Swami Shivapadananda Puri on truthfulness and congruence (inside matches outside)

What you think – the words – you must say the same thing and when you say that and you act accordingly, then only your prayer will be answered. Not that you go in the shrine and say, 'God, God, you are my father, and all the world are your children, and we are brothers and sisters' and you come outside and treat someone like a dog. Or hate somebody, talk ill about somebody. God never answers the prayers of people like that. You have to be pure inside and pure outside. Then only, whatever you say will come right.

Khudiram [the father of Sri Ramakrishna] – how did he lose his little piece of land? How? The landlord there [in the village of Karmarpukur in West Bengal, India] said, 'Look, there's a man I don't like. I'm going to take him to court. You must come as a witness. And Khudiram said, 'But that man didn't do what you claim.' The landlord said, 'Well, you must give false evidence.' Khudiram said 'No! I will not.' The landlord replied, 'Well, you know what the result will be. I will take you off this land.' Khudiram responded: 'Never mind if you put me out'. The landlord repeated, 'I'll take your land.' Khudiram replied: 'Take it, but I will not go to court.' And truly, he did not go to court to give false evidence – and the landlord chased Khudiram away from there, and he was left without property. Until some [sympathetic] people got together and got five acres more land somewhere else and they built a place.

God [Sri Ramakrishna the Incarnation – avatar] was born in that house – where man practices truthfulness. He doesn't just come into anyone's house. You have to burn in the fire of truth. How do you burn in the fire of truth? Ramakrishna Paramahamsa's father was truthful, therefore so much pain and misery came on him, that his land and house and everything was taken away. That means he suffered for the sake of truth. His ego was burning in the fire of truth and that is tapasya [austerity, self-denial]. That is tapasya. 'Tapa' means heat. The heat of truthfulness makes you suffer and when it makes you suffer, you give way to greater things in your life.

And that is what Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa said: If one practices for twelve years – truth – speak the truth, whatever he says with his mouth will come true. Whatever he says. Out of truth Sri Ramakrishna was born. And he practised truth and he realised truth, called God.