Talks Excerpt 550. Swamiji says you must have had some sort of ‘spiritual’ experience, or you wouldn’t be on the path.
From Mother Radha’s recordings of Swamiji.
Whenever you meet and greet each other, do it as if it were the first time you are meeting that person.
When I look at the ashram boys and girls, I always watch to see if they are chasing yesterday’s thought. I want to see if they are fresh or stale. To the extent they still have yesterday’s thought (or fear, or anger) with them, to that extent they are stale and need to be freshened up. To the extent they have forgotten yesterday, and have realised that today is a good day, to that extent they are spiritualised.
God bless. God speed. (May you progress Godward)
Some people do not understand why I ask them to do certain things – to come here at certain times and so on. There is a meeting point of spirituality and love. Spirituality is jnana and when you practise it to the extent that it permeates your body, to that extent you gain power.
The first rule in spiritual life is obedience. You may not understand it but that does not matter. You must know that I will not give you poison.
Everyone that is seated here must have had some spiritual experience, or an experience which was above the senses. Otherwise what are we doing here? It is not for nothing that somehow our experiences have told us that there is a God. But we do not want to surrender to God, (though I am afraid to use the word surrender.)
What do I mean by surrender? I sometimes pray to God to give me the meaning of surrender. If I say, ‘God, take my surrender, I am giving You my power of attorney.’ That too is not right, because ‘I’ am still doing it. God has not yet taught me how to surrender. Sri Ramakrishna says, ‘Do everything at the proper time and then surrender to God or repeat His name [japa].’
The free-to-read or download, 396-page Flipbook version of Swamiji’s biography is available by clicking HERE. If you’d prefer the PDF version, please click HERE.
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.