Selfless Service and Reverence to Nature

Service through Reverence to Nature

The human being is deriving innumerable debts from Nature and enjoying the amenities provided by Nature in various ways. But what is the gratitude the human is showing to Nature? What gratitude is he or she offering to the Divine? The human is forgetting the Divine who is the provider of everything. That is the reason for a person becoming prey to various difficulties and calamities. While we are receiving countless gifts from Providence, we are offering nothing in re­turn to Nature or God. This shows how unnatural and heartless is the behavior of the human be­ing. When we are enjoined to return good for evil how unbecoming it is to fail even to return good for good. We are not learning the great lessons Nature is teaching us. The foremost lesson is do­ing service with no expectation of return.

(Baba)

That is part of the text for the study circle. Baba is talking about gifts we are receiving from providence and we are offering nothing in return to Nature or God. 

But the question is not only to see it as a gift, but also how we return the gift. 

What is the gift we offer back to Mother Nature? If it is meditation or Sadhana; it is also giving back the gift we get from nature or God.  

We are enjoined to return good for evil how unbecoming it is to fail even to return good for good. We are not learning the great lessons Nature is teaching us. The foremost lesson is do­ing service with no expectation of return.

We learn that we should return good for evil and we fail to even return good for good, I know too many people who do just that giving back the good with no character.
And that we are not learning the great lessons. Th great lesson is that nature is teaching us that we have to return what we get as gift in some way and if we fail to do that and we don’t only don’t return the good, but what about reacting with good to evil, we will suffer the consequences in our life somehow.
If we have such an attitude we don’t know what bad we create and what suffering our attitude has for others, but that will be returned by Mother Nature as Baba is telling us here:

That is the reason for a person becoming prey to various difficulties and calamities. While we are receiving countless gifts from Providence, we are offering nothing in re­turn to Nature or God. This shows how unnatural and heartless is the behavior of the human be­ing. When we are enjoined to return good for evil how unbecoming it is to fail even to return good for good. We are not learning the great lessons Nature is teaching us. The foremost lesson is do­ing service with no expectation of return.

But that is why we are meditators to begin the day with good thoughts and cleaning the mind and by that we clean consciousness and we go for the good in everybody.
We begin the day with Sathva and not Rajas. If we fail to do good and even pay back the good with bad, we actually turn the natural law upside down.
How unbecoming it is to return the good for good and we return the good with evil? It is kind of sick and that is what Baba called perverted to give back the good with evil. And it is just taking advantage of everything and no service without expectation of no return, I guess it is mother nature which will pay it back, even if it takes some time, it will come back and if we have such an attitude we don’t know how much evil we have caused already. 

Selfless Service through Thoughts, Words and Deeds

Let the day dawn for you and others with the thought of the almighty, the compassionate, the omnipresent, all-knowing God. What greater ser­vice can you do for yourself and others? This will give you health and happiness. Your egoism will be shattered when you sing in the streets in full view of your neighbors. You will forget in your enthusiasm all pride and self-esteem. Thus, this nagar-saṇkīrtan (devotional singing in streets) is a great sādhanā (spiritual discipline), a great piece of social service.

It is about singing in the streets as they do in the morning in Prasanthi and that is what Baba calls the best way of service.
I guess that is not possible in the West and meditation is also a service, because we create orderliness in our own brain and mediation are the office hours for divinity, we sit down to clean the mind and consciousness, therefore, we also create orderliness in consciousness and that way we give back the gift to mother nature or God.
That is why it was good to be meditators and it was not good to stop meditation and it was good to do the Siddhis and not good to stop it and instead of replacing the yoga sutras with the thought of being special. To think we are special is not serving mother nature, it turns into mental speculation and whish fulfilling thinking and ego. Mediation is based on the knowledge that we are God, if we clean the mind to purify consciousness we are aware of it that it is not outside of us and we invite the worst to happen what was possible and instead of taking responsibility, thinking that everything is allowed and okay but we do not listen and we even think he will take care of everything instead?
We actually have instead of unity and wisdom developped the imaginative faculty of the mind. We have exchanged Sathva for Tamas and belong to the those lost in the night without knowing what is right and what is wrong.

