimarsha),
and meditation (dhyana) is the most important instrument
needed for this.
The spiritual aspirant can enter the inner quest (antar
vimarsha) through the gate of self-examination. That gate
accords welcome into the highest and holiest status possible
in life to every aspirant who is endowed with humility and
devotion.


Chapter IV

Promote the Welfare of All Beings
The meditator (dhyani) considers the realisation
of Atmic bliss as important, but the promotion
of the welfare of the world is also an equally
important aim. For carrying out that aim, he must bring
certain physical, verbal, and mental tendencies under
control. These are usually known as the tenfold sins: the
three physical, the four verbal, and the three mental. The
physical tendencies are: injury to life, adulterous desire, and
theft. The verbal sins are: false alarms, cruel speech, jealous
talk, and lies. The mental attitudes are: greed, envy, and
denial of God.
Eschew the tenfold ?sins?
The person intent on following the path of meditation
must take every care that these ten enemies do not even
approach. They have to be eschewed completely. The person
needs tendencies that will help progress and not those that
drag back. One must speak and act only good (subha), for
good alone is auspicious (mangala) and the auspicious alone
is Siva. This is what the scriptures (sastras) also say. The
good is the auspicious. The auspicious is the spiritually
helpful. The good is the instrument for merging in Siva.
Through the good, the meditator can achieve this world
and the other; the meditator can promote his own welfare
as well as the welfare of others. Welfare is the fruit of
knowledge; illfare is the fruit of ignorance. Through welfare
alone can peace, joy, and progress be attained. One?s very
basic duty is the welfare of all beings! Promoting it and
contributing to it is the right task. Living out one?s span of
life in discharging this task is the ordained path.
Be unaffected by illusion
The intellect (buddhi) in us is the witness of all things
in this objective world. These worldly things limit and colour
the intellect; they affect it and mould it into consciousness
(chaithanya). Illusion (maya) is only the intellect as affected
by everything, as warped and twisted by the impressions of
everything. Therefore, the spiritual consciousness that is
unaffected by illusion ?i.e. upon which the world has failed
to produce any impression? is the Lord (Iswara).
Therefore, the person who is striving to reach the stage
of the Lord must be unaffected by illusion, unimpressed by
the world! How can one remain so unaffected? Through
analysis, ratiocination, fearless inquiry, and pure reason. To
acquire this analytical reason (viveka), sharing in the task
of promoting the welfare of every being in nature is essential.
First, good qualities; later, the absence of qualities
The passing show (jagath) is based on illusions (maya).
That is why it is branded ?false?. But do not conclude that
mere recognition of the falsity of the world or an awareness
that one has certain shortcomings will lead one on the higher
path and take one to the highest truth. Without a good
character full of sterling qualities, one can never achieve
progress in the spiritual field. Progress depends on the worth
and quality of the individual, just as the harvest depends on
the fertility of the field. Upon such a worthy piece of land,
sow the seeds of sterling qualities and irrigate with the waters
of reason and analysis; the plentiful harvest will be ready in
due time! On lands where the seedlings of good qualities
are not planted and tended, useless weeds multiply; and
where orderly gardens could have been formed, thorny
bushes create a jungle of impenetrable confusion.
Even if a person, through perversity or blind conceit,
has thus far not cultivated good qualities, the person can at
least make a try or make efforts to secure them! If this is not
done, the excellence of life cannot be tasted and life is a
waste; its worth is nil. The mind, by sheer force of these
opposing forces, gets lost in false values and is unable to
develop along the right lines. Such a mind, turned away
from good, might cause indescribable evil. All progress won
by the aspirant (sadhaka) might be destroyed by such a mind
in an unguarded moment, like a spark falling on a keg of
gun powder because of a moment?s negligence!
Some try to be devoid of qualities, but they achieve
only living death. Their pale faces reveal only lack of zest
and interest. This is the result of unreasoned haste in spiritual
discipline. Though becoming quality-less is ultimately
needed, there should be no hurry to reach the goal. Even
though a person may have the ardour, it very often leads to
dilemmas, which many solve by means of suicide! First,
one must accumulate wealth of character. Many stalwart
aspirants have lost their way and not regained it in spite of
years of effort because they evinced no interest in earning
this qualification! Others have slipped into the morass
through which they were wading!
You can see that the path of ?achieving the absence of
qualities? is strewn with dangers. One cannot exist without
activity, so one must of necessity act through ?good?
qualities. One must put down all desires and become free.
The mind filled with good qualities will help in this process,
for it will bear other?s prosperity gladly. It will give up doing
injury; it will seek opportunities to help, heal, and foster. It
will not only suffer; it will also pardon. It will not incline
towards the false; it will be on the alert to speak the truth. It
will remain unruffled by lust, greed, anger, and conceit; it
will be free from delusion. It will always seek the welfare
of the world. From such a mind will flow an uninterrupted
stream of love.
The placid, calm, unruffled character wins out
When this mind matures and attains fruition, it easily
becomes free of all qualities: placid, calm, and pure. It easily
merges in the one Atma without a second.
Each person has the unique chance to taste the inner
peace that such a mind can grant, but, unfortunately, most
are strangers to the unshakeable joy and equanimity that is
their birthright. Meditation is the only island of refuge in
the ocean of life for all beings tossed on the waves of desire,
doubt, dread, and despair. This Vedantic truth must be
present in the mind even while the world of objects (vishaya)
is being attended to!
Consider the condition of this world hundreds of
thousands of years ago. At that time, this globe was the
scene of only two things. On one side was the fiery lava,
which poured forth from the volcanoes and crevices that
scarred the surface of the earth. The flood of destruction
descended on all sides and spread fear and death in the
regions around, as if the end of everything had come. On
another side, the scarcely noticeable molecules of living
matter, the microscopic amoeba, floated on the waters or
clung to the crevices among the rocks, keeping the spark of
life safe and well protected.
Upon which of these two ?one boisterous and bright,
the other quiet and secluded? would you have built your
trust? At that time, surely no one would have believed that
the future was with the amoeba or the animalcule! Who
could have foreseen that these minute specks of life could
hold out against the gigantic onslaught of molten lava and
earth-shaking upheaval? Nevertheless, that speck of life-
consciousness (chaithanya) won through. Unheralded by
fire and dust, by swooping gale or swallowing floods, the
amoeba, in the process of time and by the sheer force of the
life-principle it embodied, blossomed into goodness and
strength of character, into art and music, into song and dance,
into scholarship and spiritual discipline and martyrdom, into
sainthood and even Avatars of Godhead! In all these, the
history of the world is found summarised.
In the confusion of overpowering events, we see people
sometimes placing faith in loud and noisy men who are
enslaved by their own passions. But this is a passing phase;
it will not last. When things are placid, calm, and unruffled,
people can merge themselves in the atmosphere of
delusionless consciousness, which is the highest they can
reach. The peace (santhi) they taste there is subtler than the
subtlest. They must ascend to it through effort guided by
reason, through meditation. When the enjoyment is full and
complete, it is no other than the divine status, the coveted
goal of life. People do not generally strive for it, because
they know nothing of its supreme attraction. Meditation
gives them the first inkling of that bliss.
Meditation is the basis of spiritual experience
Therefore, everyone must now strengthen the mind and
make it be aware of the happy moment of bliss. Otherwise,
there is a likelihood of the mind discarding all effort to reach
what is now dismissed as ?empty? and ?useless?. But once
the mind is convinced that the moment of attunement with
divine consciousness (chaithanya) is a moment of complete
power, suffused with divine power (sakthi), then the effort
will not be slackened; the spiritual aspirant can reach the
Atmic realisation without further interruption.
With this as the ideal, carry on meditation and mental
repetition of the divine name from now on. The step
immediately after meditation (dhyana) is total absorption
(samadhi). Meditation is the seventh of the eight-fold yoga.
Do not give up this royal road that leads you on to that
sacred goal. Meditation is the very basis of all spiritual
practice (sadhana).


