Pearls of Prayer from an Ocean of Compassion and Grace
A Visitor asks: We know that the pleasures of this world are useless and even painful, yet we long for them. What is the way of ending that longing?
Bhagavan: Think of God and attachments will gradually drop from you. If you wait till all desires disappear to start your devotion and prayer, you will have to wait a very, very long time indeed. A time comes when one will no more pray for the fulfillment of material desires but for God Himself. God then appears to him in some form or other, human or non-human, to guide him to Himself in answer to his prayer and according to his needs.
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Devotee: What is Guru’s Grace? How does it work?
Master: Guru is the Self.
D.: How does it lead to realization?
M.: Invar gururatmeti ... (God is the same as Guru and Self ...). A person begins with dissatisfaction. Not content with the world he prays and is purified; he longs to know God more than to satisfy his carnal desires. Then God’s Grace begins to manifest. God takes the form of a Guru and appears to the devotee; teaches him the Truth; purifies the mind by his teachings and contact; the mind gains strength, is able to turn inward; with meditation it is purified yet further, and eventually remains still without the least ripple. That stillness is the Self. The Guru is both exterior and interior. From the exterior he gives a push to the mind to turn inward; from the interior he pulls the mind towards the Self and helps the mind to achieve quietness. That is Grace. Hence there is no difference between God, Guru and Self.
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Mr. Kishorelal Mashruwala, President, Gandhi Seva Sangh, asked:
“How is Brahmacharya to be practiced in order that it may be successfully lived up to?”
Maharshi: It is a matter of will-power. Satvic food, prayers, etc., are useful aids to it.
D.: Young men have fallen into bad habits. They desire to get over them and seek our advice.
M.: Mental reform is needed.
D.: Can we prescribe any special food, exercise, etc., to them?
M.: There are some medicines. Yogic asanas and satvic food are also useful.
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A middle-aged Andhra visitor: A man is said to be divine. Why then does he have regrets?
M.: Divinity refers to the essential nature. The regrets are of Prakriti.
D.: How is one to overcome regrets?
M.: By realizing the Divinity in him.
D.: How?
M.: By practice
D.: What kind of practice?
M.: Meditation.
D.: Mind is not steady while meditating.
M.: It will be all right by practice.
D.: How is the mind to be steadied?
M.: By strengthening it.
D.: How to strengthen it?
M.: It grows strong by satsanga (the company of the wise).
D.: Shall we add prayers, etc.?
M.: Yes.
D.: What of the one who has no regrets?
M.: He is an accomplished Yogi. There is no question about him.
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Mr. Ward Jackson said: The lady’s (from a prior question not included) difficulty is real and I sympathize with her. She asks, “If we could see the Self within ourselves, why should we have come all the way to see Him? We had been thinking of Him so long and it is only right that we came here. Is it then unnecessary to do so?”
Maharshi: You have done well in having come. “Isvaro gururatmeti” (The Self is the God and Guru). A person seeks happiness and learns that God alone can make one happy. He prays to God and worships Him. God hears his prayers, and responds by appearing in human shape as a Master in order to speak the language of the devotee and make him understand the Reality. The Master is thus God manifest as human being. He gives out His experience so that the seeker might also gain it. His experience is to abide as the Self. The Self is within. God, Master and the Self are therefore seeming stages in the Realization of the Truth. You have doubts on reading books. You have come here to have them cleared. That is only right.
(To be continued)
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