“I Will Not Let Go The Grasp”
Tuesday, August 7th, 2012
Imagine the Lord coming down donning the garb of a human and writing letters to you, in person? It is not a stretch of imagination or any more utopian…If you were tune to Sathya Sai you would have heard of such fascinating tales, of Swami writing to devotees and students in those olden golden days. Bhagawan has time and again affirmed that He would not let go the grasp on His devotees even if devotees forsook Him. Trials and tribulations are part of Divinity’s acid test that refine a devotee to excel in the game called life. Here is such a promsing letter written by Bhagawan Himself to a great Vedic Scholar, who in his dire distress started deploring his fate, losing faith even to pray to Bhagawan. Read on…
My dear……,
When life flows merrily on, without any obstruction, people exult that it is all the result of their own effort and they even forget the Lord; when at every step trouble and defeat resist the flow, people start deploring their fate and lose heart. This is the weakness of mankind; and, so, you too are subject to this failing. Since you are now meeting with obstacles at every step, it is no wonder you are also despairing.
My dear fellow, grief is something that men get, and not trees. Though trees have to encounter it, they have no power to voice it forth. Nevertheless, the life of Man is but a chapter of the Saga of Immortality and Bliss, unbroken Bliss. Yet, overcome by the storm and stress of the mind the intelligence and the ego, Man reduces himself to the status of a slave to the objective world, and to the needs of the senses; the glory of the Atma is hidden from his Consciousness; he plunges into the foul stream of sense-pleasure; he is caught in the twin torrent of calmness-confusion, joy-grief etc. He sways helplessly in this transient world from one false hope to another. This is human nature; and you must be aware of it. Nevertheless, if you grow as desperate as you have become, you are insulting the Atmatattwa, which you really are.
Carrying the Vedas Sastras Puranas Ithihasas and Upanishads stuffed in your brain, these thoughts, this grieving, this wailing, do not become you; they are appropriate only in the ignorant. You ought to be a commentary of the great ideas which fill your head. Why is it that you get so downhearted when troubled by the want of money? The most effective specific for all anxiety, for all mental agitations, is the Name of the Lord; you do not allow that Name to lilt on your tongue. Why do you repeat continuously and lament instead, over grief, loss, fear, and pain?
You have earned much learning in many subjects of study, but, in spite of that, you do not keep before you its purpose and value, nor do you try to experience the joy of putting it into practice. You spend your days full contented, feeling that what is important is to display that learning in discourses and discussions and to impress on others by external signs, your great scholarship. It is because you are thinking that you are suffering in so many ways, that you are actually suffering in so many ways. Really speaking these are all objective experiences, not those of your real Self. O, if only you have the strong faith that ‘nothing can hinder the Atmananda which is the live spring in every heart,’ if you live in the constant memory of that Ananda, how happy you can be! Just imagine how elevated will be your feelings, how deep the calm in your mind.
It is so easy to advise others; when it comes to practising what you recommend to others, you feel it as awful trouble. You go about declaring in ringing word: “Swami knows everything. Swami is present everywhere. Swami is all the Gods in one single Form” but, you forget those very things, when events occur in your own experience revealing those very truths!
Do I not know? The other day, when you were just about to start to the village of your parents, when your wife said, “We shall write to Swami about our worries and troubles”, why did you tell her “You have no permission; do not write”? Do I not know? Do I know only when I read what she writes? Silly fellow! Do I not know that you went to Rama……… puram and returned incurring more expense than what you earned there? And, you started condemning yourselves saying, all my learning is a waste, all my experience is of no value. No, do not be depressed so much over that.
For Me who is nourishing all this World, surely it is no burden to nourish you and your family. I am placing all these handicaps in your path, in order to teach you a few lessons. “Learning is not the major thing; practice is essential”: this lesson I want to inculcate in you, through your own experience.
He who plants a sapling will not desist from watering it. If He has no inclination to provide it with water, He would not have planted it. This is the inseparable relationship between the Atma and the Jiva, isn’t it?
“My Swami’s Name is resounding in home after home; my Swami’s Form is before every eye,” you write. My dear man, why revel so much in Ananda for just this? This is not all. Know this: Swami’s Name will fill not merely every home, but every inch of the World. The song, “Everything everywhere is Sai, Everything everywhere is Baba” will not fail; it will be realised in actuality.
For your part, engage yourself in that which is your duty, courageously and gladly. Strive to gain the Purushartha and you can experience the Paramartha. This “Partheesa” will be your “Paramesa”. He will hold you by the hand and raise you; He will not let go the grasp.
Do not talk lightly of the rich. Not of the rich only; do not talk lightly of any one, in any way. For Sai is in every person; therefore, you would be slighting Sai Himself. Vanity will injure only those who have it; it will not injure you. So, be engaged in contemplating the Truth. I shall not give you up; I shall not forgo you.
I am neither angry nor pained; I wrote all this only through Daya and Prema. Practise and earn, the rapture of Bliss.
He who resides in your heart…
SAI
II Samasta Lokah Sukhino Bhavantu II
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