We didn't get the right answer with meditation, but to get the right answer we have to listen and think it over and absorb. The master has to be present, people began to mediate. If there is a master, but nobody is listening to him and even if he tells them to listen a lifelong, they do everything but listening to him. 

They are all into mental speculation and think they will get it in their own minds. 

We have to tell them always, listen, think it over and absorb and we get aware that they are not able to listen to it, the mind is too strong as it seems.

Let the day dawn for you and others with the thought of the almighty, the compassionate, the omnipresent, all-knowing God. What greater ser­vice can you do for yourself and others? This will give you health and happiness.

It needs a certain attitude of mind thinking that we are better and creating a taboo instead of unity and understanding everything Baba said as something we did right to get there and harm done, we have to immediately take action, but also that was ignored.

Meditation has the purpose of purifying the mind and we went on with mediation twice a day and to go for right action we had to wait for the right insight and he was present as the master in the dream telling us how to go on, when it is about the right thing and it was about right action and truth and love, he was telling my ex that I had to come to him to make peace with him. It means there was no peace and no way to talk to him, but he still thought he was actually lovely, it was kind shocking to face the darkness and blindness what was present in him. He did everything to harm and he thought he was lovely, it was perverted and we didn't know what that was. 

And there was no listening, when we told him was as little of it as it was before, just a sick guy not knowing what he was doing.  

Behind he big friend who has sent him there and the mud hole, we were not aware of it. We went on with meditation purifying the mind, but in the end everything felt just like a joke in that mud hole.  

Listening to the inner master we had to go on and when he said, 'you didn't listen, you have to get a divorce', we went for it, but he still didn't listen and that is how it happened in the end, I had the agreement with me and in Baba's presence he signed it, otherwise, it would not be done today.   

He is telling us that Tamas is darkness and being in the dark is not knowing what is right and what is wrong. We went to Prasanthi and Baba was holding speeches.  

Just as all earthly matters are not taken di­rectly to a king but are presented to the con­cerned ministers for action, all prayers do not reach God Himself. They are attended to by His ministers Indra, Varuna and others. Only those prayers, which have their origins in the spirit of nishkāma karma (selfless action), infinite and pure love and an unsullied heart, reach the Lord directly. It is not possible for prayers of any other kind to reach Him directly. Therefore, it is only through these three media—selfless service, boundless love and an unsullied heart—that we can hope to secure direct contact with the Lord and obtain His divine sanction to our request.

Our prayers do not reach God Himself, there are ministers we don’t know … only if it is Niskama Karma, no Karma or selfless action and infinite and pure love and an unsullied heart it reaches the Lord and there have to be three media – selfless service, boundless love and an unsullied heart.

If some kind of hurt or harm is caused to oth­ers, we should make an attempt to help them by doing some service. It is not only by work and by keeping our surroundings clean that you can do service. You can do service by your words as well. With a good word, you can soothe their hearts and by doing good deeds you can soothe their minds. Therefore, by using good words and doing good work, you will give comfort to others and this is good service.

If there is harm done, whatever it is, a double moral at the edge of socitety and a difference between oneness and double moral. We should make an attempt to help them by doing some service …

It is not only by work and by keeping our surroundings clean that you can do service. You can do service by your words as well. With a good word, you can soothe their hearts and by doing good deeds you can soothe their minds. Therefore, by using good words and doing good work, you will give comfort to others and this is good service.

Truth and insights and thinking it over, it is not possible to know truth if we do not live it and we have to accept truth if we want to go the path of truth and we have to accept right action. That is service to the divine and the path of right action and truth and peace is the basis that we can experience 'pure love'.
We should keep promises, otherwise it is not accepting truth, if we don't keep promises we don't accept truth. There was harm done. Telling me it is only ‘my mind’ without second thought that is not about truth. If we don’t keep promises we don't care about truth. If we accept truth we have to keep promises. 

Service does not mean helping with hands alone. Talk softly and sweetly. Speak good words. That is also a form of service.

How interesting to think over Baba’s words and to listen and to think about ‘selfless service’.

