Ask the Right Question
In a straight talk four decades back, Bhagavan Sri Sathya Sai emphasizes the need for authentic fervor, strict discipline, and one-pointed focus as key to gaining His grace.
This is a twice‑blessed day, for it is a Thursday, otherwise called Guruvaar (the day of the preceptor or guru). It is also the day on which centuries ago the Bhagavad Gita was taught to Arjuna [a close devotee of the Avatar] by Krishna, the day when man got from God the key for his progress from falsehood and delusion into the light of his own inner reality. Arjuna was directed to engage in battle, win back his share of his lost kingdom, and ensure a righteous administration and atmosphere wherein they [his subjects] can successfully strive to attain salvation. Arjuna had to do all this in a spirit of dedication and surrender to the will of God, irrespective of his own likes and dislikes and the consequences that might flow from his unselfish activities.
Therefore, the Gita advises that service to society is the highest seva (service), as well as the most beneficial sadhana (spiritual discipline). You cannot run away from this obligation; you have to use the community of men wherein you are born for sublimating your egoism and saving yourself.
Seva taken up as sadhana teaches sahana (fortitude). Even Avatars (divine advents) demonstrate in their lives, the supreme importance of seva. When Dharmaraja [the eldest of Pandavas] performed the great Rajasuya yagnaˆ[a sacrifice performed by a monarch as a mark of his subduing all other kings] as per the advice of the sage Narada [the leading celestial devotee], in order to propitiate his deceased father, Lord Krishna attended the sacrifice and asked to be allotted some service. He preferred the service of removing the leaves on which food was served for the thousands who were fed every day! Since service was so dear to Him, He was revered as the Kingmaker of the Age, the Lawgiver for all.
Avoid lower desires
Today being Vaikunta Ekadasi [a holy Hindu day], many of you are yearning to get amrita (nectar) from Me. But of what benefit is it merely to swallow a few drops of nectar created by Me? It is when the satwic (good) quality wins and subdues the rajasic and the tamasic (passionate and ignorant) qualities in the battles between them that go on in every heart, that amrita arises therein! The amrita that confers immortality is the amrita that one wins through one’s own sadhana. One word that is used in dhyana (meditation) is urdhwa‑drishti (upward vision) to indicate an exercise in which the two eyes are directed together upward to a point between the eyebrows. Urdhwa means upward and drishti means look; so the word means not a physical exercise, but a general full-time effort of the mind to avoid lower desires, and to uplift itself to higher values. Such an effort will win amrita; it will flow from the spring of the heart.
Amrita means immortal; it does not follow that he who takes in amrita will live eternally. Even Avatars (Divine incarnations) cast off the body when their task is accomplished. It simply means fixing the mind on the reality, becoming aware of the imperishable entity that one is, and merging the consciousness in it. Look at the rakshasas (demons): Ravana and Kumbhakarna [the demonic king of Lanka and his brother] went through extreme austerities for thousands of years. God manifested Himself before them and granted them the boons they prayed for. But since the austerity did not win for them purity and cleanliness, virtue and humility, they continued as ever as monsters of violence and wickedness. They had no trace of the satwic (poised state) in their make‑up. They had the grace of God in such a large measure; God appeared, inquired, and granted. But they behaved even worse than before. They denied the grace they won by the way they acted.
Be fixed in faith
So, too, if amrita is given, one has to live up to that status – the status of having acquired the grace of God. Vasishta [the spiritual teacher of Lord Rama and his ancestor, Raghu] commissioned Raghu, the emperor, to tend his cow, the celestial Kamadhenu. Since it was an order that emanated from his spiritual preceptor, Raghu himself took up that task and led the cow into the pastures. One day, when a lion threatened to pounce upon Kamadhenu and insisted that she must be given to him for his lunch, Raghu offered his own body instead. That is how one has to live up to the assigned task.
When you are raised to the status of those who receive the amrita, you must eschew evil, and be fixed in faith. I have no intention to create and give amrita on this Vaikuntha Ekadashi day for no one walks on the path I have chalked out, and no one feels bound by the advice I give. Your enthusiasm is short lived; and your resolution to follow My instructions evaporates quickly. As boiling milk rises, overflows, and becomes still, devotion develops and dies soon. It does not stay unshaken.
Today, in certain Vishnu temples, a special door called the Vaikuntha‑dwara is opened, and people can pass through it into the Presence. Vaikuntha‑dwara is the gate to heaven, that is to say, the gateway to self‑realization. The gateway to that heaven is not to be found only there; it will open right in front of you, wherever you are. Knock and it will open.
Sympathise with the distressed
Vishnu means sarva-vyapi (He who is everywhere). So, His residence, Vaikuntha (heaven), must be everywhere. You can gain entry by knocking with the correct password on your lips. Your heart can become Vaikuntha if you but cleanse it, purify it, and allow God to manifest in it. Vaikuntha means “the place where there is no shadow of grief.” When God manifests in your heart, all is full and free.
The cow transforms grass and gruel into sweet, strength-giving milk, and it gives it away in plenty to its master. Develop that quality, that power to transform the food you consume into sweet thoughts, words, and deeds of sympathy for all. The child Krishna wept for permission to go along with the cows to the fields of pasture. Yashoda [His mother] said, “Dear child! Your tiny silken soles cannot walk along those thorny, pebble‑filled tracks. I shall get nice little sandals for you. You can go after the sandals are ready.” But Krishna prattled back, “The cows whom we serve are not shod. Why should we who are their servants avoid the thorns and stones that they cannot avoid?” No wonder the cows and calves of Gokula [the birth place of Lord Krishna] were immobilized and wept when Krishna left for Mathura [a city nearby].
When you have filled your heart with sympathy for the distressed, the Lord will shower His grace. Draupadi [the wife of the Pandava brothers] had earned that grace through her devotion and virtues. Sita [Lord Rama’s wife], too, stuck to the highest ideal of life despite the severe sufferings she underwent. Hanuman [monkey-devotee of Lord Rama] who discovered her [Sita] in the grove where her abductor kept her as a prisoner, offered to re-cross the ocean with her on his shoulders and take her safely to her Lord Rama. But she replied that she would not allow herself to be abducted back from the custody of Ravana since that would deprive Rama of the chance to punish the abductor for his crime and retrieve her through His own heroism. Splendid words these, and quite in consonance with the dictates of dharma [right action]! It is no wonder that the Lord’s grace saved her in good time. If you have no steadfastness and no depth of faith, you can have no grace.
Serve all as brothers & sisters
This warning itself is the amritam for you today, for harsh words provoke bitterness. Endeavor to earn grace by observing the discipline that I am keen you should follow. Give up the old worldly ways of earning and spending, saving and accumulating, with greed, lust, malice, and pride. So rearrange your lives that I will be pleased with you. Do not waste time in idle gossip; talk softly; talk as little as possible; talk sweet; serve all as brothers and sisters, with adoration to the Sai in them. Engage in sadhana; move forward step by step as befits persons striving to realize their own liberation. Ask Me about steps in spiritual discipline instead of fulfilling petty, trivial, and binding desires. The time is fast coming when the whole world will gather here, and you will have to struggle from miles afar even to get My darshan [sight of a holy being].
Source: Sathya Sai Speaks, Vol. 8