Chapter V

Cultivate the Blissful
Atmic Experience
People are engaged in various forms of
cultivation, but the most important of these is
cultivation of spiritual experiences. All
cultivation is based on spiritual cultivation. It is the king of
cultures. The king makes laws, but he is above and beyond
them. So too, all rules and laws, all distinctions of right
and wrong, of sin and virtue, of joy and sorrow affect only
the individual soul (jivi) that attaches importance to the
inexperienced mind (manas) and intellect (buddhi) and not
to the Atma. So, cultivation of the Atmic experience, which
is pure, convincing, and self-transcending, is essential for
all. It is also easy, for the Atma is as the mother of all, and
hearkening to the Atma is like the child hearkening to the
mother. Everyone is competent to have that experience; in
fact, it is everyone?s right to have it. That is why the Atmic
discipline is being treated by me as so important.
The primary qualifications
The Atma is also known as Brahman, so learning the
Atmic knowledge or Brahman knowledge (Atma vidya) is
to be considered as the objective by every student.
Such students have to earn some primary qualifications.
Then only do they deserve the status of studentship. These
qualifications are: discrimination (viveka), renunciation
(vairagya), and the six qualities that constitute a good
character. Aspirants who have these qualifications can hope
to attain the Atma with confidence and without much
difficulty.
Lead a dharmic life
The highest Atma (Paramatma) has six chief
characteristics: complete wisdom (jnana), complete
renunciation (vairagya), divine beauty, the fullest splendour
of power (Iswarya), undiminished fame, and inexhaustible
fortune (sri). His nature is full existence (sat), full knowledge
(chit), and full bliss (ananda). These are also related to
people through the Atma in them. So all humanity has a
right to realise and enjoy these characteristics and this nature.
That is its ordained duty. The travail of the world today is
due to people not performing this ordained duty.
In daily life, the common person acts quite contrary to
the dictates of the dharma of the householder (grihastha).
People do not follow the path laid down by the scriptures
(sastras) and by the law texts of Manu (Manusmrithi). They
do not have an iota of truthfulness in them. Truth is the
most holy virtue. So, leading a primitive type of life, people
lose courage at the slightest upset and give up the adventure
of life. People develop a kind of pseudo-renunciation. If
only they would enter upon the householder?s life with the
attitude of performing their duty, they would not need to
run away from it and seek caves and forests for escape.
Each can realise the Lord in their assignment of duty, in
their dharmic life.
The contemplation of the Lord must proceed in union
with the dharmic life. This type of life has no need for status,
scholarship, or vanity. The latter only lead people astray. It
is only through this life that the mind and the intellect can
be controlled, the knowledge (vidya) of Atma cultivated,
and the will sublimated.
A good character is essential for the realisation of the
Atma. In other words, all evil propensities have to be
uprooted. Just as the army becomes dispirited and surrenders
when the commander falls, so the army of evil qualities
will surrender its arms as soon as egotism (ahamkara) is
destroyed. The evil qualities are all natives of the realm of
anger, so if that region is devastated, the soldiers can never
again raise their heads. It is enough to acomplish this alone,
for what can commander Egotism achieve without a single
soldier to march under his orders? So, all efforts must be
directed to destroy the realm of anger so that no commander
can venture to let loose the hounds of war. Let each spiritual
aspirant preserve the region of his mind in peace, by putting
a stop to the rise of this commander and these soldiers. Let
each spiritual aspirant bask forever under the smile of the
ruler, the Atma.
The eight gates
The destruction of the modifications and agitations of
the mind is the prereqisite for getting an audience with that
ruler. His reception hall has eight gates through which one
has to pass for the audience: control of the inner senses,
control of the outer senses, sitting posture, breath control,
mind control, concentration, meditation, and super-
consciousness (yama, niyama, asana, pranayama,
prathyahara, dharana, dhyana, and samadhi).
Of these eight gates, meditation is the seventh and
super- consciousnes is the eighth. Meditation is the royal
road to super-consciousness.
After the mind has been brought under control by these
eight disciplines, the will can easily be developed. The will
is the nature of the Lord; it is also referred to as the Lord?s
ordinance. The Lord, by mere willing, can do anything
immediately and easily. But one cannot realise this will as
soon as it is entertained. The power of the will is the deciding
factor. The will is generally not so overpoweringly strong;
when one achieves that power, one gets something equal to
the power of the Lord. That is the meaning of merger (laya).
Such merger is made possible through meditation (dhyana).
Wish versus will
Some people use ?wish? and ?will? as if there was no
difference between the two. This is very wrong. The wish
is related to the tendencies (vasanas) embedded in the mind
(manas). The will is related to the fundamental character of
Atma. Wish means the craving to get something; will is the
determination to acquire it.
Both wish and will are based on the moral culture of
the individual. Once the Atma is cultivated, they can be
sublimated accordingly. But if they are cultivated without
the Atmic point of view, the faults and failings of the mind
will get mixed up with what is wished for and willed for.
Take it step by step
The lower step can be seen from the higher step, not
the higher step from the lower. So, one should strive to go
step by step, higher and higher ?in other words, from the
culture of the Atma to the culture of the will and thence to
the culture of the moral conduct. Then, the enjoyment of
the bliss of the Atma becomes quite easy and natural.
When the baby is unable to walk, the mother
encourages it to toddle a few steps at a time at home before
it is allowed to go on the road. Instead, if it is put on the
high road first, how can it learn? Besides, what of the dangers
of the road? So also, first the internal factors have to be
strengthened, and then external factors, like moral conduct,
become easy. Morals without the basis of internal uplift will
not be deep-seated. So the cultivation of the attitude of the
Atma is primary.
The aim of spiritual practice is to remove the motive,
the wish, the attachment, the yearning for the fruit.
Understanding this clearly, the spiritual aspirant must not
give way to any dispiritedness, despondency, or feeling of
failure or doubt. The aspirant must be patient and bear things
with fortitude. Therefore, the aspirant must develop within
himself enthusiasm, faith, activity, and joy. Keeping the great
big result of effort constantly in view, the aspirant must
boldly discard all difficulties and temptations. Since the
latter are but short-lived and weak, with a little patience,
they can be overcome with ease. If the aspirant is not vigilant
and patient, all already-achieved success will melt away in
an unguarded moment.
Spiritual aspirants, yogis, and renunciants (sanyasins)
have to climb a ladder, the steps of which are: argumentation,
no argumentation, analysis, non-analysis, agreement, etc.
(sa-vitharka, nir-vitharka, sa-vichara, nir-vichara, samatha,
etc.)
No past or future
The knowledge of the world is not real knowledge. It
is relative knowledge, the knowledge of the non-real. The
knowledge of the eternal Absolute is the real knowledge.
That is acquired by meditation. The fire of meditation and
yoga will reduce the sapless activities of the mind (manas)
to ashes. Immediately thereafter, the knowledge (jnana) of
the Real will flash; it will shine with undiminished
effulgence; its light will never go out. For those established
in this real knowledge, there is no past and future; all ages
are in the present, in the actual moment of experience.
Clean and feed the mind
Just as soap is necessary to make this external body
clean, repetition of the divine name, meditation, and
remembrance (smarana) are needed to clean the interior
mind. Just as food and drink are needed to keep the body
strong, contemplation of the Lord and meditation on the
Atma are needed to strengthen the mind. Without this food
and drink, the mind will just totter this way and that. As
long as the waves are agitating the top, the bottom cannot
be seen. When the waves of desire agitate the waters of the
mind, how can one see the base, the Atma? The tottering
causes the waves and is caused by want of food and drink.
So, clean the mind with contemplation of the Lord.
Feed it with meditation on the Atma. Only meditation and
spiritual practice (sadhana) can clean the depths of the mind
and give it strength. Without purity and strength, the Atma
recedes into the distance and peace flees. 


Chapter VI

Meditation Reveals the
Eternal and the Non-Eternal
The seen is transitory; this is seen through
meditation. When people wander helter-skelter
in a strange land, not knowing the road, and
when someone comes to direct them along the right path, it
is not right to laugh at and dishonour him ?it brings about
only ruin and confusion! But today, it has become the habit
of people to curdle the love (prema), these embodiments of
love, into poison through ignorance of the role of helpfulness
that these guides have come to play.
Note this! Love and destruction arise from the same
native spot. The same sea that yielded gems, the moon,
nectar, and the goddess of wealth also brought forth the
world-destroying halahala poison. Under these conditions,
one must, like Sri Narayana, accept the good and the
auspicious; otherwise, one cannot have nectar and Lakshmi.
The heroic and the adventurous, like Siva, can have the
poison as their need.
The Lord?s grace is needed to cross the sea
This sea of life (samsara), turbulent with the waves of
joy and misery, can be crossed only by those who have an
unflinching desire for the essence of bliss; the rest will be
submerged.
The capacity to overcome the qualities (gunas) of
nature (prakriti) is not inherent in everyone; it comes to
one with the grace of the Lord. And that grace is to be won
by repetition of the divine name and meditation. This must
first be clearly understood: it is impossible for everyone to
control the tendencies of nature; the power is possessed only
by those who have nature in their grip and whose commands
nature obeys.
Nature (prakriti) is the basis of everything in the
universe. It is the basis of creation and existence. All this is
nature: men and women, beasts and birds, trees and plants.
In fact, all that can be seen is inseparable from nature. In
this endless creation, the active element is the Lord
(Purusha). This truth has to be experienced, so that it will
not slip away from consciousness, and the discipline needed
for this is also repetition of the divine name and meditation.
This nature is like an ocean; even if it is agitated a little,
millions of living beings will be destroyed. When the sea
becomes slightly ruffled, ships turn into hollow reeds; you
can never cross this sea by your own effort, alone. The Lord?s
grace is essential. So pray for that raft, and when you secure
it, you can reach the shore in a trice.
Why worry over short-lived attachments?
Everything in this world is ephemeral, transitory; it is
here today but may not be here tomorrow. So, if you want
to crave something with a full heart, seek the Lord, who has
no decline. Instead, if you crave progeny, wealth, and all
comforts, you will suffer untold misery when you are called
upon to leave everything and depart. At that moment, you
would lament, ?oh, did I love so deep that I may weep so
loud?? In this transitory life, joy and pain are also perforce
transitory. So, it is indeed humiliating to get immersed in
the search for the evanescent and to forget the Supreme and
the Everlasting. Ignoring God (Madhava), who is free from
illusion (maya), and spending time in things immersed in
illusion is fruitless; sorrow alone is the final gain. Nothing
here is fit to be worshipped as eternal. Whomever you love,
that love has to come to an end.
The self-same Lord gives and takes! He gives and takes
as and when He wishes. Everything is His, so how foolish
it is to lament when things belonging to Him are taken back
by Him! Therefore, the wise person doesn?t pine over anyone
or feel undue attachment to anything. Let all the pining and
all the attachment be for the Lord; He alone is eternal, the
source of all joy. For the rest, love a thing as a thing, not
more. Love a person as a person, not more. If you love them
more, it is a sign that you have been deceived about their
real nature. You can behave only for a short time as if the
house you have rented is your own! For as soon as the period
is over, it passes on to another.
If you think on these lines, you will know that spouse,
children, possessions, and relatives are not yours for long,
but only for a short time. So why waste away, worrying
over these impermanent things? A millionaire can eat only
one bellyful, not more. You have to come to this world like
the traveller taking refuge at nightfall in a caravanserai; he
departs when dawn breaks! You go towards your goal, from
caravanserai to caravanserai, stage by stage. It is good to
take life in this light.
Animals with many legs creep along the ground. People
have only two legs, so they can move freely about. The
larger the number of legs, the greater the bondage, the tighter
the restriction. When one marries, one has four legs, one
has become a quadruped. Later, when one gets sons,
daughters, in-laws, and grandchildren, one is transformed
into a regular centipede, capable of moving only by crawling
along the ground! One cannot stand erect; one loses freedom
of movement; one has to creep slowly along the mire of
material objects; one has no time or inclination to secure
the Lord?s grace.
The attachments of the world are short-lived. People
have been born many times before and have lived out their
lives, loving and getting immersed in love and attaching
themselves to others. But does anyone now have a trace of
all that? Does anyone know where all that has gone? Does
anyone worry about those they loved then? Does anyone
remember them at least now and then? No. The same type
of love and attachment were there then also, but with the
passage of time, it has been forgotten.
So too, when one departs from this world, the love
one had for others and the joy, pain, and happiness one had
through that love will be forgotten. Like the playgrounds of
children, the senses of action of man will also change, from
here to there and from there to somewhere else! Fixing their
minds on the insecure changing love, how tragic it is that
people forget the cultivation of the disciplines that will give
them the permanent bliss of the Lord!
Everywhere, people are plunged in worry, all
twentyfour hours a day. Is it right to increase their burden?
Who can be so cruel as to torture instead of lessening the
suffering of a dying person? Already, the sea is rough; dare
we blow a typhoon over it? Therefore learn to spread a smile
on the faces of the desperate. Keep smiling yourself and
make others smile. Why make a sad world sadder by your
desperate counsel, your lamentation, and your suffering?
Adopt repetition of the name and meditation to assuage your
own grief, to overcome your own sorrow, and to plunge in
the cool waves of the sea of the grace of the Lord.
Why should travellers wrangle through the night over
useless things, instead of getting ready to leave the
caravanserai at dawn and starting out on the next stage of
their pilgrimage? By wrangling, they lose sleep and deprive
themselves of rest; they will not have the energy to continue
the journey. So do not worry too much about things of the
world. Worry ends in meaningless hurry and waste of time.
That time is better used in meditating on God.
We are actors in the Lord?s play
All living beings are actors on this stage. They take
their exit when the curtain is rung down or when their part
is over. On that stage, one may play the part of a thief, another
may be cast as a king, a third may be a clown, and another
a beggar. For all these characters in the play, there is ONE
who gives the cue!
Here, some points have to be understood clearly. The
prompter will not come upon the stage and give the cue, in
full view of all. If He does so, the drama will lose interest.
Therefore, standing behind a screen at the back of the stage,
He gives the cue to all the actors, regardless of their role ?
be it dialogue, speech, or song? just when each is in most
need of help. In the same way, the Lord is behind the screen
on the stage of creation (prakriti), giving the cue to all the
actors for their various parts.
So, each actor must be conscious of His presence
behind the screen of illusion (maya); each must be anxious
to catch the faintest suggestion He might give, keeping a
corner of the eye always on Him and having the ear pitched
to catch His voice. Instead of this, if a person forgets the
plot and the story (that is to say, the work for which one has
come and the duties that appertain thereto), neglects to watch
the presence behind the screen, and simply stands dumb on
the stage, the audience will laugh at their folly and charge
the person with spoiling the show.
For these reasons, every actor who has to play the role
of a person on the world stage must first learn the lines well
and then, remembering the Lord behind the screen, await
His orders. The attention must be on both: the lines one
learned for the role and the stage manager?s directions.
Meditation alone gives one this concentration and this
awareness.


