The Flowers that God Loves

In this discourse, Bhagavan Sri Sathya Sai Baba says, “This creation is like the bridge that connects man with God. ‘I’ is one hill. ‘God’ is another hill. The bridge between the two is the aspect of creation. If you break and destroy the bridge, you can never reach the destination.”

Citizens of Bharath [India] generally worship God with flowers, offer puja (ritual adoration) and make obeisance to God. But there is something that is more sacred than this. There is a distinctive type of devotion where you worship God with a good clean mind and good conduct. This has been given the name of para–bhakti. Worshiping God with puja and flowers, the sadhaka (spiritual aspirant) remains stationary in his place. While this is somewhat good, failing to rise to a higher position is not good. A superior type of worship involves adoring God through good qualities, conduct, thoughts, and company. The Shrutis (Hindu scriptures) have described this as worship through good qualities. What kind of good qualities please God?

Eight flowers with which we can worship God are: ahimsa [non-violence]; dama (control of senses); daya (compassion); kshama (forbearance); shanti (peace); tapas (penance); dhyana (meditation); and, satya (truth). God will shower grace on you if you worship him through these eight flowers.

The flowers in nature fade, lose fragrance, and ultimately develop an unpleasant odor. Instead of worshipping with worldly flowers that are impermanent, and receiving impermanent rewards from God, we should worship Him with what is truthful, and thereby attain a higher stage.

The true meaning of ahimsa

The flowers that you are using for worship have not been created by you. You are bringing flowers that have been created by the sankalpa (will) of God on some tree or in some garden and are offering them back to the Creator Himself. What is great in using flowers created by God and giving them back to God Himself? Many people bathe in the River Ganges, take the water from the Ganges into their palms, and offer it back to the Ganges itself. This is not what you have created; this is not what you have the right to offer.

It is distinctive to pick fruits that you have protected, grown in the form of good qualities, and offer them to God. In order to promote good qualities, you have to undergo several troubles. It is through these good qualities that your mind can also acquire divine concentration. Devoid of good qualities and thoughts, how can you focus your mind in meditation?

The first flower is ahimsa pushpam (flower). Typically, ahimsa means refraining from causing harm and hurt to other living things. However, ahimsa in truth means refraining from causing hurt and harm to any other living being either through your thought, word, or deed. Cleansing and purifying these three—thought, word, and deed—has been called triputi in spiritual parlance. This flower of ahimsa has been described as trigunam [3 qualities—satisfaction, frustration, and confusion], triputi, and ekabilvam. All of them should be harmonized and brought together as one unit of flower.

Use the sensory organs along the right path

The second flower is the control of sensory organs. Our senses run without any control, and if running horses or animals are not controlled, they pose a danger.

God has created each organ of the human body for a specific purpose. It is only when we use these sensory organs along the right path for which they have been created will we be entitled to God’s grace. God has given us a nose. We should make an attempt to breathe in and breathe out through the nose, and only accept fragrance through the nose. If we use such a nose to take snuff (tobacco) into it, the purpose will become useless. In the same manner, He has given us the mouth and a tongue in order that we may take satwic (pure) food. If we use the mouth to take in unholy food and intoxicating drinks, then we would be using the mouth for a wrong purpose.

In the same manner, we should understand under what conditions, times, and manner we should use each of these organs to keep them under control. Excitement and unnecessary sorrow will undermine our inner strength. Mental agitations and distraction will make the body ill. Indeed, man ages very quickly through excitement and sorrow. Lack of control of sensory organs is the reason for your inability to preserve this sacred instrument in sound condition. Thus, sensory control is vital in the worship of God.

The third flower is compassion to all living things—Sarvabhute daya pushpam [flower of compassion toward all beings]

The tree of creation has grown from the seed of divinity. In this scenario, fruits are the human beings that are the Jivatmas [individual self]. In each of these human fruits, there is divinity in the form of seed. That is why in the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna has said, “Beejam Maam Sarvabhutanaam” (I am the seed in all the living beings in the form of atma). Recognizing the truth that God is present in the form of atma in all living beings, we say compassion is the third flower.

