Question: If one does not have a full hour, is it alright to sit for less?

Babaji:

My Guru always insisted that we sit at least for one hour. It is necessary for a sadhak because for the first 40 minutes, the mind struggles. Only, in the end, the last five or ten minutes, one is likely to get some concentration. So it is essential to utilize this five or ten minutes, during which the mind is likely to get concentrated. The first 40 minutes will be simply warming up. So if you get up before that, even before you are warmed up and ready to meditate, you are stopping the practice. You are abandoning it. However, in the beginning, it becomes very difficult, it’s alright to sit for less, but gradually one must increase to at least one hour for a sadhak. Imagine when we did tapas. After achieving the concentration of the mind, in between the brikruti, when the mind becomes totally purified, it sacrifices all imaginations, totally 100%. Only then the real meditation starts. Like that, after it starts, we have to sit for at least seven hours at a stretch, in three shifts. I used to do that way, as instructed and ordained by Swamiji. Early morning until mid noon. After a half hour rest, from mid noon until late night, and in the night, after having a little bit of soup or some vegetables and after a half hour rest, again I used to sit until early morning.

Imagine, this was after twenty years of service, after having the physical guidance of Swamiji, who removed my ego, who had adopted so many methods, because I had authorized Swamiji. I had surrendered. After this 20 years of tapas, in the form of service, for five years we had to do meditation. Only then it became tapas. If you can concentrate in between brikruti, without any thoughts, simply in a purified state for more than seven to eight hours, that becomes known as tapas. So now you can understand how necessary it is for a sadhak to sit for at least one hour.