Sri Brahmachaithanya Pravachan-Sept.11

Scrutiny should not be Done beyond a Limit

You should try to make God your own. If you continue this effort dispassionately, you will certainly receive the grace of sadguru. If you try to practise under compulsion the sadhana advised by the sadguru and if the thoughts continue unchanged, then how can you experience the love of God? We complain that, after having worked hard for some five years and keeping away from the temptation of sense-objects, we still find no experience. Then the tempo of the sadhana slows down and faith gets diluted. We must have profound faith that whatever happens is according to the sadguru’s will and inspiration only. We forget that God alone generates love in sadhana. The whole effort will be of no avail, if we start feeling proud that from the earlier stage of doing nothing, now we are practising at least some sadhana. Some people achieve success immediately on dedicating themselves at the feet of the sadguru. But how can we allege that the sadguru is partial? One must examine where one has gone wrong. Till now we wished to take to nama but could not do so. Now that we have started the practice of nama-smarana, why should we not regard even this change as His grace?

Man must have patience in prapancha. We should have no fears if we are in continuous remembrance of God. Too critical scrutiny results into a loss. What is the fruit of entire learning? Whatever we like, we follow without scrutiny, and whatever we don’t want to do, we scrutinize it hyper-critically! Critical scrutiny should be only upto a limit. If continued beyond it, we do not understand what we talk.

In spite of the modern amenities that have helped man to travel with speed on water or in air, he is becoming more and more discontented every day. This is not true progress. Whatever be the circumstances and whatever be the times, we can remain blissful. If we look back, we shall find very little which we can claim as done by us. We should not therefore worry about the circumstances. We should do our duty and not allow our vritti to be affected. We shall achieve everything, if we establish firm faith in the doership of Rama.

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Sri Brahmachaithanya Pravachan- Sept.3

Full Faith and Earnest Longing for Nama

Everyone can attain the experience of God by some means or other, according to one’s temperament. Maruti devoted himself to God as a servant. Dasharatha loved God as a son. Our only thought should be, ‘how shall I attain God?’ Devotion has been considered to be the highest means to attain God. If the obstinacy and love of an addicted person towards his addiction could be transferred to God, the result is spiritual uplift. When I dedicate my good and bad qualities at the feet of God, the result is total surrender or ‘arpanbhakti’. We practise devotion but it is devoid of real love; this is because our mind is scattered in all directions. Therefore, concentrate your mind first; practise a little on contemplation but with single-minded devotion.
Do not practise spiritual means while under depression, or with a tired mind. You should consider how your spiritual attitude will get the proper direction to manifest itself. All saints have told us that God is residing in Pandharpur; however, if we see only a stone there, is it not the fault of our spiritual attitude alone? Have full faith in God. In a dark night, if the lamp is taken aside a little, you lose your way. Therefore, keep your attention fixed on God and concentrate without break on nama, the spiritual means. When I sing with devotion before God, I must earnestly feel that he is listening to me; love for God does not depend on rhythm or tune. Have a firm conviction that you belong to God and earnestly long for His grace; whatever you do should be with single-minded devotion. Have no grief over whatever has happened, have no worry for tomorrow, and do not lose the present awareness of God. Practise nama-smarana with a feeling that God is personally present before you. Every utterance of nama should remind us that ‘God alone is the doer’, so that pride of doership will not stand in the way. True progress in the path of devotion is not to feel pleasure over gains or grief over losses. A person who is most narrow-minded and selfish, and who feels that the entire world is meant for his pleasure, should be considered an egoist. The more the selfishness of a man the more dependent he is on others.

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Sri Brahmachaithanya Pravachan-Sept.1.

Our ‘Knowledge’ is Based on ‘Body-Am-I’ Feeling

Common people feel that sense-perceived phenomena can be instantly experienced, while divine or spiritual experience is purely a matter of inference and faith. I agree with them so far. I am not surprised that they do not abandon worldly life. I only feel sorry that they indulge in it heart and soul, under the illusion that it is imperishable, everlasting, despite evidence to the contrary. I don’t mind their rejection of divine bliss as a sheer hypothesis, provided they accept the everyday experience that sensual pleasures are only transitory. Eventually it will lead to the conviction that divine bliss alone is permanent. It is immanent in us, and does not have to be acquired from elsewhere.
Modern civilization has catered amply to the pleasures and conveniences of the senses and the body in general, but the end-result has only been unhappiness. Imagine for a moment that plenty of means of pleasures of the senses lie to entice a man, but one cannot afford them financially, or enjoy them for want of physical capacity; the absence of capacity to avail of them will only lead to disappointment and unhappiness. After all, every individual cannot command all sense-pleasures, and so, after all the struggle of life, the net result is a sense of disappointment, unhappiness. Happiness and sorrow never really existed, they are only illusory creations of our imagination. Whatever is agreeable to the moment’s fancy of the mind is pleasure, and whatever is otherwise is sorrow. Both these are the product of the illusion that the body is the be-all and the end-all, and so long as we live in that conviction, so long will all experience be necessarily polluted by illusion. That all creation, though pervaded by pure bliss, appears sorrowful is the result of illusion, which clouds our inner perception. The world, after all, is made up of so many individuals, each struggling for pleasure; how can a single person, in such a situation, get all pleasures for himself?
One cannot have guarantee of life. It can terminate abruptly, unexpectedly. Therefore, waste not even a moment, spend it in the constant awareness of God. To forget Him owing to a calamity or because of all-round happiness, is an equal loss.

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Sri Brahmachaithanya Pravachan-Aug.17

Firm Faith is a Powerful Force

If we keep firm faith in God while doing our duty conscientiously, we need never have any occasion for pain, sorrow, or regret. This firm faith has helped so many people and seen them through trying circumstances.
The greatest advantage of saguna-bhakti is that the approach being through love, our emotions experience an upsurge when we bow at the feet of Rama. At such moments we should earnestly pray to Him, saying, “O Rama, I now have no ally, no support, but You; so now call me Yours. Doubtless I am the home of drawbacks and defects, but pray do not discard me on that count, for, unworthy as I may be, I approach You with utter surrender.”
We must possess the patience, the tolerance, that can only come from firm faith in God. Such a person will ever be trusted by the whole world. People will even set God aside and adore such a person. Worldly life led in firm faith in God is bound to be replete with happiness. Grieve not about what happened yesterday, nor worry about what may come tomorrow; live joyfully, unconcernedly, in the present, doing your duty; whenever you can withdraw your mind from the humdrum of life do so, and devote yourself to nama-smarana, eschewing idle talk.
For one who is immersed in love for God no advice or precept is necessary. Nowhere in the puranas is a mention of Lord Krishna having delivered to the gopis any philosophical discourse. There was never a need, for the gopis were steeped in the love of the Lord. Such love can be obtained only by nama-smarana. So, I say, live in nama and enjoy contentment and bliss in life. Take my word for it, God will shower His grace on you.
The activities we indulge in pursuit of worldly pleasures only yield mixed happiness and pain. Progeny, wealth, prosperity of various kinds, respect in the world, acquisition of material knowledge – these and such other things can never yield unalloyed, permanent bliss and contentment. The twin-sided coin of pleasure and pain will be our invariable lot. One who lives in ceaseless nama-smarana, one who is unaware of anything else, is ever supported by God. He alone can be called a true theist who is entrenched in the firm conviction that God is the real doer.

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