What is karuñā (compassion)? Seeing a per­son in distress and verbally expressing sympathy is not compassion. Compassion must express it­self in action to relieve the suffering. Nor should you adopt an attitude of aloofness or indifference on the plea that each one is suffering for his or her own folly. Though suffering may be due to one’s mistakes—mistakes to which everyone is prone—we should seek to remedy such suffer­ing just as we try to get rid of our own suffering. Some people try to show off their sympathy by setting up charitable institutions like hospitals.

True compassion should emanate from the heart. It should not find expression in outward manifestations which only reveal one’s vanity. In the Sathya Sai Organisations there is no place for such demonstrations of vanity. Everything that is done to help the poor or the suffering should be based on the feelings coming from the heart and appealing to the hearts of those who are helped.

There is a need of action to relieve the suffering done. Who does adopt the attitude of aloofness and indifference on the plea and telling that each one is suffering for his or her own folly, is it not nearly perfect and he is using the right words to describe what you said?

Even if it would be our mistake, there is a need to accept truth and pride and greed is in our society and beastly qualities, nobody is thinking that it is their mistake, if we work for the purification of the mind is service and we go for truth.

Though suffering may be due to one’s mistakes—mistakes to which everyone is prone—we should seek to remedy such suffer­ing just as we try to get rid of our own suffering. Some people try to show off their sympathy by setting up charitable institutions like hospitals.

True compassion should emanate from the heart. It should not find expression in outward manifestations which only reveal one’s vanity. In the Sathya Sai Organisations there is no place for such demonstrations of vanity. Everything that is done to help the poor or the suffering should be based on the feelings coming from the heart and appealing to the hearts of those who are helped.

We cannot tell it is only mind, without questioning the truth? Even if the harm is done, whoever's mistake, if there is no truth it is falshood and talking us into it was based on falshood already and if we don't want to see it, it is easier if we don't have to accept truth, but it is not right, if we go for right action, we have to accept truth.

Time is infinitely precious. Hence the per­formance of good deeds should not be put off to another day. Time waits for no one. Hence both the body and the time should be utilized for doing sacred actions.

Instead of alleviating the suffering some try to prolong it for endless time.
We don’t expand suffering and make it go on and on and on and don’t do anything about it until it turns into nightmares for the whole family and it ends in amok as he said in the insight. Was it last year or is it longer two years ago?

He was not able to show off by setting up a charitable institution like a hospital, but he talked about it and he did show off with his friend who was doing it a charitable institution. The friend in his mind set off the institution and he showed off by telling that he is the friend of the friend who was setting of the institution and those things began for me only to make sense after Baba made the inner relationship, before it was like too far away to matter.  

Though suffering may be due to one’s mistakes—mistakes to which everyone is prone—we should seek to remedy such suffer­ing just as we try to get rid of our own suffering. Some people try to show off their sympathy by setting up charitable institutions like hospitals.

True compassion should emanate from the heart. It should not find expression in outward manifestations which only reveal one’s vanity. In the Sathya Sai Organisations there is no place for such demonstrations of vanity. Everything that is done to help the poor or the suffering should be based on the feelings coming from the heart and appealing to the hearts of those who are helped.

And prayers do not reach him if it is not selfless service as he just said before.

The human being is encompassed by attach­ment to worldly desires, which produce delu­sions of various kinds related to the three guñas, namely satva, rajas and tamas (qualities of purity, passion and sloth). To attain liberation one has to rid oneself of these desires. The mind is the cause of both bondage and liberation. It is only by controlling the mind that a person can achieve liberation.

Everyone is proud about the body, the mind and the intellect, forgetting the indwelling Atma, which is the basis for all of them. The Atma has no birth or death. It is the root of a tree, which sus­tains the branches, the leaves, flowers and fruits. It is the basis on which the superstructure of life rests.

We have to get rid of the desires, only purity can attain him and it begins with truth otherwise, there is no 'pure love' and as he said, ‘it is passion, stay alone’ and that has also to do with the ‘vegetables, and that they to listen, they want to hear themselves talking. We get the image of it if we think it over and when I write about it. 

