Talk Excerpt 347. Swamiji: When you begin to worship, it is just a photo. Gradually the Ishta becomes alive – if you are sincere – then It reveals Itself to you.
[When asked if Sri Ramakrishna was present in his photograph, Holy Mother Sri Sarada Devi answered:
‘The body and the shadow are the same. And what is his picture but a shadow?’ She confirmed that if a devotee prays constantly before a picture, the Master (Sri Ramakrishna) manifests himself through it, turning the spot into a shrine.]
From Mother Radha’s notes, written at Swamiji’s feet.
Guru is only One. Just as you have a father, you cannot change him no matter what happens. So regard the other holy ones, not as ‘my guru’ but as ‘my teacher, my father.’ There is no substitute for the guru.
At initiation the guru gives you his power. He wants you to become one with him, with God; but he does not really care who comes and who goes. You are not of importance to him.
Serve him selflessly and think of him continually, become one with him. As you think like this, you will become purer. You will see him in all and then his physical form will disappear and only the spirit will remain.
At present you think of the guru as ‘that man over there,’ rather than of his spiritual form, which is without name and form. Because God is God, He is your Self. The lower form of the guru, the physical form, is a projection of your own mind only. The higher view of the guru is the spiritual form, a projection of your [higher] Self. You will get the strength to realise this and more too. This is the law.
If someone hurts me, what hurts? [Ego] If something pleases me, what is pleased? Take the good and the bad as it comes. See it and then forget it. Do it and then forget it. Forget the whole past, give it away.
We must either have a pure mind, which leads to sattva (and this leads to Self-realisation) or we must give all to God, to guru: ‘Lord, all this, pleasure, pain, hurt, love, is yours.’ Try this for 6 months and see the results. This is not book learning, it is experience.
When you begin to worship, it is just a photo. Gradually the Ishta becomes alive – if you are sincere – then It reveals Itself to you. It must, this is the law.
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These recordings or the excerpts from them, were made from the early 1970s onward, by Mother Radha, a close devotee of Swamiji’s and edited for uploading here by our gurubhai and her son, Brother Tim. Please be mindful that what Swamiji was saying may have been specific to an individual or a group of people with him, at the time.