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Thought for the Day
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As written at
Prasanthi Nilayam
Source: Radio Sai
Global Harmony
Thought for the Day Archive
February 2005
February 1, 2005
Dedication to the Lord
sanctifies all activities. He is the goal of all activities. He is
the prompter, executor, giver of the required strength and skill and
the enjoyer of the fruit thereof. So, dedication must come naturally
to you, for, all is His and nothing belongs to you. Your duty is to
believe that He is the impeller of all activities, and draw strength
from that belief.
February 2, 2005
Birth as a human being
is a rare and unique opportunity. For, man is endowed with a
discriminating intelligence, the power to reason out the best among
alternative courses of action. The tongue that does not chant the
name of God, the hand that knows no charity, the years of life that
know no peace of mind, talents that do not find fulfillment, a life
that has not garnered wisdom, a temple where there is no atmosphere
of reverence, speech that does not communicate knowledge - all these
are of no worth.
February 3, 2005
One should not
undertake to analyse the good and bad in others. If we use our eyes
for finding faults in others and spend all our time in this process,
our heart will also become impure and we will develop bad thoughts.
The heart is like a camera lens. The object on which we concentrate
our attention gets imprinted on the mind. Hence, we should make an
attempt to perceive the good in whatever we see.
February 4, 2005
One may ask, if God is
controlling everything, what is the need for human effort? Yes, God
is all powerful. But at the same time human effort is also
necessary, for without it man cannot enjoy the benefit of God's
grace. It is only when you have both Divine grace and human
endeavour that you can experience bliss, just as you can enjoy the
breeze of a fan only when you have both a fan and electric power to
operate it.
February 5, 2005
You have to remove
wicked thoughts from your heart, plough the heart with good deeds,
water it with love, manure it with faith, plant the saplings of the
name of the Lord and fence the field with discipline, destroy pests
with Shraddha (dedication) and reap the harvest of Jnana (wisdom).
Understand that God is in you, with you and around you. In fact, you
are God.
February 6, 2005
Envy and greed emanate
from the ego and have to be carefully watched and controlled. Like
the tadpole's tail, the ego will fall away when one grows in wisdom.
It must fall away; if it is cut, the poor tadpole will die. So,
don't worry about the ego; develop wisdom, contemplate on the
ephemeral nature of the objective world. Then the tail of the ego
will no longer be evident.
February 7, 2005
Buddhi (intellect) is
superior amongst all the faculties that a human is endowed with. Its
pre-eminence is due to its proximity to the Atman (soul) whereby the
brilliance of the Atman directly falls on it and energizes it. The
Buddhi should exercise its control over the mind, and in turn, the
mind over the senses. But what happens generally is that the Buddhi
does not exercise discrimination; the mind arrogates to itself
superiority over the intellect and the senses arrogate to themselves
superiority over the mind. Consequently, the mind proceeds in the
wrong direction and the purpose of life remains unfulfilled. To
avoid this, the Buddhi has to be centered on the Atman and the mind
should act in subordination to Buddhi.
February 8, 2005
To realise God, it is
not necessary to have wealth, gold, luxuries and comforts; nor is
scholarship a requisite. All that is needed is pure devotion.
Without purity of thought, word and deed, it is impossible to
experience the Divine. God cannot be realised through ostentation
and self-conceit. The basic requisite is the shedding of selfishness
and possessiveness so that one can engage oneself in actions in a
disinterested spirit. Any person is entitled to embark on this quest
irrespective of age, caste or gender.
February 9, 2005
Without having
unwavering faith in an omniscient and omnipotent God, life becomes
dry and drab, shadowed by despair and doom. Love for God and fear of
sin are the two primary needs for a happy life. Without these two,
man becomes a monster. Man must be ever ready to sacrifice his
selfish concerns for the sake of the larger community. There is
nothing as praiseworthy as renunciation. Be honest and detached; and
with God installed in your heart, march forward to offer your skills
and talents towards fulfilling your responsibilities.
