Talks Excerpt 685 and 686 combined. Swamiji contrasts ashram life with secular life for sadhakas.
From Mother Radha’s recordings of Swamiji.
Excerpt 685:
Your mind can be pure wherever you are. Where you are, keep your mind pure.
We live in an ashram because here we have the help of other people, and the environment is conducive to making our minds strong to renounce the world. If you can renounce the world at home, then do it. That is very good. But then you must not even say, ‘at home’. You have no home. And the very fact you are saying ‘at home’ means you feel you have a home – you have not renounced yet.
If I take you from home and put you here, you must be quiet; and if I take you from here and put you at home you must be quiet. No matter where you are, feel and think that you are the child of God.
Mother Sita said to Sri Raam, ‘I am happy to be wherever you are, my Lord. Whether you are in the forest or in the palace, as long as I am with you, I am happy.’
Master [Sri Ramakrishna] showed renunciation when the temple manager told him, ‘Leave the place and go.’ Master picked up his shawl, put it on his shoulder and walked out. But as he came to the gate, they realised their error, and lovingly said, ‘Please come back, I am sorry.’ Master came back. He did not say a word. He immediately forgot everything and started talking about God.
When the authorities asked him to go, he left. When they asked him to return, he came back, without making a fuss. This is called renunciation. As a renunciate wherever you are, you will see God. You will not discriminate between ashram and home.
Ramana Maharshi put it very well. A man asked him, ‘Must I renounce?’ He said, ‘Look here, if you go to live in the forest you will still carry your mind. If you stay at home you are still carrying your mind; so renounce the wrong thoughts of your mind and fill it with God thought. Don’t worry about going to the forest or anywhere else.
Excerpt 686:
Renounce your mind. The mind, the ego, has to be renounced. If you become ego-less you are a renunciate. A person may wear the garb and tell everybody, ‘I am a great swami,’ but then he is not a renunciate – he still has the ‘I’ [ego].
The [gerua] garb does not make a person a renunciate. Ravana wore the garb, but proved that he was a bhogi. [worldly, deceitful man]
If you have faith in God, God will take care of it. Mirabai was exploited by people but nevertheless she enjoyed the bliss of God. When you have deep trust in God, God protects you, you will not even think that you are a great devotee of God.
Self-surrender means you have no concern; God will take care. We must be satisfied with whatever situation God puts us in. People might praise or blame us, we should not be affected by that.
Gurudev [Swamiji’s beloved Guru, Swami Nischalananda Puri] gave Vishnupriya [Swamiji’s then gurubhai] and myself our [gerua, monastic] garb at the same time. He told us, ‘When I am no more, you must wear this garb. Offer it to the Master, and then wear it. Know that with this garb I am giving you, you are a renunciate.’ He chanted the appropriate mantras and then gave the garb to us.
After Gurudev’s passing away I told Vishnupriya, ‘Now you have to put on the garb because that’s what Gurudev wanted.’ But Vishnupriya disagreed and said, ‘We must work first, save money, then we can renounce. Otherwise, we will have to depend on people.’ I thought: ‘But what kind of renunciation is it, if my strength is in the bank?’
As it turned out, he saved some money; went to India, and returned very unwell. It was a great pity that he passed away soon thereafter.
When you surrender to God, depend on Him. Let Him do what He feels like with you. You must be like a dried leaf – sometimes He blows you into deep water, sometimes onto the shore. You just sing Raam Raam [God’s name]. Sri Ramakrishna had cancer of the throat but he never stopped chanting God’s name. When Mahatma Gandhi was shot he said, ‘Raam Raam.’ He did not say, ‘Why did you shoot me?’ He was a renunciate.
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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.