One’s love should encompass all living beings

The fourth flower is kshama pushpam. Kshama or forbearance truly is the highest quality in a human being. However, as he develops narrow ideas, man wants to live in a constricted place. ‘I’ and ‘my family’ matter the most while others are all considered different from ‘me’. It is not possible for us to develop the flower of forbearance as long as we hold these ideas. It is only when we love will we have patience and forbearance. One’s love for all living beings will fructify as forbearance.

For example, we have a home with our children and a servant. In the house, a son may be pilfering something or the other and developing bad habits. We will try and control that son by scolding and persuading him to return to good ways, but we will never hand him over to the police. In the same house, if the servant boy steals a small spoon, we will immediately report him to the police. What is the inner meaning of the situation in which we do not punish a son even if he steals day after day, but we hand over a servant boy immediately to the police when he steals even a small thing? The reason for this is the narrow idea that “this boy” is my son. As the servant does not belong to you, there is no forbearance and patience. When you have the broad idea that ‘everyone is mine,’ there is room for patience and forbearance. It is only then that our love will also grow.

With truthful thoughts man will have peace

The fifth is the flower of shanti—shanti pushpam. This flower of peace should not be interpreted to mean that one should be silent regardless of attacks or blames. It is not that. Real shanti is only when one is unmoved and unperturbed by criticisms. If you can fill your heart with love, then peace will come into you from outside. We lose peace through bad qualities. With truthful thoughts, a man will have peace. With untruthful thoughts, a man will not have peace. If you can get rid of all thoughts, you will become a saint. It is only when you can be free from all thoughts that you can have peace. Your own bad thoughts are responsible for all your pain and sorrow. By good thoughts and by good ideas, you will become a sadhu [mendicant]. Sadhu does not mean one who merely wears an orange robe, shaves the head, and wears rudraakshas (holy beads). He who has good thoughts and good ideas is a sadhu. A sadhu is one who is a satya sankalpa swarupa (embodiment of truthful thoughts).

In the state of peace, human nature is like the unruffled water surface. If there is water in a vessel, you will find there are ripples on account of the wind. Your reflection also will be disturbed on the surface of the water. On an impure surface, our reflection is also impure. On a clear surface of water, our reflection is also clear. In the same manner, although the basic truth is only one, whenever reflection takes place in a mind that is full of tamoguna (materialism), you will find impurity in the image. If the reflection takes place in a mind of rajoguna (egoism), you have avidya (lack of knowledge). On the other hand, if the reflection takes place in a satwic (balanced) mind, it is maya (mere appearance). Ishwara (God) has maya as His robe. The reflection in rajoguna is the individual self and in tamoguna, it is creation. While the basic truth is one, yet the three reflections—creation, jiva, and maya—are not different from the basic truth. We should make an attempt to recognize the nature of the basic truth. Let us take a fruit. Even if it is a neem [an Indian tree with bitter leaves] fruit, it becomes sweet when it is fully ripe. When you attain the totality of peace, then only you find the sweetness of it.

The flowers of penance and meditation

The sixth one is the flower of tapas—tapas pushpam. Tapas (penance) does not mean giving up your wife and children, retiring to a forest, or standing on your head. Real tapas requires abandoning bad thoughts from our minds. The co-ordination of thought, word, and deed is tapas. Whatever thoughts sprout in your mind, to utter them as word, and put them into practice as your work is tapas. It is in this context that it is said—manas ekam, vachas ekam, karmanyekam mahatmaanam [one thought, one word, and one action]. Mahatma (a great soul) is one who can co-ordinate his thought with his word, and his word with his deed. Giving up bad thoughts is also a sacrifice and that sacrifice becomes yoga. Giving up one’s property and one’s wife and retiring to the forest is not yoga.

The seventh flower is meditation—dhyana pushpam. Today, meditation is taking on many forms. Many types of meditation that people are adopting are against the culture and tradition of Bharath. To sit in padmasana (lotus posture) and to make the kundalini shakti rise from mooladhara (basal plexus) to sahasrara (the cranium) is not dhyana. True dhyana consists in recognizing the presence of God in all types of work. God is Sarvantaryami (inner motivator), Sarvabhutantaratma (the indweller of all) and is Sarvavyapi (present everywhere). It is not dhyana to confine Him (God) to one place of your choice.