Forgetting the indwelling Atma playing a role only and if they listen to their own voice only it is a different way of seeing it. If it is passion we have an all different reality and they don't listen to him, but they listen to the mind. It is not only about a result and expecting a result, but also that it is recognized by others and if that is not present, it is about trying to get there in talking that loud that the other voice is not heard.

We wake up to the reality that we are the higher self, and it knows no birth and no death.Why is the man in our dreams present to awake us, so that we realize that we are the Atma and that there is no birth and no death. 

We are in the body to realize truth and if we are on the path of truth and we have to accept truth, we also have to accept right action and it is the higher self that truth and there is nothing else but that and we got a body because of past Karma, to get aware that we are not the body. 

For the higher self it doesn't matter if we are wealthy and in next life it could be the opposite to realize how it is if we do the opposite and not what should be done and we don't get the idea of right action. If we are not listening to Baba’s words we see it all different and it is all on a different level of reality and we never get to the truth anyhow. 

If there is harme done it seems to be our duty to do service, whatever the reason and if you don't keep a promise, no truth is there and if there is no truth, there is no right action and there is not peace and no pure love and no awarness that the divine self is not born and doesn't die. 

The Vedas have declared that the human be­ing can attain immortality by tyāga (sacrifice) and not by any other means—actions, wealth or progeny (“Na karmañā na prajayā dhanena tyāgenaike amrutatvamānashuh”). What is it that has to be renounced? One has to renounce one’s bad qualities. Humans today are human only in form. They are filled with beastly qualities. To manifest their inherent divine nature, they have to cultivate love of God and fear of sin and adhere to sanghanīti (social morality). When people have fear of sin and love of God, they will not indulge in immoral acts. Thereby morality in society will be automatically ensured. It is meaningless to be born as a human being and lead an animal exis­tence.

Reading it we just get aware of it and forget about it, only if we are reading and writing you every word seems to make sense and it is full of meaning.
It is Veda that declared that the human being can attain immortality. 

First it is Veda that declares it and that are the scriptures and they are always true, but only with Baba we get the meaning of it, only by sacrifice and not by action, wealth and progeny we can attain the wisdom of Atma and the knowledge that we are immortal beings and not the body and not the mind.

And he explains what has to be renounced. What are the bad qualities?

They are filled with beastly qualities. To manifest their inherent divine nature, they have to cultivate love of God and fear of sin and adhere to sanghanīti (social morality). When people have fear of sin and love of God, they will not indulge in immoral acts. Thereby morality in society will be automatically ensured. It is meaningless to be born as a human being and lead an animal exis­tence.

If there is no love of God, but the development of the imaginative faculty of the mind about love and that it is love, in reality God is faraway, and if there is no fear of sin and immoral acts, there is suffering and nobody is taking the responsibility for what was done and it is also immoral and not okay. To talk about money when in reality it was about something else and showing off with the big friend, it was immoral and not true. 

The promises for the causality that it is possible to do it seems as well immoral and not good, it has nothing to do with truth.
It doesn’t lead to the insight that we are Atman and truth and immortal beings, because that can only be realized if we are actually living truth and not a casualty which has no meaning and it is too superficial. That he was sent to the ashram was equal superficial and not considering the reality of truth. If we accept truth we also have to accept right action. 

It was not a question of truth and character, but something else what made you send him there and it had nothing to do with the divine and that Baba is the man in our dream who is there to awake us and to make us aware that we are immortal beings.

When people have fear of sin and love of God, they will not indulge in immoral acts. Thereby morality in society will be automatically ensured. It is meaningless to be born as a human being and lead an animal exis­tence.

If there are immoral acts whatever little they seem to us, we do not have a good influence on society and we do not know how much harm is done.
Something went wrong and it is meaningless to be born as human being and to think only about wealth. We cannot take with us anything when we die but the wisdom of the higher self and that we are immortal beings. The divine self is not born and doesn't die, the lesson of wealth has not the language of truth in it, but a double morality.

