Page 35 - Wisdom Unfurled

away we begin to assume finer forms of existence.
The man who is born in this world is sure to taste miseries. One cannot escape these. When I see the world, I find it very troublesome. Some are groaning with pain, a few are suffering from the loss of their dear ones and a great number are anxious to achieve success at each step. We try to get rid of these by going into penance, and rishis (sages) have devoted themselves thoroughly to it. All that is born of attachment is misery. Pleasure and pain both contribute to misery. There is no remedy for overcoming these miseries except devoting ourselves towards Godly thought of the purest nature.
We need not renounce the world and go for penance in the forest. Let the material world and spiritual world go side by side, glittering equally. One cannot be a loser in any way, if doing his household duties, he brings himself up to the realisation of God as well. We should soar with both wings if we want to succeed. It is a vague idea of the people in general that God is to be searched for in the forests. My idea is that He should be searched for in the heart. One is performing the household duties and at the same time is equally busy with Godly devotion. You may say that these two things are incompatible and are contradictory to each other, but it is not the case. In the long run, Godly wisdom begins to work and one does his duty from the mind beyond.
Thus, vairagya can be attained only when one is wholly diverted towards the Divine. When it is so, one naturally becomes disinterested in his own self including every thing connected with it. Thus he loses not only the body- consciousness but subsequently the soul-consciousness as well. What remains then is nothing but the “being in dead form or a living dead”.
Meditation
Under Sahaj Marg system of training we start from dhyan, the seventh step of Patanjali yoga, fixing our mind on one point in order to practise meditation. The previous steps are not taken up separately but they automatically come into practice as we proceed on with meditation. Thus much of our time and labour are saved. In certain sansthas the usual routine followed for practice is often kept confidential. It is released and revealed only to those who undertake to join them formally. What their purpose at the bottom may be, is not quite understandable. Nature has no secrets and I think that one professing to follow the divine path must also have none.
The practice followed in our Mission is meditation on the heart. The same method has been recommended by Patanjali. There is a great philosophy underlying it. We find ourselves all the time busy with worldly things. If we are not doing anything, our thoughts seem to have wings in the leisure hours.