Swami Shivapadananda on non-planning

SWAMI SHIVAPADANANDA

DAILY READINGS

Taken from Mother Radha’s
notes, written at Swamiji’s feet.

Day 317

 

If you make plans you are lacking faith. Work is the only way to God. So
work for now, plan for now. If you plan ahead then the present work is imperfect.
If you plan only for now, then the present is perfect. Go through action to
actionlessness. When the mind is sattvic [balanced, harmonious] it wants to go
inside itself.

Use concentration and memory to remember who you are, and never forget
it again. Give God first place and then every action will have your full
concentration. Practise, practise, until your nature becomes perfect. Then you
will remember who you are. Now your thoughts are haphazard.

The mind is like a torch. What happens if you focus it, concentrate it?
Think of the sun and the prism. It burns.

All else must come second. Just switch on the light and the darkness of
the ego is gone. De-hypnotise yourself, then there is no more imagination. The
guru makes plans for you then.
Then as you go deeper and deeper inside, That [God, the infinite, the Self] does
it for you. So do not plan. Rather say, ‘God wants me to do this,’ for example,
plant vegetables. Or say, ‘This is yours God,’ and then do it. Then go on and
do something else. Do not sit and think, ‘If I water it -’ or, ‘If it rains -,’
or ‘If I sell it for so much . . .’ Rely on God’s plan, God’s grace. Be like a
child. Be like a dry leaf blown in the wind. Faith, not planning.

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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.