The flower of truth is the form of divinity

When you are driving a car, the car is your God. When you are doing business in a market, the market is your God. According to the culture of Bharath, we first make obeisance to the work that we have to do. Before we undertake to do any work, we should regard that work as God.

Tasmai namaha karmane [salutations to action]—that is what the Upanishads (Hindu scriptures) teach us: “The work I have to do I regard as God and make obeisance to God in that form.” Let us see the person who plays on the tabla (Indian drums). Before he begins to play on it, he pays obeisance to the tabla. The harmonium player will make obeisance to the harmonium before he starts. A dancer before she begins her dance will make obeisance to her ghungroo (bells worn around the ankles). Even a driver who is going to drive a lifeless car makes namaskar [salute] to the steering wheel before he holds the steering wheel. You do not have to go so far. While driving, if the car hits another person, immediately we make namaskar to that person. The significance of all this is the faith and belief that God is present in all things. Thus, meditation is considering the entire creation as the form of God and to perform one’s duty in that spirit.

The next flower is satya (truth). If you simply speak what you feel and say what you have done, this can be called loukika satyam—worldly truth. However, this cannot be called truth. Truth is that which does not change at any time. What you see is truth at that moment. But it becomes untruth in the next moment. All material things that you see in this creation are things that will decay, and are bound to change. In this transient changing world, how can what you see and what you hear become truth? Truth is God. This truth is the eighth flower. This truth is the form of divinity. In the world, we experience truths of a relative nature.

Let us take chemistry as an example. You take some chemicals and mix them together. They change and you get some other chemical. If you mix turmeric in lime, you get red color. This is chemistry. You take physics. If you take a three-inch needle and put it in fire, it will become a longer needle. This is the truth of physics. How long do these truths of chemistry and physics remain? These are temporary, worldly, and scientific truths. But spiritual truths are such that they will remain unchanged whatever you may do to them, whatever fire you may use on them, and howsoever you may change the circumstances. So, whatever does not change at all is truth. Cruelty and harshness are predominant in the world today because we are not attempting to promote such sacred qualities. Today, among believers, non-believers, and the believing, the same kind of attitude is developing. That day when we can promote such good qualities in the minds of the believers, the nonbelievers will disappear from this world.

Recognize Society as a form of God

We must try to rise to higher stages from natural devotion through para bhakti (where nothing but the name and form of God is cognized). Despite the fact that 12 years have elapsed since the establishment of Dharmakshetra, you are feeling disappointed remaining stationary in the same position. Perform your bhajans (devotional singing) and pujas (ritual worship), but when you enter the society, recognize society as a form of God, recognize what exists as omnipresence in society, and thereby acquire good qualities in serving society. Forget the agitations in the world. Then you can have peace and enjoy bliss. If you develop an idea that God, who is omnipresent and is in the entire creation and the universe, is confined in a picture that is three inches by four inches, you are narrowing your conception of God.

Broaden your heart, making it as big as God Himself. If you look at a balloon, in the initial stage it is flat. If you continue blowing air into it, at one stage it will burst. Even if you begin with the ideas of ‘I’ and ‘mine’, if you ultimately move on to the place that “all are mine”, “all are one,” gradually your vision will become broader and you will merge with God who is omnipresent. You should recognize the truth that man’s life should consist of making the journey from the position of ‘I’ to the position of ‘We.’ This creation is like the bridge that connects man with God. ‘I’ is one hill. ‘God’ is another hill. The bridge between the two is the aspect of creation. If you break and destroy the bridge, you can never reach the destination. I am hoping that you plunge into society and do service to society, and thereby use the bridge to reach God.

Source: Sathya Sai Speaks, Vol. 15

You may say that progress is possible only through My grace, but though My heart is soft as butter, it melts only when there is some warmth in your prayer.

~Sathya Sai Baba