Chapter VII

Remember God and Meditate
Whatever the tangle in which people are
caught, if they get immersed in the Lord?s
name, it will make them free. Moreover,
by this means, they can realise without fail the name and
form through which they constantly remember the Lord.
There is no iota of doubt in this.
All religions remember the Lord?s name
The spiritual disciplines (sadhanas) of yoga, breath-
control (pranayama), and penance (tapas) are beset with
pitfalls at every step, and they are also full of dangers. But
in the spiritual practices of repetition of the name (japa),
meditation (dhyana) and remembrance of the name (nama-
smarana) there is no likelihood of a fall or of any other
danger. In the former type of spiritual disciplines, the
practices differ according to the caste or religion. In the
practice of the name (nama-sadhana), there is not even a
trace of such distinction. Hindus, Muslims, and Christians
may differ on many points, but they are all one in the
glorification of the name of the Godhead. All of them take
the name of the one Lord, though the language through
which the name is expressed is different. Each one recites,
repeats, and remembers the name as formed on his own
tongue. Each one turns with his fingers the rosary
appropriate to his religion. But for everyone there is nothing
so fruitful, so universal, or so holy among spiritual
disciplines as these: repetition of the divine name,
meditation, and remembrance of the Lord?s name.
Crave the Lord?s name rather than the form
The Lord and His name are both one, but the sweetness
of the name is seldom found in the form. When the name of
the flower, rose, is remembered, its fragrance, tender petals,
and deep colour spring to memory; its thorns and the trouble
one has undergone to get the flower are all forgotten. Instead,
if its origin and previous story are considered, and if the
plant, leaves, and branches are taken into account, the flower
?the most important, most beautiful, and most attractive
part? is likely to be forgotten and only ?the plant? is
discussed.
See this from another angle. As soon as the name
mango is mentioned, one is reminded of an incomparable
sweetness. Instead, if an actual mango is held in the hand,
the doubt first arises in the mind whether it is sweet or sour;
then one is engaged in distinguishing the skin, fibre, juice,
nut, rind, seed, etc. When the name alone is repeated, these
things do not come to mind. Only the sweetness is brought
to memory.
Such is the difference between the Lord and the Lord?s
name! The pure essence of sweetness is in the name. In the
case of the form, there is the chance of dread mixed with
respect ?sometimes, even attributes causing fear show
themselves.
Here is another reason why the name of the Lord is to
be craved more than the form. Riches are needed to secure
any article in the world. With riches, articles are acquired,
so it follows that the riches are superior to the articles
obtained by means of them, right? With riches, one can get
any article, any time. So too, it is by means of the riches of
the name that the article, ?the form (rupa) of the Lord? is to
be earned. If the riches called name (nama) are steadily
accumulated, the Lord can be realised through the path of
meditation, easily and without difficulty.
Another special thing about repetition of the name
(nama-smarana) is this: It is possible to acquire various
occult powers (siddhis) through yoga and penance (tapas).
And there is every likelihood of the Lord being forgotten
when these powers come. Blinded by this pride, a person
might even let go the basic victory won by their spiritual
practices. This is not the case with remembrance of the name,
repetition of the name, and meditation; no such dangers beset
these paths. These three paths make love (prema) grow in
people more and more. Through love, peace (santhi) is
achieved. Once peace of mind is achieved, all other
conditions are automatically attained. Through yoga and
penance, extraordinary power; through remembrance of the
name, repetition of the name, and meditation, extraordinary
love ?this is the difference between the two.
Do not discuss the path with everyone
However, be careful not to discuss these paths with all
and sundry, because each one?s path appears the best. If the
people consulted are treading another path, they will decry
your practice of repetition of the name and meditation and
treat them with scant respect. They will look down upon
them, as if they were very elementary and as if your were
but a beginner in school. As a result, you will start doubting
the efficacy of your chosen path! You will get concern where
before you had joy, disgust where before you had love.
Therefore, reflect within yourself which among these
is sweeter. Or, you can approach those who have tasted the
nectar of that name and ask for details of their experiences.
Do not argue about these things with everyone you meet.
The time spent in these haphazard disputations is best used
for the cultivation of joy through the repeated bringing of
the name (nama) to memory and meditation on the form
(rupa) of the Lord.
Mere weighing of the pros and cons, like which is
greater among the two, will end only with the quick loss of
all the success gained after great efforts through spiritual
discipline. Until you become an expert, bring the name
constantly to memory and repeat it firm and unruffled, either
alone or in the company of devotees (bhakthas). Then,
nothing can waver you.
Look at the fish! In early stages, it breeds its newly
hatched young ones in a quiet shallow spot. Then, it pushes
them into the wide open sea, rough and rude with its
monstrous denizens! They can then survive there,
courageously, and grow without fear. If the young ones were
bred in the open sea from the earliest stage, they would
certainly be swallowed up even by minor fishes! So,
remembrance of the name (nama), repetition of the name
(japa), and meditation (dhyana) have to be practised with a
great deal of care, according to a planned routine, and
without any discussion with others.
Repeating the name is safest and easiest
Nowadays, many aspirants are discarding the name and
taking up yoga and breath control (pranayama). These are
fraught with many dangers. To follow them correctly is
difficult. Even if correctly followed, preserving and
protecting the fruits achieved is even more difficult.
If people grope in the water while spreading the net
on the bank, can they find fish in the net? To give up
repetition of the name and faith in that path and to sit in
yoga and penance is as foolish as hoping to catch fish by
this means. If the name is taken as the refuge and support,
He can be realised tomorrow ?if not today. If the name of
a thing is known, the thing itself can be easily acquired.
But if the name is not known, even if the thing is right in
front, it cannot be recognised.
So repeat the name without intermission or faltering.
By means of the name, love (prema) is developed; through
love, meditation of the Lord can be practised. If love is
deeply rooted in you, God, who is composed of love,
becomes your own. However many the paths for the
realisation of the Lord, none is as easy as this.
Note this. When a peculiar disease is prevalent in a
country, the drug that can cure it is also found in that very
country, more so than anywhere else. Though available after
vigorous search in other lands, it will not be so good or
plentiful. Similarly, this specific drug is available now, in
the present age (the Kali-yuga)! In this age (yuga), the
ghastly evils of injustice, immorality, and falsehood infect
the world. That is why the scriptures (sastras) have been
proclaiming again and again, with greater and greater
emphasis, that in this Kali age there is no means of salvation
other than the name! Of the four ages, the Kali-yuga is the
best on account of this. Remembrance of the name, repetition
of the name, and meditation strain out the evil in mankind.
Human nature is guarded and protected by these three.
Hence, the fruits of meditation are greater than those secured
with great difficulty through yoga, sacrifice (yajna), or
breath-control (pranayama).


