We should aim for God Consciousness and nothing less
24 April 2003
The evening program began with the gathering sweetly singing Swamiji's aarati to greet Baba. Baba paid all due reverence to His Guru at the altar, then sat down on the dais and addressed His eagerly awaiting devotees.
Babaji noted that there were unfamiliar faces amongst the group but that all of their souls are familiar. He stressed that we should not compromise, that we should aim for God Consciousness and nothing less. He likened it to being able to have a whole supermarket yet, in our ignorance, we only ask for the chocolate.
He then proceeded to tell the story of Nachiketa a young but very wise boy and his scholar father, in order to illustrate that we should never compromise. In order to keep the 'promise' of his father who told his son in a moment of frustration that he would gift him to the death god, Lord Yama, Nachiketa jumped into the fire. So impressed with this boy's honesty and young age, Lord Yama granted him three boons. The boy's main wish was to know the Ultimate Truth. Lord Yama tried to dissuade the boy by offering him 10,000 years of a materially-rich life yet the boy insisted that this meant nothing without knowing the Truth and stopping the birth-death cycle.
Baba explained that we need two things to reach the Truth: adjustment and management. Adjustment means acceptance so that we have contentment in the mind. Management refers to intention and attitude.
We must turn our attention to God or the Truth and this is meditation. Meditation must be coupled with Bhakti - devotion and faith. By surrendering and praying to God, then God works on our ego. In turn, the ego is every imagination of the mind. By surrendering, we learn to control the mind and the mind, unlike the body, is immortal.
Meditation will increase our ability to love each other. Babaji noted that His Guru warned Him to be aware of how one behaves as this reveals the nature of one's culture and character. He highlighted the common gap between our words and what we actually practise.
A 45 minute meditation ensued where peaceful silence surrounded the devotees. Afterwards, bhajans were sung by devotees and Babaji delighted the group with His singing and chanting. Then, some thought-provoking questions were asked and, in response, Babaji provided His wisdom. Babaji explained that Realized Souls never revert back to an ignorant state. However, there is great danger of this occurring during Tapas so that the aspirant must take great care. Babaji also informed the group that when the mind is not attached to the world then, on death, it is able to go back to its Source, back to Consciousness. However, if the mind is still attached to this world, then it will be thinking about its next life.
Copyright © 2003 SRBY, All rights reserved.
