The New Year Day
Devotees at Prasanthi Nilayam celebrated the Lunar New Year Day, the first day of the year Plava, on Friday, March 17th. During the morning bhajan [devotional singing] session, Sri Sathya Sai Baba graciously gave holy teertham [water] to all and specially sanctified sherbet [a sweet cold drink] was distributed to everyone. In the evening, Baba addressed the assembly and conferred His benedictions. He said:
“Kasturi just now read the predictions about rainfall, crops, internal and external peace, the prices of articles, the behavior of kings and subjects etc., from the panchangam [Hindu astrological almanac] for the new year. All this only increases the restlessness and worry which you already have. Do not panic over what the panchangam says about the combination of many planets; all such prognostications are highly exaggerated. Nothing much will happen, the pralaya [deluge] is more in the mind than in nature. Take care of the panchangams in you—the five organs and senses—and you can have peace and joy. If you earn the anugraha [grace] of the Lord, no graha [planet] can harm you. So, learn how to earn that anugraha and thereafter you need not worry about the panchangam at all.
Today, you are celebrating the New Year, but it is not the year alone that is new, every second is new, every minute is new. You must make not only one day full of joy in each year; every second must yield joy and peace. Remember that every second you are proceeding nearer and nearer to death. The sun is slowly but persistently evaporating the allotted reservoir of your life so that it is becoming drier and drier with every passing day.
Now, the only source from which one can get the courage and enthusiasm to face both joy and sorrow with a calm and unaffected mind is constant meditation on the Lord. This will also ensure the development of various good qualities, like a spirit of renunciation, fortitude, optimism, desire for service, brotherliness etc. When your shadow in the water is beaten, you are not angry because you know you are not the shadow; but, yet, note how you get incensed when some one starts laughing at your shadow, and uses foul language against it! So too, remember that the Lord will get incensed if you so much as laugh in derision at another person, for that other, like you, is but His shadow! Be happy when another person is happy; do not burn with envy or try to pull him down to your level.
Start from today the chapter of sadhana [spiritual practice], of japam [reciting God’s name] and dhyanam [meditation], and of viveka [discrimination], vichakshana [?] and vairagyam [detachment]. But adhere to some regular routine, some measured timetable. Just as the doctor prescribes a certain fixed measure of a drug, so too you must keep both the physical and mental exercises and disciplines strictly within certain limits.
It does not matter at all if you have no faith in any God or in any name and form of the Lord; adhere to truth that is the God ward path. Adhere to prema [love] that is the road to Godhead. I can well appreciate a person not having faith in the Lord or another who has that faith. But, what I cannot forgive is the attitude of some persons who praise the Lord one moment and defame Him the next moment with the same tongue!
Kasturi said that in this year’s panchangam, it is stated that the number of people who deride God and who laugh at Him and hate Him will increase! How can that happen? Their number has reached the maximum already. In fact, this cynical spirit of doubt and derision is the bane of the modern age. Of course, one’s faith has to be built up on the basis of observation, practical experience, the shastras [scriptures] and long deliberation. Only then can it be steady and steadfast.
So, do not panic or be disheartened. There is no reason for fear. The Lord has come to save the world from catastrophe. Your duty is to keep calm, to pray for the happiness and prosperity of all, to share your joy with others, and to help alleviate the misery of others as much as you can. Leave the rest to the Lord.
Source: Sanathana sarathi, April 1961