Chapter VIII

One-pointedness Attention is
Essential for Meditation
It is not correct to say that the qualities and
attainments needed for temporal progress and
spiritual progress are different from each other.
The spiritual is only the purification of the temporal. Success
or failure in both depends on one-pointedness (ekagratha).
For every item of work, one-pointedness is very important.
This too is but spiritual discipline (sadhana).
Avoid no-pointedness and many-pointedness
There are two paths along which this spiritual discipline
may proceed: no-pointedness and many-pointedness. No-
pointedness is the stage of sleep; it is also called the quality
of ignorance (thamoguna). Many-pointedness is the result
of the restless quality (rajoguna), turning the vision of the
opened eye on creation and its sights. Avoiding both of these,
without falling into these two extremes, if the eye is neither
closed as in sleep nor opened wide as in the fully awakened
stage, but half-opened and directed to the point of the nose,
the pure quality (sathwa-guna) will become one?s nature,
and concentration of the mind can also be easily acquired.
Of course, this does not mean that mere fixing the sight
on the tip of the nose is enough. Fix it there in the beginning
and then turn the vision to the name and form you have in
mind; that is meditation (dhyana).
When you are engaged in repetition of the name and
meditation, other thoughts might enter you at first, but you
shouldn?t worry about this. There is no great danger on
account of them. When you begin remembering the name
of God (nama-smarana), sit down with enthusiasm. If you
enter upon any task with firm determination, no impurity
can affect you. Your only concern is to see that you are
fully pure when you start the repetition of the name, etc. Do
not worry about formalities for this. Select the name that
you like and the form of that name. That name is itself the
mantra. That mantra is ever pure, ever active, everything.
Stick to one name and form
But do not change the name and form to suit the fancy
and have one thing one day and another the next. Whatever
the name and form that first gave you contentment, hold
fast to them without swerving. They will get implanted in
the heart, without fail. Afterwards, everything will happen
through His grace. If workers are ordered to dig the earth,
their work is simply to go on digging. The gardener alone
knows how much of the earth is to be put under which plant
and how the earth is to be so put. So too, the order is to
?Constantly dwell on the Lord?s name?! Provided you
continue to do that work, He Himself will direct where and
how that has to be utilised.
Stick to the task of taming the mind
The value of name and form consists in the training
that they give to the mind (manas). What need is there to
train a horse that has already been trained? It is the untrained
horse that is ?broken? through many devices. Similarly, it
is to tame the unruly mind that we have prayer, devotional
singing (bhajans), repetition of the name, and remembrance
of the name. In the initial stages, the horse runs in many
directions, but the trainer does not worry. He should hold
fast to the reins. The mind, too, naturally runs in different
directions when you begin remembrance and repetition of
the name, but you must not yield to despair, anxiety, or
indecision. Hold fast to the reins, the name (nama)! Within
a short time, your speech and thoughts will come under
your own grip. Only, do not allow anything to come near
you that might make you forget the name of the Lord. You
will realise the profit of that name in due course.
Do not crave the fruit the moment the sapling is
planted! Do not pluck and chew the leaves and the twigs in
the hope of inferring therefrom the taste of the fruit! Doing
that does not help you enjoy the sweetness of the fruit;
besides, the plant itself will not survive.
Similarly, your task is simply to cultivate the sapling
called name of God (nama). While doing so, do not doubt
and examine whether it has the glory ascribed to it. Without
fail, that sapling will grow into a tree and give you the fruit
you hope to eat. You can achieve it. The name is capable of
yielding that fruit. So the purpose of one-pointed attention
(ekagratha) is to make you stick to the name, without
altering it, and to keep its form always in sight. The net of
?remembrance of the Lord?s name (nama-smarana)? should
have no torn holes; that is to say, it must take place always,
with no intermission. If there is any gap, the fruit that falls
into the net might escape through it! Perform meditation
until your mind comes firmly under your control. That is
the primary task.
Let the mind run wherever it likes; just be careful not
to follow it, seeking to discover where it is going! It will
then wander about for some time as the fancy takes it; soon,
getting tired and exhausted, it will come back to you in the
end! It is like a little child that knows nothing. Since the
mother is following it and calling it back, it gets courage
and confidence to run forward in any direction, but if the
mother does not run behind the child and instead retraces
her steps quietly, the child too, of its own accord, will run
back to the mother!
Do not care for the vagaries of the mind. Carry on
remembrance and meditation of the name and form that you
like best, in the manner you are accustomed to. In this way,
you will acquire one-pointedness (ekagratha); you will
realise your heart?s desire.
Everything is pure, everything is God
Do not entertain in your mind the idea of purity or
impurity while doing this spiritual practice or meditation.
There is nothing impure in the world. When the Lord is
immanent everywhere and in everything, how can anything
be impure? Even if something appears to the ulterior eyes
as impure, the moment it contacts the name of the Lord, it
becomes purified.
Note this point! If someone discovers a treasure while
answering the call of nature, will he hesitate to take it
because he is impure at the time? Purity and impurity are
the result of the mental reactions of the particular moment.
When one is giving money to someone, one talks of the
auspicious time and the purity of the hour. But when one
gets a chance to take money, every moment is auspicious!
The mind is the reason for both attitudes.
Similarly, no thought of purity or impurity will bother
you if you have full faith in the love of the name of the
Lord. On the other hand, if you feel some compulsion and
some discontent, all kinds of possible and impossible
obstacles will present themselves. Therefore, give up all
such feelings and strengthen the faith in the unshakeable
holiness of the name and its appropriate form. Firmly believe
that everything is made holy by His name.
Do not reject Him, cultivate love for Him
Cultivate love (prema) for the Lord. It has infinite
potentiality. An iron chain can be broken with ease, but not
the chain of love that binds you to the Lord. The cruelest of
animals is also overpowered by love. This is the illusion
(maya) of the Lord! If only the floodwaters of this love
were directed not to the lakes and shoals on the sides of the
river but to the ocean of the Lord?s grace, what a holy task
it would be! Then the individual (jivi) would realise the
purpose of life. This is the highest liberation (moksha). To
direct that love on to the name and the form of the Lord
without interruption ?that is real meditation.
Do not mistake this temporary abode as your eternal
dwelling place. Do not lose heart at evanescent troubles
and short-lived tragedies. Immerse yourselves in the effort
to attain the eternal Lord. Everything in this world is subject
to decay ?if not today, at least tomorrow it is bound to
disintegrate, right?
It is not right to reject the Lord, who is eternally related
to you, and to be misled by this world with which one is
related for just two days! As already written,
The relatives come up to the outer gate, or maybe
up to the burial ground, but your real relative is
the Lord, beware!
The Lord will never give you up. Considering the
number of births you have had, you have had countless
mothers, fathers, wives, husbands, sons, daughters, friends,
and enemies. Do they subsist today? Do they remember the
relationship? You are no one to them, and they are nobodies
to you. But you and they have the Lord in common as the
unchanging relative. He subsists throughout all the births;
He is eternal. He watches over you from birth to birth. What
greater tragedy can there be than forgetting such a Lord?
With the senses weakened and powerless and refusing
to function, with the parents, wife, children, and relations
all crowding on one side and the messengers of death
compelling you to pack up for the journey without delay on
the other ?who knows when this call will come and how?
Before that moment comes, be ready with the thought of
God.


Chapter IX

Spiritual Development
There are three stages of spiritual development:
first, the hazy uncertain stage; then, the active
stage of striving; and last, the highest stage.
These are the stages of passivity (thamas), activity (rajas),
and purity (sathwa). When growing out of the first stage
into the second, it is unnatural for a person not to improve
step by step.
Three stages of growth
The period from childhood to adolescence need not
be seriously taken into account. One need not worry much
about it. With the dawn of adolescence, one enters upon the
first hazy uncertain stage and engages in many fruitless
activities. Later, one attains ripeness and strength. This is
the stage between the uncertain and the certain. It is when
one has reached this intermediate stage that one must yearn
for the fulfilment that is possible in the final stage.
In the rules for penance (tapas), this law is also
observed. At first, ritual worship (puja) is associated with
divine energy (sakthi), and the subsequent stage of worship
is connected with Siva. That is to say, the period when one
is under the care of the mother is over and the period of
paternal care ?the protection of the Renovator and
Guardian of the universe, Siva? is reached. When the stage
of paternal care is come, one should not soil the body and
mind, as during the period of maternal care.
In the intermediate stage (that is to say at that particular
age), one will have certain natural propensities and
tendencies that are not desirable and have to be eschewed.
These are: conceit, mischievousness, obstinacy,
inquisitiveness, lust, greed, shame, fear, vengefulness,
disgust, etc. As long as one has these, one cannot surrender
oneself to Siva. These tendencies have to be uprooted
completely, or at least there should be a systematic
endeavour to get rid of them. Such aspirants will have to be
swimming against the current (Vyathireka pravaaha gathi).
Proceeding against the current is the means to reach the
Source; floating with the current means getting farther and
farther from It and losing sight of the Goal.
Of course, swimming up the river is a bit hard, but
every stroke takes you nearer to and not farther from the
goal. To overcome the strain, one must have the raft called
meditation. Through meditation, the weakness of the
physical frame can be overcome, the wayward speed of the
mind can be controlled, and progress towards the seat of
grace is made easy; one can attain the primordial divine
Force (adi-murthi). Instead, if one cares more for the ease
of the journey and floats along the current, one would be
travelling away from grace, turning their back on it. The
primordial divine Force will gradually become distant and
disappear. People who float along with the current will get
lost in increasing misery. And for what profit?
The evil tendencies mentioned above are the causes
for this tragedy. If only they had been overcome, the divine
Source could have been certainly reached. Without striving
for that, all activities will end in failure. Moreover, the world
loves only good people, people endowed with good
qualities; it keeps bad people at a distance. Exterior charm
attracts the animal; internal charm, resulting from character,
pleases the Lord. Do not be tempted by the low tastes of the
world and the cheap regard that people bestow. Strive for
the holy grace and love of the Lord. The affection that people
shower is inconstant, for it depends on their likes and
dislikes. But the love that the Lord bears to you depends on
your good qualities alone. It can also give you permanent
joy. Those who are enamoured of the external will tumble
into disappointment and sorrow every now and then.
Beauty consists in character, not in anything else. There
is nothing more charming than that.
Discuss the good in others, not the bad
The good should never even discuss the evil that others
do, for that will contaminate them. The stories of Dhruva
and Prahlada will, if listened to, grant merit and show the
path, and the stories of Savithri and Anasuya will destroy
the roots of evil and strengthen character. How does this
happen? What is the explanation? They are all holy, and
their careers are blameless; therefore, to discuss them and
their lives is worthwhile, and beneficial. That is the
explanation.
Some critics of ?good people? justify their own
carpings by saying that they are trying to correct the good
people still further and make them even better! No, they are
really provoking the good people to evil and drawing that
evil upon themselves. They are themselves becoming evil
people.
Never think about the badness or evil of others. If you
can manage it, always keep trying to turn them to good ways
and giving them good advice. One should cultivate peace
of mind, the charitableness and eagerness to promote the
welfare of all that is necessary for the attitude. These can
come only through repetition of the divine name and
meditation. The wealth derived from repetition of the Lord?s
name and meditation is good qualities (sadguna). Good
qualities clean the exterior and also purify and ennoble the
inner tendencies.
Waves originate in the upper layers of the sea. They
are caused by the wind, so the wind can be said to have that
power. So too, the mind of the intelligent person is full of
thoughts and opinions. When the proper atmosphere is
present, these spring up and roll in from all directions.
The Lord assumes the yearned-for form
In the same manner, the Lord is manifest in the picture
or image that one worships, but is this due to any special
excellence of the picture or image? No. The picture, the
photo, the image ?these are and remain as picture, photo,
and image. The fact is that on account of the intensity of the
devotion of the devotee (bhaktha), the Lord cannot desist
from manifesting Himself for them. For that reason, He
assumes ?in stone, wood, or paper ?the form that the
devotee contemplates and meditates upon and worships. He
materialised from a pillar for Prahlada?s sake! For Vamana,
He became visible in a stone! For Markandeya, He issued
from a linga! In order to fulfil the yearning of the devotee
(bhaktha), Hari, the Immanent Basic Being of the Universe,
will come in any form, in anything, at any place.
Seek company of the good;
avoid company of the bad
But you have to pray to the Lord with one-pointed
concentration. This type of single-mindedness comes only
out of the pure quality (sathwa-guna), and that again is the
product of meditation. Therefore, you must cultivate good
qualities, and in order to develop these, you should desire
the company of the good (sath-sang). Your real companions,
from whom you derive the maximum good, are those who
talk and discourse about the Lord, about truth, about the
service (seva) of others, and about love that considers all as
equal. Association with such people is certainly association
with virtuous people (sadhus), for these are the real virtuous
people.
Those who never speak of the Lord, or those who are
not even aware of Him; who are busy multiplying and
strengthening the bonds of worldly existence (samsara);
who preach and practise falsehood, injustice, and
oppression, and who advise you to stray from the path of
dharma ?treat those not as your friends but as people to
be avoided at all cost. Theirs is the company of wicked
people (dussanga). Associating with such leads to
committing wrongs against your will, uttering words that
should not be uttered, doing deeds that should not be done,
and, consequently, treading the downward road to ruin.
People who fear neither sin nor God are capable of
venturing into any wickedness; this is no cause for surprise.
So, seek the company of those possessed of these two fears;
this is the true good company. The company of people who
have not even an iota of these two is evil and should be
dreaded. The aspirant must always yearn for good company
(sath-sang). In that company, there is no chance for the
growth of greed or for will power (icchasakthi) to attain
anything. Whether easily available or not, seek and join only
good company. Seek and realise permanent satisfaction and
contentment. Do not distract yourself by pursuing temporary
satisfaction.
It is profitless for a true aspirant to associate with men
who spend their time in worldly affairs. If you don?t secure
friends of the type I mentioned, be solitary, without
associates; you do not lose anything thereby. Never even
think of the company of the wicked. Do not get entangled
in their wiles. If possible, when you get the chance, advise
them about the right, but do not yield to their words. In fact,
do not even entertain the desire to be in the place where
they are present. If you cultivate these characteristics, then
both repetition of the divine name and meditation will
become easy for you and will yield quick results.


