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There is no obligation on anyone to tread the path.
We indulge in no particular religion but shall absorb the good in all.
Our obsession for God (as in the Ramakrishna episode) should be there, and yet we should be practical. Our affair with God should be extremely private and confidential, and our love and heart-pouring feelings should be known to no one. Yet at other times we should keep our balance, be of this world and not be emotional and non-practical.
There is no relation of a master (or guru) and disciple between us. Bondage to a guru, even if described as spiritual and sweet bondage, is maintained by chains as heavy as those suffered in any other category of servitude.
Affective fixation on the personality of a master, teacher or guru is a serious obstacle to liberation -- the person of the liberator becomes the gaoler.
No occult teaching is ever wasted. All bear fruit in good time. Out of a thousand seeds sown by the farmer, only a hundred manifest life. But the work is intended for those hundred.
The urge of development is from within the organism itself.
It is impossible to give a person anything that could become his or her inalienable property without work on his or her part. One can only show and direct. Understanding comes only with work.
A working understanding of any law is gained only by study and practice.
Presume not God to scan, the proper study of mankind is man.
I wish to give you one word to ponder well, to observe, to honestly check your heart, mind and actions and see how far you can honestly say that you have lived accordingly: `Mental integrity'. Look at it from all angles and diagnoze your past and present and mold your future. If you find any weaknesses of the mind and heart, be honest and prepare to put an end to it.
The aspirant has to achieve `mental integrity'. This is an unending work -- millions of past memory patterns lurk, especially of ego, sex, possessions and sensitiveness. Be never satisfied with your work, i.e. believe that you have done all that had to be done.
Conscience is not an organ -- I mean a physical organ -- and yet it is something that exists. We may term it the computer not known to man. Conscience, I would say, is the voice of the soul, waiting to be heard if only we do not try and run away from it. This questioning of it helps us build mental integrity, as each action or thought would be performed intentionally and not automatically.
Work is on the subtle emotional and intellectual side -- the side that is not seen easily but is to be `caught' time and again each day.
How does work differ from practices and methods? It is like knowing the law differing from practising the law. How many indulge in the very things they condemn in others? For we may not act or do as those whom we condemn. But subtle linking thoughts, if honestly traced, would be found equally to be condemned within us.
There is not a moment without some duty. One must work beyond one's capacity daily to change one's level of being.
Time does not wait for anyone. One outgoing breath does not guarantee the next incoming breath. Are there things worthy for which your body and mind be put to unnecessary use? Ask yourself why so many false thoughts arise without any valid reason?
You better not compromise yourself -- it is all you have got. He who excuses himself, accuses himself. Give no excuse -- make none, accept none; be ruthless with yourself and
with your own failures and make more determined efforts.
On the path we do not make use of simple mathematics, for if the aspirant were not to practise one day in a week of seven days, he has not practised for the other six days also, for 7-1=0. ...On this quest, the basis of regularity is increased to 30-1=0 and is eventually perfected to 365-1=0.
The guarantee of arrival is practice.
Discipline must precede philosophy.
Talk does not cook rice.
The journey of a thousand miles starts with a first small step. True glory lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall. Decay, very often, looks like progress, and progress like decay.
Unlearn whatever you may have learnt uptil now. Begin afresh.
On this path of experience, the first requisite is a clear, unspoiled mind, free from all notions, from wrong thinking, and of all worldly knowledge. Also free from all influence of church, temple, mosque and synagogue; free from all scriptures and shastras, not even influenced by science. No pre-conceived idea is required -- `Bhikshu, empty the boat!' If we are ready and worthy of knowing higher truths we shall come across them; nothing can keep them away from us. But remember to `empty the boat' -- no instructions are given to keep this or throw that away, just empty the boat completely!
No one can come face to face with the `Truth'. Those who dare to ask `What is God or Reality?' should be ready to receive shock after shock that numb the mind and ultimately disintegrate it and leave one `naked' and `exposed' to equally `naked truth'. Such who dare may try! But for those who wish to piously believe in `heaven and hell', `sin and punishment', `prayers and rites', `shastras and scriptures', those who dare not throw overboard `all and everything', for them are these lines not written. Beware, this is not a state of atheism, but one of fresh receptivity.
If Thou were here before I was, I am not here at all;If I am not a part of Thee, there is no such God at all. If I say He is within me, the Universe is ashamed; if I say that He is without (outside) me, it is falsehood. He makes the inner and the outer worlds to be in(di)visibly one.
