Inquiry
‘We become what our thoughts are.’ These thoughts on the validity of the objective world and the value of the joys derivable therefrom, though they emanate from ignorance (a-jnana), do shape us from within. The reason we are caught in this mold lies in the absence of four requisites: (1) attention to spiritual progress, (2) steady faith, (3) devotion, and (4) the grace of God. Even if one of these four is absent, people cannot experience the highest bliss of the Absolute.
Sri Sathya Sai Vahini
Every aspirant must enter onto the path of inquiry. Only then can the conviction dawn and grow that nature and all learning connected with nature are unreal; only then will these be given a relative, not an absolute value.
They are, of course, to be learned and experienced as necessary for existence, as a kind of daily routine. However, they should not be mistaken to be the highest knowledge, the unchanging eternal truth. That mistake, if committed, leads to an agitated mind (a-santhi). Agitation produces worry and anxiety, which in turn destroy peace. If you aspire to peace, equanimity, the basic thing is to have faith in the temporary nature of Nature and be engaged in the uninterrupted contemplation of the changeless Godhead.
Prasanthi Vahini
Our inquiry should not be directed to the obvious and the superficial. This line of inquiry will only mislead us into believing what is not the cosmos. It makes us forget that it is our mind that has generated this panorama of cosmic proportions and presented it to us as truth.
It is indeed strange that this huge cosmos depends ultimately on whether ‘I cognize it as such or not! If you feel it is there, it is there; if you feel it is not there, it is not there!’ This means that we have to go deep into this process of the mind. Is there any occasion when our assertion leads to the existence of a thing and our negation results in its disappearance? Or, is this conclusion a figment of the imagination? Inquiry on these lines would undoubtedly reveal the truth.
Sri Sathya Sai Vahini
Well! If only everyone would ask the questions: ‘Who are we? Whence did we come? Where have we come to? How long will we be here?’, the truth could be easily grasped. That questioning is the sign of discrimination (viveka). When, by means of this discrimination, the idea that the world is impermanent gets deeply rooted in the mind, all attachments cease automatically. That is the stage of renunciation or detachment (vairagya).
One asks, is it worthwhile to be caught up in this unreal world? This is false and misleading, one tells oneself. One then turns one’s efforts to the realm of the Lord, the realm of truth. That is the wise decision.
It is through discrimination (viveka) and detachment or renunciation (vairagya) that one understands who one really is. Without them, it is impossible to know it. The Lord has blessed only humanity with these two. He has endowed people so that they might use them for that purpose. Hence, people are truly fortunate. But alas, people have forgotten the task for which they have come, ignored the question whence they came, closed their eyes to where they are, diverted their intelligence toward amusement and creature comfort, and wasted all their powers. What a tragedy! If in this most propitious human birth itself the Godhead is not sought, when else is a person to succeed? If today is squandered so, will tomorrow help you?
If one’s real nature is first understood, the rest can all be easily grasped. One will thereafter know who one is, whence one came, where one has come to, and how long one exists.
Prasanthi Vahini
