Swami Shivapadananda with more thoughts for the new year
SWAMI SHIVAPADANANDA
DAILY READINGS
Taken from Mother Radha’s
notes, written at Swamiji’s feet.
Day 203
New Year discussion continued:
May the new year come with happy tidings – on health and wealth,
prosperity and enlightenment. May the Ramakrishna Centre [of Southern Africa, founded in 1942 by Swami Nischalananda Puri] be in the Light of God and not in darkness.
May your faith
in God increase. May you become the helpmates of God – to serve Him and help
Him in thought, word and deed.
Get up before sunrise. Do more sadhana [spiritual practice]. Get up earlier. Increase your
sadhana but do not rush it.
Don’t worry – be happy. You can only not worry when you surrender to
God. Only then you get happy.
This ‘don’t care’ attitude does not get you anywhere.
I do not know whether I am good or not – but I try to do good. Man is
good but only when he does good is it seen.
Guru [the spiritual Preceptor] disciplines the chela [disciple or devotee] as part of himself.
God has as many forms as there are minds in this world – and one form is
death [see footnote] – Bhagavad Gita [a major Hindu scripture] Chapter 10 verse 34.
We are so used to choosing the pleasant and not the unpleasant. We must
go above the pairs of opposites [like and dislike etc.] and we need a very
important instrument to do that – detachment.
Grace is not cheap. That it comes to all is amazing. What is the
qualification for grace? One requirement is your speech must be sweet.
How many of you practise one of Gurudev’s [Swami Nischalananda’s – Swamiji’s own Guru]
Spiritual Precepts? There is no realisation without these qualities. Take
constancy for example. Women must practise this and the men too must be more
soft and tender.
Sri Ramakrishna, the Cosmic Mother, reveals Brahman – that means the
tender qualities of the Mother. And this leads to brotherhood, not to arrogance
and pride, because there is no tenderness or grace in them.
Footnote:
Bhagavad Gita Chapter 10:34
"And I am the all-devouring Death. I am the prosperity of those who are to be prosperous; and of female qualities I am Fame, Fortune, Speech, Memory, Intelligence, Constancy and Forbearance."
1) Care should be taken by the reader to understand and take Swamiji’s
words in these postings, in context. Every teaching or instruction that he gave
was specific to the people who were with Swamiji at the time.
2) Mouse-over the words highlighted in
red in the posting for further explanation
or links.
Besides these daily readings Mother Radha recorded
many hours of our beloved Swamiji speaking. There are currently 40 different
CDs available in sets of 10 for R200 per set. This price includes postage. Please
email timhoare@webmail.co.za to
order.
Reference websites: Ramakrishna Math & Mission, Ramakrishna Centre of Southern Africa, Sri Ramakrishna Dham
Posted by Clive Simpkins