What Thou art, thus may I be.
God cannot know himself without me.
Jesus said: If the flesh has come into existence because of the spirit,it is a marvel; and if the spirit has come into existence because of the body, it is a marvel of marvels. But I marvel at how this great wealth has made its home in this poverty.
If we place God beyond the limits of Existence, then we cannot invoke the Power of God within Existence! If God intervenes by way of miracles, then the laws of Existence are violated; if He does not intervene at all, then the struggle is doomed to end in disaster. It is not a satisfying picture of God sub-side the hazards of Existence -- but we cannot know beyond Existence.
If the power of corruption (degeneration) had no check, then by the very nature of its contagion the Universe is doomed.
Nothing that exists has of itself the power to change or modify its own nature. It is bound to the laws of recurrence. It does not follow however that Existence is static; but only under the impulse of essence forces can it progress.
The beginning and end of beings are unknowable. We see only the intervening formations.
That which is not shall never be; that which is shall never cease to be.
Nothing can live eternally but that which hath lived from all eternity.
That is perfect, this is perfect, perfect comes from perfect. Take perfect away from perfect, the remainder is perfect.
Whatever that lives is full of the Lord-claim-nothing.
They that know and can distinguish between the shapes of Nature and the seeds of Nature shall by the first cross over the perishable in safety, and shall passing beyond the second attain immortal life.
Every thing has in its heart the seeds of an inevitable taking\passing away.
The son of man hath nowhere to lay his head.
Thus from the first differentiation of Prakriti proceeds mahat, or the germ of individuality.
Where there is mind, there is the world of multiplicity.
Things do exist apart from the mind, but it may still be argued that they do not exist independent of the act of cognizing.
Manifestation is mind; and so is Voidness too.
Enlightenment is mind; and so is blindness too.
Mind is the cause of bondage and liberation of man. Expressed in objects it leads to bondage, free from objects it leads to liberation. The brain (the thinking instrument) of man is the cause both of his bondage and of his liberation. Its attachment to the objects of sense is the reason for his bondage and its separation from the objects of sense is the means of his freedom. He who is capable of this discriminating knowledge should therefore restrain his brain and meditate upon para-brahman to attain liberation.
The Mind, as it is in itself, is free from disturbances, ills and follies, and every thought is thus of transcendental knowledge and wisdom... Being so, there is no use establishing anything. When erroneous thoughts do not arise, this is precept (shila). When erroneous thoughts are no more, this is meditation (dhyana). When the non-existence of erroneous thoughts is perceived, this is transcendental wisdom (prajna).
How, with the conception of a perfect, just and merciful Deity, can be reconciled the existence of the imperfect and the evil? The perfect never becomes the imperfect. It become nothing. It is all spirit and matter, strength and weakness, knowledge and ignorance, peace and strife, bliss and pain, power and impotence. The All includes manifestations and non-manifestations. The puzzle arises when man asserts separately one of the inseparable pairs of the opposites.
'Evil' per se is not existent, as is good. Only in time and space are there varying states of consciousness producing differing outer effects.
Those who recognize this objective world (the organism's world) and yet find their minds (the deeper brain below the top soil) undisturbed are in true dhyana. But to let the mind (the brain's top soil) move on by itself, and perform its inexhaustible functions, this is the way to be in accord with the mind essence.
Whenever there is more of dhyana and less of prajna it helps the growth of ignorance! The more you practise dhyana (meditation), the more the chances of ignorance increasing. Many pass fruitless years in attempts to calm their minds and bring them to rest in meditation. Many do not advance because they stick to penances and particular exercises, while they neglect the love of God, which is the end.
When one's mind is thus known in its nakedness, this doctrine of seeing the Mind naked, this self-liberation, is seen to be exceedingly profound. Seek, therefore, thine own wisdom within this. It is a vast deep.
The brain of a thinking man does not exceed in size the brain of a non-thinking man in anything like the proportion in which the mind of a thinker exceeds the mind of a savage.
Nothing is viewed clearly or objectively, but always through an intervening haze of likes and dislikes, partialities and prejudices, obsessions and idiosyncrasies. How can we ever hope to see things and persons as they are unless we can get rid of this quotient of personal error? How indeed can we obtain any more knowledge, and more especially that kind of knowledge that comes through intuition or direct perception rather than through the intellect, unless the personality can be got out of the way; otherwise, such intuition is only a manifestation of our own prejudices and biases and nothing more than that.