It is delusion to hold on to it, it keeps the mind busy and we cannot let go and get detached and in that case it is not possible to get aware of our own higher self which is immortal.
If we are attached to wealth and progeny, too good to talk, there are reason that they are often in mental speculation and it is not about truth. The difference between mind and truth – Atma. It is the higher self and as it was in the thought for the day it is not different from Brahman and Atma and Om, it is the lesson to learn only and nothing else and whatever it is if it keeps us on the mind level, we will not be able to realize it. 

If we don’t understand and we think we do everything we can to be recognized in a role and we like to listen to our own voice only and there is no listening to him, we are not on the level of the higher self and there is no truth, it is just another way of developing the imaginative faculty of the mind.

The reality of the Atma is forgotten if we are vegetables, we live from the soil and love is the fertilizer, but the outcome is not truth, but vegetables and salad.

If we don’t live morality, we are automatically on the level of the beast and we don’t do any service for society, but only for our own ego.

Thereby morality in society will be automatically ensured. It is meaningless to be born as a human being and lead an animal exis­tence.

Only if we realize the higher self and that we are immortal beings our life has meaning and does make sense.

God can be known only by experience and not by experiments. Sādhanā (spiritual discipline) is needed for this purpose. Human beings who are engaged in exploring space do not make the slightest effort to explore the Divine within them. Of what use are experiments aimed at exploring space, while there is no genuine cultivation of human qualities and the practice of such basic virtues as showing reverence for the mother, the father and the preceptor? Everyone should act up to the motto “Help ever; hurt never”. Every edu­cated person should engage himself or herself in selfless service to society with humility and a pure heart.

Sadhana, spiritual discipline is needed, it doesn’t work without it, only if it is about space only and we do not make an effort to explore the Divine within, we cannot realize that we are the immortal self … to explore the divine within we have to do self-enquiry to get the right answers.
With meditation alone we were exploring space, but we also had the siddhis as divine qualities as we know by now that one-pointed focus made us experience the divine within.
It means he didn’t come from the outside, we went from the inside to him and if we think we came from the outside, it is wrong and we think we have done it when in reality he is the doer. 

Without seeing divinity in the parents and in the teacher and without the motto, ‘help ever; hurt never’ is no way we can realize divinity and our own higher self as the immortal divine and we get there only if we realize the truth in our own higher self and selfless service to society with humility and a pure heart is a help to get there.

The dull, activity-hating tāmasic persons (ones dominated by qualities of sloth and inac­tion) cling to the ego and to kith and kin. Their love is limited to these. The rājasic (passionate) persons seek to earn power and prestige and love only those who will contribute to these. But the sātvic (pure persons) love all as embodiments of God and engage themselves in humble service. Pundalika was one such. He was massaging the feet of his old mother when God appeared before him. He did not interrupt the service, for he was serving the same God in his mother. Tukaram declared to Pundalika that it was God who had manifested before him but Pundalika did not waver. He asked God to wait for a while until he had finished the service of the God he had started serving.

The dull activity is Tamas and clinging to ego and kith and kin but at the same time it makes it impossible to put it into practice when he said he is the man in our dream who is there to awake us. He didn’t listen no matter what, no matter who said it and no matter how long it took. It was not ‘help ever, hurt never’, it was ‘hurt ever, help never’.

The rājasic (passionate) persons seek to earn power and prestige and love only those who will contribute to these.

For that side it was for sure Tamas, it was dull and activity-hating and he was just nothing doing but tellint that he takes the path of least effort and that is dull and activity hating.
And it if would be a contribution to power and prestige and love, it has nothing to do with ‘pure love’ which is never changing and present on an immortal level.

But the sātvic (pure persons) love all as embodiments of God and engage themselves in humble service. Pundalika was one such. He was massaging the feet of his old mother when God appeared before him. He did not interrupt the service, for he was serving the same God in his mother. Tukaram declared to Pundalika that it was God who had manifested before him but Pundalika did not waver. He asked God to wait for a while until he had finished the service of the God he had started serving.

Can someone who is engaged in Rajas be able to know what humble service is? 

It has to be true in all situations, there is no difference, only truth.

It is interesting that text about selfless service, not because we are doing it, but because I know those who are somehow making it come up, because they are not doing it.