Chapter X

Innocence, Purity, and Humility
The realised souls (jivan-mukthas) are like
lighthouses that point out the way to ships
caught in blinding darkness in mid-ocean. The
spiritual lighthouses show the way to those who struggle
helplessly in the thick night of ignorance.
All are born out of the womb of the one Lord. Just as
many varieties of fish and crabs and aquatic creatures move
about inside a big tank, multitudes of human beings move
about in the sea called the Lord. This is indeed a very
awesome scene. Some are undeveloped, some
underdeveloped; they swim around, greedy and selfish. In
the midst of this crowd of ignorant beings are a few highly
developed souls, the wise (jnanis) and yogis. Since they are
mixed up with the ignorant crowd, it becomes difficult to
distinguish the wise from the others. A microscope is
necessary to identify the red corpuscles in the blood;
similarly, a special microscope is needed to find the wise.
That microscope is no other than meditation.
This creation, and the wonder with which it is filled, is
really a source of amazement. But considering present
conditions, there are very few who watch for light and are
guided by light. So, instead of following this person and
that, and taking devious roads and getting lost, it is best to
place full faith in the Lord Himself and rely on Him as the
only mother, father, guru, and guide. Then you will never
lose the right path. He will never direct you to the wrong
path. To have that firm faith and that experience, one must
take to meditation; that is the one and only means. It is
enough if the name and form of the Lord is meditated upon
with love (prema) and faith, and you can choose the name
and the form that you like most.
Be ever joyful and sweet
For this spiritual discipline, you must cultivate the
quality of always being joyful, with a smile on your face;
this will give you good distinction. People will also like
you more. So, the Lord will also have joy upon seeing you.
Therefore, observe meditation with innocence, purity, and
humility.
Then, without fail, you can attain whatever you strive
for. Do not lose your temper in any situation; do not lose
courage in any contingency. Respect everyone, whatever
their status. Then the quality of universal love (prema) will
develop in you. As a result, meditation will progress without
disturbance.
For the cure of illness without resort to drugs,
meditation is the only remedy. Even the capacity to
discriminate and analyse will increase, and by means of that,
illness, however serious, can be overcome.
In every word uttered, there are two kinds of senses:
the obvious and the innate, the native and the qualitative.
The Upanishads take up the second kind and elaborate,
clarify, and make the Brahman known. One important thing
to be remembered is that it is possible and desirable to utilise
the full power of words through softness and sweetness. If
one is anxious to see God in every object, the sweetness of
the word will be of immense help. Sir, Master, Lord: in these
words lie the secret of much affection and regard. Through
these and such words, how happy you can make others, and
how light your minds will become by the practice of softness
of expression! When meditation is carried on in that happy
atmosphere, how quickly concentration can be attained!
Instead, if in conversation you use words that blame
others and despise them, in turn you become the target of
blame, and your mind gets agitated by the effect of both;
then the object of meditation is not realised because the
atmosphere turns impure. Therefore, if you really wish to
be happy through meditation, as a preliminary to the process,
you must be engaged either in joyful conversation or in
happy thoughts or memories. Sweet and soft conversation
helps meditation a great deal.
You must cultivate such a character, for character
outlasts the body. Virtues are your strength and glory.
Character is power. So train the mind and use it to attain the
visualisation of the Lord (sakshathkara); hold fast to that
goal.
Have contentment and desire only the Lord
You must have contentment, whatever the gain or loss
or state. This is essential. Contentment grants and increases
happiness. For the contented mind, life is an endless festival,
but the mind worried by desire will have no rest. With desire
troubling you, concentration is impossible. Desire is the fire
in your frame; it reduces you to ashes. Contentment is the
effective drug to destroy it. Just as a bath in the cool waters
of a stream refreshes a traveller who is exhausted and
perspiring in the burning heat of day, the one suffering from
the scorching fire of greed will be refreshed by the pellucid
waters of contentment.
One should have desire only for the path of realisation.
One should not dedicate one?s life for the mean desires of
the world. Dedicate all to the Lord; that is genuine
contentment. That is the result of the acquisition of peace
of mind (santhi), joy (santhosha), and discrimination
(vicharana). Direct visualization of the Lord (sakshathkara)
is also possible then.
To acquire these, remembrance of the Lord?s name
(smarana) and meditation (dhyana) are the only means. Only
they can give you that power. Nowhere else can you get
them, nowhere else will you get them.
More than all, if you possess contentment (santhosha),
the other two will be added to you. Nothing is more
profitable than contentment. It is a treasure richer than the
three worlds. The contented person can experience
indescribable divine glory. Such a person is more joyful
than the owner of the wish-bestowing cow, Kamadhenu,
and the wish-bestowing tree, Kalpataru. Such a person can
immerse himself within himself and discover bliss therein.
Do not strive for physical joy, discarding the more permanent
joy of inner calm and contentment.
Do not get attached to this evanescent body; instead,
utilise it as an implement. Consider yourself as separate from
this destructible body, which was created out of the
conjunction of the five elements. Know yourself as the
indestructible Atma. Just as the house in which you dwell is
separate from you, so the body, which surrounds you for a
little time, is separate. The body is the root cause of all this
grief, all this calamity, and all this slavery. Understand this
well: make the body obey your will, and never bow down
to it and follow its whims. Be prepared to cast it away;
resolve to control it and keep it under strict control. You
have to deal carefully with the body; you have to train it
with great attention.
Though all that was said above related to the Atma,
some activities have to be undertaken by everyone. How
should the body be used as an implement, as a boat for
example, to cross the stream of life? Until the other bank is
reached, or in other words, until the ultimate truth is attained,
you must take care to see that it is not damaged or broken
or leaky. Do not let the boat fall to pieces; be on the lookout
for signs of this. That is to say: take moderate food of pure
(sathwic) quality at the correct time, and continue disciplined
physical activities for the body.
Such activity directed to the spiritual becomes the
discipline needed for real spiritual practice. This is what is
referred to as meditation, remembrance of the name, ritual
worship (puja), and devotional singing. When the discipline
is practised, as well as later, you must be joyful and not
gloomy. This should not be forgotten; never get tired or
timid. However, if you get tired, then you can eat a few
groundnut kernels or almond seeds soaked well in water at
the end of the day?s meditation. These will cool the body
and endow it with strength.
In summary, everyone must develop the virtue of
contentment through the practice of meditation (dhyana
sadhana). Contentment is a pure (sathwic) quality; it will
not transform you into an idler ?no, not at all. Instead, it
will permit the mind to travel towards the Lord, and it will
grant peace. It will also hinder unessential activities that
have profit for oneself as the aim. The contented person
will be fully pure (sathwic) and will lead an inner life, in
communion with the Atma. That person can do any work
without rest and without complaint. The waves of the mind,
which sway in many directions, get a single aim.
The sages (rishis), religious mendicants (bikshus), and
yogis of the past realised the goal of life by means of the
peace that came to them through contentment. Contentment
gives all spiritual aspirants the enthusiasm and vigour
necessary for treading the path that leads to realisation of
God (sakshathkara). Contented, the aspirant can ignore the
dangers and difficulties of the path. The aspirant treats all
the impermanent things of this life as poison and discards
them as trash. Discrimination, renunciation, and the spirit
of inquiry develop through contentment. The story of Meera
is an example of this. Understand well the stories of Radha,
Jayadeva, and Gauranga, for they will teach you the truth.