February 10, 2005
There is Divinity
immanent in humanity. Understand this. Today every sphere of human
activity is polluted. Once man purifies his heart, he will find
purity everywhere. The world outside is just a reflection of your
heart. If you fill your heart with love, you will experience love
everywhere. If there is hatred in your heart, the same will get
reflected outside. All that you see, hear and experience outside is
only the reflection, reaction and resound of your inner being.
Hence, it is incorrect to point out the faults and shortcomings in
others.
February 11, 2005
God certainly listens
to the prayers of His devotees. Some people hesitate to pray lest
their prayers should cause inconvenience to God. They are mistaken
in their belief, for God can never be put to any inconvenience
whatsoever. God has no suffering at all. He considers the devotee's
happiness as His happiness.
February 12, 2005
Anxiety is removed by
placing one's faith in the Lord; the faith that tells you that
whatever happens is for the best and that the Lord's will be done.
Unquestioning acceptance is the best armour against anxiety. Sorrow
springs from egoism, the feeling that one does not deserve to be
treated so badly, that one is left helpless. When egoism goes,
sorrow disappears. Ignorance is just the mistaken identity of the
body as one's real self.
February 13, 2005
If an individual wants
to attain success in his life, he should have three good qualities
in him. The first is to have firm and unwavering faith in the need
for being good. The second is to be free from hatred, jealousy and
ego. The third is to be able to appreciate and enjoy when he sees
another individual or the society around him doing good work. It is
through these three qualities that a person's greatness will come to
be known.
February 14, 2005
In Creation, no one
object is like another. No two humans are similar, for each has his
own peculiar experiences. Why, even the same individual keeps
changing with time as he passes through infancy, youth, middle-age
and finally senility. Man must seek refuge in the changeless
Paramatman (God) from which all diversity emerges and into which it
merges. Only then can man secure lasting peace and contentment.
February 15, 2005
The greater the number
of desires, the lesser the happiness you will experience. Be
contented. A discontented man loses everything; only the contented
man can experience real joy. The happiness in one's life will be in
inverse proportion to one's desires. In the journey of life, as in a
railway journey, the lesser the luggage (desires) one carries, the
greater the comfort.
February 16, 2005
He who considers
himself free is free indeed, and he who considers himself bound
remains bound. Constantly think yourself as being eternal,
unlimited, Consciousness-Bliss, and you will be free and happy. So
long as you trap yourself in body consciousness you are like a lion
moping about in a musty cave. Do not feel satisfied by saying, 'I am
the body'. Roar and say, 'I am the Universal Absolute. I am all that
is, was and will be.' Pettiness, ego, time and space - all will flee
from your heart and you will realise your own Divinity.
February 17, 2005
Man has not taken birth
merely to satisfy his mundane desires; he has come to manifest the
Divinity latent in him. That is why he is called vyakthi
(individual)- he who makes vyaktha (manifest) the Shakthi (Divine
power) that is in him. For this purpose he has come endowed with
this body, and the intelligence needed to control it and divert it
to useful channels of activity. Every man must achieve this goal by
Dharmanishttha and Karmanishttha - the steady pursuit of morality
and good deeds.
February 18, 2005
You should cultivate an
attitude of inseparable attachment to the Lord, who is your very
self. If He is a flower, you should feel that you are the bee that
sucks the nectar from it; if He is a tree, be a creeper that clings
to it; if He be a cliff, then feel that you are a cascade running
over it; if He is the sky, be a tiny star that twinkles in it; above
all, be conscious of the truth that you and He are bound by Supreme
Love. If you feel this acutely, the journey will be quick and the
goal can be won easily.
February 19, 2005
God is the great
Unseen, the vast Unknowable. Though you do not see the roots or know
how deep inside the earth they are, you pour water round the trunk,
so that it may reach them. You expect that the roots will absorb the
water and the tree will grow and yield fruit. Recognise that
similarly there is God as the very basis of Creation; pray to Him,
and He will shower fruit.
February 20, 2005
Never use foul words
against another. Such words should never defile your tongue.
