Chapter 22  ·  Contents  ·  Glossary

23. CHANT THE NAMES OF THE LORD WHICH ARE SWEETER THAN SUGAR, TASTIER THAN CURD

Embodiments of Divine Love,

The Name of God is the sweetest thing in the world. Nothing else can compare in sweetness to it. There are varieties of tastes, each person having his own taste. But that taste is of the tongue, not of the heart. True happiness comes from the heart whereas other types of happiness are temporary. Worldly happiness changes every second, whereas the bliss of the Atma is changeless. Devotees have prayed to God from ancient times. Even though they have prayed to God for a long time, the devotee did not receive what he desired. What is the reason? The reason is that the devotee does not consider that the idol or picture of the deity they are worshipping contains the living Presence of the Divine. If they would feel the Divine Presence, they would feel the Divine Bliss. But even the devotees who say that they are the servants of God do not experience the Divine Presence in the idols and pictures of the deities.

God is the eternal Bliss, indestructible and all-powerful. We do not have a firm belief in this. Once there was a student who desired to get very good marks in his examinations. He took a picture of Rama and began to pray to it. But in spite of his prayers to Rama, he found that he was unable to answer any of the questions on the exam. So the next day he put Rama's picture away in the cupboard. Because Rama did not fulfill his desires, he took Lord Krishna's picture and began to pray to it.

That day the examination was even more difficult than the previous day, so he was very disappointed. He put away Lord Krishna's picture also in the cupboard. On the third day, he took Parameshwara's picture and began praying with intense devotion. But he failed the exam that day. He then took the Divine Mother Lalita's picture and performed special prayers in the correct manner with incense, fruits and prasad. At this time he observed that the smoke from the incense was drifting towards the cupboard. He wondered why the smoke should go to Rama and Krishna's side rather than Lalita's as they did not fulfill his desires. He brought a piece of cloth, tore it into three pieces, then tied a piece around the nose on each picture in the cupboard. Immediately Rama, Krishna and Parameshwara appeared in front of him. He was surprised. He exclaimed, "Oh, what a surprise! When I prayed to You earlier You did not come. Why have You come now?" He was very happy. Hesitatingly, he asked Them, "Swami, I respected You, I praised You, I prayed to You, but You appeared only when I smothered You with a piece of cloth?" "All this time you prayed you did not believe in Our Presence in these pictures. Only now you covered Our noses believing that We breathe. Only that belief is the reason for Us to appear in front of you."

Our prayers will not reach God if we keep on praying not believing in the living Presence in the pictures and idols to which we offer the prayers. When you believe that the idols and pictures are alive, then only your desires will be fulfilled. You should understand the fact that God is alive. If you agree that God is omnipresent, but at the same time you do not feel His Presence in the picture, then you prove your disbelief in His living Presence in the picture.

O God, You are present everywhere in the entire universe. How can I build a temple for You? Your effulgence is like millions of suns. how can I offer you a small light? Even Brahma the Creator could not find Your true form. O, God, You are present in all the bodies of water; how can I offer You water? When the entire universe is in Your stomach, how can I feed you? Who can tell the ignorant people struggling for their daily life about Your glory? I cannot tell You any more than this.

O, God, You are omnipresent. You are in the five elements. Your power is inherent in water, wind, and all over the world. When we worship God, we should believe that He is all-powerful. We should not say that God is in one place and not in another place. He is everywhere.

All that we perceive are our own reflections, reactions and resounds. A shepherd, tending his cattle between two mountains, was happily watching his cattle grazing on the grass. He sat on the rocks and began singing, "Oh, God, who travels on Garuda, please come slowly and softly to drink some buttermilk." So God, disguised as a brahmin, came. The shepherd said to the brahmin, "All the pundits say that all Gods - Rama, Vishnu, Narayana - should have a namam on the forehead. But you don't look like them, so I am not certain who you are."