Chapter XI

Liberation: the Goal of Meditation
The beneficent and maleficent impulses
The fulfilment of the life consists in the realisation
of the Atma (Atma-sakshathkara). To get this
realisation, one should be entirely free from
impulses (vasanas). Liberation (moksha) is, in the true sense
of the term, liberation from the bondage of these impulses.
These tendencies are of two types: beneficent and maleficent.
The beneficent tendencies are saturated with holiness; the
maleficent ones feed the mind and make it more and more
uncontrollable and unsteady; they spread and strengthen the
desire for objective pleasure.
If the beneficent impulses (subha vasanas) are
encouraged and cultivated, they will not go on multiplying
and binding the mind indefinitely; they become fried seeds,
which will not sprout. If you stick to the beneficent impulses,
you can easily acquire knowledge of Brahman (Brahma-
jnana). These impulses are characterised by such activities
as association with great souls (mahatmas), reverence for
the great, conversation with them, following their advice,
charity, fortitude, love, patience, truth, courage, continence,
etc. These are the pure impulses.
The impure tendencies lead one to such vices as craving
to see things that cater to the lower desires (like cinema
pictures); eating dishes that are full of passion (rajas), like
fish and flesh; drinking intoxicants that ruin one?s
personality by developing anger, delusion, greed, conceit,
deceit, hatred, envy, etc.
Such impure tendencies are of three types: Worldly
impulses, scholarly or intellectual impulses, and physical
or bodily impulses. The physical impulses make men desire
a beautiful physique, a strong sturdy build, a glossy skin
that will never be disfigured by wrinkles and round hard
muscles. The scholarly impulses prompt one to crave being
known as an unrivaled expert and to crave the defeat of
every competitor in the field. And lastly, the worldly
impulses make one crave glory, power, personal authority,
and pomp. All such desires can be grouped under this head.
They are all impulses. They bind you to the wheel of birth
and death (samsara) and tie you down to this Earth.
Destroy ignorance
The giant tree called mind has two seeds, impulse
(vasana) and breath (prana). The seed becomes the tree,
the tree yields the seed. The breath moves because of the
impulses; the impulses operate because of the breath. If one
of these is destroyed, so is the other. So, if the mind has to
be free from their influence, ignorance (a-jnana) has to be
transformed first.
Ignorance does not exist alone; it has an offspring:
selfishness (ahamkara). That demon (asura) has two
children, attachment or attraction (raga) and impulse
(vasana); that is to say passion and craving. Passion and
craving are closely interrelated. As the passion, so the desire.
They are sisters.
Through attachment, one gets the feelings of my and
mine, the feelings provoke desire, and desires breed worry.
Therefore, to remove ego (ahamkara), attachment and
impulse have to be annihilated. That means ignorance has
to go, for by that means alone can ego be killed.
How to destroy ignorance and develop wisdom
(sujnana)? That is the question! The answer is through
meditation. The conquest of ignorance, ego, attachment, and
impulse brings about liberation (moksha) for the individual
(jivi).
Uproot the impulses that make up
the mind, and the mind is no more
The one who is a slave to impulses and tendencies
(vasanas) is devoid of wisdom (jnana). That one is, in truth,
a weakling! But let me assure you that there is no cause for
alarm. As soon as impulses are uprooted, that person can
earn back the divine nature that was lost by neglect.
The impulses invade the realm of the heart; they cause
endless trouble. They remind you of pleasures, agitating
the memory of past experiences, and you start craving them
again. The cravings make the senses and their leader, the
mind (manas), engage in brisk activities; there is no escape
for you from this. So you attempt to collect and enjoy the
things that you crave. All this takes place in the twinkling
of an eye, so to say.
The impulses operate so subtly and so powerfully. Just
as the seed contains within itself the trunk, branches, twigs,
leaves, flowers and fruits, so too, all this lies dormant in the
impulse. The impulses are the cause of all the objective
happiness. If they are absent, the mind is pellucid and pure.
If they are present, all purity is ruined; they are obstacles in
the path of truth, of Atma, and of immortality. A mind free
from impulse is transmuted and is no longer mind.
Nature (prakriti) is the world of impulses (vasanas).
The mind is attracted towards nature and the external objects
of the world by means of this tendency for attachment and
starts contemplating on the objects and dwelling on their
qualities because of these impulses. Without impulses, the
mind will not be affected at all by the objective world. The
mind is like a piece of cloth; it takes on any colour with
which it is dyed. Pure (sathwic) impulses make it white,
restless (rajasic) ones change it into red, while ignorant
(thamasic) ones give it a black colour. The mind is shaped
by the type of impulses with which it is filled. One has to
undertake meditation and concentration (dharana) in order
to destroy these impulses. The mind is but a bundle of
impulses.
Success in meditation from uprooting impulses
Some aspirants say to themselves that in spite of many
years of steady practice, they have yet to acquire success in
meditation and concentration. The reason is easy to point
out: they have not been able to uproot the impulses
(vasanas)! Therefore, such practitioners must strive to
conquer their innate tendencies. They must fortify
themselves with greater faith, and act.
The aspirant who is disturbed now and then by impure
impulses must overcome them by will-power and spiritual
exercises. The liberated soul (jivan-muktha) has burned out
impulses, but the householder (grihastha) is cultivating
them. There is no profit in simply controlling them; a cobra
becomes harmless only when its fangs are plucked out;
similarly, their roots must be burned. Then only can the
aspirant attain the Brahman.
Of course, even pure desires are a bond. But they are
not hindrances, however many they may be. A thorn is
removed by another and both are thrown out afterwards,
right? So also, when impure impulses (vasanas) are
overcome through the influence of pure impulses, one has
to outgrow both. This means that even the purest of impulses,
the craving for liberation (moksha), has to disappear in time.
Only then can you become That. A shackle is a shackle,
whether it be of iron or gold. One has to be free from both.
That is to say, one should attain a stage when neither good
nor bad will attract or repel.
Anyone aiming at the realisation of God should practise
the diminishing of impulses, the curbing of the mind, and
the understanding of the fundamental principle. One of these
is not enough for liberation (moksha). In the liberated soul
(jivanmuktha), impulses persist, but only as fried seeds. They
will not cause further births.
The Atma is free of everything
See, the subtle body is the seat of ignorance (a-jnani).
It is saturated with impulses and traditions and experiences.
The Atma is free from all these. It is ever pure. It belongs to
neither sex and has no mind, no senses, no form. Not only
that; It has no breath (prana), even! It cannot be said to be
alive or dead. How can contemplation on such an Atma be
anything other than pure? How can light and darkness co-
exist? How can purity and impurity co-exist?
Of all the workshops in the world, the workshop of
the body is the most wonderful, because it is the tabernacle
of the Lord. In such a factory, the impulses are sublimated
into vows, the impurities are weeded out, beneficent desires
are shaped, and good imaginings are brought about. The
main aim is the uprooting of impulse, though this is a
difficult task.
Mountains can be swept away sooner than these
deeprooted impulses (vasanas). But with will-power and
zest, supported by faith, they can be overcome in a short
time. Just do not give up your determination and faith,
whatever the loss, hardship, or obstacle. Remember, the
impulses overpower you and keep you down as their slave.
Opium and brandy enslave you and hold you in their full
grip only for some time, but impulses grip you for a whole
lifetime! The entire meaning and purpose of meditation is
to attain freedom from these mighty and manifold impulses.