Remember that there is God inside your heart, as well as in the
hearts of everyone around you. He sees and hears everything. When
you use harsh, cruel, angry and foul words against another, the God
in you and the God in the other person is hurt. The tongue is a tool
with which you can harm yourself and others too. So, be very
careful; use it only for your good and for the good of others. The
best way to use it is by speaking kind words, repeating the Name of
God and singing His Glory.
February 21, 2005
Be thankful to the Lord
that He gave you Time, as well as action to fill it with. He gave
you food, as well as hunger to relish it. But, that does not entitle
you to engage yourself in action without discrimination. When you
build a house, you install a door in front to admit all who are
welcome and keep out those are not. You do not keep the doors wide
open for all and sundry to come in as and when they please.
Similarly, screen the impulses and motives that enter your mind;
keep out the demeaning, the debasing, the deleterious. Admit only
the highest wisdom of the scriptures, the wisdom culled out of the
crucible of the experience of the ancient sages.
February 22, 2005
The dualistic attitude
of man is born out of a mistaken sense of separateness. Man should
realise his inherent divinity and get rid of the delusion of taking
his body to be his true Self. The body is only an instrument for
realising the Self. No great scholarship is needed for achieving
this realisation. The attitude of surrender to the Divine,
dedicating all thoughts, words and actions as an offering to the
Divine will lead to Self-realisation. The bliss one experiences in
that state is beyond description.
February 23, 2005
Whatever the troubles
you face, whatever the ordeals you encounter, you should not allow
your faith in God to weaken to the slightest extent. You must learn
a lesson from the Chataka bird. There may be terrible thunder and
blinding lightning in the sky, but the Chataka bird will follow the
cloud to catch the raindrops in the sky and will not go to any other
source for water. Nothing less than the pure raindrops from the
cloud will satisfy the Chataka. Likewise, you should yearn always
for the bliss of God's proximity, whatever difficulties or joys you
may experience in life.
February 24, 2005
Sadhana (spiritual
discipline) determines the character of a person and character in
turn determines one's destiny. Character is cultivated by performing
good actions. Actions are based on one's thoughts and intentions.
Whenever any thought arises in the mind, one should examine whether
it is right or wrong, whether it will benefit society or cause harm.
Actions should be based on such enquiry. It is wrong to blame anyone
for our misfortunes. Our thoughts and actions alone are responsible
for our plight. If one entertains pure thoughts and does all actions
with firm faith in God, one will be favoured with God's Grace.
February 25, 2005
When a river reaches
the ocean, it becomes one with the ocean and the river ceases to
exist. Before it joins the ocean, the river is bound by its banks
and it has a distinct form. But when it merges in the ocean, it
loses its form, name and taste. Likewise, when "man" merges in the
Infinite "I" only the Infinite "I" remains and the limited human
entity disappears.
February 26, 2005
Man is a prisoner of
his senses as long as the feelings of 'I' and 'mine' remain. Man
strays into misery and pain, because he aspires for the temporary
and the trivial. He ignores the voice of God that warns and guides
from within, and pays the penalty for the transgression. Life is to
be dedicated not to mere food and drink and catering to the cravings
of the senses. It has to be devoted to the attainment of the bliss
that God alone can confer.
February 27, 2005
The mind must become
the servant of the intellect, not the slave of the senses. It must
discriminate and detach itself from identification with the body.
The kernel of the ripe tamarind fruit is not attached to the outer
shell; likewise the mind must be unattached to this shell called the
body. Strike an unripe tamarind fruit with a stone and you cause
harm to the pulp inside; but, when you strike the ripe fruit it is
the dry rind that falls off; nothing affects the pulp or the seed.
The mature aspirant does not feel the blows of fate or fortune; it
is the unripe one who is wounded by every blow.
February 28, 2005
Wherever there is a
vacuum in any heart, love flows into it and is glad that it can fill
the emptiness. It is never held back; it is offered in abundance
without guile or deceit. It does not wear the cloak of falsehood,
flattery or fear. The tendrils of love aspire to cling only to the
garments of God. It senses that God resides in His splendour in
every heart. To discover that seat of God is real devotion.
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