Everything the shepherd was speaking echoed, so he became angry. The shepherd said to the brahmin, "You sing like me, who are you?" "You tell your name first and then I will tell my name." The same thing echoed again. This argument went on until four o'clock in the evening. The shepherd proceeded home with his herd saying to the brahmin, "I will return tomorrow." After reaching home, the shepherd told his mother that someone in the mountain had insulted him by mimicking whatever he had said. "If I blamed him, he blamed me. He is repeating the same words that I have said. I wish to go there in the early morning to search for him to tell him that I hate him. You also accompany me if you wish and i see for yourself. I cannot bear his insults and I am not going to tend the herd from tomorrow." His mother replied, "Okay, I will come to see." They arrived at the same place and the mother said to him, "Now, you speak."

So he asked loudly, "Who is that who spoke yesterday?" There was no answer. He heard the echo from his own voice. "See, Mother, he's repeating what I am saying." The Mother understood the truth. She said, "Son, there is no enemy for you here; nobody is hating you. You are in between two mountains so whatever you speak resounds."

Everybody has the reaction, reflection, and resound. If we think that somebody has hurt us, it is actually the resound of our own hateful feelings. Whatever we experience in life is the result of reflection, reaction and resound. Where is Reality? It is in your own heart. Whatever we speak from our heart is the form of Truth. This is called conscience. Your true quality is the form of your conscience. Conscience should not be altered to suit the society. When consciousness takes a human form it is called avatar. If you wish to understand the true nature of the avatar, you should believe it has Eternal Life. Whatever we worship, we should believe it has life (consciousness). We differentiate the rooms in a house saying one is a dining room, a prayer room, etc. But we should consider that every room is a prayer room. God is present in all the places and at all the times. It is not the place but one's feelings that matter. God considers your feelings, not the external appearances. You are fortunate to have the avatar in front of you who embodies Eternal Life. There are presently so many people in the world. When Lord Krishna was on earth, then there were so many; when Lord Rama was there, there were so many. Did all of those people understand and worship Them? Did they all have firm belief? No. Only a very few of them believed. If you have God's picture in front of you, you should believe that is has life. That is the Truth.

God is of the form of consciousness. God says that He resides in the heart of the person who sings, praising Him and constantly thinking of Him. If you wish to gain My grace, first become My devotee, meditate on Me, bow down to Me and believe that I have life. If you do not believe that there is a Living Presence, all your worship is of no use.

Many people are reading the holy books. Many are reciting the Vedas. But do they understand the Truth? What is the reason? It is the ego related to the knowledge of the scriptures. They do not have the feeling of the Living Presence of God because of their ego. Once the egoism is destroyed, they would be able to feel the Living Presence of God in the picture.

In the world, the spiritual practices and prayers are performed in a variety of ways. God is not attracted by the particular practice you do; He sees only your yearning and the anguish in your heart. Does He need your worship? He is the Creator. On the tree of human life there are many fruits. Everyone has the fruit of wisdom within himself. This fruit of wisdom has a sweet essence — this is the Love Principle. To get this sweet essence, one has to remove the bitter skin and then remove the seeds inside. Then only when we drink this juice we will experience the Bliss. The fruit of wisdom is covered by the skin of ego and the seeds of doubts. We must remove all of them and only then we get the pure unsullied essence. This will be sweeter than sugar, and tastier than milk and curds, tastier than honey. Everyday chant the name of God, Rama, if you wish to enjoy the sweet essence believing in the Living Presence. Even if you pray for a long time, without removing the ego, you will never enjoy the Divine Bliss.

Once, all the gopis wished to visit Madurai, so they boarded a boat on the River Yamuna. They wanted to reach the next morning, so they boarded the previous evening. All the gopis were singing the praise of Lord Krishna and sharing their experiences, conversations and His flute songs, while they were rowing the boat, one after the other. Soon it was morning and the sun was shining. They found that the boat hadn't moved at all. It was at the same place, tied by a rope to a big post. They had forgotten to untie it. This rope that prevented them from reaching Krishna was the rope of worldly attachments. The rope is the attachment to "me" and "mine". We do many spiritual practices, sing bhajans, meditate, listen to discourses — what is the use? The reason is attachment, — ego follows attachment and this leads to many bad qualities.

You don't own this body. If it is yours, why don't you cure the illnesses the body gets? This human body is the gift of God. The human body which is given by God should be devoted to do His work and services. There are no sadhanas, yogas, penance or yagnas better than this. What is the use of spiritual practices? What is the use of performing yagnas? If you don't surrender your heart to God and offer work to Him, it is like rowing the boat which is tied up.