Chapter XII

Do not Be a Slave to Impulses
Those guided by impulses and instincts wander
about the world like drunkards, devoid of
discrimination between right and wrong, true
and false. The overpowering influence of these animal
impulses makes them forget the dire consequences of
yielding to them. They have no shame or fear; instead, they
simply revel in the search for worldly pleasures, in the
accumulation of comforts, and in the sheer enjoyment of
luxuries. For those plunged in these impulses, the intellect
is a useless, functionless possession. By constant pursuit of
sensory pleasures, the impulses become hardened, and they
strike deeper and stronger roots.
That is why the advice has been given in the Githa to
give up the fruit of one?s actions. The impulses become
stronger because the fruits are always kept in mind whenever
actions are performed. This makes people proud and
conceited, and they try to thrust their pride in the faces of
others. The impulses enslave them, and under their influence
they stoop even to the lowest type of wrongdoing in order
to get rich and earn the money needed to satisfy them. They
start worshipping mammon as their God. Of course, riches
are essential, but surplus riches, riches that give worry,
anxiety, and pain are not desirable at all. One should not
seek to acquire riches to that extent.
Besides, people strive to earn the praise of others and
avoid being blamed by others. This too is to be classed as
an impure (malina) impulse.
Seeking praise and blaming others are impulses
The world is a nest of crows; some caw in praise, some
caw in derision. But you should be above the reach of praise
and blame. Make light of praise; treat it as something spat
out by others. Then only can you be free and enjoy real
happiness. About blame: See how the world has not allowed
even Rama, Krishna, Vishnu, Siva, and Baba to escape from
its tendency to blame! People talk ill even of the gods,
imputing to those perfect beings evil motives and actions!
From foul-minded people such as these, can any
consideration be expected towards mere ?man?? Any excuse
is enough for them. The white hates the black; the black
hates the white. The Shaivite scandalises the Vaishnavite,
and the Vaishnavite spreads stories about the Shaivite.
Everyone loves his own religion, his own native place and
himself; he loves his own methods of worship and forms
and ceremonies. This love takes the form of praise of one?s
own creed and blame of the other?s faith. Though all this is
related to one?s relationship with God, such impulses are
and must be classed under impure (malina) impulses.
Such mean attitudes, saturated with ignorance, have
to be removed by repetition of the name and meditation
that fill the heart with broad and universal Atmic wisdom.
Then the limited impulses will be transformed and
transmuted into holy impulses and will vanish.
It is indeed a wonder why people fail to put forth all
effort to remove the impure impulses, for by following their
path they get only pain, sorrow, and agony! The deluding
effect of these instincts and impulses makes them believe
and feel that they are on the correct path towards the goal
of happiness. That is why they are reluctant to give them
up, that explains why they hold on to them so fast. If they
read some good books about the supreme Atma, the brain
could be brightened. They could at least grasp the essence
of the scriptures (sastras).
Mere reading without practice is impure
The number of scriptures are countless. Time is too
short to study all of them, and the obstacles in the path of
understanding them are also too many. Of what use is it to
pore over silly books or jaw-breaking scriptures or to learn
about modes of devotion that are not put into action? It is
all wasteful effort. Spending all the time in study, apart from
practice, also deserves to be condemned as an impure
impulse (malina vasana).
Listen! Bharadwaja studied the Vedas for three
successive lives. When born a fourth time, he started reading
again! So Indra came to him and taught him the supreme
knowledge of Brahman (Brahma-vidya) and confided to him
the secret of liberation. Then Bharadwaja put an end to his
reading and study and entered upon hard, concentrated
meditation. He realised the Atma..
Study is a purposeless exercise if the essence is not
imbibed and practised. The greed to read about all kinds of
subjects and topics is itself not a very healthy impulse.
Once upon a time, Durvasa, the saint, reached the
presence of Siva with a cartload of religious books. Narada
then compared him to the proverbial donkey, for too much
attachment to books is itself an undesirable habit:
Though one carries the burden of a multitude of books
concerning all branches of knowledge, and though one
might have read all of them, the teaching contained in them
cannot be grasped at all without actual practical experience.
Mere pride in learning is itself an impure impulse (malina
vasana), the impulse of greed.
When Durvasa heard such words of advice, he was
enlightened; he immediately threw all the bundles into the
sea and plunged into deep meditation. See how the sages
feel that meditation is all-important for attaining full
knowledge!
It is impossible to know the truth of the Atma through
the study of manifold scriptures (sastras), by the acquisition
of scholarship, by the sharpening of the intellect, or by the
pursuit of dialectical discussions. It cannot be realised by
these means. Swethakethu, the son of Uddalaka, was a great
pundit. One day, the father asked the son, ?Swethakethu,
have you understood that scripture whose understanding
allowed all scriptures to be understood?? The son replied
that he didn?t know of such a scripture and had not learned
it. Then Uddalaka taught him the unequalled scripture of
knowledge of Brahman (Brahmavidya), which grants one
the knowledge of the truth of the Atma.
Master the wayward mind through meditation
Hence, one should first grasp clearly the habits and
mannerisms of one?s mind and its tendencies and attitudes.
Then only can he control it, gain mastery over it, and purify
and develop memory, will, and imagination.
Waywardness is the natural characteristic of the mind.
It is like the wind. That is why Arjuna described it to Krishna
thus:
O Krishna, the mind is very wayward.
It moves very fast.
It is very powerful.
It is very difficult to bring it under control.
Chanchalam hi manah Krishna
Pramaathi balavath dhridham
Thasyaaham nigraham manye
Vaayoriva sudhushkaram.
Krishna replied, ?Arjuna, no doubt what you said is
correct. But by uninterrupted attention and discipline, and
by the practice of renunciation, it is possible to control it.
Hence, practise meditation as a first step.?
Impulses and desires have to be suppressed in order to
get mastery over the mind. Desires excite the mind and make
it rush towards the senses, as a dog runs behind its master.
The individual (jiva), poor thing, falls into the meshes of
illusion (maya) produced by the illusion-creating senses and
the pleasure-pursuing mind! To escape all this agony, one
should have recourse to meditation, freed from the clutches
of desires and slavery to the senses. Do repetition of the
name and meditation. Then you can also cultivate and
develop your will, memory, and imagination along proper
lines. Without meditation, it is not possible to control and
master the mind. All other methods are as useless as the
attempt to bind a wild elephant in rut by means of a thin
and tiny thread! Meditation is essential to immerse the mind
in the Atma.
Do not lose heart, but keep up the practice
Therefore, first free yourself from the bondage to
desire. Some students and householders reserve a few wants
and desires for their private satisfaction while giving up the
rest. Even householders who are engaged in concentration
(dharana) and the like find it difficult to give up certain
desires. They retain them for their secret satisfaction. So,
their energies get spent and they achieve little progress in
the spiritual discipline in which they are engaged. These
aspirants slide down the ladder they climbed so laboriously.
To gain control over such unsteadiness, meditation is of
great help. It is not enough if one sense is conquered; all
should be mastered, from all sides. Of course, this is a very
hard task; you might feel like giving up the entire struggle.
But never lose heart. Be patient and persevering, and final
success will be yours. Only, you should not, like some
spiritual aspirants, stray from the path of discipline as soon
as you feel you are not succeeding as much as you hoped.
That is not the road to victory. Persevere, be patient, and
earn victory in the end.


Chapter XIII

Developing One-pointedness
The wayward mind wanders hither and thither,
but it is possible to fasten it on one fixed point
by means of steady discipline and persistent
training in spiritual discipline. This condition is called one-
pointedness (ekagratha). It is also referred to as single-
mindedness (dharana). The uninterrupted flow of oil from
one vessel to another is a fine symbol of the mental process
called single-mindedness.
For novices in spiritual practice, concentration appears
to be very difficult to attain because, after some progress is
won, they do not usually keep up the practice. Instead, they
give it up; even though they do not have peace of mind on
days when they desist from spiritual practice.
Concentration endows one with divine joy, wisdom
beyond measure, inner vision, insight into the deeper truths,
clearer understanding, and unison with the Godhead. This
science of spiritual discipline (sadhana) is more wonderful
than the three worlds!
Monkey meditation:
harmful to spiritual progress
The mind plans and executes innumerable deeds and
roams over vast expanses, all in the twinkling of an eye! It
operates with unimaginable speed. It conceives an object
and dallies with it a little, but it soon discards it for another
more attractive object towards which it flees and about
which it begins to worry!
The spiritual aspirant (sadhaka) has to be ever watchful
of this tendency of the mind. When the mind flits from object
to object, it must be brought back to the right path and the
right object. That is the correct spiritual practice, the path
of concentration and meditation. If, however, the aspirant
does not struggle to achieve this one-pointedness but leaves
the mind to itself, following its vagaries from this to that
and that to this, the process deserves to be called monkey-
meditation (markata dhyana) ?a type of meditation that is
indeed very harmful to spiritual progress.
Force the mind to be one-pointed
In short, the chief purpose of concentration and
meditation is to minimise the travels of the mind and force
it to stay in one place. Holding it on that fixed stage, one
should continue the spiritual practice for a long time. Then
there is no limit to the peace and joy that one can have. For
example, when you meditate on a table, your thoughts dwell
on the wood, the size and measurements, the style, the mode
of manufacture, etc. No other thought pertaining to anything
else should be allowed. If the thought hovers round a cot,
the idea of a table becomes hazy, and the cot is also imagined
incompletely. Both get confused. The state of mind must be
single-pointed. So too, when the Lord?s form is meditated
upon, the mind must dwell upon the form of each part and
its beauty and splendour, and these ideas must be
coordinated and combined into the complete picture.
That is the modus operandi of meditation. Persistent
performance of this meditation will result in the emergence
of a particular form. Contemplating on that form, looking
at it and seeing it for days and days, finally a stage will be
reached when the form will disappear and you will forget
yourself. That is the super-conscious (samadhi) stage. In
that stage, if one feeling or ideation alone persists, it is called
the superconscious state with ideation (savikalpa-samadhi).
If no feeling or thought persists, it becomes what Patanjali,
in the text on raja-yoga (Rajayoga- sastra), designated as
the end of ideation (bhava-nasana).
While doing meditation the mind should not be allowed
to wander away from the target. Whenever it flies off at a
tangent, it must be led back to the form meditated upon.
Finally, if you so desire, all things can be subsumed in that
form itself. Nevertheless, only one form has to be meditated
upon in the beginning. You should not change daily from
one to another. Again, during the spiritual practice, you
should not indulge in thoughts about things you do not like,
that cause pain, or that shake your faith. If any such peep
in, learn gradually to welcome them as beneficial and seek
to grasp the good in them, instead of the bad.
The inert mind reflects the intelligence
Of course, the mind is inert (jada). Just as when water,
inert matter, begins to shine when it is placed in the sun, the
inert mind borrows effulgence from the Atma and appears
as if it has consciousness (Chaithanya). The intellect
(buddhi) gets reflected in the mind, so it looks as if the
mind is also intelligent, that is all. Its real nature is ignorance.
The mind is not self-effulgent, like the Atma. The mind?s
splendour is as the luminousness of insects in the rainy
season. The Atma, however, is the sun of suns, the effulgence
of effulgences, the Supreme Light (Paramjyothi), the self-
effulgent (swayam-jyothi).
Control the senses as well as the mind
The senses can do nothing by themselves. They are
not independent. If the mind is brought under control, the
senses can also be controlled. Some people undergo mere
asceticism of the senses in order to control the mind! They
are ignorant of the real discipline that is necessary. The real
discipline is the destruction of desire.
However vigilant warders may be, a clever robber can
still steal in a hundred amazing ways. So too, however
skillfully you may try to control the senses, the mind will
drag them to its side and execute its desires through them.
Note how the sage Viswamitra, in spite of his austerities,
fell before the wiles of the celestial nymphs (apsaras) sent
by Indra to tempt him.
If only the outer door is closed and the inner door is
left unbolted, calamity is certain. But if both the exterior
and the interior doors are safely bolted, you can sleep
peacefully, for no thief, however clever, will find it easy to
enter and do harm. Therefore, the aspirant should establish
mastery over the external senses. Then, the mind, immersed
in the continuous succession of subject-object (vishaya)
relationship, has to be controlled by means of peace (santhi)
and renunciation (vairagya). When that is done, one can
experience real spiritual bliss (ananda) and visualise the
Atma, in its real form. That is why Krishna once told Arjuna,
?Those who aspire to have mastery over the senses must
have full faith in Me.?
The senses are always extrovert in nature; they are
greedy for external contacts. Therefore, they drag the
ignorant perpetually towards external objects. So the
spiritual aspirant, endowed with discrimination and
renunciation, must place obstacles in their outward path and
suppress their outbursts, just as the charioteer, wielding the
whip and the reins, does to the raging steeds. Uncontrolled
senses cause great harm. People in their grip cannot engage
themselves in meditation, even for a single second.
Cultivate good habits before concentration
Form (rupa) is fundamental for concentration and
meditation. Even in the absence of the form in front of you,
you should have the capacity to visualise it. This is not so
difficult for those whose concentration is correct. But some
practise concentration without first cultivating good habits
and right conduct. That is a sign of incomplete knowledge.
Concentration must have the pure qualities (sathwa-gunas)
as the basis. The mind has to be purified by proper treatment
of the character through good habits. Concentration has to
follow this purification process, not precede it. All effort
for concentration without cleansing the mind is a sheer waste
of time. Many great men have ruined their careers by
aspiring early for concentration, without the discipline of
good habits.
Make slow but steady progress
Again, in concentration you must be careful not to have
as the object something your mind does not like, for however
hard you try, your mind will not stay on it. Therefore, in the
beginning, have some object that is a source of joy.
Sit in the lotus (padmasana) pose and fix your eyes on
the tip of your nose. In the beginning, for a minute; then for
three minutes; some days later, for six; and after some time,
for as long as nine minutes. Thus, the concentration has to
be strengthened gradually, without undue hurry. In this way,
it can be held for even half an hour, with the lapse of time.
But do not force the pace. Slowly and steadily, the discipline
must be developed.
With practice, the mind will get fixed and the power
of concentration will increase. To attain concentration and
acquire one-pointedness, you must undergo exertion to some
extent. You must fasten your mind on the Lord and keep off
all other thoughts from the mental plane. By constant
exercise of this type, your vision will be firmly fixed on the
Lord residing in your heart. That is, verily, the goal; the full
fruition of meditation.
Concentration, according to yoga scriptures, is the
fixing of the mind on one object, without any deviation.
Concentration alone can make meditation successful. Its
very nature is one-pointedness; its power will negate
hesitation. It is caused by spiritual bliss. The name is
essential for meditation, for that alone can insure quick
success. Even if complete faith is not forthcoming quickly,
the practice must not be given up or changed, for practice
will certainly yield victory. Meditation is spiritual strength,
the strength that will keep off the disease of worldliness
(samsara).


