Advice to Seekers
The following article is from a discourse by Bhagavan Baba on the occasion of Good Friday in 1975. He says that the first step to self-realization is self-confidence, which we all have to develop in order to reach the goal.
If somebody says Sai Baba’s powers have been given to him, then we run to him. Sai Baba’s powers are such that they are not given to anybody else. Nobody has the ability to take powers from Sai Baba, or the ability to give them to someone else. Sai Baba’s powers are not given like that, and you should not be led away by such statements. Each one’s power is within him; it is not possible to give such power to another person.
By allowing a weak mind to get control over us in this manner, if we begin running from place to place, when are we going to get strength of mind and control our own mind? We must be able to follow one thought, one path. One does not have to search for spiritual power, going around the world and spending a lot of money. Be in your own house, develop it in yourself; such spiritual power is in you! You don’t have to run for it here and there.
God is not external; God is not outside you; God is inside you. You are not a man, you are God yourself. You are not one person, but three: the one you think you are (physical); the one others think you are (mental); and the one you really are—that is God. Don’t be under the delusion that God is some-where and you have to search for Him. God is in you; when you are able to realize that, and when you are able to develop the spiritual power from within you, then you will see God. You are moving in the path of worldly consciousness; you are not taking the path of super-consciousness. When you take the path of super-consciousness, you will get realization, and you will be able to see the truth.
The first thing you have to do is develop self-confidence. It is people who have no confidence in their own self that begin to wander about and waver and take to different paths. When you take your body to various places, and when you go about moving aimlessly, the mind also goes to different places. The first thing is to steady your physical body. If the body is moving all the time, then the mind is also moving. If you have a container filled with water, if the container is continually moving, then the contents will continually be moving. So in this context, we should not keep moving our body and our limbs in an aimless manner; this is a very essential part of our practice of meditation. We should sit quiet, and the body should be steady.
Why do we ask people to sit straight and to sit quiet in meditation? Because when the body is straight and quiet, the mind inside is also straight and quiet. If you cannot control your body, how can you control your mind? The first thing is to control your body by having all the limbs and body organs in a steady manner. The basis for the mind wandering is that your physical body is also continually wandering. So the first thing you have to do is it to give up this continual wandering of the physical body.
Many people think that concentration is the same thing as meditation, but there is no such connection between concentration and meditation. Concentration is something that is below your senses, whereas meditation is something that is above your senses. But many are under the false impression that concentration is identical with meditation, and they take to a wrong path. Concentration is something that we use involuntarily in our daily normal, routine life.
For example, I am now reading the newspaper. My eyes are looking at the letters. My hand is holding the paper. My intelligence is thinking now. Mind is also thinking. Thus, when the eyes are doing their work, the hand is doing its work. When the intelligence is doing its work, the mind is also doing its work, and there is the coordinated action of the mind, intelligence, hand, and eyes, I am able to get the contents of the newspaper. It means that if I want to get at the matter contained in the news-paper, all these enumerated senses are concentrated; and they are all coordinated and working on the newspaper.
If one wants to drive a car, unless one has concentration, one cannot drive a car on the road. All the normal routines, like walking, talking, reading, writing, eating, we do only as result of concentration. If such concentration is part and parcel of your daily life, than what is it that we practice to get concentration?
We have to practice something beyond these normal senses. We must rise from being below the senses (that is the state of concentration) to the senses (that is the middle position called contemplation); and from there we must rise above the senses—that is called meditation. Between concentration and meditation there is a border area that covers both and that is the area of contemplation. To be in that area of contemplation is to free yourself of worldly attachments. If you break away all the worldly attachments, all the routine attachments in the world, then you will enter the region of contemplation. When you have completely broken away all your attachments, you break through this area of contemplation and you get into the area of meditation.
These steps can also be described as starting from self-confidence, then getting self-satisfaction, then self-sacrifice, and the last step is self-realization. The ultimate step of self-realization depends upon the base of self-confidence. You must therefore develop as a first step confidence in your own self. Without having and developing confidence in your own self, if all the time you talk of some power being with someone and some other power being with someone else, if you thus travel all the time and depend upon power that is with someone else, when are you going to acquire any power and confidence in your own self.
Peace and bliss are within you, they are not something external to you. You may think of going to the Himalayas for getting peace. Yes, your body may go to the Himalayas for getting peace, but your mind may be left behind in the city. How are you going to get peace? You have brought your body to India; but still, if you have the same habits that you are used to in America, what is the use of bringing the body to India? Body is not the essential thing.
The transformation should come in your mind; the change should come in your mind. Many people collect a lot of information, they take a lot of information, but they do not use it to bring about a transformation of their own self. Information is useless, but the transformation in you is important. You can go on mentioning the names of many eatables. Are you going to relieve your hunger in this way? But even if you actually eat one thing only in practice, you are going to relieve your hunger. Therefore, instead of saying so many things in your talk or in your speech—all that is simply book knowledge, if you are able to put into practice one of the things you say, that is going to be useful.
Source: Sanathana Sarathi, Sept. 1975