Therefore we should surrender the attachment to the body to God. This is what Utthava did at the end. Utthava was with Krishna throughout 83 years. He respected Him as a very close friend. He didn't worship Him (as realizing) the Living Presence, but later when he realized that God was within him, he said:

"God, I surrender my heart to You which You gave me as your gift. Glorious Almighty, I dedicate my heart to You. What else can I offer You to worship Your lotus Feet? Please accept this, Swami, please do accept."

Who gave this (human) body? Who gave the Life to it? Who gave the feelings? Understand this. If you want to attain a higher level, leave your silly thoughts.

Even today we go to temples; we got to Thirupathi. Wherever God is. He is Sath Chit Anand. The devotee who goes 'to Thirupati takes with him a lot of desires and he shaves his hair off there so that his desires could be fulfilled. Why do you think God wants your hair? You should give your love to God instead of giving the impermanent hair which falls away.

Sita, in the jungle of Ashoka, waited eagerly and with anguish for the good news from Rama. Ravana came and said, "Sita, You are not going to get Rama anymore," and with his illusory power showed her Rama's head. For a moment Sita was very sad. But she realized that Rama has satwic qualities, auspicious qualities, and no one can win over Rama. Lord Narayana only has taken the form of Rama. This is only an illusion (what Ravana has shown her).

Sita took a small piece of grass and put it in front of Ravana and said, "All your capabilities are like this small grass. Without Rama's Will nothing would happen in this world."

People do not understand that nothing will happen without the Will of God. They do not try to understand what is behind His decisions and what will happen later. Why should you say this and that? You are like an ant to Brahman. People do not try to understand or to know or to inquire about this. They are very proud of their intelligence. They do not know what is going to happen to them due to their past karma.

"Even a small blade of grass will not move without Your Will" (song).

All these are the reactions of their inner motives. Even their mind will not work without God's will. You decide using your knowledge, wealth, physical strength, and intelligence. If God wishes He can make the earth into sky and sky into earth, sand into gold and gold into diamond. Therefore we should cultivate love which will soften God's heart. Love is the reason for everything. Love is God. Live in Love.

When you cultivate Love the Godliness comes into you. But there should be a time for it (the time has to come). God is the form of time.

Kalaya Namah, Kalakalaya namah
Kala thathvaya namaha
Kala swarupaya namaha
Kala vhithaya namaha

Time is everything. People wait for a long time to get the Grace of God. But they do not get it. Till the fruit is not ripe, it is sour. When it is ripe, it is sweet.

You may think that you have not got the Grace of God until yesterday. When, where, and how you will get the Grace of God depends on the accumulation of karma you have done on your previous births.

When it rains, the small rain drops make a big stream. Similarly the reason for the Godliness appearing in you is your actions of your past, present and the future.

Who knows what is going to happen tomorrow? Who knows whether we will be alive tomorrow or not?

Body is like a bubble, mind is like a monkey. Don't follow the mind. Don't follow the body. Follow the conscience. This is what we should follow. Conscience is the philosophy of Love, quality of Love. We should follow it. Do not let it go.

Ramadas sings: "If you don't fulfil my desires I won't let you take a step forward." Rama appeared in front of him with a tray in His hand saying, "Ramadas, you have been starving for four or five days. Take this food." Ramadas replied, "I do not want any food. I only want Your lotus feet." Rama brought a gold chain in front of his eyes. Ramdas being very intelligent then replied, "Do you think you can give with Your Hand and run away? You are everything to me. I have nobody." There are thousands of devotees who have learnt the Sastras, Vedas and Vedantas and the Bhagavatham. A child looks at the Bhagavatham. A pundit also looks at it. The child concentrates on the beautiful pictures of Krishna turning page by page. The pundit turns the pages and tries to find the meaning in it. Both are turning the pages. Even though the child does not understand the meaning, it fixes the mind on the form. We also should focus our minds on the form of God. What is the use of knowing only the meaning? What do you understand by saying God is Sat Chit Anand? Sat chit Anand is not in the world, it is in the form. Therefore, we should imprint the form in our heart and enjoy it with love.

Swami concluded His Discourse with the bhajan, "Bhajana bina sukha shanti nahi."

April 29, 1996

Glossary