The Ego
Hislop: Yes, I am the one who puts the separation between us. I am the ego.
Sai: Ego is untruth.
Hislop: Ego is untruth, then I…
Sai: But you are not ego. You are truth. Ego is not truth. Any amount of arguments and discussions like this is just words. You will not get this without spiritual practice, without sadhana.
An example: Someone asks us what sugar is. We say it is brownish and sort of sandy, because we know sugar. But the sweetness has no form. Like that you can describe sugar, but you cannot picture the taste, because the taste has no form. Even pertaining to the world, there are so many things we do not know, and we don’t imagine or worry about it! If we only feel intensely for God instead of so much discussion and reading books. We must get into the field and try it out. Even if someone writes a book, it is his spiritual experience.
You love your wife and she loves you. But if she is hungry, you cannot eat for her. And if you are hungry, she cannot eat for you despite the fact that you love each other dearly. Spiritual hunger is like that. Each man must seek and appease that hunger according to his faith. Even though Swami tries to explain, you do not grasp it. It is only through experience you must come to it.
When you start to learn to drive, you must have an open space for practice; but once you learn, then even on a narrow road you can go with confidence. It is just like in a school. Gradually you go and you understand. If big words are used, the child does not understand them when he is still learning the A B C’s. In the beginning, we do not understand things of the world and do not even understand ourselves, so how can you understand that which is beyond you? So, first you try to understand yourself by doing spiritual practice, by doing sadhana. First ‘I,’ next ‘You.’ ‘I’ plus ‘You’ equals ‘We.’ Then ‘We’ plus ‘He.’ Then only ‘He.’
Hislop: No. I don’t understand that.
Sai: First ‘I,’ then ‘You.’ First ‘I’; that is life. Next ‘You’; that is the world. ‘I’ plus ‘You’ is ‘We.’ ‘We’ plus ‘He’ is God. Then only ‘He.’ There is love, the person who loves, and the person you love. And when all get together, it is bliss. You see, there are three blades in the fan. The three gunas [human attributes] are represented by the three blades. Only when the blades circulate together in harmony do you get the air. When they move in the same direction they bring the cool air. Within us, the three gunas are going all in different directions. When you turn them in the same direction, all going around together, then you will get the one-pointedness and you will be enabled to know.
Source: Conversations with Bhagavan Sri Sathya Sai Baba