Chapter XIV

Remove Defects in Character
But you should avoid the difficult obstacles in
the path of meditation, viz. anger, pride,
conceit, the tendency to discover the faults of
others, mischief, etc. These operate even subconsciously,
as the currents in the depths of the ocean.
Spiritual aspirants (sadhakas) must be vigilant not to
lose their temper on even small things, for that will block
their progress. They must cultivate love towards all, and
meekness. Then, undesirable habits will fall away from
them, since anger is the parent of all wrong behaviour. Anger
can turn any person into bad ways, any moment, and in any
form. So it should be sublimated first by systematic effort.
Spiritual aspirants must welcome gladly the
announcement of their defects by anyone; indeed, they must
be grateful to those who point them out. Aspirants must
never entertain hatred against them, for that is as bad as
hating the ?good?. The ?good? has to be loved and the ?bad?
discarded. Remember, the ?bad? should not be hated. It has
to be given up, avoided. Only people who can do this can
achieve progress in meditation and spiritual wisdom.
Conceit, jealousy, the passionate (rajasic) exhibition
of one?s superiority, anger, the craving to inform oneself of
the weakness of others and their failings, trickery ?all these
are obstacles in the path of meditation. Even if these are not
patently exhibited, the inner impulses urging one along these
wrong directions are latent in the mind.
Just as a room kept closed for a long time is found
dustridden and foul-smelling, is opened, cleaned, and made
habitable by elaborate sweeping and dusting, so the mind
has to be cleaned by meditation. Spiritual aspirants must,
by inward observation, examine the mind and its contents
and condition. By proper disciplinary habits, the
accumulated dirt should be removed little by little,
systematically. Conceit, for example, is deep-rooted and
unyielding. In the passionate (rajasic) mind, it puts forth
many branches in all directions and spreads everywhere. It
might appear to be dry and dead for some time, but it will
sprout again, easily. As soon as a chance arises for its
exhibition, it will raise its hood. So, spiritual aspirants have
to be ever vigilant.
With regard to anger, spiritual aspirants have to be
vigilant even about the most minor matters that might
provoke them, because if they are careless, they cannot
progress in the least. Such people must cultivate a humble,
loving spirit. Then the bad traits will disappear. Some
aspirants become very angry when someone discovers and
announces to them the bad traits they possess. This makes
matters worse!
Eliminate pride
Aspirants must always have the inward look; if they
allow the mind to wander outward, they cannot identify their
own faults. Pride prevents the inward look and confuses
the examination of the mind. When aspirants want to achieve
success, they must bow down to those who point out their
faults. That is the way to progress quickly and fast in the
path of meditation. And they must endeavour not to entertain
the faults any longer.
It is hard to get rid of pride and self-love or ego
(ahamkara), for everyone has been shaping this life from
the beginningless period of time! Each has been allowing
his mind to flow in the direction it likes for ages past. So it
is very difficult now to turn it from its accustomed path and
bend its steps in another direction.
Individuals full of I (aham) love to exercise authority
over others. They will not agree with others that it is
?bondage?, for the arguments of others are not advanced
by them! They see everything through glasses coloured by
the smoke of selfishness and self-love. ?My words are true.?
?My opinion is correct.? ?My deeds are right.? Thus they
feel and thus they spend their days. Such behaviour is very
harmful for spiritual aspirants. They must look forward
eagerly to any helpful criticism or suggestion or advice,
from whatever quarter.
Besides, aspirants must minimise all discussion and
argumentation, for this breeds a spirit of rivalry and leads
one on to angry reprisals and vengeful fighting. Do not
struggle to earn the esteem of the world. Do not feel
humiliated or angry when the world does not recognise you
or your merits. Learn this first and foremost if you are an
aspirant for spiritual success. Do not become happy when
you are being praised; therein lies a deadly trap, which might
even lead you astray and endanger your progress.
Thus, you must reform your mental traits and habits.
Cultivate the habit of never causing pain to others. Try to
understand others and sympathise with them and do things
that will be helpful. Train yourself to take insult and criticism
as ?decorations? awarded to you. Struggle hard to be friendly
with everyone, whatever their nature or conduct. A sense
of joy is necessary for meditation and concentration to
progress, but many things deprive you of the atmosphere of
joy. So you must pray sincerely, in order to be free from
such obstacles. The recital or repetition of mantras will be
of great help.
Follow Krishna?s advice and meditate
In the third age of humans (the Dwapara-yuga),
Krishna said,
When you start fixing your thoughts on Me, all
thoughts that agitate you will be stilled through
My grace.
Mathchiththah sarva dhurgani math-
prasaadhaath tharishyathi.
This discipline of meditation must be rigorously
followed. In fact, dhyana (meditation) means ?discipline?.
Discipline, regularity, steadiness ?these are the essentials
of meditation. A spiritual aspirant who keeps these things
in view can achieve quick results. Meditation is a firstclass
cure for the illness of worldly existence (bhava-roga). Along
with it, another drug must also be taken; its name is
contentment. If there is contentment in the mind, one enjoys
an endless festival. Craving makes the mind waver; it is an
all-consuming fire that will destroy people slowly and surely.
The royal road to meditation is contentment. Just as a
traveller who has trudged along for miles in the scorching
sun feels refreshed when taking a bath in the limpid waters
of a cool and shady lake, so too the unfortunate individual
struggling in the scorching heat of desires feels happy and
relieved when bathing in the lake of contentment.
The three guards:
peace, contentment, discrimination
At the gates of liberation (moksha) and Self-realisation
(sakshathkara), three guards are posted to ask you for your
credentials. They are peace or mental equilibrium, joy or
contentment, and inquiry or discrimination (santhi,
santhosha, and vichara). Even if one of the guards is made
to become friendly, the others will facilitate your entry. First
in the series is peace. If you make peace yours, contentment
(thrupthi) is yours, and contentment is the highest source
of joy and the most valuable possession. It is as much as an
empire.
Without contentment, desire (kama) and greed (lobha)
attain dangerous proportions and will overwhelm the power
of discrimination itself. Desire easily becomes greed, and
greed degenerates into miserliness and lust, which make
you flit from object to object in mad pursuit of the evanescent
sensual joy. How can people with such qualities develop
the faculty of concentration? And without the capacity to
concentrate, how can they engage in meditation? And
without meditation, no one can get Godhead (Daivam).
Advise the mind that flows so swiftly in so many
directions: ?Oh mind, do not drag me along the floods of
objects, along the path of sensual desires, and spoil my
career. Instead, take me to the Lord. Flow in that direction,
please.? Giving up all other desires and being ever content,
dwell on His name and His form only, to the exclusion of
everything else. Meditation on the name and form is real
peace (santhi), genuine contentment (santhosha).
Contentment will not make anyone an idler, remember.
It is an attribute of true pure (sathwic) character. It will make
the mind turn always towards the Lord. It will save you
from the tribulation to satisfy the unimportant wants and to
cater to selfish needs. It will direct human talents towards
efforts that elevate. The contented person will also be
truthful and will therefore be in constant communion with
the Atma. That is to say, the contented person can be
immersed in meditation for long periods without rest or the
feeling of tiredness. Meditation is the only method of
counteracting the mental activities that surge forward in a
thousand directions; there is no other method at all.
Be comfortable in all environments
The capacity to concentrate is a very useful
qualification. You must watch the vagaries of your own mind
?how it travels, what objects it runs after, etc.? and,
slowly, by means of meditation, you should teach it to stay
still and to behave beneficially.
Do not worry about the unsatisfactory environment you
may have. Of course, the place may have some drawbacks
and it may not be ideal. But it is no use trying to run away
from all that. You can overcome the drawbacks by training
your own mind. Stay in your environment and pray to the
Lord! Pray that He may fill you with His thoughts and His
vision, making you ignore the defects of the environment.
Do not seek comfort, for comfort might not be conducive
to meditation. Learn to be comfortable in any place; that is
better. Live in joy wherever you are; that is the way. Revel
in the realm of your mind; worship in the mind the Lord
you have chosen as your goal and be free of all the defects
of the natural or human environment! Then, no spot can be
irksome to you, nor will any place seem disgusting.
Concluding admonitions
Pride is an insidious vice, so at the slightest inkling of
the disease, try your best to eradicate it by retiring into a
lonely spot and engaging yourself in meditation. Delay is
dangerous. ?Even divine nectar (amritha) becomes a poison
if the dose is delayed,? says the proverb. Remember this
and act swiftly. Meditation stills the agitated mind and makes
it clear and full of joy.
Many in this world, even among the learned, do not
spend their allotted span of life in the pursuit of certain
selected ideals. Hence, their earthly careers are like the
voyage of a storm-tossed ship that has lost both its anchor
and its compass and is caught in mid-ocean. They are torn
between opposing ideals and goals; they listen to diverse
appeals; and their lives end in waste and failure, for they
say one thing and do another in their ignorance and fear.
Meditation gives them fixity of purpose, courage, and also
wisdom.
The feelings that arise in the mind, which are classified
as serene, restless, and ignorant (sathwic, rajasic, and
thamasic), also have to be watched and cleansed. The
restlessness and ignorance have to be uprooted. Meditation
is the weapon for this task.
The path of meditation (dhyana-marga) will destroy
ignorance (a-jnana), and it will grant the individual union
with the Godhead (Brahmaikyatha).